She narrowed her eyes at me.
“Please, Peg,” I said. “I need to know. If the pirates are afraid to fight the Superiority—if they don’t want to risk the good things they have now—how do we persuade them?”
“We?” Peg said. “You’re joining in?”
I glanced at Chet, who nodded.
“Provisionally, yes,” I said.
Peg grinned. “Words. Well, we don’t need to persuade the pirates—not individually. We merely need to get my sons to follow me again.”
“Your sons?” Chet said. “They turned against you!”
“Yeah,” Peg said. “They lead the two largest pirate factions. I’ll admit, I didn’t expect both of my sons to grow enough muluns to rebel. After we all left Surehold the first time, I tried to get everyone to attack it. We had a small initial clash, but our people were frightened by that, and disorganized. When my coalition collapsed, my sons took away some of my strongest forces to start their factions. Makes a mother proud.”
“Proud? That they rebelled?”
“Exactly!” she said. “They were incredibly bold. Overthrowing their own mother? They were barely adults! Ah, it was great. But it’s inconvenient, so we have to win them back. My eldest—Gremm—has been champion for a year now. Leads the faction called the Jolly Rogers. An Earth term, no?”
“I believe so,” Chet said.
“Well, you’ll probably get to meet my son’s forces soon. The moment word of your skill reaches them, I suspect Gremm will send a raiding party to attack us. They’ll be growing delens to know the truth—and I’ll expect you to show them.”
“I’m eager for it,” I said.
“I doubt Gremm will join the raid. But afterward I can demand a contest between you and him—and he’ll accept. I know my son. And though he’s the best pilot among us, he’s nothing compared to you. If you defeat him, he will be forced to grow the tagao.”
“Which means?” I asked.
“A very rare fruit, meaning he feels submissive to his parents. If you defeat him, he will listen to me again.”
“You sure about that?”
“Absolutely,” Peg said. “It is our way.”
I didn’t point out that she’d been surprised by their betrayal, so I had my doubts. But I was willing to give it a try.
“What about his brother?” Chet asked.
“Semm leads a different faction,” she said. “He’ll return to me too, if my faction claims the championship. Trust me.”
Yeah, that sounded too convenient to me. There was more to this—Peg still had her secrets.
She watched me a moment longer, then started through the ruins toward our ships. “We should be returning,” she said. “I expect a raid at any time, and I don’t want to leave the others too short-staffed.”
“Well?” I asked Chet as she wandered off. “Did you know we’d have to get into Surehold itself?”
“I suspected,” he admitted. “The portal there is one of the largest and oldest in the region. I had hoped it wouldn’t be necessary…but at least we have a path forward.”
“Assuming we can trust Peg’s plan.”
“She seems to trust it,” he said. “Come, we should return to our ship. You remember what happened last time after we saw one of these?”
Yeah. Our entire fragment had been destroyed in a collision. Perhaps it had been a coincidence, but I found myself hurrying after Chet just in case. We gathered Maksim, and soon the four of us were lifting off to join the resonants and start back toward our home base.
“You two appear unusually solemn,” M-Bot said as we fell into formation. “It worked, I assume? You again saw the past?”
“Indeed, AI,” Chet said. “We kind of contacted a cytonic person in the past.”
“Uh…” M-Bot said. “Clarification please?”
“She could feel my questions somehow,” I explained, “in her time—and left answers for me. Or maybe she just heard the general curiosity of all who came after her. Either way, I think we know what happened to the kitsen cytonics—and why there was a sudden dearth of contact between Earth and aliens after some initial interactions in ancient times.”
“Really? What?”
“War,” I said. “With a delver.”
“We don’t know it was a delver,” Chet said. “But it did seem to have been some kind of…delverlike entity. The cytonics of the galaxy—those that had contacted one another—gathered to fight it. And…not many survived.”