The Caphenon

by Fletcher DeLancey

  The Lancer spoke solemnly. “We have come to the final moments of our time with our dead. Please give your support to the families of the fallen, who now release their loved ones to take their places with Fahla.”

  Twenty-three groups of Alseans walked onto the field, each heading for a pyre, and the symphony and Voices joined again in a composition that made Ekatya’s throat tight. The stringed instruments seemed to weep, as did some of the choral parts, and Ekatya wondered how the families on the field could avoid crying from the music alone. Perhaps they couldn’t—many of them were holding hands as they walked, seeking both physical and emotional comfort from each other.

  The music intensified, the weeping changing to something more anticipatory, and the groups were now at their pyres. One person in each group took the torch from its rack and held it aloft, waiting.

  The cue came in the music, which gradually built up to a crescendo of sound that collapsed into itself with the strike of the largest long bell. As one, every torch bearer touched their flame to the base of the pyre. The initial bell note faded but never died, and Ekatya glanced at the symphony platform to see Chrysaltin drumming softly on the bell, keeping the tone low and constant.

  The flames curled around their fuel, hovering on the ground for a few breathless moments before climbing up the pyres, higher and higher, and the long bells climbed with them. Chrysaltin ran from one side to the other, striking high and low, softly and loudly, somehow turning the rich tones of the bells into the crackling of flames. Bells and fire grew together, the sound filling the stands as the flames reached the tops of the pyres, and then the symphony and the Voices joined in.

  The swell of music raised the hair on the back of Ekatya’s neck. It was visual and aural overload, and she could only imagine how Lhyn must be feeling right now. She’d have been thrilled to watch something like this on a planetary broadcast, but to be sitting here, right in the middle of it all, feeling the bells and drums through her chest cavity…it was truly the experience of a lifetime.

  Eventually she became aware of a low roar beneath the music, growing louder every second. It wasn’t the bells, nor the drums, nor the deepest of the stringed instruments. Something else was happening. She looked at the Lancer, whose gaze was fixed on the eastern sky. The question died on her lips when the roar became earsplitting and the first transports flew over the field, so low that she had to grab the rail to stop herself from ducking.

  They kept coming and coming, five abreast in tight formation, and by the time the last ones flew over, she thought there must have been a hundred of them. The music grew more urgent and the transports returned, this time at a higher altitude, and began a complicated series of maneuvers that must have taken untold amounts of practice and skill. Back and forth they flew, around and higher and around again, putting on a show she’d have paid to see at any other time, and then the Voices and the symphony exploded into a crash of music at the same moment that a quarter of the transports fell out of the sky.

  They dropped straight toward the spectators, red smoke flowing off their wings, and didn’t level out until they were nearly in the stands. Then they began circling directly overhead, the red bleeding off them, and the only sound was their engines and a long, sustained note on the highest of the long bells.

  Except…that wasn’t the bell anymore, was it?

  A sigh from the spectators alerted her to something happening on the field, and she looked over to see a woman standing motionless at the very top of the choir’s platform, her face lifted and her mouth open as she poured out a soprano note exactly matching that of the bell. Ekatya didn’t know when the bell’s note had died away and this one began; the transition had been seamless.

  At last the singer ran out of breath. She paused for only a moment before resuming, now singing a soaring aria that dripped with loss, and the Voices and symphony slid into a heartbreaking accompaniment.

  Lhyn turned around and widened her eyes at them before turning back and leaning forward, apparently not knowing where to look. Her head kept tilting up to look at the circling, bleeding transports and over again to watch the singer, then swiveling to take in the roaring conflagrations of the pyres.

  “She knows,” Lancer Tal said.

  “Who is it?”

  “Kyrie Razinfin, the greatest voice of both my generation and the last. She and the pilots are performing the Flight of the Return.”

  Ekatya looked up again and with a sudden realization began counting the transports. It wasn’t easy when they were continually circling, and she lost track twice before Lancer Tal said, “There are twenty-six of them.”

  Twenty-three Alsean warriors had died. Three of those transports were for her people. The breath shuddered in her throat as the import of the ceremony suddenly overwhelmed her.

  “Thank you,” she managed, and focused her blurry gaze on the singer before she could embarrass herself.

  The aria dropped into a lower octave, and the music bridged into something else altogether. Something hopeful rather than sad, anticipating instead of mourning. Ekatya looked back up at the transports and discovered that their red streamers had changed to white. They were still circling, but every loop was a little higher than the one before. Far above, the other seventy-four transports continued their circuits, waiting.

  Another bridge in the music, and now the hopeful tones had changed to those of joy. The drums swept in with a lively beat, the horns began to dance their notes, and the long bells rang out in celebration. The twenty-six transports circled higher and higher as the singer’s voice ran up and down in giddy time, telling of love, happy reunions, and an eternity of peace. Ekatya’s foot began to tap all by itself, so catchy was the melody and the percussive line backing it up. She wasn’t alone; many of the warriors on the field were swaying, wide grins on their faces. The Flight of the Return may have started as a lament, but it was ending as a party.

  The beat became more insistent and the strings pushed everyone to a higher level as the music rose to what had to be its culmination. The Voices of the Deep joined the soloist, repeating a refrain over and over again, until the symphony, the Voices, and the soloist all joined together on a single triumphant note. Every head on the field looked up, and Ekatya followed their gaze to see the twenty-six transports in a vertical climb, shooting up and through the circle made by the others. The music held its crescendo, with drums and long bells drawing it out, until the twenty-six became distant dots and their circling compatriots exploded outward, flying away in all directions at top speed. With a crash the music ended, and Lancer Tal moved beside her, shouting as she threw her arm up. Her voice was joined by thousands more, and Ekatya looked around in surprise to see every warrior on the field, every officer on the platform, and Lancer Tal herself holding a sword aloft. A forest of shining blades speared the sky in a final salute, and the warriors roared out their farewell.

  When the shout died away, there was no sound but the crackle of the flames.

  Not a warrior moved until Lancer Tal pressed something on the grip of her sword and the blade collapsed into its base. The warriors followed suit, their movements rippling outward from the platform, and the Alseans in the stands burst into applause. Ekatya watched as Lancer Tal reattached her sword grip to her belt. So that was what the cylinder had been.

  The symphony struck up a new piece, this one mellow and easy. Ekatya guessed it was meant to usher people out of the stands. “It’s done?” she asked.

  “It’s done. The holograms are off as well.”

  “Thank the stars. Those things made me nervous.”

  “I know.”

  Ekatya’s eyebrows drew together as she remembered her sudden surge of confidence just before she’d begun her eulogy. “That was you. You pushed me over my nerves.”

  “I hope you don’t mind. I should have asked, but there wasn’t any way to do so without fifty thousand Alseans noticing.”

  “I don’t mind at all. In fact—” She held up her hand, pleas
ed when Lancer Tal clasped it. “Thank you. That was a truly beautiful ceremony. You certainly kept your promise; my crew could not have asked for a better send-off.”

  “Holy Shippers.” Lhyn had found her way up to the dais. “That was fantastic. Utterly amazing! My heart is still pounding. And Kyrie Razinfin! Did you see it, Ekatya? She disguised herself as one of the Voices; I never noticed her until she dropped that white robe. It was all so…so…I don’t even have words.”

  Lancer Tal’s face creased into a grin. “Now I know what it takes to strike you speechless. Though not entirely, I notice.”

  “There’s so much I want to know about this! Do you have something I can read about it? Someone I can ask? How old is this ceremony?”

  “Ancient, though the transports are a relatively new addition.” Lancer Tal held up her hand when Lhyn would have barraged her with more questions. “It’s not something I can speak about with you now. I’m sorry, Lhyn, but my duties don’t end with the Flight. The spectators may be leaving, but the families are not, and I must conduct my tour of the pyres.”

  Ekatya looked past her to the pyres, where the warriors were giving respectful salutes to the families as they streamed past on their way out. What a contrast, to begin the funeral of your loved one in front of fifty thousand, and end it alone.

  “Then I think we have no place here anymore,” she said. “Will your pilot take us back to our ship?”

  “Yes, of course. And he’ll return your wounded to the healing center.”

  “Thank you. We’ll leave you to your duties.”

  Lancer Tal nodded and stepped away, then turned back. “I nearly forgot. Lhyn, Lead Templar Satran has agreed to meet with you tomorrow at hantick nine. She may have as many questions for you as you do for her. And you can ask her about this ceremony as well.”

  She moved off the dais and down the steps, leaving Lhyn looking at Ekatya with wide eyes.

  “Just when I thought this day could not get any better,” she said.

  Ekatya took her hand and squeezed it. “Come on, oh great scholar. Let’s go see if Captain Habersaat has picked up a response from Admiral Tsao on our reports.” She tugged Lhyn to the edge of the dais before remembering to let go of her hand.

  “Way to ruin my after-ceremony buzz. I still can’t believe she thought I could distill most of a year of research into a report on one day’s notice. Your admiral may be good at her job, but she’s terrible at mine.” Lhyn perked up when she caught sight of the soloist speaking with some of the Voices members. “Kyrie Razinfin! Can you believe it? I would love to talk to her.”

  “Well, why don’t you?”

  “She’s a superstar, Ekatya.”

  “So? You’re an alien.”

  Lhyn stopped. “Hey…you’re right. Do you mind?”

  “Go.”

  She bounced off without another word, making a beeline for the tall singer in her shimmering robe, and Ekatya looked after her with a smile on her face. She started when Baldassar spoke next to her.

  “Star-struck, is she?”

  “Very much so. I think if she had her way, she’d set up a lab here and not come back to Protectorate space for another five stellar years.”

  “I hope she gets her way, then.”

  Ekatya bit down on her retort, realizing just in time where that would lead, and for a brief moment she wondered if he’d said that on purpose. Then she remembered that Lhyn had called her by her first name just before he’d arrived. Had he heard it?

  She groaned to herself as more of her crew joined them and the post-event discussion began. This business of keeping Lhyn a secret was getting worse by the hour. And it wasn’t even a secret to begin with; it was just a non-disclosure. It wasn’t supposed to matter. She’d knock out the Voloth threat, return to Protectorate space, and she and Lhyn would resume their relationship on their own time. No problem.

  But now her ship was lying broken in a field, Fleet was having to send a personnel ship to pick up her crew, and she was already on some kind of shit list for fighting a battle on the wrong day. Admitting a non-disclosure and conflict of interest would probably be just what somebody was waiting for to bust her down to ensign. It certainly wouldn’t help her advocate for the Alseans. And if Baldassar knew about it, he’d be duty-bound to report it. Not doing so would put him in the same bind she was in now.

  Her gaze fell on Lancer Tal, speaking with the nearest family at the base of their pyre. Alseans couldn’t hide their relationships even if they wanted to, could they? What a profound effect that must have on their culture.

  And what a culture this was. She’d teased Lhyn about her enthusiasm, but in truth she now shared it. She just hoped that between the two of them, they could convince the bureaucrats back home.

  Chapter 39

  The alien and the templar

  Lanaril Satran couldn’t remember the last time she’d been this nervous. By the time one became a Lead Templar, one was fairly immune to performance anxiety, but this was not exactly in her normal line of duties. She had her blocks up to silence the emotions of the handful of other worshippers in the temple, and she’d done all the usual tricks to center herself. They hadn’t helped.

  She lit another bowl on the rack, its small flame joining those of the other nine in its row, and silently asked Fahla to give her the strength she needed for this day. The temple door opened in the middle of her prayer, giving her a jolt of expectation, but the tall woman entering alone wasn’t who she expected. Lhyn Rivers would be escorted in by the Lancer’s Guards.

  Turning back to her bowl rack, she stared at the ten flames filling the top row and wondered if she should unlock the whole rack and light all one hundred of them. Sometimes, she was certain, Fahla appreciated prayers with a little extra oomph.

  “Lead Templar Satran?”

  “Yes?” She turned and barely held back a gasp when she saw the newcomer smiling at her. The woman’s face was bereft of any ridges. “Oh! I’m sorry, I didn’t realize…I thought you would be coming with Guards.”

  Lhyn Rivers held up a palm. “They’re outside. I’m sorry as well; I didn’t mean to startle you. But I’m very pleased to be meeting you.”

  Lanaril met her palm, absorbing the unalloyed pleasure and anticipation radiating off the Gaian. “Well met indeed. I did plan a more graceful greeting for your arrival. If you’d like, I can give it now.”

  “Only if it will demonstrate some aspect of temple ceremony that differs from the usual social greetings. Otherwise, you needn’t go to any trouble on my account.”

  “No, it wasn’t anything different. Just a little less embarrassing for me.”

  “Please, there’s no reason. I’m here to learn from you. And I have so many questions.” She looked around the temple in delight. “I can’t believe I’m actually standing here. You have no idea how much I wished I could do this. Your temples are so beautiful, but seeing them on broadcasts is nothing like seeing one in person. And oh, the molwyn tree is gorgeous! May I touch it?”

  Lanaril felt a little dazed, partly from Lhyn’s rapid change of subject but mostly from the sheer depth of emotion pouring off of her. Lancer Tal had not exaggerated about the Gaian broadcasting. It was like speaking to a child, except that Lhyn’s emotions held the richness of adult experience. And they were entirely positive; this woman was truly thrilled to be here.

  She remembered Lancer Tal saying that the third betrayal would be the worst and began to grasp just what she’d signed herself up for.

  “Of course you may touch it. The molwyn tree is here for all.”

  “How old is it?” Lhyn asked as they walked toward the gnarled tree in the center of the temple. The morning sun slanted through the skylight and lit the tops of its branches, an effect Lanaril had always loved.

  “As old as the temple. One thousand, three hundred and sixty-one cycles.”

  “You’re kidding! I mean…no, you’re probably not. But the original temple burned in the Second War of Succession. I thou
ght surely the tree burned with it. This is actually the tree planted by the Betrayer?”

  Lanaril looked over in surprise. “You know Alsean history.”

  “Only what we’ve been able to piece together. I’ve been studying your culture for more than seven of your moons, and your broadcast stations have made it much easier by airing so many documentaries. My team loves your documentaries.”

  “I wonder if the writers and directors would have changed anything if they’d known aliens were watching.” She’d never considered how their culture might be viewed based solely on their broadcasts. “Do you watch the weepers as well?”

  “Some of my team are addicted to Merchant of the Mountains. They count the days until the next episode, and I don’t even try to get anything done when it’s airing. You’d think, given the fact that we can record anything and study it later, that otherwise adult scholars could wait a hantick or two before watching their show. Apparently not. I’m told it must be watched as it airs or it’s not the same.”

  Lanaril imagined a bunch of smooth-faced aliens rushing to watch that awful weeper and had to laugh. “To think that should be our cultural representative! I can only hope that you and your team don’t take it seriously. At all.”

  “Oh, don’t worry. We’ve had a lot of practice at telling the horten from the hornstalk.”

  Great Fahla, the woman even knew Alsean idioms.

  They arrived at the edge of the tiles and stepped onto the wooden platform around the base of the molwyn tree. Lhyn stopped and went down to her hands and knees, peering between the slats. “Declano was right,” she muttered, and stood again. “So you use this to cover the soil and keep it from getting tracked all over, right? And meanwhile the tree has room to spread its roots.”

  “Yes, exactly. The platform also serves as an attachment point for the drip irrigators, and keeps worshippers from compacting the soil.”

  “Is taking care of the molwyn tree a specialty job? I mean, do the temple scholars do it, or do you have a producer on staff?”