C. J. Cherryh - Serpent's Reach

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SERPENT'S REACH

Suddenly, far off down the wings, there was crashing and shrilling of alarms, from every

point of the building: blue-hivers were in. A domestic azi darted from cover, terrified,

darted back again, up the stairs - and screamed and fell under a rush of majat down them.

Red-hivers. Raen whipped the gun to target and fired, breaking up their formation, even

while blue-hive swarmed after them.

There were human cries. Doors broke open from west-wing: Ruils burst from that cover

with a handful of blues on their heels. Raen left majat to majat, steadied her pistol on new

targets and fired, careful shots as ever in practice, at the weapon's limits of speed. Her

eyes stayed clear. Time slowed. They fell, one after the other, young and old, perhaps not

believing what they saw. Their faces were set in horror and hers in a rigid grin.

Then a baritone piping assailed her ears and the blues in all parts of the corridor signalled

each other in booming panic, regrouping to signals she could not read. From east-wing

came others, reds, golds, a horde of armed azi.

By the same author

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C. J. CHERRYH

Serpent's Reach

v1.0

Scanned and Proofed

by Neugaia (#Bookz)

[07/04/2002]

Mandarin

A Mandarin Paperback

SERPENT S REACH

First published in Great Britain 1989

by Mandarin Paperbacks

Michelin House, 81 Fulham Road, London SW3 6RB

Mandarin is an imprint of the Octopus Publishing Group

ISBN 0 7493 0100 7

A CIP catalogue record for this title is available

from the British Library

Printed in Great Britain

by Cox & Wyman Ltd, Reading

This book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not,

by way of trade or otherwise. be lent, resold, hired out,

or otherwise circulated without the publisher's prior consent

in any form of binding or cover other than that in which

it is published and without a similar condition including

this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.

"HYDRI REACH: QUARANTINED. Approach permitted only along approved lanes. SEE.

Istra."

—Nav. Man.

"HYDRI REACH: CLASSIFIED: Apply XenBureau for Information."

—Encyclopaedia Zenologica

"HYDRI STARS: quarantined region. For applicable regulations, consult Cor. Jur. Hum.

XXXVII 91.2. Native species of alpha Hydri III include at least one sapient species, majat,

first contacted by probe Celia in 2223. Successful contact with mafat was not made until

Delia probe followed in 2229, and mafat space was eventually opened to very limited

contact under terms of the Hydri Treaty of 2235, with a single designated trade point at the

station of beta Hydri II, locally called Lora.

"The entire region Is under internal regulation, assumed to be a majat-human cooperation,

and It is thus excluded from Alliance law. Alliance citizens are cautioned that treaties do

not extend to protection of Alliance citizens or property in violation of quarantined space,

and that Alliance law prohibits the passage of any ship, or person, alien or human, from

said zone of quarantine into Alliance space, with the exception of licensed commerce up

to the permitted contact point at Istra, by carefully monitored lanes. The Alliance will use

extreme force to prevent any such intrusion into or out of quarantine. For specific

regulations of import and export, consult ATR 189.9 and supplements. The nature of the

internal government is entirely a matter of speculation, but it is supposed on some

evidence that the seat of government is alpha Hydri III, locally called Cerdin, and that this

government has remained relatively stable during the several centuries of its

establishment . . .

"Majat are reported to have rejected emphatically all human contact except the trading

company initially introduced by Delia probe. The Kontrin company is currently assumed to

he the government of the human inhabitants. Population of the mission was originally

augmented by importation of human ova, and external observation indicates that

colonization has been effected on several worlds other than Cerdin and Istra within the

quarantine zone.

"Principal exports are: biocomp softwares, medical preparations, fibers, and the substance

known as lifejewels, all of which are unique to the zone and of moat manufacture; principal

imports are metals, luxury foodstuffs, construction machinery, electronics, art objects."

—XenBureau Eph. Xen. 2301

"MAJAT: all information classified."

—XenDureau Eph. Xen. 2301

"The fact is . . . we've become dependent. We can't get the materials elsewhere. We can't

duplicate them."

—report, EconBureau, classified.

"Advise you take whatever opportunities exist to establish onworld observation at Istra,

even to clandestine operations. Accurate information is of utmost importance."

—classified document, AlSec

BOOK ONE

If it was anywhere possible to be a child in the Family, it was possible at Kethiuy, on

Cerdin. There were few visitors, no imminent hazards. The estate sat not so very far from

the City and from Alpha's old hall, but its hills and its unique occupation kept it isolated

from most of Family politics. It had its lake and its fields, its garden of candletrees that

rose like feathery spires among its fourteen domes; and round about its valley sat the

hives, which sent their members to and from Kethiuy. All majat who would deal with Men

dealt through Kethiuy, which fended one hive from another and kept peace, the peculiar

talent of the Meth-marens, that sept and House of the Family which held the land. Fields

extended in one direction, both human-owned and majat-owned; labs rambled off in the

other; warehouses in yet a third, where azi, cloned men, gathered and tallied the wealth of

hive trade and the products of the lab and the computers, which were the greatest part of

that trade. Kethiuy was town as much as House; it was self-contained and tranquil, almost

changeless in the terms of its owners, for Kontrin measured their lives in decades more

than years, and the rare children licensed tore. place the dead had no doubt what they

must be and what the order of the world was.

Raen amused herself, clipping leaves from the dayvine with short, neat shots; the wind

blew and made it more difficult, and she gauged her fire meticulously, needle-beamed She

was fifteen; she had carried the little gun clipped to her belt since she had turned twelve.

Being Kontrin, and potentially immortal, she had still come into this world because a

certain close kinsman had died of carelessness; she wished her own replacement to be

long in coming. She was a skilled marksman; one of the amusements available to her was

gambling, and she currently had a bet with a third cousin involving the target range.

Marksmanship, gambling, running the hedges into the field to watch the azi at work, or

back again in Kethiuy, sunk it the oblivion of deepstudy or studying the lab comps until she

could make the machines yield her up communication with the alien majat . . . such things

filled her days, one very like the other. She did not play; there were years ahead for that,

when the prospect of immortality began to pall and the years needed amusements to

speed them past. Her present business was to learn, to gather skills that would protect

that long life. The elaborate pleasures with which her elders amused themselves were not

yet for her, although she looked on such with a stirring of interest. She sat on her hillside

and picked an extraordinary succession of leaves off the waving vine with quick, fine

shots, and reckoned that she would put in her required time at the comp board and be

through by dinner, leaving the evening free for boating on Kethiuy's lake . . . too hot during

the day: the water cast back the white-hot sky with such glare one could not even look on

it unvisored; but by night what lived in it came up from the bottom, and boats skimmed the

black surface like firebugs, trolling for the fish that offered rare treat for Kethiuy's tables.

Other valleys had game, and even domestic herds, but no creature but man stayed in

Kethiuy, between the hives. None could.

Raen a Sul hant Meth-maren. She was a long-boned and rangy fifteen, having likely all

her height. Ilit blood mixed with Meth-maren had contributed that length of limb; and Meth-

maren blood, her aquiline features. She bore a pattern on her right hand, chitinous and

glittering, living in her flesh: her identity, her pledge to the hives, such as all Kontrin bore.

This sign a majat could read, whose eyes could read nothing of human features. Betas

went unmarked. Azi bore a tiny tattoo. The Kontrin brand was in living jewels, and she

bore it for the distinction it was.

The tendril fell last, burned through. She clipped the gun to her belt and smoothly rose,

pulled up the hood of her sunsuit and adjusted the visor to protect her eyes before leaving

the shade. She took the long way, at the fringe of the woods, being in no particular haste:

it was cooler and less steep, and nothing awaited her but studies.

A droning intruded on her attention. She looked about, and up. Aircraft passing were not

unusual: Kethiuy lake was a convenient marker for anyone sight-navigating to the northern

estates.

But these were low, two of them, and coming in.

Visitors. Her spirits soared. No comp this afternoon. She veered from the lab-ward course

and strode off down the slope with its rocks and thread-bushes, tacking from one to the

other point of the steep face with reckless abandon, reckoning of entertainments and a

general cancellation of lessons.

Something skittered back in the hedge. She came to an instant halt and set her hand on

her pistol: no fear of beasts, but of men, of anything that would skulk and hide.

Majat.

She picked out the shadowed form in the slatted leaves, perplexed to find it there. It was

motionless in its guardstance, half again as tall as she; faceted eyes flickered with the

slightest of turns of its head. Almost she called to it, reckoning it some Worker strayed

from the labs down below: sometimes their eyes betrayed them and, muddled with lab-

chemicals, they lost their direction. But it should not have strayed this far.

The head turned farther, squaring to her: no Worker . . . she saw that clearly. The jaws

were massive, the head armoured.

She could not see its emblems, to what hive it belonged, and human eyes could not see

its colour. It hunched down, an assemblage of projecting points and leathery limbs, in the

latticed play of sun and shade . . . a Warrior, and not to be approached. Sometimes

Warriors came, to look down on Kethiuy for whatever their blind eyes could perceive, and

then departed, keeping their own secrets. She wished she could see the badges: it might

be any of the four hives, while it was only gentle blues and greens who dealt with

Kethiuy—the trade of reds and golds channelled through greens. A red or gold was

enormously dangerous.

Nor was it alone. Others rose up, slowly, slowly, three, four. Fear knotted in her belly—

which was irrational, she insisted to herself: in all Kethiuy's history, no majat had harmed

any within the valley.

"You're on Kethiuy land," she said, lifting the hand that identified her to their eyes. "Go

back. Go back."

It stared a moment, then backed: badgeless, she saw in her amazement. It lowered its

body in token of agreement; she hoped that was its intent. She stood her ground, alert for

any shift, any diversion. Her heart was pounding. Never in the labs had she been alone

with them, and the sight of this huge Warrior and its fellows moving to her order was

incredible to her.

"Hive-master," it hissed, and sidled off through the brush with sudden and blinding speed.

Its companions joined it in retreat.

Hive-master. The bitterness penetrated even majat voice.

Hive-friends, the majat in the labs were always wont to say, touching with delicacy, bowing

with seeming sincerity.

Down the hill a beating of engines announced a landing; Raen still waited, scanning the

hedges all about before she started away. Never turn your back on one; she had heard it

all her life, even from those who worked closest with the hives: majat moved too quickly,

and a scratch even from a Worker was dangerous.

She edged backward, judged it finally safe to look away and to start to run . . . but she

looked now and again over her shoulder.

And the aircraft were on the ground, the circular washes of air flattening the grasses near

the gates, next the lakeshore.

A bell rang, advising all the House that strangers had come. Raen cast a last look back,

funding the majat had fled entirely, and jogged along toward the landing spot.

The colours on the aircraft were red striped with green, which were the colours of the

House of Then, friends of Sul-sept of the Meth-marens. Men and women were

disembarking as the engines died down; the gates were open and Meth-marens were

coming out to meet the visitors, most without sunsuits, so abrupt was this arrival and so

welcome were any of Then.

The cloaks on the foremost were Thon; and there was the white and yellow of Yalt among

them, likewise welcome. But then from the aircraft came visitors in the red-circled black of

Hald; and Meth-maren blue, with black border, not Sul-sept white.

Ruil-sept of the Meth-marens, with Hald beside them. Raen stopped dead. So did others.

The welcome lost all its warmth. Save under friendly Thon colours, neither Ruil nor Hald

would have dared set foot here.

But after some delay, her kinsmen stepped aside and let them pass the gates. The aircraft

disgorged more, Thon and Yalt, but there were now no welcomes at all; and something

else they produced—a score of azi, sunsuited and visored and anonymous.

Armed azi. Raen stared at them in disbelief, nervously skirting round the area of the

landing; she sought the gates with several backward glances, angry to the depth of her

small experience of Ruil, the Meth-marens' left-hand line. Ruil had come for trouble; and

the guard-azi were Ruil's arrogant show, she was sure of it. Then would have no reason.

She put on a certain arrogance as she walked in the gates.

Sul-sept azi closed them securely after her, leaving the intruder-azi outside in the heat.

She wished sunstroke on them, and sullenly made her way into the House, the whole day

spoiled.

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SERPENT'SREACHSuddenly,faroffdownthewings,therewascrashingandshrillingofalarms,fromeverypointofthebuilding:blue-hiverswerein.Adomesticazidartedfromcover,terrified,dartedbackagain,upthestairs-andscreamedandfellunderarushofmajatdownthem.Red-hivers.Raenwhippedtheguntotargetandfired,breakinguptheirforma...

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