Rhon

Rhon refers to the group of psions from the Ruby Dynasty who can create/manage the Kyle Web, in Catherine Asaro's novels regarding the Saga of the Skolian Empire.

Rhon psions, also being sometimes called Ruby psions because they descend from the ancient Ruby Empire, are the strongest psions with a Kyle rating so high as to be unmeasureable numerically.

The Rhon got their name after Skolian geneticist Hezahr Rhon, who first successfully isolated the alleles that combine to create a Ruby psion. Dr. Rhon is generally believed to be creator of the Rhon psions. This is however just a Skolian propaganda meant to hide the true origins of the Rhon, which are not very pleasant.

The Rhon project

When Skolians returned to space, millennia after the fall of their original civilization the Ruby Empire, they discovered the Locks. To be operational, Locks require extremely powerful psions, with highest Kyle rating possible. Psions with such a high Kyle rating were however already all extinct at that time, thus first attempts to create them in a laboratory were undertaken soon.

A part of these pursuits was the Rhon project lead by the prominent geneticist Hezahr Rhon. The initial project of Dr. Rhon was actually undertaken to prevent the suffering of psions by attempting to modify their brains so they wouldn't receive the pain of others. The attempt took a nightmarish turn for worse, and spawned a race of human beings whose KAB and KEB organs are hardwired to interpret pain signals from normal telepaths as orgasmic pleasure called "transcendence". When he realized what his creations were, Dr. Rhon wanted to destroy them; but they murdered him first and destroyed his work.

As a result there arose a race of people known as Aristos whose members are the ultimate anti-empaths, sadists utterly devoid of compassion save for a few exceptions (Corbal Xir, Tarquine Iquar, Jaibriol Qox III). The Aristo nature is characterized not only by their cruelty but also by power-hunger and sense of superiority. Their leader Eube Qox, founded the Eubian Concord and his descendants presently rule it.

Creation of Rhon psions

Due to their need for transcendence Aristos started to breed psions, using them as pleasure slaves, so called providers. Their main goal was to produce an extremely strong psion, the "ultimate provider" (the stronger psionic abilities, the stronger pain signals a psion produces while tortured and the greater pleasure an Aristo experiences).

The first actual Rhon psions were a pair of siblings meant to be bred to each other to found a pre-eminent line of providers. They were created from genetic samples of long dead members of the once so powerful Ruby Empire's ruling caste, who were known for their great empathic and telepathic abilities. The male half of the pair, name unknown, committed suicide upon realizing his intended purpose. The female, Lahaylia Selei, killed her captors and escaped.

Lahaylia then founded the Skolian Imperialate using the power of the Locks to create the psiberweb. The psiberweb is a form of ansible, or faster-than-light communications network, that Lahaylia could use to tie her country's government and economy together and to coordinate military movements with a speed and finesse that the Traders could not possibly match. Later Lahaylia discovered a natural Rhon from a nearly dead race of Ruby colonists, named Jarac Skolia, and took him as her consort. Together they acted as Keys to the psiberweb, Lahaylia being the Assembly Key and Jarac the Military Key.

The Rhon project therefore indirectly created the initial modern Rhon family, whose history has since been plagued by forced marriages, numerous birth defects, war, and other tragedies.

All members of the Rhon are allowed to use the name Skolia. The ruling family of the Rhon are the Selei, members of whom order the succession to the Ruby Throne, upon which sits the Ruby Pharaoh, titular head of the Skolian Empire. The Ruby Throne is also synonymous with the psiberweb term of Assembly Key, as the Pharaoh rules through coordinating the Assembly's communications throughout the Skolian Empire.

At a later point in history, the Aristo emperor Jaibriol Qox I used genetic engineering to sire an heir on a provider who would carry Rhon genes heterozygously. The plan was to create an Aristo emperor who would have the psionic power of the Rhon (secretly, due to psions being regarded as subhuman). The next emperor, Ur Qox, then had a son with another provider which resulted in Jaibriol Qox II being a Rhon psion. He escaped and married Soz Valdoria, thereby providing a new source of genes to the inbred Ruby Dynasty.

Usage in modern Skolian Empire

Rhon can act as Keys to the psiberweb. A Key is a psion who engages a Lock to obtain the ability to create and maintain psiberweb links. The Locks can support a limited number of Keys. This limit is determined by a psiberspace law equivalent to the Pauli Exclusion Principle, in that no more than one personality of a specific type can be joined to the Locks at any given time.

Rhon psions that "join" the Locks are considered members of the Dyad or Triad, depending on the context of the novel in the series. A Dyad is formed by two complementary personalities, and a Triad is formed by three such. The Dyad or the Triad when acting together forms the full executive authority that governs the Skolian Empire together with an elected parliament, the Assembly.

The different Keys that can exist, (depending which time period the particular novel occurs in), are the Assembly Key, the Military Key, and the Web Key. Each of these Keys has a line succession that is hereditary, though all the members of the Skolia family are in each of the lines at various points due to issues of consanguinity.

Assembly Key

The personality powering the Assembly Key is required to have a peerless intellect and a piercing analytical mind. Therefore the person who is the Assembly Key takes the sobriquet of the "Mind of Skolia", or the style of Ruby Pharaoh, with at least the executive powers of chief-of-state. The Selei branch of the Rhon produces the Assembly Key with following line of succession: "Lahaylia", then "Dyhianna", with "Taquinil" the designated successor.

Military Key

The personality powering the Military Key is required to be robust, ruthless, agile, forceful, and uncompromising. Therefore the person who is the Military Key takes the sobriquet of the "Fist of Skolia", or the style of Imperator, with the executive power of commander-in-chief of all armed forces in the Imperialate. The Skolia branch of the Rhon produces the Military Key: "Jarac", "Kurj", "Althor Valdoria Skolia", "Sauscony Valdoria Skolia", and "Kelric Valdoria Skolia". Jarac's daughter Roca Skolia was mentioned as an emergency alternative choice, as while she does not have the military skills she has a personality more similar to Jarac than to any of the other Rhon.

Web Key

The personality powering the Web Key is not required to have any great intellectual or organization skill, merely large amounts of willpower and emotional strength. The person who is the Web Key takes the sobriquet of the "Heart of Skolia". No style presently obtains to the Web Key, however that person does have the de-facto executive power to parley on behalf of the Imperialate (in practice devolving from the executive power of the Ruby Pharaoh). The only one so far who has ever been the Web Key was "Eldrinson Althor Valdoria", consort of Roca Skolia.

See also

Catherine Asaro