[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
He consoled her with lavish affection, support and understanding, until, spent
with such an emotional storm, she fell asleep.
When she appeared the next morning, she was calm and her usual self-effacing
self though there was a sadness in her eyes that wrenched
Rojer's heart.
She's over her menses, now, Damia said very privately to him.
Thank you for calming her down.
You're a sweet boy as well as a clever one.
Sweet? Rojer replied in disgust. Zara's too tenderhearted for her own good.
His mother continued, but not to him, to his father and on such a subject that
Rojer was surprised to be included. Then he realized, he wasn't included: he
was catching a private conversation he ought not to be able to `hear'. He'd've
shielded had his mother not been discussing
Zara with his father.
She's a dysfunctional Prime, Afra, Damia was saying with deep regret and
distress. Father can't expect her to do Tower service.
She'd wilt under the stress. And with everyone knowing she's a
T-1, they'll expect her to go to a Tower.
Everyone is not your father, nor Gollee Gren who has a lot more to do with
placing Talents these days than Jeff. Certainly we must inform
Gollee of our anxiety and our assessment. Zara can be trained for other
duties, less emotionally laden. She's got good thrust.
Erratic as her sympathies. . . His mother's tone was peevish.
Generated by ABC Amber LIT Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abclit.html
Well, I'll admit that I felt a pang of sympathy for the Queen YOU?
Rojer was equally startled, and relieved.
Yes, I. It's an attitude that won't endear me to many, but to be honest,
Damia, and we have always been honest in our private thoughts, there was
something pathetic about that Queen! Pathetic, awkward, and... valiant, I
think one could say.
There was a long pause of silence. If one isn't swayed by conditioning, his
mother admitted slowly, and unfortunately, I am biased about Hivers - I can't
help it - one could call her brave to leave the pod.
Of course, she had to, didn't she? No oxygen, no food.
Page 116
ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.html
Rojer nearly cheered to hear his mother admit this.
I worry more about Zara's `Dinis, Damia went on. They do not understand her
perversion...
Not perverse surely, Damia. Wayward, or maybe deviant, but not perverse. She's
an extremely sensative girl . . . I'll work on reassuring her `Dinis.
Oh, I think they'll pull round once they're over the shock of hearing Zara
defending the Queen.
I don't think she's defending the Queen so much as empathizing with her. And
she's thrown up a very tight mental shield about her thoughts. We must allow
her the privacy we always permit other
Talents, Afra said.
She's not adult yet.
But nearly. I seem to remember.
Afra!
Generated by ABC Amber LIT Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abclit.html
There was such an intimacy in their minds that Rojer hastily closed off the
intriguing conversation.
That mental exchange was not the only one he inadvertently
`overheard' in the next few days for there were `pathed messages filtering in
from all the Primes. Some of the messages Rojer would rather not have heard:
others were curious and fascinating.
Especially the badinage his mother enjoyed with her father, or her pithy
remarks to her brother, Jeran, and her sister, Cera, both of them
Towered Primes.
Rojer now caught Laria's reports from Clarf. Those he was glad
Zara couldn't hear.
There was a faction on Clarf that mirrored the Aurigae City wish for summary
execution as public as possible.
He also caught all the reports from Heinlein Base.
The Queen had remained stationary for seventy-six hours, ignoring
replenishments of the foods she had been seen to eat. Xenobiologists and
xenozoologists were doing their best to be sure the offerings covered all
nutritional requirements for they were certain she would be laying the eggs
that strained her lower body to the point where striations or cracks were
visible in the bulb of it.
There had been several more failed attempts in laboratories within the
Alliance to vitalize the larvae and their numbers were dwindling rapidly. That
was when someone suggested that perhaps the remaining larvae should be sent to
Heinlein Base in the hope that the Queen could hatch them. Perhaps she
required attendants for the egg-laying and, Generated by ABC Amber LIT
Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abclit.html
with these missing, she would be unable to function.
Some of the larvae of each type were therefore `ported into the base, to see
if their appearance would activate the Queen. Men seemed to dominate the push
to give the Queen the larvae. Women seemed less inclined to sympathize with
her condition. For, apart from eating again, the Queen had done nothing else,
though her egg-filled bulb continued to expand.
However, when the decision to give her some of the three types of larvae was
implemented, Rojer got Zara off by herself to give her what he felt should be
good news.
`The least they can do,' was all Zara said in a disgusted tone, though, for
the rest of the day, Rojer thought she was more cheerful.
Certainly she was on hand to see a screening of the transfer. The scene was
even more dramatic than the Queen's emergence.
The Queen rushed to the larvae, running her upper limbs across each sac,
emitting a low hum.
Page 117
ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.html
She deftly turned each larva so she could inspect all round, then she
awkwardly swept a path to the nearest building. This, the experts said, had to
be some sort of instinctive behaviour for the paving had been brushed clear of
any dust or grit when the base was cleaned for her occupancy. She ran back to
collect the day's green offerings and piled them in the big entrance hall.
When she'd done that, she patiently rolled each larva to its new site, with
many pattings and turnings and hummings. The day's efforts seemed to exhaust
her for she resumed the immobile post-prandial position, propped up by her
hind limbs.
Generated by ABC Amber LIT Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abclit.html
Biologists and zpologists - including two eminent human orthopediterists -
argued over what sort of `bedding' would suit her needs, and chose straw and
wood shavings, as well as several types of artificial chips, bits and bobbles.
A quantity of fine artificial
`wax' and natural tallow were added to the offerings, in case she was more
apiarian than insectoid.
When she settled on the shavings, heaping them in mounds over the larvae, more
was sent in. Rojer had a private smile for the things cousin Roddie had to do
as the Observation Talent.
Zara brightened at each new concession granted the `prisoner' and kept within
viewing distance of the screen, waiting for the next development. Her mother
let her because, as Damia privately admitted to Afra, she was more use in the
house than in the Tower. Zara was certainly not the only one so involved in
what happened at Heinlein
[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]