“He’s a good friend and an insightful leader. I’d follow him to the ends of the Earth and so would any member of his clan. He inspires that kind of loyalty.”
“Sounds like a cult leader,” Jim scoffed.
“Not on your life,” Gina was quick to defend. “Every member of the Brotherhood is there because they want to be. We chose life with the Zxerah, and there’s definitely no mind control or drugs involved. We don’t have to worship the Alvians or even agree with everything they say. We’re free among them, and they protect us from their fellows.”
“So what’s in it for them? Why did they take you in? They could have just left you to rot or be captured by the goon squads.”
“It’s not the Zxerah way to let other beings suffer.”
“And yet they’re assassins.”
“Some are, yes. And I’ll admit that’s the main value the Council sees in keeping the Brotherhood around. But even when they are sent to kill, they do it swiftly and silently. There is no honor in making a being suffer unnecessarily.”
“Are you an assassin, Gina?”
The look in Jim’s eyes was bleaker than she expected. The thought that he’d believe she could be so cold made her realize he didn’t really know her at all. Not the woman she’d become or the values she still held close to her heart.
“None of the human Zxerah have ever been asked to kill. We won’t do it. For that matter, only a very few of the Brotherhood—those who are already part of the Alvian military machine—have ever been sent on such missions. As a general rule, the Council doesn’t rub out every thorn in their side with a bullet. They have a lot of political muscle they can bring to bear on those who dare oppose them.”
“You stick up for them. Gina, I don’t understand how you can feel safe with them. They’re aliens.”
She had to find a way to make him understand. Too much was riding on gaining his—and eventually all humans’—understanding of Alvians and how they could all live together.
“Soldiers are different from most Alvians, and Zxerah are a cut above that. It has to do with their genetic lines. Soldiers were left with the echoes of aggression that was completely obliterated from the rest of the population. They can almost feel. It makes them question and think more deeply than the worker bees in the city. They want to understand. I think it’s because they’re kept separate from the rest of the population. All that time for introspection and study. Many of the soldiers are well read and highly educated. They’re the thinkers of Alvian society, regardless of what the scientists believe.”
“You know a lot about them.” Jim’s tone was neither accusing nor warm but she figured at least he was listening.
“I’ve been with them a long time. I was the first human to encounter the Patriarch and his men, not long after the Alvians landed. I was the first to be invited to their compound, but certainly not the last. Human martial artists often join the Brotherhood, but no human is turned away from the clan. The clan protects the weak and helpless, the workers and the nurturers, so the Brotherhood can perform its tasks.”
“Who decides what tasks they perform?”
“The Patriarch.”
“And who pulls his strings?”
Chapter Ten
Gina was uncomfortably aware of what Jim was driving at, but she had to speak the truth.
“The High Council is the only entity aware of the Patriarch’s existence. They give him and his men orders directly.” She saw Jim’s jaw tighten and his gaze harden.
“But—” she added quickly, “—the Patriarch has always been a power unto himself. He plays a deeper game than even the Council realizes. He has his own agenda, and I believe he plays them as much as they try to play him. The time is coming when the Zxerah will come out of hiding. They’ve kept the rumors about the ancient Brotherhood alive in the populace, enlarging their role to mythic proportions among regular Alvians. When the Zxerah show up on Earth after generations of secrecy, the rest of the Alvian population will sit up and take notice.”
Jim was silent a long time, watching the railway ahead. She could almost feel his thoughts flashing through his mind.
“It’s an ingenious idea if this Patriarch of yours is interested in creating a monarchy or a dictatorship. He’ll hold a lot of power if and when he pulls off his coup.”
“It won’t be like that,” Gina said quietly. “If you knew him like I know him, you’d understand. He guides. He protects. He never dictates, and he doesn’t seek power for power’s sake. He knows the Alvian people are driving themselves toward extinction, and he has some comprehension of the horrors his race has visited on humanity. Soldiers feel more than any other Alvian line. He has echoes of emotion—not much—but enough to tell him something’s terribly wrong with the status quo.”
The pod started decelerating, and Gina realized they’d been talking for close to an hour. Wally had told them it would take some time for the pod to come to a complete stop as it slowly lowered toward the rails as the magnetic field became weaker toward the turning point. The first leg of the journey was the shortest according to the maps. Once they got the pod onto the next set of rails, there would be a few hours before they had to stop again.
“I’ll be honest, Gina, I don’t understand how you can be so close with Alvians, no matter what kind they are.”
“We have time.” She watched the rails in front of them, illuminated by an overhead string of bulbs that created a flashing effect as they passed. “I want you to understand them, Jim. I want you to realize why I think they’re vital to our survival as a race—as a joined race.”
“I’ve heard rumors of a human woman who married an Alvian, but I still don’t understand how it’s possible. They said that guy had emotions. I’ve never met an Alvian yet who did.”
“You’re talking about the Chief Engineer and his mate. Funny, I was just talking to someone who knew them both rather well before I came here—a warrior named Grady Prime.” She felt warm thinking of the serious man who’d learned how to cope with new emotions. “He said Davin—that’s their Chief Engineer’s name—had always had emotions. He was what they call a throwback. He was born with emotions and was considered a bad experiment genetically, but he was so talented with their crystals, they let him live, though they would never let him reproduce. Then he found Callie, a human girl. Grady Prime said they were true Resonance Mates, which is something rare and special among Alvians.”
“What’s a Resonance Mate?”
“You probably have realized by now that the Alvians planned the crystal bombardment from space to change the resonance of our planet so they could survive here. They resonate on a higher level than us. We can’t hear it, but their voices, their brains, their bodies, their very cells, operate on slightly different frequencies than we do. That vibration is something they need to survive. They chose our planet because we had a lot of what they call untuned quartz crystal deposits. The bombardment was the fastest, dirtiest way they had to sort of wake up our crystal deposits and get them resonating to their frequency. People like Davin take the raw crystal and tune it so it can be used for everything from powering their cities to communicating over long distances. Almost all their technology is based on crystals. That’s why Davin has so much power and was able to defy the Council and take a human mate.”
“I heard they tried to kill him not too long ago.”
“You heard right. Rogue members of the Council activated a Zxerah assassin. They wanted him to take out Davin, but the man they sent had recently retired so he could take part in a genetic study. He was the first to be treated with a gene-altering agent that changed his DNA on a molecular level. He gained emotions. When it came time to pull the trigger, Sinclair Prime—the assassin who’d been sent to kill Davin—couldn’t do it. He missed on purpose and has not been seen since.”