The emphasis in her words, the bitter anger and the fear was so strong that those who listened to her swayed backwards beneath the wave of emotion. They shared the fear for long moments before Malsas< broke the silence.

“Send for Ikemei. We will hear what has been done.”

They were not only to hear about the research progress, but were to see the results with their own eyes. Ikemei entered, followed by a train of heavy-laden fargi, who hurriedly put their burdens down and left. Ikemei pulled the covering from a cage that was large enough to hold a grown Yilanè.

“The ruler of the skies,” she said proudly, her single eye bulging. “A raptor of skill, strength—and intelligence.”

The great bird ruffled its feathers and turned its head about slowly to look at them. The hooked beak was made for tearing flesh, the long wings for flying high, fast, tirelessly. The bird’s toes were tipped with curled sharp claws designed only for killing. The creature did not like to be stared at. It shook its wings and screeched angrily. Ikemei pointed to an elongated, dark object that clung to one of the raptor’s ankles with tight-wrapped toes.

“This beast is a neurological image recorder,” she said. “Very much improved for this use. As I am sure you know an image from its eye is focused on a membrane within. Neurons then store the image in microganglia for future retrieval. Since single images are being stored, not memories of complex series or motions, there is almost no limit to the number of these images that can be recorded.”

“Images of what?” Malsas< asked abruptly, bored by the technical talk, little of which she understood.

“Images of whatever we wish to record, Eistaa,” Ikemei said. “This bird is almost immune to cold—the creatures fly at very high altitudes while searching for their prey. Therefore after its training had been completed this creature was instructed to fly north. The training has been most successful. Normally the creature has no interest in longtooth, carnivorous ustuzou that dwell far to the north. They offer it no threat and are too large to attack and eat. But the bird is well-trained and knows that it will be rewarded if it follows instructions. This one flew far to the north. And, here, we can see exactly what it saw.”