The Hidden World

by Melinda Snodgrass

  Boho leaned back, dug his hands into his pockets. “You’re going to bust my balls, aren’t you?”

  No answer. Instead a slim hand stretched out, took the wine bottle. Mercedes refilled her glass, took several slow deliberate sips, the long lashes lifted, and her eyes met his. He thought he saw a shadow of sadness in their brown depths.

  “Captain Lord Eugene Montgomery has a wife. Seven children.”

  Boho grunted. “He’s to be commended. Didn’t know he had it in him.”

  A flash of anger crossed Mercedes’ face. “The other four men on the promotions board all have families and children as well.” Her fingers tightened on the stem of the wine glass. “I’ve ordered them back on active duty aboard an explorador along with the most egregiously unqualified of the officers that bought a promotion. They are being sent to Sector 470.”

  It was as if ice had replaced his spine. Sector 470. There was something in that distant sector that made ships and crews disappear. Worry over what lurked beyond had led to allowing and even encouraging women to join the military, despite the upheaval it was causing in society. Now the sector was carefully off limits until the crown needed to remove an… inconvenience. Assignment to 470 was a way for an emperor… or an infanta… to deal with a problem and leave no fingerprints. Boho shoved back his chair, stood, and walked to the fireplace. He studied the flames, tried to quiet his jumping pulse. Anxiety knotted his gut.

  “And will I be aboard that ship of death?”

  “Don’t be absurd. You’re my husband.” He sagged with relief. Saved, saved, saved! Mercedes continued, “Your father is too highly placed, I need you to reassure the conservatives, and the press loves you.”

  And what about you? Boho thought, but he didn’t allow the words to pass his lips. He feared the answer. He cleared his throat. His initial relief had passed, leaving behind the oily taste of guilt. Men were going to die because of his scheme. The thought of living with that knowledge, and how he had escaped the noose, was not something he contemplated with any pleasure. He searched for another angle. Another scheme. Another way. He turned back to face her and was shocked at the contempt he saw in her eyes.

  He recovered and said, “This seems extreme, Mercedes. You couldn’t just court-martial them?”

  “The danger is too great that they would implicate you.”

  “So make it a soft landing. Suggest they retire. Losing a ship, even one of the older exploradors, is an expensive proposition. You could buy them off for far less.”

  “And allow them to blackmail the crown?” She shook her head in disgust. “You caused this, Boho. These deaths are on you.”

  “Oh, no, I’m not going to eat that sin, my dear. You gave the order. Or did you pass the buck to Daddy? And how far will this purge extend? A lot of families paid bribes,” Boho said.

  “They didn’t realize you were one of the beneficiaries of their largesse. At least you were that careful. And I’ve kept this from Father. You can thank me for that too.” She threw down her napkin. “I’ve lost my appetite. You can sleep in the blue room tonight.” She left.

  * * *

  She had dismissed Tako, the Hajin batBEM who had been with her since her days at the academy, telling the alien she would handle her own evening ablutions, but she hadn’t. Mercedes was still dressed, gazing out the window at the darkness of a rare moonless night on a planet with three of them. The expanse of the canopied bed yawned behind her but she was too agitated to sleep. Even the sybaritic Mist had abandoned the comfort of pillows and comforters. He had joined her, sitting on the windowsill, dilated blue eyes also staring out at the darkness. His purrs were a quiet rumble in the silent room, his fur soft and warm beneath her fingers as she slowly stroked him. Occasionally his head butted against her stomach. She wished there was someone to rub her shoulders, some shoulder where she could rest her head.

  The guilt she had seen in Boho’s eyes matched the gnawing sickness she had felt ever since the order had been given. Unlike her father she had put only the guilty aboard that ship. He had always been willing to sacrifice innocent crew to kill one man. It didn’t help much to salve her guilt.

  But the problem of Boho remained. Placing him on an allowance had clearly backfired and led to this disaster. At least he hadn’t used that whining excuse to try and justify what he’d done. Maybe if she’d explained that the recession had reduced tax revenue and that there was a new upstart political faction arguing that the royals were a parasitical institution he would have understood, but process and detail had always bored him. So she had kept silent and now the republicanos held two seats in parliament. It was negligible support but they were the first, and it might signal a shift in public attitude toward the crown and the FFH.

  And lurking in the background was the ever-present and smoldering resentment of her father’s first cousin and once his heir. As the years had passed and none of the Emperor’s wives had borne sons, Musa del Campo, Duque Agua de Negra, became convinced the throne would be his. Then just before Mercedes’ eighteenth birthday the Emperor had forced through parliament a change that would allow a woman to take the throne, assuming she attended and graduated from the High Ground and served her five years. Mercedes and two of her half-sisters had done that, which meant that three bodies now stood between Musa and the throne. Unfortunately, none of those three had children to secure the succession. If the Arango line was going to hold power one of the three qualified daughters had to get busy. God knew Mercedes had been trying to no avail. Beatrisa was a lost cause. She was still in the service and loving it. She was also a lesbian who had no desire to “whelp” as she put it. Carisa, the youngest of the Emperor’s daughters, had wanted to stay in O-Trell. Mercedes suspected it was a way for her to get away from her smothering mother, the current empress, but the Emperor had refused and Carisa had been returned to the palace. Since Carisa was the only unmarried and acceptable daughter left, their father had been holding her as a trump card. Carisa would not be marrying for love. Their father would see that she married for advantage—his advantage. And as much as Mercedes loved Carisa she wasn’t sure the girl had the right temperament for rule, the ability to make the hard calls. Like sending men to die for a cover-up—

  Mercedes jerked away from that line of thought. Musa wasn’t pleasant to contemplate, but he was better than that. Musa had become a bitter old man, which left the question—did the three sons share their father’s ambition? The youngest del Campo son, Arturo, had been a classmate of Mercedes’. Arturo had done his five years, left O-Trell and entered government service. He had been a secretary to ambassadors, been posted on numerous League worlds, and had recently taken a seat in parliament, but in the Commons rather than the House of Lords. Arturo knew how to move the levers of political power. Mercedes could only conclude Arturo was being positioned by his father to further their ambitions.

  Next up was the middle son, Bishop Jose del Campo. In Mercedes’ opinion the true viper in the del Campo family. He had bedeviled her during her years of service, managing to be the chaplain on several ships where she had served. After her return to the capital, he had been assigned to serve at the cathedral in Hissilek. She had begun to dread Sundays since Jose’s sermons had increasingly focused on the role of women, and how children glorified and blessed a woman, allowing her to find her true role and potential. The sermons dovetailed nicely with the disgusting “Baby Watch” that a tabloid news outlet had begun keeping after Mercedes concluded her five years of mandatory military service. At first they kept count by days, then weeks. Now they kept a running tally of all the years that Mercedes and Boho remained childless. And they never missed an opportunity to report the bastards.

  Finally, there was the eldest son, Mihalis, who would presumably take the throne if his father died from an overdose of spleen, and if Mercedes, and her half-sisters, should fail to ascend to the throne. Mihalis had stayed in O-Trell, and for the past three years his father and his conservative allies had been agitating for Mihal
is to be made admiral of the Gold fleet. Given Mihalis’s status that could probably not be avoided, but it would also give the del Campos command over half the fleet, a worrisome prospect. Thus far that decision had been postponed by the expedient of keeping old Admiral Mustafa Kartirci in command, but reports indicated that it would come sooner than Mercedes or her father might have liked as Kartirci’s health and mental acuity were declining. Bottom line, Musa had his tentacles in the church, the state, and the military. The only silver lining was that one of Mercedes’ allies controlled one half of the fleet.

  Of course that promotion carried its own problems and had probably added to Boho’s sense of ill usage. He had wanted the promotion to admiral and command of the Blue fleet, but instead it had gone to Davin. Boho still thought of the other man as his wingman and court jester, not recognizing that Davin had changed, grown, matured. It wasn’t that her father hadn’t trusted Boho to command the Blue, it was his position as royal consort during those early years of their marriage that had denied him the position. Both she and Boho had traveled almost constantly, their schedules packed with official events—ribbon cuttings, hospital tours, ship christenings. The palace had thought to capitalize on Boho’s charm and popularity. None of them had grasped the level of resentment and boredom it would engender. That miscalculation had led Boho to casinos, brothels, and mistresses, resulting in scandals, bastards, and debts. In an effort to get him off the front pages of every news site her father and the high command had given Boho a seven-ship squadron, and made him a vice admiral. What Mercedes now understood was that it hadn’t been enough. Nor was he going to meekly accept the allowance. He had found a way to thumb his nose at both crown and wife, an act of rebellion that had now sent men to their deaths.

  On her command. To save the honor and reputation of one man—

  There was a knock on the door.

  * * *

  The blue room didn’t have a canopy bed. Instead Boho, arms folded behind his head, gazed up at a ceiling that held an elaborate painting of Kalliope, her son Orpheus and her sister Terpsichore. As he studied the figures set against the blue vault he figured this room must have belonged to the Emperor’s lover Gerhardt who had been a professional musician.

  What would he have done if Mercedes had ordered him aboard that ship? Dropped to his knees and begged, threatened, run? Boho didn’t think he would have had the nerve to salute and obey. Montgomery and the others would. Because they had no idea what was coming. Not that Boho did. No one did. All he knew was that they would not return.

  He threw back the covers and got out of bed. The Sidone silk of his pajama bottoms was soft against his skin, so fine it caught a bit in the hair on his legs. Was it only politics and the avoidance of scandal that had saved him? Or was there still something left between them?

  Sorrow and regret were not emotions with which he was very familiar. Boho shrugged into a dressing gown and padded down the halls to the master bedroom. He had a sudden memory of that wonderful first coupling they’d enjoyed on their wedding night. Back then he had been so sure of the path that lay before them. She would get pregnant, he would serve with distinction, the old man would die, and they would jointly rule, content and adored. But here they were.

  He tapped on the door. She opened it. He took in her haunted eyes, the lines between her brows. “Mercedes, I’m sorry.”

  Later as she lay in his arms she said quietly, “What happened to us?”

  There were a host of reasons and a multitude of answers. Any of them would shatter the moment and he shied away from the discussion. “I don’t know, love.”

  “Is it fixable?”

  He didn’t know the answer to that either.

  7

  ONCE A SOLDIER, ALWAYS A SOLDIER

  A few hours later, Tracy, arms folded behind his head, laid in bed staring at the ceiling and listening to Lisbet’s gentle snoring. It was adorable. Her butt, warm and soft, was pressed against his hip. He rolled onto his side and spooned her, let his hand snake around to caress her breasts, lightly pinching her nipples. She woke, stretched, and shimmied around to face him. Gave him a kiss.

  “Greedy.”

  “You have to admit it’s much better than an alarm,” Tracy said. “Lizzie, I’ve been thinking—”

  “Uh oh.” She pulled free, sat up, and twisted her braids into a bun. “Sounds like we’re going to have a serious conversation.”

  “Don’t joke. I am serious.”

  “All right.”

  “I’ve been thinking I haven’t been fair to you. I never asked if you wanted something more. More permanent, I mean. This was convenient for me so I just kept things as they are. Maybe we should change that. It would be nice to have someone to… come home to.”

  She gazed at him for a long moment then leaned in and kissed him softly on the lips. “You’re a lovely person, you know that? But no, I don’t want anything more permanent.” An odd mélange of emotions went through him. Relief, a bit of pique, and confusion. She read his face and smiled. “You want to know why.”

  “Yeah. I do.”

  “I’ve been with a lot of men. Not telling you anything you don’t know, but you learn to read them. The young ones are easy. Raging hormones, bravado, and anxiety. It’s the older men where you start to read their… souls, I guess. Some are lonely even if they’re married. Others need a place where they don’t have to be competent and in charge. Others are the widowers looking for a place where they can just talk to someone, get their temples rubbed, someone to squeeze hot water down their back.”

  “So where do I fit into this?”

  “Getting to it. Finally there are the men who are just satisfying a normal physical drive, but while they’re getting their nuts off they aren’t seeing you and they aren’t truly in the moment. There is something just beyond their reach that still consumes them. Sometimes it’s another woman they’re picturing in their arms, another face superimposed over yours. Sometimes it’s more elusive than that. It’s like they’re always hearing a distant call, clutching for a dream that is just out of reach.”

  Tracy felt ashamed. “I’m sorry if I made you feel that way.”

  She pushed back his hair where it had flopped onto his forehead. “It’s all right.” Her voice was gentle.

  “So which category do I fall into?”

  “Both. So what is that dream? And who was the woman?”

  He stared down at the sheet, began to pleat it between his fingers. “The dream was a chimera… no, worse than that, it was a fucking delusion. And the woman…” He gave a cough to clear the sudden obstruction in his throat. “She was someone I could never have.” He fell silent, stunned at how badly the wound had been reopened just from seeing Cullen again. Tracy hated his grief so he reached for anger. “And she betrayed me, and in a way that cost me everything. I haven’t seen my dad in twelve years. Once I changed my identity and bought the ship I couldn’t go home. I occasionally get a letter to him—old school, written on dead tree—but only if someone I trust is heading to Hissilek. If the League found out they’d take everything I’ve got. I can’t do that to my crew.”

  “You have the alias. Make a few alterations to your looks and go.”

  He shook his head. “I can’t take the risk. They may still be watching.”

  “You know that sounds deeply paranoid,” she said.

  The hint of laughter in her voice helped to break the grip of anger and regret. He gave a chuckle. “Not to mention arrogant,” Tracy said. He put an arm around her shoulder and pulled her close. Her hair tickled his chin. The smell of her shampoo and conditioner warred with the smell of sex. It was a pleasant mix.

  “You didn’t tell me about the dream.”

  He slapped her gently on one rounded buttock. “To spend an afternoon in bed with a sexy, beautiful woman and then take her to dinner. And speaking of… we should shower and get dressed if we want to keep our reservation.”

  “Nice dodge. Okay, I’ll let you get away with it.
”

  * * *

  An hour later, showered and dressed, they arrived at Graze. The tables were filled, conversations bounced off the steel and concrete surfaces. Graze was one of those restaurants that equated noisy with chic. Tracy pulled out the chair for Lisbet and noted there weren’t a lot of women present. The San Pedro cosmódromo wasn’t a place to settle. It was a place to work, to pass through. He wondered how many of the women were wives and how many fell into Lisbet’s category. Apart from her exotically colored hair Lisbet looked like a well-to-do middle-class woman of middle years. Dress, shawl arranged gracefully at her shoulders, sensible heels. He donned one of the suits he wore when he dealt with banks or officials. It looked handmade because it was. He had tailored it himself and it matched any bespoke suit from any upscale tailor. Alexander had taught his son well.

  Their table was against the back wall. Next to them was a couple with whom Tracy was peripherally acquainted. Jibran Boudin and his partner Abe Guttermann worked for a large natural resource company. They scouted systems for Goldilocks planets or mining potential, focusing only on the rarer elements like lithium and helium. When they found something, they staked a claim in the name of Interstellar Energy & Assets. They were older than Tracy, bluff and cheerful, and seemed to hear every rumor before anyone else.

  “Randall, have you heard? There are goodies on the way.” Guttermann tapped a fat forefinger against the side of his nose. A fringe of silver hair circled his skull just above his ears, a bright contrast to his dark skin, giving him the look of a jolly monk with a tipsy halo.

  “Give him a little context, Abe,” Jibran chided. Jibran was as fat as Abe. A cautious man in his business dealings, less so in his personal life, whether it ran to food or sex. Tracy knew of three wives in disparate parts of the League. Or at least they thought they were wives. Tracy had a feeling the cagey Jibran wouldn’t have put anything in writing that could indict him.