Scattered Suns - Kevin J. Anderson [257]
All across the city, Ildirans stared into the sky with fear. After the Hyrillka rebellion, their leader had rewoven the strands of thism and made them feel whole again. Now, through his command of the soul-threads, he tried to keep his people calm.
Jora’h faced the armada of silent hydrogue ships. A small bubble emerged like a dewdrop from the side of the nearest warglobe. He could sense Osira’h through the thism as soon as she drifted free from the high-pressure turmoil within the warglobe.
When the crystalline bubble came to a gentle rest before him on the high platform, he saw his young daughter inside. She appeared tense and exhausted, but unharmed. Her grave expression was far too serious for a little girl.
Jora’h drew another breath to calm himself. Oddly changed, seeming simultaneously strengthened and broken, Osira’h stepped into the bright light and breathed the open air, but she did not smile at her return to freedom.
“The hydrogues have agreed to communicate with you.” Each word sounded like a death sentence instead of a cause for celebration. “They may agree to an alliance, but they will impose conditions. If you do not agree, Father, none of us will survive.”
Jora’h wanted nothing more than to embrace his daughter, but he did not move as he addressed the hydrogue enemy in the sky. “In exchange for no further aggression against the Ildiran Empire, what do you want?”
When she relayed the answer, Osira’h would not meet her father’s eyes. “They require that we help them destroy the humans.”
Chapter 133—DOBRO DESIGNATE UDRU’H
No longer needing to keep his secret, Designate Udru’h flew with a group of companions down to Dobro’s southern continent. The transport pilot quickly found the isolated island where Nira Khali had been hidden for many months.
The Dobro Designate spoke little, but he was glad not to make this journey alone, as he had done on all previous occasions. Daro’h accompanied him; the young Designate-in-waiting had been an apt student and had managed the colony well enough while Udru’h dealt with his brother Rusa’h. Two guards rode along in the transport, as well as a lens kithman, a bureaucrat representative from the Prism Palace, and a medical kithman to ensure that the female green priest received immediate attention if she needed it.
Wrapped in his own thoughts, Udru’h stared out the craft’s window as they flew across the terrain approaching the vast lake. Before, he’d had to do everything himself, his thoughts walled off, unable to let anyone else in on the secret. Now the Mage-Imperator knew the truth.
Beside him, Daro’h gazed around with questioning eyes, not sure how to support his uncle. The young man guessed that Udru’h had done something unpleasant, perhaps even unforgivable. He had heard only sketchy details, but soon everything would be explained, once they recovered the green priest.
Though ready to make amends to the Mage-Imperator, Udru’h did not regret what he had done. Even after he delivered Nira to the Mage-Imperator, he knew that she would never forgive him. But he didn’t want or need her forgiveness. He had done this for his own reasons.
“We are approaching the island, Designate,” the pilot said.
Udru’h looked across the expanse of calm water toward the spot of land and its thick vegetation. The green priest had everything she needed there: sunlight, water, and the company of plants. Everything except contact with other people.
Now her exile was over. Udru’h would bring her back. If Osira’h had completed her mission, then the half-breed girl had made all those centuries of experiments worthwhile. Nira would not ever understand that, but she was not required to.
The transport craft landed on the long, tan beach. Udru’h sniffed the air and listened. Daro’h followed his uncle out onto the packed sand, staring into the