The First Kaiaru (35 page)

I
f a sea monster were to fling a ship loaded with barrels of oil inland, so that it crashed and exploded, burning the forest and scattering wreckage for miles around, Turesobei figured it would probably create a scene much like the one surrounding him. Except instead of shattered planks of charred wood, this debris field consisted of torn and twisted sheets of metal. Some of the blackened fragments were as large as a fisherman’s hut.

He struggled to imagine a vessel constructed of metal, much less one that could crash to the earth. The very idea was absurd. On the other hand, he had no better explanation for what he saw around him.

Also strewn amongst the wreckage, still visible beneath the twilit sky, were the charred remains of hundreds of people. Those who weren't completely burned to a crisp wore strange clothing made out of a cloth he didn't recognize.

The sight of so many bodies didn’t disturb him nearly as much as he thought it should, but maybe it was hard to be horrified by deaths that had taken place nearly fifteen thousand years before he was born.

Amazingly, the wreckage wasn’t the only strange thing here.

Across the landscape flowed multicolored clouds of kenja, like streams of fog driven by strong winds, all of it visible to the naked eye, without any need for kenja-sight. And then there was the buzzing, loud and insistent, as if he had bumblebees stuck in his ears. The sound was composed of dozens of repeating tones, all strung together, and it was oddly familiar, though he certainly couldn’t remember having ever heard anything like it before. He shook his head, trying and failing to clear away the sound.

If this moment was supposed to be the birth of the Kaiaru, then it was an odd origin indeed.

“The buzzing…” Lord Gyoroe said enthralled “…do you hear it?”

Turesobei nodded. “Do you know what it is?”

Gyoroe stared at him incredulously. “You do not recognize it?”

Turesobei shook his head.

“But you have heard it all your life!”

“I don’t think I have, master.”

Over the buzzing, Turesobei picked up voices, coming from behind a large section of metal nearby.

“Master, I think there may be survivors.”

Turesobei stepped around what was essentially a metal box with the back ripped off. Gyoroe followed along behind him.

Two people, a man and a woman, were sheltered inside the remains of the box-shaped structure. Both wore the same odd, silvery clothes Gyoroe did. Suddenly, Turesobei realized the clothing on the bodies amongst the wreckage matched as well, and the odd amulet Gyoroe wore appeared to be a small fragment from this same wreckage. How could it be that a man from a few centuries before Turesobei’s time was wearing, in his ghostly form, clothing identical to that worn by people from fifteen millennia ago?

The woman had dark hair and deep brown skin. She was leaning over the man, with her back turned to Turesobei, so that he couldn’t see her face. She also blocked his view of the man, who must have been injured, because he was trembling and uttering nonsense.

“Brother,” the woman said, soothingly, “there’s hope for us. Look what I found.” She held something out in her hand. “The buzzing had nearly driven me mad, but then
something
called out to me. I followed that…voice…that feeling…and it led me to this stone. When I picked it up, my mind cleared. And as long as I keep it with me, I can think straight.”

Turesobei stepped around to get a better view. The woman, who had a heart-shaped face and exceedingly pale green eyes, held in her hand a red-orange gemstone. Turesobei would have thought it a kavaru, except for its odd, diamond shape. Every kavaru he’d ever seen or heard about was rounded. Embedded into flesh, this one would appear almost triangular.

“Look how the weird energy flows connect with the stone.” She held the gem up. Crimson kenja streamed into the stone, and out of it came a pink-hued trail. “Holding this stone, I feel deeply and intimately connected to the energy fields. As if, through the stone, I have become a part of them.”

Turesobei’s jaw dropped. It
was
a kavaru! And this woman, whoever she might be, was apparently the first Kaiaru. Except she wasn’t fully a Kaiaru…not yet. Right now she was a human holding onto a kavaru at a time when kenja flows were visible. Lord Gyoroe’s answer was definitely close at hand, waiting to be uncovered, because somehow this woman was soon going to find a way to unite herself with this kavaru.

“I found hundreds of these stones, brother. I don’t have a functioning slate, so I can’t do an analysis, but whatever they are, I’m certain they’re unique to this world.”

With his eyes locked onto the stone, Gyoroe knelt beside the woman. “The first kavaru,” he whispered reverently. Then his eyes moved to the woman’s face and lit up. “Oh! I know you. I remember you…Na–Na–Na….” He stuttered unintelligibly as he tried, and repeatedly failed, to say her name.

As Gyoroe groaned in frustration, Turesobei turned to the man on the ground—then staggered backward in shock.

The man, the woman’s brother,
was
the gray-eyed Gyoroe!

E
xcept for a bandage wrapped around his head and another on his shoulder, the man lying on the ground was identical to the ghostly Gyoroe who knelt beside Turesobei.

“It’s you!” Turesobei said.

The ghostly version of Gyoroe didn’t look at the real version of himself in the past. He remained utterly fascinated by his sister, whose name he could not remember.

Turesobei gestured to the man on the ground. “Master, that’s
you
lying there!”

Again Lord Gyoroe ignored him.

“I can’t explain how this one gemstone out of hundreds called to me, and over a distance, anymore than I can explain how it works,” the woman said. “When I hold it, instead of buzzing I hear a range of notes, sweeping melodies layered one atop another.”

Of course! That’s where Turesobei knew the buzzing sound from. All the different types of kenja possessed tones, like musical notes, tones so subtle they were normally felt far more than they were heard. And it was only recently that he learned those tones were chords consisting of three notes each. This buzzing was like hearing all the notes being played loudly and at once.

The sister continued, her eyes alight with wonder. “Peppered in amongst the melodies, I can hear a chorus of sibilant voices, and I know it’s absurd, but I think the energies might possess some rudimentary sentience.”

She drew a familiar yellow stone from a pocket. It was oval-shaped and definitely a kavaru. “I picked up others, as many as I could carry, hoping I could find one that would help you.”

The eyes of the Gyoroe lying injured on the ground held the same dazed look the Kaiaru they’d seen decades later had possessed. Drooling and shaking, he couldn’t manage to focus on his sister, much less take the stone she offered him. Either the buzzing of the kenja or the wound to his head—or both—was driving him mad.

She placed the yellow stone in his hand and curled his fingers around it. No energy flowed into the kavaru during the few moments it rested in his hand.

“Let’s try another,” she said, giving him a scarlet stone, which also seemed familiar.

But that didn’t get a response, and neither did the seven other kavaru she had brought back with her.

“If I can’t find a way to take you there safely, then I’ll just have to keep bringing stones here, until we find one that works.”

Lord Gyoroe, the Blood King, looked at the nine kavaru lying on the ground, then back to the woman. He still hadn’t looked at himself on the ground.

“You do realize that’s you on the ground that she’s talking to, right?” Turesobei asked, but Gyoroe continued to ignore him. “Hey, Blood King! That’s you on the ground—right there!”

Enraged, Lord Gyoroe snapped at Turesobei. “Stop bothering me! I do not know what your attempt at deception is supposed to accomplish, but I am not an idiot. That is not me on the ground. How could it be? That is nothing more than a common man of little importance.”

He returned to staring, only now he alternated between his sister and the nine kavaru on the ground. For whatever reason, Lord Gyoroe just could not see himself. Was this a side effect of ghosting into the past?

Turesobei gasped as realization struck him. All
nine
of the kavaru the woman had brought him
were
exceedingly familiar! He knelt to examine them, just to be sure: light blue, emerald, scarlet, yellow, blue-white, vermillion, violet, orange, pale green…. Yes, these were, in fact, the exact same kavaru the Blood King had bound to himself in the future.

That couldn’t be a coincidence. None of this could.

A pattern was emerging that could explain a lot of the Blood King’s obsessions and madness. He might claim he wanted to restore the Kaiaru race, and maybe he did, but deep down, it had to be this connection that made him so desperate to return to this moment.

Just as Turesobei started to ask the Blood King if he at least recognized the stones, the wounded Gyoroe pointed up toward the sky, and with the voice of a child said, “Nal, look at the pretty lights!”

In the dark sky flashed twelve lights: stars Turesobei had never seen before.

“Why haven’t they changed course?!” Nal yelled. “I sent the signal.” She glanced at the bodies amongst the wreckage. “No…please, no…you have to turn back.”

The injured Gyoroe, now with a clear, intelligent voice said, “They can’t change course. There’s not enough fuel to reach the next star.”

“It’s enough to get them close.”

“They saw what happened to us. They understand the risk.” He giggled, then he spoke again as a child. “The lights are very pretty, Nal. Are they for me? Is it my birthday? I would love to have a party.”

The Blood King stood, as he too gazed now at the twelve new stars. “The Kaiaru,” he said reverently. “The Kaiaru are coming.”

With a determined nod, Nal stood. “I’ve got to get to work. I only have a few days to figure out how the gemstones interact with these crazy energy fields. Assuming any of them survive the landing, with all the interference this planet has, they will then need help to survive the buzzing. Otherwise, it will drive them all mad.”

“We will have a party when they get here, right?”

The woman scratched her chin thoughtfully and said, absentmindedly, “Yes, Gyo, we will.”

Turesobei shook his head in amazement. She had said
landing
, which meant those lights were—inexplicably—ships of some kind, sailing in from the stars themselves.

“The buzzing…voices on the wind…” the Blood King said “…visible energy flows…nine kavaru…Nal….”

At least he could see the stones and say his sister’s name now.

“Do you know what it all means?” Turesobei asked. “Can you see yourself yet? Do you realize now that Nal’s your sister?”

“Silence! Do not speak to me again without permission, apprentice. I do not have time to deal with your ridiculous attempts to distract me. There is much I must contemplate, and the present yet tugs upon us. We only have a few hours here
at best
.”

As the Blood King knelt to meditate, Turesobei muttered a curse and took a few steps away. He wanted to wander around and examine the debris, but he wasn’t sure if it was safe to move far away, and he certainly couldn’t ask him now.

“What is the meaning of it all?” the Blood King implored the heavens.

“If you want to figure out something,” Turesobei muttered, “maybe you should start by looking at yourself.”

The Blood King either didn’t hear Turesobei or ignored him.

“He has forgotten himself,” whispered a sultry voice, “and not everything that is forgotten can be remembered by seeing it again.”

Turesobei spun around to see a ghostly woman. And it wasn’t Hannya.