Eternity's Mind (11 page)

As the threatening voidpriests came for her and Collin, the chittering Onthos swarmed into the fronds overhead. They stared down, no longer pretending to be innocuous survivors to elicit sympathy. These creatures were evil. The voidpriests were even worse. Kennebar wanted to kill Arita, and they intended to
absorb
Collin.

That sickened her—and made her angry. She looked within herself, cast about for any sort of strength, any unexpected hope.

Collin had sent his mind into the heartwood of the silent worldtrees; he had communed with them, demanded answers, and upon emerging, he seemed inspired by what he had learned. “I know what you are now!” he shouted to the voidpriests as he pulled Arita close. He glared up at the Onthos. “The trees told me.”

Kennebar and his dark companions were undeterred. They reached toward their trapped victims, and Arita and Collin pressed back against the trunk of the huge tree behind them. “The worldtrees are not dead,” Collin said. “They are aware of you!”

“The trees are weak,” said Kennebar.

Then Arita felt the whispers stir in her mind again with a wordless urgency. Something
else
was awakening in the cosmos, something that sensed the danger of the growing shadows. Arita didn't understand it, but she reached out for it nevertheless.

She had despaired of ever knowing what it was like to be a green priest, to share thoughts with a mind so vast. But the trees had altered her, left her open for something more. It seemed impossible, but she realized that the inner voice also belonged to some grand sentience, different from the verdani. It was beyond the faeros, wentals, and hydrogues. Arita was connected to it, could commune with it the same way Collin connected with the trees.

As the voidpriests reached out to kill them, coronas of blackness shimmered from their hands. Arita felt Collin grab her like a safety net. “The trees know me,” he rasped. “They remember me … and they have to remember themselves!”

Collin dug deep and touched the slumbering worldforest, while Arita called on that other presence. And the power of her plea joined with his, magnifying it, building, reverberating until it woke the trees at last, forcing the verdani to defend themselves.

Arita felt dizzy as the inner sounds became a roar in her ears. Her vision expanded, and she could see through the clustered trees, their thick fronds interlocked in a canopy that now began to stir. Leaves thrashed about, and vines twisted up from the forest floor.

Startled by the unexpected response, the alien Onthos skittered away, some scrambling higher into the fronds while others dashed across the branches.

Kennebar and his voidpriests froze as if in disbelief.

Collin shouted out to the verdani. “Save us! Save the forest.”

The other voice inside Arita also thrummed out wordlessly, offering defenses against the spreading stain of the destructive shadow.

Alive, the thrashing fronds hurled dozens of fleeing Gardeners into the air, dashing them against the branches. Newly wakened vines and branches reached out to catch the Onthos and squeeze them like huge fists.

Fronds whipped about with the sound of a great windstorm. Branches wrapped around Kennebar, engulfing him. The voidpriest leader struggled with his ebony arms, soulless eyes wide on his blank, shadowed face. The other tainted priests made no sound as they struggled.

Arita felt as if her mind would burst from the surge of energy using her as a conduit. Collin's eyes were squeezed shut, his lips drawn back. He groaned at the strain of the impossible effort.

The trees shuddered with a last gasp of their own energy. Gold bark scales flaked away, and the tree trunks split open with a resounding crack. Gaps in the heartwood spread wider, yawning like dark and dangerous mouths in the thick trunks. The frond tentacles that held the struggling voidpriests scooped them into the gaps. Thrashing, the dark priests fell into the wooden maws of the angry trees, which swallowed them like predators devouring prey.

It took only seconds, but one by one, all of the tainted voidpriests were swept into the yawning gaps, and the openings snapped shut again with a loud crack.

Arita gasped, and Collin still clung to her. They collapsed, shaking, onto the tangled platform high in the trees where the isolationist priests had made their home. Arita didn't understand what she had just experienced, but now she dared to hope they might survive after all. The trees around them thrummed, shaking as if in great pain.

Collin rose to his knees. He touched the worldtree trunk again, as if for reassurance. The wood shuddered. The conjoined trunks that had swallowed the voidpriests now rumbled and spasmed. Alarmed, he grabbed Arita's hand. “Come on, it's not over yet. We're not safe!”

Where the heartwood mouths had snapped shut, a black stain began to spread as if from a fatal dose of poison. More golden bark scales fell off, tinkling down and leaving the wood blotchy, like the skin of a leprous lizard.

“The trees are dying,” Collin cried. “We have to climb down.”

They scrambled to the fronds and began to drop from one branch to another. The broad fanlike fronds fell off as if being ejected by the worldtrees. Arita and Collin were still high above the ground, and she felt the trees rocking. Loud shattering sounds echoed through the air as parts of the contaminated trunks broke apart in the spreading blackness. Consuming the voidpriests was killing the trees from the heartwood out.

“We've got to make it to the forest floor!” Collin yelled. “These trees sacrificed themselves, but they'll help us for as long as they can.”

Taking risks, they jumped down to lower branches, clutching fronds and barely catching themselves in time. Arita had spent much of her youth climbing among the trees, and she remembered those skills now. As a green priest, Collin was in tune with the worldforest, even though the verdani mind was stunned and writhing now.

High above, heavy boughs cracked and broke off, tumbling down to smash through the thickets of dying fronds.

“Faster!” Arita risked a glance upward and saw that the tree trunk, branches, and fronds had all turned black, like pure coal, and the stain was spreading as fast as they could flee. With cracking and crumbling sounds above, more shards of the burned-out worldtree fell all around them.

She and Collin both let go of the last branch, fell the rest of the way to the ground, and tumbled into the underbrush.

“Run!” Collin said.

They bolted away from the thick trunk. The poisoned trees turned dark and each collapsed into a mound of razor-edged crystal shards like fossilized obsidian.

The shards cut their skin, but Arita and Collin got far enough away to check each other for injuries. They were both shocked, but safe now. Arita held him, and they stared at the black scars of shattered worldtree wood.

“Did we kill them?” Collin asked. “Did we cause all that destruction?”

“The trees were dying already,” Arita said. “And we would be dead, if we hadn't summoned help. The best thing we can do now is get home and bring the rest of the green priests back here to fight the Onthos.”

 

CHAPTER

16

ZHETT KELLUM

The smoke from the departing faeros dissipated in the bright Ildiran sky, and Zhett Kellum shook her head. “A Shana Rei shadow cloud, a robot attack fleet, and a swarm of giant fireballs all in the space of a week. And I thought running a distillery would be a boring career.”

Patrick Fitzpatrick slid his arms around her waist. “Don't forget the hydrogues and the shadows that destroyed our skymine on Golgen. That's why we had to go to Kuivahr in the first place.”

“You two brought bad luck with you, by damn,” said Del Kellum. With his barrel chest and potbelly, he was clearly the stockiest man among the Ildiran crowds in the Foray Plaza.

“I prefer to call it ‘circumstances beyond our control,' Dad,” Zhett said.

Her son Kristof and baby Rex were also with them. Toff, who had no sense of personal danger, was grinning up at where the faeros had vanished. He shaded his eyes against the dazzling Ildiran sunlight, but the fireballs were long gone. “That was the most amazing thing I've ever seen!”

Zhett raised her eyebrows. “You have a high bar.”

“Let's hope the sight lasts you a while, boy,” Del said. “We can't afford too many similar adventures.”

“We can't afford adventures … or anything else,” Patrick said. “We lost our skymine on Golgen, we lost the distillery on Kuivahr, and it's not likely we're going to set up new operations any time soon. Who would finance us?”

Del puffed up his chest. “By the Guiding Star, I'm a former Speaker of the Roamer clans! I can find credit. Someone will fund us.”

Patrick frowned. “Nobody with any sense, once they look at our string of bad luck.”

Zhett interjected, “Not bad luck. Circumstances beyond our control.”

Thankfully, most of their distillery crew had escaped the shadows and black robots, fleeing in time, though her heart felt heavy to know that their operations manager, Marius Denva, had not gotten away. He was the last to leave the distillery, for reasons that had made sense to him, but which certainly seemed stupid to her in retrospect. He hadn't made it out before the black shell swallowed the planet. Even those ships that did make it to orbit had a difficult time evading the black robots. Fortunately, the Solar Navy had rounded up Zhett and her family, along with Osira'h and Prince Reynald.

Nearby, Reynald looked weak and sickly, but he kept himself steady. His face was drawn with concern rather than pain as he stared up at the towers of the Prism Palace. He muttered, “Please be all right up there, Osira'h.”

Before long, the Mage-Imperator emerged from the arch accompanied by Osira'h, Gale'nh, and Muree'n. All of them looked scorched, their faces red, their hair singed, their clothes crisped. A resounding cheer broke out among the Ildirans, and Zhett found herself grinning.

“I am now convinced the faeros understand the danger of the Shana Rei,” the Mage-Imperator announced. “Whether they will help us as they did in ages past … I cannot be certain.”

“They will help us,” Osira'h said, strengthening the crowd with her crystal-clear determination.

Reyn rushed to her. “You're safe!” He embraced her, looking rejuvenated, and she winced with pain from her burns.

“I do not think any place is safe until we defeat the Shana Rei,” she said. She took Reynald's hand, addressing her father. “I brought Reyn to Kuivahr so that Tamo'l's research could help him. We still have the viable kelp extracts, but it is not enough. He needs to be back home in the worldforest.”

Nira nodded. “The worldforest will share its health and give him strength. I certainly understand that.”

“I need your strength even more, Osira'h,” Reyn said. “Will you come with me?”

“Of course.” She did not even look at her parents for confirmation.

“Let's not be left out of the party,” Zhett said to Patrick, urging her family forward. Seeing no point in being shy, she spoke to the Mage-Imperator. “If an Ildiran ship is heading back to the Confederation, could we tag along?”

Mage-Imperator Jora'h looked at the Prince, but his gaze took in the Kellums as well. “We will see that you are returned to your own people.”

“We can't pay for passage, though,” Del grumbled. “We lost everything when the Shana Rei wrecked Kuivahr.”

Jora'h gave a dismissive wave. Zhett knew that economics meant little to the Ildirans. “You helped rescue Osira'h. We will deliver you wherever you wish to go.”

Zhett didn't have to consult the others. “Newstation is where we'll most likely find the help we need.”

“And where we'll find the rest of our distillery workers,” Del said.

“We don't have any money to pay them,” Patrick pointed out.

Zhett said, “I'd rather be penniless at Newstation than anywhere else.”

 

CHAPTER

17

GARRISON REEVES

Working in operations at Fireheart Station, Garrison couldn't help but stare at the ominous void in space. The black opening was a stark blot in the nebula sea.

As a Roamer, Garrison had wanted to be part of the Big Ring project, a part of history. He had accomplished what he set out to do. Kotto Okiah had done something spectacular, no question about it, but Garrison wasn't sure that the dimensional wound would lead to a new transgate network, as intended. The thing just seemed … dangerous.

Though not a superstitious man, Garrison didn't want to go near that void. None of the Roamers did. At the Iswander extraction fields, he had already seen a Shana Rei shadow cloud: a roiling black nebula emerging from its own doorway in space. This new hole in the universe reminded him too much of that experience. Once was enough.

Kotto would keep studying how safe—or unsafe—the vicinity was, but Garrison didn't want to take any chances. He took it upon himself to deploy danger buoys along a very conservative perimeter. Roamers often made up their own minds, getting cocky and feeling immortal. His perimeter buoys wouldn't prevent any determined pilot from flying too close, but he felt better just for having laid down a warning.

Station Chief Alu rallied his workers and set an ambitious production schedule to bring the complex back to profitability. Many of Fireheart's facilities, laboratories, and packaging habitats had taken a backseat to the Big Ring project, and now it was time to catch up. Alu appointed him a new team leader with increased responsibilities—although Garrison never promised he would stay.

Fireheart Station was like a wonderland for a Roamer, a facility for scrubbing isotopes, developing ionic catalysts, and cooking exotic raw materials in the extreme environment. But Garrison wasn't sure this was where his Guiding Star led him. His thoughts turned more and more often to Orli.…