A Princess of the Aerie

by John Barnes

  “And all the other possibilities seem much more farfetched. She could be secretly married to a commoner and need me for some part of the cover-up. She could be secretly pregnant with a child from a rare genetic line—say a purebred gracile or a schiz-free leo—and afraid to be charged with criminal gene loss.” He ticked off other possibilities with his thumb against his fingers. “Or, addicted to a psychosis or retardation-inducing drug, maybe xleeth or dreamballs. Or, so deep in shopping debt or gambling debt that she’s used shares in her kingdom as collateral and a rival house bought the IOUs. Or, secretly engaged to Psim Cofinalez—every message from her she talks about what a toktru fine heet he is, and half the solar system would go to war to prevent a marriage between them. But she said she didn’t need me to run a message to her secret lover. What am I leaving out?”

  “Try not to hate me but it’s ethnographic.”

  “The whole universe seems to be ganging up to make me learn everyone else’s social customs,” Jak grumbled.

  Sib looked thoughtful and pulled at his goatee for a moment. “You know,” he said, “you’re righter than you think you are, pizo. The whole universe is ganging up to make you do that. Eventually you’ll figure out that you can’t fight them. Anyway, I think she’s a target of republicans—perhaps they’ve gotten hold of something they regard as a sex scandal—and she needs to do some unofficial suppressing.”

  “Uncle Sib, why do you always say ‘republican’ with that tone of voice? I mean, the Hive is republican—we don’t have an aristocracy.”

  “Jak, there’s republican and then there’s republican. The Hive is a republic because it was built as part of the first development of the Wager, and Paj Nakasen designed our society, and he thought a republic was a better idea than a monarchy. (Who knows why he thought something stupid like that?)

  “Now, as for me, I moved to the Hive ninety years ago and I’ve never ceased regretting that we don’t have a king, but at least the Hive is goofy but livable. Most of the solar system’s republicans want to eliminate hereditary aristocracy because they want to reintroduce the sort of social degeneration that made such a mess of Earth in late medieval times, just before the big leap into space. Especially in places like Greenworld, where people are used to preserving whatever stupid traditions came down from their stupid ancestors.

  “They have this silly thing called a bill of rights, a bunch of arbitrary limits on what the government can do, which had to be left in place as a concession when Rufus Karrinynya conquered the place and established his dynasty. Believe it or not, Greenworld republicans think that bill of rights, written on Earth by people who thought they were going to seriously worship Mother Gaia, should take precedence over a right of conquest eleven hundred years old. That’s what makes me furious! The abstract right of words against the commonsense rights of a bloodline. There were Karrinynyas on that throne before the Bombardment fell, and if Circle Four has anything to say about it, there always will be Karrinynyas—bright, brave, and beautiful to everyone, cruel and deadly to their enemies, loyal, generous, and kind to their friends, and understanding power politics the way a hawk understands thermals. Those are the kind of people you want running a nation.”

  “Well, obviously,” Jak said, “you do. The rich important families of the Hive are the same way, and they—”

  Sib charged on; having achieved a high haranguing orbit, he would now go on forever, or until he collided with something to stop him. Jak braced for more lecture.

  “Look at the republicans: ratty little schoolteachers and teacher’s pets, unsuccessful business boors, army officers with stalled careers and delusions of grandeur, idiots with plans for utopia, all full of rules of conduct for their neighbors. They will nearly all consider it somehow wrong that your ex-demmy enjoys spending vast amounts of tax money on herself. And they don’t see that to be ready to rule, she needs vital contacts and connections in the aristocracy, which she gets spending time with them—shopping, getting drunk, partying, taking drugs, dancing, attending lavish displays of wealth, and so on. Honestly, what better way to get to know each other than to learn exactly how best to lick each other’s genitalia—”

  “Um,” Jak said, trying again, “obviously people need an emotionally bonded network. I mean, I toktru dak why hereditary aristocracy works so well—”

  “Oh, anyone as bright and clearheaded as you would. But it’s not so obvious to republicans. They have these ideas about who-has-the-best-ideas and who-is-best-qualified, as if life were school. (It’s the sort of folly one gets into by allowing oneself envy and resentment just because one wasn’t born to a crown.)”

  “Um, yeah, all right, Uncle Sib, so these republicans get precessed about sex—”

  Sib was deflected but not stopped. “Well, of course, because one of the most important strengths of a monarchy is the way that your feelings about your parents are the model for your feelings about the king and queen, and nobody likes to think about their parents having sex. (Look at how you react to Gweshira and me—)”

  “Yuck, Uncle Sib. Okay, I get it. So you think republicans have gotten hold of Sesh’s recreational recordings, or something, and they’re trying to blackmail her?”

  “Blackmail, or more likely they’re just planning to go public with it, as a way to embarrass her. Greenworld has a big nest of republicans, and because of that bill of rights nonsense, the princess can’t just call up a government agency and have them suppressed. She needs someone outside the government to do it. So she might need you and Dujuv to destroy a video facility, or hack and wipe underground text media, or just beat the shit out of some dissidents. Possibly she wants to set up a small secret police unit, consisting of Myxenna to do the intelligence work, Dujuv for the strong-arm stuff, and you to supply creativity.

  “Now, I could be completely wrong. But if I had to bet, I’d think … young beautiful princess, Greenworld’s puritanical republicans, can’t just send the pokheets … I guess that’s what I would be thinking.”

  “And thugging for Sesh—do you think the Dean will buy that as a Junior Task?”

  “I’m sure he will. One of the oldest Hive policies is to provide personal assistance to friendly monarchs. Or, as we used to put it when the Dean and I were in the same office—I’ll tell you all about that some other time, if you’re not good—”

  “I’ll be good!”

  “Insolent puppy.”

  “Old gwont.”

  They both laughed; it was good to be getting along so well. “Oh, well, what we used to say was, Hive policy is that if it’s a king and it’s an ally, we’ll shine his shoes. Roughing up a couple of too-sincere student leafleteers, or destroying the data of some meddling historian, on behalf of one of our oldest and most important allies, would fit that policy perfectly. I think the Dean will be very pleased with this; I have a feeling that your troubles are over.”

  Jak had never before known the Dean’s office to be such a friendly place. Caccitepe had greeted them at the door and shaken their hands, steered them onto three perches facing his desk, and given them each a bulb of coffee. But as the Dean airswam to his perch, Jak and Dujuv were still nervous. Who could say how long it might stay friendly? Myxenna Bonxiao, on the other hand, was wonderfully relaxed, as she was in any situation that involved people. Jak found himself sitting between her and Dujuv, wishing he either had Duj’s stolid stoicism, or Myx’s lively warmth, or any seat other than the one directly opposite the Dean.

  “Let me first say that I’m very pleased,” Dean Caccitepe said, bringing the bulb to his mouth and taking a little sip. “I really must congratulate you on finding such an advanced and interesting project so quickly. Jak will have to exercise all sorts of judgment and discretion to do well at it, it will call upon Dujuv’s courage and discretion, and it will engage many of those social skills that we’ve felt so strongly are Myxenna’s gift. I would say it plays to everyone’s strength while offering a solid challenge to everyone. Furthermore, I had already accepted t
he job of finding and supervising the Junior Task for Myxenna”—he nodded to her, smiling warmly—“and I’d had no idea what would be an appropriate challenge for her, since she does so well at everything.”

  As happened often around Myxenna Bonxiao, Jak suppressed a flash of envy. Myx really was good at everything, and so great-looking, in a completely sexual way, that it made you ache.

  After enjoying smiling at her for longer than Jak would have thought strictly necessary, the Dean went on, “So of course I expect great things of you all.”

  The sinking sensation in Jak’s intestines grew stronger.

  Dean Caccitepe’s face was in perfect bliss. “This is exactly the kind of thing that all three of you will be doing in your early years working as operatives in public service, and hence, as I said, perfect, and so, as I said, I congratulate you. Any questions?” He said it flatly and carelessly, not really a question.

  “None at all, sir.” Dujuv’s tone was level, even, as careless as the Dean’s.

  Myxenna said, “I’m looking forward to it. I had been afraid the Junior Task would be something for the office of air conditioning or the post office.”

  Jak, never sure how long any favorable situation could hold together, said, “No questions. It’s toktru a lot clearer than most assignments, sir.”

  A few minutes later, the three of them took a table together in the Public Service Academy commons, a big drum that tumbled slowly to provide enough grav in the booths to keep drinks in cups and papers on tables. Myx sat at Jak’s side, Dujuv across. Both stared at the wall.

  “Weehu,” Jak said. “Toktru I don’t want to referee between you two. First of all none of this was my idea and I think Sesh was out of her mind, or way too sentimental, which might be the same thing, when she specifically asked for the two of you. I know perfectly well that you are not together, and haven’t been mekko and demmy for a long, long time.”

  “One year, seven months, and three days,” Dujuv said.

  Jak ignored that. “I know that you avoid each other and that neither of you wants to know anything about what the other one is doing.”

  “True for one of us,” Myx said.

  “And I know that the two of you are never, never, absolutely never, ever, going to be mekko and demmy again, and you both know I normally wouldn’t even ask either of you to be civil to the other one. So I am not looking forward to sharing a vague open-ended mission with you.”

  Dujuv stared at the wall and said, “I can behave. Just don’t expect me—”

  “You’re not behaving.” Jak was exasperated. “You’re acting like you’re about to attack or maybe hide in a storage compartment and cry.”

  “I’ll talk to you later.” Dujuv leapt to the top of the booth wall and launched himself into the center of the drum, where the grav was only about five percent. He airswam out a service entrance, snagging and consuming two desserts off an incoming robot dessert tray. The service door swung shut as two empty plates caromed off the dining deck, making people in other booths jump.

  Myxenna looked sideways at Jak and raised an eyebrow. “So are you going to give up and just let him behave like a silly barbarian pig, or chase after him like a gweetz and spend hours trying to soothe him? You know what they say about panths. They were created for the old Martian emperors, and if you’re going to raise a biologically-enhanced Praetorian Guard, of course you make it super-loyal. Probably they copied imprinting off baby ducks, mixed it with devotion off big dumb dogs, and set it to develop at adolescence. So poor Dujy bonded to his first real demmy, and now he can’t feel right unless he’s being loyal to her.

  “Well, I’m not a panth, and nobody bred me to have all that stupid doggy loyalty, and I can’t return his feelings. It’s tough on him to have those feelings, of course, but unless he’d bonded to a panth girl he’d never have found anyone who would accept all that devotion—except, of course, some aristo who would have used him as an expendable resource. I’m not a panth and I’m not a queen, so he’s stuck.” She brushed her thick jet-black hair away from her face, wet her lips, and focused the blue stars in her green irises directly into Jak’s eyes, her smile coaxing his smile out to join it.

  She was fascinating in an utterly different way from Sesh. Jak knew, having found out on a few occasions which had toktru precessed Dujuv, that her pale skin, spattered with small freckles, was soft and delicate but that Myx liked a firm grip and deep pressure when touched; he knew that when you were in bed (or up against a wall, or in a freefall room, or a Pertrans car … ) with Myx, she seemed to guide you singing-on into what you had always dreamed of doing. “It’s been a while,” she said, smiling, “and Dujuv can’t possibly get any more precessed than he already is, you know.” She tugged her top tighter and sat up straight; for such a small woman, she had very big breasts.

  “Assuming this won’t bother Fnina,” she said, “or that she won’t find out.”

  Jak smiled. “Or that I don’t care if it bothers her. Besides, she never knows anything that’s going on unless Mreek Sinda makes a viv out of it—my demmy is that media-gweetz’s number one fan. Sure, let’s go back to my apartment.”

  Afterward, as Jak and Myx lay comfortably naked on his bed, idly touching, Jak said, “Sometimes I speck you’re the only person who feels like I do about sex and friendship and so on.”

  She kissed him lightly. “You mean, sex is good, friendship is good, sex with friends is really good? And that’s about all?”

  “Something like that.”

  She rolled over onto her belly, letting him admire her perfect back. “Hmm. Well, of course, that was always Sesh’s attitude, too, masen? Except I don’t think she cared much. She could always buy all the sex and most of the friends she wanted.”

  “Kind of a cold thing to say about a friend.”

  “Just realistic. You didn’t notice a lot of things about her. Not being male, I wasn’t hypnotized by the high firm tits, or the long legs. Or that cute little sweet smile, which I’d watched her practice in the mirror when we were both fourteen. She’s cold inside. All her life people have been fun to hang and dine and fuck with, but toktru disposable. Now, maybe she’s sentimental, the way people are about pets. Maybe she was trying on the feelings of friendship and loyalty just to see if she liked them, the way she used to try on feeling in love or being proud or being horny. Maybe I’m completely crazy and just projecting everything backward.

  “But still … this whole deal smells weird, Jak. Toktru. Sesh wants her old gen school toves for a secret mission? She could hire two or three top-end private ops or mercs for a year out of her monthly shoe budget. And besides, if she’s not as ‘aristocratic’ as she always seemed and she actually can form real, close, personal friendships, then wouldn’t she have one or two by now, maybe among her ladies, maybe in her guards, that would be better on the job than we would? Since they would know their way around the Aerie, and around Greenworld?

  “So I don’t know about all this, Jak. Of course it would look fine to Dujuv—she’s a friend to him because once a friend, always a friend. And it would look good to your uncle and to the Dean, because as far as they’re concerned, it doesn’t really matter what Sesh actually wants, it’s a chance for someone from the Hive to do some big favors for the Karrinynya heir. But I’d rather know what the other players are playing for, before they deal me in to the game.”

  “But you’re going.”

  “Weehu, yeah, I’m bored, Jak.”

  “Me too, Myx.” Jak turned toward her and found himself lost in the green and blue star patterns of her eyes. “Toktru, sometimes I think I’m just bored stiff being here, bored stiff with being an ornament in Fnina’s social life, bored stiff with all the things in my life that weren’t those few weeks of adventure a few years back. Just plain bored stiff.”

  Myxenna smiled and turned on her side; Jak stroked under the curve of her full breast. “Mmm. Well, I do know something that will get you stiff, besides being bored. Do you want to think o
r have more sex?”

  “How about one then the other?”

  The second time was slower, gentler, with more laughter. When they were both sated and happy, lying in each other’s arms, Myxenna traced a finger down Jak’s sternum and said, “So it’s in your liver.”

  “Unh-huh. Uncle Sib wrote that down on the agenda for that mission, back then. Deliver the sliver in the liver to River. Not that anyone actually calls Riveroma ‘River.’ He’s not the kind of heet who gets nicknames—I speck that Sibroillo just figured that if word of it ever got to him it would precess him. Imagine two petty ten-year-olds who hate each other—that’s Sibroillo Jinnaka and Bex Riveroma.”

  Myxenna sighed. “So the sliver is still in there?”

  “ ’Fraid so. I’m safer with it than without it. No one would ever believe I’d had that little sliver of silicon removed, and if I’m ever captured by Riveroma, or by Triangle One, or by any of a dozen other malphs … well, chances are they’ll just kill me and pick through my liver at leisure, but they might speck that the sliver might be booby-trapped or that I might have some value as a hostage. If there’s no sliver, they’ve got no reason at all to keep me alive—and at least one thing they’re going to be toktru precessed about. So no matter how you look at it, I’m better off with that sliver.”

  She shuddered. “I hate the idea of anyone cutting into your body. Or anybody’s body. If you left it up to me we’d all spend our three hundred and fifty years eating and making art, dancing and telling jokes, and fucking. Especially fucking.” She kissed him just at the base of the sternum, feeling and savoring his skin with her full, soft lips. Her hand gently pressed his thighs apart. The tip of one finger brushed gently up and down until it found the singing-on place to flick, quickly and lightly. “If only Shadow on the Frost hadn’t rescued you—if he’d known about the sliver—”