‘Arise!’ came the spoken command, and Pug stood up.
He saw Acaila and Tathar, but they looked alien to him, beings of coarse matter and finite energy, while he was a creature of enhanced perception and unlimited power. He glanced at Miranda and saw a being of stunning beauty.
She wore no clothing and revealed no hint of sex. Where he should have seen breast and hips, as familiar to him as his own body, he saw only smoothness, featureless and without distinguishing marks. Her face was an oval, with a pair of burning lights where eyes should be. She had no nose. A single slit where her mouth should have been moved, but rather than his hearing her voice, her mind touched his.
‘Pug?’ Miranda asked.
‘Yes,’ he answered.
‘Do I look as odd to you as you do to me?’ she said.
‘You look stunning,’ he replied.
Suddenly he was seeing himself through her eyes. He was as featureless as she. They were of like height and they both existed with a shimmer of energy illuminating them from within. Neither had hair or sexual organs, teeth or fingernails.
From a great distance they heard Acaila’s voice. ‘What you see are your true selves. Look down.’
They did, and saw their own bodies lying on the grass, as if asleep.
‘Hurry, now,’ said Acaila. ‘Follow the thread that leads you to Macros, for the longer you are out of your bodies, the harder it will be for you to return. We will keep you alive, and when it comes time to return, you only have to think of it. Your bodies will appear wherever you need them to be,’ he repeated. ‘May your gods protect you.’
Pug sent, ‘We understand.’ He said to Miranda, ‘Are you ready?’
‘Yes,’ she replied. ‘Where do we go?’
With a thought he made the thread appear to her, and he said, ‘We follow that!’
‘Where does it lead?’ she asked as he reached out with his mind and ‘took her hand’ leading her along the thread’s path.
‘Don’t you sense it?’ he asked. ‘It is going to the one place I should have expected it to lead us. It’s taking us to the Celestial City. We travel to the home of the gods!’
SIX - Infiltration
Calis pointed.
Erik nodded, then signaled for his squad to move out behind him. The men duck-walked in the gully, keeping their heads below the rim of the wash through which they were approaching their opposition.
Erik was both sick to death of this drilling and frantic that it might not be enough. In the six months since he had taken the first band of soldiers into the mountains, he had judged he had a solid twelve hundred soldiers under his command, reliable men who would survive on their own for as long as possible.
There were another six hundred men who were close, needing a bit more training.
The band he led now were those he feared would never become the soldiers needed to win this coming war.
Alfred tapped him on the shoulder and Erik turned. The corporal pointed to a man on the other side of the gully, who was not walking as instructed, letting the discomfort in his knees drive him to recklessness.
Erik nodded, and Alfred nearly dove to get to the man and pull him to the floor of the gully. Sharp rocks cut both men, but Alfred’s hand clamped hard over the soldier’s mouth, preventing his cry from being heard by the nearby sentries. Erik could hear his corporal’s whisper: ‘Now, Davy, your sore knees just got you and your comrades killed.’
A distant voice told Erik the exercise was a failure, and as if reading Erik’s mind, Calis stood and said, ‘This is done.’
Erik and the others rose and Alfred jerked the soldier named Davy to his feet with one powerful tug. Now his voice was unleashed in all its volume and fury. ‘You rock-headed layabout! You sorry excuse for a water boy! You’ll regret the day your father looked at your mother when I’m done with you.’
Calis heard a challenge, turned, and called out the password. He motioned to Erik, and the Sergeant Major and his Captain walked away from the men. Calis said, ‘Corporal, start them back to camp.’
Alfred shouted, ‘You heard the Captain! Back to camp! Quick march!’
The soldiers set out at a ragged run, and the Corporal harried them every step of the way.
Calis watched in silence until the men were out of sight; then he said, ‘We have a problem.’
Erik nodded. The sun was setting in the west and he said, ‘Each day about this time, I feel as if we’ve lost another step. We’re never going to get six thousand men trained in time.’