Destiny's Blood by Marie Bilodeau (best authors to read .TXT) 📗

fading, and Gobran wavered in her vision as she rose to her feet.

“Can you smell that?” She looked around the bridge and under stations. The crewmembers moved away in advance of her as if she were royalty, or insane.

“Smell what, Lady?”

“Plants. All cut and bleeding…” She paused and looked down, gasping to see Josmere sprawled on the floor beside her. She knelt down, unable to touch her friend or the green that bled out all around her.

“Josmere!” she cried, patting the floor. She knew the Berganda was not actually there, but she was unable to stop herself. So much blood! The eyes were dull and open, the skin yellow, the hair withered around her head…

“Josmere!” she screamed. Gobran was pulling her back, but she needed to hold her, to save her friend. Josmere had only been wounded because Yoma had wanted her to help her sister.

“No!” she screamed. She kicked, elbowed and kneed, and was rewarded by shouts of pain. She was tackled down, could hear Gobran shouting at her to be still, could hear him shouting at others to be gentle, and then she could only hear her own screams. “Josmere!”

She was on her belly on the floor, beside her vision of Josmere’s corpse. The stench of sap attacked her nose; the blood, so thick and cold, oozed toward her until it covered the side of her face and clung to her hair. She tasted its bitterness in her mouth.

Tears erupted, mixing with the blood, and Josmere’s glassy eyes looked at her. Josmere’s dry, dead lips moved: “Be strong, Layela.”

Yoma felt herself snap. “Nooooo!” She managed to throw three crewmembers off of her as she stood, looking toward the heart of the nebula — toward Mirial, where her soul ached to be. She pleaded with all of her heart, with all of her sins and heroics. She pleaded that her friend be saved, and offered to pay the price. She pleaded that they be allowed to meet once more.

“Please,” she whispered, exhausted. The faint light of Mirial seemed to flicker and grow. Gobran was beside her in an instant.

“Lady...” His voice shook as he held her, and she looked down. Josmere was gone, the vision ended, yet it continued to clutch her soul. The side of her face still felt sticky with Josmere’s blood. Her hair felt weighed down by its thickness. Her nose was still filled with the smell of death.

“Captain, something’s happening.” Loran reported. The sky filled with light and a deep wail crossed through Yoma and caressed her soul. “The nebula — I mean, the shields of Mirial...They’re expanding!”

The ship rocked gently and Yoma smiled.

Mirial had heard her daughter and granted her wish.

i

“What’s that?” Avienne asked from her station as she looked towards the nebula, the lights that danced at its edges shimmering brighter and turning faster, as though the entire beast was twirling.

...28 seconds to impact...

“Death,” Lang replied simply. He swigged the remaining liquid in his flask and threw it away in disgust.

“It’s Mirial,” Cailan whispered. The faint light of his home shimmered in his eyes.

Another hit rocked the Destiny, but Avienne couldn’t pull her eyes away from the nebula. The sun throbbed with a different light, as if it was pushing against its previous boundaries.

“It’s beautiful,” she whispered.

It’s home. Her eyes warmed with tears.

“It’s expanding!” Ardin shouted in surprise. As Avienne watched, Mirial vanished within the glow, its shields pushing outward until they swallowed the few ships before the Destiny. She held her breath. The Solari ships went dark. Their hulls cracked and the oxygen escaped, and some of their crewmembers were sucked out into space — Avienne could see them as small, bright specks of dead weight floating away. The ships of the dwindling Mirial fleet seemed unaffected as they were swallowed by the purple beast; they only vanished into the purple, while the Solari ships died.

The nebula’s light approached slowly, like a bride walking down the aisle. Destiny was helpless to get out of her way. As it washed over them, it rocked Destiny gently sideways, as a mother soothing a crying child.

Purple was all they could see. Mirial and the other ships had all vanished from view.

Destiny’s lights flickered, responding to Mirial’s caress.

“Torpedoes were destroyed!” Avienne cried joyfully.

Cailan sat quietly in his chair, looking at the purple around them as though poised for what came next. Avienne’s panel flared to life.

“Distress calls, Captain,” she whispered. “From the farming communities. The nebula, it’s not stopping.”

“We have some power back. We could get to them, maybe,” Ardin said, his voice thin and hesitant.

The distress calls ended abruptly, and Avienne frowned. “Our systems are still up, I don’t understand…” A glance down at her instruments stopped her. The planets had been as easily destroyed as the Solari ships.

“Blood and bones,” she whispered and fell back in her chair, unable to tear her eyes away from the purple beast. It had swallowed them, killed thousands, but also saved them.

“Blood and bones.”

i

“I’m fine, really.” Josmere smiled at Layela from Zortan’s arms. He carried her as though she weighed nothing. “In fact, I feel quite giddy to be carried by such a handsome gentleman.” She smiled coyly at Zortan, who ignored her.

“Stop making fun of the man who saved our lives, Josmere,” Layela scolded, but she smiled. Zortan ignored her as well, his dark eyes focused ahead. Layela lighted the way with Zortan’s flashlight. If Josmere felt good enough to joke, then perhaps the wound wasn’t that bad. She wished she knew more about Berganda physiology. In all their years of friendship, Layela had never needed to tend to the Berganda’s wounds.

“Where are we going, anyway?” Josmere asked.

“The shuttle bay,” Zortan replied.

“Why?” Layela turned to him, flashing the light in his face.

He stopped, but didn’t turn away. “The Destiny is too wounded to go on. She’s taken bad hits, her engines have stopped, and her armour, as strong as it is, will eventually fail. We need to leave and cross Mirial’s shield.”

“But, we can’t just leave everyone else!”

“If Captain Cailan can get his