The urs told of hundreds dead . . . and that a High Sage of the Commons was among those slaughtered. Asx had been standing near a group of curious spectators and confused alien lovers, waiting to parley with the visitors. After the dust and flames settled, the traeki was nowhere to be seen.

The g'Kek doctor tending Uthen expressed the grief they all felt, rolling all four tentacle-like eyes and flailing the ground with his pusher leg. This personified the horror. Asx had been a popular sage, ready to mull over problems posed by any of the Six Races, from marriage counseling to dividing the a.s.sets of a bisected qheuen hive. Asx might "mull" for days, weeks, or a year before giving an answer-or several answers, laying out a range of options.

Before the courier departed, Lark's status as a junior sage won him a brief look at the drawings in her dispatch pouch. He showed Ling a sketch of a ma.s.sive oval ship of s.p.a.ce, dwarfing the one that brought her to this world. Her face clouded. The mighty shape was unfamiliar and frightening.

Lark's own messenger-a two-legged human-had plunged into the ranks of towering boo at daybreak, carrying a plea for Lester Cambel to send up Ling's personal Library unit, so she might read the memory bars he and Uthen had found in the wrecked station.

Her offer, made the evening before, was limited to seeking data about plagues, especially the one now sweeping the qheuen community.

"If Ro-kenn truly was preparing genocide agents, he is a criminal by our own law."

"Even a Rothen master?" Lark had asked skeptically.

"Even so. It is not disloyal for me to find out, or else prove it was not so.

"However," she had added, "don't expect me to help you make war against my crew mates or my patrons. Not that you could do much, now that their guard is raised. You surprised us once with tunnels and gunpowder, destroying a little research base. But you'll find that harming a starship is beyond even your best-equipped zealots."

That exchange took place before they learned about the second vessel. Before word came that the mighty Rothen cruiser was reduced to a captive toy next to a true colossus from s.p.a.ce.

While they awaited Cambel's answer, Lark sent his troopers sifting through the burned lakesh.o.r.e thicket, gathering golden preservation beads. Galactic technology had been standardized for millions of years. So there just might be a workable reading unit amid all the pretty junk the magpie spider had collected. Anyway, it seemed worth a try.

While sorting through a pile of amber coc.o.o.ns, he and Ling resumed their game of cautious question-and-evasion. Circ.u.mstances had changed-Lark no longer felt as stupid in her presence-still, it was the same old dance.

Starting off, Ling quizzed him about the Great Printing, the event that transformed Jijo's squabbling coalition of sooner races, even more than the arrival of the Holy Egg. Lark answered truthfully without once mentioning the Biblos Archive. Instead he described the guilds of printing, photocopying, and especially papermaking, with its pounding pulp hammers and pungent drying screens, turning out fine pages under the sharp gaze of his father, the famed Nelo.

"A nonvolatile, randomly accessed, a.n.a.log memory store that is completely invisible from s.p.a.ce. No electricity or digital cognizance to detect from orbit." She marveled. "Even when we saw books, we a.s.sumed they were handcopied-hardly a culture-augmenting process. Imagine, a wolfling technology proved so effective . . . under special circ.u.mstances."

Despite that admission, Lark wondered about the Danik att.i.tude, which seemed all too ready to dismiss the accomplishments of their own human ancestors-except when an achievement could be attributed to Rothen intervention.

It was Lark's turn to ask a question, and he chose to veer onto another track.

"You seemed as surprised as anybody, when the disguise creature crawled off of Ro-pol's face."

He referred to events just before the Battle of the Glade, when a dead Rothen was seen stripped of its charismatic, symbiotic mask. Ro-pol's eyes, once warm and expressive, had bulged lifeless from a revealed visage that was sharply slanted, almost predatory, and distinctly less humanoid.

Ling had never seen a master so exposed. She reacted to Lark's question cautiously.

"I am not of the Inner Circle."

"What's that?"

Ling inhaled deeply. "Rann and Kunn are privy to knowledge about the Rothen that most Daniks never learn. Rann has even been to one of the secret Rothen home sites. Most of us are never so blessed. When not on missions, we dwell with our families in the covered canyons of Poria Outpost, with just a hundred or so of our patrons, Even on Poria, the two races don't mix daily."

"Still, not to know something so basic about those who claim to be-"

"Oh, one hears rumors. Sometimes you see a Rothen whose face seems odd ... as if part of it was, well, put on wrong. Maybe we cooperate with the deception by choosing at some level not to notice. Anyway, that's not the real issue, is it?"

"What is the real issue?"

"You imply I should be horrified to learn they wear symbionts to look more humanoid. To appear more beautiful in our eyes. But why shouldn't the Rothen use artificial aids, if it helps them serve as better guides, shepherding our race toward excellence?"

Lark muttered, "How about a little thing called honesty?"

"Do you tell your pet chimp or zookir everything? Don't parents sometimes lie to children for their own good? What about lovers who strive to look nice for each other? Are they dishonest?

"Think, Lark. What are the odds against another race seeming as gloriously beautiful to human eyes as our patrons appear? Oh, part of their attraction surely dates back to early stages of uplift, on Old Earth, when they raised our apelike ancestors almost to full sapiency, before the Great Test began. It may be ingrained at a genetic level . . . the way dogs were culled in favor of craving the touch of man.

"Yet, we are still unfinished creatures. Still crudely emotional. Let me ask you. Lark. If your job were to uplift flighty, cantankerous beings, and you found that wearing a cosmetic symbiont would make your role as teacher easier, wouldn't you do it?"

Before Lark could answer an emphatic no, she rushed ahead.

"Do not some members of your Six use rewq animals for similar ends? Those symbionts that lay their filmy bodies over your eyes, sucking a little blood in exchange for help translating emotions? Aren't rewq a vital part of the complex interplay that is your Commons?"

"Hr-rm." Lark throat-umbled like a doubtful hoon.

"Rewq don't help us lie. They are not themselves lies."

Ling nodded. "Still, you never faced a task as hard as the Rothens'-to raise up creatures as brilliant, and disagreeable, as human beings. A race whose capability for future majesty also makes us capricious and dangerous, p.r.o.ne to false turns and deadly errors."

Lark quashed an impulse to argue. She might only dig in, rationalizing herself into a corner and refusing to come out. At least now she admitted that one Rothen might do evil deeds-that Ro-kenn's personal actions might be criminal.

And who knows? That may be all there is to it. The scheming of a rogue individual. Perhaps the race is just as wonderful as she says. Wouldn 't it be nice if humanity really had such patrons, and a manifest greatness waiting, beyond the next millennium?

Ling had seemed sincere when she claimed the Rothen ship commander would get to the bottom of things.

"It's imperative to convince your sages they must release the hostages and Ro-pol's body, along with those 'photograms' your portraitist took. Blackmail won't work against the Rothen-you must understand this. It's not in their character to respond to threats. Yet the 'evidence' you've gathered could do harm in the long run."

That was before the stunning news-that the Rothen ship was itself captured, encased in a prison of light.

Lark mused over one of the mule spider's golden eggs while Ling spoke for a while about the difficult but glorious destiny her masters planned for impulsive, brilliant humanity.

"You know," he commented. "There's something screwy about the logic of this whole situation."

"What do you mean?"

Lark chewed his lip, like an urs wrestling with uncertainty. Then he decided-it was time to bring it all in the open.

"I mean, let's put aside for now the added element of the new starship. The Rothen may have feuds you know nothing about. Or it may be a different gang of gene raiders, come to rob Jijo's biosphere. For all we know, magistrates from the Galactic Migration Inst.i.tute have brought Judgment Day as foretold in the Scrolls.

"For now, though, let's review what led to the Battle of the Glade-the fight that made you my prisoner. It began when Bloor photo'd the dead Ro-pol without her mask. Ro-kenn went livid, ordering his robots to kill everyone who had seen.

"But didn't you once a.s.sure me there was no need to delete local witnesses to your team's visit? That your masters could handle it, even if oral and written legacies survive hundreds or thousands of years, describing a visit by human and Rothen gene raiders?"

"I did."

"But you admit gene raiding is against Galactic law!

I know you feel the Rothen are above such things. Still, they don't want to be caught in the act.

"Let's a.s.sume credible testimony, maybe even photos, finally reach Migration Inst.i.tute inspectors next time they visit Jijo. Testimony about you and Rann and Kunn. Human gene raiders. Even I know the rule-'police your own kind'-prevails in the Five Galaxies. Did Ro-kenn explain how the Rothen would prevent sanctions coming down on Earth?"

Ling wore a grim expression. "You're saying he played us for fools. That he let me spread false a.s.surances among the natives, while planning all along to strew germs and wipe out every witness."

Obviously it was bitter for her to say it.

Ling seemed surprised when Lark shook his head.

"That's what I thought at first, when qheuens fell sick. But what I now imagine is worse yet."

That got her attention.

"What could be worse than ma.s.s murder? If the charge is proved, Ro-kenn will be hauled off to the home sites in dolor chains'. He'll be punished as no Rothen has been in ages."

Lark shrugged. "Perhaps. But stop and think a bit.

"First, Ro-kenn wasn't relying on disease alone to do the job.

"Oh, he probably had a whole library of bugs-infectious agents used in past wars in the Five Galaxies. No doubt starfaring qheuens long ago developed countermeasures against the germ raging through Uthen's lymph pipes right now. I'm sure Ro-kenn's concoctions will kill a lot more of us."

Ling started to protest, but Lark forged ahead.

"Nevertheless, I know a thing or two about how pestilence works in natural ecosystems. It would be a complete fluke for even a string of diseases to wipe out every member of the Six. Random immunities would stymie the best-designed bugs. Furthermore, the spa.r.s.er the population got, the harder it would be to reach and infect dispersed survivors.

"No, Ro-kenn needed something more. A breakdown of the Commons into total war! A war that could be exploited, pushed to the limits. A stmggle so bitter that each race would pursue its victims to the farthest corners of Jijo, willingly helping to spread new parasites in order to slay their foes."

He saw Ling struggle to find a way around his logic. But she had been present when Ro-kenn's psi-recordings were played-sick dream images, meant to incite fatal grudges among the Six. Those present weren't fooled because they were forewarned, but what if the messages had been broadcast as planned . . . amplified through the compelling wave forms of the Holy Egg?

"I will tell of this, back home," she vowed in a low, faint voice. "He will be punished."

"That's gratifying," Lark went on. "But I'm not finished. You see, even by combining plagues with war, Ro-kenn could never guarantee annihilation of all six races, or eliminate the off chance that credible testimony might be pa.s.sed down the generations-perhaps stored in some cave-to finally reach Inst.i.tute prosecutors. On the other hand, he could influence which race or sept would be left standing at the end, and which would perish first. There is one, in particular, whose fate he knows well how to manipulate. That one is h.o.m.o sapiens.

"The way I see it, Ro-kenn's plan had several parts. First, he had to make sure Earthlings were hated. Second, he must weaken the other five races by releasing diseases that could then be blamed on humans. But the ultimate goal was to make sure humans went extinct on Jijo. He didn't give a d.a.m.n if others left a few survivors to tell the tale."

Ling stared. "What good would that do? You said testimony might be pa.s.sed down-"

"Yes, but with Earthlings on Jijo only a hated memory, all history will tell is that once upon a time a ship full of humans came down, stole genes, and tried to kill everybody. No one will bother emphasizing which humans did these things.

"In the future-perhaps only a few centuries, if someone plants an anonymous tip-Galactic judges would arrive and hear that people from Earth did these dreadful things. Earth will bear the full brunt of any sanctions, while the Rothen get off scot-free."

Ling was silent for a long moment, working her way through his logic. Finally, she looked up with a broad grin.

"You had me worried a minute, but I found the defect in your reasoning!"

Lark tilted his head. "Do tell."

"Your diabolical scenario just might make sense, but for two flaws- "First-the Rothen are patrons of all humanity. Earth and her colonies, while presently governed by Darwinist fools on the Terragens Council, still represent the vast majority of our gene pool. The Rothen would never let harm come to our homeworld. Even in the current galactic crisis, they are acting behind the scenes to ensure Earth's safety from the enemies besetting her."

There it was again ... a reference to dire events happening megapa.r.s.ecs away. Lark yearned to follow that thread, but Ling continued with her argument.

"Second-let's say Ro-kenn wanted all blame shifted to humans. Then why did he and Ro-pol emerge from the station and show themselves? By walking around, letting artists sketch them and scribes take down their words, weren't they jeopardizing the Rothen to the same eyewitness accounts you say could damage Earth?"

Ling seemed ready to accept that her immediate boss might be criminal or insane, but with bulwarks of logic she defended her patron race. Lark had mixed feelings about demolishing such faith. He, too, had his heresies.

"I'm sorry, Ling, but my scenario still stands.

"Your first point only has validity if it is true that the Rothen are our patrons. I know that's the central premise around which you were raised, but believing does not make it so. You admit your people, the Daniks, are small in number, live on an isolated outpost, and see just a few. Rothen. Putting aside mythic fables about ancient visitors and Egyptian pyramids, all you really have is their word regarding a supposed relationship with our race. One that may simply be a hoax.

"As for your second point, just look back at the way events unfolded. Ro-kenn surely knew he was being sketched when he emerged that evening, using his charisma on the crowd and planting seeds of dissension. After living so long together, all six races are affected by each other's standards of beauty, and the Rothen were indeed beautiful!

"Ro-kenn may even have known we had the ability to etch our drawings onto durable plates. Later, when he saw Bloor's first set of photographic images, he hardly batted an eye. Oh, he pretended to d.i.c.ker with the sages, but you and I could both tell he was unafraid of the 'proof being used to blackmail him. He was only buying time till the ship returned. And it might have worked-if Bloor hadn't uncovered and recorded Ro-pol's corpse, bare and unmasked. That's when Ro-kenn went hysterically murderous, ordering a ma.s.sacre!"

"I know." Ling shook her head. "It was madness. But you must understand. Disturbing the dead is very serious. It must have pushed him over the edge-"

"Over the edge, my left hind hoof! He knew exactly what he was doing. Think, Ling. Suppose someday Inst.i.tute observers see photos showing humans, and a hunch of very humanlike beings n.o.body ever heard of, committing crimes on Jijo. Could such crude pictures ever really implicate the Rothen?

"Perhaps they might, If that's what Rothen looked like.

But till Bloor shot Ro-pol's naked face, our crude images posed no threat to Rothen security. Because in a century or two those facial disguise symbionts won't exist anymore, and no one alive will know that Rothen ever looked like that."

"What are you talking about? Every Danik grows up seeing Rothen as they appear with symbionts on. Obviously there will be people around who know . . ."

Her voice faded. She stared at Lark, unblinking. "You can't mean-"

"Why not? After long a.s.sociation with your people, I'm sure they've acquired the necessary means. Orsce humans are of no further use as front men for their schemes, your 'patrons' will simply use a wide spectrum of tailored viruses to wipe out every Danik, just as they planned to eliminate humans on Jijo.

"For that matter, once they've tested it on both our peoples, they'll be in a good position to sell such a weapon to Earth's enemies. After all, once our race goes extinct, who will protest our innocence? Who will bother to look for other suspects in a series of petty felonies that were committed, all over the Five Galaxies, by groups of bipeds looking a lot like-"

"Enough!" Ling shouted, standing suddenly, spilling gold coc.o.o.ns from her lap. She backed away, hyperventilating. Unrelenting, he stood and followed. "I've thought about little else since we left the Glade. And it all makes sense. Even down to the way the Rothen won't let your kind use neural taps."

"I told you before. It's forbidden because the taps might drive us mad!"

"Really? Why do the Rothen themselves have them? Because they're more highly evolved?" Lark snorted. "Anyway, I hear that nowadays humans elsewhere use them effectively."

"How do you know what humans elsewhere-" Lark hurriedly cut her off.

"The truth is, the Rothen can't risk letting their pet humans make direct mind-computer links, because someday one of you Daniks might bypa.s.s sanitized consoles, draw on the Great Library directly, and figure out how you've been p.a.w.ns-"

Ling backed away another pace. "Please, Lark ... I don't want to do this anymore."

He felt an impulse to stop, to take pity. But he quashed it. This had to come out, all of it.

"I must admit it's quite a scam, using humans as front men for gene theft and other crimes. Even two centuries ago, when the Tabernacle departed, our race had a vile reputation as one of the lowest-ranking citizen tribes in the Five Galaxies. So-called wolflings, with no ancient clan to stand up for us. If anybody gets caught, we'll make perfect patsies. The Rothen scheme is clever. The real question is, why would any humans let themselves be used that way? "History may hold the answer, Ling. According to our texts, humans suffered from a major inferiority complex at the time of contact, when our primitive canoe-s.p.a.cecraft stumbled onto a towering civilization of star G.o.ds. Your ancestors and mine chose different ways of dealing with the complex, each of them grasping at straws, seeking any excuse for hope.

"The Tabernacle colonists dreamed of escaping to some place out of sight of bureaucrats and mighty Galactic clans-a place to breed freely and fulfill the old romance of colonizing a frontier. In contrast, your Danik forebears rushed to embrace a tall tale they were told by a band of smooth talkers. A flattering fable that indulged their wounded pride, promising a grand destiny for certain chosen humans and their descendants , . . providing they did exactly as they were told. Even if it meant raising their children to be shills and sneak thieves in service to a pack of galactic gangsters."

Tremors rocked Ling as she held up one hand, palm out, at the end of a rigid arm, as if trying physically to stave off any more words.

"I asked . . . you to stop," she repeated, and seemed to have trouble breathing. Pain melted her face.