Blood of the Cosmos (72 page)

When they made preparations on the platform under the terrifying, blackening sky, Tamo'l was dismayed by the size of the task. She shuddered, then forced herself to be strong. “Go, Chiar'h—take the first group to the transportal wall and send them away.” She began to move. “Use Gorhum as a transfer point. That's where our supplies come from. The people there will be as ready as any.”

Tom Rom said to her, “You and I should be in the first group.”

Tamo'l glared at him. “I will go with you, Tom Rom, but only
after
everyone else is safe.”

For a moment the man looked as if he would seize her against her will, steal one of the boats, and simply race away, abandoning all the others. Instead, he scanned the people on the upper deck, as if calculating how many remained behind; then he looked up into the sky and assessed how the black shell had grown noticeably more complete in just the last few minutes. “There is no time to waste—I will assist in order to expedite the operation. But we have to move.”

Chiar'h took the first boat, and Gor'ka piloted the other one; they raced off carrying eight misbreeds, including Mungl'eh in her support bed. The dome's other medical researchers brought more misbreeds to the upper deck, waiting, but there was no boat to take them away until the first two returned. They all crowded and waited, looking fearfully at the dark sky. Fennis stared after his Ildiran wife as she sped away, leaving a white wake in the choppy water.

Overhead, the shroud continued to grow as thousands more hex plates built the curve, drawing the opening closed. Only a quarter of the sky remained now.

Through her close connection with Osira'h, Tamo'l sensed that they had escaped into orbit … but her sister still wasn't safe. Stronger yet, she felt a thrumming pain in the darkness above—Rod'h, helpless, a conduit that the creatures of darkness were using.
Rod'h
 … She gathered her strength to call out to her brother, hoping that he could help them from inside the shadows, if only he could fight back.

Then, to her delight, she spotted figures in the water—graceful, sleek-skinned swimmers, hundreds of them. They had left their seaweed colonies and rushed to the sanctuary domes. With their large eyes and vestigial ears, they always looked astonished.

One of the swimmers called out to Tamo'l, waving at the black barrier in the sky. “They will swallow us up.”

“Escape through the transportal wall!” Tamo'l pointed with her hand, urging them. “We are taking as many as our boats can carry, but you swimmers can all go. Now! Reach the wall, travel to another world where you'll be safe. Chiar'h is sending people to Gorhum. Go!”

Instead, the swimmers pulled themselves onto the platform, dripping wet, and stood before her. “But we can assist.”

“How?”

“We can ferry you, if you have any sort of flotation. We will pull you across to the transportal wall.”

Shawn Fennis brightened. “We have seven more levitating platforms in the infirmary. The swimmers can take the worst of the misbreeds.”

“We can take more than that,” said Tom Rom. “Those of you healthy enough can hold on to the platforms, while a misbreed rides aboard.” With swift efficiency, he grabbed Fennis by the arm, and the two men ducked back down into the sanctuary domes to retrieve the needed equipment.

Tamo'l insisted that many of the swimmers should go. “Get yourselves safe. Twenty-five swimmers should suffice. The rest of you, go through the transportal!”

Several swimmers dove under the water and swam away, arrowing toward the rock outcropping and the alien transportal wall.

Meanwhile, Tamo'l and her staff brought up the slow-moving misbreeds. The remaining ones were growing panicked. The darkness in the sky was oppressive, grinding down on them. The barricade seemed not only to cut off the sunlight but all contact with the rest of the universe.

Tom Rom and Shawn Fennis returned carrying the first of the levitating platforms. “Three can go on this. One or two more can hold on as the swimmers pull you.”

The waves were choppy, but the Ildiran refugees didn't hesitate. Three misbreeds climbed aboard the first platform as it bobbed up and down centimeters above the waves. The swimmers attached a cable, two of them ready to pull the platform. Har'lc wrapped a flopping tentacle-like arm around the back of the levitating platform and dove into the water. One more grabbed onto the platform and held on. When they were ready, two swimmers pulled the caravan across the waves.

A second levitating bed was similarly loaded and set off. Tom Rom assessed the sky with concern, watching the myriad hex plates that kept adding to the rim of the shell. “We have less than an hour remaining.”

“It might be enough time,” Tamo'l said, but she wasn't convinced.

A third levitating platform was loaded, and five more misbreeds escaped. Finally, Chiar'h and Gor'ka returned with now-empty boats ready to take another group.

“Quickly,” Tamo'l said. “Fill them up!”

“The transportal is difficult, Tamo'l,” said Chiar'h. “It is high tide, and the stone wall is partially submerged. When we open the dimensional gate, the Gorhum side is flooded.”

“No other choice,” Tom Rom said. “It is our only way off the planet now. Load up and go again.”

The two boats took eight more, but Tamo'l could see that the pilots would have to return for several more trips. Nevertheless, she felt hope. Many were getting away. Osira'h and Reyn had escaped along with the Kellum distillery workers, and if all the swimmers evacuated through the transportal wall, then that was most of them. Not so terrible a disaster as she had feared.

Her heart felt dark and cold as she reached out with her mind to touch Rod'h again—and he continued to scream in despair and pain, trying to warn Tamo'l. “The Shana Rei want
you
!” She closed her eyes and tried to link with him, tried to strengthen the bond so she could understand him better, and he wailed, “No—don't!”

When she connected with him, it felt as if a dam had broken, and deep darkness flooded through. Shadows rose inside her mind, behind her vision, and Tamo'l gasped, blinded. On the precarious deck, she swayed and fought back with everything she could. She collapsed—but Tom Rom caught her in a grip like iron.…

She lost track of time. When her vision cleared, she saw that more groups of evacuees had gone. The last of the levitating beds had left, and the two boats had returned for a third trip. Only a few remained here on the platform.

Shawn Fennis rode one of the returning boats with Chiar'h. He shouted for the rest to get aboard. Everything was so dark, and Tamo'l realized that most of the sunlight was gone overhead. The black shroud was nearly closed, like the jaws of a predator clamping down.

How long had she been lost? What had happened to her?

Tom Rom urged her to the boat. “I met your conditions. Now we must go—immediately. This is the last trip.” He wrenched her arm and put her into the boat crowded with the others. They raced away across stormy waves, with a grim Tom Rom piloting the boat himself.

Tamo'l fought to clear her head, but she could barely see, because darkness had swallowed Kuivahr. The entire sky was closing up overhead. Once the shadows finished their englobement and cut Kuivahr off from the universe, she didn't know if the Klikiss transportal wall would still function.

Tamo'l turned around, watched the sanctuary domes dropping away in the distance. They were mostly submerged, but now shadows had fallen over them as well. “Is everyone safe?”

“Safe?” Tom Rom looked at her. “They are gone, at least. That is the best we could hope for.”

The comm squawked as they raced along, bouncing on the waves. Suddenly a loud burst of chatter, numerous voices over competing channels filled the speakers. “This is Adar Zan'nh. The Solar Navy is here to pick up refugees—and also to fight the shadows. We have a full cohort and all the sun bombs available to the Solar Navy.”

Tamo'l's heart leaped with hope, even though all those warliners could not help them down here. The inexorable englobement continued.

The Solar Navy battle would commence in orbit, but Tamo'l, Tom Rom, and the last of her refugees would find their own way off the planet.

They reached the rocky outcropping, which was now just a foam of waves and the upright trapezoidal wall partially submerged in the rough tide. Another group of refugees was there, activating a coordinate tile. As the dimensional gateway opened, Tamo'l saw a shimmer of another place behind it. A gush of seawater flooded through, and the refugees were swept into the doorway, safe on another world—and then the transportal closed.

Shawn Fennis and Chiar'h jumped out of the boats along with the last refugees and climbed the slick reef rocks. Chiar'h did not bother to tie up the boat, simply abandoning it.

Overhead, hexes linked to hexes, nearly finished sewing up the last opening in the sky.

The transportal opened, another dimensional doorway to Gorhum. Fennis and Chiar'h turned and gestured for Tamo'l and Tom Rom, but Tamo'l felt dizzy again. Too much blackness surrounded her eyes, closing in on her vision just as the englobement sphere overhead was closing off Kuivahr. She collapsed, and Tom Rom caught her before the waves swept her off the outcropping.

“Go!” he shouted to the others, hauling Tamo'l against the rush of breakers. “We'll activate it again.”

Chiar'h, Shawn Fennis, and the last researchers leaped through the doorway to the planet Gorhum, and the wall solidified behind them.

When he and Tamo'l climbed up onto the stable rocks of the outcropping, she was too weak to walk, and so Tom Rom supported her. He secured his satchel with all the Ildiran genetic medical records. They stood on the slippery, wave-washed rocks, and he faced the alien wall with an odd, determined calmness. He scanned the ring of coordinate tiles, but intentionally did not choose the same one the others had used for evacuating.

“My ship is at Auridia,” he said. “I know a place where I can take you.” He activated a coordinate tile, and the stone wall shimmered again. Before Tamo'l could ask questions or argue, he grasped her wrist and pulled her with him. She could not have broken free if she tried. She took one last glance at the Kuivahr sky, but very little light remained. She couldn't see much of anything else.

Then Tom Rom carried her through to safety.

 

CHAPTER

124

ARITA

When Arita and Collin flew back to the Wild, they did not stop to see Sarein. Rather than bringing her into their current mission, they went deeper into the unexplored verdani wilderness, where even Collin had lost contact with the isolationist green priests.

Something terrible was happening here.

Arita marveled at the vast lushness. Every one of those tall trees was a conduit for information that any green priest could touch and access. Yet Kennebar and the others had just vanished. How could the trees not have noticed?

Arita was glad to be with Collin, but they were both tense. Beside her in the flyer, he gave her directions, and they cruised over the pristine green sea of the canopy. She felt a chill as she flew, though. From the sky, she could see disturbing brown stains below, sections of the worldforest that had died off from the mysterious blight, just like the swath of withered trees she had spotted on her last visit. It did not look natural. A poison was seeping into the worldforest.

Tears welled in Collin's eyes, but he insisted on looking closer. He pressed his face against the window of the flyer. “This is the area, Arita. We need to land.”

She circled, looking for a natural break in the thick canopy, an open clearing where she could set the ship down. Finally, she spotted a broad meadow garnished with white flowers. She had established numerous base camps like this for her scientific research, but she hoped this would be more of a rescue mission. She landed easily.

When they emerged from the cooling aircraft, the worldforest seemed oppressively silent around them. Arita turned around, straining to hear insects or the rustle of fronds … but everything was still and quiet, as if trapped in a kind of stasis.

“Even the worldtrees are hushed,” Collin said in a breathy voice. Though his skin was emerald green and his body completely smooth, Arita saw the same vulnerable boy who had run through the forest with her, talking about the future, flirting with her, kissing her in a stolen moment. Now it felt as if they were all alone on the entire continent.

Collin's look of concern increased as he hurried deeper into the forest, and Arita followed him. He gazed up into the trees, sniffed, then closed his eyes. He touched the trunk of a worldtree, then withdrew his fingers, as if burned. He blinked. “I can't find them. They should all be close—this is where we lived.”

Arita called out. “Hello? Kennebar! Any green priests?” Her own loud voice startled her, but no one responded.

Collin stopped beneath a tree with low branches and swung himself up, climbing hand-over-hand. Arita hurried to follow him, scrambling from one frond to another. After all of her years in the worldforest, she was as good a climber as he was. Together, they ascended through the lower branches and up into the thicker fronds.

Arita noticed flat platforms, woven benches, and other indications that Kennebar and his followers had made a primitive settlement here. Green priests considered the entire forest their natural home, yet they still had designed some comforts.

Kennebar had led his group away from the rest of the population, wanting to be isolated from the Confederation and the Spiral Arm. But this place was entirely empty. Could they have retreated farther into the Wild, seeking even more complete isolation? Had they been taken? Or killed?

Collin touched the woven platforms and sleeping areas; then he grasped a branch again, sinking his thoughts into the worldforest mind. He emerged and shook his head. “No answers. It's … blank.”