Total pages in book: 139
Estimated words: 130991 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 655(@200wpm)___ 524(@250wpm)___ 437(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 130991 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 655(@200wpm)___ 524(@250wpm)___ 437(@300wpm)
A slightly opaque cloud of water spread from him.
I hid a sigh. “I will speak to the Sovereign on your behalf.”
Oond’s fins fluttered weakly. “You will?”
“I will. You are our guest. Your wellbeing is important to us. I’m sure some solution can be found. Rest and try not to worry.”
I took Sean’s hand for moral support, before I lost it and peed myself too, and the two of us went back upstairs.
“I don’t understand.” Miralitt frowned at me. “The oombole does not want to be the spouse? Does he think we can’t protect him?”
I sighed. Around me Kosandion’s private balcony was a flurry of activity. Right after the Game Day assassination attempt, Kosandion had requested a private portal. Considering that a civil war in the Dominion was looming, refusing seemed unreasonable. The big portal was shut down most of the time anyway, so we completely closed it off, and opened a smaller one right on the balcony. It could only transport one person at time.
As soon as the portal was opened, Miralitt’s guards came through and positioned themselves all around the balcony, ready to respond to any threats. Normally I might have taken that as an insult, but if I balked, Miralitt would’ve had an aneurism, and we needed a favor from her. This whole affair was a lesson in learning to compromise.
With the opening of the portal, the balcony transformed into the Sovereign’s remote office. On one side, Orata sat surrounded by translucent screens, scanning their contents and issuing brisk commands to a small pack of her staffers. On the other side, His Holiness was in an identical position, with the screens and a throng of aides. He was pointing to the screens and delivering instructions in short confident bursts like a general in the middle of a battle. Kosandion sat at his table, closest to the rail and the water, reading and signing things, while Resven hovered nearby with a small army of staffers. Periodically he would single one out, and then the staffer would take off at top speed and vanish into the portal.
Tension vibrated in the air. The balcony sparked with it, as if the molecules that made it had somehow acquired a charge.
“A spouse hasn’t been murdered for the last 70 years,” Miralitt said. “It won’t happen on my watch. I guarantee it with my life.”
“It’s not personal. It has to do with their evolutionary origin,” I said. “Sapience evolves in many ways across a myriad of life forms, but the fastest and the most common category of sapient beings are either predatory omnivores or omnivorous predators that come from the middle of the food chain. For intelligence and problem-solving skills to develop, it helps if you are both a hunter and the hunted. Earth’s humans are predatory omnivores. The vampires of the Holy Anocracy are omnivorous predators. The omnivorous quality is important because organized hunting, animal husbandry, and crop cultivation are essential progress milestones.”
“The oomboles are also predatory omnivores,” Miralitt said.
“Technically,” Sean said.
“Their diet consists of plants and several species of crustaceans, all of which have evolved to be sedentary,” I explained. “Their protective shells are attached to the ocean floor. They don’t move.”
“Why is that important?” Miralitt asked.
“Because they don’t hunt,” Sean said. “They are grazers. They don’t chase and eat other fish, so they do not understand the predatory mindset. They only fear it.”
I nodded. “They are closer to the bottom of the food chain than the middle, and they have a pathological fear of being eaten.”
“What are you trying to say?” Miralitt asked.
“They are cowards,” Sean said. “It’s an evolutionary adaptation, and it will be almost impossible to overcome. Right now, Oond sees everything that isn’t an oombole as a predator.”
“This is consistent with their ask,” Resven said.
I hadn’t realized he was listening. “What are they asking?”
“Their planet is a single shallow ocean with occasional deep trenches,” Resven said. “They’ve killed off the predators in the shallows. In the absence of predators, their population and that of other prey fish has exploded to unsustainable levels. Killing other fish who are not a direct threat to them is against their philosophical doctrines, so they are asking the Dominion to save them from themselves.”
“How?” Miralitt asked.
“Targeted commercial fishing or the reintroduction of the predators,” Resven said. “It is still being discussed.”
“Oond is spiraling down,” I said. “If you attempt to select him as a spouse, he will withdraw.”
“What are the numbers from the pool about the new selection?” Kosandion asked without looking up.
“No change from two hours ago,” Orata reported.
Kosandion gave a small gesture to Resven.
“May I have a few moments of your time?” Resven asked.
“Of course.”
The three of us left the balcony for the privacy of a long hallway leading from it to the throne room.
“The Dominion is in crisis,” Resven said, keeping his voice casual. “Our citizens are distressed by the progress of the selection process. They are dissatisfied and anxious, and they are rallying behind their Sovereign against Behoun. Over the past twenty-four hours, the number of premature labors has quadrupled. It is the best indicator of the population’s overall stress level. Such a rise indicates that the Dominion has reached a boiling point.”