The Rift War (2 page)

"Well don't give it to me." She grimaced, putting a lie to her disgusted expression when
she brushed a kiss on his cheek and kept a grip on his arm until he reached his cradle in the
transport area. "Go home and knock it out. Word just came through that my team is supposed to
start preliminary preparations." Her eyes sparkled as she gently guided him into the front bench
seat of his transport. "We need you if we want any kind of success." A teasing smirk lit her face.
"And I have to admit, I'm just arrogant enough to enjoy the prestige of being the team leader's
sweetheart."

"Co-leader," Grego mumbled, and wiped the sweat from his forehead with his sleeve.
"And I'll skewer anybody who says you're ambitious or arrogant."

"I didn't say I was ambitious." Brysta brushed her fingertips across his cheek, then
stepped back and slapped the controls for the hatch of his transport. "Feel better." She kissed her
fingertips and flipped them at him as the transport powered up.

Grego nodded and closed his eyes, shivering with the force of the headache trying to
split his head open. The overpowering need to go talk to the Rakkells surprised him.

He was glad to let the robot system carry him home, while he curled up on the seat,
sweating and shivering in privacy. His discomfort decreased as he drew nearer to home, so he
was able to think clearly and rationally, and plan.

And make a hard, possibly career-damaging decision as to where his loyalties lay.

He owed the Rakkells the chance to do the patriotic thing and voluntarily leave their
home, turning it over to the Science Directorate for the good of their country. He was sure he
could persuade them, if he could only have the time to explain the situation. Grego suspected if
he emphasized the wonder of finding real star-metal here on the coast of Moerta, they would be
easier to persuade. There was no need to dislocate them, confiscate their home, and threaten
them with incarceration and prosecution if they resisted or talked to the wrong people.

When he reached his home, he climbed out of the transportation cart in the main
courtyard and hurried up the steps to the estate entrance. The front door opened automatically
when he was two steps away from it, and closed behind him, while the cart parked itself. Grego
nearly crossed through the house to the back door and headed through the forest to the Rakkell
estate. He stopped himself, backed up, and headed up the stairs to his office. He had to log into
his system and open the data and at least present an illusion of being hard at work, as usual. Just
in case Kayn decided to check on him.

An hour later, as the sunset painted the tall trees with gold and crimson, Grego finally
escaped out the back door, with a detour to the kitchen. His stomach had settled enough to
remind him he hadn't eaten since breakfast, caught up in his work to the point of ignoring the
rumbles and pinching. Probably part of his headache and nausea could be blamed on low blood
sugar. He snatched up a couple meatrolls to eat cold, with a large dollop of fire paste, as he
followed the path through the forest. He had changed his clothes to dark, worn-comfortable,
casual tunic, trousers, and heavy boots, suitable for long walks through the woods at night or
riding bareback, if Emmi was in the mood for a moonlight ride. He never knew what sort of
adventure would occur while he visited Master Illis and his granddaughter. Whatever had been
tormenting him, it was almost gone by the time he reached the boundary between his estate and
the Rakkells'.

The fiery taste in his mouth turned to real heat, shooting through his entire body,
freezing him as he put one foot over the imaginary line. Grego choked, spat out the last of his
meatroll, and dropped the half-roll still in his hand. He went to his knees, crossing completely
into Rakkell property. Dangerous memories shot up from the dark, locked regions in the back of
his mind, colliding with a sense of urgency that explained the faded headache and nausea.

The half of his life that he left behind when he went to the Science Directorate to work
had awakened, rising to reclaim his mind and heart.

"I hate this," he growled. Then he grinned at the incredible feeling of freedom and
exhilaration that shot through him, the same every time the locked doors in his mind slammed
open and the secrets he carried returned to his consciousness.

All the wonders of being a person of power and influence at the Science Directorate and
the knowledge he was a certified genius were nothing, compared to the knowledge that magic
was real, and the Estall had granted a small portion to him to use.

Grego staggered to his feet and took a deep breath. He stretched out his right arm,
snapped his fingers, and held his hand out, palm up. Blue sparks danced across his fingertips, and
answering sparks opened a panel in the stone pillar of the arched opening in the raw stone wall
that surrounded the Rakkell estate. A thumb ring of woven threads of star-metal, glowing softly
blue and silver, flew through the air to land on his palm. He inhaled deeply, feeling another
missing piece of himself had come home, as he slipped the ring onto his thumb. His inborn
imbrose
flared to life.

"By the grace and mercy of the Estall," he whispered, renewing his vows as he turned to
continue down the path. "By the
imbrose
in my blood. I do swear my life, my strength,
my honor to the Warhawk, and to his daughter, my queen."

Grego's euphoria vanished with the force of a house collapsing. He usually didn't mind
the physical reaction when Mrillis' mind-shield spell went dormant, every time he crossed onto
the property. The wonder and awe of sharing such a world-shattering secret made up for the
price he had to pay. After all, he had requested the mind-shield when he earned his position at
the Science Directorate.

Illis Rakkell and Emmi were in actuality Mrillis the enchanter and Emrillian Warhawk,
daughter of Athrar. Sixteen years ago, the spell that protected Emrillian and let her sleep through
the ages had been attacked and destroyed by Edrout, son of Megassa and the Nameless One.
Mrillis had brought Emrillian to Moerta, to raise her in the modern world and prepare her for the
day she would return to Lygroes, to lead the Valors of Quenlaque in defending their land against
Edrout and his Encindi barbarians, and prepare for the return of Athrar.

Grego had met them only a few days after coming to live with his grandparents, just an
old man and a little girl, five years old, having a picnic in the forest. He might have continued
exploring the forest, lost in the haze of pain from the death of his parents, but Mrillis had been
drawing pictures with light, making Emrillian laugh and the Threads dance. Grego had seen the
light and the Threads and felt the humming of power in the air that enclosed the clearing, and he
stayed, fascinated, pulled out of his misery.

By seeing the lights that day, he had proven he had
imbrose,
and that had been
enough for Mrillis to listen to his heart, to his sense of destiny, and take the lonely, hurting boy
under his wing. Grego had been included in Emrillian's lessons about the history of Quenlaque,
the Rey'kil, magic, and warfare. He had investigated the Archaics, devoted to scholarship,
delving through the many false legends Mrillis and Meghianna, Queen of Snows had sown
through the centuries, to protect the truth. It had been the natural thing to join the Archaics and
search for others who had
imbrose
, and when he was sure they were trustworthy, to
introduce Mrillis and Emrillian to them. The plan was to recruit from those trusted friends among
the Archaics who had proven themselves honorable, skilled, and devoted to Quenlaque, and take
them down the tunnel beneath the sea someday, to help in the defense of Lygroes.

"It's happening too soon," Grego muttered, as the upper towers of the Rakkell estate
became visible through the thick forest. He had no idea how he would slow the progress on the
star-metal reclamation project, now that the sensors he had developed were operational.

Dangerously operational. He hadn't expected them to work so well, or so soon.

The irony was that Emrillian and Mrillis had encouraged him to stay involved in the
project. They felt it would be better for him to be at the center of this threat to the integrity of the
dome of Threads that protected Lygroes and kept it safe in far distant history. If he had resigned
his position, he could have come under suspicion of treachery by the Science Directorate and
Kayn's paranoid compatriots, and he wouldn't be in a position now to warn Emrillian and Mrillis
when their worst fears came true.

Which he was about to do.

He was so busy with his thoughts, trying to frame the right words to share the news, that
he didn't notice the streamers of gold, silver, and blue light swirling around Emrillian's workshop
until he ran into them. They were as tangible as streamers of spun sugar, brushing against his
skin and startling him out of his thoughts.

Grego 's bare skin prickled a little where the light had touched it. Amazed as he always
was, even after all these years, he reached out one hand, brushing his fingers against a
particularly vivid streak of royal blue. Sparks fizzed and spun around his fingers where they
penetrated the light. Still moving forward, he pressed his hand deeper into the light, enjoying the
somewhat pleasant, faintly ticklish sensation. Such a strong reaction among the Threads
protecting the Rakkell estate meant only one thing: Emrillian was at work at the forge in her
workshop, taking another step in the project she and Grego and Mrillis had shared for three years
now.

The construction of a suit of armor entirely made of star-metal, for Emrillian to wear in
hand-to-hand combat with Edrout. She had sworn at the age of twelve to destroy the enemy
enchanter so her father would not have to face the man again.

Grego stepped out of the forest and into the intricate gardens surrounding the main
house of the Rakkell estate. The lights swirled and spun in a dome around the large workshop
that sat a good hundred meters away from the manor house. Mrillis' voice came from the
workshop, answered a moment later by Emrillian's rich alto. Relieved to be able to share this
perilous news as soon as possible, Grego pushed through the barrier of light and came out the
other side, feeling as if he had taken several whiffs of pure oxygen. His skin tingled all over as if
scrubbed clean. He pushed the door open, and knowing how Emrillian worked, he moved quietly
and slowly. It was not wise to distract or startle her while she worked star-metal.

Emrillian stood in the center of a globe of silvery-blue light, eyes closed, hands spread
midway between shoulder and waist. A glowing, molten mass of silver-blue metal, almost the
same color as her eyes, churned in mid-air, suspended by green and white streaks of light coming
from her fingers. She moved her left hand out, and the metal streamed out and flattened into a
sheet. She raised her right hand, just a little, and pointed with her index finger, twirling it, and
the sheet of glowing metal folded in on itself, again and again, as if it were a paper being
compacted into a packet. Then she flattened it into another sheet, and again folded it. Flattened
and folded.

Grego remembered to breathe. He had watched her do the exact same thing not two
moons ago to a piece of fine steel, working it and tempering it and folding it, then shaping the
hot metal with a stone hammer until she formed it into a thick cuff to protect an archer against
the snap of the bow string. Emrillian had quite a reputation as a metalworker among their
Archaics friends, and the bow guard, engraved with the image of a drakag, had been a gift for a
friend of theirs when she graduated to Valor rank.

With star-metal, the streamers of light and the slight movements of her fingers were
Emrillian's tools, rather than the forge, the anvil, the tongs, and hammer.

"Grego!" She lowered her hands. The cuff floated gently down to the granite surface of
her worktable and the sphere of light surrounding her faded to nothing. She wiped sweat off her
face and then wiped her hands on the seat of her loose trousers. "What a nice surprise. It's more
than a moon since you visited."

"Is the armor finished?" He nodded to Mrillis as the man stepped out of the shadows at
the other side of the workshop to join them at the table.

"Why?" She laughed and raked her hands through her sweat-damped hair, white and
gold touched with red highlights. It had come loose of her braids in the strenuous work and the
gusts of air and thrashing of the Threads, as always, and hung past her waist. Her silver-blue eyes
sparkled with the euphoria of the energy she always gained while working star-metal.

"You're going to need it. I assume since you're working on bow guards, the armor is
done?"

"Done, and ready for a celebration party," Mrillis said. He nodded at the cuff. "That is a
gift for Shalara. I anticipate great things from her, when her
imbrose
is awakened."

"What's happened?" Emrillian gestured across the workshop, to the corner where a
coldbox and padded benches formed a resting place amid the multiple work stations and projects
in various stages of completion throughout the large, one-room building. The three settled down
in their usual places for one of their long, intense, rambling talks.

"Something dire, I fear," Mrillis said. He gestured at the coldbox. The door swung
open.

Grego was somewhat relieved that the white-haired man didn't levitate a bottle of juice
over to him. Now wasn't the time for amusing tricks. He gathered his thoughts as the three served
themselves.

"It's happened," he said, after considering and tossing aside a dozen different ways of
breaking the news. "The next phase in my project. They'll load the ships with the power siphon
equipment in the next few days, to sail to the Death Zone."

"But how?" Emrillian said, slowly shaking her head. She put down the bottle of juice
and leaned forward, elbows on her knees, hands clasped together, as if that would help her
concentrate and understand. "The next step is to get the sensors working."