Right, there was pain, a lot of it, but he could always fix that. And once the pain was driven away, the wound could be healed. “Mamet. Stop.” His legs dropped.
Mamet leaned into view. “You healed yourself!”
Horace sat up, blinking. “Simon! The bullet! Did it work?”
“I don’t know. I dragged you away after you got hurt.” She rubbed her forehead. “I don’t know anything anymore.”
Horace smoothed away the strain in her. “Thank you, but we need to go back.”
There were still shouts and gunfire, and Horace thought for a moment that Mamet would try to stop him, but she eventually agreed, both of them picking up speed when the noise ceased. By the time they reached the tree, a strange tableau lay before them. Drushka stood around a handful of half-naked humans who’d been bound so tightly with vines, it was a wonder they could breathe.
“The drushka won!” Mamet said.
Horace sent his power over the captives, detecting something strange, though he couldn’t quite put a finger on it. Liam stood in armor near the captives, and when he saw Horace and Mamet, he waved them over.
“Your boyfriend learned some new tricks,” Liam said.
Horace couldn’t help beaming. “He’s all right?”
“Better than that, I’d say.”
“Where is he?”
Liam spread his hands, a drushkan gesture. “He said he was going to kill Dillon and walked off. That’s the Storm Lord, right?”
“Yes.” And if Simon was angry enough to kill, the Storm Lord had to have done something truly awful to him in Gale. “Which way did he go?”
“I don’t think he wanted anyone to follow him.”
“That’s not going to stop us,” Samira said as she joined them. She smiled, and Horace felt like throwing his arms around her, but before he could get the chance, Mamet beamed and took her hands.
“You’re all right!” She seemed as if she might hug Samira and then kissed both her hands instead.
Samira grinned and wrapped her arms around Mamet’s neck, drawing them together for a long kiss. Mamet’s eyes widened before she returned the favor.
Horace studied Samira with his power. She’d been healed, too. He cleared his throat, but that didn’t stop them, and he finally said, “Well, time to get going!”
“We’re all headed in the same direction,” Liam said. “Let’s go together.”
“As long as we go now.”
*
With the arrival of dawn, Dillon had decided to march without the paladins who’d been chasing after the lunatic who’d tackled him. They’d catch up, he was certain, and they might have some dead drushka or renegades to show for it; it’d be especially nice if they bagged the asshole who’d given him so much trouble.
He smelled smoke before he caught sight of Celeste. The area directly in front of the walls was all churned mud and burnt grass, quite the shithole, and groups of people seemed to be mixing it up near a big hole in Celeste’s wall. He stood with his hands on his hips, trying to watch and see who had the upper hand. If the dead bodies in the field and the holes in the wall were any indication, both sides had gotten some hits in.
“There are people using yafanai power down there,” a telepath said.
He nodded but didn’t bother to explain. That would be the Sun-Moon and maybe Naos if she’d decided to join in.
“Leave the wagons,” he said. “Break out the railguns.” What little ammo they had left for the big guns might as well be used here. “Form into your squads. Let’s poke our noses in a bit, see who bites.” If both sides were tired, he could take them all in one swoop.
He knew some of his people could be killed. He could be killed. Even knowing that, he wanted this. Everything in Gale had gone ass up, but this fight fell pure somehow, even with the death it had caused. The enemies were clear, and all he needed to do was kill them.
Lieutenant Lea brought him a railgun, the man’s face as impassive as a corpse’s, and Dillon didn’t know if that was just him or if he was still pissed about Brown. Some of the yafanai seemed nervous, milling and shuffling. He scattered them among the soldiers, knowing they’d do what they had to once the killing started.
*
Patricia Dué waited just behind Naos, sensing an ending coming but not knowing when it might happen or where. She looked through Kora’s eyes and felt as if she was watching a vid, but unlike when she relived her old memories, she’d never seen this before.
Naos let their senses drift through Celeste. Lives fluttered against her thoughts like butterfly kisses. The fragility of them was amazing, as if she was standing in a room full of candles, and any sudden movement would snuff them.
“How very poetic,” Naos said. “I should let you out more often.”
But she wasn’t letting, not exactly. She was slipping, but Patricia didn’t tell her that. Naos searched through the candle flames until she found a mind from the Atlas. Lisa, one of the breachies. Her thoughts danced around them: loves, fears, a childhood theft that still sometimes filled her with shame. Naos took Lisa’s mind with her power and squeezed. A long scream from just inside Celeste rewarded them.
“What did you do?” Natalya asked.
Even as Naos turned, Patricia sighed, wishing this one would learn to keep quiet. “I liked you better when all you cared about was power,” Naos said.
“You took that away, remember?” Natalya asked.
She was alive with rage, and Naos lapped it up like honey. She loved strong emotions, especially when she knew exactly where they were coming from and why. Patricia thought it was one reason Naos enjoyed tormenting her. She snuffed more lives, heard the screams, the cries of rage, the desire for revenge. She cackled, and Patricia cringed to hear it.
“You’re insane,” Natalya said.
Naos gestured, and one of her followers punched Natalya in the gut. Natalya doubled over, retching. Naos waved the follower away. She held them so tightly now. She thought they couldn’t be trusted. Some had already run away.
“Insane,” Natalya wheezed, desperate, it seemed, to poke the bear.
“Why do you have to ruin all my fun?” Naos asked. “Do you need more lessons? There’s little of you left that I can take away.” She raised a hand, and Natalya drew back. “Ha! Two for flinching!”
One of the followers kicked her hard, sending her to the ground with a grunt before he kicked her again.
“Ooh, I think that was a rib!” Naos said.
When Natalya didn’t answer, Naos turned her attention back to the city. She sorted through the flickering lives until she spotted two that seemed brighter than the rest. “Ah ha! The Sun-Moon again.”
Patricia tensed, trying to keep her thoughts quiet as Naos attacked Lieutenants Christian and Marlowe with her mind. Patricia braced herself. If Christian and Marlowe rallied and forced Naos to leave Kora, Patricia was determined to stay behind. But Naos caught the lieutenants with her micro powers, and they barely struggled. They were weak, tired; even their awesome power had been dulled by fatigue. All it would take was a little push.
Patricia felt panic creep up on her. The lieutenants were her greatest hope, but she didn’t know what she could do to help them, trapped as she was. She felt around with the residue of power left to her and sensed him nearby. He could help her, even if he was only a distraction.
One of Naos’s followers died, then another, and another. “Dillon is here,” Patricia said quietly.
Natalya was screaming about guns, and Naos released the lieutenants and turned her senses west. She commanded the followers to fall and make themselves into smaller targets. Then she grinned as she sensed Dillon and his toys.
“You can’t save him now,” Naos said. “Not now that he’s attacked us.”
Patricia stayed silent, watching, waiting.
Chapter Twenty-eight
Simon kept his senses fixed on Dillon, but now Naos’s followers had gotten in the way as the two groups tangled with one another. “Dam
n, damn, damn.” Aggravation disrupted his rage-calm, but he took a deep breath.
“Shawness?” Reach asked.
“Naos’s army is in the way.”
“Well,” Cordelia said. “You’re going to have to go around her or through her.”
He sighed. Stopping her might mean saving some of the plains dwellers who’d gotten mixed up with her. Besides, if he had to fight Dillon first, he didn’t want to take on Calamity’s most powerful deity while winded.
He switched his senses to Naos, the woman he’d always thought of as Dué, but he supposed he should change that thinking now. She’d gone from the bizarre, powerful creature that barely got involved in life to a war mongering, power-hungry monster. He sensed her vessel easily, moving from Celeste to where Dillon was attacking her western flank. He also sensed her power extending from the vessel like spokes on a wheel, piercing every plains dweller around her.
“We’re going to need help,” he said. “Not just me, but Horace and the Sun-Moon and all the yafanai.”
“Think they’ll agree to that?” Cordelia said.
He grinned. “I don’t give a rat’s ass. I don’t need them to agree. And we’re not going to attack the link where it meets the girl. There’s only one way to kill a diseased plant.”
“At the root, shawness,” Reach said.
“Just so, shawness. We’re going to break this link and make it so she can never have another.”
There were some plains dwellers on the fringe of the army, running from Dillon or maybe trying to take cover. Simon put them out with a thought. “This should be close enough. I’ll gather the power, and Cordelia, you’ll deliver it.”
“Me?”
“Unless you know someone else that can fly. And once Naos is finished, we’ll put you back where you belong.”
He felt her fear, then excitement overtook her. “I’ve been waiting to get back in this fight!”
With a chuckle, he used his power to find the Sun-Moon. They’d been injured, but that helped him at the moment. They’d be less likely to struggle. Across the distance, he borrowed their telepathic power and added it to his own, sort of like a communion, but they didn’t have any choice. He felt their protests but disregarded them and collected any micro or telepathic yafanai, using his power to merge them into a weapon.
Casting his senses behind him, he sent an invitation to Horace. Horace lent his power eagerly, almost gladly, and Simon had to smile. To this giant cord of power, Pool added the weight of drushkan telepathy, though they’d never used it as a weapon against one that wasn’t their own. Simon didn’t even know if it would work, but it coiled around the human power as a vine might, adding weight.
When Simon searched for Naos’s vessel again, he found she’d only taken a few steps, seemingly oblivious to his presence. Well, maybe she was too focused on Dillon.
“Ready?” he asked Cordelia.
“Fuck yeah.”
Simon coiled the waiting power through her, using her as a conduit as she’d told him Horace had earlier.
“Shit! I feel so…heavy.”
“All in your mind. Now, up you go. I’ll stay linked with you, like a transmitter, and you’ll take the fight to her.”
“Oh yes,” she said. “Fuck yes.”
“Steady. Follow her blue light all the way to the space station, quick as you can.”
She streaked away, and his senses went with her, all of the hopes of those in Celeste going, too.
*
Cordelia gritted teeth she didn’t have and forced down the desire to whoop with joy. She was fucking invincible. Through their connection to the drushka, Cordelia felt Simon in her mind as if he was an extension of Pool’s tree. She raced up the blue cord that connected Naos to the ground, not touching it, just tracing it to the hunk of metal that she’d always thought of as the unwinking star, the Atlas, a satellite in orbit. As the atmosphere thinned and blue gave way to black, she paused at the multitude of stars, remembering infinity.
“Focus,” Simon said in her mind.
She moved toward the Atlas, enough metal to satisfy even the greediest Galean, and stayed with the blue light, passing through the hull and floating down corridors until she finally found Naos in the flesh.
She’d expected more, a body as titanic as the power that emanated from her, but she was a normal looking woman. She floated in the middle of a room as if someone had turned the gravity off. She wore a blue jumpsuit, and her hair spread out around her like seed fluff. Her mouth was open, her eye half-lidded, and her empty socket a dent in her face. She was alone, would be alone forever if they succeeded.
“You can’t afford pity,” Simon said. “Just touch her. I’ll do the rest.”
Cordelia would have taken a deep breath, but because of this woman, that wasn’t an option. She flew, taking all the power with her as she punched up through Naos’s torso. “Remember me?”
The eye flew open, and Naos thrashed in mid-air, staring at Cordelia. Her power hammered against the forces Simon had gathered, but his attacked from a multitude of directions, outflanking her left and right.
With a snarl, Naos rammed a hand into the space where Cordelia’s chest would have been. “Ghosts can be killed if one knows the right spots.”
Cordelia screamed as agony wormed through her. She hadn’t known she could hurt like this, like someone was tearing her apart.
“Hang on, hang on,” Simon said in her mind.
The pain leveled off, and Cordelia fought the urge to run. Fucking swamp couldn’t kill her. Fucking God couldn’t kill her. She’d be damned if she’d let some space-bound megalomaniac kill her.
“I channeled her attack away,” Simon said, “and two yafanai are dead. You have to give me more time!”
“Oh yes.” Blood oozed from Naos’s nose and floated away as little red beads. “Stay here, little bee, far from the good doctor. Stay and let me rip you to shreds!”
The pain spiked, and Cordelia cried out. Thoughts fled as if her mind was unraveling, little parts of her slipping away piece by piece. “Fuck. You.” The pain lessened; someone else had died, but she felt Simon chipping away at the link. She howled into Naos’s face and stayed where she was, trying not to think of what she was losing, memories she might never get back, her very awareness. She could die up here, and only Simon would know what happened. He’d have to tell Nettle and Liam as well as all her friends and makeshift family.
“Yes, think of your friends,” Naos said as the pain roared again. “If you leave now…” She trailed away, and her face screwed up as she stared at nothing. “Patricia Dué, what the fuck do you think you’re doing?”
*
When the attack had first started, Naos had pulled both herself and Patricia back from Kora, leaving her nearly alone. Well, she couldn’t be alone anymore. There wasn’t enough left of Kora to occupy her body, but Naos was good at splitting her attention.
With all the different powers hammering at her, the link was dissolving, taking any chance for Patricia’s freedom with it, but what could she do? Help Naos fight? As the link grew weaker, Naos had to pull more of herself out of Kora, out of all her followers. Power against power, she’d win or at least live, but her ability to link to the ground might be gone.
Patricia tapped into a bit of that power, redirecting it her way while Naos was distracted. She used micro-psychokinesis and telepathy like a scalpel, sawing her and Naos apart as if they were conjoined twins. Her thoughts locked on how amazing it would feel to be alone for the first time in over two hundred years, to walk, to speak, to just exist. She worked as quickly as she dared, feeling herself sliding out of her own body, but it hadn’t been hers since she’d been forced to share with this stranger. No, share wasn’t the right word. She’d been taken over, and as much as she would have loved to have her own body back, she knew that ship had sailed.
“Patricia Dué, what the fuck do you think you’re doing?”
“Saying good-bye.”
She was so clos
e now. Naos couldn’t stop her, and if Simon Lazlo or this new attacker sensed her, they didn’t try to stop her either. She cut the last ties to her old body and flew down the link as it buckled behind her, Simon Lazlo’s power shutting it down forever.
*
Natalya watched Naos stagger around the field, putting her hands over her head and screaming, cursing, spouting nonsense. Around them, plains dwellers shook their heads as if trying to clear them. The gunfire had stopped, and everyone seemed to be going crazy at once.
Whatever it was, Natalya saw a chance. She leapt on Naos, knocking her to the ground. “Kora, if you’re still in there, I’m sorry.” Without Kora, Naos would no longer have a vessel. She might possess Natalya again; she might kill her, but at least this particular madness would be over.
And Kora deserved some peace at last.
Natalya locked the bend of her elbow around Kora’s neck and flexed, using her other arm for leverage. Her injured ribs ground together, making her swear and spit, but she kept up the pressure. Kora’s hand beat against her weakly, as if the body barely held the strength or the wherewithal to fight back. Tears crept down Natalya’s cheeks, and she tried to remember the last time she’d cried twice in one day. Now seemed the right time, when she didn’t know if it was goddess or girl trying to fight her off.
“I’m sorry,” Natalya said. “Let go. You’ll be free.”
The plains dwellers crowded around them, but none attacked. Maybe they didn’t know whether or not they should, or maybe they wanted to be free, too. “Stay back,” Natalya said, just in case.
Kora’s thrashing grew weaker, and Natalya thought she ought to say something, to explain how Kora had changed her or try to say what Kora meant to her, but when she thought it might be Naos listening, she couldn’t do it. Kora’s last attempt to fight her was a light graze, almost a caress, then she went limp. Natalya began to let her go when a bubble of force exploded from her, pitching Natalya away.
Widows of the Sun-Moon Page 31
