“Is that the Takisian version of a dog whistle?” asked Jay.
Zabb gave a short bark of laughter. In a manner of speaking, yes.”
“It is the Council Call,” Taj said, irritated by their flippancy.
Zabb’s grin became even broader. “Little cousin, you are more troublesome and get a bigger reaction than a swarm of scissor wings. They’re actually coming down.”
Panic took a brief run around the pit of her stomach like a frightened rabbit seeking its burrow.
“You can take some credit for this,” Taj said gruffly. “Pulling in the Network on us -”
“Which makes him a renegade and a traitor,” Egyon said with that tight, prissy voice that lawyers use when addressing a jury. “A perfect candidate for the Raiyis’tet.”
“Zabb is not the issue here, I am,” flared Tis.
“You’re bickering like the blind,” Taj exploded. “We now all wait on the decision of the Ajayiz, which will be several hours in coming. I suggest we adjourn to wait in more comfortable surroundings.” He paused and eyed the two humans: Jay dressed in his brown slacks and sports jacket, Mark in jeans, tennis shoes, and a T-shirt. He shuddered slightly. “And get something decent for these stirpes to wear.”
“Go away, Egyon,” Tis said softly. “Taj is still regent of House Ilkazam… and despite his courtesy I don’t think that was a request.”
Out-and-out warfare is rare in a Takisian noble house. Murder, when it occurs, is accomplished in shadowed corners, cloaked in the trappings of an accident.
This was how Blaise did it, thought Tisianne. If I possessed the jump power, I could take Egyon, manipulate the puppet body to attack, and jump back as the guards killed him.
But Egyon obeyed, and she didn’t possess the jump power, so she regretfully watched as the Kou’nar filed obediently from the audience chamber. Well, since no new and arcane powers were available to her, she would have to rely upon those fundamental Takisian talents – conspiracy and treachery.
Mark’s touch on her shoulder pulled her out of her reverie. “You should rest,” he said.
“No.” She shook her head. “First I must find a toilet. Then I must see my father.” She forced a casualness into her voice which she didn’t feel.
Zabb and Taj both looked at her sharply, and Zabb took her by the elbow and walked her forward until they stood at the base of the dais looking up at the throne. He seemed uncomfortable, like a man who was picking up and inspecting words to find the ones with the least potential for pain. At last Zabb said, “You’ve been warned what you’ll find.”
“Yes.”
“You can do a scan?”
“With Taj’s help.”
“Then you know what to do.”
Zabb turned and walked away, and Tis watched him go with hatred growing in her heart.
When Zabb’s hand fell like a stroke of doom on his shoulder, Mark wanted to shrug it contemptuously away. He could tell by the Doc’s expression that her cousin had again delivered some emotional body blow, but rudeness didn’t come easily to the gawky ace, and he secretly feared that he couldn’t carry off the gesture with anything approaching aplomb. Mark had looked ridiculous too many times in his life for it to be an unfamiliar sensation, but close association with the emotion didn’t make it any more welcome.
It took a quarter second for all these random, regretful, and scattered thoughts to shoot through Mark’s head, and then Zabb was saying, “Come, I need you with me.”
“Me?”
A flicker of a smile briefly relieved the intensity of the Takisian’s expression. “As incredible as that might seem… yes. Your grasp of our language is better than the noisy man’s, and in your case I am acquainted with your powers.”
“My friends,” Mark corrected softly. “And don’t assume you’ve met them all.” It was a gently couched warning, and Zabb didn’t mistake it.
“You may believe me when I tell you that at this moment my cousin has nothing to fear from me,”
Zabb was walking toward the door, and Mark said to his back, “Because right now you need something from her.”
The alien looked back. “Quite astute of you, groundling.”
“Wait a minute.” Mark knelt, snapped open the case, and removed five of the vials. Slipping them into the leather pouch at his belt, he crossed to where Tis was expostulating with Jay Ackroyd.
“Hey, man, watch this for me. Okay?” He handed the case to Jay and hurried back to join Zabb.
On this walk, with only a pair of guards as escort, and without the accompaniment of a frenzied explanation from Tachyon – Tisianne – Mark had the leisure to inspect his surroundings. Judging from the striations in the stone walls of the audience chamber, it was located in the ancient section of the house which had been carved from the rock of the cliff. Now they had entered the newer sections of the sprawling villa. The range of decorations was bewildering to the eye, and jarring to the mind. In some areas paintings and tapestries adorned the walls; in others just the polished stone; in still others there were inlaid mosaics.
“I take it that Takisians don’t believe in a coherent decor.”
Zabb laughed. “To understand Takis, you must first understand how territorial we are.”
“Yeah, I know. All the different families and Houses…”
“Yes, but that extends in-House as well. Each breeding line stakes out a section of palace for their own, and that includes the corridors.”
“So they get to decorate it as they please.”
“And maintain it at their own expense. It’s a way for the Raiyis to cut costs.”
That raised a new thought for Mark. “Money. How do you get it?”
“Investments, taxes, theft.” The alien laughed at Mark’s expression. “No, nothing so romantic as you are thinking. When we battle, the winner doesn’t cart away the treasures of a House. Our theft is of the electronic variety.”
“But when you absorb a smaller House -”
“It happens very rarely. Nothing fights like a cornered Takisian, so out-and-out victories are costly. Also, if we reduced the number of Houses…” He paused, considered. “Well, it wouldn’t be as interesting or challenging.”
“Then you like to fight.” A wealth of flower-child disapproval was ladled onto the words.
Zabb’s quick pace slowed, and he cocked his head curiously at Mark. “Yes, we’re a warrior culture. There’s glory in warfare, very little in peace.”
“That’s a lot of crap. A sincere and dedicated pacifist is braver than any soldier. Look, I don’t particularly like the Network – too profit oriented, and money’s never meant much to me, but, like, they’ve got the right idea. You don’t squander your energy in war, you direct it out – for exploration, scientific research. You’ve had space flight for a hell of a long time, and you’ve got only a few colonies and no alien allies. I think that’s sad, and really wasteful.”
Zabb stopped before an elaborately carved door. He laid a hand on the cut-crystal knob and quirked a smile up at Mark. “One could argue we are even now forging a unique alliance with you humans.”
Mark stared seriously down at him. “No… you despise us.”
There was the briefest of pauses, then Zabb nodded abruptly. “Yes.”
As Mark watched the alien step through the door, he had to admit to a certain grudging admiration. A human would have expostulated, temporized, weaseled. Takisian honesty was as brutal as their politics.
Mark checked just on the threshold. “This is your room,” he said.
“Very perceptive.”
Mark surveyed the collection of weapons on the wall, the series of paintings featuring animals that resembled a cross between giraffes, horses, and impalas. A large stained-glass window depicted a hunt, but the riders were mounted on enormous flying creatures of a genus so alien that Mark couldn’t even think of an earthly comparison.
“Nobody touched it in five years?”