Metal Swarm - Kevin J. Anderson [42]
'But we have tried before.' Rod'h was not complaining but simply pointing out a fact. Nearest to her age, her brother seemed the most interested in linking with the worldforest mind.
'And we will try again. And we'll try tomorrow and the day after.'
With his penchant for practical and military matters, young Gale'nh had a different concern. 'I do not understand the goal.'
That was the largest question, Osira'h knew. 'The goal is to show the potential we have. We can do something that other people can't do, I'm sure of it. The Empire worked for many generations, just to create us.' Her gaze swept them all, and they caught her enthusiasm. Tamo'l and Muree'n were too young to understand what Osira'h was trying to do, but they happily joined in what seemed to be play. Playing was a new experience for them.
Together, they reached forward to touch the golden bark. Osira'h stroked the pale fronds. 'Be careful. Don't harm it,' she said when Muree'n grasped too tightly.
Even without telink, the halfbreeds' sensitivity to unified them. Rod'h joined her mind in much the same way as they had used their thoughts on Dobro to seek out and contact distant hydrogues. Their bond of - or was telink part of it as well? - connected them to each other in a private web much more powerful than the one other Ildirans shared.
Osira'h drove her thoughts into the treeling, sensing the leaves, the bark, the living heartwood, the roots - just as her mother's memories showed her. She had opened the conduit of her mind to Nira, receiving a flood of thoughts and memories, and later learning to channel the vengeance of the worldforest itself through the treeling, through her mother, through her mind - and into the unsuspecting hydrogues.
Though they were enemies, the verdani and hydrogues had common ground, an elemental foundation. The worldtrees also shared synergy with the wentals, as they had proved in combining themselves to form huge verdani battleships. No doubt the faeros were similar as well.
Mentalists and lens kithmen talked about how the whole universe was connected in ways that no one, not even a Mage-Imperator, could see or understand. Osira'h believed that, because of their unparalleled ties to both their green priest mother and the of all Ildirans, she and her siblings held a key. She knew it.
With her eyes closed, the girl followed the strands through the tree trunk into the neuron like root fibres… and beyond. Her siblings followed. She expected a flash of a connection, but heard only whispers, distant thoughts, and ghostly voices, as of a vast audience that didn't know the children were eavesdropping. 'We are close!'
'I can sense it,' Tamo'l said.
'Keep concentrating,' Gale'nh added.
The outbursts were enough to disrupt Osira'h's focus, and she rocked back on the balls of her bare feet. It was a tantalizing glimpse of what they could do. She felt that the five of them were about to find something extremely important, something that no green priest or Ildiran comprehended. The idea thrilled her. She would help her brothers and sisters achieve the apex of what their special breeding made possible. 'We almost did it that time.'
Rod'h blinked. 'I see what you have in mind now.'
Exhausted but excited, they gave up their efforts for the day. Tamo'l and Muree'n, eager for new distractions, stood and hurried across the shining rooftop to the precipitous edge, where they looked down into Mijistra. Gale'nh looked from Osira'h to his brother for explanations, like a boyish soldier needing to be debriefed.
Osira'h rubbed her temple, felt a throbbing ache. But even the pain could not diminish her exhilaration. 'Tomorrow we will be closer.'
Twenty-four
Anton Colicos
He had never wanted to return to Maratha again. Ever. That place held only nightmares and terrifying memories. But Anton certainly couldn't let Vao'sh go alone to document the defeat of the black robots for the Saga of Seven Suns. Standing in the warliner's command nucleus,