Sebastian of Mars Read Free Page B

forget that there are things greater than any of us on
Mars. And dreams greater than any of us. My own dreams are what
keep me going. Don’t ever forget yours.”
    He cocked an eye at me. “Promise?”
    “I promise.”
    “Good. Now sleep. You look tired. I wish
there was more we could do to improve your strength. You have been
burdened with this weakness of body since birth, and it only adds
to your burdens. But I get the feeling that in other ways, it has
made you strong. As I said before, you are much like your mother.
But she had the advantage of a strong constitution, also. She could
fight like a devil when she had to.”
    “You mean like my sister?”
    He rolled his eyes. “Amy is a tiger, but I am
afraid she is all claws. She never sits still! If I were to try to
have this talk with her, she would be hanging from the curtains and
shouting a challenge to the world while waving her wooden sword
madly in the air!”
    I laughed at this image, which wasn’t far
from the truth.
    “Anyway, Sebastian, take care of yourself and
be well. I will return as soon as I can. And this time Thomas does
not have to come with me.”
    “It is lonely when the two of you are
gone.”
    He tucked me into my bedding and then, to my
surprise, kissed me lightly on the forehead.
    “I always thought of your mother as my
daughter,” he whispered, and I detected his sadness. After I lost
my own daughter, I thought Haydn would be with me into my old
age.”
    A tear from old Newton’s eye fell onto my
forehead, where he had kissed me, as he straightened.
    “Be well – Sire,” he said, still a
whisper.
    When he was gone and the door had been closed
and then locked by the guard, I lay for a long while and stared at
the clouded sky, which had begun to clear. I thought of the many
terrible and wonderful things Newton had told me – and then, just
before sleep descended, the clouds parted, letting in the light of
a bright star, Saurus, I’d wager.
    And next to it, blue and dim and mysterious,
and with a small white companion, what hadn’t been shown by my toy,
the Blue Lady herself, Earth, floating majestically in the
dark.
     

Three
    T he next morning I
was awakened by commotion outside my door. As I called for the
guard the door burst open and my sister Amy, along with her friend
Charlotte, rushed into the room laughing. The guard, behind them,
looked in at me sheepishly and closed the door behind them.
    “Brother!” Amy shouted, jumping onto my bed.
She wore a bright blue tunic fringed in deep red brocade. The white
fur of her face, with a single patch of amber over one eye, was
stained with whatever she had eaten for breakfast. Her deep gold,
almond-shaped eyes were bright.
    She held what looked like a real sword up
high. “Death to traitors!”
    With a mad cry she thrust the sword down into
my middle – and to my horror it seemed to pass right through the
bedclothes and into me!
    “Amy!” I shouted.
    And yet I felt nothing.
    She laughed wildly, and pulled the sword
back. The mad gleam was still in her eyes.
    “Look! A gift from Newton!”
    She pressed the edge of the sword into the
palm of her paw the blade retracted into the handle with a snick. As she pulled it away from her paw the blade shot out
again to full length.
    “Ha!” She thrust the sword into me again and
again.
    “Amy, I really am tired . . .” I
protested.
    She jumped to the edge of the bed and then
back up to where I lay. “How can you be tired? You slept all
night!”
    Again she thrust the sword into my
bedclothes, in the vicinity of my heart. “Die, traitor, die!”
    Wearily, I looked over at Charlotte, who was
staring at me strangely.
    “What’s wrong?” I asked, giving her a baleful
look. “After all, you put me here with your trip wire, didn’t
you?”
    “I’m sorry!” she said, to my utter amazement,
and then she ran from the room just as Thomas was entering it.
    “Amy!” he scolded, picking my sister up from
the bed and putting her on the