The Cleansing (Book One: The Folara Chronicles)

011:Jerrika

"Strip her of her armor."

Jerrika shrank away from the prying hands of two huge Minions who entered her cell. If they took her uniform, they took her ability to heal, to be nourished, and to fight with her physical body. It also gave them the ability to take her kai, thereby taking her will. She knew they called it assimilation.

A diminutive woman stepped confidently into the cell.

Yet Jerrika struggled, using all her feeble strength to fight them. She was trained, a warrior, but some powerful force (Quildor's witch?) held her bound and kept her weak. Her only thought was: she would not let them take her alive!

Could the Witch divest her of her Kai? Without the kai she would not be able to breathe on the land. She knew beyond a doubt that Adara Sebille had this knowledge. But did she have enough power alone to do it?

She called to her Kai, the indigenous creature she'd bonded with in order to survive on the planet's surface or in its waters.

"I won't let her assimilate you!" Jerrika screamed to her Kai.

"She is strong! She has power to take your armor! The only way to keep her from taking it is to fully integrate with me. To do so, I must tell you my name. If we do this, you will have more than just my power to breathe the planetary air, Jerrika, you will have further planetary power to adapt... but you will lose the power to procreate!"

Jerrika did not know the powerful name word for her Kai. It was to be used only as a final effort. If she knew the name... she would be giving up the one thing besides the Talisman she could give her people, a child to carry on her legacy. Now, trapped in Auditorium, she would never be able to search for the Talisman again, and if she chose to keep her kai and the kai power, she'd never have a child. Did they have the power to assimilate her anyway, or could she, like Belakane before her, receive further power? Enough power to escape?

Choose. She had known this day might come, but now faced with it, she faced her own weak humanity. Bonded with the shape-shifting entity that had chosen her as its Kai when she became a warrior for her people, the possibility of permanent bonding was always there, and they both knew the consequences. Should the day ever come when Jerrika was captured and her will or her life threatened, they two had decided to fight to the death. Both of them giving up the opportunity to continue. Did Jerrika believe this was that time?

"Do you believe breach is imminent?" The Kai shivered into her awareness as that lovely floating tendrilled spark of beauty and peace.

"Tell me your name." Jerrika commanded, making the decision.

"Losira."

They knew what it meant. Fight to live, live to fight.

"Losira." She repeated. "You are mine and I am yours, bonded now forever. Losira."

Jerrika felt the sudden pulsing enclosure around the base of her skull as Losira completed the meld that would keep them alive. But alive for what? There had to be hope.

"We will fight this together now more than ever, Jerrika. We are one."

Proudly she stood and with the tiniest of thoughts, Losira produced a silver dagger. Jerrika threw the dagger straight at the heart of the Witch and watched as it plunged deeply. The two minions ran.

Jerrika made it to the door and would have followed the two, but a sharp pain lanced through her head, causing her to double over.

"Oh no, you don't, Princess!" A very deep and foreign male voice announced as two vice-like meaty hands shoved her up against a stone wall to look into her face. "I have seen what comes of complete kai meld, and I'm ready for you this time!"