Lords of the Seventh Swarm

Chapter 2

“Och, this is no proper place for a bear,” Orick growled. He sniffed at the dead monster at his feet.

The creature looked like some huge gray slime mold. It had just come slithering out of the stream not forty feet distant, and Gallen had been forced to fry it with his incendiary rifle. Now it lay, burned and quivering, just outside camp. It was the third monster Gallen had killed in the past three hours.

Orick shook his head, wondering if the slime was edible. “My mother always said that you’d bring me to Ruin, Gallen, and here we are.”

“It’s just the name for the planet-because of all the alien ruins hereabouts,” Gallen said. He grunted, pulling at some vines near the edge of camp, trying to get them from the ground so that he could burn them for a campfire. The little bear, Tallea, went to his side and began pulling with her teeth, trying to help Gallen out.

Orick glanced off at the skyline. Ruin was a strange world-too far from its primary sun, which sat directly overhead like a child’s purple ball. It gave the landscape a violet hue.

Here, strewn across the desert, were huge red boulders, shaped like eggs, lying in the sand, and farther in the distance, a wind-sculpted sandstone mesa rose above the desert floor like some castle. Odd bushes grew all around-some sprouting like hair, others all thick and rubbery. The plants filled the air with alien scents.

Only the sound of the stream, burbling as brooks will, reminded Orick of home. No, Ruin was no proper place for a bear. Still, Orick wouldn’t have minded it so much if he could actually see some of these famous ruins that the planet was named after, but Orick had no such luck. It was, after all, just another alien landscape.

The gray mold at Orick’s feet quivered, whether in dying throes or in an attempt to escape, he didn’t know.

“Maybe we should move the camp away from the brook,” Orick said. “I think it attracts predators.”

Gallen didn’t answer. He’d got some of the dead vines over in front of the spaceship and was trying to set them afire. Tallea was out looking for more wood. Perhaps Gallen was building a fire in the hope of scaring off predators. Perhaps he did it because they planned on camping here, next to this stream, and Gallen was just used to having a campfire. They didn’t really need a fire, as far as Orick could tell. Though he’d grown sick of riding in a spaceship these past few weeks, he still thought it safer to sleep in there than to sleep out here in the open, on an alien world.

Why couldn’t Gallen find some nicer planet to camp on? Surely there were worlds in the process of being terraformed hereabouts, places where forests grew and the grass was green. Proper places for a bear. But, no, Maggie wanted this planet because it wasn’t listed as inhabitable on the star charts: “A good place to hide from the dronon,” she said. They were already well quit of the Milky Way. Here in the Carina Galaxy, they’d come to the fringe worlds, on the edge of civilization.

Gallen quit fiddling with the wood, looked up at the ship. The Nightswift’s landing lights blinked violet and ivory. It was a sleek ship, some sixty meters long and thirty wide.

The headdress of black ringlets that Gallen wore over his long hair glittered in the soft lights, the crystal disks of memory for his mantle jiggling as he drew ragged breaths. A single sapphire gem began to glow in the center of Gallen’s mantle. Gallen had just chosen that moment to download his memories into his mantle so that if he died, his memories could be placed into a clone.

After a few heartbeats, the gem quit blazing so fiercely. Maggie was still in the ship, resting. Being nearly five months pregnant was taking its toll on her energy levels.

Gallen gazed down at Orick. “I’ve been thinking,” he said softly, so as not to be heard through the ship’s open door. “We could move this ship to another camp-or maybe we could go back the way we came. It’s time to quit running from the dronon. I have to fight them sometime.”

Orick had been Gallen’s friend for years, yet he felt no less loyal to Maggie. He didn’t like having to side with one or the other.

Orick said, “Fighting is too risky. For every minute you keep running, that’s another moment of freedom you give to every man and woman in the galaxy.”

“That’s where Maggie is wrong!” Gallen said, voicing an argument that had been going on for weeks. “The dronon are setting outposts on every world, searching for us. They’re killing those who help hide us. The very threat of invasion keeps our people in fear: what kind of freedom is that?”

“It’s a devil’s bargain,” Orick agreed, “but you have to admit, Gallen, you don’t have an answer to this problem.” He looked down at the quivering mold, pondering.

“What do you mean, I have no answer?” Gallen said. “I just told you my answer.”

“I know, I heard you. Kill Kintiniklintit. But you’ve been killing outlaws and usurpers ever since we met,” Orick grumbled. “And what has it got you? You killed the Lords of the Sixth Swarm, and now you want to face the Lords of the Seventh Swarm. And when you beat them, maybe you’ll have to fight some more, or maybe you can go back to killing folks who are no better than dronon, though they have human shapes. And do you know what it’s got you, Gallen: you’re a slave. You’re a miserable slave!”

“A slave?” Gallen said, amused by Orick’s tirade. “Maybe so, but … I was born to be a Lord Protector.”

“Yeah, so you’re a clone of some famous Lord Protector,” Orick grumbled. “That doesn’t mean you have to follow in his footsteps. As I remember the story, didn’t he eventually get martyred? Are you going to follow in his footsteps? Are you going to let somebody else decide how you’ll live your life?”

“What else can I do?” Gallen said. He began pacing, hardly daring to look at Orick.

And at that moment, the answer came to Orick, an answer he had felt in the depths of his soul but never had been quite able to voice to Gallen. “Ignore evil,” Orick said. “Jesus said to forgive others. If a man comes to you, though he has sinned seventy times seven, and asks forgiveness, then you forgive. Ignore evil.”

Gallen shook his head angrily. “I disagree! ‘Resist Satan, and he will flee from you’! God strengthened David so he could slay Goliath. God ordered Joshua to destroy the Hittites and the Jebusites.”

Orick grinned, a glint in his eye. “The devil quotes Scripture, too. You’re not a religious man, Gallen. When did you start quoting Scripture?”

Gallen laughed. “I warmed my share of pews as a kid. You forget, I’ve got more than one priest in my family.”

Orick felt chagrined. He said softly, “Sometimes, sometimes God has commanded men to fight. But I’d like to know Gallen, are you so eager to fight because that’s what God wants of you, or is it just in your nature? Sometimes God tells people to run, too. Moses took the children of Israel and fled from Pharaoh. Joseph and Mary were told to flee Israel when Herod sent his soldiers to slaughter the babes. Sometimes you should run from evil. Maggie’s right in this, in asking you to run. Her life is at risk as much as your own. And there’s the babe to worry about. She has to make the choice for her own life.”

Gallen opened his mouth to argue, yet nothing came out.

Orick looked up at Gallen, then shook his head in despair. “Gallen, my oldest and dearest friend, I think it’s time for me to leave you.”

There, he’d said it. He’d been thinking it for months, and now he’d finally said it.

“Leave?” Gallen asked, astonished. “Where would you go?”

“Anywhere. We’ve been on a dozen fine planets. Home, maybe. Back to Tihrglas.”

Gallen’s mouth just worked of its own accord, as if he would speak but couldn’t find the words. He’d been totally unprepared.

Orick felt weary, sick at heart. “Oh, don’t you see it, Gallen? I’ve been thinking about this for months. The night the dronon came to Tihrglas, I almost left you for good. You know I’ve always wanted to be a priest. I wanted to serve God, but you’ve become a slave to evil, and I can’t watch it anymore. You sicken me, my friend. You’re destroying yourself!”

Orick’s eyes watered with tears. It hurt to say these things.

“What do you mean, I sicken you?” Gallen asked. “I haven’t changed.”

“Oh yes you have!” Orick said. “Remember the day we first met?”

Gallen looked at Orick, confused, and shook his head.

Orick reminded him. “We were on that hot August road that runs through the hills by the mill outside Gort Ard, and you was hunting for that killer, Dan’l O’Leary?”

“You mean the very first time we met?” Gallen asked. “You were with that friar, what’s-his-name.”

“Friar Bannon,” Orick said, remembering the thin old fellow with the rotting teeth, his head shaved bald. “A godly man-one of the best there has ever been.”

It had been a scorcher of a day, and Gallen was tracking a murderer and had lost the boy’s trail somewhere along the road. Dan’l O’Leary had managed to leap off the margin of the highway into some brush. Gallen could not discover his trail. Yet Gallen also knew the general area where the boy had vanished, and he’d asked Orick to sniff the killer out.

Now, Friar Bannon had known the killer. Dan’l O’Leary was only fifteen, but he was a big kid, and dumb. The kind who figured it was easier to make it as a highwayman than as a farmer. So one summer’s night he waylaid a wealthy traveler, brandishing a cudgel. When the fellow was slow to get his purse open, Dan’l hit him in the head, hoping to subdue him, but in his excitement he hit the fellow too hard, knocking his brains all over the dirt road.

While Dan’l stood over the corpse, looking for coins hidden in the man’s boots, his own mother rounded the bend in the road and discovered her son was a murderer.

In her shame, she ran into town and told everyone what had happened. Dan’l took off into the woods, where he foraged off the land and sometimes visited Friar Bannon, telling how he was tom by the desire to return home, wanting to repent, knowing he’d hang if he did, suffering from the pain of a damned soul. So it was that Orick came upon Gallen, hunting for the killer, and Gallen asked Orick to sniff the boy out.

“What will you do to him if you catch him?” Orick had asked, for Orick was a young bear, and having heard of the boy’s grief from Friar Bannon, he was not sure if it would be appropriate to help apprehend the youngster. Friar Bannon felt convinced that the boy would repent, and he hoped that the law would be lenient with the child-perhaps give him a good beating rather than a hanging. The murder was a youthful mistake, after all, not the act of a hardened criminal.

Yet the boy compounded his crimes by not turning himself in. Friar Bannon had said that given one winter in the wild, this boy would become a hardened highwayman-or the weather would break him, and he’d come to his senses. Friar Bannon hoped for the latter.

“I don’t know what I’ll do with this one,” Gallen had answered Orick thoughtfully, sitting down on the roadside. “It’s been bothering me. Gut him, maybe. I don’t want to put the kid through a hanging. The wait and embarrassment. His poor mother is beside herself already. He isn’t a mean lad. So I think I’ll kill him swiftly. Looks like that would be about best for everyone.”

“Not for Dan’l,” Friar Bannon had said quickly.

“Maybe not,” Gallen had agreed. “But I can’t just let him go free.”

“No, the best thing for the boy would be to make his peace with God and man,” Friar Bannon had said. “If only he would run far away and start his life over, but I think the lad is sort of like a dumb calf that hasn’t realized it’s time to wean from his mother. He still wants to go home, and there’s no telling him otherwise. “

Gallen had looked the friar in the eye, just held his gaze for a moment.

“I helped you hunt Dan’l, for three days,” Orick said, wondering if his message would get though, “and when you caught him, what did you do? You gave him some money from your own purse, pointed him toward the border, and kicked him in the pants as you sent him on his way.”

Gallen’s face took on a closed look. “It was the best thing I could do, it seemed. Like Friar Bannon, I hoped he would change.”

“A devil’s bargain,” Orick intoned. “A year later, Dan’l became a highwayman, and we had to track him down all over again, and that time you gutted the lad.”

“I thought he’d go straight,” Gallen whispered. “But he murdered three more people. Do you think I did wrong letting him go the first time?”

“No, you idiot. Don’t you see it? You did exactly right.” Orick replied. “You exercised compassion. You hoped for the best. It wasn’t our fault the lad didn’t live up to our expectations. It was his fault. He deserved what you gave him-both the forgiveness and the punishment.”

“So what is your point?”

Orick grunted and frowned as he considered. “My point is this: when I first helped you catch that boy, I almost didn’t do it. I only came with you that day because you were trying to do what was best for everyone. Sometimes, we have to make a choice, and hope that it’s best for everyone, and offer no blame to ourselves or others if we’re wrong.”

“That’s what I’ve been trying to do,” Gallen said.

“No. Ever since Dan’l let you down, you’ve found it harder and harder to exercise common sense. Jesus said that ‘In the last days, because wickedness shall abound, the love of many will wax cold.’ Well, Gallen, your heart has been waxing colder and colder ever since I met you. You’re a hard man now, hot for vengeance, hot to kill the dronon. You’re willing to go die under a tide of your enemies, while your sweet, sensible wife just wants to get away from this mess.”

“Sensible? We have a duty,” Gallen said. “She isn’t thinking of other people, her obligation to humanity. She’s afraid for herself.”

Orick countered, “She has a duty to her child, too. And she has more brains in her right ear than you have in your whole head! Gallen, I know you have faith in yourself, but that first win against the dronon was a fluke. The dronon know how you beat them, and Kintiniklintit won’t make that same mistake again. Maggie’s right to ask you to run. If you had any sense, you wouldn’t be talking like this!”

“But I’ve been exercising,” Gallen said. “I’m stronger now. I think I’ve got a kick that will pierce a dronon’s exoskeleton. I could win this fight!”

“Och, maybe,” Orick said, unwilling to let him pursue this line of thought, “but in the long run, your tenacity will only plant you in an early grave!”

“Maybe that is exactly what he wants,” Tallea said. The little she-bear had just pulled another vine over to the fire and hunkered on the ground, her paws down under her nose.

“What?” Orick asked the she-bear, his voice betraying his surprise at the remark.

“Maybe he wants to die,” Tallea said. “It’s what I’d do. Just as the Lords of Tremonthin transferred my memories, my dreams, into this body, they can design a new body for Gallen, one with the speed and strength of a Tekkar, the size of a Rodim. That’s what he wants. What does he care if the dronon slay him, so long as the Lords of Tremonthin bring him back stronger?”

“I wish it were so simple.” Gallen sighed. “Download my memories into a more fearsome body. If I could do it, I would slough off this flesh in a heartbeat.”

“Then why don’t you?” Orick asked.

Gallen looked to Tallea. “I think Tallea can tell you part of the answer.…”

Tallea scratched her snout with a paw and said, “A new body is clumsy. Arms and legs are shorter or longer than you remember. Muscles don’t work as you think.” Orick had noticed that Tallea was rather bumbling, even for an adolescent she-bear. He’d hoped she would grow out of it, but he hadn’t dared say anything. Tallea, after having been a human in her last life, had enough difficulty trying to acclimatize herself to being a bear without worrying about the fact that she was a hopelessly clumsy bear.

“Exactly,” Gallen said. “When you switch bodies, every muscle and bone is different in size and shape. It takes years for your brain to acclimate to those changes. I don’t have years. If I got myself downloaded into a clone tomorrow, I’d just get killed.

“But even if I could get a new body, I doubt that if I made such a major change, the dronon would allow me to fight. Veriasse considered rebuilding himself, but my mantle tells me he wisely chose against it. The dronon might see my genetic enhancements as weapons, unlawful for use in unarmed combat.”

“But that hasn’t stopped Kintiniklintit from fighting in the arena,” Orick countered.

“Kintiniklintit isn’t human,” Gallen said. “You know how reluctant the dronon were to let me fight in the first place. The same rules don’t apply to us that apply to them.”

Orick lay on the sandy ground and put his chin on his paws. He had never even imagined downloading Gallen into another body, yet everyone else around him had given the plan considerable deliberation.

“So there’s nothing you can do to better your odds,” Orick grumbled in such a tone that he let Gallen recognize that he, too, could see the futility of this plan.

“No,” Gallen said. “No stratagem I can come up with. Their exoskeletons are too thick. They fly too quickly. But, Orick, Orick, before you argue too strongly against fighting back, consider this: right now, I have defeated only the Lords of the Sixth Swarm. Six other lords want to fight me, but you also must recognize that they almost never challenge one another. Have you asked yourself why?”

“It’s not worth the trouble,” Orick said. “You don’t fight someone that tough if you don’t have to.”

“Precisely,” Gallen said. “I beat the Lords of the Sixth Swarm, but I didn’t do the job convincingly. The other dronon Lords see my victory as a fluke, a performance that is not likely to be repeated. But what if I did win again? What if I killed Kintiniklintit, and I did it convincingly?”

“So you think that if you kill him, the rest of the dronon Lords will shy away from fighting you in the future?”

“Exactly,” Gallen said. “The dronon have chosen this form of succession by nature. It seems right to them to fight for control. Their inherited behaviors, their sense of what is right, won’t allow them to explore any other method of succession. But the dronon aren’t stupid. The young Golden Queens don’t simply rush into battle when they attain their mature colors. They watch the Lords of the Swarm and consider and plot, often for decades. So long as the Lords of the Swarm appear strong, younger goldens don’t attack. According to my mantle, some Golden Queens live their entire lives without seeking to take control of the hive.”

“So you hope that if you can beat Kintiniklintit, the dronon might leave you alone?” Orick said, warily.

“I hope so,” Gallen said. “I have to believe there is something we can do. I have to believe that through strength and speed, and wit, and skill, and sheer force of will l can transcend this problem. The dronon are beatable. I’ve proven that. But even Maggie doesn’t really believe I can whip them a second time. I know I can. I can, and I will. But I can’t discuss this with Maggie now. She’s not ready to fight. She’s too frightened-she can’t even sleep because of the nightmares.” He looked off toward the ship, and there was worry in Gallen’s eye. Maggie was falling apart.

“Transcend the dronon then-” Orick said, “transcend your enemies. But don’t play their game. Don’t think that just because you learn to toss them two throws out of three, that you’ve won the war. They’ll come back and kill you for it. Even if you could beat Kintiniklintit, even if you killed every one of them, you’d lose your decency. Forget about them. You’ve fought them all you can, Gallen. Let someone else take up the sword. Forgive the dronon and everyone like them.”

“Orick,” Gallen said, shaking his head, “what does that accomplish? If we ignore evil, it will simply thump us on the head until we pay attention to it.”

Orick said, “I have a question for you: did David slay Goliath, or did God?” Gallen considered a long moment. “Are you saying that if I ignore the dronon, God will fight them? Even you don’t believe that!”

“Is anything too hard for the Lord?” Orick whispered, and he knew in that moment, though for his whole life he had fought the doubts, he did believe it. Gallen drew a surprised breath and stepped back. “Orick, I think maybe you should become a priest after all.”

Orick wasn’t sure what Gallen meant by that. Orick had considered leaving Gallen to study for the priesthood many times. Perhaps, Orick thought, this was a fight-the first fight they’d had-and Gallen was telling Orick that the time had come for Orick to leave. But no, Gallen spoke with a tone of both surprise and reverence. In the past, he’d always seemed amused by Orick’s interest in the priesthood. Now Gallen seemed astonished by it, and he took it seriously. Gallen was simply acknowledging a side of Orick that he’d never really appreciated. Orick said softly, “I would that all men were priests, devoting themselves to God.”

Gallen studied Orick, perplexed. “I … I’ll consider what you’ve said.”

Gallen reached down absently and ruffled Tallea’s fur, patting her snout. He was lost in thought as he stalked off back into the ship, his black robes flowing out behind him, his head bent. The doors to the ship closed off quickly as he entered, swallowing him.

Tallea watched him leave, then grumbled, “I wish he wouldn’t do that!”

“Do what?” Orick asked.

“Pat my nose like I was some damned hunting hound!”

Orick stared at her, his mouth opened in surprise. He always liked it when humans patted his snout or scratched behind his ear.

“I was a grown woman, swinging a sword in battle, before he ever got out of diapers!” Tallea said, then she growled in disgust, a throaty rumble.

“Gallen’s a good lad. It’s not disrespect he’s showing you,” Orick apologized.

Tallea shook her dark head, wagging it broadly from side to side, and she was so angry that tears formed in her eyes. She turned and began heading into the ship.

“Really,” Orick said, “he’s just being affectionate!”

“Well maybe I don’t want his affection!” Tallea said, turning on him so fast that Orick thought she’d bite him.

“Halloo there,” Orick said. “You don’t have to act like you’ve got a tick on your butt. What’s eating you?”

“What’s eating me?” Tallea asked. “Nothing-Everything!”

“Everything? Really? Everything?” Orick said. It was true that they didn’t have a home, that the dronon were chasing them, that they were camped for the night on an alien world filled with monsters. But far from everything was wrong. At least they were alive.

“You-this is not what I had planned …” Tallea said in exasperation. “I didn’t come here to be patted like a dog, and have people making fun of my clumsiness!”

She spun and bolted for the ship; the door hardly had time to whisk open before she reached it. Orick hurried after her, unsure why she’d broken into tears.

Tallea ran into her stateroom, jumped up on the bed. The door to her room began to slide closed in front of Orick’s nose. Tallea shouted, “Lock!” but Orick leapt through before the door shut. The lock snicked into place behind him.

Tallea made whining noises, little barks, as bears will when they cry, and she turned her back.

“Well now,” Orick said, climbing up on the bed, nuzzling her ear with his snout. He licked it just a bit. “Sure, it must be hard to go from being human to being a bear, but you always struck me as a woman who was mostly gristle and sinew. All good things have their price. At least you’re not one of those funny-looking human varmints without any hair anymore …” He hoped she’d laugh, but Tallea just sniffled.

Orick let the silence stretch uncomfortably, until at last Tallea said, “Did I make a mistake, Orick?”

“A mistake? How could it be wrong for a human to finally get a pelt like the rest of the mammals?”

Tallea snickered, turned her brown eyes to him. There were tears in them. “Did I misunderstand something, Orick? I thought you loved me.”

“Well … I do!” Orick protested. “How could I not love you?”

“I thought you would love me-in the same way a man loves his wife.” The sentence was clipped, the words uninflected, yet Orick knew there was a depth of emotion hidden beneath those words. He licked her ears gently with his broad tongue.

“Is it a formal proposal of marriage you’re wanting?” Orick asked. He knew she did. It wasn’t decent to keep a woman waiting-especially when it was obvious she loved him, that she’d chosen to live as a bear solely so they could be together. It was a strange alliance they had formed on Tremonthin-the Caldurian warrior and the bear, fighting in the caverns beneath the Hollow Hills. By nature Caldurians bonded to those they protected, and that bonding was arguably a form of love. But Orick had never imagined she would bond to him, nor that after she gave her life in his service, she would ask the Lords of Tremonthin to place her memories into the flesh of a bear. Such a sacrifice.

Orick had always wished to find a she-bear who would love him as truly as he could love her-a she-bear whose affections would remain steady even after she was no longer in heat. Tallea had asked the Lords of Tremonthin to tailor her body so she could fulfill Orick’s dream.

The thing is, that while Orick had always dreamed of love, he didn’t quite know how to manage the little things-like how to talk about all the important things he and Tallea needed to discuss.

Tallea sighed. “I don’t need a marriage proposal. By becoming a bear, I think I’ve already made the proposal myself. l just need to know if you accept me.”

Orick’s heart pounded. This was the moment he’d feared. He didn’t quite know how to tell her that he’d long considered a career in the priesthood, that her show of devotion was both totally unexpected and somewhat troubling. “I care for you …” he tried to ease into the topic.

“If you love me, then why don’t you make love to me?” Tallea said. “I’ve been a bear for months!”

Orick gaped in surprise, then sniffed the air. “You … are you in heat?” he gawked, wondering if his nose was plugged.

“No!” Tallea said, perhaps even more shocked than Orick. “Is that what you’ve been waiting for?”

“You mean-you would do it even when you’re not in heat?” Orick shouted. He’d never heard such an outrageous proposal, never even considered the possibility. Sure, humans did it that way, but they were an aberration in the animal kingdom. Right-thinking bears would never-

“Yes,” Tallea said, turning suddenly to face him full. “Yes, please, yes! Take me now!” she growled with such desire in that throaty rumbling that Orick could hardly imagine it.

“But … but I’ve taken a vow of chastity!” Orick said, blurting the first objection that came to mind. It was true. Though he’d never made the vow to proper priesthood authorities, he had indeed made that vow to God in his heart.

Tallea cried, “Why would you do a stupid thing like that?”

“I promised myself to God’s service,” Orick said. “Never thinking-I mean it was before I met you.”

Orick looked at the poor she-bear. If he kept to this course, it would prove a tragedy for Tallea of epic consequences. He didn’t want to hurt her, but for now, he was still unresolved as to his course of action. He wanted to serve God, but to be truthful, in the past he had found that when a she-bear was in heat, the temptation had been more than he could easily endure. He wasn’t good at maintaining his vow of chastity, but with each successive failure, he became more determined to keep to it.

“So you can’t serve God and me?” Tallea asked.

“No man can serve two masters,” Orick said, and then suddenly realized that she would not understand the allusion. Tallea was a heathen who’d never heard of Christ or his gospel. “The Son of God said that.”

Tallea studied him. “He was right. Every Caldurian warrior knows that he or she can only be bound to one master.” Tallea considered his words. “So you’ve decided? You will not bind yourself to me?”

Orick had seldom found himself wedged into so tight a crevice. If he told her that he was undecided, that during every passing hour of the past few months that question had been foremost in his mind, yet he was still vacillating, then he might find himself voicing words that would only give her unrealistic hopes. At the same time, it would be equally unfair to the both of them if he told her that he had decided against her. For it was untrue. “Give me some time. I love you as a friend already, a true friend. But you chose me without warning. This all came so suddenly.”

“I see.” The warmth had all gone from her voice. After a long moment, she whispered, “Orick, as far as bears go, am I attractive?”

Orick looked into her eyes, which sparkled under the ship’s lights. Her fur was dark and glossy, her nails long and black. She was, in fact, one of the most beautiful she-bears he’d ever met, and once she went into heat, Orick imagined that every bear on Tihrglas would fight for the chance to be her mate. What she did not know was that as a juvenile, those looks did not matter. It was scent that excited Orick, not her lusty appearance.

“Indeed, you are fair, my love, more beautiful than the mountains of Tirzah.”

“Good,” Tallea said, then she yawned and stretched, lowering her head, arching her back so that her tail raised seductively in the air. Orick doubted that she had ever seen a female take the mating position, but she did it now quite naturally, then came and licked Orick once on the mouth. “Very good,” she whispered, “and good night to you.” Though it was not yet dark here on Ruin, Orick and the others were still running on ship time, and he indeed felt weary. Apparently Tallea, like Maggie, had decided to keep to the ship’s schedule.

She sent him from her room. Orick padded back outside, somewhat glad for the fresh air, where he lay on the ground thinking of that last inviting look she’d given him. For a moment, when speaking to Gallen, he’d felt as if he were truly a priest, speaking under the power of inspiration. Now he felt miserable, and he lay wondering how he would ever be able to spurn such a lovely creature once she went into estrus.

It was with these thoughts in mind that Orick was disturbed by the sound of flapping wings. He looked up to see the oddest creature soaring over the desert-a winged man, who soon landed at Orick’s feet, with a fascinating invitation for dinner.