Raising Caine - eARC by Charles E. Gannon Page B

volume to maximum. Be certain you cannot hear me—even my orders.”
    “Yes, Tagmator,” he replied, making haste to comply.
    Once the lictor had settled the light duty helmet over his head, with the blasting static still clearly audible, Hirkun nodded. “Proceed, Antendant.”
    “Tagmator, I am unsure that our chief sensor operator is fully competent.”
    “You mean Nezdeh, the senior Agra?”
    “Yes, she. Tagmator, I shall speak further only at your express encouragement.”
    That cautious phrasing puzzled Hirkun. “Antendant, that is the formula whereby an Intendant—or an aspirant, such as yourself—warns one of the Evolved that to continue might involve speaking ill of another one of the Evolved.”
    Letlas avoided Hirkun’s eyes. “It is as you say, Tagmator.”
    Hirkun was too surprised to suppress the frown that he felt bending lines into his face. “Speak clearly, Antendant: do you suspect that Agra Nezdeh is Evolved, but masquerading as non-Evolved?” Impossible.
    “This is why I was irresolute in expressing myself, Tagmator Morsessar. I know full well how absurd this must sound. But I have watched her manipulate the controls as she tracks the Aboriginal craft that is orbiting just above us, while we remain beneath the storm heads that block their rudimentary sensors.”
    “Yes, and so far, she has done an adequate job.”
    “Yes, Tagmator. She does an adequate job. But no more. It is not the place of us non-Evolved to merely perform adequately in their specialization. Since we lack the onerous responsibilities of ensuring dominion, we have the luxury of becoming true specialists. Nezdeh has not done so, but rather, shows a great breadth of competencies.” Letlas paused. “It is more akin to the skill diversity routinely associated with the Evolved.”
    “Even among Intendants, to say nothing of huscarls, some non-Evolved have far more promise as generalists than as specialists. It can be frustrating. It can also prove invaluable.”
    Letlas looked away. “Tagmator, I do not wish to seem obstinate, but—”
    “Your insight is sought, Antendant. Speak your mind.”
    “If Nezdeh were young, I would be less concerned. But by her age, a trend toward generalization at the expense of specialization would have been noticed. It would have been either corrected or exploited. But for her to come to this ship, at the last moment, touted as a sensor and communications specialist when she is, at best, adequate—this fills me with misgivings.”
    Hirkun nodded. “It is peculiar.” He did not add his own misgivings, which did not concern Nezdeh’s skill levels so much as the peculiar manner in which she had been added to Red Lurker ’s complement. The veteran communications specialist who had been part of the patrol hunter’s rota for the last three years—Lokagon Emren Arrepsur-vah—had made his final return to space only four days before Red Lurker had been deployed. Wrapped in the winding sheets of a defeated duelist, Emren Arrepsur-vah had been pushed toward the winking red speck that was V 1581, four and half light hours away. By the time his remains were embraced and immolated by that red dwarf star, all memory of him, and the House to which he had aspired to add his geneline, would be long gone.
    Nezdeh Kresessek-vah had been Arrepsur-vah’s logical replacement, recommended by the Aegis database as both capable and seasoned. Her slightly greater age and her status as ’vah—aspirant to having her geneline formally integrated into that of House Kresessek—had led Hirkun to conjecture that she was a promising Intendant, about to come into her own. However, now he began to reconsider: it was possible, given her rank, that she was in fact Evolved, a refugee from a House so badly defeated that it had been Extirpated. If so, then that would certainly explain why her skill set was marked more by breadth than depth. He would have to investigate her origins more closely upon the return of Ferocious