Noma crept into the pit that her people had disabled during the rescue. She entered the chamber and destroyed all of the sleep tubes, and the moment she felt something move under her feet, she ran.
She was out of the temple with the priests lodged in her tendrils as she made for a safe distance. She dropped them on the walls of the city and kept running, stopping to turn only when she had a place to hide.
The rumbling increased, and she watched the temple exploded as the ship headed for space.
“You should not have come alone.” Urad landed next to her.
“Sorry. Will you help me blow it up?”
He grinned and stood so they could be shoulder to shoulder. Their hands lifted and the blast was blinding in the contrast between light and dark.
The ship exploded and fell to earth in a forest near the city.
“Should we go and get it?” Urad asked.
She shook her head. “They need to see it.”
“Then, should we return to the city? You have a course on dexterity and manipulation of social norms to teach. By the way, our house is almost ready.”
She smiled. “Good. I hate leaving you at the door, and I am not going into the pit for nookie no matter how hard you beg.”
“I can wait. We can wait. The shapers have worked very hard on this, and they want it to be perfect.”
He lifted her in his arms and they flew off on tendrils of light.
She liked it when he held her. It made up for the nights they had to spend alone.
With the explosion of the ship, she had engaged in her final move. She had rung the dinner bell.
Their population had doubled and classes were divided by talent types with the teachers being the masters of their own abilities who could explain it to others. Robes abounded.
Talents were regularly walking up to the wall and waiting for someone to come and recruit them. A few normal folk came in search of friends or relatives, and visits were encouraged with a visitor’s centre being set up over the months between the blast and what came next.
Noma watched the first star fall with a sense of anticipation. Urad was standing behind her, and they watched the first Vorwing ship descend toward the city where the shuttle had been destroyed.
“You knew they would come.”
“I suspected it. They got the notice that their supply was being cut off. They are going to have to come and do it for themselves now. We need to prepare.”
“They will attack us?”
She turned in his embrace, looping her arms around his neck. “No. They will filter through the cities, looking for talents. The citizens will come for help.”
“How do you know that?”
“It is part of the mythos of the Citadel. They confined the talents and the talents were asked for help when they were under attack.”
“You really know all this?”
“I was taught from childhood that this is what the Citadel was, that I could not go to it in my own world but that was the only rule. No one said I couldn’t start it.” She nuzzled his cheek.
“Isn’t it cruel to let the citizens be attacked?”
She winced. “Yes and no. I would love to have the recruiters swarm the area and defend them, but they are still afraid of talents, and to offer the help without being asked would devalue our ability and our very lives. Powers were the dregs here, something to be hidden. They have to ask us to come out and help, or they will never acknowledge how important this part of their population is.”
“It seems cruel.”
“As does handing your children over to be thrown into a pit. We both are familiar with that phenomena. Not all are good, not all are evil, but they need to act in unison to call for help.”
He exhaled and pressed his forehead to her shoulder. “It is difficult.”
“I know. Have the communicators send your family a warning. Have everyone with family send a warning. The Vorwings are going to check all the shuttles, and they won’t like what they find.”
Each underground shuttle had one unbroken tube and the rest had been ripped to pieces. If the Vorwings wanted talents of Skora-Mark, they were going to have to find them and the Citadel was ready to face whatever came.
They just had to wait until the fight came to them.
Three days later, their community at large was concerned. They were now six hundred strong and voices needed to be heard.
She stood at the podium and listened to the concerns of the citizens of the Citadel.
“I understand your concern for your families and friends, but if they come to us for help, we will give it, for a price. If they did not want to fight on your behalf, we will make them pay to have us fight on theirs.
“Warnings have been sent to your loved ones, and we now have to wait.”
One of the front watchers waved their arms. Noma climbed across the crowd to the inner wall. “What is it?”
He pointed toward the distance. “Two groups of citizens, riding fast with no weaponry.”
To her surprise, they were coming from two directions. She smiled and patted his shoulder. “Get the greeters ready and buckle up.”
He winked and she returned to the podium.
“We have just been alerted to two approaching groups, from different directions. They have had to face their gods for the first time, and they might not like what they saw. Anyone who is prepared to fight, report to Rybril and stand by. Everyone else, prepare to pull extra duty on food prep and clothing production. This will not be forever, but it will last for a few weeks. We have been through a lot together and created a community. Remember that. Now, all to your stations, classes will resume the moment there is a master with a day off.”
Urad smiled, and they headed for the front gates by the expediency of walking over the crops and livestock. The cattle didn’t even flinch anymore when the light and shadow touched down next to them.
“This is the moment you were waiting for.” Urad murmured it for her ears only.
“This is just the beginning, but yes, it has to happen. The Citadel needs to become a business and not just a collection of refugees.”
“In case I haven’t mentioned it, thank you, Noma. Your efforts to move us forward are truly mind boggling.”
Noma smiled and took his hand. “Normally, you only thank me when we are in bed and all sweaty, so I will take it. You are welcome.”
As the folk approached from either side, she caught a glimpse of someone in the shadows. She had seen the woman several times over the last few months, and the red hair and starry eyes were distinctive.
She didn’t mind being watched, but there was something that Skiria had told her about the Watchers. They had a link to the Vorwings that went beyond just being creepy. They bore watching.
She stood with Urad by the guard post and waited for the incoming citizens to herald the next phase of the Citadel’s evolution. It didn’t take long.
With Urad, Noma was able to blast the ships that carried the invaders. Precision allowed them to target strategic points that just kept the ship from taking off so that they could rescue any talents frozen inside.
City by city, they attacked the invaders, gaining minerals and wood for the Citadel as well as trading contracts.
It was only when a huge vessel took up position over the Citadel that she met her first Vorwing.
The commander of the vessel flew down to meet with the heads of the Citadel.
In the open plain outside of the Citadel, Noma waited with Urad and watched the lavender man descend.
He smiled and inclined his head. “I am Captain Temross. I would like to engage in a treaty with you. I would like to exchange technology for some of your personnel.”
Noma felt the hair on the back of her neck rise. “Unacceptable. We are free born, free talents and free to blast you out of the sky.”
“You would defy your gods?”
Urad chuckled. “You are not gods. You are aliens who prey on less technically advanced species by using superstition and paranoia. We have gained that knowledge and shared it. You will not find gullible citizens here any longer.”
Temross sighed. “Then, I will take the citizens of the Citadel.”
“You will not.”
Temross flicked his hand forward and a ball of seething dark energy struck Noma in the chest, sending her stumbling backward.
Urad caught her and held her as the Vorwing took to the skies, returning to his ship.
* * * *
Urad watched as Noma fought for air; the dark energy was in her chest and moving across her skin.
A woman rushed to his side and placed his hands over the energy. “Let in the light. Burn out the infection.”
He did as she said, watching as Noma’s pain eased and the light began to glow under her skin. “It is working.”
“You are causing the ancient energy to retreat. It will not hold forever, and eventually, she will be encompassed by the power of a dead universe, but that is in the distant future. I will come at that time and take her to the next phase of her life.”
“You are saying she will die.”
“I am saying that the moment that energy hit her, she was already dead. You can keep that infection at bay, and she will remain active as long as you do.”
“So, when I die, she dies?”
“She will move on, yes.”
Noma opened her eyes. “I don’t want to be without him.”
The woman frowned but quirked one side of her mouth up. “You would take him with you into eternity?”
Urad looked down at his wife. “I would follow her wherever she went.”
The woman grinned. “Good. With the mingling of power you have engaged in, the infection will soon spread to you. Her darkness will support you as your light supports her.”
In his arms, Noma asked, “When were you going to tell him?”
“Before I left. I will be checking in from time to time.” She smiled as if her words were amusing. “For now, the ship is getting ready to attack.”
Urad tried to hold his wife down, but she got up and stood shoulder to shoulder with him. “Aim for the engines, sweetie.”
The ship was moving into position over the Citadel, and it spun violently to the side as spiralling light and darkness struck it. They pushed it over into the edge of the mountains and their power surged evenly through them, welling from the ground and out through their hands.
They smiled when the ship started smoking, and a moment later, it fought to gain altitude.
Urad caught Noma in his arms when she collapsed. “I am fine, just a little tired.”
He looked around for the woman, but she had disappeared. “Do you know what she was?”
Noma smiled and patted his cheek as he elevated them and walked back into the Citadel. Her smile was soft and had hope. It gave him the boost he needed to get her to the healers.
* * * *
Noma sat up in bed and watched Urad come in from the bathroom, towelling his hair dry. He was still beautiful after two hundred years of working with her. That took stamina.
“You are as pretty as the day I met you.” She smiled and drew her knees up, putting her chin on them.
“And you grow more lovely with each passing day. Now, what is wrong?”
She smiled and reached out for him. “I think I am almost at the end of my stamina.”
He sat next to her and pulled her into his arms. “I know. I can feel it. What will happen next?”
She looked up into his eyes, and a black night’s sky slowly spiralled outward from his inner self.
He smiled down at her and smiled, “There are stars in your eyes.”
She laughed and pressed her lips to his. “There always are when I look at you.”
A woman appeared next to their bed, and she smiled, “I see you have both relaxed into your situation.”
Urad smiled and kissed Noma’s hand. “As long as we go together.”
“Then, come with me and I will take you home for basic training. There has been much discussion of your situation, and you will be allowed to return here to the moment you left. Your lives are here in this world, and as long as Skora-Mark remains separate from other worlds, you will be allowed to continue your work.”
Noma got to her feet, put on her robes and held onto Urad, “We can go now. I need to get back before too much time passes.”
The woman smiled. “That will not be a problem.”
Months went by in the pocket universe and only a few moments had gone by on Skora-Mark.
Noma went about her business and explained the ocular change by saying she and Urad had been infected by the Vorwings years earlier.
This current generation of talents was restless and highly trained. They needed to do more than protect Skora-Mark.
Envix—Urad’s great-great nephew—was desperate for new worlds to explore and new places to be. His one journey in the experimental ship housing Skiria’s consciousness had left him wrapped in a dark nebula that had bonded to his abnormal strength and ability for flight. He didn’t resent the power that he had, but it did make it hard to find a woman.
“I want to go somewhere again, Auntie. I need to be off this world and doing something.”
Noma smiled and looked closely at him. He was finally the right age. “You know, you remind me of a portrait my sister drew once. If you want to be part of a world that is in turmoil, needs protection and needs a calm head, I have just the place for you.”
“Your sister? She looks like you?”
“She is blonde, blue eyed and needs someone to protect her. She has just become the Avatar to a world that is under siege.”
“Isn’t that a little weird?”
“You are not my great-great nephew by blood. I don’t have any descendants. My sister is the only one of my bloodline. Resicor offered you to her when we were children. I am thinking that it is time to send you over to deliver on that promise.”
He blinked. “You said that you were from six hundred years in the future.”
“I am, and now, I can put you in the moment when I left my world and my sister was in her most vulnerable moments.”
“You are serious?”
She waggled her eyebrows. “Of course I am. Now, are you interested in the thought of joining a world at war to rescue a woman whose light shines in the darkness and whose good nature makes her put her own self at risk to save others. She needs help.”