Cures

19

Cures

    BrTl stood on five legs, fidgeting.

    “Stand still!” gasped L’Thea, giggling madly.

    “You look very grand,” said R’shn solemnly. Then she broke down and giggled madly.

    “Ho, ho, ho,” he noted gloomily.

    “Stand STILL!” cried L’Thea.

    BrTl put the sixth foot down and stood still. L’Thea adjusted the last buckle.

    “Most impressive, Great BrJk!” squeaked the Flppu. BrTl gave it a sour look.

    “There aren’t any reins to go with it, are there?” asked R’shn.

    “NO!”

    When Fl’Oo-ooueroii had picked itself up off the floor at the far side of the cabin and returned to BrTl’s side, R’shn said remorsefully: “I’m sorry, BrTl. Only I thought there might be, because when we saddle up the big grqwaries for the little kids on Midsummer Day at home, they have reins as well as saddles.”

    “Aren’t grqwaries birds?” asked L’Thea, looking puzzled. “They farm them on Whtyll.”

    “Big birds. But it’s only the really little kids that ride them.”

    “Like S’zzie,” agreed BrTl kindly.

    “Well, she wasn’t big enough last Midsummer Day, but she will be next year. Only we won’t be there!” said R’shn happily.

    “With a bit of luck!” he agreed, wriggling. Ooh, ugh, ouch, these Grand Occasion Saddles weighed you down like an IG ton of mok shit sitting on your spine! Added to which they smelled almost as bad: he’d forgotten about that charming aspect of the Vvlvanian-cursed things.

    S’zzie at this point crawled over from the corner where she’d been inspecting BrTl’s discarded Number Twos and began patting his left foreleg. BrTl tried not to fidget, or even wince. It was an uneasy feeling, having a very small, soft being like S’zzie somewhere down by your forefoot where you couldn’t quite see it. But to his relief R’shn picked her up, cooing: “Look at great big BrTl, S’zzie! Isn’t he grand? See his Grand Occasion Saddle?”

    “Does it fit you comfortably, Great BrJk?” squeaked the Flppu.

    BrTl wriggled slightly. “As well as can be expected. The things date back to before we had customized garments. –Well before,” he noted glumly.

    “It’s very fine, Great One!” it squeaked, bobbing.

    “Something like that,” he sighed.

    R’shn looked up at it wistfully. “I don’t suppose—No.”

    L’Thea was also looking up at it wistfully. It was harder to tell with S’zzie, but BrTl fancied there was a hopeful gleam or two in her round mammalian eyes. He didn’t bother to check, he’d already discovered that mammalian humanoids that small did not have thought processes as such. And while he could cope perfectly well with this phenomenon in a pair of dRewers from dRew or an adult Bhaxanian, to name but fourteen, he couldn’t cope very well with the knowledge that one day what went on inside S’zzie’s unexercised mind would, with luck, develop into thought processes. He liked S’zzie, more especially as he very much liked R’shn and S’zzie was her pup; but that didn’t mean he liked looking at her mind. He was managing to think of it as “unexercised”, but that was far as he’d got.

    “Go on,” he groaned. “Get up.” He knelt, creaking and groaning. He wasn’t too sure whether it was the saddle or him doing most of the creaking, he seemed to have been standing here for hours while they fiddled with it and polished it and similar mok shit.

    “Great BrJk, this is most inappropriate!” squeaked the Flppu in horror as L’Thea scrambled on, followed by R’shn, carrying S’zzie.

    “Who cares, it’s only diplo junk,” he groaned. “Oooh, ugh, ouch.”

    “Are we too heavy?” gasped R’shn.

    “Uh—no. Are you on already?” he said, peering round at them. “Oh, so you are. Fl’Mnn-nnlluyii, do you want a ride or not?”

    The Flppu looked longingly at the three humanoids perched on the Grand Occasion Saddle but said: “It would not be appropriate for this humble being to ride on the Great BrJk’s Grand Occasion Saddle, Great BrJk.”

    “GET UP HERE, THAT’S AN ORDER!” he roared.

    Fl’Oo-ooueroii picked itself up from the far side of the cabin, smoothed its fluff and, with the help of a few bits of hair and—ouch!—skin, plus an appendage-up from L’Thea, got up. “I’ve never ridden on the great BrJk before!” it panted.

    “You have, you have, you have,” he groaned. “Oh, forget it. –It forgets,” he explained.

    “Yes. Memories flit in and out of its mind like fttzi-flies in summer over the snu fields,” agreed R’shn composedly. “But de-Fl’Oo-ooueroii-ifying it’s made it worse.”

    “Yes. Um, did Trff tell you that or did you see it?” he asked cautiously.

    “‘I saw it.”

    BrTl had thought she might have: yes. “Uh-huh. Look, we can’t go outside,” he warned, creaking to his feet, ooh, ugh, ouch. “We’ll go for a nice walk round the ship, okay?”

    “Ride,” corrected R’shn happily. “Okay!”

    “Yes: lovely!” agreed L’Thea.

    “Lovely and very okay, Great One!” squeaked the Flppu.

    “Something like that,” he sighed.

    Creaking a bit, they went.

    ... “Where are you calling from?” he asked cautiously, massaging the middle of his spine with an off hind foot. It still felt compressed and the hair felt matted, even though the thing had been off his back for a measurable IG period of time.

    “In terms of the commonly perceived space-time continuum, not from Urrgaynia II: is that what you-it wanted to hear, BrTl?”

    “It’ll do,” he sighed. “Have you been in contact, then?”

    “It hasn’t ceased to be in contact, BrTl.”

    “Skip it, skip it,” he sighed. “How is she?”

    “Intact,” replied the engineering brain.

    “WHAT?” he roared.

    Trff whistled anxiously. “Don’t be like that, BrTl. Intact’s good!”“

    “Intact implies SHE MIGHT NOT HAVE BEEN!” he roared.

    “Yes.”

    BrTl took a deep breath. “Trff, tell me exactly what’s been going on—um, there.”

    “No being can intercept—”

    “YES! GET ON WITH IT!”

    “She-it’s been in a skirmish.”

    He breathed heavily. “How did that happen, pray? Because last time we heard,” he noted politely, “Evil D’ru-son and Evil—no, Good Rhan-son had become allies, or did the sprtzz-fibres have that one wrong?”

    “It isn’t possible for the spr—”

    “That’ll do, thanks,” he said grimly. “Who won?”

    “Her-its side, of course. Also Rhan-son’s side and D’ru-son’s side.”

    “What?” said BrTl, very, very quietly.

·   “They were all on the same side!” Trff explained quickly. “One of the other cliques was fighting them under what appeared to be a misapprehension about their intentions, but it was all cleared up very quickly!”

    BrTl took a deep breath. “I see. With no loss of life or appendage, I trust?”

    Trff began to detail who, precisely, had lost what. BrTl just let it get on with it: there didn’t seem to be much point in trying to stop it. Besides, it gave him a breathing space. Or, as it were, thinking space.

    “Got it. So is she or is she not hovering over Rhan-son’s bed?” Absently BrTl massaged his right middle leg, just below the hip joint.

    “It doesn’t still hurt, does it, BrTl?”

    “No! And is she?”

    “To some extent, yes,” it said cautiously.

    “Vvlvanian curses,” he muttered.

    There was a short silence. Then Trff offered anxiously: “Naturally she-it feels responsible: the being was acting under her-its orders.”

    “That’s a relief,” he noted.

    “Oh, yes!” it agreed airily.

    “What else?” he demanded grimly.

    “The it-being has picked up feelings of considerable ambivalence in her-it.”

    “You mean ambivalence towards Rhan-son?”

    “Yes. Certainly. And also towards D’ru-son.”

    “Uh... Is this good or bad, Trff?” he said feebly.

    The silence lasted an appreciable IG microsecond. “The it-being doesn’t see that situation in terms of ‘good’ or ‘bad,’ BrTl,” said Trff cautiously. “Not unless you-it could define the precise reference, perhaps?”

    Grinding his teeth only a very little, what huge restraint, he replied: “Good or bad for US, asteroid-brain!”

    “Possibly good,” it returned cautiously.

    BrTl didn’t insist. For one thing, it wouldn’t get him anywhere. And for another, he was uneasily aware that Trff was as upset as he was over the possibility, no, virtual certainty, that Jhl wouldn’t want to come back to the merchant-trading game now that the bottom was about to drop out of it.

    “This Rhan-son will live, will he?” he said glumly.

    “His-its injuries aren’t grave enough to cause him-it to die, certainly.”

    Ooh, almost confirmation! “Yes. Well, given this ambivalence stuff, can you tell which of them she’s likely to take?”

    “No.”

    BrTl blinked. “Oh.”

    “Possibly she-it won’t take either of them,” it offered.

    “Dare I ask if that’s the opinion of the Trff or of the it-being?”

    “Yes.”

    He breathed heavily but admitted: “I see.”

    “She-it’s never wanted bond-partnership before,” Trff reminded him.

    “Mm. Look, I’ve got an idea about R’shn—maybe L’Thea, too. We need to talk,” he said cautiously.

    “Talk, BrTl.”

    BrTl sighed. “Not now, I’ve got to get back to them. And somehow I feel uneasy when I have to communicate on this Vvlvanian-cursed hyper-loop.”

    “It’ll come aboard on a formal visit tomorrow, seven hours Urrgaynia II time.”

    “Do that. But how’ll I get them out of the way?” he sighed.

    “G’gg’s just spent a happy day with this it-being seeing the spaceport. It thinks he-it may be content to escort them to the uptown J’rd’s tomorrow.”

    “Is that the one with the roof-top restaurant that’s a sort of huge lifter?”

    The engineering brain produced: “No. That restaurant’s blob-driven and rises up a hundred IG fluh and descends to its previous position during the Urrgaynia II hour. Would that be enough like a lifter?”

    “Yeah, yeah,” he groaned.

    “In that case, it can assure you-it that G’gg’ll be happy to go with the females.”

    BrTl didn’t even ask if this assurance took account of the phrase “free will,” he just sighed and said: “Good.”

    There was a short pause.

    “Can you tell me what Jhl’s doing right now?” he asked glumly.

    “Of course.”

    There was another short pause.

    “DO IT!” he roared.

    “It’s sorry, BrTl: it did understand, but it was wondering how to phrase it.”

    BrTl thought he caught an anxious hooting note in there. He winced. “Go on, phrase it, Trff: I suppose I can take it.”

    “She-it’s hovering over Rhan-son’s bed,” it said apologetically.

    “I’ll see you-it tomorrow,” BrTl promised grimly.

    “Yes. Seven hours, Urrgaynia II time.”

    BrTl took a deep breath and broke the connection. Hovering! Couldn’t it have used a different expression, at least?

    “Very well, my Lord Regent. If that is Your Royal Highness’s wish,” said old Fh’Ly’haiyn and Rh’n’lhd stiffly, bowing.

    Rh’aiiy’hn had almost exhausted his strength in explaining to the stiff-necked old man the agreement reached between himself and Drouwh, and getting him to agree to join them. “It is my wish,” he said, very faintly. Feebly his hand crept over the bedclothes.

    The watchers saw the old man’s throat work. He lifted the hand, bent over it, and touched his lips to it. “Your wish is my command, Highness.”

    Some of the watchers looked on incredulously as he then walked backwards from the room.

    “They used to do that at Court all the time,” said Allie feebly.

    Rh’aiiy’hn’s mother returned calmly: “Yes, but you can tell them about that another time, dear boy. Your uncle needs to rest now. Off you go. Perhaps T’m would like to show you how to look for lr in the forest?”

    “It isn’t the season, Lady,” said the little boy. “Couldn’t we just blob onto the Encyclopaedia instead?”

    Mh’aaiivh of Old Rthfrdia replied kindly but firmly: “Not on a lovely day like this, T’m. Show Allie how to set snares for lop-ears, then. Off you go.”

    The two young faces had brightened. “Yes: come on, T’m! I’ve never done that,” said Allie eagerly.

    “Two galaxies, haven’t you? I’ve done it loads of times!” replied the squeaky little boy’s voice as they exited.

    Mh’aaiivh smiled a little. “Sweet,” she said to her son, laying a gentle hand on his forehead.

    Rh’aiiy’hn sighed. After a moment he managed to say: “T’m is. Allie’s merely… inane.”

    Mh’aaiivh bit her lip. “I suppose he’s had little chance to be otherwise,” she murmured.

    Jhl and K’t-Ln had got up uncertainly. “Shall we go, too, Ladyship?” asked Jhl.

    “Yes, if you don’t mind, Captain. He needs to rest,” she said, gracious but dismissive.

    Smiling feebly, they stumbled out.

    K’t-Ln tottered over to the railing round the first-floor landing and collapsed against it. “Bears’ teeth!”

    “Gracious, isn’t she?” said Jhl in a voice that came out a lot weaker than she’d thought it was going to. She tottered to K’t-Ln’s side.

    “Gracious! That isn’t the half of it! I hadda tell my legs not to curtsey every other minute!”

    Jhl made a strangled noise of agreement.

    “And what’s more, she’s got a will of xrillion under it,” added K’t-Ln feebly.

    “Yeah,” she croaked.

    After a moment K’t-Ln said weakly: “Am I picking up what I think I am?”

    Jhl swallowed. “You are, if you’re picking up what I’m trying not to think.”

    K’t-Ln eyed her cautiously,

    “She’s just so incredibly like Shan’s mother!” she burst out.

    Gulping, K’t-Ln tried to smile. “Um, nicer, though?”

    “Sure, but—” Their eyes met. Abruptly they both went into wheezing hysterics, hanging helplessly onto the railing, snorting and gasping.

    In the lodge’s best guest bedroom Mh’aaiivh bent over her son. “Is that all right, my darling? I could ask the Captain to stay with you, if you wish.”

    His hand squeezed hers feebly. “No.” He paused, gathering his strength. Mh’aaiivh just waited. Finally he said in the thread of a voice: “Hurts... more than… helps.”

    She had feared that might be so. The Captain’s frequent presence in his room was not helping her son psychologically, and Rh’aiiy’hn’s emotional reaction to her was directly hindering the healing process. She had never before seen a wound after a blob had been applied, but she had read about such things and she was aware that Rh’aiiy’hn was not recovering nearly as fast as he should be.

    “Very well, my dearest boy. You needn’t see her unless you wish it.”

    He squeezed her hand silently. Gradually his face relaxed and he drifted off.

    Mh’aaiivh got up slowly and paced over to the window. “Yes,” she said to herself with a sigh. “It’ll have to be. And I shudder to think what her price will be!”

    “The Old Woman?” echoed Drouwh dubiously as the three of them lunched quietly together in the little downstairs breakfast-room that he usually never bothered to use. M’ri had decided the Regent’s mother couldn’t possibly be asked to eat in the kitchen, and Fh’Ly’haiyn and Rh’n’lhd had added himself to the party as a matter of course.

    “I think it must be. And without delay. –Thank you,” said Mh’aaiivh as Drouwh passed her the kettle-bread. “I doubt that the joint presence of yourself, Lord Fh’Ly’haiyn and Rh’n’lhd, you, Mk-L’ster, and Representative M’Klui’shke’aigh will be sufficient to convince my son’s party without his aid. And time’s getting on.”

    “It’s only been three days,” said Drouwh uneasily.

    “A wound that’s been treated by a lifter blob,” replied Mh’aaiivh firmly, “should be well on the way to being completely healed by now. But Rh’aiiy’hn’s is very far from being that. –You saw this morning, Lord Fh’Ly’haiyn and Rh’n’lhd, how weak he is.”

    “Aye,” he rumbled. “It’s all Feddo nonsense, anyway. Much better to get The Old Woman! –If she’ll come.”

    Drouwh hesitated. Then he said: “I’m sure she’ll come. But I think I’ll have to go and ask her. I have a feeling she’s temporarily lost interest in all of us and our doings.”

    Lord Fh’Ly’haiyn and Rh’n’lhd nodded. “Aye. They’re harvesting the khyai’llh on the Islands, that’ll be it.”

    Drouwh agreed seriously: “Very probably.”

    “You’d best go straight after lunch, then,” the old man grunted.

    “I shall accompany you,” decided Mh’aaiivh calmly.

    “Your Royal Highness, it may be an uncomfortable experience. Even painful,” said Drouwh cautiously.

    Mh’aaiivh of Old Rthfrdia replied composedly: “I’m aware of how Dh’aaych’llyai’n U-Fl’aiir’th got that snr-cat wound on his arm, Mk-L’ster. My late husband, G’rgaiyh, was once so foolish as to attempt to visit The Old Woman.”

    “I remember,” grunted the old Lord. “Ripped to pieces. Spent the best part of the next six months in bed.” He sopped up gravy with a piece of kettle-bread and added to Drouwh: “It was hushed up, of course. You’d have only been a tiny lad back then.”

    “I’ve certainly never heard that tale before,” he admitted. “–Your Royal Highness knows the risks, then.”

    Mh’aaiivh picked up the dish of steamed bursneys and hotter-and-hotter leaves. “Yes. Pass me your plate, Mk-L’ster. –You, too, Lord Fh’Ly’haiyn and Rh’n’lhd: you men never eat enough vegetable matter if you’re left to your own devices.”

    Limply the two men passed the Regent’s mother their plates. Neither dared to say he loathed cooked hotter-and-hotter leaves.

    The peak of the Isle of Slrw showed grey-mauve against a clear blue sky, with just a glimmer of ice on its tip.

    “Bit different from last time,” noted Shn’aillaigh.

    Drouwh was concentrating on piloting the pale green Feddo lifter. He had a feeling that its blobs didn’t much like him. “Shut up,” he grunted. “No-one asked you to come.”

    “T’m’s Kitten asked me!” piped T’m from beside his left elbow.

    “Mm.” Drouwh was used to a left-hand drive. He concentrated grimly.

    “Nothing better to do,” said Shn’aillaigh, smothering a yawn in the warm afternoon sun. “Did you catch Sh’n and his friends on the political broadcast last night, Drouwh?” –She and A’ailh’sa had gone over to Mk-D’rm’d Manor in order to ease the congestion at the lodge. R’rt Fh’laiin was very weak, but his leg, in sharp contrast to the Regent’s chest wound, was healing rapidly.

    “No. The larder had got a bit low: T’m and I went out to set a few snares for ghrr or lop-ears, didn’t we, T’m?”

    “Yeah! And we seen a hairy-nosed burrower cleaning out its burrow, didn’t we?” he said excitedly.

    Mh’aaiivh of Old Rthfrdia was abruptly visited by a vision of how it might have been, if her boy’s father had been able to stay, or if she had been able to go off-world. She leant her head back against the head-rest and closed her eyes for a moment.

    “Really? Refreshing its bedding?” said Shn’aillaigh enviously. “I’ve never seen that.”

    “You have to keep very quiet. And sort of not think, ’cos it hears ya!” the little boy explained.

    “I see. Wish I’d been there.”

    “What about the broadcast?” asked Drouwh.

    “Huh? Oh! Only that R’bbie and I thought it was quite effective. They only had about thirty seconds each, so they all stood in exactly the same position, behind a large card that read ‘Vote for Amended Choice 542’, and to start with they all said that. Then they put over a message to the effect that you and the Regent were agreed on Amended 542. After that they had each man sitting down reciting part of a speech explaining about the choice, and so forth. Then the whole thing was repeated, throughout their allotted broadcast time. I timed it: they had eighty minutes out of the total hundred and twenty, so we’re not doing too badly, are we? When Fh’Ly’haiyn and Rh’n’lhd’s lot come over to our side it should be even better.”

    “Mm. If anybody’s watching. Though Fh’Ly’haiyn and Rh’n’lhd hasn’t much influence with the Parliament: that’ll only give us about three more Representatives, I think, Shn’aillaigh.”

    “Every little helps. And he’s got half the Lord’s Circle in his pocket, remember: we need them if we want to prevent bloody mayhem in the clan lands.” She paused. “Begging your pardon, ma’am,” she added feebly.

    “Not at all, my dear. So Mr M’Klui’shke’aigh’s on the job already, is he? That’s good. What a very determined man he is.”

    “Yes,” muttered Shn’aillaigh uncomfortably.

    “Bright, too,” murmured Drouwh. “Have you ever heard of the presidential system, Shn’aillaigh?”

    “No,” she said blankly.

    He sighed a little. “It’s Choice 1783, I think. A president is—um—a little like an elected Leader of Parliament, I suppose. The people, not the parliament, vote for him.”

    “Vote for him directly?”

    “Mm. He has considerable powers. Sh’n would make a cursed good one.”

    Shn’aillaigh swallowed. “Um, yes. Only he’s not much interested in politics as such, Drouwh. He’s keen to see total adult suffrage, but I think that’s more out of a sense of—um—not loyalty to his class, so much, as a feeling that after the sacrifices his mother made for him, he owes it to her memory to see that her people get something. That’s not putting it too well, but it’s something like that.”

    “I think that puts it very well indeed. So he was very fond of his mother, was he, Lady Shn’aillaigh?” said Mh’aaiivh kindly.

    “Yes, ma’am,” she said a trifle hoarsely. “She seems to have made great sacrifices for him when he was a boy. Working all hours of the day and night, giving up her own food to him and his little sister: that sort of thing.”

    “I see,” she said gently.

    “Perhaps it’s just as well for us that he doesn’t fancy himself as president,” said Drouwh on a dry note.

    “So what does he intend to do after the Referendum, if I may ask, my dear?” asked Mh’aaiivh.

    “Um, well, expand his business interests, really,” said Shn’aillaigh on a weak note. “Set up more factories and so forth. He thinks we could do a lot more with our horticultural products. Expand the mn-mn trade, export mn-mn silk and wh’h flax, that sort of thing. And he’s very interested in encouraging tourism. He seems to think Feddos would pay to stay in our keeps and—uh, well, just see our countryside, really. I thought we’d have to install all sorts of amusements to attract them, but he says that the countryside itself will be a great draw, if it’s advertised properly.”

  · “And if the keeps are done up with decent drains and Feddo hygiene cabinets!” said Drouwh with a sudden laugh.

    “Yes. What Feddos seem to fancy,” explained Shn’aillaigh, smiling at the Regent’s mother: “is putting up at the most luxurious sort of intergalactic tourist palace imaginable, in order to go out on hunting and sight-seeing trips which entail sleeping rough in the most exquisite discomfort!”

    Mh’aaiivh twinkled at her. “So I’d heard!”

    There was a little pause. T’m reported the island was getting closer. Shn’aillaigh leaned forward and tried to identify the spot where she and Dh’aaych had landed. T’m vetoed all her suggestions, citing T’m’s Kitten’s better information. After a little Drouwh asked drily if T’m’s Kitten thought he should resign the controls to The Old Woman and was withered by the reply that they were gathering khyai’llh on the Isle, The Old Woman was too busy.

    “Ask The Cat,” drawled Shn’aillaigh.

    “She’s not interested in lifters,” said T’m immediately.

    She sat back, shrugging.

    Mh’aaiivh of Old Rthfrdia had smiled just a little. She murmured: “And will you yourself go into politics after the Referendum, Lady Shn’aillaigh? Many of the Lords’ Circle intend to, I believe.”

    “Me? Become a Reppo?” said Shn’aillaigh feebly. “No. I mean, I’ve never thought about it.”

    “I certainly can’t see you representing the wishes of the people,” drawled Drouwh.

    “And I can’t see you!” she flashed.

    “I don’t know that I intend to go into politics, either.”

    “But you must!” said Mh’aaiivh unguardedly.

    “Must I, ma’am?” he murmured.

    “Uh—look, Drouwh, you’re a natural leader,” said Shn’aillaigh uneasily. “Forget what I said just then: if there was ever any time the people needed a leader—”

    “They needed them when we came here and had to fight the bears,” piped T’m solemnly.

    Shn’aillaigh had jumped. “Er—yes. Well, there you are, Drouwh!” she said, rallying. “Isn’t the Lords’ Circle just as much as a threat as the bears ever were?”

    “Possibly. If we’re assuming that the people will want a democratic form of government.”

    “They must do!” she said energetically.

     He shrugged.

    “Come on, Drouwh, what have we all been fighting for?” she cried.

    “Sometimes I ask myself that,” he murmured.

    “And what do you reply, if it isn’t too much to ask?” she said angrily.

    “Oh… Fifty percent devolution, saving some vestiges of the old life out of the wreckage? I don’t know... Have I been fighting for myself, or the people?”

    “The people,” squeaked T’m. “K’t-Ln says so!”

    Drouwh bit his lip. “Mm.”

    “For a middle way,” murmured Mh’aaiivh.

    “I suppose so: yes,” he said tiredly. “But aren’t we wandering from the point? What are your plans, Shn’aillaigh?”

     She swallowed. “I intend to marry Sh’n, if he’ll have me,” she said in a low voice.

    “Good,” said Mh’aaiivh placidly.

    “Mm. Good,” agreed Drouwh. “And?”

    “And nothing! I can’t think past that!” she said crossly. “Are you completely inhuman?”

    Mh’aaiivh touched her hand gently. “We understand, my dear. There will be time enough for other plans, when you’re over the big hurdle.”

    “Yes,” she admitted hoarsely.

    “What about your people?” demanded Drouwh.

    “Fifty percent devolution? And doesn’t democracy mean that they’ll have to start looking after themselves?”

    Drouwh made no reply. His nostrils flared slightly, and the long mouth tightened. The green lifter tilted at an alarming angle and swooped for the ground. T’m gasped, and even Shn’aillaigh grabbed at the edge of her seat, but the Regent’s mother remained unmoved.

    Drouwh landed the craft without speaking. He opened the hatch and helped Her Royal Highness out, still without speaking.

    They stood motionless and silent in the clear island air under a high blue sky with the sweet smell of drying khyai’llh on the breeze. Drouwh threw his head back and breathed deeply.

    “Democratic processes or not, over ninety percent of the population are born to follow,” said Mh’aaiivh calmly. “Whereas you were born to lead.”

    Drouwh’s mouth opened slightly.

    Shn’aillaigh leapt down lightly. “And unless you’ve suddenly gone mind-deaf,” she noted drily, “you must be able to hear The Old Woman of Slrw agreeing with Her Highness.”

    “Yes,” he said feebly. “I suppose I can.”

    T’m jumped down with his kitten. “Is The Old Woman always right about everything, Mk-L’ster? T’m’s Kitten says she is.”

    “Does he, indeed?”

    “Yes. But the Captain says no being is right about everything.”

    “Well, I’m only a being, too,” he said drily. “I can’t say who’s right in this instance, T’m. –Come on, it’s this way.” He strode off.

    T’m pattered along at his side. The two women followed more slowly.

    “I don’t know that this is the way,” muttered Shn’aillaigh after a few moments. “It doesn’t look right to me.”

    “Never mind, my dear. I for one am content to follow our leader,” said Mh’aaiivh placidly.

    Shn’aillaigh goggled at her.

    Her Royal Highness smiled calmly.

    Shn’aillaigh shook helplessly. “Born—like—it!” she choked.

    Mh’aaiivh of Old Rthfrdia just nodded calmly.

    “There are three of them, not two,” noted Trff.

    “Huh?”

    “Isn’t you-it forgetting the Fleet Commander?”

    BrTl winced, even though there was a Ju’ukrterian shield around the ship. “Oh—yes,” he said lamely. “I suppose he will be in the running: yes. How is he?”

    Trff replied immediately: “Physically, very well. Mentally, he-it has reached the age of a being such as S’zzie.”

    BrTl gulped.

    “That’s very good progress.”

    “You’ll have had that from the joint minds of the Full College of Full Surgeons,” he noted viciously.

    “More or less,” it replied tranquilly.

    BrTl shuddered. Fortunately Trff wasn’t too close. “How’s Jhl going to react to him?”

    “Now that she-it’s experienced the cognates, it means sons? By react, it takes it that you-it means will she-it find the Fleet Commander more appealing as a possible bond-partner?”

    “You-it puts these things so clearly,” he said, wincing.

    “This it-being has after all spent many IG years, in terms of the commonly perceived space-time continuum, in the company of humanoids,” it explained.

    BrTl goggled at it but it actually appeared sincere. Well, just sat there like the usual ball of pale green fluff. But he thought there was a whiff of sincere. “Uh—yeah. Well, let’s say she will find You-Know-Who appealing—just for the sake of argument. And without going into whether that was the whole point of the exercise. That means, again just for the sake of argument, her and him, R’shn and one of the sons, and L’Thea and the other son—right?”

    “G’gg and the female son?” it offered.

    BrTl gulped. “Uh—I think he’s too young, isn’t he?”

    “Not biologically.”

    “Don’t let’s go into that!” he said hurriedly. “In terms of Bluellian social norms.”

    “It’s not sure,” it admitted.

    “I probed L’Thea and she laughed like a drain at the mere idea.”

    “Oh. Well, that works out quite nicely then, BrTl! –In terms of humanoid biological partnering!” it added hurriedly as BrTl’s tail lashed his cabin floor. Fortunately there was nothing within lashing reach to break or fall over.

    “Nicely,” he said, grinding the word between his crunchers.

    “Possibly we can prevent her-it from bond-partnering with the Fleet Commander.”

    “Possibly grqwaries might fly, too, though they haven’t so far. But would you mind awfully asking the it-being to bend its mind to the point?”

    “It is,” it hooted mournfully.

    “Oh. Um—good. Well, all right: for the time being let’s concentrate on getting the other two—those ones she’s ambivalent about,” he reminded it heavily—”out of the way by bond-partnering them with R’shn and L’Thea.”

    “Yes. Which shall have which, BrTl?”

    BrTl admitted gloomily: “I was just going to ask you-it that, Trff. It’s you that’s been picking up all these semi-sensory impressions or whatever they are. –Don’t explain. Just tell me about the two of them again, there’s a good old Trff.”

    Trff told him. Given that it was Jhl’s mammalian impressions filtered through a World Shield, a x’nb web, and the combined mind of the it-being, not to say through pale green fluff, it wasn’t too bad. Given that the whole subject of mammalian repro was a mystery to him anyway.

    “She’d like to do this repro stuff with both of them: right?” he concluded.

    “Yes. But that isn’t the same as bond-partnering, BrTl,” it reminded him anxiously.

    “I THINK WE’VE ESTAB— Sorry. I think we’ve established that.”

    Trff righted itself crossly. “Yes.” It dusted off its fluff.

    “Sorry,” repeated BrTl uneasily.

    “It thinks it’s time for a shot of fermented laa,” it decided.

    Thankfully BrTl ordered it. And a small basin of nnru juice for himself. Smallish.

    “Suppose,” he said after the nnru juice had found its way to his fifth digestive conduit and he was beginning to see the Known Universe in a pleasantly greenish light, “that we sort of… run an impression of the two sons by them?”

    Trff choked down a tube.

    Kindly BrTl shot out a pseudopod and patted it on what might possibly have been the back if it had had a front.

    “Thanks!” it gasped. “That’s better! You-it means if it does.”

    “Uh—I could do the running-by-them bit. You might have to remove the memory of it,” he said cautiously.

    There was a short pause.

    “Is this ethical within the Meaning of the You-Know-What, BrTl?”

    “Who cares?”

    “The it-being doesn’t care. The Inalienable Being Rights Declaratory Act is a practical code by which the Federation is enabled to function relatively smoothly, but—”

    “Don’t go on, that spaceport lawyer,” he groaned.

    “—but the notion of ‘ethical’ in that sense is foreign to it.”

    BrTl sighed. He had noticed that, actually. “Mm. When they come back from J’rd’s we’ll give them a shot of something and then run it by them, okay?”

    “Okay. R’shn was overwhelmed by a picture of the Fleet Commander’s physical appearance, at one point. She-it’ll probably want the one that’s visually more like him-it.”

    Well, yeah. If you applied logic to a situation where no logic pertained, that conclusion was probably fair enough. Well, possibly fair enough. BrTl drained his nnru juice and waited for it to hit the fifth digestive conduit. Oooh, that was better...

    “That’s that, then!” said Trff briskly, the experiment having concluded. “It was right!”

    BrTl eyed it uneasily. “Uh-huh.” R’shn had gone overboard about Rhan-son’s personal appearance and Trff’s version of his character. L’Thea had been almost as ecstatic about Evil D’ru. Exactly how much of all that Trff might have suggested they feel, he wasn’t gonna ask, because frankly he didn’t have the guts to face the answer. “We need to see whether they really like them in the flesh,” he reminded it.

    “Yes. And if they don’t like them enough?”

    “Uh—well, it sort of depends on what Jhl’s decided. If anything.” He cleared his throat. “You could give them a sort of nudge, I suppose,” he conceded weakly.

    “All of them? The males as well as the females?” asked the engineering mind calmly.

    BrTl swallowed. “Would you agree, if I said so?”

    “Yes,” it said instantly.

    “Er—yeah. I thought you would. Well, then, yes: give them all a nudge and let’s get the whole thing settled! Only listen—” he said quickly as Trff picked up its shot glass.

    There was a short silence.

    “It’s listening, BrTl,” Trff prompted kindly.

    “Yeah. Promise you won’t do anything until we’ve talked it over, okay? Um, what I mean is, I know you’re more than capable of doing it on your own, and I know you wouldn’t even mind taking the decision all on your own, but, um, it had better be both of us, okay?”

    “Both head down in the mok shit if she-it finds out: yes,” it agreed tranquilly. “It promises, BrTl.”

    BrTl sagged. It wasn’t a bad old Trff.

    Mh’aaiivh of Old Rthfrdia was very pale. “That is the only condition on which you will help my son?”

    “Yes,” said The Old Woman calmly.

    The Regent’s mother swallowed. “The end of the monarchy... That’s what you’ve always wanted, isn’t it? You and the rest of the clanspeople!”

    “Is it?”

    Mh’aaiivh bit her lip. “I beg your pardon, Old Woman.”

    “Not at all; I understand you are under considerable strain. A strong man will make a place for himself in any system.”

    “True,” she said in a low voice. “Though I think we both know that Allie is not that.”

    The Old Woman of Slrw watched unemotionally as Mh’aaiivh stared into her lap, twisting her hands together.

    “Old Woman, according to the law a former regent may not stay on as advisor in any case. And surely you must know that Rh’aiiy’hn believes in equality for all? He—he would not discourage Allie if he—he expressed a wish for a more democratic—”

    “We both know that laws may be changed. And we both know also of your son’s promise to the boy’s father. It will be better if Rh’aiiy’hn does not stay on Old Rthfrdia.”

    “I’ll lose my son,” she said hoarsely.

    “Not necessarily. You might go with him.”

    Her lips trembled infinitesimally. “Rh’aiiy’hn’s father no longer wants me on his world.”

    “Whether or not you let that weigh with you is entirely up to you. –If you agree, we had best go.”

    Mh’aaiivh licked her lips. “I must agree. I do agree. Rh’aiiy’hn is frighteningly weak.”

    “Yes.” She paused. “I could remove his infatuation.”

    Mh’aaiivh shut her eyes for a moment. “Don’t tempt me,” she said faintly.

    The Old Woman just waited.

    “No,” said Mh’aaiivh hoarsely: “please don’t. I know he would never realise it, but— No. I can’t do that to him.”

    The Old Woman got up. “As you wish.”

    “Shall you—shall you influence the boy against him, as well?”

    “To the extent that he will experience no desire to have his uncle’s help or advice once he’s of age: yes. Better safe than sorry. And I think he might marry the stupid Mk-L’ster sister.”

    “She’s several years his elder,” said Mh’aaiivh dubiously.

    “What? No! T’m’s sister!” she said impatiently,

    “Little M’ri? But she’s a commoner!”

    The Old Woman looked at her drily.

    “Oh,” said Mh’aaiivh feebly. “I see. Yes, it works out well for you, doesn’t it, whichever way the people take it. If they resent his marrying a commoner, it may well help to bring the monarchy down. And it can only make Allie’s desire to resign the throne so much more credible.”

    “Of course,” she said, draping her cloak over her head.

    Mh’aaiivh got up limply.

   “Regrets, my Lady?” said The Old Woman sardonically. “Thoughts of the greater good?”

    Mh’aaiivh took a deep breath. “I’ve thought of the greater good all my life, Old Woman. But now, when it’s my son’s life in question?”

    “That’s what I thought,” she said placidly, going out.

    Mh’aaiivh followed her, mouth tight. She could feel The Old Woman asking: Might the end of the monarchy not be the greater good, after all? But she closed her mind. She was past rational thought.

    K’t-Ln sat silently by Dh’aaych’s bed. Over by the window old Lord U-Fl’aiir’th stared unseeingly at the forest in its summer foliage. The house was very quiet. Dh’aaych’s window was open and the humming of insects and the smell of grass and leaves filled the room.

    “His mother should be here,” said the old man abruptly.

    K’t-Ln went very red. “Yes,” she said hoarsely. “But The Mk-L’ster forbade it.”

    “Aye. Sometimes I wonder just how human Mk-L’ster is.”

    “Mm,” she said, licking her lips. “He is much better, Lord.”

    “Yes. –Did you see that business with the lifter blob?”

    “No.”

    The old man grunted. K’t-Ln looked at him uncertainly.

    Finally he sighed and said: “Come here, Miss.”

    She came over to him, looking wary.

    He put a gnarled hand under her chin and tipped her face up to the light. K’t-Ln looked up at him dubiously. She didn’t think he was the sort of man that took village girls to be his Pleasure Girls, but then, with the lordship class, you never knew.

    He sniffed slightly. “Mm,” he said. “Mk-L’ster’s maternal grandfather: aye, I can see him in you. And the fellow they married his mother off to: aye.”

    K’t-Ln went very red. “So what?” she said crossly.

    “Mk-L’ster blood isn’t bad blood,” he said heavily, releasing her. “And Drouwh’s father was a womaniser and a heedless fool, but there was no real vice in him. And it’s plain even to an old has-been like me with none of these Feddo mind-powers that you’ve more of your grandfather in you than of him. You’d better have him. See if you can make something of him.”

    “Who?” she said faintly.

    “My son,” said the old man harshly.

    Unexpectedly K’t-Ln’s eyes filled with tears. “I duh-don’t— I mean, I duh-don’t know if I… I want to be a lawyer!” she burst out.

    He sniffed. “No doubt. Well, you can do that and marry my son at the same time, can’t you? Women of our class are not obliged to stay home and suckle their brats and mind the fire, you know.”

    “Yes; but who says I want to have his brats?” she said angrily.

    “You’ve been sitting here with him every available minute of the day,” he replied drily.

     She bit her lip. “Yes. But—”

    “He’s not as young as you,” said the old man with a sigh. “He hasn’t got those extra ten years or so to fool around in, making his mind up. It’s time he was settling down. And I’d quite like to see him with his son at his knee before I go!” he ended harshly.

    “Mm.”

    Lord U-Fl’aiir’th looked down at her pink and scowling face. “I suppose I can’t expect you to acknowledge that I’ve just done you the signal honour of welcoming you into my family, girl!”

    K’t-Ln looked him in the eye. “No. You must know that I don’t see it like that. And—and it’d be my son, too.”

    His mouth tightened. “And U-Fl’aiir’th blood isn’t good enough for you, hey?”

    K’t-Ln cast a look at the sleeping Dh’aaych’llyai’n. “I like him,” she said in a low voice. “And I—I think I’m in love with him. But he—” She swallowed. “It isn’t that he’s soft, exactly. And he’s brave enough, only...”

    “He’s a follower, not a leader,” said his father shortly.

    “Yes,” she agreed gratefully. “That’s it.”

    “And he is soft. Possibly not in the way you mean. But compare him with The Mk-L’ster: he’s a hard man. Dh’aaych’llyai’n’s not like that.”

    She nodded. “You’re right.”

    Old Lord U-Fl’aiir’th took a deep breath. “You’d always have to be the one who took the decisions: you realise that?”

    K’t-Ln stared at the floor. “Mm.”

    “I think you’re capable of it.”

    She looked up suddenly. “Yes. I know I am. But what if he drives me mad?” she said in a voice that shook.

    Lord U-Fl’aiir’th rubbed his chin. “Happens in most marriages. Uh—well, you’d have your law stuff. Wouldn’t be living in each other’s pockets, would you?”

    “No.”

    There was a long silence.

    “What will he do, Lord?” said K’t-Ln in a tiny voice.

    “Eh? Oh: after this Feddo referendum nonsense?”

    She nodded.

    “Look to his property, I should hope!” said the old man harshly.

    K’t-Ln looked dubious. “Will there be any left?”

    “Aye. That skinny fellow I brought with me, he’s our family lawyer. Signed the papers this morning turning Keep U-Fl’aiir’th and all its lands into a cursed limited company with the clanspeople as shareholders. And we own large tracts of land that’s never been clan land. Mostly down in the tropical belt and the Southern Continent. Can’t stand the tropics, meself: debilitating. Climate prevents thought and action and rots the brain. The Southern Continent’s not bad. Mostly grasslands. Flat.”

    K’t-Ln nodded slowly. “We might try farming grqwaries there.”

    Lord U-Fl’aiir’th was swamped with an overwhelming sensation of relief. He replied only: “Could do. Too new-fangled for me, I’m afraid.”

    “Yes...” she said vaguely. She looked uncertainly at Dh’aaych.

    “You might have to ask him,” said the old man. “This business has taken the stuffing out of him.”

    “Yes,” she said, swallowing. “Not only that: it was me. I was mean to him, I suppose.” She chewed her lip. “I couldn’t help it, I didn’t know what I wanted.”

    “No.” There was a pause. “Are you a virgin?” demanded the old man, going very red.

    “Yes,” said K’t-Ln simply.

    He sagged. “Thank the old gods! –It’ll sweeten the pill for his mother,” he explained as she stared at him.

    “I see. Don’t you care?” she asked curiously.

    Lord U-Fl’aiir’th grimaced. “Oddly enough, I do.”

    “I see.” K’t-Ln went slowly over to the bed and stood there looking down at Dh’aaych.

    The old man came up to her shoulder. “Suggest the grqwaries thing to him when he wakes up.”

    “All right.”

    He hesitated, then went out without saying anything more. K’t-Ln stood there looking down at Dh’aaych’llyai’n.

    After what seemed to the girl a very long time his one eye opened. “Grqwaries, law… brats,” he said faintly.

    K’t-Ln swallowed hard. “Were you awake? Did you hear all that?”

    “Yes,” he said faintly. “Not awake ’nough… to speak.”

    She swallowed again and was incapable of uttering.

    “Will you?” he whispered.

    “Um—grqwaries, law, and brats, you mean?” she said hoarsely. “With you?”

    “Mm.”

    “Um—it doesn’t have to be marriage,” she said on an anxious note.

    Dh’aaych squinted at her. “Yes: does. M’father’s… approved!” he said with the ghost of a laugh.

    K’t-Ln bit her lip. “That’s what I mean.”

    “Never did take… blind bit of notice of him,” he said with an effort. “He knows that.”

    She nodded silently.

    “Will you?”

    “Do you really want to?” said K’t-Ln with tears in her eyes. “I mean, you’re not just saying it because he wants to have a grandchild or—or because you think he’s given me the idea that it ought to be marriage, or—or anything dumb like that, are you?”

    “Nothing dumb,” said Dh’aaych faintly. He took a deep breath. “Only because... I love you.”

    Her lips trembled. “I’ll boss you around,” she warned.

    “Know that.”

    “Um—well, um— If you really want to, then yes!” she said with a mad laugh.

    Dh’aaych closed his one remaining eye. A tear slid out of it. “Yes: really.”

    There was a long pause. K’t-Ln gulped, sniffed, and tried to hold back her tears.

    Dh’aaych opened his eye again. “Kiss me.”

    “Um—yes,” she said uncertainly. She bent over the bed and put her lips gently on his.

    After a long moment he murmured: “Not that much of an invalid.”

    “No—um—what?”

    “Go on, kiss me.”

    “I am,” she said in bewilderment.

    A slow smile slid over Dh’aaych’s battered face. “Mm.” He put his good arm round her and gently pulled her closer. “Go on.”

    K’t-Ln put her lips on his again.

    Dh’aaych smiled inwardly. He didn’t attempt to show her what a real kiss was: he was just cursed glad that she didn’t know. And that it would be up to him to teach her.

    “Lord Fh’Ly’haiyn and Rh’n’lhd and I are going to town with All’yhaiyn,” said Drouwh, frowning.

    “Yes,” agreed Jhl mildly.

    “You’ll have to keep an eye on things here. Though I don’t anticipate trouble.”

    “No,” agreed Jhl mildly.

     His lips tightened. “Very well. Say it!”

    “Say what?”

    “That it’ll be cursed boring!”

    “It already is,” replied Jhl on a grim note.

    “I thought so.”

    “Look, they’re all your friends and relatives, not mine, Mk-L’ster: I can’t really empathise with them. Well, I’m glad that Dh’aaych and K’t-Ln have worked it out between them. And that Shn’aillaigh and Sh’n are engaged to be bond-p—married. And even that M’ri and Allie are getting on so well together. And if R’rt Fh’laiin’s actually asked your sister to stay on at the Manor, I suppose that’s a good thing, too.”

    “You suppose no such thing!”

    She shrugged slightly. “Possibly he deserves a being with more brain-power and something that approaches a conscience: yes. But he’s tired, you must have seen that.”

    “Tired? He’s been wounded, what do you expect!” he said angrily

    Jhl looked at him drily.

    “Oh. Yes, I see. But he’s a young man still: surely—”

    “Humanoid psychology isn’t my subject. If my opinion’s worth anything, which I strongly doubt, I’d say he’ll settle for something soft and undemanding—let’s say mentally undemanding—to come home to.”

    “Yes. She isn’t that soft,” said A’ailh’sa’s brother uneasily.

    “I think I meant physically soft. Um... ducklingish?”

    Drouwh goggled at her.

    “Physically soft and fluffy. The Bluellian expression refers to grqwary chicks. Small balls of fluff,” said Jhl with a wry inflection that he missed.

    “Oh! Kittenish, we’d say.”

    “That suits her better: kittens have claws and play cruel little games.”

    “Uh—Forget it. It’ll do,” he muttered, passing his hand over his curls. “You’ll look after things here, then?”

    “If you want me to: yes. And I suppose I shouldn’t leave Rh’aiiy’hn, now I’ve found him.”

    “He is a lot better,” he said with a sigh. “Whatever that muck was that The Old Woman gave him, it seems to be working.”

    “Ye-ah…”

    “What are you looking like that for?”

    “Nothing. Um... Is this the first time he’s mentioned the idea of living off-world once the period of his regency’s over?”

    Drouwh shrugged. “I don’t know. We’ve never been close. It isn’t a rumour I’ve heard round the Court. But then, Rh’aiiy’hn’s never been one for expressing his thoughts or plans to anybody. But if you’re asking my opinion, I’d say it’s a cursed good idea. Our law doesn’t allow for his staying on to advise the Ruler, you know; and although he’d make a decent fist at leading some sort of political party, the mere idea of the erstwhile Regent starting up a political faction—! The old gods know what the consequences for the monarchy would be, for a start: Allie’s stupid enough to ally himself publicly with any faction of Rh’aiiy’hn’s, and then what would happen to the idea of a constitutional monarchy where the Ruler can’t interfere with the political process? It could lead to civil war!”

    “Yes. I can see that.”

    Drouwh looked at her uncertainly. “If you’re thinking he’ll miss Old Rthfrdia, don’t. He’s a bit of a cold fish, you know. In a way, he’s like R’rt Fh’laiin: cares more about ideas and cursed theories than he does about anything halfway to reality!”

    “Mm.”

    “I’ve got to go. I’ll try and get back before the damned Court goes into hyperdrive over the welcoming ceremonies for the off-world delegations, but I may not manage it: I can’t leave everything to Sh’n. And I certainly don’t want to leave the boy to Fh’Ly’haiyn and Rh’n’lhd’s tender mercies! And listen—” He broke off, frowning.

    “What?”

    Drouwh chewed on his lip. “Rh’aiiy’hn’s still cursed weak. Well, very much better, yes, but… He’ll have to turn up for the welcoming ceremonies, you know.”

    Jhl nodded. “I’ll come with him.”

    “Mm,” he said on an uneasy note. “Good.”

    She took a deep breath. “All right: I’ll come as a Vvlvanian-cursed Pleasure Girl!”

    “It would be safer. Let it be implied that he’s had you down on his property on the Southern Continent or somewhere for some time.”

    “He’ll enjoy that.”

    “He’d enjoy seeing you end up in a Feddo jail even less! –I’m off.” He flung his cloak over his shoulder and strode out.

    Jhl shrugged. “Bye-bye and good luck to you, too,” she muttered.

   “This isn’t logical, BrTl,” warned Trff.

    “None of it’s LOGICAL!” he shouted. “Uh—no, sorry. Go on.”

    “It explained that all these other mammals she’s surrounded with seem to be preparing for bond-partnership, didn’t it?”

    “Yes,” he groaned. “I suppose it could’ve been more boring but at the moment I can’t see how.”

    “You-it said that SK14/82 in Sector 100249 was the most boring experience in the Known Universe,” it recalled.

    “SK14/82 is so boring it hasn’t even got a name; and those pools of brown soup it’s covered in haven’t got names for THEMSELVES!”

    “In some ways the SK14/82 beings are akin to blobs,” it noted. “Not in others, of course.”

    “Get—on—with—it!”

    “As it said, this isn’t logical. She-it likes... yes, likes Rhan-son more and more each day and dislikes D’ru-son more and more each day. And she-it wants to do repro stuff more and more with him-it.”

    BrTl rolled his eyes. “Which does she want more and more to do repro stuff with?”

    “As it said: D’ru-son.”

    After a period of blank puzzling, BrTl gave in entirely and admitted: “In that case, you-it’s right: logical is what it isn’t.”

    Trff waved an antenna up and down. After a period of blank puzzling, BrTl realised what it was trying to do. “Don’t attempt a humanoid nod, Trff, you haven’t got the build for it,” he said kindly.

    “But it’s never been a Lone Delegate before, and what if it does it all wrong? How does one communicate with humanoid beings that have only just come into the Federation?”

    BrTl removed his translator and said kindly in Ju’ukrterian: “Let the Slp-Og V. Trff not worry. The beings not-of-it-beingness won’t even know if it’s trying to communicate or not.”

    Trff removed its translator gratefully. “The Slp-Og V. Trff offers grateful thanks to the Great Being not-of-it-beingness. Thanks, BrTl. But that was its point. The beings not-of-it-beingness won’t know that it is trying to communicate.”

    BrTl replied slowly and carefully: “Let the Slp-Og V. Trff not try to communicate with the beings not-of-it-beingness.”

    “But—Oh,” it said.

    BrTl smirked. “Why bother?” he said in horribly demotic Ju’ukrterian.

    “Why bother, indeed?” Trff agreed happily. “It will stand by its banner and thus appear in the greatest degree of it-beingness to the beings not-of-it-beingness!”

    BrTl gave up and put his translator back on. “Did you say ‘appear in the greatest degree of it-beingness’? Or did my sensory organs deceive me?”

    Politely Trff replaced its translator. “It said ‘appear entrancingly foreign’, yes.”

    “Right. Gotcha. Of course you did.”

    “Within the limits of the Act and not to be anything-ist,” it amended, less happily.

    “Uh—Yeah, of course, Trff. Within those, exactly. ‘Entrancingly off-worldly’,” he said in an evil voice to his up-market new translator, approaching it very close to his crunchers. “It sounds as if it’s catching: all these beings not-of-it-beingness, Vvlvanian curses, mammalian humanoids, going round bond-partnering and stuff.”

    “Only psychologically catching,” it said cautiously.

    And presumably only to mammalian humanoid psyches: right. Which would DO, in case no being had noticed!

    “Don’t be like that, BrTl,” it said sadly. “If it had been up to this it-being, Jhl would never have gone within a megazillion glps of the vacuum-frozen FW dump.”

    “No. True. Sorry. Just try to think of some way to ensure, I mean absolutely ensure, that all this bond-partnering mok shit won’t make her decide to take the Vvlvanian-cursed Whtyllian!”

    “The it-being is doing so, BrTl. Would you-it find it altogether bad if she-it took Rhan-son?”

    “What? Great steaming piles of mok droppings! The we-it likes him, is that it?”

    “Yes. In your-its terms, ‘likes’: yes.”

    “I would find it altogether bad, yes! If your description of him’s even halfway right, he’s a boring piece of mok shit that’ll make her stay home all day looking after the egg sheds and knitting fluffy down hats!”

    “No, that’s the other one,” it replied tranquilly.

    BrTl gulped. “Oh. Uh—well, in that case he’ll get her involved in some deadly earnest cause, political or social or both, and put pressure on that Bluellian conscience of hers so that even though he’ll say he wants her to do whatever she wants to do, she’ll never do it.”

    “Yes.”

    “That would also be altogether bad in my terms!” he shouted.

    “Right!” said Trff quickly.

    “So bond-partnering with Rhan-son is out: okay? He can have R’shn, instead. Though I like her. I don’t suppose you could turn him off the whole idea of bond-partnering, could you?”

    “You-it supposes incorrectly. Certainly it could. Though it would be unethical in term of the Act, and Jhl would certainly find it un—”

    “Yeah. Thought so. Forget it, Trff.”

    “It seems to be important to a mammalian’s sense of its innate self,” it noted mournfully.

    “Ugh! Uh—I see,” he lied. “We’d better get on with it, then,” he concluded sourly.

    “On with what—Oh!” Trff went over to the door. “This it-being will go and practise standing by its banner.”

    “Do that. –Wait; what’s she doing now?”

    “Sitting on a high place, wishing the Fleet Commander was there to talk to. She-it’s very bored. Largely very bored with all the mammalian bond-partnering that’s going on around her-it,” it offered on a hopeful note.

    BrTl brightened. “That’s a good sign!”

    There was an IG microsecond’s pause before it agreed but BrTl didn’t register this.

    “Well, off you go, then: start standing by your banner!”

    “Yes,” agreed Trff, going.

    BrTl got out his Grand Occasion Saddle and looked at it with modified approval. “You could do with a bit more polishing. –Fl’Oo-ooueroii!”

    Nothing.

    “Mok shit,” he muttered. “Fl’Mnn-nnlluyii!”

    The blue Flppu shot in at top speed. “Yes, Great BrJk?” it gasped.

    “We’ll do a bit more polishing of this saddle,” said BrTl.

    “Yes, Great One! My honour, Great One!” it gasped.

    “Yes,” said BrTl in an absent voice, reaching out a hand for a senso-tissue or twelve. “Did you find out who’s holding my delegation’s banner?”

    “Yes, indeed, Great BrJk! A being called BrLc.”

    “Huh! –What’ll he take for it?”

    The Flppu polished industriously. “He will accept S’zzie and one hyperblob, Great BrJk.”

    “S’zzie? What in the Known Universe for? She wouldn’t even taste as good as a grqwary, to his metabolism.”

    “No, indeed, Great One! I think he means to trade her.”

    “Well, he’s not getting her!”

    “No,” it agreed sadly. “Of course not.”

    BrTl eyed it sideways. “Anything else he’d take?”

    “Um—me, Great One,” it admitted.

    BrTl was tempted, very tempted. “Do you want to belong to him?”

    “Oh, no, Great BrJk! That being would put me in a bracelet!”

    “Well, that’s out, then,” he said sadly.

    The Flppu bobbed frightfully, and polished industriously. “That’s out, then! That’s out, then!” it squeaked happily.

    “I could always fight him. How big is he?”

    “Very, very big, Great BrJk,” it said sadly.

    “Is he as big as me?” he asked carefully.

    “Oh, no, Great BrJk!”

    BrTl looked dubiously at its bluish mind-picture of BrLc. Half his size. But was there an affective factor in there? Well, flattering, if so, but— He scratched his shoulder. “I’ll think about it.”

    “Yes, indeed, Great BrJk! Why should the other Great One alone have the honour and pleasure of being a banner-bearer?” it squeaked with tremendous sympathy.

    BrTl coughed slightly, and began to polish very industriously indeed.

    Jhl had borrowed K’t-Ln’s cloak and gone out very early. Gliding was great fun: no doubt it would catch on like Mklontian b’x-fever in a herd of mok and become as popular as olfacto-mutable berries throughout the Federation before you could say “Federation.” Now she sat on a “high place”—high in a tree on the crest of one of the low, rolling hills of the Forests of Mk-L’ster—staring out across the peaceful vista.

    She was positive The Old Woman had done something to both Allie’s and Rh’aiiy’hn’s minds. In fact with comparatively little effort she could be sure precisely what. But she wasn’t that interested in making the effort. Who gave a cptt-rvvr’s fart? She’d done her bit, she’d found Rhan—Rh’aiiy’hn—and rescued him from the evil D’ru. Now all she had to do was get off the Vvlvanian-cursed primmo! Who gave a cptt-rvvr’s fart what happened to the lot of them, after that?

    She was aware, somewhat uneasily, that her thoughts were becoming so aggressive, not to say disgruntled, because she couldn’t work up any interest in these Old Rthfrdians she’d come to know so well over the last few months. Not even in K’t-Ln or Shn’aillaigh, definitely the best of the bunch. But as they’d plumped for bond-partnership with a pair of the most boring males in the Known Universe… Jhl made a face and admitted to herself that Dh’aaych and Sh’n both had their good points. In fact Sh’n M’Klui’shke’aigh was precisely the sort of man that sensible persons such as Dad and S’zaan, to name only two, had been telling her for years she ought to find and settle down in bond-partnership with. Solid, hard-working, intelligent… All of that. But by the bones of Brqa and all fourteen of its moons, he was boring! …Limited. Yes, decided Jhl gloomily, staring out across the green forests of Old Rthfrdia, he was limited. Okay, it was obvious his business was going to expand tremendously once his world was in the Federation: as a merchant he had enterprise enough. But did his vision extend any further than creating a solid commercial empire for himself, and, at the outer limit of its range, setting Old Rthfrdia itself on a sound financial footing? No, it didn’t. Poor Shn’aillaigh.

    For a moment her mind glanced guiltily at the nudge she’d given the pair of them, on the day of the hunt. Oh, well, she’d hardly been herself at the time. And if it wasn’t exactly too late to undo it, it was certainly too complicated to undo: far too many others knew of the relationship. And besides, the two beings themselves were happy! If that counted for anything. Jhl shrugged.

    At one stage, Federation alone knew why, she had actually contemplated asking Drouwh M’A’ail Mk-L’ster to come off-world with her once all this F-Day mok shit was sorted out. Adventuring round the two galaxies together: y’know? By now she had had more than time enough to recognise this for the klupf-induced fantasy it was. Drouwh Mk-L’ster in the first place content to take orders from her aboard her ship, and in the second place content to abandon his Vvlvanian-cursed Old Rthfrdian responsibilities and his Vvlvanian-cursed Old Rthfrdian clanspeople? Not to say the scent of the fl’oouu trees and the khyai’llh. He’d come back from the Isle of Slrw with his mind full of the scent of the drying khyai’llh. He’d never be happy off-world. Oh, well.

    And as for Rh’aiiy’hn… Jhl sighed. She liked him as much as any being she knew, and admired him more than most. But… It wasn’t that she didn’t fancy him, it wasn’t even that he lacked a sense of humour, like his brother: on the contrary, he was both sensitive and intelligent, with a considerable sense of humour. But…

    Jhl wrinkled her nose. He was too good for her, that was what. In her place, he’d never have let himself so much as look at the idea of influencing Sh’n’s and Shn’aillaigh’s minds. The capacity for doing so wasn’t in him. She knew: she’d looked. Oh, dear. She’d make him Vvlvanian-cursed unhappy, if— And in the end he’d make her unhappy. She’d try to live up to his principles and it might all go as smoothly as a whllubbly-gell bath for, well, maybe five IG years? Then she’d start to resent him because she couldn’t live up to his standards, and start to chafe because the word “fun” was, frankly, not in Rh’aiiy’hn’s vocabulary.

    Yes! Jhl gave a deep sigh which was as much one of relief as anything. That was it! The factor that Rh’aiiy’hn lacked that she’d being trying to identify ever since she’d first encountered his unclouded mind. He had no sense of fun.

    She stood up in the big, gnarled old tree and stretched her cramped muscles. The only thing to do was get off the vacuum-frozen FW dump and forget about the pair of them! Though what she would actually do, once she was back with the ship, was another matter. Well, presumably Trff would be all right: a Ju’ukrterian it-being didn’t need to junket round the Known Universe with a pair of intergalactic clowns with immensely inferior mind-powers. What about BrTl? Um, well, he was an adult being within the Meaning, he could make up his own mind. Maybe he and she could both apply to go back to Space Fleet? Ugh. Well, they might accept him, he hadn’t done anything particularly— Well, she was pretty sure they didn’t know about the things he had done. But it was highly unlikely they’d take her back—unless there was an Intergalactic Emergency, say an attack from the Third Galaxy, a megazillion megazillion light-years away. Yeah, really likely, ho, ho, ho.

    Jhl launched herself into the warm wind and soared across the forests of Old Rthfrdia.

    Bliss! Better than fermented laa! Shan would love it! Remember that time in the mountains of H-Ra IV when he’d shown her how to body-sled in the H-Ra IV nitrogen crystals? Vvlvanian-cursed dangerous, the whole mountain area was geologically unstable, but—Fun? You betcha Space Issue boots it was fun!