The Testimony of Her Eminence and Most Puissant Sentience Tara del D’myn, Matriarch of Skarsia and All Humanity, Nuncio to the Combine of Sentients
I was almost ready for bed when I realized that someone else had snuck in unannounced at my window. Geez, you might think palace security would notice glowing winged people, even if they don’t show up on the usual scanners. I never had cause to fear Cu’endhari, but after the Cu’ensali War, and the way that Lilith and D’noe have been manipulated, and Hellborne’s insanity, it’s time to update the equipment.
Of course it was D’noe. I wondered if his intention was to assassinate me. Perhaps I should start keeping nullets in the drawer with my gun. I couldn’t rely on Ash’s protection; Tielo was still standing in front of the Atlas Tree, motionless.
D’noe flew inside, landed awkwardly, staggered a bit. Usually moonlight (well, actually planetlight) looks good on everybody, but he looked awful.
“I’m sick,” he confessed. “I don’t know what to do.”
I couldn’t believe that he was really that naïve. I realized that this was my chance to talk the kid off the ledge. He needed the guidance of an adult. He was at least smart enough not to bring the Staff.
“Do you really want to die for Venahalee?” I asked him. “Because that’s what this comes down to. She’s technically Matriarch now, not Nan-Zee. Venahalee doesn’t care about Nan-Zee in the least. She wants to use you and Lamark. In fact, it’s for the best that Nan-Zee isn’t here, because if she were in the Domha’vei right now, Venahalee would’ve threatened her life the minute that you took off with the Staff.”
D’noe looked like I slapped him across the face. He had never considered that. It had never occurred to him.
“I don’t have enough power,” he said. “I can’t even beat Ashtara when he’s off his roots insane, and he’s not controlling the power grid. I can’t even keep the power grid running. Lamark was supposed to grow another tree and help me, but he hasn’t. I’ll bet he can’t.”
“It isn’t that easy,” I soothed. “There’s a reason why Ashtara is the only one who has done it.”
“That’s not what the SongLuminants said,” he told me bitterly. What he didn’t realize – or perhaps was too naïve to care, as he surely had the capacity to sense it, is that I have security cameras activated whenever Ash isn’t on the premises. It’s no supposition on my part – he implicated the fucking bubbles, and I can produce the proof.
“I don’t want people to die because of me,” he said. “I know my first priority has to be Nan-Zee, but she’s so far away. It takes six days to get a message to her! I don’t know if I can hold out until then. Not with Ashtara fighting me. So I came to ask you to make him stop.”
Man, that kid was not only naïve, he was stupid. “D’noe, I’ve got another idea. You know that Lamark says he can give Nan-Zee the Blood of the Matriarch. You don’t benefit at all from Venahalee having the Staff. In fact, you lose. You’re risking your life. So why don’t you bring me the Staff, and I’ll take over, and Ashtara will take over, and we’ll fix the Domha’vei, and then when Nan-Zee gets here, she can try to take it back.”
“I can’t do that! I have to give her the Staff.”
“You can’t give it to her if you’re dead. Look, does Nan-Zee even want to be Matriarch?”
D’noe looked at the floor. Score! Because nobody knows what you want better than your Cu’enashti.
“She thinks she does,” he said sullenly.
It was time to name the big pink dobergator in the middle of the room. “What she really wants is Ashtara.”
“I tried!” he screamed, loud enough to make me take a step backwards. For a few seconds, I was scanning to see how far I was from the closest ceremonial sword. But then he became cowed, defeated. “I don’t even look much like Lorcan.” And then suddenly defensive. “But I did better than Lamark. He’s a lousy Patrick.”
“He’s supposed to be Patrick?” My genuine, appalled surprise brought a fleeting smile to D’noe’s lips, the first I’ve ever seen. “I would’ve guessed Ross. But Ross can pull off that slick perfection without seeming obnoxious or phony. Lamark is just sleazy.”
“The problem is that we’re not the real Patrick and Lorcan. We’re the media push Patrick and Lorcan. And Nan-Zee is starting to figure out that it’s all really phony and hollow.”
“Nan-Zee doesn’t want Ashtara. She’s never even met him. He can’t fill her dreams. His destiny is to fill mine. But you’re a Cu’enashti. Becoming the dream of your Chosen is your deepest, truest instinct. If you’d only had the Cantor to teach you, you’d know it.”
I could hardly believe that I was giving relationship advice to someone who was trying to usurp my throne.
I took his hand. “Look D’noe, you have that capacity in you to become what she really wants, not what she thinks she wants. Your heart is telling you the truth. You can’t be a phony copycat dream. You might need another emanation to do it. Or two. Or three. Or twenty. But that’s all good because they’re your brothers, and they’ve got your bark. Not like Lamark, who wants to incinerate you.”
“Why should I trust you?” he asked.
Mother of compost, kid, you’re asking that now?
“Because I’ve always been a friend of the Cu’endhari,” I told him in complete honesty. “Hell, I like trees better than people. I don’t have anything personal against you, and you’ve really been screwed. By the SongLuminants, by Venahalee and Almiss, and – I know you don’t want to hear this – by Nan-Zee, who probably didn’t mean any harm, but did something really unethical.” I paused dramatically. “And most of all, because I want Nan-Zee to hook up with Ash as little as you do.”
“I’ll get the Staff,” he said quietly. “I hid it on the verandah.”
Oh man, he was really really really short on brains.
Suddenly Ash came flying through the window. D’noe ducked behind a sofa. He’d never seen Ash in his mothman form before, and although Ash is smaller than he used to be, he glows with a dark brilliance. He has legs and a face. D’noe stood unsteadily. His lower lip trembled.
I nodded at him encouragingly. I hoped that he would get the Staff and not try to run. I would have hated for Ash to have to take it from him by force.
We followed him down to the verandah. He pulled the Staff from beneath the wicker settee. He didn’t even hide it well. I had to stop myself from slapping my forehead.
His eyes were full of tears as he handed it to me. “I hope Nan-Zee doesn’t hate me,” he said quietly.
Ash gazed briefly in his direction. D’noe cowered involuntarily. “The end of an Aion,” I said with not nearly as much drama as Venahalee. Honestly, after you do it two or three times, it begins to wear thin. “Initiate Aion.”
“Primary node Atlas uplinked,” said the Staff. “Secondary node Goliath uplinked. Tertiary node Yggdrasil uplinked. Quaternary node Ashvattha uplinked. New hardware detected. Configuring quinary node Canopus. System is online – 416,000 relay hubs, 2,912 receptors responding.”
“Well fuck me senseless,” I muttered. “Canopus is online. That I didn’t expect.”
And then a new man was standing before me. He was handsome, rugged, wearing a denim jacket which didn’t look the least bit regal. His hair was dark and his features were strong. “Hey there,” he said, giving a lazy salute. “I’m Nash Ashton, darlin’. I know, I know, what kind of a name is that?”
“How…how do you do that?” sputtered D’noe. “I can’t even do two.”
Nash shrugged. “Get’s easier with practice. I can give you some tips. You made a smart decision. I’m real glad I won’t have to stomp on you or your lady-friend. We’ll straighten out that little filly and everything will be dandy.”
“Where did you dig up that accent, Ash? That’s got more corn than a bluedog vendor.”
“Those old broadcasts Marty likes. Nash Ashton sounds like a country singer anyway. Maybe I should learn to play the banjo.”
D’noe was gaping like a Floatfish. He couldn’t quite get over how casual Nash was being, his utter lack of concern over, well, everything.
Neither could I. “Venahalee and Almiss are still at large,” I informed him. “And we’d better smack down those SongLuminants once and for all.”
“Our bigger problem is Molly, and what she’s up to inside of Mt. Ouroboros.”
“Molly? She’s in jail.”
“She’s still inside the pleroma. We think she’s up to something big. Didn’t you get our messages?”
“Messages?”
“On my datapad.”
“Oh fuck! I’ve been so preoccupied with everything else that I forgot to check it.” I grabbed his hand. “We’ve got to wake Lord Danak and explain what happened. D’noe, you come with us. I’m going to vouch for you. As long as Nan-Zee and Lamark don’t do anything stupid, I’ll guarantee their safety, too. The same isn’t true of Venahalee and Almiss.”
“Glad to hear it, darlin’. Are you gonna do it, or do we need to get Patrick?”
“We’ll need to get Ross, eventually. I’m going to have them captured and tried. It’s gone too far. We need to make a public show of their execution.”