Primary Inversion

by Catherine Asaro

  Tager regarded me. “You think three weeks instead of three years makes your emotional scars any less valid?”

  I regarded him from the safety of my post near the bookshelf. In the three times I had come to see him, I had never sat down. It made me feel vulnerable. He usually stood as he did now, near his desk, neither crowding nor pressuring me.

  “Look,” I said. “Most providers live their entire life in captivity. What happened to me was nothing.”

  He came over to me. “You’re wrong.”

  “I’m trained to—”

  “Bullshit.”

  I blinked, startled as much by his intensity as by his reaction. Both were out of character. “Why do you say that?”

  “No training in the universe could make that ‘nothing.’ Yes, your armor is strong. But a human being lives underneath that armor. You were tortured and sexually assaulted, and the fact that you’re a Primary, that you’re trained to endure hardship, that other people have experienced it over a longer period of time—none of that lessens your injury.”

  “It was ten years ago. I should have been over it a long time ago.”

  “Why?”

  Why? That maddening question again. “Because time heals wounds.”

  “Only if you treat the wound.” His voice gentled. “Repressing the experience is a survival mechanism, a way to keep functioning. But no matter how much you deny it, it will affect you. It can hurt your self-esteem, hamper your ability to function, make it hard to maintain relationships.”

  “You think I have problems relating to people because of that?”

  “It’s possible.”

  I stepped back from him, feeling crowded. “I’m just overly sensitive.”

  “Why do you say that?”

  I snorted. “I saw a holomovie last month. It was one of those ‘Jagernaut goes amok’ things. It made me furious. I walked out and ruined it for the people with me. Then I almost busted someone in the face just because he said my attitude annoyed him. You don’t call that overreacting?”

  “No,” Tager said. “Not given the combat experiences you’ve had.”

  “The people with me thought I was crazy.”

  “The fact that they didn’t know why you reacted that way doesn’t invalidate your response.”

  Why couldn’t I make him see? “I almost stabbed a man in the heart just for being obnoxious.”

  “You almost stabbed him,” Tager said, “because he reminded you of a hideous experience where you were repeatedly and violently brutalized.”

  Did he believe Hilt had triggered my memory of Tarque? I didn’t want a dead Highton to have so much power over me. “That can’t be true.”

  “You had no control over what happened when Tarque kidnapped you,” Tager said quietly. “If you were robbed of material possessions, you could replace them. If you’ve been robbed of your self-respect, of your sense of worth and security, where do you get those back?”

  “I knew the danger when I went to Tams. I should have been more careful.” I voiced the thought that had pressed on me for so long. “What happened was my own fault.”

  “The problem was never yours.” He regarded me steadily. “It’s not your fault. No matter what he said to you, what he called you, what anyone has ever said—it’s not your fault.”

  I was testing mental ground I had avoided for years. “Why would it all stir up now, when I’ve been fine for so long?”

  “What makes you think you’ve been fine?”

  “Of course I’ve been fine.”

  “Then why,” Tager asked, “was it seven years before you could have a serious relationship with a man?”

  “You mean Hypron?”

  He nodded. “Seven years is a long time for anyone to stay alone. For an empath it’s almost unheard of.”

  I almost objected. I had always avoided large groups or situations where I had to deal with the emotions of people I didn’t like. But I knew what Tager meant. In love, empathy was a gift, especially with another empath. The lack of that intimacy created a loneliness that hurt like a wound. Jarith and I shared a bond that fulfilled me on a level I couldn’t reach with a normal person. I thought of the locked file in my mind, festering in the dark. I knew what had shaken it, releasing this barrage of memories I wanted to hold back. Jaibriol Qox.

  All I said was, “It can’t all be Tams.”

  For once Tager didn’t disagree. “Going into combat against Aristos, feeling people die—it has to be a nightmare.” He regarded me with that compassion of his that seemed to have no limit. “You’ve lived through hell a thousand times. That you’ve survived, psychologically intact, is miraculous.”

  I stared at him. Nothing about me was miraculous. I was a mess. “Everyone has troubles. They don’t go around pointing Jumblers at their head.”

  “Primary, it’s a—”

  “Soz,” I interrupted.

  “Soz?”

  “That’s my name. Soz.”

  “Well. Good. Soz.”

  That was his only outward reaction, a pleasant nod. But I caught his true response even though he thought he masked it. His pulse leapt. He had made a breakthrough with me, a big one. And that mattered to him. It mattered.

  “Why?” I asked.

  He blinked. “Why is your name Soz?”

  “No. Why do you care what happens to me?”

  “Because you’re a remarkable person.”

  “How can you think I’m remarkable? You hardly know me.”

  He smiled. “I’m trained to understand people.”

  “It’s more than training.”

  He regarded me curiously. “Why do you say that?”

  I searched for the right words. “You naturally care about people. I’m not used to that. I’m used to Traders. Or ISC politics.” I grimaced. “Both get pretty vicious.” I thought of Rex, Hypron, my first husband Jato. “When I do find love, it doesn’t…stay.” I winced. “The only person I’m capable of maintaining a relationship with is a boy half my age who has no political opinions and looks as different from an Aristo as is humanly possible.”

  “What’s wrong with that?”

  “It’s not normal.”

  “Why not?”

  Why did he always ask me that? “I should have a more mature lover.” Like Rex. But Rex didn’t want me anymore.

  “Why?”

  “I don’t know why. Because it’s embarrassing when doddering Jagernauts fawn over beautiful young boys, that’s why.”

  Tager actually laughed, as if I had made a joke. “I would hardly call you doddering.”

  “I’m almost forty-eight.”

  “I would have guessed younger.” He regarded me. “Even forty-eight is young for your rank.”

  I shrugged. “I’m good at what I do.”

  “Why does that make you angry?”

  “Angry? It doesn’t make me angry.” That was a lie and I knew it and Tager knew it. Yet until this moment I had never consciously thought that my rank made me angry. Why should it?

  I spoke slowly, as if I wee reading a book I had owned for years but never summoned the courage to open. “He sent me to Tams knowing what could happen. He sent me out there on the front lines, for years, far longer than most officers, and he sent out my brother Althor, and he sent out my brother Kelric.” I forced myself to go on. “And Kelric never came back.”

  Tager spoke quietly. “Who is ‘he’?”

  “My brother.”

  “Althor?”

  I shook my head. “No. My half-brother. Kurj. The Imperator.”

  Tager paled. I had more than shaken him this time, I had thrown him into an earthquake. But he was right. I was angry. Angry. The words came, breaking the dam I had put around them.

  “I lost my first child,” I said, “The only child I’ve ever conceived, because Kurj told me that if I left active duty, I abdicated my claim to his title. I lost my first husband because of it, I lost Rex because he didn’t want to be my crippled consort, I lost my bab
y brother to death and my older brother to distrust, I lost my ability to relate like a normal human being—” My voice shook. “Kurj would take my soul if he could. He has no right.”

  It was a long moment before he answered. That he spoke at all was a marvel. His position was the nightmare of every heartbender, knowing he could bring down the Imperator’s wrath with one wrong word. I never intended to tell Kurj I had seen Tager, but Tager couldn’t know that. Yet he didn’t back down, not even now, when he knew the danger. And in that he earned my respect forever.

  “Why does he ask so much of you?” Tager asked.

  “Because if I can’t give it to him, I’ll never be strong enough to face Ur Qox.” I spread my arms out from my body. “It’s not like I can say, ‘Oh, I changed my mind. I don’t want to do this anymore.’ If neither Althor nor I follows Kurj as Imperator, who will? Who has the training, the Rhon mind, the knowledge, all that combined?” I dropped my arms by my sides. “A thousand worlds. How many people on each? A thousand? A million? Ten billion? Do I have to carry the burden of every one of their damned lives?”

  He let out a careful breath. “You’re the Imperial Heir.”

  “One of them. There are two.” Two left. Out of three. “How do you like that? The future of the universe may be in the hands of a crazy woman.”

  “You think you’re crazy?”

  “Aren’t I?”

  “No.” He spoke as if he were walking through a forest of fragile, crystalline trees with branches that might break at the slightest touch, their fractured ends sharp and deadly, ready to pierce his body. “Injured, yes. You’re suffering from so many forms of stress disorder I’m not sure I could count them. Even for a psion, you’re extraordinarily sensitive. You’ll probably never be able to endure crowds or their uglier emotions without withdrawing emotionally. But crazy? No. Not at all. To have experienced what you have and still function takes a phenomenal strength of mind.”

  He stood watching me with that incredible empathy of his and I didn’t know what to say. So I just looked at him. And he let me. He didn’t push, didn’t crowd, didn’t retreat, didn’t turn away.

  Finally I said, “Well.” It wasn’t the most articulate response, but it would do. Tager smiled as if I had said something intelligent.

  I walked to a corner of his office where the walls met at an acute angle. A shelf there held a small mirror, an old style square of silvered glass inside a jade frame. As I looked at my reflection, I could almost see Kurj behind me, always watching, always waiting, never satisfied.

  Watch carefully, brother, I thought. Or I may surprise you.

  #

  When Jarith came into the bedroom, I was just waking up. I lay in the warm sheets, absorbing the sight of him walking across the room. It was a nice view. He wasn’t wearing anything but his pants. The hairs on his muscled chest caught the sunlight like a dusting of gold. His face was flushed, though. Red. Really red. In fact, he looked frantic. He was headed for the pile of our clothes on the floor by the bed. When he reached it, he searched through the garments, throwing them here and there.

  I peered over the edge of the bed. “What’s wrong?”

  He jumped up. “You’re awake.”

  I smiled. “Just barely. Come on back and make us sleepy again, hmmm?”

  “Soz.” His face turned even redder. “We have company.”

  “Company? What do you mean?”

  He motioned toward the living room. “When I woke up, I went to get a drink—and she was there. Reading a holobook.”

  “Someone is inside my apartment?” What the hell? I scrambled out of bed and scooped up the underwear and jumpsuit Jarith had tossed on the floor after he peeled them off me. “Who is it?”

  He found what he was looking for, his sweater. “She says her name is Cya Liessa.”

  I stopped and straightened up. “Ah.”

  He yanked his sweater over his head. “Ah?”

  “That explains your reaction.”

  “It does?”

  I laughed softly. “She affects everyone that way.” I finished dressing and went to meet my guest.

  I saw her as I came through the archway that opened into the living room. She was standing by a window, looking out at Jacob’s Shire. Gold hair poured over her arms, back, and hips like spun sunlight streaked with gold. It glistened in the ringlight. She wore a rose-hued dress, Foreshires style, with the same lace and straps that felt so awkward on me. On her, the simple shift looked spectacular. She had the face of an angel, the body of an erotic holomovie goddess, and the grace of a ballet dancer, which she used to do for a living, performing under the assumed name of Cya Liessa.

  “My greetings, Mother,” I said.

  Jarith made a strangled noise behind me. “Mother?”

  She turned to us. “Sauscony.” Her gaze shifted to Jarith, who was standing slightly behind me and to my right, as if for protection from this apparition that had shown up in my apartment. A smile tugged up her lips. “I’ve met your friend.”

  Even at forty-eight, I felt guilty having my mother find me with my lover. “How did you get inside?”

  “Pako let me in.”

  Before Jarith and I had gone to sleep, I had told Pako we weren’t to be disturbed. Why would it let her inside? True, its Evolving Intelligence tried to anticipate my wishes. But even I wasn’t sure in this case. “What did it tell you?”

  “That you weren’t available, but I should wait.” She glanced at Jarith. “I can come back…”

  “No. Don’t do that.” I motioned at the bar across the room. “Would you like a drink?”

  Sauscony.

  Her thought came into my mind as clear as sunlight, and brought my memories rushing in of Lyshriol, my father’s world, where I had grown up. Home. I saw the silvery plains rippling from the village of Dalvador to the Backbone Mountains in the west and the huge mountain range we called Rider’s Lost Memory in the north. Shimmerflies flitted over the plains, their gauzy wings iridescent in the sunlight. Home, with all its love and pain, the joy and loss, the place where I had retreated in my childhood, whenever I needed succor, to the nurturing arms of the golden woman who had given me birth.

  Behind me Jarith made a soft noise, as if he had seen a beautiful picture. He touched my shoulder. “Soz, I have a music lesson this afternoon. I should go practice.”

  I turned to him. He was smiling, no longer red-faced. But sad too. Why was he sad? And why did he have to practice? He had been playing his stringed lytar all morning.

  “Can I call you this evening?” he asked.

  “Yes. Of course.” I started to kiss him, then remembered who was watching us and decided to leave the kissing for later. “I’ll talk to you then.”

  Jarith gathered up his things from the bedroom. When he tried to leave my apartment, he ran into my mother’s bodyguards, two Jagernauts hulking outside the door. As they searched him, Jarith gave me a puzzled look.

  Sorry, I thought. She’s a dancer. A celebrity. They’re being careful. It was a lame excuse. My mother hadn’t danced for years. I hid the real reason for the search from him. More than one “friend” of our family had tried to smuggle out holofilm of our private lives, records that brought a phenomenal price on the media black-market. Explaining that would mean telling him why, and I didn’t want to contaminate what I had with Jarith by revealing I was a member of the Ruby Dynasty.

  When Kurj chose an heir, that person would spend the rest of his or her life as he, my aunt, and my parents lived now, guarded day and night. I didn’t want that prison. Maybe someday I would have to accept those constraints, but for now I still had a choice.

  When the guard finished checking Jarith, she bowed to him. “You may go through.”

  He blinked, seeming more surprised by the bow than by the search. Then he glanced at me and smiled. “See you tonight?”

  “Tonight,” I said.

  After Jarith left, I went to the bar and poured a glass of ale. “Want some?” I asked my m
other.

  She shook her head, rippling her glorious hair. “No, I’m fine.” Ringlight glimmered on her skin and reflected off its metallic sheen the same way light did off Kurj’s skin. Her eyes had gold irises and black pupils exactly like his did, at least under the shield of his inner lids. Although she hadn’t inherited the inner lids from my grandfather, she and Kurj could otherwise have been twins. But where Kurj was hard, my mother glowed. I longed to go to her, to lay my head in her lap as I had so often done as a child. Except I wasn’t a little girl anymore, I was a grown woman, and I had no intention of running to my mother every time I stubbed my toe.

  “Why are you here?” I asked.

  She smiled. “Well, I happened to be on Forshires, so I thought I would—”

  “Mother.” I clunked my glass on the counter. “You have no reason to be on Foreshires Hold. So why are you here?”

  She came to the bar and sat in a tall chair, sliding onto it easily despite its height; she was taller than me, taller than my sisters, as tall as my father. She spoke with the gentle voice that had comforted my night fears when I was little. “Kurj told me about Rex. I’m sorry.”

  I ran my finger around the top of my glass. “He knew the risks.”

  “Sauscony. I’m not Kurj.”

  I looked up at her. “What is that supposed to mean?”

  “You’re hurting. I can feel it.”

  “It’s personal.” When she started to speak, I put up my hands. “I mean it. Let it go.”

  “All right.” She watched me with an expression I knew well. She was casting around for a subject that wouldn’t make me edgy, trying to find a way to talk to her daughter. The older I got, the more often I saw that look on her face.

  “Your friend Jarith is very handsome,” she said.

  “I guess.”

  Young, though, she thought, reaching for the closeness of a mental link.

  Leave it, Mother.

  Sauscony, I’m not your enemy.

  Block, I thought. The synapse psicon flashed, taking away her concern.

  My mother looked frustrated, but she said nothing, just watched me with concern. I scowled and stuck my glass under the fount, refilling it with ale. Then I stalked out from behind the counter and went to sit on the couch. After a moment, she came over and sat in one of the armchairs. She looked like a picture, an artist’s vision of beauty, her body relaxed in perfect lines, her angel’s face pensive. I wondered if she had any idea how hard it was being her daughter.