There wasn't much talk after that, the serious questions seeming to have run out, and in the shuffle that followed of Traiti settling into their bedrolls for the night, Tarlac spent a moment considering his surprise at their action. The Traiti hadn't waited a night or even an hour to correct something which surely was not an urgent mistreatment. The cloudcats were comfortable, Hovan said, even if they were confined; the human prisoners were almost certainly confined somehow, too. Merely treating intelligent beings as nonsapient was a cause for dishonor, it seemed, which spoke well of Traiti honor. True, the dishonor might be in underestimating a possible enemy—but that didn't quite seem to fit, somehow.
When the messenger returned and had taken his place in the sleeping room, Hovan touched a control on the bulkhead to darken the room. Then he said a couple of words, and all but Tarlac joined him in what the Ranger thought could be a prayer, a chant, or a song. Whatever it was, he liked it; the sounds in the musical Traiti language evoked peace. When it was over, the room grew quiet.
By Tarlac's inner clock, though, it was still too early to sleep. And so much had happened that he wasn't sure he could have slept if it were late for him instead. So he lay there in the dark silence, hands linked behind his head, and let his thoughts wander.
He had plenty to think about, and not enough solid facts to make any conclusions reliable. Most of what he'd learned only served to raise further questions. The Ordeal was the key to the whole thing; Fleet-Captain Arjen had said as much. And it was dangerous, Arjen made no secret of that—but how dangerous? Aside from the fact that it left scars and wasn't universal, he knew little about it. Had they tested any other humans before deciding to try a Ranger? If so, what had happened? He had no way of knowing.
Then there was the evident contrast between battle-readiness in men and ship, and the obvious concern for mental comfort in the ship's decoration. Being a generalist, not a xenopsych, Tarlac could only wonder about it. Still, morale was as vital as guns, and he had to admit that the shipboard art gallery was no more unlikely than the forested recreation areas on the Sovereign-class cruisers. It was less space-consuming, as well, though to a ship the size of a battle cruiser that wasn't really significant. On the other hand, despite their designation, IBCs weren't purely battle craft, and were often sent on long-haul non-combat missions. This ship and the others in the Traiti fleet, from what he'd seen, were warships, pure and simple. If nothing else, they just didn't have the size to be either multi-purpose or long-duration.
That made him think. Unless the Traiti were a lot more fragile psychologically than any human thought, such concern with amenities on a warship was out of character. They might be more alien than other evidence indicated—or a lot more aesthetic. He couldn't believe they were all that fragile psychologically, and his current close contact was showing less, rather than more, underlying alienness. That left the last possibility, that these ferocious fighters were also artists.
If there were any parallels at all with Terra, that could be true. History showed plenty of military men, on any side in any war, who had expressed themselves through art. Tarlac could think of several offhand, just from the last World War: Hirohito, poet; Mauldin, cartoonist; Eisenhower and Churchill, both painters; and Hitler, architect. It seemed plausible that art was as important here in everyday surroundings as it seemed; he would use that as a working hypothesis unless he found evidence to the contrary.
Then there were the few hints he had about family life. It was important, that was obvious, and he couldn't help speculating, despite almost total lack of data, on what it was like. There was strong clan structure, yes, but "clan" covered a lot of territory. With the low proportion of women and the touchiness about parenthood, the setup might be like the old Arabian sheikdoms, with women belonging to the dominant males and kept in a kind of protective custody, used as breeding machines.
He didn't like that picture, though he knew a lot of human men would find it an attractive fantasy. Still, under the circumstances, it seemed like a reasonable assumption.
Then he rolled over, pulling the blanket up over his shoulders, as his thoughts went back to his earlier misgivings. Dammit, he didn't want to brood about that! Sure, bringing peace would be worth his life; plenty of others had paid that price, without the half-promise he had. He'd have to follow them into final nothingness eventually, and he'd go without protest if he knew it would mean the end of this ten-year slaughter—but it wouldn't.