Redemption of Light (The Light Trilogy) (55 page)

Cole lunged off the dais, racing erratically for Amirah. “I believe him. Come on!”

Together, they careened out the door and down the blood-spattered corridor, heading for the surface.

CHAPTER 57

A jolt like a cannon attack brutally threw Carey into her restraints and woke her. Her spirit seeped back into her flesh like a warm rush of water, aching in her glacially cold hands and feet. She shivered and sucked a sudden breath into her lungs.

“Carey?”
Jeremiel’s surprised voice demanded. A hard hand gripped her arm.

She blinked at the cramped interior of the fighter, noted the five Gamants in bloody rags huddled in the back and the instincts of twenty-five years of war kicked in. She straightened in her seat and scrutinized the weapons, power, and communications panels. “What’s happening, Jeremiel?”

“Get on the weapons console! We’ve got six fighters on our tail!” He threw her a fleeting smile, before rushing to input data into his nav com. His blond hair and reddish beard bore a dusty shroud of tan dirt.

Carey spun around. Out the round side portal she could see the familiar landscape of Palaia, the Pharaggen Mountains, Naas and
Zohar.
The black hole rose like a malevolent whirling eye over the horizon. A tingle of terror wound through her. Red flashes caught her eyes and she glanced back at her weapons com, noting the positions of the incoming fighters. “Jeremiel, there are two fighters flanking the Magisterial line—”

“Ours! Mikael and Sybil.”

Jeremiel’s hands danced over the nav controls and their ship plunged and twisted sideways, ruthlessly slamming Carey back in her seat. She watched the hills blur into a mass of green and brown as they soared toward the Pharaggen Mountains on full thrust.

On her monitor, she saw the lead Magisterial fighter swing around, coming to point-blank range on their port side. “Firing,” she announced.

Purple lances shot out from their fighter, slamming the Magisterial ship. It hurtled sideways and five others dropped into formation around her and Jeremiel, boxing them. Mikael and Sybil swept by overhead, blasting the formation, killing one of the ships. It spun sickeningly and exploded.

“Firing again!”

Carey’s shot arced across the closest fighter’s shields as Jeremiel dove, then decelerated so shockingly that Carey’s empty stomach heaved. As they swerved up and around, escaping the deadly formation, Carey fired again. The enemy fighter flared and exploded in a blinding flash of silver.

“Brace yourselves,” Jeremiel coolly commanded. “We’ve got to get back to the mountains, before the Magistrates’ ground forces trap the Gamant population that’s gathered at the Spires.”

“Affirmative.” Carey wiped the sweat from her forehead and gazed out the portal at the mountains. Her mouth gaped. There had to be a thousand Gamants blanketing the green side of the eastern slope. And behind and all around them, purple-uniformed soldiers ran, firing in calculated patterns of devastation, picking off the most vulnerable segments of the fleeing masses. Purple flashes dusted the sunset drenched hills. In a desperate whisper, Carey murmured, “In the name of blessed … Aktariel. What are they doing there?”

Jeremiel glanced at her curiously. “Arikha says they’ve gathered to await the arrival of the Mashiah.”

A hollow ache built in Carey’s chest.
Who was the Mashiah in this universe? Was there one?

A barrage of cannon fire came out of nowhere and struck them catastrophically, flipping them over. Their aft shields flared and died. Carey heard a woman behind her scream hoarsely when she saw a fighter swoop up from behind the cover of a rugged ridge. Jeremiel spun their ship frantically, trying to keep their forward shields to the attacker. Three more fighters emerged from the cover of the ridges. They swung up and around, then dove like hawks descending on a wounded mouse.

Carey fired again—missed—retargeted—fired. She sliced off the starboard wing of the lead fighter and it heaved and gyrated as it slammed into the ground and tumbled in fiery fragments across the plains.

Two of the fighters joined up with one of the survivors from the last pass, lining out on either side of them. They fired simultaneously, pouring every erg into the forward shields. Another fighter sailed down from the heavens, dropping to fire point-blank at their vulnerable aft section.

The ship lurched and waffled violently. “We’re hit!”

“I know,” Jeremiel said calmly while he fought the helm to keep them from tumbling to their deaths. His eyes went stern. “Where are Mikael and Sybil, do you see them?”

Carey examined the tracker on her com. Nothing. “I don’t know. Maybe they landed. Maybe they got hit.”

Smoke boiled into the command cabin, blinding Carey. Flames licked around the edges of the door to the rear storage area. Lurching out of her seat, Carey weaved to the emergency equipment compartment, but instead of grabbing the fire control extinguisher, she tugged out five chutes and two jet packs. She threw the chutes at the terrified Gamants. “Do you know how to use these?”

The woman with long dark hair nodded. “Yes! I’m Arikha. I’ll show the others.”

Carey ran forward and awkwardly slipped the pack over Jeremiel’s shoulders while he battled to keep the pitching ship in the air. He gave her a worried but warm look as she fastened the belt around his waist and pulled it tight, then hastily got into her own pack.

To the Gamants, Jeremiel called, “Arikha? Get ready. I’m going in low. You’ll have to jump in quick succession.”

“We understand, Commander.” Arikha waved the other Gamants into the rear of the fighter by the side doors.

Carey watched the top of the Pharaggen Mountains heave up to meet them. The rocky plateaus loomed out like eager jagged teeth. The side doors parted and each Gamant jumped. Their chutes opened like blossoming flowers below.

“Ready, Carey?” Jeremiel asked tautly.

“Yes. Let’s go.”

She held her breath as Jeremiel hit the eject patch …

Carey tumbled end over end, the darkening yellow sky and tree-clad mountains swirling in a muddy smear around her. A savage roar exploded from somewhere below and a searing wall of heat rose to roast her face. Carey gasped and jammed her palm against the activation patch for her pack.

The jets kicked in with a ferocious jolt and she found herself flying like a hurled rock over the peaks. Their ship blazed below, pitching into rocks and disintegrating as it plunged down the western slopes.

Jeremiel?
Carey frantically searched the skies, but saw only fighters forming up for another run and a few low-flying shuttles. On the plains below, either Mikael’s or Sybil’s fighter lay in a crashed, fiery heap. Another fighter sat intact beside it. Carey dove, skimming the ground, heading for the Engineering Spires where the Gamants had gathered. From her perspective the leveled out spaces appeared to form a huge animal of some sort, broad-shouldered and with horns. Trees passed below in green strips. She soared over the heart of the animal intaglio and decelerated.

Screaming people charged erratically out to meet her, waving their arms and cheering. And though Carey hadn’t seen them in twelve long war-torn years, she recognized Mikael and Sybil standing hand-in-hand between the two prongs of the strange rock formation.

She landed in a burst of tan dust and frantically shoved through the swelling crowd, shouting in rage at them,
“Get back! Get back, damn it! I have to get to Mikael and Sybil!”

The station shuddered turbulently under her feet. Carey ran, legs pounding as madly as possible over the reeling surface.

Mikael recognized her and threw down Sybil’s hand to lunge for her. His black curls fluttered around his cheeks tangling in his beard as he ran. Dressed in a bright red robe streaked with dust and blood, he seemed a tattered pillar of flame.

“Lieutenant Halloway!” he called.

“Mikael! You’re the leader of Gamant civilization! You’ve got to get these people off this mountain! The government forces are closing ranks! They’ve got you surrounded.”

She grabbed him by the arm as they collided and bodily hauled him back up to the high point overlooking the mumbling, shifting crowd, where Sybil waited. Brown hair draped in thick curls to Sybil’s waist, accentuating the pale shimmer of her ivory robe.

As they climbed up between the two spikes, Sybil shouted,
“Look! It’s Jeremiel!”

Carey spun around to see Jeremiel racing up the northern slope, followed by a wailing crowd of ragged dirty soldiers with rifles clutched in their arms. He had a granite expression on his face.

“Carey!”
he shouted.
“Get down! Get down! Fighters coming in!”

She leapt for Mikael and knocked him flat as eight fighters swept over the peaks and blasted the mountaintop. People ran screaming, shoving, trying to find cover. Brilliant purple flares gouged the pastel colors of sunset and rippled through the clouds like lurid fire.

A hushed cry of astonishment began and swelled to crashing climax. A wave of people pointed at the doors to the subterranean control chamber. Carey rolled off Mikael’s tall body and shaded her eyes. When she saw Cole and an unknown Magisterial captain running toward them, she lunged to her feet.

“Cole?”

Rudy rolled feebly to his side, coughing, gasping for breath. Blood smeared his face plate like thick pudding. He struggled to find a clear space so he could inspect the forward screen. His soul cried out at the sight that met his searching gaze. Bodies and debris had congealed into a spinning cloud around the
Hammadi.
Beyond the cloud, battle cruisers soared, still attacking stubborn starsails and freighters. Where was Merle?
Merle?
Palaia hung below, its orange bulk silhouetted against the looming blackness of Zohar. Purple splashes tormented the plains.

“Is that you down there, Jeremiel? Sorry we couldn’t keep ‘em off longer, old friend.”

He shoved up on his elbows. Dead crew members sprawled hideously across the bridge. On the three-sixty monitors, he could see that decks two, five, and ten through twenty had breached.

He slammed a fist into the floor and suppressed the angry insanity that threatened to engulf him. “Do something, damn you. Do something!”

Rudy dragged himself back to the nav com and hoisted his injured body into the tip-tilted chair. He probed the few screens that worked and squinted at Palaia. The station’s defense shells oscillated furiously.

“Breaking up… ?” Rudy peered pensively at the readings. Hope grew. He flexed his gloved hands over the controls and a low, desperate laugh took him. He struck a few patches, asking for updated information, then his smile faded to a miserable grimace.

“Forgive me,”
he whispered to all of the crew members with damaged suits who might still be alive on the contained decks. Methodically, he rerouted every shred of remaining power, including life support, to the weapons.

Flopping back in his chair, Rudy lifted a finger over the patch and let it hover …

Before striking it.

CHAPTER 58

A broad violet beam gored Paiaia’s shields, slashing the rolling hills with pulverizing force. Hope flared inside Carey. Six of the fighters swerved up and away, streaking toward the offending cruiser.
Kopal! It had to be! He was trying to draw the fighters’ fire away from them.
“Move!” she shouted to the swarming Gamant multitude. “Get down!”

The Magisterial captain hauled Cole forward, partially supporting his weight. Overhead, three fighters swerved back through the twilit skies.

“Oh, God!” Carey beard Sybil Calas cry. “If we only had a
Mea.
In my dreams we always had a
Mea!“

A Mea? Carey started to take off hers….

But the blonde captain with Cole tore a
Mea
from around her throat and shouted, “Here!” She tossed it to Sybil.

Sybil’s mouth dropped open, but she took the sacred device and pulled Mikael forward; in a tender gesture, she put the
Mea
between their foreheads and they kissed….

Carey stumbled backward when the
Mea
ignited, burning with such a blinding blue light that the entire mountaintop erupted in screams and shouts of awe. Against the dwindling coral rays of sunset Mikael and Sybil seemed to merge, melding into a cerulean pillar of Pure Light. And over their heads, the tips of the rock spikes started to glow.

“The Horns!” Yosef Calas shouted. He staggered backward into Ari Funk’s arms. “Look!”

The azure flame spread down the shafts and flooded forth like a watery carpet to drown every man, woman and child on the mountain. In awe, people frantically brushed at each other’s fiery countenances.

A deep-throated growl percolated from somewhere in the depths of the station, rising to a rumbling roar that shook the foundations off the universe.

Carey’s throat constricted as a huge spinning well of Darkness opened beside Mikael and Sybil. Like a slithering ebony serpent, it stretched endlessly into the flaming sky, twining out into space.

Blessed Aktariel, where does this go?

Shrill whines sounded as the fighters began their final run. Carey let out a jagged cry of rage. The fighters lined out into two wedges and hurled headlong for the Pharaggen Mountains.

A blinding flash of gold exploded near Mikael and Sybil. Carey spun breathlessly. As though in response to her cry, Aktariel walked gracefully forward and touched Sybil’s forehead. Carey couldn’t hear what Aktariel said to them, but Mikael nodded fervently.

When Aktariel lowered his hand and stepped back, Mikael and Sybil closed their eyes, as though concentrating harder. The cyclone of Darkness broadened, spreading like a sea of night into the heavens.

Aktariel turned to gaze forlornly at the terrified crowd, then he turned his attention to the blonde captain. She seemed dazed and uncertain as though some communication passed between them that left her reeling. Aktariel smiled sadly, lifted his hand, and vanished.

The captain stood rigid a moment, then glanced at Cole and shouted at the crowd, “What are you waiting for? Hurry it up!”

Cole desperately reached for her. “Amirah? What are you doing?”

The woman ignored Tahn, sprinting forward into the cerulean blaze that enveloped Mikael and Sybil. She climbed up the gritty side of one of the horns to wave frantically, shouting,
“Run into the Void! It’s the only way to escape the cannons! RUN! RUN, OR YOU’LL ALL BE DAMNED.”

The hushed cry of
“Salvation … this is it … salvation
…” eddied through the assembly and a din of humanity raced forward in a flood that sounded like the crashing waters of an avenging sea swallowing up an enemy army. Male and female, young and old, they bravely lunged down the throat of the black serpent.

Carey charged headlong for Jeremiel. He stood, suddenly alone, on the downhill side of the Horns. He seemed barely aware of the enemy fighters that aimed straight for him. Jeremiel had a peculiar expression on his face as he watched the blonde captain: disbelief, awe.

“Jeremiel, hurry!” Carey demanded as she slid to a halt in front of him. “Run!”

The fighters opened fire. A din of whines like a herd of dying animals rose as the world vanished in a purple wash of light and flying debris. Carey dove for Jeremiel and together they rolled down the slope, tumbling headfirst toward the edge of the dark Void Mikael and Sybil had opened. For the briefest of instants blackness enveloped them as they toppled over brush and rocks to land hard against an upthrust sandstone slab. Jeremiel threw himself over Carey, covering her protectively.

… But all the noise had stopped.

The whine of the fighters was gone. The screams had died away.

Only the rhythmic surging of Carey’s heart gave voice to the ethereal quiet.

Jeremiel eased up and peered around. Blood coursed from the scratches on his left cheek and oozed from rips in his black sleeves.

He slowly pushed to his feet and his blue eyes darted over the landscape. “Carey, where are we?”

“I don’t know,” she whispered fearfully. She got up. They stood on a sandy hilltop overlooking a fortified village surrounded by high stone walls. Goats frolicked in the dirt streets, the bells around their necks jangling. Gamant refugees ran in a triumphant flood for the nearest gate.

Jeremiel put an arm around her shoulders and hugged her. On a hillside in the distance, a group of people had gathered beneath a series of standing crosses. An odd sensation of premonition made Carey feel hollow.

“Let’s go ask somebody over there.”

Jeremiel hesitated, his keen eyes scanning the hills. “Do you see Cole, or Mikael and Sybil?”

“No. But they may have been the last to come through.”