Unseen

I wanted to let go, to succumb to that soft, welcoming embrace of the eternal. I wanted to be what I had been, vast and powerful and perfect.

But part of me was always going to be here, in the dirt, in the blood, in the sweat and heaviness of a body. There was a strength and a power in that, too. One Ashan couldn’t really understand.

And it allowed me to close the door between us.

“No,” I said again, softly but very firmly. “I won’t abandon them. I can’t.”

Ashan stared. I had, again, surprised him. “Not even to save us. Not even to save the Mother.”

I was silent on that point. I pressed a shaking hand to my injured side. The pain turned glassy and sharp. Broken ribs, I imagined. The head injury had taken on a remote, unreal aspect; I still felt blood trickling down my neck and matting in my hair, but the pain had subsided to a dull, throbbing ache. I didn’t know if that was better or worse.

Ashan was considering what I’d said. He finally shook his head. “You’re not in your right mind,” he said. “You’re injured.”

It was kind of him to notice. “It doesn’t matter if I’m injured or healthy. I won’t kill them. If you want them dead, do it yourself.”

“One of us must lead,” he said. “We’ve always agreed that it would be me, Cassiel. Always. And a leader must order others into battle.”

I felt a cold wave of anger push back the simple human anguish of my injuries, and I looked up sharply at him. “Maybe it’s time for a change,” I said.

He laughed. “You won’t fight me. Look at you. You can’t stand on your own, and you refused my gift. You can hardly exist at all.”

I climbed slowly to my feet, moving with great deliberation. I didn’t wince, even when the pain bit deep; I didn’t allow so much as a flicker of hesitation. I never looked away from him as I stood, unaided, and faced him.

The wind bent the trees around us, and pitiless starlight rained down. The silence seemed to stretch for an eternity.

“All right, enough,” Ashan said, finally. “I never doubted your stubbor

“I have ability,” I replied. “And will. And I don’t need more than that.”

“I’m not battling you. It isn’t the time, or the place.” Ashan’s pale lips twitched into a brief, very cool smile. “If you would be polite enough to wait, it’s more than likely I will be destroyed soon enough. We live in a dangerous world, Cassiel. And all of us will pay a price for survival, if we survive at all.”

“I’ve never heard you say such things.” Ashan was, after all, self-interested and a coward first, before all things except his protection of the Mother herself. That made him less of a pessimist than most.

“There has never been such a time,” he said. His tone was calm and dispassionate, and all the more powerful for it. “The disease the Wardens have brought to this world may destroy us yet; even Pearl has taken advantage of it, in her use of the Void. With Pearl seeking our destruction at the same time as the Wardens’ mortal enemies, do you really believe we can win without great loss?”

“I’m only surprised you even consider that you may be one of those losses.”

He bared his teeth in an almost genuine smile. “David has no reason to protect me.”

“Nor you him, though it hasn’t seemed to have worried him a great deal.”

David, the leader of the New Dji

My attempt to show strength was spoiled as my knees weakened. My body gave me no real warning—a thick wave of dizziness, and then I felt myself falling. I put out my hands to brace myself—or my one human hand, and the misshapen lump of bronze that weighed down my left arm—but I never hit the ground. Instead, Ashan stepped forward, caught me, and eased me down to a kneeling position. I was having difficulty breathing—my lungs felt thick and wet—but I still managed to wheeze, “This is how you like me, on my knees to you,” before I began to cough, explosive mouthfuls of hot blood.

Ashan made a sound of frustration, and I felt a cold silvery power glide through me, from the crown of my head downward. I tried to resist it, but his touch was seductive and powerful, and the comfort it left behind it was so extreme that I felt an urge to weep. I didn’t. My eyes were dry by the time Ashan stepped back, and I looked at myself disorientingly from the aetheric.

My head still ached, but the broken skull was fused together, and the ragged tear in my scalp had closed. The broken ribs had likewise reset, and the blood in my lungs was gone. He hadn’t bothered with my collections of bruises, but overall, I was in sound condition, considering my recent injuries.

“I could have destroyed your physical body,” he said. “But I wasn’t sure that even at the last, you’d choose to regain your rightful place. This has to stop. I need you with me, Cassiel. We can’t allow Pearl to pursue this course, and there’s still only one way to stop her.”

“Genocide,” I said.

“Extinction,” he corrected me. “As it has been before, as it will be again. It’s the reason we were created, to protect the Mother. And we will, with or without you.”

I got off my knees. “Then you’ll do it without me,” I said, brushing the dirt from my filthy, shapeless gray uniform with both hands ... and only then did I realize that he’d repaired my metallic left hand. I left it to the faint starlight, examining the finely detailed flexible metal skin, the precise movements of the metal fingers. He’d done a better job of it than I had, originally. I rubbed my fingertips together, and the sensation that came to me was absolutely realistic. Except for the warm matte color of my forearm and hand, it might have been the original appendage.

“That’s a gift,” he said, nodding toward it. “And I think you’ll find that in the end you’ll know I was right about the humans. They were a mistake, and they need correcting.”

I sensed he was about step into the aetheric and leave me behind. “Wait! My co

He met my eyes, and in his silver ones I read a trace of the man I’d liked, back in the camp. A trace of regret, and kindness. Then Ashan blinked, and it vanished. “Very well,” he said. “But you won’t like what you find. I was trying to spare you the pain.”

I felt a hot snap inside—not something breaking, this time, but something reforging. It burned, then cooled, and I felt ... nothing for a few seconds.

Then, distantly, I felt pain, echoing through the co

I opened my eyes and stared at Ashan. “What have you done?”

“Nothing,” he said. “You destroyed Pearl’s brightest acolytes. Did you think she would simply let that go? She’s like you. Emotional.”

The shock of it wore off, and now the dread set in, heavy and black in the pit of my stomach.

I’d done this. We’d done this. Luis was under attack, injured, maybe dying. I had a flash of Ma

I had to save him.

Ashan was already begi

“Please,” I said. “Please take me there. Please, Ashan. I will beg, if that’s what you want.”