The former Kell Hound let a grin light his face. "May you and Khan Ulric continue to take pride in my actions."

"Very good, very good, indeed." Cyrilla tilted her head as she studied Phelan for a moment. "But you made a great mistake in pulling Vlad from the wreckage of the bridge of the Dire Wolf,young man."

The statement startled Phelan, and he rubbed without thinking at the cut Vlad had given him during his adoption ceremony into the Clan. On one hand, he was praised for saving the Khan, but rebuked for saving another Wolf warrior. "I am confused. Vlad is a warrior of the Wolf Clan. How could I not save him and still serve the Clan?"

Cyrilla considered his reply with a smile. "A valid point. Would you always put duty to the Clan above what might be your best interest?"

"Hypothetical questions are always the ones that get me into trouble when I try to answer them."

"A deft parry. Good." Cyrilla smiled again, folding her hands in her lap. "Do you understand why I think you should have let Vlad die?"

"Not really, but having been with the Clans for a while, I think I can guess."

"Good." Cyrilla leaned back into her chair. "Please explain."

"Bottom line is that the fewer enemies you have, the longer you live." Phelan sighed heavily. "Ever since Vlad captured me in a battle on The Rock a year and a half ago, he has looked for every opportunity to prove that he is superior to me and anyone else from the Successor States. He is not alone in this attitude, but he is perhaps rather more enthusiastic in expressing it.

"Though I beat Vlad in a fist fight on Rasalhague, he could say that I jumped him unexpectedly when he was still exhausted from the recent battle for the world. He lost no face, but Vlad's not one to allow himself so easy an out. Even giving me a severe beating aboard the Dire Wolfhas not bled off his hatred because I never let him break me."

The elder MechWarrior watched him carefully. "And this leads you to believe ..."

Phelan shrugged. "One way or another, Vlad will do anything to get me. He took my adoption into the Clans as a personal affront. He was forced to welcome me into the House of Ward, a duty he seemed particularly loathe to perform."

Cyrilla rested her chin on steepled fingers. "You must have known all this before you found him on the bridge."

The young man nodded. "Yes, but I did not know the body lying there was his until I got to where he was. By then, I really had no choice."

"Even knowing that he hates you with his whole heart and soul, quiaff?"

Phelan smiled in spite of himself. "I never said I wouldn't regretsave him. I only said I had no choice in the matter." He shrugged. "I am not the sort of MechWarrior who shoots up fleeing 'Mech pilots, and I am not the sort who could abandon someone wounded, be it enemy or friend, if I could do something to save them."

Phelan looked from Cyrilla to Natasha with a rueful smile. "I will say one thing for Vlad. He can carry a grudge further than anyone I have ever met. It's hard to believe he can hate me so much because I shot some armor off his 'Mech. Especially since he blew the hell out of my Wolfhoundat the same time."

"There ismore to it than that, Phelan Wolf." Cyrilla pointed to a cream-colored chair near Phelan. "Please be seated. I think, in short order, I can help to clear up that mystery. Do you know what it means to have a Bloodname, quineg?"

"Neg."

"Three centuries ago, General Aleksandr Kerensky led ninety percent of the Star League's army from the space you call the Inner Sphere. He detested the civil wars and nationalistic pressures that had wracked the Star League from the time Stefan the Usurper proclaimed himself First Lord. After smashing the Usurper, Kerensky took his people away, hoping to keep them from the path of self-destruction toward which the rest of humanity seemed hell-bent."

She leaned back in her chair, seeming to warm to the task of telling the tale of history. "Kerensky feared that his troops would begin to fight among themselves if they had no common cause to unite them. He reorganized the armies and mothballed seventy-five percent of the BattleMechs and materiel they had brought with them. He told his troops that bringing industry on line to replace parts would take time, so they had to limit the number of machines in use. He set up a system by which pilots were grouped into quartets tested yearly to see which would be the Primary or Secondary pilot for a 'Mech. The other two members of the team would perform support and tactical duties.

"Unfortunately, General Kerensky's death shattered the last bond holding the former Star League troops together. Within a generation, the Star League troops who had left with Kerensky had battered themselves worse than all the damage the Successor States have done Anone another since then. Colonies survived by the barest of margins, and cobbled-together BattleMechs stalked the landscape scavenging for spare parts, ammo, and food."

The white-haired woman leaned forward, resting her elbows on her knees. "The only exception was Strana Mechty, the depot world. The name is Russian and means Land of Dreams, so named to encourage people to work together. From there, Nicholas Kerensky and Jennifer Winson led some six hundred Kerensky loyalists on a crusade to destroy the bandits wandering the colony worlds, intending to unite them all under the control of Strana Mechty.

"To these loyalists Nicholas Kerensky gave the highest honor he could imagine within the new society he formed. From that time forward, the surnames of these people would be designated as Bloodnames. Within any Clan, only twenty-five individuals are allowed to claim one of these Bloodnames. And such a claim is acknowledged only after that individual has defeated anyone else who makes a claim on the name."

Cyrilla touched a button on the arm of her chair. A wall panel slid up to reveal a holovid viewing screen. With the touch of another button, the image of a nursery filled with row upon row of babies appeared on the screen. A half-dozen older people wandered among the children, attending to their needs with the gentle care of loving grandparents.

"Nicholas Kerensky launched the Clans on an ambitious plan for rebuilding. Using the most advanced techniques available to our scientists, he began to match warriors and their bloodlines. Children were bred specifically to cultivate those traits that would make them the ultimate in warriors. As you have seen with Evantha, children intended as Elementals are bred for size and strength. Our pilots, like Carew, are bred physically small, but quick of mind and reflex to handle the difficulties of air combat."

"And others, like Vlad and Ranna, are bred to be Mech-Warriors?"

Cyrilla nodded. "What you see here is a sibko. One hundred children are produced from artificial wombs at the same time and then raised together. Natasha and I were raised in the same sibko, though we do not share any recent ancestors. As the children grow, they are trained and tested to determine if the desired traits have bred true. Yet before the first sibko is five years old, another from similar pairings will be started, and the first sibko will have lost twenty percent of its children to accidents or rejection because of poor test scores."

Phelan frowned, not wanting to accept what he was hearing. "You mean children are allowed to die if their bloodline is not pure? That isn't natural selection. It's monstrous!"