Princess of the Void ch 58 - Renewal

The first day they have no luck. Even with Ipqen by their side, the translator needs only to say Tamuraq for whatever wary Eqtoran they’re communicating with to clam up and close off.

“Do you reckon there’s a different way we should go about this?” Grant conferences with Tymar outside the meetinghouse, in the artificial violet of the evening.

“Just be around them today, I think,” the cleric replies. “Just be present. We can’t blame them for being insular.”

Maybe not, Grant thinks. But our time is running out. Sixteen nights left, and then the death of Taiqan.

He goes to bed with plans and implementations and anxieties crowding his head. Normally when a day ends with this much consternation, he lets his wife’s sleeping breath against his chest carry it all away.

But Sykora isn’t here.

For much of the second day, it seems like it’s going to be the same thing. Grant and Tymar and Ipqen and their intermediary speak to blank faces and downcast eyes.

“Is there something I should do differently?” he whispers to Ipqen.

She shrugs. “If I could talk to them, I’d tell you.”

Grant sighs and squares his shoulders. He looks across the flickering bonfire to where the omnipresent music drifts from Tektnal’s amplifier. He approaches the man.

“Can I try—would you let me give this a shot?”

He holds his hands out. Tektnal gives a slow, considering blink. Then he lays his instrument into Grant’s outstretched palms.

“What’s this thing called?” Grant carefully hugs it to his chest, mirroring Tektnal’s playing posture.

“Lquok,” Tektnal says.

“Lquok,” Grant repeats. He taps a knuckle against it and listens to the resonance. He plucks a string and its spectral song crackles from the little shoebox amplifier.

The tuning is droney and microtonal; there are no frets to guide the notes into a scale. That’s okay. He’s played a fretless bass a couple of times out of curiosity. He traps his tongue between his teeth as he explores the neck.

Tektnal, who’d been shifting from foot to foot, pauses as Grant finds his groove. Grant plays a simple pentatonic along one string, finds his interval on the next, and strums a chord that makes the big soft-bellied Eqtoran grin and let out a string of gritty syllables.

“He says that’s very pretty,” the translator reports.

Grant rises his plucking along the instrument’s neck. “It’s a very pretty lquonk.”

Tektnal laughs. “Lquok.”

Grant gives a self-effacing shrug.

Tektnal starts to hum along with the music, a low and resonant tone that climbs and sinks like an autotuned sine wave. Perfectly pitched. Grant grins.

“You play that thing funny,” Ipqen says.

“I don’t use the same notes or structures you all do, I’m sure.” Grant slides down the lowest string. “It’s nice, though. Lilting.”

Ipqen hums along with Tektnal, and that same warm, sonorous slide comes out. Maybe Eqtorans all have good voices.

They’re departing the meeting house when a limber Eqtoran woman with a sleek fringe and a squinting, seeking expression takes the translator aside, into the shadow cast by the meetinghouse’s garlic-bulb roof.

“Royeb is—” The translator starts, and the woman hisses her to silence. “Uh, one moment. This way, please.”

The woman leads them to one of the white-topped buildings clutched like a cluster of eggs off the side of the meeting house. She ducks into the furthest-out building. Grant follows and is buffeted by a wall of sweltering, pine-scented air. The single room beyond is an uneasy amalgamation of synthetic creature comforts. A patterned rug with too-perfect, machine finished stitching. A kettle over a fireplace whose flame is an obvious hologram under a heating element. The Taiikari have tried their best, but this isn’t anyone’s home.

“Royeb thinks she knows where to look for this book,” the translator says, as their hostess murmurs over the fake fire’s recorded crackle. “She says her cousin is caught up with a Tamuraqist sect on Eqtora, that she’s always had a cache of unapproved literature. The Book of Renewal is among it.”

Tymar’s face lights up. “Is that Book of the same structural prefix as the rest of the Library Sacrosanct?”

The translator nods.

“Fuck yes. Get that location from her and then tell her thank you as effusively as you know how.” Grant extends his hand. “Thank you, Royeb. I can’t tell you how much this means that you’re giving it to us. I mean I literally can’t tell you. But I wish I could.”

She takes his hand like it’s a live wire linked to some sort of high explosive and completes one of the most incredulous handshakes Grant’s ever taken part in.

“Tni iknamaq tniqui,” she says.

The translator’s brow furrows. “A fish from the sky is still a fish.”

Ipqen titters. “It means, uh. Means blessings can be fucking weird sometimes.”

***

It’ll take a handful of days to get their hands on the Book of Renewal. Tymar and Grant take a break from poring over what parts of the Library Sacrosanct they’ve already got in order to eat together.

“If I’m taking a hiatus from the Pike on this weird religious study, I’d like to get an education in the Taiikari ways, too. I want to know more about the Omnidivine.” Grant tinkers with the cutlery his hosts have supplied. They offered Taiikari rations, but Grant requested Eqtoran food instead, which means he’s using an Eqtoran handhook to eat it. “How does an Empire develop such a universalist approach to religion? The Maekyonite way has always been a lot more… exclusive, when it comes to religion.”

“Our permissiveness began as a matter of necessity.” Tymar spears a steamed root vegetable the color of the fake sky. “When you’re unifying a world, a universalist approach, as you call it, that’s important. Long ago there was a thicket of Taiikari religions, and the church of the Omnidivine was a veritable melting pot. But on a long enough timespan… things melted, I suppose. And I am the agglomeration. It does my heart good to see the halls of my order fill up with the monks and missionaries from new civilizations.”

Grant pops one of the purple veggies into his mouth. It crunches and unleashes a thick oily roux into his mouth that tastes like almonds.

“As aggressive and expansionist as my species is, religion as a weapon, to unify a culture against its outsiders—this isn’t the Taiikari way, because it isn’t necessary for our warriors. They are eager to obey; individuals are as easy to rally round as dogmas. Is that a virtue or a vice? I’m not sure. But it’s allowed us to build a church of tolerance. I’ve read treatises on freedom and self-reliance written with such eloquent facility from our sister species. I’m sure that Maekyon has its own share. It’s somewhat like reading about desire, from my place of asexuality.”

Grant settles his hook across the shingle they’re eating off of. “Do you take K-wort like Narika?”

Tymar shakes his head. “Just my natural inclination. That means Sykora’s the only one of Inadama’s spares who are getting any. With luck, you’re knocking boots enough for the whole family.”

Grant coughs and sips some of the storm-dark, savory tea that they’ve been supplied.

“Handy enough as a cleric, I can tell you,” Tymar says. “My submission is to the Omnidivine exclusively.”

“What about the Empress?”

“The Empress is an Omnidivine facet. Closer to the Inner Core, she’s the deity of a score of imperial cults and, of course, the Heavenly Court of Empresses Past has a seat for her, once she’s, well, past. The Amadari of the Fekl Cliffs have a religion that revolves around whoever you love as your deity. So in a way, my sister’s the Omnidivine too. As are you. That’s omni for you.”

“Is that how it works? What you said to Sykora about dogma-shopping?”

“Somewhat,” Tymar says. “I’m not exactly denominational. The clerics of the Omnidivine are sort of… counselors. Our place is to keep harmony between the various faiths and to shepherd the curious or the doubtful to whatever facet of the Omnidivine best suits their personal relationship with God. Or the gods, as the case may be. For most Taiikari, that’s the ancestor worship of the Heavenly Court of Empresses Past. But it’s a point of pride within my order that there are Taiikari supplicants to nearly every religion we’ve incorporated. I’ve made a study of every civilizational aspect of the Omnidivine. I’m excited about encountering another. I can’t wait to investigate further into your species’ collection. Christianity fascinates so far.”

“Yeah?”

“The holy book is rather dense, in parts. I won’t lie. A lot of begetting. But there’s such gorgeous poetry in it. And crystal-clear familiarity in many places. The Garden of Eden, the Original Sin. I think I’m learning a lot about your people. The recognition of mortality’s intense flaws, the longing for transcendence past the needs of the flesh. The striving.” He nods thoughtfully. “I appreciate all your striving. I see why Sykora is so fascinated by you.”

“I’m not exactly a religious guy.”

“Perhaps not. But through reading these stories and understanding these perspectives on the metaphysical, we can learn our commonalities. Throughout the firmament, do you know what’s surprised me over and over?”

“What’s that?”

“How similar our souls are,” Tymar says. “All over. The eyes are different, but so much is the same behind them. Different versions of the same fundamental stories.” He pulls a cheap, glossy-covered copy of the Bible from his rucksack. “That’s what I love about this. How clearly it’s such a conglomeration of ideas and sources and voices. Some holy texts all stem from the same pen. They’re cohesive, but they aren’t intriguing. There’s nothing to grab onto but the handholds that were chiseled for you. Your people’s book reminds me of Taiikari Oksaianism, actually, the way it depends on archaeology and reinterpretation. So many voices. So much intrigue.” He chuckles. “The Song of Solomon was quite the eye-opener.”

“Is that the one that’s just porn?”

“It’s not just porn. But it’s surprisingly explicit, yes.” Tymar places the book on the table and picks his hook back up to spear another creamy strip of whitefish. “You’re afraid of the Empire coming for your home. I understand that. But I’m excited to learn from your clerics. I hope that by the time your cradle world has joined with the Empire, I’ll know enough of your language to pray with them.”

“My dad used to say he was a born-again, but he practiced none of what he preached. It gave me an odd taste. Seeing beliefs so boldly spoken and tepidly practiced.”

“Lip service is the common pain of the parish. You get plenty of that with the Omnidivine. Your wife, Divine keep her, wishes grace and blessings without actually feeling the import behind the words. No judgment from me. She’s already under so much pressure to serve the flesh and blood of the Empire. She’s always told me that having spiritual masters stacked atop her material ones seems like a recipe for a nervous breakdown. Perhaps it would be. All of Inadama’s bastards share a dogged approach to loyalty, I think. It can make us single-minded. But I hope some day to show her the succor one can draw from it, the practices and preachings.”

Grant rests his chin on his fist. “What do you believe in, Tymar? You personally, I mean.”

Tymar gives this question slow and careful consideration.

“You, Majesty.” He smiles. “I believe in you.”

***

Grant returns to his room. In its simple and spartan accoutrements it reminds him of the cell his wife threw him into, on his first night aboard the Pike. Taiikari seem to favor their sleeping situations recessed; in the absence of an architecturally included pit in the floor, they’ve supplied a low lip around the bed that puts Grant in mind of a crib.

Strange how quickly he got used to the luxurious silks and fabrics of his wife’s nest. The dorm room feeling of this bed bothers him more than his lowborn blood cares to admit.

In the pocket of his discarded tunic, his communicator chirps.

Grant blinks. A moment of panic lances through his chest. He’s not supposed to have any outside contact. All the names in his communicator are aboard the Pike. Is someone disobeying the blackout?

The communicator chirps again and then solidifies into a call tone. Grant mantles the low wall of the bed and retrieves it.

His chest compresses. MY BEAUTIFUL WIFE is calling him. He presses the sideswitch and the call connects.

“Oh Grantyyyde,” his wife’s dark-chocolate alto sings over the line. “Guess whoooo?”

“Baby, I thought—” Grant’s smile aches the edges of his mouth. “I thought it was too risky for us to talk.”

“In the latest survey report, they told me we’d be fine as long as I keep to close-band audio only,” Sykora says. “So I can’t see your face, but I can at least hear your voice. There is a minuscule risk of signal interception, but I really—forgive me. I need this.”

“I do, too.”

“I missed your voice so badly.”

“I missed yours.”

“What’s this Book of Renewal you’re chasing, dove?”

Grant rolls onto his stomach and props the communicator up in front of him on the bed’s nesting border. “Are you snooping?”

“You may have been my second call. The first was a request from the listening post for resources and a quick confirmation of your command.”

“Confirmation? They had to run it by you?” He scratches his nose. He surprises himself at how frigid his touch is in this cold-ass facility. “That feels like some princely disrespect.”

“I know it does. Do try to forgive them, dove. They need to get used to obeying an alien male. And I am glad they called. If a mission calls for a planetfall, I want to make sure it’s Pike boots on the ground. They’re the ones I trust. Sergeant Ajax has insisted on leading the effort, in fact.”

“He has?”

“Mmhmm. Wants to deliver the package himself. You know what I think? He misses you. God knows I do.”

Grant grins. “You think?”

“Don’t tell him I told you.”

“Aww.” Grant chuckles. “He’s such a sweetheart.”

“He is. I didn’t realize. I suppose because he’s a protégé of Hyax’s, I thought he was a natural hardcase. Anyway, I’m sure you’ll see him soon. I instructed him to bring my fond regards.” A shuffling acoustic burst accompanies her repositioning on the other end of the line. “Do you know something ridiculous? I’m here getting everything ready to bomb the hell out of Taiqan and you’re there looking for a way to save it. I’m the damn antagonist again.”

“It doesn’t feel like it.”

“That’s because I’d love for you to come home and stop me. You could tie me to the bed and keep me away from my orbital cannons.”

“That’s a solid Plan B. I might tie you to the bed, regardless.”

“Would you tell me what it is you’re planning yet?”

“I’m close to giving you something real. Let me make sure I’m not chasing my tail, and I’ll fill you in.”

“You don’t have a tail.”

“It’s an expression.”

A rattling rustle as she moves the comm. “I think Maekyonites have tail envy.”

“I think Taiikari wish they weren’t so shrimpy.”

“Shrimpy.” She gasps. “Okay. Now we’re actually fighting.”

“Let’s agree whoever gets their way on Taiqan is in charge of dinner for the next tenday. To make up for it.”

“That’s psychological warfare,” Sykora says. “You’re bribing me with cheese to let you win.”

Their laughs mingle and fade across the unimaginable distance between them.

“The first time we made love, you told me I’d never wake up alone again,” she whispers.

“Do you want me to give you a call in the morning and wake you up?”

“No, no. I’m being foolish. I’m an adult. You’ll be back in no time at all. And you’re never the one who wakes up first. My big sleepy husband.”

“If your pillow purred like mine does, you’d stay in bed all morning, too.”

“I miss you,” she murmurs. “I miss your face.”

“I miss your eyes.”

“I miss your hands. They’re so big.” Her breath thickens. “I’m thinking about them and touching myself and I’m too small.”

“I miss how small you are. I miss picking you up.”

“I want to be picked up so badly right now, Grantyde. I miss your beard.”

“I miss your scent. You have so many of my shirts. I should have stolen your pillowcase or something.”

“I miss how heavy you are. I want to be underneath you again. I want your shelter.”

“I miss your ass.”

“I miss your ass. I want to wrap my ankles over it while you’re crushing me.”

“I’ll be back soon. I’ll come home and we’ll have a big dumb cheesy Maekyonite dinner and then I’ll bend you across the table and fuck the twist out of your tail.”

They stay on the line and whisper the things they want to do to each other until Sykora’s voice cuts out and Grant hears her gasping exhalation in a tangled rush of static over the line.

He breathes with her a while.

“God, we’re ridiculous. Comm sex, like desperate teenagers.” She giggles weakly. “What’s wrong with me? My whole life by myself, relying on myself. And then you’re here for half a decacycle, and suddenly I’m falling apart without you. You bring me something that works, dove. Okay? And don’t let Tymar god-bother you too much. I told him you already had a Maekyon religion, so he’d leave you be, but I think that just excited him. It’s been so long—I forgot how inquisitive a man he is.”

“He’s been nothing but helpful. If anything, I’m the one pouring the questions on.”

“You’re delighting him, I’m sure.” Sykora’s voice saturates as she moves closer to her receiver. “Could I ask you for something?”

“Of course.”

“I’m sleepy, and I’m sure you’re sleepy, too. But could you… could we stay on tonight?”

“All night?”

“Just put the comm by the pillow. So I can listen to your breathing.”

He laughs gently. “Okay.” He rests the communicator next to him.

They don’t speak much more after that. Just a few whispered endearments before she goes unresponsive and her soft snoring pulses across the line.

Sleep finds Grant much easier than it did on the first night.

He dreams about Richard Hyde.

They’re at the mall; at the kind of mall you see in movies where there’s people everywhere and stores stocked full. Not like the malls Grant has been to, the half-dilapidated liminal ones. Dad keeps getting lost, and he keeps having to ask people have you seen a guy who looks like older-me? He’s sick and I have his meds. Have you seen him? He’s pointed all over the place.

When Grant finally finds him, he’s crouched on the ground. A little Taiikari girl is teetering toward him. C’mere, kid, he says. You got it. Come here.

She has hazel eyes, Grant’s daughter. That’s how he knows this is a dream. When she comes, they’ll be red, like her mother’s.

She’s growing fast, Richard says. The Taiikari words are so strange coming from his smoky drawl.

Not as fast as I did, Grant says. Making sure of that.

It’s hard, boy. Hard as hell. There’s so much you just gotta figure out, and so many people know exactly what you gotta do, but nobody has the same advice. And everyone’s so confident.

Hard. You wanna tell me about hard? You knocked up a Chili’s waitress. I’m challenging an interstellar empire for my kids. You never wanted me. And I want mine so goddamn bad.

You think you’re gonna be such a good dad, huh? Gonna do all the shit I never did, make none of my mistakes?

I could make them all, Grant says. I have Sykora in my corner. They’d still end up surpassing me. And I’d still be a better man than you.

No, someone says.

Grant turns around. Thror, the Marquis Consort of Entmok, is standing in the aisle. His head’s open like a rotten melon. His one remaining eye is wide and accusatory. Grant’s throat goes numb; he can’t talk.

“No,” Thror repeats, in his wife’s voice, and Grant sees through the gory hole in his head, out to the other side of the aisle, and Grant’s eyes open. A staticky sound of motion from the communicator.

“No,” Sykora mumbles. “No no no.”

Grant blinks the lingering dream away. “Batty.” He fumbles for the communicator. “Batty?”

Her groan resolves into a wail: “No!”

Grant’s heart bungee-jumps into his guts and back up his throat. “Sykora.” His hands scrabble for the communicator. “Sykora. Baby. I’m here.”

“What?” A shifting hiss from the other side. Heavy breath. “What’s—oh, God.”

“Are you okay? What’s going on?” Grant forces a full breath to calm his galloping pulse. “You were screaming.”

“I just—just a bad dream, dove.”

A wet sniff.

“Just a dream,” she repeats. “Two nights away from you, and I’m having nightmares about that shitty cell again.”

“Fuck. I’m s—that’s terrible.” He sits up, cross-legged, his communicator cradled in his lap.

“No, it’s not. It’s fine. It’s just my stupid brain being pathetic.” Her voice shakes. “I didn’t—I thought I was strong again. I thought I was all the way back, but I’m not. It was all fake. It was just you. You’re what was keeping me above water. And now I’m falling apart so quickly. Everyone needs so much from me and I’m messing up, and I keep on starting some lame joke or aside to you, and then I remember you’re not there. This is what I was afraid of. That I’d shake apart without you. I’m so weak.”

“You’re not weak. I’m your husband. I’m supposed to be there for you. It’s not your fault. Should…” Grant goes ahead and says it. “Should I come home? Should I give this up?”

“No. No, don’t. It was just my mind being silly. Just a nightmare. I’m not a child.” Sykora attempts a lightness in her tone, but she can’t keep her voice from quaking. “I just need to stiffen my chin. What you’re doing is…” A staticky sigh. “The evacuations are just a bare trickle. The takeoffs are all private luxury vessels. Any public efforts have stalled out. And what’s worse—there are no riots. No holding of the takeoffs by force of arms. The people who are left aren’t being kept there. They just aren’t leaving.”

Her words put a vertigo feeling in Grant’s stomach. This isn’t a plan B anymore. She needs this to work.

“These councilors are trying to call my bluff or find some backdoor weakness or else they’re crowing about this Book of Thorns.” Sykora’s sharp scoff hisses the connection. “I wish Vora’d never said that name to me, because now it’s all I can think about. The mentions are endemic now. Those numbers crawling upward.”

“What about Tamuraq?”

“Tamuraq’s there on the edges, and it’s growing, too. I think—I don’t want to put anything on you, but whatever your alternative option is, I’m praying for it.” A stuttering laugh. “Actually praying, I mean. I think my big dumb brother’s influenced me.”

“He’s a sweetheart. And he’s smart. We’re going to figure this out, and I’ll come back.”

“I know you will,” she whispers. “I love you.”

“I love you, too.”

“My whole life, the Pike’s been home. A home I’ve brought with me wherever I’ve gone. My deepest fear on Maekyon was that I’d return, and that feeling would be gone. And then I set foot back on the Pike and I thought—thank God, this place is still home. And it isn’t. I fooled myself. I changed.” She sniffs; he hears the tears gilding her words. “You’re my home now, Grant Hyde.”

His fingers are so longing for her softness beneath them they flex involuntarily.

“You aren’t allowed to leave again, okay?” she whispers. “Not until you give me a son.”

“Okay.”

“With your eyes.” Her voice is getting bleary again with fatigue. “So that I can see them while you’re away.”

“I’m hoping they’ll have your eyes.”

Her words have a soporific slurring at their edges now. “That’s why we’re gonna have three.”

“Three? I’d do three. Like Wen and Tik.”

He hears the sleepy smile on her face. “Mmhmm.”

“They seem happy.”

“They seem so happy.” She’s mumbling at the edge of coherency now as she drifts away. “I want babies.”

“I do too.”

“Come get me pregnant.”

He chuckles. “Be right there.”

A wordless, drowsy hum from the Princess. She’s slipping under again.

Grant rolls onto his back and looks at the shadows shift across his ceiling and imagines the weight of his warm little Taiikari wife across his chest and feels lonelier than he’s ever felt.

***

The shuttle slides into the fluorescent span of the listening post’s hangar. Grant remembers the first time he saw a Taiikari vessel, how silent and foreboding it was. The chattering calls of the hangar crew and the roar of the unfurling landing equipment and the whooping safety siren are a stark contrast. The shuttle lets out a hydraulic hiss as its bay doors open. Brother Tymar stands by Grant’s shoulder; the two watch the marine squad pile out from its crimson interior and file across the gangplank.

“Always so goddamn cold, this system.” The marines aren’t easy to tell apart in their full armor, but Grant recognizes the squad leader’s voice and the shape of his horn sheathes.

“Sergeant Ajax.” He raises his hand in greeting.

“Majesty.” Ajax salutes as he strides down the gangplank. There’s an emergency-red hardshell case in his other hand. “Brought your book. Hope it’s a page-turner.”

“Outstanding.” Grant holds his hands out and the sergeant places the case into his grip. The visible billow of Grant’s breath dulls its metal patina. “Any trouble retrieving it?”

“No, sire. Simple homestead, easy in-and-out infiltration.” Ajax taps a knuckle on the case. “Just about froze a bollock off when I stripped down for the camo, but that was the only threat of casualty.”

“Well, I’m thankful, Sergeant.” Grant inclines his head and dips his shoulders—the superior’s bow (one of five that Sykora taught him). “The Princess told me you personally requested to take this on.”

“Just wanted to make sure it went right. Her Majesty impressed the import, and I don’t know these listening post boys.” A wry tone edges into Ajax’s terseness. “Back to the training wheels.”

“That’s right. We’ll make a stuffed-shirt bodyguard out of you yet.” Grant puts a hand on Ajax’s back and pivots them to Brother Tymar. “This is Sergeant Ajax of the Black Pike.”

“Honored to make your acquaintance, Sergeant.” Tymar shakes the marine’s hand. “Are you His Majesty’s valet?”

Grant snorts. Ajax’s spine stiffens. “I’m a marine.”

“Is it not possible to be both?”

“Let’s just call him my friend,” Grant says. Ajax’s helmet pivots his way. The marine’s face is, as always, hidden.

Tymar gestures to the hardshell in Ajax’s hand. “May I?”

Ajax snaps the clasps open and passes the case to the cleric.

The three men behold the Book of Renewal.