by Chris Reher
Tychon had come to his feet and stared at his protégé with astonishment. “You cut your hair?”
Nova tugged on Jovan’s sleeve to turn him. His blue hair was cut in a fetching way but there was no braid trailing over his back. She bit her lip before mentioning that she actually found his new look rather attractive.
Jovan turned back and put his arm around her shoulder, possibly as a defensive measure against Tychon’s disapproval. “Yes. It’s a long story. So! Where is Cyann?”
“On her way,” Nova said with a glance at Tychon. He was still studying Jovan’s coiffure, his expression unreadable. “She is going to tease you without mercy about your haircut. How was your trip?”
Jovan grinned. “The last eight years or the jaunt from Targon?”
“Don’t think we haven’t been studying your reports ever since you got back into com range. By now Tychon knows more about your travels than you probably remember. What wonderful things you’ve seen.” She nudged him to sit on one of the broad lounges. “You’ve made him all itchy to head out with Anders in a few days. Your timing is excellent.”
Tychon came to sit with them. “Just a short cataloging trip to Cet-Norwan,” he said. “But we may have found a sentient species related to the ancients of Gramor and Pella.”
“That would make quite a mystery,” Jovan said, interested. “There’s not even a keyhole linking those systems.”
“How long will you be on Delphi?” Nova asked.
“A while. I had my med tests on Targon but I need to catch up at the enclave. Then I want to get some real air, some real food, some real hot baths.”
“You’ll stay with us, of course,” Nova said. “Not that dreary enclave. The Shantirs can wait. There is a huge meal waiting for you at home and all the hot water you want.”
Jovan smiled broadly. “You don’t know how much I’ve missed that. Well, and you, of course,” he added quickly. “And my little Cyann. Did she ever forgive me for leaving?”
“She got over her crush eventually,” Nova smiled, remembering a time when Cyann had regarded Jovan as every handsome hero of the adventure stories she used to read. “Too busy for boys right now, I think. She’s become a very accomplished biologist. Her work with Anders has drawn attention all the way to Targon. She also did a year on Aikhor as a field medic. It was time well spent.”
“Until she almost got herself killed trying to patch up a bunch of rebels,” Tychon added with a scowl. “She has a good heart, but I found myself vindicated for insisting on combat training for her, as much as she hated it.”
Jovan laughed. “Cyann? With a gun?”
“Don’t scoff,” Tychon said. “She’s nearly as good a shot as Nova. Ended up blasting her way out of there and escaped on a half-dead charger. Her regret was having killed the men that she just spent all that effort in healing.”
Jovan shook his head. “I’ve missed a lot.”
“You’ll catch up,” Nova promised. “And while we’re on that subject, hand it over.”
He threw a knowing glance at Tychon. “You saw that, huh?” He shifted to withdraw the gun lashed to his thigh. She took it eagerly and turned toward the light of the window to inspect it more closely. “It’s yours,” he added. “You’d rob me at gunpoint for it otherwise, anyway.”
The men watched her expertly handle the weapon as she examined it for the new innovations he had brought back. “You’re a sweet boy. How did they get this so compact?” she marveled. “This comes from Cha’el?”
“Well, that’s what the smuggler said. You’ll have to test it. I’d love to know where we can get more of those.”
“I’ll be the envy of Targon with this. I’ll have to show it off for a while before we take it apart.”
Jovan turned to Tychon. “Does Cyann at least still appreciate pretty baubles brought at huge expense from the Badlands, even if Nova prefers rail guns?”
Tychon sighed dramatically. “She’s her mother’s daughter. If the pretty bauble you brought back comes with a caliper or a gene map, it’s sure to please.” He smiled when he felt Nova’s touch in his mind like a playful kiss.
They turned to the door when it slid aside to bring Anders into the room. He also wore a heavy coat and clapped his arms in an effort to get warm. “Here you are. And a wise choice that is, what with it being cold enough outside to freeze the gonads off a polar daram. Right balmy in the valley compared to this.”
“Hey, Anders,” Nova said. “We’ve been worried.”
“No, we haven’t,” Tychon said in lieu of greeting his Human brother-friend. “Where’s Cyann?”
“Uh, she went to the ship for a bit. Said she had to shut down a centrifuge.”
Nova frowned and glanced at Jovan. “She had to do that now?”
“Apparently,” Anders said. He spread his arms and Jovan dutifully submitted to the traditional Human greeting involving embrace and full body contact that most Delphians viewed with curious amusement. Anders released him to scrutinize him through narrowed eyes. “What happened to your hair, Jovie?”
“What happened to yours!” Jovan replied, jerking his chin at Anders, whose closely cropped blond hair had turned completely white now.
“Never mind that,” Tychon interrupted. “It’s not like Cyann to be rude.” He raised his arm to activate his com.
Anders put his hand on Tychon’s wrist to stop him from calling her. “She’ll be along shortly,” he said. “She’s... I don’t know. Give her some room.”
“What do you mean?” Nova said. “She was feeling better yesterday.”
“Is she ill?” Jovan said.
Anders shook his head. “I don’t know. Something is bothering her. Trouble concentrating. Had a close call with a native species on Cet-Norwan. Not sleeping well. And yet she refuses treatment from the Shantirs. Shan Moghen is very concerned about her.” He ran his hand over the silky stubble on his head. “That voice is back. She’s very disturbed by that, I think.”
Nova gasped. “It’s back? It’s been years.”
“Has it?” Tychon pondered. “You’d think she’d mention something if it had come back all of a sudden.”
“Why wouldn’t she?”
He shrugged. “Kids don’t tell their parents everything.”
“Stop it, you two,” Anders said, sounding exasperated. “She is not a kid. You seem to forget that she’s only half Delphian. No one knows how old she really is, compared to her peers. She’s leaps ahead of people in her age group. I’m guessing she’s catching up to Jovan’s age now. She’s got your massive streak of mischief, Nova, but she’s proven a maturity that I’d not expect from a Delphian her age.” His pale eyebrows drew together when he looked directly at Nova. “You should know better. But even you only see the Delphian there because that’s what she looks like. Well, she’s not all Delphian. And she is not a child, so stop treating her like one.”
The others gaped at him in silent astonishment.
Anders seemed surprised by his own outburst. “Well, it’s true,” he said more calmly. “I’ve been working with her for years now. I see what she’s capable of. But not only do we not know how old she is, we don’t know how her mind works. The difference between Human and Delphian is largely cerebral and so far not even the Shantirs have figured out that synapse anomaly. Who knows what’s going on in her head? If she’s suffering some sort of mental aberration we need to find out, not grief her for showing up late.”
Tychon nodded thoughtfully. “And we’re not likely to find out if she won’t talk about it or allow the Shantirs to help her.”
“Isn’t there anybody who might know what’s going on?” Jovan said.
Anders shook his head. “Not really. I’m as close to her as anyone. She gets along with the crew, but they’re just colleagues. She spends a fair bit of time with one of the younger Shantirs at the enclave. Tava, I think his name is.”
Jovan made a hissing sound and sat back.
“What?” Nova asked.
“N
ot the most upstanding specimen ever produced by the enclave,” he replied. “Although I haven’t seen him in a long time, either, so who knows.”
“Tell me more,” Tychon said, a dangerous edge in his voice. Nova winced when she felt the change of his mood. Although he valued the Shantirs’ tremendous mental abilities he barely tolerated their presence and avoided them as much as he could. He did not fault Jovan for joining their sect – it was the previous generation that had irrevocably harmed his clan, long ago. It had taken years before he had allowed them access to his only daughter so that they could study the peculiar circumstances of her birth. So far, none of them had given him reason to regret that decision.
Jovan raised his hands in a placating gesture. “Just a bit of a tosspot,” he said quickly. “I would not worry.”
“Yes, she’s safe at the enclave,” Anders hastened to reassure. “She’ll come around. I told her that I won’t let her crew if Shan Moghen has any doubts about her fitness. That should be enough incentive to let him take a look. But I know she’s following her khamal exercises and she already seems a lot more relaxed.”
Tychon’s frown did not leave his face.
“I’ll take a room at the enclave,” Jovan offered. “Maybe I can be of help there.”
“I think that’ll put our minds at ease,” Nova said. “But not until tomorrow. You’re in desperate need of that meal I promised. Look at you! You’re so thin and pale!”
Anders nudged her with an elbow. “Delphian, remember?” He grinned at Jovan. “Don’t worry. She didn’t prepare any of it. They’ve got a new cook that’ll have you begging for thirds.”
Jovan leaned back with a deep sigh of relief, which earned him a painful pinch to the thigh from Nova.
“There she is,” Nova said, probably louder than necessary, when her daughter entered the lounge. “Hello, Cyann. Come look who fell out of the sky today.”
Cyann seemed startled when all four of them came to their feet. Then the fleeting glimpse they had had of her tired face disappeared and was replaced by the beguiling smile that could turn the mood of even the most dour of Shantirs. “I’m sorry,” she said. “I forgot to close up one of our experiments.” She winced when she looked at Anders. “The centrifuge shut down on its own but I’m afraid the sample is spoiled. I’ll start again tomorrow.”
Anders shook his head at this triviality and then tilted it toward Jovan.
Cyann turned to her family’s one and only liege and it seemed for a moment that she would, as had always been her custom, careen across the room and into his arms, as impulsive and affectionate as her Human mother. But instead she just smiled warmly. “Welcome home, Jovie,” she said. “We have missed you.”
Nova peered at the young Shantir, a little surprised by Cyann’s stilted greeting. What she saw there, however, was even more surprising. She had heard his quick intake of breath when Cyann had entered the room and now he was staring at her with an expression she had not seen on his face before. Gradually, whatever it was faded behind the practiced mask of indifference that Delphians used to keep their thoughts private.
“Hello, Cy, I’ve missed you, too,” he said.
Did you see that? Nova sent to Tychon.
He started at the small jab of pain when she did that. See what?
Not sure. Did these two have a fight or something before he left?
Not that I know of. Tychon studied Jovan’s bland expression for a moment before returning a mental shrug. Probably worried about her. She’s not even noticed his hair.
Not going to task him about that, are you?
He ran a long-fingered hand through his own tresses. Suits him. Think it’ll suit me?
Don’t even think about it!
Nova stepped forward and slung her arm around Cyann’s waist. “Let’s get home before someone notices I’m still around and starts complaining about the astronomy experiment going on over our heads.” She herded them toward the door. “No doubt I’ll have half the Council on my doorstep in the morning because of that asteroid.”
Chapter Three
“You are still not finding it?”
Cyann shifted her eyes from the crystal display in front of her to the Shantir seated below the curved window of the meditation room. “I try, Shan Regin.”
She said nothing for a long while during which she returned her attention to the focus of her meditation. The khamal she was using was meant to reach beyond the physical boundaries of herself to help her find the source of these rare thoughts that were not her own. She breathed deeply, as always enjoying the aroma of waxed wood and the healers’ herbal medicines permeating the entire communal wing of the enclave. Although she had not linked her mind to the Shantir, she felt the woman’s soothing presence as much as the scents.
The Shantir nodded to another cleric that had shared the room. He rose fluidly from his mat and left them alone. “Why are you afraid?” Regin said.
“I am?” Cyann replied.
“It’s what I feel from you.”
“I’m afraid you won’t let me rejoin the expedition.”
“You would be right,” Regin said dryly. She straightened an already impeccable fold of her long blue vest. “But that wasn’t my point.”
Cyann shrugged. “I’m not afraid of anything at the moment. Anders Devaughn is making too much of nothing. I was tired and I got distracted.”
“But the voice?”
“You said yourself that I could be catching random patterns. Mental echoes from other species. Memories. Shantir meditations, even. You’ve always maintained that theory.”
The Shantir seemed to ponder this. “Yet you feel that this voice is speaking to you. Calling to you.”
“It could well have been coming from one of the natives we were studying. We don’t know anything about them. I really do think that I was picking something up from them. Surely it’s something we should study, no? So I need to go back there and check it out.”
Regin smiled. “You are persuasive. Let me talk to the others. We’ll decide tomorrow.”
Cyann nodded and stretched her legs a moment before standing. The Shantir’s decision had more weight than even the doctors at the Union’s base clinic. Not only was the expedition to Cet-Norwan funded by Delphi’s considerable scientific community, but Cyann had long ago been declared by the Clan Council as Delphian. No off-worlder ever argued with the Shantirs on the matter of Delphian mental states. And it would not occur to Anders, who had lived among them all his life, to question their authority in this. “I’ll come back at noon.”
She bowed respectfully and slipped out of the room and into the silent hallway. A few Shantirs and their initiates passed her. The elder Shantirs nodded, as always strangely deferential to the accident of her birth which made her the enclave’s most revered mystery. She had no real idea why that would be so; both her own and her parents’ genes had been studied in excruciating detail. Whatever hadn’t been discovered by now would likely remain a secret, she thought. The younger Shantirs simply regarded her warily, as though she might sprout an extra nose or two. No one questioned her presence here in the publicly accessible section of the enclave.
She turned a corner at the end of the hall and hurried into one of the enclave’s residential wings. The broad corridor served as a commons area, furnished with comfortable benches arranged companionably along a glass wall. It offered a pleasant view of the gardens and fields where even now some of the novices worked to prepare for the growing season. Although supported by the people to whom they dispensed healing, the sect preferred to be as self-sustaining as possible, beholden to not even the governing body of Delphi. It was no secret that it was the Council, in fact, that took much direction from their advisors within the enclave.
To her left a long row of doors running the full length of the wing led to the private rooms used by the Shantirs. Cyann quickly walked to the end and tapped on one of them. After a few moments Tava appeared and looked over her shoulder into the hall. “I did n
ot think I would see you today,” he said.
She stepped into his room. Like all of them, it was plain but comfortable, furnished in polished wood and several interesting tapestries. “I was with Shan Regin. I told you that. I’m hoping she’ll let me go back out tomorrow.”
He regarded her silently, without expression. It was not often that he allowed anything to show on his face and she told herself that she didn’t care enough to find what he might be thinking. It was just a Delphian custom to display emotions only among closest kin and rarely meant any sort of subterfuge anyway. But the hard blue eyes in his hatchet face seemed to see a little more than she was prepared to share and she began to regret coming here today. She walked to the small balcony, little more than a platform with a low railing, overlooking the eastern mountain range.
“You know, maybe I should just get some sleep before tomorrow,” she said, still looking outside. But he came to stand close behind her and she felt his hands on her shoulders.
“That isn’t what you want, though, is it?” he said. His fingers brushed along her neck and then to the side of her head.
She closed her eyes and shook her head.
“You want to try again?”
“Yes,” she whispered and almost at once felt his presence slip into her mind to create the khamal mind-link. His touch was as edgy and harsh as Regin’s was soothing but this was what she needed. This made it work.
“Come sit,” he said and turned her toward his sleeper, a neatly made-up couch along one of the walls of the narrow room. She obeyed, feeling his touch inside her head expand and take hold. Far more intrusive than the expert contact of the elder Shantirs, it felt both familiar and frightening. He eased his grip, asking for her trust and her surrender to his ministrations.
She smiled when she let her mind wander free to float weightlessly somewhere out there in the distance and yet deep inside herself. Why would anyone ever want to be anywhere else? She sighed contentedly when he took her further into this void, almost as enraptured by this as she was.
