He saw the woman.
She stood on a crude raft, her boots planted wide. The web stretched from her arms in every direction, tangled in and above the water from here to the horizon. She was the only full node in the web, a desperate goddess holding together a universe, and he had no doubt that if she lost hold of those lines, the web would cease.
Her raft was disintegrating.
Even now, a portion crumbled under her boot. She stepped onto a more stable section, but it wouldn’t last much longer. When it dissolved, she would plunge into the ocean and drown.
He thought her name.
Soz.
She looked toward him, though he was everywhere, no longer a man but an ocean. No, he was a man, too. A father. He thought of Soz, and then he was next to one of her outstretched arms. He laid his hands over hers and tried to take frayed strands of the web. She stared at him with emerald eyes, her gaze hollow, unseeing, and she clenched the mesh, either unwilling or unable to let go.
Eldrinson felt her exhaustion. She must have been here since the mesh had begun to unravel, over three days ago. She was the reason it survived. He had known she was strong, having dealt with her tenacity all her life, but even he had never realized the extent of her indomitable will. He could answer Majda’s question now, why the web continued to exist. Soz held it together, even knowing its final collapse would pull her down as well.
He tugged the lines. Let me help.
She regarded him with haunted eyes, and he sensed his son Eldrin’s mind, too, somewhere distant, both buoyed by her and buoying her mind, all despite his own dying.
No! He would lose no more of his children. He folded both of his hands over hers. I can help.
Soz groaned. By the barest amount, she loosened her grip, just a twitch of her fingers, but enough that he could pull a few lines free. He handled them with care, and they coiled around his body. Then he eased the swell of the ocean under her precarious support. He wove it into glasswood and rebuilt her raft.
Her thought came to him, drained and ragged. Hoshpa, how are you here?
I made a Triad. He gathered more of the mesh from her hands. ISC should take better care of these webs. They have many weak points.
A Triad? Hoshpa! No, that cannot be. Do you know what that means? It is impossible!
Well, it must be possible, he thought. I am here.
Tears ran down her drawn face. I am glad.
I, too. Had he been speaking, his voice would have caught. But here it flowed around them in a healing mist.
He set about fixing the mesh, just as he had mended the ripped toys for his children when they were young.
It was so very easy.
Brigadier General Devon Majda didn’t return to her quarters at the end of her shift. She stayed on the bridge of Roca’s Pride, monitoring communications among her crew and the ships in her flotilla. Messenger vessels were regularly arriving and leaving now, carrying out news and bringing it back to the flotilla. Devon had sketchy details of the situation; ISC had repulsed the invaders at Parthonia but only after extensive damage to Selei City. No one knew how many ships had escaped. If the evacuation had foundered, hundreds of thousands could have died—including a significant fraction of the Assembly. Her flotilla was due to arrive at Parthonia in less than a day, but she felt certain ESComm intended to attack some other Imperialate center. They were needed elsewhere.
Where?
Devon touched a panel on the arm of her chair, and holos formed above it, updating her on Soz Valdoria’s condition in the Dyad Chair. Nutrient lines nourished Valdoria, and medtechs kept close watch, but strain showed in all her medical signs. Devon had no idea what Soz was doing, but the web continued to exist beyond all expectations. She wrestled with her decision continually—let the Imperial Heir stay in the Chair and risk her death or bring her out and let the Kyle meshes fail.
The captain knew her duty; she had to leave Soz connected. But it was grinding her down. She had known the royal family all her life and had almost married Soz’s brother. The young man had declined, freeing Devon to marry the man she loved, though it meant abdicating her title. The members of the House of Skolia lived by their hearts, with an intense and fierce loyalty to those they loved. Unlike many of the imperial court, they honored strength of character above wealth, heritage, or style. They had their flaws, but they didn’t care a mudrat’s ass that their titles gave them stature. They actually wanted to do what was right for their people, not what satisfied their egos. She would have put her life down for any of them, and she hated that instead she was killing Soz.
Her comm hummed. She touched a panel. “Majda here.”
“General, this is Major Kolonta. A messenger has arrived from the Orbiter, a Captain Gerrat. I have him on channel four.”
“Understood,” Devon said. “Switching.”
A man spoke. “Captain Majda, this is Major Gerrat on the ISC-IF Zephyr.”
“Understood, Major. What message do you bring?”
“From Imperator Majda, ma’am. You’re to proceed to Onyx Sector. They’ve had a report of ESComm ships. I’m sending the holodocs to your EI.”
Devon touched another panel on her armrest. “Verify identity and authenticity of incoming documents.”
“Verified” That came from Sigma Alpha, the central EI brain of the battle cruiser.
“Come onboard, Captain Gerrat,” Devon said.
“Thank you, General.”
It startled Devon to hear her army title; the crew here called her captain. A holo appeared above her comm, the blaring horn that indicated an urgent summons on six, the bridge channel.
Devon switched channels. “Majda, here.”
Communications answered. “Ma’am, several bridge systems just activated.”
Devon wondered why Communications thought she needed to report such routine information. “Is that a problem?”
“It’s odd they would come online now.”
“Which systems?”
“One feeds coolant to the neutrino transmitters. The other regulates the doors for docking bays.”
Devon still didn’t see the problem. “Probably they’re on timed cycles.” Communications ought to know that.
“They were, a few days ago. The cycles failed because the systems they control have links into the comm network. Ma’am, four more systems came on—what the hell? Make that five.”
The voice of Weapons burst out. “Captain, our Annihilators are reactivating!”
“Long distance comm, too,” Communications said. “This is incredible. We’ve had crews working on these for days, with no luck. How could so many come up so fast?”
No wonder they had contacted her. Every one of those systems had links to short- or long-distance comm, which meant they had faltered when the Kyle web began its collapse. Devon spoke to Sigma. “Put me through to Cadet Valdoria.”
A new voice came on the comm, young, but resonant with power. “Valdoria here, Captain.”
“Gods almighty,” someone muttered on the bridge channel.
Communications inhaled sharply. “I didn’t open a channel to the Dyad Chair, Captain.”
Devon swallowed. Neither had she. “Cadet Valdoria,” she said evenly. “How did you access my station?”
“I’m in all the systems, ma’am.” Soz’s voice remained strong, but Devon heard its underlying strain.
“How can you be in all of them?” Devon asked.
“I’m bringing them back up,” Soz said.
Devon realized her crew was listening throughout the ship. Soz’s voice was coming over all the channels, and other voices were murmuring on many lines. She didn’t know what had happened, but power coursed through Soz’s voice.
Devon rubbed her chin. “Valdoria, the systems you’re fixing failed because they were linked into Kyle space.”
“Aye, ma’am,” Soz said. “We’re fixing the nodes.”
“I can confirm some of that,” Weapons said. “Our missile systems are back in operation.”
/> “Our gates into Kyle space are reforming at a rapid rate,” Communications said. “Not just here on the Pride, but throughout our flotilla.”
“Gods,” Devon said. “Valdoria, did you manage all that with the Dyad Chair?”
“It’s no longer a Dyad Chair, ma’am.” Soz’s voice had an odd sound, drained but exultant.
“What is it?” Devon asked.
“A Triad Chair.”
The voices went silent on every channel. Devon stared at the comm. Either the impossible demands of her duties had pushed Soz over the edge—or history had just changed for the human race.
It was a good five seconds before Devon found her voice. “You joined the Dyad?” she asked.
“Ma’am, no! Not me. My father.”
Her father. Devon had no way to fit her mind around this concept. Skolia had a new Key? The last time a Rhon psion had made the Dyad into a Triad, a Key had died. Kurj Skolia had killed his own grandfather. Who would die this time? The pharaoh? Imperator Skolia? Devon couldn’t absorb the immensity of that disaster.
“What about the rest of the Triad?” Devon asked.
“For now, they’re alive.” Soz sounded subdued. Then she suddenly spoke more urgently. “Ma’am, Imperator Majda wishes to speak with you.”
It took Devon a moment to switch mental gears. “My aunt?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“But she is on the Orbiter.”
“Yes.” Soz took an audible breath. “I’m in contact with the War Room.”
Gods all-flaming-mighty. They had brought back the Kyle web. Devon took a breath. “Very well. Put her through.”
A man spoke. “Imperator Majda coming online.”
“Understood,” Devon said. Protocol required she answer first, as the officer of lesser rank.
Jazida Majda spoke in a clipped voice. “Devon, forget about Onyx Sector. With the web coming up, we have new information. ESComm has launched an invasion ten times the size of the one that attacked Parthonia. Half a million ships. It’s too large for them to hide with our sentry nodes coming back in-mesh.” Then she said, “They’re headed for Metropoli.”
Devon swore. With ten billion people, Metropoli was the most heavily settled world in the Imperialate, with even more people than Earth’s seven billion. “I’ll need everything you have on it.”
“We’re transmitting now,” Jazida said. She spoke quietly. “Gods’ speed.”
Devon swallowed. “We’ll need it.”
17
The Blue
Like great waves rolling across an ocean, power flooded Kyle space. It coursed through the blue and supported meshes everywhere in its undulating embrace. Nodes reformed. Lines knit together. A new web didn’t need to be created; enough remained of the old to repair. Throughout Skolia, lights switched to green, probes sent reports, and telops reestablished links. The recovery surged across space.
With that resurgence came the news: an invasion fleet was sweeping through space, straight into the most heavily populated center of Skolia.
Soz sat in the War Room command chair.
She wasn’t actually in the War Room; the Chair on Roca’s Pride had created this simulation because her father believed he was in the War Room rather than the Triad Chamber on the Orbiter. It allowed him to center Soz’s mind here. She was serving as a central node for ISC as it rewove its forces into a coherent defense. Soz had nothing resembling the experience needed to coordinate the War Room; however, she knew enough to ensure that the information Imperator Majda needed to command ISC was properly routed through to her.
Jazida Majda’s voice came over her Kyle link. Valdoria, do you have contact with Pharaoh Dyhianna?
Nothing. It worried Soz. If she has access to a Triad Chair, she isn’t using it.
Her father asked, What about your mother?
Nothing. Soz couldn’t forget her first time in the Chair, when it had reminded her about her mother’s birthday. The bizarre interaction preyed on her thoughts. Something is wrong. We must find Mother. I don’t think she can help herself. She may not even remember us.
Majda’s answer came with tension. The Traders are using Kyle space to infiltrate our defenses. It connects to your family, but we don’t know how. We cut our Kyle links with the non-military members of the Ruby Dynasty, but we didn’t have a chance to warn your mother. She disappeared before we could tell her escort not to use the Kyle web. Majda paused. We didn’t know, when we cut Pharaoh Dyhianna out of the web, that we would need a Key.
Soz didn’t see what difference it would have made. Either way, Dehya would have disappeared when her shuttle tried to invert. Soz wanted to search for her mother and her aunt, but messages were pouring into her mind from all over Skolia. Data about the invasion flooded the War Room, coordinated by Imperator Majda through Soz and the Chair, and telops rerouted it to millions of ships, from the giant Firestorms roaring through space to tugs lumbering among asteroids.
The ESComm fleet was currently hidden in inversion. Unlike their ISC counterparts, however, they had limited communications during superluminal travel; the longer they spent inverted, the more their ships were spread out in time and position when they dropped into normal space. To remain a coherent force, they periodically had to reenter normal space and regroup, taking hours to gather their fleet It was their greatest vulnerability.
ISC saturated space with probes around the predicted course of the ESComm fleet. Most returned nothing useful, but a few were in the right place each time the invaders dropped out of inversion. Although ISC could have attacked, Majda held back. The Traders didn’t know Skolia had regained the web, and ISC would have the element of surprise only once. They had neither the personnel nor the resources to match ESComm, but they could move faster and with more precision.
It might be enough to prevail.
Maybe.
Eldrin slumped against the bulkhead, his legs stretched across the deck. The freighter managed a low apparent gravity with its rotation, but it was uneven enough to create noticeable Coriolis forces. He doubted that was what nauseated him, though. He just plain felt like hell.
But he was alive.
Although the craving remained within him and his head ached, he could bear it. His hallucinations had faded to visual distortions and an unsettled sense that colors were too bright, edges too sharp.
Refugees crammed the cargo hold. He had expected he would disgust these people, who had witnessed his bonecrushing weakness. As an empath, he would feel condemnation, especially with his mind so sensitized by the withdrawal. And a few did condemn him. But most felt sympathy. Many spared him an encouraging word or nod. His years in the elegantly cutthroat universe of the Imperial Court had jaded him; this reaffirmation of human kindness was a gift.
A slender man was making his way through the refugees, his gait awkward in the minimal gravity. Gripping a projection on a bulkhead, he stepped past a group of young people playing a game with sticks that floated lazily off the deck and settled again. He edged around a sleeping man strapped into a hammock and past an elderly couple chewing on the ship’s dull rations. The man looked familiar to Eldrin, but it took him several moments to figure out why. It was Kaywood, the doctor who had stayed at his side during his ordeal—the man who had saved his sanity and his life.
Eldrin became aware of two children, a small girl dozing against the bulkhead and a boy who sat on her other side, also asleep, his cheek resting on her head. They had curly dark hair and similar features, probably brother and sister. He remembered; they had shared his hammock.
As Kaywood reached them, the girl opened her eyes, then closed them again. The doctor knelt next to Eldrin and spoke in Skolian Flag. “Good morning.”
“Good morning.” Eldrin’s ruined voice grated. Gods only knew if he would ever sing again. It hurt too much to contemplate, that the phorine may have taken away the only other thing he loved besides his family.
Kaywood offered him a water tube and a stick of food. It was all E
ldrin could do to accept the tube calmly rather than yanking it away. He fumbled with it, but he didn’t have the patience to open it properly, so he tore off the top. He drank deeply, and water ran down his parched throat.
Kaywood had an odd expression, as if he wanted to rejoice, but wasn’t certain yet if he should. He gave Eldrin the food stick.
“My thanks,” Eldrin whispered.
“You seem better today,” Kaywood said.
“You’ve a gift for understatement.”
“It was rough for a while.”
Softly, Eldrin said, “I am in your debt.”
Kaywood sat cross-legged on the deck. “I felt like I wasn’t helping at all.”
“You were.” Eldrin would never forget his words of comfort. They had been a lifeline for him. “More than you know.”
“Well.” Kaywood nodded self-consciously. “Good.”
They sat for a while, chewing rations. Eldrin wasn’t certain he could keep the food down, but he was too hungry to hold back.
Eventually Kaywood said, “I was wondering if I might ask you a question.”
“What did you want to know?” Eldrin asked, wary.
“Sometimes your accent sounds Iotic. Other times I can’t place it.”
Eldrin hesitated. If Kaywood recognized an accent as rare as Iotic, he probably knew only royalty and the nobility spoke it as a first language. It didn’t surprise him, given that the doctor worked on the outskirts of the Skolian capital.
“I learned Iotic in school,” Eldrin said, which was true. His parents had also taught him, but he didn’t want anyone to guess his identity, not only because it could endanger his life, but also because they would probably give him special consideration that he didn’t deserve. Other people needed it more, and he had put these people through enough.
“What is your native language?” Kaywood asked. He seemed only curious; Eldrin had no sense that the doctor suspected who he had been treating.
“It’s called Trillian,” Eldrin said. “That is the accent you hear.” Although the language had probably descended from ancient Iotic, it had changed over the millennia until it became a separate tongue. He had learned Trillian and Iotic together, but he used Trillian more and considered it his first language. “My parents wanted us to have a good education.”