Scattered Suns (56 page)

Chapter 119—IMPERATOR RUSA’H

The once-bright thism was unraveling all around him. The soul-threads that Rusa’h had seen so clearly and held so tightly now slipped like razor wires through his fingers. How could the corrupt Mage-Imperator be so strong?

The pain of this was greater than sliced skin and imagined blood loss. All the nialia fields had been obliterated, and there would be no more shiing. Although his fortified citadel palace was still crowded with loyal guards, lens kithmen, pleasure mates, attenders, and doctors, the Mage-Imperator’s men pushed closer, working their way through the defenses. Rusa’h had never dreamed his brother would be willing to kill.

Two of the septars from his commandeered Solar Navy maniple also remained at Rusa’h’s side as military advisers. Even their tactical expertise could not offer him a way to escape, much less achieve victory. The news was desperate.

From the open citadel, Rusa’h watched Thor’h and his battleships go on a rampage, but most of the warliners had slipped away and turned against him. With insidious powers, the Mage-Imperator had seized control of them, disengaging the crews from
him
and tangling them in the old perverted web of soul-threads. And more were falling every moment. Jora’h seemed convinced that he would win.

During the course of this rebellion, his brother had underestimated him, and now it seemed Rusa’h had made the same mistake. The Mage-Imperator’s control of the
thism,
though twisted, was powerful...too powerful.

How could the false leader control so much, if his understanding was warped, if he had gone completely astray? Why did the Lightsource not give Rusa’h, the true Imperator, a crushing retaliation to prove the validity of his claims?

“The forces of our enemy are strong,” one of his pleasure mates said, sidling against him, though her eyes and her body language were edgy and sharp. “Is there no way the Lightsource can aid us?”

From his ornate chrysalis chair, Rusa’h turned to the open sky, so that his retinas burned with Hyrillka’s blue-white primary sun. During his sub-
thism
sleep, he had seen the answers so clearly. He had walked in a realm of absolute purity; he had followed the soul-threads and knew their true pattern. His head injury had liberated him, enlightened him.

Rusa’h clenched his hands on the arms of the chair and stared into the dazzling light, seeking an answer, but he saw no clear paths anymore. He was sure that he had not been deluded. The
thism
threads were fading; he could not understand what the Lightsource wanted him to do now. The sun itself seemed to call him, showing him a way to protect himself. He must flee these slaves of a once-glorious Empire that was now based on lies.

One of his septars stood before him delivering a report. “Our citadel palace is entirely besieged, Imperator. All but Prime Designate Thor’h’s lead warliner and two others have been recaptured by the enemy.”

The other septar said, “We still have numerous loyal soldiers willing to throw down their lives before they allow the false Mage-Imperator through.”

Rusa’h pursed his lips. “Unfortunately, Jora’h has the soldiers and the weapons to break through whenever he chooses—if he is willing to accept casualties.” His pleasure mates stood close, caressing him, as he weighed the possibilities. “Will my brother make such a sacrifice?”

“Ildirans do not kill Ildirans,” said the first septar. “He will never attack us directly.”

Rusa’h narrowed his eyes. He had made that assumption before, and he had been wrong. “No. He will hesitate, but he will do it.” Rusa’h nodded. “Jora’h has already broken with many of our traditions. Look at him now at the bottom of the hill. He stands with his sacred feet on the ground like a common servant. Back at the Prism Palace, his own daughter, a
noble-born
female, is his personal guard. Since we have justifiably killed Ildirans, my brother will concoct a similar justification to do the same to us.”

“Either way,” said the second septar, “we have
lost,
Imperator. Hyrillka will fall. We do not have the personnel, the weapons, or the warliners to maintain our hold. We cannot get reinforcements from the other worlds that have joined our rebellion.”

Rusa’h listened to the military preparations outside, the sounds made by his own defenders and Jora’h’s far more numerous Solar Navy troops. Overhead, nearly four hundred warliners cruised and converged. Thor’h had only three ships left to stand against them.

Rusa’h could do nothing to salvage his crusade.

He drew a deep breath. “Let me speak with the Prime Designate. I have final instructions for him.”

Thor’h was barely maintaining control over his three warliners, while all of the other vessels continued to wear down the former Prime Designate. The Adar could have destroyed the rampaging rebel ship at any time, but for some reason Zan’nh held back. Jora’h had probably issued orders for them to capture Thor’h alive.

Perhaps Rusa’h would have enough time...

“Prime Designate, I had meant for you to be my successor to the true Lightsource, but we have failed,” the Imperator said over the private channel. “You have always been an honorable companion. You aided me even before I received my revelation, and you believed me when I saw the true path. Now, when all looks darkest, remember that I saw the truth. I alone have the correct guidance. We are not blind. I will never stop trying to achieve our holy goals.”

On the screen, Thor’h looked deeply troubled. “I still have three ships, Liege. I have no need of superior weaponry if I have superior resolve. What do you require me to do?”

“At this moment, your corrupt father is marching his regiments up the hill toward my citadel palace.” The Imperator gave a confident nod. “However, you and your warliners can give me the chance I need.”

Thor’h seemed too choked up to bid his uncle farewell. He gruffly acknowledged the orders and signed off.

Rusa’h commanded his fanatically loyal pleasure mates and the two septars: “Prepare to depart. My engineers have arranged a fully fueled escape ship in the rear courtyard. A small group will accompany me in my escape.” He stared at the blazing sun again. “We will go directly to the Lightsource.”

Chapter 120—MAGE-IMPERATOR JORA’H

The Solar Navy soldiers tightened their cordon around the citadel palace. Ground troops moved forward, closing all escape routes on the paths that led to the mad Designate’s stronghold. Surrounded by guards, the Mage-Imperator led the way to assured victory. While Jora’h struggled to seize their minds and free them from delusion, the rebels opened fire. His soldiers had no choice but to shoot back to defend their leader.

Though most of the rebellious warliners had restored their loyalty to the Mage-Imperator, the lead warliner piloted by Thor’h and his two flanking battleships swung around in a wild, suicidal attack. The three rebel warliners drove forward, firing their remaining weaponry in a blazing staccato.

Two of Jora’h’s damaged defender ships reeled away, limping toward cleared landing areas. At the point of the wedge, Thor’h’s warliner careened toward the Mage-Imperator and the siege troops working their way up to the citadel palace.

Adar Zan’nh’s clustered warliners tried to block the rebel ship’s advance, but as soon as they closed in, the other two rebel vessels split away from the Prime Designate and threw themselves in the way. In a horrendous explosion, the two rebel warliners took out the nearest Solar Navy ships in a suicidal impact that left a black scar of smoke and wreckage dripping out of the sky.

The deafening boom and shockwave stunned the armies on the ground. Jora’h shaded his eyes, feeling the sting of tears and the wrench of sorrow as so many Ildirans died.

The two rebel warliners had sacrificed themselves just to let Thor’h fly safely to his target.
His father.

The lead warliner ripped through the smoke, plunging downward as if the Prime Designate meant to crash into the side of the hill where Jora’h stood. Zan’nh’s flagship roared after him, firing repeatedly at the other ship’s engines. At the last moment, Thor’h pulled up and leveled off, so that he could dump his last barrage of explosives. Then the stolen warliner opened fire on the ground troops, mowing down dozens of Ildiran soldiers.

Explosions ripped along the sloping path up the strategic hill. Guards threw themselves upon Jora’h to protect their leader from injury. The Dobro Designate quickly found cover for himself. Air support swooped in, providing protection, but a swath of soldiers fell, like stalks of grain under the scythe of the Prime Designate’s strafing run. Thor’h held nothing back, depleting all weapons systems in his final attack.

From the ground, Jora’h watched the battle play out. Following hot behind Thor’h, Zan’nh drove his own warliner forward, as if to be just as reckless as his rebellious brother. The howl of enormous engines sounded even more deafening than the successive explosions of detonating artillery. The pair of warliners circled and approached each other like two asteroids about to collide. Zan’nh didn’t seem to care if he rammed his brother out of the sky.

Thor’h dragged his ship aside at the last moment, and the two giant ornate vessels only caromed off each other, barely striking and sliding along each other’s hulls, then separating. Armor plating smashed against armor plating with a titanic clang, followed by the shriek of scraping metal. Heedless of the damage to his warliner, Thor’h succeeded in swinging around and heading back to complete his attack.

Udru’h shouted, “Liege, tell the Adar to destroy that ship now! There is no saving Thor’h.” Even without any remaining weapons, Thor’h could plow his warliner into the hill and obliterate the Mage-Imperator.

Jora’h picked himself off the ground. Shading his eyes as the shadow fell over him, he stood to face the oncoming vessel. “Not...yet.” He clamped his teeth together and squeezed his eyes shut. With all his mental strength, he sent out a shout through the
thism,
an absolute command. He concentrated utterly on extending his mental grasp, focusing on the minds of Thor’h’s command crew, a few at first, then all of them. One at a time, he seized their thoughts and wrenched them back to the overall
thism,
as he had done with the other vessels. He sensed their souls, herded them back into the fold.

He reached for Thor’h, his own son, working to wrest him from his criminal rebellion. But Thor’h blocked him off, sliding away from his father’s mental touch. Jora’h was astonished. He had been unaware that the Prime Designate had such power or resolve. Reeling, he grasped the other Ildirans.

Suddenly, aboard the last rebellious battleship, the crewmen, now reconnected to the primary
thism,
understood the crimes they were about to commit. Jora’h felt as if he could see through their eyes, though his own son remained a blank to him. In the command nucleus, the warliner’s crew frantically changed course. At the last moment, the lone warliner pulled up and roared overhead, nearly scraping the roof of the citadel palace.

The newly freed crew then turned against Thor’h in his own command nucleus. Surrounding the former Prime Designate, they seized him as he howled and thrashed with frustration.

While the Solar Navy had focused on stopping Thor’h’s wild suicidal run, Imperator Rusa’h had used the diversion to make his escape. Unexpectedly, a single royal escort craft shot upward from the courtyard, ascending under intense acceleration like a projectile fired from heavy-caliber artillery.

The soldiers surrounding the citadel shouted. The Dobro Designate, always suspicious, grabbed a nearby soldier’s comm device and barked into the general channel, “Zan’nh! That is Rusa’h. He is going to escape.”

“No,” the Adar transmitted. “He will not.”

Jora’h’s Ildiran soldiers finally rushed the rest of the way up the hill. Sweeping into the citadel palace, they captured it from the last rebel holdouts, those most strongly corrupted by Rusa’h, tangled and strangling in the heretical
thism
. Even though the Hyrillka Designate had fled, his brainwashed followers continued to fight against the Mage-Imperator, many of them to the death. Jora’h’s soldiers were sickened at what they were forced to do to achieve victory.

The Mage-Imperator glanced up at Zan’nh’s warliners in their pursuit of the royal escort ship. Now if only Rusa’h could be stopped...

Chapter 121—ADAR ZAN’NH

Increase acceleration!” Zan’nh stood on his command platform, issuing orders. “Intercept that vessel before it reaches orbit.” The navigator shook his head. “Impossible, Adar. His acceleration is too great. We will not be able to catch him.”

“Continue pursuit. How far can he go with that escort shuttle?”

“Those engines appear to have been modified, Adar. The thrust is already much higher than expected.” The man shook his head. “But he does not have the capability of leaving the Hyrillka system.”

“Where does he intend to go?” Zan’nh wondered. “Follow him!”

From the main command group at the citadel palace, the Mage-Imperator sent a message. “Take the Designate into custody if you can, Adar...but do what you must to ensure that he does not escape. Rusa’h has caused too much damage already, and we must end this.”

The Adar’s flagship continued to build up speed in pursuit. The heavy warliner’s momentum increased slowly, but his engines were superior to the equipment on the small royal shuttle. The Hyrillka Designate was nearly burning out his propulsion system in a crazed but pointless flight. Zan’nh continued to transmit warnings, demanding the Designate’s surrender, but Rusa’h defied him.

In space around them, the closely packed stars of the Horizon Cluster glittered as if someone had hurled a handful of gemstones into the black emptiness. Hyrillka’s orange secondary star shone high above the other planets while the large blue-white primary burned like a flare at the center of the solar system.

“The Designate corrupted all of you, forced you to turn against your Mage-Imperator.” Zan’nh looked fiercely at his own crew. “He is responsible for immeasurable turmoil and bloodshed. We must stop him before he escapes to continue his heresy and rebellion.”

Soon, the mad Designate’s intention became apparent. His objective was not escape at all.

Flying his ship at impossible speed toward the center of the Hyrillka system and the bright primary star, Rusa’h sent a last message to the pursuing flagship. Instead of sounding desperate and fearful, the Designate seemed almost triumphant.

“I will return with these last faithful followers to where all illumination is pure and intense. We will become one with the Lightsource. Unbelievers like you would find it intolerable—but we will be saved.”

“He is flying directly into the sun. Open fire and damage his engines. We have to stop him.”

The warliner’s gunners took several careful shots, but as Rusa’h flew closer to the star’s hot corona, sensors and aiming systems became unreliable. One shot caused minor damage to the royal shuttle’s propulsion systems, but the Hyrillka Designate flew onward. Another shot caused significant damage to the engines, but by now it was far too late. The escape shuttle had been caught in the quicksand of stellar gravity. It fell toward the photosphere, where plumes and flares roiled upward and plasma oceans bubbled in turbulent cells.

Zan’nh could barely keep his balance as the flagship rocked in the magnetic storms. Static flared across the viewscreen. Sparks showered from several control panels in the command nucleus.

“We need to pull back, Adar,” said the navigator. “The Designate’s ship is already lost, and if we suffer more damage to our own engines, we won’t be able to pull away.”

“He is not worth it, Adar,” the weapons officer insisted. “He is already lost.”

Zan’nh stared at the heavily filtered image on the screen. Rusa’h’s vessel was no more than a small glinting flare as it tumbled into the sun. The Adar finally nodded. “Pull us back. I will not allow my uncle to cause any more deaths—certainly not ours.” Straining, the warliner backed away.

In a final transmission that roared with background static, the Hyrillka Designate cried out, “Behold! The Lightsource has not abandoned us!”

To Zan’nh’s surprise, something happened in the gaseous layers of Hyrillka’s primary sun. Flares looped up for thousands of kilometers, like open archways following magnetic field lines. The churning convection cells of the roiling star cleared for a moment, like clouds parting.

To his amazement, Zan’nh saw incredible structures, like a
city
on the surface of the sun—spheres and domes and pyramids that contained molten incandescent material too bright to look at. Rising through the ionized clouds was a cluster of fiery ellipsoids, vessels shaped out of sheets of flame and controlled thermal energy.

“The faeros!” His voice was filled with awe. “That sun has a faeros city in it.”

Fireball ships rose up to shelter the Hyrillka Designate’s craft moments before it would have burned up. Rusa’h sent a final transmission. “Behold the light, so bright and pure!”

While the flagship warliner lumbered out to a safe distance at the edge of the corona, the fiery entities surrounded Rusa’h’s ship and then returned to their incandescent plasma sea. In spite of the viewscreen filters, Zan’nh’s eyes watered from the intensity of the light, and he could discern nothing more as the faeros fireballs vanished into the depths of Hyrillka’s sun.

Shaken and subdued, his officers snapped off reports. “Most primary systems are back online, Adar. We are effecting repairs to our damaged systems. We can make it safely back to Hyrillka.”

Zan’nh stared for a long moment at the blue-white sun where the mad Designate had vanished, then nodded. “Yes. Take us back to the Mage-Imperator. This revolt is over now.”