Metal Swarm - Kevin J. Anderson [47]
Once, he had tried to guide the Ildiran race down a new path, but he had been forced to flee into the sun. After being engulfed by that inferno, though, his body had been changed rather than consumed. And now Rusa'h understood how he could influence the faeros to bring down the corrupt Mage-Imperator Jora'h - and save his people.
Now that he had joined the fiery entities, Rusa'h hoped to use his understanding of Ildirans to satisfy the faeros need for rebirth. At times, even the blazing elementals did not understand him, but they knew he burned with a longing for revenge, and for control.
Fulfilling a personal Ildiran need, Rusa'h had incinerated the treacherous Dobro Designate Udru'h. As he did so, he followed the soul-thread and drew on the potent fuel of Udru'h's life force. When Udru'h's dying spark added to the flames of the waning elemental beings, Rusa'h was astonished by the connection. How had he not seen it before? He could link the soulfire of the faeros to the soul-threads of . It was a revelation both for him and for the fiery entities.
Much as green priests had spread the worldtrees, Rusa'h could replenish the faeros. He could spark more faeros by burning soul after Ildiran soul, until the fiery beings became unquenchable. Rusa'h had begun his crusade to resurrect the dwindling numbers of the faeros, but at the same time he would be bringing his lost Ildiran people directly into the Lightsource.
There would be resistance, of course, but he would be doing a good thing, no matter how much pain it caused. Some of his people would be required to make an important sacrifice.
Rusa'h decided to go first to the worlds where he had already laid down new paths of . Those connections would allow him easy passage while he built up his strength. Entire planetary populations had no way to resist him. Leaving the dead sun at Crenna, he guided his fireball toward the Horizon Cluster, where countless souls were already ripe - waiting to be harvested.
* * * * *
In the days of Rusa'h's spreading rebellion, Dzelluria had been his first conquest after subsuming the population of Hyrillka. He had declared himself Imperator and taken his followers to unsuspecting Dzelluria. Forcing young Designate-in-waiting Czir'h to watch, Rusa'h killed the old Designate, then compelled Czir'h to submit to the new . After the rebellion failed, however, the cowardly young Designate had grovelled for the Mage-Imperator's forgiveness, and the people of his planet poured themselves into constructing their capital, their cities, their lives. Now, with an entourage of blazing ellipsoids, Rusa'h returned to Dzelluria - to bring them the fire.
As his fireballs rolled in across the sky, Rusa'h saw how frantically everyone was working. Construction crews on tall scaffolding erected monoliths and fountains, and raised statues in a furious effort to erase the scars of the previous takeover. It had only been a few months, but the main city already blossomed with taller towers and grander halls than ever before. The people thought themselves safe now in the Mage-Imperator's web.
They needed to burn.
From his fiery craft, Rusa'h gazed down with enhanced senses and saw the young Designate standing with a lens kithman on a balcony, looking up into the sky, as if wondering why the sun was growing brighter. Another sun - several of them, in fact, that descended like huge meteors sheathed in flame. Czir'h watched the ellipsoids race across the sky toward him.
Rusa'h easily found the old, never-healed paths of in the young Designated mind. He cut Czir'h off from the soul-threads of the lldiran race, completely isolating him, separating the lens kithman took even less time. With the hunger of the faeros behind him, Rusa'h did not see them as people, but as sparks. In a searing burst of energy that pulsed like lava through the , Rusa'h set loose the cleansing fire.
Czir'h and his lens kithman collapsed as the elemental blaze consumed their soulfires