The Dreaming

by Peter F. Hamilton

  “Although I have an egotistical opinion of my own ability, I can’t actually manage every aspect by myself, even with an augmented mentality. Too many details. For an expansion phase on this level, I need people I can trust in senior management positions; especially offworld.”

  “That’s very flattering.”

  “Yes and no. You’d be capable management, I think; you have the right kind of drive and mindset. You don’t have the experience to be top rank, but that will come.”

  She frowned. “Why me?”

  “How much research did you really do? On Sheldon himself?”

  “None,” she admitted. “Just what I picked up in school.”

  “The old Dynasties were just that, family enterprises. The surest way humans have ever come up with to retain loyalty and control. Nigel used his own flesh and blood.”

  “Ah.” It was as if the room was suddenly on the move: downwards.

  “All the senior positions were held by his own children,” Likan said. “That’s also what I do.”

  A memory abruptly rushed to the fore of her mind. “Debbina?” she said before she could stop it.

  Likan actually winced. “What did I ever do to you? No, okay, not my beloved little girl. But a lot of my other children are running sections of my company.”

  “And how do I fit into this?”

  “How do you think?”

  “Spell it out for me.”

  “You become one of my wives. You have my children. They take their place in the company.”

  “You really know how to romance a girl.”

  He flashed her a wry smile. “Come on, we’re grown-ups. Every marriage today is half business. We’ll have a great time in bed. I can afford any lifestyle you want. Your children grow up being part of the most dynamic company in this section of the Commonwealth. They’ll never want for anything, and they’ll be presented with virtually unlimited challenges. I know you well enough to know that appeals. Who wants trust fund brats, right? And the same goes for you. Stick with me for ten, fifteen years, then you can either continue with a post in the company, or you cut loose with a huge chunk of money and enough insider knowledge to run circles around everyone else.”

  “Ozzie’s mother! Are you serious?”

  “Perfectly.” He sidled up close, and put his arm round her, kissing again, more gently this time. “I don’t want an answer this instant. This is why you’re here. Experience everything you can and you want, then take your time and decide.”

  Wow, second time I’ve had that proposal in a month.

  “Okay,” she said shakily. “I’ll do that.”

  “You mean it? You’re not just saying that?”

  “No. I mean it.”

  ***

  Araminta didn’t wear her own clothes for dinner. That was the first thing she learned about what membership of the harem would be like. A stylist called Helenna was waiting in her bedroom when it collected her from Likan’s airy office. A jovial woman, close to rejuvenation, whose age meant she’d piled on a lot of weight in recent years. Genuinely friendly, she was keen to confide household gossip, most of which made no sense to Araminta, although there was a lot of it. She’d been with Likan for fifty years. “So I know it all, honey, seen even more. I don’t judge anyone, and nothing you do here is going to surprise me. You want anything special for tonight, you just ask me for it.” Araminta wasn’t sure what counted as that special. It was tempting to ask what other girls had requested. One thing Helenna was sure of was that, “Likan likes his woman elegant. So we’ve got to get you spruced up, ready to stand your own ground against the others.”

  That took hours. Her bedroom bounded all over the ovoid house to link up with various other specialist rooms. The sauna to start with, clearing her pores. Massage, by a man called Nifran, who was as brutal as he was skilful; afterwards she just sort of poured herself off the table with loose floppy limbs. The fitting room. A house that has a fitting room? Where she was measured up for her evening dress.

  Spiralling dawn to the salon, where Helenna was finally exposed as a sorceress. Layers of cosmetic membrane were applied, yet when Araminta looked in the mirror there was no sign of them. Instead her nineteen-year-old self looked back at her. A nineteen that she’d never known but always wanted, with sharp cheekbones, absolutely no excess flesh, soft long eyelashes, perfectly clear skin, eyes that sparkled. Another hour saw her hair repaired, as Helenna disapprovingly termed the first procedure. Then extended, thickened, softened, waved, and styled.

  Clemance had the chair next to her as it was being done. Another member of the harem, Alsena, took the other side. They chatted comfortably enough, which was an insight into the kind of sisterhood the women had. She was given a rundown of Likan’s genealogy with emphasis on the wayward children, a saga for which she needed to open a new file in a storage lacuna to keep track of.

  For all their friendliness, the girls weren’t quite engaged with the real world. Which was a pretty bitchy observation, but one Araminta felt applied. If Likan wanted women like her, what was he doing with the others? They certainly didn’t aspire to run sections of his corporate empire.

  “He likes variety,” Helenna told her as the salon rendezvoused back with the fitting room.

  The classic little black dress had never fallen out of style. And looking at the one the fitting room’s apprentice sorceresses had conjured up for her, Araminta could see why. She felt randy just slipping into it—so Ozzie alone knew what effect it would have on any male that crossed her path. It clung disgracefully, yet allowed her breasts complete freedom of movement. She blushed the first time she walked in it. Somehow the high hem and silk-gloss microfabric sprayed on her legs made her calves and thighs slim down to that same nineteen-year-old ideal Helenna’s spell had blessed her face with for the night.

  Pre-dinner cocktails were served to the household and Likan’s guests in the music room, which had claimed his office’s lake view. Araminta walked in with her head held high, knowing just how great she looked. Likan’s double take, and the smiles from the harem, Clemance’s little bounce as she clapped her hands excitedly, were all the accolades she was simply due. It all helped buoy her confidence close to levels of arrogance. So when Likan introduced her to the Prime Minister and her husband, she was perfectly civil, and treated them as if they were almost her equal.

  All the while as she made small talk and sampled weird-tasting canapes she kept wondering how Bovey would behave if he were here. He enjoyed his culture, and could be as snobbish about food and wine as anyone. But the company she mingled with; the world’s powerful and wealthy, and a few merely famous—she just couldn’t get away from the idea of how he’d turn his nose up at them.

  Yet here I am, holding my own.

  The evening did have a downside. The Prime Minister’s husband, who she was seated next to at the dinner table, was fantastically boring. Thankfully, Eridal, one of Likan’s older sons, sat on her other side. As smart and charming as Likan, he ran a finance house in Ludor; but he lacked that bullish determination which drove his father. She dutifully tried to not spend the whole evening chatting to him.

  When it was all over, after the dining hall had descended to ground level so the guests could walk to their capsules, there was just Likan and eight of his harem left. The door contracted and the walls resumed their sparkle; everyone gave a spontaneous laugh of release which Araminta joined in wholeheartedly.

  Likan gave her a congratulatory kiss. “Damnit I’d forgotten how awful that dickhead was,” he told her. “I wanted to smack him one, and he wasn’t even talking to me. Thanks for putting up with him.”

  Doors were opening into various bedrooms around the dining hall. The harem were vanishing through them. Out of all the women at the dinner, they were undeniably the most beautiful, most of them astonishingly so. Despite all Helenna’s efforts, Araminta couldn’t help but feel like the poor relation in their presence.

  “Go and get ready,” Likan told her. “We�
��ll be waiting.”

  He turned and left through a door into a small darkened room. Araminta stared after him for a moment, then summoned her own bedroom. That whole alpha male issuing orders thing just didn’t do it for her. For one, he didn’t have the charisma to pull it off, not with his dress sense and throwback physical appearance. On the other hand to have accomplished so much was darkly compelling. She grinned at her own inner argument. What the hell, at least Clemance will be fun.

  “Dress me the way he’ll enjoy,” she told the waiting Helenna. A process which turned out to be more elaborate than she anticipated. For a start it involved Nifran again, who chided her about lack of proper exercise, and how he couldn’t relax her enough. What he did with her legs was virtually sex in itself.

  Helenna applied some fabulously scented oil which acted in conjunction with Nifran’s pummelling to make her flesh glow.

  “He’s not into sadism or anything, is he?” Araminta asked. These preparations were all very detailed. Her usual idea of getting ready for a hot night was wearing something a man could remove quickly.

  “Not to worry, sweetie, he enjoys sex the way he enjoys his women; tasteful.”

  Pondering that, Araminta allowed Helenna to dress her. The white negligée was mostly straps, yet perversely managed to cover more of her body than the black dress. She checked herself out in the mirror. So his idea of tasteful is a Slut Princess? How very male.

  Her bedroom whisked her away to Likan’s boudoir—no other word for it. Vast bed in the middle, naughty-shaped furniture, low rose-gold lighting. Harem in attendance, and yes, dressed elegantly in silk and satin, with open gowns swirling, lounging on couches sipping champagne as they watched two of their number make love on the bed.

  Araminta strolled in, trying not to appear too apprehensive. Likan greeted her, wearing a black robe. “Champagne?” he offered.

  “Thank you.” She took a crystal flute from Marakata, who gave her a detailed appraisal. There was something alarmingly erotic about the way the aloof woman seemed able to look right through the negligée.

  “You two should kiss,” Likan said.

  Araminta pressed herself against the statuesque woman, enjoying the sensual touch. Marakata certainly knew how to kiss.

  When they’d finished Araminta took a sip of the champagne as Likan took her hand and led her slowly over to the couch where Alsena was waiting. Araminta knelt down, and began the kiss.

  As she went on to kiss all the other women as he instructed, Araminta decided the experience wasn’t so much tasteful as formulaic. Likan had ritualized his lovemaking. Finally she kissed him. After that she was taken over to the bed. There was a specific way of kneeling he wanted her to assume, very sex kittenish. One of the harem helped arrange her hair decoratively over her shoulder.

  Clemance removed Likan’s gown. Araminta stared at his huge erection.

  “I have a gift for you.”

  “Yes,” she said emphatically. “I see that.”

  “A program.”

  “Huh?”

  “A mélange I’ve composed myself over several years. It allows you deeper access to your own mind, opening levels that verge on the subconscious in the way the old yogis achieved through meditation.”

  “Right,” she said dubiously. Talk about killing the mood. He smiled fondly, and stroked her cheek. “I use it myself to focus. It helps to clean your mind of extraneous thought. You can revert to the animal basics which form our core identity.” His face came close to hers. “There are no inhibitions to be had in such a state. Whatever you pursue is unashamedly pure.”

  “No inhibitions?”

  “Clarity is a helpful tool for business. But also for lovemaking. You can concentrate on the sensations of your body to the exclusion of anything else. It helps to amplify even the smallest nerve signal.”

  “You mean I can make a climax stronger?” It sounded like an electronic version of the sex aerosols she and Bovey used.

  “Yes. There are also adapted biofeedback routines which can influence your physical self. Once you determine the origin of your body’s pleasure, you can repeat it.” His voice became softer, tempting. “As many times as you have the physical strength for.” Her u-shadow told her he was offering the program. Suddenly, she was feeling very hot in the negligée. “Scan it for infiltrators and trojans,” she told her u-shadow as she held his level gaze.

  “It’s clean.”

  “Load and run.” Through her exovision she watched the program expand into one of her lacunas. It had many similarities with a learning program, which she allowed to mushroom into her grey matter. Instinctive knowledge bubbled away in her mind.

  “Don’t be afraid,” Likan said softly. “I’ll use it with you. It will make our first time spectacular.”

  She nodded, not trusting herself to speak. Now she considered it, clearing her mind was a simple process; following the rising sleep cycles yet never accepting them. Her breathing steadied, and she grew aware of the body’s rhythms, the flow of nervous energy. Heartbeat. Peripheral thoughts fell away, allowing her to centre herself in the boudoir, on the bed. Her awareness grew of the light touch of fabric against her skin. Tiny beads of perspiration clung to her. The sound of bubbles fizzing in the crystal flutes. Likan’s breathing. She saw his arm move out, a finger beckon.

  Marakata answered the summons, sliding sinuously over the mattress. Her fingers stroked Araminta’s skin. The sensations her nerves experienced flowed like a tidal wave into her brain. She gasped at the impact, and pulled her attention to the sensations which were most pleasurable. Wallowing in them.

  Under Likan’s direction, Marakata plucked the negligée straps off Araminta’s shoulders. Air flowed over her exposed breasts, followed by warm fingers. Araminta shuddered fiercely at the touch, smiling as she centred her mind on the feeling. Blood was loud and hot as it rushed into her nipples, swelling the buds.

  “There,” she told the owner of the fingers.

  The caress was repeated, the ecstasy replicated. Then many hands were gliding over her. Warm eager mouths kissed. She wailed with helpless delight at the symphony of sensation which the harem kindled. The negligée was removed completely. Instinctively she arched her back. Likan’s cock slid inside her. The experience was close to unbearable, it was all there was. Still her mind remained steadfast on the torrent of physical joy. Araminta promised herself, no matter what, she would not faint away as she had done with Bovey. This time there were no chemicals fugging her mind, this she was free to experience its incredible conclusion. She laughed and wept simultaneously as Likan started to move in a powerful rhythm. Then the harem recommenced their virtuoso performance.

  ***

  The Skylord glided across the outer atmosphere of the solid planet; its vacuum wings long since retracted. Thick turbulent streams of the ionosphere swept across its forward section, creating lengthy vibrations across its giant bulk. Energy stirred in specific patterns within it, thoughts mingling with its body’s elemental power, manipulating the fabric of the universe outside. Its speed began to slow, as it imposed its wishes on reality. Gently it started to lower itself into the atmosphere. Far below, the minds of the sentient entities sang out in welcome.

  ***

  “Now!” Cleric Conservator Ethan commanded the obedient waiting minds of the Dream Masters.

  Their thoughts flared out into the gaiafield in a single stream, pushing at the dream fabric, seeking entry. Tendrils of raw will prodded and poked at the stubbornly resistant image emanating from the Second Dreamer. As the Skylord began to focus its attention of the ancient coastal city beneath, they felt its perception turn outwards, towards them. It felt them! It knew they were there!

  “My Lord,” Ethan called with profound respect. “We need your help.”

  The Skylord’s descent halted. Those dreaming the Skylord felt the mass of the planet press against the magnificent creature’s perception. In that way they knew the winds that blew across the Iguru Plain. Experienced th
e waves rolling lazily over the Lyot Sea towards the coast. And there, right underneath them, so tantalizingly close, the physical form of Makkathran’s buildings brushed against their consciousness. Each one exactly as it was in Inigo’s dreams.

  Adoration and gratitude swelled out into the gaiafield, buoying Ethan’s thoughts along. “We seek to reach you. Show us the way to you, my Lord. Receive us.”

  The dream shattered into a glorious pinnacle of agony. The Skylord’s magisterial thoughts were wrenched away by a terrible power.

  “NO!” the Second Dreamer commanded amid the ruined bliss. “I am me.”

  An infinite black surface swelled with malignant anger, sealing the gulf between the gaiafield and the Skylord.

  Blinding pain seared deep into Ethan’s mind as the blackness snapped at him. He screamed, every muscle contorting to fling him out of his chair and fall into merciful unconscious.

  ***

  Araminta woke with a gasp, shooting upright on the bed; heart racing and breath coming in judders. She instinctively applied the program’s knowledge again; settling her racing mind and quelling her body’s distress. It worked a treat.

  What the fuck is it with that dream?

  It had been quite pleasant to start with, drifting gently above a strange planet; warm sun on her back, mysterious continents rolling by underneath. Then something happened, a smothering sensation that triggered an adrenaline rush, and she had to thrash about, trying to wake herself. Push herself clear from that oppressive constriction. It was as if someone was trying to steal her soul. She yelled defiance at the dark force, and finally managed to wake.

  Kicking and writhing around as she shouted. Surely? Yet actually all she seemed to have done was shuffle round a bit and sit up.

  She looked about her in confusion. Likan’s boudoir was still illuminated by the same warm light. Nobody else was awake. Clemance was curled up beside her, one arm draped over her legs. The girl was stirring, blinking in confusion as Araminta moved. Araminta stroked her tangled hair and cheek, soothing her as she would a troubled child. A drowsy Clemance smiled worshipfully then closed her eyes again.