"Since we are being candid," Invidia said, "I must tell you that my motivations for cooperation are somewhat diluted by the fact that I am fully aware that when you no longer have a use for me, you will dispose of me."
The vord Queen tilted her head, her expression pensive. Then she nodded slowly. "Nearly one million freemen have come to me wearing the green," she said. "They are being sheltered and fed, and I will honor the bargain I offered them. It might reduce the amount of disruption if, when the organized Aleran resistance is broken, they are governed by one of their own. Someone who understands reality." She paused, and added, "I suppose it might prevent needless suffering. Preserve lives that would otherwise be lost. If that matters to you."
Invidia narrowed her eyes. "Are you making me that offer?"
The Queen nodded. "I am. Our partnership has been mutually profitable. I see no reason why it should not continue at the conclusion of hostilities. Survive, serve me well, and it will be so."
Invidia was silent for a moment. She looked away from the Queen, and Isana saw her bow her head. There was a flash of emotion from the burned woman, of fear and elated hope and bitter shame.
"Very well," she whispered.
The vord Queen nodded. "Go."
Invidia left the hive.
Several moments later, the vord Queen said, "I know you didn't sleep through that noise, Isana."
"I thought it would be more polite not to disturb you," Isana said.
"You thought you might gain information covertly," the Queen said. "It was a sensible attempt to attain some small measure of advantage." She stared down at the pool for a moment, and murmured, "Your son has grown."
Isana's heart seemed to skip a beat as a sudden pang went through her chest. "I assume you do not mean physically."
"His tactical furycraft is impressive. Less subtle and complex than Sextus's talents, but applied with greater flexibility and intelligence."
Isana swallowed. "You're trying to hurt him."
The Queen looked back at Isana, her expression surprised. "Of course."
Isana carefully did not grind her teeth or show the vord fear or rage. "But you have not succeeded."
"Yet," said the Queen, "there was a very low order of probability that this attempt would succeed. That was not its purpose."
"A sensible attempt to attain some small measure of advantage," Isana said.
"Precisely." She studied the pool's surface. "Thus far, I estimate my own strength to be the greater by a considerable margin."
"Unless he's holding something back," Isana said, primarily to plant doubt in the Queen's mind.
The Queen smiled. "Always a possibility."
Isana chewed on her lower lip for a moment, then asked, "May I see him?"
"If you wish."
Isana rose carefully. Her dress was beginning to smell almost as untidy as it looked. No, she decided. She was beginning to smell almost as bad as the dress looked. Her hair must look a fright. How many days had it been since she had bathed or changed clothes? There was no way for her to tell.
As she approached the pool, she saw a ghostly image appear deep within it, one that grew brighter and clearer as she drew closer to the Queen. It showed a large field of fallen stones and ruined buildings. There were warrior-vord corpses all over it. The Queen waved a hand, and suddenly the vord sprang back to life and were surrounded by the blurred form of legionares. An instant later, the wall rose up again, colored oddly green, then a slender young man stood before the city gates of Riva.
"This is what he did no more than an hour ago," the Queen murmured. "The image becomes too indistinct to be useful as his Legion closes to battle. These events transpired just prior."
Isana watched in awe as her son, tall and proud, tested his will against the furycrafted fortress and reduced it to rubble. She watched as the enemy came forth to kill him and found only death instead. She watched as the Legions marched up to the city and hammered into the vord. She watched her son cast his defiance into the teeth of the enemy who had all but destroyed Alera - and emerge victorious. Her heart pounded hard with terrified pride, with worry, with hopeful anxiety.
Her child. Septimus's child.
"If only you could see him, my lord," Isana whispered, closing her eyes against sudden tears.
"Was it difficult?" the Queen asked a moment later.
Isana willed her tears away with a simple watercrafting and opened her eyes again. "Was what difficult?"
"Rearing the child without the aid of your mate."
"At times," Isana said. "I had help. My brother. The other folk at his steadholt."
The Queen looked up from the foggy haze that had enveloped the pool's image. "It is a collective effort, then."
"It can be," Isana said. "Was it difficult for you?"
The Queen tilted her head inquisitively.
"Bringing forth this horde without the aid of subordinate queens," Isana clarified.
"Yes."
"Would it not make it easier to use your warriors effectively if you had the help of more queens?"
"Yes."
"And yet you have not created more."
The Queen turned her young-seeming face back to the pool, troubled. "I have tried," she said.
"But you cannot?"
"I can create them." The Queen's face became puzzled, wounded. It was a child's expression. "They all try to kill me."
"Why?" Isana asked.
For a moment, she thought the Queen wasn't going to answer. When she spoke, her voice was very small. "Because I have been changed. Because I do not function in the manner which their instincts tell them I should."
A slow wave of sadness and genuine pain washed out of the vord Queen. Isana had to fight to remind herself of the destruction and death brought by this creature to all of Carna.
"That's why you left Canea and returned here," Isana said suddenly. "Your junior queens turned upon you, so you escaped them."
As she sat beside the pool, the Queen drew her knees up to her chest, wrapping her arms around them. "I did not escape them," she replied. "I merely postponed the confrontation."
"I don't understand," Isana said.
"The continent across the sea called Canea has been overrun," the Queen said in a quiet monotone. "But it will take decades, perhaps centuries, for my children to consolidate and fully exploit their new territory - to make it impregnable. Once that is done, and they have a secure base of operations, they will come here to destroy me and everything of my creation. Already their forces have grown to an order of magnitude beyond mine."