Borne along with the ships of Nikko’s fellow water bearers, theAquarius raced into the turbulent flare zone around Ildira’s primary star.

“Where do you think we’re going, boy?” Caleb asked.

Nikko shrugged. “We’re following them.”

The first tree-bubbles dragged their captive flames down into the sun’s photosphere. Without hesitation, they plunged into the roiling stellar sea, pulling the trapped faeros with them. One after another, the expanded bubbles dropped like stones into the star, sinking deep until they vanished in the plasma oceans.

His father watched with keen interest. “Looks good so far, but now what are they going to do?”

Nikko had a sense of the answer. “I think they’ll hold the faeros inside the suns and seal the transgates. Those traps will keep the faeros within their stars, just like they bottled the hydrogues inside their planets.”

“I wish they’d just snuff out the damned things,” Caleb muttered.

Crim Tylar still didn’t understand. “Don’t the faeroslike living in the suns?”

Nikko had only a tenuous grasp of what the wentals really wanted. “The wentals and the verdani have enough power to imprison them there. Theycould snuff them, but they need to achieve balance, not destruction. The wentals and the verdani have to neutralize them, not eliminate them.”

Hundreds more tree-bubbles submerged themselves and their captives in the incandescent layers of the bloated sun. Somewhere deep inside, the elementals reached a point where they could seal the transgate in the stellar core, permanently cutting off the flow of emerging faeros.

As the raging fireballs around the star grew more desperate, the wentals inside theAquarius ’s hold seemed ready to pry their way out through the hull plates. Nikko flew directly toward the firestorm.

“What are you doing?” Caleb yelped.

“Can’t you feel it?” Nikko hit the cargo doors and released all the wental water he carried. With an exuberant leap, the spray of elemental liquid spread out in a shimmering curtain. Before the faeros could dodge around the curtain, a second wave of tree-bubbles converged on them from behind, capturing fireballs before they could join the battle at Ildira.

“Now, that’s satisfying,” Nikko said through a wash of adrenaline. Behind him, he saw many of his fellow water bearers doing the same. The innocuous-looking tree-bubbles continued to engulf and remove the faeros. The new synthesis of verdani and wental proved stronger than the flaming elementals.

“I think we can call it a good day’s work,” Crim said. “And let’s get the hell out of here.”

152

Osira’h

Adar Zan’nh, take me down to Mijistra — whatever is left of it,” said Mage-Imperator Jora’h. “I need to see the city with my own eyes.”

Though apprehensive, the Adar was ready to face the disaster he had left behind. He and Osira’h had rushed away from the faeros without ever witnessing the carnage of the impact. “Yes, Liege.”

Osira’h closed her eyes, already able to feel her siblings down there with Prime Designate Daro’h. She sensed how she, Rod’h, and the others could help the Mage-Imperator vanquish Rusa’h, and she was ready for it. But this would be far worse than facing the hydrogues again at Golgen. She opened her eyes, stepped forward to stand between her parents, and stared at the images of destruction on the viewscreen.

As her father and Adar Zan’nh absorbed the magnitude of what had happened here, Osira’h could feel a wave of their dismay rush through thethism, strong enough to produce a stab of physical pain. Buildings had been flattened for kilometers: towers, museums, political buildings, warehouses, and habitation complexes — all collapsed and burned. The Prism Palace and its perfect elliptical hill had been ground zero for the immense crash; the grand structure, the hill, the seven symmetrical streams — everything was simplygone.

“A part of me has died,” said Jora’h as he gazed in disbelief.

“A part, yes. But not all.” Nira wept to see the holocaust, but she clasped his arm. “We will save the rest.”

Osira’h spoke up. “We need to descend to the surface. They are all down there waiting for us.” She drew a deep breath. “I can do more against the faeros incarnate if I am with my brothers and sisters. Together, we can tap into a kind of strength that even the wentals cannot use.”

Though the mist-swathed ships and the frozen projectiles had decimated the faeros, the danger was not over yet. Great numbers of fireballs continued to fly in all directions; vengeful and capricious, they struck wherever they could. The battle screens in the warliner’s command nucleus showed the constant clashes all around Ildira.

Nira considered the images. “If Osira’h says it is what we must do, then I agree. After all, she was right about the hydrogues on Golgen.” She held up the treeling she had carried with her. “And now we have the verdani to help.”

“Descend, then,” said the Mage-Imperator. “Much of our battle is yet to come. We will all fight against Rusa’h.”

Flanked by a dozen intact warliners, the flagship descended into the atmosphere, flying toward the site of the capital city. Leaving Zan’nh in the command nucleus, Jora’h led Nira and Osira’h to the warliner’s docking bay, where they boarded a ready cutter. Piloted by one of the soldier kithmen, the small ship passed directly through the warliner’s hazy cocoon and fought its way down through the thermal turbulence in the air.

On the way down, her father stared at the wrecked capital city, unable to protect the morality of his people by dampening the shock he experienced. Osira’h could also feel the lingering pain that resonated from all the Ildirans who had survived down below, though she sensed her half-breed brothers and sisters, along with Prime Designate Daro’h, trying to bolster the people. She directed the pilot to where tiny figures stood at the edge of the still-smoking ruins.

As soon as the cutter landed and the hatch opened, Osira’h bounded out. The air burned her lungs; the whirl of fiery elementals overhead seemed to singe the very atmosphere. Grasses, bushes, and any remaining combustible wreckage had begun to smoke.

Prime Designate Daro’h and Yazra’h ran forward, barely able to believe that the Mage-Imperator had returned. When Osira’h’s brothers and sisters came to her, she grasped their hands and formed a mental circuit. Preparing herself, she retreated into her mind, then extended her thoughts outward, both to her father and to her siblings. She had to bind them all together. Tight. strong.

The faeros incarnate was out there, a cauldron of fiery hatred, a nexus for the revived elementals. Osira’h could find him, too, and force him to come.

She squeezed the hands of Rod’h on one side and Gale’nh on the other. Her two sisters completed the ring. “Like we did before,” she said. “Form a barrier that’s stronger than fire, stronger thanthism.” As they worked, the air acquired an impermeability that stopped some of the worst heat. The children concentrated on the intangible connections that tied the whole race together. “Reach out and strengthen the soul-threads. Find the other Ildirans — all of them. Rusa’h has burned his own paths. Now it is time for us to undo them and weave our shield.”