Of Fire and Night - Kevin J. Anderson [244]
Udru'h, still looking bruised and battered, his skin discolored, stepped past the guards to Daro'h. "Tonight they decide my fate, and I will be done with this waiting. Perhaps the people will feel shame. Will they be afraid to impose a harsh retribution?" Strange ghosts seemed to be haunting him behind his eyes; memories of what he had done were not so easy to justify when those memories came from Nira's point of view. It wasn't clear to Daro'h if the former Designate wanted the people to forgive him anymore.
Daro'h shuddered. "You are my mentor. I was the new Designate. Had this happened a few years later, it would be me instead of you."
Udru'h shrugged. "We will see if my good intentions outweigh bad memories. Crimes must be punished, one way or another. I know that now."
Unexpectedly, Daro'h felt a sudden and unusual heat down his spine and in his mind. The air became crackling hot. The smell of smoke and scorched bones intensified around him. The normally stoic guards looked into the sky, alarmed.
A trio of shimmering ellipsoids encased in flame descended like comets toward the scarred settlement.
"Faeros," Udru'h said. "What are they doing here?"
Daro'h had never seen the flaming shapes up close before. He couldn't tell if they were ships or living elemental creatures. Many thousands of the faeros had been extinguished in their battles with the hydrogues. But why would they come to Dobro? What did they want?
The pulsing faeros drew closer, blazed brighter. Daro'h feared he might go blind if he stared, but he could not tear his eyes away. The fireballs loomed directly overhead, pausing as if they had come to the former Designate's residence on purpose. Udru'h flinched, as if he heard something loud inside his head.
The thism within Daro'h grew hot, like overheated wires burning through his nerves and his thoughts. He felt the strong and silky soul-threads being pulled and strained, knotted, melted. . . .
A voice boomed through his mind, a roaring, skull-splitting shout that wasn't even directed at him. "Udru'h, you betrayed me. Because of you, I lost everything. I failed."
The former Designate reeled, as if his head might explode. The hammering molten voice continued its damning speech. "But I am stronger than ever now. I no longer see the Lightsource--I am the Lightsource."
In shock, Daro'h recognized the angry voice of the mad Designate. At the end of his defeated rebellion, Rusa'h had flown his ship into Hyrillka's sun. Now he was alive and intact . . . and with the faeros?
Unable to tear himself away, Udru'h shook his head against the thoughts, covered his eyes and ears, but the booming continued to rip through the thism. "Many faeros have perished. Now you will spark the creation of new faeros. Let your treachery consume you."
Daro'h drew back in horror as Udru'h's face began to glow as if his very bones had grown incandescent. The former Designate opened his mouth to scream, and smoke gushed out. His flesh turned white-hot. Suddenly Udru'h burst into flames. Fire licked out of his eyes, his mouth, his ears, and finally cracked out of the bones in his fingers.
Daro'h watched, unable to run, unable to scream.
Udru'h was engulfed by a single flare that incinerated every speck of his physical being. The new curl of fire, rolling and braided, shot up like a spark into the nearest pulsating faeros fireball.
Nothing was left of the former Designate but a black mark on the ground, a smear of residue. Glassy footprints marked where the heat of his body had melted the dirt. Daro'h looked up, feeling his skin singe.
Six more faeros fireballs descended to join the others over Dobro.
145
ORLI COVITZ
It was Orli's turn to bring a delivery of homemade food to the EDF barracks near the Klikiss transportal wall. There was nothing wrong with being good neighbors to the fifteen soldiers still