Carnelians

by Catherine Asaro

  Her face heated. “I’m sorry. That was silly of me. Never mind.”

  He spoke softly. “I would be honored to be your guardian.”

  “Really?” She gaped at him. “Really?”

  “Yes.” He smiled. “Really.”

  A realization hit her then. He was lonely. He had everything any human being could have, but he was lonely. He wanted a family, too.

  Red was coming back to them, ambling along, more relaxed than she had ever seen him, dressed in neither the rags they had worn in the slums nor in the lushly expensive clothes of a provider, just simple blue trousers and white shirt. He seemed taller, though she wasn’t sure if he had really grown or just stood straighter.

  As she and Kelric rose to their feet, Aliana thought that maybe Skolians were all right.

  She felt safe.

  And happy.

  Jaibriol stood on a balcony above the Amphitheatre of Providence. The hall was empty tonight except for a few robots cleaning the tiers. Those, and the mech-techs examining the largest robot arm, the giant hand. Unlike the arm on Delos, this one had never malfunctioned. But they were checking it anyway, verifying that whatever had happened on Delos wasn’t inherent to the device.

  Steps sounded behind him, not his guards, but a smoother tread. He turned as Tarquine joined him at the railing. She watched the techs working on the robot hand. “It looks so innocuous when it’s docked.”

  “I suppose.” He knew they would find nothing wrong. “Your nephew died with honor.”

  She didn’t look at him. “So he did.”

  Jaibriol knew the truth now; Tarquine had never betrayed him. Whatever had motivated Barthol to treason, it didn’t manifest in the empress. God only knew, Barthol had been a fool to think he could betray her.

  “I would not see my Line dishonored.” She seemed subdued. “Neither for my kin nor my heirs.”

  “There is Barthol’s son.” If the general had lived a long, full life, some hope might have existed that his son Hazar would someday pull out of his debauched hedonism and be ready to take the helm of the Iquar dynasty. Instead, the title had come to him decades too early.

  “Hazar and I have enjoyed a little chat,” Tarquine said.

  Jaibriol spoke dryly. “My sympathies to Hazar.”

  “It seems that he has grave doubts about assuming the Iquar title.” She regarded him with her calm red gaze. “He has asked that I assume the Iquar Title once more. To ease his mind, I found it within myself to agree.”

  “Ah.” Jaibriol could just imagine Hazar “agreeing.” By the time Tarquine finished with him, he probably hadn’t known up from down.

  So they had come full circle. Tarquine again ruled her House. Jaibriol knew he would never fathom her mind, how she decided on right and wrong. She lived by a fierce and uncompromising code that benefited even as it chilled him. He didn’t know if he would ever reconcile the love he felt for her with his dismay at her actions, but he could no longer imagine his life without her.

  She gazed at the techs working on the bronzed hand. “Barthol was my nephew. For all his crimes, his treachery, his cruelty, despite all that, he was my kin.”

  “I know,” he said softly.

  They stood for a time, watching the amphitheatre. It would see no assembly of Aristos for some time. Most of Jaibriol’s top people were still on Delos, putting the summit back together. He and Tarquine, as well as Corbal and Admiral Erix Muze, would participate from here, on Glory, via virtual reality simulations of the conferences with the Skolians.

  He had brought Tide back with him, to remain on his personal guard. So much of what he had valued in Hidaka he had also found in Tide, the intelligence, loyalty, sense of honor. He couldn’t give Tide what the Razer most wanted, to marry Aliana, but he would do everything within his power to provide Tide with the best possible life. The Razer had protected Aliana, making it possible for Jaibriol to free his young cousin, and for that Tide would always have his gratitude.

  Eventually Tarquine said, “Was it worth it, Jai? So many plans and intrigues, so much grief, so much anguish, all so we and the Skolians could meet in the same place. To what purpose? We are back where we started.”

  Jaibriol doubted he could ever tell her what it had meant to him. The scene burned into the collective consciousness of humanity was that instant when his party and the Skolians had stood together on the dais: he and the Ruby Pharaoh, Kelric and Barthol, Tikal and Tarquine, Roca Skolia and Corbal Xir. The historians were already writing about that meeting, the chaos that followed it, and the determination of both sides to continue with the peace summit despite everything. They were calling it the moment that changed the history of the human race. But for Jaibriol the greatest moment had been far different, that achingly brief time when he had stood in the shattered amphitheatre having what looked to the rest of humanity like a stilted exchange with the Ruby Pharaoh. Did Tarquine know what else had happened? Did Corbal suspect? If they did, they would never know the full truth. It was locked within Jaibriol, a gift beyond any he had expected.

  His kin had begun to heal him. The mental scar tissue that ravaged his mind had melted under the Ruby touch of his family. He had always known a longing, but until they had flooded him with their warmth, he had never understood what he needed. Those moments couldn’t fully heal him; that would take years with them that he could never have. He might never see them in person again. But those moments had begun the process, and he would keep the result with him forever. Even if that had been all that he took from his meeting with the Ruby Dynasty, it would have been enough.

  But in those few seconds, Kelric had given him something far greater.

  Jaibriol had never truly understood Quis. Kelric had shown him Coba, the world where Quis originated, an entire civilization playing Quis, one huge, never-ending game played by tens of thousands of people, so much a part of their culture that they did it from the day they were old enough to pick up the dice until they were too old to hold the pieces in their hands. Those who dominated the Quis shaped their world. It was subtle, gradual, and pervasive, a social phenomenon that stopped at no walls, that could be played at any level, from simple gambling games to a predictive process so complex it verged on precognition.

  Jaibriol would give Quis to Eube, to the taskmakers, over two trillion of them. Kelric would give it to Skolia. As it spread, encompassing their peoples, so would the subliminal messages its adepts wove into their game. More than the memes that spread throughout a culture, more than the trends that saturated the multitude of human lifestyles, more even than a song like “Carnelians Finale,” the game would spread. Who would care? It wasn’t inflammatory, political, or subversive. It was simply a game. And if Jaibriol poured his hopes and dreams of peace into the dice, who would know? If he used Quis to tell the story of a universe without slavery—a place where all humans had the rights of their humanity—the identity of whoever seeded the dice with those ideas would be lost in the ever-evolving process as all humanity played the game.

  Eventually, in the decades to come, scholars would analyze Quis. Some people would play it terribly, others with inspiration; some would never play at all, others would become adepts. Societies would become dedicated to developing Quis. Competitors would learn its intricacies. And the Aristos would play. They would realize its power, learn to use it for themselves, and probably believe that in their exalted state of being, they had created that advanced aspect of Quis.

  By then, it would be too late.

  Several thousand Aristos couldn’t stand against trillions of taskmakers if their subjects refused to remain slaves. With the Quis, Jaibriol might achieve what he could never do overtly. He would free his people by changing their culture at its very roots, until they were spinning stories of freedom without realizing it. It was an audacious plan, maybe an impossible one. Whether he and Kelric could actually succeed, he had no idea.

  But they would give it one hell of a try.

  “Yes,” Jaibriol said. “It wa
s worth it.”

  Epilogue

  It was one of the most effective weapons known.

  It didn’t explode. It shot no projectiles. It didn’t spread chemical, biological, or physical poison. It created no flames or shrapnel.

  It knew no boundaries.

  It was no more than a game.

  It could bring down empires.

  It was Quis.

  Characters & Family History

  Time Line