The cymek landers crashed into the silvery-purple wilderness, scattering animals, blackening fungal vegetation. Fireguns spat gouts of lava from the hulls, setting fire to dense foliage. The conflagration spread quickly.

With a groan and crash that echoed through the cloudy air, the cymek vessels split open and the mechanical warrior bodies emerged. Three landers disgorged armed glider-forms, while the rest yielded crablike combat walker-forms that bristled with weapons.

In his angular glide-body, Xerxes cruised above the jungles toward the enclave of telepathic Sorceresses. Silently airborne, he extended his wings and began steering on the up-drafts of wind. “I’m heading in.”

“Kill the bitches for us, Xerxes,” said Juno, as she and Agamemnon prepared their own glide-bodies.

In an angry voice, Agamemnon added, “Kill them for Barbarossa.”

Xerxes soared toward the pockmarked cliffs. Below, the nimbly advancing combat machines of the eager neo-cymeks plowed through underbrush, blasting obstacles, destroying everything in sight.

In full view of the cliff warrens, Xerxes briefly hovered above the polymerized canopy that formed a small landing area for hrethgir ships, then launched fifteen projectiles. Half of them struck the hard cliff walls, detonating in white-and-black starbursts of broken rock; other shots penetrated the tunnels where humans lived like grubs infesting wood.

In rapid retreat, Xerxes raced back across the treetops and lifted into the sky. As Agamemnon and Juno soared toward him, he crowed in triumph, “Our first score! Let the neo-cymeks continue the rout.”

Smooth fiber-wound systems and extruded legs carried the neo-cymek footsoldiers through the underbrush. From front launcher tubes they shot plasma grenades that incinerated a pathway to the tunnel cities. Soft purple foliage ignited around them, fungal trees bursting into columns of flame and sending indigenous animals fleeing. Majestic birds soared into the sky, and the cymek attackers blasted them into clouds of crackling feathers.

Though pleased that the initial salvo had gone smoothly, Agamemnon did not offer any congratulations. He and Juno swept silently forward for the second airborne attack from different positions. Below them, the crablike neo-cymek walkers arrived at the cliffs to complete the destruction.

ZUFA CENVA AND her Sorceress commandos prepared themselves inside an internal room that Aurelius Venport had designed for his business meetings. None of them showed fear, only anger and determination. For the past year, these women had accepted their primary purpose in life, even if its completion would result in their deaths.

“This is what we’ve trained for,” Zufa said. “But I won’t delude you about our chances.” Uncertain of her words, she nonetheless tried to sound confident.

“We are ready, Mistress Cenva,” the women said in unison.

She drew a deep breath, calming herself, using the mental control she had worked so hard to instill in her students.

The chamber’s stone walls trembled as the first bombs found their targets, dispersing poison clouds into the tunnels. Thinking ahead, Aurelius Venport had made certain every woman had a breathing mask while he evacuated the rest of the population. Zufa was surprised she hadn’t thought of the precaution herself. She hoped he had managed to get to safety, that he hadn’t foolishly wasted time trying to protect his stockpiles of drugs.

Now she looked at the devoted women with her, knowing their names and their personalities: Tirbes, who might become the best if she could harness her potential; impulsive Silin; creative and unpredictable Camio; Rucia, who followed her code of honor . . . and more.

“Camio,” she said, “I choose you to strike our next blow.”

A thin young woman with long straw-white hair stood, her expression settling into a bloodless smile. “It is my honor, Mistress Cenva.”

Leaving her sisters behind, Camio adjusted the breathing mask over her face, then emerged from the sheltered chamber. She moved forward steadily and began the meditation necessary to summon the power locked within her brain. Surprisingly, she saw no bodies in the stone corridors, which reassured her that the population had been successfully evacuated. Now nothing would hinder the Sorceresses.

Rubble lay strewn on the tunnel floor, dislodged by explosive blasts. Wisps of greenish vapor carried poison into the caves. Camio was not afraid for her own life, but she had to hurry.

She heard the whistle of an approaching projectile and pressed herself against the tunnel wall. A powerful blast struck the cliffside, sending a shockwave through the interior corridors and dwelling rooms. Camio regained her balance, then pushed onward. The inside of her skull sang with pent-up energies. She did not glance at the tapestries and furniture, at the rooms and meeting chambers where she had spent her life.

Rossak was her home. The machines were her enemies. Camio herself was a weapon.

When she made her way to the opening and looked out upon the burning jungle, she saw three crablike walker-forms with heavily armored brain canisters hanging like egg sacks just above the legs. Each was a human who had sold his soul and sworn loyalty to the thinking machines.

Out in the jungle Camio heard the thunder of continued explosions, a roar of plasma blasts incinerating purplish foliage. Glider-forms soared in for a new attack, dumping poison, spraying flames. Dozens of neo-cymek walkers strode toward the protected cliffs, destroying everything around them.

She must wait until the right moment in order to eradicate as many enemies as possible, all at once.

From below, Camio heard a smooth skittering. The three fastest walker-forms were scaling the sheer cliff, using explosive-driven anchors and diamond-edged claws to grasp the rock face.

She smiled at the trio of crablike neo-cymeks. Flexible armored legs hauled the weapon-studded body cores up to the main caves. Camio stood alone in the doorway, facing her cyborg enemies. She knew when they were close enough.

The first neo-cymek invader raised itself, and she saw the sparkling optic threads around its weapon turrets. Detecting her, the cymek turned its flamers toward the new target. Fibrous scope-cameras shone brightly.

In the instant before it could fire, Camio released the pent-up energies within her mind and body. She let go with a mindstorm that boiled the brains of the three closest neo-cymeks, and damaged two others just beginning to climb the cliff. Five cymeks, removed from the battle.

Her last thought was of the excellent bargain she had made for her life.

AFTER CAMIO, FOUR more Sorceresses emerged, one at a time. As she dispatched each woman, Zufa Cenva felt the acute loss. These trainees were like true daughters, and losing them felt like swallowing gulps of acid. But her volunteers willingly marched out and sacrificed their lives to crush the cymek offensive. “The thinking machines must never win.”

Finally Zufa’s sixth volunteer, Silin, returned alive but disoriented, her milky-pale skin flushed. She had mentally prepared herself to die. Instead, she had found nothing left to destroy.

“They have retreated beyond range, Mistress Cenva,” she reported. “The cymeks are pulling back to their ships. The combat walkers and gliders have returned to the landing area.”

Zufa hurried through the wreckage to the window overhangs. She saw the charred remains of her five fallen commandos, each woman burned from the inside out with white-hot mental fire. Her heart felt the volcanic heat of anger and loss. She watched the terrible machines with human minds climb aboard their vessels and punch back into the atmosphere.

In time, the scattered refugees would return. Aurelius Venport would bring them back. Under his supervision, the Rossak people would rebuild and repair the cliff cities with pride and confidence, knowing that they had stood up against the thinking machines.

Zufa Cenva had to cling to that. “We define victories in our own way,” she said aloud.

WHEN THE THREE Titans joined their ships with the robotic battle fleet, Agamemnon issued his summary before Juno or the fool Xerxes could give the thinking machines information he didn’t want them to have. The cymek general would color the truth to suit his purposes.

“We have made a significant impact,” Agamemnon declared to the recording watcheyes. “Though we lost several neo-cymeks in our direct assault on Rossak, we did inflict mortal cellular damage on at least five of the powerful Sorceresses.”

Over a tight private channel, Juno transmitted her surprise and delight at the Titan general’s skewing of his report. Xerxes wisely knew to remain silent.

“We have caused substantial harm to the new hrethgir telepathic weapon,” Agamemnon continued, sounding proud in the face of the disaster. “It should be a drastic setback to their capabilities.”

He had similarly colored past events while writing his memoirs, painting his own biased version of history. Omnius would never question the summary, because it fit technically with the objective facts.

“Best of all,” Juno added, “we lost none of the Titans in this offensive. The neo-cymeks can all be replaced.”

With Rossak’s two orbital stations severely damaged by the robot warships, and thousands of humans dead on board, the thinking machine fleet withdrew from the wreckage of ships and platforms. Below, the jungles in the habitable canyons continued to burn.

“In my assessment, Omnius can record the strike on Rossak an unqualified victory!” Agamemnon said.

“Agreed,” Juno and Xerxes both chimed in.