"Zahn, Timothy - Conquerors 02 - Conquerors' Heritage" - читать интересную книгу автора (Zahn Timothy)

He paused for breath... and as he did so, he suddenly noticed that all eyes in the vast chamber seemed to be frozen on him. He glanced at the Prime, back at the first row of speakers, settled on the thunderous expression of Speaker Cvv-panav...

He looked back at the Prime, feeling his tail begin to speed up. Was Prr't-zevisti's disappearance supposed to have been a secret?

"Your initial testimony is hereby at an end, Searcher Thrr-gilag," the Prime said, his voice and face still unreadable. "You will stand down and await further examination. The Overclan Seating thank you for your time."

"The honor is mine, Overclan Prime," Thrr-gilag said, a sinking feeling at the base of his tongue as he stood up from the couch. His words were long gone into the air, with no way to retrieve them. If the expression on Speaker Cvv-panav's face was anything to go by, Thrr-gilag might soon wish he could vanish along with them.

The other testimony was finished, and the Speakers were filtering out for the midarc meal, when the summons Thrr-gilag had been dreading finally came.

"You are called to the private office of the Overclan Prime," the Elder told him, his voice and manner short. "Follow me."

Thrr-gilag sighed silently. "I obey," he said.

It was a long, lonely railcar ride-nearly half a thoustride long, in fact-down the deserted underground tunnel that led from the rear of the Overclan Seating chamber back to the two main office buildings of the complex. Eventually, they reached the end and returned to ground level. Leaving the railcar, Thrr-gilag followed the Elder to an elaborately carved door with large wooden rings in place of the usual doorknobs, and the look and smell of great age. "Enter," the Elder said, gesturing to the door. Taking a deep breath, Thrr-gilag gripped the ancient wooden ring and pulled the door open.

The room turned out to be a small, intimate conversation room, furnished with no tables and only a handful of couches. Three Zhirrzh were waiting for him: Cvv-panav, the Speaker for Dhaa'rr; Hgg-spontib, the Speaker for Kee'rr; and the Overclan Prime himself. None of their expressions were especially encouraging. "Come in, Searcher," the Prime said gravely, gesturing to a row ofkavra fruit on a ledge beside the door. "I presume you know the Speakers for Dhaa'rr and Kee'rr."

"Yes, Overclan Prime," Thrr-gilag said, nodding politely to each of them in turn. Picking up one of thekavra fruit, he sliced through it twice with the cutting edges of his tongue and dropped it into the disposal container beneath it. "How may I serve you?" he asked, wiping his hands on the cleaning cloth hanging beneath the ledge.

"The alien prisoners have been brought to the complex," the Prime told him. "They're being prepared for interrogation in the medical center."

"I see," Thrr-gilag said. He'd instructed the healers to let the aliens recover from the stresses of landing before moving them: strictly speaking, he should have been informed of any transfers. Under the circumstances he wasn't really surprised that he hadn't. "How well did they withstand the journey across from the landing field?"

"I'm told they're quite weak, but that their metabolic readings are stable," the Prime said. "I expect to be able to speak with them in a few hunbeats." He eyed Thrr-gilag. "Before we do, though, Speaker Cvv-panav has some questions concerning your testimony of this premidarc."

"More specifically, concerning your glaring breach of security," Cvv-panav bit out. "I want to hear what you know about the Prr't-zevisti incident on Dorcas. And how you learned of it."

"I spoke with my brother, Commander Thrr-mezaz, just before we were evacuated from Base World Twelve," Thrr-gilag said. "He told me that Prr't-zevisti'sfsss cutting had been captured and that Prr't-zevisti himself had not been seen since then. That's all I know."

"And did Commander Thrr-mezaz happen to mention that this incident was to be kept a secret?"

Thrr-gilag felt his tail speed up. "No, Speaker, he didn't."

"Do you generally consider discussions with warrior commanders to be the stuff of casual conversation?" Cvv-panav persisted.

"Not at all, Speaker," Thrr-gilag said. "I've always treated such information as private and privileged."

"And yet you simply blurt out this private and privileged information without any thought whatsoever?"

Thrr-gilag looked him straight in the eye. "I would not have thought, Speaker, that testimony before the Overclan Seating would be considered casual conversation."

"I would agree," Speaker Hgg-spontib spoke up from his couch on the Prime's other side. "In fact, I'd venture to say there are many other Speakers wondering why it required a slip of a young searcher's tongue for us to learn of this incident. One might think the Dhaa'rr were attempting to keep vital information to themselves, for their own private purposes."

"The death of a Dhaa'rr Elder is a private matter for the Dhaa'rr clan," Cvv-panav growled back. "Not a gossip item for idle conversation."

Hgg-spontib's midlight pupils visibly contracted. "Are you suggesting that members of the Overclan Seating have nothing better to do than indulge in idle gossip?"

"What the Seating does or does not do hardly matters at this point," Cvv-panav snapped. "There were probably two thousand Elders observing the meeting, not counting those of the Overclan itself. Thanks to this loose-tongued young fool, the news is probably all over the Elder community by now."