By Heresies Distressed

by David Weber

  “Believe me,” Cayleb told her, “I know exactly how that feels. But at least he was insisting that you not be killed. My cousin set out deliberately to murder me.”

  “I almost wish he had, too,” Sharleyan sighed. “That way I could at least be rid of this . . . ambivalence where he’s concerned.”

  “It doesn’t help,” he said wistfully. “Not a lot. And it’s hard learning to trust again after something like that.”

  “No,” she replied, and he looked at her in surprise. “Not for me, Cayleb,” she amplified. “But I grew up having to fight for my throne. I had to learn then that some people can be trusted, even if others can’t. And that sometimes it’s not because the ones who can’t be are evil or naturally teacherous, only a matter of otherwise good people being pushed too far by competing loyalties. It doesn’t make the betrayal any less a betrayal, but it does let you understand how they were driven to it.”

  “And that only gets worse when matters of faith get cranked into the situation,” Merlin agreed.

  “I know.” Sharleyan gazed pensively at something only she could see for several seconds, then surprised them all with a sudden smile.

  “Your Grace?” Merlin said.

  “I was just thinking I’m going to need to keep written notes on who knows what,” she said. “And I have to admit that I never would have thought that Nahrmahn Baytz should be anywhere near the innermost circle.”

  “I believe he’s had a crisis of conscience,” Merlin said dryly.

  “Nonsense,” Cayleb snorted. “The answer’s a lot simpler than that, Merlin. Like you’ve always said, the man is smart. He and his princedom and his family were caught between a rock and a hard place. He had to make a decision, and now that he’s made it, there’s no going back. Clyntahn certainly isn’t going to welcome him back with open arms, whatever he does! Which means all of his considerable intelligence is on our side now.”

  “I think you’re both right,” Sharleyan said thoughtfully. “I know how much I resented being forced to cooperate with Hektor in an attack on a kingdom which had never done me or mine any wrong. I don’t think Nahrmahn liked it one bit, either. In fact, I’m inclined to think that finding himself forced to dance to Clyntahn’s tune probably did push him over into an open and genuine break with the Church.”

  “Well, whatever happened, I think he’s right about how we need to handle this situation,” Cayleb said more soberly, and Sharleyan nodded.

  Nahrmahn’s advice, once he got over learning about Seijin Merlin’s “visions”—which, actually, he did rather quickly—had been succinct.

  “Your Majesty,” he’d said, “the one thing you can’t possibly afford to do, for so many reasons I can’t count them all, is to try to conceal Halbrook Hollow’s part in all of this. I’m sorry if that’s going to cause the Empress pain, but that’s all there is to it. First and foremost, you’re going to have to explain what happened to him. Second, it’s going to be essential for Baron Wave Thunder to ‘discover’ he was part of the conspiracy—and for Her Majesty to confirm it, preferably in person, and not by letter, in Chisholm. Even with her standing on Chisholmian soil, without a single Charisian armsman in sight, there’s going to be someone who insists that you and your Charisians were really behind it all, and that the Empress is being constrained to lie about it. Someone besides the Church, I mean. They aren’t going to care who testifies to his involvement. In fact, they’re probably going to hold him up as some sort of martyr, murdered because of his faithfulness and then smeared with false accusations by his killers. At any rate, nothing as unimportant as the truth is going to make one bit of difference to the way their propagandists try to use this . . . affair against you.

  “Since you can’t do anything about the Church’s version, it’s particularly important that you get what really did happen across to all of your own people. And, in addition to making it clear you didn’t simply do away with him because he was an irritating obstacle, it’s absolutely essential to make everyone in Chisholm aware that although the assassins might have been Charisians, the two men most responsible for the entire plot—Halcom and Halbrook Hollow—were both from outside the Kingdom. In fact, that the man who actually put it all together not only wasn’t a Charisian, but was one of the first nobles in Chisholm. If you do that, and if Her Majesty emphasizes the way in which her Charisian bodyguards fought to the last man to save her from an assassination planned by her own uncle, you can actually turn this entire thing around, at least in the view of any Chisholmian who’s not already adamantly opposed to the formation of the Empire.”

  “I do agree,” Sharleyan said now. “But I don’t see any way I can personally return to Chisholm, at least until you get back from Corisande. For one thing, if I leave Charis now, won’t your Charisians see that as evidence that I don’t trust them? That I’m running away from them because this whole thing has made me suspicious of all of them?”

  “I don’t know, love,” Cayleb said with a sigh.

  “With your permission, Your Majesty?” Seahamper said diffidently.

  “Which ‘Majesty,’ Edwyrd?” Sharleyan asked.

  “In this case, both of you, Your Majesty.” Her personal armsman smiled slightly, then sobered. “I believe Prince Nahrmahn has a point. And it seems to me that if you appear before Parliament, and perhaps on Wednesday in Tellesberg Cathedral with the Archbishop, and explain frankly to all Charis that it’s essential for you to return to Chisholm as quickly as possible to reassure your subjects there of your safety, and to tell them how your Charisian guardsmen died protecting you, they’ll probably believe you. And, I’m certain, that if you leave Earl Gray Harbor and Archbishop Maikel to act as your regents here in Tellesberg while you’re away, you can count on them to keep things running smoothly until you—or the Emperor—can return. And the fact that you trust them enough to do that should also help to reassure the rest of Charis that you really aren’t running for home because you’re afraid.”

  “I think he’s right, Sharleyan,” Cayleb said after a thoughtful moment. “If you hadn’t been here, and if it hadn’t been essential for both of us to demonstrate that we truly are equals, I would have left Rayjhis and Maikel in charge, anyway. They’re certainly capable of keeping things running, as Edwyrd put it, for a few months. And, now that I think about it, having you decide ‘on your own’ to return to Chisholm—and demonstrate that you have both the right, the intelligence, and the will to act on your own initiative when it’s impossible for the two of us to consult with one another—is only going to further strengthen our ability to share the decision-making process when we are forced to operate separately.”

  “I think Edwyrd and Cayleb are both right, Your Grace,” Merlin said. “And it happens that this entire near-disaster has demonstrated to me that I’m not nearly as smart as I thought I was.”

  Sharleyan cocked her head, gazing at the tall, broad-shouldered, sapphire-eyed man she still couldn’t quite think of as a woman named Nimue. She wanted to learn more about Merlin—and Nimue—and the strange, wonderful, and terrifying world from which they’d come, but she’d already realized what it was that she’d never before been able to put her finger upon where Merlin’s attitudes were concerned. She understood his comfortable familiarity with Cayleb—and with her—now. Even Seahamper, who would have died for her in a heartbeat, who’d helped to raise her, and who, she knew, loved her as much as if she’d been his own daughter, still had never managed to forget she was a queen and now an empress. There was always that natural, inescapable edge of deference, that inner awareness of roles and places. But Nimue Alban had lived in a world without kings or queens or empresses, and apparently, her father had been one of the wealthiest and most powerful civilians in that world. Merlin respected Cayleb deeply, there was no question in Sharleyan’s mind about that, but Nimue Alban’s upbringing had immunized him against that automatic, instinctual deference.

  And the fact that Cayleb didn’t expect that deference out of him, or
feel insulted when he didn’t get it, said a lot of very interesting things about Cayleb, as well, she reflected.

  “I’ve always realized you weren’t as smart as you thought you were,” Cayleb told him now, with a grin. “What brought this minor fact to your awareness?”

  “Well, Your Majesty,” Merlin replied with a smile, “I could have warned Her Grace about the assassination attempt from Corisande if I’d only left her with a communicator. And if I had,” his smile abruptly disappeared, “all those men would still be alive.”

  “Don’t, Merlin.” Sharleyan shook her head at him. “You couldn’t have left me any ‘communicator’—whatever that is—without telling me all of this before you left. And while I can’t pretend that I don’t wish you had told me, I understand why you didn’t. For that matter, I think it was probably the wisest decision, given what you and the Brethren actually knew about me at that point, although obviously events have changed that.”

  “I think you’re being kinder to me than I deserve,” Merlin said. “You may be right, though. At any rate, this is a communicator.”

  He reached into his belt pouch and extracted a device smaller than the palm of Sharleyan’s hand and made out of some hard, shiny, black material. He touched an almost invisible stud on its surface, and a lid popped up to show a series of small buttons below a rectangular panel of what looked like opaque glass. Sharleyan’s eyes rounded in wonder, and then she gasped in delight as the opaque glass suddenly glowed to life, like a magic slate board overwritten with glittering letters.

  “This is called a ‘security com,’ Your Grace,” he said. “I’m not going to try to explain everything about how it works at this point. To be honest, most of the people I knew back when I was Nimue didn’t really understand it, anyway. All they had to know was how to use it, and that’s all you need to know. Its primary function is to allow people to communicate quickly and safely over great distances by talking to each other, although it has several additional features that I’ve disabled, at least for now,” he told her. “Among other things, this unit is capable of displaying holographic imagery—essentially, pictures, Your Grace—as well as transmitting simple voice messages. Eventually, I’m sure, you’ll want to reactivate some of those features, but for now I thought it best to avoid complications. For example, it might be just a bit difficult to explain if you accidentally began playing back a holographic recording of Cayleb where someone else might see or hear it. I don’t think any of us would like the interpretation most people would put on it,” he finished dryly.

  “Somehow, I don’t think so, either,” Sharleyan agreed, when he paused.

  “I thought you’d probably agree, Your Grace.” He smiled. “Cayleb, on the other hand, was a bit less cheerful about it when I did the same thing to his communicator.”

  “Which,” Cayleb put in, “was because first he showed me how those ‘holographic recordings’ of his work. He can call them ‘pictures’ all he wants, but they’re actually more like . . . like statues that move and talk. And,” he gave Merlin a severe look, “he started out by showing me a ‘picture’ of you.”

  “In that case, it’s probably just as well he’s not going to show me the same thing,” Sharleyan replied.

  “Show you a picture of yourself?” Cayleb asked innocently, then ducked as she took a swing at him.

  “As I was saying,” Merlin said a bit more loudly, “it has several useful features. The most important one, for our purposes, is the ability for you and Cayleb—or for either of you and me—to speak to one another, no matter where you, or we, are. Obviously, there are still going to be limitations. For example, it’s difficult enough for me to find anything like true privacy when I want to use something like this. It’s going to be much more difficult for the two of you to do the same thing, but there are a few things we can do to simplify matters.”

  He touched a blinking symbol—a man’s head, with an index finger vertically across his lips—on the glassy panel with a fingertip. The panel blanked, then filled with another group of letters. Sharleyan leaned closer, and read them.

  “Secure relay link initiated,” they said. Despite the fact that they were all words she recognized, she had no idea what they meant in this instance.

  “Basically, what I’ve just done is to establish a link between this unit and the SNARC I have permanently parked in orbit above the Cauldron. There’s one above Chisholm, too, now, for that matter. When you touch the screen icon—that glowing symbol—I touched, the com automatically seeks the nearest secure relay. The transmission is electronically steered to—”

  He paused, then shook his head.

  “That’s starting to get into those details we don’t need to get into. At any rate, when you touch the icon, the communicator links to the secure network I’ve set up to keep myself in touch with Owl and let me access the SNARCs. Even if the orbital array I told you about is watching for unauthorized transmissions, it won’t see anything from this. But, once the link is established, Owl can connect you to me any time you need to talk to me, no matter where either of us might be.”

  She looked at him in amazement, as if she couldn’t quite believe what she was hearing, even now, and he smiled.

  “Watch,” he said, and raised the “communicator” towards his mouth.

  “Owl,” he said.

  “Yes, Lieutenant Commander?” a voice replied out of the “security communicator” after the briefest of pauses.

  “Owl, I’m adding Empress Sharleyan, Emperor Cayleb, and Archbishop Maikel to the list of authorized network users. And while I’m thinking about it, let’s add Sergeant Seahamper, as well, just in case. Please confirm.”

  “Yes, Lieutenant Commander,” the voice said. “Empress Sharleyan, Emperor Cayleb, Archbishop Maikel, and Sergeant Seahamper have now been added to the authorized network users.”

  “Good. That’s all, Owl.”

  “Yes, Lieutenant Commander.”

  “Was that really that ‘computer’ thing of yours?” Sharleyan demanded in a delighted tone.

  “I’m afraid so,” Merlin said, shaking his head with a crooked smile. “As computer AIs go, he’s not the sharpest piece of chalk in the box, but the manufacturer’s instruction manual promises me he’ll get better.”

  “He sounds miraculous enough to me as it is!”

  “He may right now, but just wait until you have to explain something outside his normal operating parameters to him.” Merlin closed his eyes and gave a deliberate shudder. Then he opened his eyes again and handed her the device.

  She took it rather gingerly, and he smiled reassuringly.

  “Don’t worry, Your Grace. I’ll go over it all with you again, before I leave. And I’ll be leaving another one of them with you, for you to hand to the Archbishop.”

  “Are you thinking I’m supposed to pass on your explanation to him?” Sharleyan tried to keep the trepidation out of her voice, but from Merlin’s expression, it was obvious she’d failed.

  “Don’t worry,” he repeated. “It’s really a lot simpler than things you already do every day. However, there’s also this.”

  He reached into his pouch again and extracted something else. It was hard to make out its shape as it lay in his palm, because it was made of something clearer than water.

  “This goes into your ear, Your Grace,” he said. “I have one of these for the Archbishop, as well.”

  “And what, pray tell, does it do in my ear, Seijin Merlin?” she asked a bit warily.

  “Actually, you probably won’t even notice it’s there,” he said reassuringly. “It’s deliberately designed to be invisible and comfortable enough to wear permanently. As for what it does, it’s an audio relay from the communicator. As long as this is in your ear, and as long as you’re within a thousand feet or so of the communicator, you can hear a message from me—or from Cayleb—without anyone else overhearing it.”

  “I can?” Her eyes lit up again, and she looked quickly at Cayleb.

  “I
thought about that when Merlin explained it to me on the way here,” Cayleb told her. “Unfortunately, love, while you can hear me without anyone at your end noticing it, I’ve still got to talk into the ‘communicator’ from the other end. And I’m afraid that if I sit around doing that during, oh, I don’t know—a council of war, let’s say—people may notice.”

  She laughed and shook her head at him, then turned back to Merlin.

  “Will this ‘relay’ keep me from hearing anything else through that ear?”

  “No, Your Grace,” he assured her. “It’s designed to pick up any sound you would hear normally and pass it on. In fact, if you wanted to, you could adjust it to a higher level of sensitivity and actually hear things you wouldn’t have been able to hear, otherwise. I’d advise against playing with the settings, though, until you’re used to it.”

  “Oh, I think I can resist that temptation easily enough!”

  “Good.”

  Merlin handed her the transparent little plug, then helped her settle it into her ear. He was right. There was a moment of discomfort as the ear canal was blocked, but then the “relay” almost seemed to disappear as it conformed perfectly to the shape of her ear.

  “It’s also designed to let your ear breathe, and to prevent sweat from getting trapped behind it,” Merlin told her. His voice sounded just a tiny bit odd. It was clearly his own, yet it had a strange, new timbre to it. It was a small thing, and she felt confident she would quickly adjust to it, but it still gave her a shivery, excited feeling to realize she was using at least a tiny part of the “technology” Langhorne and Bédard had stolen from the human race so many centuries before.