“To wish for change is meaningless. Be who you would become.”

—The General Principles of Gens Nethress

----

Last Era Libraratory

Rising Blooming 30, 1885 CE

It was nothing more than Dorsin toying with her in the bedroom. The pain was nothing more than a gently caressing whip, the tweak of a nipple, the loving blows of his hands against Rosabella’s body as he—

Pain pounded through her veins again, and she arched her back and screamed. There was no fantasy into which she could escape; there was no imaginary country available for retreat. Fire was in her eyes, and her back was a bow stretching to the breaking point. She was screaming, she knew, insofar as she knew anything.

The poisons vanished, leaving behind burnt and frayed nerve endings. But when she had fought the echoes of agony far enough back to be able open her eyes, Eztli’s cold stare greeted her.

“Eztli, please. Please. No more—”

And the conflagration enveloped Rosabella again. Between each pulse of torment, she prayed to the gods for death.

“How could you betray me?” Eztli’s voice floated in as the pain drifted away like a covering of oil on a stormy sea. “I trusted you, Rosabella. Moira. I vouched for you and brought you into Nxtlu’s bosom. And this is how you repay me?”

“Please, Eztli. I beg of you. If ever you loved me—”

“Do not speak to me of love.” The raging fire returned. “Because you said you loved me. You said you loved me, and you lied. I opened my heart to you, and you lied. Betrayer of hearts, betrayer of family, do you know what Gens Nxtlu does to its traitors?”

Pain. “Eztli, please. This— ahhhhh! This isn’t you!”

“You have no idea what I am. You have no idea what I am capable of. I love my family, and I hate betrayers of my heart. I could have been something else to you, but this is what you chose to make of me.”

Somehow through the pain, Rosabella managed to clutch at a principle she’d heard espoused long ago, though she couldn’t place its origin. “Be who you would become,” she mewled through a storm of knives.

“Nethress heresy!”

The agony redoubled. How long before Rosabella’s mind broke?

***

“I cannot make sense of this, Oralie. Where did this wealth come from?”

Dorsin’s sick wife smiled weakly. First the cancer, and now the genophage. She deserved so much better than to live the remainder of her life in this bare, sterile cell. “Rosabella left the letter of credit before she departed. There are benefits to being a Sodalite.”

“Easier access to the genophage,” Dorsin mused.

“She says some of it is from her breedstock and some from the peer economy.”

“It must be her entire fortune.”

“Enough for six intervals.” Oralie bent forward and coughed; Dorsin went to her side, but she waved him off. “She apologized for only being able to repay half of what she cost.”

“Why didn’t you mention it earlier?”

“I didn’t feel right taking Rosabella’s money. I still don’t. Not for myself.”

“Are you sure you don’t want it?”

Oralie’s skeletal hand clutched at Dorsin’s strong fingers. At least the genophage had no Symbiont to manipulate within her; Dorsin did not think he could bear watching his wife turn physically into a monstrosity. “Dorsin. My love. It’s not just the cancer anymore. It’s the genophage too. Look at me, darling. I’m dying. And you know what will happen if you give me the treatment.”

“You won’t die,” Dorsin lied.

“I’ll wish I had, at least as long as I keep my sanity. After that, you’ll wish I had. Do you really want to grant me a Bond, only to put down the Chimera that was your wife?”

“Oralie— I can’t live—”

“Hush.” Her finger quivered toward his lips. “Don’t say such silly things. You lived without me before, and you’ll live long after I’ve gone. You know who needs these treatments.”

“If we treat Tvorh, he won’t be trained in time.”

Oralie chuckled indulgently. “Weren’t you listening to Senrii’s briefing? The boy withstood torture that burned out his eyes. Before that, he charged into lungburner gas to rescue your daughter. And look at the results of his tests. Rosabella’s Chirurgeon says he may not require more than three intervals. There could even be enough left over to purchase a Bond for Jorn or Norman. Don’t let your grief drive you, darling.”

Tears burned in Dorsin’s eyes. “I don’t want to let you go.”

“You have to, my love. You have to. Tvorh has the willpower of a giant. If anybody deserves this, it’s him. And he might be exactly what you need to end this.”

What kind of man would let his wife die in favor of a bloodless street urchin? And yet… “I know. I know, love. You’re right.”

“Of course I’m right. I’m a woman.”

Dorsin stood and walked to the shortsphere inset into the wall. “I’ll give the word to prepare the Tools.”

“I’ve already done it. The Sodalitatis are already preparing the chamber.”

“When?”

“Last night. While you were sleeping.”

Dorsin could not justify glaring at her. “You should not be out of bed. You need your rest.”

You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.

Oralie coughed weakly. “I’ll be resting soon enough, Dorsin.”

“Not if I have anything to say about it. Den, this is the Dux.”

“We hear you, Erus.”

“I am authorizing the Symbiosis for the boy Tvorh. For the sake of my family, I will not be breaking quarantine. Ask Maga Senrii to provide the boy with the briefing and commence the procedure as soon as possible.”

“Yes, Erus.”

“And give her my love. Tell her I will see her soon.”

“Yes, Erus.”

“Out.”

“I wish I could see her before I die,” Oralie murmured.

“You will see her many times before you die, love. I promise.”

“Don’t make promises you can’t keep, Dor.”

“I promise,” Dorsin lied again. “Now rest.”

***

“I hear there’s a really nice sunset going on right now,” Tvorh said, his feet dangling off the edge of the building.

Through the changing currents of the wind, he heard Senrii nod. “You got it, kid. Reds and golds and oranges, and the way the sunlight reflects off the water— it’s crazy. To die for.”

“Too bad. I never got much a chance to see the ocean.”

“Sorry, kid.”

“Not your fault.”

Senrii shifted next to him. He felt her body turn his way. “You know, you’re really brave, Tvorh.”

Tvorh groaned. He liked Senrii, but why did these blue-bloods have to beat around the bush all the time? “Don’t patronize me.”

“I’m not. I mean it. I’m pretty sure… I’ve stood up against a lot of things with the Symbiont inside me. You never had that, but you stood up just the same.”

He gestured at his face. “Look what it got me.” They’d given him a visor that they said would help feed blood back into the broken areas and might even allow them to restore his eyes, but he’d kept Aoife’s hairsilk scarf on anyway.

It smelled like Aoife, and he liked that.

“Better blind and true than sighted and false,” Senrii said.

“That one of Nethress’s General Principles?”

“No. One of Senrii’s Principles. Or maybe my dad’s. I dunno. So yeah, you won’t have to memorize that one. Not for acceptance into the Gens, anyway. For me, on the other hand…” She slapped her fist into her palm. “Or else.”

“I wouldn’t want to make you mad, Senrii. You’d probably sarcasm me to death.”

“You’ve got no idea. My mouth is a deadly weapon.”

“Too much information.”

They sat in silence for a while as the air grew cooler.

“Your sisters will be okay, you know.”

“Unless I die and you need new Keys.”

“Yeah.”

Going back to Acerbia a third time… Tvorh couldn’t imagine this would turn out any better than the first two spans he’d spent there. “This really is a suicide mission, isn’t it?”

“Yup. Gens Nethress is in a really bad way, Tvorh. We’ve lost seven duchies and twenty counties in the past twenty years. Sometimes it seems like Thorssel is all we have left. You’d have to be an idiot to join up with our Gens.”

“Nobody ever accused me of having an overabundance of brains.”

“Shut up, you stupid kid. You’re way smarter than that. I’m just being level with you, Tvorh.”

Okay, maybe sometimes blue-bloods were able to be honest. “Thanks.”

“We’re pulling out all the stops on this one. There’s no reason to leave anything in reserve; if we fail, we’ll die anyway, so we may as well go big. But if we succeed… well, Gens Nxtlu won’t survive, because we’ll be able to prove they’ve been doing genophage research.”

“The other Gentes would all band together and kill them for that.”

“That’s right.”

Though Tvorh couldn’t see the setting sun, he could feel its dying heat on his face. The chill in the air seeped into his bones, and he shuddered. “What happens if I fail during the accelerated treatments?”

“With the accelerated treatments, there’s no purple-blooding. You can’t bail halfway through and get a Half-Bond. It’s all or nothing. You connect fully with the Symbiont, you Chimerize, or you die.”

“You’re asking me to put my life, or my humanity, on the line in order to join a failing Gens.”

“I’m asking you to reach for the power you’ll need to save your mom, kid.”

Tvorh clutched at his stomach. “Right in the gut.”

“I don’t fight fair. Will you do it?”

“Will you take care of my sisters if I die?”

“As long as I can. Which might not be much longer than you’ll be able to, so just don’t die and we’ll call it square.”

Tvorh was about to say yes, but something stopped him. “I don’t want to give up my family.”

“You don’t have to. You’ll always be Ortus— what were your parents’ names? Well, you’ll probably be Ortus Acerbia, but—”

“Ysur and Meghan.”

“You’ll always be their son, Tvorh. You never have to give that up. You’re not losing your old family. You’re gaining a new one.”

Tvorh released a deep breath. “All right.”

“All right?”

He nodded. “I’ll take the Bond.”

“You’re a good man. Come on down. They should be ready by now.”

The Cathedral was a half-dome chamber in the center of the Palace. “Pretty impressive, huh?” Senrii whispered as they stepped through the doorway.

“What do you mean?”

“Oh. Right. Echolocation means some details are missing. The girders are made of steel, Tvorh. Real steel.”

“That must have cost a fortune.”

“You got that right. Those vines climbing the walls? Hibernian sun-eaters. They go straight up through the walls to the outside. Their outer nodes absorb the sunlight, and the inner ones use that energy to regulate the climate down here.”

“Power-leaves do that. Isn’t there a whole forest of those outside Thorssel?”

“Well, yeah, but these are Hibernian sun-eaters. They’re more… natural.”

“And a good thing, too,” came an unfamiliar voice. “Without the particular attributes of the Hibernian vine, the air would not maintain the proper temperature-humidity for the survival of the chrysalises.”

“Tvorh,” Senrii said, “that’s Magus Presbyter Sodalitatis Jeoffries. Where are you, Jeoffries?”

“He’s behind that wall of hanging moss,” Tvorh said. “Fiddling with the controls.”

“Right you are,” Jeoffries called. “The Maga informs me you have quite an ear for these things.”

“He’s going to be your lead technician,” Senrii said. “He’ll monitor your vitals while you’re within the chrysalis.”

“We should be only a few minutes,” Jeoffries said.

“All right, kid. One more time. Let’s go over this. Standard process?”

“Results in either a SOPHIOS or a SOPHIAS.”

“Meaning?”

“At the cost of hour-long treatments separated by week-long intervals, you can be guaranteed either an optimal bond with a Symbiont or at least an adequate bond, enough to interface directly with genetic data, like if you need to be a gengineer for animals or for Stigmata.”

“Radical treatment?”

“Symbiont cast-off fluids. Like a vaccination uses damaged phages. You get a SOPHIIS. An inadequate Bond. A Warlock.”

“And the accelerated treatment?”

Tvorh paused. He might be about to recite his own death liturgy. “Constant treatments without rest intervals. You get— I’m going to get— a SOPHIOS, Toolhood, death, or Chimerization, because there are no suppressive intervals if you fail to bond.”

“You bond how?”

“Tame it to my will. It’s going to be trying to alter me, take me over. It’ll want to own my body. I have to use it against itself, fight back the changes until it realizes that I’m the boss.” Tvorh cracked his neck, then his knuckles. He was as ready as he’d ever be.

Senrii slapped him on the back. “All right, kid. Let’s get you Bonded. Presbyter, are we ready?”

“We are indeed, Maga.” An aging man— he had to be truly ancient, if while bonded to the Symbiont he still seemed old— wearing priestly robes pushed through the lush flora. “Well met, fellow traveler.” He bowed to Tvorh, then intoned, “Tvorh, Ortus Acerbia—”

“Don’t call me by my city. Ysur and Meghan are my parents’ names.”

“Very well. Tvorh, Ortus Ysur et Meghan, have you in proper solemnity contemplated the act of Bonding?”

“Sure.”

“And have you, by solemn contemplation, chosen to undergo the marriage of man and Symbiont?”

“Yeah.”

A humming, pitch perfect in its harmony, arose, echoing off the domed ceiling and suffusing the inner vegetation with deep, melodic warmth. “Then we,” Jeoffries said, as three like-garbed men pushed through the foliage and came to stand beside the Presbyter, never breaking their harmony, “shall be yours witnesses and your caretakers, until you awaken from that dream or from this one. Come, now, to the sacred chamber, and prepare yourself.”

The four priests surrounded Tvorh so that he had no choice but walk in the path they forced. At the edge of the wall, they separated. In the mossy ground beneath him, a maw awaited, a gigantic Venus flytrap sized to consume prey even larger than he was.

“Here, O traveler, take your leave of us, until you awake from the dream.”

Tvorh stepped down into the maw.

“Good journeys, O traveler, and when we next see you, may you have taken the next step to Apotheosis.”

“Hear our prayer, lord of the body,” intoned the acolytes.

The chrysalis closed over Tvorh, wrapping him so tightly that he could not move. Motion tickled the back of his neck.

Face adversity without fear, Father had said.

This was for him.

Fangs plunged in, and something entered Tvorh.