Iva and Aevan Sengihr

10402

"You've got to stop doing this! Aevan, are you even listening to me?" Iva turned her dark face toward her half brother, and rolled her green-blue eyes. "You're not. You're totally in your own world... Great."

Iva tapped her long fingers on her arm, holding herself carefully and hoping for that haughty-look that their father did so well. Her mother did it too. Probably why she was so interested in Vanya in the first place - they were a strange mirror of each other. Iolen Chanay, long-married to a very nice Land Holder, finally Bred to one of the premier gene stock providers of the century.

The results of that breeding came about hardly two years after the results of another rather bizarre pairing. She stared at him, from across the room, as he played with the two children of the Slaves he'd just bought.

Now, Iva could hardly fault him for loving the kids. They were adorable - two years apart like he and Iva, with almost opposite coloration from their father or mother respectively. Those parents sat patiently at the edge of the big desk, in Iva's office, waiting for their Owner to get with the program.

"Aevan!" Iva said sharply, startling the Slaves, as well as the children, into silence.

Grudgingly, Aevan stood up and sat back down in the big black chair across from Iva. He felt like his dads often did, when they sat in that chair. It was the 'Iva's caught us at it again' chair. Their shared joke.

"So, are you going to help with this or not, Iva?" Aevan said, oblivious to the fact that his new Slaves were shocked that he'd refer to the Mistress Breeder that way. Well, not entirely oblivious - but he was concentrating on the great feelings of relief they both still had, and not their panic at his little Status faux pas.

Iva glanced at the paperwork in front of her. It was very clear to her that the female Slave, Nalclar, was Tuned to a strong degree and might even be Hyperfertile. Her mate, husband Ebondil, didn't show much more than a tendancy to plants - that might help but in a court it wasn't going to hold for automatic Raising. Iva wanted to try for that option first, though, because if they were both found to be Tuned - animal or otherwise - no one would actually have to pay anything to change their Status. It would be awarded automatically and by the Area.

Their next step would have to be the harder one, that of suddenly being either Animal Masters or Free Workers, in a world which relied upon money for every small facet of life. They had none.

Aevan kept spending his, and Iva was constantly reminding their father to be more responsible with his own. These two Slaves and their children might mean Aevan would have to sell off some of that vast property he Held.

Or...

"Aevan, do you still Hold that land in Vesi?" Iva asked.

"Of course I do. It's got lots of people on it, Slaves. I think they're having some kind of --"

"Aevan, do you think that either of these people here," Iva waved her dark hand at the Slaves, "would do well there? Is there need for their abilities?"

"Oh yeah!" Aevan said, leaning back and putting his long arms behind his head. His spines stood out, and the Slaves stayed away from them. They didn't want to poke their eyes out. How he hadn't done this to himself was beyond them. "Ebondil could work with the garden - I'm having a big hedge maze built. Nalclar and I have already talked about the dragon nests there."

Iva raised her eyebrow at that. "You've actually put some thought into where they'll go?" She said, half surprised and half snide.

"Yes, I have, I'm not completely stupid you know," Aevan said - he didn't snap at her, but instead stuck out his tongue and the kids both fell into hysterics in the corner.

"Well that makes this much easier then. I'll put this into the service mail and hope we get a response soon." Iva turned to Nalclar and smiled, "your testing shows some great possibilities, which I'm sure you're aware of already if you are around his investments." She nodded toward Aevan. "But let me be honest with you, Ebondil doesn't have as much going for him." The looks on the Slaves' faces changed, and so did Aevan's demeanor. He reflected their desperation. "It's best to just be patient, and it's a very good thing that Aevan will have some place to put both of you should the proceedings go as planned. If there were no post-Raising jobs for you it might not go through." She tapped the papers, then straightened them out to distract herself from their big-eyed stares. "But I think it's almost an entirely done-deal. Since you've both proven yourselves able to Breed easily, I think you may even attract the attention of other Breeders."

"I've been meaning to ask if you could test Nalclar for Hyperfertility," Aevan suggested, and Iva nodded.

"I've got that in the works."

It was odd, to Aevan anyway, that Iva could toss about such statements without really regarding the woman in question - she was right there, after all. But she was still a Slave, still no one worth worrying about until she's Raised. Iva wasn't much for Animal Tunings, however once the idea of Dragon Tunings came along she was right up there with her father's crew.

Aevan worked with the rescue teams and backup Medical help when attacks came - but that was in the off-racing season. When there were Steed races to be held, he was going to be there regardless of the state of the Invasion. He hardly noticed Status, which didn't go without its down side. Few people seemed to take Aevan seriously in social situations - other than at his own parties. Racing, medicine, he was taken quite well. But outside of that?

Everyone knew that this man couldn't hold on to money if it was welded to his hand. How he managed to keep such large Holds under his title was amazing. The lanky green-skinned spliced-together young man knew what he wanted and went out and got it.

Iva reflected that perhaps she could learn a thing or two about bedside manner from him. His way with children was superior to even Vanya's, meaning that he often made the parents feel as at home as the kids - whereas Vanya often just scared the crap out of them while he grinned and giggled with their kids.

"So, we're mostly done here," Iva said, and packed away the paperwork. "I'll get this all finished and we'll be in touch as usual anyway." Iva turned to the Slaves. "I hope that the next time I see you, it's to place a new Status badge on your collar. So be sure to be wearing your best."

Aevan collected the kids, escorted the pair of Slaves to the door, and then turned to his sister. "I'll be sure they've got the best to wear, don't worry."

Iva sighed and sat back down.

***

"Let's celebrate," Aevan said, with a big grin. "They're all where I wanted them to be, and even Iva has to admit we pulled it off well."

"Then that is cause for celebration," Vanya muttered, his dark face drawn into a distracted smile.

"What do you think the kids'll be like, Aevan?" Aern asked, as always interested to see his son really using his talents properly.

Aevan tilted his head, nodding. "They've got their mother's talents, I think. I know they've got her Tunings. And, at least the boy has her fertility level. They won't know what that means for years, though. But I bet they'll become some of the better Breeding stock in the field."

"Then that is the important thing," Vanya said. He was far less interested in the successful placement of the family of Raised slaves, than what exactly they would be doing that evening for dinner. He was going to want to look for some good Breeding stock, wherever they wound up. And, he was hungry for once. A rare occasion like that had even brought him to Aevan and Aern's place at all.

"I was thinking we should go to the beach," Aevan said, almost exactly after Vanya had stopped thinking. He was in fact privy to both his fathers' private thoughts - they knew it, and it did make both of them slightly uncomfortable. At least for Vanya, it was a relief that he didn't have to do some invasive prying to know what was on his mind. That always made his head hurt. Aern preferred to know when someone was knocking on his mental doors - but would never refuse this son of his. None of them, in fact. Aern immediately agreed and started looking for something appropriately small and tight to wear.

Then, it dawned on Vanya what their spliced son had just said. "... You are joking, right?"

Aern stifled a laugh at his friend's trepidation. He continued digging through Aevan's stuff looking for his own clothing. He knew it was in here somewhere...

"No, not joking. I have a great little slice of beach I'm renting," Aevan said, "with the guys. You know, so we can get some sun?"

"You remember the sun, Vanya," Aern sidled up next to the dark-brown skinned Breeder, dropping what appeared to be a thong in his lap and draping himself over his broad shoulders. "It's what makes you warm."

"I remember that beach," Vanya growled, only half serious. He didn't have to turn his brilliant blue eye to look at Aern, who filled the side of his vision - instead he glanced down at the little thong and picked it up with two long fingers. "It's where the water is. You remember water? That stuff I'm afraid of?"

"You take perfectly normal baths, like everyone else," Aevan said, "and besides, we don't have to go swimming if you don't want to." Aevan took the thong from Vanya, handed it back to Aern with a glowering stare, and tugged Vanya out of the chair.

"I couldn't even if I ever *had* wanted to," Vanya muttered, his voice getting smaller and smaller compared to the others. It was quite odd for him, being pinned in by two taller men - Vanya was one of the tallest, leanest men on the planet, and here his son and spliced mate were both half a head higher. He suddenly felt quite oddly out of place. Aern rooted around a bit more in the clothing bin until he found a nice pair of shorts, tossed them at Vanya with a grin, and waited.

"Let's just go," Aevan said, "you'll love it. Just you wait."

He didn't have to wait very long. Aevan laughed at the pair of guys as they strutted around the beach. The property was near a publically sponsored park, where people put together Freeworker parties and kids celebrated their birthing days. The sound of the ocean made all three of them react quite differently.

To Vanya, it was a haze of white-noise, blotting out a lot of the otherwise loud background sounds. He liked it, only for that reason. In any other way, he was terrified to the core of being pushed under the waves again.

To Aern, the constant swelling of the tide over the pebble strewn sand told him how deep the water was out past the shelf, and what point would have been perfect to do a nice dive off the nearby cliffs.

And to Aevan, the waves meant that there were two dozen fantastically healthy women bobbing up and down wearing very little clothing over their colorful skin.

By the time they had hit on the same women, in sequence, they'd gotten Vanya to relax just a little more. Several people mistook them for brothers, so they played to that end if only for a while. They did look like it, Aern and Vanya shared many of the same features physically, perhaps in Vanya they were more drawn and cynical while in Aern they were more playful or easy to look at. It was their son, sitting right between them on the boardwalk barricade, who made them look most similar - his dark green skin and darker hair, long arms with short spines on them, they looked as though he was their middle brother. It was only the fact that Vanya didn't have their two-toned hair, that made him still a bit of an outsider.

"She's cute," Aern said, of a grey-skinned and red-headed woman. "How about her?"

"You've got half of it right," Aevan said. He was using his powers to check out people's genes at a distance. Vanya wanted to use him in the clinic, or maybe as a sort of Breeder's Seeing Eye dog. Of course, he was just jealous. Vanya's own powers of genetic manipulation were wholly internal. He'd spliced up this power from them, turned external, for his son.

"Why half?" Vanya asked, and then glanced the woman over again more closely. "Ah - she's infertile."

Aevan looked a bit deflated. "Yup, that's it. She's quite healthy - dad, you might be able to do something with her though."

"I could. Not right now. I don't have any business cards with me." He smiled.

"Other dad," Aevan said with a grin, "you suck at the Breeder's Eye game."

"I got the last three at least half right!" Aern whined.

"But the last four before those, almost entirely wrong," Vanya said, leaning around their shared miracle. "Quit while you're ahead."

A distant siren came to life, and everyone on the beach sort of froze in place. Then, they began packing up and heading back home. An invader's attack siren.

"Well, there goes this afternoon." Aevan said, grumpily.

***

The convention hall was filled with Breeders, Animal Masters and Dragon-related everyone. Iva stood near a busy hallway, not even really watching the people with her eyes. She felt them with her empathic powers, as they moved by her. Here and there were people who were hungry, one had stubbed his toe and was miserable as he hobbled past - a healer sweetly offered to fix it for him for free. Iva soaked up the emotions hungrily, as though she were a vampire.

Of course her true vampire friends would love to be here, with her, but they had other matters to attend to. Juvon and his disreputable friends were busy digging a hole, somewhere. Fine. Let them.

She was in her element. At this Breeders Convention, hundreds of prominent and up and coming people would show off their abilities and their success stories. Some would gloat, and some humbly accepted the praise that was heaped upon them.

Iva almost entirely wanted to be there just so she could be among interesting people. While the numbers and contract writing were things she could do in her sleep - she often did. They were things that any Breeder would be expected to do. As a Membayar, she had always had it in her blood to work out the right wording, to accept only the best conditions.

As a Breeder, however, she learned from absolutely the best there were. Her father contributed the most odd things to her education, something about how to get the genetic balance of height versus build, but also how to treat a child who's having an entirely awful experience at the clinic. Morgontain did her best at showing Iva the way to locate the right genes (the chart was huge, but to Iva it was almost like a very complex roadmap) and place them with the best choices in mates. Dozens of high ranking Breeders would eventually contribute to Iva's education.

The elderly Morgontain wasn't there, but Iva knew that everyone would still have trouble recognizing her now. Iva suggested, after her half-sister Megami was Bred, that Vanya do something about Morgontain's addiction to pain killers. Every time Morgontain was around, Iva got a splitting headache from her sensing the woman. And if that was what she was like all the time, how in the world could anyone blame her for her addiction?

An entourage of Slaves and Bayaran surrounding an exotically beautiful Lady Healer came sweeping through the hall, and Iva narrowed her eyes. The Slaves had all been bought or bred for the purpose of clouding psionic activity around the Lady, so when they went by, Iva's long bask in the emotions of everyone came to an abrupt end. It did piss her off.

"Well somebody's full of themselves," Iva muttered when the group had passed.

"That's saying a lot, coming from you," a young man's voice carried through the mental air. "I'd have found you earlier, but this lot kept wandering by."

"Essel," Iva said, with a smile, looking for him past the people in the hall, "where are you?"

She spotted her 18 year old assistant, darting through the crowd. His burgandy colored skin shone with the bright lights in the ceiling, he really was quite the attractive young man. Iva would probably get to him sometime. For now, though, he was only on Bond to her and would be paid off within weeks if his excellent work was kept up.

"I got one," he said, panting. "The whole place had been stripped of the darn things, because everyone always thinks they're 'unsightly' or something, but they had em on display downstairs in the dealer's hall. Why do you want that, anyway? I didn't think it was safe to have that." After he'd handed her the object nestled in its cloth wrapping, he almost looked relieved.

Iva looked at the small sliver of black stone. "This is a very important piece of ore, Essel. Do you know what it does?"

"Yeah, they told me right off," Essel said, looking around as though he didn't like talking about it here in a crowded hallway. "Plus I could tell, it was hard to contact you. You felt all faint."

"But it's very helpful for people like myself, and like you, too." She said. "With this near by, it will make it more difficult to perform even the simplest of psionic tasks."

"But... I thought the idea was to do those tasks..." Essel said, his brightly yellow eyebrows crossing up on his forehead.

"Well, certainly." Iva tucked it away. It had a tingling sort of feel to it, it was already affecting her. "But with this stone, we'll soon know how much stronger we could be, if only we worked at it."

Surprised, Essel said, "well, I didn't expect that... I thought you wanted it maybe to keep people from doing stuff in your office, or something."

"No," Iva said, "I've got the Alabaster security team working on my office, this is a personal strength issue."

Essel shrugged, and then suggested they find seats at the seminar Iva wanted to attend. As a sort of seeker-psionic, Essel would always have a good place with the Chanay family - or with Alabaster, if they offered. Iva's half brother worked with them, Haesh never seemed the type to be a spy yet there he was.

The seminar went well, and eventually Iva would try out her new stone.


	Lord Healer Aevan Sengihr Kshau Healer 1st Degree/Owner (/DragonBreeder) Curra/Polaen/Behat, 10364 Holds 1493 Land; 9 Bayaran; 23 Slaves Lucidity, Familial Empathy/ Telepathy, Enhanced Agility and Appearance; Emotion Sponge, Genetic Sense and Alteration (dragon, human, animal); Automatic Regeneration	Mistress Breeder Iva Chanay Sengihr Breeder 6th Degree/ Membayar (/DragonBreeder) Tana/Imaa/Fi'ir, 10366 Holds 253 Land; 12 Bayaran; 9 Slaves Human Empathy, Limited Flexibility, Sense Dragon Genes, Enhanced Senses; Minor Genetic Alteration (human, dragon), Information Absorption; Automatic Regeneration
10402 "You've got to stop doing this! Aevan, are you even listening to me?" Iva turned her dark face toward her half brother, and rolled her green-blue eyes. "You're not. You're totally in your own world... Great." Iva tapped her long fingers on her arm, holding herself carefully and hoping for that haughty-look that their father did so well. Her mother did it too. Probably why she was so interested in Vanya in the first place - they were a strange mirror of each other. Iolen Chanay, long-married to a very nice Land Holder, finally Bred to one of the premier gene stock providers of the century. The results of that breeding came about hardly two years after the results of another rather bizarre pairing. She stared at him, from across the room, as he played with the two children of the Slaves he'd just bought. Now, Iva could hardly fault him for loving the kids. They were adorable - two years apart like he and Iva, with almost opposite coloration from their father or mother respectively. Those parents sat patiently at the edge of the big desk, in Iva's office, waiting for their Owner to get with the program. "Aevan!" Iva said sharply, startling the Slaves, as well as the children, into silence. Grudgingly, Aevan stood up and sat back down in the big black chair across from Iva. He felt like his dads often did, when they sat in that chair. It was the 'Iva's caught us at it again' chair. Their shared joke. "So, are you going to help with this or not, Iva?" Aevan said, oblivious to the fact that his new Slaves were shocked that he'd refer to the Mistress Breeder that way. Well, not entirely oblivious - but he was concentrating on the great feelings of relief they both still had, and not their panic at his little Status faux pas. Iva glanced at the paperwork in front of her. It was very clear to her that the female Slave, Nalclar, was Tuned to a strong degree and might even be Hyperfertile. Her mate, husband Ebondil, didn't show much more than a tendancy to plants - that might help but in a court it wasn't going to hold for automatic Raising. Iva wanted to try for that option first, though, because if they were both found to be Tuned - animal or otherwise - no one would actually have to pay anything to change their Status. It would be awarded automatically and by the Area. Their next step would have to be the harder one, that of suddenly being either Animal Masters or Free Workers, in a world which relied upon money for every small facet of life. They had none. Aevan kept spending his, and Iva was constantly reminding their father to be more responsible with his own. These two Slaves and their children might mean Aevan would have to sell off some of that vast property he Held. Or... "Aevan, do you still Hold that land in Vesi?" Iva asked. "Of course I do. It's got lots of people on it, Slaves. I think they're having some kind of --" "Aevan, do you think that either of these people here," Iva waved her dark hand at the Slaves, "would do well there? Is there need for their abilities?" "Oh yeah!" Aevan said, leaning back and putting his long arms behind his head. His spines stood out, and the Slaves stayed away from them. They didn't want to poke their eyes out. How he hadn't done this to himself was beyond them. "Ebondil could work with the garden - I'm having a big hedge maze built. Nalclar and I have already talked about the dragon nests there." Iva raised her eyebrow at that. "You've actually put some thought into where they'll go?" She said, half surprised and half snide. "Yes, I have, I'm not completely stupid you know," Aevan said - he didn't snap at her, but instead stuck out his tongue and the kids both fell into hysterics in the corner. "Well that makes this much easier then. I'll put this into the service mail and hope we get a response soon." Iva turned to Nalclar and smiled, "your testing shows some great possibilities, which I'm sure you're aware of already if you are around his investments." She nodded toward Aevan. "But let me be honest with you, Ebondil doesn't have as much going for him." The looks on the Slaves' faces changed, and so did Aevan's demeanor. He reflected their desperation. "It's best to just be patient, and it's a very good thing that Aevan will have some place to put both of you should the proceedings go as planned. If there were no post-Raising jobs for you it might not go through." She tapped the papers, then straightened them out to distract herself from their big-eyed stares. "But I think it's almost an entirely done-deal. Since you've both proven yourselves able to Breed easily, I think you may even attract the attention of other Breeders." "I've been meaning to ask if you could test Nalclar for Hyperfertility," Aevan suggested, and Iva nodded. "I've got that in the works." It was odd, to Aevan anyway, that Iva could toss about such statements without really regarding the woman in question - she was right there, after all. But she was still a Slave, still no one worth worrying about until she's Raised. Iva wasn't much for Animal Tunings, however once the idea of Dragon Tunings came along she was right up there with her father's crew. Aevan worked with the rescue teams and backup Medical help when attacks came - but that was in the off-racing season. When there were Steed races to be held, he was going to be there regardless of the state of the Invasion. He hardly noticed Status, which didn't go without its down side. Few people seemed to take Aevan seriously in social situations - other than at his own parties. Racing, medicine, he was taken quite well. But outside of that? Everyone knew that this man couldn't hold on to money if it was welded to his hand. How he managed to keep such large Holds under his title was amazing. The lanky green-skinned spliced-together young man knew what he wanted and went out and got it. Iva reflected that perhaps she could learn a thing or two about bedside manner from him. His way with children was superior to even Vanya's, meaning that he often made the parents feel as at home as the kids - whereas Vanya often just scared the crap out of them while he grinned and giggled with their kids. "So, we're mostly done here," Iva said, and packed away the paperwork. "I'll get this all finished and we'll be in touch as usual anyway." Iva turned to the Slaves. "I hope that the next time I see you, it's to place a new Status badge on your collar. So be sure to be wearing your best." Aevan collected the kids, escorted the pair of Slaves to the door, and then turned to his sister. "I'll be sure they've got the best to wear, don't worry." Iva sighed and sat back down. *** "Let's celebrate," Aevan said, with a big grin. "They're all where I wanted them to be, and even Iva has to admit we pulled it off well." "Then that is cause for celebration," Vanya muttered, his dark face drawn into a distracted smile. "What do you think the kids'll be like, Aevan?" Aern asked, as always interested to see his son really using his talents properly. Aevan tilted his head, nodding. "They've got their mother's talents, I think. I know they've got her Tunings. And, at least the boy has her fertility level. They won't know what that means for years, though. But I bet they'll become some of the better Breeding stock in the field." "Then that is the important thing," Vanya said. He was far less interested in the successful placement of the family of Raised slaves, than what exactly they would be doing that evening for dinner. He was going to want to look for some good Breeding stock, wherever they wound up. And, he was hungry for once. A rare occasion like that had even brought him to Aevan and Aern's place at all. "I was thinking we should go to the beach," Aevan said, almost exactly after Vanya had stopped thinking. He was in fact privy to both his fathers' private thoughts - they knew it, and it did make both of them slightly uncomfortable. At least for Vanya, it was a relief that he didn't have to do some invasive prying to know what was on his mind. That always made his head hurt. Aern preferred to know when someone was knocking on his mental doors - but would never refuse this son of his. None of them, in fact. Aern immediately agreed and started looking for something appropriately small and tight to wear. Then, it dawned on Vanya what their spliced son had just said. "... You are joking, right?" Aern stifled a laugh at his friend's trepidation. He continued digging through Aevan's stuff looking for his own clothing. He knew it was in here somewhere... "No, not joking. I have a great little slice of beach I'm renting," Aevan said, "with the guys. You know, so we can get some sun?" "You remember the sun, Vanya," Aern sidled up next to the dark-brown skinned Breeder, dropping what appeared to be a thong in his lap and draping himself over his broad shoulders. "It's what makes you warm." "I remember that beach," Vanya growled, only half serious. He didn't have to turn his brilliant blue eye to look at Aern, who filled the side of his vision - instead he glanced down at the little thong and picked it up with two long fingers. "It's where the water is. You remember water? That stuff I'm afraid of?" "You take perfectly normal baths, like everyone else," Aevan said, "and besides, we don't have to go swimming if you don't want to." Aevan took the thong from Vanya, handed it back to Aern with a glowering stare, and tugged Vanya out of the chair. "I couldn't even if I ever had wanted to," Vanya muttered, his voice getting smaller and smaller compared to the others. It was quite odd for him, being pinned in by two taller men - Vanya was one of the tallest, leanest men on the planet, and here his son and spliced mate were both half a head higher. He suddenly felt quite oddly out of place. Aern rooted around a bit more in the clothing bin until he found a nice pair of shorts, tossed them at Vanya with a grin, and waited. "Let's just go," Aevan said, "you'll love it. Just you wait." He didn't have to wait very long. Aevan laughed at the pair of guys as they strutted around the beach. The property was near a publically sponsored park, where people put together Freeworker parties and kids celebrated their birthing days. The sound of the ocean made all three of them react quite differently. To Vanya, it was a haze of white-noise, blotting out a lot of the otherwise loud background sounds. He liked it, only for that reason. In any other way, he was terrified to the core of being pushed under the waves again. To Aern, the constant swelling of the tide over the pebble strewn sand told him how deep the water was out past the shelf, and what point would have been perfect to do a nice dive off the nearby cliffs. And to Aevan, the waves meant that there were two dozen fantastically healthy women bobbing up and down wearing very little clothing over their colorful skin. By the time they had hit on the same women, in sequence, they'd gotten Vanya to relax just a little more. Several people mistook them for brothers, so they played to that end if only for a while. They did look like it, Aern and Vanya shared many of the same features physically, perhaps in Vanya they were more drawn and cynical while in Aern they were more playful or easy to look at. It was their son, sitting right between them on the boardwalk barricade, who made them look most similar - his dark green skin and darker hair, long arms with short spines on them, they looked as though he was their middle brother. It was only the fact that Vanya didn't have their two-toned hair, that made him still a bit of an outsider. "She's cute," Aern said, of a grey-skinned and red-headed woman. "How about her?" "You've got half of it right," Aevan said. He was using his powers to check out people's genes at a distance. Vanya wanted to use him in the clinic, or maybe as a sort of Breeder's Seeing Eye dog. Of course, he was just jealous. Vanya's own powers of genetic manipulation were wholly internal. He'd spliced up this power from them, turned external, for his son. "Why half?" Vanya asked, and then glanced the woman over again more closely. "Ah - she's infertile." Aevan looked a bit deflated. "Yup, that's it. She's quite healthy - dad, you might be able to do something with her though." "I could. Not right now. I don't have any business cards with me." He smiled. "Other dad," Aevan said with a grin, "you suck at the Breeder's Eye game." "I got the last three at least half right!" Aern whined. "But the last four before those, almost entirely wrong," Vanya said, leaning around their shared miracle. "Quit while you're ahead." A distant siren came to life, and everyone on the beach sort of froze in place. Then, they began packing up and heading back home. An invader's attack siren. "Well, there goes this afternoon." Aevan said, grumpily. *** The convention hall was filled with Breeders, Animal Masters and Dragon-related everyone. Iva stood near a busy hallway, not even really watching the people with her eyes. She felt them with her empathic powers, as they moved by her. Here and there were people who were hungry, one had stubbed his toe and was miserable as he hobbled past - a healer sweetly offered to fix it for him for free. Iva soaked up the emotions hungrily, as though she were a vampire. Of course her true vampire friends would love to be here, with her, but they had other matters to attend to. Juvon and his disreputable friends were busy digging a hole, somewhere. Fine. Let them. She was in her element. At this Breeders Convention, hundreds of prominent and up and coming people would show off their abilities and their success stories. Some would gloat, and some humbly accepted the praise that was heaped upon them. Iva almost entirely wanted to be there just so she could be among interesting people. While the numbers and contract writing were things she could do in her sleep - she often did. They were things that any Breeder would be expected to do. As a Membayar, she had always had it in her blood to work out the right wording, to accept only the best conditions. As a Breeder, however, she learned from absolutely the best there were. Her father contributed the most odd things to her education, something about how to get the genetic balance of height versus build, but also how to treat a child who's having an entirely awful experience at the clinic. Morgontain did her best at showing Iva the way to locate the right genes (the chart was huge, but to Iva it was almost like a very complex roadmap) and place them with the best choices in mates. Dozens of high ranking Breeders would eventually contribute to Iva's education. The elderly Morgontain wasn't there, but Iva knew that everyone would still have trouble recognizing her now. Iva suggested, after her half-sister Megami was Bred, that Vanya do something about Morgontain's addiction to pain killers. Every time Morgontain was around, Iva got a splitting headache from her sensing the woman. And if that was what she was like all the time, how in the world could anyone blame her for her addiction? An entourage of Slaves and Bayaran surrounding an exotically beautiful Lady Healer came sweeping through the hall, and Iva narrowed her eyes. The Slaves had all been bought or bred for the purpose of clouding psionic activity around the Lady, so when they went by, Iva's long bask in the emotions of everyone came to an abrupt end. It did piss her off. "Well somebody's full of themselves," Iva muttered when the group had passed. "That's saying a lot, coming from you," a young man's voice carried through the mental air. "I'd have found you earlier, but this lot kept wandering by." "Essel," Iva said, with a smile, looking for him past the people in the hall, "where are you?" She spotted her 18 year old assistant, darting through the crowd. His burgandy colored skin shone with the bright lights in the ceiling, he really was quite the attractive young man. Iva would probably get to him sometime. For now, though, he was only on Bond to her and would be paid off within weeks if his excellent work was kept up. "I got one," he said, panting. "The whole place had been stripped of the darn things, because everyone always thinks they're 'unsightly' or something, but they had em on display downstairs in the dealer's hall. Why do you want that, anyway? I didn't think it was safe to have that." After he'd handed her the object nestled in its cloth wrapping, he almost looked relieved. Iva looked at the small sliver of black stone. "This is a very important piece of ore, Essel. Do you know what it does?" "Yeah, they told me right off," Essel said, looking around as though he didn't like talking about it here in a crowded hallway. "Plus I could tell, it was hard to contact you. You felt all faint." "But it's very helpful for people like myself, and like you, too." She said. "With this near by, it will make it more difficult to perform even the simplest of psionic tasks." "But... I thought the idea was to do those tasks..." Essel said, his brightly yellow eyebrows crossing up on his forehead. "Well, certainly." Iva tucked it away. It had a tingling sort of feel to it, it was already affecting her. "But with this stone, we'll soon know how much stronger we could be, if only we worked at it." Surprised, Essel said, "well, I didn't expect that... I thought you wanted it maybe to keep people from doing stuff in your office, or something." "No," Iva said, "I've got the Alabaster security team working on my office, this is a personal strength issue." Essel shrugged, and then suggested they find seats at the seminar Iva wanted to attend. As a sort of seeker-psionic, Essel would always have a good place with the Chanay family - or with Alabaster, if they offered. Iva's half brother worked with them, Haesh never seemed the type to be a spy yet there he was. The seminar went well, and eventually Iva would try out her new stone. Next