Shadow Hunters (28 page)

Adun.

Jake felt a shiver run down his spine.
Zamara … you said you showed me these things for a reason. Adun’s story—it was to show that the protoss are really one people, and that their split was due to fear and ignorance.

Yes. I am taking you to Shakuras, the world that the dark templar settled after they were expelled from Aiur so callously. You needed to understand the division, and the attempt to heal it.

No, more than that. Don’t you see? We can fight this dark archon after all! We can do what the dark templar did!

He thought of the psionic storms unleashed by the dark templar, the raging, out-of-control energies that had whirled across Aiur’s surface so long ago, attracted by mental energy and destroying everything in their wake.

Jacob—the powers the dark templar wielded are not known to traditional protoss. Those Who Endure are not dark templar.

What about the Forged? The Sundrop—sure it was used to keep the Tal’darim docile, but it also cut them off from the Khala, remember? It changed their personalities. Altered them. What if—what if that was what Ulrezaj was going for? What if he was actively manipulating them to make them of better use to him in those experiments? Preparing them somehow?

… Such a thing had not occurred to me. I will converse with Alzadar. If he will let me probe his mind…

Jake waited, fidgeting. A few seconds later Zamara was again in his thoughts.

Your theory is correct. Alzadar’s brain chemistry has been altered—permanently or not, we do not know. I also spoke with some of the others who are still actively addicted to the Sundrop. Their chemistry is even more greatly altered.

He fanned their hatred and fear of the dark templar … and all the time he was trying to turn the Forged into them,
Jake said.

So it would seem. But they are untrained and undisciplined, and the psionic storms that so devastated Aiur in Adun’s time were uncontrolled.

Maybe—the storms would go right to that thing out there?
Jake asked.
Directed or not?

Yes. Yes, it could work—but there is one more thing you need to know if you are to teach the Forged and Those Who Endure to do such a thing.

We don’t have time!

We do. We must.

And before he fully understood what was happening, Zamara was unfolding yet another memory in his
mind while she and Rosemary worked desperately to repair the warp gate.

It was wrong. Jake knew it, Adun knew it, the templar knew it. And yet wrong as it was, it was still better than watching dark templar corpses stiffening in the green light filtered through the canopy. At least the dark templar were still alive to be exiled.

Anger and a great sense of hurt rolled off the assembled Conclave in waves. Mixed with it was a partial sense of satisfaction and relief—at least the heretics would no longer endanger the protoss people with their refusal to link with the Khala. Jake watched grimly as dozens—hundreds—of the banished protoss moved slowly up the ramp of the curving, luminous vessel that was the last ship left behind when the Wanderers from Afar departed this world. It had taken the protoss centuries to even get inside the xel’naga ship, and it still held mysteries. The ship had been the template for much protoss technology, and it was a testament to how strongly the Conclave believed they were right that they would surrender such a prize in order to be rid of the dark templar.

Raszagal was boarding now. She lifted her robes so as not to stumble, her head held high, as always. He saw her pride, even now, although as she was not and would never be in the Khala, he could not feel it.

Raszagal, I am so sorry,
Jake sent, for her and her alone.

She turned to regard him.
Do not be. You did what you could. This, we know.

And then—

“Adun! We expressly forbade you to attend!”

Jake felt his friend’s thoughts, as calm as those of Kortanul were agitated. Adun mounted the platform on which the Conclave members stood and sketched a brief bow. “I know, Judicator. And yet again, I respectfully disobey. These people trusted me. It is my duty to see them off safely.”

“Duty! What does a templar who deliberately deceives the Conclave know of duty? You pollute the word!”

The little line of refugees had come to a halt. Every one of the dark templar was looking at Kortanul and Adun. Tension was in their bodies and their eyes. The templar guards began to move forward, and Jake sent a thought to halt them.

“Please move aside, Kortanul,” Adun said gently. “I ask to escort them onto the ship, and to see them safely launched. Nothing more.”

“You ask too much!” Jake could hardly believe it, but the judicator, a full head shorter and much less powerful than Adun, actually shoved the high templar off the platform. Adun executed a graceful turn as he fell, landing smoothly. An uproar went up from the other Conclave at Kortanul’s actions and their thoughts washed over Jake. Whatever Adun had done, painful and wrong as it was, the Conclave knew he believed it to be right, just as the Conclave believed their decree of banishment to be right. Lost in his outrage, Kortanul had gone too far for even the Conclave.

“Touch him not!” Raszagal’s youthful broadcast thoughts slammed into Jake. She was stronger than even he had thought, and he had not thought he underestimated her. “He
has shown nothing but the best of what we can achieve! He—”

Kortanul, twisted with zealotry so violent that the rest of the Conclave recoiled from it, whirled on Raszagal. Jake saw the girl stumble and fall to her knees. At the same moment, pain from several of the Conclave washed through him as the more adept dark templar responded. Jake sent the order to fall back and protect Adun and the Conclave. As his templar guards fell back, the Conclave members, now convinced that their own lives as well as the protoss as a race were in danger, began to attack. Jake saw several dark templar fall and he saw the panic begin to spread through them. Their untrained mental powers were no match for the combined might of the Conclave. But they were still a very real danger. If in their defense, one or more lost control again, it would surely create a psionic storm.

Adun said nothing, merely rushed forward, arms spread out, head thrown back, eyes closed. A radiant blue glow emanated from his wrists, and then moved to encase his entire body. Such Jake had seen before; such, he had even done. But what happened next—

The glow expanded like smoke, moving forward to encompass the now-panicky line of dark templar who, until the outbreak of violence, had been walking toward the ship. Now they were running full out, and the cloud of blue settled down upon them and embraced them.

What was he doing? How was he doing it? Jake tentatively inclined his thoughts to Adun’s and was sent reeling backward. Not from an overt attack, but from the very
power—and the very unfamiliarity—of what his friend was somehow managing to do.

Jake sensed the energies that were familiar to him through centuries of focusing his powerful mind. And there was something else, something strange—familiar yet completely alien to him.

“Both … he’s using both types of energies—the familiar energy of the templar and the … shadow-stuff of the dark templar!”

“Precisely.”

“But—if a protoss had already used the dark templar energy—why is it so feared and shunned and—”

“Watch.”

Recovering, Jake could only stare at his friend in awe. What was Adun managing to do? What kind of breakthrough in psionic power had he just achieved?

The dark templar were seemingly as confused as anyone, but they understood protection, and they moved forward into the vessel. When the last ones had nearly made it through—a party of elderly protoss and small children—the curving, graceful doors of the ancient xel’naga vessel began to close.

Adun stood, back arched, hands up to the sky, eyes now open. He was swathed entirely in the radiant blue cloud, and as Jake watched, Adun’s armor, too, began to glow.

And his hands … and his face—

Blue light everywhere, glorious, intense, too much to behold. Jake had to look away but he could not bear to,
could only stare in stunned disbelief and wonder as Adun himself glowed like a star in the night sky, bright, magnificently bright; but stars that burned so brightly always—

“—burn themselves out,” Jake breathed.

Bright, too bright; Jake squinted, but he saw what happened. Saw, and for the rest of his life wondered at it. Tried to understand it, and failed.

Adun’s form glowed as brightly, as truly, as a star falling to the ground, transient in its glory, but breathtaking. For a moment, the light came from him, but as Jake watched, it began to consume the executor. Before Jake’s horrified gaze his friend began to disintegrate. And a moment later, he was gone.

A mental cry of shock and anguish went up among the assembled templar and Conclave. And although Jake did not feel it, he knew that the dark templar were stunned and confused and in pain as well. The blue glow that had taken Adun with it when it departed was gone, and after a few moments, some of the appalled Conclave channeled their grief toward the beings that, Jake realized, they believed had caused his death.

“Go!” he shouted to the dark templar. “Hurry!”

They snapped out of their paralysis and the last few ducked quickly through the door before further harm could befall them. The door closed right before the first rush of angry Conclave had made it up the ramp, at once sealing the exiles safely away from the anger of their former brethren and entombing them. Their destiny lay in the hands of the gods now.

Nothing was left of Adun’s body. Jake reached into the Khala, frantically searching for his old friend, trying to fathom what had happened. For the first time, there was no trace of Adun’s bright and shining spirit in the Khala. He was—gone. Utterly, inexplicably gone, and already the stories were beginning to grow around him, mere moments after his—death? Ascension? What in the world could they even call it?

Jake bowed his head, even as the ship lifted off, bearing the dark templar away from the only home they had ever had and into the face of the unknown. Taking with them, Jake suspected, the truth and the true greatness of what Adun had done.

“Adun, my friend … will this world ever see your like again?”

The grief Jake felt was not entirely that of Vetraas or the long-ago Conclave. Much of it was his own. Adun had not made the choices he had easily or lightly; he had struggled with his conscience and done the best he could to save innocent lives, going against a code of forthrightness in order to attempt to teach others how to integrate into society without compromising their beliefs.

Jake understood now why Zamara had shown him this. He was limited in his thinking. He’d thought that merely by having the protoss conjure up the storms that had once devastated their world—because every one of them had more experience than the dark templar—all would be well. But bearing witness to
Adun’s final act of heroism had put that idea in context. Not only had Adun tried to bring together traditional and dark protoss by teaching the dark protoss how to use their psionic abilities, at the very last, he had understood that both types of power were necessary. Both types of
protoss.

The storms alone weren’t enough.

There was no time for planning, or first attempts. They would have to succeed the first time or fail spectacularly, both Forged and Those Who Endure, human and protoss and preserver together. The only thing they had going for them right now was the fact that neither Valerian nor Ethan wanted them dead. They would have to defeat Ulrezaj, or at the very least drive him back enough so that everyone could safely escape.

I cannot guide this. My attention is needed here—I am close to awakening the gate to Shakuras. And your mind—cannot handle another experience with the Khala without my guidance.

They will have to do it themselves,
Jake sent back.
They are protoss.

He sent the thought to the protoss, complete with the memories of Adun and Vetraas. The entire exchange took a heartbeat. He felt their stunned awe, their anger at the deception, but now was not the time to react. Now was the time to do what Adun had done—embrace the two types of protoss psionic powers, the wild and the regimented, the dark and the light.

The Forged, with the exception of Alzadar, were still suffering from the dampening effects of the Sundrop. They could not enter the Khala. They could share thoughts, as the dark templar could, but until they had cleansed themselves of the drug they could not share emotions.

But they had also been changed by the Sundrop. They, like the dark templar had done so long ago, potentially could summon storms of devastating power.

Those Who Endure would be their guides, their lifelines, their protectors. They could draw strength and calm and support from one another as they linked to the Forged to shield them from the storms once they were created. They could not individually use both types of power, as Adun had, but as a group, as a united species—

The earth trembled and nearly everyone, zerg and protoss and terran alike, lost their footing. Ulrezaj was nearly upon them and Jake felt wind and electricity stir his hair as the atmospheric effects from Ulrezaj’s outer nimbus reached them. Dark tendrils of shadow began to snake across the ground, and protoss and zerg jumped away to avoid them. Those that did not …

A little time to prepare,
begged both Alzadar and Ladranix, but Jake was implacable.

“There’s no time!” he screamed, reverting to habit in this moment and shouting the words aloud as well as thinking them. “Start figuring it out
now!”

VALERIAN STARED AT THE JUMPY IMAGES THAT were coming in on the view screen. He had patched in feed from six different ships, including the one that carried his ghost. On the screens now was something that looked like—like radiant darkness.