…and as I stood there on the edge of the ramparts, the spores just drifted away — slid silently off Plebon and the Mandasars, sifted over the parapet stones, and drew back to the stairwell. Ten seconds later, Dade was still covered in fuzz but the rest of the area was absolutely clear.

"Holy shit," Festina whispered. "Did you do that?"

"Um. Maybe."

"With pheromones?"

"Maybe."

She shuddered. "Makes me glad I’m wearing this tight-suit. If you can drive off the Balrog, you probably smell like the rear end of something whose front end is dead."

"No," I said. "I smell like conscience." Then I stepped over the rampart wall and onto the parapet.

Fast as we could, we heaved Plebon and the Mandasars onto the top of the glass cube. The unconscious Zeeleepull took a ton of work and when we were finished, his shell had a bunch of new dents and scratches… but at least we got everybody safely onto the cube’s upper surface. No way we could get them all inside — it would take a heavy-duty winch to lower Zeeleepull through that hole in the roof — but if Tobit could hold the cube level as it flew, our friends would be safe where they were.

Provided Tobit could fly the cube at all.

"Ready to go?" Tobit yelled up through the hole.

Festina looked back at the parapet. Kaisho and her wheelchair still sat in the mouth of the stairwell. The admiral paused a moment longer, then sighed. "Hold on a minute, Phylar. One more passenger to pick up."

I was already hopping onto the parapet one last time. The main mass of Balrog had retreated a bit down the ramp, leaving Kaisho sitting out on her own. She’d slumped good and limp when Dade shot her with the stunner; but as we grabbed the arms of her chair, she lifted her head. "That won’t be necessary," she whispered.

Festina jerked in surprise. She let go of the chair and balled her hands into fists; but after a second she let her hands relax. "You recover amazingly fast from being stunned," she told Kaisho. "Most organisms stay unconscious for six hours."

"Only if they have conventional nervous systems," Kaisho replied. "I’ve gone a bit beyond that."

"Were you unconscious at all?"

"Part of me," she admitted. "As for the other part… it’s thrilled not to be linked with Alexander York."

"There are still versions of him on Celestia and New Earth," Festina said.

"Not in working condition," Kaisho replied. "When the Balrog retrieved that gizmo from the clone’s gullet, we used it to send a shot of feedback along the line. One good focused pulse of psychic energy… and the containers inside the other two Admiral Yorks suffered rather spectacular meltdowns. At the time, the New Earth version of the bastard was sitting with the entire High Council at Admiralty HQ. His death made quite a splash. Consider it a windfall for the other admirals’ dry cleaners." She turned to me. "Should I offer my condolences or my congratulations?"

"Um."

I didn’t like my father. I didn’t like my sister either, not once I learned all the awful things she’d been doing. It seemed really dumb to be sad they were gone.

But then, I’ve always been dumb, haven’t I?

A booming thud hit the palace’s west gate: the first slam of a battering ram. "No more time," Festina snapped. "Hang on, Kaisho, you’re coming with us."

"Where?"

"Anywhere the Black Army isn’t." She pointed to the hoverchair’s controls. "Fire up your engines and let’s go."

"No need," Kaisho said. "We’re safe here."

Another boom smashed the gates. The Black Army’s Laughing Larries spun into a full hyena cackle, their whoops echoing off the palace’s stonework. Any second they’d open fire.

"Hear that?" Festina asked. "Nobody’s safe, not tonight. Even your precious Balrog should worry. Those troops are surely prepared to burn every speck of moss they see. No matter how fast spores can eat through an enemy’s shell, fire works faster."

"There is no enemy," Kaisho replied. "Not anymore. We’ve dealt with Admiral York, and everybody left is just an innocent pawn."

"Those pawns have been ordered to kill, and there’s no one to call them off."

"They’ll call themselves off, dear Festina… if we demonstrate there are forces in the universe that lesser species shouldn’t fuck with."

"Uh-oh," Festina said. "You aren’t going to… remember, you just called them innocent pawns."

"Of course," Kaisho answered sweetly. "But as Teelu told you a few minutes ago, the Balrog loves jumping out and going, ‘Boo!’ "

Another boom banged above the Larries’ howl. The noise was followed by a heavy crunching sound… but the crunch didn’t come from the army at the palace gates. I looked toward the front of the palace, out where the moss was thickest. It had blazed up bright and angry, a furious fuzzy crimson all over the stonework queen’s head and her four claws.

One of the claws was trying to wrench itself off its foundations.

Slowly, ponderously, the claw crunched back and forth, as if it was stuck in a bit of mud and just needed to be teased.loose. The moss on the wriggling claw flared another notch brighter… and suddenly the claw was moving freely, a building wing four stories tall, lifting into the air.

The claw flexed once, as if it was stiff from lying immobile for so long. Mortar crackled and dust showered put from between cracks in the stone, but the whole thing held together somehow: from the sheer telekinetic force of a trillion Balrog spores showing off their strength. Without a pause, another claw began to work itself free.

"If I were you," Kaisho told Festina, "I’d hop onto that glass cube and head a hundred meters straight up."

"It’s going to get dangerous down here?"

"No, the Balrog won’t hurt anybody. But you’re going to kick yourself if you don’t go high enough to get a good view."

She caught Festina’s gloved hand and pulled it to her lips for a kiss. As she did, the hair covering her face slid aside; with a squirm in my stomach, I saw crimson moss now coated her cheeks, her forehead, even bristly wads over her eyes. There was no way she could possibly see through that glowing fuzz… but I guess Kaisho had reached the point where the moss did her seeing for her.

"Go," she said to Festina: a single word, spoken in a real human voice, not her usual whisper.

Then Kaisho turned to me and held out her hand. A bit reluctantly, I came forward and took it. She clasped both hands around mine and drew me in gently, so I was forced to crouch up close to her. "Teelu" she whispered, her breath brushing my cheek, "a pity we won’t be working together. I would have enjoyed touching my mind to yours. But you’ve persuaded the Balrog not to embrace you as its own. Others have prior claim on you."

"Who?" I asked.

She gave me a little kiss on the nose. "Your people," she whispered, "as you know full well. You still consider yourself unintelligent, Teelu; it’s charming, but you’ll have to grow out of it. Kings need confidence."

Before I could answer, she put her finger to my mouth to stop me from speaking. Next thing I knew, her voice was talking right inside my head. "Sometime in the next eighteen years, Teelu, I’ll visit you, wherever you are. The Balrog believes it would be amusing for you and me to have a child: mostly human, but with your control of pheromones and my enhanced mental abilities. Apparently, this is why the Balrog fused with me in the first place; and for twenty-five years, it’s been transforming my body chemistry to make such a pregnancy possible. A few more years, and I’ll be ready." She leaned forward and kissed me with her moss-covered lips. "It’s a bitch dealing with precognitive races. But if everything I’ve gone through is gearing me up for a night with you… well, life has its compensations, doesn’t it?"