"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!"

*****

Dinner was to be a family affair this night. Kara scrubbed in her own rooms and put on her uniform, in no way giving Galantyne the impression that she had given up her plan to rescue Jerrika by wearing a courtly dress. She entered the family dining room to the tantalizing smells of freshly seasoned protein. The sea's bounteous vegetation always smelled divine coming from Feniece's kitchens. Kara wished she were invited more often.

Feniece sat at the head of the table with her youngest son, Herfond at her right and Galantyne at her left. She presided. Galantyne stood as Kara entered, but it was her thirteen-year-old nephew, Lailoken who stood at her chair and offered her his most winning manners.

"Lailoken!" She smiled in genuine happiness to see him home from school where he attended on Carrigah.

"Aunt." Lailoken said formally, but Kara winked at him.

"Call me Kara." She reminded him. "You are of age now, and soon to be trained, I hope." She turned her gaze to Galantyne for approval, and he deliberately shook his head. She understood instantly that he did not want her to discuss training in Feniece's presence. Her barest nod indicated her submission.

"I have learned the ways of sea navigation in the smaller shuttle craft." Lailoken offered with a grin. "Faherdin and I are both able to traverse from Carrigah to Aquaria even to Etrusia and home."

This fact was not lost on Kara who felt that if Lailoken were already traveling to the other undersea domes, then his political views were to be questioned. Factions in Etrusia would be enticing to a young man his age.

"I trust all of your studies are as successful?" A maid brought breadsticks and soup.

"Yes, I believe they are. I have become well versed in the ancient earth language of Latin."

"Oh yes! I remember that class! Is Master Merkim still the instructor? He taught both Jerrika and I. Perhaps we should have paid more attention. What is the word for rescue? I was just thinking of that word earlier today. Do you recall it?"

Kara kept her eyes on Lailoken as she tasted her soup, but remained acutely aware of Galantyne's dangerous expression.

"Of course, Aunt-- I mean Kara! To rescue is liberandum in Latin. We have learned many such verbs. I enjoy Master Merkim's instruction very much, although I don't always see the pertinence of such studies."

Kara kept her eyes on her bread. "Pertinence, now that is a big word! It comes from pertinent, to do the right thing quickly and efficiently. Perhaps we can all learn some pertinence. Although I find eripio an especially good Latin word as well."

Lailoken's forehead scrunched up in confusion, and he missed his father's narrow-eyed glare in Kara's direction, as the clinking of silverware from the three little girls began to fill the silence.

"I believe it means to deliver, as in snatch or tear away-- not to retrieve or send a message." Lailoken said in confident triumph. He looked to his mother who beamed at him in pride, but his father scowled and stared down at his food.

"Oh, yes, but I was under the impression that it meant to save or to free someone." Kara went on in as innocent of a blistery scathe as she could muster.

Lailoken's eyes scrunched again, his spoon paused halfway to his mouth.

"Do not confirm her, son." Galantyne admonished too roughly and Lailoken's eyes widened in dismay. "But Father, I was just going to--."

"No need. Kara knows what it means."

Lailoken looked disappointed and even shot his father a disgruntled glare. He didn't contradict, so Kara took another bite of her bread. She wiped her hands on her napkin and then put both hands in her lap.

"I believe that word is salvo. To save someone in dire need, to release them from captivity. It is a very pertinent word, don't you think?"

"Kara." Now Galantyne's warning voice was directed toward her and she bowed her head as her cheeks flushed red.

"Gal." She retorted.

"You will not push this at my dinner table." Feniece and the children all looked up in unexpected startlement. Galantyne glanced at his wife. "I'm quite sorry, my dear. She is being impertinent."

Lailoken looked as if he were about to expound on the meaning of the word, when Kara shook her head at him.

"Should I ask where Jerrika is this evening?" Feniece asked, trying to change the subject.

Kara immediately put down her spoon. Galantyne choked on his bread.

"She is ill." He sputtered and Kara's eyes shot up at him in anguish.

"I cannot keep up this farce!" She glared. "How can we sit here and eat this sumptuous meal as if nothing--"

"For sand's sake, Kara, stop it this minute!"

"I will not!"

"I will call for Korlon!"

"By all means-- perhaps he will help me!" She pushed back her chair, her eyes filling with tears. "I'm sorry, Feniece!" She began to step around her chair when Lailoken stood.

"It's Jerrika isn't it?" He looked to his father. "She's been captured inside the mountain."

Now everyone had put down their spoons and all were staring in shock at Galantyne.

"Galantyne?" Feniece queried softly, laying a hand on top of his rigid fingers.

He bowed his head. "We will not speak of her, as custom demands."

Kara stopped her flight in order to hear what her brother might explain to his wife and children, and was furious at his reaction. "Not speak of her!"

"Kara, you know as well as we all do that if Jerrika has been captured there is nothing we can--." Lailoken was trying to comfort her and uphold his father's wishes.

"I can't stay here. I'll take dinner in my rooms."

"I ordered you to attend me at this meal!"

"Let her go, Gal--."

"Stay out of it, she is defying me yet again!"

"As I will continue to do, as long as you continue to refuse to help me!"

"Sit down!"

"No!"

"I said sit down, or I will not tell you what I have learned."

Kara sank into her chair in guarded acquiescence, her tears streaking her reddened cheeks.

"Since you see fit to make this a family matter and include my youngest, tenderest children in your tirade." He sighed and leaned into the table. "Yes, I have sent for both Archer and Korlon. I have convened the council and we will all attend the Festival of the Harvest Moons tomorrow and there will be a meeting afterward."

"A meeting afterward to discuss what to do? By then it will be too late! We must launch a mission right now!" Kara was not appeased.

"Launching a mission as you so brazenly put it, sister, is an act of war!"

"You-- you could do it without a war!" She couldn't disclose how she knew he could, but her eyes bore into his in abject confidence and misery.

Galantyne's palms slapped the table. "Perhaps Korlon can explain this to you so that you will understand."

"I understand perfectly. You do not care enough about her-- or anybody--!"

Kara caught Feniece's shock, looked around the table at the children, and was instantly ashamed.

"I take it back." She choked on her anger and tears. "You do care, Gal, I know you do. But-- I cannot sit here and-- eat, while she is out there."

She stood again and pushed back her plate.

"I will have someone bring a plate to your rooms, sister." Feniece hushed her two-year-old's pleas for more food.

Kara simply nodded, her fingers pressed tightly to her lips. "I cannot sit here, Galantyne."

"Go then." He waved a hand at her and didn't look up as she left his rooms.

******