Rift in the Sky (55 page)

 

 

 

 

When Veca appeared beside her, Haxel snapped aloud: “How many?”

The Chosen held up both hands, fingers outstretched. “Syb and I could have handled them.” With barely restrained
frustration.

Enris shook his head. “Not with knives,” he said, remembering Louli's threat. That it involved his blood still made him flinch inwardly, as if he'd betrayed his own. “And not if more keep coming.” And they would. He and Haxel had
shared
with the M'hiray what they'd seen above; he'd added what Aryl had shown him of the homes built one upon the other, the rooftops filled with Humans and other beings. No M'hiray doubted there were even more above.

“He's right.” Haxel turned to the waiting Council.

Enris lost whatever was said, whatever he could see around him, his mind suddenly consumed with
heat
and
need
and something
twisted
and
dark
. . . It was in their Joining. After his Chosen!

The sense of violation was gone as quickly as he'd felt it.
Are you all right? What was that?

The Human.
With
revulsion. He has some kind of Power. He
touched
me.

Enris could hardly breathe for the rage coursing through him.
I'm coming!

But even as he formed the locate . . .
No. Stay. Protect the others.
With reassuring calm.
Naryn and I will handle this.
That, not calm at all.

His hands were fists. Enris made himself relax. Protect the others. She was right.

“You paying attention?” Haxel asked. “Council's agreed.”

“Move everyone back,” he warned. Everyone but those he'd picked for this task: Worin and Fon, Kran and Netta. UnChosen and young. They were nervous, not afraid.
We can do this,
he told them, believing it.

Though he couldn't have explained why.

Once the M'hiray had climbed to the uppermost ledges, Enris and the others positioned themselves on the lowest. “Those first,” he said, pointing to the crates of rattlers. An easy start that rid them of a potential threat.

Power surged from all four. Stacks of crates rose in the air. Disturbed, the creatures made their rattling sound. “Don't drop them,” Enris advised mildly.

Worin made a face, but concentrated.

Stack by stack, the crates were carefully placed across the opening.

“Now.”

He'd
shown
each what to move. Worin and Netta displaced the supports within the opening. Kran and Fon raised a mass of rubble into the air and flung it at the crates. While Enris concentrated, focused . . .

. . . . and
dropped
the wall above.

As the roar subsided, they grinned at one another, faces covered in dust. Cheers broke out from the others. A swell of
pride
and
relief
moved from mind-to-mind. They were safe, Enris thought.

For now.

Haxel jumped down beside him. “Good. The lights still work.”

He squinted at her in disbelief. “You let us do this without being sure?”

“Weth was ready,” with absolute calm. “We've oillights.”

Pebbles tumbled; stone continued to groan into place. He cast an eye over the rest of the wall. Some carvings had lost their faces—if those had been faces. A crack snaked upward from where he'd
tugged
rock out of position. But nothing else appeared ready to fall. Enris ruffled Worin's dusty hair. “Well done. All of you.”

Coughing, Fon frowned. “What's to stop the Humans using Power to remove it?”

“They can't.” Gur had joined them. “Feel the M'hir, unChosen. Do you sense anyone there but us? Of course not. It is ours alone. As for the Humans? Our most Powerful Adepts have
reached
to their limit. Some open minds, none capable of answering. Humans are lesser beings. The feeble Power of a few is no threat.”

Enris?
Quiet. Too quiet.

Beloved.
Enris didn't hide
joy
or
relief.
The
something
loathsome was gone from their link. It had been like a whiff of rotting food . . .

I felt your Power.
Familiar
curiosity.

We locked the door.
Gur claimed Humans were no threat, but he'd
felt
what one had tried to do.
Tell me he's dead. The Human.
To dare touch his Chosen—not only her skin, but her mind. He fought to keep his shields tight.

Peace, Enris.
So much for that effort.
Naryn's dealt with the Human. She's learned what we need to do. Even better,
an underlying
unease
contradicted her words,
we know how to influence his mind.

His blood pounded in his ears.
You mean control. That's what he wanted to do. Make you obey him.
What were Humans, to conceive of such a thing? The enormity of that trespass—

“What's wrong?”

He didn't acknowledge Worin's question. Couldn't.

Why isn't he dead?
Enris asked with what remained of his control.

He'll save the M'hiray. He has no choice.
With a bleakness he'd never
sensed
from her before.
We've left him none.

Enris shut his mind. Closed his eyes. Wished he didn't understand.

But he did.

This was the price of their future.

N
ARYN'S EYES WERE HALF-SHUT, her face beaded with sweat. Her hair, freed of its net—the M'hiray no longer confined their hair—lashed against the mattress. She was conscious. And impatient. “How long will this take?”

Seru didn't laugh, but dimples appeared in her cheeks. “As long as it does.” She busied herself rearranging towels.

Aryl perched on the windowsill and poked the
senglass
with a finger. Still hard. “Nippy outside,” she commented. The transparent stuff responded to its environment as well as the wishes of those inside. As the day warmed, it would open to let through the breezes and whatever smells or sounds Naryn had decided to enjoy. She wasn't fond of florals.

The warming was controlled, too. As befitted an Innersystem world, Stonerim III had civilized weather, thoroughly planned and implemented. Necessary rain was scheduled during sleep cycles, unless other arrangements had been requested. For a fee—there was always a fee—a rousing thunderstorm could be supplied to order, or an evening kept summer warm and dry for an outdoor party.

“No one else is coming.”

Aryl met Seru's troubled look, then hopped off the sill to sit on the end of Naryn's bed. “Who else do you need?” she asked lightly. “You've our Birth Watcher and me. I can call Enris if you like.”

“That big oaf?” Naryn almost smiled. “No, thanks.” She grimaced as another powerful contraction rippled over her abdomen. The sheets were dark purple na-fiber—nothing but the best for the M'hiray—but she'd tossed off her coverings. “Hurry up, will you?”

Don't you listen,
Aryl sent inwardly, her hand on the so-far quiet bulge at her waist. The
presence
within acknowledged this attention with a cheerful
ticklemeticklemeTICKLEME
that she quickly shielded from the other adults, then obliged, fluttering her fingers against a protruding foot. Conversation would come eventually, she supposed, but babies were all about needs and wants.

There should be others here. A birth was attended by the other pregnant Chosen. Should be celebrated by family and friends.

And the father.

Which was the problem. Aryl gazed at Naryn, filled with her own curiosity. No one, not even Naryn, could explain how she'd Commenced and become pregnant without a Joining. At first, they'd assumed she'd somehow survived when her Chosen had failed to make the journey from the Clan Homeworld, or been left behind during the Stratification.

A place and event with names now, the beginnings of M'hiray history, kept with care.

But none of their Healers, not even Sian, with his ability with the mind, could find any trace of a Joining. Worse, they'd found no trace of a mind within the developing child.

No one else was here, because no one, Aryl thought sadly, expected a live birth. The M'hiray respected Naryn too much to be witness to her failure.

Not that Naryn di S'udlaat admitted the possibility.

“Oh,” she said suddenly. “Oh. I think something's going on,” in a strangely calm voice. “Seru?” That, not so calm.

Seru bent over Naryn, ran fingers lightly over the distended skin.

“OH!”

“We'll help you stand. Aryl?”

They eased Naryn to her feet. Her abdomen flexed in and out, each powerful contraction driving air from her lungs. Her hair lifted in a blinding cloud and Aryl batted it away with her free hand, holding her friend tight with the other.

If her hands were busy . . .
Seru, how are we going to catch—

Before she could finish, the birth sac slipped free with a rush of clear liquid, landing on the pillows her more experienced cousin had wisely put in place. Easing Naryn into Aryl's arms, Seru went to her knees to pick up the sac in a towel.

Welcome . . .
The sending died away. “There you are,” her cousin said aloud instead, cradling the sac. She turned her back to them, hair limp to her waist.

“Let me see her.”
Aryl, please!

She slipped an arm under Naryn's shoulder and helped her to where Seru stood before the hammock.

The sac was as black as Seru's hair, flecked with starlike patches of pale, new-grown skin. It steamed in the room air.

It didn't move. It should move.

“Naryn—” Aryl began, her heart thudding in her chest.

“She knew,” Naryn said, the strangest look on her face. She reached a trembling hand to the sac, touched it lightly. “She couldn't come with us. All along, she knew but didn't say a word.”

“Who knew?”

“This wasn't her time.” Naryn staggered, and both Aryl and Seru supported her.

Fingers brushed Aryl's.
Get her back to bed. I'll look after this.

Wait!
She knew what—who—Naryn meant. Didn't she? Someone old but strong, someone . . .

The memory slipped away, no matter how hard Aryl tried to hold it.

“To bed,” Seru insisted. “You're getting cold.”

Naryn didn't move. “The vessel is empty. Look in the M'hir. See for yourself. Please, Aryl!”

The M'hir? Aryl eased into that
other
place, rested in its steady motion, then tried to
see
what Naryn meant.

Their glows—Naryn, her cousin and her baby, the life within her own body—lit the darkness. The glorious pulse of Power that was her Joining to Enris, his comfort
there
if she needed it. Always.

Nothing more.

But something made her keep
looking
, though the M'hir reacted to the effort and became turbulent and distrustful.
Looking, looking
until . . .

Something
looked
back.

Something
interested.

A Watcher. Or more than one. No M'hiray was sure of their number, only that they'd brought with them from the Homeworld a presence—or more than one—that existed in the M'hir and nowhere else.

Benign, declared Council. Guardians of the M'hir. They never spoke, only watched. But this . . . she almost grasped
identity.

Who are you?
Aryl demanded.

And was answered by a mindvoice so different and distant, she wasn't sure it was real.
We are you.

Meaning what?
What do you want?

Not an echo. Not her imagination. She held on as the M'hir crashed against her, held on and poured Power into her sending.
I want the baby to live! Fill the vessel!

A question so ordinary and impossible to answer, it threw Aryl out of the M'hir.

She stared at the sac. “Make her move.”

“Aryl—it's—”

“I'll do it.” Naryn grabbed the sac in both hands.

Seru pulled it away from her and put it down again. “Naryn. Come to bed. I'm sorry, but there's nothing more we can do. Aryl. It's time to remove the husk—”

“She still has a chance to live,” Aryl said bluntly. “The Watchers have to find her. She has to move.”

“What are you—” her cousin stopped, her hair lashing her shoulders. “Stop this, Aryl. You aren't helping.”