Roca stirred under the covers and his body immediately reacted. He didn’t know how she worked this magic, but he felt dizzy with needing her. It was quite pleasant, though nowhere near as good as the actual consummation. If she had no longer wanted him, he couldn’t imagine that she would have undressed and joined him in bed. He drew her into his arms and folded his hand around her breast. Amazing that a woman could be so well endowed and not fall forward when she stood up.
Roca laughed softly, her eyes closed. “What a romantic thought.”
“A fine morn to you,” he murmured.
“And to you.” She curled closer, her hands wandering on him. “Dancers shouldn’t really be that big.”
“You are a dancer?”
“Hmmm…” She had no trouble reaching the places she wanted to touch; someone had undressed him while he slept. “Never asked me to make ’em smaller, though. Sells tickets…”
“Ah.” He had no idea what she meant. His mind was blurring into a sensuous haze.
Then Roca pulled away.
He tried to tug her back. “Come here, beautiful lady.”
She braced her palms against his chest. “I don’t want to overdo it.”
He brushed a kiss over her ear. “Why not?”
Her lips parted, tempting, but she kept pushing him back.
“Come on,” he murmured. “What is wrong?”
“I…well, I don’t want you to have another seizure.”
“You mean like yesterday?”
“Yes.” She sounded subdued.
“Making love never caused them before.”
“You’re sure?”
“Positive.” He went back to kissing her. He could tell she liked it, especially when she started to move against him.
So they greeted each other, moving together under the soft, warm quilts. He savored the warmth of her body against his, their limbs entangled.
Sometime later, as they drowsed, she said, “Morning is coming.”
“Hmmm.” Eldri stretched, half asleep. Belatedly, he realized what she had said. “How do you know? It is dark in here.”
“My spinal node has an atomic clock. It keeps time.”
He wondered if he would ever understand the things she said. “What is ‘spinal node’?”
She was quiet for a while, and he sensed she was thinking of how to respond.
“It is part of my memory,” she finally said.
“Ah.” Now he understood. “Where you store what you learn.”
“Well, yes.” She sounded surprised. “Exactly.”
Eldri pressed his lips to her temple, this time in respect for her duties as a Memory. “We should begin our preparations to go down the mountain.”
Her mood brightened. “Do you think we can make it today?”
“I don’t know,” he admitted. “I haven’t much experience with travel in such weather. It never snows in the plains.”
“Well, we can try.”
They climbed out of bed, shivering in the icy air, and dug garments out of the tube-narrows against the wall. For some reason, Roca seemed surprised he stored his clothes by stacking them in a vertical tube. She exclaimed over the blue glasswood and its gilded mosaics, though it all looked quite ordinary to Eldri.
“And this!” She pointed to a design of a blue and green sphere circling two larger gold ones. “What does it represent?”
“The gold orbs are the two sun gods.” Eldri rubbed his arms to warm them. The fire had died to embers, and it was too early for the maid to have built a new one. “The green is Lyshriol.”
She seemed to expect his answer. “The star system.”
He wasn’t sure what she meant, but her recognition implied her familiarity with the sun gods, supporting his theory of how she had come to him. He had no clue why Valdor and Aldan would send him such a treasure when he had been so remiss in attending them, but he would remedy that from this day forward, performing any expected rituals. He didn’t actually remember what most of them were, but he could ask the Memory.
They returned to the warmth of bed and dressed under the quilts, laughing and kissing. Eldri thought of it as a dream. Then they tumbled back out and put on jackets. Roca went to the alcove and opened the tall shutters. As soon as snow blew inside, Eldri knew the storm had returned. Saddened, he stood with her, gazing outside while powder blew over them. Falling snow blurred the world. It must have been coming down all night; the drifts were so deep now, they buried the bottom of the castle. Everywhere, in every direction, he saw nothing but snow.
For a long time Roca gazed at the silent snowfall. Eldri stood behind her, his arms around her waist, watching the storm that had gifted him more time with her, but was breaking her heart. He couldn’t imagine the great war she described. He had only one enemy, Lord Avaril, and his men had fought only skirmishes with Avaril’s small army. This pain in Roca went much, much deeper.
“I am sorry,” he said. “I wish I could make it stop.”
She said nothing, just turned and put her arms around him, burying her face against his neck. “Fate is capricious, that it offers me so great a treasure, but exacts such a terrible price.”
He went very still. “What treasure would that be?”
She drew back to look at him. “You are a miracle, Eldrinson Valdoria.”
He touched her cheek. “It is you.”
“How many people will die because of it? Thousands? Millions? Billions?”
“Don’t,” he murmured.
“No one knows where I am. I hid my trail.” She shook her head. “Another ship may not put in here for months, maybe even longer. The port has no link to my people.”
“I will take care of you.”
“And who will protect you when my son finds us?”
“What do you mean?”
She spoke dryly. “He avenges first and asks questions later.”
That didn’t sound promising. “I will make offerings to Valdor and Aldan.”
She sighed. “I wish it were that easy.”
“Roca, we will make it work out.”
She cupped his cheeks with her strange hands, her fingers so slender and delicate, her “thumb” to the side. Her palms felt warm against his cold skin. “You are a wonder.”
“It does not trouble you, what you saw yesterday?” He made himself ask the question he had been avoiding. “The attack?”
“It troubles me greatly. The longer your condition goes untreated the worse it could become.” She considered him. “Do you know what triggers the seizures?”
“I am unsure what you mean.”
“What causes an attack?”
That was easy. “Stress. Tension.”
Mischief flickered in her face. “Then we must make sure you are happy, hmmm?”
Eldri grinned. “I like your healing advice.” He brought his lips to hers and showed her just how much.
But as much as he rejoiced at having her with him, foreboding plagued him. His time with Roca was a fragile dream that could soon shatter.
The web shimmered.
Humanity knew it by many names: Kyle web, psiberweb, Kyle space network, other ever more abstruse designations. Kurj experienced it as a lattice extending in all directions, awesome in its central regions, where its nodes reached their greatest numbers and concentration, but fragmented near its edges.
His command chair on the Orbiter served as a portal into Kyle space. His body remained in the chair, but his mind occupied another universe, one defined by thought rather than position or time. The vertices of the lattice provided doorways to and from real space. Their proximity to one another had little correspondence to the location of the telepathic operators, or telops, using them; instead, the more similar the thoughts of the telops, the closer their vertices in Kyle space.
Any telepath with sufficient training could become a telop. They could use the web, but they could neither build nor maintain it; such functions required a more powerful mind than almost any telops could claim
. As a Ruby psion, Kurj did have the strength, but he had no access to the power link that created the web. He chafed at its denial: control the web and he would control an empire. The Assembly claimed it ruled Skolia, but he knew better.
His grandmother, Lahaylia, had created the web using an ancient Lock, her mind acting as its Key. She had maintained the web on her own for decades, struggling as it grew larger and more unwieldy. No other choice existed; without the web, her fledgling empire would have fallen before it ever had a chance to rise.
Then she had found Jarac. No one had known what would happen if he became a second Key. What little they had deciphered of the ancient glyphs in the Locks suggested that joining two Ruby psions into a power link would overload it and kill them both. But Lahaylia had reached her limit. She needed help or her empire would collapse. So Jarac joined her—
And so he survived. Together they formed the link that powered the web. The Dyad.
Jarac had taken command of the military, becoming Imperator. The job could only be done well, to its full extent, by someone with access to the power link that allowed communication across the stars; as Imperator, Jarac could spread his mind throughout the far-flung reaches of his interstellar military forces. Thus two Keys ruled the Skolian Imperialate: Pharaoh and Imperator.
Lahaylia and Jarac had very different minds. They existed together in the Dyad without interfering. Kurj desired to become a third mind in that link, but he feared the consequences to his grandparents. He and Jarac were too alike. That Jarac fit well with Lahaylia could mean Kurj would, too, but it might also be that minds as similar as his and Jarac’s couldn’t occupy the link at the same time. Or the power surge from adding a third Ruby psion might overload the link and short-circuit the web. At times like this, when Kurj was deep within the lattice, becoming part of it, his drive to harness its power tormented him. He struggled to rein in his ambition, aware that it could endanger his grandparents, two of the very few people he could admit he loved.
Now he searched, haunted by knowing that his resolve to control his mother’s votes in the Assembly had made her vanish. He skimmed the lattice, looking for a sign. Any sign. Echoes of her visit to Irendela bounced everywhere, but then her trail became strange. Every time his spy network found a lead, it faded away. She had disguised her escape too well.
Today he repeated procedures he and his people had tried many times before. He hunted for back doors she might have used to slip through his spy network. He traced her finances, but found no record of her travel. A search on Cya Liessa produced millions of references to her dancing. Too many people adored her. He couldn’t wade through it all. He sent thought-spiders to collate the data, attaching them to an outer shell of his mind as he browsed Kyle space. His node sifted through the data and listed references in order of their relevance to her recent activities. It all looked useless, but Kurj tagged a few comments for review later.
A gold ball approached him. Kurj paused, waiting within a lattice cell.
His grandfather’s thought reverberated: Kurj.
His answer rumbled: Grandfather.
The Assembly begins. The gold ball spun away, into the web.
So it was time. Roca had to be hiding, waiting for this moment. He had his EI spiders on alert throughout the web, ready to stop her if she tried to attend the Assembly session through Kyle space. He also had human operatives in every starport on Parthonia, the world where the Assembly met, and he had posted agents in the session hall itself. If she came, he would catch her.
And if she didn’t come?
No, it wasn’t possible. She would be there.
As Kurj moved through the lattice, it grew rich and complex, with so many nodes he could no longer distinguish them individually. He had reached the systems that networked Parthonia, the capital world of Skolia. He thought of the Assembly session and one node swelled in size.
A large amphitheater formed around Kurj. He was attending as a simulacrum, with his body still on the Orbiter. Projecting his image into the Assembly, he appeared behind a console, what they called a “bench,” though it was actually a virtual reality workstation. With his brain linked into its system, he would experience the session as if he were actually here. He could even smell the air and brush his hand across the bench where his simulacrum formed.
People overflowed the amphitheater. The controlled pandemonium of Assembly sessions always struck Kurj as inefficient. Tier after tier of seats ringed the central area, and above the tiers, balconies held yet more people. They filled every seat, including VR benches such as where Kurj sat, high in a balcony. It all ringed a dais that could rise or descend according to where a speaker wished to address the audience. Mechanical arms on every level also made it possible for speakers to move to the center of the amphitheater to address the assembled representatives.
Kurj found no trace of Roca. If she revealed herself on the web, his people could track her signal. They would let him know immediately. To attend the Assembly in person, her ship would have to land on Parthonia. It would be prohibitively difficult for most people to evade his on-planet security, but if anyone could manage such a feat, it was Roca.
She hadn’t yet arrived.
The speeches were interminable, divided about equally between supporters and opponents of the invasion. Kurj had sent his best J-Force officers to speak, and they presented their case well. Platinum was crucial to modern technology. Although nanobots could construct Bose-Einstein platinum substitutes, the process was extraordinarily time-consuming and expensive. Mining proved easier, and the Platinum Sectors abounded with ore-rich asteroids. Skolia had long challenged Eube’s claim to that region, a dispute that had heated as the need for rarer metals grew. Skolia’s forces had to take action now to reclaim its asteroids, before the Traders strengthened their position even more.
When the speeches finally ended, the Assembly prepared for the ballot. The number of votes held by each delegate depended on the size of the population that had elected them and their status within the Assembly. The First Councilor, Skolia’s leader, had the largest bloc. The next largest went to Councilors of the Inner Circle: Stars, Intelligence, Foreign Affairs, Industry, Finance, Judiciary, Life, Planetary Development, Domestic Affairs, Nature, and Protocol. Ten years ago, Roca had won election as a delegate for Parthonia. She had risen in the ranks of the Assembly until two years ago she had attained the coveted position of Foreign Affairs Councilor.
The Ruby Dynasty and House of Majda had the only nonelected positions with significant voting blocs. They inherited their seats rather than winning them through election, a remnant of that ancient time when the dynasty ruled. Every noble House claimed votes, but only the Ruby Dynasty and Majda carried blocs large enough to affect most tallies. The Ruby Pharaoh and Imperator each held almost as many votes as members of the Inner Circle, and Roca, Kurj, and Dyhianna had smaller blocs associated with their titles. When Roca’s votes as a Ruby heir were added to those she held as the Foreign Affairs Councilor, she wielded one of the largest blocs in the entire Assembly.
She still hadn’t arrived.
Kurj leaned forward when the Councilor of Protocol called the vote. As the ballot progressed, the tally showed on a holoscreen above the podium. Kurj didn’t like the numbers. The vote against the invasion was higher than he expected, well over fifty percent. When Protocol called his aunt Dehya, his mother’s scholarly sister, she voted against the invasion, a disappointing but not unexpected development. Kurj voted for the invasion, canceling her bloc but doing nothing to shift the balance in his favor.
Then Protocol called Roca’s vote.
Kurj stood behind his console, knowing he appeared solid and huge. A red light on its front provided the only indication that he was present as a holographic simulacrum. His voice rumbled throughout the amphitheater, amplified by the console audio. “In her absence, Councilor Roca has authorized me to cast her votes.”
A clerk at a console on the dais spoke into her comm. “Proxy choice ve
rified.”
Protocol addressed Kurj. “What is her vote?”
He spoke clearly. “All in support of the invasion.”
A tumult broke out, voices everywhere raised in disbelief. Roca’s preference for peaceful resolution was well known. The First Councilor was standing by the podium on the dais, a tall, lanky man with dark hair. He opened his mouth with undisguised shock, and for an instant Kurj thought he would protest. Then he closed his mouth in an angry line. No changes could be made; the vote was final.
Kurj stood, patient.
“Your vote is recorded,” Protocol said. She sounded stunned.
With a nod, Kurj resumed his seat. The balance of the tally moved solidly in favor of invasion.
“Jarac Skolia, Imperator of Skolia,” the moderator said.
Kurj’s grandfather stood, towering behind his VR bench just as Kurj had behind his. Seeing him, a giant of gold metal, gave Kurj an idea of how imposing a presence he made himself. Jarac looked around the amphitheater, his gaze sweeping the tiers as if that alone could press everyone into their seats. When it reached Kurj, Jarac stared at his grandson for a long, hard moment. It was one of the first times in Kurj’s life that Jarac had looked at him with his inner eyelids closed.
Then the Imperator spoke, his words rolling out. “I cast all votes against.”
Once again startled voices arose in the amphitheater, a wave of sound. Few people expected the Imperator to go against the vote when so many of his top officers—indeed, his own grandson and daughter—went in favor of invasion.
Protocol cleared her voice. “Your vote is recorded.” As Jarac took his seat, the tally moved toward a balance, though it was still slightly in favor of invasion.
Protocol turned to Lahaylia. “The Ruby Pharaoh of Skolia.”
Lahaylia rose to her feet, regal and tall, her hair piled high on her head. The amphitheater became silent. Kurj could see people leaning forward in their seats to better see and hear their legendary ruler. She spoke in a clear, resonant voice. “All in favor.”
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