by M. K. Wren
Elise Woolf was resplendent, her hair an intricate crown of burnished curls and braids, her gown—not the peacock gown; that was for the ball—pale green satinet shimmering with crystal brocade, complemented by a full-length cape of lapis blue trimmed in sable. Phillip Woolf was attired in umber and ochre, his cloak fastened with loops of gold, dress boots adorned with gold chains, the doublet under the open surcoat rich with gold-threaded brocade. The latter served a purpose beyond decoration: the flexsteel strands woven into the design could stop a light laser beam or deflect a knife thrust. Alexand and Rich wore suits similar in style, including the protective brocade, but with the shorter mantlets, rather than cloaks.
The lead ’car, with its complement of House guards and gonfalon bearers, landed in front of the podium, and a few seconds later, Hilding, their chauffeur, set the Faeton down as lightly as a feather. Alexand turned, feeling an indefinable chill.
Beside him Rich sat stiff and mute, trying hard to hide his misery, but Alexand felt it as if it were born in his own mind. Rich was well aware of the curious stares his crutches attracted and looked forward to becoming the focal point of those multitudes of eyes with nothing but dread.
No one would laugh, not at the son of Phillip DeKoven Woolf. But they would stare. The curiosity would be there, and the pity.
Alexand found his mouth dry, his eyes burning. It wasn’t fair. Not Rich . . .
One of the guards opened the ’car door, and the blare of trumpets, the massed voices of the crowd, seemed to explode against his eardrums. Rich went pale, but when Elise paused to kiss his cheek before she stepped out of the ’car, he called up an uncertain smile. Woolf sent him an anxious glance as he followed his wife.
Alexand preceded Rich onto the landing area, restraining the impulse to close his eyes against the glare of light, and if he could, his ears against the onslaught of sound. From behind the barrier of Directorate guards, vidicam and imagraph lenses flashed avidly. Alexand didn’t offer Rich a helping hand, but he was close enough to reach him in a split-second. The ’cars whisked away, and the Woolfs mounted the first tier of steps beneath the podium, then turned, standing side by side, the scarlet-clad House guards forming a line behind them with a gonfalon bearer at each end. The ampspeakers blared, “The Lord Phillip DeKoven Woolf and the Lady Elise Galinin Woolf, with their sons, Ser Alexand and Ser Richard.”
A roar of applause and cheering followed, a concussive shockwave of sound. And Alexand wondered, as he always did, why they cheered.
Confetti and flowers thrown by the jubilant crowd showered the landing area and the tier of steps where they stood. Alexand saw his mother’s radiant smile as she leaned down to pick up a blossom, kissed it, then tossed it back to the crowd, where it was hungrily fought over, and the volume of sound increased. He held himself erect, looking down at the shouting, ecstatic, grinning faces. What did they see? Something bigger than life, the stuff of legends: the Black Eagle of DeKoven Woolf, and his fair Lady, so exquisitely beautiful in the white light, and their handsome sons.
Of course, it was too bad about Ser Richard. . . .
Woolf offered his arm to Elise, and the roar began to subside as they turned to mount the steps to their seats. The guards hadn’t yet realigned themselves, when Alexand heard a scream from the crowd behind him, and saw something small and dark fly past.
He ducked reflexively as the missile sliced close to his head, shouts of alarm and panic a meaningless assault on his senses. All he could think of was Rich.
He must not fall. Alexand reached out for him, dimly aware of a sodden smash and his mother’s cry of surprise. Rich was off balance, staggering.
Alexand caught him, and at the same time, saw his father’s face, dark with rage, and his mother’s bewildered expression; not anger, only bewilderment and hurt. Rich was trembling, a tangible aura of fear emanating from him as he stared at the dripping stain on Elise’s cape.
Black against the lapis blue. An ink bomb.
Alexand concentrated on getting Rich balanced on his crutches, his mind reverberating with the shock of realization.
An ink bomb. A childish prank, and harmless enough, but that the Lady Galinin Woolf had suffered such an indignity was incomprehensible.
He felt something of his father’s rage then, and knew himself capable at this moment of violence against the person responsible for the hurt chagrin in his mother’s eyes and for Rich’s fear and embarrassment. The panicked crowd edging the landing area was on the verge of breaking through the cordon of guards. Reinforcements were moving in, some joining the House guards, and at Woolf’s command forming a protective circlc around his wife and sons.
But he didn’t join them. He strode to the edge of the tier and, coldly, regally aloof, surveyed the crowd. Silence moved out from him, every eye fixing on the Lord Woolf, standing in magnificent solitude.
“Who is guilty of this outrage?”
Alexand heard his mother’s quick intake of breath; fear for her husband standing isolated and unprotected.
An uneasy murmuring from the crowd, and again Woolf’s commanding voice rang out.
“My patience runs thin—I demand an answer!”
At length, individuals within the crowd near the landing area began to shift. An opening appeared, growing slowly wider, until finally one man stood alone.
The guilty one, Alexand realized. The others accused him not with words, but with fear, drawing away from him as if his guilt were contagious. A Bond wearing a black-and-gold Concord tabard; a young man, not yet thirty. He stood alone now as Phillip Woolf stood alone. But the difference was infinite.
Alexand’s breath came out in a long sigh. Seconds ago he’d been stifled with rage, but this man . . . what could he feel for this miserable human being awaiting his fate in a paralysis of terror except pity? It was a senseless, mindless act for which he stood condemned, something irrational in its triviality.
Woolf said not another word. He only glanced at the ranking Directorate guardsman and nodded. The officer bowed, gestured to another guard, and together they stepped into the crowd and seized the Bond.
“No—oh, no. . . .” The words were a whisper. Rich.
Woolf turned and rejoined his family, then, moving with calm deliberation, removed Elise’s stained cape, tossed it to one of the House guards, and draped his own cloak around her shoulders. This done, he looked at his sons.
“Are you all right?”
Alexand answered; Rich wasn’t capable of it. “Yes, of course, Father.”
The trumpets burst into shimmering fanfares, the prelude to the Hymn of the Concord. Two aircars were slipping down into the landing area. The lead ’car was purple with a gold lion crest emblazoned on its side; the Faeton-limo following it was black with the Concord crest, but it sported double banners, black and gold, purple and gold.
The Chairman was arriving.
A collective sigh swept the Plaza, tension dissolving as the massed voices took up the words of the Hymn. The glittering rows of Elite rose to add their voices, their relief at the diversion as patent as that of the Fesh and Bonds. Alexand found the distraction especially welcome; it made Rich’s passage up the steps to their seats less conspicuous. Finally, when the Hymn came to its end and the Elite ranks settled into their seats, Rich sank gratefully into his and put the crutches out of sight at his feet.
There was no cessation in the volume of sound. The Plaza reverberated with an ovation mounting to an awesome crescendo that nearly drowned the trumpet fanfares. On the first tier, Mathis Galinin, white-haired, white-bearded, a towering patriarch, accepted the deafening accolade with upraised hands.
The Chairman had arrived: the Lord Mathis, First Lord of Daro Galinin, Chairman of the Directorate, the ruling body of the Concord of the Loyal Houses.
But to Alexand—Grandser.
With him was his only s
urviving son, Lord Evin, Evin’s wife, Lady Marcessa, and their son, Marc, and daughter, Camila.
Rich was still trembling, but it was easing. He leaned close to Alexand to make himself heard.
“What will happen to him, Alex?”
Alexand didn’t have to ask whom Rich meant. The Bond. And he knew exactly what would happen to him.
“I . . . don’t know.”
“He’ll be executed, won’t he?”
“I suppose so.”
“Why did he do that? He isn’t even a DeKoven Woolf Bond. Why, Alex?”
Alexand looked down at the cheering crowd, and it occurred to him that it was an equivocal entity, and perhaps something to be feared.
But that Bond . . .
Why?
Some questions have no answers; at least, none the human mind is capable of encompassing. Those were Theron Rovere’s words. Alexand closed his eyes against the threat of tears.
But the human mind must always keep asking questions if it is to remain human. And those were also Theron Rovere’s words.
“I don’t know, Rich. I don’t know.”
4.
One more gauntlet for Rich to run in the name of duty: the family’s obligatory appearance at the Daro Galinin Estate ball. Alexand looked out the ’car window, not at his brother. It didn’t require direct observation to know Rich’s state of mind after the incident at the Plaza.
Incident.
Perhaps that was the word for it. A small event that would be noted by witnesses and reporters simply because the Woolfs had been involved, but would soon be forgotten.
Rich would never forget it because he didn’t understand it. The inexplicable motives of the man who tossed the ink bomb would fix the incident indelibly in his memory.
The Galinin Estate was near the Plaza complex on a bend of the Yarra River. It was one of the oldest structures in Concordia, surrounded by parks and glades, its venerable, rose-hued stone walls garlanded with ivy, a sanctuary of calm, like Mathis Galinin himself. But tonight it was lighted and decorated for the festivities, and even though Hilding had the flashing clearance lights on, their approach was slowed by the tangle of traffic. Daro Galinin was traditionally the first stop on the Concord Day tour of the Concordia Estates, and the influx was at its peak.
That tradition was the reason for this last gauntlet for Rich. The Woolfs wouldn’t find it necessary to tour the other Houses, but a stop at Daro Galinin was mandatory, and not because Mathis Galinin would be offended if they didn’t put in an appearance tonight; he found social affairs on this scale tiresome and would much prefer to see his daughter and family in private.
Custom commands, according to the old maxim. To defy this custom would create speculation about the relationship between Daro Galinin and DeKoven Woolf. That the bond between the two Houses was generations old and cemented by personal affection and respect wasn’t enough. Rumors could be disastrous in the games of politics; appearances were generally more important than truth.
The ’car was finally approaching the landing area at the foot of the entry stair below the ballroom. Alexand felt a change in Rich’s posture; he was bracing himself.
Woolf had suggested casually that Rich might prefer to have Hilding take him home. Elise had seconded the suggestion, her tone light. But he refused. This duty call would be brief; it always was. There was nothing wrong with him.
Alexand recognized that decision as an error; Rich too often overestimated his strength, and emotional stress affected his muscular control. But he didn’t argue with Rich, not did his parents. At least there would be no stationary steps for him to contend with; the entry stair had moving ramps. And their stay would be brief; only long enough to pay their respects to Galinin and to Evin and Marcessa.
Alexand wondered if the Lady Camma would be at the ball. His grandmother’s illness was seldom discussed, perhaps because it was hopeless. She hadn’t accompanied her husband to the Plaza ceremonies.
The landing seemed to come with a lurch. Elise rose as the guard opened the door.
“Rich?”
“I’m fine, Mother.”
The ramp carried them up into the crowd milling about the columned foyer off the ballroom, into the laughter and music, the silken rustlings, the murmuring of multitudinous footsteps. Alexand heard the change in the tone of voices, saw the faces turning in their direction.
The foyer level, the end of the ramp, and Rich managed it easily enough. But he was too pale.
“Ah, Elise! You’re exquisite, my lady—as if you were ever anything less.”
Elise laughed, extending her hand to the tall, golden-haired Lord Ivanoi.
“Alexis, you’re the only man I know who can flatter without insult. Honoria, how are you?” This to Ivanoi’s wife, a regal woman whose beauty was reason enough for her renown in the Concord, but it was overshadowed by her character; a woman of intelligence and outspoken conviction fortunate enough to marry a man who valued those qualities.
“I’m very well, Elise, except for an incipient case of boredom. I’m looking forward to Master Demret’s symphalight concert at your ball to alleviate that.”
“It’s beautiful, Honoria, at least the little Demret would let me see of it.”
The greetings extended to Alexand and Rich, and Woolf and Alexis Ivanoi took a moment for a sotto voce conference. Politics, Alexand knew. Ivanoi was a Director and a staunch ally of Galinin and Woolf.
Rich was still capable of smiles and polite responses. The Ivanoi drifted away to be replaced by the Robek, then the Matsune, the Reeswyck, and later Lord Charles and Lady Constanz Fallor with their daughter Julia in tow, all eyeing Alexand speculatively. The Woolfs moved steadily toward the ballroom, but their progress seemed unbearably slow; familiar faces that must be recognized, unfamiliar ones that called for introductions, seemed to expand in geometric progression. Alexand automatically made the expected responses, seldom looking directly at Rich, but keeping him always in the periphery of his vision.
And Rich was faltering. The trembling wouldn’t be apparent to anyone else, but it was there, and his pallor was more pronounced. Rich had the will for this gauntlet, but not the strength, and he was beginning to realize it now.
Lord Cadmon, then the Cordulay, and the Zarlinska with three marriageable daughters on display; the Estwing, the Sharidar, the Delai Omer, the Cameroodo. . . .
“Alex . . .” Alexand had to lean close to Rich: he was nearly whispering. “Alex, perhaps I could wait near the ramp. . . .”
“We’ll go to the car.” Alexand caught his mother’s eye; she only nodded, sending Rich a smile as they turned away.
But Alexand paused at the touch of his father’s hand on his arm: that and the significant turn of Woolfs head focused Alexand’s attention on a man standing near the ballroom doors.
The Lord Orin Badir Selasis, looming massively, his bulk draped, not disguised, by full-length robes heavy with fur, the black eye patch giving his swarthy features a sinister aspect against the background of festive decorations and costumes. Selasis was displaying a rare smile for the man with whom he was talking, a handsome man in his forties, tall and broad-shouldered. With his blond, Noreuropan coloring, he was a marked contrast to the woman beside him, who was slender and small with an oriental cast to her features.
“The gentleman enjoying Orin’s attention,” Woolf said, turning his gaze elsewhere, “is Loren Eliseer.”
Alexand emulated his father’s disinterest. “The Lady is his wife?”
“Yes. Galia Shang.”
“Is their daughter here?”
Woolf glanced briefly toward the Eliseer. “I don’t see her. At any rate, this isn’t the time for—”
“Rich—” Alexand spun around, suddenly cold, his pulse leaden. Rich was gone. He’d started for the ’car, thinking Alexand was fol
lowing him. But it wasn’t Rich’s absence in itself that brought that chill. It was a sound small in this pressing crowd, but one his ear was attuned to.
A metallic clatter. A crutch falling.
Alexand struck out through the crowd in a straight line toward the entry, veering slightly to one side of it. He couldn’t see Rich, nor was there time to wonder why he moved so purposefully in this direction, how he knew exactly where Rich was. But he knew.
And he knew Rich needed him desperately.
He collided with someone, aware only of a mass of brocaded robes and cloying perfume. He didn’t stop to apologize; he was oblivious to everyone around him, smiles and greetings meeting with silence and unseeing eyes.
An eddy off the mainstream, a transient gathering of young Sers and Serras. Alexand knew them all, knew their names and lineage; they were his peers. But only one of them registered in his consciousness.
Karlis Selasis.
Lord Orin’s flawed Adonis, as fair as his father was dark, as handsome as he was sinister; Karlis attired in blood-red down to his gold-scrolled, sharp-heeled boots; Karlis with his Grecian mouth drawn in a languid smirk, bending his golden-curled head to a companion; Karlis laughing. The laugh was taken up on cue by the others, and Karlis was vain enough to think they followed his lead out of deference to him.
They laughed on his cue because all of them recognized behind him the shadow of Orin Badir Selasis.
Alexand plunged toward that psychic eddy, a circle shaped by an emotional current that would dissipate in a matter of seconds as it had formed in seconds, but those seconds were each eternities of pain. He was choked with it. It emanated from Rich and translated into blind rage in Alexand’s mind.
Rich was at the center of that circle, isolated in that transient vortex like a trapped animal suffering the taunts of the closing hounds. One of his crutches lay gleaming on the floor, while he balanced precariously on the other. Under normal circumstances, he could retrieve the fallen crutch easily, but his nerves and muscles wouldn’t respond now; even with the one crutch, he might fall in another second.
