Conquerors' heritage by Timothy Zahn

Author:Timothy Zahn [Zahn, Timothy]
Format: epub, mobi
Tags: Science fiction, Fantasy, Adventure, General, Science Fiction - General, Fiction, Science Fiction & Fantasy, Fiction - Science Fiction, Space Opera, War & Military, High Tech, War stories
ISBN: 9780553567724
Publisher: Bantam Books
Published: 2010-01-21T15:41:03+00:00

The battlefield, once Thrr-gilag was finally able to get a good look at it, was horrifying.

Dead Chig and whelps littered the ground, some with their limbs twisted at bizarre angles, all crisscrossed with the blackened lines of laser burns. A group of Zhirrzh moved back and forth across the carnage, going silently about the grim task of collecting the dead.

And at one edge of it stood Klnn-dawan-a. Her face as dead as those of the Chig.

She didn't look up as Thrr-gilag stepped over to her. "Hey," he said softly, touching her shoulder. "You all right?"

"They killed them all," she said, her voice as dead as her expression. "All of them. Even the grazing party."

Thrr-gilag nodded. "I know."

"The grazing party wasn't even doing anything," she said. "They weren't bothering anyone."

"I know," Thrr-gilag said again with a sigh. That wasn't how the transport's pilot and Director Prr-eddsi were going to report it, of course. That much he'd been able to figure out from the snatches of conversation he'd heard while the healer had patched up his head wound. Prr-eddsi was going to report it as a coordinated Chig attack, with a violent but necessary Zhirrzh response.

Thrr-gilag and Klnn-dawan-a knew better. Not that anyone was likely to listen. Or was likely to care.

"We're finished here," Klnn-dawan-a said, looking slowly across the bodies. "Our chrysalis studies, our whelp examinations—all of it. Gone, just like that. The Chig up here will never trust us or cooperate with us again."

"Maybe," Thrr-gilag agreed. "But if the warship hadn't spotted us when it did and sent the transport over, we'd be Elders by now. You think that would have left your relationship with the Chig in any better shape?"

"No," Klnn-dawan-a conceded. "Certainly not after the reprisals were finished with." She turned and looked at him, wincing as her gaze came to rest on his bandage. "I'm sorry, Thrr-gilag. I didn't even think to ask about your wound."

"Oh, it's all right," he assured her. "And I'm fine. A near miss by a crossbow bolt, they tell me."

"More near than miss," she said, a flicker of life coming back into her face as she touched the bandage with gentle fingers. "You sure you're all right?"

"I'm fine." He looked back at the transport. "I don't mean to be callous or anything, but I'm going to have to leave soon, and we still haven't got anywhere on our problem. You have any idea of what levers we can use against the Dhaa'rr leaders?"

Klnn-dawan-a took a deep breath, visibly extricating herself from her emotional tangle about the Chig slaughter. "I don't know," she said. "I can't think right now."

"I understand," Thrr-gilag said. "I can probably stay a little while longer."

"No, you'd better head back while you can," Klnn-dawan-a said, flicking her tongue in a negative. "We won't have any chance at all if you show up late at Unity City. I'll talk to my family and friends. See if we can come up with something."

"All right," Thrr-gilag said. "Just try to be careful which Elders you use as your pathway.

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