The Crucible of Empire (15 page)

"What shall we do?" one youngster with an uncommonly red aureole cried, a head shorter than all the rest.

Grijo saw by the patterns on her robes that she came of the Foodsculptors, an impoverished
elian
of the arts who obviously had no one older and more experienced to send. "Hush, daughter," he said. "That is what we have assembled here to decide."

Hakt of the Shipservicers made his way through the ranks of benches and stood beside Sayr. He was good-sized for his age, sturdy and of pleasing demeanor, every fold of his robe in place. His pale-silver aureole fanned his face. "We have made what repairs we can," he said. "Two of our ships were lost in the engagement and cannot be replaced. We have stripped them of all that could be salvaged."

"What of our numbers could be transported to another system with the ships still in service?" Grijo asked.

"Less than a hundredth," Hakt said. He glanced up at the unseeing
Boh
faces.

So few. Grijo had suspected it might be so. He closed his old eyes, filled with grief. That would not save even a tenth of the
elian
, who held in trust all of Lleix wisdom and culture, and of course there was no question that the
dochaya
would have to be left behind.

"I would also speak to the Han!" someone cried.

"Jihan!" Sayr's cracked old voice was filled with reproach.

Grijo opened his eyes again, saw a restless young figure in the great doorway, outlined in the early red sunlight, shifting from foot to foot. She darted forward with unseemly haste to stand beside Sayr, looking sorely out of place, her head not even reaching his shoulder. "What is this?" Grijo said.

"Jihan is the junior-most member of our
elian
," Sayr said, "with a dissenting opinion on the analysis of the recovered debris. She should not be here and she knows it." He turned to the youth with great dignity. "Return to the
elian
-house, youngest," he said. "We will speak of this later."

"The Han needs all of the information to make an informed decision," the youthful Starsifter said. "It was not just the Ekhat stalking us this time. It was also the Jao!"

"Jao?"

"The Jao?"

The odd name echoed through the vast hall, different on each tongue. Grijo could feel the radiated puzzlement. He himself did not recognize the designation, though he could see the youngster expected otherwise. He leaned forward, taking care to keep the folds of his robe properly arranged. "What does that mean?"

A Historykeeper rose from her bench, her robe encrusted with scenes of events that had taken place so long ago, no one remembered. "She names the architects of our destruction," she said, "from two thousand years ago. They drove us from system after system until finally, what was left of us fled here into the nebula to Valeron."

"They are the handservants of the Ekhat," Jihan said. She gazed about the hall, her aureole quivering with indignation. "They must have come to finish the task they left incomplete so long ago."

There had been something about a servant species . . .savage and relentless . . .Grijo cudgeled his mind, seeking to remember long ago lessons in the Children's Court.

"I have researched the records. Our last contact with them was a little more than a thousand years ago," Jihan said, her fingers quivering as she belatedly twitched her robe into an almost acceptable configuration. "They were the ones who drove us from our Last-Home, Sankil."

Once the Lleix had held fourteen systems, traded with all manner of species on faraway worlds, built ships so vast and swift that other species commissioned them to build their own fleets. The markets in Lleix cities had been rich with fine scents, exotic fabrics, and imported woods. The tales of that long ago abundance were still told, so fancifully embellished, though, even Grijo, who wished to believe, had trouble crediting them. His people had prospered under the benevolent spiritual guidance of the
Boh
and never known war—until the Ekhat came and harried them, system after system, from the lush favored worlds they had once called home.

Now they had taken refuge on this one resource-poor planet, concealed within the nebula, so isolated, they had thought—hoped—obviously deluded themselves—that the Ekhat would not detect them here. Nor had they, until now.

"There is very little physical evidence for the presence of the Jao," Sayr said, "only a few scraps of organic tissue that survived the explosion of the smaller ship. What we do know is that the remaining Ekhat vessel fought a second battle sometime after our ships withdrew. If it had been the Jao, surely they would not have attacked their masters. They would have fought
for
the Ekhat, not against them."

Alln of that dreaded
elian
, Ekhatlore, rose, robe garish with bloody scenes of their ancient enemy. His aureole was so faded with age that Grijo could no longer make out its color. The elder gazed about the assembled representatives, gathering their attention until the hall quieted. "The Ekhat fight one another just as avidly as they seek to exterminate extraneous species. If they fought someone else, it must have been a second Ekhat ship."

Jihan turned back to Grijo. "If I am right," she said, "and these Jao do come after us here, we will not be prepared!"

"Child," Alln said, "since we left the
Boh
behind, we have been prepared for two thousand years to die at the hands of one or the other of these barbarians. What more would you have of us?"

She looked up at him, indeed at all of them, for she was the youngest, and therefore smallest, present. In spite of her brashness, she was a promising child, he thought, with her classic silver aureole, though her robe-draping was positively haphazard.

"I think we should find a way to live, not die," she said. "And to do that, we first have to understand the Jao."

"No one understands them these days," Alln said. "There must have been a Jaolore
elian
once, but it obviously died out when there was no longer any necessity for it."

"Then we need a new one," she said. Her black eyes glittered as she faced the array of elders.

A new
elian
. That happened but once in a lifetime for most Lleix, Grijo thought, sometimes not even then.

"There is little evidence for the presence of the Jao in that battle," Sayr said. "And if we could not defeat the Ekhat, how would we do any better against the Jao, even if it was them? Would not our efforts be better spent readying our ships to take a portion of our population to new safety?"

The assembled representatives muttered and turned to one another, arguing in low, intense voices. Grijo, his thoughts whirling, sat back, the prickly chair creaking under his weight, and tried to come to some conclusion himself.

Then speakers rose and one by one made their points, to be replaced by those of opposite views. Voices, though never raised, were fiercely eloquent. Ekhatlore thought perhaps young Jihan was right, while many other elders believed she was unused to the rigors of logical thought and merely sought to make herself important beyond her height. It was pointed out repeatedly that even the Starsifters themselves did not support her.

Outside, the morning light gradually transformed from its fierce red into a thin gold that did not warm at this elevation. Stiff and uncomfortable, Grijo watched it change, creeping through the day until the shadows had gone long and purple and yet nothing was resolved.

Finally, he heaved onto his feet again and the hall fell silent. "We have reached no accord," he said, "which in itself is a measure of the direness of this turn of events. Therefore, we must accommodate both views." He motioned to Hakt of the Shipservicers. The elder rose. "You will ready our ships to transport what portion of our population they can to another world," he said. "Consult the ancient charts for a possible destination. Requisition whatever you need of the other
elian
."

Then he turned to Jihan. "And you, outspoken child, will form a new
elian
, Jaolore," he said. "All of the colony's records are to be at your disposal. You may recruit any who are willing from the other
elian
, especially Ekhatlore."

Her silver aureole wilted with amazement. "Me?"

"You have put yourself most unbecomingly forward for one of your tender age and girth," Grijo said, "and you have boldly gainsaid the elders of your own
elian
, who have far more experience to make sense of the situation in which we find ourselves. This is a chance for you to redeem yourself. Make what you can of it. I doubt you will ever get another."

Jihan made herself respectfully small, lowering her head, averting her eyes, flattening her aureole. "I regret the necessity of what I did," she said, "but I felt I had no choice."

"Many times down through the ages the Lleix have had no choice," Grijo said, heaving back onto his feet. "And the sum of all those have led us to this, which may well be the Last-of-Days." He waved a hand in dismissal. "Go and form your new
elian
while you can, daughter."

"It is not the Last-of-Days!" the youth said with all the audacity of her inadequate years and experience. "I will not let it be!"

And she turned with inelegant recklessness so that her robes actually fell
open
and headed back down the mountain.

Jihan knew the Starsifters would learn of her disgrace from Sayr. So, after leaving the Han, she descended the mountain and then wandered the city's river promenade with its sculpted waterfalls and elegantly pruned trees, trying to order her thoughts before confronting their rightful anger. Wind-borne spray from the falls soaked her face and robe as she passed, but, already numb with the shock of what she had done, she did not heed the chill.

The moment when she had broken
sensho
played endlessly in her mind, the stunned expressions on the Eldests' faces, the heavy silence that had hung like a shroud afterward. Now she feared what the elders of her
elian
would say when she faced them. Quite simply, she had committed the unthinkable. Had anyone ever behaved as badly in the entire history of the colony? She had made herself infamous. Why had Grijo not simply remanded her graceless self to the
dochaya
the moment she dared contradict her elders? Even the sharp wind blasting down off the mountain could not clear her whirling head.

It was less than six years since she'd been released from the Children's Court. She was so junior, it was amazing the Han had listened to even a word of her prattling. Now she'd been assigned this immense responsibility and she knew full well that she was inadequate. Form a new
elian
? It was obvious that she hardly knew how to function in the one that had already accepted her.

Finally, hungry and exhausted, she headed for home, following the winding path even as the promenade's evening lights blinked on. The temperature had dropped with the setting of the sun and now each breath seemed laced with ice crystals. The air crackled with cold. Few individuals were out, evidently preferring to remain in-house with their
elian
and contemplate the devastating return of their ancient enemies in private.

She turned up the path leading to the structure where she had dwelled since being accepted. It was modest, only a single story constructed of
giln
-wood with a few carved finials above the eaves, a sharply pitched roof, and a garden for day-to-day nutritional needs, mostly bluebeans and bushes of pavafruit. The remaining stalks were now dried and brittle with the arrival of cold weather.

The Starsifters' single spacecraft was not here, of course, but kept out on the colony's landing field. It had been called into use only rarely down through the years since the Lleix had fled to this world in the nebula. Long-range data and the analysis of debris from space were largely irrelevant in times of peace.

But this was no longer a time of peace. She opened the doors of the dwelling and stepped inside, pausing to inhale the familiar homey smells of evening-meal, evidently roasted sourgrain and spiced mealnut tonight. A servant clad in a gray shift glanced at her, then looked down as though Jihan were a rudely intruding stranger. Passing through the deserted Application Chamber, she found two of the elders, Sayr and Kash, seated in the house's communal kitchen, finishing small mealnut cakes.

Sayr looked up from his privileged place closest to the radiant heat-source. His entire body drooped with weariness. "Young Jihan, come in," he said, dark-pewter aureole flaring. "We have been discussing your reassignment."

Miserable, she threw herself at his feet, arms clutching her head, making her body as small as possible. "Forgive me!" she cried into the gleaming wooden floor. "I did not mean to disgrace the
elian
. I was just so—worried!"

"Gently, child, gently," Sayr said from above, then took her arms and pulled her up to face him. "Strong emotion clouds the intellect, and you will need all of your reason now."

She sat back on her heels, hands clutched to her chest, rocking with distress, unwilling to rise. "I do not—know—what to do!" she said brokenly. "The responsibility is too great!"