by Wren, M. K.
“I hope you’re right—for her sake. Ben, how is Jan doing in FO?”
“Damned well. He’s already recouped most of the losses from the Solar Fleet disaster, and FO’s running full rev. Predis is concentrating on a military buildup.”
“Of course.” Again, inevitable and predictable, but that didn’t dull the edge of anger and disgust. “Exactly what does he hope to accomplish with a military campaign, Ben?”
“Well, he never really comes out with any detailed plans, but the general idea seems to be common knowledge. It isn’t so far off the Peladeen Alternative and General Plan ex seqs except on a few crucial points. He isn’t planning on just forcing the Concord to the bargaining table with a limited, controlled military campaign, he plans to force the Concord out of the Centauri System, and the prime objective isn’t anything so modest as the Directorate reestablishing the House of Peladeen with him as First Lord. He’s talking about reestablishing the Republic, too.”
Alex concentrated on slowing his breathing to ease the ache in his chest. His pulse rate was going up.
“I wonder what kind of ‘republic’ he really has in mind. And he expects to accomplish all that with a military campaign—and without the LR-MT?”
“He’s ignoring that; he hasn’t much choice. And without it, we don’t have much to bargain with.”
“So he’s also ignoring the bargaining phase?”
“Oh, he talks about offering the Concord ‘terms.’ That’s after we bring them to their knees with our overwhelming military might. Then it gets even more grandiose. Something about using the Centauri System as a power base for future expansion into the Solar System.”
“Damn. He’s insane.”
“I know,” Erica said quietly. “Literally.”
“Erica, the members don’t accept that nonsense, do they? I mean, except for his loyals?”
“If he handed it to them straight and in total, they wouldn’t, but he feeds them one piece at a time, all in terms of possibilities, and he makes it sound not only feasible, but nearly inevitable. He has an extraordinary talent for that, and we can’t prick his bubbles too openly because of the risk of schism.” Her mouth tightened, white-lined. “Since you and Andreas have been gone, he’s come into full flower as the resident Lord of the Phoenix; he plays the role to the hilt. It’s ludicrous, really—Predis swaggering about with a cloak draped over his shoulders, surrounded by his awed sycophants. And we have sycophants in Fina, too.”
Ben said grimly, “There’s one more little item our resident Lord has in mind, Alex. He plans to ‘rally the citizens of Centauri to our banner.’ Open revolt.”
“Including the Bonds?”
“Nothing specific has been said about the Bonds—yet.”
Alex let his breath out slowly. This was also inevitable and predictable, but averting a Bond revolt was a basic tenet of the Phoenix from its inception. The members weren’t ready to accept that. At least, as Ben said, not yet. Alex met Erica’s haunted eyes and called up a smile.
“I’ll have to step up my ‘sociological research.’ ”
“Thank the God you’ve already laid a strong foundation for it.”
“Thank Rich.” He paused, then, “Do any of the members know Predis betrayed Andreas?”
Ben replied, “We’ve kept it quiet. As far as most of them know, you and Andreas were picked up on a fluke. We’ve lined up a few solid loyals, though, and told them the whole story.”
“How much did you tell them about me?”
“Only that you offer another alternative for Phase I.”
Alex nodded, and through the short silence, that followed, he was aware that they were both waiting. Erica finally put it into words.
“Alex, what are you going to do?”
He laughed at that. All he wanted to do was sleep.
“In long-range terms I don’t know, but for now you’ll have to dig deeper into your medical kit. I intend to be at that Council meeting, but I want to be sure I can stay on my feet.”
“I can give you a drenaline injection, but I warn you, it’ll slow your recovery. It will last about two hours. Four at the most.”
“That isn’t much time.” He glanced around him, wondering at the sense of confinement induced by the shadowy walls. “Another thing, I’d prefer to convalesce elsewhere.”
Ben nodded. “You’re moving into the guest room in HS 1 as soon as possible—by MT. No use advertising your change of quarters. Oh—you’ll need an MT fix.”
“I might need some clothes, too.”
Erica laughed. “I’ll take care of that, Ben, and the fix for him.”
“Good. Well, I’d better get it set up now.” Ben paused as if he were reluctant to leave. “Alex, will you be—”
“I’ll be safe here for a while, at least. You said Predis has no loyals on this shift.”
“Only one we know about, and she’s busy elsewhere. Erica has you on a no-visitors stat, but we can’t seal off the infirmary.” Ben’s right arm came down with a quick snap that brought a small X1 into his palm from the spring sheath on his wrist. “Here—keep this handy.”
Alex took it and put on the bedside table, thinking how indicative it was that Ben was carrying a gun in Fina. He wondered if Erica was armed, too.
“There’s a pocketcom and a jambler in the drawer under the table,” Ben continued. “The ’com’s set for an emergency frequency; hit the switch and I’m on.”
Alex nodded. “Thanks. By the way, any news from the outside world I should know about?”
The question produced a tense silence that brought Alex’s attention into immediate focus on Ben. He was the source of the silence. Erica was only vaguely curious as she looked up, waiting for his answer.
Ben managed a quick shrug. “Nothing important. I’ll send down some tape capsules when you get settled in HS 1.”
It was an evasion, but Alex let it stand. “All right, Ben.”
Ben turned to leave, then stopped and said a little too casually, “Erica, why don’t you walk with me to the hall.”
Alex studied him a moment, then nodded to Erica. “Go ahead. I need a few minutes to sort things out.”
She rose and followed Ben through the screens and along the aisle between the cubicles. As they turned out of sight, Alex closed his eyes, considering Ben’s constrained attitude. It had nothing to do with Predis Ussher.
News from the outside world.
When Erica returned a few minutes later, Alex was sitting on the edge of the bed, frowning down at his legs and arms, at the bones too close under the skin, the laxness of the muscles. It would be a long time before he was fully recovered from the last twenty-six days.
Erica stepped through the screens, then paused. “You’re getting rather ambitious, aren’t you?” She came over to him and pressed her hand to his forehead. “You shouldn’t even have to be awake now, much less—”
“Erica, I’ve had ten hours of sleep and medication. Now, please, sit down and tell me why Ben was holding back on me.”
She hesitated, then with a sigh sank down on the bed. “His concern was partly medical. He thought I should decide whether you’re up to dealing with it now. I’m not sure you are, but I’d rather take the risk of telling you myself than have you find out from a newscast. Alex, it’s the . . . Selasis-Eliseer match.”
No doubt she’d chosen the words carefully. The Selasis-Eliseer match. That put it in objective, political-economic terms. Equations. Calculations.
At first he didn’t understand the dizziness, the palpable pain that struck so abruptly, choking off his breath.
Adrien . . .
The illness. It must be the illness.
There was no pain for him in that name, not even when it was linked with Selasis. He could never make Erica understand that. There wa
s no pain. No pain . . .
Yet something doubled him in breathless agony.
He shut his eyes against it and heard what seemed a cry of anguish. No. Laughter; sardonic laughter, and a rattling. The black angel, the beast he had wrestled into its steel-barred cage in that equivocal other time that was suddenly now. And now he understood.
He understood that it wasn’t Erica who had been deluded all these years. It was he who deluded himself in thinking there was no pain. It had only been caged, locked in with the black angel, the immortal beast waiting within him.
Adrien, what have I done to you?
Eyes still closed, hands gripping the edge of the bed, he searched desperately for a touchstone, a focus for his own identity.
Alex Ransom. The Ransom Alternative. Methodically, he considered every aspect of it, past, present, and future, and its every implication and potential. Equations. Calculations.
I came to finish my brother’s work.
Finally, he could even remind himself that there were more imminent threats to the Ransom Alternative now than the Selasis-Eliseer match.
Still, he had made a decision that had no bearing on the Ransom Alternative, or Alex Ransom, or even Rich.
I owe her something—at least she must know the truth.
He wouldn’t verbalize the decision, not even to Erica, who was capable of understanding it. But it was made.
It was rooted in his pain-born understanding of two truths. First, he understood now that the Lord Alexand wasn’t a tool of Alex Ransom existing in frozen suspension on some mental life-support system, waiting to be called back to life by the command of equated necessity. Alex Ransom was only a mask to be tossed aside, and the Lord Alexand wore that mask, and the Lord Alexand had never given up that hope that had no bearing on anyone’s calculations but his own: the hope that he might one day fulfill the life vow he had made to Adrien Eliseer.
The second truth was Adrien herself. A Selaneen with bones of steel. How would she respond to the factor of the Selasis-Eliseer match? That was something Alex Ransom had never considered, but the Lord Alexand could not ignore. The Lord Alexand knew Adrien Eliseer would not accept marriage to Karlis Selasis submissively, and in that equation was the cipher of death.
“It’s past the rumor stage, then?” Alex didn’t try to meet Erica’s eyes yet, but his voice was under control, his tone level.
“Yes. Ben had a report from Lile Perralt a few hours ago.” Her tone was as contained as his, her face stringently expressionless. “Lord Loren and Lady Adrien are in Leda now. Perralt says she’ll return to Helen on her private planethopper this afternoon, but her father has chartered a ship for Concordia. Perralt’s sure he has the Contracts of Marriage with him. The Lady Adrien has already signed them.”
He was silent for a moment; the control was slipping.
Then he frowned. “You said she—Lady Adrien and Lord Loren are in Leda now. Why?”
Erica replied, finally, “Lord Loren is meeting with Lazar Hamid. Business, for public consumption, but no doubt it has to do with the marriage. It will give Eliseer something of an advantage over Hamid. Business is also the reason he’s giving for his trip to Concordia. The marriage negotiations have been kept entirely secret.”
Alex nodded absently. There was still more.
“Why did Lady Adrien accompany him to Leda?”
“Ostensibly to see Aron Luxe, who was a professor of hers. She visits him quite often. But the real reason was an appointment at the . . . University Medschool Hospital. The reporters have been laying siege to the hospitals in Helen for weeks. Rumors have been flying about the marriage, of course, and they all want to be first with—with confirming evidence.”
He frowned, feeling as if he’d missed something. Then with comprehension came an acid surge of anger.
“Of course! Lord Orin wants medical verification of the Lady’s virginity. Holy God, even DeKoven Woolf didn’t subject her to that humiliation!”
“I know, Alex, but it’s an old custom in Elite marriages. Many of the Houses still—”
“I’m well aware of the customs of Elite marriages!” The words came out cold and slashing, a voice he didn’t recognize as his own. He closed his eyes, reaching blindly for Erica’s hand, holding on until he had himself under control again.
“Erica, forgive me.”
“There’s nothing to forgive,” she said softly.
He pulled in a long breath, consciously relaxing his tense muscles. “Lord Loren is leaving for Concordia this afternoon? When will he return?”
“Perralt wasn’t sure, but probably Friday. Lady Galia is planning a banquet that evening. It’s been assumed that the announcement will be made then.”
Friday. Four days.
“Erica, there’s no hope of stopping this marriage now?”
“You know the odds are against it at this late date.”
He nodded, wondering why he’d bothered to ask.
“What about Adrien? Has she given Perralt any hint of what she might do?”
“Do? What do you mean? She wouldn’t try to avoid this marriage; she knows she can’t without jeopardizing the House.”
He laughed bitterly. “And has she no other options open to her? Did we enter Adrien Eliseer into our calculations? Did we assign a factor value to her loathing for the Selasids and all they stand for? Did we equate the potentials of her courage and intelligence against—” He stopped; it was getting out of control again.
“Alex, what is it you think she might do?”
“I don’t know.” It was true, but he doubted that was what silenced her. He looked at the clock. “Erica, perhaps you should get my clothes and the MT fix now.”
She didn’t respond for some time, studying him, a mute question in her eyes. Then she rose, glancing at Ben’s gun on the table.
“All right, Alex. By the way, the medallion is in the safety box in my office. Ben found it in your apartment after you were arrested.”
“Thank you. Erica . . . what about Amelia?”
Her breath caught on a brief sigh. “She died. The same day you and Andreas were arrested.” She broke the short, aching silence that followed with, “I’ll bring your clothes and a fix, then you can rest until the MT’s clear.”
“And the drenaline injection?”
“Not now. I’ll give it to you later. I told you, it’ll only last a few hours, and I won’t give you another; not in your state of health. I might be doing Predis a favor.” Then she touched his hand and smiled. “Alex, thank the God you’re safe. We need you.”
He could find no adequate answer to that.
6.
He slumped down on the bed, the slacsuit trousers in his hands, inwardly rebelling at the weakness that forced him to rest after the grand achievement of putting on his underclothing and taking a few steps to test his legs. Then he looked up, his eyes drawn by a movement outside the cubicle.
Valentin Severin.
She was questioning a medtech, a short exchange ending with the medtech’s nod, a finger pointing toward Alex’s cubicle. Then Val’s smile, a few words of thanks.
His surprise at seeing her was brief; he could guess her purpose. Ussher had no loyals in the infirmary on this shift, and he wanted a firsthand report on Alex’s condition.
He watched her curiously as she stopped at the signal console outside. She was carrying something in one hand, but he couldn’t identify it. And she was uneasy, despite the confident expression she wore. She touched a button, and a chime sounded from the bedside console, but Alex didn’t respond to it. Instead, he folded his slacsuit and stuffed it under the pillows, swept the gun and ’com into the drawer, then lay back in the bed and pulled the covers up. He didn’t intend to let Ussher know he was well enough to be on his feet yet.
The chime sounded again
. Val glanced around the ward, one hand moving to her hair to arrange what needed no arrangement. He wondered what she’d do if he didn’t respond at all. Finally, he reached for the intercom.
“Come in, Val.”
She jumped at the sound, glancing at the console, then put on a smile and stepped through the screens.
“I hope I didn’t . . . wake you . . .” The smile faded.
He hadn’t had access to a mirror, but no doubt his appearance was a shock.
“No, Val, I was just resting.”
She recovered her smile and approached the bed.
“I—I know I shouldn’t bother you, but I was so relieved to find out you’re back safe and . . . sound.” She was nervously toying with the object—no, objects—she was carrying: three pill bottles. Her eyes shifted from his bandaged wrists to the burns visible on his chest and arms. “I guess they—they gave you a hard time.”
He smiled faintly. “I wouldn’t care to enjoy their hospitality again, but fortunately it’s all over now.”
“Yes.” She looked down at her hands and seemed to become aware of the pill bottles for the first time. She put them on the bedside table. “These are for you. Dr. Radek asked me to bring them over from the pharmacy. She said you’re going to need all the help medical science can offer.” It was meant to be humorous, and Alex laughed, but Val couldn’t quite manage it.
She asked hesitantly, “Are you . . . really all right?”
He glanced at her, then picked up one of the bottles, noting that Erica was listed as the prescribing physician.
“I can’t say I’m feeling too well, but I understand I’ll be up and about within a week.” Acetyhistine: one every hour as needed. “It’s nothing serious, actually. The SSB is just a little lax about medical care for some of their guests.” He leavened that with a laugh, intent on her reaction, even as he picked up the second bottle. Trimycin: one every four hours. And the third—
It nearly slipped from his hand.
Doricaine: one at night for sleep.
“Alex? Are you—Alex?”
He masked his shock with coughing, and it wasn’t entirely a subterfuge. The physical response to what he read on that bottle choked off his breath. Ussher obviously had a loyal in the pharmacy. Erica would never prescribe a sedative for him; she knew his aversion to them and knew he would never take one of his own volition. But Predis Ussher wouldn’t know that.
