The queen raised her neatly trimmed eyebrows. “Ah, you worked that out. Yes, the Gotti. They helped and they brought with them their oracles. They too were being attacked by the Beasts, so in return for a standing army of the finest Hezara warriors, we took their scientists, their womenfolk, because on their world, men are subservient and merely perform minor functions. The idea took shape that Hezara could do something similar.”
Minor functions meant mating; the idea for the Gifts came from the Gotti.
“But why not increase the ratio of women to men if you needed more for breeding?” she asked the fundamental question.
The queen took a sip of migini and her hesitation quickened Shayla’s pulse once again.
“The droids proved very successful. Too successful, because while our warriors, which are bred for war, were increasingly difficult to control, the sexdroids satisfied their primal urges and contained their aggression. It was decided that the men of Hezara were best served by droids even though it stagnated our population because, as you might have realized, only the comfort of a real woman can stem their Hunger and make them virile as possible.”
Shayla thought of the arena, the visceral power of many hungry men waiting to be unleashed. Great on a battlefield, but dangerous in the bedroom.
“You reward the most deserving with Gifts. Aliens like me, because it helps not only control them, but give you offspring?” Not quite humane, and nothing like she’d been told during her training.
“Yes.” Now the queen finally looked at Shayla—her cheeks were flushed. “It was a terrible thing to do. A truly bad time for us. We snatched thousands of women from the arms of their menfolk, their families, and turned them into slaves. It fed the Hunger, but the atrocities nearly tore us apart. As our population stabilized, and we started to push the Beasts to the farthest points of the galaxy, then our needs changed, and the truth became a lie.”
“A lie?”
“I think you know. You’re a fine woman with a natural beauty, and brains. We should never have underestimated the brilliance of the mind, even an alien one. The Gotti are exemplary of that ability.” The queen smirked, unable to hide her disgust. “Mercenary species. Quite despicable really. They are as much to blame with their secrecy.”
“You used the Violence as a bargaining chip? There is no threat, is there?” Shayla sprang to her feet. “The Gifts replaced captive females because you knew the Violence was not real.”
“Oh, it was real—we did not know back then if they might come for you—but not now, at least not in your part of the galaxy. We falsely used the threat of the Violence to prevent retaliation for taking captives. Once the agreement was in place, it has remained and solidified around the lies. Please sit down. Displays of anger will set off the alarms and you will be removed.” The queen’s authority was in the sharpness of her voice.
Shayla sat. “I’m sorry, but you have to appreciate, you have manipulated Earth, and other worlds. It isn’t r
ight. Not now.” Shayla seethed. What did the queen get out of the arrangement? A life underground, no friends, no family. Her existence was no different in some respects to a droid.
A sadness descended over the queen. Her bright eyes lost some of their fire. “No, it isn’t,” she said quietly. “I envy you. Your freedom. Not how you live here on Odesta, beholden to our rituals, but before you left—you had choices, and you chose to come here.”
“Kind of.” Shayla shrugged. “It was mapped out for me. I had the right to refuse, but the pressure is intense.”
The queen nodded. “I feel it, too. I would like to end all this...” She waved around her.
“You would?”
“We all would, we queens. We are a hive, a network, keeping in contact.”
“Then why don’t you?”
“Change is hard, isn’t it? The Gotti have what they want, and we have an army of mighty warriors. Too many of them. What do you do with an army when there is no enemy left to fight?”
“Give them something else to do?”
“They don’t know that they can.” The queen spoke so quietly, Shayla struggled to hear her.
“I don’t understand.”
“The queens can outlive many of them. We age slowly, so that we can keep reproducing, and we have been trusted with the knowledge of Hezara. Generations of wisdom is locked into our genetic code. We know things.”
A bright spark lit up in Shayla’s mind. “You’ve always had the ability to reproduce more females.”
“Yes. Things can be reversed. More females instead of males, and then as you do on Earth, we rely on selection by chance without interference.” The queen examined her long nails. “However, to rebel against the Junta is punishable by death.”
Shayla swallowed hard. Walls had ears, was that what Nieve had warned her about? Was this all a trap to get the queen to speak of treason, to have Shayla arrested again?
“I’m not asking you to do anything,” she said nervously. “I was only curious.”
The queen smiled. “It’s something of a relief to speak of it. But I think you know that your curiosity is a bit of a lie. You have been asked by somebody, somebody you trust.”