Ah, Memor thought. Sarko was drawing fire to defuse the tension in the room. And it worked. Those clustered around made derisive noises, though some just fluttered their feather-fans. “Surely that is too simple,” an elderly Savant hooted. Others just laughed.

The Packmistress allowed a flicker of irritation to ripple through her feathered corona. “For we—Savants, Profounds, all those in the tier below Astronomers—corruption of purpose means simple bribery, graft, or nepotism. But for lower Folk who enjoy their lives in the unchanging state our Bowl ensures, corruption has an entirely different meaning. It is the failure to share any largesse you have received with those with whom you have formed ties of dependence.”

Sarko said, “Surely that is predictable, my—”

“Our view of corruption makes sense in a culture of laws and impersonal institutions,” the Packmistress rolled right over Sarko. “But theirs is a small world whose defining feature is the web of indebtedness, of obligations that ensure the social order. So to them, not to give a job to a cousin is corrupt, even if others are better qualified. Not to do deals with tribesFolk because better terms may be found elsewhere is also corrupt. Reducing corruption of this sort demands—” The Packmistress let her voice fall to a grave tone. “—resolve.”

A sobered silence from those who saw what was going on.

“It is useful to recall the full brunt of our measures,” she began, displaying a somber arc-pattern of grays and pale blues. “I remind us all that while such social dissension occurs on occasion, there is a rogue element afoot, and not far from these territories where the water temples are failing to make a benign equilibrium.”

With this she cast a significant long look at Memor. “Witness, I bid you, the current state of those we have condemned for committing offenses of this type.” With a great sway of her body, she signaled the attendants. The dome over their heads surged with popping energy, and a wide image played upon it. Memor shivered with fear when she recognized the context.

The greatest preventive the Astronomers had, used against only those whose actions threatened the Bowl’s environment and fate, was the Perpetual Hell. Mention of its very existence could silence a crowd.

Those who violated the Code could face having their very minds mapped, and their bodies then executed. They would then awake suspended in a virtual, mental Hell from which none escaped. Ever.

Memor had gone through the mandatory sampling of a mere single Hell, and would never forget it. And now here it came again, splashed across the ceiling.

A glowering sky, shot with red and amber. Beneath lay a vast swamp flooded with fuming lava, the stench—the Packmistress had ordered the full sensorium to come into play across the chamber—so strong, it now crawled into her nostrils and stung throughout her head.

“Attend!” the Packmistress commanded. Heads had already averted the images, eyes snatched away.

Memor looked up against her will. Rooted in this acrid slime were … the doomed Folk. They writhed and screamed in tiny shrill voices. Fires danced upon them as they twisted. A din of shrieking pain played across the bodies. They could not wrench free of the fires and so endured it like trees whipped by winds of agony. Eyes pleaded with them all—for those in this place knew they were watched; it was part of the torture—begging for release from agonies she could see but do nothing about. Rocks fell from the smoldering sky and smashed the fevered mud.

The first time she had to watch this, the intent was to educate her, and the lesson never left her mind for long. Now the Packmistress meant to instill discipline. Memor trembled, for the message was clearly focused on her.

At a nod, the image and scents fled. Sighs and worried murmurs laced the air as the Packmistress settled herself, looking satisfied.

All waited and the Packmistress let tension build. She’s toying with me, Memor thought. At last the Packmistress said slowly, “The Bureau of the Adopted had as its Research Minister a Profound of the most high stratum. He will present their views now, and our guest, Memor, will answer. Attend—these are the firm results of our global staff, an analysis of the nature of these … aliens.”

Memor watched as the Profound—a male, of course, since males push at the boundaries, as a rightful, youthful function—gave a rather hurried talk. He swept his great head about to stress his points, feathers ruffling constantly at his neck for emphasis. Masculine energy surged through his sentences.

“These are clever creatures, a form we never saw evolve in the Bowl.” The Profound tipped his head at his audience, mirth playing in his eyes. “This may come from their tempting role as game—” This brought a storm of laughter, obviously a release from the tension of watching the Hell. “—but we can deduce aspects of their evolution from their surprising intelligence.”

Memor knew where this was going. She was not so far from the male phase; she could still anticipate the channels of their thoughts; after all, that was a core female talent. Evolutionary theory would predict a clear pattern in the aliens, and males loved the mechanisms of theory. Selection pressure on some world had favored the climbers of trees, and then had somehow shifted, so the climbers came down to the ground. There they learned to hunt. As strategies go, hunting in groups compelled social communication, to find prey and coordinate attacks. That drove speech and language. In turn, intelligence acted on social cues so that group survival became enhanced, in conflict with other hunting groups of the same species. That drove cooperation. Particularly, selection would favor both the charismatic minds that could lead, and the analytical ones, which would see deeper. The social pyramid would have a bulge in the middle, of the variously competent.

“But this is a commonplace,” Memor injected, a calculated move whose risk made her heart pound. She tasted in her breath the tang of her own sour apprehension. “We can all see where the argument goes. We ourselves evolved in something like this manner, in the Home.”

Invoking the Home was a bold move, but she had to make it. Memor made a fan display of rattling colors. “But these creatures are tiny! They would lack the advantage of size, and so should not be very successful.”

The Profound gave a jut of his head and a jaunty spray of derisive colors. “Size can become an instability, as surely even nonspecialists must know.” This dig provoked a titter among some. “It is simple to grow large and dumb, yet remain secure. We—the Folk—found a balance. We became smart and yet our size let us develop the civilized arts. Our societies matured. We learned to sustain, the greatest of virtues. We learned to Adopt other species through modification of their genes, our great skill—though, of course, even the Adopted at times need recalibration.”

Memor rose to her full height to challenge this. Rising was a risk, for it could offend. But her life was at stake here. Plainly, the Packmistress had chosen to subject them to the Perpetual Hell to make this point without speaking of it. “You speak of strategies we do not in fact know at all. Adopting is our method here, yes. But, I might remind the Profound, we do not know how we evolved!”

Memor had not expected this sally to deflect the Profound’s argument, and it did not. He said, “Standard theory declares that this skill, plus our extraordinary social coherence, was decisive. I am not surprised you do not know this, for you are untutored in the evolutionary arts.”

“Do you know what sort of world we came from?”

“Of course. The best parts of it were much like our Bowl.”

“You like mean the Great Plain, the Knothole, the Zone of Reflectance, or—what?”