“Your history is correct. Alas, the Maxer Movement is not completely extinguished, and I fear this flaw in our defenses can be laid at their door.”

“I did not know!” Memor did not have to pretend; this was indeed bad news, a defense flaw coming at the worst time, with Late Invaders at large.

“It is not your matter, Memor. Concentrate upon the Late Invaders.”

“You mean, capture and kill?” That would be easiest, and would get Memor out of the spotlight. Though she would regret their loss, for they were intriguing in their odd mysteries.

“No! I felt that way before, but there are now new issues. To understand, and keep these discussions secure, we must visit the Vaults.”

Memor felt a tremor of unease ripple up from her Undermind. Grave matters came to those who had to consult the Vaults. “But why?”

“That you must ask Unajiuhanah, Keeper of the Vault Library.”

The idea itself was puzzling, and filled Memor with dread.

FOURTEEN

About Unajiuhanah there was a timeworn joke, that she loved to sing the ancient songs at public events, even at funerals. Asked if she had performed at a recent high burial, Unajiuhanah answered no, and the riposte was, “Then it was a merciful death indeed.”

“Compliments to you, Asenath,” Unajiuhanah began with a ritual rippling feather salute in gray and violet. This achieved the feat of representing the Great Seal of the Vaults in an actual fluttering picture, a striking image on Unajiuhanah’s high fan display. Memor could even see a jittering vague white patch that stood for the formal writing of ancient times, indecipherable now but signifying the weight of vast history. It shimmered like a mute reminder of the long purpose of the Bowl and thus of the Vault.

Asenath introduced Memor, which proved unnecessary as Unajiuhanah brushed aside a summary of Memor’s life details and turned to address her directly.

“Memor, I will entertain your notions because I knew your great ancestors and feel I owe them some indulgence. Indeed, I live because a certain fine SheFolk many generations ago stood and fought against an insurrection that very nearly toppled all order in this Vault. That ForeFolk stands before me now, represented by a minute genetic fraction—in you, Memor.”

“I am most grateful,” Memor said with a simple mild flourish of ruby, embarrassed neck-fringe.

“Now I have a surprise of sorts for you, to bring you into our deliberations. Here is your other self.”

Unajiuhanah paused, her voice rising to call, “Bemor, come forth.”

“Be More” Memor heard, the very name plunging her backwards into her young days—while her eyes fixed on the big, somewhat ungainly senior male that was … she saw, breathing hard … herself. At least, genetically. Bemor! Lost brother! They had been separated long before Memor went through the Revealing. Now with “Bemor” she heard again the joke between the two of them. It had been funny then while young but had turned sour many twelve-cubed Annuals ago … Be More. More than Memor. Be smarter, swifter, know more, exert power, fathom more deeply, stand taller, command power. Be More.

“Brother!” Memor called, for Bemor had not suffered the Revealing’s agonies and transformations—all done in their youth, by high design. Be more … be male.

“I thought this meeting should best come as a surprise, or else one or the other or even both of you would surely dodge it.” Unajiuhanah gave a mirthful display, fluttering ruby breast-feathers discreetly. Clearly she was enjoying this.

“Your great turbine of a mind reports you well,” Bemor said as overture. “I’ve sensed your reports. Quite complex and deep.”

“Sensed?” Memor realized her own whole-mind scans, carried out routinely to monitor performance, were not private. Usually they were, but of course not in matters of high security.

“They are also quite entertaining,” Bemor said. “You remember well, and your Undermind is a source of insight. The facts you confronted alone are high drama. I could scarcely imagine such odd aliens as these Late Invaders. What zest!”

“You mean, how did I let them escape?”

“No, I mean they have a crafty nature we could use.”

Memor was sure Your great turbine of a mind was an ironic salute, but best not to draw Unajiuhanah’s attention to it. “If we can Adopt them, perhaps—”

“I think not. Too unstable, as species go. They can be better used to carry out our larger cruising agenda.”

This was new, beyond the time-honored precepts of the Astronomers, and indeed, of all other castes. Larger cruising agenda? Memor should be shocked, she knew, but had no time for that now. “I acted to constrain their actions, under Asenath’s direction.”

Bemor waved this aside with a cluster-flourish in green and sea blue. “Those orders now vanish. There is new wisdom, falling upon us from the stars.”

Memor contented herself with a fan-feather gesture and let Asenath carry the conversation. She was still staggering mentally from the sudden meeting of her near-self: the path not taken, if somehow she could have stayed a male. Bemor had a quick, brusque way of saying things that swept away the niceties of diplomacy and polite evasion. Quite male. Best to change direction.

“I was discussing how I was forced to carry forward the reconnaissance of the Sil, who had sheltered the primates. They proved better at bringing down our skyfish with their simple chemical cannon, admittedly. I—”

“Fled, as you should.” Bemore spoke kindly, shuffling his large feet in a faint echo-dance of welcome—to soften what was to come? “The primate ingenuity combined nonlinearly with that of the Sil, who were always an irksome and crafty kind.”

“Destabilizing,” Asenath added, “still.” But then she backed away, as if to let the twins negotiate their own newfound equilibrium. So did Unajiuhanah, with a muted bow. Memor saw this meeting was arranged to divulge information, in a way slanted to make best use of the perpetual jockeying for position in the Astronomer hierarchy—and of course, in the status of the Vaulted, who tended the most ancient records, integrating them with the emerging new.

So, take the momentum away from them. “What new wisdom intrudes?” Memor chose to use an ancient saying, said to come from the Builders, though across the sum of Bowl eras, no one truly knew.

“We fathom more of the gravitational waves, and their true origin,” Bemor said.

“As I recall, they come from Glory, or from some source well beyond,” Memor said, for this had been the received wisdom from before she was born.

“Not so,” Bemor said. “Not beyond. The source is in the immediate Glorian system.”

“There is no plausibility, as some argued, that the gravitational waves came from a chance coincidence in the sky? From some cosmological source far away?”

“Not even close. I see your early education has been a waste of time.”

Memor knew this gibe, a lancing shot at her earlier ranking in the rigorous status queue of the elect, pre-Astronomer examinations. Quadlineal calculus had always eluded her somehow, and Bemor had never let her forget it.… She now had to get back some position in this conversation playing out before their elders.

“But surely there cannot be heavy masses moving near a planetary system. That would render unstable the orbits of any planet nearby—”

“No, that must now be considered untrue. Facts say otherwise. We have heard from our Web trading partners.”

“What can they—?”

Bemor beamed, yet kept to his clear, factual mask. “You may recall some long Annuals ago we asked them to erect gravitational wave antennas to concentrate upon Glory. They have so done, and with felicitous trading strategies, we have secured their data.”

Very well, play for time. And think. “I did not know that. Expensive, I suppose?”