Tylaxis

The Tylaxian greeting party was not what Dustin had anticipated. Given they were arriving with a princess as the nominal point of contact, he’d been expecting luxury vehicles, authority figures, and at the very least a handful of the press interested in getting candid shots of visiting aristocracy. What they got instead was a pair of official looking hovertanks, a man wearing a junior officer’s uniform of some kind, and a small shuttle that looked more appropriate for carrying livestock than dignitaries.

Their welcome was minimal, a bow from the Tylaxian official with two of his four arms clasping neatly onto the antlers that protruded from the back of his head. It was clearly a ceremonial gesture, and Dustin wasn’t entirely sure how to reply - although Jaisyl seemed to think that an inclination of her head and a dip that wasn’t quite a curtsy was more than sufficient as they stepped past the man and towards the waiting shuttle.

Climbing inside after his wife, Dustin was surprised to see that they were not alone; from the general level of effort that had been put in thus far he’d been expecting to just have the man who’d greeted them along for the ride to escort the group from Sola to wherever more official functions would be held. Instead, as he helped Bleu and Yaerwen in behind him he took a moment to surreptitiously inspect the people sitting opposite his wife.

The pair of Tylaxians were clearly well off, judging by the cut and quality of their outfits. Their antlers too looked polished, with a level of care that spoke of significant affluence. Both also had the casual confidence that came with power; whether they were wealthy business people, government officials or nobility didn’t really matter. Whatever basis they had for being there, they had authority behind them of some kind.

Thus, Dustin offered the pair a polite smile as he settled into his own seat while the officer who had met them on the landing pad closed the shuttle door. “Dustin Smith, pleased to meet you…?” He let the question hang in the air for a moment, before the taller of the two Tylaxians leaned forward and offered her hand for him to shake.

“Visitors usually find the pitch of our language hard to emulate, leading to them mangling our names enough to cause insult. Mine is…” she paused, before letting out an ethereal echoing sound that shifted rapidly from bass to treble in register and sent chills up Dustin’s spine. As he tried to calm the goosebumps that had risen on both arms, she smiled sadly at him “…which as you can see is also quite hard on the hearing for many species. We have consulted our knowledge of Earth, and have found suitable - if crude - translations for our names. You may call me Dew, and my colleague here is Oak.”

Oak grimaced at that point, before nodding, his own voice coming out in a far deeper baritone than Dustin had expected from a man of his stature. “Oak is an exceedingly crude translation, but timber carries other connotations in Earth speech, as does wood. Technically, a more accurate translation would be ‘Growth rings of the aged tree at the heart of the forest, first planted there in the seasons of my great-great-grandfather in honour of the alliance between seedling and my line, the father oak of the woods.’ But I think we can all agree that is exceedingly long for use as a name, so the simple ‘Oak’ must suffice.”

Dew wrinkled her nose. “Quite. I was rather lucky that my parents were of the new school of naming and so the closest translation for mine is just ‘first sunlight on the morning dew in spring’… the old names are beautiful, but they really don’t work well for interspecies diplomacy. Most of us have short-names now for that reason.”

The shuttle’s engines spun up as they talked, the craft lifting from the ground and skimming low over the spaceport terminal. “Where are we going?” Jaisyl asked, raising an eyebrow as they began heading away from the more metropolitan areas nearby.

“Somewhere a little more private,” Oak rumbled. “While we will naturally have a suitable banquet in your honor later on today for the look of the thing your highness, you and I both know the real reason you are here is so that your husband can speak with those of us opposed to our planet’s current allegiance. To that end, landing right by all the news cameras in the middle of the houses of governance would send several messages to people we’d rather not know we were even having this conversation. Far better for you to be received by an established family than as a state visit.”

Dew joined in at that point, the tall Tylaxian leaning back in her seat and folding all four of her arms neatly in her lap. “As Oak says, we need to talk where we will not be overheard by unhelpful ears. To that end, our group ensured you would be met by the minimum amount of military possible, and we are now heading to my family’s estate in the mountains. I believe all the other relevant parties should have gathered there by the time we arrive - only the premier was missing when we left to meet you, and he was always going to be the last to move given how closely his actions are watched.”

Dustin exchanged glances with his lovers. This was sounding far more complicated than he’d first assumed. Seeing his expression, Dew laughed. “Oh, ambassador, don’t worry. Tylaxian society is very much unhappy with the current situation. The issue is, the Durathisians know it - what we thought were tourists and merchants that were eager to visit our world when their hegemony began have turned out to be rather thoroughly embedded spies and informants. Of course, they still maintain their pretence that they are here on peaceful business, which lets us get away with a lot, but equally… they are all always watching.”

The shuttle skimmed down towards a idyllic snow-swept manor set in delicately sculpted woodland high in the mountains. Looking out the window, Dustin frowned as he recognized the amount of effort that clearly went into maintaining a property looking that wild and natural when it was also anything but. “What exactly is your title, Dew?” he asked politely as they began the final descent towards the landing pad.

The Tylaxian sighed. “Everyone always thinks that just because my family has money we must be nobility. No offense to your highness, but that’s never appealed to most of us. Oh, sure, my great-great-granduncle once married into one of the island lordling dynasties - what would be the equivalent of the family of a Duke on Earth - but as for the main line? We are wealthy because we work hard. We’re all given a stipend until we come of age, then a small sum equivalent to about a year’s wages for the average person on the planet and left to our own devices. Once we’ve made our first million, the family welcomes us back.” She sniffed as their craft touched down. “I was the fastest to do so in three generations, but I got lucky with the colony ship development program.”

Seeing Dustin’s confused expression, Dew chuckled before rising and heading for the now-open door of the craft. “Oh, don’t let my attire and etiquette fool you ambassador. I trained as an engineer, and my company - well, now it’s a subsidiary of the family trust, but whatever - was responsible for the design of the habitation modules and botanical facilities for the colony vessels being built in orbit. I helped design well over half of the things my company won the contracts for as well.”

Dustin shook his head as he followed the Tylaxians out of the shuttle before pausing and taking Jaisyl’s hand. Behind her, Yaerwen and Bleu followed rapidly, and the four visitors from space turned to take in the full splendour of the estate.

The house itself was partially built into the hillside, with two sweeping snow-capped wings extending out to circle around the shuttle-pad, a rather fancy fountain flowing freely nearby despite the cold, and an exquisite view of the grounds as they gently sloped down through the artfully maintained ‘wild’ forest. Beyond that, the hill dropped off into a valley, melt water from the mountain above cutting a few channels through into a small stream that seemed to mark the boundary of the main property.

Turning back to the manor house, the group followed behind the two Tylaxians as they headed in. Beyond the main double doors, a massive entryway with a staircase that wouldn’t have looked out of place in any English stately home gave them pause - firstly, for the impressiveness of the architecture. And secondly, for the number of people present, all of whom stopped what they were doing and looked up when Dustin and his lovers arrived.