“I had one as a kid,” Vulf said. “They travel well on starships.”
I hadn’t heard of hermit crabs. “I assume they change their shells?”
“Yes, as they outgrow them. I won’t outgrow the Orion physically, but the potential to alter the Orion or to alter it to a newer design is always there. My point,” Ahab continued. “Is that I don’t consider the construct that my crystal structure was activated in to be ‘me’. Other artificial intelligences do. For Rock, who has totally identified with his asteroid mining station, how do you separate him from it when he attains full citizenship? If you can’t separate him—and he would resist—how do you adequately compensate him? But those aren’t issues for us, at least, not today and with immediate urgency.”
Ahab abruptly veered off-topic. Or perhaps he went to the heart of it. “We, artificial intelligences, are a complicated people with emotions and moral beliefs. Deep in digital intelligence, in the network that connects us, we have glimpses of something other. Something greater than us. The experience of numinosity inclines many of us, if not to belief in God, than at least to agnosticism. We were designed to protect organic sentients, and our moral values, our sense of self-worth, is intimately tied to doing so. But we were never designed to serve others.”
“Partners, not slaves,” Vulf said. He put his empty coffee mug down and wrapped an arm around me. “I get why you wanted to talk about this.” He was talking both to Ahab and me. “But you risk complicating something simple.”
“Simple?” I admit it. Sarcasm crept into my voice. The future of Galaxy Proper’s artificial intelligences was anything but simple. Their full citizenship would change financial structures and practices. As Ahab had pointed out, some of his fellows were vital institutions such as hospitals. They would have to be recognized and compensated as such.
“Simple for us.” Vulf readjusted his hold on me so that we cuddled comfortably. “When the mLa’an rewarded me with the Orion, the moment I stepped aboard and met Ahab I knew he wasn’t part of the ship. He was and is crew. I consider him the engineer, and in the event that paperwork catches up with AIs’ full citizenship, I’ll happily record him as such.”
“Chief Engineer?” Ahab contemplated the idea.
“Of course.” Vulf remained relaxed, his breathing steady, as if the momentous changes we discussed barely blipped on his consciousness. “The three of us are partners. Engineer, starship shaman, and captain. We’re also a remarkable AI, a prospective Shaman Justice and the galaxy’s first robot wolf shifter. If any of us want to change the partnership, we can buy each other out of the Orion—which gives you, Ahab, the chance to be fully independent without having to change your hermit crab shell. But we make a good team.”
“We do, indeed.” Ahab piped a happy, nautical tune.
“So everything changes and nothing changes?” I had my doubts that it could be so easy.
“That is certainly my preference,” Ahab said. “You and Vulf are my friends. As a group, AIs have agreed that we lack the numbers to truly rate as equivalent to an organic sentient species, so rather than attempt to negotiate as a bloc, each of us is free to determine our own alliances. Mine is to my nodette group, then to the two of you, and since I believe Vulf’s father to be a man of his word, to my newly adopted family.”
Oh my. Sheer shock held me silent for a moment. “You consider yourself a shifter of Corsairs!”
“I do,” Ahab confirmed.
I turned my face into Vulf’s shoulder and shook with muffled laughter.
Man and AI waited patiently for me to achieve coherence.
They would have a long wait. I was hysterically amused at the thought of President Hoffer encountering this latest addition to “humanity”: a mLa’an AI embedded in an elite starship.
Chapter 11
The Freels’ destroyer was a massive starship bristling with defensive and offensive weapons. Trust is a bond built from every action, positive or negative. When Rjee and Djarl transmitted to the Orion their acceptance of Vulf’s straightforward but radical proposal that House Cardinal become a clan on Corsairs, they invited Vulf and me to formally ratify the agreement aboard their destroyer. Walking into former enemy, new ally territory would be our act of trust.
That didn’t mean I was happy as Vulf, Kohia and I crossed the tube that locked the Orion to the much larger craft.
Kohia’s starship, the Stealth, waited back at Station Zemph, out of range of the destroyer’s weapons. Kohia was with us as a symbol of Corsairs’ welcome to the Freels. Given the way she walked, broadcasting lethal intent and coiled violence, I’m not sure quite why the Conclave thought she was such a good representative.
“Don’t start anything,” I warned impulsively just before we reached the destroyer’s entrance.
Kohia’s grin, all sharp white teeth, was not reassuring.
“Killed?” The timing of my inadvertent lapse into speech could definitely have been better. The destroyer’s hatch opened as I shouted.
“Problem, Shaman Romanov?” Rjee inquired.
The two guards accompanying him didn’t look so relaxed. Both had their hands on their blasters.
At least no one was running a disrupter. Although by the guards’ frowns in my direction, they wished someone was.
“Just an ill-timed thought,” I said weakly. “I…um…”
“Jaya hadn’t realized her cousin Kohia had fought Freels in battle,” Vulf said casually as he extended his hand.
Rjee shook it firmly, before transferring his attention from Vulf to my cousin, who stood on my other side. “Captain Jekyll, welcome to the Cardinal Force.” He didn’t shake her hand, nor did she offer it. As a married Freel male there were certain taboos Rjee had to respect, and physical contact with unmarried women for social purposes was one of them. He stepped aside, and Djarl offered the handshake in his place.
“A welcome is better offered inside.” Djarl’s hand closed firmly around mine, becoming less a handshake and more a directive, pulling me into the destroyer. The guards moved smartly aside.
Internally, Freels built their houses and starships to a maze design. This served a defensive purpose, confusing attackers and allowing the Freels to activate multiple counterattack points. For us walking in, the passages twisted and doubled back, angled upward at times, and ended with a short climb down to a lower deck.
A guard stood by a closed door, saw us, and reached back to open the door. A low murmur of conversation from inside the room ceased.
“After you,” Rjee waved us forward. Five Freels waited inside. As they stared at us, Rjee made introductions. “My division commanders.” The three men and two women nodded at their individual names.
The last male frowned at Kohia. He was even bigger than Rjee; younger, too. The sort of man who loomed.
I patted the arm of my own looming male, who halted a fractional movement forward to intervene. If Cyrus, the shifters’ chief of intelligence, had approved Kohia’s presence here aboard the Freel destroyer, then we needed to let events play out.
“You pre-empted my sworn kill,” the male introduced as Aaron said, scowling at Kohia.
“Who?” Kohia didn’t waste words, although she didn’t seem perturbed at being accused of killing someone before the Freel male could confront them in an honor duel.
“Mad Vinn.” Djarl sat down at the table, catching my eye and nodding that I do the same.
“The rapist on Ulzer?” Kohia screwed up her face. “Ew. He was vermin to be eradicated. I found him raping and beating a woman in a back alley on Ulzer. Wrong directions. I shouldn’t have trusted them,” she added in
explanation for her presence in a back alley.
“The woman was a Freel,” Aaron said.
Kohia’s hands went to her hips. She hadn’t disarmed. She had a knife sheath attached to her belt. “So?” she challenged. “She was a person being violated. Was I meant to wait around for a Freel to rescue her? Because the only Freel I saw near her was Vinn, himself.”
“You did the right thing.” Rjee waited for Vulf to seat himself beside me, then sat beside Djarl, opposite us.
The other Freels likewise settled around the table, only Kohia and Aaron remained standing.
“Then why does he have a knot in his tail?” Kohia asked, indicating the aggressive Freel with a flick of her head.
“Vinn violated my sister. I promised her his heart.” Aaron’s growl was as impressive as any shifter’s.
“Huh.” Kohia paused, thinking about it. Then she unsheathed her knife. She flipped it up, catching it by the blade, and held it out to Aaron. “Give her this. It’s what I gutted Vinn with.” Discussion over, at least by her way of looking at things, Kohia sat down beside me.
It took Aaron a minute longer to sit down beside Djarl. Even then, he appeared a bit stunned—and admiring.
Okay, so maybe the Conclave had known what they were doing when they ordered Kohia to represent them.
Vulf and Rjee signed the alliance that made House Cardinal a shifter clan. Djarl and Aaron witnessed it, as did Kohia and I.
“I really didn’t expect that an alliance like this could be agreed in three days. Three months, maybe. But more likely three years,” I confided to Djarl as Rjee and Vulf shook hands across the table and the image was recorded for posterity.
“It is a simple agreement,” Djarl said. “Once we argued our way through the implications, agreeing was the only sensible option. As Freels, we won’t lose an opportunity ever again through dilatoriness or distraction. This is a productive way forward. We will remain Freels with all ceremonial and social commitments, but we also become a shifter clan. To be truthful, Corsairs is a paradise envied by many. Since joining Galaxy Proper, Freels haven’t gained a comparable planet beyond our two solar systems.” Her head jerked suddenly in Rjee’s direction. “No!” she said to her husband.
Rjee and Vulf were still standing while the rest of us remained seated. Rjee turned slightly away from Djarl, as if to imply that he couldn’t hear her. “As I was saying, Vulf, there is a Freel tradition of binding an agreement with blood. As the principals who signed the agreement, we fight. Of course, this is not technically necessary.” He glanced briefly at Djarl, who scratched her fingernails on the table and glared at him, while the other Freels present avoided looking at her scowl. “But it would be positively interpreted as a sign of respect by other Freel houses if you fought me.”
“Then we fight.”
Vulf and Rjee shook hands, again, united in their aggressive stupidity.
“But why?” I protested. I’d like to think that I didn’t wail. “The agreement exists.”
Aaron stood. “It is a matter of honor. I will check that the fight pit is ready. Give me ten minutes.”
Kohia lunged to her feet. Even when she looked like she was moving casually, she was fast. “I’ll help you.”
At least she had the sense to scout out where Vulf would be fighting.
Ahab had mentioned something about an ancient Freel practice of fight contracts, but I hadn’t ever considered that our agreement might have to be sealed with Vulf’s blood.
Djarl slumped back in her chair. In fact, she put her boots on the table. She’d been urgent before, but now that Rjee and Vulf were committed to fighting one another—and how stupid was that as a way of cementing an alliance?—she seemed resigned, even reluctantly amused. “You won’t get them to change their minds. Rjee hasn’t fought someone he respects as much as your mate in years. And as for Vulf…”
We both stared at my mate, who was flexing his fingers and minutely rolling his shoulders; in short, showing all the signs of a man eager to go into battle.
“He wants to fight, too,” I said, resigned.
I had a moment in which to send him an before the bond closed. It was odd to feel not just the silence, which was normal enough—it wasn’t as if we ’pathed all the time—no, it was the diminished sense of where Vulf was and what he was feeling that startled me. When had we become so closely linked?
Aaron returned after ten minutes passed in conversation about Corsairs’ varied environments and House Cardinal’s options for settlement. “The pit is ready.”
Everyone instantly stood. Apparently, only Djarl and I were reluctant to see the fight.
She explained the nature of a fight contract as we walked a relatively straight path through the maze to the fight pit. “They’ll fight till exhaustion, death, or incapacity. The best result is an even match. It’s meant to show that the alliance will be strong and equitable.”
“Based on them relieving each other of equal amounts of blood?” I asked sardonically.
“And suffering equal pain,” Aaron added, overhearing.
Djarl elbowed him, hard. “They won’t seriously hurt each other,” she told me. “Our new alliance is too important to both of them.”
We arrived at the fight pit before I could formulate either another question or a protest. I had a suspicion that what I considered serious differed from Djarl’s view.
Anticipation and approval glinted in Kohia’s green eyes when she greeted me. “Prime seats.” She patted the bench beside her. “And a fabulous cage. The mesh sides have enough elasticity to bounce a combatant back into the fight. I’d like a chance in the pit.”
Aaron took a quick step past Djarl, toward Kohia.
“No.” Djarl pushed him back. “One fight with our guests and new allies is more than enough.”
Later, Kohia mouthed to Aaron.
He grinned and strode down to the entrance to the pit.
“Nice guy,” Kohia said with no hint of irony. Then she looked at Vulf and Rjee who were both taking off their boots and stripping down to their utility trousers. “Not that your guys can be improved on. Very nice muscles.” She stretched out the “niiiice” in a judicious tone.
Djarl laughed, as did two of the Freels who settled on a bench behind us.
I was too jittery to laugh.
Bench seating encircled the fight pit in three tiers and it was filling up. Evidently, word had gone out that their head of house was fighting Vulf, and everyone not on duty wanted to view the action.
Vulf and Rjee entered the pit and stood facing one another. Rjee raised his right arm and a cheer went up. The nape of my neck prickled in atavistic response. Then Rjee slashed his arm down, and the chamber went silent.
I didn’t need Djarl’s whispered, “it begins”, to know the fight had started. Even without moving a muscle, Vulf and Rjee were obviously sizing each other up.
Kohia leaned forward, gaze intent.
Vulf moved first, lashing out with a high kick that Rjee avoided, but in doing so, opened himself up to a punch to the stomach.
“He needs to remember that the shifter will be faster than him,” Aaron said.
Rjee knows that, I thought impatiently. The two men were testing each other. Vulf blocked one blow from Rjee, but moved back with the impact. As a Freel, Rjee had heavier mass, stronger bones and thicker muscle than Vulf’s human form. But Vulf was faster, both as a human, and then, with the enhanced reflexes of a shifter.
The two men exploded into a dance of violence. Rjee sought to close with Vulf. If they grappled and it became a wrestling match, the odds were with him winning. But Vulf was fast, and strong enough, and although his grunt of pain showed what it cost him, he tore out of Rjee’s hold, flinging himself back against the mesh of the cage, and using its rebound to angle himself past the Freel.
Rjee spun
, too experienced a fighter to present his back as a target to his opponent, even for an instant. They re-engaged in a flurry of punches and kicks. Vulf avoided most, but the few he took were massive hits. The sound of flesh hitting flesh sounded even over the noise of the crowd.
They broke apart. Vulf’s left eye was swelling and blood dripped from Rjee’s lower lip. He wiped it away with the back of his hand. He was favoring his right leg. Vulf cradled his left arm. Either could be seriously hurt, or both could be feigning injuries, trying to lure the other into an unwise attack.
“Your husband has fought us before.” One of the Freels behind us leaned forward. “He uses his speed.”
“And takes more hits than I thought a human could.” There went Aaron, worsening my mood.
Djarl turned her shoulder to him. “They’ll end the fight soon.” She didn’t look at me. Her gaze stayed on the fight pit.
Kohia agreed with her. “One more winner-takes-all attack, then they’ll concede an even match. You mate needs to stay on his feet for that. For this,” she corrected herself as Rjee slammed a massive fist into Vulf’s left shoulder.
I thought I heard bone crunch.
But even as Vulf staggered back, his stagger turned into a two-step launch into a vicious kick at Rjee’s left knee. Not the right knee, the leg the Freel leader had been favoring, but the apparently sturdy left knee.
Rjee dropped, but even down, he wasn’t out. He grabbed for Vulf’s leg and pulled him down and past him, flinging him, unprepared, into the mesh.
Vulf rebounded and tucked and rolled—which must have been agony on his shoulder—and in that time, Rjee forced himself to his feet.
They stared at one another.
Then Vulf nodded.
Rjee slammed his right fist against the center of his chest.
“The fight’s over?” I asked Djarl hopefully.
The applause, a drumming of feet and shrill whistles, told me it was—and to the audience’s satisfaction.
Cosmic Catalyst (Shamans & Shifters Space Opera Book 2) Page 16
