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“Why do your people do it, Trader?” asked Chris Alan as they looked south at the great Bruin-built space elevator that hauled endless tons of salt and other products up to geosynchronous orbit.

“Do what, Undying Singer?”

“Gang-rape every star system that comes into your hands.”

Chicha looked at Chris Alan in wide-eyed shock. By nature, the Adamim weren’t as promiscuous as most mammals (sentient or otherwise), but they were potentially free and easy indeed compared to the instinctively (and for rodents, most unusually) monogamous Nihekhim. The latter had no word for “rape” until they encountered the Adamim. Chris Alan had just uttered the Nihekhi equivalent of obscenity and blasphemy combined, and both of them *knew* he had done so.

< Diplomacy no more! > thought the Trader. < Well, I was warned this moment might come. >

Kung all but barked at Chris Alan as he put his hand on his pistol – which was every bit as wicked-looking as his rifle. Quickly Trader Chicha spoke some words to him in the Sui’s own language. Kung gave Chris Alan a growl and a rude gesture in parting, then walked off toward a group of native Tai’tui saurians being instructed under a portable parasol by a Nihekhi overseer.

“You were saying?” said the Trader, deliberately adopting the Adami gesture of crossing his arms in hope of keeping the Lightchild off-balance. It was a forlorn hope; Protectors like Chris Alan defended the innocent, and put their whole beings into it when roused.

“This planet doesn’t even belong to you, ethically speaking,” Chris Alan went on, making emphatic gestures of his own. “You use the native population to do most of the heavy labor for you – even work this salt lake and its surrounding flats, in many ways the most hostile environment on the planet. You use them to strip the crust of every available mineral resource…”

“Leaving one-tenth of the refined products in trust for their future use…”

“You crack open whole moons and dwarf planets to get at their cores, extract every useable substance from their shattered mantles…”

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“While teaching the natives how to make use of what we hold in trust for them so that they too can become tied into the Knot…”

“Not as interstellar partners, but as dependents serving an elite class.”

“Isn’t that what you Adamim are – and especially you Lightchildren: an elite class?”

Chris Alan had heard that accusation many, many times before. It was a half-truth. True, the Adamim were created to rule over all other organic species, sentient and otherwise. True, their eventual reward from the Lord of the Realms and His Heavenly Emperor was commensurate with that responsibility. But theirs was to be “servant leadership” – and the Lightchildren’s “servant leadership” over the Adamim was meant to facilitate their own leadership over other mortals.

“Would it surprise you, Trader Chicha, to learn that the Big Picture as we see it has close parallels with what the symbol of your Knot represents? Rafael, display a pane with the Temperament Matrix.”

They were standing on the vast salt flat surrounding the salt lake that filled the lowest point on land of the Tai’tui’s world. The lake and the flat were in the middle of a tectonic rift valley that had rich mineral deposits (volcanic and sedimentary alike) all along its length, all of which were either being explored or being exploited by the Nihekhim and their Tai’tui “employees”. This part of the valley had the worst summer heat, and it was now high summer there: a blistering fifty-five degrees centigrade with humidity as low as a mammal could breathe for any length of time. Rafael was projecting filter panes for shade and to counter the heat and light reflected from the salt, and Chris Alan was drawing upon his supernatural Gift of Life, but even so Chris Alan was very far from comfortable. As for the Trader, he had his usual supply of slightly salty water with him, and his fur was designed to help him endure extremes of both heat and cold, but these conditions were extreme even for him. It didn’t help matters that this world’s sun was an F-class star, considerably hotter than the G-class sun of Chris Alan’s homeworld.

“Now look. We Adamim have four temperaments and four interaction styles, combining into sixteen personality types. But if you’ll look at our species as a whole and compare it to other sentient organic species, you’ll find that we fall into the upper left quadrant of the Temperament Matrix: the Catalyst quadrant. We have a series of archetypes for each quadrant which we call the Cherubic Order. Starting in the lower right quadrant going counterclockwise, they are the Lion, the Ox, the Man and the Eagle. These point to which sentient organic species have which predominant temperament.

“Carnivorous mammals like the canine Kayaim and the feline G’le-g’laim fall into the lower right quadrant: the Improviser quadrant, represented by the Lion. Herbivorous mammals such as the various deer, antelope and bovine derivatives fall into the upper right quadrant: the Stabilizer quadrant, represented by the Ox. Omnivorous mammals such as the Adamim, the Nihekhim, the Bonobos and the Bruins fall into the upper left quadrant: the Catalysts, represented by the Man. All other sentient organic species are non-mammalian. Interestingly, they all fall into the lower left quadrant: the Theorist temperament, represented by the Eagle. It’s surely no accident that the most noble such species are of one or another avian archetype, and not of a saurian or arthropod archetype.”

The Trader was intrigued despite his earlier offense. “So you’re claiming that in the Grand Knot, you Adamim are meant to be the diplomats interweaving the tactical, logistical and strategic species?”

“Yes, and you, the Bruins and others of the same cast are meant to assist us in this. The basic role of the Lightchildren is to facilitate that process. And as the archetype of all Lightchildren, I am *the* Catalyst: the Locus of the Metacosmic Realms.”

“With all the potential power said to go with that state of being.”

“Exactly.”

Chris Alan didn’t need to tell the Trader what that implied. If Chris Alan really *needed* to stop what the Nihekhim were doing in this star system, then nothing in all creation could prevent him from doing so. He could even make the Nihekhi presence in this system – in the Ring of Stars itself – as though it had never been, if necessary. Obviously, he could get away with telling the Trader exactly what was on his mind – hence the deliberate “rattling of the Trader’s cage” earlier – and both of them knew it.

“Were my mate broaching the subject of Nihekhi policy,” Chris Alan went on, “she’d take a much less confrontational approach. But there are different styles of diplomacy, and mine sometimes requires ‘straight talk’. As a Treaty Power and as a Catalyst in the Ring, the Knot needs to reckon with what its association with the Covenant Sphere demands of it. There are some self-proclaimed Hostile Powers that are far less openly exploitive of the Ring’s natural and sentient resources than *you* are.”

“Are you implying that you’re watching us?”

“The Lord of the Realms and His Viceroy, the Hooded Man, are *always* watching you, Trader.”

“And standing ready to condemn us for our material values, no doubt?”

“Well, you said it.” Chris Alan nodded in Kung’s general direction. “Call your bodyguard back. We’ll be glad to escort you back to your cave in the shade. It’s cruel and unusual punishment for *any* mammal to go out in the afternoon sun on a day like this.”

Trader Chicha sighed; there was certainly no need to continue the conversation, even if Chris Alan had wanted to do so. “No need, Undying Singer. The foreman can take us back there. The Tai’tui can handle long walks in the open, but *we* at least have the sense to use air-conditioned flyers when we can.”

“Very well. Thank you for doing business with the Deep Space Guild.”

“The business part, at least, is always a pleasure.”

After the Trader and his bodyguard had gone, Chris Alan ordered Rafael to contact the *Hind of the Dawn*, which was in high orbit over the planet.

“How did it go, Captain?”

“About as expected, Amethyst. Hopefully the spice will help him and his overlords swallow the advice. Are we ready for the next phase?”

“Yes. Kit Fox says she’ll be in-system within the hour.”

“Very well. Open a portal and let me get out of this wicked heat.”

“Acknowledged.”

A two-dimensional mirror appeared out of nowhere on the salt flat. Chris Alan (with Rafael in Rest Mode following him) walked into it, leaving ripples like those made by a stone falling into still water. Once the ripples had ceased, the mirror vanished.

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N.B.: The Temperament Matrix and its associated terms was developed by Linda V. Berens of Interstrength Associates.