I could feel my eyebrows climb. “If I could ask a question, Atu Vi. Just who was it that I insulted?”
“Masru Ahniva, retired first jetah of the Tsien Denvedah. Masru Ahniva now serves as military jetah to the Earth diplomatic mission.”
“One more question, Atu Vi. Would talma be served by offering my apology to Masru Ahniva?”
The Drac smiled and answered with a question of its own: “Did Uhe need more sand?”
On Draco I avoided the fellow from the diplomatic mission, although I hated leaving him there at the spaceport knowing that he had blown it. It would be a hot time once he got back to the office. There was ground transportation, and I took a limo bus into Sindievu where I could catch another bus that went by the Jeriba estate. Both bus pilots informed me, as I came on board, that I was required to sit at the front of the bus along with the vemadah, outcasts. Most of the outcasts were vemadah because they had refused to fight in the war. There was a Vikaan and a couple of other races among the passengers, but they sat in the back with the rest of the respectable citizens.
Why the front of the bus, I asked one of the outcasts on the bus I picked up in Sindievu. The vemadah explained and it made perfect sense. The doors are located at the front, making the ride there, to a slight degree, dustier and draftier than the rear. Besides comfort, being in the rear also allows those seated there to keep an eye on the untrustworthy passengers up front. Why the back of the bus was considered second-class at one point in old American history made me wonder at the reasoning of the time. If I ever got back to Earth, I’d have to look into it.
The vemadah nodded toward the next stop, a road that left the main road and lost itself between wooded hills. It said in Drac, “You must get off here and walk that road to your destination. Stand, or the pilot will not stop for you.”
I stood, and as the bus slowed I looked at the outcast. “Thank you.”
It looked at me. “Do humans have vemadah?”
“Yes. Many different kinds.”
“Are you vemadah on Earth?”
I thought on that for a moment, and as the bus hissed to a stop, I said, “I guess I am. You probably wouldn’t be, though.”
I climbed down from the bus, the door snapped shut behind me, the vehicle dug out and was gone in a matter of seconds.
The Jeriba estate was set in a deep rugged valley of gray stone cliffs and tall trees. A high stone wall enclosed the property, and from the gate, I could see the huge stone mansion that Jerry had described to me. It was almost a castle I told the Drac guard at the gate that I wanted to see Jeriba Zammis. The guard stared at me like I had just crapped on its shirt, then it went into an alcove behind the gate. In a few moments, another Drac emerged from the mansion and walked quickly across the wide lawn to the gate. It wore an iridescent green robe that flowed like silk. The Drac nodded at the guard, then stopped and faced me. The face looking at mine was a dead ringer for Jerry.
“You are the Irkmaan that asked to see Jeriba Zammis?”
I nodded. “Zammis must have told you about me. I’m Willis Davidge.”
The Drac studied me like I was some kind of freak. “I am Estone Nev, Jeriba Shigan’s sibling. My parent, Jeriba Gothig, wishes to see you.” The Drac turned abruptly and walked back to the mansion. I followed, feeling heady at the thought of seeing Zammis again. I paid little attention to Estone Nev’s manner or my surroundings until I was ushered into a large room with a vaulted stone ceiling. Jerry had told me that the house was four thousand years old. I believed it. As I entered, another Drac stood and walked over to me. It was old, but I knew who it was. That face had been described to me so many times that it was more familiar to me than my own father’s.
“You are Gothig, Shigan’s parent?’
The yellow eyes studied me. “Who are you, Irkmaan?” It held out a wrinkled, three-fingered hand. “What do you know of Jeriba Zammis, and why do you speak the Drac tongue with the style and accent of my child Shigan? What are you here for?”
“I speak Drac in this manner because that is the way Jeriba Shigan taught me to speak it.”
The old Drac cocked its head to one side and narrowed its yellow eyes. “You knew my child? How?”
“Didn’t the survey commission tell you?”
“It was reported to me that my child, Shigan, was killed in the battle of Fyrine IV. That was over six of our years ago. What is your game, Irkmaan?”
I turned from Gothig to Nev. The younger Drac was examining me with the same look of suspicion. I turned back to Gothig. “Shigan wasn’t killed in the battle. We were stranded together on the surface of Fyrine IV and lived there for a year. Shigan died giving birth to Jeriba Zammis. A year later the joint survey commission found us and—”
“Enough! Enough of this, Irkmaan! Are you here for money, to use my influence for trade concessions—what?”
I frowned. “Where is Zammis? I’m here to see Zammis. Where is it?”
Tears of anger came to the old Drac’s eyes. “There is no Zammis, Irkmaan! The Jeriba line ended with the death of Shigan!”
My eyes grew wide as I shook my head. “That’s not true. I know. I took care of Zammis—you heard nothing from the commission?”
“Get to the point of your scheme, Irkmaan. I haven’t all day.”
I studied Gothig. The old Drac had heard nothing from the commission. The Drac authorities took Zammis, and the child had evaporated. Gothig had been told nothing. Why?
“I was with Shigan, Gothig. That is how I learned your language. When Shigan died giving birth to Zammis, I—”
“Irkmaan, if you cannot get to your scheme, I will have to ask Nev to throw you out. Shigan died in the battle of Fyrine IV. The Drac Fleet notified us only days later. That was six years ago.”
I nodded. “Then, Gothig, tell me how I came to know the line of Jeriba?”
“The Jeriba line?”
“Do you wish me to recite it for you?”
Gothig snorted. “You say you know the Jeriba line?”
“Yes.”
Gothig flipped a hand at me. “Begin.”
I took a breath, then began, except I began with Zammis: “Before you here I stand, Zammis of the line of Jeriba, born of Shigan the fighter pilot. A flyer of courage and distinction, Shigan stood before the archives in the year 11,061 and spoke of its parent, Gothig, the teacher of music… “
By the time I had reached the hundred and seventy-third generation, Gothig had knelt on the stone floor next to Nev. The Dracs remained that way for three hours of the recital. When I concluded, Gothig bowed its head and wept. “Yes, Irkmaan, yes. You must have known Shigan. Yes.” The old Drac looked up into my face, its eyes wide with hope. “And, you say Shigan continued the line—that Zammis was born?”
I nodded. “I don’t know why the commission didn’t notify you.”
Gothig got to its feet and frowned. “We will find out, Irkmaan—what is your name?”
“Davidge. Willis Davidge.”
“We will find out, Davidge.”
Gothig arranged quarters for me in its house, which was fortunate, since I had little more than eleven hundred credits left. I’d never seen a full-blown Drac apartment before. It was like a number of orange slices laid out in a semi-circle, with the focal point being the greeting room. All doors opened onto the greeting room: a sitting room, a sleeping room, a tiny kitchen and dining area, and a meditation room. I never got a chance to stretch out. After making a host of inquiries, Gothig managed to get a lead on Zammis. Gothig sent Nev and I to the Chamber Center in Sindievu. The Jeriba line, I found, was influential, and the big stall was held down to a minimum. Still, it was a shuffle from one office to another until we were, at last, directed to the Joint Survey Commission representative, a Drac named Jozzdn Vrule. It looked up from the letter Gothig had given me and stared at me like I was wearing my pet kiz on my head. “Where did you get this, Irkmaan?”
“I believe the signature is on it.”
The Drac looked at
the paper, then back at me. “The Jeriba line is one of the most respected on Draco. You say that Jeriba Gothig gave you this?”
“I felt certain I said that; I could feel my lips moving—”
Nev stepped in. “You have the dates and the information concerning the Fyrine IV survey mission. We want to know what happened to Jeriba Zammis.”
Jozzdn Vrule frowned and looked back at the paper. “Estone Nev, you are the founder of your line, is this not true?”
“It is true.”
“Would you found your line in shame? Why do I see you with this Irkmaan?”
Nev curled its upper lip and folded its arms. “Jozzdn Vrule, if you contemplate walking this planet in the foreseeable future as a free being, it would be to your profit to stop working your mouth and to start finding Jeriba Zammis.”
Jozzdn Vrule looked down and studied its fingers, then returned its glance to Nev. “Very well, Estone Nev. You threaten me if I fail to hand you the truth. I think you will find the truth the greater threat.” The Drac scribbled on a piece of paper, then handed it to Nev. “You will find Jeriba Zammis at this address, and you will curse the day that I gave you this.”
The address referred to a place that was three thousand miles away on another continent in a place called Vakudin. Back at the estate, Gothig took the address and gave it to one of the family retainers, named Okiri Niba, to make arrangements. We then seated ourselves in the main sitting room, a place hung with tapestries and weird chandeliers that was about as cozy as a hangar deck. Gothig and Nev talked excitedly about the confirmation of Zammis’s existence, but I could only sit quietly and devil my mind about why Zammis had not been returned to its line’s estate. Had it been injured? Shortly after, Niba returned looking very shaken.
“The address, jetah,” it said to Gothig. “Vakudin. It is the Sa Ashzhab Kovah.”
It was as if all breathing in the known universe suddenly ceased. Kovah means a school or institution, but ashzhab was not familiar. I was trying to piece together the meaning of the word from the words that were its parents, but before I crossed the finish line Estone Nev said to me in English, “It is the Dracon state colony for the insane.”
I frowned as I faced Nev. “Poorzhab means insane. What does ashzhab mean?”
The Drac dropped its glance and placed its hand on Gothig’s shoulder. “Criminally insane, Davidge. The word means criminally insane.”
It took two days for Gothig’s operatives to arrange the permissions to visit the colony, and to charter transportation. During that two days, I could not stand the pain of imagining what Zammis had gone through—was going through. The guilt was almost a physical presence. I would see Zammis in my mind, saying those very prophetic words: “Uncle, I can carry you. We shouldn’t separate.”
We shouldn’t separate.
I told the kid I couldn’t make it. I told it to go and I watched as it ran across that purple plain.
Remember me, I had told Zammis.
Remember me.
I felt like running out and booking passage on the first ship off Draco, wherever it went.
Alone in the meditation chamber I would cry. Helpless, frustrated, needing to change the past and powerless to do anything about it. What if I had let Zammis carry me? Perhaps neither of us would have made it off Fyrine IV. We would have been together, though.
Deep within my darkness, Estone Nev came into my apartment and entered the meditation chamber. It waited a moment, then said to me, “Davidge, we are leaving for Sindievu to take a charter flight to Vakudin. Are you coming?”
I looked at Nev and said, “I should never have let Zammis go on without me.”
“You had no alternative, Davidge.”
“I did have an alternative, Nev. We could have stayed together.”
“Davidge, that is a talma that would likely have achieved death for both of you.” It lifted a hand and placed it on my shoulder. “Listen, human. You are assuming blame for something that was out of your control. It does not serve talma.”
“What in the hell does serve talma?”
“Travel with us to the Sa Ashzhab Kovah, Davidge. That is where Zammis is. That is where a new talma, if one is possible, must begin.”
It was dark through the windows of the plane as it hissed through the night across an ocean. Twice I saw lonely little lights below. Blue, cold, and all but lost within the depths of so much black. What were they? Ships? Signal lights? Was some poor lonely Drac up keeping watch in all that dark?
Those dangerous thoughts of suicide that used to tease me when I was stranded on Fyrine IV touched me again. All that Jerry and I were to each other, all that Zammis and I were to each other, gone, taken away like a leaf caught in a hurricane. How dark can it get, I asked the night.
Then the words of Namvaac in the Koda Sitarmeda drifted into my mind. It was a time of civil war and endless horrors. Between the weapons and the determination of the warring sides, all that had taken centuries to build had been swept away, leaving starving hoards picking among the rubble for enough food to last another day. In the darkness of a ruin, Namvaac had come upon one of its students, and the student was working a talma of self-death. The jetah took the student’s knife and demanded to know what was going on.
…the student said to Namvaac, “Jetah, the darkness covers all the Universe. It is such an all-powerful evil, I feel so small and helpless within it. Next to this darkness the black of death seems so bright.”
Namvaac studied the hooked blade, then handed it back to the student. “Where you are now, child, Tochalla has been before you. It, too, was in darkness. It, too, had a knife. But Tochalla also had talma.”
There are an infinite number of paths from the present to the desired future. Talma is both the most efficient path and the discipline for finding the path. Until the infinite number of paths have been exhausted, the Dracs look upon quitting—any kind of quitting—as a character defect.
The short version was what I used to tell Zammis: “Don’t throw dirt on it until it’s dead.”
Something Grandpop used to say to wrestle down my projections about what might happen. I thought about the old guy and wished I had known him better. I only spent the one summer when I was eight with him; it took that long for my father to forgive his father for whatever it was and let me visit. The next winter, Grandpop had a stroke and died. When they read his will, Grandpop had left me an envelope. My father brought it home with him. I took the envelope to my room and opened it with trembling fingers. In it was a sheet of paper that contained only seven words: “Now you can throw dirt on it.”
I laughed then and I kept the reason why I laughed a secret between me and Grandpop. I smiled at the memory and let it chase away the dark. Zammis was still alive. I was still alive. Talma was still possible.
As we met the sun, the ocean below still dark, Estone Nev sat next to me and asked in English. “Have you slept?”
“A little. How about you?”
“No sleep at all. I was thinking of Jeriba, how thrilled my sibling was when it became pregnant the first time. I used to tell it that, to hear Jeriba, one would think no one had ever been pregnant before.” The Drac raised its brow and smiled. “I was an insufferable little… ” Nev looked at me and held out a hand. “Gafu.”
“Brat,” I answered.
“Yes. I was an insufferable little brat. I was jealous, as well. Jeriba was getting so much attention. But nothing I could say or do diminished the joy my sibling was experiencing. When Jeriba miscarried, I thought my sibling would kill itself. I think that’s why it entered the flight denve and went to war. The last communication I had from Jeriba was the news that it had conceived. That was only a few days before the Battle of Fyrine IV.” Estone Nev turned its head and faced me. “Did my sibling get to see Zammis before it died!”
“No,” I answered in a whisper. “I had to tear Zammis from the womb.”
Nev was silent for a long time. When it spoke, it said, “It must have been very hard for
you, rearing a Drac child by yourself.”
I thought on it for a bit, then shook my head. “No, Nev. It wasn’t hard. It was the most important part, the most fun of my whole life.”
The airport was on an island that had two fishing villages and a dock. At the dock we took a sleek high-speed ferry to an even smaller island, Vakudin. The heavily forested island ringed with white sand sat like a jewel in the greenish-blue sea. We had to come much closer before we could see the powered fences, the watch towers, the guards, and the ruvaak, tireless trained guard animals that looked like a cross between a hairy alligator and a nightmare. When we reached land, a guard took us to the visitors’ waiting room in the main administrative building, where we were, for all intents and purposes, forgotten. After an hour of this, Gothig’s patience evaporated. It said to Nev and me, “Come, children, it is time to cross the Akkujah.”
We wandered hallways for a few minutes until, after turning a corner, we faced the records office. Gothig, with Nev and I backing it up, cornered the clerk of records. The clerk, Toccvo Leint, immediately began running off at the mouth about patient confidentiality, going through proper channels, and such, when Gothig placed its hand on the fellow’s shoulder and asked again. From the expression on the clerk’s face, I assumed it was making a choice between letting us know what we wanted or forgoing the continued use of its shoulder and arm. The clerk decided that it could help us after all.
First, Gothig wanted to know by what lights Zammis was considered insane. Second, it wanted to know by what lights Zammis was considered criminal.
Jetah Toccvo Leint called up the records, studied them, and then told us, “I remember this case. Jeriba Zammis, ever since it was rescued from Fyrine IV, professed to love humans.” Toccvo Leint looked at us as though that explained all.
Receiving little but dumbfounded stares in return, the clerk continued. “For that reason, Jeriba Zammis is dangerously insane. Long before the ship that brought it to Draco had landed, Jeriba Zammis had committed several major assaults, according to witnesses, and eventually reached a point where it couldn’t even speak a coherent sentence.”
Enemy Papers Page 18