"I know," Thrr-gilag assured him. "And one way or the other, I promise I'll talk to you after I get back from Gree."
"Good. In the meantime I have friends with access to Unity City. I'll see what other information I can dig up."
"All right," Thrr-gilag said. "You know, you really ought to consider having a cutting taken. You could get yourself a niche in a pyramid near Unity City and watch all this political stuff directly instead of having to sift through rumors."
Again his father's tongue flicked oddly. "No, I don't think so," he said. "Not now. Tell me, are you going to see your mother before you go?"
"I'd planned to," Thrr-gilag said, frowning at the abrupt change of topic. "Thrr-mezaz told me she'd moved out to Reeds Village?"
"Yes," Thrr't-rokik said. "About thirty fullarcs ago. You were out on Study World Fifteen during the preparations; and then this whole Human-Conqueror thing came up, and you were rushed out to Base World Twelve."
"Yes, I've been busy," Thrr-gilag said, studying his father's transparent face. "Hardly out of touch, though. What is it you and Thrr-mezaz aren't telling me?"
Thrr't-rokik looked away. "Perhaps it would be best if you spoke with her for yourself," he said. "If you have time, that is. This matter with Klnn-dawan-a should take precedence."
"My family takes precedence," Thrr-gilag told him firmly. "I'll make the time."
It was only a five-hunbeat walk to the rail stop near the shrine. Three cars were waiting there on the siding; climbing into the first, Thrr-gilag fed in his value number and keyed for the main nexus at Cliffside Dales. The car beeped its acceptance and eased onto the main rail, and they were off.
There was a flicker, and an Elder appeared in front of him. "You are Thrr-gilag; Kee'rr?" he asked.
"Yes," Thrr-gilag said.
"I was told you wanted information on space-flight schedules," the Elder said briskly. "When, and to where?"
"As soon as possible," Thrr-gilag said, wondering what had taken the travel communicator so long to get out there to him. He'd put in the request with Thrr-tulkoj before leaving the shrine. "Destination is the planet Gree."
"Gree?" The Elder seemed taken aback. "That's a Chig world."
"There are indeed large numbers of Chig on it," Thrr-gilag agreed. "Along with a few hundred Zhirrzh in about fifty study groups."
The Elder sniffed. "The proper study of Zhirrzh is Zhirrzh," he said primly. "What anyone thinks they're going to find on a planet full of aliens I'll never know."
"I'm sure you won't," Thrr-gilag said, not trying overly hard to hide his disgust. With Human forces gathering against the Zhirrzh like storm clouds over a field of grain, it should be blindingly obvious that the ability to understand alien cultures was going to be of critical importance in the fullarcs ahead. Obviously, there were still Zhirrzh too stupid to understand that. "Just check the schedule for me, please."
The Elder sniffed again and was gone. Thrr-gilag turned back to the window, running the numbers through his mind. One fullarc each way to Gree; six and a half until he needed to check in again with Nzz-oonaz and the rest of the Mrachani study group. That left barely four and a half fullarcs to try to get all this straightened out.
He gazed at the scenery going past outside, a twinge of guilt tugging at him. He really ought to call the Overclan before he headed off-world this way. The Overclan, or at the very least Nzz-oonaz. Let someone in authority know where he was going and what he was doing.
But if he did that, Speaker Cvv-panav would almost certainly find out about it. And he'd either summarily cancel Thrr-gilag's trip or else push the Dhaa'rr clan leaders to move even more quickly on their repudiation of his bond-engagement to Klnn-dawan-a. Or both.
Besides, there was no reason why anyone in Unity City would need him for the next few fullarcs. The Mrachani bodies weren't going to need any more examination, and Nzz-oonaz surely had the study group's end of the upcoming voyage under control. And if for some reason he needed help, Gll-borgiv and the Dhaa'rr would be more than happy to assist.
And anyway, Thrr-gilag would be back well before the time he'd been told to return. No, best just to keep it quiet.
With a flicker the Elder was back. "A warrior supply flight leaves for the Gree encirclement forces in seven tentharcs," he growled. "It'll be lifting from the warrior field at Pathgate; flight time approximately nine tentharcs. Do you wish a place reserved for you?"
"Please," Thrr-gilag said, holding out his identification card and, for good measure, his Overclan-complex pass.
"Um," the Elder said, peering at the cards. "The reservation will be made in your name. Payment is due one tentharc before departure."
"I understand," Thrr-gilag said. A hundred cyclics ago, right after the first credit/debit system had been set up, Elders had carried value numbers directly between buyers and sellers. But as the system had expanded, someone had belatedly realized that Elders who could handle whole sections of a conversation should have no trouble at all memorizing a few strings of numbers. A handful of dishonest Elders had been caught proving it—to the tune of nearly half a million in fraudulent purchases and fund transfers—and that had been that. "Thank you."
The Elder sniffed one last time and was gone. "You're welcome," Thrr-gilag murmured, settling tiredly back against the railcar couch. Seven tentharcs before lift. Plenty of time to get to Reeds Village first and see his mother.
And to find out what was going on out there that neither his father nor his brother would tell him about.
He sighed. It was unfair. It really was. This looming war against the Humans was enough trouble for anyone to have to handle. To throw in family and personal crises on top of it was asking far too much.
7
"Getting pretty noisy out there," her assistant Bkar-otpo commented from across the shelter, his tone sounding a little uneasy. "How strong do these winds get, anyway?"
"Don't worry, we'll be all right," Klnn-dawan-a told him, shutting the analyzer back to standby and keying for a datalist. "These shelters can handle anything Gree's likely to throw at us. At least this time of cyclic."
"Yes, I've heard stories about those equinox storms," Bkar-otpo said. "You ever been in one of those?"
"A couple of times," Klnn-dawan-a said. The datalist came up, and she ran a quick eye over the numbers. Promising; definitely promising. Maybe this time they'd finally hit the proper window for the genetic-ring transmutation. "I wouldn't want to be in a field shelter during one, but a perm building stands up to them just fine."
"It must still be pretty impressive—"
"It's wonderful and exhilarating both," she interrupted gently, stepping over to him and holding out the datalist. "File this into the recorder, would you? And then run up a comparison between it and the other samplings."
"I obey, Searcher," he said briskly, all business now as he took the datalist and pulled his couch up to the recorder. "Will we be taking another set of samplings this latearc?"
"Assuming the wind dies down, yes."
"I've been wondering about that," Bkar-otpo said doubtfully. "Even at the best of times, Chigin whelps can be pretty unpredictable. No telling what this storm will do to their dispositions."
"We'll be fine," Klnn-dawan-a assured him, focusing her attention again on the wind. Was it marginally less violent than it had been a few hunbeats ago? Possibly. "I'm going to take a quick look outside, see if I can spot the edge of the storm."
"You want me to go with you?" Bkar-otpo asked, half standing up.
"No, I'll be fine," she said. "I won't be going very far."
"I could call an Elder to go with you," he persisted, his hand hovering near the signaler control.