Shades of Gray (73 page)

Closing his eyes and concentrating, he built a picture of himself as a Valtegan in his mind’s eye then began to project it slowly outward. He wasn’t prepared for the energy he’d taken in to suddenly take over. The pain hit his legs first; so intense that it took his breath away. He staggered, felt them give under him, and fell to his knees. Then it hit his hips and shoulders, and this time he did cry out in agony as he collapsed forward onto the stone floor.

His limbs felt as though they were being stretched to breaking point, then beyond, as wave after wave of fiery pain wrapped itself around him, searing every part of his body. Just as he thought he could bear no more, the pain intensified as his hip joints were wrenched into unnatural positions.

He could do nothing, only lie there and suffer, unable even to make a sound as he felt himself changing. Forcing his eyes open, terrified, he watched his arms as his pelt disappeared, leaving behind the textured green skin of a Valtegan. Fresh agony poured through him as his fingers lengthened, straightened, and his claws extended to become nonretractable.

In his mind, Carrie’s scream echoed endlessly, and he heard Shaidan shriek “Pappa!”

His son’s fear mobilized him as nothing else could have done. Slowly he pulled his arms toward him, every muscle and joint sending spikes of sharp pain through him. He managed to push himself up to his hands and knees but collapsed backward, ending up sitting on his haunches. Blinking through tears of agony, he raised his head just in time to see Kaid rush to intercept Shaidan and sweep him up into his arms.

“No, Shaidan!” said Kaid. “You mustn’t try to change!”

Conner was already on his feet and reaching for the cub. “Give him to me,” he ordered. “I can stop him.”

Already Shaidan’s body was beginning to arch backward and shimmer slightly in Kaid’s grasp.

“No!” Kusac managed to croak as Conner grabbed his son from Kaid. “Shaidan, don’t follow me!”

 

“The time of Testing is here,” said L’Shoh, appearing suddenly at Ghyakulla’s side in her Realm. He held out his hand peremptorily. “Come. He tried to change too soon. He is not ready.”

He must succeed,
she sent, taking his hand and with a gesture transporting them back to L’Shoh’s Realm.
Everything we are depends on him. We must take him now!

They materialized to one side of the Entity’s dark throne, beside a wide brazier of fire.

L’Shoh passed his hand over it, making the flames leap higher. In their midst, an image began to form, that of a Sholan transformed into a Valtegan.

Bring him now,
Ghyakulla sent as she joined her power to L’Shoh’s.

 

A blast of heat swirled around him, forming a shimmering cone of fire through which he could barely see the others. It pulled at him, seeming to suck him into the vortex it was creating. He felt himself falling, falling into darkness and cold.

CARRIE flung herself to the empty spot on the floor where, moments before, a very different Kusac had sat.

“He’s gone,” she said disbelievingly, feeling around the flagstones, oblivious to the heat still in them. “He’s gone! Who took him?” she demanded, her voice rising an octave as she looked wildly around her. “Who took him back to the Margins?”

With a glance at Conner and Shaidan, Kaid ran over to crouch down beside her. “You don’t know it was the Margins.”

“I can smell the fire, Tallinu! Can’t you?”

“That doesn’t mean the Margins.”

Kezule came toward them, stooping to pick something up. “What’s this?” he asked, holding it out to them.

Kaid looked, his ears flattening back to his head as he saw what was in the General’s hand.

“Carrie,” he said, his voice flat and emotionless.

Turning, she saw what he held. Reaching out slowly, she took the two halves of a white flower from Kezule’s hand, then a lump of misshapen bronze. As she did, the fresh scent of nung blossom banished the last of the smell of seared stone and fur.

Kaid rose, helping Carrie to her feet and wrapping his arms comfortingly around her. “Not the Margins,” he said.

Conner, cradling an unconscious Shaidan, joined them. “I believe he’s with Ghyakulla and, despite the display of fire, L’Shoh,” he said quietly. “Look, the flower has been severed exactly in half.”

“But why? What would She want with him?” asked Carrie. “And what’s the importance of the metal lump?”

“Examine it, Carrie. You’ll find that there are still remains of its original form. Kusac showed it to me,” said Conner as Rezac offered to take Shaidan from him.

She turned it over in her palm, seeing the faint outline of a reptile still on one side of the surface, and on the other, the vague shape of a Human face.

“He was able to reshape it,” explained Conner. “He found it on a desk at the weather station.”

“I remember that,” said Kaid suddenly, letting her go to take it from her hand. “It was a norrta. How in the Gods’ names did he manage to re-form it?”

“New abilities have been emerging,” said Conner. “Like this one.”

“He can change matter, as Zayshul and I could?” said Rezac. “But that took both of us, and we had to be pairing at the time to generate the energy needed to affect people!”

“What’s he become?” whispered Carrie, her hand closing on the severed flower and crushing it. She flung it from her. “What have They done to him?”

Turning to Rezac, she grasped hold of Shaidan. “Give him to me,” she ordered, pulling her son from his unresisting grasp. “What did They do to my son?”

“Shaidan’s sleeping, Carrie,” said Conner gently. “I put him to sleep to prevent him trying to follow Kusac.”

“You caused this,” she said accusingly, spinning around and looking at them each in turn. “All of you! You wanted so much of him for
your
purposes, he had nothing left to be my husband and the father of our children! That’s all
he
ever wanted!”

“That’s not true,” began Conner.

“Shut up and just leave us alone! You’ve all of you done more than enough!” she snarled. Adjusting her hold on Shaidan, she pushed through them to the exit.

A small crowd of Primes stood there, M’kou among them. As he hastily cleared a way for her, they bowed, chanting something that sounded like a Litany in voices so low she was only just aware of them.

“Tell me if he returns,” she ordered M’kou as she passed him.

Consciousness returned slowly to Kusac, but wherever he was, it was pitch dark. He sent out questing thoughts, trying to check his body, but he could sense nothing—no pain, no movement. He could be in a sensory deprivation tank for all he knew. Pushing back his rising panic, he automatically began reciting the Litanies. He’d learn nothing unless his wits were about him, and even they seemed to want to desert him right now.

Everything had a rational explanation; he just had to find the one that fit. What had happened to him in the last few seconds before he’d passed out? He remembered losing control of the illusion and it turning into a horrifying reality, as he actually became a Valtegan. There had been heat as intense as that at Vartra’s forge when L’Shoh had taken him there, a spinning cone of heat with himself at the center—had he somehow triggered the damned la’quo still in his system and been dragged back to the far past of the Fire Margins again? Was he stuck here now, forever separated from all that he held dear, that he’d only just regained? It didn’t bear thinking about.

A sudden loud knocking broke the silence, and suddenly his world was flooded once again with light and senses.

“General Chokkuh, you said to wake you when the female arrived. She’s here,” said a voice from outside the door.

A bed creaked, and his body got to its feet. “Have her wait in the lounge.” The voice sounded uncannily close, almost as if . . .

Legs came into view, khaki-clad uniformed legs, ending in heavy boots. Then the owner lurched to his feet.

Terrified, he pulled his mental presence back into itself as far as possible. What would happen if his host found out he was there? Where the hell
was
here, what was he doing here, and how the hell could he escape this?

His thoughts tumbled one after another as he watched through the male’s eyes. They passed a mirror, and he caught a fleeting glimpse of his host in it—Valtegan, as if he’d had any doubt.

The General opened the door and stepped into the softer lighting of the lounge. Standing by a stack of shelves was a small figure wrapped in a hooded cloak, her back to them.

“Still looking at my readers,” said the General, gesturing the soldier to leave. “They’re not for you.”

“Oh, I know,” a familiar voice said lightly as she reached up to lower the hood, exposing a short bob of golden hair. “I can’t read your language anyway, but the shapes on their covers are interesting.”

Chokkuh reached out to pull her cloak away and throw it on a nearby chair. She turned around and smiled at him, once more sending Kusac’s mental self into a state of shock. It was Carrie!

“A drink first?” Chokkuh asked.

“You are most kind,” she replied in a soft, seductive tone, glancing up from under her long eyelashes at him, but there was a note of surprise in her voice.

The General turned away from her to go to the small dining table at the other side of the room where a wine bottle and two glasses were already waiting. As he poured, he watched her approach him.

“Thank you for the dress,” she said. “Do you like it?” She turned around slowly, the better for him to see it.

“It is adequate,” he replied, handing her a glass as he—and Kusac—appraised her.

Of a semitransparent material, the purple fabric did little to conceal her nakedness under it. Two folds of the diaphanous material swept from behind her neck across her breasts, barely covering them while leaving her back totally exposed. Gathered by a sash at the waist, the rest fell in soft folds to her feet, which were encased in small slippers of the same color.

Where were they, and when? Was this a future yet to come? Carrie hated the M’zullian Valtegans; nothing would make her put herself in such a situation—unless she thought him dead and there was a way she could kill his killers. Hard on its heels came the thought—was he in fact dead? He recoiled further into himself, unwilling to even think about that.

She sipped her wine, coming closer and pressing herself against Chokkuh’s side, placing her other hand against his shirt.

“Straight from work?” she asked, wrinkling her nose delicately. “What were you doing this time?”

He took a small drink. “In the field again,” he said shortly. “Chasing your rebels.”

She took another sip of the wine, her fingers slowly beginning to unbutton his shirt. “Mmm, this is good.”

“It should be, it’s locally made.”

“We do make good wine. Did you catch anyone this time?” His shirt open, she slipped her hand inside and began stroking his chest.

Not like this, Carrie!
he almost cried out.
You’re being too obvious! Use your mind, not your body, dammit!

The Valtegan finished his wine in one mouthful and put the glass back on the table; then he reached for her, wrapping one hand around the back of her neck.

“No. We’re looking for a hideout in the forests to the east. Do you know anything of it?” His voice was harsher now.

She smiled up at him. “Me? I rarely leave here. What would I know of rebels? They hate women like me.”

At last Kusac was beginning to pick up some of his host’s thoughts. This was his favorite female, and he was angry with her for asking so many questions.

Oh, Gods, he had to help her, let her know he was here, inside the mind of this M’zullian. She must know how dangerous a game this was! Even on Keiss they’d had a saying,
never be noticed by a Valtegan
, and here she was, throwing herself at this one to get information!

Chokkuh reached out with his other hand, pushing aside the flimsy material covering her nearest breast, grasping it firmly, and letting his claws dig into the surrounding flesh.

She winced, but she kept the smile on her face.

“It would be a pity,” he said, flexing the hand still around her neck, “if you should ever betray me, Lise.” He released her breast and grasped the dress at the waist, ripping it off her, leaving her standing there rigid and naked. Keeping his eyes on her face, he drew a claw tip down the center of her body, leaving a thin red line. “You have no idea what the Inquisitors could do to a soft-skinned being like you.”

“Do you doubt me?” she asked, voice strained by his grip on her neck and throat. “You never have before.”

“Call it a warning. You’re good at what you do. It would be a shame to lose so—talented a slave.”

He released her, taking the glass from her hand and throwing it aside. “Enough talk! You know why you’re here.”