Roman garrisons all over the rebellious provinces mustered out, but up to sixty percent of all the forces in those provinces were currently made up of local levies; as such, hundreds of thousands of people deserted, leaving their uniforms behind. The handful of Gauls and Goths who remained in the Legion were decried as traitors to their people, and eyed with suspicion by their fellow legionnaires as possible spies . . . when in fact, most were people of principle, who had taken an oath to the Legion and to the Empire, and felt an obligation to see it out. Levy forces stationed in Nahautl and Quecha, trying to end the civil insurrections there, were particularly hard-hit as the Goths and Gauls began simply walking off of bases . . . through jeering crowds who pelted them with rocks and garbage, for having been part of the Legion. Or for leaving. Or for both.
Adam watched these scenes on the far-viewer, his stomach churning. On the one hand, he just wanted to see these young men and young women get home safely. He didn’t want to see them attacked by any bands of renegades who might be looking for sacrifices for their gods. And on the other hand, he’d served Rome for forty years. He hated seeing them desert. And on a less visceral level, he was worried about the ramifications. Gaul and Germania made up, between them, about forty-two percent of the Empire’s population. Quecha and Nahautl, another thirty-nine percent . . . but they were in rebellion. They’d stopped sending levy troops. Many of their existing levy forces who’d been stationed in places like Asia Minor or northern Europa had quietly let their terms of service run out, and not re-enlisted. They might not have gone home . . . but no one from their homelands had been replacing them. The result had been more levies from other countries. Up to sixty percent of the Legion was currently Gothic or Gallic. “They’re going to start shooting the deserters, Sig,” Adam said . . . and received no answer. He looked up. Damn it, Sig. I told you to go. I told you to go be a goddess. But I just . . . want to talk to you. But he couldn’t. He could say her Name, get her attention. But he might distract her. Maybe get her killed. Worse than carrying a satellite phone around, but I suppose she can’t drop her Name and can’t turn it off. He rubbed at his eyes, his throat tight, and swallowed. “They’re going to start shooting them, or crucifying them. Right now, the tribunes and legates don’t know what to do, but the general staff can’t afford to lose this many men. You’re going to have to be ready to defend them.” He paused, and the urgency of it hit him. “Do you hear me, Sigrun . . . Stormborn? You’re going to have to cross borders to protect your people as they retreat—”
We know. Thor is already on his way into Nahautl to bargain with Quetzalcoatl. I am being sent to Tawantinsuyu to speak with Mamaquilla. After I deal with a small errand in the North Sea.
Adam swallowed, hard. “Doesn’t it hurt, Sigrun? You were in the levy forces for longer than I was. Doesn’t it hurt, seeing it all fall apart?”
Of course it does. Her voice was raw. I offered to let the gods of Rome execute me, if it would keep everyone standing strong and united. The affairs of gods and humans have intermixed in this case, and Julianus and Jupiter have both made asses of themselves. How Trennus must be laughing. He’s been proven right, yet again. ‘As above, so below.’
Adam’s mind had already moved on, however. “There’s been no progress announced on the investigation of Caesarion IX’s death,” he muttered. “There was more coverage of Livorus’ assassination. I can’t tell if it’s just that news we’re hearing in the provinces is so tailored, or if there’s been a deliberate effort to keep everything quiet . . . .”
It has all the hallmarks of someone powerful knowing what happened, and choosing not to pursue it.
“Julianus himself?” Adam asked, his heart sinking.
He’s no sorcerer, nor is he god-born. But he has funds, sorcerers can be bought, and he’s in the best position to slow the investigation. We may never know, however, why his father died when he did.
Adam changed the channel. It was wonderful to hear Sigrun’s voice, but she sounded different. “Sig? What in god’s name do I tell Governor Caesarion? How do I look him in the eye after your errand?”
Tell him the truth. Prometheus, Hecate, and their ally are settling a vendetta that’s over four thousand years old. It is not an attack on his god or his Empire. And tell him to stay as far from Julianus as possible. He’s showing most of the classic signs of being a very bad Imperator.
Iulius 5, 1993 AC
Minori, Erida, and a half-dozen others huddled in a small poured-stone bunker built on the island of Darsah. They were in the process of erecting powerful barriers and heat-redirection spells, all intended to dump any energy that came their way out into the blameless sea. Kanmi hovered beside Minori as she stood over the calculi and control crystals. At the moment, this bunker was linked to the test site at the other end of the island by a single strand of heavy copper wire. Lassair and Zhi were on hand to observe the hydrogen incantation, and protect the technomancers, if the spell misfired. Both were at the test site now, hovering in air. “I still don’t think we’re ready to test this,” Erida muttered, her expression tight.
“The order came directly from Rome, and they’ve been funding us through the JDF,” Minori replied, feeling helpless. “I think this has to do with the rebellion of the Goths and Gauls.”
“Grandstanding,” Bodi Eshmunazar muttered. “They want to show not just the Persians, but the rebellious provinces, that Rome has this kind of power.”
Minori’s hands hesitated over the control crystals. There was a moment of silence in the room, and Ninson Tehro piped up, “Do you mean to throw the test?” the man asked, folding his hands over his pudgy belly.
Erida glanced at Minori. “A fizzle now would be explicable by the fact that we’re being pushed to complete the spell parameters ahead of schedule.”
“If we have a fizzle, we lose funding,” Minori said, quietly. “And then we don’t have a weapon to use on the ghul. And potentially even on the mad godlings. We’ve seen that they can overfeed, Erida. They can be destroyed in that way.” She exhaled, and tried to see all the variables in her head, but geopolitics wasn’t an equation that ever really seemed to balance.
Another glance from Erida. “If you want to use this on godlings, we’re going to have to find a spell-storage medium that can handle this amount of power. We’re not particularly mobile at the moment. Diamond would work, but natural stones of sufficient size are expensive, and cannot be reused.”
“Artificial diamond,” Minori replied, hands moving on the keyboard once more. “Judean laboratories turn those out rapidly. A spell of this power and complexity might require a twenty-carat diamond. They don’t have the flaws and inclusions of the natural stones.” She frowned. “I don’t honestly want to imagine how much power could be held in a lab-created diamond matrix of a hundred carats or more.”
Ninson Tehro raised his eyebrows, and moved closer, putting a hand on Minori’s shoulder. “I would say that it is a good thing that such power is in the hands of people like you and Lady Lelayn. The handful of gods Chaldea had left, are dead. Many other gods have fled, or given up. It is up to humans to save this world.”
She turned her head to look at him, and the portly, middle-aged Chaldean smiled at her. The words sounded oddly like what someone in Blood Pact or Potentia ad Populum might say, but there was nothing actually wrong with saying that human agency should work to save the world. It was all in what those two groups wanted to do to ensure that humans survived, that made them so questionable. Potentia ad Populum wanted to bring down the god-born, sorcerers, everyone with power. Level the playing field, as it were, and make everyone exactly alike: mortal. Or, as in Fennmark, give the power of the gods to everyone. Blood Pact was more radical, and more secretive. Their stated goal was destroying spirits and gods, or at least, controlling them. Leashing them. The primacy of humanity, through their most powerful summoners and sorcerers. And presumably, normal mortals would be trodden beneath their feet. Two halves of the same poisonous equation. Neit
her one added up.
“I would not say that the gods have given up,” Minori told Tehro, mildly. He’d gotten a little closer than she was comfortable with, and she moved away, letting his hand fall from her shoulder as she recoiled. Masako had mentioned the suspicions that Rig had brought up, in reference to Tehro. Judean Intelligence was looking into his background and finances a little more thoroughly at the moment, but a few pressing invitations to Erida’s daughter weren’t quite enough to turn up red flags for anyone who was a professional threat evaluator. Even Tasalus had shrugged, saying that he’d check the financials again, as JI had when Tehro had first been tapped to work on the defense dome and hydrogen spell.
A hot blast of wind swept sand at the man’s face in a stinging rattle, however, as Kanmi groused, in her mind . . . hitting on my wife right in front of me . . . .
Be fair, Kanmi-kun, it’s not like he knows you’re here.
. . . opaque to my Veil senses . . . . blood-bound or soul-bound to someone.
He’s of the Magi. Most of them have blood-bargains for protection with their spirits. Erida says he’s from a good family, if a minor one. No suspicious affiliations.
. . . all right. Probably just me . . . wanting a body . . . .
Minori looked up at Kanmi, giving him a smile, not caring if everyone in the room thought her mad. Bodi and Masako hadn’t seen Kanmi yet. They weren’t spirit-born or summoners.
Then she settled in to double-check the math, as Bodi brought up the incantations for her on the green-glowing spherical screen. Kanmi leaned over her shoulder, invisible to most of the others, as she studied the diagrams one more time, latching them into her mind as she began to build the framework of power with whispered words and gestures. Some of the smaller components of the incantation, to avoid error, were already laser-etched into the quartz crystals in the array in front of her. Minori spun the spell construct in her mind, verifying it against the displays, as she almost vibrated in place with the power building around her and in her. “Erida?”
“I don’t see any problems in the spell matrix,” Erida confirmed.
“Bodi?”
“Thaumic readouts are holding steady, and the spell-field is stable.”
“Masako?”
“All of the spell crystals are charged. I can begin sequencing them when you’re ready.”
Anything I need to change? she asked Kanmi.
. . . your math is perfect . . . .
“Masako? Initiate the spells in the crystals.”
And as her daughter released the spells primed in the crystals, sending them ahead as a precursor charge, Minori released the spell framed in her mind. It had come together with shocking ease, but then, Amaterasu was a sun-goddess. Hydrogen ignition was second-nature to her. The spell lanced out, leaving her floating on a wave of mild euphoria. She could see the power racing to the other end of the island. See it rend the hydrogen from the water, building it into a contained, spherical cloud, while the oxygen content in the air around it built and built.
The air is now highly favorable for burning, Lassair commented, from where she and Zhi were observing. Normal atmosphere consisted of twenty percent oxygen and seventy-eight percent nitrogen, with the remaining two percent being made up of other gasses. May I ignite it?
. . . it should ignite automatically as part of the sp— Minori’s words were cut off as the entire room around her went white, and the island itself shook. Their bunker had one window with a view of the blast zone, which had been blocked over with exposed X-ray film. The fireball was enormous. A shockwave radiated out from it, debris slamming the barrier spells around the bunker. “Are we getting this on the cameras?” Minori asked, quickly. “Are we getting footage?”
In the sky overhead, the laws of thermodynamics took over, and a cloud of smoke and heat formed the same domed shape she recalled from the desert south of Carthage, long ago.
“We’re getting images,” Bodi confirmed, his voice shaken, as he checked the cameras. “This is what my father did, on his own, with nothing more than his mind?”
Minori nodded. “Yes. He held a portion of a god’s power at the time . . . but the spell was his.” She caught the glance from Ninson Tehro. He wasn’t cleared for the details, of course.
. . . desperation . . . is the mother of invention . . . lot of estimation . . . sloppy spell. Inefficient . . . .
“Lassair?” Minori lifted her head. “Zhi? Are you all right?”
In the cloud, the phoenix floated on wings of amber flame, the edges tipped in red. Reveling. Glorying. Wrapping thermals around herself as she danced in the greatest bonfire she’d ever known, and took the flames into herself. More than fine. Lassair played with the edges of the firestorm. I see how this might be pushed inwards, or how it could be spread outwards. I believe . . . that I could replicate this—or douse it.
Beside the phoenix, the efreeti spun, twining himself through the cloud. Feeding on it. Gorging himself on the flames, the heat. Others will want to feed on this kind of energy source. It may be a beacon.
Would you like it put out, Truthsayer? Lassair offered, a little reluctantly.
Not yet. We need video of the entire explosion.
Lassair cruised out of the cloud, trailing flame behind her as she crossed the island to the bunker. This was a most excellent pyre, Truthsayer. I thank for you it. I am feeling quite renewed. She settled down on the bunker’s wall, where her talons began to superheat the poured-stone.
Several hours of observations later, Zhi gave them their first warning. Are you ready to fight, fire-that-creates? he asked, his voice wary. A mad godling comes. It has been drawn here.
“Too much power,” Minori said, tightly. “I wanted to keep the spells small and tightly focused, but . . . Zhi, how big is the godling?”
Larger than the first one I destroyed. However, I have practiced since then. Perhaps these spells might serve as traps. Zhi’s voice was predatory. They think to come to the waterhole to feed, and find, instead, such as me.
And me, Lassair said, and rose into the air once more.
And me. Kanmi’s voice. Min looked up, horrified.
“Kanmi, no,” she blurted. “You can’t. You’re not strong enough yet—” just as Erida ordered, peremptorily, “Zhi? Carry me with you. I will not permit you to fight another one without me.”
Bodi and Masako’s heads had both snapped towards Minori, their eyes wide. Both had seen chalk rise and write in their father’s handwriting, and had it hurled at poor students in their presence, but this was the first time that they had heard his voice.
Kanmi’s tones suddenly lacked the laborious effort to speak that had previously marked them. It’s my fault that the godlings exist in the first place. I’m going to fix the damage I’ve done.
“Not without me, you’re not.” Minori reached within. Amaterasu? Can you aid me?
I can do better than that. I can let you aid yourself.
Minori looked down and discovered that Kusanagi-no-Tsurugi, the Grass-Cutting sword, had appeared in her hands. She smiled, and lifted herself into the sky alongside Kanmi. Zhi descended in a black cloud, and lifting Erida off with him. To the north, Minori could see the amber-flame phoenix racing to meet the godling . . . which, through Amaterasu’s eyes, took up about a third of the sky. It’s a big one, Minori thought. Will there be enough of us to fight it?
I believe so, Zhi said, with the assurance of experience in his voice, showing them images of a battle fought with a godling over polar ice. See how Freya and Stormborn tore each smaller one asunder? We are enough, and Lassair and I are empowered at the moment.
The efreet’s assurance was not arrogance. But it took them an hour to fight the damned thing to a standstill, Minori slicing off its tendrils of power with Kusanagi, every time they came near her or the others. Of course, that was only a deterrent; where one was removed, it simply reformed from the core again, shortly. Amaterasu-within seethed as a tendril got too close, licking at Minori’s skin, and pulled
protections tightly around Minori’s body, swaddling her like a child.
She was adept in the air now, and could control her flight with a fair degree of precision, but she lacked the raw speed of a valkyrie, which she rued every time she saw a tendril lash out at Lassair or Kanmi, and simply couldn’t get to it in time. Zhi and Lassair raced in close and tore at its central body, ripping portions of it away before diving away again. Lassair’s firebird form seemed to be bleeding. Droplets of golden fire leaked from her breast, dripping down to the dark sea, where algae blooms exploded on the surface of the water. Then a blast of white light nearly blinded Minori as the phoenix assumed her full glory, and the tendrils all recoiled from her.
The Goddess Embraced Page 69
