Fire with Fire(159)

Yaargraukh considered. “When we are in private, or among humans, so shall we speak to each other. But among the Hkh’Rkh—particularly those of the Old Families—we must follow my ways: they will not understand your custom. And they would not approve of it if they did.”

“Very well. The Old Families seem less flexible than the New Families.”

“Like all generalities, that is an over-speaking, but yes: the Old Families feel that their ways are the only true ways. And that their bloodlines are the most worthy.”

“But if a New Family is often built from the survivors of an Old Family—”

“That matters not. An Old Family that falls is deemed to have grown weak: that it could be overthrown proves that its members no longer deserved to be an Old Family. And Old Families no longer fall very often; that is mostly a fate of New Families.”

“Are your Families always at war?”

“Understand, Caine. What we mean by ‘war’ is not what you mean. Only warriors are to fight in wars—and only warriors are to be killed in wars. Our planets—our homeworld included—are not blessed with the riches of yours. So our wars were not like yours. It was a breach of the honor-code—and madness, besides—to destroy cities and farmlands and great masses of the Unhonored.” He paused. “At least, it was thus for millennia. But now—” He looked up, but not at Caine: Yaargraukh was staring at his own delegation. Whether he was focused on First Voice or Graagkhruud, Caine could not tell.

Caine proposed the conclusion to his unfinished musing: “Now, things have changed.”

A single, slow pony-nod. “Things have changed—since we have factories. Since we have ground vehicles and air vehicles that range far and wide and swift. The honor-code is no longer law, but a tradition, a folkway: obeyed if convenient, ignored if it becomes too great an obstruction. And it is apparently becoming a greater obstruction with each passing year.”

“Given what you have said, I do not understand why the Old Families tolerate the growth of New Families, why they do not band together to eliminate them.”

Yaargraukh made a sound like a nickering snort. “You sound like an Old Family patriarch, Caine, though you do not mean to. The truth is that we are their pawns; the Old Families hold all power, almost all property, all authority. So the New Families do all of what you call the ‘dirty work.’ It is we who work mines, build structures under the seas, are granted leases and sometimes fiefdoms in deserts or polar wastes or on the marginal worlds we have found. And since I am your advocate, I may tell you—for you should know this—the Hkh’Rkh have only found marginal worlds.”

Caine blinked. “Yaargraukh, if you tell me such secrets, won’t you be—?”

“First, these are not secrets. We make the truth of us known at all times; you will see this in the self-reference, when you read it. Secondly, you must understand that I am indeed your advocate; it is part of my responsibility to ensure that you understand us so that your interactions with us are not marred by ignorance. And I say again: we have only found poor worlds. Even the best have only sparse vegetation and creatures that are so simple that one hesitates to call them animals at all. Most of the planets are too cold or too hot or too dry, and the New Families struggle to make them of value, so that we may survive—and so that the Old Families may prosper by our labor.”

Caine looked up at Yaargraukh. “I can’t believe they”—he looked at the other Hkh’Rkh—“would want you to be telling me that.”

The Advocate’s tongue extended, did a quick side-to-side wag, disappeared again: “No. Probably not. But you must know that our hopes—to find green worlds such as yours—have been unrewarded thus far.”

“Yaargraukh, I appreciate your candor, but why do you feel that these particular truths are so important for me to know?”

The lidless, pupilless black eyes looked at him. “Because, Caine, the Hkh’Rkh are restless. The Old Families had thought the stars would bring them new worlds upon which they would plant new seeds of their power. The New Families longed for worlds where they could claim good, rich land for their own posterity. The worlds we have found have not merely disappointed these dreams; they have made mockeries of them.”

“So why not press on further? You’re bound to find—”

“We cannot do so. We do not have the shift range. It may be many years before we achieve it.”

“But one of the member states might provide you with the technical information you need in order to—”