The Gripping Hand (37 page)

Glenda Ruth slid quickly into a towelsuit and moved up beside her.

Henry Hudson was a young Motie furred in brown and white; the pattern didn't match Glenda Ruth's memories of Jock and Charlie. Family markings differed, maybe. The creature seemed both strange and familiar. This one was probably no more than twelve Mote Prime years old, but Moties matured much faster than humans.

And Mediators aboard the other Motie ships would be watching everything. Glenda Ruth felt a surge of stage fright . . . nothing to what Jennifer must be feeling.

"Good day to you, Ms. Ambassador," the Motie said. Brown-irised manlike eyes looked directly into hers. "Jennifer tells me you are Glenda Ruth Blaine, addressed formally as the Honorable Ms. Blaine. I call myself Henry Hudson, and I speak for Marco Polo, my Master. Might I know the nature and extent of your political power?"

Glenda Ruth smiled with the hint of a deprecating shrug. "Through family relationships, but none given formally. We came in some haste. I'll be granted some decision power just because I was here and others weren't, and my family . . ." She trailed off. It felt like talking to a squid: the creature wasn't reacting right.

She was vaguely aware that behind her Jennifer was speaking rapidly and quietly into a mike. A middie was in the second view-screen; then an officer; then Balasingham himself. Good. He didn't try to interrupt.

The Motie said, "It delights me to speak to you regardless." The creature's Anglic was textbook perfect. Her arms . . . "Your progenitors visited us before my birth! Including your—father?"

"Father and mother."

"Ah. How did it change them?" Arms, shoulders, head, moved wrongly, with a momentary illusion of broken joints, and Glenda Ruth was suddenly terribly aware of her own arms, shoulders, fingers, body language . . . moving without conscious thought, in a language learned from Charlie and Jock. And suddenly she understood.

"You were not trained by a human's Fyunch(click)!"

"No, milady." The Motie moved its arms in a pattern unfamiliar to Glenda Ruth. "I have been taught your language, and some of your customs. I am aware that you do not experience our cycle of reproduction, and that your power structures are different from ours, but I have been assigned no one human to study."

"As yet."

"As you say. Not until we meet the givers of orders in your Empire." It paused. "You do not speak for your Masters. I have been told that I would meet—humans—who were neither Mediator nor Master, but I confess that the experience is stranger than I had anticipated."

"You speak for . . . ?"

"Medina Traders and certain allied families. My sister Eudoxus returned to the Mote with your ships."

Glenda Ruth grinned. "Eudoxus. Medina Traders. For Mr. Bury's benefit, of course."

"Of course. The terms would be familiar to him."

"But that name would imply that you do not speak for the Motie species. Who are Medina Traders? Who must we negotiate with?"

"We are the family with the foresight and the power to be here in the moment after Crazy Eddie's Sister opened a path. You are surely aware that none can speak for the Motie species. It's a problem, isn't it? The Empire doesn't like that." Henry Hudson studied her for a moment. His own posture still showed nothing. "You have learned Motie customs, some of them, but from a group I have never met." It paused again. "I wish to consult the Ambassador. Forgive me." The screen blanked.

"What's happening?" Freddy asked.

"I'm not sure. Captain Balasingham, have you spoken with these Moties?"

"Only formalities, my Lady,"
Agamemnon
's skipper said from the viewscreen. "We instructed them to take station here. They have requested to be taken to our seat of government, and we told them that would happen in due time. Not much else. There's something odd happening, isn't there?"

"Yes."

"Why did he have to go running to his superior?"

"He doesn't represent King Peter. Or anybody who knew King Peter's family."

"King Peter?" Balasingham prompted.

"King Peter headed the Motie alliance that dealt with
MacArthur
and
Lenin
. They sent us our first group of Motie ambassadors, the ones I grew up with. But these Moties don't represent King Peter or any large Motie group. He doesn't even know the . . . well, the signals, the body language that Charlie and Jock taught me." Glenda Ruth's arms, torso, shoulders, moved in twitchy intricacy as she recited, " 'Irony, nerves, anger held in check, you ask too much, trust my words, trust me fully! Universal, simple stuff even a human can learn."

Jennifer Banda wasn't breathing. Behind her unfocused eyes she was trying to memorize what she had seen.

"I'm afraid that still doesn't mean anything to me, my Lady," Balasingham said.

"This Motie represents a group that has been out of contact with King Peter's group for a very long time," Glenda Ruth said. "Cycles. Several cycles."

When Balasingham frowned in puzzlement, Jennifer added, "But King Peter's organization was very powerful. Widespread. Very likely planetwide."

"Planetwide, indeed. They had to be," Glenda Ruth said.

"So any group out of touch so long . . ." Jennifer fell silent.

"I still don't get it, but I guess I don't have to. So what are they consulting about?" Balasingham demanded.

"I hope," Glenda Ruth said, "I hope he's getting permission to tell us the truth."

"I am instructed to invite you to the Mote system," Henry Hudson said. "To offer you any assistance we can to aid in that journey and thereafter terminate this conversation. I regret that this is necessary."

"I had hoped you would tell us much more."

"We will . . . explain everything, to those who have the power to make decisions," the Motie said. "My Lady, you understand, when we talk to you, we tell you more than we learn, yet if we convince you to aid us, we must also convince others."

"So you are still concealing Motie history," Glenda Ruth said.

"Details that might aid your bargaining position? Yes. Not the basics. It is clear that you now know we are capable of war. You infer our capabilities from the probes we have sent," Henry Hudson said. "But you conceal your recent history, your military abilities, your strategies, as is proper. Doubtless you will reveal these in due time. As we will reveal ours. My Lady, it has been delightful speaking with you, and I hope we will meet again after we have been permitted to speak with those whom you obey. I will receive any recorded message you care to send. Good-bye."

Commander Balasingham pulled his lips into a tight line. "Andy, I don't like this much."

Anton Rudakov,
Agamemnon
's Sailing Master, nodded in sympathy.

Balasingham activated the mike again. "Mr. Townsend, it's not yet established that I should permit you to go, much less store your surplus gear and personnel!"

"Oh, well, that's all right, the Moties offered to take care of my gear if you didn't have room," Freddy said.

"Yeah, I heard that."

"I mean, George will have to stay with you, but he's a retired Navy cox'n, he won't be in the way. Good cook," the Honorable Freddy Townsend said wistfully.

Balasingham sighed. "Mr. Townsend, you want to go off to the Mote system. Your ship is unarmed. We've been shooting at Motie ships since before you were born!"

"We've been invited," Freddy said. "By the Moties, Eudoxus and Henry Hudson. We have recognition signals, and both say there won't be any shooting."

"They say it. And you're headed into totally uncharted areas. If you don't come back, the Blaines will have my head even if your parents don't. And to what end?"

Glenda Ruth's voice spoke from off camera, and Freddy was seen to wince a little. "Commodore Renner thought it was important. Mr. Bury thought it was important enough to send one of his ships to rendezvous with us and fill our tanks. It's important, Commander."

"Okay, I'll give you that, they think it's a good idea, but ma'am, that's a dangerous area."

"
Hecate
's faster than most people think," Freddy said. "Now that we've taken out the luxury stuff."

"And you'll get lost—" Balasingham cut off the mike when he saw his Sailing Master waving. "Yeah, Andy?"

Anton Rudakov said, "Skipper, whatever happens to them, they're not likely to get lost. I know you don't follow yacht racing much, but even you have to have heard of Freddy Townsend."

"Freddy Town— Oh. Invented something, didn't he?"

"Reinvented. In the Hellgate race he did a gravity assist around the star and then unfurled a lightsail. Everybody calls them spinnakers now, but he was the first."

"You sure that's him? He looks like a kid."

"He started racing as crew on his cousin's ship when he was twelve," Rudakov said. "Skippered his own at age seventeen. In the past eight years he's won a bunch, Skipper. He lost at Hellgate, though. The sun flared and the sail shredded."

Balasingham opened the mike again. "My crew tells me I ought to know who you are, Mr. Townsend. And that I should ask you about the Hellgate race."

"Well, I didn't win that one," Freddy said.

"Suppose I send one of my officers with you?"

"Thank you, no."

"Suppose there's a fight?"

The image on the screen changed. A surprisingly adult young lady, very serious. "Commander," Glenda Ruth said, "we do thank you for worrying about us. But we don't need help! Freddy's ship will be faster without any extra people. We have a good engineer, and if there's a fight, we'll lose, and it won't matter if we have one or fifty of your crew with us."

"Miss Blaine—"

"Warriors," she said. "They're a Motie subspecies bred specifically for war. Nobody's ever seen them in the flesh and lived. We have statuettes of them on record. Our Motie ambassadors tried to tell us they were mythical demons, and that's what they look like. . . ."

Glenda Ruth's prose turned rich and purple as she went into detail. Freddy found himself sweating. Given what she knew, why was she willing to face such creatures? But Glenda Ruth had never backed away from a dare.

"Exactly," Balasingham said patiently. "It's too dangerous."

"If we're attacked, we'll surrender," she told him. "And talk."

"Why would they listen?"

"We have something they want. We need to put it in Commodore Renner's hands so that he'll have something to negotiate with."

"What is it, Miss Blaine?"

"I'm afraid that's not my secret, Commander. My father gave it to me. I expect you'll find out in a few weeks. The trouble is, in a few weeks almost anything could happen. Commander, you're risking your ship, your crew, the whole Empire, on your ability to block the Moties from getting past you."

"It's not what I'd choose—"

"And we admire you for it. But we all know it may not work. Commodore Renner and His Excellency are trying their own approach, and they've asked for our help. Commander, some of the aristocracy may be riding on its privileges, but the Blaines don't!"

Then, more reasonably, but in a tone that did not even hint that it could be disobeyed: "We have a fast ship. Freddy's a racing pilot, his computer is better than yours, our engineer is first rate, and I can talk to Moties better than anyone including my brother. We thank you for your concern. Freddy, let's go. Thank you, Commander."

The screen darkened for a moment.

"She wouldn't dare," Balasingham muttered.

The screen showed the Honorable Frederick Townsend. "
Hecate
requesting permission to come alongside for fueling," he said formally.

Balasingham heard Rudakov chuckling. No sympathy there! He turned back to the screen. "Permission granted. You can turn your excess baggage over to Chief Halperin."