Guardian of the Storm

by Kaitlyn O’Connor

  Weak with relief, she collapsed in a puddle, covering her mouth with both hands to muffle the laughter she couldn’t seem to control.

  She’d stepped within a zone that measured motion and tripped the ancient mechanism. It was automatic doors and she’d reacted to as if she had never seen such a thing before in her life.

  No wonder the natives were so fearful of the place! No wonder they thought it was ‘sacred’. To their minds it was magic.

  When she was finally able to control herself once more, she pushed herself to her feet.

  It was nothing short of amazing that the doors worked after all this time. She had no idea of the age of the thing, of course, but it had certainly been long enough that the Niahians had regressed and had no memory or record of it.

  It was probably not at all safe to go inside. With the doors now open, a minute amount of light penetrated the interior, but it wasn’t enough for her to do much exploring. At any rate, what if the doors closed behind her? What if the mechanism on the other side didn’t work? She would be trapped.

  And Kiran thought she was at the encampment. It seemed doubtful that he would think to look for her here even if he discovered she had vanished and decided to search for her.

  Finally, she decided just to move a little closer. The doors had moved very slowly. If they showed any sign of trying to close, she could leap to safety, she assured herself.

  As she walked slowly toward the doors, light flickered to life inside. She stopped, took a couple of steps back. The lights dimmed and went out. She moved forward again and once more the lights illuminated the interior.

  Everything seemed to be keyed to movement, no doubt to preserve the power source.

  She stopped on the threshold, leaning inside to peer around. Lights, recessed in the ceiling, advanced as she did, illuminating a huge room. In the center, a fountain came to life, sputtering droplets of water into the air, which fell back into a tiny pool at the base. The red dust of Niah coated everything in sight. As tightly as it had been sealed, even that hadn’t prevented the fine particles from invading.

  It smelled of dust and stale air.

  After a moment, Tempest stepped inside. The moment she did so, the doors began to close. Unnerved, she leapt out again. The doors paused and began to swing open. Waiting until they were fully open, she started through, again pausing on the threshold.

  After moving back and forth several times, she was finally reassured that the doors would respond and moved further inside. A shiver crawled up her spine when the doors closed completely. She turned to stare at them a long moment and finally moved toward them. As she neared, the doors began to open.

  Breathing a sigh of relief, she turned her back to the doors and began to wander around the structure. There was little to examine in the room itself. Doors had been set into the walls and lined either side, but, except for the fountain and an occasional table made of stone, there was nothing to see but dust and more dust.

  After looking around, she decided to see if the doors to the rooms leading off of the great hall would open as the entrance had and moved to the nearest. Disappointment filled her when it didn’t open. She stared at it for several moments, examining it to see if there was a manual catch, but didn’t find one. Finally, she put her shoulder against it and pushed. It didn’t budge. Shrugging, she moved to the next door.

  None opened, but, at the rear was another set of double doors similar to those at the entrance. At her approach, the double doors swung open and lights in the ceiling flickered to life.

  It was yet another vast room, but this one was filled almost to overflowing with row after row of tall shelves. Each shelf was filled with box like objects of various sizes. Finally, she picked one up to examine it.

  It wasn’t a box. It was some kind of recording device she finally decided after examining it for several moments. On the outer surface, she saw symbols similar to those she’d already seen above the entrance and on the plaque beneath the statue. The outer surface, which was hard and stiff, was attached on only one side and when she lifted it she saw that, sandwiched between the outer covering were thin sheets that looked similar to fabric. They were stiff, dry, and the edges crumbled when she touched them. They were also covered with the symbols, each, on both sides.

  Frowning, she returned it to the space, moved down the shelves and removed another one.

  It had to be some sort of recording devices, she decided, deeply regretful that she couldn’t decipher the symbols. It seemed odd, though, that there were nothing but these, no mechanical devices for recording their knowledge. She shrugged. That wouldn’t help her figure it out either. She didn’t know any of the languages of the Niahians—or the language. It seemed possible that they had more than one.

  Kiran hadn’t seemed to have any difficulty understanding the Mordune, however.

  After a while, she tired of looking at the recording devices. They all looked much the same to her and it wasn’t likely she would suddenly become ‘enlightened’ and able to understand what the strange symbols meant.

  At the very back of the huge room, she found something that looked far more familiar to her … a computer.

  * * * *

  Thoughts of Tempest teased at the back of Kiran’s mind even while he went through the motions of performing the ritual as he had been taught. He struggled with the thoughts as he had each time they had risen to tease him, but he found that the more he tried to focus on banishing her from his mind, the stronger her hold on him became.

  Disgusted with himself, he gritted his teeth and persevered until he had finished the chant and settled by the sacred fire again, hoping to clear his mind and open himself to the goddess. His frustration grew as the minutes ticked past and nothing was revealed to him. Desisting at last, he opened his eyes and stared angrily at the flames.

  The sensuous dance of the flames at the heart of the fire conjured images of Tempest’s glossy hair, though, and did nothing to bring him peace.

  He had known instinctively, he thought with disgust, that that would be the case if he kept her with him. He had managed, by dint of sheer, grim determination, to keep his body chaste—or relatively chaste, he amended—but she had wormed her way insidiously into his mind and soul. Not with evil intent, he knew, but as destructively to his cause.

  He was not even certain of how she had done it. He had shielded himself from her as best he could, refused to yield to the temptation to welcome her friendliness the same as he had refused to give in to the desire that had pounded through him with increasing frequency the more time he spent in her company. His determined coolness had kept her arm’s length, made her close herself off from him, as well.

  He had wanted that. He had needed that, and yet he began to realize that she had not really shielded herself from him. She had tried. He almost thought it was the struggle he saw in her face each time he rebuffed her that had slowly chipped away at his resolve. He had wounded her, over and over, with his reserve. He had seen it in her face, and each time he did, it drove a deeper wound into him, crumbled a little more of his resolve until she had slipped deeper and deeper inside of him, found a place where he could not dislodge her.

  He should have known by the possessiveness that washed through him like a sickness, by the sense almost of desperation that began to tear at him the moment she turned her thoughts to her people, that she had snared him so completely that he had lost all will to resist his desire for her. That his resistance was nothing more than willful blindness.

  It ate at him, though, destroying the inner peace he had set out with and replacing it with chaos, with powerful emotions that he had tried to blind himself to. While, in the back of his mind, the determination had grown to possess her. Deep inside, in that place in his soul that he had refused to look, determination had sprouted. His quest had become secondary to his true desires.

  He would honor his duty and then he would claim her.

  That was what danced in his mind—not the glory and ho
nor he had been born for, not the hope for the future of his people and his world, his own needs.

  There was no evil in Tempest. It was he who was unworthy. From the pity and the honorable desire to protect an innocent in need of his protection had sprouted far less noble desires. He coveted. He thirsted for the smiles and affection and happiness that welled from her with the slightest encouragement, hungered for all those things about her almost more than he yearned to wrap himself in her body and find the promise of pleasure he sensed there.

  He thought he could have put it from his mind if he had been certain, still, that she would hold it for him, that she would wait upon his freedom to bestow it upon him … and him alone. He’d seen the covetous gleam in the Mordune’s eyes, though, recognized it because it was the same near desperation to have her that he had begun to feel.

  And there was fear, now, of her own people, that she would slip through his fingers and vanish the moment she was reunited with them.

  She wanted that. She had made no pretense otherwise. He should want it for her, be glad that she had the chance to find happiness among her own kind.

  He was not. The turmoil such thoughts caused him was why he could not focus as he needed to. He could not clear his mind because of the fear that he could not banish that he would return and find her gone.

  The minute that thought came to the fore of his mind, he felt coldness wash through him, a sense of urgency that made him feel weak and sick. Rising abruptly, he abandoned the sacred fire and strode purposefully along the path that he had followed to the summit. He would bring her with him, he decided grimly. If she was close, if he was certain that she was safe and nearby, then he would be able to focus on the ritual.

  Chapter Eleven

  At first Tempest wasn’t certain whether it was her imagination or not. There was no doubt in her mind that it was some sort of mechanical device, but it didn’t look like anything she was familiar with—only vaguely similar.

  It began to hum as she neared it and a thrill of excitement surged through her as she moved closer to study it. It had been built in a crescent shape. As she stepped up to the open end of the crescent, a light from the ceiling formed a beam on the floor. She chuckled as she saw the shape of two feet etched into the stone. That must be what triggered the hologram display, she decided, glancing around at the tiny lights dancing over the structure as she moved inside and walked carefully around the highlighted area, studying it.

  She waved her arm under the beam, wondering if that would be enough to trigger the system. Nothing happened. Shrugging, she stepped cautiously on the stone, peering down at the image and discovered she had stepped onto it backwards. The feet were pointing the other way. As she leaned down to look, however, something stung her on her hip. Yelping, she jumped off of the stone and looked down at the injury.

  A crescent had been burned on her hip.

  “Shit! What the hell is this thing anyway?” she murmured out loud, glaring at the machinery that surrounded her.

  It wasn’t a damned computer! Rubbing her stinging flesh, she avoided the spot on the floor and vacated the machine she’d mistaken for a computer. Losing interest in everything except her wound, Tempest rushed from the room and headed for the fountain. Cupping her hand beneath the fine spray, she captured a handful of water and splashed it over her burn.

  She was twisting, trying to get a better look at her injury when she heard the doors open. Whirling, she stared guiltily at Kiran, who stood on the threshold, staring at her as if he’d never seen her before.

  Tempest was still trying to think up a believable excuse for her behavior when Kiran, looking at her as if stunned, slowly moved toward her.

  * * * *

  Panic washed over Kiran in a terrible tide as he reached the campsite where he had left Tempest and found her gone. Disbelief filled his mind, even though he had feared just what he had found.

  She could not be gone, he thought, turning to look around him, trying to absorb the completely unacceptable truth—that she was, indeed, gone, might be anywhere, might be many days away from him by now.

  Fury borne of fear descended upon him as the thought flickered in his mind that the Mordune had simply circled around and returned, that they had found her and taken her. For several moments he was so filled with rage and thoughts of vengeance that he could think of nothing else.

  It was the grat that brought him to his senses before he could act upon the crazed thoughts that ricocheted back and forth through his mind. It landed in the clearing where he stood, stared at him balefully for several moments, and then lifted its head, sniffing. Lowering its head after a few moments, it began to sniff at the ground, searching in ever widening circles and finally trotted off, up the path that he had followed down the mountainside.

  Frowning a little doubtfully, Kiran watched the grat until it disappeared. After glancing down the mountain and scanning the terrain as far as his eyes would allow, he turned to follow the grat, abruptly certain that the animal was in pursuit of Tempest.

  He was less certain of that when they reached the plateau, scanning the empty area with a mixture of frustration and doubt, but the grat seemed to have no reservations. It trotted briskly across the plateau, heading toward the temple.

  Kiran followed the grat, jogging a little faster as a sense of dread began to move through him the closer they came to the temple.

  Tempest was nowhere in sight. If she had come this way, then there was only place where he was likely to find her.

  His worst fears were realized when the grat trotted up the steps to the temple and sniffed along the stones until she reached the doors. After nosing around it for a few moments, she trotted off and dropped to her belly on the cool stones, clearly waiting for Tempest’s return.

  Kiran stared at the grat, struggling with his reluctance to approach the scared temple. His need to find Tempest quickly overrode his uneasiness about the temple, however. He strode toward the doors, wondering even as he approached them how he would get to her if she had, as he feared, gone inside.

  To his shock, the doors swung open as he neared them.

  The sight that greeted him stunned him immobile, brought even his thought processes to a halt.

  * * * *

  “I can explain,” Tempest said quickly.

  As if her words had released him from a spell, he surged forward. “None are allowed to enter the sacred Temple! No one!”

  Tempest gaped at him. “I didn’t touch a thing .... Well, hardly anything.”

  Grasping her by one arm, Kiran hauled her back toward the entrance. He stopped jerkily when the doors opened, but after that brief hesitation, he strode outside, dragging her with him.

  “What have you done?” he demanded angrily when he released her.

  “Done?” Tempest echoed, stalling for time.

  “How did you enter the sacred Temple?”

  Tempest frowned at him curiously. “The same way you did. The doors opened. I went in.”

  Kiran studied her angrily for several moments and noticed that she was absently rubbing her hip. Catching her wrist, he pulled her hand away. The blood left his face in a rush as he stared at her hip.

  Tempest felt a little faint at his expression. “Is it that bad? It hurts like hell, but I didn’t think it was that bad.”

  “I do not understand,” Kiran said, his voice strange.

  “That makes two of us! I thought it was a damned computer. Then, out of the blue, this laser goes off and burns the hell out of me. What possible use could they have had for a thing like that?”

  Kiran stared at her. “It is the mirror of my own. The symbol of the Guardian and the Storm.”

  Tempest gaped at him. “You’ve got a burn like this?”

  Kiran shook his head. “It is a mark I was born with.”

  Tempest looked him over. “Where?”

  He turned, pushed his loincloth to one side to expose his leg. On his upper thigh, Tempest saw what looked like a birthmark. Bending, she
examined it more closely. It felt smooth to the touch. It looked like a birthmark, except for the fact that there was nothing irregular about it. A series of dots and lines formed a perfect crescent. When Tempest stood upright once more, she realized that it was, indeed, an exact mirror of her burn, in position anyway.

  She frowned. There was only one explanation if, as it appeared, Kiran had never been near one of those things.

  He’d been genetically encoded.

  Kiran shook his head as if waking from a dream. “I do not understand this.”

  Tempest empathized with his confusion. “I don’t understand either, but I can tell you one thing. This is no Temple, sacred or otherwise. It’s some sort of repository of knowledge … a library, maybe, or hall of records.”

  Kiran turned and studied the facade. “It has been accepted as the sacred Temple to Zoe for generations. How could you, an Earthling, know this?”

  She studied him a moment and finally took his hand and led him to the edge of the porch, gesturing toward the paved courtyard. “This isn’t natural. It was made, by Niahians some time long ago.”

  Kiran nodded. “This, I know.”

  “Do you know how?”

  “No.”

  “I studied it before I decided to go inside to explore. It’s absolutely, perfectly flat. It wasn’t blown away by any sort of primitive explosives and then ground down. There are no markings that would indicate that. It was cut, smoothly, by something like a laser.”

  He merely looked at her and Tempest felt a touch of frustration. Kiran was no fool, but the technology that had been a familiar part of her world wasn’t at all familiar to him.

  “Like something we used at the colony.”

  Kiran nodded. Plainly, he still had no idea what she was talking about, but evidently the Niahians had discovered far more about the strangers among them than vice versa.

  “You didn’t think we were gods, did you?”

  Kiran gave her a look that told her he found that insulting. “We understand that you are much like us—only from another world. The Keepers of the Memory tell of such things.”