“What enemies?” This from Terk, who wrapped one large hand around the viewer. “Scats?”
“I don’t know how they are involved. They may not be.”
Bowman’s eyes narrowed. “Something happened on Pocular, didn’t it, Barac sud Sarc? Something pulled Morgan here, away from her. Something drove Sira to hide among the Drapsk. Care to tell us about it?”
Barac found himself on the edge of a precipice. This wasn’t the cultivated trust he’d planned, the carefully coached revelations of just so much and no more he was accustomed to playing out with other species.
Bowman might have read his thoughts again. “Barac. You’re exiled from your own kind. Space knows, we never had reason to trust one another, but this time it’s different, isn’t it? This time we both know there are dangerous currents stirring. The telepaths. This trouble on Pocular and Ret 7—”
On the verge of agreeing completely with the Enforcer, and telling her everything he knew, Barac froze. Baltir, he thought, no longer in any doubt about where Morgan might have gone. No wonder Huido hadn’t told him; the Human must be out of his mind to confront the Retian on his homeworld. He asked aloud: “What trouble on Ret 7?”
Terk seemed to relish being the bearer of bad news. “Our contact there, Malacan Ser, was found murdered in his room last night. Someone used a force blade to separate him from his artificial parts. And Morgan’s insystem there—at least the Silver Fox is docked, bold as you please—but he’s not responding to his com. No one’s seen him. He may have been attacked as well.”
Did they not know their fellow Human at all? Barac asked himself. Or was this concern a lie? If ever there was a being capable of taking care of himself, it was Morgan. If ever there was a being with the means and motive for murder—Barac stopped there, his silent musings having made him the target of Bowman’s crystal-sharp gaze. “I tend to prioritize finding those who harm my people,” she said. “Do you know something about this, Clansman?” she asked with deceptive softness.
Here was help and protection such as no Clan would offer him. Here was a powerful ally and equally dangerous foe.
Barac smiled with regret. “Nothing you’d want to know,” he said, before concentrating . . .
As he materialized in Huido’s office, Barac said to the empty room: “Morgan, you’d better be able to explain all this.”
Unlike Huido, he doubted Morgan could.
Chapter 34
THE harsh voice hadn’t changed, hadn’t softened; its message remained equally implacable: “Join with our Choice for you.”
The darkness around me was crowded, filled with nightmare shapes that leaped at me with teeth oozing venom and smoke. I eluded them desperately, shouting: “I have made my Choice!”
The round globe of a Drapsk face floated past me, oblivious to the threats on every side. “No, you haven’t. No. No. No.” His voice trailed away, then came back as a whirling, confusing echo. “There’s been no Joining. See how you bleed? How you bleed? You bleed?”
I twisted but couldn’t see myself. What I did see was a stream of crimson, pouring away from me. It split into thousands of tinier, seeking rivulets, each hardly wide enough be visible, almost all lapped up by tongues belonging to the dark.
A new voice, with the sound of a campfire behind it. “What will he do when there is nothing left? Do you think he will survive you?”
I sat bolt upright, breathing in ragged gasps as though still fighting off the creatures in my dream. Without thinking, I looked around for Morgan, stretched out to him in my thoughts. Nothing. No presence to offer warmth, no comfort.
Of course, I chided myself. I was alone.
I may have been alone, but it was a state I endured only within the cabin the Drapsk had made for me. Elsewhere on the Makmora, I was a magnet for whatever crew were in my vicinity. I’d have been more flattered by the attention and outright adulation if I hadn’t known how much of it was chemical. Still, it eased something inside me to have the small beings accept me as theirs. It wasn’t Clanlike, I knew.
It wasn’t Clanlike to regret past actions either, but I did—every minute—whether herded through the ship by my chorus of adoring Drapsk or by myself at night. No doubt where the nightmares came from now. There was no way to turn back time, no second chance to stop myself before sending Morgan into danger. I understood enough of his depth of feeling for me to know I’d only freed him to do what he himself wanted to do. But I could have stopped him, held him by me until we could tackle the Clan together. Now that the Makmora was underway, I felt a return of the burning impatience I’d experienced earlier. I wouldn’t be too late to help him. I wouldn’t.
We’d needed a destination. Feeling very silly, but hopefully not showing it, I’d ordered the Drapsk to take their immense and beautiful ship two days’ translight to check on my order for truffles.
Simplicity itself to convince the Drapsk this was necessary. I thought guiltily they’d probably send the ship straight into the Drapskii sun if I told them it was essential. Where I found my conscience truly suffered, however, was observing the anguish of several of the Drapsk, including Captain Makairi. They took the implied failure to please me very personally because I had, it was true, missed the promised celebratory feast and so the truffles. Since that had been because I’d happily slept through it didn’t seem to console them at all. Copelup, who knew exactly how little the feast and the truffles meant to me, nonetheless cheerfully aggravated matters by suggesting the Makii could have postponed the feast until after I awoke.
So nothing was going to stop them from providing one for me now. As I’d slept my innocent, if nightmare-ridden, sleep, the Makmora had flung herself between stars in pursuit of truffles while her crew scrambled to plan the finest celebration possible.
I really could have tied Copelup’s antennae into knots. But at least we were on track for Plexis.
And, I hoped, Morgan or Morgan’s trail.
“Plexis-com is requesting docking information. How do you wish to respond, Mystic One?”
“They were able to do this before I arrived, weren’t they?” I whispered to Copelup.
The Skeptic sucked a tentacle pensively. “I assume so,” he said back as quietly. “They really are showing you the most extraordinary courtesy. Perhaps your Makii scent is unusually potent.”
Great, I thought, glaring around at my usual ring of devoted crew. “Captain Makairi, could I speak to you in private, please?”
“What about Plexis-com, Mystic One?”
“They can wait,” I assured whoever had spoken, looking over my shoulder to be sure Captain Makairi was following me. So was Copelup, but I’d learned days ago he considered the word “private” to mean the two of us plus someone else.
Actually, privacy on a Drapsk ship wasn’t much. There was a spot on the bridge Copelup had told me was kept free of the airborne com signals. The Captain could retire there to rest or perform eopari, depending on the circumstances. I’d looked that one up on the vidtapes. Eopari was the term for tucking oneself into a tight ball, with antennae retracted and curled in for protection. The reference concerned proper safety precautions if caught in extreme weather conditions, which didn’t quite explain the incidences of this behavior I’d seen so far. Why the Captain might decide to do this on his bridge was something I couldn’t find in the tapes and somehow didn’t think polite to ask.
But this area was to one side of the crewed portion of the oval bridge, and it gave me the illusion at least of speaking to only two Drapsk instead of an awestruck audience of a dozen.
“Would you like to sit, Mystic One?” The Makii had tried to show me how to summon a stool from the floor, but this, as well as certain other modifications to the surfaces of the ship, required either some biochemical signal from a Drapsk foot or a form of mental contact which so far had eluded me. So they were always quick to ask if I’d like the service performed for me.
“No, thank you,” I said, then went on quickly to forestall any more delaying courtesies—Plexis wouldn’t wait that long. “Captain, I appreciate the way the Makii are responding to my every need—”
“But of course we are. Have we missed something? Offended you?” As I’d feared, his first reaction was to fuss.
“No. I’m delighted in every way. I’d be even more delighted if you would contain your enthusiasm, especially when we arrive on the Station. What I mean is—”
Copelup hooted rudely. “What the Mystic One means is you are all acting like a bunch of gripstsa-starved idiots. And I agree. Nothing’s getting done properly. Next, you’ll starting asking the Mystic One for permission to clean your plumes! This is no way to show respect and gratitude to someone of your Tribe!”
“Is this true, Mystic One?” the Captain asked miserably, the plumes in question seriously drooping.
“I wouldn’t have put it quite so firmly,” I said, distressed in turn. “You’ve treated me well. It’s just that—”
“Yes, it’s true,” Copelup interrupted again. “The Mystic One has too much patience with you. I would have spoken to you myself if I’d thought it would penetrate.”
“What should we do, Mystic One?”
I touched the back of his hand. “If the Makii on this ship would treat me with the fine and gracious courtesy they accorded me before I became a member of your Tribe—without locking me in my room, you understand—that would be more than sufficient. I don’t need to be involved in running the ship, Captain Makairi. I’m not qualified to make these decisions for you anyway. Just take me where I must go.”
I glanced over at the suspended chaos around the com console. “And you could reassure Plexis-com for starters. Without,” I suggested as the Drapsk’s plumes struggled bravely upright again, “letting them know you have a passenger.”
The plumes shot ceilingward. “No one shall know of your presence, Mystic One. I swear it.”
Copelup inhaled two more tentacles to suck as he listened. I didn’t bother to explain.
I’d just realized what docking at Plexis meant. I was back into the part of space regularly used by the Clan.
My self-imposed exile was officially over.
INTERLUDE
All Clan. Rael surveyed the group of conspirators, still mildly surprised how well her sister Pella fit in, and waited for Ica di Teerac to finish her liptus tea. Ru looked impatient. Only Larimar was missing, which was just as well. Those from Acranam wisely avoided any chance of direct confrontation with the Council.
Camos was a familiar world, Rael thought; more, despite its Human population, it remained a Clan world. She wondered if the Humans really believed the Council would abandon Camos. So what if their secret meeting hall was discovered beneath the Humans’ government building? There was too much here of value to the Clan—not in replaceable property, but in the invisible lacework of passageways forged through the M’hir around this place. More Clan lived or visited Camos than anywhere in the universe—save, perhaps, the mythical Clan Homeworld. This was both the source of the passageways and the reason for the continued Clan presence. This was as close to a home as their kind now acknowledged.
Making it the most dangerous place in the universe to plot against the Council, whose Watchers kept their senses probing the M’hir as much for suspicious activities by their own kind as for alien intrusion. The group in this room kept their thoughts shielded and their voices low. Rael’s own pulse tended to race whenever a servant opened the door or a shadow flickered on the opaque window screens.
None of this affected their hostess, it seemed. “Welcome again, Pella sud Sarc,” Ica said after delicately patting moisture from her pale, thin lips. Her hair stirred, its heavy locks slowed by age but retaining the rich dark amber of her Commencement. “Your courage was—unexpected.”
Rael thought Pella’s smile a bit forced. “Thank you, First Chosen,” her sister said graciously enough. “But there really wasn’t any other decision to be made, was there? The Council,” her smile faded, “the Council would lead us into perversion—destroy the Choosers and our way of life. We can’t allow it.”
“Exactly,” Ica approved. “See, Rael? I told you our cause would attract others. It is only a matter of time.”
“Time is what we don’t have,” Ru di Mendolar snapped, her lean features drawn and gray-tinged. “Forgive me, First Chosen. But events have begun without us. The Council must be about to move against the Choosers. They’ve started with Sira di Sarc. Where will they stop? Who knows what they plan? What can we—”
The ancient Clanswoman shook her head. “Calm yourself, Ru,” she admonished. “Hysteria will not help. We are—” she drew her fingers in a sweeping gesture, “many more than meet here. Just because you do not know or see all that is happening, does not mean we sit idle and wait for disaster.”
Ru leaned forward, eyes brightening. “Do you have news for us, First Chosen?”
Ica’s gaze moved from one to the other, stopping briefly at each. Rael, meeting those expressionless, light blue eyes, retested her own shielding.
“I will not reveal all of our works to you,” Ica said sternly. “For safety’s sake, even my mind does not hold all of our secrets. But it is time you knew more.
“Tell us, Rael,” she continued in her paper-thin voice, “how Sira was able to gain control of the Power-of-Choice.”
Rael blinked in surprise. “I don’t think she did—not completely.”
“Come now,” Ica said, as if humoring the Clanswoman. “She was a Chooser yet did the unheard of: she was able to contain her instincts, to hold herself from Testing your cousin, Barac, as well as Yihtor.”
“Sira wanted to protect—” Rael closed her lips and changed what she was about to say. There were advantages to speaking aloud instead of mind-to-mind. “Sira had been practicing for years; she’s incredibly powerful. Who else would be the first of us to control the Power-of-Choice?”
“She did it to protect that Human.” This scathing remark from Pella, who glared at Rael. “I don’t know why you can’t admit it. You know what she’s done. You know she’s Chosen this perversion.” With a more respectful glance at the other two, as Pella remembered her place as sud, she went on: “Sira’s mind was damaged. She didn’t know what she was doing until it was too late. First Chosen, our sister hasn’t regained her true nature. We must help her. Rael has told me all about it.”