Mazé'yum had been wondering what role he should play in the journey Eeri and her companion were planning.
When the Fyrossa had presented him with her project, the Zorai had quickly come to the conclusion that the chances of survival in the Old Lands were for these two close to zero. So what was the point of spending there any energy at all? However, this apprentice girl was a resourceful homina; sending her to her death was a stupid wastage. Moreover, she had several qualities that Mazé'yum particularly valued and that he wished to see developed within the hominity. He couldn't just abandon her to her fate, even if he disagreed with some of her decisions. So he had given her some basic advice. Then he'd been thinking about this journey, figuring out how to improve their chances.
They really needed to understand that in the Old Lands, every human had to be an ally. The environment was so fierce that no one could afford to put their seed of life in peril for silly homin squabbles. However, morons were as common in the Old Lands as they are here. The two Fyros had to learn to give the right pledges. Good thing Eeri had decided to gain some recognition among the Marauders, however limited. If her companion became a Ranger or Marauder in his turn, then they would already have a good base.
Poisons and goo bombs were a bad idea. He had tried to explain it to Eeri, but she was Fyrossa and therefore stubborn as a bodoc when she had an idea in mind. At the same time, the Marauder clans of the Old Lands seen on the New Lands gave a most pitiful image of that civilization. Between the show-offs of the Throat Cutters' Clan who were content to look for a brawl, the awful murderers of the Black Sawdust Clan whose sadism fueled stories one tells for the kids to stay still, and the others who were just youngsters looking for easy glory and grand gestures, it was understandable that Eeri, like so many others, considered the Marauders to be interested only in the various ways of killing homins.
But it was different in the Old Lands. Over there, the imperative was to survive and prevent the kitins from advancing to the sanctuary of the New Lands. It was not only a matter of warrior prowess, but also of strategic skills and the ability to fight together in a united and efficient manner. If some day the kitins would disappear (which was not likely to happen) and these Marauders would decide to impose themselves in the New Lands, they would conquer them in less than a month. In the meantime, every homin life was precious, as long as it could be used to fight the kitins. The only useful poisons were those active against the chitin covered monsters. Goo bombs could be used as a temporary repellent, but playing with goo was always tricky. If a region became contaminated, it might stop the kitins, but it might also mobilize homins to keep the Purple from devastating their own territories. The Fyrossa wanted these toys, he would provide them to her; she wouldn't do much harm with so little and maybe it would amuse the scholar clans a little, but she could also look like a dangerous terrorist carrying this kind of weapon around with her.
Could his own contacts be of use to them? He had spent some twenty years in the Old Lands, preferring this exile to the fate that awaited him after having badly weighed the risks during his experiments on the seed of life. He was young then, and he had paid the price for his imprudence. At the Citadel, he had been one of the countless minions in the laboratories of the Clan of Horizon Surveyors, trying to scrape together a few crumbs of knowledge without learning enough for his taste. This growing frustration had finally pushed him to join a team of explorers like the ones formed from time to time, in search of artifacts of the Ancient Civilizations and information about the kitins. The last expedition to Karavia had been an almost total fiasco, in which they had lost most of their companions and, more importantly, many promising amber cubes. This latest blow to Mazé'yum's ego had prompted him to return to the New Lands with a much clearer goal: to ensure that useful knowledge would be available for future generations.
Could he send Eeri to the Horizon Surveyors? That clan was a respectable one. Knowledge-oriented, its members could support explorers in exchange for the information they would bring back, while being fairly indifferent to their origins. He was certain, however, that his name would be a double-edged sesame. Many of them, indeed, considered that he had only survived by showing cowardice and that he should have perished with the other explorers, or at least brought back more from the expedition.
Knowledge. It all came down to this, in the end. Mazé'yum had found a currency that might interest the Surveyors and motivate them to consider the two Fyros "valuable". The work was not complete, but would it ever be? He had the data, he had the way to share the knowledge. Already, copies of the first versions were being discreetly distributed in the New Lands. There was no reason why that couldn't go to the Old Lands as well.
The Zorai picked up one of his copies, checking its condition. These objects were one of his greatest achievements. It was heavier and less complete than an amber cube, perhaps a little less durable because it was easier to destroy, but easier to use too. He would have liked his co-writers to come up with a less far-fetched text, less mocking too, but it had to be admitted that it served the basic purpose. Who would have thought that behind this harmless text were hidden the secrets of the seed of life?
When the Fyrossa had presented him with her project, the Zorai had quickly come to the conclusion that the chances of survival in the Old Lands were for these two close to zero. So what was the point of spending there any energy at all? However, this apprentice girl was a resourceful homina; sending her to her death was a stupid wastage. Moreover, she had several qualities that Mazé'yum particularly valued and that he wished to see developed within the hominity. He couldn't just abandon her to her fate, even if he disagreed with some of her decisions. So he had given her some basic advice. Then he'd been thinking about this journey, figuring out how to improve their chances.
They really needed to understand that in the Old Lands, every human had to be an ally. The environment was so fierce that no one could afford to put their seed of life in peril for silly homin squabbles. However, morons were as common in the Old Lands as they are here. The two Fyros had to learn to give the right pledges. Good thing Eeri had decided to gain some recognition among the Marauders, however limited. If her companion became a Ranger or Marauder in his turn, then they would already have a good base.
Poisons and goo bombs were a bad idea. He had tried to explain it to Eeri, but she was Fyrossa and therefore stubborn as a bodoc when she had an idea in mind. At the same time, the Marauder clans of the Old Lands seen on the New Lands gave a most pitiful image of that civilization. Between the show-offs of the Throat Cutters' Clan who were content to look for a brawl, the awful murderers of the Black Sawdust Clan whose sadism fueled stories one tells for the kids to stay still, and the others who were just youngsters looking for easy glory and grand gestures, it was understandable that Eeri, like so many others, considered the Marauders to be interested only in the various ways of killing homins.
But it was different in the Old Lands. Over there, the imperative was to survive and prevent the kitins from advancing to the sanctuary of the New Lands. It was not only a matter of warrior prowess, but also of strategic skills and the ability to fight together in a united and efficient manner. If some day the kitins would disappear (which was not likely to happen) and these Marauders would decide to impose themselves in the New Lands, they would conquer them in less than a month. In the meantime, every homin life was precious, as long as it could be used to fight the kitins. The only useful poisons were those active against the chitin covered monsters. Goo bombs could be used as a temporary repellent, but playing with goo was always tricky. If a region became contaminated, it might stop the kitins, but it might also mobilize homins to keep the Purple from devastating their own territories. The Fyrossa wanted these toys, he would provide them to her; she wouldn't do much harm with so little and maybe it would amuse the scholar clans a little, but she could also look like a dangerous terrorist carrying this kind of weapon around with her.
Could his own contacts be of use to them? He had spent some twenty years in the Old Lands, preferring this exile to the fate that awaited him after having badly weighed the risks during his experiments on the seed of life. He was young then, and he had paid the price for his imprudence. At the Citadel, he had been one of the countless minions in the laboratories of the Clan of Horizon Surveyors, trying to scrape together a few crumbs of knowledge without learning enough for his taste. This growing frustration had finally pushed him to join a team of explorers like the ones formed from time to time, in search of artifacts of the Ancient Civilizations and information about the kitins. The last expedition to Karavia had been an almost total fiasco, in which they had lost most of their companions and, more importantly, many promising amber cubes. This latest blow to Mazé'yum's ego had prompted him to return to the New Lands with a much clearer goal: to ensure that useful knowledge would be available for future generations.
Could he send Eeri to the Horizon Surveyors? That clan was a respectable one. Knowledge-oriented, its members could support explorers in exchange for the information they would bring back, while being fairly indifferent to their origins. He was certain, however, that his name would be a double-edged sesame. Many of them, indeed, considered that he had only survived by showing cowardice and that he should have perished with the other explorers, or at least brought back more from the expedition.
Knowledge. It all came down to this, in the end. Mazé'yum had found a currency that might interest the Surveyors and motivate them to consider the two Fyros "valuable". The work was not complete, but would it ever be? He had the data, he had the way to share the knowledge. Already, copies of the first versions were being discreetly distributed in the New Lands. There was no reason why that couldn't go to the Old Lands as well.
The Zorai picked up one of his copies, checking its condition. These objects were one of his greatest achievements. It was heavier and less complete than an amber cube, perhaps a little less durable because it was easier to destroy, but easier to use too. He would have liked his co-writers to come up with a less far-fetched text, less mocking too, but it had to be admitted that it served the basic purpose. Who would have thought that behind this harmless text were hidden the secrets of the seed of life?