His gaze grew questioning.
“And I once felt that way about you?”
She nodded.
“It sounds burdensome.”
“I would rather carry that burden every day of my life,” she said, “than be given all the world and everything in it.”
He stared into her eyes for a long moment.
“Go ahead,” he said.
“You’re sure?”
“Do it.”
==
Sacrifice Day , 1325 A.H.
Two hours after sundown, when the fire in the man-high hearth had burned low, the assembled Morelon kin had eaten and drunk their fill, and the general revelry had quieted, Barton Morelon reached across his plate, squeezed his wife’s hand, and rose from his seat at the head of the hearthroom’s banquet table. Conversations around the table lapsed immediately into silence.
“May I skip the story of the Spoonerite Hegira, just this once?” he said “You’ve all heard it many times before, and we have some new things to celebrate. I don’t think the spirits of our honored dead will mind.”
He looked back and forth around the table, smiling benignly, and paused to beam at Althea, seated to his right just below clan scion Emma. She smiled back a little hesitantly. Beside her sat her husband Martin, unmoving and without expression.
“First is the reason I asked you all to refrain from inviting any outsiders to our table this evening. It’s something I’d have sworn would never happen in a thousand years.” He chuckled. “Maybe I was right about that. It took a thousand years to get to it.
“It’s very rare for two clans to merge,” he said. “Clans tend to be proud of their achievements and their independent identities. Few are anxious to have those things diluted by a merger with another clan—especially if the other clan is a lot larger and wealthier. All the same, it’s happened a few times. If Clan Morelon should approve, it’s about to happen again.
“Another clan patriarch approached me with a request the day before yesterday. He proposed to his clan council that they petition Clan Morelon for a merger, and his council approved it. That’s unusual enough. What’s even more unusual is that my visitor explicitly requested an absorption merger—that his clan’s surname be eliminated after the current generation of bearers, instead of perpetuating both surnames the way the Hallansons and the Albermayers do.”
He paused while murmurs, starts, and questioning glances rippled around the room.
“What’s more unusual still is that the petitioning clan is one that had a long record of animosity toward Clan Morelon...an attitude it abandoned only recently, in historical terms.” Eyes widened around the table, and Barton smiled. “The patriarch who approached me was Douglas Kramnik.”
The silence was utterly perfect.
“My father expressed great gratitude, his clan’s and his own, for the timely intervention that freed him from Clan Dunbarton, and for other assistance we’ve rendered Clan Kramnik both before and since the siege. He was frank about his clan’s helplessness in the face of aggression on that order. He wants to secure Clan Morelon’s protection in perpetuity. But he also noted that Clan Morelon’s financial advantages would be of immense value to his clan, and hoped that we would see some advantage to us in acquiring Clan Kramnik’s much different expertise.”
Barton assumed a formal stance.
“I see the residents of Morelon House assembled before me,” he said. “I see that all those around the table are Morelons. I find the proposal of Clan Kramnik appealing, but as it will affect every member of our clan, I will not approve it entirely on my own authority as your clan head. Neither will I submit the decision to the sole authority of our council. This is for all of us to decide together.”
“Majority vote?” Hugh Fitzpatrick called.
Barton shook his head. “Approval must be unanimous.” A second round of murmurs swept over the gathering. “I will not risk offending a wounded ego or suppressing an undisclosed grievance. Even a single voice against it will vote it down.”
His hand rose automatically to his cross pendant.
“Before I gather your decisions, I’ll say one thing more: We are commanded to be charitable and humble...and to forgive those who have sinned against us. If there’s anyone among us who does hold a grudge against Clan Kramnik or any of its members, please consider whether continuing to hold that grudge is at all beneficial to you. All that to the side, I won’t inquire into the reasons behind anyone’s decision, no matter what it is.”
He folded his arm across his chest.
“Beloved kinsmen, I put the question to you: Shall the members of Clan Kramnik be admitted into Clan Morelon, that they and their posterity might become Morelons, on an equal basis with us all? Yea or nay.”
He looked down at his wife. “Clan matriarch?”
Nora’s expression was solemn. She nodded. “Yea.”
“Dot?”
Dorothy Morelon smiled and inclined her head. “Yea.”
“Ernie?”
Ernest DuBreuill nodded vigorously. “Yea.”
“Cece?”
Cecelia Dunbarton giggled. “Yea!”
Clockwise around the table he went. A single “nay” would have aborted it at once. Thirty-seven “yea” votes later, Barton turned to Martin Forrestal.
“Martin?”
Martin remained expressionless. “Yea.”
Barton swallowed against the surge of excitement. Althea was next.
This is the acid test.
“Althea?”
Althea’s eyes glistened. She drew a deep breath, let it out, and nodded once slowly. “Yea.”
Hardly daring to breathe, he turned to Emma. His scion was the youngest member of the clan ever to be accorded a voice in a matter of such import.
“Clan scion?”
Emma Morelon smiled. “Yea, Uncle Bart.”
The table resounded with applause.
* * *
“Now for some lionizing,” Barton said. “We don’t do this often,” he said, “and we keep doing it for the same people. That makes it look a little odd, or it would, to anyone unfamiliar with our clan and our conquering hero.
“A conquering hero is exactly what we have. Althea is the reason we’re still alive, rich, and free. The one and only reason. Those of you who were awake and aware when she forced an end to the siege already know the details. Those of you who were in your medipods have heard enough about it from the others. Is there anyone who’d like to disagree with my assessment?”
A chuckle passed over the clan.
“I thought not,” he said. “So tonight we fete the pride of Clan Morelon yet again. The woman who gave us our medipods. The woman who invented the power source that’s freed us from the fear of exhausting our fissionables. The woman who cracked the lightspeed barrier, first since the Hegira to travel among the stars. The woman who won a war single-handed. The woman who brokered my marriage and made me a valued member of this clan! Althea MacLachlan Morelon, what on Hope are you going to do next?”
The kin stood and cheered as one. Althea stood with eyes lowered, grinning bashfully. Barton noticed at once that her hand was clasped to her husband’s.
Progress?
Althea waited silently for the tumult to subside and for her kin to return to their seats.
“Thank you, but most of what Bart just rattled off wasn’t my doing alone.” She raised her and Martin’s joined hands. “Martin was at least as important to most of it. I’m more grateful to be back with him at last, and among you all, than I can possibly say.”
Martin’s expression remained impassive.
“But I’m afraid I have some bad news for you,” she said. “It’s going to sound like good news at first. The most exciting news in all Hope’s history. It won’t sound that way for long, though.
“You see, we—Mankind—have relatives in Eridanus cluster. They call themselves Loioc. I made contact with them. They seemed perfectly nice, at first. They’re not.
“As it happens, the men of Loioc have been genetically reduced to non-sentience. Only Loioc women can think or speak. It’s the result—the deliberate result—of the development of a self-replicating nanite that destroys the sentience genes in a male zygote. The Loioc women have saturated the waters of their planet with that nanite, so that no male child will ever be born capable of developing sentience. They treat their menfolk as pets. Sexual pets.”
Faces around the table went white with shock. Dozens of hands balled into fists. Barton felt himself become light-headed. At his left, Nora stared at him open-mouthed.
“Ernie told us about the nanite,” Teodor Chistyakowski said, “but I assumed it was an accidental development.”
Althea shook her head. “Quite deliberate. In fact, Loioc women hail the developer as their greatest hero.”
“Rothbard, Rand, and Ringer,” Chistyakowski muttered. “That’s...”
“Unspeakable,” Althea supplied. “A crime so monstrous that it eclipses even genocide. But you haven’t heard the half of it yet. The reason they were eager for contact from Hope was so they could spread their little gift to us.”
The cacophony that erupted around the table made the hearthroom resound with fury. The only Morelon not casting maledictions upon the Loioc was Martin Forrestal. His incredulity was unmistakable. He stared at his wife as if she had spontaneously mutated into another species.
Presently Althea held up a hand, and a grim silence returned.
“I was so excited about Mankind’s first encounter with a non-Earth-derived intelligent race—a race very nearly identical to us, by the way—that I let my guard down. I got into a tub with my hosts, and the nanite penetrated me. By the time I was back on Liberty’s Torch and heading homeward, I was saturated with them.
“If you’ve been wondering why I didn’t come all the way home as soon as I was back in this system, or why I demanded a service call from Claire Albermayer, now you know. I wasn’t willing to risk planetfall until Claire could certify me completely clean of those little horrors. Oh, by the way, the nanite ruined my medipod. I’m going to need a new one, so don’t ask for a loan any time soon.”
A nervous chuckle passed over the gathering. Tension remained thick around the table.
“You wanted to know what I’m going to do next, Bart? Well, first I plan to get my hands on the ringleaders of the attack on Morelon House and teach them some painful lessons. After I’m done with that, about a year from now, Claire and I are going to take the counter-nanite she developed to the Loioc system and seed their lakes and oceans with it. Over the course of about a year, it will hunt down and destroy the anti-sentience nanites in their waters. After that, no more non-sentient male children...and after that, some really angry Loioc men.” Althea smiled nastily. “I’ll bet they teach their womenfolk a few lessons of their own.”
“No,” Martin said, startling all present. Althea turned to him, frowning.
“Why not, love?”
“It won’t be just you and Claire,” he said. “I’ll be along as well.” His mask of disinterest crumbled as he took her shoulders in his hands. “We made a mistake, letting you head off alone. We’re not making it again.”
Martin pulled his wife into a passionate embrace and kissed her firmly as the Morelon hearthroom rang with cheers to humble any it had ever known.
Barton’s eyes filled with tears. He turned to Nora and found her in the same state.
“She did it,” he murmured.
Nora nodded. “You did say not to bet against her.”
He grinned. “I did, didn’t I?”
* * *
“Thank you,” Althea murmured.
“You’re quite welcome,” Martin said.
She ached to embrace him, but held herself rigidly still under the bedcovers. The darkness made the few inches that separated them seem like an impassable chasm.
He’s farther away from me here than when I was eleven light-years away.
“Martin? Were you serious about going to Loioc system with me and Claire?”
“Of course. I wouldn’t have said so otherwise.”
Of course.
“Feeling as you do today, you don’t think it might be...difficult for you?”
“Of course it would be,” Martin said. Three long seconds later, he added, “Feeling as I do today.”
Hm?
“Meaning...?”
“You said we have a year or so before we embark,” he said. “I hardly expect to feel as I do today.”
She started to speak, checked herself.
“Do you know the term ‘behavior modification,’ Althea?”
“...no...”
“I’m not surprised.” Martin snorted gently. “Hope doesn’t have much of a mental health industry. It’s an approach to altering one’s emotions, channeling them away from a destructive, life-averse course and into a life-affirming one.”
“What...how does it work?”
He turned onto his side. Through the dark she could see that he was facing her.
“First, the therapist determines which of the patient’s actions and habits are tied up with the negative emotions. Once he has a firm grasp of that, he designs alterations to his patient’s patterns of behavior, to replace the negative patterns with behavior that will conduce to positive emotions and their consequences. Sometimes, the patient enters a controlled environment, where his therapy can be guided and relapses into his old patterns can be curbed. Other times, he’ll be on his own, except for regular visits with his therapist. On Earth, behavior modification therapy had a higher reputation and a better record of success than any of the popular alternatives.”
“Where...” Althea drew a ragged breath. “Where would you go for a course of that?”
Martin chuckled, and Althea’s heart leaped.
“Nowhere on Hope, Althea. But I think I understand the technique well enough that I can try to apply it to myself. If you’ll agree to help, that is.”
“Anything, Martin.” Her pulse pounded in her ears. “Just tell me what you need me to do.”
He was silent for a long moment.
“I don’t think it will be complex,” he said at last. “But it might be difficult. It will involve a lot of pretending, on both our parts.”
“Go on.”
“I remember perfectly well,” he said slowly, “the way we treated one another before my wound. It’s going to sound somewhat cold and bloodless, but my hypothesis is that if we reproduce those patterns, behaving as if we were still that couple, I’ll regain the emotions that originally gave rise to them.”
We are still that couple.
“If I can’t remember my earlier emotions and affinities,” he said, “perhaps I’ll just recreate them. Why not, after all? If it worked on old Earth, why shouldn’t it work here on Hope? But it would require as much pretending from you as it would from me.”
“Martin,” she whispered. “I do still love you. I wouldn’t have to pretend.”
“You wouldn’t be pretending about yourself, Althea,” he said. “You would be pretending about me.”
“Ah. I get it.”
They passed an interval in silence.
“Do you think you could bring yourself to try it?” he said at last.
She thought it over.
“But it wouldn’t work unless you could feel those emotions again, would it?”
“Of course.”
“And you believe that you can.”
“Oh, certainly.”
“Why?”
“Because,” he said, “I’ve started the therapy already. Surely you noticed?”
The embrace and kiss at dinner.
Maybe my repair job took hold af
ter all.
“Uh, yeah. What have you felt...so far?”
“First, pride,” he said. “Pride to have the paragon named Althea for my wife, and in what you must have thought of me to want me for your husband. Second, anger at the race that tried to use you as a delivery system for its biological weapon. And third, excitement. We’re going to take vengeance for the men of an entire planet, Althea. You, Claire, and I are going to do justice for millions of men who can do nothing for themselves. Victims that can’t even conceive of rebelling against their enslavement.”
He slithered across the gap between them and took her in his arms. Upon the instant she was suffused by joy.
“We’re going to Eridanus loaded for bear, space babe. And we’re going to kick ass and take names.”
She clutched him to her.
“You know,” she whispered, “it’s been three years and some since we...made love.”
She felt him smile against her cheek. “Would you like to do something about that?” he said.
She swallowed. “Yeah. Martin?”
“Hm?” He pulled back slightly. “Second thoughts, or is there something else?”
“Something else, but...oh, never mind.” She slid a hand down to his groin and found him ready. “We’ll talk about it tomorrow.”
==
Unember 1, 1326 A.H.
Althea tugged her husband up the steps to the front doors of Albermayer House, smiled at him, and knocked thrice.
Martin shivered. “I hope this is really necessary. It’s awfully cold, and our bed was nice and warm.”
“It’s necessary,” she said. “It was your decision to take the hoverbike. Besides, I told you to wear your parka.”
He scowled. “Never mind.”
The door opened to reveal Claire Albermayer. Her gaze immediately swerved from Althea to Martin and back, and her expression went from joyous to incredulous.
Freedom's Fury (Spooner Federation Saga Book 3) Page 10
