Ghost Legion (55 page)

The hand on her mouth loosened slightly. Kamil squirmed in the
cyborg's hold, which was like a metal vice.

"Xris! It's me!" she mumbled, tugging at his hand.

And either he understood her or he had just taken a good look at her.

"Kamil?" he said in astonishment, letting her go.

Trying to recover from her shock and fright, she leaned dizzily
against a wall.

Xris stared at her a moment, then grunted. "Sorry. I didn't
recognize you in that getup."

"What's going on?" she demanded. "What are—"
She stopped.

Another odd-looking figure had appeared at the cyborg's shoulder—the
person Xris had carried into the temple. Male or female, Kamil
couldn't tell at first glance, but it had to be one of the most
extraordinary people she'd ever seen. And certainly one of the most
colorful.

"The priestess who brought us here rests comfortably, friend
Xris," said the flamboyant beauty. "I do not believe she
has been permanently damaged. She has simply fainted—out of
fear, I think. You were rather severe on her."

"I don't have time to play nice," Xris said. Half of a
soggy twist drooped from his mouth. He regarded Kamil grimly. "Do
you
know where something called the Cavern of the Holy Goddess
is?"

"Yes, I've been there, but—"

"Good." Xris gripped her by the arm, began propelling her
across the room toward a window. "Where is it? Can you see it
from here?"

"You can't go there!" Kamil protested. "Astarte's
there, praying. She'll be there all day. We're forbidden to disturb
her—"

She paused. "What do you mean, she's in danger?"

"Nothing. Forget it. Just show me where this damn cave is."

He thrust her bodily at the window.

Kamil, frightened by his intensity, pointed. "Do you see that
giant oak tree, the one way, way up the side of the cliff? That tree
stands in front of the cavern. You can't see the cave. It's hidden."

"How do you get there?"

"A road leads to it You can see part of it from here—that
white trail leading up the mountainside. It's made of crushed marble.
..."

"According to the Little One, the invaders know the way,"
said the pink velvet beauty. "They move with swiftness, purpose,
and resolve."

Xris adjusted his mechanical eye, brought the road in focus, stared
intently into the groves of trees and bushes at the foot of the
sacred mountain. "Yeah, I can see 'em. That's the way they're
headed, too." He glanced at Kamil. "I don't suppose there's
another way to get up there?"

Kamil hadn't heard him. She was staring at the raincoated personage.
"The Little One. I know you. And you must be Raoul. Dion told me
about you—"

"Not now!" Xris said through clenched teeth, biting the end
off the twist. "Well, sister? Is there another way?"

"Yes, there's another path," said Kamil slowly, making up
her mind. "I've taken it. Astarte showed me. She and I used it."

"Give us directions."

"I couldn't. I can find it again, but only if I see where I'm
going."

Xris eyed her speculatively. "All right. You lead."

Kamil turned, almost fell over the prostrate figure of the priestess.

"She'll be all right," said Xris. "Get going."

Kamil did so. They left the room, entered the hall, moving swiftly.

"I'll go on ahead," Xris said to Raoul when it became
apparent that the Little One could not keep up. "You two follow
as quick as you can. And stay in touch. Let me know what he knows.
Use the commlink." The cyborg tapped his ear, glanced at the
Little One.

"Yes, friend Xris," Raoul replied, waving his hand
nonchalantly. "We will act as guardians of your rear end."

Xris grunted, shook his head, and spit out the remainder of the
twist. He increased his pace, keeping his hand closed firmly over
Kamil's arm, urging her along.

"You can let go of me," she told him. "I won't run off
or cause trouble. You said Astarte was in danger. What do you mean?
What invaders?"

"Just show me how to get up the mountain, sister."

"I will when you let go!" Kamil planted her feet, pulled
back.

Xris eyed her, released his hold. Kamil kilted her long skirts up
into the belt at her waist, started forward again at a run. The
cyborg joined her, moving swiftly and easily, but with a strange,
awkward gait, as if his mechanical leg were involved in a contest
with the physical limb. It soon became obvious to Kamil that the
cyborg could have run far faster had he wanted, but he was matching
his pace to hers. Knowing the distance she would have to travel, she
set her own pace at one she knew she could maintain.

They emerged from the main building. People saw them, shouted at
them; a few attempted to follow, but none could catch up with them.
Kamil led the way through the massive garden, heading for the
grapevine-covered shrine that marked the entrance to the hidden path.

"What invaders?" she asked again.

Xris didn't answer, but his gaze flicked over to the north side of
the mountain. Kamil glanced that way herself, thought she saw
movement, but couldn't be certain.

"You don't trust me, do you?" she said.

"Should I?" The cyborg returned. "It would make life
easier for you if she dropped out of the picture."

Kamil felt blood burning in her face, and it wasn't from the exertion
of running. "I suppose I earned that." She couldn't look at
him, kept her eyes on where she was going. "But I'm not that
bad. I'm really not. If she is in danger and if there's anything I
can do to help, I will. Put it this way; She saved my life. I owe
her."

"Fair enough," said Xris. He wasn't even breathing hard.
"How far is it?" He had glanced again in the direction of
the north path. Now Kamil could see small figures, dwarfed by the
mountainside, moving among the fir trees at the mountain's base.

"There .. . that little shrine." She was having to pause,
to catch her breath. "Behind it. The path goes . . . almost
straight up. That road they're on . . . takes longer, but it's
easier."

"Got it," said Xris.

He scanned the cliff face, and though Kamil could see noth-ing
herself, she guessed that the enhanced vision of the cyborg could
pick out the small footpath, winding among the rocks and trees.
Reaching the shrine, the two stopped. Kamil bent over— hands on
her knees—to catch her breath. Xris was conversing with Raoul.

"They are beginning their ascent." The Adonian's voice
could be heard faintly, coming from Xris's commlink. "There are
twenty of them. Commandos. They have already killed one person—a
priest—who tried to stop them."

"Killed!" Kamil looked involuntarily in the direction of
the invaders.

She could see them winding up the path. They had abandoned their
white robes, but they must have been wearing some sort of camouflage
body armor, for they blended id well with the wilderness background.
She saw a brief flash of bright light, heard the whip-shot echo of a
laser blast ricochet off the rocks.

"What are they firing at now?" Xris asked Raoul.

"A small group of temple guards is chasing after them. I don't
think they will be for long," Raoul reported.

"Those . . . the temple guards aren't armed!" Kamil
protested. She saw them, in her mind's eye—mild and devout
young men and women. The office of temple guard was given as a reward
for scholarly pursuit. "They weren't really meant to guard
anything." She felt sick.

"They're not. Not even keeping 'em busy," Xris muttered,
frowning. "I'm going on up," he said to Raoul.

"I'm going with you," Kamil said, but she said it faintly
and he didn't hear her.

"Be ready for my signal," he continued, talking to Raoul,
then ended the transmission.

Circling around the shrine, he found the small path and began loping
up it. Kamil wanted to follow, but she couldn't move. She stared at
the snakelike line of men—murderers— moving with swift
and practiced skill up the mountainside. They were heading for the
cavern, heading for Astarte. And down below, the dead. People dead
and dying. Kamil didn't know what she had expected from the intruders
exactly, but it hadn't been death, violent death. Violence seemed
ludicrous, out of place in these beautiful surroundings. This
peaceful tranquillity should have prohibited such acts of terror.

"And she is alone, up there," Kamil whispered, the
realiza-tion twisting cold inside her. "They've killed to get to
her. Twenty of them...."

Kamil began to run, started scrambling up the cliff face behind the
cyborg. She couldn't have said why she followed, except that she was
suddenly angry—angry at the fact that a place and a people
dedicated to peace had been so savagely violated. And there was
instinct—the instinct of the shieldmaiden, of Olefsky's
daughter, to protect and defend. And then there was shame. She'd been
stung by Xris's accusation. And though she told herself she didn't
give a damn what some mercenary cyborg thought of her, she did care
what she thought of herself.

Kamil had been raised in the mountains of her homeland. She caught up
with Xris and kept up with him.

"Go back," he ordered, not stopping to look at her. "You'll
only get in my way."

She ignored him, kept moving. Glancing at her, Xris said nothing
more, shook his head.

The path was steep, but not difficult to climb. The two were making
good time, but so were the commandos, forging up the opposite side of
the mountain. Nothing, no one was stopping them now.

Reaching a flat, level piece of ground, Xris halted, grimly surveyed
the enemy.

"We'll never make it!" Kamil gasped, pulling herself up
over a sawtooth ledge to stand beside him. "What . . . what are
you doing?"

"Going to slow them down. Give 'em something to think about."
Xris had removed his cybernetic hand. Opening his weapons leg, he
took out a hideous-looking device resembling a hand with three
gigantic hollow fingers, those fingers cut off at the knuckles. He
attached the hand swiftly, then inserted three small torpedolike
objects into each finger.

"You got a good carrying voice?" he asked Kamil.

"Yes," she said, gulping. Her heart beat fast and light;
the air she breathed was clear and pure and seemed to sparkle before
her eyes: rocks and trees were flat, two-dimensional, cut out and
pasted down against a blue sky.

"Pitch your voice toward those rocks over there and yell like
the devil himself had hold of you."

"What ... what do I yell?"

"Anything that comes into your head. It's not the words, it's
the sound I want." He handed her a lasgun. "You shoot?"

"Yes. My brothers taught me. But I can't hit anything at this
range. ..."

"Doesn't matter. Just blast away. Raoul, we're going to turn
ourselves into an army. You understand?"

"I understand, Xris Cyborg."

Raising his voice, Xris bellowed, "Commence firing!" His
voice came tumbling down the cliff like a rockslide. He shouted
again, kept shouting, "Take them from above! Outflank them!"
Pointing his weapons hand in the air, he fired off the three rockets.
They arced high into the air, exploded among the commandos, sent them
scattering.

"Aye, aye, sir!" Kamil yelled, sudden excitement making her
giddy. The echoes of her voice came shrilling back from a different
direction, so loud that they startled her. She didn't recognize
herself. "We're moving up behind them, sir!" Aiming the
lasgun, she fired at a fir tree, set it ablaze.

"Good girl," said Xris. "Look, that's done it."

"What? I can't see." Kamil squinted. Then she did see.

The commandos, uncertain of where the attack was coming from or how
large the force against them was, had halted. They were taking cover,
deploying themselves along the path.

"It won't hold them for long," he said, and even as he
spoke, Kamil saw the commandos steadily crawling their way upward.
"But it'll slow 'em down. Come on, sister ... if you're coming."

He began climbing again. Kamil stashed the lasgun in the belt of her
robes and hurried after him, her feet slipping and stumbling, her
hands sweaty. Her injured arm had begun to throb painfully. She
ignored it.

Down below, she could see Raoul starting up the path, shrieking
something unintelligible about "air strikes" at the top of
his lungs, and suddenly another, deeper voice began thundering from
ground level.

"Circle around behind them, men!"

Kamil, peering down below, was astonished to see the archbishop,
hampered by the folds of his elaborate ceremonial robes, standing in
the garden, waving his arms and shouting for all he was worth.

Xris smiled. "Good for you, Brother Daniel."

The cyborg stopped again farther up the mountainside, fired off three
more rockets. Kamil blasted away with the lasgun. More trees were
burning; smoke was drifting up over the area.

In answer came an eerie, hair-raising whistling sound. Xris grabbed
hold of Kamil, pulled her down flat on the ground. The mountain
rocked beneath her, heaving up, falling back down. Splintered stone
and bits of tree flew through the air. Dust and a bitter, acrid smoke
filled her lungs and set her coughing. Dazed, it took her long
moments to realize that they were under attack.

The ground had not stopped shaking before Xris—with a brief
glance at her, to see if she was all right—was up and on his
way again. Hardly knowing what she was doing, moving by instinct
alone, she staggered after him. She could see the cavern now and
thought she caught a flash of white near the entrance. Astarte must
be wondering what was happening, or perhaps she'd already guessed. As
queen, she must have lived every day with the knowledge that she was
a potential target.

The whistling sound came again and this time Kamil knew what it was,
reacted. She dove beneath an overhanging rock ledge, crowding her
tall body under it as far as she could manage. The mountain shook and
shuddered, rocks and boulders bounded down around her, a shattered
tree trunk slid past.