76

Ajiñe was only on the edge of it—her sync with Nália and Wenthi and Varazina was muted, as if she had been sheltered from the brunt of it. But she felt the wave of Varazina’s power. The moments of Wenthi’s agony as his body was blown apart. Nália’s joy as the song of the land, the song that Varazina had composed with her power, played through her body and spirit.

And the sky was blinding.

And then Wenthi—Renzi, in her heart he was Renzi, and that was how he should be honored—was gone.

The light washed over the world.

“What do we—” Gab asked. Ajiñe knew she was just a meter to her left, but in the blinding light, she couldn’t see her.

“Wait,” Ajiñe said. “Don’t pull iron until you can see them.”

The light faded, and Ajiñe’s eyes adjusted, but the song still played in the back on her head, like a radio on the other side of a wall.

The other sounds were crying and retching.

When Ajiñe could make out the Alliance officers, they were all on the ground, on their knees. Thick black liquid—thick as blood, thick as oil—seeped from their mouths, noses, and eyes. They wailed, making sounds that more befit an animal being slaughtered than a human being.

“Are they dying?” Mensi asked.

“Don’t know,” Nicalla said. “But they look like they’re suffering.”

“Shame,” Gab said. She strolled over and started taking their guns away. None of them—not one—was able to resist. “Do we put them out of their misery?”

“No.”

That was Nália. She walked over, her face filled with peace and serenity.

“There’s no need to kill them. They should live, live with the pain of what they’ve done to us, to our country. That’s what they’re going through.”

“What is that?” Nicalla said, looking closely at the black gunk that was coming out of one officer’s orifices, even as he weakly pleaded for help. “Is it oil?”

“It does look like it,” Fenito said.

“They’re feeling what the land felt,” Nália said. “Feeling what they had done to it.”

The train doors opened again, and Miss Dallatan—Ajiñe had no idea she was among the prisoners here—stuck her head out. “Is it safe?”

“It is,” Ajiñe said. “Come out, come out.” She watched the other prisoners as they came out, waiting to see her father. He came out, helped down by Isilla Henáca. Ajiñe went to him, wrapping her arms around him.

“Are you all right?” he asked her. “Did they hurt you?”

“I’m fine,” she said. But his attention was on the Alliance officers on the ground.

“What happened here?”

“Varazina happened,” Nália said. “She released the full weight of her power, pouring it out of her dying body, and with that she cursed the people who intrude upon this country. The pain they put upon the people and the land will be visited back upon them sevenfold.”

Fenito and Mensi had collected the guns, dragged the officers into the train’s prison cars, leaving them with the Civil Patrol officers who had already been locked up. Nicalla and Gabrána checked on the other survivors. Ajiñe held on to her father, never wanting to let go, while still the distant song vibrated in the back of her head.

“You’re hearing it, aren’t you?” Nália asked.

“What am I hearing?”

“Varazina was made to reach into an empty space—where the vibrations connect us, our spirits and minds to the mushroom, and the mushroom to the land. Through that power she discovered it resonated with the frequencies of the radio. All the transmissions, all the receivers. You’re hearing the song she placed in there, the song that we can make our own. The song we can use to tune into those frequencies.”

Ajiñe tried to wrap her mind around what Nália was saying.

Nicalla came up, putting her hand into Ajiñe’s. “We can do it now. Take back this country. Teach the lessons of Varazina. Return Zapisia to what it was supposed to be.”

“No,” Nália said. “We’re not going to do it that way. We’re not going to stay mired in the past. We have to look toward tomorrow.”

“And who are you to say?” Nicalla said with a sneer. “I brought you in. You haven’t—”

“She’s the one Varazina blessed,” Ajiñe said, wrapping a protective arm around Nália. “And the one who rescued us here. She’s the one with the power to lead us.”

“You need to lead us,” Nália told Ajiñe. “That’s what she wanted. She trusted your vision. Your voice. She knew I could bring the power, but that you could be the just voice that Pinogoz needed.”

Nicalla was still on it. “Pinogoz is a fake name, put upon us—”

“It’s our country,” Ajiñe said. “Pinogoz, Zapisia, whatever you call it. It should be ours. It’s high time we made it ours, now that we have the tools and the power to do it.”

“How do we have power now?” Miss Dallatan asked.

The radios in the armored trucks all sparked to life with a burst of static, and as Nália spoke, her voice came from all of them at once.

“Because we can be heard. And we can call everyone to our cause.”

Miss Dallatan bowed her head and stepped back. Nicalla looked shocked, and then stepped forward, taking Nália’s hand. “You are the one she blessed. I’ll follow wherever you say.” Many of the others stepped forward, bowing their heads. All ready to follow. All ready to fight.

“So now what?” Gabrána asked, curling one arm around Ajiñe’s back. “Do we take those trucks and drive back to the city?”

“We do take those trucks,” Ajiñe said, the smile coming to her mouth. “But they were expecting us at the work camps, and I think we shouldn’t let them down. Let’s go and show them what we think about that place.”

Nália nodded. They would liberate the camps today. And then the country tomorrow.