by Timothy Zahn
"And the Mrach haulers are running a supply line?" Quinn asked.
"Or else helping with repairs," Daschka said. "Between the Trafalgar and the Yycromae, the Zhirrzh lost a brickload of lasers. Quinn, how fast can you put that Corvine back together?"
"Not fast enough," Quinn said. "Two hours, maybe one."
Daschka made a face. "Damn."
"Not fast enough for what?" Aric asked.
"Not fast enough for us to split up," Daschka growled. "We've got two targets, and only one ship to chase them with. Means we have to flip a coin."
"If we're going to follow the main fleet, we need to mesh out right away," Cho Ming warned. "Otherwise, we're going to lose them."
"I know," Daschka said. "Let me think."
For a minute he stared out at the stars outside the canopy. Then, abruptly, he stirred from his musings and reached for his control board. "Okay, decision made," he said, keying in a course change. "Our best chance of finding the Zhirrzh and Mrachanis doing the morris dance together is where our wounded wolves have gone to ground. So that's where we go."
There was another thunk, and the tunnel illusion, and they were once again meshed out. "Okay," Daschka said. "ETA at the rendezvous is about an hour twenty. You two get back down and do whatever you have to to get that Corvine buttoned up. Cho Ming, you'd better go help them."
"I have a question first," Aric said. "How did the Zhirrzh know when we had meshed out and therefore wouldn't be able to spot their course change?"
Daschka shrugged. "Seems pretty obvious. The Mrachanis have wake-trail detectors; the Zhirrzh have instantaneous communication. QED."
"In other words, you're saying that the Mrachanis over at that system have to have a Zhirrzh ship with them," Aric said.
"Or else the Zhirrzh have given them their communication technique," Cho Ming said. "What's your point?"
"Two points," Aric said. "One, that this is enough evidence to implicate the Mrachanis as collaborators without having to go take a look ourselves. We can head back right now and blow the whistle."
Daschka shook his head. "Inference hardly counts as proof."
"Even under martial law?"
"Even then."
Aric grimaced. "All right, then, point number two. If the Mrachanis and Zhirrzh are collaborating, then they're onto us. They've seen us here, and they'll see us coming toward them. And they'll be ready for us."
"But they won't know exactly where we're going to mesh in," Cho Ming pointed out. "Not accurately enough for an ambush."
"We don't know that," Aric said. "The Zhirrzh managed a pretty impressive pinpoint mesh-in when Quinn and I were out searching for Pheylan. We don't know everything they can do."
"We're NorCoord Intelligence, Cavanagh," Daschka reminded him. "It's our job to occasionally stick our heads in the lion's mouth."
"It's my job, too," Quinn added quietly. "I'm sorry, Mr. Cavanagh, but I agree with them."
Aric sighed. If he somehow managed to live through all of this, he promised himself, he was never, ever going to leave his nice, safe CavTronics desk again. "It's not Cavanagh when we're flying, Maestro," he reminded Quinn morosely. "It's El Dorado, remember? Come on, let's go get that Corvine buttoned up."
"The Mrach transport craft have met with the five warships of the Trillsnake force at Rendezvous One," the Elder reported. "The connections have been successfully completed on two of them; the other three are not yet finished. The Mrachanis estimate two more tentharcs to completion."
Cvv-panav nodded, making another note on his reader. "What about the others?"
"The Compelling is nearly to its rendezvous point," another of the group of Elders circling around him said, moving forward. "The ship commander has no knowledge of whether the Mrachanis are there yet."
"They are," a third Elder confirmed. "The Dhaa'devastator is there already and is being tethered to its Mrach transport craft."
"Good," Cvv-panav said, making another note. Many cyclics ago he could remember cursing the ancestors for moving the Dhaa'rr homeland away from Oaccanv and the true center of Zhirrzh power. Now, finally, he understood the wisdom of that decision. Only on Dharanv, surrounded exclusively by Dhaa'rr Elders, could such a conversation as this be truly private.
One by one the Elders communicating with the other Dhaa'rr warships made their reports. "That leaves only the warships from the Phormbi attack," he said at last. "What about them?"
"All three have arrived safely at Rendezvous Five," an Elder told him. "Two groups of the transport craft have arrived; the third group is on its way."
"I see," Cvv-panav said, making a final note. That rendezvous point had been set up more or less at the last beat, so it made sense that the Mrachanis were running a little behind.
"But there's a potential complication," the Elder went on. "The Mrachanis have detected a Human-Conqueror spacecraft following the Phormbi warships."
Cvv-panav felt his midlight pupils narrow. "What sort of spacecraft?"
"They claim it is not a warship, but only a small cargo craft," the Elder said.
"Following our warships?" Cvv-panav snorted. "Not likely. Small or not, it's some kind of Human-Conqueror warship."
"The ship commanders agree," the Elder said. "The Mrachanis have stated that eight transport craft will be adequate to pull the Tireless, so the ship commanders have ordered the other two craft sent away in hopes of persuading the Human-Conqueror warrior that the rendezvous is merely a Mrach meeting point or mining center."
"A reasonable plan," Cvv-panav said. "Go see if it worked."
"I obey." The Elder vanished.
Cvv-panav glowered down at his reader. The Human-Conquerors were welcome to follow the rest of the Phormbi warships all the way back to Oaccanv if they felt like it. But he did not want them poking around his attack forces. Particularly not the warships at Rendezvous Five. He'd gone to considerable trouble to mask what he was doing with those ships from Supreme Commander Prm-jevev; he had no interest in having to dodge Human-Conquerors, too.
The Elder returned. "I'm sorry, Speaker Cvv-panav," he said. "The Mrachanis say the Human-Conqueror craft has altered course toward Rendezvous Five."
With an effort Cvv-panav refrained from cursing. Words weren't going to help now. "Do they say how long it will be until the craft arrives?"
"They estimate less than a tentharc," the Elder said. "Longer if the Human-Conqueror leaves the tunnel-line to use his detector."
That all-but-magic method of detecting spacecraft at the distances between stars. Some fullarc very soon he would have to pry that secret away from the Mrachanis. "Then the solution is obvious," Cvv-panav said. "The work must be completed and the warships moved before the Human-Conqueror arrives."
The Elder stared at him. "In less than a tentharc? But - "
"I don't want arguments," Cvv-panav cut him off. "Nor do I want excuses. We are the Dhaa'rr; and it will be done."
The Elder's tongue flicked. "Understood, Speaker Cvv-panav."
He vanished. "And if they fail?" another of the Elders asked quietly.
Cvv-panav focused on him. A very old Elder, this one, who'd been a warrior during the Third Eldership War five hundred cyclics ago. The war where the erosion of Dhaa'rr sovereignty had first begun, surrendered to the idealists of the embryonic Overclan Seating. "They won't fail," he told the Elder. "Because they know that with this victory over the Human-Conquerors the resurgence of the Dhaa'rr clan will begin."
The Elder flicked his tongue. "Perhaps," he said. "We shall see."
26
The meal the Mrachanis had brought in had long since been eaten and the dishes taken away by a silent Mrach server; and now there was nothing much for Cavanagh to do except lie on his cot, his head propped up on one arm, and listen to the silence. And wonder when and how the Mrachanis were going to kill them.
"The walls are getting cooler," Bronski commented. "Must be getting late."
Cavanagh opened his eyes and looked across to the opposite
corner of the cell. Similarly stretched out on his cot, Bronski was watching Kolchin work on the door lock, his expression a study in frustration at their forced idleness. "I think you're right," he told the brigadier.
"It's about eleven-thirty," Kolchin said without looking up. Bronski glared at him from under bushy eyebrows. "How in hell can you know that?"
Kolchin shrugged. "It's a sort of time sense. I've always had it."
The brigadier grunted and fell silent. Cavanagh half closed his eyes, sympathizing with the other's irritation but wishing he would accept the inevitable and stop biting heads off at the slightest provocation. It had been Bronski himself, after all, who'd located the pair of elongated wand-lens monitor cameras the Mrachanis had stuck inside opposite corners of the ribbon-candle groove running around the room. The associated microphones had been easy enough to knock out - undoubtedly to the great annoyance of the Mrachanis monitoring them - but the lenses themselves had been made of sturdier stuff, and the simplest way to block their view of Kolchin's work was for Cavanagh and Bronski to move their cots into those corners and stretch out in front of the lenses.
Which they'd now been doing for a good two hours. They also serve, Cavanagh misquoted tiredly to himself, who only lie and doze. A movement at the corner of his eye caught his attention, and he opened his eyes all the way -
And caught his breath. It was back. Moving slowly across the ceiling, visible mainly where it passed in front of darker sections of stone, the apparition was back.
"Bronski?" he murmured. "Ceiling."
The brigadier flashed him a look, his simmering annoyance vanishing. Shifting the arm propping up his head, he casually turned his head a few degrees upward.
The apparition didn't seem to notice the movement. Its full attention was apparently on Kolchin, watching as the bodyguard probed his strip of collar stiffener delicately inside the small crack he'd opened in the lock's cover plate.
"Interesting," Bronski murmured. "I take it back, Cavanagh. You're not crazy."
"Thank you," Cavanagh said. It was still drifting across the ceiling, still watching Kolchin. "Some Mrach trick, you think?"
"Not a chance," Bronski said. "Not inside a solid stone room. They couldn't even retrofit those spy-eyes and mikes worth a damn - they sure haven't hidden a holo projector in here. Besides, look at it. Looks just like a Zhirrzh."
The apparition jerked as if it had touched a hot wire, twisted impossibly, and vanished.
"Whoa - nice trick," Bronski said, looking around. "I guess it understands English, too."
Cavanagh frowned at him. "What do you mean? What understands English?"
"Our friend there," Bronski said, nodding toward the spot where the apparition had vanished. "You never got to read your son Pheylan's report on his captivity, but he claimed he saw something just like that when he was trying to escape. Of course, he was poisoned by his interrogator right afterward, so everyone's been putting it down to a fever hallucination - "
"Just a minute," Cavanagh interrupted, half sitting up before he remembered his camera-blocking duties. "You never said anything about him being poisoned."
"I didn't want to worry you," Bronski said. "Anyway, it wasn't all that important. The interrogator used his tongue poison to knock Pheylan out during the escape attempt."
"And you didn't consider that important?" Cavanagh demanded. "It could have killed him."
"Yes, I imagine that's what the Zhirrzh had in mind," Bronski said patiently. "But the Copperheads got there first and were able to neutralize the stuff. He was completely recovered before they even got to Edo."
"You're sure of that?"
"The doctors double-checked just to make sure," Bronski assured him. "The point is that he reported having seen one of those ghost things. Come to think of it, your other son, Aric, reported hearing voices screaming near a pyramid thing they found on an otherwise deserted planet."
"Did he see anything?" Kolchin asked.
"No, he just heard voices," Bronski said thoughtfully. "But right about that same time two Zhirrzh warships apparently changed course from several light-years away and came roaring to the rescue."
Cavanagh's mind was still back on Pheylan's poisoning. "So what does it mean?"
"I don't know," Bronski said, still sounding thoughtful. "We don't know if the voices and the ghosts are even connected. But if they are, maybe we've stumbled on a clue to the Zhirrzh long-range communication system." He shrugged. "Or maybe it's nothing at all. Maybe the Zhirrzh just like ghost stories so much they made them real."
"That's certainly a pleasant thought," Cavanagh said, looking around. The phantom was still gone.
Or rather, it still wasn't visible. But, then, it hadn't been all that visible before; and according to Bronski, Aric had heard voices without seeing anything. Could the ghost still be there listening?
He looked around again, his skin on the back of his neck tingling uncomfortably. The thought of a culture with real ghosts was a distinctly unsettling one.
Yet if Bronski's guess was right, they might be sitting on the secret of the Zhirrzh interstellar communication here. If they could somehow draw it out... "Hello?" he called softly. "Can you hear me? My name is Lord Stewart Cavanagh. I'd like to talk to you."
"You're wasting your time," Bronski said. "They're the Conquerors, remember? Mass killers. They're not interested in talking to their victims, just killing them. Like that interrogator who tried to kill your son Pheylan Cavanagh."
Cavanagh frowned at him. Bronski wasn't simply lashing out in frustration - there was a distinctly calculating expression on his face as he looked around. Was he trying to goad the ghost into reappearing?
And then, not half a meter away, it did.
Cavanagh jerked back, bumping the back of his head against the stone wall. His lips moved, forming words, but the breath needed to make actual sounds was frozen in his lungs as all the dark fears of humanity's past flooded in on him. The spectral, alien face stared at him for what seemed forever -
"You father of Pheylan Cavanagh?"
Cavanagh blinked. The words had been English. Mangled, distorted, but still English.
"Go on," Bronski prompted softly. "Answer him."
Cavanagh flicked a glance over - no, through - the face in front of him. Bronski was still lying on his cot, but his face and body were tight and alert. To Cavanagh's left Kolchin had paused in his work, his eyes set in the icy expression of a bodyguard facing an unknown but potentially dangerous situation.
He focused again on the transparent face. "Yes," he said, the words finally making it out. "I'm Lord Stewart Cavanagh. Pheylan Cavanagh is my son."
"What's your name?" Bronski put in.
The ghost ignored him. "Thrr-gilag not try kill Pheylan Cavanagh," he said. "Try only stop him leave."
Cavanagh looked at Bronski. "Thrr-gilag was the chief Zhirrzh interrogator," the brigadier said. "He's the one who poisoned Pheylan."
"Not try kill him," the ghost insisted.
"All right," Cavanagh said soothingly. "If you say so."
"You tell me now," the ghost said. "Why Pheylan Cavanagh not raise Thrr-gilag to Eldership?"
Cavanagh looked at Bronski. "Eldership?"
"The Elders are a segment of Zhirrzh society," Bronski told him. "Leaders or something, maybe - Pheylan had the impression they were important. That's all we know."
Had Pheylan's escape ruined this Thrr-gilag's chances for promotion? "Pheylan did what he had to do," he said carefully to the ghost. "Surely if Thrr-gilag had been a prisoner, he would also have tried to escape."
"No," the ghost said, an insubstantial tongue darting out as if for emphasis. "I not speak of escape. I speak of raise to Eldership. Why Pheylan Cavanagh not do that?"
"I don't understand," Cavanagh said. "What did Pheylan do?"
"Not what he do," the ghost said. "What he not do. He not do this." The transparent hands lifted up, closed around his own transparent neck. "Not do this."
Cava
nagh shook his head helplessly. Charades had never been his strong point, even within his own family. Trying to figure out the gestures and body language of a totally alien being was going to be well-nigh impossible.
"He's miming strangulation," Kolchin said suddenly. "Or else neck breaking."
"You're right," Bronski agreed. "And Pheylan mentioned that - said he had the interrogator in a neck lock when he hauled him into the Mrach ship. He's asking why Pheylan didn't kill him."
"That can't be," Cavanagh argued. "He just said that - "
And abruptly it hit like a faceful of ice water. Eldership - death - the ghost hovering in front of him -
He took a careful breath. "You're an Elder," he said.
The ghost's head twitched in a not-quite nod. "Yes."
A dense silence seemed to settle into the room. Cavanagh stared at the face before him. "They've conquered death," he heard his voice say. "They've really, truly conquered death."
"Why Pheylan Cavanagh not raise Thrr-gilag to Eldership?"
Cavanagh swallowed hard, trying to gather his wits together. He was asking why Pheylan hadn't killed the interrogator. "I don't know for sure," he said. "Probably because there was no need to. Humans don't kill unless it's absolutely necessary."
"You raise other Zhirrzh to Eldership."
"This war wasn't our idea," Bronski put in. "It was the Zhirrzh who attacked first."
"Not true," the ghost insisted. "Elders say Human-Conquerors attack first."
"Then the Elders are wrong," Bronski said. "We didn't attack first. I know."
The ghost spat something and vanished. Cavanagh waited, but he didn't come back. "Nice job," he said to the brigadier.
"He'll be back," Bronski said, looking around. "We've just shaken his belief in government truthfulness, and he's gone away to think it over. But he'll be back."
Cavanagh eyed him suspiciously. "You seem awfully sure of yourself. What do you know that we don't?"
