Page 230 of Seer Prophet

I shook off the image, but not before it brought a harder flush of pain.

I shoved back my last memory of Cass, right before they put me under in my mother’s bedroom. I fought out the image of her face, smiling at me, the satisfaction in her expression.

It hurt too much. Even now, after everything, it hurt too much.

Anyway, dwelling on that wouldn’t help Lily.

Peering closer at those dark threads, I frowned. I followed with my eyes and light where Shadow deliberately used those metallic structures to replace her naturalaleimicshape. He’d more or less forced the rest of heraleimito grow around them. I could see now, what he’d done––beyond just the cloud of shadowy spiderwebs Balidor showed me before. I could see the actual mechanics of what he’d removed and replaced.

He’d deliberately targeted the threads that tied Lily to her physical body.

Being the most “semi-dimensional” areas of her light, they provided the interface that kept Lily connected to Earth, so to speak.

If that interface got cut, or disrupted, Lily would die.

Which meant, if I removed those metallic threads, I would kill my daughter.

Now, looking at Lily’s light, I could see how deliberate that had been.

I could see where Menlim had broken threads, burning them out of existence before they’d been allowed to grow and thicken under the natural resonances of Lily’s light. After altering, breaking and removing those fluid,livingthreads, he’d replaced them with the cloying, metallic, rigid, and dead-feeling light of the Dreng.

I stared at the connecting points, looking at where they began and ended.

I looked at how he’d fractured pieces of her light, fusing them with structures infused with the light of the Dreng. I could see how her light had grown right into the structures through that same forced resonance.

It was like grafting the branches of a tree together.

Or maybe more like forcing a tree to grow into the side of a steel skyscraper.

In any case, I could see why Tarsi and Balidor warned me not to get my hopes up. From what I could tell by scanning Lily’s light, the natural structure she’d lost as a baby wouldn’t simply regrow on its own.

Not in time, anyway. Not before she died.

The problem was absolutely structural.

Thinking about that, I frowned more.

I was still looking at those structures when a low tone came from the higher portion of one wall. The organic speaker there sparked to life a half-second later.

“Esteemed Bridge.”I recognized the voice as Balidor’s. It rose slightly, as if he’d twisted the volume knob on the speaker from the security station.“What is it that you are doing, exactly, my dearest of sisters?”

He must be monitoring the security console from the CIC.

Rolling my eyes, I continued to keep most of my attention on Lily’s light. “Examining my daughter’s light. Is that all right with you, my loveliest of brothers?”

From the couch, Revik let out a low snort.

“Not really,”Balidor said.“Esteemed Sister, we discussed this––”

“No,” I said, cutting him off.“Youdid. You discussed it, Balidor… and I listened. Now, I’m overruling you.”

There was a silence.

When I glanced at Revik, he raised an eyebrow at me in question.

He didn’t speak, though. Lily remained quiet, too, tugging on the necklace I wore with Revik’s ring on it. I could tell she was listening, just like Revik was. I may have imagined it, but I swear I felt something leave her light, something that felt a lot like hope.

Maybe that’s what finally did it.

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