An Ancient Peace

by Tanya Huff

  “Better it not happen again. I’m afraid there is no time remaining; so many calling.” They rose until Torin stood eye to sternum. Noting the point where the power source would go in, she didn’t feel intimidated if that was their intent. “We’ve accepted your apology, however little reason we feel exists for it, as you’ve accepted our thanks. I think I have come to know the Younger Races a little better through this, through your living, student Warden.”

  Torin came to attention as they inclined their head. “Zegazt.”

  She stayed in place, as ordered, until they were gone. They undulated a lot more when they were alive.

  The entire team waited outside the park when she emerged. “Where’s Ng?”

  “He left with the H’san liaison and an assortment of assistants. According to a lingering assistant, you talked them into spending more time with the Younger Races. She ran off when we said we’d meet you.” Craig fell into step on one side of her, Werst on the other.

  “I didn’t talk them into anything.”

  Craig bumped his shoulder into hers. “You can be unintentionally persuasive. How did the apology go?”

  “They agreed I didn’t need to make one.”

  “Really?”

  She smiled. “Essentially.”

  “Did you ask why they refuse to destroy their weapons?”

  The smile slipped. “It’s their past, they want to hold it.”

  “So, they refuse to destroy their weapons because they don’t want to destroy their weapons?”

  “Pretty much.”

  “And the rest of it?”

  “Honestly, I don’t know. I suspect I was speaking to a politician.”

  Ressk leaned out around his bonded. “Were they male or female?”

  “No idea.”

  Binti shook her head. “You got anything for us, Gunny?”

  “They smell a lot better when they’re alive, like puppies and pie.” She thought about that for a moment. “Sequentially.”

  “So, Boss . . .” Alamber walked backward down the corridor, still relatively empty after the passage of the H’san, “Something occurred to me. The Younger Races don’t know where the H’san planet of origin is, right? And they think it’s lost, so they don’t know to ask, right?”

  “Right.”

  “Well, whoever Major Sujuno was fetching the weapons for, they knew.”

  “Don’t be ridiculous, rehabilitation isn’t enough. He needs to be permanently silenced.” Pale fingers tapped against the plastic display stand under the piece of ceramic, then rose to trace the metallic pattern in the glaze. “I don’t care how. Make it as visible as possible; it does no good if no one hears about it. Wield knowledge as power.”

  The interior of the bowl had begun to warm, the temperature rising with every repetition of the pattern. “If that idiot Dion and the major arrive with the weapons, fine, wonderful, that changes things, but we won’t wait for them.” Enough repetitions and a harmless looking piece of ceramic would grow hot enough to melt through stone. With no understanding of how long the power source would last, not a particularly useful item, but fascinating. It was the only piece of ceramic in his collection. He was more interested in plastic. What could be done with it. What it had done. He’d been looking for the perfect piece for years now. Eventually, he’d find it. Or he’d create a situation where it would come looking for him.

  “Yes, that’s exactly what I mean. Human’s First will become more than a mockery of a movement when we make Richard Varga a martyr to the cause.”

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