“Do you care to share?”
He shook his head. “Just keep your head up. And make damn sure you keep hold of those cats,” he added as he gave Vishlog and Frog a stern look.
“You mean they won’t like this, either?”
The team leader shook his head and ignored the fact that he had the undivided attention of everyone in the cockpit. Instead, he ushered Stephanie toward the hatch. “Remember, keep your head up. V’ritan said he would meet us. You can murder him later.”
She gave him a puzzled frown as she paused and smoothed her dress. “Why would I want to murder him?” The answer to that became evident as soon as she stepped out onto the top step leading down from the shuttle.
Cheers erupted around her in a single roar of sound. Looking around, she felt herself go weak at the knees. “V’ritan is going to string me up,” she muttered. “How can I share the honor if he isn’t here?”
And honor it was. More cheers erupted when Lars stepped out beside her and slipped her arm through his.
“We’re holding the party up,” he murmured and raised his hand to salute the crowd’s greeting. “And you might want to acknowledge them.”
Stephanie pasted a smile on and let him guide her down the stairs. As they descended, a voice announced them over a loudspeaker.
“Welcome, Stephanie Morgana, Witch of the Federation, Master-Mage of Meligorn, our Valiant Soul, the Ghargilum.”
The crowd roared again and this time, the cats roared in answer. She glanced over her shoulder to see them coming down the stairs on either side of Vishlog. The Dreth had their leashes wound around his forearms and walked as though they were an extension of himself.
“Please welcome the Ghargilum and thank her for destroying the Telorans that came to destroy us. Ghargilum, we thank you.”
As the crowd roared again, she lowered her head.
“V’ritan’s going to murder me,” she whispered.
“Why?” Lars whispering in return.
“Because I’m stealing all his honor.”
“Not all,” he assured her. After all, you did kill the Telorans.”
“Not all of them. His ship destroyed a fair number of them too.”
He patted her hand and they cleared the bottom of the stairs so the rest of the team had room to join them. As they did so, they looked for where they had to go next. A second shuttle landed and the Marines trotted out with Captains Moser and Sartre in the lead.
They separated around the team and assumed flanking positions. The two captains stopped parallel to the ship’s captain. “Do you mind if we join you, sir?”
“No, we could do with the extra company.”
Vishlog had come to stand with Stephanie, albeit a little ahead of her as the two cats strained at their leads. He murmured soothingly to them but the crowd roared again as the announcer introduced the Marines.
The felines had had enough. They roared in response and the crowd shrieked with joy before giving voice to as full-throated a roar as a Meligornian throat could manage.
“Well,” the Dreth stated and glanced at the others. “I think we’re meant to go over there. I believe they are waiting.”
He indicated a large stage erected at one end of the arena in which they stood. The shuttles had set down at the other side and it looked like a long walk. Stephanie had no sooner thought that when doors opened on either side of the stage at the end of the arena.
From one emerged two columns of the Meligornian Royal Guard. From the other, two rows of Dreth warriors in full battle regalia. Before she could wonder what was going on, the Dreth and Meligornians wheeled around the ends of the stage and trotted toward them to form two columns leading up to the stage.
“Well,” she observed. “I guess we walk that way. Vishlog, if you and the cats would take the lead.”
He gave her an uncertain look but he didn’t argue. Instead, he directed the felines toward the stage and walked as a vanguard for her, Lars, Brendan, Frog, and Avery. Behind them came the three captains and the chief engineer, the pilot and the weapons commander.
The Marines formed an honor guard on either side to escort them as they made their way to the stage. Vishlog hesitated at the bottom of the stairs and dropped back so she could lead them onto the stage itself.
The king and queen were waiting when they arrived, and Stephanie dropped into a deep royal bow. She was surprised when the royal pair not only returned it but stooped as deeply as she had to show their respect.
“Stephanie Morgana, Ghargilum, this world is yours and we are grateful for your protection.”
“Your Majesty, the honor of its defense was mine.”
They rose together, and he directed her to one side of the stage before he took the time to greet and thank each member of her team. She followed the gesture of his hand and stood beside a familiar figure in teal-green armor edged with gold.
Opposite them, across the stage, stood a figure in the bronze-and-black of the Dreth, and Stephanie’s heart lifted to see Admiral Jaleck alive and well, flanked by her command crew. “She made it,” she whispered, and V’ritan bent close and replied, “Yes, she did.”
They watched as the king greeted the Ebon Knight’s crew and thanked them for bringing the Witch safely to their world. He greeted the Marines and they were thanked for their protection of the Witch.
“Without whom,” the king concluded, “our world would have been without its savior.”
She blushed and slid a glance to V’ritan. “I’m sorry,” she whispered.
He gave her a look of startlement in reply. “For Selestine’s sake, why?”
“For stealing your glory.” She gave an abbreviated sketch with her hand. “This should have been to honor you.”
To her surprise, he laughed. “Selestine’s mercy, I hope not. Besides, who do you think set this up?”
Her jaw dropped and he winked at her. “I don’t want to be the one in the limelight. That kind of thing’s for younger people.”
Across from them, Jaleck snorted and the sound came clearly over their comms.
“Closed loop,” V’ritan told her before the admiral spoke.
“It is,” she added, “much easier to accept this kind of fuss when one is youthful.”
The words made her blush harder. “I was not alone,” she muttered rebelliously, and they both laughed.
V’ritan nudged her. “You’re up…and so am I.”
“Me, too,” Jaleck murmured, and the two senior warriors moved to take their place beside the royals as King Grilfir called Stephanie forward.
“It is my honor,” he announced, “to once again confer upon you the Modfresha Ghargilum, now with the three-orb cluster known as the Meligorn Dek’thresha, or the Blood of Meligorn.”
He paused to allow the sounds of awe to die down. “We have never before had a champion serve our people twice and at such great sacrifice—and once again, I do not find our thanks sufficient.”
“Your Majesty,” Stephanie began. “I only did what many of Meligorn’s people were doing.”
He smiled. “That is why you are but the first. You honor us by calling us your own. You honor us by going beyond your very human limits to save us.”
“But I did not die.”
At the back of the stage, someone cleared their throat. “That is not strictly true.”
Stephanie raised her head as one of the medics came forward.
“Your team kept your body alive long enough for us to reach you. We needed an immense amount of energy to mend the magical parts of you that had broken in that last display of power—and we thank Captain Pederson and Chief Engineer Hargreaves for the use of the Ebon Knight’s engines in that regard. Without them, you would have been lost.”
She paled as she listened. In all honesty, she hadn’t realized how close she’d come to dying.
“However,” Brilgus added and stepped forward, “you did save my Afreghil and The King’s Warrior and all aboard her, and for that, I am personally gratef
ul, although I extend the gratitude of a world as well.”
“And you saved the Dreth who had answered Meligorn’s call, protecting them even as you destroyed every Teloran we battled,” Admiral Jaleck proclaimed. “Although I do not know whether to be thankful or furious that you risked yourself like that to steal so many of our kills.”
A rumble of affirmation ran through the ranks of the Dreth honor guard before they laid their fists over their hearts and cried, “The Talons of Dreth salute you!”
“Garghilum!” the Meligornian honor guard shouted in response.
“Talon!” the Dreth roared.
“Garghilum!”
“Talon!”
“Garghilum!”
The cats roared in duet and both Dreth and Meligornians turned toward them. Before any of them could bellow in response, the king raised his hand. Silence followed as Grilfir turned to Stephanie.
“You are both the Talon of the Dreth and the Garghilum of Meligorn, and this will make you our soul twice over, albeit one who has bled.”
The queen stepped forward holding a cushion containing a medal identical to the one Stephanie already wore, save for the cluster of three blood-red orbs in one corner. She eyed it with some trepidation and turned her face to the king as it was pinned to her chest.
Sadness, anger, awe, and gratitude warred inside her and robbed her of the words she needed to respond. All she could do was sink into the deepest bow she knew. When she rose, power crackled around her and the king gestured to the crowd.
“Thank you, your Majesties,” she said and bowed her head as she turned to face the auditorium and address the Meligornians gathered there. “People of Meligorn, I thank you.”
She touched the medal over her heart. “Thank you for accepting me as one of your own. For that I am grateful, but remember, I am not yours alone. I am the Witch of the Federation, which is one set of people separated by three languages.”
She looked at Vishlog. “And occasionally, attitude.”
Laughter rippled through the crowd but faded as she continued and power crept into her words. “But all of us are fighting one enemy together—an enemy that is devoted to taking our freedoms, our lives, and our families.”
That last phrase echoed with the prophetic power of the Morgana and her eyes turned as black as pitch as she spoke. In her mind, she remembered the Wanderer sacrificing itself to divert the rock from her world and purple lightning flashed over her skin.
She did not hear Lars swear as she went on. “We think nothing of putting our lives on the line for those who need protection, for we value others over ourselves.”
Magic floated around her when she made a gesture with her hand and added, “We will drain our energy and our very blood and ignore our worries and instead, infuse our need to support our brothers, our sisters, and our shipmates with all that we have. We are committed to doing whatever it takes to turn the tide against those who would deny our people the opportunity to see tomorrow free.”
More lightning arced over her skin and her hair floated free, twisting in the currents of power that rose from her body. V’ritan stretched his hand across the front of Grilfir and pushed him back slowly. When the king went to speak, the Afreghil put a finger to his lips and shook his head.
Further down the line, Lars and Vishlog did the same, although the Dreth was hampered by the two cats. Neither was happy about what was happening to their mistress and backed away from her, their heads lowered and their ears back. Before her, the people sat silent, enthralled by her words as much as the power rising about her.
As the royal couple allowed their guards to guide them from the stage and Stephanie’s team took up station around its edges, V’ritan turned back. He couldn’t help raising a hand toward her.
Power swirled around her, and his upraised hand invited its attention. Before he could pull it away, purple lightning had arced between the Morgana and his palm. It raced along his arm, sank into his skin, and caused his hair to float around his face. The heat of it made him take a step back.
She continued to speak. “Neither I nor my people will allow this to happen. Not for as long as we breathe, as we live…”
At the edge of the stage, Vishlog leant over to Brenden. “Okay, I understand Elizabeth’s comment about a short life and not being able to spend that money.”
His teammate suppressed a smile, and Avery gave a solemn nod. “Yup.”
In the center of the stage, the Morgana had more to say. “We will continue to fight, whether the threat be from within and from among our own people, or external to our world, for only by fighting the threat wherever we find it can we enable peace to be restored.”
“Sonofa—” At the exclamation over their comms, the team looked at Lars.
To their surprise, he wasn’t focused on the Morgana but at where V’ritan stood at the head of the stairs leading from the stage. His silver hair floated around him exactly as the Morgana’s surrounded her, and his eyes were as black as pitch.
She fell silent but she did not go still. Instead, she walked forward and moved off the stage and into the space before it. The crowd watched her, their mouths agape, and eyes shining when they noticed purple strands of MU flowing toward her.
In silence, she drifted the length of the stadium, passed close to the stands, and studied every face. The crowd froze and each one of them waited until her gaze fell on them. Every single one of them wanted to know she had seen them.
When she did, they knew she remembered them and that they meant something to the most powerful being they had ever seen. After making a single pass around the auditorium, she turned back as V’ritan stepped forward and came to meet her.
The lightning flashed around her and rippled ahead to play around the King’s Champion as well. A gasp of sheer awe went up from the crowd to see the Garghilum Afreghil and the Garghilum walking the air before them, and the king returned to the stage.
“Behold!” he cried. “Our two champions, the ones who led us in defeating the Telorans that dared shadow our skies!”
The crowd roared and V’ritan cupped his hand over his earpiece to speak over the team’s comm channel. “Okay, Lars. Do you have any suggestions on how to bring our girl back?”
Chapter Fifty-Seven
A week later, Stephanie sat across from V’ritan in his suite. She nodded. “Exactly. My thoughts exactly. I’m thinking it’s the best we can do. How about you?”
He gave her a solemn nod. “Yes. I agree.”
Her tablet chimed, and she pulled it out and looked at it with a sigh.
“My time’s up, I’m afraid.” She rose. “Thank you. For everything.”
He rose, too, and came around the table to engulf her in a hug. “The gratitude is mine. Hartuitus Baskilor, Stephanie. I look forward to when we meet next.”
She squeezed him tightly and stepped back, resisting the urge to wipe her eyes. “Me too.”
Lars waited at the door, having insisted on staying outside with Brilgus while Stephanie and V’ritan talked. He shook the Meligornian’s hand and slapped his standard bearer on the shoulder. “Take care of him,” he said.
Brilgus grinned and looked at V’ritan and Stephanie in turn. “I’ll take care of mine if you take care of yours.”
He returned the grin. “I’ll do my best.”
“That’s all we ask,” V’ritan told him. “Journey safe.”
“Happy hunting,” Brilgus concluded and stood beside the Afreghil as he watched the two head to their ship.
“I will miss them,” he told his friend as they entered the umbilical connecting The King’s Warrior to the station.
“And I,” V’ritan agreed. “Let us hope it’s not so long this time.”
He looked at the empty corridor, then at his companion. “Observation deck?”
The King’s Warrior nodded. “Observation deck.”
“How long do you think it’ll take them?”
“Knowing Wattlebird and Emil, the Knight’s engines
are already warming. I’d say we have until Stephanie clears the airlock.”
“You don’t think they’ll wait until she’s on the command deck?”
V’ritan shrugged. “That all depends on how much she wants to see the planet before they leave the system.”
“She’ll want to,” he assured him. “She will always want to.”
“Are you saying she’ll always be saying goodbye?”
“I’m saying part of her heart is still on Earth. No matter how much her soul is Meligornian, she’ll always have to visit Earth. I bet she watches it disappear behind her, too.”
He sighed. “Either way, it won’t take her long.”
They hurried to the observation deck and waited. V’ritan proved correct. It took the Knight fifteen minutes to emerge from the station, five minutes to pull clear enough to give its crew an unhindered view of the planet, and thirty seconds to vanish.
“I have got to get me one of those ships,” the warrior muttered and stared at empty space.
“I don’t think the Federation Navy’s ready to share,” Brilgus told him, as they turned away.
Stephanie reached the command center in time to see Meligorn glowing against a backdrop of pure night. Emil glanced at her and smiled but he didn’t stop the count-down.
“Lieutenant Commander Wattlebird, if you’d please press the red button in…three…two…one.”
In an instant, Meligorn was gone, hidden in the distance as they arrived at the outer edge of its system.
“What are we stopping for?” she asked.
“Engine check,” the captain told her. “We did some in the dock and some when the Warrior’s technicians worked on other sections, but nothing that would risk either. We’ll test them before we jump out. That way, if anything goes wrong, we can limp back or call for help.”
She chuckled. “V’ritan would love that.”
“We’d never live it down,” he told her while Jonathan worked his hands over the control board.
The Knight ran through the sequences without a hitch.
“She’s good to go, Captain,” the pilot announced and Emil breathed a sigh of relief.
Witch Of The Federation III (Federal Histories Book 3) Page 61
