An old story
Approximately 23 years ago, a young man of uniimic biology is taken in by the court to serve in the coven. As he is taught the high ways, he is told about an event of the recent past, described as old.
Not even 6 years earlier, the nation of Ciwa had a stable relationship with a sky uniima collective from the southern islands, giving them an open gateway to the ueema and the rest of the central land.
This relationship was greatly weakened after one of many intercontinental trips taken by the two species, when one of the uniima envoys was lost in Kuiqua, the political and religious capital of Upli'ta-kaw (Ciwa).
Death is not considered a rarity for those traveling to alien lands, where one can easily get poisoned by local sources or badly kept rations. It was automatically assumed the uniima would have died. However, it would be quite unlikely for an alien body to come unnoticed.
After long conversations, messages, and threats, the ciwans had failed to give the collective information about their lost envoy. It's unclear how the parley ended, but the uniima withdrew from Ciwa in relative peace and with a lot of gifts.
Only a few know the whole scale of what happened to the delegation member. But most had heard the old complaints about lack of knowledge, the lack of an upper hand on alien biology. How unreliable aliens are with information. Or how they must have been vivisecting slomen for years. Be it an accident, an intent, or a misstep, nowadays every court member would be against it.
Neal has grown to think in similar ways. But it's not as effortless for him.
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It's easy to think that nobody would notice one of many visitors disappearing with the lack of oversight and the distance between the political bodies. The slomen had sent many more than the uniima would usually send; they would barely read the loss records, and they didn't ask for the bodies to be brought back unless it came to a higher caste member. Anyone would have been terribly decomposing on the long journey. On the other hand, the uniima sent trained individuals, and read all taken back from the trip. The tension from a war was still palpable to them; many had lived in those times, while most slomen were a new generation. The communication that was taken back about the envoy made it clear that things went wrong. One of their colleagues also said the envoy had a bad relationship with the locals, but never trailed off alone. The last time they would see them, it was after an argument about alien emotions, or the lack thereof. When they met with the slomen, they had acted as if they didn't even know the person. Acting like they couldn't tell them apart, how they don't remember how many came. "It was ridiculous!"
