Star Bridge (Chaterre Trilogy Book 1) Read online

  Nimri cocked an ear to the wind. “I hear a child’s voice.”

  “Good.” Bryta looked satisfied. “By rights, the entire Tribe should attend.” She tugged at her best tunic to get it to hang just right over her wide-legged trousers.

  “What will we do with so many?” Nimri looked from Bryta to her beloved garden and swallowed hard.

  “Nothing. They come to escort a great man into the mystic realm, and to see you take up his staff. They did not climb up to the bluff for dinner.” Bryta chucked Nimri under the chin. “Don’t worry child, they’ll stay by the pyre, no one will so much as sniff your basil.”

  Nimri looked down at her plump companion. Bryta had been her great-grandfather’s housekeeper for half a century before his granddaughter’s half-dead orphan had come to live with them. Perhaps Bryta had learned his mind-skills and would be better suited to replace Rolf. At least she had been able to place the staff on the pyre without it slithering out of her hands.

  Bryta gave Nimri’s hand a motherly pat. “They’ll never get another chance to attend the last rites of a man of Rolf’s standing. It’ll be something they can tell their grandchildren.”

  As if any of them would live to see that day. Would she even be able to pick up the staff, which seemed impossibly slippery in her hands?

  “No one else in our 1064-year history produced such a flood.” Bryta launched into her favorite story. Nimri gritted her teeth to hold back her scream of despair. “Never before, nor since, has the river been so fierce and deadly. Nor a storm so wild.” Bryta’s face flushed with pleasure at the memory. She placed her fists on her ample hips and raised her triple chin, in imitation of Rolf's arrogant stance.

  “I wish I could have seen Rolf raise the staff and shout out across the water,” Bryta said, then she began the familiar quote, “‘Any Lost who sets foot on the land of the Chosen with evil intentions will call yet another storm against their land! Next time, I will spare no one!” Bryta’s eyes flashed as she copied Rolf’s arrogant tones and gestures.

  Nimri put her hand to her mouth in a vain attempt to hold back a laugh.

  Bryta glared at her, then lapsing into her own persona, she fanned her face and relaxed her spine. “To think Pearl actually witnessed the great event.” Her wistful tone stifled Nimri’s mirth.

  “At least you got the honor of cleaning the mud off his moccasins.”

  “There was that.” Bryta raised her chin. “I still have it, too. All Pearl has is the memory.” Her jowls jiggled with pride.

  Nimri felt another bout of senseless laughter threatening. To distract herself, she grabbed a torch. “We need to get down to the funeral pyre.” Nimri snapped a branch off the sprawling rosemary bush, which an ancestor had planted beside the kitchen door to bless the dwelling and protect its inhabitants. She sniffed its piney scent.

  Bryta tipped her torch toward Nimri, an expectant expression on her face. Nimri took a deep, cleansing breath and prayed that for once she could work the myst-power. She snapped her fingers. A pale yellow glow ignited on the torch’s tip. It flared for a brief moment, and then fizzled into a puny wisp of smoke. ‘Rolf assured me Nimri would be a worthy Keeper of the Peace.’ If her great-grandfather had told Zurgon the truth, she could do this. She snapped her fingers, again. This time, the flame caught and held.

  Bryta smiled as the torches blazed. Head and flame high, she assumed the ceremonial gait and paced toward the steep trail, which led into the gorge. Step-step-pause, step-step-pause. Despite her age and portly build, Bryta embodied the dignity of the solemn occasion.

  Nimri watched Bryta’s proud posture descend over the lip of the cliff, and then looked at the secluded lodge where she’d been raised. She turned and gazed up at Sacred Mountain’s peak. A huge black shadow shrouded the summit. Did the harsh, barren rock truly conceal the magic magenta of the balata grove, or were the trees merely another story only meant to entertain children? Nimri shivered.

  Abruptly, the last rays of the setting sun bathed the harsh rock in blood red. Nimri gasped and fled toward the gorge trail. When she caught up with Bryta, Nimri skidded to a halt. The older woman appeared too focused on the coming ceremony to notice. Nimri adapted her longer legs to the tedious ceremonial gait. They slowly approached the waterfall, which drummed the same beat. When they came to the place where she usually dived over the precipice into deep, rock-free water, Nimri missed her step.

  If she couldn’t even walk to the ceremony, how could anyone expect her to shield them?

  Despite her doubts, they arrived at the pyre without major incident. They turned their backs to the drumming waterfall and looked silently at Rolf. His frail hands clutched the twisted wood of the black Staff of Protection and his best robe flowed in a violet cascade over the high wooden platform, which looked like a ceremonial bed. Her great-grandfather looked more relaxed than he had in years. If she hadn’t known the fabric concealed the firewood beneath the pyre, and if she hadn’t confirmed his death a dozen times, she would expect his eyes to open.

  If only he could arise!

  Bryta jabbed her elbow into Nimri’s thigh. With dignity, they turned to face the head of the valley trail. Within moments, Zurgon appeared at the head of the now-silent column. Dressed in his crimson chief’s robe, and chin as high as Bryta’s, he led the procession into the clearing. Slowly, they circled the ceremonial pyre three times, then shoving Bryta aside, Zurgon stepped to Nimri’s left.

  Nimri’s jaws clenched at the subtle insult. Zurgon had always stood on Rolf’s right, granting him highest Tribal status. Other Council members, attired in their flowing rainbow hues, took their places in order of rank on her right. Her spine straightened at their show of support. Flame, clad in her white baker’s smock, defied tradition and slid between Nimri and Talon.

  Pearl failed in her attempt to insinuate herself between Bryta and her husband. Lips thin, she settled for stepping on Bryta’s foot as she took the place on Bryta’s other side.

  The corner of Bryta’s lips twitched as she straightened her spine.

  Meanwhile, the council members gave Flame furious looks, but she ignored them. Beneath the folds of her white healer’s robe, Nimri touched her best friend’s hand in silent thanks.

  Masses of tribe members continued filing into the clearing, until every inch of land filled with farmers, millers, carpenters, weavers, blacksmiths and potters. The stragglers were forced to wade into the pond.

  Torches held high, they silently watched the setting sun. As the last ray of sunlight disappeared, Zurgon took a small step forward. “We come to pay our last respects to Rolf Tramontain,” he said in his most sonorous voice. The greatest Peacekeeper in the thousand-year dynasty.” He stepped back in line.

  “Rolf’s revenge was wonderful,” Pearl said to the sliver of dark sky outside the deep cleft. “When he pitted the natural forces of Chatterre against the Lost, he gave us one hundred and sixty-seven moons of harmony.”

  Her great-grandfather’s vengeance for her parents’ death had started with angry black clouds, which had formed at Rolf’s command; then fire had streaked down and scorched the Lost's boats; balls of ice, big as cantaloupes had then pummeled the enemy’s land. Nimri tried to hide her revulsion.

  “Rolf understood the laws of Chatterre: the cycle of the seasons; the movement of the stars; the patterns within the weather,” Bryta said. “He knew things he should never know, sometimes years before they occurred. He was a worthy Keeper.”

  “Rolf was a good and honorable man,” Talon said.

  The soft crackling of the torches grew loud in the ensuing silence. Nimri’s skin crawled with the knowledge that they expected her to say something worthy, but she couldn’t think of anything to say. A drop of sweat trickled down her spine. Then another drop fell and another, until it felt like the waterfall spattering her.

  When the stillness nearly became unbearable, Pearl started the long low-pitched “Hummm.” One by one, the others joined in. Soon, the sound surged, bass to high
soprano, growing, expanding and building until it became strong enough to transport Rolf’s myst to the Otherworld.

  Step-step-pause the Tribal Council began pacing around the pyre. One by one, they thrust their torches into the kindling. The flames licked at the wood and leaped up the violet robe.

  Without warning, a whoosh of flame shot skyward like lightening. It cast light and shadow across the faces and consumed the air.

  “Oooohhh!” a hundred voices exclaimed. Only Pearl continued toning, her rich alto consecrating the ascending myst-power.

  As the rest of the Tribe again added their voices, the blaze consumed Rolf’s body.

  Nimri thought she saw the black staff aflame. If it were consumed, her fate would be averted. Her throat felt suddenly dry at the unexpected possibility of reprieve. Afraid to stare, she focused on the steps and tones of the all-night ceremony.

  As the first ray of dawn appeared over the lips of the cleft, the glistening black staff lay unharmed atop a smoldering mound of ash.

  Zurgon’s pitch lifted, as he changed tune to the induction ceremony. The Tribe joined in with the uplifting tone. When the sound peaked, everyone looked toward her. Nimri swallowed, then leaned forward and picked up the cool, slick staff. It tried to slip from her grasp; she grabbed it with both hands and tried to hold onto the impossible stick, which looked like solid wood, but felt slick as taffy and just as flexible. Satisfied that she’d accepted her duty, the Tribe turned, as one. Left right kick, right-left-kick, all except Flame and Bryta moved toward the mouth of the valley trail.

  Quark trailed at the end of the column; as he passed them, the potter paused. “I’m not good at words,” he told Nimri. “But, I made Rolf this pot. I hope you find it worthy.” He pressed a wheat-colored crock decorated with the Tramontain hawk into her hands, and then hurried after the Tribe. Nimri struggled to hold it and the untrustworthy staff.

  With a disdainful snort, Bryta grabbed the staff of protection, wrapped it in her apron and marched back up to the house. Nimri bit her lower lip, knelt and fought back tears of shame, while she scooped ash into the crock.

  “Where will you release his essence?” Flame asked, as if she hadn’t just witnessed anything significant.“I gave my word.” Nimri looked up at the high sun-bathed peak. In the golden light, it looked magical and deadly. She must have been under a spell when she’d given her grandfather the promise. “I will scatter his ashes at the Guardian’s feet.”

  Flame gasped. “But no one has ever returned.”

  Nimri swallowed, but the lump of despair in her throat refused to budge. “I know.”

  Chapter Two

  “You would keep your word to a dead man?” Flame hissed. “A man who never had a kind word for you?” Flame glared at her. Nimri shrugged. “You’d deny your tribe protection?” Hearing the mixed shock and fear in her best friend's voice, Nimri looked toward Bryta and admired the ease with which she carried the staff. “What if the balata is only a myth?” Flame whispered expressing the doubts they’d often shared. They both looked up at Sacred Mountain’s cloud-shrouded peak.

  “The Chosen have Talon, Zurgon and the entire council. My great-grandfather only has me.” Even if she stayed, Nimri knew she could never protect the ones who were relying on her, at least when she was gone, her tribe would no longer need to live with the delusion that she could help them. Everyone, except her, could pick up the staff of protection, but only the staff’s human half could complete the magical bond. And she wasn’t that person. Nimri gazed at the clouds. At least this way she would die with honor. Perhaps that’s what Rolf had intended when he demanded her word.

  “Talon.” Flame snorted. “Hot air won’t save us from Thunder Cartwright.” Flame had despised Talon’s loud bluster since they were toddlers.

  Nimri sighed and asked, “Has anyone ever seen Cartwright?” Flame stared at her, so Nimri pushed harder at the thought she had never dare utter while Rolf lived, “Perhaps it’s just a name the Lost use to terrify us with. Like the evil Yetis he supposedly lives with.”

  Flame shook her head and shuddered. “I know in my bones that he’s real.”

  Wrong answer. “I must go and prepare myself.” To die. Nimri gave Flame a hug. Her best friend squeezed her back, unwilling to let her go; as if she understood this might be the last time they saw each other. Tears flooded her eyes. Flame turned and fled down the valley trail.

  Eyes damp, Nimri ran up the steep path to her garden. Greens seemed more vibrant and scents more intoxicating through the layer of unshed tears. Did others experience such heightened consciousness as they approached their death walk?

  She sped into the house, dashed up the seven flights of curving stairs to her room and threw her flowing robe of office on her bed. Better to leave it for Bryta to immortalize than to catch her foot on its hem and fall to her death. She changed into well-worn everyday tunic and pants. The browns were faded, and there were grass stains on the knees, but they were her most comfortable clothes and after she fell, the spots she had gained while tending her garden would seem minor.

  Before Nimri could lose her resolve, she headed for the old, debris-covered footpath, which her great-grandfather had sworn led to the sacred grove.

  By late afternoon, Nimri hugged Sacred Mountain’s treacherous granite face; she gritted her teeth and inched her moccasin-clad foot toward the next toehold on the squirrel-thin trail. Then, she dug her bleeding fingertips into the next crack and imagined the funeral crock within her backpack growing heavy with reminders of her inadequacy.

  As she forced her toes into the niche and shifted her weight, a rock beneath her foot moved. She gasped. It stabilized for a moment, then dropped away. Nimri pitched sideways. Her body smacked a jagged outcropping.

  Her tunic snagged.

  Beneath her fingers, dirt cascaded from the widening crack. Gravity seized her with invisible tentacles and she slid toward the abyss to the chorus of ripping cloth.

  Nimri screamed.

  A blood coated pebble dislodged and plummeted into the chasm. A fist-sized stone broke free, hit her foot and then dove out of sight.

  Waves of agony shuddered up her leg.

  Desperate, blood-slick fingers scratched at the crack.

  Tasting copper and blinking away tears, she pulled herself toward the safety of a slender ledge. Her vision tunneled until the hand-wide jut of rock became the only thing in her existence.

  As if from a great distance, Nimri heard an odd shrill tone. It grew in shrillness and volume. The short hairs on the back of her neck quivered in response. The screeching tone gained intensity, came closer until it surrounded her.

  Nimri clasped the mountain. Teeth biting her lower lip, she followed Rolf's most basic lesson and willed the rock to stabilize.

  Suddenly, Kazza dashed up the emaciated lip of a path and leaped over her. Nimri screamed and closed her eyes, so she wouldn’t watch him plummet to his death. He landed with a soft thud. Her scream echoed from rock to rock, but no feline cry or sounds of a fall came. She opened one eye.

  Kazza sat atop a pile of loose rubble, which appeared undisturbed. A breeze ruffled the thick fur on his back. He glanced back at her, his amber eyes aglow with intelligence and mirth. The feline looked like he was having the time of his life and didn’t have a clue how close he’d come to death.

  When the shrill echoes of her scream subsided, Nimri raised her head and peered beyond her perch. Ahead, the trail widened, and then disappeared into a wall of haze. Though most of the mist appeared solid white, one spot shimmered magenta.

  The sacred balata grove.

  It had to be.

  It wasn’t a myth.

  Elation soared through her.

  Nimri scrambled toward the shrouding mist. As it enveloped her, everything chilled into a clinging white emptiness so thick that she couldn’t see the end of her black braid or where the trail ended and the precipice began.

  ~0~

  Larwin had envisioned death in victorious battle, no
t drifting in darkness. Yet, as he lay in the black oblivion, he accepted that his childhood metaphysics instructor had been wrong when he’d spoken of death as a bright white light place filled with wonders for warriors who had died in honorable battle.

  Wrong.

  Death equaled the absence of light and sound.

  It was emptiness.

  Blackness.

  Soundlessness.

  Nothingness.

  Everything was gone except the stench of bile and the clamminess of his environmental suit.

  Apparently, dying while testing the protocols for a new line of pilot androids and getting killed for his efforts didn’t constitute an honorable death.

  “All systems have malfunctioned.” The android’s sensual timbre conflicted with the cool oblivion.

  How had the defective prototype passed into the humanoid beyond? His teeth ground as his hands searched for the restraint’s release. He paused when his gloved fingers brushed the familiar controls. So, he wasn’t dead. Yet. “What happened?”

  “The course was not altered.” GEA-4 matter-of-factly stated the obvious. Blood thundered in his ears, but Larwin willed himself to relax. “The Pterois Volitan collided with the planetoid.”

  “I meant, why am I still alive?”

  “Dust covering the planetoid cushioned the collision, then flipped the ship upside down.”

  “Great,” he said through clenched teeth. Planetoids were dead rock with nothing to sustain life—no water, no air, no food. Now he faced GEA-4 talking him into oblivion or worse.

  Dehydration.

  Asphyxiation.

  Starvation.

  Unless...“Were you able to transmit our coordinates after the stabilizer failed?”

  “Communications were lost when the APU module ruptured,” she said.

  “Great time to tell me we lost auxiliary power.” He found the release for the safety restraints and pulled. Nothing happened. Big surprise, with his weight suspended against the harness. Odd that the dead world retained a gravitational effect, when there was no star for it to revolve around. “How long before we crashed?”