Anne McCaffrey - Acorna 7 - Acorna's Triumph

ACORNA'S TRIUMPH

Book 7 in Acorna Series

By

Anne McCaffrey and Elizabeth Ann Scarborough

Acorna's Triumph

ANNE McCAFFREY

and

ELIZABETH ANNSCARBOROUGH

An Imprint ofHarperCollinsPublishers

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author's

imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons,

living or dead, is entirely coincidental and beyond the intent of either the author or the publisher.

ACORNA's TRIUMPH.

FIRST EDITION

HarperCollins Publishers Inc.,10 East 53rd Street,New York ,NY10022 .

ISBN 0-380-97900-4

Printed in theUnited States of America .

OTHER ACORNA NOVELS

Acorna's Rebels

Acorna's Search

Acorna's World

Acorna's People

Acorna's Quest

Acorna

In fond memory of Connie Johnson:

mathteacher, bibliophile, adventuress, and friend

Acknowledgments

Our thanks go to Rick Reaser, science and salvage consultant and Ambassador to the Sulfur Beings, for

his continuing advice and support. Also we wish to thank our editors Denise Little at Tekno Books and

Diana Gill at HarperCollins for their suggestions and help, with special thanks to Denise for being the

Keeper of Acorna's Database of names and Linyaari words. Thanks are also due to Margaret Ball,

cowriter with Anne McCaffrey on the first two Acorna books, for inventing the Linyaari language, among

other things. And we would most particularly like to thank Martin H. Greenberg, without whose trust and

support this project would have been impossible to continue.

Chapter One

Acorna moaned. She struggled desperately to regain control of herself. As always, she was powerless.

She could only watch as the room changed and the time portraits swirled around her like dervishes.

The white lights symbolizing Linyaari blurred, blinked out, returned. Vhiliinyar's panoramas changed from

lush toblighted, then became fertile again in a dizzying kaleidoscope of shape, color, time, and place. The

images shifted to the deafeningboom-boom boom-boom boom-boomof a drumbeat.

It doesn't really move that fast, she thought in an oddly detached way.And where are those drums

coming from?

Then she knew that the drumlike booming was the frenzied pounding of her own heart. Her blood

seemed to be trying to leap out of her skin with each beat of her pulse. She struggled upright and reached

for the door but something felt odd. She looked back to see herself still lying on the floor of the ancient

time laboratory.How strange, she thought. Her hands twitched as she tried once more to rise. She had to

get to the door.

Aari would be coming through it soon.Coming with her.

And the danger.She could not remember what the danger was, but she knew it was something horrible

and unexpected, even though she realized that she had been through this same sequence countless times

during many other sleep cycles. She knew what the danger was. She just didn't remember it.

Didn'twantto remember it.

But she had to. If only she could open the door quickly enough, get herself through it, gethiminside, and

close it fast enough and hard enough, the terrible thing wouldn't happen.

The room stopped spinning, and time stood still. She rose.

Where is the door?she thought. Then she thought,Whatdoor? She could see grass and rivers, craters

and furrows, mountains and trees, but no door.But there has to be a door…

And then she walked through the wall, coming into the room. She wore a shipsuit and helmet and she

was covered in something green and slimy. Right behind hercame Aari.

That was it. That was when she had to shut the door.But therewasno door, she thought. She struggled to

reach out again, but then realized she was still lying on the floor.

Klik-klak, klik-klack.The sound entered the room with her ship-suited self and Aari. It was like the

beating of her heart, but a different tone. Its volume increased, and the regular beat quickened and

loosened into an overwhelming cacophony ofklikity-klak-klak-klikity-klak-klakings.

She reached for Aari. He didn't seem to see her. He turned and raised his arms.

Behind him, Khleevi swarmed into the room, their mandibles and pincersklaking, their antennae rubbing,

their immense jaws devouring the floors and walls. Once more, the insect race was bent on destroying

Vhiliinyar and the Linyaari who had returned to populate it.

Acorna felt rather than saw something looming over her.

Just as she was sure her death was certain, she was grabbed and shaken.

"Khornya, Khornya, wake up! What's the matter?"

Acorna opened her eyes and looked up into the concerned face of her young friend Maati. They were

both inside the time lab within the great ruined office building that was among the remains of the lost

ancient city ofKubiilikaan . This city was the original home of the shape-shifting people who were the

fore-bearers of Acorna and Maati's race, the Linyaari, along with the unicorn-like Ancestors. Long

buried and forgotten, the city was the only part of the Linyaari home planet that had escaped the

depredations of the Khleevi invasion safe within its sophisticated shields beneath the surface of Vhiliinyar.

The walls of the time lab were not spinning now, but as usual the static maps of the planet were dotted

with small points of white light that indicated the places where Linyaari personnel were located. Many

teams were back on the planet's surface, mapping, surveying, and otherwise planning each phase of the

planet's renewal by regional applications of the terraforming process.

"Khornya, are you all right? You look funny," Maati said.

"I had a bad dream. That's all," Acorna assured her. Dream fragments filled her head. She looked

around for the phantom door that had haunted her dream, but of course it wasn't there. The room was

vast and spartan and very clinical-looking. Only Acorna's bedroll and the pool of water in the center from

which a beam of energy rose to pierce the ceiling and each story above it saved the chamber from the

sterile ambience of a typical research facility.

"What kind of dream?" Maati asked.

"I can't even remember what it was about now.Something about the Khleevi."

"No wonder you were crying out and trying to run in your sleep," Maati said. She laid her horn gently

against Acorna's head to soothe her friend and heal her of the residual effects of the dream.

"Thanks," Acorna said. "But I'm fine now, really."

"You shouldn't be spending all your time down here alone," Maati scolded. "You can'tpullAari out of that

machine, you know."

"I know," Acorna admitted. "It's not that I expect that, it's just that now that I know that Aari is with one

of the Ancestral Friends, and they're using the device to cross time and even send messages back, I want

to figure out how they're doing it. And Imightfind Aari in the process," she finished hopefully. "You never

know."

Maati sighed. "I miss him, too, Khornya. I barely got to know my older brother before he disappeared

on us. But staying down here all the time is just plain unhealthy. That's probably why you're having all

these bad dreams. Really, you should come up to the surface just for a little while," Maati coaxed. "You

haven't been up in ages and ages, and you won't believe the progress we've made with the terraforming."

"Of course I would," Acorna said, but her attention was elsewhere. She rose to inspect a hole in the wall

behind one of the great maps showing the time and place of each person on the planet's surface. For a

moment the hole gave her an odd turn, reminding her of something terrible in her dream. But that was

silly. It was just a dream. And she had put the hole there herself — though with much trepidation.

She'd wanted to see the workings of the map or whatever it was that was driving the time machine. "I

can see everything that's going on up there on the maps," she told Maati. Returning her attention to the

pictures on the surface of the wall, she gestured to the appropriate image as she spoke. "The watersheds

are all exactly where they ought to be now, the streams are flowing, the rivers and their currents are

behaving properly, the tides are turning the seas at the correct times, the waterfalls are falling, and even

the rain is coming at the correct appointed intervals. All that water must be making everything quite

green."

"Yes, but you don't care about that at all," Maati said. "You can't fool me. You only know about the

waters because they're needed for the time travel. But honestly, Khornya, you've done so much to make

Vhiliinyar live again. It isn't just the planning and the exploration. You made it happen. It was all because

of you that we got the catseye chrysoberyls."

"I wasn't exactly alone on that journey. Anyway, it's only because of Captain Becker's negotiating such a

good price with Uncle Hafiz that we ended up out of debt and with credits to spare to fund the rebirth of

this planet." Captain Becker was her good friend, Jonas P. Becker, pilot of theCondor, flag and only ship

of Becker Interplanetary Salvage and Recycling Enterprises, Ltd.

Becker, a canny businessman himself, was undaunted by the bargaining skills of Acorna's adoptive

uncle, Hafiz Harakamian, the semiretired former head of the also interplanetary enterprises of House

Harakamian. Unlike Becker's business, Hafiz's boasted many ships, flitters, and other vehicles, a portion

of one moon, and all of another.

"It was pure good luck that we found the catseyes just when we needed to refine our terraforming

process, so that we could restore sections of the planet instead of doing everything at once." Acorna was

fully awake now and ready to return to her investigations. Maati and the others who had already voiced

similar concerns about her only fussed because they cared, Acorna knew, but it was distracting. If she

was going to justify spending all her time in the time lab, she had to make it pay off by conducting real

research.

With a pointed glance at Maati, she pulled down her goggles, turned on a special saw, and with a

whirring of the blade enlarged the hole she'd made so it was big enough to stick her head through.

Maati made a face. "It's nice to know that you've been listening to what we tell you when we come to

visit you. But you can't fool me. It's not like you've seen anything up there for yourself. And this is a feast

day. The best grasses of the season are all ready to harvest. Please come up and graze with us. Everyone

will be there."

"Not everyone," Acorna said.

"Not Aari, I know," Maati agreed reluctantly. "I'm sorry. I know how hard it's been on you. I know that

you feel like you've missed contact with him while others have received telepathic inquiries from him."

Acorna frowned and withdrew her head from the hole in the panel. "You didn't tell me that when I talked

to you from Makahomia. You said 'indications.' You didn't say 'telepathic inquiries.' "

"Okay, I didn't. But it was no big deal. Aari's communications were very sporadic and scattered, and no

one was really sure what they meant until they talked to each other and to you," Maati protested. "This

has been frustrating for Mother and Father and me, too. At least you were doing something useful on

Makahomia. That's why we decided to join you. And Aari's okay. You found that out yourself when you

heard that message from him that the priest gave you down on Makahomia. You know very well that if…

no…whenhe comes back it will be at some wildly romantic moment, when you need rescuing or help

fighting some horrible enemy, and the rest of our people are being too analytical and fair-minded to be of

any help at all."

"You have a very big imagination, Maati," Acorna said, dusting off her hands. "We've finished off the

Khleevi. I can't think of any other horrible enemies standing in line to be vanquished at the moment. And I

think my own fair mind has just about analyzed this contraption. I'm beginning to understand how it

works."

"Really?"Maati was actually very interested in the time machine, so Acorna's ploy was successful. Maati

crowded closer to see what Acorna was doing.

"Yes, and the better I understand it, the more it explains a few things to me. Like the thought messages

from Aari. I have entered all of the instances reported to me. I found that, far from being random, they fit

a definite pattern — the same pattern that the time/space mechanism follows. Only at certain intervals are

there connecting ladders between the time and place Aari occupies and our own time and space.Though

he has made a couple of jumps."

"How do you know that?"

"I'll show you," Acorna said, and passed her hand across a section where the column of liquid light rose

from floor to ceiling. At once a familiar shape appeared in that unfamiliar place. It was a double helix, a

shape typical of the cellular blueprints comprising most life-forms.

"What is that?" Maati asked.

"Time," Acorna said. "And space also. Or a road map through both of them. Where the helix twists we

intersect, but otherwise we travel separately. I've labeled the intersections between Aari and us in this

interaction. There, and there, and there. See how they form a pattern?"

"Yeah," Maati said. "How did you find all that out?"

"Mostly by accident," Acorna admitted. "But after a couple of those accidents, things began to make

more sense to me. And if the pattern holds, we're about due for another contact with Aari. So I've got

too much work to do down here to spare the time to go to the surface."

She waved her hand again, and the column shimmied and turned back into its amorphous self.

She crossed to the map of Vhiliinyar, which dominated the wall with the hole in it. While Acorna

concentrated on her excavation work on the wall, Maati noticed that some white dots flickered near the

underground lake, a couple of blocks downhill from their position. When white dots appeared on one of

these maps, they indicated the presence of Linyaari in that location.

Acorna noticed the dots, too. There was a breathless catch in her voice as she inquired, "Did anyone

come with you when you came through the tunnels?"

Maati shook her head. "No."

To reach the underground city from the surface, people had to enter through the labyrinth of caves

occupied in ancient times by the Ancestors and their attendants. The caves led up into the building

through an opening a few feet from the door of the room she and Acorna were in.

Because of many previous accidents caused by malfunctions of the time device that had resulted in the

disappearances of various beings, Aari among them, access to the area was carefully controlled, if not

completely restricted. There shouldn't have been any Linyaari there to make those white dots on the map.

"We'd better see who it is," Maati said, but Acorna had already passed her and run out the door.

With Maati at her heels, Acorna took off, running so fast that she all but teleported herself to the shores

of the lake.

Acorna had had a premonition the moment she saw the white dots. Maybe, after all this time, Aari had

returned. There was an Aari feeling to those dots, and she just suddenlyknewthat he had returned. And

then she saw him, standing with another Linyaari beside the underground lake. It was unmistakably Aari,

though he looked more erect and confident, and his horn was beautiful and gleaming, unbent, no longer

stunted, just as it had been in her dream back on Makahomia.

She was down the hill in an instant. Then her arms were around his neck, her head resting in the hollow

of his shoulder, just as she'd wanted to be since the day he'd gone missing.Except thathis arms did not

embrace her back, though one hand did tap against her shoulder in a sort of awkward pat.

Behind her, Maati cried, "Aari? Is it really you? Your horn is fixed! When did that happen? Where've

you been? What— "

Aari held up his hand to stop Maati's stream of questions. "Greetings," he said. "Yes, it is I. At least, I

am Aari, and this is Laarye, and we have just arrived. If Grimalkin's calculations are correct, you would

be" — he juggled Acorna aside slightly to hold his wrist to one ear — "oh, yes, our beloved little sister

Maati, unknown thus far to Laarye. And this affectionate lady" — he patted Acorna's shoulder again —

"is my own lifemate, Khornya."

A sour taste rose in the back of Acorna's throat. Though Aari was here, something was terribly wrong.

This wasn't the Aari that she knew and loved!

"I have received much data concerning you both," Aari said. "It is a pleasure to… er… renew… our

acquaintance, I'm sure."

(Acorna?)Maati thought, (What is going on here?)

(I don't know. Maybe he's been recaptured by the Khleevi, and this time instead of torturing him

physically, they brainwashed him,) she told Maati telepathically.

(I assure you thatis not true, Khornya,) Aari told her. (Grimalkin helped me navigate time so that both

Laarye and I avoided the Khleevi altogether. Once I found Laarye, he and I jumped here. I confess it's

extremely disorienting. I have in my recorder notes from myself about my capture on the other timeline,

the torture, the death of my brother, and the realization that our homeworld had been destroyed. I have

recorded meeting Captain Becker and Riidkiiyi, also meeting you and my sister, and also my healing. I

have many other events recorded, but the one that truly causes me pain — as it true that in this timeline,

Grandam Naadiina has died?)

(Yes, that's true,) Acorna said. (She died saving her people. I'm glad you've taken good notes of your

life in our timeline. I take it since you identified me as your lifemate, you also recall our joining?)

(I have it recorded as a most profoundly enjoyable experience,) Aari replied with a lusty gleam in his eye

that reminded her of Thariinye. (I hope that soon we will have occasion to refresh my memory in this

timeline to add verisimilitude to the recorded memory.)

Maati, who had been talking earnestly with Laarye, telling him about her childhood after their parents'

disappearance and her role in their recovery, felt emanations coming from Acorna such as she had never

felt when her friend was among only other Linyaari.Dangerous emanations.Highly combustible.

She didn't even have to eavesdrop on their thought-talk to hear it. Aari was putting up no shields, as if he

was carrying on a casual conversation among a group of friends, as she had been told her people often

had before the Khleevi came. Khornya was broadcasting on all frequencies, loud and clear enough for

anybody to read.

Acorna recoiled from Aari's light embrace as if shewere a Khleevi and he was coated with the

Khleevi-killing plant slime that had helped them destroy their enemy. "Perhaps you should have chosen

that time to return," Acorna suggested in an overly calm voice. Maati noticed that Acorna was now

speaking aloud and guarding her thoughts. It seemed that this Aari was a stranger to her.

"Oh, I couldn't have done that," Aari said. "This is really the first opportunity to cross over to this side

without contaminating any major part of what's gone on already: the only change, as Grimalkin explained

this thoroughly to me — I wish he were here to explain it to you, but he had pressing business elsewhere

— the only change is that I don't actually remember anything from the time Laarye and I left home

together until now. It's an awfully big chunk of time, but Grimalkin thought it would be best if in this

timeline, the capture by the Khleevi never happened. So he rescued both Laarye and me — or rather, he

assisted me as I rescued both of us."

"How thoughtful of him," Acorna said. "It's a pity he couldn't have spared the planet the whole Khleevi

catastrophe and let us all just skip that part. It would have saved a fortune in terraforming expenses."

Aari had been chattering happily up to this point, but now he stopped and regarded Acorna more

thoughtfully, "You're upset," he said with some surprise. "Why are you upset, Khornya? According to my

records, you love me. I would think you'd be happy I'd found a way to return to my people with my

brother alive and without having had to endure that endless torture."

"And all it cost you was the couple ofghaanyiof memories of our life together," she said. "I can easily see

why it was worth the trade to you."

Acorna was struggling to be reasonable and keep the hurt out of her voice, but it wasn't working. Then

she amazed Maati by employing one of Captain Becker's favorite curse phrases. Acornanevercursed.

"Frack it all, Aari! I have searched through time on this world. I have caused the Ancestors to put a stop

to the wholesale terraforming to return Vhiliinyar to its original state in case you returned to an unstable

world. I have traveled to Makahomia, where all of us could have been killed by people who worshiped

you and your friend Grimalkin as some sorts of deities. I got the message you left for me. But then…

you… sounded like you. And now you've returned a stranger."

He held up his wrist and listened to it again, then said, "Oh, yes. That. Well, I left the message for you on

Makahomia, but that wasbeforethe crucial jump. I appreciate all of your trouble, Khornya, but really, I

was fine. Grimalkin and I just had to wait for the proper moment, as I believe I said in my note."

Aari clearly didn't understand why she was so upset — maybe because Acorna didn't understand it

herself. She knew that if someone had offered her the chance to make Aari's torture vanish, and his

brother Laarye live, all at the cost of Aari's memories of their love, she would have willingly agreed.

Grabbed at the chance, even. But… she hadn't been consulted. And those memories had been a central

part of her life, too. Now, looking into Aari's beautiful but emotionally distant eyes, those precious

memories felt as if they were part of some sort of dream, or maybe of a vid she'd seen. Or as if their

shared experiences and emotions — some of the most beautiful in her life — hadn't really happened.

She felt discarded.

She knew that feeling was not exactly logical and reasonable. She should be happy that Aari was whole

again. She should be ecstatic that he was no longer tormented by memories of what the Khleevi had

done to him. She should be thrilled that he had even managed to save the life of his brother — Laarye's

death had haunted him and left him wracked with guilt. But the way he had done it made her feel as if she

was irrelevant in his life. And what was worse was that it felt as if, somewhere in his voyages in time, the

Aari she knew and loved had melted away to be replaced with this… this… infuriating stranger. Even

worse yet, her own Aari had cooperated in the destruction of the person he had been. He'd allowed their

love to fade from his mind and heart.

She was a stranger to him. AndthisAari was very much a stranger to her.

Maati was apparently taking all this much better than Acorna was. But Aari was only Maati's older

brother, not her lifemate. And now Maati had her other brother back, and could get to know him. Maati

had been born after Aari and Laarye were stranded on Vhiliinyar, where Laarye had starved to death

while he lay injured in a cave and Aari had been captured and tortured by the Khleevi. The only family

Maati had known as she grew up was Grandam Naadiina, who had died heroically during the Khleevi

attack on narhii-Vhiliinyar. After Aari was rescued, he and Maati had helped to save their parents, and

now they had theirotherbrother back. Maati's family was finally complete, so of course she was rejoicing.

Maati loved Aari, of course, but she naturally did not know him as Acorna did — or had.

But for Acorna, this new twist on her relationship with Aari was just one thing too much. She had in fact

moved mountains and oceans and the rivers of time to find him. Now that he was back, he'd forgotten all

that they had shared. Aari looked at her like she was someone he'd met at a party once, not the love of

his life. For Acorna, it was past bearing.

Acorna excused herself with a mumbled apology and returned the way she had come. Aari didn't even

call after her — he started talking with Maati as if nothing out of the ordinary had just happened. Acorna

kept on walking as she passed the room containing the time machine; for the first time in months she felt

no urge to go inside it. Instead, she followed the hallway to the trapdoor leading to the cave connecting

the abandoned underground city ofKubiilikhan with the surface.

She needed someone to talk to, preferably someone who could not read minds, since hers wasn't fit to

share with company at the moment. She wished Nadhari Kando was here. Acorna needed to talk to

someone who could understand what she was feeling. Nadhari had seen and done so much that nothing

surprised her or shocked her anymore. Nor was she one totsk-tskover the expression of negative

emotions. When Nadhari felt negative emotions, whoever was causing her pain usually got to share that

pain, and often got flattened in theprocess.

But Nadhari was back on Makahomia right now, too far away and much too busy to serve as Acorna's

confidante. Acorna thought she would be able to confide in her aunt Neeva, but Neeva and her

spaceship, theBalakiire, were on the Moon of Opportunity, known as MOO to its tenants and all those

who loved it. Neeva was consulting with Linyaari scientists regarding the terraforming process. She, too,

was busy with important work. Acorna would have to find someone else to talk to. But she couldn't think

of anyone who would believe her, much less understand.

As she emerged from the cave into the open meadow made deliciously fragrant by sunshine and recent

rain, courtesy of Dr. Hoa's weather wizardry, theCondor'sshuttle settled onto the surface.

Acorna smiled broadly. That expression might be interpreted as an aggressive act by the Linyaari

people, but Acorna knew that Captain Jonas P. Becker would see her human-style grin and correctly

deduce that she was overjoyed to see him arrive. Becker and Maak — the android who affected an

artificial horn attachment while on Vhiliinyar to spare Linyaari sensibilities about outsiders landing on their

planet — and RK, theCondor'sfeline first mate, all disembarked. Acorna had never been so happy to see

a group of beings since the day her human foster fathers had pulled her out of her castaway life-support

escape pod.

Acorna ran to meet her friends. Becker took one look at her face, and said, "Acorna! Princess! What's

the matter? You look like you've lost your best friend." That was all it took. Acorna fell into his arms and,

in a big rush, poured out what had happened and how she felt about it all. At the end of her story,

Becker let her weep on his shoulder while Maak patted her head awkwardly and RK twined around her

ankles mewing anxiously, just as if he didn't know how to thought-speak, though Acorna knew all too

well that he did.

"Captain, I know it's silly," she said, drying her eyes and wiping her nose inelegantly on her sleeve since

she lacked a handkerchief. "All I've done since he went missing istry to get him back. Now he's back, but

— "

"Silly? Naah, it's not silly. Sounds to me like Aari is suffering from a bad case of mistaken identity — he

doesn't know who the heck he is. You know, maybe Karina Harakamian can sort him out. She's the kind

of person who is always trying to help the kind of people who are trying to find themselves."

"Maybe.I suppose he'll have to figure that out on his own, though," Acorna said, thinking that the

problem from her point of view was more that Aari didn't know whoshewas. "He doesn't seem to need

Anne McCaffrey - Acorna 7 - Acorna's Triumph

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