“You want status, Sezen?” Gloria blithely ignored the fact that everyone knew she had been forced to execute her heir for raping and murdering his own kinsmen. “Marry one of these.”
She indicated the fellow who had been blushing, and he looked even more uncomfortable, if that were possible. “Nobody beats the Constantins when it comes to pedigree,” she said. “And pedigree is the one thing you Kotos need.”
The ghost of Lady Sheba frowned. “The opposite is true. How rude.”
“Let her have it,” said Lady Sheba’s ghost.
“Lady Gloria, I’ll ignore your breach of protocol—” I began.
Gloria interrupted me with a caw of laughter. “You silly bitch!”
“—And I won’t file a complaint with the Charmaynes, which I could certainly do, since you’ve invaded their territory,” I continued. “But rest assured that they’ve noticed your invasion. How you choose to apologize to them is your affair.”
The smile died on her face, and again I found myself questioning Sheba’s judgment concerning whether Gloria might hurt me.
But I’m not afraid of pain. “Your proposal deserves no answer, Gloria. Because it is inappropriate. Stop making it and go away.”
I’ll never forget her expression. Even the real Lady Sheba would have been impressed.
Gloria walked right up to me, stopping so close, I could smell mint on her breath. (Instead of blood—amazing!) She would have been nose to nose with me, except that she was a full head shorter. This did not intimidate her in the slightest. “You’ve changed,” she said.
Uh-oh, I thought.
But before I could get too worried, she said, “You’ve grown a spine. Too bad for you. You would have lived longer without it.”
Gloria snapped her fingers and brushed past me. Her kinsmen scurried after her, the blushing fellow bringing up the rear. From the way he was behaving, I guessed that he was the one Gloria wanted to match Sezen with, despite her offer of letting me chose from the bunch. I closed the door firmly behind them.
“And if we had any doubts about why Lady Gloria isn’t invited to parties,” said the ghost of Lady Sheba, “they have been thoroughly dispelled.”
True. It was hard to imagine Lady Gloria’s blunt manner going over well at the parties the other Executives orchestrated so carefully. I had already seen what happened to rude people who offended the Charmaynes—Glen Tedd being the perfect case in point. Did Gloria have any idea how close she might be to getting the same treatment?
Or—did she have some reason to believe she was immune? I pondered that while I peeled off Sezen’s trappings and enjoyed a thorough scrub with water that was genuinely hot, in a shower that lavished me with that commodity. The water would all be recycled, so it wasn’t wasted, but it still seemed frivolous.
Terry Charmayne knew Gloria’s trump card was false—her DNA was no more “pure” than mine. And if he knew it, then the heads of his clan certainly did. But was the perception of purity enough to strengthen Gloria’s standing with the other clans?
I didn’t see why Bunny would have been killed, otherwise. It seemed Ryan and Baylor Charmayne didn’t want the other Executives to know the truth about their DNA. Yet I had a hard time understanding their fear. They didn’t need a pedigree to retain their power over others. My fellow worms and I didn’t give a damn about their purity—we thought they were simply lucky, not superior. And I really doubted that even the lowliest members of the Executive families would suffer humiliation if their bloodlines were less than stellar.
Then why would it be destructive to tell the truth? If nothing else, it would knock an obnoxious woman off her high horse and reduce her influence in the House of Clans. Gloria was so despised, any embarrassment would be more than offset by the satisfaction of watching her crash and burn.
Yet she knows about Gennady, I reminded myself. Not so much as she thinks she knows, but enough to give her an idea of what she can get away with.
I, in turn, had no idea how much Sezen could get away with.
So I went to bed and amused myself with a movie from Nuruddin’s database, a Russian film called Alexander Nevsky, which I selected in honor of Gennady’s pride in his Russian heritage. I was already familiar with the film score by Sergei Prokofiev, who had considerable standing in my father’s music database, but it was fascinating to see the images that went along with the music, scenes from a time and a society that were more like my own than unlike—especially in terms of ambition, murder, and intrigue.
But the ending was a bit of a surprise. Alexander Nevsky and his troops were not only outnumbered by the Teutonic knights, but also outclassed in terms of technology—the knights wore heavy armor and rode warhorses that could run down ground troops like tanks. Yet Nevsky prevailed because he knew the terrain better. He lured his enemies onto the thin ice of the Volga, and they fell through. Their armor was no advantage when they fell into the water.
Thusly could a smaller, weaker force get the jump on their enemies. But where was the thin ice on Olympia?
And who was currently standing on it?
* * *
Regardless of where I am, I always wake with a start. I’m alert and ready for trouble. But the dawn of my first morning in the Charmayne guest quarters, announced by a change of lighting in my suite, was kind and full of breakfast menu choices.
You may think I spent the night worrying that Gloria and her minions would come back and make good on their threat. But that was the last thing they would do. Their intrusion was a one-shot deal. If they tried it again, they would be directly insulting the Charmaynes.
Plus Kumiko was hiding in the access tunnels next to my quarters. So I slept like a baby.
I chose waffles with strawberry syrup, coffee, and a small glass of orange juice. My order was delivered to my door fifteen minutes later. It was fortunate that I waited for the steward to leave before I ate those delicacies, because I would have betrayed my wormy origins with every intoxicating bite.
When I sat back and was nursing my second cup of coffee (from an urn that held three servings), I turned my inner eye to Lady Sheba’s ghost.
“She responds to correspondence,” said Sheba. “And—about that…” She showed me the volume of messages waiting for me. I almost spat my coffee when I saw it.
My in-box was swamped.
“Something is up. You have four times as many invitations from Executives as Sezen normally receives. And the social rank of the correspondents is higher.”
Much higher. One of the most recent communications came from Ryan Charmayne.
I look forward to spending time with you socially this evening, said Ryan, using a tone that, while not humble, was more restrained than his usual I-am-the-son-of-the-scariest-muckety-muck mode. I hope we have a little time in which to get better acquainted than we have been in the past.
“His recent communications with his wife indicate that they may be ending their partnership.”
That was a common occurrence among Executives.
“This is a standard courtship approach.”
For an unknown time, I stood in a ringing silence. I wasn’t thinking about the other way Ryan Charmayne had courted me, when I was a Servant and he bit my lip. I was thinking about Sezen Koto’s expression as she waited in the air lock to die. It wasn’t the emptiness of an unhappy, privileged life that had driven her to kill herself. It was the opposite of emptiness. It was an onslaught. But I had yet to determine what had brought on the torrent.
I took a deep breath.
“Be formal,” she suggested.
Thank you for your kind sentiments, I responde
d. I am looking forward to an evening with excellent company.
“Perfect,” said Sheba’s ghost.
“Not in the least.”
And then I smiled, because something occurred to me. “Lady Gloria must be absolutely livid.”
“Yes. Her perfectly pedigreed young men must be shaking in their shoes right about now.”
I grinned as I dived into the rest of the correspondence.
* * *
When I came up for air again, it was with a very different idea of how Executives spent their time. I knew they communicated with each other quite a lot. But I had never thought about the time commitment for such an activity. It turned out to be considerable. Sezen’s load of messages took me several hours to answer properly.
To my horror, my responses prompted more correspondence.
“The quick responders are the fools,” said Sheba’s ghost. “See how eager they are? And much too florid in their compliments. Ignore most of them. A few must still be humored, but not today. Tomorrow we’ll see if the nervous ones have grown more nervous.”
I had thought my years as a Servant would stand me well in my charade, but now it was plain that Sheba’s ghost was my most essential asset. This became especially apparent when we surveyed Sezen’s wardrobe to choose an outfit for the party.
“In view of Sezen’s new status,” said Sheba’s ghost, “we must be more conservative. Her flamboyance was artful, but she is being courted now. We must present her as one who could gracefully lead a household.”
So we downshifted the gold and bronze to auburn and brown. The dress covered me from neck to wrists to ankles. Its lines were elegant and feminine, but not overtly sensual, and it occurred to me that women of power on Olympia never tied their authority to sexuality. Sexiness served only to remind men that Executive women were broodmares.
“I think you’ll find,” said Sheba’s ghost, “that the young Executive women you encounter are more mature than their apparent years.”
That brought Edna Constantin—now Edna Charmayne—to mind. She was on the guest list, along with Marco Charmayne. You people are dead to me, she had messaged to Gloria, putting an ugly past behind her. I hoped Gennady would arrange for us to sit in a spot where I could observe Edna, because I was curious to see how she was doing.
“Two hours until the party,” warned Sheba’s ghost.
Almost the entire day had been consumed with empty messages! Something occurred to me.
“Baylor has been delving into several history databases recently,” said Sheba’s ghost. “Let’s review his sources. Perhaps we can guess what his topics of conversation will be for the evening.”
So we did a bit of research. But we concluded it was unlikely Baylor would want to discuss anything he was currently reading.
Lately, almost exclusively, he had been studying the records regarding the destruction of Titania.
* * *
An Executive party is conducted in three parts: (1) Auspicious Arrivals, (2) Supper, and (3) Let’s Get Down to Biz.
Auspicious Arrivals may seem like the most fun. You get to show up in your best attire, in fine company, and ogle the other fancy people. You remain standing, because your hosts don’t want you to get too comfortable and park in the reception area; you’re going to be there for only an hour, at most. Your hosts stand where everyone can see them, but they don’t greet people. The Servants do that. Sort of.
Gennady and I arrived unfashionably early. I know this because Baylor frowned when he saw us, and I had seen that particular expression on his face many times when I worked as a Servant. But Gennady was amused by it. He watched the Servants with appreciation as they performed their ritual movements that ushered us from the hallway to the roundabout that was designed to herd us out of the way and into the lobby. I divided my attention between Gennady and Baylor and Ryan Charmayne, who stood together in the place of Most Honor—though protocol demanded I keep my eyes exclusively on my hosts.
They kept their eyes on me. Or Baylor did—Ryan’s gaze lighted on me and he flushed a deep purple. He looked away again quickly.
That was the extent of my interaction with Ryan Charmayne at the party. Can you tell how delighted he was to get to know me better?
I was surprised to hear Mendelssohn’s Midsummer Night’s Dream playing in the background, a playful piece that was not in the repertoire Sheba had favored. But it suited the festive scene around us, and hinted at the underlying foolishness (though how aware the Charmaynes were of that undertone is debatable). When at last the swirl of guests brought us within speaking distance of our hosts, Baylor nodded to me. “Your color scheme is a bit subdued, Lady Sezen.”
“I’m exploring the beauty of austerity,” I said.
“You set a compelling example.” His gaze was direct; next to him Ryan looked like a plum sitting atop a suit.
It would have been a mistake for me to continue to engage Baylor after he got in the last word—especially since his remark had been a compliment, and one should always quit while she’s ahead. So Gennady and I drifted with the other guests toward the door that would soon let us all into supper. I saw Marco and Edna Charmayne enter the lobby from the corner of my eye. Their appearance seemed to go otherwise unnoticed.
“I’m an aristocrat by default,” Gennady remarked. “Pomp and circumstance are so tedious.”
“The rituals are comforting,” I said. “The protocols give us structure.”
“Yes, that was the idea.” Gennady seemed pleased, as if he could take credit for those cultural developments.
I waited to hear if he would elaborate on his remark, but Percy O’Reilly chose that moment to arrive. He was unattended, as usual—the O’Reillys were a conservative bunch who prided themselves on family solidarity, but Percy was an illustrious black sheep. He had entered and ended two marriages by the time he was twenty-five, and he never pretended they had anything to do with love or even with duty. He had dismissed both wives when they failed to produce sons for him, and he was currently hunting for wife number three. He sauntered into the party at just the right moment, neither too early nor too late, and immediately made eye contact with his best friend and fiercest rival, Ryan Charmayne. Then they both looked at me.
Percy grinned like a shark. Ryan turned a deeper purple and averted his eyes again.
“Body language is so entertaining,” said Gennady.
For my part, I was thinking that Percy O’Reilly would have made an excellent soul mate for Gloria Constantin. Because I’m pretty sure he would have demanded to inspect my teeth if he had been standing any closer.
Percy’s arrival amped the party dynamic several notches, but that was no problem for the Charmaynes. The stragglers who had misjudged their time of arrival were ushered in, some blushing and some toughing it out with cool smiles. Baylor and Ryan did not bother to greet them, because they had already turned their backs, and now the doors to the dining area spun open.
Auspicious Arrivals were over. It was time for Supper.
The Charmaynes preferred garden parties. Moisture wafted over us from the Habitat Sector as Servants conveyed us to the seating area, a long table standing on pavers that had been painted in the French Provincial style. Climbing roses arched overhead, their f
ragrant blooms shedding petals on the tablecloth. Sweet alyssum and fragrant stock had been placed in pots at the perimeter.
At last, Pachelbel’s Canon dictated our pace, though some guests seemed oblivious to the beat.
I had thought I would look for Nuruddin, but I was too riveted by Gennady’s interaction with the Servants. He had no intention of allowing them to usher us anywhere. As Servants, they could not force him to follow directions, subtle or otherwise.
An Olympian would have handled the discord awkwardly, but Gennady reveled in it. He took charge, selected seats for us that he preferred, and left it to the Servants to rearrange.
I felt proud of the seamless way they handled the change, but Gennady seemed to take it for granted. He and I stood behind our chairs and waited for the rest of the guests to line up. Marco and Edna sat a third of the way down, about where you would expect midpack Charmaynes to end up.
Percy ended up directly across from Gennady. He wore a mild expression as he watched Baylor and Ryan walk to the places of honor at the head and to the right of the table. Matilda Charmayne, Baylor’s wife, seemed to appear out of nowhere as she moved to the seat immediately to Baylor’s left.
At the sight of her, Lady Sheba’s ghost stirred from her virtual corridor. “There she is: the queen of protocol—and wasted opportunities.”
“Executive wife,” she corrected. “There is a difference.”
Baylor sat, signaling the rest of us that we could do the same, and the Servants placed our first drinks in our hands, light beverages to whet our appetites. I sipped mine, imitating the nonchalance I saw around me. But it was the first time I had tasted anything like it, so I felt anything but.
“Pleasant,” said Gennady, almost to himself. He was the gourmand again, exploring new things.
New things. This was his first formal supper, too. That was what I had expected, since I had never seen him in my role as a Servant, but it didn’t shed any light on what activities he had been conducting to make the Executives comfortable with his appearance.
Medusa Uploaded_A Novel_The Medusa Cycle Page 18
