Children of a Foreign God

by Pam Uphoff

  Aunt Rael’s brows rose, and she reached to take the witch’s hand. “So it’s not just during sex?”

  “Not once you master channeling.”

  Rael jerked her hand back suddenly. “Holy One! I’ve never . . . Let me feel that again . . . I can see what you’re doing . . . I can’t . . . I could pull power, but not that fast. And I’d have to take it in, I can’t shunt it around like that.”

  “Ah, what we call shunting, is just diverting the power into the ground or air as fast as we absorb it. Send a small fireball my way and I’ll demonstrate . . .”

  Ryol took her eyes off the two of them and glanced at the Priest-Princesses. Avid hungry stares, aimed at Q. They want power, or rather the ability to handle so much power.

  They practiced shielding, shunting, and the basics of mental spells. They practiced telepathy, while they split up and walked away from each other. A kilometer, two . . . five . . .

  They soaked in the hotsprings, in swimsuits, with Rael and Q kidding each other.

  “No, I swear. Totally naked, from old grannies to little kids. Not a blush to be seen.”

  Q laughed. “Except yours, Rael? I heard all about it from various friends and relatives.”

  They dragged out, cooled down and dressed—most of them behind trees—and took the corridor back to the city.

  It was a bit late for lunch, but some other kids were just sitting down, and looked them over. Their hair was rainbow of red shades, from a bare tint through strawberry and carrot to a girl with deep, dark, red. The strawberry girl grinned. “Are these our long lost sisters, Aunt Q?”

  “Yep. And what are you four doing here?”

  “Umm, our moms needed a bit of peace and quiet. In the Rip Crossing Inn. So they told us to go hang out here for a few weeks.” The boy with the headful of gorgeous blonde-with-a-hint-of-red curls tried and failed to look innocent.

  “In other words, they wanted a report?” Q waved at the quartet. “Girls, these are yet more half siblings. The boys are Xav,” she pointed at the blond, “and Levi.” Carrot orange waved at them. “And the girls are Kassy and Styx.”

  Styx, the dark red one, grinned. “And there’s how many of you? Vero said fifteen girls and a dozen boys?”

  “Yep. I’ll let them introduce themselves.” Q took a side table, and the quartet started hauling tables around.

  “C’mon, we want to meet all of you.”

  ***

  “Arno?”

  Arno looked around at Master Xen.

  “Look at the moon.”

  The waning half moon was almost directly overhead, a pale white half circle fading into the blue sky as it lightened with the rising sun.

  “Close your eyes and imagine, oh, something like a horse’s tail, running from the moon down to the Earth, and the Earth to the Moon. The gravitational attraction between them pulling both of them, as they whip around their mutual center of mass.”

  Arno pictured it, the gravity like a rope, holding them together in their ponderous month-long swing.

  “Now picture yourself, where you are, in the middle of that gravity field. Look up and see a strain, the bend in the warp of space. A gravity channel running between Earth and Moon. See the stress like a glowing fog.”

  The man’s voice was nearly hypnotic . . . :: Why not telepath ::

  “Because this is something you need to know you can do by yourself. Look back at the strain, that glow. Reach out and take a tiny pinch of the glow. Squeeze it and watch it brighten as it gets denser.”

  Arno did, and winced at a prick of pain in his fingers. He opened his eyes and . . . looked at the bright spark between his finger and thumb.

  “Open your hand. Let it expand and dissipate into the air.”

  He spread his fingers and the spark expanded and dimmed. A white marble, a foggy ball, blowing away.

  “Well that was easily ten times as much power as I’ve ever seen a new witch gather. You’re going to need to work very carefully, in very small amounts.”

  “What?”

  “Witches source from gravity. I have a witch power gene, but I usually go for light and heat first, and gravity as a last option. You seem to have slid quietly into using gravity, and that being unknown in the Empire, nobody, including, apparently, yourself, noticed you’d bloomed. Blossomed. Whatever you lot call it.”

  Arno blinked looked at his tingling fingers . . . and pinched a very tiny bit of the gravity. Compacted it, then let it go. “Oh. That’s . . . interesting.”

  A giggle, and Aunt Rael walked up and hugged him. “Only you could be quiet enough to pull that off.”

  “Well . . . I didn’t mean to.”

  Rael laughed and hugged him again. But the biggest zing was from the hand that squeezed his shoulder. From the father he’d never before touched.

  Chapter Eighteen

  Grandparents and great grandparents

  Dinner turned out to be a buffet in the school, with some new Fallen relatives.

  Ryol nearly hyperventilated. “Ambassador Never is my great grandmother! And, and . . .”

  Gior nodded. “One of Those Left Behind. A Comet Fall Old God.”

  “Wolfgang Oldham. The God of War is our Grandfather!” Lala squeaked.

  Ryol eased closer to the tall woman with the bright blue eyes. And the deep well of power just showing through her shields.

  Lady Rustle Neverdaut smiled. “You must be Rael’s girl. Ryol is a much more . . . pronounceable name than most.”

  Ryol blinked. “Have you met A . . . Rael?”

  “Oh yes. She worked with us on the Helios deflection. Plus she came to check on Xen, oh, almost a year ago now.” An exasperated sigh. “The last time he was seriously injured.”

  Yeah, it was in the news . . . but he was back just a couple of weeks later, so the damage was obviously superficial.

  “I hadn’t realized she’d ever been on Comet Fall. I mean after . . . umm, well. I can see where everyone might be leery of letting her get near Master Xen.”

  Her newly discovered grandmother snorted. “I certainly was. She caught me by surprise just riding into Ash one evening.” Her eyes softened, and she looked across the room. “Then we saw them together. See how much space he keeps between himself and that person who’s vamping him? But Rael? No hesitation, and pulling her into a hug. Trusting her.”

  Ryol bit her lip. “I think they’re trying to behave like acquaintances around us kids. Set a good example or something. But sometimes they just sort of lean on each other. It’s . . .” She broke off in confusion. And embarrassment. She blushed and made herself say it. “It’s like they’ve been in love for so long, they don’t have to say it out loud anymore.”

  Rustle nodded. “It is a pity that they’re on opposite sides of something so close to war.”

  “I think, after the Helios Cannibals, we really don’t want to go to war with you. At least I hope not. Master Xen is . . . a very interesting teacher. I’ve learned so much in three days it’s kind of a shock.”

  “Umm, yes. Given the low level of magical training common on the One World, Xen may not be doing you kids any favors. From what my mother says, day-to-day magic use involves privacy shields and Speed in sport fencing. You’re all going to have to be careful about what you do in public, where people will notice it.”

  “Oh . . . yeah. Especially just showing off.” Ryol squirmed. “Umm, did Master Xen tell you that Aunt Rael didn’t know . . .” She broke off at her Grandmother’s nod.

  “That was a bit of a dirty trick . . . and probably quite understandable, as poor as our relations with the Empire have been.” She shrugged. “We’ve never made the slightest attempt to locate relatives of the half Oners we’ve raised. Never contacted the men who weren’t rapists, just casual lovers.”

  “Were there any? I mean, even we don’t feel safe around the old kind of Action Teamers.”

  “Not many. But your Philosopher Ajha was an Info Teamer on Comet Fall over fifty years ago. I believe his daug
hter met him once, briefly, his granddaughters never.”

  “Oh. Wow.” Ajha the Philosopher! The Subdirector of Exploration! With half-Fallen kids like me!

  Rustle shrugged. “So we’re kind of out of high ground to look down from and complain. I know of seven other half Oner children, without even searching my memory. Actually eight. Xen said you’d met the Smuggling sisters? Crimson was support staff for our infiltration and, well, Ocelot’s father is a Oner. Hopefully we can . . . regularize a friendly relationship and possibly connect to distant relatives . . . sometime.”

  Ryol swallowed. “Yeah.” It came out a nervous squeak.

  Master Xen meeting my parents and grandparents. Other grandparents. Eep! Some of the things Grandad has to say about his daughter and . . . my biofather. And I don’t think Dad will appreciate Master Xen either, and Mother . . . what will Master Xen think about the woman who took Rael’s children? His children.

  “That could be . . . interesting.” Ryol looked around the room. “Hopefully not as large a shock as twenty-seven teenaged grandchildren to meet, all at once.”

  Rustle chuckled. “So introduce me to some more of them.”

  Which was easy enough. Lady Rustle looked so non-threatening, compared to the God of War. Or even the Ambassador and Duke Dydit. At least those two got enough mention on the news to be . . . known. And frequently at odds with our government. And thus, scary, in person.

  Wolf had half the kids looking for a place to hide, even with him showing just a tiny bit of “polite society” glow.

  The chaperones were all sitting across the room, eyes on the man.

  There’s glow, and then there’s deep. And he’s DEEP!

  Lady Rustle nodded. “The Ash kids grow up around him, and think nothing of it. Even the Rip kids see him often enough to not feel threatened.”

  Ryol concentrated on stiffening up her mental mirror.

  The grand- and great grandparents talked to everyone, and didn’t stay too long.

  Ryol wasn’t the only kid to collapse in relief. “It’s not that they’re not perfectly nice, and well mannered. They’re just so very . . . very.”

  Chapter Nineteen

  Horses

  Instead of watching eight guys walk around looking at the ground as they built new water mains, Arno slipped away and tried to chat up some of the Fallen kids. His other new found half siblings. They all had jobs, mostly in the barn. Arno'd never had anything to do with horses, but a big dark brown animal had walked up and talked him through the basics of brushing a horse.

  Levi'd laughed. "That's Dad's horse. Pyrite is one of the originals, the God Horses, some people call them."

  "Originals? Did you, the Fallen magicians, I mean, make them?"

  The horse shook his head.

  A building. A laboratory. Men in white coats, needles.

  Arno blinked as the vision faded.

  :: That was on Earth. Then there was The Black. Then Xen freed me. ::

  Levi nodded. "It was the God of Art that grabbed them. Have you seen the inside-out bubbles? From the outside, they like, coat whatever's inside like a coat of bronze paint. Inside they've got a ten thousand to one time dilation, so whatever is inside ages very slowly. A week, outside, feels like a minute inside. A double bubble, and you can't even measure any movement. Art triple bubbled a bunch of horses and displayed them in his museum. That's where most of the God Horses came from."

  Like what Master Xen did to Aunt . . . my biomom . . . when she was ordered to kill him.

  "And Art's dead." Xavi crossed behind them, leading another horse. "He bubbled people, too. Seriously nasty person."

  Arno boggled. "He didn't, like, display people like statues, did he?"

  Levi nodded.

  "Wow. Like . . . Rael.” Aunt Rael said Master Xen had a reason—to keep her safe until those War Party idiots got kicked back out of power—and she didn’t mind. I’m not sure she was being entirely truthful, I think it bothered her.

  “Yeah . . . that was a weird couple of months.”

  He staggered as he was bumped from behind.

  :: I haven't been brushed yet. :: An elegant black creature.

  Was she the one who given him a ride out of the Maze? He got to work with the brush.

  Arno spent all of his free time, and some that ought not have been, out with the horses, and a couple of the other half-Oner kids joined him. Rain was already horse crazy, and an expert rider. Utly was a city boy, and had had lessons.

  Arno learned how to ride, both with and without tack. Fell in love with the big black filly.

  Chapter Twenty

  In Enemy Territory

  “We’re going to visit Comet Fall!” Ryol’s voice squeaked a bit.

  The chaperones all looked horrified.

  Diuc crossed her arms and glowered at Master Xen. “How can you even think of exposing these delicate modern children to the unknown pathogens of a medieval level civ?”

  Rael snickered. “Does that translate to, ‘Those vicious people might try to keep them?’ Or worse, the kids might not want to return?”

  Six glares. “We will come too. Of course.”

  Xen grinned. “Bring your coats. It’s a mild winter day, sunny and just above freezing. It’ll get cold as the sun sets.”

  They walked through the gate that was in the front courtyard of the Western embassy. And on the other side they found horse drawn carriages waiting for them, for a tour of Karista.

  All the drivers and the guides were in uniform. And they all obviously knew Xen, and thought his having twenty-seven suddenly acquired children was amusing.

  Ryol climbed up into an open carriage with a cute young guy . . . well, he was actually totally average . . . except for the glow. Wow! He’s strong . . . but there’s something different about his glow. It’s not like Master Xen’s . . . somehow.

  “Welcome to Karista, or I suppose I should say, Welcome to Comet Fall. I’m Captain Jek Lebonift, your guide today.”

  Ryol got her mouth back in motion. “I’m Ryol, this is Nyok, Viin, Voih, Foyh, and Rain. And Ytry.”

  The wagon lurched into motion . . . with much jingling of the metal bits on the harness and clomping of hooves . . . at probably less than ten kilometers per hour.

  “Right oh.” He looked perfectly cheerful. “I’ll probably mangle them, sorry about that. Now, as you can see we’re a good ways south of the city proper, so I can point out the buildings on the three highest hills in town. Furthest to your left is the Royal Palace complex. Those two tall buildings further left are part of King’s University.

  “The hill in the center sports the Council Hall.”

  “That’s your Dukes, right?” Ytry was sitting up and taking it all in.

  “Dukes, Governors, Marshals, City and Guild Representatives.” He flashed a grin, going from plain to charming in a flash. “Dukes inherit their positions, Governors and Marshals are appointed by the Crown and Spear, the representatives are elected by their people.”

  “Wow! That’s pretty mixed up. Do they get along?” Ryol blinked as the cute Captain’s grin widened.

  “Pretty well on most things. Every once in a while, though, they get pretty . . . loud.”

  Snickers from just about everyone.

  Ryol eyed the third building . . . “That one burned?”

  “Yep. The Grand Temple of the Church of Ba’al.”

  A yeep from Nyok. “On the One World, Ba’al is an evil god that people sacrificed their children to. Was. Centuries ago. Before Islam, let alone the Prophets.”

  “Huh. I wonder if that’s where the name came from? Here it was the worshipers of the God of Virtue, who’d trapped himself, or been trapped, for centuries in multiple layers of reversed bubbles. I suspect the church hierarchy took the church wherever they wanted, which was not in a virtuous direction.”

  He nodded at the distant ruins. “They were anti-magic, and crashed head on into Ash, when they found it, in a very illegal attack on the village. They were, o
f course, repulsed.

  “But several years later they snatched a pair of women—a witch and a wizard—and attempted to sacrifice them to their god.” He waved at the half-fallen dome. “Turned out to be a really bad idea.”

  He looked over his shoulder. “And here’s a cross town corridor, so you can see the palace up close.”

  A big broad stately building. Ryol tromped down on the thought that it would fit right into the Government District in Paris.

  They got a quick tour, hitting the main throne room, the Treasure Room with the Crown and Spear, and fancy formal regalia, then down the Aisle of Statues, then circled back through the gardens to their carriages. From whence they had an elevated view of the Changing of the Guards in front of the Council Hall.

  A hundred gorgeous golden palomino horses weaving patterns in the forecourt . . .

  A sigh from Rain. “They’re even better than the Black Horse Drill Team.”

  “Well, there’s more of them.” Viin pointed out.

  “That just makes the coordination harder.” Rain glanced at the captain. “Are they real guards, or just for show? Ours are real guards.”

  Instead of being indignant, he was grinning. “Oh, they’re real. I wasn’t here to see it, unfortunately. But, well, there was an assassination attempt seventeen years ago, that Xen found out about at the last moment. He blasted in here on Pyrite. Rode right through all the guards and up those steps. He went in, and Pyrite turned to hold the steps. Deena and Easterly were just a few minutes behind him, riding double on a god horse we call the Old Dun.

  “The two horses kept the council guards out until the First Army showed up in force, and straightened everything out.”

  The captain snickered. “Then, having unhorsed a large number of the guards, they stole all the mares and drove them home to the Crossroads. The Council guards chased them all over the hills, and finally had to politely ask Rufi to order Xen to bring them back.”