Date: June 2, 2440 Time: 6:00 PM CST
The air aboard the V’ren vessel was cooler than Earth’s summer heat, with a subtle scent of ozone and metal—sterile, but not unfriendly. The lighting was diffuse, like sunlight seen through a cloudy sky. Matthew Jonathan Boone Marmaduke stepped off the boarding ramp, boots echoing softly on the polished composite flooring.
The ship had been cleaned of the dead, their remains buried across the road. Simple markers had been placed—temporary, for now—while permanent ones were still being made. That process would take another month. Everything that couldn’t be repaired, plus old and broken equipment from Matt’s landfill, was being fed into the shipboard recyclers. Waste gases were separated, distilled, and reserved for future use. In the final stages, the fabrication units had begun to produce volcanic glass grave markers—each one etched with a story of the fallen.
Matt had attended several of the V’ren ceremonies. He’d been moved by their reverence and knew that, before T’mari left—perhaps for the last time—there was one more place he had to take her.
“Captain K’Rem T’all, I thank you for your invitation to visit your ship and am honored to be aboard.”
K’Rem bowed his head with a respectful tilt of the shoulders—a V’ren sign of deference—and replied in increasingly confident English. They were both on display here, with a drone for the human media following. The formality that would have been natural the day they landed had quickly become warm familiarity between both men.
“You are a most honored guest, Matthew of the Houses Boone and Marmaduke.”
Matt smiled. The alien’s accent was still sharp around the edges, but the cadence was steadier now. “Your English is improving rapidly.”
“The students you sent us have been helpful,” K’Rem said with something like pride. “They are learning V’ren quickly as well. My niece tells me the languages are structurally similar. It is mostly a matter of vocabulary.”
Matt nodded, glancing at the side corridor where two teens from Arrow Rock waved enthusiastically before ducking around a corner. “She’s right. Syntax isn’t the problem—it’s learning what people mean when they speak, not just the words.” He let that sink in for the audience, then switched to his smoothly polished V’ren, which—after eight sessions and thirteen total hours in the interface—was setting a standard for willingness to learn.
He pulled a tablet from his satchel, activating the projection with a flick of his thumb. “I bring good news. The first five hundred brand-new homes will be ready for families within ten days. I know that is but a fraction of the needed homes, but it is a start.”
“That it is—and much faster than I expected,” K’Rem said, clearly impressed, and wondering why Matt had switched to V’ren, but carrying on in English.
“It is,” Matt agreed, tilting the display so the captain could view the rotating 3D floor plans. “But I’ll need laborers to make it happen.”
“What sort of laborers?”
“Preferably skinny ones.” Matt grinned, saying it in V’ren and then switching back to English for the cameras. “The homes are modular and compact. All the service connections—power, water, waste—are under the units. The work isn’t difficult, but it’s awkward, hot, and slow. We also need a team familiar with plumbing and electrical systems. T’mari reviewed your crew list and identified several good candidates.”
T’mari took the drone with her on a different tour, as they had agreed earlier. She and Matt knew this part of the discussion was something they wanted to keep private.
K’Rem examined the housing design, his expression shifting to quiet wonder. “These dwellings are generous. Spacious. One could house multiple families…”
“That came up with T’mari, too. But it would be a mistake,” Matt said. “First, the utilities are designed for no more than six to eight people per unit. More, unless they are children, would strain the systems. Second—and more importantly—it would reflect poorly.”
K’Rem looked puzzled. Matt elaborated.
“I want your people to be seen as equals. If we cram multiple families into a single home, it’ll look like you can’t support yourselves—like you’re outsiders who don’t belong. That image would hurt you more than a rough night’s sleep in tents ever could.”
Matt had seen the polling data, and while reactions to the V’ren sleeping in army tents or Amazon-provided sleeping bags hadn’t been bad, they also hadn’t been good. Some of the English speakers were being moved into Columbia. The city, largely through his cousin Devon’s work, had rushed through council resolutions allowing the first hundred families—provided they could be housed without driving up rents or displacing current residents. Five hundred university students would also be admitted, assuming accommodations and reciprocity could be arranged.
K’Rem’s brow furrowed as he considered the deeper implications. “Your logic is sound. And I thank you for thinking of how we will be perceived, not only housed. Most of our people… do want to make a home here.”
Matt nodded. “That’s what I hoped to hear. This region has been dying for lack of hands and hope. If your people want a future here, I’ll do everything in my power to help build it.”
K’Rem’s composure cracked slightly—his voice grew softer, more personal. They were back on display again, and he knew the script, or at least the rough outline, T’mari and the other members of her joint communications team had sketched out for him and Matthew.
“You will have a willing workforce. How will they be compensated?”
“On par with my own,” Matt replied simply. “Each worker will have an account opened in their name. In addition, their families will be invited to a large party we are throwing for the workers in two days. We’ll need even more people for kitchen work, cleanup, and logistics. Shared labor builds shared trust.”
“Shared meals hold deep meaning among my people. It is not something offered lightly, nor often. In the past, only those of high birth would extend such an invitation to those of the lower castes. Many who would come… may not believe they are worthy. They are humble people, and they possess very little.”
Matt’s voice was quiet now, too. “They only need a desire to belong. That is the measure by which I welcome them as my own.”
The silence hung for a moment. Then K’Rem stepped forward and placed himself in front of Matthew. This part had been kept from both T’mari and Matthew. He had been talking it over with W’ren Th’ron, Keeper of the Flame, and the other members of House T’all. K’Rem was their senior member—but not the only prominent one.
“And does that welcome extend to all of us, Matthew?” K’Rem said in a motion that included every high-born man and woman standing there, not just the useful ones.
Matt met his eyes, unflinching but not unconcerned; every high-born person in the room was wearing a House T’all insignia. The human media wouldn’t notice, but he had clocked it instantly.
“It does.”
There was a shift in the room—a tangible reverence, as if something sacred had just been said aloud. This, he was sure, the humans would notice, even if they didn’t understand what it meant.
Without breaking eye contact, K’Rem reached to his waist and drew a slender dagger with a carved obsidian hilt. Its blade shimmered faintly, etched with the sigils of his lineage. He offered it with both hands.
“Then I offer you my service and fealty. From this day forward, my house stands with yours.”
Matt took a breath, nodded once, and reached for his belt. He drew his own blade—an honest blade that had seen honest work, still holding an edge and a visible Damascus pattern, the osage orange handle worn smooth by twenty years of use. He held it out with equal reverence. He used the formal V’ren of old. He hadn’t been just learning the languages; he had their oldest tales and stories transferred into audiobooks he could learn from. He began in the more guttural version of the language that reminded him of his Norse ancestry.
“K’Rem T’all, I accept you as my brother. Take my blade, say my name, and my house will be yours.”
The shock that went around the room was palpable. A house whose last lord had not been accepted into the Council of High Lords out of petty spite had just been given new life. Matt had learned that history—but not what it truly meant.
“I am at your service, Matthew Jonathan Boone Marmaduke. I serve you and your house from this time forward.”
The V’ren officer received the blade with reverence, turning it in his hands to admire the craftsmanship. His eyes widened as the pattern-welded steel caught the light. He walked the line of House T’all members, which included L’tani in the back, who said nothing but watched in awe.
“My people have not made anything like this in over a thousand years,” he said, returning to his spot before Matthew. He was about to ask questions with real consequences—questions that would bind not just him but every V’ren man, woman, and child of House T’all in this star system. “This is a beautiful blade, a gift of honor,” he said in awe of the heft, the swirling patterns, the obvious use. “Forged by a master who knew his craft. Has it drawn blood?”
Matt smiled faintly. “I don’t have much time to forge blades anymore. It was time to pass that one along.” Feeling the moment was right to go a little Tolkien, a little Viking, and a little whoever in his ancestral past had celebrated blood magic, he reached out, took K’Rem’s hand, held the blade steady, and wrapped his other hand around the steel—pulling just hard enough to bleed for the room and the cameras.
“It carries my blood from this point forward, and you carry it with you always.”
K’Rem nodded deeply, cradling the knife like a sacred relic. The blood oath was made upon a blade—and upon K’Rem himself—as he took the bleeding hand in his own, going to his side.
“I name you and know you as Lord T’all. House T’all lives.”
The chorus of House T’all, forever! came back. They knew the next part of the script, even if they were now flying so far from it that the original authors would barely recognize it. It was shouted again—House T’all! Forever!
“I am K’Rem T’all, senior of my house in this star system, and we serve at the pleasure of Lord Matthew Marmaduke, Lord T’all. My ship, my house, and my family are yours to command.”
Matt reached out with a slightly bloodied hand and put it on K’Rem’s shoulder.
“You are K’Rem T’all Marmaduke.”
That was most certainly not part of the script.
Matt didn’t say the next part aloud, but he knew exactly what he’d just done.
Marmaduke blood was now tied to T’all blood. Not an alliance. Not a handshake. A merger.
If K’Rem fell, Matt would be bound to avenge him. If Matt fell, House T’all would be expected to rise in his defense.
No walking that back. Not in a year, not in a century.
L’tani, the youngest of the recognized House T’all adults, knew what to do. Her father may not have been the one to teach her as a child, but she could not have wished for a more appropriate teacher at this moment.
“By blood and honor, I serve Lord K’Rem T’all Marmaduke and Matthew Jonathan Boone Marmaduke, risen as High Lord of the V’ren.” She walked to the front of the room and, none too gently, took Matthew’s bleeding hand and pressed it to her forehead.
“From most senior to most junior, we are yours.”
