There was obvious pride in her tokara’s voice, behind the synthetic translator. It was the parren version of ‘survival of the fittest’. And Lisbeth could not deny it had some things to recommend it. Many humans fell in love with one political side, and nothing that side did, no matter how awful, could dissuade them that their love was pure and true. It seemed to work that way for many parren, too, while they remained within the same phase. But while flux numbers to each of the five phases remained constant, poorly-behaved denominations simply failed to attract the flux numbers of new parren to replace those lost who fluxed out, into a new phase. Or that was the theory, at least.
“So the Incefahd will not attract many new recruits if its leader kills me in cold blood,” Lisbeth summarised. “How comforting.”
“And the Togreth will not allow it,” Timoshene added, indicating those before her. “They are all Harmony Phase, as are we all, but the Togreth are a denomination to themselves. Should they allow you to come to harm, their dishonour shall be worse.”
“But you say that not all of them are reliable?” Lisbeth questioned. “How can both be true? A denomination with unreliable members surely has no honour?”
“Membership can be faked,” Timoshene said darkly. “It is the oldest trick, between denominations, to destabilise the other.”
Ah, thought Lisbeth. Parren loyal to one denomination would then fake loyalty to another, and pretend their shenor, their flux-destiny, had brought them to another. There, they would become secret agents, serving their true denominational masters, to the detriment of their apparent ones.
“And have you any problems of that sort within the Domesh?” Lisbeth pressed.
“Rarely. It is hard to be Domesh. Such dedication is not easily faked.”
The last Togreth guards were chosen, and made a formation about Lisbeth as she walked into the grand hall between towering columns. The vast floor was tiled with intricate blue and green patterns, and the ceiling rose in great vaults, with stone balconies and balustrades running the walls with ornate yet solemn symmetry.
Parren gathered on the wide stairs ahead to stare with cool displeasure, at this vulgar human thing in their hairless, elegant midst. The stairs led into a long, smooth-marbled hall, and finally to a great room with an enormous table, roughly rectangular but made irregular with delicate swirls and bends. The abstract patterns in the stone and tile decoration were breathtaking, and Lisbeth gazed at the high walls and ceiling, the long rows of old-fashioned bookshelves on the upper balcony, and the ceiling decoration that showed no figures or shapes she could recognise, yet reminded her of the greatest church ceilings from old Earth that she’d seen in pictures.
Behind the table stood a tall parren man in white robes. He gestured for her to stand opposite, across the wide table. “I am Tobenrah,” her earpiece translated his words. “Lisbeth Debogande. I apologise on the behalf of my House for your detainment. It is not my preference, and I would return you to your brother did not our laws defend the right of denominational practise.”
“Humans find this notion of ‘denominational practise’ very uncivilised,” said Lisbeth, smoothing her gown before sitting, and hoping she made it look elegant. “The compulsions of parren psychology have created some political practises that my people would consider abhorrent.”
She’d had this discussion with Stan Romki, on late-shifts in Phoenix Engineering, when their eyes had begun to blur with weariness, and conversation had drifted without either being aware of how it got there. They’d begun discussing the finer points of alien diplomacy, and she’d been surprised to hear him voice measured approval of some of Fleet’s more muscular assertions of human identity.
‘There are woolly-headed wimps in academic departments across human space,’ he’d said, ‘who think the aliens will like us more if we try to be more like them. You know, if we come in softly, and wear their clothes, and practise their ways, and try to show them that we care and we understand. Well let me assure you that neither the chah’nas, nor the tavalai, nor the alo, have the slightest need of human approval and acceptance. To not assert our humanity, our difference, will be seen by them as a sign of weakness, that we lack confidence in our place in the Spiral. When you meet a strange alien, young Lisbeth, be human, and proud of it. It may not always be polite, but odds are they’ll respect you more for it. In my experience, very few of the Spiral’s sentiences have any real use for politeness, outside of patronising flattery.’
“Indeed,” the head of all House Harmony said now, gravely. “We neighbouring species are neither too pleased with this human tendency to annihilate your neighbours. Some amongst us consider it rude.”
“Our neighbours killed ninety-nine percent of our species,” Lisbeth said coldly. “Without provocation, and without mercy. We recovered, and did them one percent better, in turn. Some of our neighbours consider that heroic.”
Tobenrah steepled his fingers before his mouth. It was a relief to see a full parren face, after weeks amongst the Domesh. Her Togreth maids showed their faces, but were so disciplined in the art of expressing nothing that they may as well not have. Tobenrah was disciplined in the way of all parren, but he showed more expression than either. Or perhaps, Lisbeth found herself wondering, it was only House Harmony parren who displayed this discipline. She truly did not know, never having met a parren from another of the five houses.
“Would that I could save you from your predicament,” Tobenrah completed his previous thought. “But I cannot, and house laws would punish me greatly, and my denomination, should I interfere in the affairs of the Domesh.” He leaned forward, ringed hands flat on the table. “Are you aware of the devastation it will cause, should the Domesh rise to lead House Harmony?”
“And have the parren become so weak that a man like Aristan could win a majority amongst you?” Lisbeth asked with mild scorn. “Surely there are not so many that pine for brighter days so much that they would revere a man who worships the murderous machines?”
“No,” said Tobenrah, placing a finger point-down on the tabletop for emphasis. “He cannot win a majority, and this is the point. The five phases are well divided, even House Fortitude today holds no more than thirty percent of all parren, though it is enough to let them rule. It can take a century to shift that number by even a single percent, one way or the other.
“But Aristan can win a majority within House Harmony, and rapidly. He is a fanatic, and will stop at nothing once he gains this power. I do not fear that he could win power over all parren, whatever his lustful fantasies. I fear that he could win power within House Harmony, and lead us into a war that will destroy us utterly, and from which we shall never recover.”
Tobenrah’s eyes flicked to Lisbeth’s Togreth guards. Considering them, then back to her. Lisbeth felt the small hairs rising on her arms, and a most unpleasant, cold feeling in her stomach. Was he talking to her? Or to them? Could the Togreth be won over, whatever their professed loyalties? Tobenrah was telling them just how bad things could get. Was he asking them to break their oath to protect her, in the Domesh’s absence?
“You threaten me,” she said coolly, and was pleased at least that her voice did not tremble, or show any obvious fear. “How can I be such a key to these terrible things you fear?”
“I have just returned from Kantovan System,” Tobenrah replied. “I have seen your Phoenix in action. And I met your brother, face-to-face.” Lisbeth stared. “Him with a gun, and his marines killing several much less well armed and prepared guards. Strange goings on in Kantovan System, Lisbeth Debogande. Most terribly and alarmingly strange. My guests, the tavalai foreign affairs people, were not very forthcoming, but my own sources indicated that there was trouble on the hothouse moon of Kamala. Where the great Vault of Secrets is reputed to be located.
“Who could dare to raid such a facility, under the eyes of all those heavily-armed tavalai?” Tobenrah’s eyes narrowed at her. “I heard stories of technological witchcraft on the Tsubarata itself, human m
arines making impossible shots, and later disappearing from a secure medbay facility when tavalai guards responded to what sounded like a full-scale attack upon them, their comrades crying for help on their coms, with gunfire crackling in the background. And when the guards arrived, they found nothing… and returned to the medbay to find the humans gone.
“Later they miraculously reappeared, your brother amongst them, to rescue a man we were interrogating, who had been performing similar wizardry in the foreign affairs headquarters. Then tales of commotions in Gamesh, down on Konik itself, of humans disguised as Domesh parren, who melt through walls and fight off entire divisions of robot security. And now I hear that you have a protector, a small winged thing that kills as it stings, and is most certainly not organic. But human technology can construct no such machines, nor instruct them to respond with such circumstantial precision.
“And all this, after the tales of battle between Phoenix and some unidentified enemy near the sard and barabo space, with a great Dobruta warship as your partner. The Dobruta, who are supposed to be destroying this ancient, evil technology, not spreading it.”
He stared at her, indigo eyes intense, and tinged perhaps with fear. Lisbeth said nothing, lips pressed thin. Somewhere beneath the collar of her gown, she fancied she could feel the faint pressure of tiny feet, moving against the fabric.
“You would bring this evil here?” Tobenrah insisted, and it was certainly fear in his eyes now. “These relics of the Tahrae, who sided with the machines to end the lives of billions of their own people? You lost nearly ten billion in the destruction of Earth. The parren lost nearly forty! Forty billion! Entire worlds turned to ashes! Systems in ruins! And you seek to bring it back!”
This man would kill her, Lisbeth was increasingly certain. Togreth honour and house laws be damned — if her life was giving Aristan leverage over Phoenix, and Phoenix was collecting these evil things, as Tobenrah saw them… then her death would at least deprive Aristan of that prize. And perhaps, Lisbeth saw, that would be for the best.
But there was great danger here for Phoenix, also. The fear in Tobenrah’s eyes would be shared by the vast majority of parren, from all the five houses. Phoenix’s command crew had hoped to prevent this reaction by keeping Phoenix’s hacksaw ties a secret. But the secret was leaking out now, slowly but surely. Denial would now help no one — not Phoenix, and certainly not herself. Lisbeth saw that there was still a hand to be played here. That the Incefahd denomination and others would lash out in fear was no longer in doubt — but how, and at whom, was yet to be decided.
“You fought drysines,” Lisbeth said quietly. “We follow the paths of that old history. But the drysines are long gone, Tobenrah. Long dead, and nearly vanished.”
“Nearly?” She had, Lisbeth saw, only made the fear worse. For a non-Domesh parren to learn that the hated drysines were nearly gone, was like telling a human that the krim were not yet extinct.
She took a deep breath. “What remains are fragments, and harmless for the moment. But there is an entire race of hacksaws that we fear are not dead at all. Are powerful, in fact, and in league with the alo.”
“The alo?” Tobenrah breathed. “Who?”
“Deepynines. We’ve seen them. Queens and combat drones, fighting at the alo’s side, in that battle near sard and barabo space.”
Tobenrah drew himself up. “Alo space is a human concern. Parren do not fear deepynines, only drysines.”
“Then you are a fool. The deepynines were infinitely worse.”
Tobenrah glared. “Deepynines did not kill forty billion parren!”
“An accident of history,” Lisbeth retorted. “Do not lecture me on the machines. You have history books and ancient tales. I’ve seen them, with my own eyes. And I can assure you — once the deepynines have finished with humanity, they’ll come here. And everywhere else, and finish what their predecessors started, forty eight thousand years ago, when they annhilated their original creators.”
“Finish with humanity?” Tobenrah repeated, some of the fear returning. “You think there are that many? That they could defeat you?”
Lisbeth nodded, feeling the parren’s fear echoed. “And now, we seek the means to defeat them, before it happens. A drysine means, with drysine knowledge, long lost from the galaxy.”
“Parren cannot allow humanity to possess such knowledge. One day you might use it on us!”
Lisbeth leaned forward, and gave him a look she’d only learned from Major Thakur, when driving home some point of particular intensity. She met Tobenrah’s eyes, and stared hard and dark. “Not if you had that knowledge too! Tobenrah of the Incefahd denomination. This could be your power, and your knowledge, to use for the benefit of your house, and of all parren.”
“You would share it with us?” The Incefahd leader looked astonished. And then his expression changed, as a whole new series of calculations flashed behind his eyes. Possibilities. Shifting scales in the balance of parren powers.
Lisbeth knew that she had no authority whatsoever to promise such things. But to hell with it — she was here, her brother was not, and this battle in Phoenix’s war was hers alone to command. “Yes,” she declared. “Will you help us seek it?”
About the Author
Joel Shepherd is the Australian author of fourteen SF and Fantasy novels in three series. They are ’The Cassandra Kresnov Series’, ‘A Trial of Blood and Steel’, and ‘The Spiral Wars’.
For more information;
@ShepJoel
joelshepherdauthor
www.joelshepherd.com
Kantovan Vault (The Spiral Wars Book 3) Page 52
