Between Darkness and Light (Sholan Alliance) Read online

  More cautiously this time, he looked inside. It was a standard single occupancy cabin with a desk and chair, a couple of easy chairs and a table. Beyond it he could see the open doors to the bedroom and the bathing room. It seemed spacious enough.

  “Will the doors be locked?” demanded Dzaou before Banner could prevent him.

  “Ah, thank you for reminding me.” M’zynal dug deep in his uniform jacket pocket and pulled out a small packet. “Your keys, Captain,” he said, holding them out to Kusac. “There’s one for each of you. The General assumed you’ll want to lock your quarters when you’re not in them.”

  Gesturing to Banner to take the key cards, he stepped inside.

  “Noolgoi will show you the Officers’ mess and recreation lounge on this deck once you’ve settled into your cabins. If you’ll allow us to do the search now, Shartoh can take you on a tour of the ship before our evening meal,” said M’zynal. “You can join us in the Officers mess or eat in your rooms if you prefer, just call Noolgoi on the desk unit and let him know your choice.”

  TeLaxaudin home world, Ghioass, same day

  “He wakes,” he heard Naacha say quietly.

  “About time,” a deeper voice replied. Sokarr’s.

  Annuur stirred, feeling a deep ache in every bone and joint. At the edges of his mind, he sensed the presence of his three sept companions, felt their concern for him. Naacha, the mystic, his mind calm as always, his concern masked with his customary gruffness even there; Lweeu, mate and life-giver to them all, her youthfulness betrayed by the constant sea of half-formed fears and worries that she tried to keep to herself; and finally, Sokarr, their nurturer . . .

  His eyes flew open and he lifted his head sharply to look at Sokarr, trying not to groan out loud at the pain it caused. His last coherent memory before being thrown from his navigation couch against the far bulkhead had been of watching one of the ceiling struts falling toward Sokarr and Lweeu and being unable to warn them.

  “I thought you were dead,” he said lamely, realizing even as he spoke that the Camarilla must have retrieved them. Only on their home world or here—though his surroundings looked like the med level on Anchorage, he knew it wasn’t—was Unity possible without the neural nets.

  “I was,” said Sokarr, leaning forward to touch noses briefly. The wave of affection that surrounded him was unrestrained. “Your injuries were greater. Four of our mystics were needed, as well as the TeLaxaudin physicians, to heal all the broken bones and damaged organs in your body. My own were slight by comparison.”

  Four? Since their mystic had joined them, he’d never known an occasion when Naacha hadn’t been able to handle healings—even a simple death—on his own. He was one of the most powerful.

  “He understates, as usual,” said Naacha gruffly from the end of his bed. “An hour more, maybe two, and I could have done nothing. He’d have stayed dead.”

  As sparing as Naacha was with words, Annuur knew better than to discount him when he did speak. Lowering his head, he looked at Lweeu, knowing she was always a good barometer for the mood of the sept as a whole. Her eyes sparkled too brightly and between her mobile ears, her short crest of stiff hair was constantly moving. She was very distressed. He hadn’t realized he’d been so close to death. It had obviously been a near thing for both himself and Sokarr.

  Clenching his teeth together, Annuur pushed himself slowly upright, trying to ignore the swirling of the room. Finally he was sitting on his haunches. “We achieved the Camarilla’s goal and survived,” he said faintly, reaching out an unsteady forelimb to Lweeu. “Without risking our U’Churian family.”

  Gratefully she took hold of his hand, making soft chittering noises of comfort.

  Naacha grunted, dropping back down onto all fours. “Camarilla don’t interfere lightly. More trouble ahead.”

  “This was a major intervention,” agreed Sokarr, looking across Annuur’s bed to the window beyond. “They will need us again.”

  Annuur followed his gaze. In the distance, the shapes of five Watcher ships could be clearly seen, the sixth shrouded behind a covered armature.

  “All will need to be processed,” said Lweeu, following his gaze. “Captain Tirak is not pleased at what we did.”

  “Tirak’s awake?” asked Annuur, surprised.

  “They could not stay in the ship while it was being repaired,” said Lweeu.

  “What’s he said?”

  “Nothing, yet. He waits for you,” replied Naacha, trotting round to the side of the bed and rearing up on his haunches again.

  “Someone has a sense of humor to allow the rest of our family to be wakened during this time,” Annuur murmured, glancing at Naacha. He found himself unable to look away from the swirling blue tattoos on the other’s cheeks until he felt a hand touch the underside of his jaw and raise it.

  Naacha’s eyes held his as firmly as his hand held his chin. “Glad am I you are still with us, Phratry Leader,” the mystic said quietly before releasing him.

  Surprise and pleasure washed through Annuur in equal measures. He knew that Naacha had chosen to join their sept out of the many that had courted him, but he hadn’t known till now that their taciturn mystic cared so much for them.

  “So am I,” he said with heartfelt sincerity, beginning to sway slightly as his aching body started to tremble with the effort of remaining seated.

  Naacha leaned against him, offering him support just as the door opened. The TeLaxaudin Azwokkuss, his bronze spindly limbs partially concealed by the colored strips of drapery that fell from his waist and neck, stood there. A faint thrumming filled the air before he began to speak.

  “Your Captain have I brought,” he said.

  “Azwokkuss said you were awake,” began the black-furred U’Churian coming into the room. He stopped dead, mouth falling open in shock. “Sokarr! But . . . You were dead! We left your body in the . . .” He ground to a halt.

  “Azwokkuss definitely has a sense of humor,” Annuur murmured very quietly as Naacha helped him to lie down.

  “The cold, it must have been the cold,” Tirak said, starting forward again. “It put you into suspended animation.” He stopped at the foot of Annuur’s bed, eyes wide, ears disappearing into his mane of black hair.

  “You haven’t a mark on you,” he said in a voice so quiet they had to strain to hear him. Leaning down, he grasped the end of the bed for support. “I don’t understand. It’s only been five days, how could you possibly have healed so quickly?”

  “Our mystics can do many things beyond navigating or planet-forming worlds,” said Annuur tiredly, settling himself on his side against the soft bedding. He knew that waking Tirak and bringing him to them had been a small act of revenge from Azwokkuss and the Reformer faction of the Camarilla for making them have to intervene in such a drastic fashion. “Don’t forget we saved your people many generations back when a solar flare would have almost destroyed them.”

  “Where are we?” Tirak asked abruptly, straightening up. “We’re not on Anchorage, are we?”

  “We’re on the TeLaxaudin world,” said Sokarr, dropping down onto all fours to go fetch a nearby chair and push it over for the Captain. “They brought us here to heal us.”

  Seeing the small Cabbaran struggling with the chair, Tirak went over to take it from him, then returned with it to the end of the bed, where Annuur’s head was, and sat down.

  “The jump point,” he said slowly. “As we entered it, Sheeowl said it was different. I don’t remember anything after that until I woke here five days ago.”

  “Yes,” agreed Annuur. “It was a TeLaxaudin one, sent to fetch us here.”

  “Sent?”

  “It’s more than a jump point,” said Sokarr. “It transports people and things.”

  “Did you send for help? How could you? We were running silent to avoid the M’zullians picking us up.”

  “They could see what was happening and came to help us,” said Annuur.

  “It was they who slowed you, whe
n you were spinning out of control,” Tirak said thoughtfully. “Why didn’t they take you then, and why take us all? I assume the other three ships are here too.”

  “All six are here, Captain,” said Sokarr, unable to prevent himself glancing out of the window at the ships sitting on the landing pad.

  Tirak looked, remaining silent for some time.

  “A drink, please,” said Annuur quietly to Sokarr. His throat was dry with talking.

  Lweeu beat Sokarr to his night table. Annuur’s mobile upper lip curled gently in a smile when the older male deferred goodnaturedly to her. Many had doubted his wisdom in choosing one as young as Lweeu, not yet out of her first century, as their mate. Her talent as an engineer had been a factor in choosing her, but Annuur had to admit he’d been drawn to her by her youth and personality. His sept had accepted his choice because it was his right as their patriarch to choose their mate, but little incidents such as this confirmed that he’d chosen wisely.

  While she held the glass, he raised his head to sip the drink through the flattened straw. It had a strange tang to it and he glanced quizzically at her.

  “Azwokkuss said to give you this when you woke,” she said. “It’ll help the pain.”

  Already a welcome numbness was beginning to creep through his limbs.

  “A night’s rest and you should be fine,” reassured Sokarr. “The damage was deep and they wanted to monitor the restructuring process. Stronger analgesics would have interfered with that.”

  “The solar flare wasn’t the only time you interfered in our past, Annuur,” said Tirak suddenly. “You stayed very quiet when we discovered that there was a genetic link between us and the Sholans. When did your people interbreed us?”

  Annuur waved the glass away and lowered his head to the bed again, closing his eyes. Azwokkuss couldn’t have anticipated this. The TeLaxaudin wouldn’t be that vindictive. How was he supposed to answer him?

  “We were not involved with your species before the flare, Captain Tirak,” he said at length.

  Tirak regarded him steadily. “Your people turned up very conveniently in time to repair the genetic damage done to those on Home and our nearest moon. How did you know there was an inhabited planet in our system? How could you have the knowledge to help us if you’d never been to our world before?”

  Annuur hadn’t expected Tirak’s questions to take this direction. He’d assumed he’d focus on the why’s of their attack on the M’zullian destroyer and the TeLaxaudin part in it.

  “And what the hell were you doing attacking the M’zullians and risking our lives and the Alliance to do it?” Tirak continued angrily after a moment’s silence, almost as if he’d been following Annuur’s thoughts.

  He was too exhausted to lie. “Thousands of years ago, the TeLaxaudin lost a matter transformer in hyperspace,” he began.

  “Annuur, you cannot tell our Captain!” exclaimed Lweeu, her mobile nose twitching in distress.

  He ignored her interruption, aware through Unity that Sokarr was already reassuring her that the Captain wouldn’t leave here remembering anything of this conversation. “They searched for it for many years before giving up, assuming that it was gone forever. When we heard of the destruction of the two hunter worlds, we knew that somehow the M’zullians had found it and turned it into a weapon. It had to be . . .”

  “Hunter worlds?” interrupted Tirak.

  “Sholans,” Annuur corrected himself tiredly. “The transformer had to be located and destroyed. It wasn’t until the M’zullians used it on the J’kirtikkians that we knew exactly where it was. We had an opportunity to destroy it, and we took it.”

  “You’ve known all along what killed the Sholan worlds and you didn’t tell the Alliance about it? You were prepared to let the J’kirtikkians die and risk everyone and everything just to get it yourselves? Dammit, Annuur, you’re no better than the Chemerians!” the U’Churian growled angrily, his thick mane of black hair beginning to rise around his shoulders. “If we’d known, we could have captured it . . .”

  Annuur lifted his head to look Tirak in the eyes. “Our common enemy is now halved, Captain, at no loss of life to ourselves, and the weapon is destroyed with no chance of them making another. Had we told the Alliance about it, they would have demanded to have one of their own, just as you were about to do. It was never designed to be used as a weapon, Captain, nor should it be.”

  “Leaving that aside, when did you intend to tell me this? We’re family! There should be no secrets between us! Now I find out you’re working with the TeLaxaudin, that when we’d barely come down from the tree canopies, you interbred us with the Sholans! How can there ever be trust between us again?”

  “Enough!” roared Naacha. “Be silent, Child!”

  Shocked by the outburst from the usually silent Cabbaran, Tirak glanced over at him.

  As the silence lengthened, Annuur looked up at Tirak again. Their exchange had used up most of the little energy he had remaining and his awareness of the others in his sept had faded. He saw what he expected. Tirak’s eyes were wide and staring, fixed, he knew, on the swirling tattoos on Naacha’s face. As he watched, the Captain began to sway gently.

  “Sokarr, support him before he falls off the chair,” he said. “Lweeu, fetch Azwokkuss!”

  Ghioass, Zhal-S′Asha 30th day (October)

  Shvosi acknowledged Azwokkuss’ mental message with a sigh. It meant the Camarilla was due to convene shortly to make a decision on Annuur’s so-called seditious behavior. As his Operator, her testimony for or against him would hold much weight.

  I’ll meet you in the refectory in ten minutes, she sent.

  Take transporter and be here now.

  I prefer to walk, she replied dryly. Sometimes her TeLaxaudin colleague’s reliance on technology irritated her, as it did now.

  We are products of our own worlds, responded Azwokkuss with a chuckle.

  Apologies, Skepp Lord, she sent, instantly contrite. Thought was private, not meant for you to hear.

  Understood. I get your food?

  Please, she said, getting up from her meditation cushion.

  Leaving her small indoor conservatory, she scurried round her living quarters to find her note reader. Rearing up onto her haunches, she scrabbled through a pile of papers on her desk with her spatulate four-fingered hands until she found it.

  Securing the device in a pouch on the body harness she wore, she dropped down onto all fours again and headed for the door.

  It was a balmy day outside, with the sun shining in a lightly cloud-flecked sky. Linking into Unity, she searched for the weather report—no rain was scheduled until nightfall. Satisfied, she trotted out of the Cabbaran enclave and headed for the moving sidewalk that would take her to the main TeLaxaudin center.

  Ghioass, the TeLaxaudin home world, and primary home of the Camarilla, was a strange mixture of contrasts. Here, where she lived, the environment reflected the Cabbaran world, one of lush vegetation surrounding the adobe dwellings. Each one had been grown from the raw soil by its owner using only their natural psi talents. Their personal individuality was reflected in the shapes of the buildings and no two were alike. Her people were terraformers, capable of reshaping a world and all its growing things. They could do naturally what the TeLaxaudin had once used their matter transformers for.

  Three species lived here, much the same way as they did on the Cabbaran home world, which provided a second, lesser chamber for the Camarilla. The TeLaxaudin population was not large, and was controlled, an easy task when each TeLaxaudin was born male in gender and didn’t develop into a female till halfway through their lives. They were one of the oldest species in this galaxy, and had developed a highly technological life style.

  Reed slim and just over three feet tall, the TeLaxaudin were fragile in build. Their body shape and size had placed certain restrictions on them. Recognizing this, millennia ago, they had interfered in the evolution of a larger, more powerful species, one whom they could train to help the
m. The U’Churians were therefore the second inhabitants of this world. The numbers of these, their Children, were far less than those of the TeLaxaudin themselves. Again, their population was restricted so that it remained at a stable number.

  The six foot tall U’Churians lived either in villages adjacent to the TeLaxaudin cities and commuted, or in appropriately sized accommodations provided by their smaller employers. When not working, they were free to come and go as they pleased, and had their own entertainment outlets—shops, restaurants, theaters and so on, in the cities. To Shvosi’s way of thinking, too many of the TeLaxaudin considered them as invisible servants, there to perform a function and no more. They weren’t even granted citizenship on Ghioass. This attitude was part of the reason for the current split in the ranks of the Camarilla.

  The third species, and the only other member of the Camarilla, was her own, the Cabbarans. Four-legged, when they sat up on their haunches, they were almost four feet tall. They were vegetarians, with forward facing eyes set in a long face that ended in a snout with an almost prehensile upper lip. A narrow stiff crest of dark hair ran the length of the skull and down the neck, spreading out in a ruff across the shoulders and again over the flanks. On her shoulders, Shvosi’s sandy body fur had been shaved to display the intricately colored tattoos that showed her Family and her rank as a Phratry leader, and her cheeks bore the spiraling blue tattoos that marked her as one of her people’s mystics.

  She was passing out of her sector now and into the more modern area of the TeLaxaudin city. Buildings here were also designed to be aesthetically pleasing to the TeLaxaudin’s more insectoid senses. Their usual low-lying buildings were dwarfed here and there by slim organic shaped towers that spiraled high above them. Transparent, brightly colored surfaces and shimmering force fields, blended with metal and polished stone, all glittered in the sunlight. A movement to her left drew her attention and she saw that the TeLaxaudin were reshaping one of the civic buildings, adding another level and a tower. As she looked, the outline blurred and the roof split into four sections that suddenly reared up to become the new walls. From one of them, a sloping roof started to form, rapidly advancing toward where the beginnings of a whorled tower was taking shape.