by Brandon Barr
_____
WINTER
The corridors of the underwater facility were cold. Winter did her best to keep pace with Karience, who had an arm propped under her shoulder for support. A sick churning gripped her stomach. It wasn’t the vision of Karience and the fiery light tearing through her that made her sick—she felt certain she had been able to prevent that fate—but the lingering fear that Aven was in imminent danger. The gory vision of the monster felt nearer and it filled her with dread as they hobbled along. The Empyrean had communicated to Nephitus through the walls by some means she did not know of, warning him of a suspected attack on the facility.
Nephitus had just returned to the Guardian Tower from some errand. His voice issued a reply from the facility walls, “The foreign ship has landed three clicks north of us in the Green Dune Territory. Readings show large amounts of capable weaponry. Our ship’s shields won’t be able to take that kind of beating for very long.”
“They’ll know it, too,” said Karience, entering the starship with Winter. “But if they’re here for VOKKs, they’ll be worried about their precious cargo.”
Nephitus’ voice came again from the wall, “How are you so certain they are after the VOKKs?”
“The Green Dunes,” said Karience, “That’s where all our Missionaries are.”
Nephitus swore.
“Strap yourself into that chair,” said Karience to Winter, as they entered the bridge.
Winter quickly obeyed.
“I’m afraid this is not going to be as smooth as your first ride. The gravity generator on this thing is ancient, and I expect we’ll take some nasty hits from them.”
Winter had a picture in her head of two starships ramming into each other like a pair of angry bulls. How else did starships battle?
_____
ZOECARA
Zoecara stood in the shadows, a large wooden beam keeping her out of sight. Footsteps sounded outside the barn.
“Zoecara, where are you?” came Rueik’s voice.
Then Pike’s, “We’ve got to hide! They’re coming this way!”
The whine of the mercenaries’ ground vehicles flared in the distance.
“Quick,” shouted Zoecara. “I’m in here.”
Two bodies entered the barn. The twilight had almost faded completely, and every shadow was deeper and darker within the large wood building, the space between the wood slats glowing dimly.
“Over here,” she called. “In the shadows on your left.”
They came closer, and she readied herself.
“I can’t see you,” said Rueik, stepping almost within range.
“Here,” she whispered.
He took two more steps. She wouldn’t get to see the look in his eyes, but it would be quicker this way. She took a step and swung the heavy blade with precision that had come from years of training.
The blade slashed the air where Rueik’s neck had been, but found only empty space, then crashed with a dull thud into the wood beam she’d hid behind.
An arm grabbed around her neck, squeezing with deadly power. She bent forward and swiveled her head, yanking it free from the choke hold, but her attacker grabbed a portion of her long hair and pulled painfully on it.
Zoecara’s heart pounded in her throat. Something was terribly wrong. Had a mercenary slipped in with them?
“Rueik!” screamed Zoecara. “Help me!”
Her attacker dragged her out of the shadows by her hair. She raked her legs against the ground, trying to gain balance, but the attacker held on to her hair like a rope, and by brute strength, spun her off the ground and began twirling her through the air.
Zoecara shrieked in agony, her skull on fire until her hair tore free from her head, sending her flailing through the air. She let out a whimper as her back and head struck the dirty floor, her body skidding to a stop on the dirty ground.
She gasped in pain, and tried to reorient herself. Willfully, she blocked the horrible pain just as she’d been trained, concentrating instead on the deadly action she needed to take. She sprang up in a ready stance, battling the shooting pain in her back.
Blood from the torn scalp ran down into her eyes, blinding her. She wiped quickly at it, straining to see in front of her.
A form came toward her. She lashed out with a fist and struck flesh. A grunt sounded, and then a laugh that chilled her. It was a friendly, familiar laugh.
“Is that as hard as you can hit?” Rueik said playfully. She could hear the smile on his lips. “You must have a weak master.”
Words escaped her. She stared, fighting the fear rising inside.
“You should see yourself right now,” continued Rueik. “You’re an ugly girl without your hair.”
Out of the corner of Zoecara’s eye, she saw another figure moving around to her side. Pike. In the confusion, she’d almost forgotten him. She had a weapon in Pike, thanks to the Mind Scries.
Rueik took a step closer. “Where’s that seductive face you always put on for me? I’m going to kiss you, like you always wanted me to. One to remember. The kiss of death. It won’t hurt, I promise.”
His hand sprang out to grab her uniform. She blocked, threw a punch at his face but he twisted out of the way.
“Come on, Pike,” said Rueik. “If you want Aven, you have to help me.”
She glanced at Pike, confused by Rueik’s words. Had Pike been tampered with? Had Rueik used the mind probe?
“Kill him.” she said, “Pike, help me kill Rueik!”
Pike stopped, then turned and moved toward Rueik.
Zoecara grinned through the pain and the blood running down her face. “I’m going to make you pay, Rueik.”
She heard Pike’s feet pivot on the loose dirt of the barn floor, then begin to run, but the scuffing of his feet was coming toward her, and not Rueik! She jerked toward Pike just as his hands came down hard on her shoulders.
“Pike!” she yelled. “Kill Rueik!” His grip did not relent, and she realized in that instant her suspicions were correct. He was no longer hers to command.
She twisted free of Pike’s hands and spun low, throwing a fist at his groin. She thrust her palm up hard, to drive his nose into his brain, but Rueik’s arms wrapped tight around her from behind. He hoisted her up against his chest, then thrust her forward, toward the ground, his weight diving down on top of her.
Her face slammed the floor with brutal force. Her nose shattered. Bits of teeth rolled loose in her mouth like pebbles.
With what little strength remained, she tried to lift her neck, but there was only shooting pain. She knew it was broken, and, just as certainly, she knew she was going to die.
“You are a Shadowman, too,” she mumbled, blood and spit spilling from her mouth onto the dirt floor.
“Yes. From Hearth,” said Rueik into her ear. “My master has deceived the Guardians and lives within The Triangle, if you know of such things.”
She coughed. “I’ve failed my master.”
“I take it you won’t reveal his name to me?”
“I will die with it in my mind.”
“That is fine. It will be retrieved by my own master’s Mind Scries once you reach Hearth.”
Questions formed through the fog of thoughts, but Rueik’s arm slipped up, around her neck, before she could voice them.
She could hear Pike moaning nearby, then Rueik placed his lips on her ear and began to constrict her throat with his bicep, the searing pain and the pressure on her broken neck dizzied her.
She blacked out for a moment, then awoke to his whisper.
“My master, Isolaug, thanks you for your service. You were the perfect cover. Your work strengthening the Guardian opposition on Loam was well done. Your master is weak, but you did well with what training you had…enjoy the quiet of forever.”
Zoecara gasped for one last trace of air, but the strong arm squeezed like a clamp and nothing would pass through. The pain receded and she could only lay there. All she felt was anger, anger at her failure
, anger at the thickening haze of darkness closing in on her.
Raith…Raith…I am weak, master. I failed you. I deserve the eternal silence.
Darkness slid over her eyes like a welcomed friend. The pain faded further away. The moment before she slipped into the void, she thought she felt lips on her cheek.
_____
RUEIK
“Pike, get up. They’re here.”
Rueik watched the riders through the slats. Two mercenaries sprang off the vehicle and ran toward the entrance, their features formless in the dimming light.
Rueik waited in the shadows, where Zoecara had hidden from him and Pike. The farm boy was still laying on the ground, sobbing, holding himself between the legs. She had put a good hit on him. It was just as well.
The first mercenary who entered was lean and carried his energy weapon poised against the side of his face, gingerly stepping into the dimly lit barn. The weapons would be set on low, as Rueik had told them, that way as many of the Missionaries as possible could be taken back alive. The second mercenary was thick armed but short, less cautious. Rueik stepped out of the dark behind him.
“There are two of them,” said Rueik, “there on the ground.”
The mercenaries spun, energy guns raised. Recognition passed over their faces, and they lowered their weapons.
“Quickly,” said Rueik. “The dead girl, and the oaf beside her.”
“Not me,” groaned Pike, sitting up in the dirt. “Don’t let them take me!”
Rueik looked at Pike briefly. The bastards VOKK had been easy enough to alter with the mind tool. He’d dropped the memory gates erected by Alael, and had overridden Zoecara’s Mind Scries, then laid down his own instructions. Pike’s head was a maze of selves…a mental disaster. But Pike preformed the job Rueik had programmed. His usefulness was at an end.
Rueik turned to the short mercenary closest to him. “Did you get Dheeg Sar’s collection of brains?”
“Yes, they’re loading them now.”
“Rueik, you promised me Aven,” groaned Pike. “You dirty liar!”
“Shut up,” said Rueik, and pointed to Pike. “That one there. His head’s a mess, but keep him alive.”
Both men nodded.
“Now get them on the bikes and get back to the ship.”
Pike stood, holding his head in his hands. “Please,” he mumbled. “I don’t want to feel this way. I want to go back to how I was.”
“You,” said Rueik. “Give me your gun.”
The short mercenary handed it over.
Rueik turned the dial up.
Pike backed away, still holding his head. “Please,” he whimpered. “Please.”
Rueik pressed the trigger. Bolts forked into Pike’s chest and he screamed, body convulsing as he flopped to the ground.
“Go now!” shouted Rueik over Pike’s screaming. He released the trigger and the crackling energy bolts died. “Get to the Guardian Tower—blast it to the ground. I don’t want anyone left alive.”
CHAPTER 36
AVEN
The riders sped over the grass field that Aven and Daeymara had just run across at startling speed. Their engines pitched high like horses whinnying in terror. Muffled shouts sounded from the riders as they drew closer.
Up on the road they’d left moments ago, Aven saw the soldiers who had been sent to protect them begin to scatter.. Something flashed like lightening from one of the oncoming riders. The body of a soldier contorted, caught in an intense strand of searing light.
The luminous bolt disappeared, and the soldiers body collapsed to the ground.
Aven gripped the glass jar under his shirt. Part of him wanted the winged creature inside to work for him, somehow, as it did for Winter. But he doubted it would. Winter was the chosen one.
The other half of him wanted to throw the butterfly jar at one of the rider’s heads.
“We have to get one of their guns,” Daeymara whispered.
His VOKK registered the word, gun, and he instantly knew what it was. What it could do.
Aven shivered.
“Hold me. Like you’re trying to protect me.”
Aven did as Daeymara said, and put his arms around her. One of her hands gripped his back, but the other held something. He felt the contour of a knife. The engines of their small, wheeled vehicles went silent, and both riders dismounted. They held sleek metallic objects in their hands, and Aven knew exactly what they were.
He remembered Daeymara’s earlier warning, Don’t let them take you alive.
“Why not just surrender?” whispered Aven, hoping she might change her answer.
“We might become like Pike, or worse,” said Daeymara. “They’ll alter us through our VOKK. We wouldn’t be ourselves anymore. We might be forced to do things we’d rather die than do. Trust me.”
Aven embraced Daeymara tighter, squeezing her close. The thought of wresting weapons away from the two approaching mercenaries seemed suicidal. He remembered his fight with Rozmin and his longing to protect Harvest. He felt that same way now, his heart was pounding so hard he was certain Daeymara could feel it in her chest pressed tightly against his. He felt incapable of protecting Daeymara. Or himself.
Death had never felt so near.
The two mercenaries stepped slowly closer, weapons raised. One of the men was taller, with hair like spear points down the center of his head, his clenched jaw was faintly outlined in the dying glow of dusk. Dark shadows hid his eyes, which were couched behind the weapon held to his cheek.
The other mercenary shouted, “Step away from each other. Put your hands out.”
Daeymara squeezed Aven’s shoulder, then pushed away, raising her hands in the air.
Aven did the same. He noticed the faint grey shadow of the knife pinched between two of Daeymara’s fingers. It hung down the back of her hand like a retracted cat’s claw.
“You,” one of them shouted at Aven. “Hands on your head.”
He obeyed.
The mercenary with the spiked hair fastened his weapon to a holder on his suit and went toward Daeymara. His long arm sprang out and grabbed her by the wrist. With his other hand he brought up a chain with loops, but as he went to secure it to her wrist, she flung her knife hand down on his shoulder.
Something in his suit blocked it from penetrating. He shoved her and she fell backward into the grass.
Aven reached for the man’s weapon, but the mercenary seemed to have anticipated his move. An arm swung across Aven’s jaw, knocking him back on his heels.
“Move and I’ll shoot!” shouted the other mercenary.
Aven saw Daeymara spring up, and dart toward the back of the tall mercenary coming toward him.
Daeymara’s face lit for a brief moment, and then crackling streams of blue light surged into her from the weapon of the shorter mercenary standing at a distance. Daeymara screamed and screamed, her body flailing grotesquely as she lurched over, into the grass.
Daeymara’s unrelenting cries devoured Aven. He rushed forward, grabbing the glass jar from under his shirt and charged the spike-haired mercenary in front of him blocking the path to Daeymara. The mercenary stumbled back at Aven’s impact, the jar shattering against the side of the man’s face, but the mercenary did not fall. Aven twisted to get past him, the briefest thought flashed in his mind that he likely had just killed Winter’s gift. But the thought ended as fast as it had come. He knew instinctively what he must do: end Daeymara’s cries—sprint and jump onto her flailing body, blocking the path of the blue fire wracking through her.
Aven neared her and focused on the sizzling stream of blue light stretching from the weapon to Daeymara. He readied himself to spring on top of her body when two arms wrapped themselves around his legs, tackling him from behind. Aven hit the ground, his arms stretched out, as if he might spare Daeymara some of the pain if only he could touch her. But his fingers were an arms length away.
Something hard cracked the back of Aven’s head, then a knee dug into his back. The
mercenary pressed Aven’s face into the ground.
Daeymara’s cries demanded he try and heave the man off his back. He pushed with his arms, lifting his chest off the ground, but another blow to the back of his head knocked him back down.
“You’re going to kill her!” shouted the mercenary on his back. “They want them alive!”
Aven struggled to remain conscious, slipping in and out of darkness. The second blow to the head left him disoriented. But she was dying there, the sound of her horrible suffering slipping away as her voice faded.
His fingers dug feebly into the grass.
Daeymara’s silence brought the crackle of the blue lightning to an end. She lay still upon the ground, the sudden darkness hiding the horror of what had been done to her.
“Damn,” said the mercenary on his back. “I think you killed her.”
The mercenary with the gun came up beside Daeymara and pushed his boot against her side. “Maybe. If so, she deserved it. Tried to stab you.”
As the second mercenary moved toward him, Aven could think of only Daeymara. Her agonizing screams. His soul felt sick. He had failed her.
He wanted to die.
Clasps came around his wrists, locking his arms in place.
“Get up!” said one of them.
A seething fury surged through Aven’s veins at the mercenary’s command. Slowly, he rose to his feet. The man reached to grab his chains.
Aven swung his hands like a club at the man.
The mercenary ducked, and threw a fist, but Aven avoided him.
A jolt slammed him from behind, as the second mercenary tackled him to the ground.
Aven struggled, but his clasped wrists were trapped beneath him. Before long, they had his feet and arms bound in rope. They lifted his body and placed him face down on a vehicle, strapping him tight against a metal frame.
The engine roared to life, and the vehicle lurched toward the ominous mass blackening the starry horizon. Intermixed with the whine of the engine, Aven could hear screaming. But it was only a memory.
Daeymara’s cries, ringing in his ear.