Norton, Andre - Brother To Shadows

"Their control is not yet complete," the captain stated. "It is difficult to believe that they will prevail over such fortresses as Smagan or Wer."

"Thanks to our friends here," the port officer nodded to the three on the other side of the table, "they have the Holder. As do all who rise to power he has for years systematically weeded out all below him who could question his authority, depending on those linked to him so tightly that his fall would mean theirs also. They may hold out in pockets because it means their lives, and even ras-rats will turn and fight if they are cornered, but there is no longer any leader to rally them and there has long been jealousy and infighting among them."

"You have been watching the building of this situation for long, Commander?" Zurzal's frill was lightening in shade.

"As the one responsible for this port I have had to make observations," the other agreed. "Every form of government sooner or later reaches a plateau from which there is no longer an upward advance. Since the lives of sentient beings do not remain static, there follow changes. As your people know so well, Learned One. So it happened here. But when the rebels win they will have something to thank your guard for—that they have the Holder."

"As I have said!" the captain scowled, "interference with the native government—"

"You would rather, Captain, that we be dead?"

Startled, it was not only the Patrol officer but all the rest of them who turned now to look at the fifth member of the party. Gone were the floating, seductive garments of the assured Jewelbright. Taynad had asked for and changed speedily into a spacer's drab garb. The long waves of her hair had been tightly braided, and were now bound around her head, though the wealth of that hair made it seem she must be wearing a turban.

"Yes," the captain had almost instantly adjusted to her entrance into this meeting, to the implied criticism of her question. "There also remains you, Gentlefem. I believe that you arrived here by the invitation of the Holder, is that not so?"

"Having done so," Taynad returned calmly, "there is no reason for my remaining once he is no longer my host. My very presence in his company would probably have damned me with these rebels. I owe my continued existence to the Learned One and his guard. And I am duly grateful. I hardly think, Captain, that you are going to hand me over to Tssekians—"

Jofre was sensitive to what she was doing, using trained willpower. Even though she had not turned it on him, he could feel the gathering force of it. And he did not believe that this Patrol officer, disciplined as he might be, could stand against the issha assurance of the Jewelbright.

"Why did you come?" It was not the officer but the port commander who asked that bluntly, and she answered as fully:

"The Holder had (I saw him cut down in the hall and so he is no longer my employer) a Horde Commander who was ambitious. He had gone off-world hunting the Learned One here as an offering to his master, and on Asborgan he chanced to learn of the Jewels. As was custom he bargained for my services. I was to be another gift. He had plans—" She shrugged. "I was a weapon; he did not have time to use me."

"Now that we have discussed a number of explanations and scraps of news," Zurzal cut in, "may we return to the main point of this meeting? I have suffered a crude and unnecessary interruption to plans I have been making for years. It is my intention that I carry those out and I do not think that anyone, Captain, is going to produce a good reason why I cannot."

"You will wait until there is a settlement here!" returned the Patrol officer flatly.

Zurzal spoke then, not to him, but to the port commander. "Commander, you have shown that you have ample reason to believe that my coming here had in reality nothing to do with the present embroilment. You also know that my appearance on Tssek was entirely against my will. By Stellar Law can we be held in this fashion?"

The commander looked neither to the Patrol captain nor to the Zacathan, instead he was studying with great interest the nails on his right hand.

"He's right, you know," he observed. "We have proof of the kidnapping, of the fact that he was being used against his will. He has claimed refuge under the Code of Harktapha—that has held since the first spacers met with his kind. We have no quarrel with Zacathans—their knowledge is ever at our service—their persons are diplomatically sacred—"

"This one presumes too much!" the Patrol officer interrupted.

"In your opinion—" The three words brought a sour silence from the captain. His hands clenched on the edge of the desk as if he would upend that innocent piece of furniture and send it in the general direction of those three across from him.

"So, Learned One," as if he need expect no more interruption the commander turned again to Zurzal, "what is your will?"

"I would return to Wayright and carry out those plans of mine," returned the Zacathan. "My guard goes with me and this gentlefem also, if it is her will."

"It is," Taynad agreed. She added nothing to that and Jofre wondered what thoughts clustered now in her head. Since he who had oathed her was dead by what the issha-sworn would consider chance, she was free from employment. Would she, once more on Wayright, seek to return to Asborgan?

"Also," she was speaking again, "there is the matter of the Jat."

"That can be easily attended to." The Patrol officer must have been glad he had a clear and definite answer to that. "It will be returned to its home planet."

"In the condition in which it now exists?" she queried.

The officer looked to the port commander for an answer.

"Unfortunately, the creature has gone catatonic and cannot be roused," he reported. "The bond between it and the Holder was so harshly broken as to send it into a coma. The medic reports that nothing he has been able to do will restore it."

"It might be well to let me try." To Jofre's surprise the Jewelbright spoke. "A broken bond might indeed break a mind, but a transferred bond—"

"Can this be done?" the commander questioned.

She hesitated for only a second. "My kind have certain powers, Gentlehomos. I have developed a liking for the creature and I saw more of it when it was with its bond master than any of you. Let me try to transfer the bond."

"But it still must be returned—"

"Let that be decided after we see how this will work," said the commander. "Yes, Gentlefem, I shall give orders that you are to try this—and may you be successful."

To Jofre's complete astonishment she turned her head and surveyed him. "This is one of my world," she indicated him. "The training he has been given grants him a certain rapport with other species. I will need him to give me aid."

Jofre had no chance to talk to her alone. She had admitted obliquely that she knew him for what he was. But that that would constitute any tie between them was chancy. The commander escorted them over to the medic quarters and there they looked down upon the small body which had balled itself almost into a knot on one of the bunks.

"It still lives," the medic reported, "but it has had no food nor drink, and the heartbeat is very slow. It is close to death."

"Yan searches for he who is gone, that one who became his other half." Taynad seated herself on the edge of the bunk and leaned over, to gather the Jat into her arms as if it were a hurt child.

"Medic, on our world we have certain training which can unite us with other living creatures beside those of our own species. It may be that we can reach Yan and bring him back. We can only try."

The medic shook his head. "Gentlefem, I fear it is hopeless. But if there is anything you can do—"

He went to seat himself on a stool at the other side of the room, watching them intently.