The new Hiru pointed at me. “Is this her?” Its voice was soft, sad, and feminine.

“This is her,” Sunset said. “This is Hope.”

* * *

I stood in the middle of the empty room. A six-foot-wide circle of soft turquoise light marked the floor around me, identifying the boundary of the recording area. I wore my blue robe with the hood down and held my broom in my hand.

It took some time to settle the two Hiru. I wasn’t sure if the Hiru had genders, but if they had been human, I would’ve guessed our new guest to be female. She was smaller than Sunset, her sad voice was higher pitched, and when the other Hiru spoke of her, his translation software used “she” as the identifying pronoun.

However, the galaxy was a big place. While dual sexes and sexual dimorphism occurred often enough, it was only one of the myriad of configurations for procreation and sex. The Garibu had three sexes and six genders, the Allui males were smaller and more fragile than females, and the Parakis formed a mating ball, where everyone went through a three-stage molting process, during which they changed sex twice. When one of these beings visited Earth, their translating software struggled to assign gender to make alien speech palatable to humans, often with hilarious results. So, I wasn’t sure if the new Hiru was truly female, but since Sunset referred to her as she, I referred to her so as well. After I took her to see the Archivarians, she told me her name. She was called Moonlight-on-the-Water.

Moonlight loved Sunset’s room. She walked over the threshold and gave a little gasp. He reached for her, and they walked toward the pool together, their metal arms touching. That’s where I left them, floating in the basin and staring at the clouded ceiling.

The Hiru settled, I went to look for my sister and found her in the kitchen carefully spooning coffee she’d brewed into a mug half-filled with eggnog. She shrugged and told me Arland needed it. And then she took it up to his rooms. I thought about telling her that the last time the Marshal of House Krahr had coffee, he stripped off his clothes and ran around my orchard in broad daylight, flaunting the gifts the vampire goddess gave him until Sean finally tackled him, but she did make fun of me when I’d called for Sean, so I decided to let her discover the wonder that was drunk Arland on her own. She had measured that coffee very carefully, so maybe Arland would manage to keep his clothes on.

I checked on Helen, who’d fallen asleep in her room, with the cat curled up by her feet. I checked on Wing. The battle shook him up and he’d reenacted his heroic deeds for me just to make sure that they were truly heroic. Confirming the heroism took a little longer than expected. It was 10:40 pm now and my window for communication with the Assembly was approaching.

Tension twisted the muscles of my neck. This would be the third time in my life I addressed the Assembly. The first time, I just stood by my brother’s side, as Klaus petitioned the Assembly for assistance in finding my parents. That time we heard nothing for over a month, after which the Assembly expressed its condolences and informed us that their investigation uncovered nothing. The second time I petitioned them for my own inn. The reply had come in twelve hours with the name of the inn and Gertrude Hunt’s address.

I ran the message through my mind one more time. I’d rehearsed in my head six or seven times now. It was correctly worded: no names, no addresses, nothing that would lead back to me if it was somehow decrypted by a third party. I shouldn't have been this nervous, but tension had clamped me like a bear trap and refused to let go.

Sean slipped into the room, the wall behind him sealing the moment he entered. I’d invited him. He wanted to check the grounds first, which in his speak meant he wanted to scout the Draziri and see how much damage we’d managed to inflict. I asked him to find me when he was done and told the inn to show him the way. I’d hoped to talk to him before I sent the message, but it was too late now. We’d have to speak after. It was better this way anyway. I wasn’t in any shape to talk until the message was out.

The scanner snapped to life, bathing me in the light and setting my blond hair aglow. I almost jumped. I’d programmed the scanner for 10:40, but it startled me all the same. I was wound up too tight.

The light focused on me.

The galaxy birthed many languages, but one of them was older than most, so old it was almost forgotten except by innkeepers and those like us. I opened my mouth and the lilting words of Old Galactic rolled off my tongue like a song that was as ancient as the stars.

“Greetings to the Assembly. I bring two matters before you. First, two of my guests are Hiru. Tonight the Draziri besieging my inn fired a nuclear missile at the inn’s grounds. To save the lives of my guests, I directed it off world. I deeply regret the resulting loss of life and hope no sentient beings have been harmed as a result. I do not require assistance at this time.”

There. I made a formal notification that the treaty had been breached. The ball was in their court. I’d included the coordinates of the nuclear explosion and they could view the evidence for themselves.

“Second, I was attacked by an unknown enemy at Baha-char. It was a creature of darkness and corruption. With the assistance of friends, it was defeated and brought to my inn, where the corruption attempted to leave its host and infect me and the inn itself. The corpse is contained, but I do not know how long the containment will last. Before sealing the body, I took a DNA sample, and a match was found in the database. The body belongs to an innkeeper, a friend of my family. I’ve enclosed the evidence for your review.”