Lyon's Pride by Anne McCaffrey Page A

framework of long-held ethics and morals was—in some minds—prodding minds through the once comfortable habits of generations.
    Afra was also fully aware of other pressures at the highest level—for the Rowan and Jeff often used him as a sounding board and, as often as not, followed his advice.
    The intransigence of Prtglm and the deaths of Gil andKat were having a more far-reaching effect on Human-Mrdini relations than that carrier left on Clarf’s Tower field. A strong faction of high-ranking Mrdini were of the opinion that, if Rojer Lyon had been old enough for the duties of a Prime, then he should have complied with Prtglm’s plan to devastate the planet Xh-33, regardless of the fact that Rojer was a non-combatant, a minor, following the orders he had been given by his superiors. He had only been on the
Genesee
as a substitute until his older brother was available. The fact that Thian also would not have complied with Prtglm’s orders was irrelevant. But Thian already had “hero” status in ’Dini eyes which would have given him the stature to reason with the ’Dini captain and helped him defuse the incident tactfully. It was also quite likely that Prtglm would never have tried to coerce Prime Isthian Lyon.
    Yet, since the Mrdinis had allied themselves with Humans, Afra mused, they must often have had dreams, and delusions, of using the human kinetic abilities to produce a grand rout of the Hive species. The fact that the Talents had defeated a Hive colony ship without suffering a single casualty was a frequent theme of ’Dini dream-projections and story-telling. When the Mrdini and Humans had finally made contact, the Humans had enthusiastically embraced ’Dini aspirations and followed their guidance, since obviously the ’Dini had far more information about the Hive predators than Humans did.
    In total, such information boiled down to a painfully intimate knowledge of Hive ordnance, its range and destructive abilities: of the number of suicide ships needed to penetrate and destroy any Hive intruders; enough of the Hive mode of colonial expansion to know it was fatal to any planetary life form. Deneb IV was remarkable as the only world where Hive tactics had been unsuccessful.
    Since these tactics had been effective so long, the Hive species had not altered them, or its ships and armaments, in the centuries that the Mrdini had been defending themselves. The Mrdinis had, on the other hand, improved spaceships and peripheral technologies, and created more effective unmanned missiles. They had managed to protect their own colony worlds, all the time searching for allies, the Hive homeworld and new resources to help them win the final victory.
    Humans had far too long eschewed wars: naval strength being deployed more in the search for colonial worlds, or as deterrent against the occasional renegade privateer. Consequently minor incidents of friction were bound to occur between a war-honed species and one which had been at peace, where the only casualties had occurred in space accidents which were then so ruthlessly investigated that repetitions were unlikely.
    On the positive side, since the Alliance had been formed and great efforts made by both species to improve communications and appreciation of each other, there had been significant developments that ought to have had a morale-building effect. The fortuitous discovery of the ion trails of three Hive ships had given the Alliance the splendid opportunity to send an expedition to backtrack and locate the Hive homeworld. The trail had led first to the hulk of the biggest Hive ship ever seen by the Mrdini: a hulk which had been partially destroyed by a searing nova explosion. To discover if the nova had indeed destroyed the system which had spawned the Hive species, one resolute ’Dini ship, with Prime Isthian Lyon on board, had driven to the origin of the fading ion trail.
    Discovery of the damaged Hive ship disclosed