Of Fire and Night - Kevin J. Anderson [180]
She recalled her youth as an acolyte, enamored with stories, loving to sit high in the canopy and read aloud to the trees. When she was chosen to become a real green priest, Nira had gone alone into the densest worldforest, and the verdani had claimed her, swallowing her up in the living underbrush. She had emerged with green skin and an unbreakable link to the worldforest mind. At least she had thought it was unbreakable.
Nira squeezed the wood in her hands, plunging her silent mind into the woodgrain. She had never needed to work to establish telink before, had never considered the exact process. It had always just . . . happened. She didn't know how to force it. She had grasped at any hope. But that was gone, too.
Without opening her eyes, Nira reached out and grasped Jora'h's hand as tears began to flow from beneath her closed eyelids. She took comfort from his touch, though she knew there was no hope of forming a mental bond like the one the Mage-Imperator shared with his people through the thism. He could not connect with her, any more than she could connect with the dead wood now.
She felt a spark like electricity. Faint, like heat lightning in the distance . . . but definitely there.
She clenched her hand, letting her fingers press hard into Jora'h's skin. Something about the contact with him was helping. The spark grew brighter, and suddenly she felt a tiny echo deep within the worldtree wood.
"What is it?" he asked.
Nira did not respond, but concentrated furiously, following the faint thread, burrowing into the thick wood with her memories. Although this tree itself might be dead, all worldtrees were connected. Startled, she looked down to where her free hand had been tracing the burned edges of wood, sure that she could now feel the bloodsap moving, stirring. Something was changing, and somehow Jora'h's powerful control of the Ildiran thism had aided her. A small gasp of awe escaped her lips. She had broken a new path!
In a barely audible voice, she whispered, "Please--hold me," and pressed both of her palms hard against the wood, making as strong a contact as possible. She felt him put his arm around her shoulders. There!
"Jora'h, I can sense a change . . ." He held her tightly, increasing their bond.
But it wasn't just her telink, or just the Mage-Imperator and his thism. Something new and incredible was happening with the verdani--all of them. Right now on Theroc, a deep part of the worldforest mind was awakening, just as hers was. The thoughts reached out, straining upward until they shot like a bright flare into the night sky. Nira didn't know what had triggered this new burst from the heart of the worldforest, but she felt the effects of the resurgence rippling across the Spiral Arm.
In her hands, the chunk of wood shifted. A knot thrust up, a hard lump that split . . . and shot forth a fresh sprout. Before her eyes, it grew into a tiny pale frond. How could that be? This dead wood had come to life again, through her! The frond was barely as long as her index finger. But it was enough.
Nira touched it. In a flash, she reconnected with the worldforest. Finally!
Gasping, falling, she drowned in an amazing flood of information. She poured out everything that had happened to her over the last eight years. In a rush of images and painful memories, she dispersed her knowledge. Nothing could stem the outburst of her thoughts.
When she was done, every green priest and all the worldtrees across the Spiral Arm understood everything.
105
BENETO
Beneto had always been part of the trees--both when he was human and after his absorption into the worldforest. Since his rebirth on Theroc, he had shown the forest what it meant to walk, to move, and to live. The verdani understood much more about what it meant to be human now, to be a living independent being with sorrow and joy.
And Beneto understood