Lanaya smiled and spread her arms. “All of you here are privileged to witness this. Join with me in savoring our moment of glory! Today, we see the beginning of end of Damerya. Today, Oberkion’s dream dies!”
She leaned forward over her console, leering out at the cliffs, as if she was taking physical pleasure in the prospect of the destruction ahead.
“Fire when ready!” she commanded.
#
Jarlus stabbed the guard under his chin, thrusting the clawed baekon blade into the hilt.
The man’s eyes rolled up, he thrashed, and then went limp. Jarlus eased the body to the ground and removed his blade from the flesh.
There was no place to hide the corpse.
Damn, he thought. I’m leaving too much of a trail.
It wasn’t by choice; it had been the guard’s misfortune to come upon Jarlus in the corridor of the great ship, and the Xai Ashaon had simply reacted.
Still, things might have been worse.
Jarlus had expected the monstrous ship to be swarming with men inside, a massive crew like those which manned the great Kokytian sailing vessels.
Instead, the craft seemed to be only lightly manned, no doubt a benefit of the ancient aon technology.
But he still had no idea of where to find the da’ta se, and every moment wasted increased his chance of discovery. There had to be some hint of their whereabouts, something …
A few steps down the corridor he heard it. It was a song—a song that someone was humming. The notes were just barely audible over the constant vibrations of the ship. The tune was familiar, and he recognized the voice: Ralley Quenn. It was one of his “opera” songs.
Jarlus pressed his ear to the smooth crystal of the wall, tried to figure out where it was coming from. It was hard to be sure, but it sounded as if the source was on the other side. But how to get through?
He slid along the wall of the corridor until he came to a round seam set low in the wall. He knelt down and touched it, and a circular hatch slid open under his fingers.
Beyond it was a low, round corridor, more like a tunnel. It was dark inside, and so Jarlus pulled a tiny ambia light-rod from his vest and rotated it so that pale light shone out.
The humming was coming from the right. He crouched down and entered, crawled towards the noise. It grew louder, and then he found himself looking into a tiny square room, where the Princess and Quenn were manacled, chained to silver-plated projections jutting from the walls.
Quenn was humming and they both had their eyes closed, unaware of his presence.
Relief surged over him—though he had to remind himself that his task wasn’t done, that they still had to get out.
“I always appreciate a good tune,” he said. “Especially when it leads me to my quarry.”
Their eyes flew open. “Xai Ashaon!” they both gasped in unison.
In better circumstances, he might have laughed at their childlike response. But now, he moved silently forward to examine their manacles.
“They’re aon bonded,” the Princess said. “Unbreakable by normal means.”
He took his knife and started to pry at one of the links in the chain binding Taxamia’s right arm.
“No good,” she said. “But I have something. Reach into my pocket.” She nodded towards her vest.
Following her direction, he reached in and pulled out a handful of silvery tools.
“One of them is a welder,” she said. “See that one there, with the bent head and the little dish around the needle at the tip?”
“This one?” He held it up to her. It looked almost like a stylized silver flower.
“That’s it,” she said. “The beam should be focused enough to cut through. There’s a small ambia supply inside—I hope it’s enough.”
Jarlus had never held an aon instrument before; he wondered what Orcus Gaelti might say, seeing such a valuable little thing in his untrained hands.
“Use it on one of the links,” Taxamia said. “They will be the easiest to cut through.”
Holding the needle-tip up to one of the chain’s links, he depressed the stub.
A thin line of ambia lanced out just an inch from the needle, and he held it there until it burned a gap in the metal. Then, he twisted the link around until he was able to slip the next link through the gap—and Taxamia’s right arm was freed, albeit still clad in a manacle and few links of chain.
Taxamia took the welder now and repeated the process for her left arm; though her hand wielded the tool with deft certainty and she seemed to take half the time that he had.
“How did you get in here?” Ralley asked. “We feared the worst when the saw the bodies of the Xa Ashaon back in the forest, and we—“
“We’ll discuss it later,” he said. “Right now, I just want to get both of you out of here.”
Taxamia had already freed Ralley’s left arm and had burned halfway through one of the links on the chain binding his right when the ambia beam of the tiny welder sputtered and died.
She jabbed the button on it several times, but only managed to generate tiny flickers of white energy before it stopped working altogether.
“It’s run out!” she exclaimed.
The gap in the link wasn’t yet big enough to pull another link through. Ralley yanked on the chain and pulled down with all of his weight, but it accomplished nothing. “Still too strong,” he sighed.
Just then, there was a shimmering in the air. A sound was building, faint but increasing in volume as if approaching from a distance: a familiar whistling-shuffling noise.
“Convergence!” Taxamia gasped, her golden eyes going wide.
The air around them had begun to subtly glow.
“Damn,” Jarlus swore. “This is dangerous?” That noise and the lambent glow made his skin crawl.
“Jarlus!” Taxamia shouted. “You have to get out now! We’ll both survive but … There’s no time!”
Without thinking, Jarlus’s hand went to the princess’s arm, tugging on it.
She’s small, he thought, I can pull her along quickly if need be …
“You vowed to protect us both!” Taxamia snapped, her tone commanding and her golden eyes seeming to bore into Jarlus’s soul.
She was unflinching, and he knew that he had to trust her judgment on this matter.
Still, Jarlus felt like he was once again abandoning her as he scurried from the chamber …
Damn aon science and damn this hateful ship!
As he exited the chamber and the circular hatch slid back down behind him, he gritted his teeth, enraged at his own helplessness.
#
“Love,” Ralley said. “Jarlus was right. You should leave me here. If you are gone, the convergence will fail—and the cannon won’t have enough reserve energy for a third shot.”
Taxamia shook her head, her pretty mouth just a tense line. Ralley knew she would never accept the argument.
She slid forward and embraced him, hugging him tightly.
He felt her breath on his cheek and smelled her perfume—the same scent that had beckoned to him in his dreams back on the Isle of Briars, in a time that now seemed like ages ago.
He’d wanted to be close to her so badly then, be a part of her, joined with her. That need had given him such strength and …
“Love!” he said. “That’s it! We can use this!”
She looked at him questioningly. The sounds of the convergence were building now, and her skin was beginning to glow, pale fire flowing over her. That pain was flaring again in the center of his own head …
“Don’t fight it this time!” he explained. “Fighting is what weakened us before. Accept the pull—the link is what gives us strength. Look into my eyes love, be with me, be one with me, know me, know my soul.”
She nodded and stroked his cheek. Her fingers burned white.
“I love you and I want to join with you,” she whispered, and though the whistling-shuffling of the convergence was now deafening, he understood her words.
They clutched each other as the energy built and the light grew brilliant.
She raised her head to kiss him, and he felt a slight tingle as her lips passed through his cheek …
They were joining, and despite the pain, it was glorious.
This time, they stayed conscious as the energy exploded. Her voice was there inside his head: “I love you, I am with you, I know you.”
“I know,” he thought back. “We are joined, we ARE da’ta se.”
And then, Ralley Quenn was no more. No longer a distinct entity, there was only one voice now, one mind.
The new voice growled in a passionate bass rumble: I AM DA’TA SE. I AM THE ONE, AND I AM STRONG.
-39-
This time, Jack was determined to lead the dance.
He knew that he needed to get Aubren’s flyer in front of him for a prolonged ambia blast; that was the only way to destroy one of the crystal-armored craft.
Jack dropped his flyer down suddenly, skidding over the surface of the river, trailing a fan of water behind him. Then, he took the Hummingbird up again, rapidly rising towards the giant flying fortress, which was gliding upriver.
Perhaps he could catch Aubren off-guard by flying close to the giant ship …
Missing its right wing, Jack’s little flyer had a tendency to lean to the left, and it shuddered a bit when accelerating. But Jack compensated easily. He shifted his body’s weight slightly to the right side of the craft; he didn’t know if this actually helped, but it made him feel better.
Jack made for the flying fortress, weaving and bobbing all the way, now so accustomed to such evasive maneuvers that he had barely to think about them.
The missing wing barely slowed him now. The Hummingbird flyer wasn’t really like a bird, and the placement of the wings was more ornamental than anything; each of the eight lifting rods attached to the control harness corresponded to one lifting point. He’d only lost one point … aon, wasn’t that the Dameryan word for it?
But if Aubren thought him wounded and helpless, perhaps he could use that to his advantage.
He guided his craft directly over the prow of the monstrous vessel, while a dozen other Dameryan flyers blasted the flying fortress’s hull with ambia. Scores of crystalline claws and axe-head vessels flitted amidst them, trying to fend them off.
In the corner of his eye, Jack saw a flash of white, then an explosion as bits of white-painted wood and gold trim spun off into the void.
Another royal Dameryan flyer destroyed, just … gone. They were badly outnumbered and outgunned by the Baek Tayon crystal ships.
Jack barely knew the pilots he now served with, yet he felt that he’d never seen braver men.
This aerial arena was the most dangerous battlefield he’d ever witnessed; yet, not one of these men hesitated to throw his flyer and himself into the fray. They had honor and courage equal to the most stalwart of Dragoons. He felt proud indeed to wear their iconic silk scarf.
Now, Jack flew only a few feet from the top of the hull of the flying fortress, rising up slightly to avoid the projections that jutted out from it.
There was an opening in the hull … a rectangular slot leading to some sort of chamber beneath. Was this a door of some sort that the enemy had forgotten to close? Might it be a vulnerable spot to strike?
This contemplation was interrupted by a burst of whistling white energy.
Aubren was still behind him, following him over the top of the giant vessel, still intent on the kill.
Jack swerved underneath the big ship, dodging a friendly vessel that flew into his path.
He was considering his next move when there was an odd sound.
An ambia sound, to be sure, whistling low, but also rumbling … the shuffling background noise like a continuous cycle of roars.
It made his guts churn and the hairs of his beard stand on end, he and could feel a buzzing vibration through the flyer’s control harness.
Then, a great, wide beam of white energy shot forth from the recessed “mouth” at the front of the giant ship with an ear-splitting screech. It was blindingly bright, and Jack dropped his craft down so that he wouldn’t be caught in it.
One of the crystal flyers wasn’t quick enough. The claw-shaped craft, caught instantly in the beam, simply vanished from existence.
It was as if all the light of heaven had been unleashed by a very angry God.
Or a goddess, Jack corrected himself. Pai Lanaya, indeed. No doubt she saw this as proof of her divinity.
Unlike the standard ambia blasts, which had a radius of a few inches, this was a virtual river of white fire, at least a hundred feet across.
The beam was pointed at the cliffs on the western side of the river, near the narrow end of the Valley of Tombs.
Wasn’t that where the Tomb of Oberkion was?
The Tomb containing the all-important Key of Oberkion. A little black pyramid which, as Ralley had explained, had an exact twin back on the Isle of Briars—both of which were needed to create a gate between worlds.
And Ralley had asked him to defend the Key. He felt a pang of guilt like cold iron in his chest … But how could he have expected an attack like this?
As the beam continued to flare out towards the cliffs, something else was happening.
The air around Jack’s flyer began to shimmer and shift, and then the terrain below seemed to slide to and fro, the river shifting in its bed.
What in the name of …?
He looked down to see that the beam from the great ship was bathing the area of the Tomb of Oberkion with a flood of white energy, searing like the sun and painful to look at.
On the cliff-top, he could see the platform with the three obelisks where they’d appeared when they’d first come to this world. The obelisks were flaring with ambia energy now, pulsing with it, beams shooting upward while jagged bolts of it crackled around the platform like white lightning.
He saw the cliff-face melt away as the ancient limestone began to dissolve under the pounding fire of the ambia, leaving the obelisks and platform standing alone on a pillar of dark crystal.
The air around Jack’s flyer grew bright, and the shuffling-whistling noise was now loud enough that he tried to pull his hat down to muffle the noise.
He took his craft up, desperately trying to climb above the building energy—but then it became too bright to see …
And he lost all sense of direction as the world started spinning. He felt as if his flyer was falling end over end, while beyond the canopy’s glass there was nothing but a world of blazing white.
Clutching the now useless control harness, he said a little prayer and waited for the end …
-40-
Ed shuffled backward in the darkness and covered his face as the servant-things tumbled down the shaft. One of them smashed into him, knocking the breath from his lungs and pushing him down.
Another fell on top of it, and then another …
Flat on his back in the dark, he found himself buried under the crushing weight of the stinking things.
He braced himself, expecting to feel them biting and tearing at his flesh at any moment.
But it didn’t happen. When he reached up and touched the rubbery cold hand of one of them, then patted it experimentally, there was no reaction.
Had they died along with their master, then?
Unable to push the things off his body, Ed instead slowly and achingly wriggled his way out from under the piled flesh. He burned with pain all over, and could taste his own blood in his mouth, mixed with the less savory substances that lingered there. His right arm throbbed where the demon had bitten down deep.
“Edwyn!” came a girlish voice.
He looked up to see Julea standing at the top of the shaft, holding a candle. “You’re alive!” she shouted, jumping up and down in her excitement.
Thank God, he thought. She’s all right.
“Are you … okay?” he asked. “Where’s your father?”
“He’s
not going to hurt anyone now,” she said, shaking her head. “But I couldn’t open the door … Edwyn, please come up.”
He grabbed the silver cord fastened to the side of the shaft and used it to start pulling himself up. His muscles were so sore they felt as if they’d been scrubbed with stinging sand, and he was weak—but the last thing he wanted was to stay down in the dark with all of the dead things.
It seemed like an eternity before he finally made it to the top; the close air of the cavern tasted sweet after the reeking miasma of that death-filled pit.
Once he reached the top, he slid down on his side, breathing hard and trying to regain his strength.
Julea put down her candle and came over to him, stroking his hair, then moving her hand to touch his claw-wounded cheek. Her fingers came away bloody.
“You’re hurt, Edwyn,” she whispered.
“I’m … all right,” he panted. “We have to get out.”
He heard the sound of a piteous sob and sat up to take a look.
Guardian Crandolph was kneeling on the floor in front of the pedestal that supported the pyramid Key, hugging his head to his knees and crying. Just a few feet from him, Mott’s charred body was sprawled face-down, like a monument to his failure.
Ed had a moment of pity for the man—and hated himself for it. Slowly, with Julea’s help, he rose to his feet, then went over to the small table and picked up the music box and the marriage certificate. He handed the box to Julea, then rolled up the certificate and stuck it into his own jacket pocket.
“Julea,” he said, touching her shoulder, “we have to leave.”
She stood unmoving, staring at her father. “He has to open the door for us,” she said.
Ed limped his way over to the sobbing Guardian. “Let us out,” he said. “Your master’s dead and I want to …” He corrected himself: “My wife and I want to leave.”
Julea was behind him, and when he used the word “wife” he heard her let out a little gasp.
“So much death,” the Guardian sobbed. “So much. And for what? Julea, child, you were right. I thought that the Master held the secret to immortality, that he could conquer death. After your mother died, I feared death so much … I wanted us to be able to go on forever, joined with Krotan.”
Battle Across Worlds Page 29