A novel by Meredith Skye

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Their airship touched down at the security port in Urrlan. Having the pouch with the god-stone this long had calmed Asta.

Colors remained: lavender, aqua, gold.

She woke from a dream, certain that she'd been talking to someone ... an important conversation that she couldn't quite remember. She closed her eyes to continue it, but the dream faded from memory.

Miserable, the Garrans sat in the back guarded by several soldiers. A twinge of guilt passed through Asta for having betrayed the Garrans. She'd led the Chanden straight to them.

Once the doors opened, Asta followed the soldiers onto the landing bay, where she waited while Ruben held a conversation with his superiors.

Soldiers unloaded the Garrans and brought them over to wait, not far from Asta. Other soldiers arrived to take the prisoners. No one said what would happen to them.

As the soldiers herded them past, Morrhan stopped. "Help us, Asta. You owe us that!" They pulled him away. It was out of her hands. Their fate wasn't up to her.

Anyway, they had the thing they wanted. The god-stone was awake again.

Mauve, gray, black.

The pain in her head eased somewhat, but guilt still ate at her. Would the gods forgive her or did she need to forgive herself?

Chitchat. Conversation that Asta couldn't really follow, which she answered in monosyllables.

A jump in time and they stood at the intersection of a corridor—Asta, Ruben and two security guards.

"You should get some rest," said Ruben. "I can't believe you pulled this off—on your first solo mission. I was very impressed." He looked proud, but none of it mattered. He tried to talk to her more, but she gave him little encouragement.

"All right," Ruben said at last. "You're tired. After the medical exam, you can sleep."

The guard came and took the stone from Asta. She could have resisted but she didn't. She let him have it, wincing slightly at the increase in pain. "Where will you take it?"

"Just into a holding cell for tonight, to keep it safe," said Ruben. "Tomorrow, we'll have it shipped off-world, for safe keeping and study. Best not to leave it here."

No. They would not keep it.

Ruben and the two security guards left Asta standing in the hallway, empty-handed. She watched them go, determined.

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She found herself in bed and woke with a start, head pounding. Not her own bed nor a Garran bed, but a bed on the base. Vaguely she remembered a medical check-up they'd given her, telling her she was fine. No injuries.

It was the middle of the night. Asta got up, dressed and walked into the hall, trying to ignore the pain in her mind. The scene was slow, dreamlike. She held a gun in her coat.

Crimson, flame, flesh-tone.

Up the stairs and past the security station that all but ignored her. "Just getting some air," she said. They nodded. Down the hall, up the stairs. Down another hallway over to where a man stood guarding a door.

"Any trouble?" asked Asta.

"No," the man said. "Seems—"

Asta shot him. He fell. She had remembered to put it on stun, hadn't she?

She opened the door and went in. The stone was there, in a bag. Asta checked it—it glowed red. She took the bag. Outside the room, Asta dragged the guard back into the cell and locked it.

Hallways, guns, security: it was all a blur. Asta made her way out of the building. Ruben didn't matter. Her father didn't matter.

She had one goal: the Temple of the Stars.

There was a stolen vehicle, a short drive, a few startled pedestrians and a large doorway. Finally ... the temple.

Burgundy, blue-green, cream.

Pictures formed and reformed in her mind, shapes, objects, meanings. All just out of reach. A message that she couldn't hear.

She was through the door and into the temple, which was now a museum. She broke some glass and entered a doorway. She shot another guard. Had she killed him?

She kept going up the stairs, up through several rooms to the Chamber of Souls. There she stopped a moment, unsure of where to go. Too many things were changed. The Chanden had covered over many parts of the ancient temple.

Glass cases displayed ancient Garran artifacts: pottery, weapons, a few sacred ooluks not too different from Asta's, some golden masks of a ceremonial nature, decorative pipes for smoking—probably also ceremonial.

Along another wall were more displays: elaborate priest clothing, robes and cloaks, senchai daggers and helmets, delicate bone and glass necklaces, all made long ago. Drums, chineth flutes, zhri lythes and yothars. Most of these things didn't belong here. All stolen from the Garrans.

All were from varied, scattered time periods, different tribes, different uses. None of which were comprehended by the Chanden who built this museum on the remains of a sacred Borrai temple. She understood, but she didn't know how she understood.

Asta broke a case and took a finely made silver helmet, along with a jeweled ceremonial dagger and cloak. She smashed another case and took a crystal medallion that reflected rainbow colors: maroon, sky-blue, and orange-yellow. This she put around her neck. But these were not what she was looking for.

She looked farther and found it: a single hexagonal crystal lined with gold and silver and a rune on the top: "bor"—god. The key. On the dais at the front of the room, she inserted the key in the large stone mural. A clicking sound preceded a rush of stale and ancient air as a secret door opened behind the dais.

Asta removed the key and entered, closing it after her. Here she stood in the Hall of the Ancients—a long narrow chamber whose ceiling tapered to a point high above her. The walls were lined with all manner of crystal, many of which were a deep red color. The floor was an elaborate mosaic of stone with pictures that represented many of the original clans.

On the wall in the center was a circular carving of crystal and gold which had a small opening in its center just large enough to hold the god-stone. Connected to this, in front of it, was an altar inside a golden circle.

A panic surged over Asta—she knew what was coming. She had struggled thus far to maintain partial control of her mind from whatever the god-stone contained. But here the god-stone had been made—and here it would be unmade. The intelligence that possessed the stone now fought to possess her. This chamber would release it.

Something drew her towards the wall and she felt a wave of dizziness. As in a dream she walked forward and took out the god-stone and placed it in the center of the crystal carving. The god-stone was also a key. All that remained was to kneel at the altar and the deed would be done.

Asta knew if she did this, she would lose the battle for her mind. The gods would take possession of her fully. Impelled by the forces of the stone she took several steps towards the altar and stopped.

She mustn't do it. Whatever was in that stone would probably be hostile to the Chanden and herself. But she didn't know that for sure. She thought back on the gentle music she'd heard, the colors. They didn't speak of vengeance or anger, but of justice and harmony.

Asta found herself standing in front of the altar. In the center sat a single crystal which now glowed red. With all her heart, Asta resisted and stopped just short of kneeling at the altar. It was what they wanted—it would give them power over her. She wouldn't give up her own soul for some alien cause.

A vision burst on her mind of a thousand clan warriors gathered on a plain. Then from the sky came Chanden attack ships that shot lasers, scattering the warriors—dealing out death and destruction. Hundreds died at a time. The shock and pain of each death forced Asta to her knees and she reached out to the golden rail that encircled the altar to steady herself. She resisted the urge to touch the red crystal that the god-stone drew her towards.

The vision shifted and Asta saw the death of many Eke herds across the plains as the Chanden hunted them for sport, then the capture of many of the remaining ones for domestication—and their slaughter by the hundreds for processing as food that would be shipped to other worlds for sale.

Asta saw the razing of the jungles on the Kinsikk Sea—the annihilation of an entire bios-culture in favor of an alien biology. The death of these plants and animals caused Asta renewed pain.

The focus of the vision shifted, showing other atrocities committed by the Chanden down through the ages. Then other wrongs committed by the Garrans also, such as their wrongs against the tacha—turning them out of their natural area and taking it over for Garran dwellings. Driving the tacha away and killing them when it suited the Garrans.

She saw the attack of the Sand Plain people on the Chanden village less than a week ago and the deaths of many unarmed Chanden as well as the slaughter of the clan by the Chanden enforcers.

After that, Asta saw things that she had not heard of: attacks by the Chanden on gatherings of Garrans and their deaths. Another unprovoked attack by the Garrans on Chandens just outside Urrlan. A whole series of violent outbursts that grew each time in intensity.

The war had escalated.

After that the god-stone showed her the future—how it might end in bloodshed and battle between the two as they continued to fight and to extract their own justice.

But the earth itself had its own form of justice. Asta perceived that the god-stone had the power to force her to do this. It was showing her in order to gain her cooperation—but it didn't have to. It was giving her a choice—to join it in stopping a terrible war and righting wrongs that had spanned a hundred years.

Asta knew that what the Chanden had done to the Garrans wasn't right but there was a deeper issue here—something even more primal, with respect to the earth and life. In a corner of her mind she could still hear the music and feel the colors changing, moving.

She could run—take the god-stone with her but what then? Give it to the Chanden? And what would they do with it? Put it in a box and ship it to a planet light years from here for study in some lab? But she couldn't do that—it was alive. Half of its consciousness had already joined with Asta's own mind. She was sure that the separation would kill her.

But what was the god-stone? She didn't even know this. The consciousness of the world, somehow?

Even if Asta rescued the Garrans from prison and gave the god-stone to them, what would they do with it? They weren't without guilt in this war. That didn't seem right. Anyway, it had already bonded with her. She didn't feel that the stone was evil—but her mind felt so confused.

The war had to be stopped or many more people would die. There were other ways besides the Chanden way and the Garran way. The god-stone held its own solutions. And something more wondrous—the understanding of the Ancients.

But there were dark places in Asta's heart. She had helped kill the priest Jaynanth. She was Chanden; this was a Garran artifact. Would it reject her and drive her mad as Sindke had said? Already the contact with the stone had magnified the guilt she'd already felt, magnified the pain in her heart. Or was her fear deeper that that—that she was unworthy? Was her soul one that the god-stone could accept or would it destroy her?

Or perhaps this was this the path to absolution?

If she gave up her life now, then the priest's death would be forgiven? Where else would she get that kind of forgiveness? Not from herself. She'd hated her life anyway, had hated it for years. This isn't the person she wanted to be.

Or this could be a second chance, a way to start over.

Drawn by this thought, Asta bent forward and touched the stone. Light burst forth in her mind and washed through her body. Knowledge filled it, no longer hidden in the corners of her mind. There was a merging of memories and a surge of light then the god-stone ceased to glow.

Inside Asta, memories clashed as wave upon wave of memories flooded her mind. Every corner of her mind was open to review. Mercilessly, the entity from the god-stone raided every sacred place she'd kept. She no longer had the power to resist. Instead of finding peace and forgiveness, the pain increased.

She felt accused. Humiliated.

She cried out. What did it want? She'd tried to do the right thing. She fought the dizziness but soon lost.

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