Heir of Shandara (Book 4) (31 page)

Aaron’s eyes widened. “Are you infected right now?”

“Yes,” Bayen whispered.

The others in the room shifted their stance. They had all fought the Forsaken in the battle and knew the stakes.

“It’s contained,” Bayen said.

“How?”

“With this,” Bayen said, holding up the bracer that housed the AI.

Aaron looked at Tanneth. “Are are you able to detect anything in his system?”

Tanneth shook his head.

“He can’t. Passive scans won’t work. I will need to grant you access,” Bayen said.

“Please do so,” Aaron said.

“Sam,” Bayen said, “please allow passive scans and reporting from the Nanites in my system.”

“Sir, I’m unable to comply with this request,” the AI replied.

Bayen frowned and looked up uncertainly at the others. “I’m giving you a command. Why can’t you comply?”

“You don’t have the necessary privileges to allow me to grant the request,” Sam replied.

Aaron’s lips curved into a smile.

“What is it?” Verona asked.

“It seems as if our young friend here doesn’t know all there is to know,” Aaron said. “Sam, would you accept such a command from me?”

“Affirmative, granting limited access to requested data now,” the AI replied.

Bayen looked at him, understanding registering in his eyes.

“How did you know?” Tanneth asked.

“Earlier the system said it was designed by me. Perhaps some information is restricted,” Aaron said.

“If you accept that, then do you accept the rest of Bayen’s story as well?” Verona asked.

“I’m not sure. This could be an elaborate script the AI was tasked to follow,” Aaron replied.

“I had no idea you were this slow to trust,” Verona said.

“It’s not a matter of trust. The AI, while lifelike and intuitive as it is, is still a machine bound by specific protocols for which it was specifically designed. We’ve witnessed the effects of that,” Aaron said.

Verona nodded. “The Drake.”

“Exactly,” Aaron said, and turned to Tanneth. “Do you think we can remove the bracer?”

Tanneth tore his eyes from his readout. “No. It’s just as he says. The bracer is more than a comms device. It’s also managing his Nanite protocols to contain the infection. If we remove the bracer, then those will fail.”

Aaron frowned and leveled his gaze at Bayen. “And expose us all to the virus.” After a few moments of silence, he continued. “Why help with the infiltrators? You gave us a way to stop them.”

“I was trying to prevent the outbreak of the virus,” Bayen said.

“I understand that. Why did you try to hide the fact that you were helping us? They’ve used the process you’ve sent in Khamearra and Lorric. It saved a lot of lives,” Aaron said.

Bayen held up his bound hands. “This was one reason.”

Despite himself, Aaron chuckled and then said, “You blame me for things that I haven’t done yet.”

Bayen’s gaze immediately hardened. “For as bad as the battle at Rexel was, it gets much worse. My life was stolen from me. I wanted to fight alongside the others. Die if that was my fate. But you took that away from me.”

Aaron took a breath and glanced at the ceiling, collecting his thoughts. “Maybe it was for your protection. Or perhaps having lost everyone else, he needed something kept safe for the future.” As Aaron said the last, he thought of his grandfather leaving Safanar behind to keep his mother safe.

Bayen’s eyes locked with his own, and for a moment the anger was replaced with something else that Aaron had scarcely thought he would see from the youth. Understanding and acknowledgement. Aaron knew because he had to endure similar trials when his grandfather, Reymius, died. It was a hard burden to bear, and if Bayen was indeed his son, then not protecting him from this burden was one of Aaron’s failures as a father. There was one way he could confirm who Bayen was. It involved the bladesong and tapping into the energy. Aaron wasn’t sure what he was more afraid of: if Bayen was telling the truth or if it was all a lie.

Tanneth gasped and exclaimed something that Aaron didn’t understand. “Since you instructed the AI to allow us access, I’ve been scanning it for information. What I’ve found are the keys to the Zekara’s military apparatus. We can use this to level the playing field. Tap into their communications and perhaps turn the tide of this war.”

“We’ll need to test it, but with the Zekara listening to our communications, let’s hold off from informing the others at this time,” Aaron said.

“I’ll come up with some small things we can try without alerting the Zekara,” Tanneth said, and moved over to the corner of the room.

Verona pressed his lips together in thought and looked at Bayen. “You seem as surprised as Tanneth by this discovery.”

“I didn’t know any of that was in there,” Bayen said.

The door opened, and a sailor poked his head in. “Admiral Morgan requests that Aaron and Verona join him at their earliest convenience.”

“We’ll be up in a few minutes,” Aaron said.

Verona left the room, but Aaron stayed behind for a moment. “Untie him,” Aaron said. It was a gesture of good faith and one that wasn’t lost upon Bayen.

The soldier removed the bindings around Bayen’s wrists. Bayen rubbed the circulation back into his hands and looked up at Aaron.

“Can you work with Tanneth to see what else the AI has been hiding?” Aaron asked.

Bayen said he would, and Aaron left the room.

In the hallway, Verona waited for him.

“Well, that was a leap of faith, my friend.”

Aaron nodded. “Tanneth is pretty smart and will be studying Bayen as closely as he is studying that AI of his,” Aaron said.

“I still sense some hesitation,” Verona said.

Aaron sighed. “It’s a lot to take in. Either we have to trust everything that Bayen is telling us, or we can’t trust any of it. There is no middle ground for this. It puts us in a rather precarious position for the next battle. Don’t you think?”

“Agreed,” Verona said.

Truthfully, Aaron was a bit relieved that Morgan summoned them. He wanted to get away from Bayen and everything he represented. This war had reached across worlds to pull him into this fight, whether it was the High King or actions stemming from General Halcylon. Now, someone or something was reaching across time to help avert disaster on an unimaginable scale. But a nefarious force could just as easily be leading them to certain doom. It was enough to give anyone pause. He needed a little bit of time to get his bearings, to center himself, and make the best decisions he could with the information available. It was how a leader should behave, but he worried it wouldn’t be enough. Bayen’s presence was testament that in the very near future Aaron’s best wasn’t enough and all of Safanar would pay the price for his failure.
 

C
HAPTER
24

RETURN

The great towers of Shandara stretched toward the sky. Some were in a state of repair with scaffolding built around them. Approaching by airship allowed Aaron to appreciate all of the changes to the immense city and the green and lush land surrounding it. From this distance, the city walls appeared smooth and white, glistening in the sunlight. The Alenzar’seth family sigil alternating with a massive tree adorned the city walls. When they had first come to Shandara, it had been little more than a graveyard, dark and forbidding. Now it was growing into a city reborn. The breaches in the walls had all been repaired with the only evidence of their existence firmly in Aaron’s memory. Airships dotted the sky above the city and the surrounding area. A Hythariam flyer rose into the air and sped north, heading to Hathenwood. The De’anjard manned the walls and the towers between them. Many wore golden armor found in the weapons caches hidden throughout the city. Though the armor appeared golden, it was not made out of the soft metal. The armor was stronger and lighter than steel. According to Braden, they were as effective as the Hythariam light-armored shirts. There was no lack of volunteers to join the De’anjard, stemming from descendants of the original guard to those coming from the Free Nations Army. Braden had been adamant that the De’anjard needed to be reborn to protect Shandara as a separate entity from the FNA. Aaron saw his point, and he couldn’t see standing in the way of the honored tradition of the Shields of Shandara’s rightful place. Aaron let his preference be known that he wanted only men and women of integrity to be part of the De’anjard, but it was Braden who pointed out that sometimes the people you want fighting at your side could be a bit rough around the edges.
 

Aaron had only spent a handful of weeks in Shandara and hardly any of that time at the palace. The time he had spent there had been in the encampment or the command center, familiarizing himself with the city’s defenses. It seemed that many of the systems required a member of the Alenzar’seth line to activate and grant access. Iranus had told him that his great-grandfather, Daverim, was fiercely protective of Shandara. The Hythariam had some redundancies put in place, but they never had the opportunity to try any of them out. When Shandara fell, the Hythariam looked for other ways to prepare against the threat of the Zekara. Aaron wasn’t convinced that alienating themselves, by way of restricting all Hythariam to Hathenwood, was the best course of action they could have taken. Even if it was put to a vote. He wasn’t shy about letting Iranus know his thoughts. Granted, living under the threat of the High King and his Elitesmen was no inconsequential thing. Still, Aaron hoped they would make better decisions in the future.

As the
Raven
flew over the city, there was a section set aside to bring the rubbled remains of the old so it could be fashioned into something new. Significant progress had been made restoring the city, and the Hythariam had some ingenious ways of dealing with the large fissures that snaked their way through parts of the city. But it was the old members of the Safanarion Order that were able to repair the damage. While the Elitesmen had been primarily an order that focused upon martial skills, the Safanarion Order was comprised of many different focuses. Not all of the Order were warriors. Many had chosen to focus their efforts in a capacity for which they were suited. Promoting such a diverse pursuit of knowledge spurred innovation and was one reason the Hythariam had aligned themselves with the Shandarians.
 

Tanneth came on deck with Bayen following him. Four FNA soldiers trailed in their wake. Bayen’s mouth hung open as he took in the sight of Shandara. He caught Aaron watching him.

“Shandara was destroyed when I was young,” Bayen said.
 

His skin was ashen, and there were signs of strain showing around his eyes. The clone of Aaron that Halcylon had used had deteriorated rapidly, which was one of the ways Roselyn had known that the clone was an imposter. Bayen’s state could be the result of a rushed cloning process rather than the temporal matrix coming out of alignment. Aaron had sent a sample of Bayen’s blood to Roselyn a short time ago for her to test. One way or the other, he would know if Bayen was a clone or not.

The
Raven
descended into the courtyard of the White Rose. The palace had been home to the Alenzar’seths for generations and dwarfed the palace at Rexel. The sheer size rivaled the palace in Khamearra, but the architecture was radically different. Aaron saw the Hythariam influence in various parts that held technological advances that were beyond anything else on Safanar. Verona occasionally commented that the palace now belonged to him, and Aaron supposed he was right, but it didn’t feel like home. Aaron found the whole place intimidating.

The gangplank automatically extended to the ground, where a large company of De’anjard waited to welcome him home. They lined a path and stood with rigid attention. At their head was Braden, who carried his Warden’s hammer. His armor did little to hide the bulging muscles underneath. His dirty-blond hair was tied back with a black leather cord.

Admiral Morgan barked an order, and the sailors and FNA soldiers alike formed ranks along the deck. As one, they saluted with fists across their hearts. With his head held high and his shoulders back, Aaron returned the salute and walked down the gangplank. As his feet touched the ground, Braden shouted a command, and the palace grounds thundered with armored fists striking armored chests as the De’anjard saluted the Heir of Shandara.