John looked at her. “Together?”
“Naturally,” she said. “You are my husband.”
“I am . . . ?” he said haltingly. He felt a warmth rise in his face. And then, as he realized how fortunate he was to be married to someone so beautiful, he added, “I mean, of course I am.”
Agrayn waited until John and Maleen had left the room and were out of earshot. Then he turned to his fellow councilors.
“Apparently,” he told them, “our ancestors’ machine isn’t infallible after all. At least, insofar as the Green Lantern’s reprogramming is concerned.”
“He doesn’t seem to have any of the memories we wanted to give him,” Darmac noted.
“Not even the ones that concerned Maleen,” said Jerred.
Agrayn frowned as he considered the situation. “It’s all right,” he said at last. “She’ll tell him everything he needs to know.”
But that wasn’t the worst part of the problem.
“What is it?” asked Jaapho, a tall man with long, white sideburns. “You still seem worried, Agrayn.”
“I am,” the councilor admitted. “But not about what the Green Lantern doesn’t remember. I’m concerned about what he does remember.”
Jerred saw what he was getting at. “You think if the machine failed to implant new memories . . .”
“Then it may not have been effective in eliminating the old ones,” Agrayn said, finishing the thought.
“You mean he may remember who he is?” Darmac asked in alarm. “And where he came from?”
“He doesn’t seem to,” Jaapho noted.
“Not yet,” Agrayn agreed. “But in time, who knows?”
“We’ll have to watch him,” said Jerred. He glanced over his shoulder at the door. “Maleen will have to watch him.”
Agrayn nodded. “Let us pray that the Green Lantern serves his purpose before his memories return. Otherwise, we may find ourselves with two powerful enemies on our hands.”
Agrayn was determined to avoid that . . . even if it ultimately meant eliminating John Stewart.
John found himself walking through hallways of pale orange and soft yellow. Like the walls in the room he had woken up in, these were sculpted and met over his head in a series of arches.
They should have looked familiar to him, but they didn’t. It was as if he had never seen them before in his life.
He turned to Maleen. “Who’s Evil Star? And why was I fighting his henchmen?”
She frowned. “You don’t remember Evil Star at all?”
“No,” John said. “Tell me about him.”
His wife shrugged. “Once, he was a member of a Council of Elders—just like Jerred or Darmac or Agrayn, but in a different city. He was a brilliant scientist, a respected member of the community, with a wife who loved him dearly.”
A lot like me, John thought.
“But he became obsessed with death,” Maleen continued. “He poured all his wealth and his genius into finding a way to make himself immortal.”
Immortal? “Did he succeed?” John asked.
“We don’t know. What we do know is that he invented a device he calls a starband. It draws light from our sun and other stars and converts it into a terribly destructive form of energy.”
“Was he using it against us? Is that what I was fighting against?”
“You’re our champion, John. The one who stands between us and the fate that’s overtaken the other nations of the world.”
“What did Evil Star do to them?” he wondered.
Maleen sighed. “He took them over and proclaimed himself their emperor. All who opposed him were either killed on the spot or thrown into prison. That’s how he got the name Evil Star.”
John scowled. He didn’t like the idea of defending one nation when all its neighbors were being crushed to death by a tyrant. It didn’t seem right—and he said so.
Maleen looked at him. “That’s exactly what you told me this morning. ‘It’s not enough to keep Escraya safe,’ you said. ‘We need to free all of Aoran from Evil Star’s rule.’ ”
Just as she said that, John saw that they were approaching a window. His gaze was drawn to it. After all, he didn’t know how long he had been unconscious or what time of day it was.
As he got closer to the window, he saw that it was dark out. Then a queasy feeling began to take hold of his stomach. It wasn’t just dark. The sky was black.
Completely black.
“Where are the stars?” he asked.
Maleen took his arm. “We haven’t seen the stars in more than a year. You don’t recall that either?”
John shook his head, feeling more disoriented than ever. “No,” he said. “I don’t.”
“Evil Star’s band draws into itself all the energy the stars have to give. There isn’t any left to light up our sky.”
John felt a muscle twitch in his jaw. He didn’t know what bothered him more—that Evil Star had stolen so much from them or that he didn’t remember any of it.
“We’ll get the stars back,” he vowed.
Maleen didn’t say anything in return. She just smiled at him. Then she guided him past the window and down the corridor.
The man known to Aoran as Evil Star stood on the balcony of the enormous, sky-shouldering palace his subjects had built for him, and looked down on the city of Ulandir.
The Ulandirans milled in the winding streets far below him, floating globes lighting their way in the otherwise complete darkness. But none of the Ulandirans came too close to his palace. They didn’t dare for fear of being noticed by him.
It pleased Evil Star that it was so. The people of Ulandir were right to fear and avoid him. After all, he had the power to crush them with a single thought.
He raised his right hand and admired the metal starband on his arm. Once, his colleagues on this city’s Council of Elders had laughed at the idea of such a band, just as they had laughed at the idea of his defying death and achieving immortality.
He wasn’t immortal. Not yet, anyway. But he had shown the Council how foolish it was to laugh at him.
Once Evil Star had perfected his starband, he had appeared before the Council of Elders and destroyed everyone on it. Then he had crushed anyone else who might have stood against him. And after that, he had pronounced himself Monarch of Ulandira, the nation of which Ulandir was the capital.
But he hadn’t stopped there.
Evil Star hadn’t invented the starband—or worked continually to improve it—just to become the ruler of a single country. He had greater ambitions than that.
Before long, he had conquered Dashiri, Ulandira’s neighbor to the west. Then he seized Chifathia, Ulandira’s neighbor to the south. And Asandor. And Wodacron. And most recently, Oldasia.
Nine-tenths of the planet Aoran now bent their knees to Evil Star. But he wasn’t satisfied. Not as long as the nation called Escraya still defied him by remaining free.
Unlike the other populations on Aoran, the Escrayans had taken steps in time to stop him. They had erected powerful energy shields to keep him out of their lands.
It did not surprise him that Escraya would give him the most trouble. Only there did the Council of Elders still study the histories of their ancestors. Only there were the arcane mysteries of the ancients still preserved in some small way.
But for Evil Star to achieve his ambition, Escraya would have to fall. And it would, he told himself. The Escrayans would bend to his will like everyone else.
It was just a matter of time.
John Stewart was sitting alone at a table in the house he shared with Maleen, eating breakfast by an open window. It was cool by the window, but not uncomfortably so.
What made him uncomfortable was the darkness.
It was daytime. It should have been light out. However, it was barely any different from nighttime. A dark gray, maybe, instead of black, but that was about it.
But then, that made sense. The sun was a star too. If Evil Star was stealing the power of every
light in the sky, the sun would be like one big power battery.
John studied the sky and tried to imagine a sun hanging in it. A big yellow ball of light that stung the eyes and made the sky a deep and vibrant blue.
In brightest day . . .
The phrase came to him as if out of nowhere. It seemed so familiar somehow. He was sure he had heard it somewhere. But try as he might, he couldn’t remember where.
“John?” said a female voice. It wafted in from the next room.
He recognized the voice as Maleen’s. But somehow it still didn’t sound as familiar as it should have.
“I’m in here,” he said.
A moment later, Maleen appeared. She looked even more beautiful with the coolness of the morning reddening her cheeks.
“I didn’t see you when I woke up, so I made myself some breakfast,” John said.
“I’m glad you did,” she told him. “I had to see to next week’s food deliveries. Life goes on, even in a city under siege.”
“I suppose,” he said.
John didn’t like living in fear of an invasion. He didn’t like knowing that only a series of-transparent-energy shields protected Escraya from a brutal tyrant.
“So,” he said, taking Maleen’s hand to get her attention, “a starband . . . that’s Evil Star’s weapon, right?”
His wife looked at him. “Yes. It is. But he’s created other weapons as well.”
“Such as?” John asked.
Maleen sat down opposite him. “Such as his Starlings.”
The name didn’t ring a bell. But then, nothing else did either. “And what are those?”
“They’re artificial life-forms that obey only Evil Star. Separately, they’re manageable. But together, they’re almost as difficult to defeat as their master.”
John nodded. “I see.”
“Jerred thinks it was the Starlings who assaulted you and caused your head injury. But of course,” said Maleen, “we don’t know for certain that’s what happened.”
John frowned. Obviously, he had his work cut out for him. But somehow he didn’t feel afraid. If anything, he was eager for a rematch with Evil Star and his henchmen.
Just one thing puzzled him. “You say Evil Star’s starband draws its power from the stars.”
“That’s right,” said his wife.
He held up his ring. “What about this? Where does my ring get its power from?” The green circlet on his finger crackled with emerald energy as he spoke.
Maleen smiled a little sadly. “I wish I knew, John. You insisted that your ring’s power source be kept a secret, in case any of us were ever captured by Evil Star.”
John sighed. Maybe it would come back to him in time. But for now, the source of the ring’s power would have to remain a secret even from the man who wore it.
“You still look a little woozy,” Maleen observed. “Maybe you should rest.”
John shook his head. “No,” he said. “I want to go after Evil Star as soon as possible.”
His wife looked at him for a moment. Then she nodded. “All right. If that’s what you want.”
And she showed him how to get to the council chamber.
As soon as Maleen saw the Green Lantern fly off, she opened her personal communicator and contacted her uncle. A moment later, his face appeared on the device’s tiny screen.
“Yes, Maleen?”
“John is on his way to the council chamber,” she said. She felt a little guilty talking about the Green Lantern behind his back. “He should be there at any moment.”
“Thank you for letting us know.” Jerred’s expression turned thoughtful. “How is he?”
Maleen shrugged. “A little confused, but otherwise well enough.”
“Does he suspect what we’ve done?”
She shook her head. “I don’t think so. John seems to accept everything I tell him as the truth.”
Jerred nodded. “That’s good. But keep an eye on him. His memory may come back to him at any time.”
“I’ll watch him,” Maleen agreed.
“Jerred out.” A moment later, his image vanished from the communicator’s screen.
She frowned. This assignment she had undertaken for Escraya’s sake was more difficult than she had thought it would be. Falsehoods didn’t come easily to her.
A breeze blew in through the open window, bringing with it the sweet, fragrant scent of yula blossoms. Maleen smiled. When she was a girl, her family had had a yula grove. She remembered playing in it with her sisters.
That was a more pleasant time—before Evil Star had obtained his unholy power, before he had dimmed the light of the stars. And before she had felt compelled to lie in order to save her world.
The Council’s meeting chamber was a large room where pale blue walls twisted higher and higher until they were lost in spiral shapes high above a white flagstone floor.
John’s footsteps echoed as he approached the semicircular table where the Council sat. All six members were present, and all six of them seemed eager to hear what he had to say.
“I want to go after Evil Star,” he told them. “What kind of resources do I have at my disposal?”
“Resources?” Darmac echoed.
“I’m talking about weapons,” John explained. “And people who know how to use them.”
Agrayn placed the palms of his hands together. “We have no weapons—unless you count your ring.”
“And,” said Jaapho, “the only soldier we have is you.”
John frowned. “What about the people?”
Agrayn shrugged. “They fear Evil Star. But then, he has given them ample cause to do so.”
“Is it possible they might try to overthrow him on their own?”
Jerred shook his head. “Never. By now, they have all but resigned themselves to his rule.”
John nodded. “I see.”
“What are you thinking?” Jerred asked.
“I may not be a military strategist, but I know one thing—to overthrow a tyrant, you’ve got to start at the bottom. And that’s where the people are.”
Agrayn’s eyes narrowed. “Do you have something in mind?”
“We need to do something spectacular,” John said. “Something that will give the people hope.” He thought for a moment. “What’s the most important thing in Evil Star’s possession right now? The thing he would hate most to lose or see destroyed?”
It was the Council’s turn to ponder. They looked at one another for a while. Then Agrayn spoke up.
“There’s the prison in Dashiri.”
“Dashiri?” John asked.
Agrayn nodded. “A nation on the other side of Aoran.”
“And why is this prison so important?” John asked.
“It houses those who have spoken out against Evil Star and those who tried to spur the people to rise against him.”
“He would have killed them all outright,” said Jerred, “but he finds it more useful to keep some of them around.”
“As a reminder,” Darmac added, “of how futile it is to oppose the likes of Evil Star.”
“Then that’ll be our target,” John decided.
“It’s well guarded,” Jerred noted.
“We’ll need a plan,” Jaapho said.
“And a good one,” Darmac added.
John felt confident that he could come up with one. “Leave that to me.”
Maleen stood in a large, open plaza and watched the green and black figure of John Stewart grow smaller and smaller against a dark patch of sky visible between two tall, elegant towers. It wasn’t long before she couldn’t see him at all.
The technicians who operated the ancients’ shield projectors had been alerted that John was coming. They would drop their shields so he could pass, then put them up again to protect Escraya against attack.
Maleen was so intent on watching the Green Lantern’s departure, she didn’t notice her uncle’s approach until he was standing right next to her. He put his arm around her as he had done
since she was little.
“May our champion succeed in his mission and come back safely,” said Jerred.
Maleen didn’t say anything in response to his remark. She was too troubled to speak.
“What is it?” Jerred asked gently.
She looked at him. “I don’t like this charade, Uncle. I don’t like it at all.”
“I don’t like it either,” he told her. “But it’s the only chance we have.”
She eyed the starless piece of sky where she had last seen John Stewart. “He’s a good man, Uncle. He’s a hero. Must we deceive him this way?”
“If we don’t,” said Jerred, “Evil Star will subjugate us as he has subjugated others. That is unacceptable.”
“What if we were to tell him the truth?” Maleen asked. “Maybe he would still decide to help us.”
“It’s possible,” Jerred allowed. “But it’s also possible that he would abandon us. After all, he’s a Green Lantern, a servant of the Guardians. And if he were to find out how we’ve tricked him . . .” His voice trailed off, leaving the rest to her imagination.
Maleen sighed. It didn’t seem there was any other way to proceed. “I trust you’re right.”
“I am,” said Jerred. “Someday, when this is all over, you’ll see that it was worth it. You’ll be satisfied that the end justified the means.”
“I hope so,” she said.
But until that day came, she would feel bad knowing she hadn’t told John Stewart the truth.
As John flew over a chain of dark, brooding mountains, the green glow of his ring the only thing lighting his way, he tried to remember coming this way before.
Maleen and the members of the Council had assured him it wasn’t the first time he had flown to Dashiri. But like almost every other memory, it was lost to him.
In any case, John seemed to have made the trip before Evil Star came to power, when the land had looked very different. The lakes and rivers must have shone with reflected sunlight and the forests must have been alive with birds and animals.
If there were any creatures below him now, they were chillingly silent. Clearly, the unrelenting darkness had thrown off their natural rhythms. If it went on much longer, they would probably become extinct, one species after another.
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