“Agreed. We are wasting time asking why, when we should be asking ‘what now?’” Second had effectively called the council to order, and all eyes turned back to Jael.
“Furcho, tell us what you can about this badly born. Then I will add what I have learned from The Collective.”
“His name is Cyrus, and, until he disappeared, he was teaching at the university where I work. He’s very dangerous because he’s always been fascinated by the ancient religions and is well versed in their doctrine and the tactics they used to generate followers.”
Jael picked up the thread of information. “He apparently recruited several followers at the disaster Furcho spoke of, and then they showed up at the scene of a later disaster and tripled their number. That group divided up and visited disaster scenes in multiple locations.”
Diego frowned. “Which doctrine is he espousing?”
“He’s drawing from the basic theme that ran through the most widespread and enduring religions—one deity that judges all and punishes those who don’t pay homage to him.”
Raven shook her head. “A patriarchy? This is very dangerous.”
“Life springs from the womb,” Michael said. “The Collective has understood this for more than a century. How could people be convinced to return to a patriarchy that is based on power and judgment rather than rebirth and renewal?”
It was a needless observation. Each of them had lived as male and female, had seen life from both sides. And all had lived through the Great War of Religions—the end to a long era of dissonance and a bloody beginning to a century of reconstruction before this past century of world peace. It also was the first calling of their covert Guard, three units of which existed in different parts of the world.
“Discontent, as always, is born from need.” Furcho shook his head. “This recent cycle of severe weather has lasted longer than any that history has recorded. World food supplies are drastically decreased. He is promising that, if they adopt his beliefs, they will be among those who deserve to eat while others go hungry. He is telling them that the world is nearing the end and only those souls who follow his teachings will remain immortal.”
“And so, The Calling was issued, and I was summoned by The Collective Council,” Jael said.
“You have seen them?” Michael leaned forward eagerly. “You actually spoke with them?”
“Yes.” Jael was aware of Second next to her, stiffening at her words. “There is a portal nearby.”
“Which ones?” Second’s voice was but a whisper. “Which of The Collective Council appeared to you?” Her voice was stronger but held a faint tremble.
“All.” Jael clasped her cousin’s forearm and squeezed. “I saw all of them.”
“Our orders?” Tan voiced the question on every mind except Second’s.
“Our immediate mission is to gather and train an army.”
Because long peace had diminished the need for their skills, only twenty-one of The Guard remained active. They were the ones solely responsible for watching all who were badly born and making sure their souls were properly released by cremation at the end of their current lifetime. The time for watching had ended.
“This won’t be easy,” Raven pointed out. “Very few purebloods remain in the world, and even fewer true descendants like the ones around this table.”
“The Calling will draw about a thousand, if the vision shared with me by The Collective Council is accurate. We will have to screen their DNA, and the close matches will have the option to partake of an elixir to enhance their genetic potential and to train for a bonding. The others will be offered auxiliary jobs in support of the army.”
Diego threw his hands up. “This is doomed from the beginning. They’ll never be able to bond if their blood isn’t pure.” He pointed at Furcho. “This is precisely why I said over and over that we should require that our kind only mate others of the same blood.”
“That goes against the very premise of The Collective—strength through diversity,” Raven said.
“And once we have our army?” Tan ignored the philosophical debate.
Jael again met the eyes of each before she spoke. “We will hunt and immediately destroy the badly born called Cyrus, as well as any who refuse to renounce his convictions and return to The Collective.” She stood and squared her shoulders. “If any of you feel you cannot fulfill this mission or follow my command without question, speak now. If you feel you cannot work with, even give your own life for, any of the others in this Guard unit, speak now. You will be relieved without prejudice. I will not be kind if you swear allegiance now and fall short later.”
They stood one by one, raising their right fist to their left shoulder. “I am sworn,” they chorused.
She returned their salute. “And, to you I swear the same loyalty and trust.” She motioned for them to sit again.
“The Calling will gather on a secluded plateau in the Sierra Madre.” She canted her chin toward Furcho. “Not far from you since the nest is in your quadrant.”
He nodded. “I’ve kept monitor on the nest, and they’ve grown larger in number than I’ve ever witnessed.”
Jael nodded. “Good. We’ll need every mount possible, I suspect.”
“What about the pretty Advocate upstairs? Where does she fit into all this?”
She stared hard at Tan. “Hands off.” She swept her gaze over the others. “She is a first-life and knows nothing of war and who we are. So, watch what you reveal around her. I’ll decide how much she needs to know and when to tell her.”
“There must be a reason she’s here.” Raven was always the perceptive one.
“She brought the message that summoned me to The Collective, but even the Council cannot foresee her purpose in this. They said only that her life path is entwined with ours.” That wasn’t entirely true. They said her life path was entwined with Jael’s. “You know as well as I do that every aspect of our lives is not predestined. Our paths are determined by each choice we make along the way. Because they can’t foresee our choices, even the Council cannot know exactly what the future has in store for us.”
The answer didn’t satisfy Raven. “Still, it’s difficult to see what role a first-life could play as part of our unit, even if she is an Advocate of The Collective.”
“She’s an extremely powerful empath.”
“So what? She’s going to tell us how they feel when we incinerate them alive?” In twenty lifetimes, Diego still hadn’t learned to filter his thoughts before they became words.
“She can project as well as read.”
They stilled, each considering the implication of this gift. This talent was so rare that most thought it was as fanciful as dragons living in mountain caves. The fact that someone could make another person feel something was more intimidating than a telepath reading your thoughts. At least they were still your thoughts, not what someone else wanted you to think.
Second huffed. “Don’t be idiots around her, either. She’s very nice.”
“Maybe you didn’t really like her,” Tan offered. “Maybe she was making you feel as though you like her.”
“Why would that concern you?” Diego asked Tan. “You like anything breathing and of legal age. Is there anybody you haven’t jumped?”
“Jealous?” Tan shot back.
“She hasn’t jumped me,” Michael said, grinning. “But I think I’m the lone holdout.”
Jael slapped her hand on the table to silence them. Dragon balls, whatever happened to the strong, silent warrior types? If one of them said the sky was blue, the rest would argue over the specific shade of blue. “I’ve been deep into her thoughts. She has no ulterior motives, and she’s trained to shield what she absorbs and what she projects. Han was her teacher.”
The group relaxed back into their chairs. They all knew Han. Most had trained under him. If he trusted her, Jael knew they would, too.
“I’m going to check on the mounts.” Jael stood. “I want each of you to prepare a quick status
on your sectors and transmit them to Second. She’ll leave tonight for the training site. Furcho and Diego will go with her. Since it is near their sectors, they’ll have the contacts to help equip the camp. Michael and Raven, you’ll leave tomorrow night with the rest of the mounts. I don’t want them traveling in a single group. Tan and I will travel by land with the Advocate.”
They stood as she left the room. Before she stepped through the doorway, she turned back to them and arched an eyebrow. They simultaneously snapped a belated salute, fists sounding dull thumps against shoulders. They were preparing for war, and it was time to act like soldiers, not a bunch of sleepy watchers.
*
Jael whistled softly and Specter jerked his head up from the clover he was munching. He flicked his ears in irritation, grabbed another mouthful, then began ambling toward her. She chuckled at the picture that formed in her head of the other horses finishing off the patch of clover he was eating. He wasn’t accustomed to sharing and was a bit off temper at the onslaught of other horses visiting their mountain.
“Brat,” she said, even though he didn’t understand most words. She sent a picture back of a mountainside covered in clover. Plenty to go around.
A mental picture formed in her head of the training camp shared with them by The Collective Council, the mountains around them covered first with rock and shale, then changing so they were covered with hay and clover. It was a question and she shrugged her answer. He did understand body language.
He stepped closer and lowered his head so she could touch her forehead to his. Contact made their pictorial conversation easier. She conveyed to him that he and Phyrrhos, Tan’s mount, would travel with Raven and Michael and their mounts. He pictured her with him, and she supplanted that image with her and Tan riding a solar train with Alyssa. He sent back an image that was a close-up of Alyssa. She replied with a confusing array of glimpses—Alyssa hitting her head on the door, her reading Alyssa’s thoughts, Alyssa performing the tai chi movements. She wasn’t sure how to explain the Advocate to him yet. He jerked back and shook his head, then pressed against her again.
He projected an image of dragon-horse travel without humans. This time, she shook her head. Blazing balls, did everybody have to argue with her? She showed him Raven and Michael guarding the group as they slept during the daytime hours. He swished his tail in irritation but dipped his head in acceptance. She understood his reluctance. Their bond made it difficult to be separated, even for a few days. She projected an image of them reuniting in the Sierra Madre to soothe him.
When she released him to go back to his clover, she knelt in the long grass that waved in the wind like a gentle sea. She turned her face up to the waning but still warm sun and spoke to the person she had heard walk up behind her during her conversation with Specter. “Go ahead and ask.”
“You…you saw her? You saw Saran?”
Jael sighed at the break in Second’s voice. It was a good thing she’d never found a soul mate, because if her heart could ache this badly for her cousin’s pain, she didn’t think she would survive if the loss had been her own. “Saran-Sung-Josh is well, but even in the eternal comfort of The Collective Council, I could feel her longing for you.” She wasn’t sure if that would ease or aggravate Second’s pain, but they’d always been truthful with each other.
Tears ran down Second’s sculpted cheeks. Jael and Second had once been nearly identical except for their eyes, but Second had lost weight since the mountain-climbing vacation that abruptly ended with Saran’s fatal fall. “They say that our kind never fully bond with a soul mate because of our bond with our mounts, but it isn’t true.” Second’s voice was tight but steady. “Every fiber of me aches to be with her.”
Jael stood and wrapped an arm around Second’s shoulders. “Seeing your pain makes me glad I never found a soul mate.”
Second turned and grabbed her by the shoulders. “Don’t say that. Don’t ever say that.” She shook her gently. “The soul bond is so exquisite that it’s worth any amount of pain from separation. Would you deny the bond with your mount to spare yourself possible separation?”
“No, of course not.”
“Think about what the bond means to you and multiply it a hundredfold. That’s what a soul mate feels like. You still have time, cousin. That special soul may be out there looking for you at this very minute.” She brushed the tears from her cheeks and wiggled her eyebrows, lightening the tension between them. “The Advocate is certainly attractive, and you seem to like her well enough.”
Relieved to see Second smile again, she pushed her away with an affectionate shove. “I’ve got a war to run. I’ve got no time for mooning over some woman.”
But Second was suddenly serious again. “When they taught you to shield your thoughts, Jael, I’m sure they didn’t mean for you to shield your heart, too.”
Dusk was falling, and she could see Diego and Furcho standing at the edge of the pasture, waiting for Second, waiting for the transition so they could be on their way.
“This war is my destiny, Danielle.” It was rare for anyone to speak Second’s birth name, but she wanted her to understand the commitment in her decision. “I feel in my heart that this mission is the fulfillment of my soul’s purpose. Would you have me bond to some poor woman and leave her to grieve like you? I can’t do that to anyone, especially not for my own selfish reasons.”
Chapter Eight
Alyssa’s first conscious minute was a sudden gasp for breath. She often woke that way. Sleeping in the temple dormitory had been torturous when she arrived because she would absorb the emotional leakage from her dorm mates’ dreams and nightmares. Advocate Han had taught her how to sleep deeply enough to shut out those emotions, but it slowed her breathing to the point that waking required a sudden intake of oxygen.
The second gasp was from the surprise at opening her eyes to see a face only inches from hers.
Tan sat back. “Bloody. I thought I’d killed you. No one’s ever recorded an allergy to the drug I gave you, but there’s always the first time.”
Alyssa’s mouth felt like a desert again, but her headache was gone and she was hungry. “I’m not allergic to anything that I’m aware of. I just sleep deeply.”
“How do you feel today?” Tan held out a cup of water with one hand while she moved a med scanner over Alyssa’s head and chest.
She carefully scooted up to rest her back against the pillows and headboard of the bed and took the cup. No vertigo either. Still, she drank cautiously. “I feel a hundred percent,” she said, marveling at that truth. She didn’t even have a residual hangover from the drug.
“Good. We have to leave later today, so it’s good to know you’re up to traveling.”
“Where are you going?” She shook her head. Maybe she was a little fuzzy. “I’m sorry. That’s none of my business.”
“Not me…we.”
She scrunched her brow. She must not be focusing clearly. “Huh?”
“We all are going—you, Jael, and me. To the Sierra Madre, eh?”
“I don’t understand.”
“Michael has breakfast ready downstairs.” Jael stood in the doorway, tall and lean in her tight olive-drab T-shirt and loose cargo pants. Did the woman sleep in those clothes?
Alyssa flushed when she realized she was the one who had slept in her clothes. Breakfast? “What time is it?”
“Oh-eight hundred,” Tan said.
She blinked at them.
“You slept through the night.” Jael’s eyes were unreadable but impossibly blue in the sunlight that streamed in the windows. “We have a lot to do today, so I hope you’re feeling better.”
“She checks out fine.” Tan held up the scanner. “I got the rest of my things from town so I could be sure. Head injuries can be tricky.”
Jael nodded but didn’t take her eyes from Alyssa. “You’ve got time to shower, if you want. I’ll catch you up after you’ve had a chance to eat.”
With that, she was gone. Tan stood up
from her seat on the bed. “Don’t take long. Michael is vegetarian so we won’t have any bacon, but don’t miss his waffles.”
Alyssa was already scrambling out of bed. She was starving. Food first, information later.
*
The hum of the solar train normally would lull Alyssa into an instant, restful sleep, but even after two days of travel her mind was still moving faster than the train’s glide of three hundred and fifty kilometers an hour.
She cast a sideways look at Tan. Even without the tribal paint she wore when Alyssa had first met her, she was intimidating. When they boarded the train, Tan had led the way to a nearly empty six-seat compartment and basically glared at the lone man occupying it until he left to find a seat in another compartment. Even now, she sat stoically in one seat by the door with her feet in the other, blocking anyone from joining them. Tan reminded her of a guard dog. Jael sat next to the window, perusing news bulletins on her d-tablet.
“Don’t you think it’s time you let me in on where we’re going?”
Jael looked up at her, then glanced at Tan, who slid the compartment door shut. She tapped a few things on her tablet and handed it to Alyssa. She scanned the article on a new group called The Natural Order gaining momentum and members.
“I don’t understand.”
“Several centuries ago, before the Great War of Religions, people grouped themselves together by things like race, religion, sexual orientation, and income.”
Alyssa frowned. “That’s what history tells us, but I have trouble imagining such a thing.”
“It’s true. Races and ethnic groups were encouraged to marry within their own groups. There were many purebloods then, unlike now.”
“I know that. I studied about it just like every other schoolchild. Except for some of the very ancient religions, few understood reincarnation.” She shuddered. “I can’t imagine people killing each other over these misguided beliefs and the world divided into countries that cared only about their citizenship. We know better than that now.”
Dragon Horse War Page 7