“A possibility,” agreed Jurrel.
“He keeps coming back to children, though,” said Ruth, tapping the now heavily underlined transcript. “And what happened to him on the Kz’adul. Why the connection? Why does he say The time I spent as J’koshuk’s prisoner left too many scars for me to easily forget. It left a darkness on my soul that I need to somehow try and remove first. I wish it wasn’t our children that had to bear the consequences because they’re the truly innocent ones. It’s not their fault that we, their parents, were used as we were on the Kz’adul.”
“Parents and children, actually,” Carrie said, thinking back to those days of captivity. “When they did release me from isolation, I was convinced they were trying to breed us. Not only did they remove my contraceptive implant so I fell pregnant immediately Kaid and I Linked, but we were sure that Kate had been pregnant and miscarried without her knowing it.”
“Breed you?” asked Ruth, surprised. “Why would they want to breed you?”
“Why experiment on Kusac and me to find out about our Link?” she asked. “Because having their own hybrid telepaths could be very useful to any species. Look how the Chemerians tried to kidnap Kate and Taynar. And Chy’qui, the Prime in the Directorate who did the experiments, he tried to keep Kusac’s presence on the ship secret.”
Jurrel looked at Ruth. “Without mothers, how could they possibly breed them? Medical science in the Alliance hasn’t perfected artificial wombs yet, and the Primes don’t seem to have either.”
“As far as we know,” countered Carrie. “We do know that Kezule married the doctor who treated Kusac on the Kz’adul and at Haven. What if they did manage to breed hybrid children, and Kezule has them? If Stronghold somehow found out, that would be a good enough reason to send a secret mission out to look for him.”
“Let’s hold fire on this a little, Carrie, it’s all supposition,” said Ruth. “You’re using pyramid logic—if this is true, then that must be too. It doesn’t work like that. You said you checked with Ghyan about the sailing incident. Did you check with Vanna on how many crew survived the crash on Keiss?”
“I don’t need to, I know. There were four of them, five counting Kusac,” she said.
“Ah, but Kusac says five crew and Vanna,” said Jurrel. “That makes six in all, not counting Kusac.”
“It can’t,” she said. “The survivors were Garras, Vanna, Mito, and Guynor, that’s all.”
“So why did he say six of them?” asked Ruth thoughtfully.
“Six children bred by the Directorate, or the Primes?” Carrie suggested.
“Let’s stop there,” said Jurrel, sitting back in his seat. “We need to check if we have any hard facts now. Kusac has a command mark on his knife, so he may have been given a mission that none of us knows about. We have a reference to your twin spying on Valtegans, and an out of context reference to Kusac and Ghyan when they were ten years old. Finally, we have the number of the survivors of his crew given as six, not four.”
“Valtegans have ten-year-old cubs, six of them,” said Carrie automatically. “And he’s been sent to spy on them. If that doesn’t constitute a highly secret mission that the Brotherhood would go to any lengths to keep quiet, I don’t know what does!”
There was a small silence as they looked at each other, taking in what she’d said.
“Again, it is possible,” said Jurrel. “The attacks on the two colonies could have resulted in captives, but why take cubs, and how would we find out about it now?”
“It’s certainly more realistic than the idea of breeding hybrids without having mothers,” said Ruth. “Even if they had, they couldn’t possibly be ten years old now.”
“The only Valtegan Kusac could approach would be Kezule,” insisted Carrie. “Just like the one that kidnapped Kate and Taynar from Keiss, he was an Intellectual/Warrior caste officer, not as affected by the racial hatred of us as the ordinary soldiers were. Kezule is involved in this somehow, I know he is.”
“Well, we have one person here who could give us a few answers,” said Jurrel. “Prince Zsurtul. He was on the Kz’adul before and after the hostage exchange. He was also at Court part of the time Kezule was there. Perhaps if we spoke to him and told him what we suspect, he’d have some new information for us, something he couldn’t tell you at the time.”
“Not possible,” said Ruth. “Zsurtul’s at the Palace today, he won’t be home till tomorrow.”
“I’ll talk to him then,” said Carrie. “Meanwhile, I’ll find Kaid and ask him about the command mark on Kusac’s knife.”
“No, let Jurrel do it,” said Ruth. “You and Kaid have rowed too much about Kusac. He’ll at least hear Jurrel out.”
“You have a point,” she admitted reluctantly. “What do I do, then?”
“Nothing till we’ve talked tomorrow,” said Ruth, taking the crystal from the reading slot and passing it back to Carrie. “As for today, you can help me get second meal ready. I’ve got Ray and Andy coming back to eat, and I suppose I’ll have to feed Jurrel. You might as well join us, Carrie.”
Kaid had headed over to the house where Rezac, Jo, and Zashou lived. He sent out a questing thought, making sure Rezac was there, and received a reply.
I’m as outnumbered as you are, Rezac replied, a touch of humor in his mental voice. Meet me in the staff lounge at the gym if you don’t want the females around.
He sent an assent, and heading off the path into the deeper snow, tried to cool his anger. By the time he reached the gym, he’d forgotten it, but was cursing himself instead for being so foolish as to take the cross-country route when there was a perfectly adequate, almost snow-free path.
Frozen snow clung to his pelt to about knee level, and he was cold, very cold. He ducked in a side entrance, heading for the lockers and shower room. Rezac was already sitting there, waiting for him. As Kaid approached, his father held out his brush, trying not to grin.
“Thanks,” he muttered, taking it and bending down to begin the painful job of brushing out the solidified snow.
“It’d be easier to just have a shower,” Rezac suggested, when he’d winced for the third time.
“You’re right,” he said, standing up and putting the brush down on the bench.
Rezac handed him his soap. “Want me to help?” he asked, keeping his tone noncommittal.
Kaid glowered at him and, ignoring the bottle, began peeling off his layers of clothing.
Like father, like son, sent Rezac. Been there, done that, know the consequences. Don’t use hot water, though, or you’ll get chilblains. I did. The mental tone was pained this time.
Kaid had to laugh then. Why not? he sent, opening his unlocked locker and shoving his outer coat in it.
As Rezac got up and began to undress, too, Kaid glanced at him, trying to not remember that his father, like him, was an exile from Shola’s far past, and younger even than his own son, Dzaka.
“I suggest a warm shower, then a hot meal up in the staff lounge,” said Rezac, hauling off his tunic and putting it in his own nearby locker. “Then if you want to talk, we can talk over coffee. Coffee because it is mildly intoxicating,” he added. “I could do with it on a day as cold as today.”
“Where d’you get the common sense from?” Kaid asked dryly, unfastening his weapons belt and stowing it away.
“Family trait. Brothers do share ‘em, you know,” said Rezac lightly, for the benefit of anyone else around. “You’re still not used to having me here yet.”
Kaid nodded. Rezac was right. Having a father was still something of a novelty to him, let alone one whom the world outside their families knew as his brother.
Though still not quite adult, therefore lacking a little of his full physical development, Rezac and he did look enough alike to be brothers. The similarity was more in the way they moved and held themselves, and their personalities than in their coloring. Rezac’s pelt was dark brown, and his hair almost black, whereas his own pelt was mid-brown and his hair the dark brown of his father’s pelt.
Their ears were the same, though, wider and slightly shorter than average, showing their Highland ancestry, and both shared the same almost hooded brown eyes and strong jawline.
“C’mon,” said Rezac, finished. “You’re shivering. If you take much longer, you could end up with a chill.”
Kaid snorted good-humoredly and hauled off his tunic, shoving it into the locker. Slamming the door, he activated the lock.
“Don’t lecture me,” he said with a grin. “I spent longer than you growing up in the mountains.”
“True,” agreed Rezac complaisantly, picking up the soap container as they moved off to the showers.
“Fatherhood has mellowed you,” Kaid said. Or should I say grandfatherhood?
“Ah, shut up, old one,” retorted the younger male, jostling him forward.
“Who you calling old?” demanded Kaid, shoving him back. You lived those fifteen hundred years in that stasis cube, I at least jumped forward in time and lived all of mine!
We lived our years more intensely, countered Rezac, clutching hold of him as his foot slipped in a patch of wetness on the floor.
“Oi! You two!” bellowed out a voice. “Stop behaving like kitlings in here!” Ni’Zulhu, head of the estate security, suddenly appeared in front of them, then backed off hurriedly. “Sorry, Master Kaid, didn’t realize it was you and your brother. But don’t you go setting the young ones a bad example!”
Sniggering, Rezac grabbed the surprised Kaid and hauled him off out of sight into a cubicle. As he leaned against the cubicle wall and began laughing, Kaid just looked at him. “Now see what you’ve done,” he began.
Rezac turned the shower on, drenching them both and effectively silencing Kaid. Still laughing, he shook his head, sending even more water flying. Damn, but it’s good to laugh, he sent as Kaid began to see the funny side, too.
They’d finished their meal, and their talk, and were sitting nibbling on fruit pastries with their coffee when Jurrel knocked on the door.
“Come in,” said Kaid.
“This is a cozy little place,” said the younger Brother, stepping in. “I didn’t know there was a staff lounge here.”
“Don’t go telling everyone,” murmured Rezac from his position sprawled out on the sofa. “No point in having a bolt-hole if anyone can come in.”
“It’s open to anyone taking classes as an instructor here, Jurel,” said Kaid, lazily swinging the leg hanging over the arm of his chair. “What can we do for you?”
“Wondered if you could answer a question for me, that’s all. Win me an argument,” Jurrel said, sitting down on the arm of the remaining easy chair.
“So long as it doesn’t require much thought. What is it?”
“Who was in charge of the Jalna mission?”
“Kusac, ostensibly,” said Kaid. “But we did it together.”
“Ah, then he has had a command.”
Kaid roused himself. “A command? From Raiban, yes,” he said.
“Raiban? I thought the Jalna mission was for the Brotherhood.”
“No, the Forces,” said Kaid, sinking back into his chair again. “Kusac hasn’t had a command from the Brotherhood yet.”
Jurrel was silent for a moment or two. “Then that command mark on his knife can’t be there.”
“What?” Kaid jackknifed into a sitting position. “What the hell are you talking about?”
“The message from Kusac—he keeps playing with his knife at the beginning. I saw a command mark on it.”
Kaid sat back again. “Not the message,” he groaned. “It was likely Banner’s knife you saw.”
“No, it was Kusac’s. You can clearly see the single command mark and the graduation seal on the top of it. It’s dated for last year.”
“You’re mistaken,” said Kaid.
Jurrel shrugged and got to his feet. “I hope not, because Banner’s been gone long enough. I’d prefer to think he was on a Brotherhood mission rather than jetting about randomly with someone on the edges of sanity.”
When he’d reached the door, Rezac called out to him since he knew Kaid wasn’t going to. “Are you positive it wasn’t Banner’s knife?”
“You think I don’t know my sword-brother’s knife?” he asked, his tone slightly acerbic as he opened the door.
The silence after he left was unbroken till Rezac spoke again. “Well, she was right. She did find something. Are you going to look at the message again, or must I?”
Kaid looked over at him.
“Don’t make this an issue of pride,” Rezac warned him, sitting up. “Look at all the problems that caused Zashou and me.”
“If it’s really Kusac’s knife, then I’ll watch it again,” he said eventually. “Check it out for me, please.”
“How will I know if it’s Banner’s?”
“The graduation date will be some twenty years ago, and there will be at least four command marks on it.”
“And if it’s Kusac’s?”
“He graduated late last year. And if they’ve given him a command mark, then he is on a mission, and I’ll want to know why we’ve been lied to and he was thrown to the wolves,” he said grimly.
“Jurrel!” Rezac called, sprinting up the path to the village. “Wait up for me!”
Jurrel stopped and turned.
“Any chance I can see that message?” he asked as he drew level.
“Kaid sent you?”
Rezac nodded. “Yeah, asked me to look into it for him,” he said, sinking his hands in the pockets of his long coat. “Pulled the ‘That’s what little brothers are for’ stunt on me.”
Jurrel chuckled as they began to walk on. “We’ll need to stop at Ruth’s, see if Carrie’s still there talking to Ray and Andy. If not, she’ll be back at the villa.”
Carrie was back at the villa.
“Why should I let you see it?” she asked Rezac. “Kaid shouldn’t have sent you, he should have come himself.”
“He asked me to come because I could be more objective than he would. He thinks it’s Banner’s knife and that Jurrel made a mistake.”
She gave him a scathing look. “And just how likely is that?”
“I know,” he said. “The point is, Kusac has never been given a command. If it’s his knife, the grip should be completely plain—no command mark.”
She got up and headed toward the den workstation, climbing the few steps up to the half level by the entrance. Switching on the comp, she put the crystal in the reader.
“See for yourself,” she said. “Then read the notes we made this morning while analyzing it.” She reached into an eye level pigeonhole and pulled out a sheaf of papers, slapping them down beside him, then headed back down to the main level.
Stronghold, same day
“You’ve a sure touch with the ointments, right enough,” said Noni, sealing the last jar.
In his seat by the stillroom fire, Conner laughed gently. “I told you I’ve been making them since I was less than half the age of your apprentice, Teusi.”
“So you did, so you did,” said Noni, heading back to sit in her seat opposite him.
“I know,” he said. “Just as I would, you needed to see for yourself. I take it you’re satisfied now?”
“You’ll do, I suppose,” she admitted grudgingly.
“Then make good on your promise,” he said. “The knowledge exchange—your religions for ours.”
“You young ones are always so hasty,” she grumbled, sipping her drink. “What’s wrong with learning it the old-fashioned way?”
“It was your suggestion,” he said, frowning. “What’s the matter, Noni? Afraid?”
“Me? Afraid?” she said, faking outrage. “I’ll have you know there’s nothing of Shola that can frighten Noni!”
“But I’m not of Shola, that’s it, isn’t it? Then let me do it.”
“You? An untried, untrained off-worlder ...” she began scornfully.
As she spoke, she was peripherally aware of the temperature in the room dropping sudd
enly, and the lights beginning to flicker then dim. It wasn’t till the fire also began to fade that she realized he was drawing energy from them, and then it was too late.
Conner stood up, almost disappearing into the shadows because of his black robe. He seemed to grow taller, larger, as he fed on the energy. His blue eyes and long gray hair crackled with it as he stared at her.
She tried to stop him by blocking the flow, but found her efforts as useless as if she’d tried to stem the spring floods. Here was a Talent far more encompassing than any she’d encountered before, that carried within it the echoes of many, not just one. He, the stranger, the alien, had done the seemingly impossible—he’d harnessed the energies of fire and air and earth all at once.
“Do not make the mistake of underestimating me, madam,” he said, his voice rolling through the small room like thunder echoing in the mountains. “I’ve played your games long enough. I will not be toyed with again.”
As he turned, he seemed to gradually shrink back to his own height again. The lights flickered and buzzed, then resumed their normal brightness; in its grate, the flames once more began to dance. When she looked back at the door, he was gone.
“Power all over the building was being drained, Noni,” said Lijou. “That’s all I can tell you.”
“What I want to know is what is he,” muttered Noni. “Ain’t natural, is what it isn’t.”
In one of the armchairs, Alex was sitting chuckling quietly to herself.
“What’s up with that youngling of yours now, Rhyaz?” Noni demanded tartly, glancing over at her.
“Ask her,” said Rhyaz, looking up from the report he was reading. “I’ve no idea, Noni.”
“Well?” the elderly Sholan demanded.
“Nothing,” said Alex. “I was just thinking, that’s all.”
“Vartra preserve us now!” exclaimed Noni waspishly. “She’s thinking!”
Alex’s smile died and she got to her feet. “Fine. Find out for yourself, then. Go ask Vartra, see if he’ll help you.” With that she swept out of the room in a huff.
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