Valour and Victory (46 page)

The Vada is of
course, like one very large, extended family and no one even
thought of raising an objection.

Rilla outlived
her sister Zilla by some years. As was usual, on their retirement,
she and Zawlei left Vada for Zawlei’s home rtathlians.

There, amongst
the woods that circle the domta, the two of them spent the evening
of their lives amongst his rtathen.

* * * * *

The
Power-Core

It took many
years to excavate the hulk of the WCCS
Argyll
, the spaceship
that had brought half of the human colonists to Rybak, thus
indirectly saving the planet from the Dglai.

If, six
centuries ago James Rybak had not found the planet on his star maps
there would have been no way the Lai, the Lind and the Larg could
have destroyed the
Ammokko
.

The Dglai would
have won.

The resting
place of the
Argyll
is under marshland a few miles distant
from Settlement. There the engineers from the Technicians Guild
worked hard for years to dig down into the cloying, seething mud to
reach her, often delving only a few inches at a time, shoring up
the hole with painstaking patience. The pumps worked day and night
to keep the deep hole open and relatively mud-free.

Eventually the
engineers had dug deep enough to reach the hull. Using plans for
the ship found in the print-outs they then cut through the hull
(thriftily removing the metal) and entered the mud-filled interior,
the pump hoses sucking greedily at the black slime and dragging it
back to the surface (it made very good fertiliser).

Slowly but
surely the intrepid guildsmen and women made their slow way to the
engine room and located the power-core, undamaged in its cocoon of
see-through housing. With care, they removed it (and its connecting
wires) and placed it in a box.

They left the
Argyll.
The pumps were shut down and an eerie silence filled
the air where the steady thrumming and banging of the pump rotors
had been working for so long.

One of the Lai,
Aniku was his name, took the box containing the power-core and flew
away with it to the other continent where it would be kept safe …
just in case.

Without the
pumps the marsh mud began to seep back into the spaces.

There the
Argyll
lies to this day.

* * * * *

Niaill

Niaill and
Taraya had been surprised and honoured to be chosen as 2IC
Vada.

After the war
the Vada numbers were very much reduced and he worked with Julia
helping her make sure that Vada responsibilities were upheld.

He attended
King Elliot and Queen Zilla’s wedding at Fort, taking the
opportunity to begin the formal peace negotiations between Vadath
and Murdoch and where he met Robain again. The two became very
close friends.

When he
returned to Vadath he performed what he always considered his
saddest duty as 2IC.

In his bold and
clear script, the product of this duty can be seen to this day. He
wrote down, in ‘The Book of the Fallen’, the names of all those who
had been killed during the war and a resume of their lives.

Niaill filled
page after page. He often cried as he wrote and had to be careful
that his tears did not blot the pages. The tears flowed strongest
when he came to those of the members of the First Ryzck, the men,
women and Lind who he and Taraya had commanded, Deby and Alfei,
Berni and Dansya, Megan and Sachdei.

It was good
that Niaill had a tidy mind, as 2IC Vada he had to do a lot of
paperwork.

His wife Nadala
and he had four children, all four of who became vadeln-paired.

The families
(Niaill and Nadala’s, Taraya and Teriyei’s) often visited the mound
close to Vada where they would picnic. They were often accompanied
by Danal, Grainne, their family and the ltsctas of Asya and
Inalei.

There he showed
them Kolyei and Tara Sullivan’s message behind the stone dedicated
to Jim and Larya. He explained to them that this was where it had
all started - of how as a little boy he had found her message and
of how it had led him and Taraya to the domta of the Gtrathlin when
he and Taraya had found the Boton.

“We owe them a
great debt. If I hadn’t seen this and remembered it I would not
have known that Taraya and I must go to warn the Gtrathlin. Then
things might well have been very different, because of her, there
was time for us to do something, time to find the means to destroy
the Dglai, to muster the armies and to stop the Larg.

“What does it
say?” asked Delia, daughter of Danal and Grainne. “Will you read it
to me?”

“I don’t need
to read it,” he answered his niece. “It is ingrained in my
memory.”

‘
If danger
dire dost thrive.

And north and
south fight to survive,

Look ye to the
west,

Where at our
behest,

As Mariya was
solemnly bidden,

Gtrathlin
evermore keep hidden,

Deep inside the
ground,

Answers may be
found.’

‘
TS and
K’

When he retired
from active duty, he and Nadala, Teriyei and Taraya said their
goodbyes and departed west, to the other continent where his
friend, the Lai Haru now resided in an honourable retirement of his
own.

There he
visited the grave of Tara and Kolyei, the first ever vadeln pair
and thanked them for what they had done. Her foresight and writings
had saved them all. He breathed in the dalina blossoms that covered
their grave.

“Thank you Tara
and Kolyei.”

The wind
swirled around him, carrying with it a thank you of its own.

Rybak, Planet
Wolf, was at peace.

* * * * *

Danal, Elliot,
Julia, Niaill, Rilla, Robain, Zilla and Friends

It started out
as a small idea. Niaill had decided that it would be good for his
elder brother Danal to have a holiday and where better than on one
of the islands on the Island Chain where a number of hotels were
being built?

In fact, Niaill
had planned it as a birthing-day surprise for Danal. He knew of
Danal’s great friendship with Philip Ross, the Lord Marshall of
Murdoch and he had written to him, inviting him to the island
during the first two tendays of Lokrhed, in AL 622.

Like many good
ideas, it did not remain a secret between the three of them for
long and Niaill’s idea of a small, private get-together had
escalated into one of grandiose proportions.

Philip told
Robain who told Elliot. They thought it a wonderful idea and
decided to go too. Zilla heard about it and wrote to her sister
Rilla, who told others.

After much
letter writing and messages sent to and fro, no less than
thirty-eight individuals were planning to make up the party.

The royal ship,
the
Tala
tacked into the new built harbour one fine summer
day.

On board was
the contingent from Murdoch, some royal, others not but all knew or
knew of the members of the contingent from Vadath. Everyone on
board was intent on enjoying their vacation and the adults were
looking forward to making the re-acquaintance of friends they had
not seen for fourteen years.

This was not
the first ship that arrived at the harbour, another had come the
previous day and also full of noisy, excited passengers.

The ship from
Vadath had brought Rilla with Zawlei, Julia with Alyei and Niaill
with Taraya. With them had come Danal, Grainne and two of their
children, Delia and Aline. Danal’s Asya had come with Inalei and
their three ltsctas, Talaya, Danei and Padei. The last member of
the excited party was Jilsei.

Jilsei, who had
been Philip Ross’s mount during the mission to find the power-core
had expressed a desire to see Philip again. They had become close
during that time and had not seen each other since. Rilla and
Zawlei were there so that she could see her triplet sister. Danal
and his family had come because he, like Jilsei wanted to see
Philip again. He had heard that Philip was ill. Grainne had
insisted she join the party because she too wanted to see Philip.
She also wanted to meet Elliot, the King who had abolished
slavery.

Julia and Alyei
had been invited because they had been Susyc at the time of the
Dglai War. She wanted to meet Elliot and discuss how their two
countries could work together to eradicate the pirates who now that
the slave trade had been abolished in Murdoch had extended their
depredations. She also wanted first hand information about how
Elliot was coping with the Larg.

Niaill and
Taraya were there because the first idea had been theirs.

The hotel where
they were to stay was not the largest nor was it the most expensive
but it was big enough to accommodate them all and had one advantage
over the others. It was situated by itself, on the island’s
southern tip.

The Vadathians
disembarked chatting to each other and made their way to the hotel,
taking over most of the ground floor rooms (so that the Lind would
not have to climb up and down the parquet steps).

They settled
down to wait the arrival of their southern friends.

The Murdoch
party had set out from Fort the previous month. They had made of
their journey a kind of mini progress through the kingdom.

Zilla insisted
that the number of servants they took with them to the hotel were
kept to a minimum and Elliot agreed with her. This was a holiday
and not a state visit.

On board the
Tala
were only eight servants, three ladies-maids, three
valet-footmen plus a nursery maid and the Royal Governess.

King Elliot and
Queen Zilla had with them their five children, ranging from the
twelve year old Hilla to Ian, age five. Duke Robain and Duchess
Susan had five children with them, Robain, age ten was the eldest
and the youngest was little Philip, aged one and a half.

The Lord
Marshall, Baron Philip Ross and his wife Baroness Anne were
accompanied by their youngest son, the seventeen year old Kellen
David Ross, a young man very like what his father had been at the
same age and the unofficial royal bodyguard appointed for the
duration of the holiday.

With the three
families came Duncin and Stasya, Vadathian Ambassador at the Court
of Murdoch and Robain’s brother Liam.

* * * * *

Rilla, Danal
and Niaill were growing impatient.

“Is that the
ship?” asked Rilla, jumping up and down in excitement. It was a hot
day and the rest had elected to remain under the shade of the trees
in the hotel gardens.

“I can’t wait
to see Zilla again,” continued the happy Rilla.

“I can
imagine,” replied Niaill, looking at her flushed face. “I wonder if
she and the others have changed?”

“Sure to have,”
pronounced Danal. “Fourteen years! Elliot was little more than a
boy when I saw him last. Time and responsibilities are bound to
have changed him. He’s probably as fat as an egg-heavy Lai!”

“Do you
recognise anyone on deck?” cried Rilla.

“I think I can
see Philip,” answered Danal. “Look, that grey haired man at the
end. Must be Philip.” Danal began to wave and the figure at the
taffrail waved back.

The
Tala
drew closer. Rilla, Danal and Niaill began to recognise more than
just Philip.

“The tall man
dressed in grey, that’s Robain,” announced Danal, “and that must be
his wife standing beside him.”

“And there is
Zilla,” interrupted Rilla. “Elliot is beside her, look, can you
see? He’s plumper than I remember.”

“Age,”
explained Niall with a sigh, “it comes to us all.”

The
Tala
docked and loud were the cries of welcome and greeting from shore
to ship and ship to shore. The gangway was swung over and made
fast. The three on the quay watched the jostling on the deck.

It appeared
that everyone on board wanted to be the first to disembark. Niaill
could hear the pleading cries of the children demanding to be let
go but it was Elliot and Zilla who led the way on to dry land and
Rilla rushed towards her. The two women fell into each other’s arms
as Elliot looked on with an indulgent smile. Robain and Susan
descended next then Philip and his wife and son. Liam Hallam
followed, instantly recognisable as Robain’s brother by his
looks.

Then came
Duncin and Stasya, Stasya limping down the gangway with due care
for the uneven struts of wood that criss-crossed it.

The ten
children, with their nursemaid and governess followed Stasya.

Elliot, a
delighted smile on his face stepped forward to make his greetings
to Niaill and Danal.

“Well met by
sunlight,” he said, deliberately misquoting one of the ancient
literary masters.

The quay
resounded with cries about how everyone had changed during the
intervening years.

Then the
visitors from Murdoch followed their Vadathian friends out of the
quay area and along the leafy track towards the hotel.

In the gardens
the others were waiting and the ensuing noise rivalled that of the
noise on the quay.

There were
introductions to be made for those meeting for the first time.
Grainne for instance knew none of the new arrivals bar Philip and
the wives of Robain and Philip knew none of the northerners at all
although Susan dimly recognised both Rilla and Niaill from her
brother’s wedding.

Amongst it all
were the Lind who were almost as excited by the occasion as the
humans. Even Philip, in obvious pain and looking very frail was
talking in an animated voice with Jilsei.