The light in the Shimmering Eden was not born of a sun. It bloomed, a silent, violet tide rising from the vitrified floor of the crater. It was a light you could feel on your skin, a pressure and a warmth that promised transformation. Nysa Calder stood at its heart, her body a fragile column of clouded glass and pale, glowing veins. She was an oracle, a conduit for the great psychic broadcast of her people, and she was trying to listen. Her goal was simple: to hear the song of the Radiant Canticle.
She closed her eyes, her own faint, internal light pulsing in time with the Eden’s slow breath. She reached out with her mind, not as a hand groping in the dark, but as a tuning fork seeking a specific, resonant frequency. The Canticle should have met her halfway, a chorus of a million souls singing a single, harmonious truth. It should have been a wave to lift her, to fill the hollow spaces of her own identity with the certainty of the whole.
Instead, she found only noise.
It was a sound like a billion tiny, frantic clicks, a cascade of spiritual static that had no rhythm or reason. It was the sound of a system breaking, of signals colliding and erasing one another in a constant, grinding friction. The clarity was gone, lost in a psychic roar that felt like grit beneath her eyelids. She pushed against it, straining to find the pure note buried beneath the chaos, but the noise was a wall, a shrieking cacophony that pressed in on her. The connection was there, but it was corrupt. A signal drowning in 85% noise, a message of faith reduced to a whisper.
From the edge of the central dais, Elara Vane watched her. Elara was Nysa’s acolyte, a girl whose faith was as bright and uncomplicated as a freshly bloomed shard of Eden-crystal. Her concern was a palpable thing, a wave of pure, devotional energy that washed over Nysa and felt like another layer of pressure. Elara’s own light was a steady, unwavering gold, a painful contrast to the flickering uncertainty Nysa felt within her own translucent limbs. Elara saw an oracle in communion; Nysa knew she was a fraud, listening to a dead channel.
The static in her mind felt like a broken Geiger counter, its frantic, meaningless clicking a constant measure of the poison that had seeped into their song. It was a sound she had grown used to, a secret sickness she could not name.
The arrival of the Envoy of Eden was an intrusion of solid matter into a world of light. He moved with a purpose that was political, not spiritual, his robes the same colorless linen as everyone else’s, but they hung on him with a different weight. His inner light was contained, disciplined, a lamp turned low to conserve fuel. He stopped before the dais, his head bowed in a gesture of respect that his posture denied. He was not here to worship. He was here to deliver an order.
— Oracle, — his voice was smooth, the edges polished off by years of speaking in councils. — A hymn has descended. A new verse for the Canticle.
He held out a data-slate, its surface dark and inert. A hymn did not descend onto a slate. A hymn was felt, a truth that bloomed in the shared consciousness of the Chorus. This was not prophecy. This was a memo. Nysa felt a cold dread crystallize in her gut, a feeling far clearer than the Canticle had been in years.
The Envoy began to chant, his voice reciting the "hymn" from memory. The words were beautiful, full of images of light and witness, of a pilgrimage to the grey lands to observe the heresy of Matter. But the structure was wrong. It was a military directive wrapped in the language of scripture, a vector and a timetable disguised as a holy quest. It was a lie, and Nysa was its designated vessel. The price of this meeting was the last shred of her belief that she served a spirit, and not just a committee.
— The prophecy requires a pilgrimage of witness into the Wastes, — the Envoy concluded, his eyes fixed on her. — The faithful look to you to lead them. To show them the truth of the light.
Nysa opened her eyes. The violet glow of the Eden seemed dimmer, the warmth on her skin replaced by a clinical chill. She looked from the Envoy’s impassive face to Elara’s, which was alight with excitement. A pilgrimage. A chance to see the Oracle perform a great work. Elara’s faith was so absolute it was a cage for them both.
Nysa let out a breath she didn’t realize she was holding. The choice was simple. She could refuse, and in doing so admit her own spiritual blindness, shattering the faith of acolytes like Elara and inviting the scrutiny of hardliners on the synod. Or she could obey, and become a willing part of the lie.
— The spirit is quiet today, — Nysa said, her voice a low whisper that was nearly lost in the hum of the Eden. It was the most dangerous truth she had ever spoken aloud.
The Envoy’s expression did not change, but a flicker of annoyance crossed his face, the barest twitch of a man whose schedule had been disrupted. It was Elara who answered, her voice ringing with the pure, terrible certainty of the devout.
— The spirit is never quiet, Oracle, — she said, taking a step forward. Her concern had sharpened into a fine point of correction. — Perhaps it is you.
The words struck Nysa with the force of a physical blow. It was the system’s perfect defense: if the signal was corrupt, the fault must lie with the receiver. The institution could not fail; only the individual could. In that moment, Elara was no longer her student. She was an agent of the synod, a warden of the faith, and Nysa was her prisoner.
The frantic clicking in her mind seemed to intensify, a chorus of tiny, mocking voices. She had a choice: to break the system by admitting its failure, or to preserve it by sacrificing her own integrity. She looked at Elara’s shining, hopeful face. She thought of the cold, political weight of the Envoy’s gaze. The cost of defiance was chaos. The cost of obedience was just… her.
— You are right, — Nysa said, the words tasting like ash. She forced her own light to burn a little brighter, a parlor trick she had perfected over the years. She rose to her full height, the image of an Oracle accepting her duty. — The hymn is clear. I will lead the pilgrimage.
The chaotic static in her mind did not vanish. Instead, it resolved. The million random clicks snapped into a single, unified rhythm. A cold, steady beat. The sound of marching feet. It was the sound of an order being followed.
The Envoy nodded, his objective achieved. He turned and departed without another word. Elara’s face was once again soft with adoration, her brief moment of doubt erased by the Oracle’s return to form.
Nysa turned to her acolyte, her face a mask of serene purpose. — Gather the faithful, — she commanded, her voice now steady and clear. — We walk the grey path. We will be a witness.
She walked from the dais, her movements graceful, her expression placid. She was a perfect imitation of a woman of faith. A hollow shell, marching to a rhythm she despised, leading a flock of true believers toward a destination she knew in her bones was not a holy site, but a kill box.
The violet light of the Eden pulsed around her, warm and constant, but she knew they were walking into a trap.
