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A drop of something plunked into the succession pool, just below the master’s feet. Another followed, and another.

When Mezhan Kwaad finally turned, Nen Yim saw it was blood, drizzling from her nostrils.

“Greetings, Adept,” the master said. “Have you come in search of me, or of the succession pool?”

“Of you, Master. But if you would speak at another time …”

“There will be no better time until my cycle of sacrifice is complete and my Vaa-tumor is removed. You had your first implanted yesterday, did you not?”

“I did, Master. I cannot feel it yet.”

“Bear it well. It is one of the oldest mysteries.” She cocked her head, focusing her regard on Nen Yim’s face. “You wish to know what it does, the Vaa-tumor?”

“I am content in the knowledge that the gods desire this sacrifice of our caste,” Nen Yim replied dutifully.

“Once passing to adepthood, you enter the mystery,” Mezhan Kwaad said, as if speaking in a dream. “As warriors take on the outward aspects of Yun-Yammka, so we take on the inner qualities of Yun-Ne’Shel, she-whoshapes. The Vaa-tumor is her most ancient gift to us. Yun-Ne’Shel plucked a fragment of her own brain to make it. As it grows, it models our cells, changes our very thoughts, takes us nearer the mind and essence of Yun-Ne’Shel.” She sighed. “The journey is painful. It is glorious. And, regrettably, we must return from it, excise her gift from our bodies. But though we return to a semblance of who we were, each time that we are vessels for that pain and glory we are forever changed. Something of it remains with us. Until …” Her words seemed to fail her.

“You shall see,” Mezhan Kwaad finally said. “And now—what have you come to tell me?”

Nen Yim glanced around, making certain no one was within hearing.

“It is quite safe here, Adept,” Mezhan Kwaad assured her. “Speak freely.”

“I believe I have finished mapping the Jeedai’s nervous system and brain structure.”

“That is good news. Very commendable. And how would you proceed now?”

“It depends on what results we want. If we wish her obedience, then we should use restraint implants.”

“Why, then, have we mapped her nervous system?”

Nen Yim felt her headdress fidgeting and tried to calm it. “I don’t know, Master. It was your command.”

Mezhan Kwaad tilted her head and smiled faintly. “I am not trying to trick you, Adept. I chose you for very particular reasons. I have told you some of them; about others I have remained silent, but I suspect you are bright enough to know what they are. Suppose, just for a moment, that there are no protocols to be followed. In the absence of direction, what would you do? Hypothetically.”

“Hypothetically,” Nen Yim said. She felt as if she were poised over the digestive villi of a maw luur. She could almost smell the sour scent of the acid. If she answered this question truthfully, she might be revealed as a heretic. If what she had come to suspect about her master was wrong, this conversation would be her last as a shaper, and one of the last in her life.

But she could not surrender to fear.

“I would modify the provoker spineray to fit our expectations of her nervous system, to give us very fine control.”

“Why?”

Nen Yim did not hesitate this time. It was already too late, whichever way it went.

“Despite the assurances of the protocol we followed, what we have now is only an educated guess concerning how her nervous system functions. All we have done is to map unknowns onto knowns. But the ‘knowns’ are Yuuzhan Vong norms, not human ones, and we know already that she lacks analogs to some of our structures and has others that have no comparable configuration in ourselves.”

“Are you saying, then, the ancient protocol is meaningless?”

“No, Master Mezhan Kwaad. I am saying it is a starting point. It asserts certain things about how the Jeedai’s brain works. I suggest that we now test those assertions.”

“In other words, you would question the protocols given us by the gods.”

“Yes, Master.”

“And you understand this is heresy of the first order?