PROMISE

CHAPTER 30

The door to Memory clicked shut as Lilith left, and Hain settled back as he had before. He stared at the empty air before him and cleared his throat.

"Let's begin, Memory."

Memory's soft voice purred. "Yes, Hain. Commencing."

The air gave birth to points of light that spread soundlessly into a view of rolling hills on a backdrop of snow-striped mountains. Men swarmed from opposing sides of the emerald hills, their ranks like black tides washing over the shiny green. Then the two groups fell on each other, and Hain could hear the din of battle. The wails of the wounded. Of the dying.

Text scrolled across the bottom of the image. His eyes soaked it in as it moved.

Resource Conflicts begin in Asia and Europe as global fresh water supplies diminish.

Then the scene changed, and a wide open room lay before Hain's eyes. Oblong shapes like black coffins sat upon the floor in ordered rows. Humans draped in white knee-length coats flitted from one coffin to the next like mourners at a mass grave, their bright dress almost spectral against the gleaming finish.

Mages.

The word flashed behind his eyes for a slivered moment, but he banished the thought before it had time to take root. Mages meant magic, and magic didn't exist.

Words rolled over empty air at the bottom of the image.

Initial research into Surrogate breeding at the headquarters for Genetic Endeavor into Neo-Tissue Engineering: Tacoma, Washington.

The picture changed, and Hain watched as a room packed with enormous glass tanks stretched across his field of vision. The view panned around the room, and Hain could make out markings etched into the metal lids capping each tank.

He squinted, leaning forward. Letters and numbers stretched over the metal in a seemingly random fashion, but at the end of each series was the same symbol–two intertwined lines, flanked on one side by what looked like an axe head.

Recognition tingled in the base of his neck. Where had he seen that symbol before? In Promise? Maybe, he thought. He'd seen so much since coming to the haven, surely it was possible that he'd caught a glimpse of the thing without even realizing it.

Before he had another chance to stew on the question, the view moved closer to one of the tanks. His breath caught in his throat. Amber fluid the color of honey filled the tank, and drifting amidst the soupy liquid hung a body, all white hair and milk-colored limbs drifting like a shipwreck victim closed in the fist of the sea.

It was either a Vrai, or a Foew–Hain couldn't say for certain which. But there was no mistaking the thing for human.

But then the scene changed, and Hain's body went rigid with shock.

A gallows loomed in the foreground. Rope after rope hung slack from its crossbeam–one end lashed to the wood, the other bound about the neck of a human man or woman. Even from the pulled-back view afforded by Memory, Hain could see fear plain on every face.

An unseen speaker shouted an order, and the floor dropped from under the condemned. Ropes yanked taut. Hain flinched at the sudden violence playing out before him. At pair after pair of legs jerking like frenzied snakes.

Vrai Begin Human Extermination: Nashville, Tennessee, United States.

The scene changed again, quick as before.

A smoke draped street lay before him, flames lapping orange tongues over the buildings to either side. Humans packed the space, frantic as they fled a surge of wide-shouldered Surrogates. Vrai, Hain realized, wielding tools, and blades, and sticks to scythe through that panicked humanity. Screams rose into the smoky air. Bodies fell, some still clutching small children as they dropped.