by Jo Zebedee
“I don’t remember being that forgiving when I was her age,” he said.
“You were a brat,” she snorted. Lichio, as a child, had been their mother’s golden-boy, almost a mascot for the Banned. When she died he’d changed, lashing out at anyone who tried to help him. Only Rjala, not as bent under the loss as Sonly and her father – and Eevan, who’d been nearly as broken as Lichio – had managed to reach him. She’d guided Lichio into a teenager who resembled the smart, funny child he’d been. He’d become army-mad, perhaps seeking to meet Rjala’s expectations of him and exceed them, or to validate himself within a fractured family linked only by their rebellion.
“My point exactly. She could be doing more than slamming doors.” He gave a rueful smile, and then sobered, and she steeled herself for a lecture. “If she’s a Controller, it’ll happen anyway. It’s not like you can close her head down. Better that she learns to do it properly.” He sat back in his seat. “Kare will agree to it, you know. He grew up with Ealyn. This won’t even get filed under kooky.”
Sonly fiddled with her data pad, opening and closing its cover. Lichio was right; for Kare, the idea of becoming a Controller would be perfectly normal. He’d treat her as if she was the weird one, and that wasn’t fair. She didn’t make ships fly or take over people’s heads.
“Lich, she’s heir to the Pettina name, whether Kare likes it or not. She can’t become a Space Roamer.”
“She’s a Roamer princess, too.” He shrugged. “It’s not worth fighting about at this stage. She isn’t talking about running off to live in space. She’s asking to learn to fly. If she’s going to be around the Roamers – and I think that’s a given, since they’re the bulk of Kare’s fleet – she’s going to absorb some of what they do.”
She bit her lip. “Maybe….”
“Besides,” he said. “Forbidden fruit and all that; if you ban it, she’ll want it. Remember what Dad used to say, you have to let them go to—”
“Keep them,” she finished, nodding. Her father had let her follow the path she wanted, even though it put her at odds with Eevan. He hadn’t forced Lichio to conform the way Eevan had chosen to. He’d even advised him not to join the Banned’s junior reserve at thirteen, she remembered, pleading with Lichio to at least know what he wanted first, but when Lichio had gone ahead anyway, he’d supported him. She pushed her hair back. “You’re right. I’ll talk to her when she’s calmed down.”
“Of course I’m right,” he said. “I’m the smart one, remember?” His voice was ironic but the humour was forced and his blue eyes were shadowed, more like those of the bereft child than the man he’d grown into.
“Lich…” There might not be another chance to talk. When they landed, it would be meeting after meeting, for both of them. “Is there anything I can do?”
“Conjure me back three months?” He quirked a half-smile. “No, I’m fine.” He looked not just sad, but helpless, and she couldn’t leave it at that, not knowing he had no one else he would talk to.
“It isn’t your fault if Josef didn’t make it out of Abendau.”
“No? I risked him, asking him to put me in touch with the agents. What if that’s why he was picked up?” He got up, the old reflexes coming to the fore. No one was better at deflecting concern or questions. “I can’t talk about it. I need time.”
“Time for what?”
“To think.” It sounded like the last thing he wanted to do.
“About what?”
He looked at the ceiling, as if seeking inspiration. “Do you ever wonder….” He stopped, gave a quiet curse, and then met her eyes. “Did we do the right thing? So many have died: Rjala, Silom, Sam… maybe Josef.”
What was he saying? He’d never doubted before – he’d always been so sure about what he was doing and why.
“They died for what they believed in,” she said. “Just as you would have. Or me.” She looked down, to where her blouse hid the scar on her side. She nearly had.
“For what we have now?” He started to pace. “Half an empire, and war looming.”
She shook her head. She couldn’t think that. Kare was about to risk his life – no, more than his life, his sanity, the equilibrium of who he was – for their dream.
“Not half an empire – a republic,” she said. Provided Kare held as many families as he believed he did.
He took a deep breath. “Everything I thought certain has shifted. I didn’t do what I did for Dad’s dream. I was hardly old enough when he died to understand it.”
He meant it; she’d never seen him more serious. “You were fourteen.”
“I was fourteen and barely over Mother’s death. I had no idea what would be expected of me. I thought I’d be a rebel soldier, and never went any further than that.”
“So why did you go on? After Abendau fell?” He had to know he wasn’t talking sense, that he was shaken up and worried about Josef, and had things out of perspective. “You could have walked away when Kare became Emperor. Your work as a rebel was done. With the back pay you’d gathered, you could have bought a share of a party-planet and stayed there. Why didn’t you?”
He gave a strangled sound. “I…” He ran his hands through his hair, and she thought he was going to crack, but he managed to compose himself. “You know what happened in Abendau. When I saw Kare in the quarry, he didn’t know me or Silom. He was broken, scarred, so thin he could barely stay on his feet.” He slumped into his seat, rubbing his temples. “I knew what they’d done to take him there. I’d seen some of it, and heard more. And I’d had my share of it.” He took his hands down and she wanted to flinch away at the pain-filled lines either side of his mouth, at his unflinching eyes. “I would never have come back from where he was. Never. Not just by taking the quarry, or the palace, or becoming Emperor, but in getting up every damned morning and facing himself in the mirror. In having the guts to walk out in front of everyone as if he was the sort of privileged Emperor they wanted. People knew what had been done to him, the rumours were all through Abendau, but he still faced them. He fought for people who needed him – he gave you the support you needed for reform. People he said were less lucky than him.” He gave a short laugh. “To see him do that and admit I don’t have the balls to overcome half of what he did…” He looked down at his hands. “I didn’t even have the guts to tell you about Josef. I used my job as an excuse to hide him and stop myself committing to him.”
She sat opposite, not able to take her eyes off him. Lichio had skirted around what had happened in the cells for years and avoided any questions about the past. If he was opening up now, she wouldn’t stop him.
“You ask why I didn’t walk away?” He rubbed the top of his arm, his fingers digging into his jacket, as if he wanted to burrow under his own skin. “I believed in Kare. I didn’t think anyone could overcome all that and not be worth following. I thought I was central to what he was doing, that only I could be the backup he needed. He trusts so few, you know?”
“You are central to it.” Her voice was choked.
He shook his head, denying her comfort. “I fucked up. But Kare walked away from what we were supposed to achieve. I don’t know if he was too tired to go on, or if he believes a republic is the way forward. I do know, even if he does force the agreement we need, that it will leave a half-republic-empire that could take years to sort out. If it leads to war – and it might – people will die. The little people, the ones we were supposed to be helping.”
“I promise you the republic will make the difference you want.” She could hear the edge of desperation in her voice. “That’s why I’m going to accept the presidency: because it will deliver that dream.”
“I hope you’re right.” He met her gaze. “But, after the raid, I’ll take some time to decide…”
“Decide what?”
He took a deep breath. “Whether I’m staying or going, I guess.”
Silence lengthened between them. She didn’t know what to say. The idea of Lich not being at her side w
as alien. It was the way things worked: Lichio’s intelligence; her politics; Kare, the centre – a new beginning, a way forwards beyond what his mother had offered. A three-way team who’d carried an empire for a decade and a friendship for longer. He couldn’t go.
A bang broke the silence and made her jump. Lichio jerked his head at the door. “You’d better see to Kerra. I think she needs a bit of attention.” He gave a strained smile. “Go on, Sonly. I’ve said enough.”
He was right; they’d only go around in circles. She left, down the corridor to Kerra’s cabin, and pushed open the door.
“I’m sorry,” she said, before Kerra could speak. “Of course you should learn.” She stepped in, and saw that her daughter’s eyes were as red as her own. Guilt pierced her. “I just… wasn’t expecting it. You psychers, I think I know all about you, and then something happens that makes me realise I don’t.” She smiled. “Forgive me?”
Kerra nodded. “Of course.” She looked a little worried. “I didn’t mean to bash the wall so hard.”
Sonly had to smile at that. “Be careful, or there won’t be a ship left for you to fly. We’ll talk to your dad when we get to Ferran, and if he’s okay about it, you can learn.”
Kerra’s face broke into a smile, and Sonly’s breath caught. Kerra had the look of Ealyn in the way her eyes shone when she spoke of flying, the way her smile made them crinkle. She’d never noticed before, but here, on a ship like Ealyn’s, it felt like she was a child again, watching him emerge from his ship, forbidding in his dark pilot’s suit until he smiled and it flashed into his eyes. Kare had never had that way about him – he’d been steadier, more focused. But Kerra…. Despite the blonde hair, Sonly could see only Ealyn shining out of her, and it chilled her.
CHAPTER NINE
Averrine entered the main section of the palace, Phelps falling into step beside her. His doubts filled the air, and his regrets. Once she would have crushed those thoughts, removed them with a single joining to his mind, or the touch of their bodies together, but not now.
He was right to regret. He had betrayed her, he who had once been close to her, angular and hard, with pride enough to match her own. Sometimes, public displays were necessary, but not for Phelps; for him, the slow destruction of what he had been, the ruin of his self, was a better mirror for what he’d brought on her.
Still, he had his uses – there was no one better at doing what he did: finding people and bringing them in. He would find Kare, and le Payne. They had left her caged, to spend years pacing like an animal, unable to remove the block in her mind. She’d sat on her knees and reached into herself, the way she’d done as a girl to prove herself to her father, but it had made no difference; the block had been immovable, the tower inescapable.
She brought her hand up to her face. Age spots marred the skin, spots that hadn’t been there before her incarceration, when her powers had sustained her. It wasn’t just the marks: her fingers had tightened, the bones thickening until they pained her each morning when she woke. Her hips ached, bones moulded to their new shape, impossible to heal now. Old. Kare had made her old. The anger that had sustained her through that decade fed into her power, an endless source. He’d taken her empire, her lineage, her name, and left her to rot. That could not go unchallenged.
She needed to get out of the palace, with its high walls and silent corridors. She needed to feel air on her skin, to touch the garden and feel how it continued, timeless and strong. Already lush growth had returned, the plants thirsty for the water that now flowed through the moat, reaching the drought-stricken corners.
She left the palace by the top exit, dismissing Phelps, and stood at the start of the skywalk to the port, her guards keeping a discreet distance. Below, the gardens stretched. She breathed in the dry, scented air. It was the same air she’d breathed as a child, in Bendau, carried from the same desert.
Kare had changed so much about the palace in her absence. He’d sealed the entrance to the catacombs containing the ancient church of Abendau, its tribal heart, and flooded them to destroy Omendegon. He’d had a mosaic-tiled floor in her personal quarters removed, as if trying to eradicate her from the palace she’d created.
“My Lady.” The guardsman’s voice was low. “Your guests have arrived.”
She smiled; her son may have changed much, but she was back, and not without allies. She walked to a small antechamber where Tom Peiret and his son, Jake, rose to their feet. Baelan’s mother, Shanisa, bowed her head. Her brothers, standing behind her, clutched their ankhars with their right hands and snapped to attention. The woman’s head remained bowed. Her sadness cast through the room, her thoughts singing for Baelan; everything she did was for and about the little traitor.
Averrine took her seat at the table. Tom Peiret drew in a deep breath as she touched him; he had long been hers. The boy resisted but, with a small twist of extra attention, his defiance melted. She sent a blast of reward his way, and his expression slackened. It was so easy. Easier than ever.
“I understand that the position of president of the so-called republic may fall to Sonly le Payne.” She smiled at Jake, letting her eyes soften. “She wronged you, did she not?”
He tensed, and she could feel how his pride had been wounded. “She should have been honoured to become a Peiret. She claimed she and her husband had no love for each other.” The hurt was clear in his eyes. Clearer than it had been when she’d first met the boy a few weeks ago, as it should be – she had set that hurt with her touch.
“And yet she stayed with him.” Averrine leaned forward, enhancing his pain. “I can teach her that she was wrong.” She paused, letting that sink in. “I wish for you to travel to Ferran.”
“My Lady, they will know my father’s loyalties are to you.”
He dared speak against her. “You will travel to Ferran,” she said, each word precise, each accompanied by a rap of her will. “Whilst there you will carry a message to Sonly le Payne. A very personal one.”
He swallowed and she could feel how he wanted to resist; the le Payne woman still attracted him. She shot a bolt of displeasure, and his head snapped back with a small cry, but no matter – he had to be held firm. The le Payne woman was the strength behind Varnon, the hand that had guided him as Emperor. She, more than any, was a threat.
“You will do this for me,” she said. He nodded and she rewarded him. He opened his mouth, drinking her presence in.
A moment later, he cleared his throat. “My Lady, I will see it is done for you.” There was no hesitation in his words, no question about what she might ask him to deliver or do. The lingering thoughts of Sonly le Payne no longer moved him. It was easy, when a person was hurt and wished for revenge.
She turned her attention to Shanisa. “You will travel with General Phelps; he will see you are reunited with your son.”
Shanisa bowed her head, her face unruffled, her thoughts hard to read: a deep water, this one, able to use the depths to sustain her. Nonetheless, her desire was clear and easy to pull on. Baelan was the cord that bound his mother to her duty; to be reunited with Baelan, the mother would do all that was asked of her. Averrine increased her focus, enhancing the woman’s sense of the maternal. This was what was right for her son – bringing him home to the tribes, not leaving him cast adrift with a father who was an enemy.
“Your will be done, my Lady.” She met Averrine’s eyes and, in that moment, Averrine had no doubt that she, too, was hers.
CHAPTER TEN
Sonly mimed hitting something, making Kare smile. “She thumped the wall of the ship so hard I thought she’d break it!”
Her voice was loud enough to carry through the small crowd of security staff and lackeys, which was, no doubt, intentional. Look at the normal family we are. Look at me, the president who is one of the people. As ever, she played the role well but her voice held a brittle edge he knew well – something was going on, something she was hiding with animation.
“I’ll talk to Kerra later,” said Kare. A
lthough their daughter, having got her own way, had seemed mostly embarrassed and glad to stay on board. He frowned a little, sensing her, deep in the mesh. It wasn’t just embarrassment. Temptation bit, to have a closer look and find out what was bothering her, but he pushed it away – that was the old Queen’s way, to keep close to everyone and allow little space for private thoughts; it wasn’t his. His father had taught him, from an early age, that it wasn’t polite to look into people’s thoughts just because he could. Having spent most of his life learning not to look closely, he didn’t plan to change now.
“Kerra’s lucky,” he said. They moved away from the crowd, towards the Ferran hub’s administration centre – it was easier to appreciate the scale of the space station now he’d been in situ for three days. “It’s the one skill I wanted, and I don’t have a single ounce of Control in me.”
She nudged him, a little too hard. “I wouldn’t complain. You’re hardly a psychic slouch.”
“No.” But he was; all his power was stolen, provided by others and forced to his will. It was draining, holding the mesh, and he didn’t know if it was because he no longer had powers of his own, or if he’d had the wrong sort of training. Snake-wrestling would be comparable to keeping it in shape.
Farran had been working with him for the past few weeks, trying to teach him how to merge smoothly with the mesh, but it made no difference; he didn’t fit and it felt like the mesh knew it. He realised Sonly was watching him with a worried face, and gave a quick smile. “Well, I’m happy for her to learn, if you are.” Would that all their problems were so easy to fix: at some point, he’d have to tell her about Baelan’s compulsion.
They walked in silence, their steps in tandem: in a station this size there were too many ears, ready to report everything he and Sonly said or did, right down to whether they walked close together or apart. He looked straight ahead, composed; let the news-holos read something into a face that told them nothing. They usually did.
