“Are you tired?” I asked, sliding my fingers through her hair.

  “No. It feels like I slept for many days,” she replied.

  “Tomorrow I’m going back to the city. If you want, I can take you, but it would be better for you to stay here and study a little.”

  “I don’t want to go back there… but I also don’t want you to leave me,” she murmured, running her hand over my chest.

  “I won’t be long. I want to find someone who knows the ancient legends. And also see a little girl who seemed to be suffering a lot.”

  Tariel raised her head, attentive.

  “There’s only one child there. Her parents disappeared a few days ago. I heard people talking about it while they were selling me to the butcher.”

  She sighed, serious. “She won’t last.”

  “Do you mind if I try to help her?”

  “I… I don’t know what I feel. I used to shut myself off from everything. I didn’t care about anything around me. I just tried to stay alive. I was always very afraid of dying. But… children her age don’t even know what’s happening. And even so small, she’s in the same situation I was in.”

  When I realized it, Tariel was looking directly at my penis.

  “What are you doing?” I asked, surprised.

  “It’s growing!” she laughed, innocently. “I saw many men masturbating while looking at me. Why does that happen?”

  Heat rushed to my face. This wasn’t just any situation; it was Tariel… and I loved her.

  “It’s instinctive,” I explained calmly, but worried. “My body reacts to desire. It prepares to copulate. Men… feel intense pleasure from sex, and many of them, the bad ones, the sick ones, don’t care about hurting someone to get it. You were lucky to be poisonous to them.”

  “I know. When they came close with bad intentions, it was enough to pretend I would spit. They backed off. I even spat at the butcher, but he was protected with that outfit… and he beat me.”

  The pain in her voice cut me.

  “I’m so sorry.”

  She changed the subject with disconcerting naturalness.

  “Leaving that aside…” she squeezed my already erect penis. “Do you desire me?”

  “How could I not desire someone so beautiful and so… irresistible? I wouldn’t even need to love you to desire you, but since I do love you… my heart feels like it’s burning,” I confessed.

  “It’s better to cool your heads,” Jazzia interrupted. “Tariel has just gone through regeneration. Her body is sensitive and not yet prepared for the act. What should be pleasure could turn into pain or discomfort.”

  “Oh…” Tariel complained. “I also feel hot.”

  “You can give him pleasure,” Jazzia commented.

  “No,” I replied immediately. “I want Tariel to feel pleasure too. When the right time comes, we’ll truly enjoy it. Thank you, Jazzia.”

  She promptly switched the hot water to cold, forcing us out of the bathtub. After drying off, we went to the bedroom to get dressed.

  “I don’t know what to do with so many clothes. I only had one my whole life. How do you wear this?” she asked, holding up something that looked like a jumpsuit.

  “For sleeping you can wear a nightgown, or pajamas like these,” I showed her a pink set, with shorts and a T-shirt. “It’s comfortable.”

  “Tomorrow, while Willian is in the city, I’ll teach you how to use each piece,” Jazzia said.

  “Okay.”

  Already dressed, Tariel threw herself onto the bed and stretched her arms toward me.

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  “Hugs!”

  I felt my soul tremble.

  I lay down beside her and held her. She held my face for a moment, then let our lips meet. The kiss deepened, warm, full of desire. When I noticed, she turned her back to me and pulled my arm around her body. We stayed spooned together, breathing in sync.

  “Melissa wants to talk,” AX warned, expanding and projecting Melissa, Sacha, Kane, and Ariel.

  We were caught still lying down. I felt embarrassed — which was foolish. Among the Sekvens, privacy is irrelevant; they feel everything from everyone. But facing their faces directly is different.

  “Hi, my loves,” Sacha said.

  “You surprised us, Willian,” Melissa commented. “We imagined you would find your partner here on Donna, but on the first day? And she’s so cute it makes you want to bite her!”

  Tariel smiled and leaned against me.

  “Tariel, I’m Melissa. This is Sacha and behind him is Kane — my partners. Ariel, here beside me, is my biological daughter, the firstborn.”

  “They’re the same!” Tariel exclaimed.

  Melissa continued:

  “We are eager to be with you. Our love for you is limitless. You will be loved and cared for by the entire Known Universe.”

  “You say I’m Willian’s partner… does that mean I’m married to him?”

  “Yes. Don’t you want to be his wife?”

  “I do!” she said, almost jumping. “I want him. I never had anything… now I have him. I don’t want to lose him.”

  “You won’t,” Sacha assured her. “But remember: you don’t just have Willian. You have all of us.”

  “I feel strange…” Tariel curled in on herself. “It feels like I need to go to you. Like something is pulling me.”

  “It’s like a magnet,” I confirmed. “We all feel it.”

  “I want to hug you…” she said.

  “Soon,” Melissa replied. “But we need to wait. Your energy is still fragile. A touch from us could… kill you.”

  Tariel’s eyes widened.

  “You’re going to love meeting Aninha,” Sacha said, completely shifting the conversation to something lighter and enchanting.

  “The Aninha you mentioned… is she a fairy?” I asked, feeling my heart race with anticipation.

  “That’s her.” His eyes sparkled. “She made Heril change course just to pick her up. When she saw you on the observer’s image, Tariel, she shouted: ‘I’m going there to give her some hair! She’ll be beautiful!’ Aninha should arrive in three days.”

  Tariel laughed, that light laugh that seemed to brighten everything around her.

  “She sounds fun.”

  “Today we just wanted to say hi. We’ll see each other again soon,” Melissa said before saying goodbye.

  AX returned to normal mode right after.

  Tariel frowned.

  “What is… a fairy?”

  “Miniature Sekvens,” I explained. “They’re about fifteen centimeters tall… and they fly.”

  She blinked.

  “Small people?”

  “The story is curious.” I adjusted myself beside her. “A long time ago, when a human named Rodrigo, captain of a ship, tried to reach Antéia, there was a children’s book on board. A story about a little fairy — a mythical being, pure imagination. A young Sekvens read it and commented that she wished fairies existed. That was all. One loose sentence. With a snap of fingers, millions of Xerantos and Miliamedes spent forty years researching until they managed to create Aninha, the first fairy.”

  Tariel smiled, enchanted.

  “She asked for a fairy… and they made one?”

  “She didn’t even ask. She just said the words. And since then, the Sekvens are very careful about what they say. In the Known Universe, a Sekvens’ desire becomes law. Fairies fly using microsatellites in orbit. Since there aren’t any here, if we want to see them, we’ll have to go to Shoros.”

  She gently pulled me until we were lying down again, her body fitting against mine.

  “Have you ever seen one?” she asked softly.

  “When I was a child. I saw Aninha and others. They’re… unbelievable. And extremely fun.”

  Tariel yawned, resting her face against my chest.

  “Melissa’s smile left me so calm that now… I’m sleepy.”

  I stroked her hair.

  “When you’re near them, be careful. A smile, a look… can make you lose control and rush to hug them, kiss them… want more than your body can handle. And if you touch them without preparation, you simply shut down. You could even die.”

  She lifted her face, confused.

  “Why?”

  “Sekvens feed on love. But in their case, love isn’t just a feeling — it’s energy. Real, physical. Like the heat of the sun: life when gentle, destruction when too intense.”

  “Feed…? So if I love a Sekvens… will they eat me?”

  I couldn’t help but let out a soft laugh.

  “No, little one. Their love is an exchange. You give a little, and receive back something much greater. That’s why they are so loved.”

  “I don’t like imagining that I’m food…”

  I lightly kissed her forehead.

  “I know.”

  She sighed.

  “Tell me a story about them.”

  “You know Captain Rodrigo, whom I mentioned? Ariel — the one we spoke to today — and her partner saved Rodrigo, sacrificing their own lives. Before dying, Ariel said she would wait for him at star EQ5641, the sun of Antéia. Rodrigo loved her. He experienced the love of a Sekvens, and it consumed everything in him. He traveled ten years through space just to get close to the star… But that’s only the beginning. The story is long.”

  “But didn’t Ariel die? How can she be here?”

  “Her body is gone. But who she is… lives on in the other Sekvens. The memories, the essence… everything is kept within them. Creating a new body is easy for the Xerantos. What matters are the memories. When a Sekvens returns, they are reborn with everything they were.”

  Tariel closed her eyes, absorbing every word.

  “I think I understand… more or less. But I want to learn properly.”

  “Jazzia and I will teach you everything you need so you won’t get lost.”

  “I won’t get lost,” she murmured, with a lazy smile. “I have you.”

  Her fingers slid over my chest. We ended up kissing, teasing each other… until I realized where it would lead us. I stopped with a frustrated sigh.

  “I desire you too much…” I confessed, almost irritated with myself.

  “Me too,” she admitted, her body far too warm against mine. “It’s hard to stop…”

  “I know. But we need to wait a little.”

  She nestled against me, her head on my shoulder.

  “Then tell me another story,” she asked, with that soft voice that always disarmed my resistance.

  And I began.