The leader of the company wore twin crescent emblems of a full commodore on the armlets of a tidy, if somewhat threadbare, uniform. His bearing was erect, although he walked with a limp. Under a shock of dark gray hair, and dense eyebrows, his pupils reminded Maia of the northern seas of home. She shivered, and wondered why.
Inside, the officers seated themselves on mats while nuns arrived with cool drinks. Maia struggled to recall lessons about the courtly art of hosting men during this time of year. It had all seemed terribly abstract, back in summerling school. In the wildest dreams she and Leie had shared in their attic room, none had pictured facing an assembly as lofty as this.
Small talk was the rule, starting with the weather, followed by dry remarks about how lovely the men found her veranda and garden. She confessed ignorance of the exotic plants, so two officers explained the names and origins of several that had been transplanted from far valleys, to preserve threatened species. Meanwhile, her heart raced with tension.
What do they want from me? she wondered, at once excited and appalled.
The commodore asked how Maia liked the sextant she had received as a replacement for the one abandoned on Jellicoe. She thanked him, and the art of navigation proved an absorbing topic for several more minutes. Next, they discussed the Game of Life books — more as fine exemplars of the art of printing and binding than for the information they contained.
Maia tried hard to relax. She had witnessed this sort of conversation countless times, while serving drinks in the Lamatia guesthouse. The prime commandment was patience. Nevertheless, she sighed in relief when the commodore finally got to the point.
"We've had reports," he began with a low rumble, stroking the tendons of one hand with the other. "From members of our guild who participated in the . . . incidents at Jellicoe Beacon. We Pinnipeds have also shared observations with our brethren of the Flying Tern Guild—"
"Who?" Maia shook her head, confused.
"Those to whom loss of Manitou . . . Poulandres and his crew . . . come as blows to the heart."
Maia winced. She hadn't known the guild name. At sea, with Renna, it hadn't seemed important. On meeting the Manitou crew again, deep underground, there hadn't been time to ask.
"I see. Go on."
His head briefly bowed. "Among the many guilds and lodges, there is much confusion over what was, what is, and what must be done. We were astonished to learn the true existence of Jellicoe Former. Now, however, we are told its discovery is unimportant. That its significance is solely to archaeologists. Legends mean nothing, it is said. Real men do not seek to build what they cannot shape with their two hands."
He lifted his own, scarred and callused from many years at sea, as lined as the eyes which had spent a lifetime squinting past sun and wind and spray. They were sad eyes, Maia noticed. Loneliness seemed to color their depths.
"Who's been telling you this?"
A shrug. "Those whom our mothers taught us to accept as spiritual guides."
"Oh." Maia thought she understood. Few boys were born to single vars or microclans. For most, the conservative upbringing Maia shared with Leie and Albert at Lamatia was the norm. It was as important to the Founders' Plan as any vaunted genetic manipulation of masculine nature, and explained why flamboyant exploits such as the Kings' Revolt were doomed from the start.
"There is more," the commodore went on, "Although there will be compensation for our losses, and those of the Terns, we are told that no blood debt was incurred with the ruin of the so-called Wissy-Man. He was part of no guild, nor ship, nor sanctuary. We do not owe him any bond of memory or honor. So it is said."
He means Renna, Maia realized. Her friend had spoken of the cruel nickname back on the Manitou. While admiring the hearty, self-reliant craftsmanship of the sailors, Renna had implied that it trapped men in a ritualistic obsession, forever limiting the scope of their ambitions.
After Jellicoe was forcibly evacuated, how many generations did it take for the high clans to accomplish this? It can't have been easy. The legend must have fought back, clung to life, despite suppression at nearly every mother's knee.
Whether or not she ever learned the whole story, Maia was already certain of some things. There had once been a great conspiracy. One that had come close to succeeding, long ago. One that might have altered life on Stratos, forever.
The Council in those days had not been without reason, when it used the pretext of the Kings' Revolt to seize Jellicoe Beacon and oust the old "Guardians," as the Manitou's physician had called them. Those ancient wardens of science had been up to something more subversive, more threatening to the status quo, than the Kings' dim-witted putsch. The existence of the orbital launching gun used by Renna made it all clear.
A plot to reclaim outer space. And with it a radically different way of living in the universe.
More remarkably still, the Guardians managed to keep secret the location of their great factory — their "Former." The Council swiftly confiscated the great engines of defense without ever guessing how close nearby a secret remnant continued working to complete the plan. For generations it must have gone on. Men and women, sneaking in and out of Jellicoe Former, carefully recruiting their own replacements, losing expertise and skill with each passing of the torch until, at long last, the inexorable logic of Stratoin society ground their brave, forlorn cabal to extinction. A thousand or more years later it was but a threadbare fable, no more.
Renna must have found the ship and launcher almost completed. He used the Former, programming it with his OMTI experience and knowledge to make the last needed parts.
It was a staggering accomplishment, to have achieved so much in but a few days. Perhaps he would have made it, if not forced to launch early by the premature discovery of his hiding place.
Guilt was a more potent voice than reason. But now Maia felt something stronger than either — a desire to strike back. It would be futile, of course, especially over the long run. In the short term, however, here was a chance to lay a small blow in revenge.
"I … don't know the whole story," she began hesitantly. Maia paused, inhaled deeply, and resumed with more firmness in her voice. "But what you've been told is unjust. A lie. I knew the sailor you speak of, who came to our shores as a guest . . . with open hands . . . after crossing a sea far greater and lonelier than any man of Stratos has known. . . ."
It was late afternoon when the men finally stood to take their leave. Hullin helped Maia hobble with them to the porch, where the commodore took her hand. His officers stood nearby, their expressions thoughtful and stormy. "I thank you for your time and wisdom, Lady," the guild-master said, causing Maia to blink. "In leasing one of our ships to wild reavers, we unintentionally did your house harm. Yet you have been generous with us."
"I …" Maia was speechless at being addressed in this fashion.
The commodore went on. "Should a winter come when your house seeks diligent men, prepared to do their duty with pride and pleasure, any of these" — he gestured at his younger comrades, who nodded earnestly—"will cheerfully come, without thought of summer reward." He paused. "I, alone, must decline, by the Rule of Lysos."
While Maia watched in stunned silence, he bowed once more. With a tone of flustered, confounded decorum, he added, "I hope we meet again, Maia. My name is Clevin."
There was glory frost that night, floating slowly downward from the stratosphere in a haze of soft, threadlike drifts that touched the wooden railings, the flagstones, the lilies in the pond, with glittering, luminous dust. Most of it evaporated on contact, filling the air with a faint, enticing perfume. Maia watched the gossamer tendrils waft past, and felt as if she were rising through a mist of microscopic stars. For a long time after, she would not go to sleep, afraid of what might happen. Lying in bed, her skin tingled with strange sensations and she wondered what would happen if she dreamed. Whose face would come to her? Brod's? Bennett's? The men of Pinniped Guild?