Conquerors' Pride

"All I can think of is that we're on a wild-snipe chase," Cavanagh said. "Maybe they know who the man in Fibbit's threading is and don't want us talking to him. Or maybe there's something more to those Conqueror legends they don't want us to find out."

Kolchin seemed to ponder that. "Sounds pretty complicated for Mrachanis," he said. "They're not supposed to be that good at chicanery."

Cavanagh shrugged. "Most people I've met have been perfectly capable of becoming chicanerous when important interests were at stake. What differs is their abilities to do a good job at it."

"Maybe that's why the Mrachanis pointed us to Phormbi instead of someplace a lot farther away," Hill suggested dryly. "It would be days before we'd know Fibbit's friend isn't on Nadezhda."

"If you want, sir, we could turn around and head back," Kolchin said. "We've got plenty of fuel."

Cavanagh shook his head. "No point to that now. As long as we're already here, we might as well stay long enough to ask a few questions."

There was another brief warble from the control board. "We're here," Hill a

From somewhere behind them came the dull multiple thud of relays snapping open. The blackness through the canopy turned to the brief illusion of a tu

"Mrach efficiency," Cavanagh told him, peering out at the specks of light moving in the planet's vicinity. "Which ones are the Peacekeeper ships?"

Hill leaned over his displays. "Actually... none of them."

Cavanagh frowned. "None of them?"

"No, sir. I'm picking up about thirty merchant-class, but they're all Yycroman design and registry. No Commonwealth ships of any kind."

Cavanagh rubbed at the stubble on his cheek. No Peacekeepers... and here they were flying a Mrach courier ship in Yycroman space. Not a smart move, by anyone's standards. "How soon before we're in laser range?"

"Searching for a satellite or ground station now," Hill said. "Couple more minutes."

Cavanagh nodded, looked out at the dark planetary surface ahead. If the sporadic clusters of lights scattered across it were anything to go by, Phormbi was not exactly a heavily populated world. "Maybe we should go ahead and contact one of those ships first. At least that would let someone know who we are."

"I don't think it'll be a problem," Kolchin soothed him. "They haven't got any ground- or orbit-based weapons anymore."

"I wouldn't bet money on that if I were you," Hill said, his voice suddenly odd. "Lord Cavanagh, you'd better have a look." The canopy shimmered, altering from viewport to display mode—

And there, looming out of the darkness behind them, was a dark shape. A shape splashed with lights and strangely curved luminescent edges. A shape out of the history records; a shape that no longer existed.

A shape that was rapidly overtaking them.

"That's a Yycroman warship," Cavanagh breathed, his voice seeming to come from a long distance away.

"Yes," Hill said. "And I'm not sure... but I think they want to talk with us."

After the sparsely furnished style of their Mrach hotel suite, the Yycroman room they were taken into was something of a shock. Large and ornate, packed almost too full of furniture and artwork to be comfortable, it felt to Cavanagh more like a museum with seats than an office or waiting room. Fibbit, in fact, seemed to treat it in exactly that way, flitting around the room from painting to sculpture to clothwork to scroll, studying everything in sight, apparently oblivious to the pair of Yycroman guards at each of the room's three doors.

The guards, of course, were not oblivious to her. Cavanagh could see their eyes moving beneath the glitter of their helmets as they watched every twitch of her long limbs. Or any twitch from the rest of them, for that matter.

Finally, after nearly two hours of waiting, they had a visitor.

A high-level visitor, too, judging from the elaborate ceremonial helmet and tooled cloak. [Which is Lord Stewart Cavanagh?] the Yycroma demanded, striding toward the ornately carved chair facing the prisoners.

"I'm Lord Cavanagh," Cavanagh said, standing up. "May I ask whom I have the honor of addressing?"

[I am Klyveress ci Yyatoor,] the Yycroma said, brushing the cloak to one side and sitting down. [Twelfth Counsel to the Hierarch.]

A female name, plus a title and position that traditionally went to a female. "Honored to meet you, ci Yyatoor," Cavanagh said, bowing low, a little of the tension leaving his throat. There was nothing good about this situation, but at least he wouldn't have to worry about sparking the hair-trigger male Yycroman temper. "I'd like to apologize for any problems our sudden appearance here may have caused," he continued. "I hope we can quickly resolve any misunderstandings that might still remain."

[Three of you carry passports of the Northern Coordinate Union,] Klyveress said, her eyes raking each of the three humans and then flicking to where Fibbit was now standing stock-still among the artifacts. [The Duulian has no passport at all. Yet you arrived here aboard a sensor-stealthed Mrach courier ship. Explain.]

"I admit it's an unusual situation," Cavanagh conceded. "As I explained to the ship's captain, we were forced by circumstances to borrow a Mrach courier when we left Mra-mig."

[Would a human fleeing the Mrach not seek out other humans?] Klyveress countered. [Yet you came to Phormbi instead of to a world of humans or the human ambassadorhold on Kammis. Explain.]

"We were looking for someone," Cavanagh said. "A human who we were told was somewhere in the Northern Wooded Steppes region of Phormbi."

Klyveress's gaze seemed to sharpen. [Who told you this?]

"A Mrachani who came to our hotel room a few minutes before we had to leave."

[His name? Position? Title?]

"I'm sorry," Cavanagh shook his head. "I don't know anything at all about him."

[Yet you believed this Mrach whom you knew nothing at all about?]

Cavanagh grimaced. Put that way, it did sound pretty ridiculous. "We didn't have any other leads," he said. "I thought it would be worth a try."

[Who is this man you seek?]

"I'm afraid I don't know that, either."

The Yycroma cocked her crocodilian head. [Yet you follow him. Have you no better uses for your time?]

Cavanagh felt his lip twitch. This was starting to get sticky. Klyveress clearly suspected them of being agents of the Mrachanis; and given the highly illegal existence of that Yycroman warship they'd run into out there, she had good reason to be hostile toward potential spies. "We went to Mra-mig looking for information about the Mrachanis' supposed contact with the Conquerors," he told Klyveress.

Klyveress hissed gently through her long snout. [It is not supposed. It is real.]

"Are you sure?" Cavanagh asked, frowning.

[We are quite certain. Continue your story.]

"There's not much more to tell," Cavanagh shrugged, wondering how on Earth the Yycromae would know anything about two-hundred-year-old Mrach legends. Had they already been in space by then? "We saw Fibbit—the Duulian—threading on the street and observed what seemed to be several Mrachanis watching her from concealment. That caught our interest, and so we went over and talked to her. Among other things she told us about a human who'd passed her a couple of times, and offered to show us the threading she'd made of him. Shortly after that the Mrachanis suddenly seemed to be trying to get her away from us and off the planet. That aroused my curiosity even further, and when the Mrachani I mentioned came to our suite and told us the man was on Phormbi, we decided to come here and see if we could find him."