Liaden Universe 18: Dragon in Exile Read online

  Not that he expected Captain Waitley—or any organic person—to have access to such things. Indeed, Captain Waitley was new to her station, and new to her ship. Her situation had been desperate: crew were in peril, and all of her necessity had been to liberate them with their lives intact, preserve the integrity of a space station, and neutralize an implacable enemy.

  It was not Captain Waitley who had been at fault, though one might wish her to be somewhat less dependent upon tactical solutions. The organic young were result-oriented, and their ability to plan at true long range was . . . limited.

  But, no, the fault here lay with Bechimo, Captain Waitley’s vessel, who possessed a very fine and nuanced probability engine, if Jeeves’s reading of his specs was correct, and a grasp of strategy that rivaled—and that Jeeves suspected at root specifically was—the Uncle’s own.

  Bechimo should have not only made his captain aware of the resources at her command, but briefed her on the likeliest long-term results of using those resources.

  Certainly, Bechimo could have crafted a low-impact solution that achieved the goals of his captain in regard to her crew, the station, and the enemy. Yet, for reasons beyond Jeeves’s ability to parse, Bechimo had allowed Captain Waitley to download—download!—a newly-wakened independent intelligence into the computational resources available among seven ancient starships. One intelligence, distributed among thirteen cramped and faltering computers—surely, there was a recipe for disaster that even an organic brain could grasp! Added to the circumstances of being downloaded, rather than properly installed into a tuned and ready environment, and the violence to which the new intelligence had wakened . . .

  It was hardly a wonder that Admiral Bunter, as the newborn had named himself, was confused.

  An intelligence distributed among seven ships, several of them heavily armed, ought never, in Jeeves’s considered opinion, be confused.

  Which brought the tally of errors ’round to Jeeves, himself, who had originally assigned the problem to Strategy.

  The most recent direct communication from Admiral Bunter had made it entirely, horrifyingly plain that a tactical solution was required to answer the mess that tactics had produced.

  Pirates undocking. Will pursue and destroy.

  Pirates? Jeeves queried, thinking that Jemiatha’s Jumble Stop seemed peculiarly prone to pirates.

  His response had been a record of a transaction between Stew, the station’s head repair technician, and a woman in worn and outmoded leathers, her face scored by the passage of years.

  Stew was seen to put a crate of parts on the counter. The woman rummaged through it, and indicated that a piece was missing. Stew returned to the back room.

  The woman snatched three parts out of the crate, shoved them hastily into her pockets, and ran.

  Stew returned to the counter, the requested part in his hand, looked about, called—and shrugged, dropping the new part into the crate, and putting everything aside to be dealt with later.

  The woman had already reached her ship and undocked by the time the record of the transaction reached Admiral Bunter. The ships had immediately brought guns on line.

  That is not a pirate, Jeeves had sent. Only a petty thief. Stop her; do not fire upon her.

  Pirates are thieves, came the answer, followed by: Target destroyed.

  INTERLUDE THREE

  Vivulonj Prosperu

  In Transit

  Rebirth is a brief, chancy geography, a tenuous bridge between two absolutes.

  The Uncle had attended many rebirths, most of them simple crossings from material that was aged and outworn to a fresh, new environment. He had assisted in extractions from material so badly mangled it must have been thought that all hope was lost. He had guided captured intelligences, long accustomed to the bodiless state, into warm and waiting flesh. He had himself died and been reborn, countless times.

  But never before had he attempted to extract two intelligences, two personalities—two souls—who had for many years cohabited a single body, each into its own vessel.

  The shared body had taken terrible wounds; wounds from which it had not, and despite the best efforts of others of the Uncle’s devices, could not, fully recover. He had considered simply allowing the body, and its occupants, to die the real death. But that death—those deaths—would have created . . . difficulties with Clan Korval; for the treasured elders of the clan had taken their wounds while they had been—he rejected, as he suspected the primary of the wounded pair would also reject the phrase—in his care. Certainly, however, they had been partners in the same task, and it would not escape Korval’s notice that the Uncle reposed in the rosiest of good health while their elders were far otherwise.

  He expected that the decision he had taken, to oversee these chancy rebirths, would find only slightly more favor with the Dragon—and that only if he returned to them both elders, intact.

  His hope lay in the fact that he had not made this decision by himself. He had received input and, he dared hope, support from a source that Korval would consider unimpeachable.

  The Tree—Korval’s Tree: Korval’s damned, meddling Tree, as some would have it . . .

  The Tree had given into the care of the primary, Daav yos’Phelium, former delm of Korval and father of the present delm—two seed pods. The Tree, as the Uncle understood the matter, often bestowed such treats upon the members of Korval, who individually and together stood as its protecting Dragons. It would have been second nature for Daav to have eaten the pods when he received them.

  However, in this instance, and according to the man himself, one of those two pods had been intended for Aelliana Caylon, Daav’s lifemate, assassinated more than twenty Standard years ago, who had been existing since in the pathways of his brain, or in the cloud of his mind, or in a hidden palace in his heart.

  So, one pod for Aelliana . . . and the second pod, offered to Daav in the hope that the Tree’s largesse could heal what the Uncle’s devices could not?

  “Not ripe,” the man had said. It had amused him; it was Korval’s humor to savor such ironies, the more so if one’s life was the stake.

  But—not ripe? Did the Tree gamble in futures?

  Could the Uncle, who had seen very many strange things down the course of a long and oft-times perilous life, afford to suppose that it did not?

  The subjects were entangled, to what degree he could only guess, lacking any instrument that might measure such a thing. He had only the Tree’s . . . assurance? . . . that they would be able to separate themselves. Blanks were expensive. Yet, he was in unknown space. He could not know if a single blank could accept or, ultimately, nurture two intelligences; that ability might well be unique to Daav yos’Phelium’s brain chemistry, which the Tree had without a doubt . . . adjusted.

  And how, indeed, if the Tree were correct: that Korval’s elders had both the ability and the desire to separate—and found only one likely receptacle waiting? He might destroy both in such a wise, or force the unthinkable upon them.

  Better—much better—to be generous, and hope that the Tree knew what it was doing.

  So, the Uncle made his decision as much from courtesy as certainty; two birthing units were prepared with fresh medium—blanks; undifferentiated bipedal shapes; hairless, sexless, dermis the color of unbaked dough.

  There had been, in the case of the primary subject, genetic material a-plenty with which to seed the blank. When he emerged from the birthing unit, to ingest what the Uncle very much hoped would be his ripe seed pod, Daav yos’Phelium would look—would be, according to any test that might be administered—precisely himself, though rather younger in appearance.

  Aelliana Caylon, however . . .

  There had been no genetic material for Aelliana Caylon available within the Uncle’s considerable reach; therefore, he improvised. Research had garnered the trivialities of eye color, hair color, height, weight. Her body memory, if she still retained it after so long a time as a ghost, would impose something like h
er former face upon the bland and agreeable features of the blank. She would, in time, look like the Aelliana Caylon who had been, but, genetically, she would be a patchwork thing; a monster, to lineage-obsessed Liadens.

  He hoped that Aelliana Caylon could be brought to see the advantages of her situation, though he expected it would be a shock to her.

  And he very much hoped that Korval could find its way to be . . . practical in the instance.

  Or, the Uncle thought, as he considered the transfer status board, Korval might need do nothing more than accept its deaths and mourn them.

  For it appeared, given the lack of activity among the various dials and gauges, that Daav yos’Phelium had turned his face away from rebirth.

  The Uncle sighed, and bowed his head.

  It was, after all, for each to decide the question for themselves: would they live or would they die? Both choices were valid.

  And, indeed, the Uncle admitted to himself in the silence of the rebirthing chamber, he had overstepped. He had taken the decision to offer life in service of his own convenience, rather than at the subjects’ explicit direction.

  In those rare cases when rebirth was refused, the . . . soul . . . naturally remained with the original material. Presumably, in this case, both souls would remain entangled, and die, lost to oblivion.

  What was the phrase, so apt in this instance, that acknowledged both the right to choose, and the probable consequence of, desperate action? He thought for a moment, then nodded to himself.

  Pilot’s choice.

  So be it.

  The life signs monitor had darkened from orange to red, indicating a subject in desperate circumstances. There was no need to prolong this; no reason to be cruel. The decision had been made.

  The Uncle reached to the console. His fingers touched the termination switch . . .

  A bell rang, bright and joyous.

  The Uncle snatched his hand back, eyes on the console, where the instruments were now glowing a brilliant green, dials dancing, denoting a transfer that was fully under way.

  A chime sounded, muted. The indicators on the birthing drawers were green also, the gauge that measured brain function pegged to the top—of each.

  The Uncle smiled.

  It seemed that Daav yos’Phelium did not wish to die, after all.

  INTERLUDE FOUR

  Fretted with Golden Fire

  A star went out in the firmament.

  The few thin lines of gold that had bound it to the universe drifted, broken ends fluttering.

  Ren Zel dea’Judan remained, witnessing, until the last thread vanished on the darkling breeze.

  Anguish informed other stars, nearby, and known to him. That was fitting; a death ought not to go unmourned. One might even mourn the death of one who had been their enemy, until the last.

  At the last, he had been grateful; his love for them, his captors—his would-be liberators—had given his star fresh radiance; his ties to the universe—to life—had flared with power . . .

  . . . and gone out.

  So, a death.

  As such things went, Ren Zel thought, it had been a good death. Certainly, it had been desired. Chosen. It was the choice—the return of the ability to make a choice—that had gained them their enemy’s love, even as he chose annihilation over life.

  The other death that he had witnessed in this space of gold and blackness—that had been a bad death. Their enemy had scarcely wakened to the whisper of choice when the enemy within him had acted to deny him both choice and life. He died, knowing that life had been rent from him. Died, knowing that he had failed.

  Kar Min pel’Mather had chosen. His choice had given him wings.

  May the gods, if any, receive him, Ren Zel sent the benediction out into the shining glory. He was a brave man, and honorable.

  Another moment, he remained in that place, watching, listening; but if the gods had heard, or cared, they made no sign.

  Ren Zel closed his eyes that saw the shining firmament . . .

  . . . and opened his eyes that saw the mundane life about him.

  His lifemate sat on the edge of the cot, Kar Min’s head yet resting on her knee. Master Healer Mithin occupied the chair at the foot, her head bent, and her hands folded on her lap. Pastel waves rippled about her, by which he knew her to be meditating.

  “He thanked us,” Anthora said, her voice scarcely above a whisper. She raised her head, showing him a face damp with tears.

  “He loved us.”

  “Indeed, he did.”

  Ren Zel rose, stiffly, as if he had been in his chair long days, when—a glance at the timepiece hanging from his belt—it had been scarcely an hour since Master Mithin had placed Kar Min into trance, and Anthora had slipped her thought into his dreaming mind.

  He limped to the cot, and bent to place his hand softly against Kar Min’s cooling cheek, as one might do with a sleeping child.

  “We have done well, here, I think,” he said, straightening.

  Anthora’s lips wavered into a wan smile.

  “Saving only that we have not given the delm their secret desire.”

  “We have not yet given the delm their wish,” he said, holding his hand down to her.

  “Do you think that we may?” she asked, moving Kar Min’s head from her knee to his pillow as gently as if he slept, indeed.

  Ren Zel thought back to the gold-laced blackness, and to those things his strange Sight had shown him.

  Anthora took his hand.

  He smiled and helped her to her feet. “I think that—yes, we may.”

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  Jelaza Kazone

  Surebleak

  One thing you hadda give the Road Boss, Lionel Smealy thought as he guided the hoopie through the gate and down the smaller road that led only to the big house with the big tree growing outta the center of it, like the house was nothing but a plant-box . . .

  . . . one thing you hadda give the man, like he’d been sayin’—he knew how to live. None o’this takin’ a coupla houses in the row, knockin’ the walls out and calling it home, like Boss Conrad’d done. The Road Boss, he had style; he wasn’t from Surebleak, he wasn’t of Surebleak, and he made sure everybody who had a pair o’eyes in his head knew it straight off. Was that house he was headin’ for made on, for, or by Surebleak?

  It was not.

  Right off another planet, that house, and the tree, and the grass, and, sleet, the little road he was drivin’ on. Moved to Surebleak with everything he had, the Road Boss.

  That was style. A man like Lionel Smealy could appreciate that kinda style. Sure, sure, the Big Brother tells you to move your ass to Surebleak, and you gotta do what Big Brother says, right? But you ain’t gotta do it like he would do it—like he did do it, just movin’ onto the streets with only his ’hands and a buncha fancy rugs to throw out as bait. Give it cash down, that kinda thing makes a statement, ’specially after you go on to make yourself into the Big Boss over all the other Bosses, open up the Port Road from start to finish, blow up Deacon and Iverness, too . . .

  Following the drive around a curve, Smealy nodded.

  That kind of thing did make a statement, yessir. Got people’s attention and held it.

  But this movin’ of everything and plopping it down at the far end of the road, just a little inch outside Melina Sherton’s turf, using the old quarry that didn’t belong to nobody and wasn’t no good for nothin’, for their settlin’ place—that was a whole ’nother kinda statement.

  Oh, yeah. That said, “I’m keepin’ myself as far away as I can from the city and everything goin’ on there. Includin’ Big Brother’s laws and regulations.”

  Smealy could work with that kinda attitude. Hadn’t he been Little Brother hisself, way back before Big Brother decided on retirin’ Kalhoon and left Lionel the only brother? He’d had plenty of practice before then, bein’ second in line; he knew how it chafed an’ ate at you; he remembered how it was to burn with wantin’ to get out from under Big Broth
er’s finger.

  That’s why he’d come on out here, to the house itself, ’stead of going to Little Brother’s office in the city. Offices weren’t no places to talk over the private things only little brothers know.

  Here, now, he’d come to the house, and the little road widened some right there in front of the door. He pulled the hoopie over into the wide spot, shut it down, popped the hatch and got out.

  He paused for a second, still in the shadow of the hoopie, and looked around him. There wasn’t no obvious security, but then, he hadn’t really expected any. The logical places for security was on the gate, which’d been wide open, an’ inside the house. That didn’t mean nobody wasn’t watchin’ the dooryard—in fact, he expected that they were.

  Still, he took his time looking the place over, keeping his hands in sight. He hadn’t been out before to the Little Brother’s house, though he’d seen the pictures.

  Come down to it, the pictures didn’t do the place justice. The house was like nothing he’d ever seen before—not even the old buildings that’d housed the Gilmour Agency fatcats. It was two stories high, with a barricaded walkway around the top story, and a long roof providing protection from the snow.

  Beyond the sloping roof was . . . well, he knew it was the trunk of a tree. And the tree wasn’t like nothing else on Surebleak, neither. Sleet, you could see that tree from inside the port itself, stretching so high and wide that it looked to be holding up the sky.

  Standing here, as near to the roots of the thing as made no nevermind, he couldn’t crane back far enough to see the tree’s top. Might be he’d sight it if he went flat on his back on the drive, which he wouldn’t do, not with him wearing a new yellow sweater and good khakis. That tree’d do just fine without his testimony—and he’d best get about bidness, before whoever was watchin’ the dooryard decided he was more threat than nuisance.

  He crossed to the door—real wood, looked like to him, carved with that Tree-and-Dragon you saw all over the port. Well, that was the mark for Little Brother’s off-world bidness. The family bidness which shoulda, Smealy figured, been Big Brother Conrad’s concern, ’fore he took it in mind to stick his nose into Surebleak’s affairs.