Eric Flint's Blog, page 161

The Spark – Snippet 16

The Spark – Snippet 16

CHAPTER 6: Along the Way

After a few days on the Road I’d gotten healthy enough to be able to say that I felt awful and that I was in a grim mood. The physical pain was from the blow I’d taken. I had a bad burn on my back, though I hadn’t broken my collarbone or anything else as best I could tell. The arm and shoulder had swelled up and looked purple if I took the tunic off. I could open and close the fingers of that hand, but I wasn’t sure I’d ever have full use of the arm again.

I couldn’t blame Easton for my mood, though. The truth was, Easton given me a chance to work off some of the way I felt. There was plenty of it left to keep me down for a long while yet, likely for the whole rest of my life.

At least for another ten, fifteen years, I figured. That’s how long I’d been dreaming of becoming a Champion. Maybe I was through with dreams now, I don’t know. More likely I was through with believing that my dreams could ever come true.

We didn’t meet many people on the way. For the first week we ate from the pack and drank from streams on nodes along the way. Sometimes the water was muddy from recent rain, but I didn’t care and Buck had never cared. I slept on the ground with Buck curled beside me on nights it was cool.

When we passed folks going the other way, I nodded and turned my eyes down. When we came up on somebody, as we did twice, I passed on with a grunt.

The peddler going home was probably just as glad I wasn’t trying to rob him, but the young couple didn’t have a guide animal. I said, “Sorry, buddy,” and clucked to Buck to speed him up. I know they thought I was a bastard and I guess I acted like one, but I truly wasn’t in shape to mix with other people.

Twice I let Buck take me into the Waste. I’d heard that there were animals who could do that, could sense a nearby branch of the Road, but I’d have been afraid to try if, well, if I really cared about anything.

It was like stepping into a crack in black glass, but I followed Buck and in two steps I was on the Road again. I don’t even know they were short cuts, but Buck seemed to think they were.

Despite the slow first days, I think we were making better time on the way home than we had the other way when I was in a hurry to get to Dun Add. My shoulder was getting better and the pack was almost empty again, so I was wearing it normally to free my right hand. Free both hands of course, but I wouldn’t trust my left to do anything but break my fall if I toppled onto that side.

Buck growled.

He couldn’t see anything but the Waste to either side and about twenty feet of the Road in front of us, same as normal. I knew that was all he could see because I was watching through his eyes.

For all that, I trusted Buck even if he had no more than instinct. I paused to lift and switch on my weapon, then raised my shield as well. I hadn’t been sure I’d be able to pick it up, but the adrenalin that surged into my system when I heard Buck growl must have lubricated the muscles.

I switched the shield on at 20%, though I figured I’d just throw it down if I had to move fast. I knew I wasn’t in any shape for a fight, but going straight at the other fellow like I had with Easton was my best bet.

We walked forward. There aren’t any hills or curves in the Road, but there’s only so far you can see anyway.

I thought about Guntram suggesting that somebody had made the Road. I wondered if I’d ever see the old Maker again.

We came onto a Beast, a creature of Not-Here. It was the ugliest thing I’d ever seen in my life, worse than the drawings I’d seen of them.

I guess that was partly because layers were vanishing and reappearing, into Not-Here I suppose, while the creature tried to escape. It wasn’t going to be able to do that because it was a small one of its kind, about the size of May or a boy of twelve, and the Shade had it firmly.

There were supposed to be things that lived in the Waste, neither Here nor Not-Here, but I’d always supposed they were fancies like ghosts and angels. This had to be what they called a Shade, though: as lovely as blond sin, and as haughty as the Circuit Bishop when he passed through Beune every third year.

Maybe I’ll apologize to Mother Gurton for laughing when she talked about seeing angels dance on the church roof the day she was confirmed. Of course that would be if I ever got back home.

The Shade was touching the Beast with the spread fingers of both hands. If you looked close, you could see that maybe a couple of the fingers were longer than they should have been in order to reach the victim’s back. She must have come out of the Waste behind the Beast and gripped like a hawk with a rabbit.

I say ‘she’. I didn’t know what sex the Shade was or even if it had one, but it looked so human that I couldn’t help how I thought.

“Pass on, human,” the Shade said in a low, pleasant voice. I was hearing her in my mind; I wondered what Buck heard or if he heard anything. “Leave me to eat, and take pleasure in there being one fewer enemy to your sort in the universe.”

That was sort of true. Like I’d said to May, I didn’t figure that all the things from Not-Here were enemies–but when you found a copperhead in your barn you had to kill it, even if you don’t mind snakes and you know it eats rats. If you don’t, you come out in a hurry one day and grab the handle of the hay rake that the snake’s curled around. Then your arm swells up like you’d felled a tree onto it, and maybe you never get all the feeling back in your hand. That happened to Breslin about five years ago.

And that’s how I felt about the Beast: I was fine with never seeing one, but the chances were it was going to go for me as quick as it could. I’d be best off just slipping past while the Shade was holding it and neither of them could get at me.

“Let’s get ’em, Buck,” I said. We went for the Shade.

With a dog all the paths are clear. You move faster, into the Waste if you like. The Shade was a thing of the Waste so that wasn’t a choice here, but we sure could’ve gone back the way we came. Her hands were anchored in her prey, and I didn’t think she could get loose in time to grab us if we cut past her and her victim in the direction we’d been going.

Thing is, the Shade was the enemy of all life. The Beast might well be my enemy, but if I’d been by five minutes quicker the Shade would’ve had me instead. The first I’d have known was that my limbs didn’t work and everything was getting blurry as the Shade sucked my life out. Buck wouldn’t have been able to do anything but bark; if he wasn’t quick, she’d have had him for dessert.

I’d never heard about fighting a Shade. They picked single prey on the Road, never going after groups. You found the shriveled, crispy skin, or you came on a kill in process and ran the other way in all the stories I’d heard.

I didn’t figure the shield would be any good, so I switched it off. I went in close.

The Shade’s face was as smooth as marble. Her hands were withdrawing, but they wouldn’t be clear before I could hit her.

The perfect mouth opened and a three-forked tongue extended. The tips touched my cheeks and the underside of my jaw. I was hooked as sure as I ever had a crappy in the pond at the bottom of the big field. The Shade’s right hand was lifting, already clear of the Beast and reaching for my chest.

I triggered my weapon. There was a white flash.

I wasn’t really conscious of what I was doing. I think my finger twitched just because it was all part of what I was doing, get in close and strike–a single thought.

The Shade deflated, just shrank in on itself like a snowflake in the sun. There was nothing to see: no blood, no pool of liquid where the creature had stood; but it stank, stank worse than a dead mule.

I couldn’t move my head or even blink, and my body was cold down to mid-chest. I stepped backward and tripped because my left foot was dragging and I didn’t know it.

The Beast stared down at me. It had three eyes but mostly they didn’t all show at the same time. It’d be five minutes for my weapon to recharge.

It’d worked on a Shade, though; they could be killed. I wished there was somebody I could tell that to.

The Beast went on around me, giving me as wide a berth as it could. Buck was barking his head off, but he stayed close to my side.

The Beast disappeared, and after a while I got to my feet again.

 

Iron Angels – Snippet 36

Iron Angels – Snippet 36

The woman looked at Jasper. Whose contribution was “Uh…”

Temple smiled slightly. “What he means is,” she said, “we have a few questions for Carlos and his recollection of a crime.”

“Yes.” Jasper managed. “We need to speak with him, Miss — ”

“Penny Stahlberg,” the young woman said.

“Are you the receptionist?” asked Temple. “Is there someone else we should speak with?”

Penny’s eyes darkened as if ready to swing a hammer or hurl lightning bolts at him.

“No, I’m pretty much your point of contact,” Penny said. “I’m part owner of Wayland Precision.”

“May we come in?” Temple leaned forward.

Penny gestured for them to enter.

“You said Carlos wasn’t in any trouble.” Penny offered them a bench in the dimly lit reception area. “Oh, pardon the atmosphere, we don’t receive many people here at the shop.”

“No, uh, Ms. Stahlberg,” Jasper said.

“You can call me Penny.”

“No, Penny,” Jasper said, “Carlos isn’t in trouble. He may have information on the recent kidnappings. I’m sure you’re aware of them?”

“Oh yes, horrible. I can’t imagine investigating such matters. Care for some water? It’s boiling outside.”

“No thank you,” Temple said. “May we speak with Carlos?”

“I’ll send him up.” Penny moved for another solidly built door sporting a combo lock, where a sequence of numbers are pressed and a switch is turned, opening the lock.

“May we have a tour of your building?” Temple asked.

“It’s a machine shop — not much to see, really.”

“I’d be interested.” Jasper couldn’t believe how much of an ass he was making of himself.

“I’m sure.” Temple poked him in the ribs.

“How about another time?” Penny said, “We’re quite busy today.”

“On a weekend? Your business must do okay. What exactly do you do here?” Temple fired away with the questions and remained standing, as if displaying her dominance over the Norse goddess denying them entrance to the temple.

Jasper shook his head. What in the hell was wrong with him, he hadn’t felt this way since, well, since Lucy way back in the day when they’d first met. Not a good omen, but also not anything to put much stock in.

“Like I said,” Penny’s stance faltered, “we’re busy, and — ”

The intercom crackled. “Show our guests in.” That was a man’s voice; not Carlos’s, but an older one, projecting gravitas.

“You heard the man,” Penny said.

“And who would that be?” Temple asked.

“Steve Stahlberg,” Penny said. Jasper wondered if that was her husband and suddenly he was crestfallen. But —

“Steve is my father;” she explained. “We own and operate Wayland Precision together.”

“You can relax.” Temple glanced over her shoulder at Jasper and pursed her lips, as if calling him out over his ribbing of her earlier regarding his friend, Ed White.

Jasper’s ears radiated heat. Embarrassing.

Penny bit her lip, trying not to smile, and turned away.

Damn it.

“This way.” Penny punched the code into the keypad and pulled open the door.

They descended a long flight of stairs upon stepping through the door. A vegetal scent filled the air.

“I thought you ran a machine shop.” Jasper glanced about, attempting to locate the source of the odd scent.

“We have some strange hobbies,” Penny said.

“Such as?” Temple wasn’t even trying to hide her skepticism.

“You’ll see,” Penny said. “For one thing, we like growing mushrooms down here.”

“For what? Extra mushrooms on your pizza?” Temple’s tone came right to the edge of outright sarcasm.

“Don’t mind her.” Jasper said to the Norse goddess. “You must have a good reason, I mean, other than loving fungi.”

Temple shook her head, and yes, he continued making a fool of himself.

“I’ll let my father speak with you on the finer points,” Penny offered.

“But we’re here to speak with Carlos,” Temple said.

“I’m sure that can be arranged.”

Penny said the last line as if Carlos was indisposed, or a prisoner locked away in a dungeon.

The group descended into a damp cool. A substance, not slick, but slimy, coated the surface of each step, and Jasper was relieved when they reached the bottom.

The hallway glowed unnaturally under the current lighting conditions — was the light blue? Violet? Penny flipped a switch and good old incandescent bulbs flared to life, providing a harsh yellowish-white light.

“Better?” Penny smiled disarmingly.

A bench lined the hallway on one side, but acted as more of a planter. Mushrooms in varying states of growth and maturity filled the box, planted in the blackest soil. A few of the mushrooms attained gargantuan proportions.

A strange feeling crept into Jasper’s gut. Inserting a woman into a situation proved time and again the easiest way to put law enforcement at ease, and whoever ran Wayland Precision had done just that. But Temple’s bullshit detector was probably wired correctly. He relaxed. A tiny bit.

“What is it?” Temple whispered into his ear.

“Nothing, at least I hope it’s nothing.”

“There’s nothing to worry about,” Penny said.

Jasper winced. He’d never had a soft whisper.

A door opened at the opposite end of the hallway; a figure blocked the light coming from the other side.

“Bring them along, Penny.” The gruff voice echoed down the hallway.

“Don’t mind him,” Penny said.

“Who? Your father? Steve, right?” Jasper asked. Why did he feel as if he were meeting a girlfriend’s father for the first time? He shook his head.

“Yes. I’m sure we can clear all this up.” Penny swung her gaze around on him and smiled.

“Calm down there, Romeo,” Temple whispered in Jasper’s ear. Penny didn’t notice or react.

“Here we go.” Penny stepped through the door past her father, who immediately blocked the entrance.

“So, you’re FBI, eh?” Steve folded thick arms across a broad chest. He was an imposing man with an equally imposing beard and head of hair. The silver locks fell across one side of his face, which was interesting since the uncovered side appeared as if it’d been terribly scalded — apparently he didn’t care and perhaps wore it as a badge or show of defiance. Regardless of the burn mark or port wine stain, Steve’s appearance resembled the same mythological Norse stock as Penny.

“Yes, sir,” Jasper said, and introduced himself and Temple.

“Steve Stahlberg, proprietor of Wayland Precision.”

“Nice sign out front,” Jasper said. “Noticed the Thor-like hammer under the name.”

Steve grinned and glanced at Penny who stood directly behind him. “See? I told you someone would notice.”

“May we come in?” Temple asked. “I have to admit, I’m not overly fond of the pungent smell out here in the hallway.”

“I’m afraid it won’t be much better in here,” Steve said, “but please, come in.” He stepped aside, granting them entrance. “The main office is down here, away from the metal working upstairs. One of the few places we can speak at a normal level and not go deaf.”

A few aquariums dotted the office, but they were all dim at the moment, and Jasper couldn’t make out what sort of fish lived in them. Typical office furniture filled the room: filing cabinets, desks, conference table, a few computers, and other accouterments one would expect.

 

The Amber Arrow – Snippet 28

The Amber Arrow – Snippet 28

Chapter Twenty-Five: The Dark Angel Princess

Marguerite saw Windy one more time after the priest in the black coat and red collar had come through, looking for the queen’s crown.

The next morning the shadow thing came out just as Marguerite was going to bring in the bucket of milk that her sister Evangeline had milked from the cow earlier that morning.

There was Windy standing beside the barn door.

“I have to go,” it said. “To find the Dark Angel Princess and her brother, the Pale-Haired One. It’s all becoming clearer. I have to take the crown to them.”

“Well I wish you the best travel,” Marguerite said brightly. She was going to miss Windy the fulgin, even though she could hardly say she knew it very well. “What will you do after that task? Can you come back here and play?”

“No, Marguerite. After I have done that, I will die. It is the way I want to go. I will have done what I was born to do. And I can rest. It is really hard to be moving all the time like this. I would like a good long rest that lasted forever after I get this one thing done.

“I will never forget you,” said Marguerite. “The shadow that saved me from the pigs. Windy the magnificent! That’s you.”

The shadow had no face, but it seemed to vibrate a little bit, as if it were momentarily happy. Then it disappeared, this time for good.

When Marguerite went to get the eggs for the day she looked under every chicken and there was no crown.

***

That was too bad. She would have liked to have seen it. But it was better that she didn’t have it in her mind if the Romans and the red-collared priest came back.

***

Over the next days, Marguerite continued her tasks. She still daydreamed about being a handmaiden of princes Ravenelle, but she knew that the truth was she was going to be a field worker like everyone else on the plantation when she got to be ten. But that couldn’t keep her imagination from taking her places she would never see in real life. She just had to be careful to keep such things out of her surface thoughts.

Her master had recovered from his own treatment at the hands of the Romans. This hadn’t made him any easier. If anything, it had hardened him, taken away the kindness he’d sometimes shown.

He would notice if he caught her daydreaming. He might beat her for getting above herself. But now she was six and she was already good at hiding what she was thinking. Very good indeed.

***

The fulgin creature, calling itself Windy now, had almost run out of strength. The soldiers and the red-collared priest had been pursuing it across the land for days and days. During that time it had steadily worked its way north, always aware of where Ravenelle Archambeault was located. It could feel her like a compass felt north.

On its last night traveling, it had to risk a charge right up the main road into the village of Tjark.

The Romans were out in force to search for it. It knew that if it took a circular route to get to the princess it would take too long.

The fulgin was growing weak.

It might run out of strength and never make it with the crown. And since that was the creature’s reason for existence, it had to take the chance of a final direct run.

The red-collared man was smelling, sniffing. Getting closer and closer. And his army had gotten bigger and bigger as more soldiers arrived.

They had sent an army to catch it. Yet the fulgin had managed to sneak its way north as the Dark Angel Queen had wished. It felt a sense of pride, or at least fulfillment. It wouldn’t do to get caught here at the end. There must be a way through.

The Romans had moved to cut it off in front. Now it had to find a way under, over, or around them.

That was when it remembered the little slave girl Marguerite. It remembered what it had done to save her from the nasty snorting-snout animals.

My name, thought the fulgin. The answer is in my name.

Yes, there was a way through. She had named it Windy.

If it had been able to laugh, it might have done so as it whirled by. It whipped the tent flaps of the camping Roman soldiers. And if the red-collared priest had not had his windows closed in the plantation house he was sleeping in that night, he might have sniffed the amber crown as it passed him by.

The night was pleasant. It was a good thing to be outside, and not stuck in a house like the red-collared man.

The Dark Angel Queen would understand. She liked to ride the land, her kingdom. She liked to go to the mountain tops and look from the peaks and take it all in. The fulgin had this memory from her, one of several small tokens that it cherished.

Then the whirlwind set down just outside of Tjark.

The little princess was very close now. It could sense it. For the first time, it felt a pang of regret that it had to cease soon.

But it was content. It had met the little girl. It had made a friend.

It had a name.

And it was going to accomplish its great task.

If a thing like the fulgin could be happy at all, Windy was. And it was the happiness more than anything that had shielded it from the sniffing, sensitive nose of the red-collared man.

***

It was late in the night when the fulgin shadow thing crossed the border from Vall l’Obac to Shenandoah. Soon the Romans would be on its trail again. But there was time to deliver the amber crown.

There was supposed to be.

But try as it might when it got to the town, it could not sniff out the Dark Angel Princess. She was in one of the buildings, but there were so many people. It was confusing to follow her scent.

Finally it did sniff something. The princess? Maybe. With a sigh of relief it followed the trail.

But when it got there, there was only a little spring of water. It was a smelly spring, too. Some kind of fire-like odor bubbled up with the water. Maybe that was what it had detected.

The fulgin was full of disappointment. Would it ever find the Dark Angel Princess?

Beside the spring, something moved, some one. The fulgin saw that there were two people lying by the spring. They seemed to be tangled together.

Were they sleeping here?

Then one of the people by the spring, a girl with the palest blue eyes imaginable, had looked up from where she lay.

She saw it. She saw the fulgin!

How had she done that? No one could see it at night.

Even little Marguerite had not been able to see it except in sunlight when she could pick it out from the regular shadows. But somehow this one could see.

There was moonlight this night. Maybe that was why. Maybe some people could see better in the moonlight than in the day? It didn’t know. There was so much it didn’t know and never would.

“What is it that you are looking for, little thing?” asked the woman with the pale, pale eyes.

“The dark princess who needs a crown,” the fulgin answered in its whistle-voice. “I cannot find her anywhere.”

The woman with the pale, pale eyes gazed at the fulgin for a long time. It thought about running away, but it felt safe in the woman’s presence.

Finally, she spoke. “I know where to find the princess you are looking for, little thing,” she said. “I will go and get her. Then you can tell us about your journey.”

This filled the fulgin with contentment. It wanted to tell the Dark Angel Princess everything. All the things that it had seen. And it especially wanted to tell her about little Marguerite. The one who had named it. The one who had saved the Couronne de Huit Tours from the Romans.

I have had an exciting life, the fulgin thought.

And then it saw the Dark Angel Princess approaching. So beautiful.

It had done everything it had been told to do. It was very, very happy. It knew how to be happy now.

“There is so, so much to tell you,” the fulgin said to Ravenelle Archambeault. It felt positively filled with words, with impressions it wanted to share. “But first I have a crown to give you. Is from your mother, the Dark Angel Queen. She says to tell you that she loves you. She says to say she loves you no matter what.”

The fulgin unburdened its heart to the Dark Angel Princess, and died.

 

Chain of Command – Snippet 28

Chain of Command – Snippet 28

Chapter Thirteen

22 December 2133 (two day later) (first day in K’tok orbit)

The task force reached orbit and conducted its bombardment and assault as planned. To much relief and some surprise, everything went off without a hitch. Ground resistance was sporadic and unorganized, surprise apparently complete, casualties minimal, success absolute.

That evening Vice-Admiral Leman Kechik Kayumati went live via holovid to the entire task force. Sam watched and listened in his cabin, through his helmet optics. He had never seen Kayumati before and the admiral was older than he expected, well into his sixties, and slight of stature, but with rigid posture. He had a steady, confident manner and intelligent eyes in the broad, brown, high-cheekboned face that showed his Malay ancestry. With his thinning gray hair and bushy white eyebrows, he looked a bit like the tough old patriarch of the family in so many adventure holovids–strong, seasoned, and wise. Sam didn’t know much about how good an admiral Kayumati was, but he had to admit the guy looked the part.

“As you know, this morning we entered orbit above the planet K’tok,” Kayumati began. “We have been at war for twenty days, although the only hostile activity to date has been a single cowardly sneak attack, launched by the enemy before a formal state of war existed. That attack cost us a lot of good men and women, but since then the uBakai haven’t shown much stomach for a fight. They ran away from us at Mogo and it looks like their fleet’s run away from us here at K’tok as well.”

Pretty good start, Sam thought. Can’t have an interesting story without a good villain. From there Kayumati went on to caution everyone that, although the uBakai had run, they’d be back, because K’tok was too important to them to let it go without a fight. Then he told them about the protein chain differences, why they made K’tok the only place anyone had found other than Earth where Humans could eat the food grown in the ground, instead of in a hydroponic tank.

Humans had started settling the Utaan Archipelago in the western hemisphere of K’tok. The uBakai claimed all of it, even though no Varoki had ever settled anywhere but the two continents in the eastern hemisphere. There had been clashes, both sides had sent military forces as observers, but the coalition of Human states that backed the colonists had agreed to arbitration by the Cottohazz Wat.

“That’s when those cowards hit us,” Kayumati said, his voice rising in anger. “Why? Because they knew the arbitration would go our way, leave our colonists in their homes on K’tok. Most of the Cottohazz is with us on this, is tired of the Varoki having everything their own way. Well, we deserve our chance at the stars too, by God! We shouldn’t have to fight for it. We didn’t want this fight. They started it, but so help me we’re going to finish it!

“And we got a good start on that today. Every objective secured with no naval casualties and very light casualties among our Marine and allied ground forces. That’s because every man and woman in the task force carried out their duty with courage and professionalism.”

He had them. Sam could sense it, could almost hear men and women cheering that line. This was good, simple, and to the point. He’d shown them an injury to avenge, a prize worth fighting for, and bad guys to smack down. All he had to do was end on a high note and the task force would follow him to hell.

“You know,” Kayumati continued, “those Varoki think they’re entitled to everything, just because they developed the interstellar jump drive first. And then they fooled us and everyone else in the Cottohazz into signing on to their intellectual property covenants. Maybe you don’t understand the importance of that, but let me explain.”

Sam stared at the hologram in front of him. What was Kayumati doing? He had them. Make the sale, close the deal, and say goodnight. But he kept on talking.

First he gave a long explanation of how Cottohazz intellectual property law screwed everyone but the Varoki. Then he started in on how Humans were training fewer and fewer scientists every year. He had a lot of statistics to back that up and some colorful three-dimensional graphics. When he started in on the history of the settlement of K’tok and the Varoki ecoform project, Sam took his helmet off and cut the feed.

“Shut up!” he yelled at the silent walls of his cabin. “What are you thinking? Just shut up, you doddering old fool!”

Sam knew the feed was still coming in and though he didn’t watch it, he watched the incoming feed light on his data pad. Kayumati talked for another twenty minutes. Sam did a quick keyword search of the speech recording by topics and came up with:

The First K’tok Campaign of 2130

Spacecraft design

Destroyer Riders

Fire Lance Missiles

Contemporary Music

Adventure Holo-Vids

There were more entries but he stopped the scan, closed his eyes, and simply floated in the center of his cabin for a while.

Sam had worked his way up the ladder of lower management at Dynamic Paradigms, onto the rungs of middle management, and although he’d found customer fulfillment most to his liking, he had done his share of sales as well, and he wasn’t bad at it. One thing he knew was when to shut up. Over and over again he’d seen inexperienced sales people get the sale and then keep talking–and talk the customer right out of it. Sam understood why.

One thing people are very good at: they know, without even having to think it through, that if a salesman keeps talking after the customer is convinced, it’s because he’s still trying to convince himself.

*****

Vice-Captain Takaar Nuvaash, Speaker for the Enemy, covered his face with his hands to hide his shame and anger.

“Nuvaash, what are you doing here?”

He looked up and saw Admiral e-Lapeela. He had not heard him enter the briefing room. Now he rose to the position of attentive respect.

“I am composing my resignation, Admiral.”

A flicker of irritation passed across the admiral’s face. “Resignation? You would flee from your duty at the first sign of adversity?”

“Admiral, I will serve in whatever position the fleet demands of me.”

The admiral said nothing and soon Nuvaash realized the silence was his to fill.

“I believed I anticipated every enemy approach to this problem. Our heavy ground elements were well-dispersed to avoid destruction by orbital bombardment, our mobile troops placed to contain and isolate enemy landings, our aerial defense systems optimized to prevent reinforcement of their colony enclaves.”

He paused and shook his head.

“Never did I imagine they would undertake an operation so …audacious. To seize the needle itself? By meteoric assault from orbit? Capture the administrative capital of the planet, and do so with only three cohorts of troops? This will be my legacy–I will be forever remembered as the Speaker for the Enemy who allowed the only capture of a needle in history. I have shamed you as well, Admiral. All I have left to offer is my resignation, insignificant as that is.”

e-Lapeela stood silently for what seemed an endless interval, but which may have been no more than a minute. When he spoke, his voice was level and backed with authority but no contempt, so far as Nuvaash could detect.

“Sit, Nuvaash,” he said, and he sat down as well, across the conference table.

“You are humiliated, and you think you understand why, but you do not. I will explain your humiliation to you, as one who has faced that same hopeless black night of the spirit.

“You have known Humans, interacted with them, and I imagine liked some of them. You respected many of their achievements, and in your interactions with them undoubtedly earned their respect as well. This lulled you into the illusion of equality. Today shattered that illusion, and that is the true basis for your humiliation. You finally, at long last, understand that we are not their equals. They are monsters, Nuvaash–but diabolically clever monsters. There can never be any question of a fair fight with them. You understand that now, don’t you? We cannot allow them a fair fight, because they will best us!

“You will not be remembered for the capture of the Needle at K’tok. That will become a minor incident in a war which will be remembered for a thousand year. Let them enjoy their triumph for now. So rich and glorious a prize will hold them to this place, demand they defend it, pin their fleet in place for us to destroy.

“Your observation of their astrogation procedures, and the extent to which they rigidly follow their standing peacetime practices, let us surprise them once and I believe will let us surprise them again. Audacity? If you are remembered for anything, it will be for the brilliance and audacity of this next attack.”

Nuvaash straightened in his chair but shook his head slightly.

“The attack plan was yours, admiral.”

“You showed the weakness, Nuvaash. Together we devised the means to exploit it–over the objections of our own fleet astrogator, you may recall.  It is as dangerous as he counsels, but I believe the danger ensures surprise. I believe the Humans will never expect it from us for that very reason. It is too Human a risk. You believe that as well, do you not?”

“Yes, admiral, I do.”

“What you do not know, Nuvaash, is that the surprise will be two-fold. Our fleet munitions vessel ABk Seventy-One brought a special shipment of electronic warfare missiles of a radically new type. Even now they are being moved to the cruisers which will spearhead our attack. These missiles will shatter their fleet, and with it their morale. In two days we will decisively alter the naval balance of power forever. That is what you and I will be remembered for.”

 

Princess Holy Aura – Chapter 06

Princess Holy Aura – Chapter 06

Chapter 6.

Silvertail watched tensely as the pact was fulfilled and Princess Holy Aura was finally reborn. Let it work, he prayed. In the name of all we have sacrificed, in the name of all that was and could be, let this not be a failure.

With eyes that could see what ordinary mortals could not, he watched as Stephen Russ’ mortal frame dissolved in light, a core of brilliance forming into a new shape both delicate and strong as a steel blade, head suddenly thrown back, midnight-purple tresses arching up, sparkling with power, coming down in a waterfall of indigo silk, even as the armor formed, different yet exactly as it had always been. Princess Holy Aura’s crown materialized in blessed light and sealed itself to her brow, and eyes the color of amethysts and dreams opened for the first time.

Within the small figure, Silvertail Heartseeker could sense confusion and conflict, and for a moment the girl’s form trembled. But she straightened as the dhole renewed its attack and threatened innocents, and called it to confront her: “. . . this Apocalypse Maiden says that you are going down!”

That was somewhat different from the usual, but that was also good. Stephen must be accepting his mission! He began to dare to hope, and once more felt his own powers beginning to be unlocked. If she can triumph . . .

A jump, evasion, and he suddenly remembered that Stephen — Holy Aura — did not yet understand her powers, or the desperate urgency of this combat. He shouted his warning, saw her shift her stance.

The immense weapon formed without warning in her hands, and for a moment he was taken aback. Why in the name of the Sunken Lands would that be the shape of the Silverlight Weapon? But that was a minor concern. The important thing would be to guide her in how to use it. The channeling of power through the blade was not a trivial —

Princess Holy Aura, however, did not even seem to hear his attempt to instruct her, but lunged to meet the gigantic armored worm head-on. No! Such a creature cannot be defeated by brute strength, not as you are now! You need to —

His mind went blank with complete shock as Holy Aura’s bisento very nearly bisected the eldritch creature in a single blow. By the Powers Beyond . . . He felt a tiny smile stretching his furry features. She is even more powerful than I had expected. This is wonderful!

But then he saw the girl follow her victorious bow with a leap away . . . and sensed the rising turmoil, the confusion and fear. “Oh, dear,” he heard himself murmur. With the threat of the monster now gone, Stephen’s mind was now realizing the changes, the aspects that he had only contemplated in the abstract before, and Silvertail realized he had to catch up with Holy Aura — or Steve — very, very fast.

That was not, however, so simple when you were a small white rat. And even if he could change that aspect of himself, he could not even approach the speed or strength of the fleeing Apocalypse Maiden.

But a fleeing animal — man or woman or otherwise — will in the end seek a refuge. And Stephen has only one refuge.

It took him some time to make his way back to the apartment — not merely because a rat has, relatively speaking, short legs, but because the last thing Silvertail needed was to draw attention to himself or Steve’s neighborhood. More than two hours had passed before he made his way up the stairs, hopping up them one at a time and occasionally pausing to make sure that a creak from below didn’t indicate someone coming up behind him.

The door was open a crack. He sniffed; the scents told him Steve was inside, and further emphasized the confusion, fear, and anger he had sensed before. Silvertail slipped inside and, with some effort, nudged the door completely shut.

Steve sat unmoving on the battered brownish couch, staring at empty space. His hands were dirty — covered with black and gray smears of some sort — and one lay on his jeans without regard for the stains it might transfer. Two empty beer bottles were on the stand next to him, and the other hand gripped a third tightly.

“Stephen,” Silvertail said quietly.

The big man started violently, spilling beer over his T-shirt. “Dammit. Silvertail?”

“Yes. I am sorry for startling you. I see you made it home, in any event.”

“Yeah,” he agreed, and rose, putting the bottle down on the table. His attempt to look casual about it was belied by the way his hand shook and knocked over one of the others. He started, tried to catch it, and only succeeded in knocking all three down, the remaining liquid fanning out across the carpet and almost instantly sinking in. “Dammit!” Convulsively Steve threw himself across the room, ripped the roll of paper towels from the holder, and started trying to blot up the mess with a fevered focus on the mundane task.

“Enough, please. Stephen, stop.”

“Can’t stop, this will stink if I don’t get it out, and my landlady — ”

“Please, Stephen, stop.”

Stephen Russ froze in midscrub, then slowly sat back, his massive frame collapsing like a deflated balloon as he sagged against the wall, eyes closed, hands shaking and clenching.

Silvertail sighed, smelling the stench of fear and anger mixed with the hops and alcohol. “Eleitai, halama, meritami,” he muttered, and light streamed from his outstretched paw; the broad brown stain faded away, leaving the carpet clean and dry.

That roused Steve slightly. “That’d be real handy on laundry day.”

“No doubt.” Silvertail still wasn’t sure how to approach the current — very delicate — situation. “But in my current state it is not, I am afraid, something to do casually. Why not wash your hands, at least, in the more usual way?”

The man looked down at his hands as though he had never seen them before. “Oh. Yeah, they’re pretty filthy.”

Unsteadily, Steve got up and made his way to the sink, scrubbing away at them. “At least the transformation doesn’t, like, disintegrate my clothes or anything. When I turned back, I even had the backpack with me. Good thing; I just got the toilet repaired, works like a charm now. But that’s how I got all dirty, you know, even when you try to keep things clean, things get a little dirt on ’em, then you’re working with water, and — ”

“Steve –”

“WHY THE HELL DIDN’T YOU WARN ME?”

The bellow was so loud and unexpected that Silvertail jumped back in alarm before the furious, blotchily terrified face of Stephen Russ. “We had discussed the changes, Stephen,” he said finally.

The outburst had exhausted Steve; he sank into the couch and put his face in his hands. Finally he swallowed audibly, looked up. “You didn’t tell me that she . . . she had an identity. I thought it would be . . . well . . . sort of like playing dress-up, a cosplay where I had real powers and had to deal with really having a different body.”

“That was — to an extent — rather what I expected as well, Stephen. What are you saying was different?”

Silvertail could smell some of the immediate anger fading as Steve realized that Silvertail honestly did not understand the problem. “Well . . . when I became . . . Holy Aura, it was like . . . like I already knew I was a woman. Except that I still knew I was a man. But in that body, it was . . . real. I felt this . . . this impression of memory, I guess, of self, knowing how to move and run and everything, and it was all filled with the absolute . . . not even thought, just knowledge, assumption, that I was a woman. Not even a woman, a girl, a teenage girl. I . . .”

Understanding burst in. “Oh. Oh, by the stars and the Light itself, Stephen, I am sorry. There is the basic template of Holy Aura, yes, and it has been . . . well, affected, refined one might say, over the many centuries by those who wore the title. None of their souls, or their memories truly remain, but something of their essence must linger. For another girl who takes up the mantle, of course, this is not an issue at all; it merely helps make them more certain of themselves, of their role as Holy Aura. But for you . . . Stephen, I do apologize, completely and abjectly I beg your pardon. That certainty and knowledge permeating the template would be in direct conflict with your own personal self-knowledge. You did extraordinarily well, then, to push it aside — as you must have — in order to deal with the threat at hand.”

Steve extended one shaking hand and stared at it. “And . . . and that’s not going away, is it?” he said finally. “Whenever I . . . change, that remnant, whatever, is going to be there. It’s not disappearing as I, well, get used to it?”

“No. I am sorry, but now that I have thought on it, no, it is an essential part of the magic. In a sense, it can of course help you in your mission, give you some understanding of a body so utterly different from your own, but in other senses it will be a great trial.”

“I’m not sure I can do this.”

Silvertail closed his eyes and sighed. “Stephen –”

“I know,” he said, and his voice shook. “I know, I accepted it, it’s not reversible, I don’t have any choice. I made the choice. To save people.” His voice lightened for a moment. “To . . . save people.” He looked up. “I did, didn’t I?”

“You did indeed, Stephen Russ. As Holy Aura, you confronted a monster that would most certainly have destroyed that entire shopping mall and killed many of those there, and continued to do so until stopped.”

“And nothing except Princess Holy Aura — or one of these other Apocalypse Maidens — could have stopped it.”

“In this case that is not entirely true. It was an extremely dangerous and powerful creature, but the more formidable mundane weapons available to your civilization could deal with it. But many would have died, and much destruction would have ensued, before those weapons could have been brought to bear. It is true, however, that many of the foes to come will be ones beyond the power of mortal weapons to affect, and some will be ones on which your powers, even when you have learned to wield them, will not be very effectual without the assistance of the other Apocalypse Maidens.”

“Right.” The dark-haired man looked at his hands for another long moment, then clenched them into fists and stood up abruptly. “I’ll have to deal with it. Somehow. It’s not going to be easy, Silvertail. I’m going to need help from someone, and there’s no way I can talk about this to a shrink. Not without getting locked up. And maybe I’m paranoid, but I kinda think it could be a bad idea to just go to the agents that’ll be investigating this afternoon’s freakshow and tell them what’s going on. Though it’d be really nice to have the National Guard on standby.”

Silvertail allowed himself to relax a tiny bit. He is a strong-willed man, and his focus is still on helping people. That may just allow us to get past this. “I am afraid your instincts are correct. Besides the obvious mundane issues of their reaction to the sudden appearance of the supernatural, the fact is that at least some of the authorities will undoubtedly be under the influence of our adversaries. You . . . no, we, for you are correct, we must be a team, and I must help you as best I can . . . must for the most part perform this work alone, with only the other Maidens as our support.”

“Okay. Kinda goes with the whole meme anyway, right? You don’t generally see your magical girl or sentai team running over to the feds and asking them for help. Or when they do, it turns out the officer’s another eldritch horror out to eat their souls.” The humor was forced and Steve’s voice was still strained . . . but he was trying, and Silvertail felt a twinge of admiration. Would I have done so well in his place? I have to wonder. I might well be trying to run away even though I knew I had committed myself to the cause. “So, next step is to start finding the other Maidens, right?”

And we start on the next delicate part of this problem. “Yes, that would be our main goal. The sooner we can gather the full Five, the sooner we will be able to prepare to confront our adversaries, and the more practiced and skilled all of you will be with your powers. This will of course vastly increase our chances of victory when the time comes.”

“You didn’t specify when, exactly, the time will come — that is, when the Stars will be Right. Do you know?”

“Not exactly. The conditions that make it happen are tied to events here and in that other realm. The appearance of certain agents, and their activities, tells me the cycle has begun anew, and I can estimate it; no less than six months, no more than one year from now. As time draws onward, I will gain a better estimate. For now, of course, it is best that we assume it will be sooner rather than later.”

“Right. Assume it’ll be a very Cthulhu Christmas, then.” Steve’s voice had steadied. “Well, I guess it’s about time to have some leftover pizza. And I’ve got work tomorrow.” He went and got one piece out of the refrigerator. “So, how do we go about finding these others. You said it wasn’t going to be as ‘easy,’ if you can use that word, as finding four more guys willing to do the job.”

“Alas, no. While I am permitted the latitude — with, I should add, not inconsiderable personal effort — to shift the choice from a girl of the appropriate age to any other person I find satisfactory, the rest of the spell proceeds once triggered without any control by myself or anyone else, and the other four will follow the ancient pattern set by Holy Aura herself.”

Steve froze in the middle of punching in the heating time on the microwave. “Oh, Christ. You mean that the other four actually have to be teenage girls?”

“I am afraid so, Stephen.”

Steve closed his eyes, and Silvertail could hear him counting quietly to himself; the count reached sixty before the man’s eyes opened. “Let me get this clear. There are four other Apocalypse Maidens to be found.”

“Correct.”

“They’re particular individuals out there somewhere. That is, I can’t just find some teenage girl I think would make a good choice and say ‘Hey, you’re going to be Apocalypse Maiden number two’ or whatever.”

“Also correct. The magic is already at work. In the original spell, we had the opportunity to select the Maidens ahead of time, place them within the circle, and so on. Ever afterward, the spell, upon being triggered, seeks out . . . well, appropriate vessels for the power and links them to the destiny of the Apocalypse Maidens. But I cannot actually see these links until they are close to manifestation.”

Steve rolled his eyes. “Do we have any idea of where these girls might be, or am I supposed to just start wandering the world, hoping I’ll bump into the right ones somewhere between here and Cairo or something?”

Silvertail managed a laugh at that. “It is not quite that bad, Stephen. They must be within a relatively short distance of your initial manifestation, and in fact will be found regularly in relatively close proximity in locations where children of their ages gather.”

Steve’s eyes narrowed. “Just what locations?”

“Well . . .” Silvertail found himself very hesitant, yet there was no help for it but to simply move forward. “In prior eras they might be regularly gathered to perform work of some sort, or gather for church, or . . .”

“Christ on a pogo stick. A school. They’ll all be going to the same goddamned high school, won’t they?”

“If there is one such near the area of your first transformation — ”

“Yes, there is, dammit, about half a mile off is Whitney High.” Steve stared at him accusingly. “You knew this from the start.”

“Well . . . yes. But it did not matter until now.” He could not quite restrain a whisker-twitching smile. “And you should have, given that I mentioned how your world’s memes strongly direct these events and phenomena.”

Steve grimaced. “Okay, you got me there. I should have known. So . . . I have to somehow winnow out four girls from an entire high school. You know, a thirty-five-year-old guy hanging around a high school watching the fourteen-year-old girls closely is gonna end up spending a lot of time behind bars, not saving the universe.”

“I understand the implications.”

“So . . . oh, my god. That’s why you mentioned high-school students before. You knew I’d have to — ”

Silvertail nodded. “I see no alternative. You, Stephen Russ, will have to enter the high school in the only acceptable guise — that of a fourteen-year-old girl — to locate, befriend, and ultimately activate, the other four Apocalypse Maidens.”

“Son of a — ” Stephen stopped, frozen.

When Steve turned back to face Silvertail finally, he wore a smile so cold that it made Silvertail shiver involuntarily. “All right, Silvertail. I remember you saying something else — that you couldn’t do much to help me until I committed. That means you can help me now, right?”

“That is true — ”

“And you know something, I got a different view of you when I changed. Now that I have committed, I’ll bet that you also have another form you can take. A human form. Am I right?”

His perceptions must be astonishingly acute as Holy Aura. He would have been seeing my spirit — and remembering what he saw, even during a most emotionally straining moment. “You are.”

He concentrated, and felt the familiar rush of power, the triggering of the remnant of the ancient pact in the manner that directly related to him. The light gathered about him, drew him upward, built him up. Silvertail opened his eyes, and for the first time in centuries looked down upon the world around him, even upon Steve. “This is my true, original form, Stephen Russ,” he said, hearing his own deep voice again. “Varatraine Aylnell, at your service.”

“At my service? That’s great, Varatraine,” Steve said, and slapped him on the shoulder, still wearing that disquieting grin. “Because you’re just what a fourteen-year-old girl is going to need . . . DAD.”

 

The Spark – Snippet 15

The Spark – Snippet 15

“Guntram seemed to be sort of, well, outside things,” I said. “Not really close to Jon, I mean. Is he really important, then?”

“Yes, he’s important,” May said. She led the way into the passage. Turning her head after a few steps, she said, “A lot of people are afraid of him. They think he deals with things from Not-Here. I’ve heard people say that he’s really from Not-Here.”

I laughed at that. The echoes made it sound bitter, but it wasn’t.

“Guntram isn’t from Not-Here,” I said.

We were getting near the far end of the passage. I stopped talking for the moment, not because I wasn’t willing to talk about it but because May seemed to want to keep the subject private. She was the one who had to live here.

She nodded to the attendant; he muttered, “Mum,” in reply. We passed out into the sunlight above the town.

“I don’t think he trades with Not-Here either, not from what he said to me,” I resumed. “Maybe he did when he was younger, I don’t know. But I do. Trade with Not-Here, I mean.”

May missed a step, the first time I’d seen her lose her air of friendly self-possession. She said, “I see.” Then she said, “But you said you came to Dun Add to fight for Mankind?”

“For Mankind,” I said. “But that’s not the same as ‘against Not-Here and the things from Not-Here.'”

“But they’re our enemies!” May said. “They want to kill us!”

I shrugged. “Some do, I guess,” I said. “There’s plenty of stories about people getting slaughtered on the Road when they meet a Beast, and some of what comes in from the Waste may be out of Not-Here too. But there’s plenty of stories about people meeting a Beast and killing it, too. Maybe they were just lucky, and maybe they’re the reason Beasts are likely to go for the first punch when they meet people.”

We’d gotten through the town by now. There’d been people who spoke to us and May had nodded back, but I hadn’t paid much attention. I’d dreamed of Dun Add for as long as I could remember, but now all I really cared about was getting home and forgetting about it.

Forgetting about all my dreams, I guess. It seemed that I’d be better off that way.

“Anyway,” I said, “I trade by leaving stuff out where they’ll find it and they leave stuff out for me. I don’t know what the things I put out is really worth, and I don’t guess they know any more about theirs. I’ve never been able to make anything from Not-Here work, so it’s not worth anything to me. But I think we’re both being honest. Both sides, I mean.”

“I’d never heard of trading with the Beasts,” May said, not looking at me. She hadn’t drawn away–we were all through walking abreast on the path, with Buck in the middle–but I could tell I’d shocked her.

“I don’t know who I’m trading with,” I said. “I’ve never seen them. But they’re from Not-Here, that I’m sure of. And neither of us gives the other any problems.”

We were back to the landing place again. One of the nearer jewelry sellers waved a gewgaw and called, “Buy a pretty for your pretty, squire!”

He either hadn’t taken a good look at May, or he rated me a lot higher than I did. I chuckled and said, “That’s twice this morning that somebody’s called me squire. I’d better get back home soon or I’ll be getting a big head.”

There seemed to be about fifty people on the landing place this morning. A group of twenty-odd had come in under a guide with a couple attendants. They looked pretty prosperous, but they didn’t seem to be merchants. They weren’t travelling with the kind of baggage that merchants did, anyway.

Across the way, a few warriors were sparring on the jousting ground. I saw the stewards shoo back a couple boys–ten or twelve years old, no more than that–who’d rushed over to see the sparring. I knew how they felt.

“Will you be coming back, Pal?” May asked.

“No, I don’t guess I will,” I said. “I’d thought I had something to offer Mankind, but Dun Add didn’t agree with me.”

I settled my pack a little straighter. “Say,” I said. “Do I have to settle with the herald going in this direction too?”

“No, you just go back on the Road,” May said. She looked at me and said, “I hope you have a safe trip, Pal, and that you have a better time at home than you seem to have had here.”

That won’t be hard, I thought, but I didn’t say that because May had been nice to me. Actually, the only person I’d met here who hadn’t been nice was Easton, and there were bastards at home in Beune too.

Like I’d called the Adversary and he popped up out of the ground, there was Easton. He was wearing blue and orange stripes this morning, and his glittering weapon/shield combination was in the middle of his chest. The control wands withdrew into the module between uses.

One of the attendants who’d been with him when we’d sparred was here again. I remembered seeing the fellow in the castle courtyard when I’d walked across to the stables.

I didn’t have anything to say to Easton, so I looked away. I was trying to figure out whether to speak to May or just to get back on the Road with a nod, when Easton walked up and said, “So, you’re heading back to South Bumfuck, are you, hobby? I guess you’re afraid that I’ll beat you bloody again, hey?”

He didn’t have a dog with him, but he’d come here for a fight….

I got cold. I’d felt a lot of things since I got to Dun Add, most of them bad, but right now I didn’t have any feelings at all. I just wanted to kill this bastard.

“It’s Beune,” I said. I heard my voice trembling, but it wasn’t fear. “And I’m in a hurry to get back there, but I don’t guess I’ll ever be in too much hurry for a fight.”

“Well, that’s a nice surprise!” Easton said. “You want to try it at 40% then? But maybe not, you don’t have Champions to hide behind today!”

I dumped my pack on the ground behind me. “I don’t trust you,” I said, my voice ragged. “We’ll fight full power so you can’t cheat. All right!”

“This is your last fight, hobby!” Easton shouted. “You all heard him! He challenged me at full power!”

“Hey!” shouted someone, probably the herald, but all I could see right now was Easton facing me ten feet away. “You can’t fight here! Take it to the jousting ground!”

“May, hold Buck,” I said. I could barely understand my own voice. Well, May was a smart girl, she’d probably figure out to give Buck to Riki. I couldn’t deal with that now.

I switched my shield on, but just enough to give me a view of the planes we were fighting on. I strode toward Easton.

He shifted right like he had the day before and sent a shimmering cut at my shoulder. There was a little sparkling where his weapon cut my shield but not much because I had the shield at such low power. If anything saved me it was that I was closer than he’d expected when he started his swing.

The blow was like I’d jumped from the castle and landed on the point of my shoulder. Everything went white.

I thrust at the center of mass.

I guess Easton’s shield was pretty good; the Lord knew his weapon was. The module on his chest blew up, not from overload but from taking a stroke meant to drill five feet deep into granite.

I flew backward and landed on the ground. I couldn’t hear anything; I don’t know if it was the explosion making me deaf or where Easton had hit me. I couldn’t feel anything on my left side.

I couldn’t see Easton, but his attendant was still standing close by. His mouth was open in a scream I couldn’t hear and he was wiping at his face. He’d changed his clothes from stripes like his master wore to solid red.

He was wearing his master’s torso. Easton’s legs and head lay on the ground beside the attendant.

The pain was too bad to think, I could just go on with what I’d planned to do. I rolled to my left and stood up. The leg held me but I couldn’t move my left arm.

I dropped the weapon to pick up my shield and hook it. I staggered to my pack and grabbed it. I couldn’t put it on so I dragged it back and picked the weapon up to hook it also. I had a thick leather pad over my right thigh, but I knew I’d have a blister even if the glowing tip didn’t char clear through the leather.

“Come on, Buck,” I said, and he understood at least. I could lift the pack off the ground with my right arm though I didn’t know how long I’d be able to hold it up.

I didn’t see people, just movement. They were running out of my way and I began to hear screams. I wasn’t deaf, then.

People didn’t have any reason to be afraid. I didn’t want to hurt any body, I just wanted to go home. And anyway, my weapon wouldn’t recharge for minutes yet.

Buck and I reached the Road. “We’re going home, boy,” I said but I don’t know if I really got the words out. Buck didn’t need to be told, though.

I don’t know how far we got up the gray blur of Buck’s vision, but it can’t have been far before I knelt and threw up. I got up then and staggered a little farther, just because if I didn’t I’d lie where I was and die.

We didn’t get far, though, certainly not up to the closest inn. I slept on the Road, and if anybody came past they left me alone.

After I woke up, whenever that was, we went on.

 

Chain of Command – Snippet 27

Chain of Command – Snippet 27

Chapter Twelve

19-20 December 2133 (later that day and the next) (one day from K’tok orbit)

Before turning in, Sam had a visit from Lieutenant Marina Filipenko, an official visit he had requested. She accepted a hot green tea and the two of them floated in his stateroom tethered to stanchions and at first just looked at the star field displayed on the smart wall.

“Filipenko, I’m kind of skipper and XO rolled into one for now. I’m supposed to make sure the crew functions as a team, you know? Something’s eating at you. It’s hard enough dealing with a war none of us expected, but something else is going on with you. I don’t want to intrude in your private life, but you’ve become an essential officer, a keystone member of the crew. If there’s anything I can do to help, let me.”

She floated silently for what seemed like a long time, looking down at the deck, thinking. Finally she shook her head.

“I don’t know that there is anything you can do. I think I made a terrible mistake leaving home. You don’t …I don’t know that any of you can understand the sort of bond there is between folks on the BW–that’s what we call Bronstein’s World most of the time, the BW. It’s like a club, but everyone has to pay dues to stay a member, and the dues are really high, and you have to pay them every single day. But everyone there does–or they die and that’s that.”

She was silent for a while and finally Sam said, “Gotta be tough. But you got away. Took control of your life again.”

She shook her head.

“I ran away. I ran, and I abandoned my family, my friends, everyone on the BW. I said, ‘I’m not like you. I can’t do this.’ But I didn’t understand how important it was to be like them, to belong to that tribe, until I quit. That’s what it is, a tribe. None like it anywhere.

“I thought I’d find it here in the Navy, a new tribe, but …” she looked around and then shook her head.

“Strikes me as pretty tribal,” Sam said. He’d never thought of it in quite those terms, but it fits. But once he said it, the thought made him uneasy.

“Yes, but a very silly tribe,” she shot back and glanced up at him, gave him that long, penetrating stare, and then shrugged. “Not supposed to say things like that, I know. But at Annapolis, everyone was so proud of what they had endured to get through each year, so proud of what they had accomplished by the end. All I could think was, twelve-year-olds on the BW have gone through more, endured more, had to shoulder more personal responsibility for their survival, than anyone at that graduation, and nobody ever told they to throw their hats in the air and crow about how exceptional they were. Now all my classmates do is preen and bicker and jostle for the right place at the wardroom table.

“God, I hate it! I hate the Navy.”

The passion and bitterness in her voice took him back, and Sam took a while thinking about it before answering.

“It’s funny, before this whole war thing started Del Huhn and I got into it over disciplining two of my petty officers and I told him it was stuff like that made people hate the Navy. To tell you the truth, I think I was talking about myself as much as anyone. But that was before the war. War has a way of …broadening your thinking, you know?”

She shrugged, not meeting his eyes.

“I guess there are different versions of the US Navy, different layers. I don’t hate them all, and I don’t think you do either. There’s one I think of as The Entitled Navy. That’s the one where politically well-connected officers take for granted that their superiors will treat them with circumspection and wink at their shortcomings, and it turns out they’re right–that one I hate.”

Her eyes narrowed and she nodded.

“There’s another one where everyone’s got an eye on what comes next, whether it’s the next assignment or the job after you’re done with the Navy, and puts smoothing the way for that above doing their job here and now. The Nest Feathering Navy. Not crazy about that one either.”

“No,” she said.

“Tell you what I am crazy about, though. I’m crazy about my tactical department–yours too now. Joe Burns stepped up to Bull Tac like he was born for the job.”

“Yes! God, I don’t know how I’d have managed the department without him.”

“Joyce Menzies is like some sort of missile savant, and we might even make something of Ensign Robinette, too.”

“He’s trying hard,” she admitted.

“Got a pretty good engineering department, world-class A-gang. I’m even getting used to Ops. Goldjune and I are never going to bosom buddies, but so what?” Sam paused and looked around his cabin. “I’ll tell you what I’m crazy about: this boat. I don’t mind telling you it comes as something of a surprise.”

“It’s a fine boat,” she agreed.

“This is our tribe, Marina. Maybe tribes are like cats: you don’t find them, they find you.”

For the first time Sam could recall, Filipenko chuckled.

*****

After two hours of floating and sweating in his sleep cubby, Sam awoke from a nightmare of Puebla dying under a hail of uBakai laser fire because he had forgotten how to maneuver the boat, forgotten how to order the weapons division to fire, been unable to form the right words, and so they had drifted impotently into the uBakai killing zone.

He turned on his stateroom lights and checked the time: 0030 hours, literally Oh-Dark-Thirty. He felt on the edge of panic, needed help. Then he had an idea where he might find it. Over a decade ago he had taken several courses on leadership. Everyone made light of “the book,” acted as if true enlightenment could only come once you had gone far past its simplistic lessons and formulas. Sam didn’t care. At that particular moment he was willing to take any help he could get.

He put on viewer glasses and scanned several manuals, but of course there was no single guide explaining how to be a crackerjack boat captain. Finally he came across something, something he had once known by heart. Every officer candidate learned it: the eleven principles of naval leadership. Even as he read them, they came back. They didn’t answer any specific question he had, but the first one got his attention right away.

First Principle of Naval Leadership: Know yourself and seek self-improvement.

Well, that wasn’t a bad place to start.

Six hours later Chief Constancia Navarro, one foot hooked through a handhold, floated before Sam’s desk in the captain’s office, her face a blank mask.

“Chief, I sent for you because I need your help,” Sam said. “I need it bad. I’m only captain for five or six days, but I can’t afford to screw this up.”

Sam gestured in invitation to the drink dispenser on his desk but Navarro shook her head.

“No thanks, sir. You move your gear into the captain’s main cabin yet?”

“I figured Lieutenant Commander Huhn can stay there until Commander Barger shows up. No point in moving twice in one week. Chief, my problem is I’m having a hard time getting a handle on commanding the boat. I sort of know the administrative end of things, but that’s not what I mean. I’m having trouble getting some of the officers on board. I could come down harder on them but I don’t want to rock the boat too much before the new C.O. gets here. What do you think?”

She squinted at him for a moment before answering. “It’s your boat, sir. I’d say rock it as much as you want.”

She continued looking at him and showed no more inclination to volunteer additional advice. Sam sipped his coffee, unsure if he’d done something to offend her. A captain maybe shouldn’t worry about that–it wasn’t a popularity contest–but he needed Navarro’s help. He needed somebody’s help, that was for sure,

Navarro shifted and looked away.

“Chiefs,” she said.

“How’s that?”

“Chiefs,” she repeated and turned to face him. “All due respect, sir, but you spend too much time thinking about the commissioned officers. They’re fine when somebody’s shooting at us, but the chief petty officers run the boat, day-in, day-out. You don’t need the officers to run a tight boat if you’ve got the chiefs.”

“Go on,” Sam said.

“Well, the problem is, chiefs aren’t going to piss off their department officers to please a captain who’s only going to be around to cover for them for five or six days.”

“Meaning I can’t really count on them,” Sam said.

“No, sir. Meaning you can’t count on them to walk the plank for you if you’re not even willing to move into the goddamned captain’s cabin.”

Sam straightened a bit, surprised at the animosity Navarro’s words revealed. “You really want me to move into that cabin?”

“No, sir. What I really want is for you to decide what you want from this crew. Now, if that’s all. I got a pile of work I need to get back to.”

He nodded. Navarro started to leave but she paused by the hatch, her back to him.

“So far the crew’s running on inertia and rage, and that’s okay for now. But pretty soon that’ll run out and they’re going to figure out what a really tight spot they’re in. You want to do something for them? Something that’ll make a difference? Tell them why they’re here. Tell them what they’re fighting for. Tell them why someone killed their shipmates and is trying to kill them, and why maybe it’s worth their lives”

“I’m not sure I know,” Sam said. “It’s something about K’tok’s biochemistry.”

Navarro left without looking back and Sam stared at the closed office door for a long time, thinking about how empty his words had sounded even to him.

That hadn’t gone very well. She’d told him what she thought he was doing wrong, she’d said it in plain standard English, but he had no idea what it meant. What was he supposed to do? Sure, he was the captain, but only for less than a week and with his relief already appointed. And how the hell was he supposed to know what the war was about? He just followed orders, like everyone else.

He saw a shadow in the corner of his eye and he looked away. He didn’t want her or anyone else to see him like this: confused, indecisive, a powerless captain because he didn’t know how captains exerted authority except by brute force of law and navy regulations–and he knew that was the worst possible course he could take.

Maybe the only way to handle this was to just go on acting as the executive officer for an imaginary, invisible captain. He knew how to do that much. But something nagged at him, something Navarro had told him in their first conversation after the war started: for the crew the captain was the Navy. And didn’t they deserve to hear from the Navy why they were going into harms way? He’d even read it the previous night.

Fourth Principle of Naval Leadership: Keep your subordinates informed.

Sam pinged the duty communications technician.

This is Signaler First Class Kramer, sir. How can I help you?

“Kramer, get me a tight beam to the flagship. I want to talk to someone on Captain Kleindienst’s staff, whoever you can raise.”

*****

This is Lieutenant Alice Fong, Captain Kleindienst’s aide, Sam heard in his head once the tight-beam connection went active.  What do you need, Lieutenant Bitka?

“Well, you can start by calling me Captain Bitka.”

Um … I understood your appointment was only temporary.

“Correct, which is why you’ll only have to call me captain temporarily too.”

Sam waited.

Of course. Captain Bitka. What do you need?

“What I need is to know why we’re fighting this war.”

We’re very busy here, Captain Bitka. Do you have a request affecting the combat efficiency of your ship?

“First off, Puebla isn’t a ship. Destroyer riders don’t have jump drives, so they’re boats, which I assume you just forgot. Second, I’m not screwing around, Lieutenant Fong. I’ve got senior chiefs asking me what the hell’s going on and I don’t know what to tell them. Why are my people supposed to go into battle and risk their lives?”

Because they are under orders to do so.

“Not good enough. These are American mariners. They aren’t robots and they aren’t galley slaves. If you think this is the only place crews are asking questions like this, you’re kidding yourself. If you want these people to fight hard, you better figure out what it is they’re fighting for, and let them know. Or let me know and I’ll pass it on. You might want to let the West European, Indian, and Nigerian crews in on it, too.”

I’ll …have to get back to you, Captain Bitka.

“Fine. Just see that you do. Oh, and Ms. Fong? We lost people in that first attack, friends and shipmates, gone forever. The reason better be pretty good.”

Twenty minutes later Sam was finishing up the new incoming parts inventory when his embedded commlink vibrated.

Captain, this is Signaler First Kramer on the bridge. I have an incoming audio tight beam from the flagship for your ears only.

“Okay, Kramer, patch it through.”

Sam expected to hear the voice of Lieutenant Fong, or perhaps someone with more rank. He suspected that the more rank behind the incoming comm, the angrier it was likely to be. Instead the voice in his head vibrated with barely contained mirth.

Captain Bitka, are you there?

“Commander Atwater-Jones? I was expecting someone else.”

I daresay, and I won’t keep you long. Just thought I would congratulate you on making the most of what will undoubtedly be the shortest command tour in the history of your navy. Good heavens, you’ve got a knack for asking the most awkward sorts of questions! Next you’ll be demanding to see the emperor’s new clothes.

“Well, I think it’s a pretty reasonable question.”

Of course it is! That’s what makes it so bloody awkward. Well, buck up. Dame Marietta will probably try to frighten you to death, but I felt obliged to ruin her fun. They–which is to say the admiral’s senior staff–have already decided your question does require an answer, and one spread throughout the task force, so you are not to be drawn and quartered–at least not yet. Not that you’ve gained an ounce of their respect or gratitude, you understand.

“Commander, I don’t want to sound ungrateful or anything, but you being part of the admiral’s senior staff, I’m having a hard time figuring out where you stand in all this.”

I wouldn’t worry about it, Bitka, as long as you know where you stand. Toodles.

*****

Sam received the predicted comm from Captain Marietta Kleindienst within another half hour and, as anticipated, it alternated between anger and expressions of disappointment, as well as containing a veiled threat to send Commander Barger over sooner than originally planned. Sam responded respectfully but managed not to buckle under the assault. Perhaps he’d have held up anyway, but Atwater-Jones having tipped him to the bluff certainly helped. As it was, Kleindienst left him with an admonishment to “shape up.”

“Yes, Ma’am,” he had said as she cut the connection.

Dame Marietta. That’s what Atwater-Jones had called her and Sam chuckled. He respected the chief of staff, both personally and the authority of her office, but it was going to be hard to find her frightening from now on. There were just too many more-dangerous things in the universe for him to take her cross words very seriously. Besides, what could they do to him? Send him to K’tok?

 

The Spark – Snippet 14

The Spark – Snippet 14

CHAPTER 5: And One More Thing

I wanted to slip out without disturbing Guntram, but he was already up. The real windows at the top of the room were bright, though they faced north so I couldn’t tell exactly where the sun was.

I’d overslept. Though nobody was expecting me anywhere, so I ought to say I’d slept later than I’d meant to. I guess I needed it.

“I had the servants make up a packet of bread and sausage for you,” Guntram said, gesturing toward a large bundle beside the door. “There’s also a skin of wine?”

The food would fill my pack exactly as full as it had been when I left Beune. Either that was a very fortunate chance or Guntram had a good eye.

I grinned. My bet was on Guntram.

“Sir, thank you,” I said. I took the waxed linen ground sheet out of my pack and put the food in, piece by piece. That way I was sure of just what I had. “I’ll pass on the wine, if you don’t mind. I like it, but it’s stronger than the ale I’m used to. I don’t think that’s a good choice for me on the Road.”

From the smell, the sausage was spiced pork. I realized how hungry I was, but it would delay me if I said that. I’d get out a ways from town before I had anything to eat. Guntram’s kindness embarrassed me, but most of what had happened in Dun Add embarrassed me. I was getting used to the feeling.

I checked my purse to make sure I still had the chit for Buck, then lifted the pack onto my shoulders. I remembered doing the same thing in Beune just a few weeks ago. About a dozen of my neighbors had come to see me off.

Folks back home thought I was weird, true enough, but I think they liked me pretty well. I hoped they’d be glad to see me back.

I clasped hands with Guntram. “Thank you, sir,” I said. “If you’re out toward Beune, I hope you’ll stop in and see me. And if I find a piece of window–”

I nodded toward the back wall.

“–I’ll bring it to you, I promise.”

“Good luck, Pal,” Guntram said. As I walked past him out the door he added, “I hope you find what you’re searching for.”

I thought that was a funny thing to say, since I wasn’t looking for anything; I just wanted to go home. But I went down the stairs–carefully, because I had thirty pounds on my back–without turning to ask about it. I didn’t want to talk, I wanted to go home.

Nobody said anything as I walked through the Aspirants’ Hall to get to the outside door. The woman at the counter gave me a nod and I nodded back, but none of the loungers even noticed me.

I wasn’t sure I’d remember which door was the stables, but the ventilation lattices in the upper wall marked it even without the barks and whining even before I got close. I fished my chit out and walked inside. There were several fellows ahead of me before I got to the ostler’s cage.

He looked at my chit and called, “Riki! Four thirteen!”

He gestured and added, “Stand aside and your dog’ll be right down.”

I moved out of the way. After a moment, I squatted to shrug off my pack. It was going to be a while before Riki, whoever he was, brought Buck to me. I felt bad all over again for leaving him alone all day. I knew I was just looking for another reason to kick myself because I was down.

Buck was all right. God knew that with the ways I’d really screwed up since I got here, I didn’t need to invent phony ones.

As I straightened, somebody behind me said, “Hello, Pal,” and I almost lost my balance. I tabbed a hand down and turned as I got up the rest of the way. May was smiling at me.

“Ah, hello, m–” I said. “May, that is. I didn’t expect to see you here.”

Or anywhere else, to tell the truth. She’d gone completely out of my mind.

“Morseth said that you’d gone off with Guntram,” May said. “When I asked Guntram, he said that if I was quick I might catch you here. You’re going back to Beune?”

“Yes, ma’am,” I said. “I suppose there’s other things I could do in Dun Add, but I think I’ve done all I could stand to do.”

She looked down. Morseth would’ve told her what a fool Easton had made of me on the jousting ground. She’d known what to expect from the beginning, of course. What she’d said trying to warn me proved that.

“I didn’t realize you knew Guntram,” she said, still looking away. “In fact….”

I don’t know what more she’d been thinking because she let her voice trail off. She’d probably’d figured that I’d lied to her about not knowing anybody in Dun Add. A girl as pretty as May would’ve had a lot of guys lying to her; it’s nature. But it wasn’t my nature, and it wasn’t what’d happened with me.

“I met Guntram at the jousting ground,” I said. “He’s a Maker, and he was interested in my equipment. After Easton whipped my ass, pardon the language, Guntram gave me a bed in his quarters.”

I heard the edge in my voice. I don’t like to be called a liar, even if May hadn’t used the words. Since my thoughts were in that direction anyway, I added, “Say? I guess you know a lot of the Champions? Tell them that the healing couch that Guntram built, it really works. They won’t take my word for it, but if you tell Morseth and Reaves that you saw me walking out of Dun Add this morning just as chipper as when I came in yesterday, they’ll believe that.”

Riki turned out to be a girl of about thirteen, wearing a leather apron like the rest of the stable staff. She held the leash loose in her left hand, but with her right she was rubbing the back of Buck’s neck lightly as they walked along. When he saw me, he started wagging his tail so hard that his butt twitched side to side.

I didn’t know what the custom was in Dun Add, but the way Riki was petting Buck made me decide without asking May for help. I opened my purse and brought out the brass coin from Castorman. According to Duncan it was worth a bed and a full meal at any of the inns we’d stopped at on the way here.

I palmed it and slipped it to Riki when I shook her hand. “Bloody hell, squire!” she said. “Say, you’re the man!”

She curtseyed to me, which was about as big a surprise as if she’d started singing a church hymn. “Say, take care of him, will you?” she called over her shoulder. “He’s a sweet dog, he is!”

“Over tipped, I’m afraid,” said May as her eyes followed Riki back behind the ostler’s cage.

“No ma’am,” I said, tousling Buck as he rubbed his big head against the side of my knee. “I paid for value received. I guess you probably don’t have a dog.”

I felt kind of bad about that; it was a nasty thing to say, but May shouldn’t have sniped at the girl. Women do that sort of thing, I know.

Anyway, she probably didn’t realize I’d been insulting. Somebody who didn’t own a dog probably wouldn’t take it that way.

I lifted my pack on again, then took the leash off Buck and walked outside with him. He was whining with pleasure to be out of the cage, but he seemed to be okay except for that.

May came with us. I wondered why she was here. I said, “Ma’am? May, did you want something?”

“I wanted to see how you were getting on,” she said. In a different voice she added, “Pal, what did you mean when you said I knew a lot of the Champions?”

“Huh?” I said. “May, you know everybody it seems to me. Guntram said he couldn’t get warriors to try the healing couch he’d made. I think it kinda bothers him. He’s proud of the couch, you see. I figured you could talk to people and maybe they’d start using it.”

I stuck my arms out straight and flexed the elbows both ways. “I’m getting on fine, you see?” I said. “If you tell what you just saw to the guys who watched the beating I took, they’ll understand.”

I cleared my throat. I said, “Guntram was good to me. I’d like to give him something back that he’d like.”

I owed Guntram more than I could ever give him back.

“Oh, that’s all?” May said. She laughed. It sounded like the trill of a happy cardinal. “I promise I’ll tell Morseth and Reaves. I’ll even order them to try the couch the next time they’re injured.”

I smiled as I started across the courtyard. I didn’t doubt she would, and I didn’t doubt they would do what she told them to. May was the sort of girl that got men to do things.

“Pal?” she said. She was walking along with me. “Do you know who Guntram is?”

I frowned. “He’s a Maker,” I said. She couldn’t have meant just that, we’d talked about that. “He said he taught Louis, if that’s what you mean. Even in Beune I’ve heard about Louis.”

There were even more people in the park than there had been yesterday when I arrived. It was a beautiful day. I wasn’t looking forward to weeks of the Road’s drab sameness, but that was the only way to get home.

“Guntram is the Leader’s foster father,” May said. “Jon’s.”

I’d been about to step into the passage through to the south side of the castle. I looked at May. “I didn’t know that,” I said. “I….”

I stopped because what I’d thought was that Guntram felt he was a joke, really, to all the younger people who were driving to unify mankind.

 

The Amber Arrow – Snippet 27

The Amber Arrow – Snippet 27

The spring rose from an underground heat source. It steamed and smelled faintly of sulfur. The odor wasn’t strong enough to smell like rotten eggs or farts. In fact, it wasn’t too unpleasant an aroma at all when mixed with the scents of a nearby grassy field and the huge tended garden behind the Apfelwein.

As Wulf walked along, the time-smearing of the dragon-vision began. At first it was smells. The sulfur odor of the spring became the blossom-filled fresh air of a meadow, then a heated-steaming sulfurous smoke surrounded him. He saw the formation of the spring, centuries ago, as a bubble of hot rock-melt from a league below rose to the surface and flowed over the ground.

At the same time, he saw groundwater below the earth collect. It was pushed upward by the heart from below. The spring level rose. At the same moment, he saw the centaurs carving out the natural hot spring further, lining it with smooth stones. The gazebo went up.

Smeared over that, a fire.

The gazebo burning. A dead soldier next to the water, his blood trickling in to mix with the water and flow away.

Then the spring only a dry hole. It had become a gaping maw in a landscape of burned tree trunks and ruin.

Was he seeing the future?

Was this the way it was destined to end?

Wulf didn’t know how to interpret the future parts of his visions. Could he change what would be? Were they set?

Then the spring was just a spring again.

There were stone steps leading down into the pool the spring formed. A stream flowed away. The Apfelwein tapped this water for their hot baths, and for heating the rooms. The centaur hospitality might have made the inn famous, but it was the hot spring that gave it a reason for being there in the first place.

Wulf did not feel any urge to get into the water. That wasn’t what the dragon wanted.

No. Just a connection.

He knew what to do.

He drew his dagger and lay on his stomach by the edge on a stone patio. He dangled his head just over the edge. His arm with the dagger in it extended over the water.

The night air was very chilly, but the stone was warm from the spring, and comfortable. If he hadn’t been buzzing from the dragon-vision, he might easily have fallen asleep here considering the day he’d had.

He dipped the tip of the dagger into the water. It did not go in easily. Instead, the water felt like a thick syrup, almost solid. He had to use both hands and apply pressure to get it further in. Suddenly the water gave way and the dagger went in to the hilt.

And stuck there. Wulf didn’t let go, but he felt that, if he did, the dagger would stand upright in the steaming water.

Then the vision kicked in and he spread through his land.

It wasn’t that he went here and there, even instantly. No, he was everywhere at once. He experienced all things about the land in one grand vision.

But it was a dream. Because the dragon was an unborn baby. An embryo waiting to hatch in an egg that was the world. The dragon was sleeping, becoming what it would be, gathering its thoughts over thousands and thousands of years.

There was only one tiny point of consciousness in all the dragon’s vast mind. This was Wulf himself. He wouldn’t be able to remember even a small portion of what he experienced, be aware of it all, of the people, all the people. The rivers and streams. Every fallen leaf. Every flitting sparrow.

But he would remember the dream of the land. He would remember how the story of the world told itself day and night, never stopping. In the eastern marches, where Sandhaven and the mark met, villagers in their houses, their cottages, their barns, their shepherd camps, sleeping, getting ready for the day of labor ahead of them tomorrow.

Some up already.

Here a goatherd looking for a lost kid, following its bleating into a thicket, cutting through thorns to get it free before wolves or something worse came to take it.

There a sentry in a border post watching the dark plains of Sandhaven, ready to light a signal fire if soldiers came, if the mark was going to be invaded again.

And in the west, Barangath, the centaur village that Ahorn came from. The astronomers working till dawn, observing stars. Trying to look through the starlight and gain knowledge of the Never and Forever beyond the veil of night.

And down in the valley, buffalo people tending their herds.

Farther south, to fields of tobacco and cotton stubble. It was past harvest, and he could feel the earth itself sighing, resting, the cover crops of clover and barley holding the soil as the chopped remains of summer decayed to compost and a new life in the spring.

And he was at the Apfelwein also, feeling the tired muscles of his soldiers. The nervousness of the horses in the barns and corrals, the quiet resolve of the donkeys staked out in a pasture to do absolutely nothing more–or less–than they had to.

Further south, he neared the edges of the dragon’s dream. The deep and ancient forest of the Greensmoke Mountains. Secret caves beneath them that no man or Tier had ever seen, or probably ever would.

Up through the capillaries of water, though the roots of trees.

Surfacing to find–

Something running through those woods.

Moving north. Moving desperately.

Someone.

Someone who didn’t belong.

Someone being chased from the land beyond the dragon’s awareness.

Headed toward Tjark.

This person had a dark cloud behind him. Roiling, boiling, behind him.

It’s the cloud that’s chasing that . . . whoever it is, Wulf thought. His contemplation of this fact was only a tiny moment, a small piece of a melody, in the vibrating, resonating sleeping mind of the Dragon of Shenandoah. But it was that small piece of consciousness, that one awake mind, that the dragon built on to make sense of its dream.

This was why the dragon called. This was the reason for the dragon vision.

The dragon needed him. As a fire needs a spark.

The running person was getting closer. Toward Shenandoah. Toward Wulf.

Then Wulf was a young man sticking a dagger into sulfurous hot water. He pulled his hands, and the dagger, out. He rolled over on his back, catching his breath. He gazed up into the muscadine vine covering the edges of the roof. A few clumps of wild grapes still clung to the vegetation.

There wasn’t any doubt that the vision was true. Something, or someone, was seeking him.

“Blood and bones,” Wulf said in rough whisper to himself. “How am I going to get Saeunn to Eounnbard now?”

“You’re not,” answered a faint, familiar voice from nearby.

Wulf sat up quickly, gazed around.

Saeunn Amberstone was a half pace from him. She stood in the light of the half-moon. She wore only her white linen sleeping shift. A faint breeze lifted it slightly and wafted the fabric about her legs. Her feet were bare. The dark stone on the chain around her neck caught the wan light from above and shone with a faint purple glow.

She sat down beside him. “I’ve missed the moonlight.”

“You should be inside,” Wulf said.

“I’ve been inside long enough,” Saeunn replied. “I don’t have much time, and I want to spend it under the stars.”

“We’re going to get you to help.” Wulf caught himself fiddling with his dagger. He carefully slid it back under his belt.

“I’m beyond help now, my love.”

“Don’t say that,” Wulf replied. There was anguish in his voice. “We can save you. We will.”

Saeunn shook her head. She leaned toward him and gently kissed him.

“Saeunn, I will not give up, I will not–”

She put a finger over his lips. “This might be our last night together, my love. Let’s make it count.”

Wulf sat silent and gazed at her for a long time. Enough moonlight made it under the shelter to illuminate her hair, and the glowing stone put sparkle in her blue-gray eyes.

She was beguiling. Everything he wanted. Everything he had ever wanted for as long as he could remember.

Wulf brushed a wisp of hair from her cheek. He ran his hand under her blonde locks and touched her neck. Saeunn smiled. He pulled her gently toward him.

“All right,” he said.

He kissed her, hard and for a long time. She returned the kiss hungrily. Finally Saeunn turned her head and whispered in Wulf’s ear.

“I did love being a star,” she said. “But I love being a woman, too.”

They kissed again, lying down together on the warm stone beside the spring.

“And you,” she said. “And you.”

 

 

Princess Holy Aura – Chapter 05

Princess Holy Aura – Chapter 05

Chapter 5.

The silver burst from his body and he became the light, flying outward, making a universe of argent and white touched with rainbows, a whirling cyclone of light that chimed and rang and sang a song of triumph and rebirth. Steve felt a body reforming, electric warmth like a hot shower on a cold, cold day curling around and defining every line, every curve that was coalescing from pure light, tingling like a brush of lightest snow on the finest day. He seemed both within and without, part of the body yet outside of it, a slender form a fraction of the prior size, contours smooth and oddly familiar while being strange, almost alien, and he felt a distant spurt of fear.

But elation and triumph pushed fear back, drowned it out with the sound of trumpets and drums as she spun about —

She?

Steve realized that the thought had felt natural, yet at the same time clashed with the deepest reflexes of his mind. He! That’s how I . . . How Stephen Russ . . .

But I’m not Stephen Russ. Not now. Not exactly.

Now the terror of uncertainty — of his own identity being changed, being different and unknown — burst fully in on her. Yet the ecstasy and certainty of the transformation could not be denied or cast aside, and even in her confusion, Steve knew that what he was becoming was necessary, that lives hung in the balance, and he seized that horror, that numbing dread, and shoved it away, into the very farthest reaches of her mind. This must be. This I have accepted. There will be a price . . . but one to be paid later.

She threw her arms out, feeling the light blazing across her body, forming into the raiment that she knew must appear, both in the ancient echoes of knowledge from eons past and in the memories of images Stephen Russ had seen many times. Delicate armored gloves nearly to the elbow, glittering white and silver and pearl shimmering into existence as crystal and metal and cloth, shoulder-guards and sparkling boots and a chiming-crystal skirt of diamond-bright gems edged with mystic metal, woven from the purity of magic as she spun through the perfect pearlescent void — or it spun about her.

Now the light drew in, revealing the world beyond, concentrating to twin arcs of light the brightness of the sun and the essence of hope, arcs that bound themselves around her brows with a flash of pain, flame and ice and lightning forming into a glittering coronet.

It was then that she (he? a tiny voice within asked, hopelessly) realized the dhole was speaking, in a voice lower than anything human, words shaking the ground.

“Seeking, seeking, smell the light . . . consume the light . . . tell us where!” The thing reared up, looming above terrified shoppers, some trapped in wreckage. “Surface-crawlers, water-life, nothings, anakh gryll oman’nanql b’harni Azathoth!” As it finished the last incomprehensible alien phrase, it began to descend, and screams began to rise.

The screams awakened Steve and what he had become to full awareness and acceptance of this impossible reality. “STOP!“

The shout echoed across the lot, a whipcrack of imperative brilliance, and the immense rock-worm halted, curled swiftly around.

Even as it did, he/she felt her mouth open, the hand extend. Oh my God, I even have to follow through with the hackneyed introduction?

At the same time, she spoke. “I am the one you seek, monster! Mystic Galaxy Defender, Apocalypse Maiden the First, Princess Holy Aura, reborn as sword and shield, weapon and wielder, mistress of souls and stars!”

Steve, trying desperately to hold onto a sense of himself, focused on the words. I am not going to have a catchphrase that ends like “in the name of the stars, I will give you a spanking!” I will be Princess Holy Aura — I AM Princess Holy Aura — but on my terms! I accept you — now you accept me!

With that thought Steve found himself fully aware of a body that was not his, but hers, but belonged as much to Steve as ever his own had, and the words of Holy Aura belonged to Steve as well. “You have threatened innocents and brought fear to this world,” she continued, “and for that, this Apocalypse Maiden says that you” — the extended hand pointed, and then turned to a fist with the thumb outthrust, turning until it pointed to the ground — “are going down!”

The dhole bellowed its challenge and charged with a speed that belied its immense bulk.

Holy crap, what the hell am I doing?

She saw the monster bearing down on her like a runaway freight train and desperately leapt aside —

To find herself sailing effortlessly through the air, a jump thirty, forty feet high and twice that in length, evading the clumsy charge with ridiculous ease. Another charge, another leap, and her heart began to slow its pounding just a hair. It really can’t keep up with me! And me . . . I’m jumping like Spider-Man on speed!

The realization that she wasn’t helpless — that this thing was wrecking real estate but unable to reach her — finally allowed Princess Holy Aura to accept that she could act. And also to become aware of a distant, clear voice:

“Princess! Holy Aura! You must stop it swiftly, before it thinks to call to its brethren!”

Stop it? Even if her strength was equal to her jumping ability, she wasn’t sure her hand would survive punching the thing. But . . . I’m a mahou shoujo now, so I should have a weapon . . .

The thought triggered the certainty, and once more the pure silver light shone out, this time between her hands. What will it be? A wand? A bow? Please don’t let it be some kind of Frisbee or anything.

A long shaft, glittering as argent as the light, grew from pure luminance and extended out, one end a huge blade, the other a massive ball, the entire thing almost twice Holy Aura’s height, and she felt a broad, savage grin spreading across her newfound face. A broad-bladed naginata, a bisento! A weapon I actually know how to use! Despite its great size, the bladed spear felt light as a dagger in her hands, and she spun it around, creating a shining circle of dazzling reflections before her.

“That . . . is rather different,” Silvertail’s quiet voice said. “But no matter! You will need to invoke the –”

She wasn’t listening. Seeing the destruction that the monster had caused, and realizing that there were people injured — people who might die if this thing wasn’t stopped fast — raised the fury and outrage to its peak again. “Here, monster — try this!”

She leapt once more, but this time toward the dhole, drawing the great weapon back as she did. It lunged to meet her, but she rose above it, then descended, bringing the massive blade down with every ounce of strength she had and a shouted battlecry. “Ginhikari no Bisento!”

The concussion blew out the remaining windows around the mall lot. The Silverlight Bisento sundered the dhole’s head, shattering stone skin, splintering and crushing the mighty grinding jaws, driving the monster’s body downward with the same irresistible, absolute force of an avalanche, hammering the multiton creature’s body into the pavement with a shockwave of power, bowing the surface of the parking lot into a crater eighty feet and more across. The worm-thing gave one tremendous, shuddering convulsion and collapsed.

For a moment, all was silent; Holy Aura landed atop the stony corpse of her fallen foe and gazed out, shellshocked at the abrupt beginning and end, as people rose from the ground, began to stare at her and point, murmurs of shock and disbelief turning to gratitude.

Then she heard sirens approaching fast. Instinctively she gave a smile and a bow to the assembled people, then leapt away, bounding to the roof of DIY Home and sprinting across it.

As she ran, Steve felt the confusion returning, and a new panic. What happened there? I was doing that . . . but I wasn’t! I didn’t think about half of that! I just . . . did it! I didn’t make up most of that speech! And . . . who am I? I’m a . . . a man, but I’m thinking I’m not! I’m Holy Aura! I’m Stephen Russ! I was shouting an attack I never knew! What . . . and I haven’t even . . . how . . .

Thoughts beginning to unravel, the girl in glittering, implausible armor ran faster, streaking through the air, trying to outrun the one thing she could never escape: herself.