Ambassador 8: The Alabaster Army

Chapter 2

2

WELL, THERE WAS an interesting situation straight away. I didn’t even get the time to recover and already the mysteries were piling up.

I sat in the hub after he had disconnected, staring into the darkness that really was a lot darker than I remembered. I’d always known that Coldi night vision was not good, but somehow had never expected it to be so . . . limited. I could only see the hub console with all of Devlin’s empty cups lined up across the top.

The sound of talk and laughter drifted out of the living room. Ayshada was babbling at the top of his voice, making words that meant nothing, to pretend that he was talking, too.

I should go and join them.

I should talk to Thayu about this strange call and what she made of it.

Damn it, I had intended to use this supposedly quiet period to do a few jobs that would bring in some money. Unfortunately my stay in hospital had not done much for my finances and I did not want to ask Ezhya to pay for my decision to employ two new office staff and Ynggi.

But I had needed the office staff because of all the local responsibilities that continued to pile up, and I’d wanted Ynggi, because I wanted my household to be varied. I wanted people from different worlds and different clans to be part of it, so that their voices could be heard and understanding gained.

“Are you coming?” Thayu stood at the door, a silhouette backlit by the bright light in the hall.

I pushed myself up from the bench.

Devlin came in from the hall, carrying yet another cup, this one full.

“I’ll take care of communication,” he said. “You go and join the others.”

“Eirani is trying to kill us with food,” Thayu said. “You’re going to have to come to the table, or she will come in here and drag you out.”

I wasn’t terribly hungry, but I went with her anyway.

Thayu had not been exaggerating. The selection of food on the table was the most extravagant I had seen for a while.

All the members of my team were sitting around the table.

“Whose birthday is it?” I asked while sitting down. The concept of birthdays was a thing that had become hugely popular in our household. Coldi didn’t celebrate birthdays, keihu and Indrahui didn’t, either. But all of them understood the concept and enjoyed parties. Moreover, it gave Eirani a reason to break out the special food.

“We have to celebrate that you’re home,” Eirani said.

I sat down at the table in between Thayu and Nicha, in between their familiar presence and familiar smell. The food was rich, colourful, exquisite. There was nut bread, colourful salads, fruit, smoked fish for Ynggi, lizard eggs, noodles and too many other things to mention. Eirani and the kitchen really had done a lot of work.

For a while, the talk was happy.

Apparently, while I’d been away, Ynggi had turned his downstairs room into a rainforest.

“You should see it,” Deyu said. “The plants are growing up the wall and right to the ceiling. It smells of flowers in there.”

Ynggi sat at the end of the table, and he blushed, the tip of his tail describing little circles behind him.

“Don’t embarrass him,” Karana said. She was making an attempt to feed Ayshada, but he was more interested in Ynggi’s tail.

Reida snorted. “It was much better before Eirani told him that the ringgit are meant to stay outside.”

Everyone laughed, including Ynggi.

I asked where Veyada was, but Nicha assured me that he would be there for dinner.

“What? There is dinner after this?”

I had barely touched the food on my plate. Apart from the fact that my sense of smell was sensitive, my taste was not the same, and what was more, using the tongs that came with the traditional keihu dishes was awkward. I had no idea what was going on with my fine motor skills, but simple tasks like eating and writing felt like torture.

“You have to eat well, Muri,” Eirani said. “You’re much too thin.”

I knew she was right, and struggled with the tongs, never quite getting the grip right.

After watching me struggle for a while Thayu said, quietly, “You are tired, right?”

“No more than usual, but I just had a very strange conversation that disturbs me.”

She spoke in a low voice. “That was Ezhya, right?”

“How did you know that?”

“I’ve spoken to him a few times. He seemed very keen to know how you were doing.”

“Did he mention any particular reason for that?”

“He didn’t say as much, but I think that in the Aghyrian settlements, here in Barresh and way back in Miran, they tried to do something similar to what you’re doing with your body: turn people from Aghyrian into Coldi, because back then some people still viewed being Aghyrian as abomination. They found that the sheya instinct was something that was quite affected by changes in the chromosome structure. There seems to be evidence that people actually acquired the instinct after they were treated. I guess he is curious.”

“I don’t think that applies to me.”

“Doesn’t it?” She met my eyes. “Why not?”

“Because . . .” I spread my hands. “I haven’t noticed any difference in how I relate to you or Nicha.”

“I don’t know. I would have guessed that you always had a little bit of the instinct. Because I don’t think that you would have been able to do as well as you’re doing if you didn’t understand the instinct.”

“Understanding it is not the same as having it.”

“No, but understanding it to a certain level definitely requires some kind of affinity with it.”

That was a disturbing thought. I had never seen it that way. It took me back to the very first time I’d met Nicha.

I knew that if two Coldi met each other and they had never seen each other before, and there was no precedent for how the two people’s ranks related to each other, there was a chance that a fight would break out. Modern Coldi were embarrassed if they came to blows, because they considered the reaction primitive. The fact that they needed to establish if a person they met was superior or subordinate was pathological to them. The sheya instinct.

I remembered the very first time I saw Nicha. He had looked at me sideways, and his hand had twitched as if he’d been about to spring. He had never really told me that he’d had a reaction to me, but I had suspected it, because I heard it sometimes happened.

Somehow, he had been much more comfortable since he could admit that he felt subordinate to me.

I had assumed that this was because of something to do with Nicha, not with me.

Then I thought of my strange talk with Ezhya. How intensely he had looked at me. How he had used that very inclusive us pronoun.

I asked, “If I had the instinct, would it manifest through a projection?”

Thayu had to think about that. “It usually doesn’t, but then again we very rarely talk directly to people who are not already in our association.”

That was also true. It was the task of the leader of the association to deal with outsiders. It was the task of the leader to forge a safe path for the others to follow.

Maybe Ezhya had felt something about me as well—he had always displayed a curious interest in me—and wanted to know how the change affected me, whether I had developed the instinct. Throughout history, Coldi society had a record of disdain for people who did not have the instinct. It was not so strong at present, but the Aghyrian movement, its links with the zeyshi rogues—who were mostly throwback Aghyrians where the chromosome graft had come undone—was proof of that. Its past treatment of Hedron—people from the Ezmi clan who didn’t have the instinct—was evidence of that.

Maybe Ezhya’s curiosity about me came because he felt something, and because he couldn’t figure me out. Also because if I was Coldi, I would have the right to take his position—having shot his main rival—and he wanted to keep an eye on just how Coldi I was becoming. Because if this treatment made me develop the instinct, then . . . that was a whole minefield I didn’t want to get into.

I wasn’t Coldi; I hadn’t grown up in Athyl. I had no desire whatsoever to challenge Ezhya, but it might just be that this conflict was out of my hands. It wasn’t about what I felt, it was about what everyone else felt. If the upper circles in Asto cottoned onto the fact that their leader was weak because he allowed someone they saw as a challenger to live, then . . .

Damn, I didn’t even want to think about it.

The door in the hall opened and a moment later Veyada came in. He rushed into the living room and sat down at the table without saying a word. He looked down, not meeting my eyes. His face was red.

He exchanged a look with his mother, but neither of them said anything. Sheydu resumed the conversation she had been having with Reida about some gadget.

I glanced at Thayu. What was that about?

She shrugged in a noncommittal way. I had no doubt I would hear about this later.

After I had eaten as much as I could manage, which wasn’t terribly much, I went to our bedroom for a rest. I didn’t intend to sleep, but the day had worn me out more than I admitted, and reading up on reports was terribly boring. I didn’t notice when the reader slipped from my hand and I fell into blissful sleep.

Sometime later in the afternoon, I woke to a knock on my door. I pressed myself up, surprised and feeling woolly.

Devlin came in. “Muri, I am sorry to disturb you, but there has been a lady calling a few times in the last few weeks, and I am not sure what to do about her.”

“Which lady?”

“It’s that woman who was talking to you before you went into the hospital.”

I had to do a mental shift.

That had to be the Mirani wife of Earth-born academic Benton Leck. I vaguely remembered how she had contacted me about having lost contact with her husband, who was on some kind of research trip. I’d actually been annoyed with her, because, while she was worried, she wouldn’t give me any indication as to where her husband was and what he was doing there, and I remembered palming her off because of the lack of detail she gave me.

I remembered Sheydu making a cruel joke when I mentioned her to my team. She had said that the man had probably taken off with his mistress. We’d exchanged some lame jokes about it.

Oh man, I really hoped this wasn’t something that was going to turn around to bite me in the behind. One of those famous last words occasions where my lame jokes and rudeness while palming her off would be plastered across the media for all to laugh at.

Benton Leck had married into one of the old Endri families of Miran. The woman’s name was Aliandra Ilendar—that alone said everything about her background. Ilendar was one of the Foundation families, so she came with a lot of attitude. Those families were like the Nations of Earth diplomatic elite, only more established, more entitled and more self-righteous. They generally kept to Miran, but I swore they could give the Aghyrians a run for their money in the arrogance stakes.

The Ilendar family was influential in the Mirani council; they had money and owned a lot of businesses.

For all that Barresh was a shining pearl of a town, it lay inside a small enclave surrounded by the sleeping giant Miran.

Those with influence in Miran were not people to piss off, no matter how entitled their requests seemed. I just hadn’t yet figured out what this woman actually wanted from me or why she kept contacting me—wasting our time—if she wasn’t going to tell me where her husband was so that I could pass the matter off to the relevant authorities who could find him. If finding him was indeed what she wanted.

When I looked into the matter before, I had found out that she regularly wrote self-important letters to the Barresh Council, complaining about some issue affecting her, like the construction noise from next door, or the times rubbish was collected.

That had been a big factor in my casual dismissal of her. And I was extremely busy, this sort of stuff was not my normal job, and I hadn’t been well—

Excuses, excuses.

I hoped I hadn’t missed vital clues that this was going to be more important, but something in the back of my mind said that it might just be, and that I was stupid and just as arrogant as the Mirani Endri were said to be.

“Did she give out more information than usual?” I asked him.

“No, but the message came with the seal of the Mirani Council.”

Crap, that was just what I needed. They were far too easily offended.

I dragged myself out of bed and followed him to the hub. I looked at the message he had received. It was indeed from Benton Leck’s wife, written with the seal of the Mirani Council, with the image of the city of Miran’s famous watchtower. As far as logos went, it looked severe and foreboding.

She wanted me to pick up something from a private box somewhere in town. She said that her maid would give me the number and the key. Only to me. She said that there would be p*****t involved.

The message read,

It is scandalous that nobody in Barresh seems to care except you. The council is rotten to its core. I have been in there so many times and when they see me they always say yes madam yes madam, but I am sure that as soon as I turn my back they laugh at me. Because I am a silly lady.

Well maybe it would’ve helped if she didn’t always go to the council to complain about everything.

My husband is still missing. I have been threatened by people in town. They are high-profile people, too, and I have been forced to leave town while the council did nothing. You probably think I am crazy, but to show you that I’m not, and that my husband has not taken off with another woman, as some have even said, I am prepared to compensate you fairly for your help.

My ears were glowing. This was precisely what we had said, and I had very much been trying to get her off my back.

Nicha came in. His eyes widened as he noticed the logo of the Mirani Council. “Is there a problem?”

I showed him the message.

He snorted. “That woman again?”

“Yeah.”

“Why does she keep playing games with you?”

I shrugged. “Because her husband is from Earth, and in the past I have helped people from Earth.” I was talking about Robert Davidson, for whom I had gone around to all the residents of Barresh who were from Earth to find out what might have happened to him. I did remember seeing Benton Leck’s wife back then, and at some point she must have concluded that I was the go-to person for this sort of thing.

Nicha said, “If she really wants help, she should ask Melissa.”

That was Melissa Heyworth, who had been elevated to proper gamra delegate after the vote of Earth to join gamra went through.

“Melissa is dealing with politics and diplomacy. She has no time to look after individual cases.”

“And you do?”

I guessed I didn’t, but for some reason I found it hard just to tell people no to their face. No matter how much they annoyed me, people wanted something and the fact that they were asking me often meant that they had nowhere else to turn. If you were a stranger in this town, the local bureaucracy could be very hostile.

I blew out a breath. “I have to admit that I’m not sure how seriously I should take all of her stories.”

Nicha snorted. “How about none of them? The woman is crazy, and she just wants attention. We have too much to do to give this any time. You are not well. Find someone else to deal with it.”

“She says she will pay fairly, and I believe her on that front. I mean—these Mirani nobles never mention money unless they’re happy to part with it.”

And Nicha was aware of the fact that we had a bit of an income problem. He also never gave me the usual reply that I got from the others in my association—just ask Ezhya for more—because he understood why I didn’t like doing that. Coldi in general cared much more for influence than money, but plenty of people at the gamra island thought differently. I didn’t want any of my household’s ethics brought into question. We needed some independent income and had for some time.

“I guess you want to scope it out,” Nicha said, heaving a sigh.

“It seems a fairly easy project.”

“You’re just out of hospital. You nearly died. Nothing is easy right now.”

“Oh, I’m not going into town today to see what she wants.”

“Only tomorrow?”

“Yeah, maybe tomorrow.”

He rolled his eyes. “I was joking.”

“But I’m not. I’ll never become stronger if I stay inside and do nothing all day.”

“I really wished that you knew how to observe a rest period as Lilona told you to. But I’m guessing I’m holding my hopes too high.”

“I feel fine.”

“That’s what you said last time, in this very room. Then you went into the hall and collapsed on the floor.”