Robert only blinked. But in his tight shield Athaclena now found cracks. She felt her tendrils wafting over her ears, tracing the edges of those loose places, forming a delicate new glyph. “Were you feeling guilty over these feelings, Robert? Did you think they were somehow being disloyal to me?” Athaclena laughed. “But interspecies consorts may have lovers and spouses of their own race. You knew that!
“So what would you have of me, Robert? I certainly cannot give you children! If I could, can you imagine what mongrels they would be?”
This time Robert smiled. He looked away. In the space between them her glyph took stronger form.
“And as for recreational sex, you know that I am not equipped to leave you anything but frustrated, you overen-dowed/underendowed, wrong-shaped ape-man! Why should I not take joy in it, if you find one with whom you might share such things?”
“It’s… it’s not as easy as that, Clennie. I…”
She held up a hand and smiled, at once beseeching him to be quiet and to let go. “I am here, Robert,” she said, softly.
The young man’s confusion was like an uncertain quantum potential, hesitating between two states. His eyes darted as he glanced upward and tried to focus on the nonthing she had made. Then he remembered what he had learned and looked away again, allowing kenning to open him to the glyph, her gift.
La’thsthoon hovered and danced, beckoning to him. Robert exhaled. His eyes opened in surprise as his own aura unlocked without his conscious will. Uncurling like a flower. Something — a twin to la’thsthoon — emerged, resonating, amplifying against Athaclena’s corona.
Two wisps of nothing, one human, one Tymbrimi, touched, darted apart playfully, and came together again.
“Do not fear that you will lose what you have with me, Robert,” Athaclena whispered. “After all, will any human lover be able to do this with you?”
At that, he smiled. They shared laughter. Overhead, mirrored la’thsthoon manifested intimacy performed in pairs.
Only later, after Robert had departed again, did Athaclena loosen the deep shield she had locked around her own innermost feelings. Only when he was gone did she let herself acknowledge her envy.
He goes to her now.
What Athaclena had done was right, by any standard she knew. She had done the proper thing.
And yet, it was so unfair!
I am a freak. I was one before I ever came to this planet. Now I am not even anything recognizable any longer.
Robert might have an Earthly lover, but in that area Athaclena was all alone. She could seek no such solace with one of her own kind.
To touch me, to hold me, to mingle his tendrils and his body with mine, to make me feel aflame…
With some surprise, Athaclena noticed that this was the first time she had ever felt this thing… this longing to be with a man of her own race — not a friend, or classmate, but a lover — perhaps a mate.
Mathicluanna and Uthacalthing had told her it would happen someday — that every girl has her own pace. Now, however, the feeling was only bitter. It enhanced her loneliness. A part of her blamed Robert for the limitations of his species. If only he could have changed his body, as well. If only he could have met her halfway!
But she was the Tymbrimi, one of the “masters of adaptability. ” How far that malleability had gone was made evident when Athaclena felt wetness on her cheeks. Miserably, she wiped away salty tears, the first in her life.
That was how her assistants found her hours later, when they returned from the errands she had sent them on — sitting by the edge of a small, muddy pool, while autumn winds blew through the treetops and sent gravid clouds hurrying eastward toward the gray mountains.
62
Galactics
The Suzerain of Cost and Caution was worried. All signs pointed to a molting, and the direction things appeared to be going was not to its liking.
Across the pavilion, the Suzerain of Beam and Talon paced in front of its aides, looking more erect and stately than ever. Beneath the shaggy outer feathers there was a faint reddish sheen to the military commander’s underplumage. Not a single Gubru present could help but notice even a trace of that color. Soon, perhaps within only a twelve-day, the process would have progressed beyond the point of no return.
The occupation force would have a new queen.
The Suzerain of Cost and Caution contemplated the unfairness of it all as it preened its own feathers. They, too, were starting to dry out, but there were still no discernible signs of a final color.
First it had been elevated to the status of candidate and chief bureaucrat after the death of its predecessor. It had dreamed of such a destiny, but not to be plunged into the midst of an already mature Triumvirate! Its peers were already well on the way toward sexuality by that time. It had been forced to try to catch up.
At first that had seemed to matter little. To the surprise of all, it had won many points from the start. Discovering the foolishness the other two had been up to during the interregnum had enabled the Suzerain of Cost and Caution to make great leaps forward.
Then a new equilibrium was reached. The admiral and the priest had proven brilliant and imaginative in the defense of their political positions.
But the molting was supposed to be decided by correctness of policy! The prize was supposed to go to the leader whose wisdom had proven most sage. It was the way!
And yet, the bureaucrat knew that these matters were as often decided by happenstance, or by quirks of metabolism.
Or by alliance of two against the third, it reminded itself. The Suzerain of Cost and Caution wondered if it had been wise to support the military against Propriety, these last few weeks, giving the admiral by now an almost unassailable advantage.
But there had been no choice! The priest had to be opposed, for the Suzerain of Propriety appeared to have lost all control!
First had come that nonsense about “Garthlings.” If the bureaucrat’s predecessor had lived, perhaps the extravagance might have been kept down. As it was, however, vast amounts had been squandered… bringing in a new Planetary Branch Library, sending expeditions into the dangerous mountains, building a hyperspace shunt for a Ceremony of Adoption — before there was any confirmation that anything existed to adopt!
Then there was the matter of ecological management. The Suzerain of Propriety insisted that it was essential to restore the Earthlings’ program on Garth to at least a minimal level. But the Suzerain of Beam and Talon had adamantly refused to allow any humans to leave the islands. So, at great cost, help was sent for off-planet. A shipload of Linten gardeners, neutrals in the present crisis, were on the way. And the Great Egg only knew how they were to pay for them!
Now that the hyperspace shunt was nearing completion, both the Suzerain of Propriety and the Suzerain of Beam and Talon were ready to admit that the rumors of “Garthlings” were just a Tymbrimi trick. But would they allow construction to be stopped?
No. Each, it seemed, had its reasons for wanting completion. If the bureaucrat had agreed it would have made a consensus, a step toward the policy so much desired by the Roost Masters. But how could it agree with such nonsense!
The Suzerain of Cost and Caution chirped in frustration. The Suzerain of Propriety was late for yet another colloquy.
Its passion for rectitude did not extend, it seemed, to courtesy to its peers.
By this point, theoretically, the initial competitiveness among the candidates should have begun transforming into respect, and then affection, and finally true mating. But here they were, on the verge of a Molt, still dancing a dance of mutual loathing.
The Suzerain of Cost and Caution was not happy about how things were turning out, but at least there would be one satisfaction if things went on in the direction they seemed headed — when Propriety was brought down from its haughty perch at last.