Kevin Anderson - The Ashes of Worlds

Riding aboard a small, swift cutter, Daro’h sat next to one of the windows, staring out at the landscape, shocked by how much it had changed. Osira’h and her half-breed siblings had joined him as well, singed and bedraggled but very much alive.

“We are establishing as many camps as we can,” Zan’nh reported, piloting the cutter himself. “The Solar Navy is delivering food, medical supplies, tools, and prefabricated shelters.”

The Adar had already learned that his warliners could not fight the blazing ships directly; to extinguish a single fireball, he had sacrificed two warliners with their full crews. Now only five warliners remained of the septa he had brought to Ildira. The rest of the Solar Navy, the ragged remnants of his cohorts that had survived the climactic battle against the hydrogues, were dispersed thinly across the Ildiran Empire to watch over all the splinter colonies. Tabitha Huck and her work crews had been rapidly assembling new warliners in the orbiting industrial facilities when Rusa’h had arrived.

And so Zan’nh had explicitly instructed the captains of his few ships trapped at Ildira not to engage the faeros in direct conflict. Solar Navy ships returning from their routine patrols received transmitted orders to station themselves at the edge of the star system, waiting for an opportunity to move. They could not win, and he could not risk losing more warliners. Daro’h knew how much it galled Adar Zan’nh to issue those “cowardly” orders; nevertheless, the warliner captains obeyed and kept their large vessels ready — and safe.

“With your permission, Prime Designate, one of my captains has requested to take a warliner filled with refugees and attempt to flee this planet.” Zan’nh turned from his piloting controls. “We can load ten thousand of them from the most exposed camps and fly them to safety.”

Daro’h considered. “That warliner would not be able to return. Can we afford to lose it?”

“My warliners cannot fight the faeros, Prime Designate. At least this could save ten thousand lives.”

“Then it is a good choice. Tell the captain he has my blessing to make the attempt.”

The cutter flew toward the barren cliffs, and Daro’h saw small holes in the overhangs, caves accessed by wide gravel roads laid down centuries ago by digger kithmen. They landed on a broad rocky ledge. “Tal O’nh and Hyrillka Designate Ridek’h are already in the tunnels,” Zan’nh reported. “They have begun to set up the necessary equipment for our new command center.”

Daro’h emerged from the craft, looking in dismay at the round tunnel that was to be their new home for now. Yazra’h gave him a scolding look before he could say anything. “For all its magnificence, the Prism Palace is merely a structure. Remember,you are the Prime Designate.You are currently our leader.You matter more than Mijistra.”

Daro’h tried to convince himself that it was true. He had to make sure he was worthy of that faith in him.

11

Faeros Incarnate Rusa’h

Rusa’h settled into his rightful place like a bright coal at the heart of a blazing bonfire. With its towers, minarets, and gemlike ceilings, the Prism Palace was meant to be his — not for his own ambitions, but for the Ildiran race. and for the resurrection of the faeros and the bright igniting of the universe. Rusa’h had taken action for his people, for Ildira, for all those who had lost their way to the Lightsource.

Once he was ensconced in what remained of the skysphere, his power should have begun spreading like wildfire. He had tried to weave anotherthism web, to save some Ildirans by the necessary purging and sacrifice of others. But this new victory was not what Rusa’h had expected. Though bright soul-threads bound him to the faeros and the Ildiran people under his care, he still felt alone.

Although the faeros had helped him, they wanted more. always more. Every combustible object in the Palace had already burned. If he gave them free rein, the fireballs would surge across the landscape consuming everything, stealing every Ildiran soulfire they could find in order to spark new young faeros. He did his best to prevent a total Armageddon.

Rusa’h had shown the flaming elementals how to defeat the hydrogues. He was the faeros incarnate, but he was also the savior of the Ildiran Empire.

At the moment, his faeros were sweeping around the Spiral Arm to reclaim their cold, dead stars. The fiery elementals had already extinguished a major concentration of wentals on Charybdis and, thanks to the discovery Rusa’h had shown them, newborn faeros had raced along soul-threads ofthism /telink to Theroc. The battle with the worldtrees was already raging, burning. burning.

But Rusa’h had to keep at least part of Ildira intact. He had to hold the faeros in check.

Inside his Prism Palace, he drank in the crackling sound of flames around him. Yet Mijistra itself seemed too quiet and empty, most of the people having fled into the hills and wastelands. He was disappointed that true Ildirans would abandon their sacred metropolis, but they continued to stream away as if the new light were too bright for them. They hid in scattered encampments, huddled together for comfort and perceived protection. In spite of their desertion, he would shield those people from the faeros whenever he could. After all, Ildira washis.

Huge numbers of them were evacuees from his own beloved world of Hyrillka, people who had sought sanctuary on the Empire’s capital world. Rusa’h felt such compassion for them, such responsibility, but many of the reluctant refugees had never found homes here, nor had they been able to return to Hyrillka. That was Jora’h’s fault.

All would have been well if the Hyrillkans had just stayed where they belonged.

Rusa’h alone could save them, or he could let the faeros incinerate them.

Now that the hydrogues were defeated, the faeros needed to propagate. The bright, pulsing fiery entities wanted more soulfires. Insatiable, they demanded to burn more of the refugee camps, to obliterate whole splinter colonies.

Inside the dazzling skysphere his voice and thoughts boomed out to the fireballs. “You will not harm the people of Hyrillka.” The faeros shuddered and thrummed against his command. He could sense them blazing brighter, but he remained firm. “You will leave them alone.”

A searing backlash made the faeros response clear. They were hungry. The flaming elementals demanded more, and Rusa’h was required to give it to them. He had to find something to appease them.

Up in orbit, he detected a lone warliner quietly departing from the abandoned shipyards. Rusa’h was well aware that Adar Zan’nh’s few Solar Navy ships continued to deliver supplies that helped the evacuees. but this particular warliner held ten thousand Ildirans, all of them seeking to escape to some distant colony in the Ildiran Empire. The pilot had loaded his warliner with as many survivors as it could carry and had flown off, intending to take them far from Rusa’h.

He could not allow that to happen.

Once the moving warliner had attracted the attention of the faeros, Rusa’h knew this was an acceptable sacrifice, his best compromise. He groaned, then surrendered to the need and unleashed the fireballs. They raced off to the new target.

From the Prism Palace, he watched through blazing eyes as the fireballs swiftly closed on the crowded vessel. Through thethism, he could feel both hope and terror emanating from the refugees aboard the warliner. Ten thousand of them. all desperate to find sanctuary on some other Ildiran planet.

At least they weren’t the people of Hyrillka. he drew some consolation from that.

The faeros ellipsoids strained, ravenous as they began the chase. When the ornate battleship detected the approaching fireballs, its flight pattern became erratic, heading back toward the complex of heavy spacedocks and industrial facilities, as if hoping to find a place to hide.