Terk grew businesslike. “We’ve detected a large power source, Hom sud Sarc. Easily sixty quarats. Enough to supply a good-sized city.”
“And well-disguised. I’d say we have him,” Morgan added.
“Or he has us,” Huido mumbled darkly. “What’s to keep the Fox off Acranam’s screens?”
Morgan’s smile was dangerous. “And what would Yihtor see? One small ship, most likely another smuggler or pirate seeking to sell or buy. If we know a code, we land, if we don’t, he blows us up on approach.”
“Or destroys any unprotected telepathic mind he touches,” Barac’s face was equally grim. “As he did to Kurr before his ship penetrated the system.” The last was bitter and low.
“Kurr was killed here?” Morgan repeated slowly, eyes darkening.
Rael and Barac traded glances.
“So you aren’t here looking for Sira,” Morgan accused coldly. “You’ve set her up as bait to lead you and the Trade Pact to this Clan renegade. You’ve been using her—”
“No!” Barac denied fiercely. “I don’t know how Sira came into this—but it wasn’t anything I planned, believe me. I was coming to Acranam before I knew Sira was here; I was following Kurr’s last journey.” He paused and drew a steadying breath. “I didn’t know Yihtor lived. Neither of us did until Rael learned of it from Sira, and felt him for herself. That crasnig has power enough to swat Kurr like an insect, and good reason to want to keep from the Council’s notice.”
“However, our concern at this moment, Cousin, is Sira,” Rael interjected very quietly, her voice deliberate and calm. She raised her hand behind Barac’s head. Her fingers spread slowly. “What matters is ensuring her safety and well-being. She is your kin as well.”
Morgan saw Barac close his eyes and wince, almost as if he fought to reject the soothing calm emanating from the Clanswoman. After a moment, he shuddered and relaxed, the emotion draining from his features, leaving them set and numb. “The renegade will concentrate his defenses at his own base,” he said. “His foremost defense will be himself.”
Morgan’s thoughtful gaze touched each face. They waited, no one sure when or how Morgan had assumed leadership, but all aware of it. “Well, our weaponry is somewhat limited,” he said at last. “I suggest we pool our abilities, Barac. We’ll take Huido along, and leave Terk to mind the ship—”
“I can’t go if Sira’s there!” Barac said, looking startled.
“Barac!” hissed Rael. The Clansman subsided. There was a pregnant silence during which Morgan waited patiently, one brow slightly raised. “Our arrival will have the virtue of surprise,” Rael continued smoothly. “I think you overestimate Yihtor, Barac. Yihtor is, after all, one to our—three.” Her lovely features were hard. “And our combined power must be directed by me once we are ready to attack. If that’s acceptable to you, Captain?”
Morgan bowed a silent acknowledgment, but his eyes were fixed on Barac. “It’s fine with me.” He stressed the last word.
“Barac will come with us,” Rael countered quickly. Her look at her cousin was almost pleading. “He worries about old business. He makes too much of the matter.” The last was plainly a warning.
Morgan’s face had assumed its inscrutable cast. His voice held a silken menace. “This old business wouldn’t have anything to do with a rather nasty job of blockage, would it, Barac?”
The Clansman’s surprise was obvious. “Blockage? What are you accusing me of now, Human?”
“Barac had nothing to do with Sira’s condition, Captain,” Rael said, suddenly wary. “He has neither the skill nor the power.”
“Then what is he afraid of?”
“What he fears is impossible.”
“It’s not impossible,” Barac countered almost wildly. “You told me yourself that Sira—”
“There’s nothing to tell.” Rael’s eyes flashed a warning. “Our time is being wasted with this.”
“That’s for me to decide,” Morgan snapped. “Especially if I’m risking my neck with the pair of you. Barac?”
Rael made an unladylike noise and vanished into air. Barac sighed and turned his dark eyes to Morgan’s relentless blue ones. “Leave us!” This to Huido and Terk. Neither moved until Morgan gave a terse nod. Once they left, Barac sat in the copilot’s couch and regarded Morgan with an unusual intentness.
“So, Barac?” Morgan prompted.
“As you’ve noticed, Morgan,” Barac said ruefully, “my cousin and I have a difference of opinion concerning Sira. It has to do with very private matters.”
“Secrets become liabilities, Barac.”
“I suppose.” The Clansman lifted his slim shoulders and let them drop. “When Sira arrived on Auord, she was in a state we refer to as stasis. Certain of us voluntarily submit to the process in order to travel in safety.”
“Voluntarily?” Morgan’s eyes never left Barac’s. “Sira’s memories are almost totally suppressed—including most of her power. For God’s sake, she believed herself Human! And you’re telling me she submitted to this of her own free will?”
“Yes.” Barac stopped, chewed his lip for a moment. “Perhaps,” he temporized. “It should have been her decision, but I can’t say for sure.” He gathered himself visibly. “Stasis isn’t meant to harm. Sira would never have been left alone. Choosers must be protected. That’s why I was with her on Auord.”
“Choosers?” Morgan pounced on the unexpected word.
Barac sighed and went on with a defeated shake of his head. “Our ways aren’t like yours, Morgan. The constraints of our lives differ probably as much as yours do from your shelled friend’s. For one thing, we of the M’hiray, the Clan, choose our life-partners in order to increase the power.”
“Telepathy?” Morgan asked incredulously when Barac hesitated. “The Clan’s been selecting for power?”
Barac frowned. “It is not something we decided, Morgan. You have touched the M’hir. Part of our unconscious selves is always there, mingling on some level with all other living Clan, as the air on your ship moves in and out of all our bodies. The M’hir is inseparable from the Clan; it gives us abilities and strengths your species needs machines to accomplish. But the M’hir has also been a curse to some.”
“Sira.”
Barac’s nod was heavy. “When our females are ready to mature, they are driven to search the M’hir for a mate—we call them Choosers.” A moment’s longing filled Barac’s voice. “Choosers assess the power of any unChosen male who comes near. But Joining, the life-pairing through the M’hir, is only possible with a mate of equal or superior strength. Lesser males—lose.” Another brief hesitation as Barac searched for the right words. “In my great-great-grandfather’s time, losing meant, at worst, loneliness. In the last few generations, as our Choosers have grown more powerful, losing has meant death.”
“And you accept this.”
“We’ve adjusted,” Barac said quickly. “We’re not barbarians, Morgan. The Council carefully selects candidates for the more powerful—the more deadly—Choosers. UnChosen males, myself included, are protected. I’ve no intention of dying at the mind of a stronger Chooser.” He scowled. “What other option did we have? Accept that to be weak and male was to die?”
When Barac paused again, Morgan said with disbelief: “By finding equal or stronger partners for the Choosers, your Council just pushes the whole process further and faster. Is power all that matters to the Clan?”
“It is status, wealth, and survival,” Barac’s voice was resigned. “Would you give yours up?”
“The thought’s had appeal,” Morgan ran his fingers through his hair. “And more. But it’s part of what I am.”
“Then imagine what it would be like to live among those who value it, practice it. Imagine growing up with the minds of friends in yours. Imagine a culture where every contact is based upon instant and mutual knowledge of power.”
“And Sira? What was her place in that culture?”
Barac’s dark eyes sparkled. “Many believe the peak of our evolution arrived with her. Sira is the jewel of our race, Morgan: the most powerful Chooser ever born. Powerful, desirable, and quite fatal. Fatal, because there hasn’t been a male born to match her. She’s an irresistible trap, both bait and poison to any unChosen male. Now do you understand why I don’t dare come near her?”
Morgan tried to reconcile this image of Sira with the woman he knew and failed totally. “She was with you on Auord.”
“Stasis temporarily dampens a Chooser’s mind. It’s only used if the Chooser must travel during the time of Choice.” Barac sighed. “I was shocked and flattered to learn Sira was coming to Auord and I was to be her escort. She’s quite famous among us, you realize, more like one of your entertainment vids than a person. So many years hidden, isolated—my mother would tell me about her.” Something in Morgan’s face prompted Barac to add quickly: “It wasn’t against her will.”
Morgan seemed to be on the verge of an outburst, then closed his mouth and finally spoke in a slow, measured tone. “If the blockage, this stasis, of Sira’s mind protects you, I don’t understand why you’re afraid to meet her now. And why did Rael want to keep all this from me?”
Barac shook his head. “Rael’s uncomfortable with you, Morgan. You’re Human, and, well, it’s just not customary to talk about Choice and Joining.”
“You’re doing it.”
“I’m a First Scout. It’s my job to communicate with aliens.” He watched Morgan closely, almost smiling as the Human accepted the label without taking offense. “I can accept our similarities. Clan like Rael can’t. She needs to believe we’re different. But I think you’re the key to what’s happened to Sira.”
“Me?” Had Morgan been less startled, he might have prevented the rising note to his voice. “Because I removed a bit of the blockage?”
“Did you?” Barac shuddered. “Better you than me. No. You see, stasis is flexible, changeable. By its nature, stasis is an imposition—an artificial chain around the Chooser’s true nature. It can’t hold if the Chooser is kept near an unChosen male of suitable strength. Her power will strive to respond— and will, if the male can be touched. What I fear—and Rael won’t accept—is that Sira’s blocked power is responding to yours.”
Barac waited for Morgan’s comment, then continued when none appeared forthcoming. “If I’m right, Sira’s stasis could already be seriously weakened or lost entirely. And if she’s now functioning as a Chooser, we may both need to fear her.”
“What about Yihtor?” Barac could read nothing from Morgan’s expression. The Human had himself tightly back under control. “Why does he want Sira?”
“Yihtor was tested by Council as a candidate for Sira, but was refused during final testing. The unChosen feel the need for Choice, too,” Barac’s voice went softer for a moment, caught by his own feelings. “You’ve seen insects fly to a flame? The power of a Chooser within the M’hir is like that to us. And the stronger the Chooser, the brighter the flame.” Barac blushed and continued. “Yihtor persisted. He tried to see Sira in person, despite the refusal, a breach of custom and law which disgraced his entire family.”
Barac sighed heavily. “If Yihtor confronts Sira, and she’s now free of the stasis, we won’t have long to worry about him, anyway.”
Morgan went over to the controls and checked them absently. His mind was elsewhere. “You’re assuming Yihtor will begin to play by the rules. Why?”
“Choice can only be offered, Human, from Chooser to unChosen. The risk is the male’s. We cannot force our females—as your species is known to do.”
Morgan turned to Barac with a cold, piercing light in his eyes. “Your opinion of Humans aside, for the moment, I hope you’re right, Clansman. My impression of this renegade and those he deals with doesn’t allow me your touching faith. And what of Kurr? Think, Barac—Sira’s mind has already been tampered with; Yihtor’s had her drugged and kidnapped in order to bring her to Acranam.
“Rael was correct in at least one respect. I don’t think we, or Sira, have any time left to waste.”
Barac’s lips tightened. “Just you remember what I’ve told you, Morgan. Sira won’t be happy if she finds out she’s killed you.”
“I won’t be too happy about that either,” Morgan replied steadily.
Chapter 28
CLEARLY, Yihtor had spared no expense in order to turn this frontier world into a home. The glittering scene I surveyed from my vantage point at the head table could have come intact from any of the better insystem banquet rooms. There were a hundred or so people gathered around small tables; these were set with attractive randomness within the domed hall. Fountains whispered in the distant corners. It was a far cry from the wilderness surrounding us and a potent statement of Yihtor’s determination to rule here.
The crowd, many of whom I caught staring at me, was remarkably uniform. Everyone I could see was young, well-groomed, and animated. Regardless of whatever expression darkened my face as the unwilling guest of honor here, the majority of the celebrants were enjoying their leader’s success.
Another course came and went. The food was probably excellent, but I couldn’t taste it, though I was hungry enough. It wasn’t a particularly cheering thought that my body and mind didn’t always share the same opinions. If Yihtor had his way, that split could soon be permanent.
I scanned the faces below, struck by the oddness of watching excitement. Few individuals spoke aloud. Hand gestures were plentiful and often interfered with the process of enjoying the feast. It was easy to hear the bubbling of the distant fountains and the soft background music supplied by a lone musician. Indisputable evidence that everyone present was indeed Clan. Even the serving staff carried themselves with that unconscious arrogance.
Yihtor had noticed my inspection. “I—we have many faithful supporters on Acranam, my dear Chooser.”
“Bought by pirate leavings?” I asked bitterly, ignoring the jab of Fem Caraat’s fingers in my ribs.
“Actually, no,” Yihtor replied politely, courteously offering to refill my glass, nodding slightly when I refused. “Most of my wealth and influence comes from a service I provide. It is an ability of my own, one which I believe may be a first among the Clan.”