Rift in the Sky

Before or after? Not waiting for an answer, Haxel slipped to the others, brushed hands, gave her orders. Syb, Yuhas, and Galen went one way, fading into the grove; Veca, Suen, and the twins the other. They’d circle wide. Haxel flickered in and out of sight, choosing her own path.

What about us? Enris asked, crouching beside her.

Aryl stood and brushed at her no-longer-blue dress. “We,” she said calmly, “are here to visit our friend.”

“You mean walk out there and be Haxel’s bait.”

She shrugged. “That, too.”

Deliberately casual strides took them across the opening to Marcus’ door. Strides during which Aryl’s shoulders tensed and her eyes searched for the telltale shine of a vidbot or other watchful machine. Shadows shortened as the sun moved higher overhead. Her feet sank in the loose dirt.

Once there, she paused beside the inviting doorway. Lights were on inside. These weren’t Om’ray, she reminded herself. Her other senses had to do. She listened, not breathing.

Nothing.

Aryl danced in and to the side, crouching with her knife ready. Enris burst through behind her, an intimidating bulk. But they were alone.

And everything was broken.

They moved through the mess. The mattresses, used or not, were torn apart, the beds ripped from their wall supports. Cupboards and crates were open or upended. Marcus’ jars of dirt were smashed. Not a struggle. Something else. Aryl frowned. “If this was a hunt,” she wondered aloud, “did they find what they were after?”

“Wasn’t these.” Enris pointed to the devices on the counter. All looked as if someone had taken a hammer to their faces—or used a body part suited to violence. There were Strangers, Aryl remembered, who could do such damage with a limb.

“Or they didn’t want them used . . .” At the thought, Aryl pulled out the geoscanner and turned it on. Its glow was reassuring, though the red display wasn’t. Oud below. But she knew that.

Not the “Minded.” Not decision makers. Not yet, somehow.

They had time.

She thumbed on the device. “Two. Howard. Five.”

Is that a good idea?

“He answers or he doesn’t.”

“How long do we wait?”

She propped the ’scanner on what had been a table. “As long as we can,” she said quietly.

“Well, then.” Enris used his arm to clear a section of counter, brushing debris to the floor. When he sat, it creaked under his weight but held. “We wait.” He smiled with a cheer she didn’t believe for an instant. His shields were at their tightest; without an effort, she could only sense their connection, nothing of how he felt.

“You don’t think he’s coming back.”

“From beyond the world? Do you?”

Aryl found her own perch. I must, she admitted. Aloud, “Don’t underestimate—”

Come. A summons.

“Galen’s found something.” Enris stood, his hand out to her. Aryl.

“I’m all right.” She retrieved the ’scanner, her hand wanting to shake.

There’d been a warning with the sending. What Galen found hadn’t been good.

Aryl . . .

“Let’s go.”

“Oud?”

The middle building had been stripped clean, leaving only overturned tables. The far building was empty, too, but not for the same reason.

Aryl stood with the rest outside the open door. To enter meant stepping in the churned green mud that had replaced the floor.

Haxel knelt, brought a fingertip of it to her nose. “Oud,” she confirmed after a sniff, wiping her finger on her leggings as she stood. “Last ’night.”

“They collect their dead,” Galen told them, his gruff voice low as if afraid of being overheard. No need to point to the wide hole gaping in the center. “We’ve never seen where they take them. Somewhere deep.”

“Why would they be here at all?” Aryl asked. The wide door could accommodate an Oud, but Marcus had never let the creatures inside. Too many breakables, he’d said. “Why were they killed?”

“The artifacts.”

She looked at Enris.

“That’s what this is all about,” he said, gaining confidence with every word. “Marcus told us he’d left his people here, to secure the artifacts. The Oud must have understood that much. Maybe they tried to protect them.”

As one, they all stared at the hole. The deep, black hole.

“The Strangers could be down there?” Haxel asked tensely.

Aryl understood. The hole was as appealing as the waters of the Lay. All the Yena looked uncomfortable.

“It’ll lead to a normal tunnel.” Josel didn’t appear to notice the dreadful ooze underfoot as she walked to the opening. “I’ll go.”

Syb stared at her. “In there?”

“I’ll come with you.”

Enris? No, Aryl protested.

YES! His friends might be alive. I owe him this. Someone waited their chance and I gave it to them when I asked Marcus to turn off his machines. The fury turned gentle. “Wait here. Tunnels aren’t for Yena—ask Yuhas.”

“I’d go,” that worthy protested.

Enris put his hand on Yuhas’ shoulder. “Of course you would,” he said, giving the other a gentle shake. “But Aryl needs you here.”