The Comet Riders: Book Five of Seeds of a Fallen Empire

by Anne Spackman

  Chapter Five

  The Kayrian man Ettrekh Meilacu-ra paused at the top of the stairs, gripped by a hesitation he had never known before. Why was he so suddenly afraid? How was it possible for fear to enter the heart of a man who knew what he wanted and had made a decision to do something about it?

  If only he could have seen himself, standing there, his bare feet staggered over two steps, mid-stride, he would have said that the man was meditating upon something that had been mistakenly left upstairs.

  He knew what he wanted, and he was afraid of getting it.

  He wanted to see his home just one time before he died. And he wanted his daughter to know the planet they had all come from.

  Kayria.

  But did he really want to know what had happened to Kayria since he had left it? He felt the pangs of reminiscences he didn’t invite, memories of his family, the intrigue and bustle of those who knew him intimately, never forgot his vices, and stubbornly kept their impressions of the boy unchanged in their minds even when he became a man; his thoughts drifted to recollections of his world, lingering over good and bad memories alike, fond thoughts of people who had passed on even in his childhood, and of friends and by-gone days of boyhood, wanderings over the wild moors of Noritek, and games adventuring in the glades by the ancient ruins of a primitive’s dwelling.

  He thought of his younger self, dreaming of the future he thought to find and to make, never expecting what life had to hold for him. He thought of it all now with such fond devotion, though the boy he had been had left Kayria, thinking to find something far greater out there in the unknown.

  Ettrekh had grown comfortable and familiar with this Seynorynael, learned to function so very easily in its society, grown Seynorynaelian in his political leanings, begun to take the middle line in his actions, and misunderstood the uncompromising, irrational tendencies of the young Seynorynaelians he encountered almost daily in his work in the city of Falyndae.

  Could it be, though. that Kayria still owned his soul? he wondered in reverent contemplation.

  He had been pondering his death of late; he was satisfied that he would die here on Seynorynael with his Seynorynaelian-born wife, but a realization had struck him as he contemplated his actions to date: he did not want to die before he saw Kayria again.

  And what of his daughter Undina? How could he live knowing that his child would never understand his soul? His wife—for some reason, the fact that Ilina hadn’t been to Kayria never disturbed him; he had fallen in love with her for herself, and his love didn’t hinge upon a common or disparate background but upon their common interests and thoughts.

  Yet their daughter Undina was so young that Ettrekh didn’t really know her, at least not what kind of woman she would one day grow to be; he couldn’t say why it concerned him that Undina, who was a physical continuation of him, a part of him that would live ever after on Seynorynael, would never understand him, her father, because she didn’t understand Kayria.

  Ettrekh trusted Undina to make her own judgments—she was a clever girl, which made his heart so fondly proud—but she could only base those judgments on what she had experienced, and he knew her experience was scant. She had been born on Seynorynael, and she had never left the planet. For all the transmissions she could see, for all the electro-pad files she might read, she would never truly understand him, or herself, until she set her raw child’s feet upon her native soil.

  Ettrekh trotted down the stair.

  He knew what he would do.

  He could hear sounds coming from the central living area, where Ilina and her mother were teaching Undina Kayrian tradition, the uy-lana contest of concentration and strength. Ilina smiled at him when he entered, then turned again to her daughter to keep from losing. When the match was over, Ilina had won by the closest of margins, to the amusement of Ilina's mother, Gilwsa Nelana-mi, a middle-aged Kayrian woman with a small, frail body like a bird’s but a feisty glow about her that defied everyone indiscriminately.

  "Oh ho, Ilina-li. She's going to get you soon, that one." The older woman laughed; Ettrekh found it odd that though Gilwsa had never been to Kayria, her words had all of the qualities of the rich, euphonious stream of words of the Kayrian speech, not merely its language.

  “But she’ll never beat you, eh, Gilwsa?” Ettrekh said, glad that at least Gilwsa hadn’t forgotten all Kayrian traditions, even if she had given her daughter a Seynorynaelian name.

  “All this contesting has given me an appetite. I don’t know about the rest of you, but I’m going to go find something to eat." Ilina said, clambering to her feet.

  Undina stood quietly and followed her mother and father into the food preparation room; Gilwsa sat back in her chair, as though content to rest.

  Kayrian children were taught from early on in life to fend for themselves when it came to simple tasks such as eating and taking care of personal belongings and needs. But in other areas, Kayrian parents took an almost dominating interest in their children's upbringing, as far as Seynorynaelians were concerned. Kayrians were highly rational people. Seynorynaelians were of the misguided belief that Kayrians seldom showed any emotion; in fact, this was a conclusion based on misunderstanding.

  Ettrekh liked to think that Kayrians possessed a noble character and acted for the best. What was usually true and more reliable was that they often acted without hesitation; Kayrians were given to long contemplation before taking action, and in many cases, it was virtually impossible to change their minds once they had made them up.

  Seynorynaelians suffered from the general prejudice that Kayrians possessed unfailing good sense; Kayrians themselves were far less certain of that assertion but as the image it projected of their race was positive, they generally refrained from disabusing the false impressions of their Seynorynaelian allies. It was a small enough advantage to be considered equal to Seynorynaelians with regard to reasoning abilities, because many of the prejudices against Kayrians were unfounded and degrading.

  Ilina found a fresh urbin root and began scraping away at it to remove the dirty peeling, while Ettrekh stuffed some mian leaves into a pot to cook with a little bit of shredded koltri. Undina loped over to the food unit with a brazen gait and withdrew some cooked hikhu eggs which she brought back to the table carefully balanced in stacks up to her nose.

  The Seynorynaelian meal facilitator remained in its corner, but the Kayrian families rarely relied upon them. Urbin roots, native to Kayria, had become a part of Seynorynaelian cuisine, and dishes made with them could be produced in the facilitators, but the Kayrians enjoyed the activity of food preparation, because it kept the family working together.

  The four of them were all that remained of the extended Kayrian family. Ilina's father, Ertu Nelana-mi had died of premature old age radiation disease, and Ettrekh's parents still lived on Kayria. Ilina had only one brother who had disappeared years before, Viker; they seldom spoke of him. Why Viker had left suddenly remained a mystery to everyone, even though Undina was convinced she was the only one who didn’t know the reason. Gilwsa occasionally mentioned that Viker had never been content on Seynorynael. But where else in the five planets might he have gone? Undina wondered secretly.

  She thought of Viker often.

  Undina's mother had lived all of her life on Seynorynael. Gilwsa's side of the family had been among the earliest immigrants nearly five thousand years before and had in many ways grown more like Seynorynaelians than Kayrians, though they had kept a few traditions. Gilwsa’s husband Kilimay's family had lived on Seynorynael more than three thousand years, but they had moved across the Sea to Kilkor. Kilimay had joined Gilwsa in her home in Kerrai, and it was there that their daughter Ilina had met Ettrekh nine years ago.

  After the Kayrian expansion, Kerrai had grown to be the largest northern city between Lake Firien and Ariyalsynai, located only a few hundred land units northwest of the great capital city, nestled in the foothil
ls of the mountains that separated the rolling, vibrant green southern hills from the northern wild lands. Kerrai, a beautiful steep, multi-tiered city attracted Kayrians for some reason.

  Ettrekh and Ilina had later decided that the city had grown too crowded to raise Undina there. Ettrekh's descriptions of Kayrian settlements led them to the nearby northern town of Falyndae, a picturesque domed village contained in a mountain valley.

  Ettrekh Meilacu-ra had never intended to remain on Seynorynael.

  Ettrekh had decided to travel and see the Federation's five planets himself, and after a brief stay on Tulor, he secured passage to Seynorynael. After landing in Ariyalsynai, he had traveled east to get a taste of undiluted Seynorynaelian culture. But when he heard of the large percentage of Kayrians living in the city of Kerrai and the claims that they had recreated a Kayrian city, his curiosity drew him there. He was catching a transport to the historic center when he ran into Ilina's family. Ilina still laughed at how her father had decided then and there to welcome the Kayrian native and give him the grand tour.

  But if Kerrai had not been what he expected, a city still predominantly Seynorynaelian in population, architecture, and culture, it had held one of the greatest treasures in the conglomeration of five planets as far as he was concerned, one Ettrekh was never going to let go: Ilina Nelana-mi, a girl who could climb a tree better than he could, who loved to argue over politics and philosophy, and whose temperament and “ideas” were as unpredictable as the weather. He had been only a tenday from leaving the planet when he met her.

  He had never left.

  "Ilina, I want to visit Kayria. And I want to take Undina with me.” He said as they were eating.

  Ilina set down her drink; she stared at it a moment, as though extraordinarily fascinated by it for no apparent reason. She looked up at him; her eyes were strained.

  “It is time she sees her home world.” He went on.

  “She...” Ilina exhaled shortly. “Has lived her entire life on Seynorynael, Ettrekh—”

  “I’m talking about Kayria.”

  “What can it matter if she sees Kayria? It doesn’t mean anything to her.”

  “I know, and that’s precisely my point.”

  “I understand why you want to—”

  “I don’t think you can, Ilina. You were born here.”

  She stopped, visibly considered his words. “Perhaps I don’t then. But—”

  “Undina’s eight by Seynorynaelian years, twelve by Kayrian years, old enough to make such a journey that will last her all of her life. If I don’t take her there now, I think it will be too late for her to ever really know Kayria.”

  Ilina failed to see the significance of that.

  “Children see the world differently, Ilina, don’t you remember? Don’t you remember how observant you were when the world was new to you? Don’t you remember how every powerful, unique experience had the power to make a strong and lasting impression—"

  “Yes, I do.”

  “I want her to be Kayrian—Kayrian in spirit. She’ll always be Seynorynaelian, I know, because she was born and raised here, but to at least understand and feel what her people were—”

  “Because I never got that chance.” She smiled at him, a tight little smile.

  “It isn’t your fault your illness keeps you from traveling. I’m not trying to be condescending about my Kayrian roots—”

  Undina giggled. The urbin roots made a popular dish her father was known for.

  “I know.” Ilina said soberly, not hearing her.

  “And I’m not pitying you, either, Ilina.”

  “You’d better not.”

  “Seynorynael is a wonderful place to grow up, as long as there are other Kayrian descendants around.”

  “I thought so. But that’s why you never asked before—because of me.”

  “I thought I could be happy just living here, living for the future, but—”

  “I understand. I suppose I even expected this would happen. I’m not angry—I’m relieved.”

  “Relieved?” He didn’t understand.

  “All of this time, I knew I was holding you and Undina back. I knew you weren’t saying anything about wanting to go home and see your family because of me, even though you clearly wanted to go back. Even though—I always knew you would have to go back someday.”

  “Not forever. Just one last visit.”

  “Forever? Honestly, it makes me sad when you talk like that,” she said. “But I understand. I want you to know that I do. And of course,” she said, averting her eyes. “I’ll miss you terribly, you and Undina, but I’ll survive; for your sake, I’ll manage, somehow. How many years will you be gone?” Her voice was stoical.

  “A year in space each way, but several more if you factor in time dilation—”

  “What’s going on in here?” Gilwsa suddenly interrupted, having entered the food preparation room. She had taken a bowl down and come up behind Ilina before the couple noticed her. Undina's eyes only fell upon her grandmother briefly. At the moment, she was far too interested in her parents' discussion, her bright eyes shifting between them. "Isn't it early to be taking a long journey? The warm season has begun, and you’ll miss it," Gilwsa commented, taking a seat. “Ilina won’t be able to see Undina grow into a woman, and what about her education—"

  "She can receive an outstanding quality of education on one of the Seynorynaelian spaceships with the councilors' children.” Ettrekh explained. “And she’ll learn so much from seeing another planet, lessons no other experience can teach—"

  "What good will it be when she returns here?” Gilwsa asked calmly. “She’ll only have more to sacrifice—events and family she misses here, and then those she leaves behind on Kayria." Gilwsa sounded vaguely irritated, but not at Ettrekh.

  "Grandmother, I’ve always wanted to see the land where we came from," Undina's small voice was heard for the first time. She kept glancing at her father; she knew he was brilliant, more brilliant than she ever hoped to be, but she felt he never noticed how hard she was trying to live up to the standard of his intellect. Of course, she knew he didn’t know everything, but everything he said she measured with consideration; she let what he said affect her deeply, more than he ever suspected.

  “Yes, dear, but you don’t understand—”

  “Yes, I do.” Undina said firmly. “And I don’t care what leaving means. If it means going somewhere where I’m not an outsider anymore, I don’t care what I have to sacrifice here. I want to know where I came from. Who I am—more than anything you can give me. More than anything Seynorynael can give me.”

  Undina Meilacu-ra had been born on Seynorynael, but by the time she was conscious of herself, she already knew she wasn’t quite the same as the other children she played with in training; her mother said she pointed in wonder the first time she saw a Seynorynaelian on the street, but she didn’t remember that. She remembered staring at them, and numbly wondering what they were and why they looked the way they did. It occurred to her some time later that they were looking at her the same way and staring back at her. Some time later than that, she learned that the world she was living in valued these pale gray faces, not the familiar white features of her Kayrian family. The fact continued to strike her with its ability to surprise and stun her; she grasped at comprehension, the way a child wonders why his first burn has the power to hurt him.

  Her mind revolted against the unfairness of it; her sense of the injustice dulled and flared from time to time, but for the most part, she grew accustomed to the Seynorynaelians almost as soon as she remembered being alive and aware, and after a time, she was even able to forget her own appearance when she interacted with them; staring at herself in reflective glass was a daily ritual that made her wonder; she scrutinized every inch of her face like a stranger.

  But the first time she really understo
od that she was different in soul as well as in body was when she started talking about the familiar comforts of home: family meals, expressions the family used that were not actually Seynorynaelian but Kayrian, though she little understood the difference then, and the religious and cultural beliefs she had long since accepted as truth that were universally known.

  Her Seynorynaelian peers did more than misunderstand her references; they regarded her as though she were a fool or an idiot, and treated her as though she were of no value and significance to the world; she was a non-entity, and they ignored her.

  She didn’t let them get away with it. She did what she wanted, played, eventually broke past the ridiculous taboos imposed upon her by never letting them see that she had been affected by them.

  Yet from that day on, she had never again taken anything on faith.

  Could she handle all of the strange and irrational traditions of the world? She thought she could handle anything by sheer determination and force of will, with integrity in her heart—she thought she could combat prejudice with truth.

  The worst was yet to come.

  She had accepted the fact that the characters in all of the holo-dramas were Seynorynaelian, that the characters she read about and that the important figures of Federation history were primarily Seynorynaelian. She decided to value them, these fantastic heroes, independent of their race’s assessment of her and her culture; she could admire anyone with the same kind of fortitude and determination she knew she possessed, and she thought herself benevolent to be so open-minded about her conclusions.

  She reveled in the deeds of heroes, reveled in honor, in justice, in beating the bad guy at his own game, in upholding truth and defending the meek—oh yes, she believed in it all. These heroes of faraway and yesteryear—they were her idols; she felt that they were kindred spirits, familiar to her, that in some way, they would equally admire her if they could only know her heart the way she knew she believed in the principles they stood for.

  Then, on a miserable, bleak day, miserable and bleak in her recollection though it had been in the middle of the warm season—she uncovered a horrible truth, a secret conspiracy that had been operating against her since her birth.

  She could never be a hero; she was an alien girl. And Seynorynael was really a patriarchal society.

  “I wish I were a boy,” she often thought from then on, not because she envied what they were—she was perfectly happy with her own physical body—but because they were like some older sibling who could have what he wanted, while she had to make do with what leftovers she was given. She didn’t see why she couldn’t have the same thing.

  Undina was too young to know that her keen intelligence and ambition would offend men and make her unfeminine; she hadn’t grown into the subservient role society had waiting for her as a female; she didn’t even believe such genderized limitations existed yet. She only knew that she craved knowledge and adored logic, and she was very conscious of how bright and observant she was; because of this, she considered herself blessed and was unduly grateful and patient with those around her, without ever being condescending; she considered it the duty of the intellectually gifted to be aware that the gift of intelligence was a gift of serendipity, and she could just as easily have been born with average reasoning abilities.

  She was horrified to discover that there would be those who would doubt that she was even intelligent, for the simple reason that she had been born female. She was equally annoyed that the Berrachaiyans, who complained about Seynorynaelian prejudice against them were every bit as prejudiced against her because she was female, which she couldn’t have been blamed for any more than they could have been blamed for not being born Seynorynaelian.

  That was when Undina decided to retreat into science, into the pure and reasoning world of fact, where she could be secure in her conclusions, and where incidentally, she could even manage to find work with as little interaction with others as possible.

  She was only half-grown up when she made this decision. At the same time, she was jealous of and still fascinated by heroes. Could she be an explorer?

  It wasn’t until years later that she would wonder why general prejudice dictated that women were born to submit, to submit to men, and to submit to their unhappy lot of child-bearing and the even duller reality of child-rearing. She had no romantic notions that she would enjoy child-rearing.

  Why should a bold spirit be forced to submit to anything? Was not the true power in humanity, all humanity, the power of choice and the power of free will? Was not the true value of humanity and other intelligent races of the Federation to be found in their intellect, which distinguished humanity and the intelligent races from base animals?

  The poor girl didn’t know that it didn’t matter what she thought, that she was so wholly dedicated to impartiality between the sexes, that she disliked women’s superiority complexes as much as she disliked male chauvinism. It didn’t matter that she believed in the value and potential of the living being, not the man or the woman, not the alien or the native, but the being itself, its intellect and character. It didn’t matter because the world was not going to accept her belief, and it wasn’t going to change.

  Undina could have been frustrated by the errors of society, but she chose to try to put it out of her mind. To let it destroy her would be being affected by it, and she refused to concede to anything she did not believe.

  Thus she was acutely conscious of prejudice and injustice by the time she was half-grown because she was both Kayrian and female; she was acutely aware of the fact that this was the worst kind of predicament to be in and be living on Seynorynael.

  Yes, she thought, she had always wanted to go to Kayria.

  She wanted to know if Kayria was different, to test her ideals of egalitarian Kayrian traditions before she allowed herself to cling to them as though they were an aegis against Seynorynaelian injustice.

  She wasn’t afraid of learning the truth.

  "And on Tulor there is a giant, paper-thin plant that grows in patches on the surface of the water. That’s how the Emerald Sea on Tulor received its name, more than twenty-five thousand years ago."

  The Seynorynaelian storyteller on board the shuttle Neliyan looked around at the rapt expressions on the faces of the children seated in a circle around him and felt a self-conscious smile work its way to his lips. Why couldn’t they see that after all of these years telling stories to the young that he still felt as though he were a fake, that he wasn’t qualified to do it or to do the tales justice? Yet he loved this, and he loved the stories; and to pass them on to the young made his old heart feel its youth again.

  His name was Giacan, and he was the Seynorynaelian ambassador to Tulor's record-keeper, but nothing gave him a greater excitement than this, lighting the spark of imagination in the eyes of the young children. He was aware that they would forget him, but for a few fond recollections of a few of the older ones in years to come, aware that they only barely knew him for these short months as “the storyteller”, a name that spread anticipation, and that the phrase “the storyteller is starting” set swift young feet racing down the shuttle corridors for the traditional gathering place before the c-level observation window.

  "The ikulor plants cover the entire surface of the water for thousands of miles." He continued with a subtle pacing in his words, at the same time gesturing in the air. "It is said that the sea creatures that live in the murky depths of the Emerald Sea glow, for the ikulor plants block the light from Bilac, Tulor's yellow-white star, just like a blanket of snow covering the ground. The Tulorians ate the ikulor plant for many years, until they realized that the enzymes in these plants could be purified to make potent medicines to heal the sick.”

  “How did the people get sick if it was medicine, Giacan?” one of the children asked. Giacan laughed.

  "The Tulorians scientists had discovered that it could be made into medicine, but t
hey weren’t the ones who needed it so badly. The ikulor was discovered to cure a terrible illness on Gildbatur.”

  “How, Giacan?” a little Tulorian boy asked.

  “When—” one of the Seynorynaelian children began.

  Giacan laughed again, waving a hand.

  “Nearly three hundred years ago, the explorers who had found the planet Gildbatur returned to our Federation with word of a great planetary war. There had been an epidemic of disease affecting the injured, and one of the Tulorian ships was asked to contribute whatever it could to help, so that the Gildbaturans would know that they could trust the Federation.

  “The ikulor was administered experimentally, with little hope of it having much effect, but to everyone’s surprise, it had a powerful effect on the Gildbaturan life systems. And it turned out that the medicine had a more powerful effect as a medicine there than anywhere in the Federation. So, when a new crew left the Federation for Gildbatur, they took with them great quantities of the Tulorian medicine. Then, shortly after the second explorer crew arrived, the Gildbaturans ceased their conflict to join the Federation."

  "What do the Gilatoor-mans look like, Giacan?" One of the younger children asked.

  Giacan involuntarily cracked a smile.

  "Well, they are more like us than the Berrachai."

  "I saw a Berrachai once," one of the children interrupted. "They have great big chests and make a rasping sound when they breathe."

  "Yes, child, because their own atmosphere is so thin. Seynorynaelians who have lived there for generations have begun to develop a greater chest cavity, and find it difficult to readjust to life on our world if they return. Many of them like to live in the Kilkoran mountain regions now, where the air pressure is lowest and they can breathe."

  "They go to Kilkor because the great mountains to the north of Ariyalsynai are dangerous?" one of the older children suggested. Giacan nodded.

  "Yes. Now, there is a Gildbaturan ambassador aboard our ship. You will recognize him if you see him. Gildbaturans have yellow skin and green eyes, and are slightly shorter and more heavily muscled than we Seynorynaelians."

  "They didn't want to join the Federation at first, though, did they Giacan?" another older boy asked.

  "No, they didn't, Ilsat. When we visited Gildbatur, our explorers found it useful that our ships had been outfitted with defensive weapons after the explorer Nilery's report on Tulorian conflicts. The Gildbaturans' society had not even developed any form of engine, but because of their war-based culture, their struggle over grazing territories and for control of cities, at first they would only think of joining us to gain an advantage over their enemies—and out of fear of our weaponry."

  "But there aren't many differences between us any more, are there? The Gildbaturans today seem glad to be a part of the Federation." A gaunt-cheeked girl called Liera said.

  "Yes, well, over time, they have adopted much of our culture and adjusted to the peace of the Federation. They have even established an institute of higher learning there, I hear, where Gildbaturan children study the scientific foundations of our mechanized android units, transport shuttles, and spaceship technology."

  "And they don't fight any more—not like the Berrachai," Liera insisted.

  "Yes, it's true." Giacan nodded. "The wars on Gildbatur have diminished to only isolated violent incidents, much less than those fought by our ancient brother civilization on Berrachai. Now, the Berrachai conflict was so deeply entrenched in their cultural identity that it took many years to negotiate peace between the territories, and to prevent the great civil riots that often killed millions of Berrachai. In the last period of civil upheaval, four hundred Seynorynaelians lost their lives, and the Council had to move to take action against the Berrachai to prevent the disaster from happening again..."

  Suddenly steps sounded behind the assembly gathered on the observation deck.

  "Undina, there you are. I've been looking everywhere for you." Ettrekh Meilacu-ra moved to the edge of the circle where Undina was sitting, her knees pulled up, arms folded on them. She stood quietly and followed him away so as not to disturb the storyteller. She had been listening to the comments of some of the younger children with a secret amusement.

  “So, listening to stories? I thought stories were nonsense.”

  “These aren’t stories,” Undina disagreed. “They’re—histories, scientific histories.”

  Ettrekh laughed. “All right, Undina.”

  "It’s really interesting, father,” she whispered knowingly, “Giacan's been to all of the five planets except Berrachai. He's been telling us about the planets. Did you know that the Kal-teci-la mountains of Kayria are the highest in the five planets except for Mount Vicak on Seynorynael?"

  Ettrekh shook his head. "No. Speaking of which, you’re supposed to be going to the education center.”

  "That’s boring! The instructors don’t know half as much as Giacan.”

  “Boring or not, you still need a real education.”

  She nodded absently, quashing emotion. There wasn’t any purpose in arguing, she knew—she reasoned. She believed complete scientific understanding could and would prevail over useless emotions and sentimentality, and she was looking forward to a better world where reasoning and scientific calculations governed the motions of human beings rather than emotions; she even felt certain she would help to make it that way, that she would see such a future, and she lived partially in it already, by forcing the present she perceived to conform to her future vision. “Okay. At least if I go, I’ll get to see purple Cespria birds."

  Ettrekh’s expression then was disapproving. "Undina, I don’t think you should be hanging around the specimen display while you’re there. Those creatures are wild. They're dangerous. To tell you the truth, I'm surprised they would have brought them on board."

  "Don't worry, father." Undina said seriously. "Eilkorn says they're in the containment hold. He says they're being taken back to Gildbatur now that the preservation law protects them.”

  “That may be—”

  “You don’t have to get close to them, father. You can observe them through the silica screen.”

  “They’ll study you as much as you study them.”

  “I know. They’re probably thinking about what they could do to me if they could get out of the hold," she added.

  Ettrekh just started at his daughter like a stranger.

  "Father, I didn't know that the Kayrian capital was once located north of the Kal-teci-la mountains," Undina said, her nose buried in a printvolume she had received from new third level instructor. After nearly a year of travel, the shuttle was finally scheduled to land on Kayria within the tenday.

  Undina listened to the constant sound in the background, a barely perceptible whine of a local heat generator; they were sitting by the observation window, with hundreds of people milling about.

  There was no moment in which Undina was not acutely conscious of the scientific significance of her surroundings, of the miraculous and thrilling power of the innovations that had made her present journey, yes and even her life, possible. She dwelled on the concepts of space travel and physics, of time dilation and energy production, then let her mind drift in history, taking her imagination to the first explorer ships Seishinna and Velastria that had first made this long voyage so long ago. She often wondered if anyone else in the boisterous crowd ever pondered the amazing wonder of space travel, or if they were more worried about what the ship menu would be offering that day.

  "The Kayrian capital?” Ettrekh echoed, thinking back to his early education. “Yes, that sounds right. Ialeia. Then Gir-deg-dir erupted, and the tremor that split the mountains. In the aftermath, the ancient capital Ialeia was swallowed by the sea. Few people survived, and some say that is why Kayrians do not build large cities." Ettrekh made his way over from the living area of their small apartment on board t
he shuttle. "May I see?" he asked, and Undina showed him the printvolume, etched in a volume of opaque, hair-thin rubbery sheets. The lifelike holo-picture depicted what the ancient city was supposed to have looked like in its glory.

  "I suppose this printvolume is right—it did take Kayrian civilization a long time to recover. Sometimes the smaller size of our cities has restricted us or limited our growth in other areas—gathering resources and allowing more specialization in technology and industry. Though," he added, "we were almost as advanced as Seynorynaelians when they arrived—but we saw limiting the size of our population centers as the best solution to prevent another disaster, no matter what else it might cost us. Kayrians weren’t willing to risk the lives of their future generations by over-building one area again."

  "Father—did you know that the Berrachai eat a dish made of lymphis bark?" Undina asked, reaching out for the other printvolume in front of her. "And that when the Tulorians found an acid in the bark that could neutralize cini poison that they almost went to war over whether or not the Berrachai were going to share any of it with the rest of the five planets?"

  "No," Ettrekh smiled, shaking his head. How many questions could a young girl ask? "What happened?"

  "Seynorynael came in and negotiated a peace in the end." Undina answered softly, and he could see her reluctant admiration. She did not want her father to think that she preferred Seynorynael over Kayria.

  "Ilsat has been to Tulor and Berrachai." She said, referring to one of her classmates, Ettrekh guessed. "His father trained as an explorer on Seynorynael many years ago and took his family with him when he was posted, but they are returning to Kayria now. I wish we could travel on one of the explorer ships. They're so much faster."

  "And more dangerous." Ettrekh said emphatically.

  "Ilsat says soon the Council of Five Planets will be sending the explorers further than the comet belt around Berrachai. He says there are rumors that the Federation has devised another mission to explore new territories."

  "Undina," Ettrekh laughed. "Those stories are just rumors.”

  "Jerekkil, remember to contact us when you arrive in Kerrai.” Khustav Hinev said soberly to his son; Jerekkil nodded. Khustav was proud of him, to be making his own way in the world, proud and eager to see his son make something of himself. He wasn’t sure he liked the idea of Jerekkil’s training to be an explorer, which was such a difficult course that the odds were against any man passing successfully, but at the same time, he wanted to have faith in his son. He had a feeling he was going to worry about it a lot. “Do you know which transport will take you to Ariyalsynai?"

  "Murveg told me that if I wait in the cross section, the shuttle will divide and go on to Ariyalsynai." Jerekkil said, keeping still so that his mother could kiss him good-bye. Why did his parents have such a hold on him? he often wondered. He loved them, but he felt that restlessness that strikes at a young man as he begins to become a man, and he felt drawn out into the world; he was eager to meet its challenges.

  He saw his mother’s anguished expression and reached up to embrace her again, struck by the thought that he would not see her beloved face for two years, and that this was likely to be the image that stayed with him. When she let go, his father Khustav curtly moved to hug his young son, in the restrained manner of a father trying to pass on luck and a blessing of strength and courage to the son leaving home for the first time.

  He is a part of me. Khustav thought. Can he handle such a rough life? Have I done enough to prepare him?

  "If you need anything, you can contact my family in Ariyalsynai." Khustav said. "Your grandfather is hoping to see you on the Festival of the Return."

  Jerekkil nodded, the bustle and noise of Firien City's busy transport center filling in the family's silence. He felt his feet sinking into the ground to hold him while his head felt drawn away towards the sound, the meaningless roar that he couldn’t wait to sort into sense as he passed by and listened to and learned from all the people filtering past.

  A moment later, the transport arrived with its swift whine, the sound of perfection applied to the mundane world; this was the best of all the lines that ran across the planet—perhaps even the galaxy, he thought in wonder.

  Jerekkil had but a moment to board, and a quick departure would be easier than this lingering good-bye. Picking up his few belongings, he waved and tore off towards the transport gangway.