shouts of playing children, all laughing the same, syncopated trill. In the opposite direction, coming from a tower room whose lights remained on late into the night, there were recurrent sounds of anxious adult argument, the same voice taking on multiple roles.
After the landing, and Maia’s first-ever ride in a motor car, she saw no more of Tizbe, or any other Beller. Nor did she particularly care. By now Maia realized she had become a pawn in power games played at the loftiest heights of Stratoin society.
At her request, she was brought books to read. There was a treatise on the Game of Life, written three hundred years ago by an elderly savant who had spent several years with men, both at sea and as a special summertime guest in sanctuary, studying anthropological aspects of their endless tournaments. Maia found the account fascinating, though some of the author’s pat conclusions about ritualistic sublimation seemed farfetched. More difficult to plow through was a detailed logical analysis of the game itself, written a century earlier by another scholar. The math was hard to follow, but it proved more orderly and satisfying than the books provided in Ursulaborg, by the Pinnipeds. Those had emphasized rules of thumb and winning technique over basic theory. It was a mental meal that left her hungry for more.
The books helped pass time while Maia’s knee finished mending. Gradually she resumed a regimen excercise, building her strength while keeping eyes peeled for any chance of escape.
A week passed. Maia read and studied, paced her garden, tested the relentless vigilance of her guards, and worried ceaselessly over what was happening to Leie and Brod. She couldn’t even ask if there were any more letters, since Brod had apparently been forced to smuggle out the last one. The inquiry itself might only give her friend away…
She refused to show frustration, lest her captors gain the slightest satisfaction, but at night the image of Renna’s fatal explosion haunted her sleep. Several times, she awoke to find herself sitting bolt upright, both hands over her racing heart, gasping as if trapped in an airless space, deep underground.
One day the guards announced she had a visitor. “Your gracious host, Odo, of Clan Persim,” the servants proclaimed, then obsequiously bowed aside for a tall elderly woman with a wide face and aristocratic bearing.
“I know who you are,” Maia said. “Renna said you set him up to be kidnapped.”
The patrician sat down on a chair and sighed. “It was a good plan, which you helped snarl, in several ways.”
“Thank you.”
The noblewoman nodded, a genteel gesture. “You’re welcome. Would you like to know why we went to so much risk and trouble?”
A pause. “Talk if you want. I’m not goin’ anywhere.”
Odo spread her hands. “There were countless individuals and groups who wanted the Outsider put away. Most for visceral, thoughtless reasons, as if his deletion might turn back the clock, erasing
“Some fantasized his removal might stop the iceships from coming.” Odo shook her head with aristocratic derision. “Those huge liners full of peaceful invaders will arrive long after we now living are dead. Time enough to worry out a solution. Taking revenge on a poor courier would only weaken our position, when and if full contact is restored.”
“So much for the motives of others. Of course, you had more mature reasons for grabbing Renna. Like squeezing information out of him?”
The old woman nodded. “There were elements of inquiry, certainly. Our Perkinite allies were interested in new gene-splicing methods, which might lead to self-cloning without males. Others sought improved defense technology, or to learn iceship weaknesses, so we might destroy them at long range, far from Stratos.”
“Too far for the public to observe, you mean. So most would never know we’re murdering tens of thousands.”
“I was told you catch on quickly for a mouse,” Odo replied. “Nor were those the sole ideas for using your alien friend and his knowledge.”
Maia recalled Kiel’s Radicals, who had hoped to alter Stratoin biology and culture at least as much as the Perkinites, though in opposing directions. Maia knew Renna would have disapproved of being used by either party.
“Let me guess about the Bellers. Their motive was strictly cash, right? But you Persims, you blue-bloods, had reasons all your own.”
Odo nodded. “His presence in Caria was becoming… disruptive. The Council and curia had vital matters to discuss, yet were growing unpredictable whenever he was around. His calm restraint during summer had defied our expectations, winning him allies, and we realized it would only get worse with winter and first frost. Imagine how persuasive a fully functioning, articulate, old-style male might be then, to those with weak wills and minds! That describes many so-called ‘moderates’ who were fast slipping out of our faction’s control. For reasons of political convenience, it was deemed necessary to remove him.”
Odo lifted a hand, waiting until Maia reseated herself before resuming in a lower voice. “You’re right. There’s more. You see, we’d made a promise… one we were unable to keep.”
Maia blinked. “What promise?”
“To send him back to his ship, of course. And replenish his supplies when his mission was done. It’s why he came down in a simple lander, in the first place, instead of making other arrangements.” The old woman exhaled heavily. “For months, those believing in him had been working to fix the launching facility, not far from here. The machinery functioned when last used, a few centuries ago. Our records are intact.
“But too many parts have failed. Too much skill is lost. We couldn’t send him home, after all.” Odo hurried on before Maia could interrupt. “To make matters worse, he was in constant contact with his ship. Some already wanted him put away to prevent relaying information useful to future invaders. Those demands grew urgent when he started politely asking to inspect our launch preparations. Soon, he was bound to report that Stratos no longer had access to space.”
“But Renna—”
“One night, in a confiding mood, he told me that peripatetics—interstellar couriers—are considered expendable. With numberless lives already sacrificed in the new crusade sweeping Phylum space, that of recontacting lost hominid worlds, what does another matter? Ironic, isn’t it? His own words finally convinced my clan and others to ally with the Perkinites.”
“I take it the new launcher at Jellicoe has changed a few minds?” she asked.
The aged clone tilted her head. “You’d expect so, wouldn’t you? In fact, it is complex. Political tides are at work. The Great Former and its consort facilities are causing much dispute.”
“Why are you telling me all this?” Maia asked. “What do you care what a var like me thinks?’”
Odo shrugged. “Normally, not much. As it happens, we have need of your cooperation. Certain things will be required of you—”
Maia laughed. “What in Lysos’s name makes you think I’d do anything for you?”
A reply was ready. From her capacious sleeve, Odo drew forth a small glossy photograph. Maia’s fingers trembled as she took it and regarded Brod and Leie, standing together beside a vast, crystalline, spiral-shaped tube—the muzzle of the great launching gun on Jellicoe Island.
Maia’s sister seemed engrossed, drawing a closeup sketch of one of the machine’s many parts, while Brod ran his finger alongside a chart, covered with figures, leaning over to say something to Leie. Only their hunched shoulders betrayed the tension Maia felt emanating from the picture. Nearby, at least a dozen women conversed or lounged casually for the photographer. Almost a third of them were clones of the matriarch sitting across from Maia now.
“I think you care about the health and safety of your sister and her present vril companion. That persuades
