He’d always been slightly amazed that he, Afra Lyon of Capella, had been acceptable to Callisto Tower Prime Rowan. Maybe He cut off that thought. He had had parents interfering with him: he and Damia had taken great pains not to repeat such manipulation.
When Laria signed off he made his muscles go slack from the unconscious effort of such long `pathing. He told himself it had more to do with the nature of the exchange than age, since the Rowan was older than he and still going as strong as ever. That was when he also felt a bit of the framework on the left side of the couch, coming through the cushioning. How long had the couches been in use now?
Nearly four decades. About time to replace the padding.
He reached out for Damia’s mind but she was joyfully retrieving the scurriers she’d brought down with her accuracy on her sling-shot.
He smiled as he felt Morag’s envy and Ewain’s amazement at their mother’s casual skill. They could discuss Laria’s conundrum later.
Bringing her home for a brief respite from all those pressures and conflicting theories would certainly rest her mind and buffer her when she returned to duty.
They might be, as so often Talents said between themselves, only a thought away: but that was not precisely accurate. Contact, yes, but similarity or mutuality or harmony of thought was another matter: so was a cuddle when one was depressed.
Afra found himself at odds with his older son on many points on the issue of the Hivers, and even more puzzled by the bizarre actions and notions of his daughter, Zara.
Fortunately, her grandmother and Elizara, the T-l medic for whom she was named, were coping with her and she had passed through a difficult hormonal transition to young womanhood and stability. He knew Rojer was still fighting a private battle with grief, and a harder one with the guilt at having put Gil and Kat in fatal jeopardy. Laria could not escape being sympathetic to the Mrdini interpretations, even if these were considered biased by other, less involved citizens.
Afra swung his long legs off the Tower couch, feeling again the worn place – worn by just this action where the framework was no longer adequately padded.
Just like the framework of long-held ethics and morals was – in some minds – prodding minds through the once comfortable habits of generations.
Afra was also fully aware of other pressures at the highest level – for the Rowan and Jeff often used him as a sounding board and, as often as not, followed his advice.
The intransigence of Prtglm and the deaths of Gil and Kat were having more far-reaching effects on human-Mrdini relations than that carrier left on Claris Tower field. A strong faction of high-ranking Mrdini were of the opinion that, if Rojer Lyon had been old enough for the duties of a Prime, then he should have complied with Prtglm’s plan to devastate the planet Xh-33, regardless of the facts that Rojer was a noncombatant, a minor, following the orders he had been given by his superiors. He had only been on the Genessee as a substitute until his older brother was available. The fact that Thian also would not have complied with Prtglrn’s orders was irrelevant. But Thian already had `hero’ status in `Dini eyes which would have given him the stature to reason with the `Dini captain and helped him defuse the incident tacffully. It was also quite likely that Prtglm would never have tried to coerce Prime thian Lyon.
Yet, since the Mrdinis had allied themselves with humans, Afra mused, they must often have had dreams, and delusions, of using the human kinetic abilities to produce a grand rout of the Hive species.
The fact that the Talents had defeated a Hive colony ship without suffering a single casualty was a frequent theme of `Dini dream-projections and story-telling. When the Mrdini and humans had finally made contact, the humans had enthusiastically embraced `Dini aspirations and followed their guidance since obviously the `Dini had far more information about the Hive predators than humans did.
In total, such information boiled down to a painfully intimate knowledge of Hive ordnance, its range and destructive abilities: of the number of suicide ships needed to penetrate and destroy any Hive intruders; enough of the Hive mode of colonial expansion to know it was fatal to any planetary lifeform. Deneb V was remarkable as the only world where Hive tactics had been unsuccessful.