“N’aashet n’aaverti,” I tell her. “Passionate loyalty. That’s the virtue I embody.”
“You remember?”
“Not really. It’s strictly common sense, as I’m the first emanation. What’s interesting is that it isn’t the first thing Wynne named. He named love. He’s a pervert.”
For some reason, Tara thinks that is funny.
When she stops laughing, she says, “We should let the colonists know that you’ve arrived. Even if you can’t remember everything, it will still be reassuring to them that Ashtara is here. He is their god, you know.”
“Not yet. Something’s not quite right. I have a gut feeling that revealing my presence would be dangerous.”
“It’s too late for stealth. You’ve used the doors.”
“The doors?”
“Although nobody seems to have noticed you yet, the ship keeps an access log for security purposes.”
“Is the log checked regularly?”
“Hmm. No, I’d think they’d only check it if some kind of question or situation arose.”
“Then I should be safe, for now.”
“Probably. But they might be antsy because of the saboteur. I wish Clive were here. He could cover for you. He has the skills to alter those logs very easily.”
Then apparently Clive can do something that I can’t. The thought makes me furious. I change the subject quickly. “What did the girl do, exactly?”
Tara fiddles a bit with her datapad and hands it to me. It’s displaying an image from a security camera. The girl is hauling a large jug, a petrol container. She pours the contents on Ashvattha and attempts to light it.
“It was unbelievably stupid for two reasons,” Tara comments. “First, even though security for Ashvattha is barely established, it’s at least ringed with a sensor perimeter. When she crossed it, SSOps was alerted. Second, she made the incredibly moronic assumption that a Cu’enashti is just a tree – that is, because it can’t speak, it’s unintelligent, and because it can’t move, it’s helpless. The instant that petrol touched the trunk of Ashvattha, it was transformed into water. Those trees are terraforming this entire planet – more, they’re making it so that Terran and native life can co-exist, which is probably the biggest biological feat in the galaxy. The thought that she’d be able to burn the tree using such a crude method is ludicrous.”
“But there must have been serious attempts – or there would be no need to bother with a security perimeter.”
Tara nods. “CenGov has developed some nasty low-profile explosives that are very difficult for scanners to detect. They fooled Ash twice. But petrol? I can smell that, let alone a Cu’enashti!”
“I overheard the security men interrogating her. They think she’s working alone.”
“That was my assumption, too. A lone whack job. Look, it’s late. Let’s forget about it and go to bed.”
“You must realize that I don’t sleep.”
She’s smirking at me. For a moment, I’m stumbling through my memories, trying to figure out what I’ve said. Then I get it, and I feel ridiculous.
“It will make you feel much better,” she says. “And you’ll want completed stats for your trading card.” She sits back on the bed. “I’ve been looking forward to you. Deflowering a new emanation is like unwrapping a present.”
“Deflowering?” I’m baffled at the inappropriateness of the term. “It’s more like enflowering, I would think.”
Her hand is against my neck; her skin against my skin. I am a speck of dust falling into the sun, burning alive in my joy.
“You have such fine hands,” she says, “and lips shaped for love. You weren’t made to worry so.” And for a while, I don’t. No need to think about anything but Tara. N’aashet n’aaverti.
“I’m exhausted,” she murmurs as she drifts off to sleep. “Are you sure your name isn’t Randy?”
While she rests, I scan some material on a datapad she’s given me: two books, Wooden Heart and Eden Blues, and the draft of a third, a volume of her prophecies. These texts tell me everything and nothing.
Now I realize how abnormal it is for me to be alone. At least I’m not having the same problem experienced by the initial Goliath branches. Ashvattha’s roots are connected to the other trees. It was one of our first priorities, accomplished well before I emanated. My fellow branches aren’t in stasis, either. If I concentrate, I can feel them, flowing like sap beneath the bark of Ashvattha. My situation resembles what I’ve read about Lorcan, and one occurrence with Patrick. There’s a wall between myself and the others, a sense that I can’t reach them because I’m being blocked.
I’m not so sure I want to overcome the blockage. Whenever I try, I get the feeling that something terrible happened, so terrible that I don’t want to remember. And it’s relatively recent. The notes for Tara’s book of prophecies end a little over two years ago. There are only vague recollections stirred by some of the content: The Combine of Sentients, mention of the colonial project, and, of course, the time Ashtara encountered the Great Dread in Tucana.
The Great Dread.