“Are you?” I asked.
Her smile was small and fleeting. “No.”
“Help us,” I whispered. “We are alone.”
Terese nodded. Her gaze was calculating but not closed. “No matter what happens, I won’t leave you here.”
I was breathing hard. My heart pounded more quickly than it ever had.
Emiliya turned her head away, but not so far that I missed the tears shining in her eyes.
“Jireu?” Caulder’s voice and a burst of static came through the intercom. “We’ve got the rescue ship launched. We’ll be there in about six hours. How’s your air?”
With that, thoughts of the future and how I had just changed my world had to be shunted aside so the business of survival could be tended to. But I knew this: In that moment, I ended my life as a slave.
I wish to all the gods in all their many Heavens that that was all I had ended.
FIFTEEN
TORIAN
Grand Sentinel Torian Erasmus strode into the luxurious, busy birthing room. Mai Erasmus, exhausted and disheveled, sat propped up on pillows in the center, holding her infant daughter. Triumph filled her smile as she looked down at the baby. The infant had her own eyes screwed shut as tightly as any newborn kitten’s and seemed to be trying to see how far she could push out her lower lip. Estev stood to the side with a cluster of half a dozen doctors, listening intently as they pointed to a series of numbers on an active pane.
Mai barely glanced up as Torian approached her bedside. She was lost in the wonder of her new child.
“How are you, Mai?” Torian laid a hand on her shoulder. The infant wriggled in her arms and kicked rosy feet.
“Exhausted. Hoarse,” Mai admitted with a grimace. “Next time, I want the full range of drugs.”
Torian chuckled briefly. “I promise. And your daughter?”
“As fit and beautiful as could be wished,” announced Estev, moving to join them. He kissed his wife, deeply and openly for a long moment, and they both beamed down at the infant, nothing in their faces but parents’ proper pride at the new life they had brought into being.
“And they say they can do the monitoring through something other than blood samples.” Estev jerked his chin ruefully at the doctors, who had removed themselves to the background. “I think she’d object. She’s got her mother’s sense of propriety.”
Torian chuckled briefly. “I have no doubt.” He leaned closer, unable to help himself. As old as he was, as aware as he was of the totality of what this child represented, an infant exerted an attractive force on its family. “But, from what I have seen, the prognosis all seems good.”
Mai let out a long, slow breath. “Then we have succeeded?”
Torian smiled, allowing himself to drink in the deeply satisfying scene. The future is here. It is finally here. “There’s going to be reason for caution for a long time yet, but I think you may safely go ahead with your plans for celebration.”
“Bloom will be pleased,” Estev remarked.
“Possibly.” Torian stood up and back. “I will need to divert him for a little bit, though.”
“Oh?” Estev raised his eyebrows.
“Yes. I want to start putting a little pressure on Drajeske’s second-in-command.”
“Why her?” asked Mai.
“Because if you want to weaken the top, you work from the foundation,” Torian answered. Mai’s eyes narrowed. She had very fine instincts when it came to hearing the unsaid, very much like Felice had had in her time. Torian counted himself lucky that she was still dealing with the aftereffects of childbirth. Otherwise, she would have pursued the question much further.
“What form will this pressure take?” Estev inquired. Estev did not like subtlety. It took everything Torian had to persuade him that they could not do to Dazzle as had been done to Oblivion. They were still dependent on other independent beings for labor and biological resources. The spread of the Pax Solaris had made new stock difficult to come by.
Torian waved his hand, indicating that this was a minor thing, nothing for the Saeos to bother themselves with. “A little seduction, a little misdirection. Nothing Bloom can’t handle.”
Estev smirked. “And will relish, I’m sure. Next best thing to a party. But I am wondering…” He drew the last word out long and slow. “If everything is going so well, why are you perspiring?”
It was true. Sweat rolled down Torian’s temples and stood out in great beads on his forehead.
He wiped his brow with the back of his hand, looking unusually sheepish. “Damn. Some of the new modifications haven’t settled in yet. Problems with the heat exchange.”
“Nothing you can’t handle, I’m sure.”
“As you say,” Torian replied easily. “By the way, did I give you my congratulations?”
Mai smiled up at him. “No, I don’t believe you did.”
“Congratulations, then.” Torian rested his hand on her shoulder and gazed down at the tiny bundle of humanity in her arms. “It is an amazing thing to see your children live forever.”
Estev was the one who answered. “It is indeed. We couldn’t have gotten this far without you, Torian.”
Torian felt his throat tighten. Memory threatened: Hadn’t Felice said the same thing to him once? Jasper, perhaps, when they’d concluded the first deal, when the first cargo of prisoners arrived through the new gate. “It is my duty,” he murmured. “And my debt to your parents.”
The baby squeaked, a sound somewhere between a grunt and a chirp. “One of these days you’re going to tell me all about that debt,” Mai said. Awkwardly and one-handed, she loosened the top of her nightdress so the baby could nurse.
“One of these days probably, but not today.” Torian tried to keep his tone casual, as if he might actually do it. “Now, you need your rest and I need to contact Bloom.”
Torian said his farewells and strode out of the room. His heart swelled and constricted with emotion, and he tried to suppress it. This was not the time for sentiment. He must be more clearheaded, not less. They had already rushed things more than he would have liked. Before this, he had been able to test and retest every phase of his long-term plan, but events were in motion that could not be halted. Some things simply had to be fixed on the move.
This did not, however, mean that Mai and Estev needed to be bothered with every detail. Especially not with the birth of their daughter and the other infants born to the First Bloods this week to keep them busy.
He pressed his palm to the back of his neck and the spot behind his right ear. The skin there was as hot as if sunburned, and the discomfort was becoming serious.
Natio Bloom was already in the audience chamber, chatting with the servants and, ever the performer, telling jokes to see if he could make them laugh even though he knew it could get them into trouble.
Bloom always did have a mean streak.
However, he also had a faultless sense of occasion, and he bowed to Torian with perfect grace. Bloom wore his customary black and white, but also carried a black cane tied with white ribbons. This was a new affectation, and it suited his dramatic persona perfectly.
“Greetings to you on this most auspicious day, Grand Sentinel!” cried Bloom as he straightened from his bow. “I trust our new Family members are all of them well and strong?”
“Very well, thank you.” Torian had pored over the records the doctors had cross-loaded to him before he had even moved from his office. “But we have business of a different kind, you and I.” Torian gestured toward a chair.
“Of course.” Bloom perched on the edge of the seat, his hands folded on the head of his cane. “I am pleased to be able to report I have found the reason Field Coordinator Siri Baijahn is being returned to us.”
Torian steepled his fingers. “And that is?”
“It seems our saints left behind quite the illicit communications network on their last visit.”
“Did they?”
“Oh, yes. And much of it is still in working
order. I have the Clerks mapping it now, just in case you wanted a tour before you shredded it.”
Torian pursed his lips. “No, no shredding. I think it will prove very useful.”
“As always, you meet my highest expectations.” Bloom smiled as he cocked his head. “Will we be listening in on our pretty listener?”
“Perhaps. But we will most definitely be making use of her. Are you ready to do that?”
Bloom waved his hand noncommittally. “We were casual acquaintances. I think I amused her.” His tone was brittle. “The aging party host and actor, clinging to hopes of a resurrection of his playground.” He paused and Torian was forced to rein in his impatience with Bloom’s inefficient, dramatic style. “I think she had some notion I might be useful in the saints’ various efforts. I expect she will contact me when she settles back into her place on Dazzle. But then”—he narrowed his eyes shrewdly—“you knew that.”
Torian shrugged minutely. “And we can see she pays the price for underestimating you.”
“Really?” Bloom leaned forward. “How is that?”
“We have taken steps to make sure Siri Baijahn is rendered…susceptible to suggestion. That she is off-balance. We need her pushed over the edge as quickly as possible.” He had hoped to allow the imbalance they’d manufactured to take its own course, but with Ambassador Bern removed from the equation, there was a certain probability that Field Commander Drajeske might begin to stray from the path they had laid out. She was rusty, but her actions aboard Kapa’s ship proved she was not as sloppy as they had been hoping for.
“And what is the nature of this…push you’ve given Coordinator Baijahn?”
“You don’t need to know that.” Torian touched the wall, opening some windows for new reports. He blinked his eyes as a bead of sweat dripped off his brow. We must work out the heat-exchange problem.
“I beg to differ, Sentinel,” said Bloom. “If I am to create an illusion, I need to know everything that has been done to her, and I need to know how it works.”
Torian frowned. “I am only asking for some puffery.” Patience, he reminded himself, but that was difficult when it felt like the side of his neck was on fire.
“No.” Bloom raised one finger. “You are asking for a lie. A sophisticated one. It’s easy to lie to a stable person, but one who is ‘off-balance,’ as you call it? Such people develop very solid views of the world and take them very seriously. If I say the wrong thing to her, I will run into a wall, and the whole thing”—he threw up his hands—“goes up in smoke.”
Torian glowered at him, wishing he could read Bloom’s crooked mind. But that was not yet possible. His own words about being forced to rely on independent, unpredictable beings for the prosperity of his family played back to him.
“Sentinel”—Bloom sighed—“we’ve both gone too far to start doubting each other now.”
Torian narrowed his eyes at Bloom.
“What is it?” Bloom inquired.
“I am wondering what you want.”
Bloom laid his hand on his breast and bowed humbly. “You’ve offered me so much, what more could I possibly want?”
“I don’t know,” confessed Torian. “You really are the most amazing liar I’ve ever met.” And yet you are the one person on Dazzle I have to trust. You can, I’m sure, appreciate the irony in this.
“I’m an actor, my Grand Sentinel, and a very good one. But since I have demanded honesty from you, I must return it.” Bloom spread his hands and looked about him as if addressing an invisible audience. “What do I want? I want to go out with a bang.”
For the first time in a very long time, Torian found himself surprised. “I’m sorry?”
“The world I built and mastered is gone. Even if I left this ruined system—and believe me, I have thought about it—I’ll never again do anything on the scale that caused a world to be named Dazzle.” His expression grew distant, an aging man reliving his memories. “It’s over. Frittered and finished. Done.” He snapped his fingers. “I was going to kill myself, you know, before you came to me with your…proposal. But then I saw it—one last illusion, the greatest ever.” Bloom’s whole face lit up. He lifted his hands and rose lightly to his feet. “I am working in the theater of the universe, and empires are my audience. No one has ever done that. No one ever will again. This moment is unique, and it is mine to create.” He held the pose and all Torian could think was that this was a man who has looked upon his god.
Slowly, though, Bloom returned to more workaday realms. “Can you understand?” he asked.
“No,” Torian admitted. “But I do believe you.”
Bloom bowed again. “Thank you. Now”—he settled back into his chair and steepled his fingers—“I believe you have something to tell me.”
SIXTEEN
KAPA
“Well, Captain?” sneered Gull. “Now what?”
Kapa faced his crew, those who were still breathing. They had all crammed themselves into the crew cabin of Amerand’s shuttle and sealed off their own ship. What was left of it.
Aware he was facing five dangerous people whom he had promised wealth and freedom, Kapa struggled to think against the pain. It burned in his broken wrist. It spread out from his broken nose. He gasped and wheezed to get enough breath.
Unfortunately, the only thought that came to him was: I’m dead.
Either their client was going to kill him for his failure, or his crew was going to shove him out the air lock to make themselves feel better. They’d still be all in a battered can out in the middle of nowhere, but at least the fuckless wonder who’d brought them there would be dead.
Kapa understood the feeling very well. He grinned, showing all his teeth. He’d take at least one of them with him.
“Ship!” cried Isha so suddenly Kapa thought she was just cursing. But she pointed, and he pivoted. On the screen glowed a sleek silver ellipse, lights shining from its windows and its multiple scopes.
While his crew gawped, Kapa forced his boots to move. He dragged himself one-handed up into the cockpit, and fell into the pilot’s chair. Someone had followed him up the ladder. He didn’t turn his head to see who. Pain blurred the edges of his vision and he shook his head hard. He couldn’t black out. Not yet. His good hand shook as he tapped out one of the few standard commands he remembered from the academy.
One of the shuttle’s scopes zoomed in on the approaching ship.
“Fuckless,” Kapa croaked. “It’s the saints.”
SEVENTEEN
TERESE
In the end, it took closer to seven hours for the rescue to come. I kept thinking how pathetic it would be if I had destroyed my marriage and my relationship with my children for the privilege of dying out in the vacuum. By the time they clamped onto our side and started exchanging air between the peeled core and the towing ship, we were all back in the cradles with the pressure caps closed and our masks on, watching the last bar on the emergency O2 dissolve.
It was a very long, very uncomfortable wait, even without the drama of worrying if we were going to be able to keep breathing by the end. We were exhausted, we were battered, and more than a little frightened. The pirates who had donated their engine core to us had not followed good safety protocol and it was deficient of things like water, emergency rations, and sanitation facilities. Siri hadn’t said anything during that last hour, she was so sunken in on herself, and I just had to hope her Companion was taking care of her.
I struggled not to think. I just wanted to stay alive. I could think later. I had plenty of subjects to choose from: how we were relying for emergency care on a doctor sent by the Blood Family, but known and trusted by our minder, who had just given a very clear indication he was ready to switch sides; how we’d been kidnapped by a smuggler (or a pirate, depending on your definitions), who was also a friend of that same minder.
Erasmus was not a huge system, but the coincidences were starting to pile up.
The rescue ship was only a little less spartan than
the core itself, but it had air, food, water, and a functioning sanitation system. Most important, though, they didn’t have pitch, yaw, or spin. It was another twelve hours in another tin can, but we were feeling almost human again by the time they opened the air locks onto the sloping tunnel that led to Dazzle’s port yard.
Liang, Orry, and Commander Barclay were there to meet us. I hadn’t liked Barclay all that well when we met, but as a med team made up of Solarans from Liang’s crew surrounded us, I was prepared to revise my estimate. With our doctors came a fleet of carts with stretchers and O2 and about everything else we could need, no matter what state we arrived in.
As soon as I was sure that Siri—grousing about being treated like an invalid for a couple of bruises and accompanying headache—was in the hands of our own people, I looked for Emiliya Varus. I wanted to thank her.
Actually, I wanted to find out where she stood.
When she wasn’t actually checking on Siri, Dr. Varus had stayed in her emergency cradle, saying little. I hadn’t pushed her. Siri had a concussion, and albeit more slowly than at first, was being spun and sloshed around in a way that could not have been good for her. I didn’t want my unwelcome overtures making our doctor careless or reluctant.
But as I looked around the port yard, I couldn’t see her. We were a crowd of Solarans, secops, and Clerks. The slim woman in her medical whites had vanished.
To say disquiet set in would be putting it very mildly. I turned, intending to ask Amerand if he knew where she went, and almost crashed into Orry Batumbe.
“God and the Prophets, Terese!” He grabbed me by the shoulders and planted a kiss on my cheek. “I thought we’d lost you!”
“Not this time.” I shook him off, but I smiled as I did. “Orry, did…”
He cut me off, sure what I was going to ask. “You’ve got two messages from your David waiting for you, and no, I didn’t send anything out. I wanted to be sure what to send.”
Bitter Angels Page 18
