“Only profits have so far been mentioned, material things. Commonwealth membership will force you to mature as a people. Soon you won’t need knives to discuss with. But if you fail,” and she paused for emphasis, “you’ll remain just as you are, frozen in ability and evolution as well as in daily life. You’ll stay ignorant farmers and fighters and your cubs will grow up just as inefficient and deprived as you all are.”
Wind hammered insistently at doorways and portholes, the only sound in the room.
Eventually Hunnar spoke, choosing his words carefully. “You have ventured enough insults to result in a shortened tongue, woman. Yet you did so, I believe, in the hope of benefiting us. What you say is truthspeak.” Several of the other nobles now looked askance at Hunnar, then at one another. There were some unhappy mutterings and a few threatening looks in Colette’s direction.
“Listen to you all.” Ethan thought he had seen someone else behind Colette when she stepped through the cabin portal. Now that other person also entered.
Elfa Kurdagh-Vlata looked like a bewhiskered amazon in cloak and light robe. Her translucent dan caught the back light of oil lamps beyond and turned to curved sheets of orange flame when she raised her arms.
“You confirm what the human woman says every time you speak. She calls you ignorant and in response to her reasoning words you make stupid threatening sounds, like mewling cubs caught stealing vegetables.”
“We grant the wisdom of her speaking,” grumbled one of the other nobles at the table. “It was the manner of such speaking.” While Elfa was the inheritor of the Landgrave’s title, the noble had used no honorific in addressing her, Ethan noted. Such informality between rulers and ruled was one of the Tran’s most heartening characteristics.
“But would Phulos-Tervo or any of our other border rulers do likewise?” the noble finished bluntly. There was murmur of agreement from around the table.
“Perhaps not.” Elfa conceded the point readily. “But a total stranger might. Phulos-Tervo would be suspicious of anything my father might agree to. A stranger would know him not.” She gestured at the humans in the room, pointing at each in turn.
“Here are our offworld friends, proof of the truths we will seek to convince others of. No one can dispute their existence. Therefore it may be that others will accept their words as have we.”
“That is possible,” agreed a swaggering knight named Heso-idn. “If they will come with us.” He eyed Ethan expectantly.
“Oh, I’ll be staying.” Milliken Williams sounded surprised that any other possibility could be seriously considered. The ancient Tran seated next to him spoke through a white beard.
“Sir Williams and I still have much to discourse upon to one another. He could not leave now.”
“Of course I couldn’t.” Williams’ guileless enthusiasm did much to boost the confidence of the assembled Tran as he gazed blithely around the table. “You’re much more interesting than any of my old pupils, and there’s more here for me to learn. I couldn’t possibly leave.”
“You must realize, all of you, that as an educated citizen of fair achievement, citizen Williams is giving up a vote.” September sounded as solemn as he could. “That is something no qualified inhabitant of the Commonwealth does lightly, I can assure you.”
“What of you, friend September?” asked Hunnar.
“Oh, I guess I’ll hang around a while yet.” He picked at his teeth with a triangular fork left from the last meal. “Can’t say much for your climate, but the food’s good, the liquor is first class, and the company’s agreeable. Can’t ask for much more than that. Besides, nobody asks me too many questions.” He turned to his right. “What about you, young feller-me-lad?”
Ethan found he was the object of everyone’s attention, found himself wishing he was beneath the table instead of seated at its side. He gazed into his lap, fumbled for a reply.
“I don’t know, Skua… Hunnar.” His mouth felt like someone had suddenly substituted glue for saliva. “I have other interests, other obligations. There’s my contracted job and…”
“All is understandable, friend Ethan.” Hunnar smiled that simple Trannish smile, without showing his teeth.
For some reason, Hunnar’s timely words of empathy made Ethan feel even worse. Wasn’t he the sophisticated member of the advanced galactic civilization? Then why should he feel so devoid of worthwhile thoughts and meaningful feelings?
“Even if I could go with you, I’d only slow you down.” Colette du Kane looked back toward the doorway. “My father’s in our own cublicle, asleep. I can’t turn him loose to manage the family affairs, not while he journeys from one island of sanity to another across an ocean of senility. There’d be too many who’d take advantage of him. Someone is obligated to take care of business. That obligation devolves upon my shoulders—and I’ve got the shoulders for it.”
Even the Tran understood that joke, though Colette’s width was no greater than the average native’s.
“And there could be other obligations.”
Ethan did not look up, but he knew exactly where she was looking when she said those words.
“I will tell you all this. If you have the good sense and the ability to organize enough of a government to qualify for associate Commonwealth status, then the House of du Kane will establish itself on Tran-ky-ky immediately and will treat fairly with all who treat fairly with it.”
Elfa made a sign signifying agreement and compliments. The women had had run-ins before, both in Wannome and on the ship; but they could and had put their personal differences and feelings aside when logic dictated. Ethan wondered if the males in the room could do as well.
“It is settled then.” Hunnar assumed a pose expressing determination and challenge. “We will try,” he told Ethan, “because we believe in you and in what you say, friend Ethan. You have never lied to us in the past. I do not believe you lie to us now.”
There was a rumble like that of an underground transport as chairs slid back from the table and the various knights, nobles, and squires broke up into smaller discussion groups. Some talked loudly and with considerable animation while others chatted in hushed tones. Every so often one or two of the debaters would exit through the door opening onto the deck, admitting the planet’s eternal participant in all conversations—the wind.
Ethan left early, anxious for the solitude offered by his own cublicle. In a few days he could trade the poorly warmed box he shared with September for the cycle-heated atmosphere of a starship cabin. It was strange that the prospect no longer excited him the way it had when the Slanderscree had first entered Arsudun harbor.
Something like a hot summer breeze touched him on the shoulder, unnervingly warm and light in the chill air of the ship’s corridor. Whirling, he found himself staring down at Colette du Kane. Behind him, the voices of the arguing Tran, September’s intermittent bellow, William’s gentle but persuasive murmur—all faded and merged to form a distant background hum. Small crystals of emerald focused unblinkingly on his own eyes, verdant craters in that moon face. Despite the survival suit face mask her pink flesh had been tanned umber from occasional exposure to Tran-ky-ky’s harsh arctic sun.
For just a moment, he had a glimpse of sinuous beauty writhing to escape that gland-trapped coffin of fat. Only through the eyes could that exquisite self impinge on the world.
“Are you staying or coming?” No hint of coquetry there, no mock-embarrassed lowering of lashes. There was no room for it in a personality founded on bluntness. Though the door to the deck outside was closed, he felt something curl ’round him anyway, slowing his circulation, chilling his guts.