68 - No Longer Cursed

Dear son,

You are not going to believe what is going on here at home.  Father Radiance must be spinning like a drop-spindle in his grave mountain, with what his son is bringing to the city.

The Mandery school is re-growing on the stump of rock where it used to be.  The blighted cursed stump is cursed no longer.  There is a fragile, lacey and elegant building growing there. It sprang up in a few days, the skeleton of the school glowing at night like sun-flies were in the stone.  No one ever said that the old school was so beautiful, if it looked like that.

The New Releasers are proclaiming from every street that mandery, version two point one, is once more beloved of the Light and the Dark.

Some people are speculating that this is happening because his Radiance has ceased exposing self-lovers.  It is no longer a crime.  Quite a few other people have been waiting for the Great Hive to be struck by lightning and flung into the canyon for going against the natural order.

Their so-called natural order.  There are spike mice who live in threes, and waxer dogs who are both male and female in one, and... oh you know that the binary reproductive strategy is far from ‘natural’. I am so relieved that things are changing for the better.  It feels better.  It feels new.  It makes it easier to fight off my nightmares where something wants to turn my mind off.

The proclamations from the Sunrise Loggia are being recited and read out all over the city.  The Light and the Dark have reconciled and all Mandery is not only wanted, it is desperately wanted.  There are new nomarcs... astonishingly attractive young people, if you ask me, who will be testing everyone for any kind of mandery, even as little as changing the colour of a scrap of paper.

The hospices are going to be getting more people and more help all of a sudden and even crashed and burned old ladies like me are going to be talking to these new nomarcs.  The nasty old man down the hall who burned himself on... oh, I can’t say it, though Yasna has helped me understand that there are people interested in war birds in... in... an... abusive way, shall I say.  He was making and selling such images when he got burned.... anyway, he is certain that the new Hive lords are former zardukar.  Pretty, empty-headed sex workers who slept their way to his Radiance.

Yasna and I agree.  His former work seems to have tainted his mind. Yasna thinks that I might be able to help these lordly children.  He says it was my potential in mandery that caused my trouble to begin with.  I might have a true calling if I can just fix enough of myself.

I am seeing less and less of the random now, my son.  I woke from a nap the other day, hearing an enormous report and was afraid at first that the rocks had cracked or something like that.  I see something however.  Something that disturbs me.  The monster who first clawed open my mind, cracked it like a shell to pick me out of myself, wiggling like a borrower crab.  I still see it.  It tears at the foundations of the Sunrise Loggia, struggling to pick out and devour all the mirrors and gemstones and swallow them.  But it has no back so everything it eats is ruined and tumbles out its rear to fall into the canyon.

No matter what Yasna and I do... I dream of it still. It is like a skull or a skeleton, trying to eat. Day dream, night dream.  It leaps out code at random intervals.  It is the remnants of some kind of ill wish on me.  Yasna says that if it had been correctly done, I would have just died... So no wonder I keep dreaming of it clawing me open over and over again, eating what bits of me it wants.  Sorry, my son.  I shall... I will... clean that out of my head eventually.

I will write more tomorrow.

Your loving mother,

67 - A Report in the Unity

“… AS THE HONORABLE MEMBER FROM UPPER COMO HAS REPEATEDLY SAID – Order! Order in the Unity! Members, please do not be a DIS-unity – HE’S SUPPOSED TO BE DEAD!

Ky put his hands over his ears, muffling the roar of voices in the Hall of the Host. It was unreal. The Hall was an oval room with two levels, the rows in the balcony all raked to let everyone see the floor below. On the floor there were five chairs, three and two, the two in front slightly lower to let everyone see the higher three and they also had desks before them.

All guests sat in the designated bank of seats that would, one day, become chairs for more representatives.  They'd have to build a viewing gallery when that time came.

Usually the Konsiliarch and the Surdeniliarch sat side by side, with the empty chair reserved for guests or witnesses, speakers of any kind, called to speak to the Unity. There were six banks of seats in the oval, each capable of comfortably seating fifty people. Only the middle four banks were used for representatives' seats since the Milari had not grown to the population that they thought their country could support.

The one hundred and eight current representatives were all on their feet, it seemed. Order had completely vanished no matter what the Konsiliarch said. 

Once he couldn’t hear the words any longer Kyrus just looked at all those angry faces, all those mouths working. Bare faces, bare emotions.

His father stood, bare faced, in front of the guest chair, hands clasped behind his back, apparently listening to all their rage. He didn’t seem angry or upset, more intent, careful.  

EnLightened and EnDarkened may I be like him one day. So I don’t need a veil to hide my emotions. Beside him, Ilax stood as well, standing with his inamor. For all they were so different, they were both similar in their calm. Is it because they’re warriors? Or because one’s a politician, their ‘he who has mastered war’… or as they think… a peace keeper?

The noise was awful and finally the Konsiliarch, Vidarna Xshathrita, a statuesque woman who, if Kyrus had seen in the street, would have thought was someone’s favourite grandmother, got up and stepped over to a stone altar. Kyrus pressed his hands tighter over his ears. Here it comes.

She picked up a kernel from a box on a separate table and placed it on the pedestal and waited, the metal hammer in her other hand. The top of the pedestal was dished in, battered, chipped, cracked and burned. 

The noise didn’t ease so she picked up a second kernel, ostentatiously, hammer held so everyone could see it.  Then a third.

Ky could see her mouth move but not hear. Even in this debate he’d only seen a two-stone before. EnDarkened, a three stone summons to order, EnDarkened… He squeezed his eyes shut but couldn’t not see and opened them again.

She brought the hammer down sharply on the stones with a CRACK loud enough that Ky jumped, even with his hands over his ears. A cloud of smoke billowed to the ceiling where it was caught by the slow-turning fans and whisked away.

I think it is partly the smoke that shuts them up, forcing them to cough instead of yell, as much as the noise.

Ky’s hands went from his ears to his nose, holding a cloth to breathe through. It is so funny, they all look like their veil strings broke, clutching kerchiefs over their noses and mouths.

“Honourable Members of the Unity,” she said finally. Probably when the air cleared enough for her not to be gravelly, but that translated into a solemn dignity as she sat down again in the sulphur-smelling Hall. “We have heard the Surdeniliarch and Kyrus Talain both tell us their whole story. What they did. Why they did so. We have also,” she paused and held up the hammer demonstratively at one member who dared raise her voice from the back.

"—And we have heard the upset and anger expressed.” She drew a deep breath, paused to cough. “I regret that the issue devolved into fisticuffs between Honourable Amrav and the Honourable Ushtra. The server informs me that both are well and apologizing to one another.” Enough of the Unity was recovered that they could slap their desks in approval for that. She waited another moment. “As Konsiliarch it is now my duty to inform the Unity of things that have not been mentioned, for your consideration.”

She rose and murmured to both Ilax and Kyrus to be seated. 

“The Unity is no doubt aware, that the war in question is over.” That got a mutter though not a chuckle. “The Emperor of Lainz has shown his willingness to cease warfare, under our Surdeniliarch's prompting.” A dozen voices cried ‘hear!’ ‘hear!’ and she waited for them to subside. “To answer the first question posed…”

No, Ky thought. It’s too soon! He had dropped his hands after the concussion and he could hear Haraklez, next to him and Werfas on her other side... and, oddly enough, Verpiccaus, on his left, all of them holding their breaths.

“Ilaxandil Vania a Ruikart -- Vidarna added the ancestral designation to his name -- "Admits to both deceit and deception, for reasons of passion and compassion. And we Milari pride ourselves in being both passionate. And compassionate. Yet he still did his duty and an enemy of our state was neutralized, though not quite in the way that was demanded.” Ky could see that his father and Ilax, when they’d sat down, had clasped hands. Can’t they see how much they love one another?

“I also note that as surdeniliarch his service to the country has been exemplary and he has so far moved people to request his top stipend be extended, since there was no legal way for us to laud him further, for work above and beyond his mere duty.” She paused to nod at the ambassadors in their chairs, who had scrupulously kept their silence while the Milari raged, but no doubt had been taking good note. They nodded back.

They still need him. He’s gotten some pretty tough sticks of diplomats to not only talk, but work together and Xshathrita knows it. “Moreover, as we have always accepted those injured, even the enemy, because of our unwillingness to send more people early to our ancestors, Kyrus Talain was saved by our healers and has, since his salvation, been working to teach our children, taking over the duty from Agalia and Corydon, by their will. I remind you that they were our finest Dees and our finest Zon. I suggest that the Honourable Members perhaps should argue his worthiness, with those shades…”

The murmur this time was more wry and gave Ky a sense of ‘oh no… you talk to those ancestors if you want… not me…’ partially humorous. Almost a laugh.

“I speak specifically to those who were their students.”

This time there were hands thrown up, a barrier of fingers. “Honourable Konsiliarch,” the Member from Tzatzkim called. “We concede the point.”

She looked up at him and then around at the other Members. A second came from Member Ruvan. “A quick show of hands, yes... the point is conceded?” She asked. “Clerk?”

“Passed, Konsiliarch.” She nodded. “So. It is moved that the Surdeniliarch be censured for his deceit of the punters.” Their word for voters… or those who opt. “The option for his removal already having been punted down, I call for a show of hands.”

There was a pause and then hands began rising in the Hall.

She stood, waiting as the clerk counted. “A firm yes or no, ladies and gentlemen, no half-hearted hands, please.” The clerk handed her the tally and she looked down at it. 

“Passed that the Surdeniliarch be censured, 74 to 22 with 10 abstentions and two Members out for medical treatment.” She sat down again. “I open the floor for discussion on the nature of this censure.”

This is going to go on for days, Ky thought. But he could see his da’s posture had eased a bit. Do I know him well enough so fast? I suppose. Werfas reached around Haraklez and punched him in the arm.  He couldn’t make it more than a brush, around her. “They’re all right!”

“Hey, what?” People around  shushed them. “What did you do that for? They’re still going to cut him down some,” he hissed to his wing-brother.

“It’s good because nobody re-opened the ‘throw him out option’.” Haraklez whispered in his ear. “That was what the pause was before people started putting their hands up. Now it’s all about fines and stuff, not whether he can get kicked out or not. And you’ll be able to start the proper wedding party plans, since they never had one.”

“Me?” Kyrus squeaked loud enough that he got shushed again. "Why not you? That's stuff girls do."

“Yeah, you,” Verpiccaus whispered.  “It's not girl stuff in Milar.”  Werfas hissed “—jerk,” from the other side, making his head whip back and forth.  “You and her work together since you’re both old enough, and you’re both representatives of the pair.”

Wonderful. But he couldn’t put a lot of intent into his groan.

66 - He's Not Making Sense

I’m tired. This whole life I’ve balanced the good of the Empire on the point of a pin. On the point of my head, I’d say. I’m tired. I’ve seen my sons go down and my daughters, all to the service of Empire. And my grandsons and little tiny baby girls born dead. Scraps of flesh. Scraps of my heart.

Ripped off and flung out and instead of whirring away to make new colonies, they’ve fallen, been eaten... burned by too much Light or swallowed by too much Dark.  I have just now won the ability to have a truly literate society.  Just now.  I must live to see it through.  The Great Hive has no heir and the bees will likely recurse to the old protocols.  Whoever has the most of my blood and my line, will likely be acknowledged Radiance.  Who knows what will be made clear to them from the archive mind?  The broken pieces of our history.

The Milari might have a better idea. How can one mind, one heart bear this? Spread it so that old men can die in peace. 

"LEAVE ME ALONE, you EnDarkened fool of a doctor. I’m old. That’s the problem. I merely can’t lie down and rest just yet. I have to find more strength in me, more life in me somehow. I’m not raving. I’m not out of my head. Aren’t old men allowed even poetry without being called mad?"

“He’s not making sense, I’m afraid, my lords. Give him some rest. Give him some time.”

Yes. Time. Time for me to call my black and gold angels, my little sisters. Time for me to pull myself out of Death’s Jaws, avoid the final dividend one more time, fingerwidth by fingerwidth. You jackals. All waiting to pounce on me and rip the Empire between you. You fools! Don’t you know that the people... the people need the water we’ve won so hard by conquest and agreement? We need the fibres and the programs.  We need information and ways to share it! We’re not a true Empire! We’re a blighted refugee camp clinging to a frigid river-bottom in a desert, eating bees and raghnall nuts and green shellfish ripped out of icy water!

You rip apart the so-called Empire and the whole lot of us starve to death. It’s not feather-spitters and glory and gold you vultures. It’s always been the water. When we first came we were drinking our bird’s blood, the children whose parents had died of thirst carried by warriors barely able to control their dying war birds. And we found the canyon. The water... and the bees who saved us all. I’m not raving. I’m remembering my great-grandfather’s memories. I need more time enlighten you. Give me more time!

**

The Emperor’s physician closed the door of the bedchamber quietly and turned to look at the assembled court. “He’s resting. He has ordered everyone out and might sleep. It is possible he will be up this evening.”

The court dispersed, slowly, their silks rustling like the wings of honeybees, murmuring one to another. Eyes slid from face to face, judging who was most powerful, should the old man die this day. Groups shifted, nomarcs stepped away from one high lord, to another, their patterns altering as they bowed and scraped courteously.

From a door inside, the opening hidden in the pattern of honeycomb, Shashi slipped into the bedroom. The bees recognized her and though they swarmed, distressed, did not sting. “He’ll be all right, sisters,” she whispered to them as they buzzed and settled on her arms and hands. “He’s too stubborn to die yet.”

A rustling whisper from the bed. “Shashi.” Diryish swallowed, a liquid gulp. “I hate this age... water pooling in my limbs and lungs... I shall drown in my desert. Any word from... your father yet?”

“Not yet, Radiance.”

“Didn’t I teach you better, girl?”

She settled down next to the bed, looking at his tired face. “I’m sorry. Uncle Diryish.” Even though their relationship was not of blood, she would not set aside her propriety to just call him by name. If he lived long enough for her to gain enough age, she might one day just call him Diryish.

“Better.” His pale, shrewd old eyes opened, then closed again. “I have enough young moa-lords telling me nonsense they think I want to hear. ‘Immutable, indeed.’ I need your father to kick me, when I’m too full of memories.”

“You’re a honeycomb packed full of life’s honey, Uncle.”

“Ready to be capped off and sealed away.”

“Uncle... we need to keep things together for a while longer. And I’d miss you. Mariush, is not yet delivered and father hasn’t sent word on your heir. You need to get your strength back.”

“I will, child. I will. I’m not quite ready to get wrapped in my words and packed away in my own white mountain.” He smiled at her from his pillows. Did she think I missed her own concern buried in the Empire worries?

She patted the bed decisively. “I’m going to write father and ask him to bring some Milari healers with him. They might be able to help you.”

“I’m going to rebuild our Dee school.  The zardukar have never been enough.  You all are right. We need every one we can muster regarless of sex or caste or status.  My father certainly was twisted enough to make a grave mistake. Several grave mistakes.  We need mandery however faint.  A hundred Ahys can overwhelm a Cee or a Dee, especially if they can work together.  A hundred of the smallest power can change the city.  Shashi... can you imagine what a hundred Dee Manders could do if we had them?”

“We have fifty-seven Ahys in the zardukar.” She said quietly.  “Twenty-two Behys.  Four Cees.  And you.”

“Only a few of the Ahys can work together.” He closed his eyes fretting.  “I have almost enough for us to have a truly literate society once more, contrary to the original contract.”  His eyes snapped open.  “The people have lived here long enough to discard the compact.  We deserve to teach our children.  Every person deserves the right to learn.  To read.”

His eyes sagged closed again from his vehemence.  He gulped and swallowed another breath.  “The toxics are getting through to me, Shashi.”

“You need to rest.  You need to stop overdoing, Uncle.”

“I’ll rest when I’m dead.”

She pursed her lips like a youngster when the oldsters mention their mortality, as if it were some kind of bad smell produced by an aging body.  “I’ll leave you to get your rest, Uncle Diryish.”

“Yes, child, go on. I’m not sick, I’m old. There’s a difference.”

“Yes, Uncle,” she said in the unknowing way of someone under a hundred. She leaned forward and kissed his forehead quickly. “I’ll be in later.” He sighed and smiled as she fussed away back through her secret door.

In the quiet afterward he raised his hands, palm up, and called. “Little sisters... I need help... Come.” The hive rose, not as many as the night they had defended him from the assassination attempt, but enough to cover his bedclothes and his hands. He hissed a little through his teeth as they set stingers into his wrists and elbows and in a precise line along his collarbone. “Thank you,” he said as the modified bee venom coursed into him. He closed his eyes, and slept.

Questions for New and Old Readers

1: Is Diryish more interesting than Kyrus Sr. and Kyrus Jr.?

2: Is the scifi getting in the way of the fantasy or should it be the other way around?

3: Am I introducing the sf too slowly?

4: Would you like to see more of the inner workings of the official zardukar?

5: Should I explain the differences between Ahy, Bee, Cee and Dee Manders and Cliners?

6: Anything else you'd like me to address?

65 -- WHAT ARE YOU, FOUR?

Ky watched, eyes growing more and more round, as the clay golem he recognized as Zon Elemfias stopped next to Ilax.  “YOU THINK ABOUT HIM EVERY DAY?”  As exhausted as she was she reached out and with one finger poke put Ilax on his rear, then stood over him and said things at a much lower volume, but just as intensely.  Kyrus had made it over to them and tried to say something but she tapped him in the gut with her heel without looking at him until she’d finished what she said to Ilax.  Then she turned to Kyrus sitting next to Ilax.  “AND YOU!  WHAT DID YOU THINK?  DID YOU THINK I WOULDN’T MOURN YOU? DID I JUST NOT MATTER ENOUGH THAT YOU’VE LIED TO ME FOR MORE THAN TEN YEARS?

People were looking up from where they sat, exhausted. They looked up from where they hugged or cradled threatened family, saved from the mud. One woman, whose house had been inundated near the school, cuddled her husband’s body to her breast, their infant curled on his chest where he’d died trying to protect her – so futily-- from the ultimate owner, the Final Shareholder, death.

Ky didn’t take his eyes off his father and Uncle Ilax just sitting on the ground getting yelled at by the Warschool Master.  “WHAT ARE YOU, FOUR?  YOU DIDN’T THINK I’D MIND, BECAUSE YOU WERE A BLOODSUCKING LAINZ?  KYRUS, GIVE ME SOME CREDIT FOR HAVING A MIND!”

“Um,” Haraklez said in Ky’s ear.  “I guess she knows who that is.”

“I suppose I can tell you.  It’s my da... my father.  He never died.”

He heard her draw breath, but even though he flinched away her “WHAT?” still deafened him. 

“Sorry I didn’t tell you, your pa asked me not to tell, they’ve been inamour this whole time...” He was talking to her back as she stormed over to the little tableau.

“Zon,” she said, not yelling but certainly in a carrying voice.   “Should I get your stick from the school to show my father what we think of his being so secretive about his inamour?” 

I guess it’s the Milar equivalent of ‘let me hold your veil while you beat the shit out of him’.  

Werfas was looking injured.“Aren’t I enough your wing-brother that you might have told me?”

Ky jumped up, felt his muscles quivering from the overexertion and just stopped, stood panting.  There was no where to run away to.  He was committed to staying here and to staying with his father.  Even though he’d run away all his life there came a time when it became impossible to run any longer.  

 “I’m sorry.  I promised them both I wouldn’t tell anybody alive, okay?  I keep my word, even if I think the grownups who I’m supposed to venerate and nearly worship are doing something stupid.  Okay?” His hands worked but he had nothing to create, no enemy to face other than human frailty.

Werfas held up a calming hand.  “Sit, okay?  We’re wiped out and everyone is too tired to really get going with the shouting and the hand waving and, as you’d say, the veil flapping.  And they’ll remember he was a Dee mander when everyone thought there was no such thing in Lainz anymore."

“A Dee?  I thought... I thought he was just a Beemander?”

“From what I saw him doing before their high and mightinesses over there got started he’s improved.”  He paused.  “I’m glad, Kyrus.  I’m so glad for you that he’s not dead.”

That stopped anything extraneous flapping through Ky’s head.  “That’s true.  People have died here today for real.  He helped without thinking, even when he thought that people would want him dead the way they wanted him dead before...”

“—really?”  Werfas looked grim.  “You really think they’d want his life this long after the war?”

I'm just not going to mention the boys who thought I should be dead this long after the war. “He thought so.  He figured he’d live the rest of his life in hiding.”

“You know, for a really smart adult he was working on some really stupid premises.”

Ky felt himself blush, hearing his best friend be so blunt about his father.  “Well... yeah.  He’s pretty stubborn if Ilax couldn’t convince him.”

“And now this landslide and digging out everybody who was killed by it is going to take everybody’s energy for a while.”

“As well as the rebuilding afterwards,” Ky said, hopefully.   

“He’ll just be part of things by the time everybody gets up enough energy to be mad about it.”

Werfas jerked a thumb at Elemfias, even as Ky sank down to sit next to him again.  “Except for her.  She’ll make sure they know how dumb they’ve been keeping secret this long.”

“I... think I’ll just stay over here for now.  I can let my da handle the mess he made... he doesn’t need me messin’ in his soup.”  Werfas grinned at the slang creeping into his friend’s language and then wiped a hand over his face as Haraklez threw a glare over her shoulder at them.

“You’ll need to explain to her, though.  And them.”

Ky froze as Elemfias and Haraklez and a handful of other people gathered around Kyrus and Ilax looked over at him.   

“Oh, shit.”

64 - Primus Lux, Secundus Nox, Tertius Nox

The serpent huffs and sniffs hard enough that I am pressed flat to the path.  But at last it sniffs off down toward the edge of the earth, at least the edge of the earth that has been transformed.  At least Prime .3 has kept up the terraforming. 

If he or she hadn't, I would have been forced to come out of hiding and tried to face the modern might and strength of Prime.  We, as a diminished, illiterate mob, with ancient, badly written original programs, now breaking down and rewritten patches by zardukar who believe they are doing magic for the Light... I shudder to think what would happen.

Primus Lux, Secundus Nox, so Primus thinks, Tertius Nox.  With Primus surviving and finding out we are still here, still Lux instead of Nox?

It surely would be a short fight. A tiny fight.  Prime would erase us like a housewife scraping toxic crust off her filter curtains.

I suppose Prime does want the whole planet made over in the likeness of home, someday, anyway.  Though how they intend to keep the water they are so diligently hurling down off the moon actually ON the planet long term I cannot imagine.

I’m distracting myself, as I lie very still.  The serpents are only phase one of the seeking, cleaning programs.  I pull a flap of my protective, imagined robe up over my imagined head, press down into what I see as cool earth.

The cleansing flames roar over my shield, close enough to the ground that it heats in my hands. But I know to hold still and hold my breath, though I truly don’t need to breathe here.  Through a fold of robe and a hole in my shield I see one of the serpents breathing flames hex by hex over the area guarded by that laser trip line.

Sweat runs down my face.  I cannot stay here too much longer.  I can feel, back in my body, I need water.  I need rest.  But Lainz needs these programs.  I lie still.

The flames die down, leaving only Prime’s landscape uncleansed, me crouched under my ancient old shield like a tortoise under my shell.  Ha.  That's a good image.  Perhaps I shall be able to reprogram my access to make me a tortoise next time.

Things cool.  I stir and then still.  Nothing. I imagine I lie in the shadow of some tree that I don’t know the name of.  Some tree from home.  Dense leaves.  Dense foliage, thick dark shade.  There.  Things cool down very quickly.  I rise.

Then I retreat to the edges of the garden, slide out my door and bolt it behind me.   

I was just beginning to show my little Tyr how to come down here safely.  I was teaching him that it wasn’t magic or mandery, just programming.  But he is now playing in the eternal Light and the unending Dark.  Lux and Nox bless you, great grandson.

Diryish opened his eyes, holding the satchel of new program copies and patches in his mind, daubed the drop of blood off his finger, still oozing from when he’d gone in.  Each scrap of bloody lint, with its new codes, was seized by the Hive and carried off to be copied and re-copied and spread to all the zardukar’s work stations.

Then he laid his head down on the desk, feeling the cool firmness of the stone under his overheated cheek, looking at his own knobby old hands flat on the surface.  “I’m tired,” he said to no one but the bees, and was asleep before he could draw another breath.

**

He only dozed a moment or two, from years of diligent training.  “Mariush!” He pushed himself up to sitting, calling, the bees unlocking his door for her.

She came in, holding her tray before her, already beaming.  “You did it, Radiance!  Look, look!”

Her tray was a diagram made of mordant ants. “I’ve not been able to make them secrete the waterproof ink until now!” The spreading black stain on the white glass tray was far from random.  Some ants were already building with the wax from the bees.  Stamps were being formed, with microchannels filled with ink from the specialized ink makers, their abdomens already distended, the other ants milking the viscous black fluid out of them. Other ants were beginning to pick up the ink makers and tend them like larvae.

“We will be able to make inexpensive writing instruments, and printing blocks and –“

“—yes, my dear.  You should have the key to make your ants produce almost any kind of ink now.  You will be able to etch circuits as well as print paper.”  His smile was wide, but his cheeks were hollow.

“Have you had anything to drink, Radiance, after your hard work?  Any restorative?”

Diryish waved a dismissive hand.  “In a minute.  I need to get word on whether Fahm’s little sublimating bees have managed to learn from what I found.”

“You really didn’t need to find that patch, Radiance.  We get enough iodine for our population.”

“Through a slow, labour intensive, dangerous process. It is expensive in lives and injury as well as money.”  Down the hall, a whoop of joy and the sound of feet running to Diryish’s open door.  “It seems we have another success...”

Fahm fairly leapt into the room, drew up short to not disturb Mariush’s seething tray, that she quickly set down out of harm’s way.  He was dancing in place. “IT WORKED, IT WORKED IT FINALLY DID WHAT IT WAS SUPPOSED TO, IT...” he locked his hands in front of his face in the minor salaam.  “Radiance, Luminous One, it worked.”

Diryish smiled.  “You youngsters need to stop venerating me like that. You work just as hard as I do.  Secundus Lux never set out to set up a religious/political system.”  He set his hands on his desk and rose, slowly.  “I do need to go rest now.  Your two projects were the most important ones.  The others, I can hear later if the patches worked or not.  Go on...” Fahm and Mariush were barely in time, lunging with hands outstretched to catch him as Diryish went white and collapsed.