The Terran Mandate (14 page)

Priestess

Shoahn'Kra folded a tattered shawl and laid it on top of the rest
of her belongings inside a cloth bag. She patted a swollen cloth bag infused
with the pitch of a cord tree to make it water tight.

Shahn'Dra sat in the middle of their hut with her knees pulled up
to her chest. Her antennae lay still against her head as she peeked over her
hands while her mother packed.

"I still don't see why you have to go."

Shoahn'Kra tied a rope around her satchel and smiled. "You
have more important things to do than look after your tired old mother,
child."

"There is nothing more important."

Shoahn'Kra padded over to her daughter and sat down next to her,
putting her arm around her shoulder. "Don't sulk, child. You have already
shown yourself to be much too old for that."

"I feel alone already."

"You are not. The humans are here now."

"They bring war. Nothing else."

Shoahn'Kra gasped dramatically, hiding her urge to smirk.
"Oh, is that all?  Then why did you call them?"

"I was scared."

Shoahn'Kra turned her daughter's face towards her own. "As
you should be. He has abandoned The Way. He has brought the Dark Winds."
She peered deep into her daughter's eyes, probing past the sadness between
them. "He has embraced Dren'Vil. These are the reasons you have called the
humans."

"I know," Shahn'Dra said, pulling her chin away. She
stared at the wall.

"They will need your help now, Shahn'Dra. And you will need
theirs. Dren'Vil is a curse that all must find a way to conquer."

She stood up and picked up her satchel and water bag.

"Are you not also part of all?" Shahn'Dra asked.

"Indeed I am." Shoahn'Kra watched her daughter while she
adjusted the satchel and walked to the door. "My part is to free you from
the burden of tending me. I am too old for any other purpose. And so I go now.
You understand."

"I do not."

"Yes, you do, my child." She opened the door and started
to step out when Shahn'Dra leapt to her feet and ran to her mother, throwing
her arms around her neck.

"I am not ready."

Shoahn'Kra clasped her hand over her daughter's. "None of us
ever are."

"Where will you go?"

"Where I cannot be seen."

"That is too far." Shahn'Dra began to sob.

"Remember what I have told you. It is never forbidden to
defend yourself. Let the meaning of that make itself known in your mind,
Shahn'Dra." She grasped her daughter's shoulders and held her away so she
could look into her eyes one last time. "Tell me now you know what that
means. Show me I am right. Show me there is hope."

Shahn'Dra rolled her shoulders back and draped her hands at her
side. She unfurled her antennae, letting them stretch out above her head, and
held them perfectly still. "Of course I know what that means. I am the
last priestess of the Pyramid. I am its guardian. I am its keeper."

Shoahn'Kra brushed her daughter's cheek, quivering as she held
back her tears. "Indeed, you are."

Shahn'Dra took her hand. "There is a last time for all
things. I will always miss being your child."

Proposal

Shahn'Dra and Major Walker each sat on a
folding camp stool in front of his command tent. He watched her as she weaved
her hands through the air, reaching out for something that she could not yet
see, but sensed at the edge of her awareness. Walker wiped the sweat from his
brow and flicked the moisture from the tips of his fingers. He grunted as he
massaged his leg and hunched forward to stretch the muscles around his healing
wound.

Shahn'Dra popped her eyes open and her
antennae froze in place. Looking straight ahead, through everything and beyond
the furthest reaches of what her eyes could see, she groped her way out of the
camp stool to kneel in the dirt. Still staring into the distance, she extended
a claw and scratched a rectangle in the ground. Then she drew a circle in the
middle. He finger trembled as she scratched the wiggly sides of a triangle and
then tapped the ground in its center. "This," she whispered, still
staring like a blind woman.

'What does it look like?" Walker
asked.

"It is the color of the sky."
She lifted her finger and touched the inside of the rectangle. "And this
is the color of night," she said.

"Where is it?" Walker asked.

"I'm looking at it," Shahn'Dra
said, still staring straight ahead. "I can see it. There. And far away at
the same time. Hidden inside a hut that rolls through the desert and growls
like a tired animal. Sad." Her voice trailed off.

Walker looked at the diagram with
half-closed eyes, straining to visualize what she was trying to show him.

"This is important," Shahn'Dra
said, tapping the triangle. "What color do you call this?"

"Blue," he said.

"Why not the color of the
sky?" she asked.

"Blue is easier, I guess. Why not
blue?"

She lifted her snout to show a playful
grin. "Things are the color of the sky because they are beneath it. They
are the color of the ground because we walk upon it. They are the color of
trees because we cut into them."

"Green," Walker said. He had
never seen anything green on Shoahn'Tu; not even the plants that grew from the
sparse patches of soil that could nourish them could quite be called green.

"Once the color of the sea,"
she said.

"Hmm." He nodded absently.

"But this," she said, again
tapping the triangle, "is, as you call it, blue. It is not connected. It
was made this way by men with Dren'Vil in their hearts."

"Does it mean anything to
you?"

"Yes." She lowered her snout
and scooted closer to him. "It is the symbol of the Old Scrolls. They are
a key to open the Pyramid." She pulled herself away from the trance and
let her antennae settle back on her head. She looked at Major Walker and asked,
"Do you remember what I showed you?"

"Captain Holt!" Walker yelled.

Inspecting one of the Cats hunkered down
behind the command tent,  Holt yelled back, "Yessir."

"What's the status on the Guard's
Second Brigade?" Walker tried to get up, winced in pain and sat back down,
massaging the wound on his leg.

Walking up to him, Holt said, "Easy
there, boss. Doc says you need to give it another day."

"Second Brigade," Walker grunted.

"Our patrol lost contact, so
nothing new since they left their compound."

"Well, it looks like they might be
headed this way. Check the perimeter sensors, set up an OP and start working up
a fire plan to defend against an attack coming in from somewhere between here
and their compound."

"We don't have a lot to go on,
sir," Holt said.

"Well," Walker grunted,
"tell your patrol to get it in gear. We need to start now. We'll adjust as
necessary when they get closer."

"Aye aye sir." Holt saluted
and then ambled back to the Cat to finish his inspection.

"I know somebody who can
help," Shahn'Dra said.

Walker put up his hand, telling her to
wait as Petty Officer Graham approached for his hourly check on his patient.

Massaging the heal patch wrapped around his
leg, he asked Graham, "Isn't there anything you can do about this
itching?"

"Means it's healing," Graham
said, pulling a portable monitor from his pack. He attached a metal plate to
the heal patch and inserted its wires into the monitor. He tapped a few keys
and tendrils of wire emerged from the plate and dug in to the heal patch.
Studying the monitor, he said, "I told the Major, the more he fusses with
it, the longer it will take to heal."

"Can't you make these moles work
any faster?"

"You're spoiled sir. The moles take
two days. On your own, you'd need six weeks. Now, sir, quit fussing with
it." He jerked the leads from the monitor and the tendrils slipped back
into the plate. He put both in his satchel and pulled out a syringe. He removed
the plastic cap and jabbed the needle into Walker's shoulder.

"Ow!" Walker glared at his
corpsman.

"All that fussing down there -
you've killed off too many moles. Now, you need more."

"Well thanks for the warning."

Graham pulled the needle out of Walker's
shoulder and said, "Think of this next time you feel like fussing with
that leg. hmmm."

"Yeah, alright." Walker rubbed
his shoulder and worked his arm in a circle as Graham walked away. "And
Petty Officer Graham," he called after him.

Graham stopped and turned to face him.
"Yes sir?"

"Next time you come around, I need
to see an R-51 on your shoulder and some mag pouches on your belt."

Graham took a deep breath and nodded.
"Yes sir."

Turning back to Shahn'Dra, Walker said,
"You were saying you knew somebody who could help."

"You know him as Captain
Brandt."

Walker blinked and then tilted his head
towards her. "Dekker's XO?"

"I know him," she said.
"He will hear me."

Walker reached down to massage his leg
and stopped short. He rubbed his shoulder instead. "You can try, but
listen Shahn, you cannot let him find out where I am. Do you understand?"

"He will believe me."

"You can't tell him about this
camp. I know this is difficult for you to understand, so now you must believe
me." He groaned and worked his arm again. "I don't know who to trust
right now. You must keep our secret."

"I will keep your secret. And he
will believe me. And he will help. All of these things are possible."

"I wish I had your
confidence," he said.

Walker thought of the last meeting at
MEF. In his mind's eye, he scanned the faces of everyone sitting at the table,
asking himself a question as he thought of each one:
Can I trust you
? 
More than that, who among them could really do anything?  Major Walker had
found himself moving among shadows and searching out ways to remain unseen even
as he himself was blind to the unfolding events the he knew had been set in
motion - buy why?  Not only did he need somebody he could trust, he needed
somebody who would listen. Who among them understood the uncertainty of the
obvious, the implications of shadows and was still willing to explore the
alternatives?

His mind stopped to study one man's
face. He had been the only one to actually say it, to admit that his
Cataphracts were the only way to make it an even fight. He would be the one man
that was least likely to be in step with whatever forces had decided to attack
him on the very ground he was trying to protect. It was a long shot, but it was
the only one he had. He wouldn't have to reveal much - just an intention. He
wouldn't even have to show himself, would he?  If the man refused, nothing
would really change.

Walker stood up, pressing his hand
against the bandage. "Come with me."

Destiny

Shahn'Dra crouched down behind the
console deck of the jumpjet. Her antennae peeked up over the edge while she
hunkered down, her eyes darting around the interior of the cockpit. Her heart
thumped relentlessly as the craft surged through the sky. The craft bobbed and
swayed from thermals - invisible pockets of warm air boiling up from the desert
floor. She peeked out the side window to see the ground scurrying by far below.
It made her dizzy and gave her a sick feeling inside, so she ducked back into
the cockpit.

Sitting in the pilot's seat next to her,
Major Walker turned a dial on the console between their two seats and punched a
button. She watched him as he spoke, hoping to distract herself from the
reality of moving through the sky.

"Marine Two, Marine Two, Two Bravo
Delta, over."

Static, a sound she recognized from her
own radio, mixed with the shining whisper of the turbines and the sound of air
rushing by outside.

"Marine Two, Marine Two, Two Bravo
Delta, over."

Something whined in the cockpit and then
a voice crackled in the air. "Two Bravo Delta, this is Marine Two, go
ahead."

"Give me Actual," Walker said.

"Stand by."

The sickness inside her had subsided.
Although frightening, there was something about watching the ground rush by
that had intrigued her. She peeked through the side window again. Her pulse
quickened and the sickness came again, but not as much this time as she peered
at the blur of clay and brush whisking by, as if some great hand were spinning
Shoahn'Tu beneath them.

Colonel Harris's voice sounded from the
speaker. "Two Bravo Delta, Marine Two Actual. I'm surprised to hear your
voice, Major."

"Why is that Colonel?"

"You're a wanted man, Major."

"About that - can you tell me
why?"

"Not at this time. You are advised
to RTB immediately."

"We can talk about that later. I
have something more important for you right now."

"I'm listening."

"Advise Enforcer Five package
delivery Crimson Sunshine, coordinates to follow after delivery."

"My turn to ask why. What's this
about, Major?"

"Just deliver the message. Enforcer
Five will verify authenticity. Two Bravo Delta out."

The sound outside changed and the world
slowed down. Shahn'Dra's eyes grew wide and she felt her heart leap as the
ground rose up towards her. She jerked her head around to look at Walker. His
eyes were calm as he pushed a lever down with his left hand and peered through
the small window at his feet. She decided she had seen enough of the outside
and continued to watch Walker until the jumpjet landed and the world grew still
again.

The canopy hissed open and Walker
reached behind his seat to retrieve a cloth bag with a shoulder strap. He
handed it to her and she cradled it in both hands.

"There's water and some root plant,
along with the transmitter. Do you remember what I showed you about the
transmitter?"

Shahn'Dra nodded, still cradling the
bag.

"Is the Priestess of the Pyramid
ready?" he asked, smiling.

Shahn'Dra slung the bag over her
shoulder. Remembering why they had come here, she stood up and swung her foot
to the steps along the side of the fuselage. She eased down one step at a time,
easing her weight onto one foot as it found the ground and then stepped off
with the second. She walked around the front of the aircraft and looked up at
Walker.

"I am ready."

"I can't tell you for sure if any
of this is going to work, but Captain Brandt should be along in a while."

"I trust him," she said.
"He will be here."

"If nobody is here after the sun
leaves the sky, use the transmitter and I'll come back to pick you up."

"I understand."

He smiled again, but she could see the
worry behind the mask he wore for her. She was just a child to him, cowering in
the corner as Dark Winds cascaded over her soul. She thought of the word the
others used, and the gesture they made. She raised her clawed hand to her
forehead, angling it out as if she were shading her eyes from the sun. She
scowled, trying to look serious.

"We will stop him, sir," she
said.

His eyes glistened and his expression
softened for just a moment as he saluted back.

"Very well," he said,
"Carry on."

The canopy closed over him and she
turned away as the jumpjet's engines churned the dirt and bits of rock into a
momentary whirlwind. When it subsided, she turned back around and watched it
lift into the sky and then float away until it was just a speck glinting in the
sun.

She looked around, seeing nothing but
scrub, dirt and clay as far as the eye could see. She was in the heart of
Shoahn'Tu, a place where she knew she could survive for days even after the
most hardy human would keel over from dehydration and heat stroke. She felt
safe here.

She sat down and pulled her knees to her
chest. The words turned over in her mind: Priestess of the Pyramid. Her mind
wandered to the legends of the Old Way when the clergy brandished weapons and
fought to keep safe the sacred temples that dotted the world of Shoahn'Tu. She
recognized the aching twinge of fear that flowed through her body as she
thought of confronting Shoahn' Fal. Something else sang inside her, as well - a
new sensation that gave her strength and a sense of purpose - something she
would later learn was called pride.