In Conquest Born, page 6
~ A what?
~ Someone to take care of the House. You can’t expect a man to run his own household, can you? Say, who’s in the relay today?
~ (Four voices respond, mentally.)
~ Good, all male. Taste this image, Director. . . .
~ Feran. . . .
~ Honored, Director.
~ Never mind that. Our elementary reception class picked up that last transmission. No more telepathic pornography, is that clear?
~ But it was relevant to—
~ Not relevant enough. Is that clear?
~ (Pause.) Yes, Director.
~ I’ve spoken to my aides, and we all agree. You’re to take a vacation from Braxi proper at the first opportunity. I don’t like what I sense happening to your psyche.
~ What happens to my psyche is my business, Director, let’s make that very clear! You want information, and I’m trying to get it for you! But don’t tell me how to live, or where, or whom to have sex with, or how often, or anything!
~ Calm down, Feran.
~ Right now I’m very busy trying to find out who fathered me. Your spying can wait.
~ You’re not serious.
~ It matters to me. Do you know what it’s like not to know your father?
~ No one cares. You have a cover story—
~ But it isn’t true. It’s a shameful thing, A Braxaná knowing only his mother. Your “mission” will just have to wait, Director. I’m sorry. I’ll get to it, I promise.
~ (Pause.) As you wish, Ferian.
~ That’s Feran.
~ Whatever.
Standard 2D transmission, augmented/superluminal, reaching to Base One/Azea, and
Stabilized/subluminal, retransmitted:
“Director Ebre ni Kahv, please.”
The head of StarControl stirs, flicks on the visual. “Speaking.”
“Nabu li Pazua, of the Institute.”
“Li Pazua . . . yes, I remember.” An aide supplies the proper shortfiles; he glances at them as they talk. “What can I do for you?”
“You said to check in regarding Ferian del Kanar. I’m doing so.”
The files says Ferian del Kanar, prod rape Lia ki Jannor by Braxin (Braxaná?) ID unknown, conquest Lees. Potential Telepathy rated 9.38 +, FT = 9.33. Security note: FULL EXTENT OF CONDITIONING UNKNOWN. He frowns, thoughtful. “Is everything going as planned?”
“He’s fitting in well—perhaps too well. I worry that we may have overstressed the Braxaná side of him.”
“If what you tell me is accurate, I see no harm in that. Unless there are other factors to be considered—”
“I’ve told you everything relevant to the situation.”
“Of course.” He finds the place on li Pazua’s shortfile where the phrase CONFLICTING LOYALTIES? appears, and underlines it again. “And if that’s the case, there’s no reason to worry. You conditioned him carefully, and he’ll adapt accordingly. Am I correct?”
“That was our intent.”
“Then trust your plans. Trust Ferian.”
After a moment he added, somewhat untruthfully, “I do.”
~ Ferian?
~ That’s Feran, Director, and I’m here. I’ve been waiting.
~ You were hard to reach this time. The last link in our relay couldn’t find you—
~ I haven’t moved.
~ No. (Pause.) But you’ve changed.
~ Perhaps.
~ What’s happened?
~ Not much. Lina’s pregnant.
~ Who’s Lina?
~ My Mistress.
~ Oh. Congratulations.
~ (Image: Ferian del Kanar shrugs.) The celebration begins when the child lives, Director, not before. The Race is weak in that regard—practically sterile, in fact. We don’t acknowledge pregnancies, only successful births.
~ Ferian. . . .
~ Can it be Azean?
~ What?
~ I said, can the child be born with Azean characteristics.
~ I don’t think so. I’ll check the codes on your reproductive process. (Pause. Alarm.) Why? Surely you’re not waiting out the year—
~ I want to see my son born.
~ Ferian—
~ I will see my son born, Director! Is that too much for a Braxaná to ask?
~ This is going a bit too far; I think you had better come home. . . .
~ I’m not coming home, Director. I have no place in the Empire, you know that. I’m staying here. I’ll do the work you want, but I’m staying here. That’s final.
~ Does your Mistress know how to make scrambled eggs?
~ What’s that?
~ Never mind. Nothing. How’s the food?
~ Fine. The cook’s work is a bit bland, but that’s all right—I can live with it. I’m hoping to import someone a bit more accustomed to Central flavoring. I had Zatar over for dinner the other night, and it was embarrassing to serve him food so Azean.
~ Any interesting information?
~ Some. I think Sechaveh may have fathered me. I’ve learned to respect his untrustworthiness, not to mention his influence; to share his bloodline would make me proud.
~ Is that all?
~ For now. Walk in danger, Director.
~ You, too.
~ Feran?
~ The relay must be weak, Director. I can barely feel you.
~ The relay’s fine; it must be you.
~ Just as well.
~ I don’t suppose you’ve been earning your keep over there at last.
~ Oh, but I have! Ketir and I went into a joint venture in the Belekor slave market—all very secretive, of course—miserable business for a Braxaná to be found dealing extensively in aliens. I’ve been able to add considerably to my estate from the profits.
~ Anything else?
~ You must bear with me, Director. I’ve been using my telepathy to enhance sex; that takes a good deal of effort after all you did to divorce the two within me.
~ It was all for your survival.
~ The need has passed. I find the power less and less obtrusive. Braxaná were not meant to be telepaths, I’m afraid.
~ You were. Distinctly so.
~ That was twenty of your years ago, Director. A lot has changed since then. Sechaveh and I had a long talk yesterday—
~ You told him who you were?!!
~ Not what I was, but who I was, yes. I’m half Braxaná, after all. It takes more than an alien upbringing to cause one of these men to deny his offspring. And Sechaveh isn’t overly fond of women, at least in the conventional sense, which means he has even fewer sons than most . . . anyway, whatever his reasons, he’s accepted me. He granted me official bloodline rights and gave me an ancestral Zhaor which I’m busy training with . . . did you know the Braxaná females fence also? Viciously, too! . . . I don’t know if I can make the next relay, Director. There’s a costumed gathering at the Museum Archives at that time and we’re all having Braxaná barbaric tribal outfits constructed. . . . I’m afraid that once D’vra and the others come like that, I really won’t have the time or interest to get in touch. Live in danger, Director. And thanks for saving my life.
~ You’re welcome, Ferian.
~ That’s Feran.
~ Whatever.
“Director ni Kahv?”
“Speaking.”
“Director i Pazua. We have some results on Ferian del Kanar.”
“I’m listening.”
“He’s defected. Oh, I don’t think he knows it himself yet in so many words, but I’m sure we’ve lost contact for good. He’s told them his background, and they’ve accepted the Braxaná blood in him as good enough to cancel out the Azean upbringing. He has a typical Braxaná household, which means he has computer access to all the information we could want and he won’t give us a word of it.”
“Excellent.”
“Yes, I thought so.”
“This does give me faith in your reasoning. I must say, I had my doubts when we first discussed this.”
“If we had just sent him in to spy it would never had worked. We would have seen something happen just as it has—a little more slowly perhaps, without my prompting, but just the same in the end. He’d be Braxaná and we’d have nothing.”
“But this way. . . .”
“As I promised. His rapid assimilation into Braxin life is proof of his conditioning, as are a number of other signs I programmed into him. As far as he’s concerned, his telepathic talent has gone dormant—he’ll have no reason to suspect otherwise. Eventually, the Braxaná will realize his value as a negotiator and set him against us because he knows us so well. I guarantee you, put one telepath in the room and you’ll have all the information you want. He’s an open book—we designed him that way. To the right mind he’ll broadcast everything he knows. And neither he nor the Braxaná will ever suspect it.”
“You guarantee that.”
“There’s a block put in every telepath, cutting them off from conscious acknowledgment of their conditioning He couldn’t admit to suspicions of that kind if they hit him in the face. As for the rest of them, Ferian has confirmed my suspicions regarding the Braxin culture—it is wholly nonpsychic. They’ll never suspect a thing.”
“Good. Excellent, in fact. So now we have only to wait?”
Li Pazua nods, exultant. “We have only to wait.”
Harkur: A man’s most sacred possession is his privacy of mind. Examine him, torture him, break him; still his thoughts are his own until he chooses to express them. This concept is one of the foundations of Braxin philosophy. Psychic ability, by its very nature, guarantees violation of this privacy. Therefore, we should not and will not tolerate it.
FIVE
There was a Braxin spy on Dari.
The news was not made public, but it was known by those who had to know. A message had been intercepted at the other end of the Azean Empire and the giant mechanical brains had decided that Dari was its destination. That was enough. Already StarControl had been mobilized, and every available Security agent moved to the sector in question. Every port on the planet was monitored. Every communications frequency was recorded and analyzed. Now there was only waiting to be done, for Dari was a political time-bomb which the wrong move might detonate.
Slowly, those few whose power or anonymity allowed them freedom of movement came to Dari. One of them was a child.
1
To a human, Laun Set was alien; true aliens, however, would rank him with human stock, His silhouette was faithful to the blueprint of the Scattered Races—a head above a torso, upright posture, two arms, two legs, all in mathematical symmetry as befit the type. His dark brown skin glowed warmly in the sunlight, thickly textured, and his eyes were stained red in the manner of the Bloodletters. And although more joints adorned his four-fingered hands than a human would consider normal, the theory of the extremity was still the same and the musculature similar.
He was naked but for a metal mesh loincloth, protective rather than ornamental. Gashes ran darkly down the length of one arm, black stripes in three lengths, nearly two hundred of them. They were marks of conquest and therefore tickets to continued life.
His opponent was ready at last, Drago, an older man from Filque. His left arm, recently broken, was barely through healing—a weakness to exploit. The arm would be slower in response, Laun Set knew—and Drago would expect him to take advantage of it.
From the packed earth of the Circle there arose to Laun Set’s keen sense of smell the delicate odor of blood. It was something no outsider could ever detect, and even a Bloodletter lacked the sensitivity until the Hyarke was near beginning. He preferred packed earth for that reason, although a synthetic surface offered surer footing. Here the Blood of all the Fallen—
“Laun Set!” Drago’s voice was harsh, in the manner of Darian formal speech. “Come ye to face me?”
The ritual gripped his attention. “To face you, and to feed your blood to the worthy.”
“I will pour your essence out upon the earth.”
Laun Set gripped his weapon tightly. “Then let us begin,” he whispered fiercely.
They began to circle. The excitement gripped him utterly now, and the audience faded from his awareness. Hypersensitive feet tested the ground—damp and firm; good. Drago swung—it was a blow not meant to hit. Laun Set stepped easily out of reach, noting his opponent’s manner of movement even as he revealed his own.
His weapon was long, slim, and deadly. On one end of its smooth wooden shaft was fitted a scythe-shaped blade, sharpened on both edges and straightened at the tip. The flat blade on the ada’s other end was adorned with curling barbs—for the killing thrust alone, if that.
Laun Set attacked. His opponent’s neat parry brought a curved blade dangerously close to his face, then down past his arm. Laun Set let it cut him before he pushed it away. It didn’t matter who drew First Blood, provided it was done quickly. Better a controlled cut, unthreatening in the mutual courtesy of the Hyarke, than a Bloodletter desperate for this red inspiration, therefore dangerous in his chaos.
Laun Set’s nostrils flared as he breathed in the odor of his own blood. It was a drug to him and his kind, that almost imperceptible smell, and it would inspire his reflexes to their greatest capacity. From the earth a thousand voices seemed to ring, and from his soul, which had absorbed the strength of over a hundred men, reflexes came which were not his own, knowledge which he had never learned. He was one with the hundred, in the Circle, serving the Hyarke, and all were centered on the kill.
He waited until Drago’s eyes glowed with the Change before he struck again. Less would dishonor the other man’s experience. A half dozen clashing, gleaming exchanges taught him the man’s basic reflexes while exhibiting his own.
There was nothing now but the Hyarke, the bloodsport which was the soul of Dari. The Circle pulsed about him, a physical boundary pounding in rhythm with his own heartbeat. He had moved beyond conscious thought, into that nether world where the body moves faster than reason and trained instinct must take over.
They traded blows; sometimes one or the other cut, more often each was parried. Blood mixed with sweat and dripped to the ground. Occasionally the clash of steel bespoke a blow which might have left a man alive to conquer but deprived him of the right to progeny. The blood gave them strength and the ritual gave them endurance and they fought under the hot sun forever.
Then there was an opening. Laun Set saw it, let the awareness flow through his limbs and become action; without thought, he struck. The shaft of his ada tangled in Drago’s legs and the other’s faulty balance failed to compensate. He fell, and death awaited him. The long curved blade of Laun Set’s weapon was turned toward him, its back to the dirt, and as Drago fell he impaled himself upon its gleaming length. He cried once, gloriously, a song of dying to accompany the outpouring of his lifeblood, and with that cry, in pain and glory, expired.
Laun Set waited while the essence of Drago’s strength flowed forth from his body. Energy pulsed inside the Circle, free of the dead man but not of that boundary. Then the victor stooped beside his kill. “Worthy one,” he whispered, cupping his hands so that the wet redness flowed into them. Drago’s life-essence danced in the red fluid and strengthened Lauri Set as the latter drank it.
Then he stood back from the Fallen. Two young Bloodletters had entered the Circle and were rubbing his body with drugged oils which would combat exhaustion and compensate for the overdrive state he had fought in. They were all coming now, the spectators who were Bloodletters, for the Sharing, while those who were not of that brotherhood hurried to vacate the stadium, reverent of the ritual.
The two young men who had brought the drug knelt next and tasted the blood of the Fallen. Others knelt after them, touching dark hands to the killing wound, tasting Drago’s strength and skill from their fingertips. Somewhere outside the, Circle the audience was gone, leaving no visible witness to the Sharing but those who were entitled to indulge in its mysteries.
A horizontal cut was made on Laun Set’s arm and dye powder was rubbed into it. It was a long mark, for Drago had killed over a hundred opponents. Already the life force in the Circle was ebbing, absorbed into the dozen men of the Sharing. And as it was drunk by the last of them the Circle fell, becoming once more only a line on the packed, blood-soaked earth.
The ritual was over.
In the shadows, well hidden, a human girl smiled.
2
No one could have mistaken Torzha er Litz for a civilian. Her crisp stride bristled with military overtones and her eyes took in the details of her surroundings with sharp efficiency. Because she was Azean she was tall, lean, and golden; because she was Torzha er Litz she was impressive.
“I’ve come to see the Governor.”
The native receptionist looked up at her with infuriating slowness.
“You are who?”
“Starcommander Torzha er Litz, from the Vengeance.” She spoke slowly, assuming from his accent that his Azean was poor. Nevertheless, he seemed to take an interminable amount of time to absorb that information, and longer to get the Governor’s appointment schedule on the screen.
She tapped one booted foot impatiently and looked around her. In structure the offices looked like those in any Azean building—simple in design, relying more on color than three-dimensional detail for decoration. But the colors were out-of-date and Torzha found them unpleasantly garish.
“Starcommander Torzha Litz,” the secretary read slowly. Torzha suspected he knew just how much insult he was doing her by denying her the subname. She decided she disliked him.
“No appointment,” he concluded.
“I know I don’t have an appointment. StarControl should have called. Here—” She pulled her orders out of her half-jacket “—this will explain.”
It took him a century, it seemed, to go over the cellose sheets. She wanted to tell him: Damn it, man, you’ve got a translator in your desk, run it through that! But Ebre had asked her to bend over backward to avoid offending the natives, and she would certainly try. At least for the first day.
