by Pam Uphoff
The tough old man straightened. "I should have . . . I'm sorry . . . "
"Yes. Well. In the next few years you may be glad of that life long repudiation."
"No. I won't."
"Brace yourself, then."
The old man nodded and walked out.
Imgo and Fibber had been watching in disbelief.
"He apologized? The Ax?"
Jain leaned to look out the doorway. "He's going to her room!"
Imgo looked back at Ajha. "That was rather elliptical. What was he talking about?"
"Oh. I've been spouting off rather a lot lately. The birds will be coming home to roost shortly." Ajha pushed away from the remains of breakfast and fled the house. The streets weren't much better. People kept turning and looking at him. He took to the trails and wound up at the stables. Jioh was just sending a batch of early riders off.
"The lower pasture is dry enough. I'm going to turn the oldsters out, let them get some sunshine in before the next storm." She walked away, returning a few minutes later with the prancing mare. "Look at her coat! Overnight! Why aren't we selling this joy juice stuff?"
"Because it's from Comet Fall, so we automatically consider it bad." Ajha leaned on the fence and watched the mare run to the end of the paddock, wheel and run back, stopping midway to buck and kick.
"Stupid. Can it make me feel like that?"
"Yep." Ajha turned his head and spotted the newsie filming them. He turned and addressed the camera directly. "This is an elderly horse, given a dose of Comet Fall Joy Juice last night. As you see, she's feeling much invigorated. We should be testing these new therapies, not automatically rejecting them."
Jioh came back a few minutes later, towed by her other elderly horse. Ajha opened the gate for her. I really ought to warn her . . . But this is going to really impress a whole bunch of old men. Xurug bucked and kicked and raced off with the mare.
"Jioh, how old are these horses?"
"Nasi is thirty-six, she's the oldest horse I've ever owned. Xurug is thirty-one." She addressed her comment half to the newsie's vid cam.
The spectators gathered behind the Newsie were pointing and laughing.
"How old was he when he was gelded?"
"Four years old, I like to wait until their bones are fully mature." Jioh frowned and turned to see what everyone was pointing at. "Holy S . . ." She clapped her hand across her mouth.
"That's the reason they call it Joy Juice."
Ajha managed to slip away while Jioh was out catching her amorous equines.
***
Xiat found the investigator in the police chief's office, watching the news.
The investigator glanced over. "We have been informed that a number of officials are on their way from Makkah. When I asked if I should lock Ajha up so he doesn't injure himself, they declined. I hope you don't like this guy, the penalty for treason against the One is a long, slow death." He waved at the screen, and Xiat stepped around to where she could see it. "The Multitude is waking up and cheering this guy. Xiat . . . there's another possibility."
"Don't say it. Maybe he's just a fruitcake."
"In my dreams." The investigator led her off to his office and they read each other's reports and scanned the negatives coming in about purchases of sword, cloth, paint and garbage digesters.
Then they accompanied the procession to the train station, and bowed and scraped even deeper than they had planned as the priests stepped out. The Philosopher of the One and both the First and Second Alternative Philosophers followed. With lots of people buzzing around them.
They drove straight to Kiaj's house. The woman was nearly stuttering, and the Ax was right behind her.
Ajha was in the Great Room.
"The One requires you to drop your shields." The spokesman didn't bother with introductions or other preambles.
Ajha swallowed and started glowing as he opened up. And up. Xiat looked away, but it wasn't a physical light. It drilled into her soul, and showed her his. A vast soul. Warm and accepting. Curious and full of wonder and a bubbling joy. Seeing the Worlds, clear eyed. Seeing people, societies. Judging but not rejecting. Firm in his criteria, unwavering in his course.
Other souls opened, three others. One was deep and heavy, filled by the support of the People. The others were weighted as well, but to a lesser degree. And now she saw Ajha's aura sag and deepen as the combined subconscious of the People of Power, who, united, were the One, considered him. If they shifted, the balance of power would be changed. Before her was all the pride and arrogance of the One. And the canny wariness of an elite that that had fought its way to the top and was going to stay there. And also the urge to withdraw, and find safety in isolation. And something else. Curiosity, openness, reaching out beyond fear and pride. Something alive and young and new.
When those mental lights finally dimmed, Xiat was leaning weakly on the wall. She had no idea how much time had passed. Dimly she could hear voices. She mopped tears from her face.
"Welcome, Philosopher."
"But I am not a Priest."
"That doesn't matter."
"I've taken Fallen potions, changed my genetics. I am not worthy of this status."
"The One accepts you. That is all that is important. We will leave you here to settle your affairs. Join us when you will."
Xiat blinked and almost managed to focus on the procession walking by.
The door closed behind them. After a long silence, she finally heard Ajha's voice.
"You know, I was really hoping for a brain tumor."
Oh yeah. You just lost the job you loved, everyone you know is going to treat you differently, and . . . you're going to be out there in very public view espousing a very unpopular view. Every word you say is going to be broadcast, dissected, analyzed and misinterpreted.
Damn near every High Oner is going to hate your guts.
Yeah, I can see where a life threatening disease would have been a relief.
Chapter Nine
18 Shawwal 1407
Black Point Enclave, West Coast of North America
Xiat glanced out the front, to see if the newsies had the house besieged, and was shocked all over again. Ecclesiastical guards. Of course. One stood at either side of the walk up to the house. The small crowd was hanging well back. She circled the house, spotted two roving guards. No one was on the path.
Back in the Great Room, the guard's officer was talking to Ajha. Ajha glanced past his shoulder. "Xiat, would you please go out there and tell the newsies that I will not be making any further statements until after the convention, so as to not distract from this important local matter?"
Xiat nodded and left. He was back to being closed up, just a bit of 'socially polite' glow showing. I saw him closed all the way up, I saw him open up enough access for the Truth link. And I never wondered how wide open he could go.
I felt his joy.
***
"We've closed your usual mail account to incoming messages."
Ajha stared at the eighty thousand some that had gotten in before then.
The Guard Commander was still stiff. Ajha was unknown territory, to him.
"Well. I guess I'll need about three new ones. Personal, business, and . . . requests for help."
"If I may recommend, Philosopher, you are going to need staff. And a home somewhere on this World, and a business office."
"Right. Well. First, please call me Ajha."
The man looked worried.
"Unless we're someplace formal."
Captain Wrlo relaxed slightly.
Ajha searched the closed account for friends. The Fiend sent a big toothy grin and brief message. "I have just won several thousand credits. As soon as I've collected, I'll be ready to come work for you."
The others were just as gleeful. Even Idre and Egto wanted to come work for him. "They don't know what I'll need doing. I don't know what I'll need doing." He looked up as the Great Room was invaded.
Kiaj, Jain, and Fibber, maids wi
th luggage.
"Dear, we're going to get out from underfoot, One help me, up at Ahvi's. So you'll have room to put your guards, and start getting some staff. I'll leave Maij and the girls, so you'll only have to worry about secretaries and so forth." She burst suddenly into tears. "I'm so proud, and so frightened!" She hugged him and nearly ran for the door.
Ajha looked further, toward his uncle.
"I'll stick around. You may not have quite outgrown a need for advice."
Various other heads were bobbing around the room. Mushy and Whipper looked mulish.
"Hey, we're your investigators." Mushy declared.
The Guard Captain looked appalled.
"One. There's still that murder, isn't there."
Xiat shifted. "You have immunity now."
"I don't need immunity. I don't go around killing people. Unless they really need it." He turned back to his comp and sent a message to the Fiend. [I need someone to find me a house and office, set up all the systems and hire, fire, or eat staff as necessary. Probably in Freeport. I don't want to be based in Makkah or Paris. Unfortunately Black Point would be too Clannish. Pity, I like the climate. How brave are you? Umm, incoming mail is blocked. I'll send you the new addy as soon as I have one. Just as well, you'll be forced to think, just to use up the time before you can reply.]
"Right. Captain, I'll be taking the ground floor bedroom at the back. Director Ajki has the room at the end. Ladies? If you're staying, why don't you move to the two upstairs bedrooms? Then, Captain, you can do whatever you need to, to the front bedroom for your troops, just for a few days. There's an attic as well. I suppose beds will be flying everywhere. The front parlor is also available, if you want it. This room . . . leave as is, likewise the dining room." Ajha looked around. "Any other week and I could call any of three realtors and rent any size house I wanted. Poor Mother."
"For now, turn on the convention, we're missing the start." Ajha leaned back in his chair and closed his eyes. "Go arrange everything the way you want, Captain. I'll be right here, probably comatose."
He listened half-heartedly to the speakers, and drifted off to sleep. At some point, he woke long enough to get himself a new mail address and send it to the Fiend.
Krazy looked over his shoulder and scowled. "Who's she? Your social secretary?"
"A very competent young woman who can be whatever she wishes."
Poppy came up on his other side and sat on the arm of his chair. "What can she do that we can't?"
"She has information team training. Most likely she'll end up doing my political analysis. For now, she's in charge." The comp dinged and he opened the return mail.
[Tell me what you think of these three properties. I suspect you're going to have to have an office in San Francisco, just to deal with the VIPs. I can get you a corridor, if you'd like, for the commute. I've opened a grid page, will have it designed before you give me your positions to post. Right now I have it running all your interviews from the last few days. The equine hanky-panky is very popular.]
Xiat glanced at her watch. "Not bad for an hour."
Sue looked at him uncertainly. "What about us? You don't need us, do you?"
"No, but you just turned into hot property, didn't you? Go work your networks, chat with your friends. Brag. You were there when." Four of them headed upstairs.
Poppy eyed him. "You're not a Priest. Will they, umm. And can you marry?"
"I am very certain that castration is not a requirement for this particular job. And I'm too old for it to do any good, anyway. No, I am not going to marry you. You actually have experience in micromagifacturing, don't you? Let me think about that, and talk to the Fiend. Speaking of whom, I believe I ought to have a great deal of money. I need to get her access to it." He settled back and opened the real estate files. Hesitated and glanced at Xiat. "I've been assuming that you're Internal Relations?"
She nodded. "Lots of pre-cogs and dreams. About the convention, we thought. No, I don't want a new job."
"Right, well, if your boss wants you to stick around, please do, and I really did not kill Udzi, so perhaps that should be worked on?"
"I'll call my Director."
Ajki looked around the wing of his chair. "Tell him he missed all the fun."
"I will." She frowned back at Ajha. "What did she mean, equine hanky-panky?"
"Umm, you might want to stop by the stable, and see for yourself." He looked back at the comp. Office in SanFran. Ugh. She's right. He checked the three houses, stopped the Captain and got his opinions on them, and a number for a bank account, now all his to do with whatever he wished.
He sent both sets of comments on all three houses, the bank number and his agreement about an office in San Francisco.
Then he turned off his comp. "What I need to do is forget that today even happened. I need to investigate Udzi's murder, sit back and watch my Dad Play the whole Clan, and start over from a rational basis in three days. Yes, Captain, you can still guard me. But I may come close to ignoring you."
Mushy, Whipper and Bo looked up hopefully.
"Mushy, Whipper? Did you find out anything yesterday?"
Whipper looked uneasily at Ajki. "Errr. . . "
"Don't mind him. Tell."
"Director Ajki spent the evening of the ninth in The Forty Thieves, with other people coming and going from his table. He stepped into the men's several times, but was never out of sight long enough to have gotten to Jib and killed someone. He closed the place down at 1am."
"That's not bad for a completely untrained investigator," Ajki said.
"Well, bars are our natural habitat." Mushy actually tried to look modest.
Captain Wrlo was a bit stiff-faced. Poor man. Well, Eunuch. He was likely to have a rough adjustment period.
On screen, the Town Council finally finished shining in their brief moment of world-wide attention, and adjourned for the night.
The three Candidates would speak in the morning, voting would start at noon, and end at midnight. The representatives of each subclan would verbally report his vote tally starting at one in the morning and hopefully finishing by early afternoon. Unless there was a challenge, it should work. It was a bit of useless pageantry, as the electronic totals would be known within minutes of midnight, and the plots of winner and losers would have hours to thicken before the losers, as representatives of the people who voted for them, would be required to pledge their support to the winner.
Xiat walked in from the dining room. "Dinner's ready. C'mon Ajha, up and at 'em. You can't live on philosophy, not even your extra chewy variety."
"Oh yes, Good. Thank you Xiat." He poked out a tentative elbow and received her hand.
He hesitated, then seated her in the first chair to the right, and took the head of the table himself. It was going to take some getting used to.
Chapter Ten
19 Shawwal 1407yp
Black Point Enclave, West Coast of North America
Xiat woke up a bit stiff, sleeping all night in a large chair that wasn't as comfy as it had seemed a few hours ago. It beat sharing a bed with two other women, even if she was guaranteed to not end up sleeping on the crack between two mattresses, like last night. The upstairs bedrooms were smaller than the downstairs ones, as the elegant roof swept down to the single floored end of the house. But she was only sharing with two other women, not five. Luxury.
Pity the poor guards. They'd wound up in the end bedroom when they spotted the connecting bathroom. Not even the Director of External Relations was going to get that sort of access to the Third Alternate Philosopher. So the nine guards at least had the biggest bedroom in the house.
She hit the shower, and then the Great Room for the news.
It was all about the New Philosopher, and the New Philosophy, as best they could guess at this point.
And they had the poor man's complete, uncensored, personnel records.
Excellent grades, those she remembered. The school suspension for a fight with Ewmo was a surprise.
That must have gotten swept under the rug at the time. College, he'd gone straight into Cross Dimensional Studies, transferred in his junior year to the Directorate's college. Still good grades. Not top, but good.
He'd filled the sports requirement with both hand-to-hand and fencing. He'd tried out for the school teams, narrowly missed, both years.
Graduate level classes . . . in Advanced Magic. Two internships at embassies across.
Then assignment to an information team for Comet Fall before it was ever called that. Good reports from his own team leader, excellent report from . . . Post head Usse? The First Alternate Philosopher? The wary expansionist?
Surely not.
A reprimand from an Action Leader. No follow up, due to the death of the Action Leader.
Then a series of assignments. Good reviews from immediate superiors; Director Agni's added rebukes sounded like personal animosity. Difficult assignments, seniority, leadership, then suddenly it was Ajha doing the training, instead of the other way around.
After Endi Dewulfe's infiltration of the president's inner circle, and spectacular heroics, Ajha had been recalled to report on Comet Fall.
Xiat repressed a grin—she'd sat in on several of his presentations, and his reception had been chilly. And in retrospect, entirely correct.
Then he'd been sent across to resurvey the situation there. Recalled again and assigned elsewhere.
And after the establishment of the Embassy World, and the explosion in dimensional travel, he'd been sent off on a routine scientific expedition and ran head on into the outlaw Rior. The rebel princess and her gang of mostly Comet Fall witches and wizards. That report was still classified.
Then he was assigned to an Intel position. One! He'd bugged the Helios' government offices. Before the last merge. Ah. And here was the Fiend. Fean Withione. A team member he'd trained and worked with for years.
Then he'd scouting the Helios merge zone, and found kidnapped children, teenagers, mostly Oners. Holding a merge center for hours, while help arrive—Ra’d and Ebsa! They’d organized transportation and made a run for safety during the battle.
