The Marann

by Sky Warrior Book Publishing

  “You would be free to leave. I will not coerce or compel you in this matter, proctor. Freedom gives value to your choice, and nothing else.” He paused. “But I hope you will stay.”

  “And if I decide against becoming Tolari?” she asked. “Will you order me to leave Tolar?”

  He gave her a small, patient smile. “No, proctor, I would not order you to leave Tolar, nor would I order you to leave Suralia. I have said this before. You are welcome to stay here, in my stronghold, as long as I hold it, as long as you like—until your natural death, if that is your wish. You could even travel anywhere you wish on Tolar. But I could not permit you to tutor Kyza.”

  “Meaning I would have no purpose here.”

  “Unfortunately. Would you be content here with no purpose to serve other than gathering information for your Admiral up in the ship?” His mouth twitched.

  Marianne laughed at the reference to her implicit role as an untrained spook for Central Command.

  “No, I wouldn’t—you’re right.” She sobered again, her mind drifting into thoughts of pledging her life to the Sural’s. “I would have to go up to the ship—I’m sure I would require some sort of surgical implant.”

  He shook his head. “No.”

  That stopped her. “High one?”

  “Having been given this choice, you may not even leave the stronghold until you give me your answer. If you leave, I cannot allow you to return.” He met her eyes. “That is not the outcome I prefer.”

  “Will you allow a medical team to phase down, then?”

  “No.”

  “But—”

  “My apothecaries can perform any procedure you require, given the necessary equipment and information.”

  “I begin to see why you require me to consult with my people.”

  “Yes,” the Sural replied. “Your Admiral will want to think about this.”

  He will indeed, Marianne thought. He will indeed.

  <<>>

  Her Admiral did not like what Marianne was telling him.

  “What does he want with it?” he asked, in Danish, his mother’s language. “Is the Sural just trying to weasel more information on human anatomy and physiology from us?”

  Marianne understood Danish but didn’t speak it well enough to reply. She shook her head. “I don’t think that’s the case, sir,” she said. She spoke Hungarian. Admiral Howard didn’t speak or understand Hungarian, but his computer provided an English translation of her words. “He can’t allow me to leave the stronghold after giving me the opportunity to join his people.”

  “You know I can’t send the Tolari such sensitive information without clearing it with Central Command first, especially not in advance of a full exchange of cultural and scientific information.”

  “I know that, sir, but this is too good an opportunity to pass up,” she said. “Just think about what I could learn once I’m considered one of them. And I would still have no restrictions on what I could put in a written report.”

  She was right, of course. He suspected Central Command would give the go ahead, but he still couldn’t authorize it on his own authority. He dropped back into English, which he knew the invisible listeners could understand. “I’ll get back to you in a few days.”

  Marianne followed suit. “That’s all I ask, sir,” she answered in the same language. “Woolsey out.”

  The monitor went blank. The Admiral got up and stared out the viewport at the planet below, considering ways to approach Central Command with the request. Five minutes later, he glanced at the wall clock. His secretary’s duty shift ended soon. He punched the comms button on his desk.

  “Yes sir?” came the secretary’s voice.

  “Get me Ambassador Russell and his wife.”

  <<>>

  “Damn, John, we have a fantastic opportunity here,” Smithton said. The Admiral and the Ambassador sipped whiskey by the viewport while their wives clattered and chattered in the kitchen. Delicious smells wafted into the Admiral’s sitting room.

  “The Sural had to know from the beginning this would happen,” the Admiral said. “He had to know his daughter would become a high one and Marianne would then be ineligible to teach her.”

  “Not necessarily,” Adeline called from the kitchen.

  “That wife of yours—” the Admiral started.

  “—is useful to you,” she finished, brushing flour off her hands as she walked toward them. “The Sural’s daughter is already fluent in every language he wanted Marianne to teach her. That was his original purpose in allowing a human to live in the stronghold. At this point, she just needs to expand the girl’s vocabulary until she comes of age. You know what I think?”

  “No, but I suspect you’re going to tell him anyway,” her husband said.

  Adeline poked Smithton in the ribs and continued, “I think he’s attracted to her.”

  Admiral Howard laughed. “They’re not even human. What would he see in her?”

  “They might as well be human. You’ve seen the DNA analysis from that sample Marianne managed to get. They’re kissing cousins to humanity. Marianne’s naturally reserved manner and her looks—tell me you’ve never wanted to gaze into those amazing eyes of hers—those might just make her exotic and interesting to a Tolari. If only he hadn’t requested a female tutor for his daughter!”

  “They’re cold and calculating bastards,” Smithton grumbled.

  “Calculating, sure, but cold? We don’t know that either. That’s just the face they show us.”

  “Addie has a point, Smit,” the Admiral said. “Some of their customs don’t make sense if they have as little emotion as they let us see.”

  A loud crash and a yelp came from the kitchen. “Exactly!” Adeline cried, hurrying back to rejoin Laura.

  “How do you explain the way the high ones let their children die in their damned tests?” Smithton called after her.

  “Ask me later—the vegetables need my undivided attention right now.”

  Smithton grunted and took another sip of his drink.

  <<>>

  “So you see,” Adeline finished, “as in some of our own Asian cultures, they reserve emotion for the privacy of the family. And if you never anticipate grief, which they don’t, you’re going to be a lot more sanguine about everything. Think about it—if she’s a member of the family, they could drop their guard around her. She could learn so much more about their intimate family relationships!”

  Smithton had to admit she had a point. “So you think he’s inventing ways to keep her around because he wants to bed her?”

  His wife shrugged. “We don’t know enough about their culture to speculate if they would allow one of their high ones to have an intimate relationship with an outsider, much less an alien outsider, so that particular activity may not even be a part of his plans. But it does look like he wants to keep her around, and if she has status in his household, she’ll have access to a lot more information than she’s had up to now. You can’t pass that up.”

  “Marianne was also clear it puts her life in danger, Addie,” the Admiral pointed out.

  Adeline’s face clouded a little. “I know. That’s the fly in the ointment.”

  “No, that’s not the fly in the ointment, Addie,” Smithton said, “the suicide switch is.”

  Her eyebrows flew up her forehead, and her fork clattered onto her plate. “Suicide switch? What?”

  The Admiral cut in. “The Sural requires her to be willing to die for him, as he does every other member of his household,” he said. “That means she has to be wired. The Sural won’t allow her to leave the stronghold to get it done up here on the ship, nor will he allow us to phase a medical team down to the planet to do it there. He’s asked us to send his apothecaries the necessary equipment and information for them to do it. Suicide wire technology is classified at the highest levels, and even if their medical technology were up to the task, we haven’t released the required level of human anatomical information to them either. That’s w
hy I can’t okay this on my own authority.”

  “Oh. My. God.” Adeline’s voice was little more than a breath.

  “I know how you feel about things like that,” Smithton said, taking her hand.

  Laura spoke up. “What if she wasn’t wired? What if we use simpler technology which is just as effective and doesn’t require specialized equipment or detailed physical information?”

  “What did you have in mind?” the Admiral asked.

  “You know how I like to watch old movies—”

  “You and my wife,” Smithton grumbled. “You’re both stuck in the twentieth century, the pair of you.”

  The Admiral began to hum an ancient song about a submarine. Smithton glared.

  “Some old spook movies had secret operatives with a false tooth filled with cyanide, an early version of the suicide switch,” Laura continued. “Cyanide is pretty crude—we can come up with something better than that—but the principle would be the same. Or maybe two false teeth that have to be broken at the same time, each containing a harmless substance which only turns deadly when mixed with the other. But you get the idea. You wouldn’t even need to send them any information—the Tolari already know how to fix human teeth because Marianne had that problem with her wisdom teeth a few years back.”

  Adeline roused herself from her shock. “It’s still unethical.”

  “But it’s not as unethical, is it?” Laura asked.

  Adeline shot the Admiral’s wife a blank stare. Then she picked the napkin from her lap and put it beside her plate. “I’m not hungry anymore,” she said, and got up to leave.

  Smithton let her go.

  <<>>

  “Marianne, you can’t do this,” Addie said as Smithton walked into their quarters later. She glanced up. He shook his head at her and continued on to the bedroom, yawning and untying his cravat as he walked. He seemed to doubt she could say anything to sway Marianne Woolsey once she had made up her mind. She turned her attention back to the monitor.

  “Addie, I have to,” Marianne replied.

  “No, you don’t! You told me yourself, you wouldn’t have to leave. You don’t even have to stop talking to Kyza. You could still learn so much for us in the coming years before Kyza comes of age.”

  “I doubt I will ever have to use the suicide switch, or the poison tooth, or whatever it is the medical team comes up with. The Sural is the most honorable man I’ve ever met and the most powerful Tolari on the planet. He won’t be dishonored unless he’s captured, and he would die before he allowed that to happen. And have you seen the strength of his defenses? Suralia hasn’t even been attacked in a couple of generations. Tolari generations, which I think are probably twice as long as ours.”

  “Just being willing—”

  “It isn’t the same thing,” Marianne interrupted.

  “It’s unethical.”

  “In the opinion of some, yes, but it’s legal on two of the Six Planets.”

  “Marianne!”

  Marianne sighed. “I promise I’ll consider what you’ve said. Will that help?”

  Adeline slumped back in her chair, feeling glum. “It’s the best I’m going to get, isn’t it,” she said.

  “I’m afraid so.”

  Adeline sighed, then sat up straighter. “There’s something else you need to know.”

  “What’s that?”

  “We think the Sural wants you to stay because he’s attracted to you,” she said, putting on a professional face. “If you do just find him attractive—if you don’t find the idea of intimacy with an alien repulsive—it would be helpful if you could—well—let him court you.” Adeline put her head in one hand for a moment, and then looked up at the monitor again. “I know I’ve teased you about him for years, but I’m serious this time. If he’s interested in you, give him a chance.”

  Marianne went still, eyes wide and mouth agape, and then she burst into laughter. “Addie, it’s been eight years. Don’t you think if the Sural were attracted to me, he would have said or done something by now?”

  “You tell me, you’re the one down there living with him. But no, I don’t think so, not necessarily. They’re a long-lived race, and we’re sure the Sural’s a lot older than he looks. He could be eighty or ninety, even a hundred standard years old. He might consider four of their years too short an acquaintance before a first date. And it’s not as if you’ve encouraged him. I love you like the sister I never had, Marianne, but you’re blind when it comes to men. You wouldn’t believe he was courting you if he went down on one knee with a ring.”

  “Oh Addie, you’re making this up as you go along, just to yank my chain. And if he’s really that old, he’s way, way, way too old for me. I’m only thirty-four. Or is it thirty-five now? What’s the date today, anyway—I keep losing track.”

  Adeline sighed. “You’re thirty-five. But Marianne—just remember this one thing: nothing is more important than doing the next right thing. Just focus on doing the next right thing.”

  “I promise I’ll try.”

  “That’s all I ask.”

  <<>>

  Smithton held his wife and stroked her hair. She’d come to bed broody and silent. “It’ll be all right, Addie.”

  She shook her head. “I argued the Admiral into an unethical course of action. If Marianne takes her own life, some of the blame will be on me.”

  “No, darling, you didn’t argue John into anything, and Marianne is a grown woman. She’s responsible for her own decisions.”

  “I didn’t help!” she exclaimed. “What am I going to do?”

  “You can try to argue the Admiral out of it. The inimitable Adeline Russell can argue anyone into or out of anything, remember? Sell ice cubes to Eskimos, all that. You should have been a traveling salesman.”

  Despite herself, she laughed a little, then fell quiet again and whispered, “I couldn’t talk Marianne out of it.”

  “Hmpf,” Smithton grumbled. “No one can talk that woman out of anything. She’s practically a sociopath.”

  “Smitty! You can’t be ser—oh, I see. You’re trying to argue me out of my mood.”

  “Is it working?” he asked, making his face as blank and innocent as he could.

  Adeline pulled the pillow out from under her head and clobbered him with it.

  Chapter Eleven

  Marianne entered the open study off the stronghold’s audience room. Several days had passed since the Admiral forwarded her request to Central Command, and she had an answer for the Sural. He motioned her toward a chair without looking up, engrossed in reading a report. She settled into the chair he’d indicated and studied her hands.

  A few minutes later, she looked up as he stood and rounded his desk. He sat on its edge in front of her, a gentle smile playing across his lips.

  He already knows.

  What Addie had said about his feelings crossed her mind. She dismissed it. He’s pleased, that’s all, she thought. Courting a peasant like me! What a bizarre idea. But if even I can tell he’s happy, the whole stronghold has to know.

  “It is not a secret,” he said in Hungarian, his smile broadening.

  She laughed. “That took you longer than usual,” she said, wondering if the computers on the Alexander could translate Yup’ik. It had become a game with the Sural to see how long she could use a human language in her communications with the ship before he learned it. He already knew French, Hindi, German, and Mandarin. At this rate, she would run out of languages before Kyza came of age.

  “When do your apothecaries phase down the implants?” he asked in his own language.

  “In a few hours,” she answered. “The drug is a controlled substance. They can’t synthesize a sufficient quantity of it all at once. The computer won’t let them.”

  He nodded. “A wise precaution.”

  Marianne studied the Sural, trying to read him. Maybe they’ll teach me how they do that, once I’m one of them.

  “We might,” he said.

  She laughed. “
How do you do that?”

  “Humans are easy to read.” He smiled.

  She shook her head and sighed, pushing down feelings of inferiority. “I don’t have your empathy. I can’t read you, and I don’t know how to mask myself.”

  He raised an eyebrow. “No one can read me unless I allow it,” he said, “but as soon as your doctors phase down the drugs, my apothecaries will insert the implants. And then—” He stopped.

  “And then?”

  “Then you will visit the Jorann and enter a new world. Our world.” He pushed away from the desk and waited for her to get to her feet. “Come. Walk with me.”

  She fell into step with him as he walked out into the gardens. Flutters chattered and sang in the cora trees, their plumage flashing in the sunlight, and flowers bloomed in the bluish-green ferny groundcover she still called grass. Mid-spring on Tolar was beautiful, if colder than her idea of spring. They wandered along a sparkling brook. The Sural broke his silence as he stopped by a large rock next to a tree near the stream.

  “This is where Kyza walked into the dark,” he said. “Under this cora tree. This is where she proved herself a worthy heir to Suralia.” He reached up and picked a twig.

  Marianne could almost feel the pride he radiated. Am I reading him?

  “Yes,” he replied, looking down at her with a lopsided smile. “I am broadcasting loudly enough for even you to read me.” She blinked. “I want to give you a taste of what is to come. But tell me—before you go before the Jorann and become one of us—tell me if you can be content to make Tolar your home. Tell me you will not miss your homeworld enough to make you unhappy. Can you tell me that?”

  She mulled it over. She couldn’t give him a quick, glib answer, but how could she know what she would feel in the future? “I’ve been content here these past eight years,” she answered. “Four years,” she amended, trying to think of time in Tolari terms.

  “You evade my question.”

  She bowed in apology. “Forgive me, high one, but I don’t think I can answer your question. I can say I’m content here now, and I’m content to remain here for now. I don’t know what the future will bring.”

  “A wise answer.”