Up through the center of the chamber came a bright pulse of coruscating crimson energy every ten or twelve seconds, floating up from the depths and blinding us all momentarily. Each time, it floated up to the ceiling of the sphere and then vanished like a soap bubble popping. I was sure it held some great cosmic portent but its meaning and purpose were entirely lost on me.
“They should be here,” Istari was saying, his voice betraying his anxiety. “Where could—” He frowned, then, “Quickly,” he shouted, motioning to the others. “This way. They must be this way. Hurry!”
We all raced around the ring in the direction he pointed, thankful that it took us around the perimeter and therefore kept us always well away from the center of the sphere and the occasional mass of energy that flared up through it. We reached the opposite side and saw ahead of us a large opening in the smooth, silver metal wall, identical to the one behind us. As we started towards it a lone figure strode out of it. He held a data slate and was gazing down at it and had not seen us yet. His features were wreathed in shadow.
We stopped in our tracks and our guns were out and at the ready. Istari had the golden sword up and prepared to swing.
The figure stepped out into the light and we could see his face.
I staggered. I nearly fell.
“Alexius?” I blurted, astonished to find my uncle there.
He wore his dress blue uniform with gold and red trim. His shaven head gleamed in the pale light. His expression portrayed at least as much surprise as I myself felt.
“Gaius?” he whispered, incredulous. Then, louder, “What is this? Why is our palace guard here?” He glanced at Istari and frowned even more deeply.
I looked from Alexius to Istari, very confused. I didn’t know where we were, and therefore didn’t truly know if it was a place Alexius should or should not have been found.
Istari laid this question to rest for me immediately. “We have identified the traitor in your ranks, Gaius,” he said softly.
“What did he say?” Alexius demanded, stepping forward.
“Are you sure?” I asked, keeping my eyes on my uncle, feeling my stomach twist.
“This is the stronghold of the enemy,” Istari answered. “And he is here.”
Cursing, I started toward Alexius, my gun still up and ready.
“Gaius—what are you doing?” he asked, frowning and moving back a step.
“Don’t move, Uncle,” I warned him. “We are here on business of the most critically important sort and I’m afraid we will have to detain you for a short time, until—”
At that Alexius threw the data slate at me, spun about and started to run.
“Wait,” I called after him, knocking the crude projectile away.
He was shouting words I couldn’t understand at someone back down the way he had come.
None of the soldiers moved or took any sort of precipitous action. They all knew my uncle at least as well as they knew me. Most of them had served him for years. None of them had much more idea what was happening than I did. It wasn’t as if they were going to strike him down in cold blood.
Istari didn’t share that concern. He hurled the golden sword and it flew across the short open space and speared Alexius straight through the torso.
My uncle was bowled off his feet by the force of the blow and fell.
The troops were shocked, of course. They looked from Alexius to Istari, uncertain how to respond.
I was already running. I got to him before anyone else. He lay on his side, gasping, one end of the sword protruding from his front and the other end from his back.
I knelt.
“Alexius,” I said in a pleading tone, “what is all of this? What were you doing?”
His eyes were unfocused; the words he spoke next were meant, I believe, more for himself than for me.
“So close,” he gasped. “So close to ultimate power...”
And then he died.
Staggered, I fell back. I caught myself with my hands and looked up in time to see Istari lean down and draw out the sword. Its blade was red with blood—the blood of my own family.
Jerome lay there in a pool of that blood, lifeless.
“You knew there was a traitor,” Istari said quietly. “Are you so surprised now that his identity has been revealed?”
I didn’t answer. What could I say? Somehow I must have hoped it would all turn out to be a mistake.
Little did I know far bigger shocks had yet to be revealed to me.
“Come,” Istari said, reaching down with his left hand. “We have work to do.”
I allowed him to pull me back to my feet and together we passed through the doorway into what lay beyond.
+ + +
Four gods awaited us.
We emerged into an even larger open space. Another dome towered far above us. I reflected that these people really liked domes. The floor was a pale white tile that stretched off into the distance. A dim light filled the room. At the far side, we could see banks of unearthly machinery. What seized our collective attention, though, were the four luminous figures that floated directly ahead of us.
Gods indeed.
They towered over us, each at least four meters tall even if their feet had been touching the floor. Three of them were of the same race as Istari, slender and gaunt, one of them female and the other two male. The fourth figure was of the now-familiar race of gray giants. The four gazed down at us with naked arrogance and contempt. Shimmering with light and energy, they appeared to be gigantic ghosts or holographic projections.
A moment later, they proved themselves to be quite solid indeed.
As Istari and I walked into the huge room, the soldiers fanned out behind us. One of them circled around, attempting to outflank the four cosmic beings. The gray giant saw him, swept out with a massive hand, and swatted the man; he flew head over heels across the chamber and when he came to rest at last he lay very still.
“Stay back,” I called to the others.
“So,” Istari called up to the four. “You’ve done it, then.”
“The Renegade,” boomed the voice of one of the three Dyonari figures. “You have returned, as we knew you would—but entirely too late. Our apotheosis is at hand.”
Istari shook his head. “You do not fool me, Elendi. The wave has not fully reached our place and time yet.”
“Its leading edge washes over this point in spacetime even now, Renegade,” replied the one he had addressed. “Our power grows moment by moment.”
Istari looked to one of the other Dyonari specters. “You have seen what will be, Farseer,” he called. “Tell him, Yadrui. Tell him of the defeat you will shortly experience. Tell him that you and he and these other two are no gods, not yet—and never will be.”
This one, Yadrui, scowled at Istari. “The future is a malleable thing, Renegade,” he said. “I have seen conflicting signs and portents and—”
“I have looked into Orondi’s Well,” Istari shouted back. “I have seen—”
“Orondi is not infallible,” Elendi boomed.
“Orondi is not anything now,” Istari snorted. “I tossed him into the sea of fate. And he has drowned in it.”
The four of them frowned down at us.
“We know you have slain the others, Renegade,” the female specter stated, contempt dripping from her over-amplified voice. “Your crimes are almost unimaginable, and soon you will pay for them.”
“You are quite correct,” Istari said, nodding. “But you will all die first.”
“We will never die,” rumbled the gray giant. “We are now truly immortals in more than name. This galaxy will bow to our will for the rest of eternity.”
“Such delusions,” Istari said. “Perhaps godhood only magnifies one’s false assumptions.” He laughed. “And makes a mortal fool into a godlike fool. And mortal mistakes into truly divine ones.”
The ghostly giant roared and lunged forward, sweeping out with his massive hand. Istari leapt out of the way just i
n time, but the giant was fast—faster than either of the ones we had encountered previously—and his other hand came around and struck Istari, sending him sprawling. The golden sword clattered away, coming to a stop behind the four apparitions.
My troops looked to me. I had no idea what to do or say. This had been Istari’s play, and now he lay insensate on the cold stone floor. What chance did we thirteen mortals have against four alien gods?
“Gaius!”
That voice, calling to me from the far side of the chamber. I knew it.
“Aurelia?”
I ran, dodging the ghostly hands of two of the beings that reached for me. Their attention had remained focused on the one who had so enraged them, despite his being apparently unconscious, and they hadn’t been paying the slightest attention to the rest of us. I made it past them and saw my eldest aunt standing there, just ahead. She wore an elegant black dress and her red curls were down, a cloud about her pale features.
“Aurelia?” I repeated. “What are you doing here?”
“She is one of us,” boomed the voice of the first Dyonari god who had spoken—Elendi.
I looked at her, and I’m certain my expression was a combination of shock, horror, and regret.
“Your family has been of much assistance to us, human,” the alien apparition went on. He had turned about and gazed down at the two of us now. “Yes—we know you, Gaius Baranak. Long have we known of you, and long have we worked in secret with members of your family.”
“The Church,” I breathed, looking back at Aurelia. “Of course. You have always been closer to the Church than any of us, and it—”
“It was entirely our creation and our instrument,” Elendi stated, his voice overflowing with arrogance and contempt. “As was she.”
I looked back at Aurelia and met her eyes, but what I saw there suddenly changed. Instead of glee or shame or anything else I might have expected to find in the expression of my family’s second revealed traitor, I saw the dawning of a smile. A pure, untainted, and very encouraging smile.
Elendi’s massive apparition hovered now between myself and my aunt. His back was to her as he gloated to me. But before he could speak again, Aurelia suddenly dashed over to the fallen sword and lifted it.
“I was never part of this, Gaius,” she called to me as she ran with the sword toward the far wall of the dome. “They brought me into it through the Church, but I never accepted their offer of immortality in exchange for betraying my own.” She reached the far wall, where the massive banks of machinery stood, even as her words registered with the four apparitions.
“What?” boomed Elendi. “What are you saying, woman?”
“I am what we humans call a double-agent,” she declared. “And I have waited a very long time for the moment to strike.” As she spoke, she raised the sword over her head and then brought it down into a very specific spot in the machinery. Electricity flared out, massive bolts of lightning flashing across the chamber. Aurelia screamed and her hair stood on end. She shook violently, apparently unable to let go of the sword.
“Noooo!” wailed Elendi, and his cry was echoed by the other three.
And then the four ghostlike images flickered, enlarged even more, filled with static, and vanished.
Smoke filled the dome. Aurelia groaned and slumped to the floor.
I ran to her side.
Blood trailed from her nose and mouth. Her eyes were unfocused. I could tell instantly that she was dying—was near death even now.
I knelt and cradled her head in my lap. The soldiers of my house ran up to half-surround us.
“Gaius,” she said. Her eyes were unfocused and her voice a harsh rasp. “Gaius—you need to know...”
“Don’t try to speak,” I told her. I could see how much it was costing her. “We will get you to a medic—”
“Too late,” she gasped. Her voice was faint now and fading further as she spoke. “But listen—you need to know what happened to Octavia.”
“Octavia?” The one family member not at our meeting back on Victoria—the only one I hadn’t seen in months. I leaned in closer. “Yes?”
“She discovered... what Alexius and the Cabal... were doing.” Aurelia coughed, blood splattering out. “She believed... I was part of it as well. But—” Another horrific coughing fit. When she’d stopped, she tried to continue: “They captured her... and were going to kill her. But I used my influence... within the Cabal... to convince them to send her... into exile instead.”
“Octavia is alive?”
“Yes, she lives—but they carried her to a far distant dimension.” Her voice was nearly inaudible now. Blood flowed freely from her nose. “You must find a way... to go and... bring her back. She is—”
The voice faded out entirely and Aurelia collapsed, limp and lifeless.
I breathed in deeply and exhaled. Another member of my family dead, and this one not deserving it. I cursed. Then, out of the corner of my eye, I saw Istari. He was up and moving. He reached out, grasped the sword by the hilt, gritted his teeth at the current that must still have been passing through it, and drew it out of the machinery. He held it up, inspecting it; it appeared no worse for the wear.
“We aren’t done yet,” he said to me then. “Two things yet remain.”
“Two things?”
Frowning, I watched as he strode over to the far end of the banks of machinery. I lowered poor Aurelia’s head to the floor—two of the soldiers knelt down and began to examine her for vital signs— and I stood, curious.
“They were not transformed into those forms,” Istari said. “The wave of energy coming toward us from the future—the energy that would grant them actual godhood—has not yet reached this time and place in full.”
I took this in and tried to process it.
“Those ghosts we saw were merely semi-holographic, semi-solid transitional bodies this machinery created,” he went on. “Their mortal bodies still exist—here.”
He pulled back a long sliding panel and revealed four tall figures—three of them Dyonari and one a gray giant—each sealed inside a separate transparent, liquid-filled cylinder, each covered in wires and cables and tubes. Colorful lights flickered and danced along the tops, bottoms and sides. A soft hum filled the air.
I moved closer and peered at the cylinders. Inside them, I could see the four beings staring out, eyes wide, with bubbles floating up around their faces. As with their faux-godlike apparitions, one of the Dyonari appeared to be a female, the other two male. They were alive and awake but presently trapped within their tanks.
“They are pitiful,” Istari intoned, shaking his head. “They know the danger they now face. Their mortal bodies stand vulnerable before us. Yet they have waited so very long for godhood, they simply cannot bring themselves to disconnect from the equipment now—not even to try to protect themselves—when the moment of their expected apotheosis is so near.” He laughed. “And thus do they condemn themselves.”
He drew back the sword and plunged it into the first tube, which contained one of the male Dyonari. The transparent material yielded easily to his thrust, as did the alien on the other side of it, and thick, viscous fluid sprayed out as the cylinder cracked vertically above and below the spot where the sword had entered. The liquid turned a pale red and I saw then that the blade had skewered the figure dwelling within. Arms and legs thrashed frantically for a few moments. Istari then withdrew the sword and the disgusting mixture of fluids fountained out through the hole. By the time it had all drained away, the figure inside—Elendi, by the look of him—hung forward on his tubes and wires, limp and unmoving.
Istari nodded in satisfaction and moved on to the next cylinder.
“You’re just going to butcher them, then?” I asked.
“Certainly,” he replied. “Just as they were going to butcher the galaxy, due to their own selfishness.”
The other three had gone berserk the moment Istari stabbed the first. Lights above each of the cylinders were in the pr
ocess of changing from blue to orange and the liquid in each tank bubbled furiously and began to drain out. I took that to mean they had decided perhaps it was time to emerge from their cylinders after all.
The machinery wasn’t fast enough. The other three were still trapped. Istari moved to stand before the second cylinder. He struck again, impaling the male Dyonari who thrashed within it.
“A very cold-blooded performance,” I observed, feeling extremely uncomfortable watching what he was doing. I wasn’t exactly stopping him, though.
He looked back at me, his eyes burning. “They tortured me,” he growled. “They held me for ages, making me suffer for my crisis of conscience—for daring to stand up for your worlds and your race. They are unthinking, uncaring, soulless creatures, and I am quite happy to bring their miserable, eons-long existence to a very sudden end.”
What could I say to that? I held out one hand toward the remaining two, as if to say, “Then be my guest.”
Istari was not the least concerned as to whether or not he had my permission. He turned back and moved down to the third cylinder. The liquid had nearly drained out of it and the fourth one by now. The seals on each of them popped open and the front halves of both cylinders angled out and away from the figures contained inside.
The female Dyonari, her eyes wild and her movements frantic, tried to climb out, her fingers scrabbling against the smooth metal and plastic surfaces. Istari didn’t hesitate. He skewered her just as he had done the first two. She cried out something unintelligible and she died, her body dangling out of the open tube, suspended by the web of wires and tubes and cables. I later learned she had been Aleuvi, called the Assassin, one of the deadliest killers the galaxy had ever known. At the time, she was simply another being cut down by Istari, right there in front of me. I gritted my teeth and wanted to look away, but I dared not.
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