by Jon Chaisson
*
She’s almost here, Saone thought. Her senses tingled with the excitement of the crowd anxiously awaiting their savior, and of her own Shenaihu blood, hungrily awaiting its vengeance that had never been sated. It took enough energy for her to focus just on her own plans. It is not revenge, her father had told her. If the nuhm’ndah were not here for revenge, what were they here for? The two senses, the anticipation and the hatred, conflicted each other yet flowed evenly side by side, as if one were the symbiote of the other…the duality of the whole…
“Madness,” she whispered to herself and shook the thoughts out of her head. She did not have time to dwell on such trivial things, not if she was going to capture this young girl. She would have to keep her mind and her spirit separate from everyone else if she were to succeed.
Saone, a voice called within.
Kryssyna, is that you? She answered quietly, hoping those on the floor did not hear her.
It is, she responded. We’re in position in the basement whenever you’re ready. Just say the word.
A chill washed over her as she confirmed Kryssyna’s report. She leaned back against the rickety wall, daring not to question her own plans, now that they had been put in motion. Again she thought of her father’s words. Again she thought of what this all meant to the Shenaihu nuhm’ndah, what she had been taught by her father as well as her older sisters, of what happened to the Shenaihu…to the Mannaka settlers…all the way back to Trisanda, when the Shenaihu had been abandoned. Abandoned! The Mendaihu…the Mendaihu…had left. They’d broken the ties first, the connections that never should have been severed in the first place! If it was not revenge, what was it, then?
She wished Kryssyna was here, up in the mezzanine instead of somewhere in the disused subway tunnels beneath her. She needed someone by her side right now. She’d known Kryssyna since childhood, and trusted no one else as fully as her. If anyone would understand the confusion she now faced, it would be her. Kryssyna had sacrificed much of who she was for her, truly believing in their spiritual and emotional connection. Kryss was once a pure Shenaihu like herself, at one time. But in a selfless act of love, she had chosen to change that. For Saone. She needed Kryssyna to be here, next to her. She wrapped her arms around her knees and shivered.
No time like the present. Send them in slowly, she said. Let them mingle into the crowd first. I will give the signal for the next move. You will meet me near the stairs to the northern mezzanine as soon as possible.
There was a quiet pause before her response. Understood, Saone.
She left the office as quietly as she had entered it, headed back down to the main floor, and slipped back into the mass. No one had seen her go up to the mezzanine a half hour ago, and had not wondered about her absence. There was something worrisome about the fact that anyone could have followed, some busybody sticking their noses in where it didn’t belong. Were the Mendaihu that confident in their soulsensing? It was hard to avoid that cloying wave of overwhelming positivity they possessed…it wasn’t blissful ignorance, but it certainly felt that way.
Even the Shenaihu here were caught up in the excitement, and that worried her even more. They should know better than to lose themselves in this! They should not be so quick to trust anything the Mendaihu were to offer here. She’d given them the benefit of the doubt when she’d arrived this afternoon. She even let herself get lost in the flow for a while, especially whenever she ran into that Mendaihu boy, Anando. It was just a bit of harmless flirting and playing along to make him believe she had no ulterior motives.
Such fools, she thought, shaking her head and laughing to herself. Her father was right, this wasn’t revenge at all. It was a mockery. A mockery of her spirit!
Moments later, Kryssyna emerged from a large group of followers who barely noticed her, slipped awkwardly through the tight pack and tripped to a stop in front of her. “Too much happiness here,” Kryssyna smirked. “It’s giving me a headache.”
“Always the voice of reason, I see. They are all getting in position?”
Kryssyna nodded, and began pointing at various parts of the warehouse floor. “We have at least two nuhm’ndah in all the major gathering points in the main area. There’s at least a dozen near the main rolling door. There are others in the holding bays behind us. There won’t be too many down below, but I’ve kept at least ten at the tunnel entrance.”
Saone nodded, impressed by how fast she had gathered these extras in a short amount of time. “They’re saying the One of All Sacred should be arriving any moment now. I’ve heard from the outside posts that she has made her way on foot for the last mile and was last seen three blocks from here.”
“I’ve confirmed that,” Kryssyna responded. “To come without guard, though…very unexpected.”
“She has one Protector with her,” Saone said. “A girl of the Ehramanis clan.”
She snorted out a derisive laugh. “She won’t do much damage.”
Saone dismissed her gruff answer by putting an arm around her. “Come…” she said. “We have a few more things to —”
She comes.
The calm, soothing voice was so unexpected that Saone stopped dead in her tracks and gasped. She felt the dark chill rolling down her back, doubling back when all the sounds and voices that filled the warehouse quelled at once, leaving quiet and cold silence. Someone, perhaps Nehalé, had spoken within everyone in the immediate area at once — no mean feat, even for a well-trained Mendaihu — and had commanded the attention of every single person inside and outside the warehouse.
She comes!
A second chill raced down her back.
The One of All Sacred is here.
Saone dared not speak into this silence, either aloud or within. She dared not even think a complete thought, for fear that it would disrupt whatever was about to happen. Even as she shifted weight from one leg to the other, turning herself around to face the open dock doors, her steps were muffled by the overbearing quiet. The only noise came from the wind from the storm outside, racing down the cross streets and spilling into any open building. Many of the dock doors had been opened on the southern end, and now a cool breeze pushed through the warehouse, stilling the crowd even more. She heard the soft murmur of the transports at the detour a few blocks up, and the rumble of the storm reaching the Tower a few miles away. It was only seconds later, when it rumbled again, that what she actually heard was something entirely different. This was not a thunderstorm.
Rain of Light, she mouthed silently.
A dozen or so people surrounding her turned slowly and faced her without so much as a word or a sound, as if to confirm her darkest fear. When they turned back seconds later, she felt a tear fall down her cheek. It was then that she saw the crowd slowly parting to make way for the One of All Sacred.
I am here, the young girl said.
