Chapter 11 - Back Home
When he finally arrived in a wide stone chamber, Xan was feeling decidedly giddy. He was glad of Kryslie’s grip, holding him up. He didn’t dare move in case his stomach lost its contents. He just had a moment to take in the colourful mural on the floor, when that odd weightless sensation engulfed him again. He concentrated on feeling Kryslie’s grip, to stop himself blacking out.
His weight returned, and he dared to open his eyes, and then his mind went into a full-scale panic. The room they were now in, ornate and richly decorated, contained all three of the Tymorean Governors and he was like the mouse in the gaze of three hawks.
He glanced around and saw that the guards he had seen in the city were arrayed behind him. He had nowhere to run. They would be on him before he could hobble two steps.
In the other direction was a large table surrounded by chairs, although a smaller, low table was behind the Governors, with several more seats.
“I believe you have things to tell me, Prince Tymos.”
Xan identified the Tymorean President from his likeness to the senior guard behind him.
“Yes Sir,” Tymos agreed, bowing to the Governor.
“Well then, let us sit and talk in a civilised manner.”
Xan saw Tymos glance his way, and he wondered if he was to go with him.
“Your sister is perfectly capable of assisting your guest. She can join us later.”
That relived Xan of one immediate worry. Right then, he felt ready to collapse, and didn’t care when one of the other Governors approached and gave quiet orders to a servant. He heard faint noises behind him, and Kryslie saying, “Aldiv has brought a chair, it is right behind you.” She eased him down into it, and he grabbed at the cape again.
He didn’t look up, even when Kryslie began to speak.
“Father, this is Xan, a former Aeronite Commander, and once part of Warlord Kellex’s command.”
“Yes indeed,” Tymoros remarked evenly. “I remember your friend from early in our tour. He looks like he is in need of medical attention. I would also suggest that you, Tymos and your friend need time to freshen up. If I am not mistaken, you have been close to some of the large felines. Their scent is unmistakable.”
Kryslie felt herself blush. “I’m sorry, Father.”
Tymoros smiled faintly, and simply said, “I am relieved that you are back here safely.”
“Father, Llaimos is okay, isn’t he? No one has tried to get at him, have they?”
“Your brother is perfectly fine,” Tymoros assured her. “I was going to suggest taking Xan to the infirmary, but I don’t think you should just yet. It seems that transmitting long distances does not agree with him.”
“I will get Alexon to come and tend to him,” Xyron said decisively. He had been listening to Tymos’s report, as well as observing the young alien. “And I will have Thea check your daughter over.”
“I’m fine,” Kryslie protested. She glanced at her twin, and caught a faint grin on his face.
Mentally she told him, “You will have that request later!”
She turned her attention back to what Xyron was saying.
“You have a significant amount of the fire suppressant chemicals on you. They are not meant to be inhaled, or kept in contact with the skin,” Xyron told her sternly. “And what were you doing to get your clothes smelling of cat musk. It must be the only smell stronger than that of the chemicals. I would have expected, that if you were that close to the fire up in the hills, that you would have rendezvoused with the fire control team”
Xan, feeling better now that he had been sitting a while, was aware of the polite censure in the tone of the third Governor. He felt compelled to say, “They found me, and helped me.”
“Yes, indeed,” Tymoros agreed, neutrally.
“Father,” Kryslie pleaded, glancing at Xan.
“You may accompany Xan to the infirmary, once Alexon has looked him over. Then you will let Thea check you. I can wait to hear about your travels, and Tymos will give us the important points.”
Tymoros moved away, beckoning to his attendant, Aldiv, and speaking to him. Then he went to listen to what Tymos was saying.
Alexon approached with his medical kit and began examining Xan, who gripped the cape firmly.
“Xan, he won’t hurt you. He is a healer,” Kryslie assured her guest. She sensed the cause of his fear.
Although he relaxed, he eyed the device Alexon was using to scan him.
“It is a medical scanner,” Kryslie explained, as Alexon moved to his bag and took out a sachet, and then gestured to Aldiv.
“Can you prepare this?” Alexon asked.
Aldiv nodded, and transmitted away. When he returned, Kryslie took the cup of green restorative drink from him, and knelt next to Xan to hand it to him.
“Try to drink this - it tastes better than the stuff in the gourd leaves, and is designed to restore energy, settle stomachs, and disprove the truism that all medicines taste awful.”
“Princess Kryslie, would you be serious?” Alexon chided. “And tell me what you know of his condition?”
Keeping her recitation to the bare facts, and glancing at Xan when she wanted confirmation of her deductions, Kryslie outlined the injuries Xan had suffered. Alexon listened intently, checked the reading on his medical scanner. Before he could protest that his findings did not match her report, Kryslie explained. “Tymos healed much of the damage.”
“Really,” Alexon said slowly. “And when did he discover that talent?”
“When we were in Reva,” Kryslie told him. “He helped Keleb too, after we escaped from Kellex’s clutches.”
“I was not aware of that,” Alexon admitted. “Is this something you can do too?”
Kryslie considered her answer, glanced at Xan and said, “Not to the same extent. I think I am only able to stabilise injuries, so they can start healing. Tymos can sort of make things heal faster. Except for himself, that is. To heal himself, he needs to work through me.”
“And you can mind heal,” Alexon said neutrally, but Kryslie caught his flick of a glance at Xan, and sensed the question. Had she conditioned Xan’s mind, to make him change allegiance?
“I am still trying to convince him he will be well treated here,” Kryslie stated, returning Alexon’s look. That much was true, but she would discuss what she had sensed of Xan’s state of mind, with the medic in private.
Alexon accepted her statement, and went to talk to Xyron.
“What will they do now?” Xan asked, still fearful.
Kryslie deliberately listened to what Alexon and Xyron were discussing, and then gave him a brief summary. “You get to rest. Alexon will take you to the infirmary, and do a range of physiological tests, but he believes he can fix your leg so you won’t have a painful limp forever, and he will ensure you have no infections from the cat’s bite. If you let him, he can do something about your back so it won’t heal stiff. You can trust him, Xan. He is the top doctor on the Estate. Once he has done what he can for you, you can add what you will to our report.”
“And you?” Xan asked.
Kryslie sighed. “I will be relegated back to the position of precocious child, damn it. I have to be checked over too, and then quizzed for my version of our trip through the mountains. Though that might wait until I deodorise myself. I really didn’t notice the smell until I was back here. Tomorrow, I will probably be back at lessons, but I will make time to see you.”
Even before checking Kryslie over, Thea took a grip on Kryslie’s arm and transmitted her to the outer room of her apartment.
“You will get out of those filthy guard overalls and have a ten minute sonic shower,” Thea directed. “I will go and find Delia, and have her arrange food for you.”
Kryslie watched her transmit away, finding it odd to be back in her own space. As she began to walk into her private area to get some clean clothes ready, she noticed in passing that a couch had been added to the furniture. Before she had left, there had only been the two armchairs and the low table. The new couch was in a matching shade of pale green.
Once in the inner room, she took another look around. Delia had kept the room spotless and dust free. She had also tidied the desk and put all her practice clothes out of sight. All the light panels around the room were curtained off, so the room was only dimly lit. She spoke the voice commands to open the curtains, and immediately the light level rose, and the screens showed the virtual outdoor images she had chosen. It made her feel less confined, even though she knew the views were only images.
Then, she went to her wardrobe, finding as expected that all her clothes were either neatly folded or carefully hung from a rack. With a sigh, she pulled out a set of formal clothes in red and gold, and wished she could choose something more casual. As she laid them on her bed, she felt the impact of her little brother’s mind.
He knew they were back, and was impatient to see her and Tymos. A picture formed in her mind of where he was. He was with Tanya, his mother, in the solarium. The need to reassure herself that Llaimos was safe, was an overpowering compulsion. Deciding in that instant, Kryslie transmitted directly there.
She arrived in front of two startled guards, but turned at once to grin at them, as a small figure darted at her. A woman rose quickly from sitting on the floor, to run after him.
The solarium was full of the bright morning sunshine, shining directly through the clear glass panels, onto a lush profusion of fragrant indoor plants. In places, the flowers and leaves were thick enough to seem like a leafy forest glade. The effect was heightened by the polished brown wood floor, and the leaf shaped wool mats in forest colours that dotted the floor. The one where Llaimos had been a moment before was littered with toy animals.
Over by the floor to ceiling window, Tanya was engrossed in playing the great harp, but she stopped when she heard Llaimos squeal in delight. Her attendant spoke quietly, “Your foster daughter is back.”
Warned by the squeal, and startled by how much her little brother had grown in the two months she had been away, Kryslie braced herself as Llaimos leapt at her. She caught him instinctively and returned his fierce hug.
“Smell,” Llaimos said clearly in her ear.
“Cat,” Kryslie told him, as Llaimos’s nurse caught up to her charge, and began to smell the odour clinging to Kryslie’s clothes.
Though her nose wrinkled at the unpleasant smell, she made no comment except to say, “So, you are the reason for his abstraction. He has been a terror since last evening.”
Kryslie shared a sense of mirth with her clinging younger brother.
Tanya had approached and taken the opportunity to examine her foster daughter. “You look fit enough, tanned even,” she remarked, tacitly ignoring her dishevelled state. “Have you seen your father yet?”
“Briefly,” Kryslie admitted. “Tymos is talking to his Excellency, and I had a guest to tend to first. I am about to see about a sonic shower - but I wanted to see Llaimos - to be sure he was okay. I see he has been growing.”
“That he has,” Tanya agreed. “Three and a half inches since you have been away.”
Kryslie saw the trace of unease on her foster mother’s face. It was not as overwhelming as when they had first realised that Llaimos was growing at a much faster rate than normal.
“He has been fine. We feed him a special supplement, and have been maintaining the daily massage. I am told he is thriving. As for the rest, he is learning astoundingly fast. Your friends have been marvellous in helping to keep him amused. In fact, you just missed Stenn. He had to go to lessons.”
When she had decided to come to Llaimos, she had known that.
“There has been no attempt to harm him while you were gone,” Tanya guessed, shrewdly, what had concerned Kryslie. “Were you expecting trouble?”
A shrug was Kryslie’s initial answer. She thought of the need to see Llaimos, it had seemed urgent…
“I can sense no danger here,” Kryslie said to reassure Tanya. “Kellex, one of the alien Warlords, tried to take us and failed twice. Since then, we have made a friend of Xan, one of his commanders. He believes Kellex will try for Llaimos.”
As she spoke, she shielded her thoughts from her sensitive younger brother. She felt him hug her more firmly.
Just then, a very annoyed looking Thea arrived. She said what Tanya and the nurse had not verbalised.
“Just what were you thinking, Princess Kryslie? Coming here in those disgusting clothes? You have that chemical muck all over your brother. He is going to have to have a bath to get it off him before it irritates his skin.”
Thea took Llaimos and passed him back to his nurse.
“I just wanted to reassure him that we were fine,” Kryslie told Thea. “I was just about to go back.”
The nurse, trying not to smell the odour that had transferred to Llaimos, remarked, “Maybe this little demon will settle now. He hasn’t needed you or your brother around to have picked up your heathenish habits.”
Thea was tapping her foot in controlled impatience. Kryslie noticed it and returned her attention to Tanya. “I want no one in this room to mention to anyone that I am back.”
She made eye contact with her foster mother, and Gisella who was Tanya’s attendant, and then the nurse and the two guards. They each nodded in turn, but Tanya asked, “Is there a reason?”
“Discretion,” Kryslie said at once, but in fact, it was a shiver of premonition that had caused her to speak the order. She had not seen any specific reason, though when she learnt all that had occurred on the Estate during her absence, the reason might become clear.
Thea cautioned, “Don’t think his Excellency won’t hear of this.”
As a threat, Kryslie ignored it. In her mind, reassuring herself that Llaimos was fine was a priority of equal importance to reporting on her travels. Besides, she knew that Llaimos would not be harmed by the chemicals, any more than she had been. He was giggling in delight at the need to have another bath.
Thea gave Kryslie another stern look, took her arm again and transmitted them both back to Kryslie’s apartment.
Delia was in an unnatural dither. She was dressed for cleaning, not as a senior attendant. She had dust streaks on her dark green livery where she had tried to brush the dust off.
“I did not expect you back, my lady,” she apologised.
“We didn’t send warning,” Kryslie apologised in turn, as she shrugged free of Thea. “It was a sudden decision and our return won’t be general knowledge just yet, so don’t mention it to anyone.”
Thea spoke to Delia. “See her Highness gets cleaned up, deodorised, and redressed in something suitable. She will be speaking to his Excellency as soon as I have finished with her.”
“I am going to eat, too,” Kryslie insisted. The smell of the covered breakfast, waiting on a table in her outer room, was making her stomach growl forcefully. “I haven’t since last night, and I want something that isn’t raw wild roots or half cooked hopper.”
Delia gave her a startled look before saying, “I’ll fix the sonic shower…”
“No, I will do that,” Thea decided. “I know what fragrances will neutralise the cat musk and the stench of the chemicals.”
“Then I will get clothes ready,” Delia announced.
Thea intercepted Kryslie as she reappeared dressed in a long fluffy after-bath gown, and directed her towards her bed. “Lie down and let me check you over. Then you can eat and get dressed.”
This time, Kryslie knew she was not going to win, and she obeyed without comment, lying on the side away from her clothes. She thought that Thea took her time examining her, but then admitted to herself, that because she was Tymoros’s Heir Designate, the check would be more thorough.
Before Thea finished, Kryslie heard the message chime from the communicator panel and automatically tried to get up to answer it.
“Stay put, Delia can answer that,” Thea insisted. Kryslie stifled impatience.
Finally, “You are still disgustingly well. Lucky for you those chemicals didn’t give you a severe rash.”
“Then I can eat now?” Kryslie said, rising quickly. Thea nodded
Delia added, “You have fifteen minutes before you are required back in the Conference Room for a meeting.”
“I am not going to inhale my food! Everyone else who will be at that meeting will have had breakfast, and this meeting is likely to last all day.”
“Mistress, …” Delia chided. “You know not to keep your elders waiting.”
Thea added, “And you are not running wild now.”
“Tymos will need to eat and clean up too,” Kryslie said aloud, aware that her brother was still talking to the Governors. “Has Morov been warned?”
That caused Thea to react and leave Kryslie’s apartment, as Delia uncovered the still appetising cooked breakfast.
Kryslie ignored Delia’s urging to hurry, even though she was aware of the passing of the minutes. She was forcing her mind back into the mould of dependent Heir Designate, and all the expectations on her relating to that rank. The mould chafed.
At the same time, she was aware that Tymos had only just finished his shower, and had yet to eat. She was too hungry to delay eating any more, but she deliberately ate slowly, not bolting the food. Then, she dressed with obvious care, quoting back to Delia, some of her attendant’s usual admonitions about her appearance.
The reminder message chimed before she was half-dressed, and Delia’s scolding increased.
“Stop fussing, Delia. Tymos hasn’t even eaten yet, and you know I am expected to look like my rank. The meeting can’t start until he gets there too.”
Tymos arrived in his neat and tidy apartment, called for Morov, but received no answer. Unfussed, he made directly for the inner room and the sonic shower. He hadn’t noticed his own odour until he had been in the company of the Governors for a time. By the time they let him have a break, he was wondering how they could have tolerated the smell for so long.
Except for his father’s initial comment on his dishevelled appearance and the odour, the Governors had listened intently to his report. He kept the recitation to the most important points, and answered the questions put to him by Reslic and Xyron about his understanding of mutant and alien capabilities.
Even as he spoke, he was aware when Kryslie arrived unannounced to see Llaimos. He approved of his sister’s initiative. Llaimos had been increasingly impatient to see them, from the moment they had arrived. Through Kryslie’s mind, he ‘saw’ how his little brother had grown.
When he reached the end of the summary of his two months in the mountains, Tymos knew the Governors were highly concerned by the signs that the aliens were getting bolder, but also gratified that he and Kryslie had succeeded in gaining the mutants trust, and allegiance.
Tymoros finally directed Tymos to go and clean up. “We need to call a meeting of all the senior staff and section heads, to go over all this in detail,” he explained. “For that, I want you looking like my Heir Designate, not some scruffy vagabond.”
At that moment, Tymos shared his sister’s moment of realisation that now they were back, they were no longer only responsible for themselves. He too, felt suddenly closed in.
Morov arrived at Tymos’s apartment out of breath. He had raced to answer the summons of the Chief Attendant, been given a terse instruction, before transmitting directly to Prince Tymos’s apartment. He was still dressed for working with the potted plants on the terrace, and had dirt on his clothes and his hands. His initial irritation was eased when he arrived in Tymos’s entrance room, and heard the sonic shower in operation. As he picked up the trail of filthy and reeking clothes, he was glad he was not wearing his attendant’s livery.
He realised that Prince Tymos had heard him, when his name was called, followed by, “And I need food and clean clothes, like ten minutes ago.”
Well, the food was on its way, Morov knew, so he went to get suitable clothing out for his charge. A formal outfit, but not his silver and gold ‘robes of state’.
Both were ready when Tymos emerged from the shower cubicle wearing a light robe.
“I had no idea you were back,” Morov apologised, as he served the food and placed a chair next to the cleared desk he was using as the table.
“No, it was sudden and we won’t be making it known,” Tymos told him.
“I understand, Prince Tymos, but surely your friends…”
“Not even to them. I am sure they would be discreet, but…not yet.”
Tymos sat and took an obvious smell of the aroma of the meal.
“Stenn Reslic keeps asking me if I know when you will be back,” Morov explained.
“He will understand,” Tymos assured him, speaking with his mouth half full.
“And Zacary too,” Morov commented, but this time his voice sounded disapproving.
“Zacary? Why would he…? I thought he would be back off with the Peace Corps somewhere by now.”
“He hasn’t been given clearance yet, Prince Tymos. He has been assigned duties around the Estate. He was in a terrible state when he returned.”
The communicator beeped a message.
Tymos ignored it and commented, “I heard he had been tortured by the aliens, but if he got himself back here, he can’t have been too bad. You will have to fill me in later about him. I suspect that message is my time is up reminder. I have to report back to Father.”
Morov checked the message and confirmed the contents as Tymos continued to shovel the food into his mouth and eat as fast as he could.