Zoe's Tale (Old Man's War, #4)(61)

"What is that?" Hickory asked.

"A gift," I said. We continued our trip through the corridor.

A minute later I was standing in a hastily arranged conference room with General Gau. He stood to one side of a table surrounded by Obin-style seats, which were not really well designed either for his physiology or mine. I stood on the other, shirt in my hand.

"I will wait outside," Hickory said, after it delivered me.

"Thank you, Hickory," I said. It left. I turned and faced the general. "Hi," I said, somewhat lamely.

"You are Zoe," General Gau said. "The human who has the Obin to do her bidding." His words were in a language I didn't understand; they were translated through a communicator device that hung from his neck.

"That's me," I said. I heard my words translated into his language.

"I am interested in how a human girl is able to commandeer an Obin transport ship to take her to see me," General Gau said.

"It's a long story," I said.

"Give me the short version," Gau said.

"My father created special machines that gave the Obin consciousness. The Obin revere me as the only surviving link to my father. They do what I ask them to," I said.

"It must be nice to have an entire race at your beck and call," Gau said.

"You should know," I said. "You have four hundred races at yours. Sir."

General Gau did something with his head that I was going to hope was meant to be a smile. "That's a matter of some debate at this point, I'm afraid," he said. "But I am confused. I was under the impression that you are the daughter of John Perry, administrator of the Roanoke Colony."

"I am," I said. "He and his wife Jane Sagan adopted me after my father died. My birth mother had died some time before that. It is on my adopted parents' account that I am here now. Although I apologize" - I motioned to myself, and my state of unreadiness - "I didn't expect to meet you here, now. I thought we would come to you, and I would have time to prepare."

"When I heard that the Obin were ferrying a human to see me, and one from Roanoke, I was curious enough not to want to wait," Gau said. "I also find value in making my opposition wonder what I am up to. My coming to visit an Obin ship rather than waiting to receive their embassy will make some wonder who you are, and what I know that they don't."

"I hope I'm worth the trip," I said.

"If you're not, I'll still have made them nervous," Gau said. "But considering how far you've come, I hope for both our sakes the trip has been worth it. Are you completely dressed?"

"What?" I said. Of the many questions I might have been expecting, this wasn't one of them.

The general pointed to my hand. "You have a shirt in your hands," he said.

"Oh," I said, and put the shirt on the table between us. "It's a gift. Not the shirt. There's something wrapped in the shirt. That's the gift. I was hoping to find something else to put it in before I gave it to you, but you sort of surprised me. I'm going to shut up now and let you just have that."

The general gave me what I think was a strange look, and then reached out and unwrapped what was in the shirt. It was the stone knife given to me by the werewolf. He held it up and examined it in the light. "This is a very interesting gift," he said, and began moving it in his hand, testing it, I guessed, for weight and balance. "And quite a nicely designed knife."

"Thank you," I said.

"Not precisely modern weaponry," he said.

"No," I said.

"Figured that a general must have an interest in archaic weapons?" Gau asked.

"Actually there's a story behind it," I said. "There's a native race of intelligent beings on Roanoke. We didn't know about them before we landed. Not too long ago we met up with them for the first time, and things went badly. Some of them died, and some of us died. But then one of them and one of us met and decided not to try to kill each other, and exchanged gifts instead. That knife was one of those gifts. It's yours now."

"That's an interesting story," Gau said. "And I think I'm correct in supposing that this story has some implication for why you're here."

"It's up to you, sir," I said. "You might just decide it's a nice stone knife."

"I don't think so," Gau said. "Administrator Perry is a man who plays with subtext. It's not lost on me what it means that he has sent his daughter to deliver a message. But then to offer this particular gift, with its particular story. He's a man of some subtlety."

"I think so, too," I said. "But the knife is not from my dad. It's from me."

"Indeed," Gau said, surprised. "That's even more interesting. Administrator Perry didn't suggest it?"

"He doesn't know I had the knife," I said. "And he doesn't know how I got it."

"But you did intend to send me a message with it," Gau said. "One to complement your adopted father's."

"I hoped you'd see it that way," I said.

Gau set the knife down. "Tell me what Administrator Perry has to tell me," he said.

"You're going to be assassinated," I said. "Someone is going to try, anyway. It's someone close to you. Someone in your trusted circle of advisors. Dad doesn't know when or how, but he knows that it's planned to happen soon. He wanted you to know so you could protect yourself."