The Persistence of Memories - A Novel of the Mendaihu Universe (55 page)

“It's well past the time,” the Elder said.
“You have nothing to hide from, edha Eiyashné. Nothing is harming
you. Not here, not now. And once you return to Gharra, I promise,
you will be unbeatable. It's the persistence of your memories that
keeps holding you back. You're holding onto a past that's no longer
there. It only remains in your mind and in your heart. You can
remember them all you like, Alix, but do not dwell on them.”

She
clacked
a single black talon on
the hard floor over and over, waiting impatiently. She had remained
in her
kiralla
form and wasn't about to revert back. The
room had become brighter, lit from above by a large ornate
chandelier, and Crittiqila’s shiny kiralla scale took on a gorgeous
iridescence of sapphire and coral. She tilted her head from side to
side with her muzzle down, seeming to study him as well.

“Okay,” he said finally. “Say I take down
these walls.”

She twitched her tail, a quick flip that gave
no noise. “Say you do,” she said. “Your True self emerges, and you
do not suffer any side effects. No trauma, no physical harm
done.”

“What are you expecting to see?” he
asked.

She let out a short laugh. “Far be it from me
to influence your image, Alix. It's up to you.”

“Yes,” he smiled. “But you've already
influenced it by showing
your
True image.”

“This is true,” she said, amused. “But
you
are also kiralla. Did you not say you encountered a
sense of familiarity here?”

“I did.”

She grinned, flashing a set of razor sharp
fangs. “You are from here, my sehnadha. You
are
one of the
kiralla. As were your parents, as were theirs, and so on.
That
is your deep, dark secret that you've been hiding all
these years.”

Poe frowned. “That can't be right.”

The Elder began to laugh again. “Stop lying
to yourself! It
is
the truth!”

But he held firm. He wasn't about to lose any
shred of humanity, any part of his individuality by admitting he'd
been a kiralla all this time. He wouldn't accept any of these
truths simply by suggestion.

“You're as stubborn as they were,” Elder
Nayélha said with a twitch of a tail and a sigh of disdain. “If not
more so.”

“Who?” he asked.

“Your parents,” she retorted. “It took me ten
years to convince them.”

“What?” he gasped. “Wait a minute. You're
older than I am?”

“Spiritually,” she said, flashing her lethal
grin again. “Truth be told, I'm an infant kiralla spirit, around
eighty-five thousand Earth years. Most kiralla souls are positively
ancient
. Older than most Trisandi, as a matter of fact.”

Poe blinked at her. “I knew of their — of
our
existence, but I didn’t know…”

With a resigned bowing of her head nearly
down to the floor, she gave with a great rumbling sigh. “Oh, dear.
This is going to take some time,” she grumbled. She shifted on all
four legs, arched her back in a long and satisfying stretch, and
laid herself out into a Sphinx-like pose, sharp-clawed hands folded
one atop the other. She tapped another talon on the floor. “Sit,
Alix. Let me tell you about your heritage.”

Poe studied her again. He had been quashing
his curiosity for a while now, trying as hard as hell to remain
aloof. It had worked for him in the past, but it seemed this time
he was dealing with an Elder who had
much
more patience than
he could ever muster. It didn't look like she was going to let them
return to Earth until she had what she had brought him there for.
He sat on the floor, crossed his legs, and waited for her to
begin.

CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE

Sunrise

The Councillor unlocked the door and held it
open for Caren. She bowed with a little bit of uncertainty, and
walked into the oval shaped foyer. Two staircases followed the
curve of the side walls and met at the far end of the room at a
mezzanine entryway. Four matching plush chairs were placed in
between the four doorways, all the same calming beige as the walls,
which were sparsely yet methodically ordained with a number of
paintings and vidart. Two double doors faced each other on either
side of the room, recessed into the wall between the sofas. The
main floor hallway loomed ahead. Whoever owned this mansion was
certainly well off.

The only thing out of place was the metal
security arch she stood behind.

“I'm armed,” she said. “Will this...?”

“It only reads and puts you in the database,”
he said. “Not to worry, the only people who have data access are
myself and the owners of the house.”

Somehow that didn't make her feel any better,
but she relented and passed through. Councillor James followed her,
pulling off his overcoat. He hung it on a brass coat rack she'd
missed seeing before, and held his hand out for hers. He paused as
he felt its odd weight when she handed it to him, and smiled. “You
take nothing for granted,” he said. “I admire that.”

“Yeah, well...” she started, then thought
better. “I get that from my parents.”

“Anyone I might know?”

“They were ARU as well,” she said, holding
back her anger.

He caught the tone of her voice and bowed his
head. “Oh! Nyhnd’aladh, edha Johnson. That was an extremely rude
question.”

“Whatever,” she grumbled, waving off his
apology. “Look, I'm working on two hours sleep and a hell of a lot
of stress here, so I might snap at you. Let's just cut the
familiarities, shall we? And please, call me Caren.”

“Very well, then,” he smiled, and his
shoulders visibly dropped. “I hate talking nice all the time
anyway. Annoying as hell. Call me Kell.”

It must have been her exhaustion, but his
words caused her to break out in laughter. “Oh! Heh. I'm sorry,
sir.”

“Quite all right,” he said. “What did I do
this time?”

She giggled again. Goddess, what was wrong
with her? “I’m sorry, sir, you’ll have to forgive me. My partner is
a huge fan of your writings. He’s been reading you a lot lately.
I’m dearly looking forward to seeing him tomorrow so I can say 'Oh,
by the way, I talked to
Kell
yesterday, rode my bike with
him out to Sachers Island, hung out at his mansion.’”

“I’m sure I'll be meeting him soon enough,”
he said warmly. “Come, let’s head to the war room, where we can
speak freely.”

“War room?”

“The owners call it that. It's really a large
library where they like to meet up. It's right through here.” He
lifted up a hand and led her through the right side door, which led
down a short hallway to a room at the end. He swung its doors open
wide and tapped the lightpad on. Caren spun around slowly, taking
it all in. It was quite spacious, taking up this entire corner of
the mansion wing. Windows lined three of the four hardwood walls,
their curtains tied back. There were numerous wide mahogany
bookshelves. Some of them held archive data crystals and cached
vidmats, but most of them still held books, all dusty and worn. The
couches themselves were antiques, dark violet covers hand-stitched
with gold leaves and vines. She was almost afraid to sit on
them.

Kell led her to one of the couches close to
the far end of the room, near the windows overlooking the river.
The city awaited the slow approach of dawn, mist lifting up and
covering the Sprawl in a surreal, ethereal yellow glow. It was
quietly beautiful.

“The calm before the storm,” she said.

“'
Come and rejoice, for a new sun is about
to rise,'
“ he said. “One of my own, that. Saisshalé is
experiencing his own awakening, and he's gathering his flock now.
But you knew that was coming, didn't you? It was inevitable. The
Mendaihu stepped up their presence, so the Shenaihu are about to do
the same.”

“The Mendaihu stepped up their presence
because of Nehalé Usarai's Awakening ritual,” she countered. “They
wanted to make sure all was okay. It wasn't until the hrrah-sehdhyn
attack that— ”

“The Shenaihu merely balanced it out,” he
finished. “If the Mendaihu had left it the hrrah-sehdhyn, it all
would have been rectified within a week or so. The so-called
‘Season of Embodiment’ we're about to face would have been less of
an Armageddon and more of a simple misunderstanding. Not that I'm
blaming anyone, mind you. I'm just an observer.”

“A misunderstanding?” Caren glared at him.
“No one died as a direct result of edha Usarai's spiritual
actions.”

But Kell was quick to answer. “True,” he
said. “But his actions awakened the One of All Sacred. Which means
it was only a matter of time until Saisshalé would arise, through
Shenaihu means. Everything affects everything else. There were
certain things, certain events set into motion that could not be
stopped. If the Mendaihu want to reincarnate a deity, the Shenaihu
do so in kind. If the Mendaihu wish to awaken everyone on this
beloved planet, then the Shenaihu have no choice but to do the
same, preferably while the awakened are still malleable. Do you
understand?”

She frowned deeply, but nodded. “All too
well.”

He smiled warmly and shook his head. “Nothing
to be afraid of, emha Shalei.”

That name surprised her enough that she
reacted before she could hide it. She opened her mouth to speak,
closed it again, shifted in her seat, and looked away, her face
burning.

“You're afraid,” he said quietly. “But you
won't fully admit it. You think that you're about to enter into a
war with no recognizable end, and you feel completely unprepared
for it. Am I right?”

She nodded.

“Well...I'm here to tell you that you
are
ready. All of you. All of the Mendaihu at Moulding
Warehouse, and those who’ve returned home. You're all ready,
because you've been given the keys to your past. You have access to
past memories. Even you, with your
one
meeting with Elder
Nayélha.”

“How do you know that?”

He smiled again. “Elder Nayélha is one of my
closest friends. She was
very
vocal about you, I should add.
Thought you were one of the best she's trained.”

Despite her blushing, she frowned and shook
her head. “What the hell did I learn from her? A few fancy energy
tricks and a boost in my self-esteem! I need to know more.”

He held up his hand quickly and shook his
head. “No, Karinna...you don't.” He gestured towards her chest and
pointed. “It's all in
there.
In your spirit's memories. All
you need do is access them.”

“But—”

“Enough,” he said suddenly, shaking his head.
“We've gotten off the subject. What happens next, out there in our
city, is completely up to those who have taken their place in the
playing field.”

“You and that damn 'playing field' analogy!”
she snapped. “This is no damn game, Kelley! People are going to
die
, and no Mendaihu wants that on their conscience!”

Instead of answering, he ducked his head low,
frowning deeply.

“What?” she said.

He let out an uneven breath and nodded. “None
of the Mendaihu you've known have actually
killed
before,
have they?”

“Not unless it was in self-defense,” she
said, knowing how weak that sounded. She knew what he'd meant. “I'm
afraid I was too young to remember most of the last Season.”

“Once more with the memories,” he said. “Let
me tell you, then: you are right, that no Mendaihu wants a kill on
their conscience, and neither does a Shenaihu. Even the
self-defense kills are a blow to the spirit. I should know. I was
there twenty-five years ago, down at the Mirades Tower.”

“You were there?” she blurted, mouth agape.
“I'd thought you too young for that.”

“I was a bit young,” he said sheepishly. “A
little kid of twelve, and already a Mendaihu brat.”

“Goddess...” she whispered.

“And yes, it was traumatic. I was surrounded
by at least eighty soulhealers when I stood at the west facade. It
only came back to me later, when I started my run for Council.
So…what was it like to kill Shenaihu in self-defense? Awful.
Fucking horrific. When you're fighting, as a Mendaihu you don't
just sense the fear behind their eyes. You feel the
spirit's
fear. It's...” He stopped, grasping for words. It seemed the
subject was causing him extreme spiritual discomfort. “Imagine a
moment in battle, the chances of a fatal blow are high, and just
for that one moment...your spirit understands that. And for that
one same moment, you feel detached from your own spirit. You feel
resignation. No, worse than that. You feel a simple logic in your
body that admits defeat and peacefully awaits execution. Everything
stops, and your spirit stands, waiting to leave. Time ceases to
exist...”

“'...and we are all left in space,'“ Caren
quoted. “'Here lies fate, my friend. Here lies fate.'“ She
shuddered without meaning to, the ubiquitous phrase taking on new
meaning. “That was about the battle at the Tower, wasn't it? 'The
Persistence of Memories.' It's what you've been talking about all
this time. Goddess...”

Another, unspoken thought crossed her mind:
Madeleine was right.

“Well done, emha Shalei,” he said with a
tired grin. “I wrote that because I wanted others to remember what
that pain and fear was like. The poem's always been taken out of
context, of course. Especially over the last few weeks.”

“I don't think so,” she said. “I think the
context comes across, regardless. It's the kiralla that have been
spraying that phrase all around the city recently. They were here
months before it all went down. They know what's about to happen,
Kell. They're the ones with all the memories. They remember what
happened before. But why did they not tell anyone, save us all some
grief?”

“A very good question,” Kelley said, his grin
pulling into a wide smile. “That's what the sehndayen-ne are for,
aren't they? I gather Elder Nayélha would have given that knowledge
to you.”