by Reese Hogan
“Shon Aha is the Dhavnak god of lightning,” said Andrew. His hands moved the papers restlessly as he spoke, his eyes never leaving them. “God of the Main Sun too, obviously, but lightning as well.”
Blackwood’s shoulders tightened. “What are you getting at?”
“Maybe… maybe he was the one who marked you,” Andrew said in a rush.
Oh no. This again. She slid the arphanium back into her pocket, then took Andrew’s elbow to help him up. He jerked it away.
“Andrew, we have to go,” she said.
“I knew you wouldn’t listen!”
“This isn’t the best time! We can discuss it later.”
“Our parents were studying Dhavnak gods, Mila! And now you can magically use lightning like–”
“No, they were studying shrouding,” she erupted. “Whatever else you think you read–”
“I know what I read!” he yelled. “Stop treating me like I’m stupid! I know how to read, I know the things that used to happen in this place during their experiments, and I heard that flying thing try to speak Shon Aha’s name after you used that lightning. It’s not a coincidence!”
It took Blackwood a moment to realize what he was talking about. “‘Sha’ doesn’t mean it was trying to say Shon Aha. That’s a big assumption.”
“Well, where do you think your powers came from, if you’re so smart?”
“I am not talking about this.” She stood, a flush of anger heating her face. She didn’t want to discuss Dhavnak gods, and she really didn’t want to discuss sharing some sort of magic powers with one. Did he really believe these things? What had he read to lead him in that direction? What kind of things had Cu Zanthus been telling him? Now that those notes were lost to her, how would she ever know? Maybe a psychologist. Not only to help figure out the truth, but to help him, for Xeil’s sake. I don’t know what to do…
“Mila!”
She looked back down at Andrew. He was staring up at the sky now, his mouth open. She followed his gaze.
The landscape spread out before her, still smoky, still windy, still barren… but there was a faint glimmer just ahead and to the right now. A sun was rising. One end of the strange band disappeared into the hazy orange dusting the horizon just behind a distant volcano. With the faint hint of daylight, the striped band of light had faded from silver to white, but it was still strikingly bright; like the moons, it wouldn’t be banished with the full light of the suns.
“Only one sun?” she asked. “Is that what you’re telling me?”
“No! The… the light band. It’s like Neutania!”
“Neutania?”
He shot her a look of scorn. “Didn’t you ever study astronomy? Read a textbook once or twice?”
“Astronomy? Of – of course.” She looked back up, sweeping her gaze across that arc again. She adjusted her perspective, and… for just a second… the stripes weren’t above her, but around her. “Neutania. The one with the rings.”
“Obviously.”
She stared for several moments, stunned. She wanted to deny it. But she couldn’t.
“What does it mean, Mila?”
“I don’t know, Andrew. I wish I did. I don’t…” I don’t like any of this, she almost said, but stopped herself at the last moment. As the commanding officer, she couldn’t cast doubt on her authority. He had to believe she was in total control. Even if he knew deep down she wasn’t, as long as she pretended, he’d follow her. She’d seen it time and time again.
“We have to go,” she said. “Now.”
He got up without arguing this time, several of those papers still clutched in his hand.
“Do you need me to carry you?” she said. “’Cause of your foot?”
“No. I’m fine.”
She took off at a jog again, feeling the pressure of their situation more than ever. She didn’t like those rings at all, if that’s what they were. And Holland… What were they doing to him? He had a mark, too; would Cu Zanthus try to force him to use it, after what he’d seen Blackwood do? Clearly, they hadn’t been able to shroud – unless they’d come out in some completely different place, or passed them as she’d slept. Maybe the monsters had killed them already. None of it was good. None of it.
Andrew was falling behind again. Blackwood circled back and hoisted him over her shoulder, despite his vehement protests. He was shivering violently. Either because of that or because of his difficulty keeping up, he didn’t struggle long. Blackwood picked up her pace again. Rattling cries from the rocky hills haunted her as she ran. She tried to find comfort in the thought of their Goddess, and their parents’ souls within her body. But she felt distant from home, distant from Mirrix, distant from belief. It was Andrew’s fault. She’d never been shaken before. When this was all over… when they could sit and talk… then what? Since when have I ever been able to have an honest conversation with him?
The dekatite ridge she’d been aiming for came into view eventually, its sparkling face glimmering faintly through the smoke, lit by the rising sun. Blackwood shifted Andrew’s weight and pulled the arphanium pipe from her pocket. She braced herself to run straight into it. She might smash her face bloody if there was some trick she didn’t know, but it was the best idea she had. Please, please let it work.
She was about ten steps away when something came streaking toward her from the ring side of the planet. She didn’t have time to reach the rock, didn’t have time to so much as turn and face the thing, before it struck her with the force of a speeding mobi. Blackwood barely registered her body being thrown. But she felt the impact of hitting the ground and spinning end over end in a series of excruciating bangs and jabs. Somewhere, Andrew screamed. Not beside her. She’d lost him. Gasping, she pushed herself up, pain stabbing from every side. The creature looked like a giant insect, long and sinuous, with hundreds and hundreds of multi-jointed legs. Licks of fire danced over its head, in varying shades of orange and blue. Enormous black pupils peered from the tight red flesh beneath, barely stretched into the semblance of a human face. One of its long spindly legs held Andrew pinned to the rocky ground. The end of the leg branched into several pieces to spread over his torso like grotesque fingers. Galvanized energy danced over its entire body – like lightning.
“Let him go!” Blackwood cried.
It whipped that huge head toward her and spoke, more clearly than anything they’d heard yet. “Tor-dom-an-kross-ana-tal.”
“Let him go,” she said again. “Then we’ll talk.”
It let out some sort of maniacal laughter, though nothing in those sharp teeth she glimpsed seemed to be mirthful. Rather than let Andrew go, it moved another leg toward him and wrapped its flexible digits around his head. Blackwood clenched her left hand into a fist and threw the energy from her mark toward the monster as if she were hurling a ball. Lightning lanced down from three separate places in the sky, including right behind her, branching and spreading its voltage across the entire length of the beast. Thunder boomed in its wake, a crack so loud it felt like a rifle going off beside her ear. The creature reared up away from Andrew, its body twisting into impossible curls as it swung its head from side to side.
Blackwood bolted forward. She shouldered Andrew’s weight again and raced for the dekatite slope. Out of the corner of her eye, the monster swayed, like it was ready to topple. Its massive body still danced with lightning. A blinding flash of light blindsided her, and the next thing she knew, lightning was pouring down from overhead, striking the land in every direction. Far behind them, a huge wall of sound crashed forth, encompassing them, as if from a massive explosion. The truck, she thought. The self-destruct sequence triggering when it was hit. Or maybe it was one of the volcanoes erupting. Maybe both. Fear spiked in her, so sudden it almost overwhelmed her. But she got a hand in her pocket, pulled out that pipe, and dove at the sparkling gray and black dekatite ridge.
“Is-min-shana-hathi-midrib,” the creature roared behind her.
Blackness enveloped her. Seconds
later, she tumbled with Andrew to a jagged surface. The piece of arphanium flew out of her fingers as she tried to catch herself. She fell hard to the ground, sharp rocks biting into her knees and elbows. Andrew yelled as he rolled from her arms and came to an abrupt stop against a craggy boulder. The cold wind was gone, and without it, the air was noticeably warmer. Blackwood drew in a shuddering breath.
Andrew pushed himself to sitting, staring at her with naked terror. “You heard it. Right?”
“Yes, it has some sort of language,” she said. “Are you OK?”
“It said Shon Aha. It said it!”
She turned what she’d heard over in her mind. Is min shana… shana ha thi… She frowned and shook her head. “You’re reading too much into it.”
“I’m not. I’m not!” He was so agitated, she was afraid he’d explode. “What about its head? What about that lightning? What about that volcano erupting right as we left? It was like what you did, but a hundred times more powerful!”
“I don’t have Shon Aha’s powers,” she burst out, “and that wasn’t Shon Aha! It’s a stupid idea. Drop it!”
“It’s not stupid, Mila–”
“Be quiet. Just shut up for a second! I have to figure out where we are.”
She pushed herself onto her elbows, feeling every part of her body scream out in protest. She realized suddenly that the smell of the ocean surrounded them, mingled with the stench of sulfur. And when she looked up, she saw it: the sea, spreading out far, far below. They were on a cliff. In fact, the drop was a scant fifteen steps or so in front of her. Her stomach dropped. If they’d come out just a little farther forward…
But they hadn’t. A narrow escape, indeed. Jagged black rocks. This was no small dekatite mine or vein. The entire ground was of dekatite. Combined with the smell of sulfur, spit forth by hot springs and other volcanic fissures, there was only one place this could be.
Blackwood scooted right to the edge of the sheer cliff. She looked down on the northern end of Kheppra Isle – somewhere she’d visited a few times after attaining officer status, especially as a chief sea officer on the shrouding flagship. Her eyes fell on the back end of a submarine, poking from the submarine pen. After serving on her for two and a half years, Desert Crab’s shape was unmistakable. What was she doing here? Then her gaze encompassed the docks around the submarine pen, the men in black Dhavnak uniforms…
She backed away quickly, gritting her teeth.
Andrew watched her sullenly, but his tongue flicked over his lips, betraying the fear lurking beneath. “What? What is it?
“The Belzene Naval Base has a research station here,” she said. “Top secret.”
They’d spent the whole summer shrouding and keeping the Dhavnaks from sending ships in through the Qosmya Canal, while Dhavnakir’s allies in Narbona hammered away at Qosmya on the other side of the world, keeping them from coming to Belzen’s aid. No one had expected Kheppra Isle to be attacked; their enemies didn’t know the connection with dekatite, after all. How long had they been here? How long had they known?
Slowly, she turned her gaze on Andrew. “Just how long has Cu Zanthus been staying with you?”
Andrew visibly swallowed. “Why?”
“The Dhavvies have captured Kheppra Isle.”
“And you think that’s my fault?”
“I hate to say it. But yes.”
Chapter 18
KLARA YANA’S INTERROGATION
Cu Zanthus led Klara Yana into a room with garish red walls, now faded and chipped. A long table against the back wall had two tall built-in mirrors lined with round bulbs, but many of the bulbs were broken and the mirrors had been covered in white sheets. A crooked chandelier hung overhead, two bulbs in it burning with galvanized power. A cloth mannequin in the back corner had Lyanirus’s uniform jacket draped over it. The man himself was in a gray button-down and braces, sleeves pushed to his elbows. He stood in front of a map, which was fastened to one of the sheets. Pins were scattered across it in every country. The same man that had been present for Klara Yana’s first meeting was there too, sitting on one of the two plush chairs in the room. Both men turned their heads at the sound of Cu Zanthus shutting the door. Klara Yana pushed her shoulders back, tapping clasped hands to her eyes, mouth, and chest.
Lyanirus gestured and the other man stood up, then passed behind Cu Zanthus and Klara Yana to stand directly in front of the door, arms crossed over his chest. There were no other doors in the room; his intentions couldn’t have been clearer. Klara Yana held her salute.
“Sir,” she said. “May I speak?”
Lyanirus picked up something from the desk – a hoop of metal, it looked like. An attached chain trailed up behind it. He approached her, and before she could so much as open her mouth to ask, he’d opened the collar and snapped it shut around her neck. She flinched at the sudden chill against her skin. Lyanirus held the other end of the chain, wrapping it around his wrist.
Fear flooded Klara Yana’s body, threatening to spill onto her face. She fought with all she had to hold it back. Behind her, Cu Zanthus said,
“Sir, is that really nec–”
“Did I ask you, Ayaterossi?” Lyanirus interrupted. “I don’t know which is worse: that you were responsible for training this unprofessional scum, or that thanks to you, our only lead on Blackwood now is a seventeen cycle-old lowlife who may or may not be a sympathizer.”
“He’ll come through, sir,” said Cu Zanthus in a low voice.
Klara Yana started to turn her head, hoping to catch Cu Zanthus’s eye, but Lyanirus yanked the chain he held, jerking her attention back to him. She met his gaze stonily. Whatever you do, don’t show fear.
“Sir,” she said, “what is the point of collaring me?”
“It’s a precaution,” he said evenly. “If you try to strike me with your lightning, the surge will travel through the metal and back to you. That close to your brain, it will surely kill you.”
“I wasn’t going to strike you. I don’t even have that power! Sir–”
“Show me the mark,” he broke in. “The one Ayaterossi heard Chief Blackwood talk about.”
“Sir, the reason I never told you about the marks was because we had no idea they were special. They didn’t seem worth mentioning. If I’d known–”
He hit her, much harder than he had the first time she’d seen him. Pain exploded through the whole left side of her face. He hauled her back up by the chain just before she went down, and the metal bit brutally into her jawbone before she regained her balance. She struggled to slow her breathing, struggled to keep tears of pain and fear back. Her throat burned with the effort. Don’t freeze. Don’t cry. Don’t scream.
“Show me the mark,” he repeated.
Klara Yana yanked the gloves from her hands, then held out her left one with the palm up. She heard Cu Zanthus draw in his breath. Lyanirus narrowed his eyes, returning his gaze to her face.
“Is that the Broken Eye?” he said softly.
“Sir, I… I don’t know. It does resemble it, I admit, but the how and why of it is beyond me.”
“Are you a Vo Hina worshipper, Hollanelea?”
“No, sir!”
“Tell me the truth.”
“That is the truth, sir. I worship Shon Aha.”
He smiled then, as if seeing something that amused only him. It made her skin crawl. “We’ll come back to that,” he said. “For now, tell me about your Chief Blackwood. What mark does she have?”
“Like a lightning bolt, sir, on her arm.”
“A lightning bolt. How appropriate. When did she first use it to cause lightning?”
“It must have been the night of the invasion, sir, but neither one of us knew it at the time.”
“You claimed last night that you were working with a team to discover more about the lightning attack. That implies she knew before the invasion.”
“Sir. I… I mentioned they had an unnatural lightning attack during their early testing. No one yet had made the
association between that and the marks. I still don’t…”
“Have you tried to use yours yet? To do what she did?”
“No, sir.”
“Why not? From what Ayaterossi told me, she wanted you to.”
“Yes, but… but I still didn’t really believe she could. Like I told you, sir, I was never withholding anything! It wasn’t until we were ambushed in the lab that I knew for sure she could do it.”
“But you must have suspected. Especially after what happened right before I last saw you.”
“Sir, the very idea of it… If I’d said something, you would have laughed at me. I would have sounded crazy–”
“Intelligence operatives report anything and everything they see, and let their superiors worry about what to make of it. To do differently is actively withholding information, Hollanelea. It is not your place to decide what we do or don’t need to hear. Is that understood?”
“Sir. I understand completely.”
Lyanirus gestured to the other side of the room. “I want you to try the power. Aim it at the floor over there, far from anyone. Just a small strike.”
So that’s what this was about. He was hoping to use her as a weapon. To use her against Blackwood, no doubt. Klara Yana looked at the palm she still held out. As always, she felt that crawling sensation right beneath the mark, but it had never bothered her to the extent Blackwood said hers had. Nevertheless, she closed her eyes, blew her breath out slowly, and forced all her concentration onto those tiny prickles. Lightning beneath the skin. How did Blackwood do it, anyway? She pictured the lightning bolt – coming from her hand, from the lit bulbs, from the sky. Nothing. Not so much as an increase in the tingling. She blinked her eyes open.
“Nothing’s happening, sir,” she said.
“You’re not trying hard enough.”
“Sir, I’m doing exactly what Blackwood said. Concentrating on the tingling. But there’s nothing. When we were marked, on the Desert Crab, she was hit much harder than I was. She was thrown. She passed out. She didn’t wake up until the next morning. I never even fell. I’m sure whatever happened, it made her stronger than me.”