“They took staggering losses,” Arland said. “I remember reading about it as a child. Almost two hundred thousand Draziri troops died so they could kill fifty Hiru. Our strategy manuals use it as a cautionary tale about the costs of victories.”

“We are not safe,” the Hiru said.

“You are safe here,” I told him.

“Yes,” Sean said. “You are.”

His face was dark. Auul, the planet of his parents, had been destroyed too, not by an enemy but by his own ancestors. The werewolves of Auul killed their beautiful planet rather than surrender it to their enemy.

“The Arbitrator whom we had petitioned offered a solution,” the Hiru said. “We have surrendered everything we have. All the treasures we possess. We paid the price in knowledge. Everything we are and everything we were, we have given up freely.”

“I don’t understand,” I said.

“We have hired the Archivarius,” the Hiru said. “We have received word that the Archivarius has found a solution.”

Oh wow.

“The Archivarius is in its parts,” the Hiru said.

Sean and Arland both looked at me.

“The Archivarius is a multipart being,” I explained. “A hive mind possessing an incredible wealth of information about the universe. For the knowledge to be shared, all individual members of the Archivarius must come together in a single location. They do this very rarely and they reform only for a very brief time. The Archivarius will answer questions, but it is very selective about which questions it chooses and the price is beyond what most galactic states can pay.”

“The Draziri cannot know or find out,” the Hiru said. “They will try to stop the Archivarius from reforming. We have no safe place. The Arbitrator suggested that you might keep us safe.”

“Was he a human male? Pale yellow hair?”

“Yes.” The Hiru nodded.

George. George was ruthless, cunning, and calculating, and compassionate to a fault. He couldn’t stand by and let them die, so he sent them my way. It was an unspoken bargain. He helped me rescue my sister. In turn, he hoped I would rescue the Hiru. He would never ask me to do it. He would never expect that I repay the favor. He left the choice to me.

“The Archivarius and my people will make an effort to deliver the individual Archivarians, which are its parts, to your inn. But it may not always be possible. Some may need to be retrieved from other worlds. All will need to be kept safe. We wish to use your inn. We wish you to help us.”

That’s exactly what I thought. It broke my heart to tell him no, but I couldn’t. I just couldn’t.

“My deepest apologies, but the security of my inn is my priority. I am bound by the innkeeper laws. These laws dictate that I keep my guests safe first and foremost. What you are suggesting - retrieving the Archivarians - would require me to leave the inn unattended. Nor am I capable of doing the retrievals. I’m an innkeeper. I’m at my most powerful here, at the inn. This is my place.”

“We have seen you rescue your sister. We have observed. We know you are capable.”

George must’ve wanted to help them desperately. I wanted to help them.

“I can’t. Doing this would make the inn a target for the Draziri and they won’t abide by the treaty of Earth. The secret of the existence of other galactic life must be kept. It breaks my heart to tell you no, but I must. I’m so sorry.”

“The treasures we have given were our most prized possessions,” the Hiru said. “Our books. Our images. Our secrets. Everything that made us. We are dying. Our culture will be gone without us. It has value. It is rare. The Archivarius prizes rare.”

I bit my lip.

“Enough for two,” the Hiru said.

“Two what?” Maud asked.

“Enough for answers to two questions,” the Hiru said. “The Arbitrator told us.”

He raised his hand. A panel on his forearm slid aside and a translucent image formed above it, woven from the tiny yellow lights. The picture of my missing parents, the one I kept hanging on the front room wall.

“Help us,” the Hiru said. “And you can ask your question.”

CHAPTER 5

Silence claimed the room.

Maud was looking at me. It was my inn and it was up to me to respond.

“Will you give us time to discuss your proposal?”

The Hiru nodded. “My time is short, but I’ll wait until the beginning of the light cycle.”

We had until the next morning to decide.

“Follow me, please.”

I led him through the hallway, forming a new room downstairs as we walked. So little was known about the Hiru, but the one thing my mother told me was that reproducing the Hiru’s native environment was beyond the inns’ capacity. Gertrude Hunt could create almost anything with my direction and the proper resources, but some things, like intense heat, for example, were off-limits. The inns could handle small controlled flames, like fireplaces and pits, but large scale blazes put them under undue stress.

According to my mother, the Hiru's environment required a very specific combination of gasses, pressure, and gravity, and we simply couldn’t match it. A Hiru was never truly comfortable anywhere, but they liked water. When one stayed at my parents’ inn, my mother made her a room with indigo walls and a deep pool at the end. That had to be my best bet.

The Hiru moved behind me, his gait slow, ponderous, and labored. Our galaxy loved tech in all its incarnations. A high tech assault suit or a bastard sword, it didn’t matter - once it was made, someone would almost immediately try to improve on it. The Hiru were the glaring exception to this rule. There was nothing sleek or efficient about them. They were clunky and slow, as if some mad genius had tried to build a robot with things he’d found at a junkyard, but died before he could improve his design past its first, barely functional prototype. Even his translator was so ancient, it failed to associate “morning” with “beginning of the light cycle.”