“The perimeter droids didn’t record it,” Dooring answered. “We are searching the palace grounds.”
Lord Felph looked about at the group, and Zeus could tell by his mannerisms, by the minor trembling in his jaw, that Felph was worried. He looked pointedly to Zeus. “You don’t have anything to do with this, do you? Did you have a fight with him?”
“No!” Zeus said too loudly, surprised at the accusation in Felph’s voice. “No!”
Felph half leapt from his chair. “Look me in the eye and tell me. If you killed him by accident, in a fit of passion, that is one thing. But if you murdered him in cold blood—”
“I swear,” Zeus said. “I had nothing to do with this!”
“He’s telling the truth,” Arachne told Felph. “He had nothing to do with this.” Felph took her defense of Zeus at face value, making no more accusations.
“Last I saw him,” Zeus said, “he had a gun, for hunting skogs.”
Felph tensed. Hunting skogs was dangerous. He ordered the droids, “Use fliers. Search the tangle.”
Chapter 23
It didn’t take Felph’s droids long to find Herm. In an hour, the droids retrieved the corpse from the canopy of the tangle, where it lay in plain view.
A droid bore it to the garden. Athena took a glow globe from her pack to inspect the remains.
Maggie wasn’t prepared for the horror. Herm’s head was lopped off. Gone the handsome green eyes, the aquiline nose, the perpetual, secretive smile. Gone the glorious mane of dark hair. Gone, too, his left wing and lower leg. They’d been eaten—along with certain organs. Blood smeared everywhere. The corpse smelled no better than it looked.
If Maggie felt unprepared for Herm’s demise, she felt equally unprepared for others’ reactions. Athena remained stoic, stared at the body as if imagining every detail of how he had died.
Hera sobbed, falling to the ground, seeming unable to move, muttering Herm’s name. Zeus raged, shaking fists, crying for vengeance. Yet rather than running into the wild, searching for Herm’s killer, he held Hera tenderly. Zeus seemed in shock, on the verge of collapse, yet he helped Hera back to their room.
Maggie wondered if she should help Zeus and Hera. They had never faced death before. Born with the promise of immortality, they faced death with all the profound comprehension of adults, coupled with the complete emotional naiveté of toddlers. Maggie felt astonished at the debilitating combination.
But the most astonishing reaction came not from Felph’s children, but from Felph himself. He went to the headless corpse, sprawled on the lawn, and lifted the remains, cradling them as if Herm were a child.
The image of Felph, face pale in horror, eyes wide in shock, on his knees, cradling Herm’s corpse in the ethereal light of the glow globe would stay with Maggie the rest of her life.
“Herm!” Felph sobbed. “Herm! My beloved! What’s happened? What?” He spoke to the corpse as if it might answer. Felph’s shock, more than his children’s, surprised Maggie. You killed him, Maggie wanted to say. You wiped his memories from your Al, destroyed his clones. If not for you, he’d be alive.
Maggie dared not speak such hard truths. Nor did she reprimand Felph when his shock turned to rage, and he shouted at Gallen. “You’re the Lord Protector! How could you let this happen? What … what … I demand an answer!”
Gallen said, “I was gone. Remember, we were in the tangle.”
Lord Felph looked away, struggling, as if he could not recall. “But, but my son!” he said with supreme tenderness. However harsh Felph might seem, Maggie heard love in his voice.
Felph gazed down at the corpse, as if for the first time. “Oh,” he said, like a little boy in surprise. “Did you see this?” He reached into Herm’s chest cavity and pulled out a feather, short and gray at the base, dark green at its tips.
“What is it?” Gallen asked.
“A Qualeewooh feather,” Felph said.
Felph lifted the neck of the corpse, looked at the stump. “Loolooahooke,” he whispered, “the ancient art of decapitation. See how clean the cut is? A southern Qualeewooh did this. A wild one, out of the great wastes.”
Felph suddenly looked up, focusing on Gallen. “A murder has been committed. My son is dead. I demand vengeance. You will hunt this Qualeewooh, and bring him for punishment.”
Gallen bit his lip. “There must be thousands of Qualeewoohs,” Gallen said. “How will we find it?”
“It should be easy,” Felph said. “We are in a vast waste—no water or food for hundreds of kilometers. The killing took place today. Unless the Qualeewooh is hiding in the fields, it must be flying over the wastes. Finding it should not be hard.”
Gallen said softly. “You say this is the work of a wild Qualeewooh. Does it understand our law?”
“What does that matter?” Felph asked. “Herm is dead!”
“It matters,” Gallen said, leaning close. “I enforce the law, but you want vengeance. I won’t deliver this Qualeewooh simply so you can slaughter it.”
“I am the law on Ruin!” Felph shouted, tossing Herm’s corpse to the ground. He strode to Gallen, saffron robes stained with dark blood. “I make the laws here. I’ll have vengeance, with or without you! There are plenty of Qualeewooh poachers on this rock! I could hire a dozen of them. They’d be glad of the pay!”
Gallen stared into Felph’s face. Gallen’s eyes became hard, impassive. Maggie thought he would argue, that he’d turn away and quit this job forever. Instead he simply nodded. “Okay, I’m your man. I’ll find them. But I demand pay.”
“Pay?” Felph said. “I’ve already offered you half of all I own!”
“To find the Waters of Strength. You’ve offered me nothing for the Qualeewooh. If you’re willing to pay poachers, you should be willing to pay me.”
“All right,” Felph said. “Ten thousand credits, if you bring me the Qualeewooh.”
Gallen shook his head. “Too low.”
“It’s a generous offer,” Felph argued. “I could hire five men for the price.”
“It’s not money I want,” Gallen said.
“What then?”
“A fair trial,” Gallen offered. “I want a fair trial for the Qualeewooh.”
Felph’s eyes blazed, and he thrust his jaw forward. He was beside himself with rage at Herm’s death, and Maggie could see that he was in no mood to be generous. Yet he reconsidered. “Define fair.”
“A download. We will download the Qualeewooh’s memories into both you and me, then we can judge the creature based upon its thoughts and intents. No sentence will be handed down unless we both concur that the sentence is fair.”
Felph shook with anger. He could hardly refuse such an offer, not without seeming churlish. Indeed, perhaps he sensed that if he did not concede, if he merely took vengeance, he would damage his own soul. Yet by the hardness in his eyes, Maggie could tell that he did not trust Gallen. He feared Gallen would not agree to a sentence, regardless of the crime.
“You will agree to death?” Felph said. “If you find it justified?”
Gallen whispered coldly, “I’ve killed men before, dozens of them. A Qualeewooh is the same.”
Felph sighed deeply, as if his anger suddenly abated. “Very well, then.”
Gallen turned to Maggie. “I want to be certain we get the right Qualeewooh. I won’t slaughter innocents. Maggie, can you rig up a scent detector on an antigrav sled—like the Seekers the dronon send after us? It should be able to match the scent on that feather, tell us if we find the right Qualeewooh.”
Maggie hesitated, thinking. “I’d need some sophisticated olfactory sensors.”
Felph said, “The perfumery in Hera’s sleeping chamber. It has a scent detector subtle enough to do what you require. I can provide everything.” Felph turned to address the droids, commanding them to bring the provisions.
“What else will we need?” Maggie asked.
“Nothing,” Gallen said. “It shouldn’t take more than a day. I’ve still got foo
d and weapons on ship.”
“And Zeus,” Felph added, addressing Gallen. “Take Zeus with you. He should be there to help avenge his brother. Otherwise, he’ll always regret this.” The hesitation in Felph’s voice said more than words. He still didn’t trust Gallen. He wanted to make certain Gallen returned with his prize. So Felph would send his son to ensure that Galle returned.
“Do you think it wise?” Gallen asked. “He’s pretty torn up.”
“All the more reason for him to go,” Felph said. “The deeper the pain, the greater the need for action. I insist on this.”
Gallen nodded, none too quickly. “All right. Zeus comes, too. Is it likely the Qualeewooh will be flying at night?”
“Not hardly,” Felph said. “It will sleep after such a heavy meal.”
Gallen stood, thoughtful. “Maggie will need some time to put together a Seeker.” He addressed her, “Can I leave at dawn?”
Maggie considered. Even she wasn’t certain of Gallen’s intent. Perhaps he wanted them all on the ship together, the easier to leave this world once and for all. “I can throw a Seeker together, but I think I should come in case it needs adjusting or if it falls apart.”
Chapter 24
Cooharah could not sleep, though his full belly weighed on him, making his thoughts sluggish. He and Aaw slept in the open, on a small pile of rocks. It was not dangerous to sleep so, this far from the tangle. His only fear in the desert was that thin, translucent glass snakes might crawl from their sandy burrows and slip quietly up to drink some blood as Cooharah slept. The snakes drank little, but Cooharah and Aaw might be days from water. They couldn’t afford the blood loss.
Yet fear of glass snakes is not what kept Cooharah awake, gazing at stars that burned so steadily tonight, blazing in the heavens. No, not glass snakes. It was voices whispering in his head, the reproach of his ancestors. “Blood debt,” they whispered. “You owe the oomas a blood debt.”
Cooharah envisioned a Qualeewooh composed of light, beating its wings among the stars. It stared at Cooharah accusingly.
The voice of his ancestor came clear tonight, of all nights, when it bore a message Cooharah didn’t want to hear. The onus of a blood debt was heavy. If Cooharah had stolen food from another Qualeewooh, he owed food. Twice the amount taken.
With a creature as large as the one they’d killed, Cooharah could not pay the debt with less than six skogs. Probably eight. Of course the skogs could not be killed on the oomas’ territory. They must come from land near Cooharah’s own aerie.
But Cooharah and Aaw had no aerie, no territory to hunt. Their oasis had gone dry. The Qualeewoohs lived only on hope, thin as it was. Rain would come soon. The oases would be watered anew. Rivers would flow—a few months from now. But presently Cooharah and Aaw had no hunting territory.
“Even if we owe the oomas,” Cooharah said to his ancestor, “we cannot pay now. Their oasis is far from others. If I kill a skog, I won’t be able to take it to them. I will die.”
“Blood debt. You owe a blood debt,” the ancestor whispered. “Double payment. Food for food, chick for chick. Turn back.”
“Negative to the third degree,” Cooharah trilled. “I owe no blood debt. I—how do I know it was an animal the oomas owned? It could have been a predator the humans are well rid of!”
The green ancestor flapped its wings. Its eyes blazed like twin suns. “Blood debt,” it whispered. “You owe a debt.”
Cooharah knew he owed a blood debt. He’d never heard of any predators brought by the humans that used projectile weapons. This beast must have been a pet, perhaps a guardian. The humans had given it a weapon.
Cooharah could not bear the accusation in the ancestor’s voice. If he could have removed his spirit mask, he would have. He would have clawed it from his face with his tiny paws; pried it, tearing flesh from bone. Yet to do so was suicide. Cooharah could not deprive Aaw of a mate, someone to hunt for her and her chick in the new land. No, the spirit mask was part of him. His parents had painted it to his face at adulthood, and it would remain a part of him till he died and his own chicks used it to line the walls of some aerie.
Cooharah closed his eyes, trying to clear his mind, trying to deny the voice. commanding him to return to human lands. “Not now,” he screamed silently, prying at his mask with the thin fingers at the apex of his wings, clawing till blood ran down his jaws, soaking his feathers. “Not now. Someday. Someday I will pay!”
Chapter 25
Late into the night, Maggie built her Seeker. With her mantle of technology, it did not seem an onerous chore. Her first task was to disconnect the olfactory sensors from Lord Felph’s perfumery, a gaudy piece of equipment that took up a quarter of Hera and Zeus’s bedroom. The tremendously complex machine had olfactory sensors coupled to an artificial intelligence, along with synthesizers for creating scents. It could offer thousands of base perfumes, alter them at request.
She removed the faceplate from the perfumery and studied the machine, considering which tools she needed to remove the olfactors. She wondered how sensitive the equipment might be. She’d seen dronon olfactors used on Seekers, but they might be more sensitive than this. She didn’t know if this would work.
“Perfumer,” she asked, “can you smell me?”
“Yes,” the perfumer answered.
“Can you differentiate my smell from that of other humans?”
“Each human scent is unique, though it varies from day to day depending on the amounts of oil secreted by the skin; the colony types and growth rates of microbes growing on the skin; secretion of hormones; and the presence of chemical modifiers—such as perfumes or soap residues.’
Maggie wondered. The dronon had only begun sending Seekers after her a few weeks earlier. She’d been forced to run so fast, so far, she hadn’t considered options other than running. She suspected the dronon had only her scent. The nanoscrubbers in Gallen’s robe would make him difficult to track. On Manogian II, while Gallen, Orick, and Tallea were busy in a market a kilometer distant, a Seeker had found her. But the Seeker found only her, Maggie recalled. So perhaps the machines targeted only her. She was the Golden Queen. She was the one the dronon wanted.
“Perfumer,” Maggie asked. “Can I change my body scent, to make it unrecognizable?”
“Yes,” the perfumer answered.
“How?” Maggie felt hopeful.
“First, chemical and radiation therapies may kill exterior microbe colonies on your skin, and you could be seeded with new colonies of different varieties.” Maggie understood this. Every person has microscopic mites living in their eyes, lips, and skin. Funguses, viruses, and bacterial colonies are also common—so common in fact, most people have strains of microbe evolve to exist specifically on their own bodies.
The perfumer suggested that these could all be removed, thus altering the scent caused by microbial infestations.
“Second,” the perfumer added, “natural body odors can be masked. I can develop temporary scents for your use, or I can develop a permanent scent, to be continually administered.”
“How?” Maggie asked.
“Scent-generating cells can be inserted into the oil follicles of your skin. This technology is beyond my capabilities, but I can refer you to clinics that perform such services.
“Beyond this,” the perfumer offered, “your skin and body oils contain a unique aroma that can be altered through gene therapy by introducing retroviruses tailored specifically for your genome. In most planetary systems, such a radical treatment is not legal for use in scent therapy. This procedure is considered too dangerous for pregnant women.”
“You know I’m pregnant?” Maggie asked, surprised the perfumer could tell just from her scent.
“Yes.”
Another thought occurred to Maggie. This perfumer could duplicate scents. “One last question: can you copy my scent?”
“Yes,” the perfumer said.
“Do so,” Maggie said. “Make twenty grams of it.”
She pocketed the small bottle the perfumer filled. Maggie considered her options. So she could change her scent—change it completely—given time and resources. She hadn’t needed to come here at all. She could return to a civilized world. With a new scent, the dronon would never find her. Maggie almost wept from relief. I must tell Gallen, she thought.
She pulled off the perfumer’s olfactory sensors and artificial intelligence, connected them to a hoversled. She didn’t need to hook up a second Al to pilot the vehicle. A radio could let the sled talk to their ship, so flight instructions could be continuously relayed to the Seeker.
Though the Seeker was easily built, Maggie could not rest. I know how to hunt this Qualeewooh, because I have been so hunted, she told herself. She wondered how it would appear to the Qualeewooh—humans coming after it in superior numbers, bristling with weapons. The Qualeewooh could not escape her, Maggie felt certain. It might fly far and wide, but her Seeker would track it. It might come at Gallen with knives, but the Qualeewooh could not withstand a Lord Protector. Though Maggie knew Gallen hoped not to hurt the creature, Maggie felt for it. The Qualeewooh’s predicament and her own were too similar.
I am not like the dronon, Maggie told herself. I’m coming to save this Qualeewooh, not to destroy it. Yet she wasn’t certain. Gallen would track the bird; hoping to learn what had happened, then dispense justice. Perhaps the Qualeewooh had murdered Herm. Perhaps Gallen would kill it. Gallen would do what was right—as best he could determine. But in dealing with nonhumans, human minds failed at the task of judgment. So she fretted.
Gallen spent his evening checking his ship before departure. He had enough supplies to last a week on thin rations—long enough to jump to another world. Felph had outfitted the ship with weapons—heavy incendiary rifles, assorted pistols, repulsor shields, grenades—enough for a small war.
As Maggie finished cobbling her Seeker together, she went to the ship, found Gallen on his bed, servicing his old incendiary rifle. She stood in the door, leaning against the frame for support. She could hear the bears snoring in their stateroom.
Lords of the Seventh Swarm Page 23