by S. J. Higbee
His closeness steadied me, as he continued, “I’ll talk to the journos, Arlester. I pulled something together on my way here – that’s if you don’t mind, Kyrillia?”
I shook my head, beyond glad the chore had been lifted from my shoulders. Seth’s Uppie accent was much better than mine and as a member of the Priest family, he was more at ease speaking in front of a clamouring bunch of scandal-hunters. It didn’t help that during interviews these days, Vrox frequently rampaged through my head furious at the lies circulating about him, which left me locked and unable to speak.
“You need to lie down, Your Ladyship,” murmured Ellern. “You’ve lost more blood than I’d like, given your current frailty.”
“It was only a few scratches,” I protested. But on standing, a wave of exhaustion washed through me. I mumbled some sort of farewell to Seth, busy keeping upright with Ellern’s supportive arm around my shoulders.
While helping me into bed, Ellern asked a few questions, so that I found myself telling her about Mother’s hatred of me and my ability with the Node. About how she’d taken me out of school when I was nine and set me to work, looking after my paralysed father, who I’d known as Uncle Osmar. About her attempt to have me Collared for a murder I didn’t commit. Ellern made a good listener, being one of the few people who neither cringed nor honey-talked at me. Nonetheless after she left, I was a bit shocked at how much I’d let fall. Seth won’t be impressed…Come to think of it, neither was I. While she was competent and caring, we’d been careful not to let anyone in too close since we’d pitched up here in Gloriosa Prime.
Sighing, I ordered a cup of Valerian tea and shut my aching eyes.
When Seth and I fled Cnicus another lifetime ago, I’d claimed we were married so we could share a room while I nursed him back to health. But since arriving in Gloriosa, I’d been caught by my own lie. With all eyes on us in this city full of ambitious, nosy people, we couldn’t possibly risk getting married for real. And even if we’d managed it, neither of us wanted to consummate our relationship with Vrox avidly watching our every move through my MindLink with him. So we elected to have separate bedrooms with a connecting door. Normally the door was left open between us, but for some reason on this particular evening, I shut it.
Pleasantly drowsy and for once avoiding the pile of admin needing attention, I selected a talking book from my tab. Once I’d started digging through the material stored in the Prime Nodery, I’d discovered thousands of files our ancestors had brought from Earth locked away from the general population during our damaging, bloody history. I wanted to make them all freely available again, but first I needed the support of the Brarian Family, which was taking longer to win over than we’d hoped. Seth assured me it wasn’t abusing my power to enjoy the files of books and music before everyone else, given I was intending to let them loose on the planetwide Node nexus, anyhow.
So I drifted off to sleep listening to an entertaining tale about a young orphan living with an uncle and aunt who hated him because of his ability. He went off to a magical academy where he had all sorts of dangerous adventures with his friends. It was a comfort to know that children in ancient times also knew of loss and heartbreak, for all their art and music and the joy of living on a world designed just for them.
But I awoke in the night, bloody tears drying on my cheeks to find I’d – somehow – climbed out of the window in my sleep and was sitting on the thick stone sill, looking out over the city some four floors up. One slip and I’d tumble to my death.
Vrox! Help me! I’m… here. Teeth chattering and shivering with fear, I shouted for him through our mental link to get the guards.
CHAPTER TWO
Vrox croons reassurance to his poor frightened Cub as he lumbers from his den. However he doesn’t raise the alarm as he passes the first set of guards…
I shouted for Seth, but the room was designed to muffle noise. If only I hadn’t shut the connecting door!
For once it wasn’t raining, but a chilly wind sliced through my nightgown as if it wasn’t there. Freezing cold and rigid with fear, I tried shifting sideways along the sill towards the open window. But it was too far and I was too afraid.
A square of light blazed around me, blinding my dark-adapted sight.
“Vrox?” Relief poured through me that he’d sprinted to my rescue, or alerted the guards, after all.
“Kyrillia? Where are you?”
A stab of disappointment that it wasn’t Vrox pierced my thankful joy at being discovered. Because that means… “Seth! I’m outside the window. On the sill. And-and I can’t get back.”
His head appeared through the window. “Right, sweeting. Hold hard for a sunblasted minute and we’ll have you safe again.”
Helston, captain of my personal escort appeared at his side. “Evening, Your Ladyship. Don’t you worry, we’ll have you back inside soonest. How long have you been out here?”
“I’m not sure. I woke up here.”
“And are you able to move at all?”
“No.” I’m too cold. And it’s a long way up.
After more promises that they’d soon have me back inside, they disappeared.
I focused on the murmuring voices organising how they were going to rescue me, while trying not to panic. I didn’t dare look down at the ground. My night vision was far too good and being able to pick out the stone paving waiting for me should I slip wasn’t doing much to keep panic at bay. While gazing at Gloriosa’s cityscape wasn’t an option as the bright lights stabbed my silver eyes. I tilted my head up at the sky, for once not shrouded in cloud. Stars here were a watery, dimmer version of the jewel-crusted skies that crowded above our heads in The Arids. Does all the rain wash away the brightness?
Seth’s head popped out of the window. “Kyrillia? Right, here’s what we’re gonna do— Ah!” Yelling in surprise, he disappeared.
Skittering of claws…
Shimmer of bioluminescence filling my vision…
Growl of effort….
Vrox appeared in front of me, his tail coiled around the heavy bar securing the shutters and using the momentum of his headlong leap through the open window to swing round onto the sill between me and the window. He teetered, claws raking thick furrows in the stone while scrabbling for balance. A scaled foreleg gripped me painfully around the waist, dragging me across the rough sill towards the opening…
Vrox huffs with effort, as he hauls Cub through the skydoor.
I shot through the window headfirst, where a forest of hands hauled me to safety, scraping my legs on the edge of the window. Afire with pain from the grazes and my dazzled eyes, I didn’t register anything more than I was back in the brightly lit room without my goggles and the icy wind had gone. Some kind soul turned out the lights, easing my eyes as I groggily savoured the sudden warmth.
Seth was getting to his feet after being knocked down by the mantivore’s headlong dash through the window to rescue me.
Vrox? Where are you?
Snorting with panic, Vrox is slipping… straining… This is not how he would choose to die…
I leaned out of the window, trying to shrug off gloved hands restraining me, howling for the mantivore.
Vrox had lost his balance and slipped. Hanging onto the stone sill by one forearm and one powerful hindleg, he was scratching at the stonework with his other foreleg, while his tail thrashed in mid-air in an effort to keep from falling. Snorting with terror, he stared up at me, while I held out my hand.
Muscles wrench… scales break… This is not a good mantivore death… No… honour… in falling…
“No!” I flung myself towards him, breaking free of the guards, desperate to help.
“Ahh!”
Vrox’s roar not only deafened me and shook the window, it blasted clean across my mind with his blare of fury at my stupid disobedience – knocking me back inside the room, where I tumbled across the floor, coming to rest by the foot of my bed.
Wet-witted cub! Stay inside and live on!
All this crashed through my head in a handful of seconds, immediately followed by shouts from those clustered at the window as I felt as well as heard, a wavering yowl when Vrox finally lost his battle with gravity along with his grip on the windowsill.
Battered and heartsore, I shut my eyes, clenched my jaw and waited. For the sickening lurch as Vrox freewheeled to his death. For his dying thoughts to sear my mind. For the sudden Vrox-shaped void where the mantivore used to be…
It could have been the blink of a flea’s left eyelid, it could have been a long Gloriosan winter – I’ve no idea how much time passed as I curled into a ball on the floor, clamped shut against the inevitable heartbreak waiting to swallow me. My mind was eerily empty. No Vrox. I hadn’t appreciated just how much his consciousness had filled up the spaces in my head.
“Your Ladyship? Can you hear me? My meditab says you’re conscious,” yammered Ellern.
But I wasn’t opening my eyes for anyone, not even my personal healer. Pressure in my mind built. But I shut it down, anyway, not wanting to feel that giddying vacuum that used to shimmer with vari-colour vividness.
“Kyrillia? I’m so very sorry. How are you?”
I opened my eyes to see Seth kneeling beside me, sporting a blooming bruise across his temple where Vrox had knocked him flying.
Vrox? Nothing, except a sickening yawing. Vast space. Bitter, bitter cold… So this is what it’s like to lose my MindLink… Is this how Vrox felt when Rastan died? When Osmar passed away in my arms?
I shivered, queasy and chilled, before muttering thanks as Ellern wrapped a blanket around me. “Do you feel like getting up off the floor, Your Ladyship?”
The sharp scent of night air blew in from the open window where four guards were clustered, looking down. They’re probably wearing their eyes out on Vrox’s shattered body. He’d hate that...
“Your Ladyship, shall we get you up off the floor and onto the bed?” prompted Ellern.
Seth put an arm around me. I stroked the purpling lump on his high forehead, rewarded by one of his micro smiles. “Kyrillia? D’you understand what’s happening? Just nod, sweeting.”
“I know.” Though I was still keeping my mind clamped shut against the yawning emptiness where the mantivore should be.
Seth gently squeezed my fingers. “Thing is… Vrox is missing. He slipped off the ledge – we all saw him go. But he isn’t on the ground. The guards have searched everywhere he could have possibly landed. Can he fly?”
“Nah…” I felt numb, again. Is this the early stages of MindLoss? Or am I slipping back into the blanketing thickness that news of Mai’s death ripped away?
“We’ll just get you onto the bed and I’ll give you something for the shock,” Ellern said.
Which was when the alarm went off on the console linked to the Node. The skirling sound ripped through the room, echoing throughout the building in an ear-splitting chorus as other alarms in other rooms took up the refrain.
Two guards immediately took up position either side of me, their weapons drawn, while one slammed the window shut and the other rushed out, yelling into his com for backup.
Seth muted the brain-buzzing row, while I scrambled out of bed, sharply aware this was the likely outcome now Vrox was gone. After all he’d had the Command Codes. “Let’s go. That’s the Nodery alarm.”
“Your Ladyship, you’re in no state to go anywhere!” protested Ellern, turning to Seth. “Tell her, Your Lordship.”
But Seth had paled, his eyes locked onto mine. “Is this the start of…?”
His shock left me tasting bile at the realisation that when I’d explained the probable consequences of Vrox’s death, he hadn’t believed me. Because Vrox dying meant it was all too likely the Node nexus would also die back, with catastrophic consequences for Gloriosa. For the whole of Arcadia… But you disregarded my warnings. When did you start dismissing me as a vore-stunned feeb-wit, Seth?
Shivering with dread, I hauled on a vari-coloured robe, dismissing Ellern’s fussing, before starting the long walk to the Nodery. Seth accompanied me, along with the small squad of guards skin-welded to my side wherever I went. Brarian Place didn’t just resound with ear-holing alarms, it was also drenched in lurid red lighting while luminous arrows pointed in a nonsensical direction.
Until a dishevelled Arlester ran up the corridor to join us, panting, “No! Follow the arrows. You’re off to the Nodery, right?”
“Right,” I said.
“There’s a tram that leads straight from Brarian House to the Nodery.”
“Right!” I wheeled around, following the roaching arrows along corridors and flights of steps leading downwards. Course Uncle Trislen would waft off to the Nodery on some kind of transport! Him and Beal wouldn’t break a bead of sweat if they could help it. And typical no one thought to share it with me until a major emergency.
The arrows led to a small train with plush padded seats for me and my party while the guards sat either side on wooden benches. As it racketed along the rails, I tried to contact the duty Brarian at the Nodery, but my slate wouldn’t work. Heart racing, I tried not to think of Vrox, because when I did, swinging giddiness and icy cold swept through me. I fumbled for Seth’s hand as the train rattled around a corner faster than I wanted. Before letting go of it, when I recalled his shocked surprise as the alarm sounded.
“Ah… News has leaked out of an incident at Brarian Place, leading to an emergency lockdown,” said Arlester, peering at his slate.
“Why are you plugged into the journo-spots when I can’t get hold of the duty Brarian?” I demanded.
“Because your uncle didn’t want to be too connected to the Nodery if and when it all came crashing down,” replied Arlester, still gazing at his screen.
Yeah – he didn’t blink at dangerously neglecting the job that entitled him to all this luxury, yet came over faint and frightened if the journo-spots weren’t honey-talking him to the skies and back! I didn’t have to ask why such a tilted set of priorities was in place, but it still left me angry enough to kick a kitten. And grimly determined to fix the hole in the current protocols, once this emergency was over. If this emergency wasn’t the beginning of the end of everything we’d worked for…
“Well, leastways that’s something!” Relief was evident in Arlester’s tone. “Denzel Brarian, who’s on duty is solidly reliable. Ah, yes…” He was flicking through his slate with impressive speed, given he wasn’t Brarian-trained. “Just checking his voting records… He’s always been in the faction wanting to upscale Brarian responsibility and regain ancient lost skills.”
“Isn’t that information supposed to be confidential?” asked Seth.
Arlester tore himself away from his slate to finally look up. “In theory, yes. Though, it’s just as well I’ve been able to select several Brarians who are loyal to what you stand for. Otherwise, right now we’d be up to our necks in it, instead of just up to our knees. And here we are – this is our stop.”
Denzel Brarian was waiting on the small platform as the doors slid open, bowing so low he could’ve licked the floor at our feet. “Your Ladyship, Sire… What an honour. I just wish it was under happier circumstances.”
I took a gasping breath to ease the sick giddiness and terrible sense of swinging over black nothingness. Oh, Vrox! “Greetings, Mr Brarian.”
“Do call me Denzel, I’m so—”
“Many thanks, Denzel. Hopefully, we’ll get a chance to chat another time, but right now I need to know what the problem is,” I said, conscious Uppies could take half a day in long-winded, lace-lined greetings.
“It’s the Node…”
Yeah – I didn’t reckon it was the skelping flyerpark! Evidently, he caught a sense of my impatience.
“You need to se
e this…” Leastways he didn’t dawdle. In fact, I was struggling to keep up, given all my bruises and grazes had painfully stiffened during the short train journey, as he continued gabbling, “Wall one, tank G7 – activity 87% over norm, outgassing 78%, mean bioluminescence emissions – 6,200 lux…”
I realised that we must have been underground when we had to climb several flights of stairs before reaching the entrance to the Prime Nodery, the most important room on the planet. This was the first Node nexus established on Arcadia. At least half of these bubbling tanks full of organi-packs of information actually came from our mothership, Distant Dream, while the rest were seeded from the stock brought by the colonists. Every time I walked into this Nodery, I was busy focusing on these facts instead of remembering this was where I’d killed Uncle Trislen and Beal.
Right now, red alarm lights were still strobing throughout the hexagonal room and because we were in Emergency Mode, Seth and I were the only ones, other than Denzel, security-cleared to enter the room. Seth grabbed Arlester’s arm and stopped at the entrance, clearly unwilling to enter. Breathing in the rich, sweet smell, I marched across and switched off the alarm.
Denzel looked agonised. “Should we do that, do you think?”
“We all know there’s a problem and I’ve never found flashing red lights improved my thinking equipment, so why bother to keep it on?” Vrox also reckons… reckoned organi-packs don’t like the red lighting.
Denzel’s face cleared. “Never thought of it like that. Master Trask, who trained me, always knocked it into me that I had to do it by the book. And here… this is the problem.” The Brarian gestured at the frantically bubbling tank, which was also emitting dizzying gusts of a sweet pungent smell I knew all too well.
Seth looked around from the doorway. “What’s wrong?”
“Has activity within the tank tailed off since you sounded the alarm?” I asked.
“No,” husked Denzel, looking bereft. “None of the tanks have ever behaved like this before. And I’ve been night-duty Brarian for six years and apprentice-Brarian in this Nodery for five years before that.”