Universe Vol1Num2

by Jim Baen's Universe

  He knew the location of the market only from maps he had studied as a Calani, and he wasn't sure he could find it. He heard it first, a rumble of voices in the street. The lane crooked around a corner—and opened into a bustling plaza like a tributary feeding a great lake. Merchants, stalls, and customers thronged the area. Buildings two or three stories high bordered it, many with balconies. Chains adorned with metal Quis dice hung from their eaves, clinking in the ever-present wind. A tumult of voices poured over Kelric like Teotecan music. So much color and vibrancy and life.

  "Too many people," Axer said, his hand on his gun.

  Kelric barely heard. He walked forward and Cobans flowed around him. Merchants called out their wares; children ran and hopped and shouted; street artists sang, played instruments, or acted out skits.

  In the first Quis game Kelric had ever played, the Dahl Manager had bet him one tekal, "enough to buy a sausage in market." He had owed her Estate that tekal for twenty-eight years. He didn't know how much a sausage cost now, though, besides which, he had no Coban money.

  Although people noticed him, they paid less attention than he had expected. Just as he started to relax, though, a woman in the red and gold of the City Guard stared hard at him. Then she spun around and strode across the plaza.

  "Not good," Axer said, watching the woman.

  "She knows we're out of place," Najo said. "She's going to tell someone."

  "Probably at the Estate." Kelric indicated a fortress of amber-hued stone and ancient crenellations on a hill across the city. "The Manager lives there." His heartbeat felt too fast. He might soon see Ixpar, perhaps his children. Just as he had needed time alone after Jeejon died, now he needed to prepare. Somehow. Before he faced Ixpar, he wanted to know how it felt to be part of Coba in a way he had never known when he lived here.

  Strava was studying him with that penetrating gaze of hers. "What is a Manager?"

  "The governor of a city-estate," Kelric said. "The Manager of Karn, this place, is also Minister. She rules Coba."

  Najo tensed. "Does she pose a danger to your person?"

  Danger indeed. "No," Kelric said. The only danger was to his heart.

  Nearby, a man was sitting against the yellow-stone wall of a shop. He wore fine clothes: a white shirt, suede trousers with gold buttons up the seams, and suede boots. He had an air of confidence, like a king in his milieu. Quis dice were piled on his low table.

  "Someone you know?" Strava asked.

  "I've never seen him before," Kelric said.

  A woman had seated herself at the table, and a crowd was gathering. Kelric stayed back, behaving like a Haka man, never smiling. With so many people around, he absorbed a sense of their moods even through his shields. They found him exotic, but he didn't sense anyone realized he was more than a visitor from a distant city. Although his guards and their guns disturbed people, they didn't seem to realize the Jumblers weren't just oddly designed stunners.

  The man at the Quis table cleared off his extra dice, and the woman rolled out her set, pieces carved from wood. The two players were talking, setting a bet that involved many coins and goods, it sounded like. When they finished, the woman opened the game by playing a blue cylinder.

  Conversations drifted around Kelric from the crowd.

  "I heard she came all the way from Ahkah to challenge him," a man was saying.

  "His reputation is spreading," a woman replied.

  "I can't figure why he isn't in a Calanya," another woman said. "Everyone says he's good enough."

  "Maybe he has some problem," someone else said.

  A man snorted. "Right. A problem with living in a cage."

  "Why go in a Calanya?" another man said. "He's making pots of coins here, and he doesn't have to abide by an Oath straight out of the Old Age."

  "Did you hear about the offworld Calani in Viasa?" a woman asked. "Viasa Manager kidnapped him, just like in the Old Age."

  "Heard he was good-looking," a second woman said.

  A third one chuckled. "You want to carry one off, too?"

  The other woman bristled. "I don't need to kidnap a man to get a husband."

  "You haven't heard?" a man said. "The fellow escaped."

  "He did not," a woman said.

  "Play Quis with someone from Viasa," he countered. "It's in their dice. He stole himself a windrider and whisked off."

  Kelric listened as people embellished Jeremiah's tale. Manager Viasa had built her cover story well; he heard no hints of his own involvement. So he returned his focus to the game. The players competed rather than studying problems or plotting the ascendance of their Estate. They were opposed rather than aligned. It reminded him of the Quis played among Managers, but on a less intense scale, for fun rather than politics.

  Both players surely rated the title of Quis Master. They built towers, arches, stacks, bridges, rings, claws, and more. Whenever one gained advantage, the other wrested it back. The man was probably the better player, but the woman seemed more experienced. They vied solely for advantage, without the complexity of Calanya Quis. Kelric had no doubt the man would thrive in a Calanya: he had the gift. He would find such Quis far more satisfying than anything Out here. That he chose freedom despite the price it exacted—never to play true Quis—hinted at far-reaching changes in Coba's social structure.

  Suddenly the man grinned. "My game."

  "What?" The woman looked up with a start.

  Murmurs rolled among the crowd. "He hasn't won . . . "

  "His tower has more dice than hers . . . "

  "She collapsed his tower . . . "

  "But look! He hid an arch."

  Axer spoke to Kelric in a low voice. "Do you have any idea what these people are saying?"

  "They're arguing over the game," Kelric said absently, intent on the dice. The man had bridged several structures with an elegant arch, increasing their worth enough for him to claim victory. He had managed it despite his opponent's vigilance because he used dice of a similar color to surrounding pieces, so it looked as if he were creating lesser structures. A camouflage.

  The woman ceded the match, and applause scattered as people slapped their palms against their thighs. After arranging to pay her debt, the woman stood and bowed to the Quis Master. Then she went on her way.

  Kelric walked forward.

  The gleam in the man's eyes when he saw Kelric was the same as everywhere in settled space, the calculation of a master player sizing up a rube. Kelric eased down his barriers. With so many people at market, it was hard to distinguish moods, but he gathered the man didn't see him as a challenge. Good male Quis players were in a Calanya. He also associated Kelric's large size with low intelligence. The crowd that had watched the last game was dispersing.

  "Have a seat," the Quis Master said. "I'm Talv."

  As Kelric sat down, he wondered if he had somehow let on that he didn't know market-style Quis. He had never learned to gamble, and he had played nothing but Quis solitaire for ten years. He wasn't certain he could beat Talv. But if he could win a few tekals, he could buy a sausage and indulge his admittedly whimsical desire to repay his old debt.

  Talv glanced at the pouch on Kelric's belt. "You've brought your set, I see." He started to remove his extra dice.

  Kelric knew if he rolled out jeweled Calanya dice, the game would end before it started. As much as a Quis Master might want to challenge a Calani, he would never risk the ire of a Manager. So he indicated Talv's extra dice. "I prefer those." Speaking was even harder here. "Your extra set."

  "Are you sure?" Talv yawned. "Most people find it easier to use their own. They will be more familiar to you."

  It was, of course, something any child knew. "Yours will be fine," Kelric said.

  "All right." Talv smirked at him. "What shall we bet?"

  "How much for a sausage?"

  "A sausage?" Talv wasn't even trying to hide his disdain. "One tekal."

  So. Same price. "Let us play for two tekals."

  Talv shrugge
d. "Well. You can start."

  "Shouldn't we draw dice?" Going first was an advantage.

  "If you insist." Talv pulled a disk out of his pouch and handed over the bag. Kelric took out a lower-ranked piece, a flat square. So he had lost the draw.

  "Your move," Kelric said.

  "So it is." As Talv set a red pyramid in the playing area, he projected both boredom and the belief that the game would be over fast enough to make the tedium bearable.

  A sense of opening came to Kelric. After so many years of solitaire, sitting here made him feel . . . expanded. It hadn't happened with Jeremiah or Dehya, but he had held back then. Now he envisioned a myriad of elegant patterns stemming from the one die Talv had placed. He set down a grey pyramid with curved sides.

  Talv looked up at him. "If your die doesn't touch mine, you aren't building a structure."

  "I know," Kelric said.

  "Are you sure you want to play that piece?" Talv said. "Nonstandard dice are difficult to use."

  Kelric was growing irritated. Calani never disrupted a session, especially not with unasked-for Quis lessons. "It's your move."

  "Suit yourself." Talv set down orange pentahedron.

  Kelric saw his intent: a queen's spectrum. Few players could manage them; they were too easy to block. Kelric had slipped one past Dehya because she hadn't known the rules, but he wouldn't be that lucky with her again. To succeed against someone who knew Quis, Talv either had to camouflage the spectrum or else hope his opponent was too stupid to see it. He hadn't bothered with a camouflage.

  Kelric had met only one player on Coba who consistently managed to build a Queen's spectrum in high level Quis: Mentar, the Karn Fourth Level, widower of the previous Minister. Mentar's Quis had thrilled Kelric. Ixpar had claimed that when he and Mentar played dice, the world shook.

  This callow player was no Mentar. Kelric slid an aqua piece against the orange die, disrupting the spectrum. Talv grunted and placed a yellow cube. So. He was trying to recover his spectrum by turning it at an angle. Kelric blocked him with an ocher cube.

  "Huh." Talv rubbed his chin. He set down a green die, again turning his spectrum.

  Enough, Kelric thought. He bridged Talv's pyramid and his own cube with an arch. The cube had a higher rank, so the advantage went to Kelric. He had no idea what points went with it, but he doubted he had enough to win. And indeed, Talv continued playing. Good. Kelric didn't want to stop; he was envisioning an exquisite pattern. His Quis thoughts pleased him, and he set about making them reality.

  Talv became quieter as they played. His sneer vanished. He spent more time considering his moves. Then he began to sweat.

  Kelric built for the sheer beauty of it. Dice spread in patterns of platonic solids, and geometric elegance covered the table. After a while, Talv stopped sweating, and his game took on a new quality, as if he were appreciating a work of art. When he quit fighting Kelric, he became a better Quis partner. The structures flourished.

  With regret, Kelric pulled himself back to here and now. As much as he wanted to keep playing, he had business to attend. He set down a white sphere. When Talv started to place a ring, Kelric spoke quietly. "It's my game."

  Talv lifted his head like a swimmer surfacing from a dive. "Your game?"

  A woman behind them said, "I don't believe it!"

  Startled, Kelric looked around—and froze.

  People.

  They had crowded around, more even than for the last game. The woman who played before was gaping at the table. Others looked from her to the board, obviously puzzled.

  "What is it?" Talv said.

  Kelric turned back. He tapped a line of dice that wound across the table, around and through other structures: grey, orange, gold, yellow, yellow-green, green, aqua, blue, indigo, purple, and finally the white sphere.

  Murmurs swelled in the crowd. Talv stared at the structure for a long time. Finally he lifted his gaze to Kelric. "I don't think I've heard tell of anyone, even the highest of the Calani, building a grand augmented queen's spectrum."

  X

  The Twelfth Band

  Kelric hadn't intended to draw attention; he had become too caught up in the game. He had to admit, though, it was a good spectrum. He inclined his head to Talv. "You play well."

  "I had thought so," Talv said. "Now I know better."

  "You have talent. It's wasted on market Quis."

  Talv's voice heated. "You won't lock me in a Calanya!"

  "Find other ways to use your talent," Kelric said. "Join the Minister's staff. Work your way up in the Estate Quis."

  Talv snorted. "In case you haven't noticed, I'm the wrong sex."

  "No laws forbid it."

  "Sure they do," Talv said. "They're just unwritten."

  "So break them."

  "Who are you?"

  Kelric smiled slightly. "I believe you owe me two tekals."

  Talv squinted at him. "Just two?"

  "That was the bet."

  Talv shook his head, but he handed over two coins. Kelric turned the copper heptagons over in his hand. One side showed a Quis structure, a nested tower that symbolized protection. The other had the portrait of a regal queen.

  "That's Ixpar Karn," Kelric said.

  "Haven't you ever seen a tekal before?"

  He looked up to see Talv watching him oddly. Kelric rose to his feet. "Thank you for the game."

  "The honor was mine." Talv stood as well. "That was Quis like nothing I've ever played."

  It was a high compliment among Quis Masters. Kelric nodded to honor to his opponent. His guards gathered around him, and he could tell they wanted him away from this attention. He left the table, and people stepped respectfully aside as he walked through the crowd. He felt their curiosity.

  Kelric went deeper into market until he lost himself among the crowds. A familiar aroma teased his nose, wafting from a stall with yellow slats. A sausage merchant stood behind the counter, a plump man with a white apron pulled across his large belly. He beamed as Kelric paused. "What can I get for you, goodsir?" He motioned at sausages hanging from the rafters. "I've the best spiced-reds from here to Haka."

  Kelric indicated a fat specimen. "Kadilish."

  "Ah! A man after my own tastes." The merchant wrapped the sausage in waxy paper, accepted Kelric's tekal, and handed over the purchase as if it were the most natural thing to do. For him, it was. To Kelric, it was another watershed.

  "Sir," Najo said, his voice uneasy.

  He followed Najo's gaze across the plaza to where a street opened into the market. Far beyond it, on its distant hill, the Estate glowed amber in the sunlight. Strava stepped closer, and Kelric was aware of Axer behind them, tall and solid.

  Someone was entering the plaza. Many someones. Kelric drew in a deep breath. They came in formation, all wearing the uniform of the City Guard, and they were headed toward him. He had no idea if they suspected his identity. If Ixpar had sent them, she might hate him for drawing attention to her world. He had no reason to think she would want to see him. But he couldn't turn back.

  In the same moment Kelric's guards drew their Jumblers and took aim at the approaching group, he saw the woman walking in its center. He grabbed Najo's arm and spoke in Skolian. "Don't harm them!"

  His guards waited, poised, glancing from him to the woman. She was tall even among Cobans. Her hair blazed like fire, pulled loosely into a braid. Her suede trousers did nothing to hide the muscular lines of her long, long legs. She had a powerful beauty, wild and fierce under a veneer of elegance—a face that could inspire armies and conquer a world.

  For Kelric, time slowed down. She continued toward him, never pausing despite the monstrous guns of his guards, and in that crystalline moment, he thought the two of them would be here forever. She came closer, closer still, and then she was in front of him, her gray eyes filled with incredulity. He had thought of a million words for this moment, planned for days. For years. Now the words left him.

  "Kelric?" she asked, her voice husk
y.

  She was one of the few Cobans who had known him as Kelric rather than Sevtar. Seeing her filled him with an emotion he couldn't define, jagged and painful and miraculous. They stood together as if they were inside a bubble, and he wanted to touch her, feel her cheek, her hair, her lips, but he feared even to move, lest it burst this tenuous sphere.

  He spoke in a voice rough with the feelings he couldn't express. "My greetings, Ixpar."

  XI

  Rosewood Suite

  "It cannot be." She reached into her pocket and drew out a half-melted ring of gold. "This is all that remains of Kelric Valdoria."

  He pulled up his jacket cuff and uncovered the guards embedded in his gauntlets. "These, too."

  Ixpar looked from him to his bodyguards and back to his face. In her dusky voice, she said, "If the god of the dawn has come seeking vengeance, I entreat him to reconsider."

  "Vengeance?" He would have laughed if this hadn't all hurt so much. "For what? My shattering Coba?"

  Moisture gathered in her eyes. "Ten years is a long time."

  Too long. He wanted to say so much, but he could neither move nor speak.

  Finally he found his voice, enough to ask a question that was always with him, in the back of his mind. "My children?"

  Her face gentled. "They are well."

  Softly he asked, "And who came after me?"

  "After?" She seemed as lost for words as him.

  "As your Akasi."

  "None now."

  "You have no husband?"

  "I thought not." Her voice caught. "It seems I was wrong."

  He took her into his arms then and embraced the wife he had never expected to see again. She tensed, and he was aware of his bodyguards looming around them. Gods only knew what they thought.

  Then Ixpar exhaled and put her arms around him, leaning her head against his. He held a stranger, yet he recognized the curves and strength of her body. If he had erred in coming here, it was too late to turn back. Too many people knew. In this incredible instant, he didn't care.

  ****

  Kelric stood with Ixpar by a high window that overlooked Karn. Houses clustered along the streets and down the hills below. Plumberry vines grew in a profusion of purple and blue flowers, climbing walls and spiraling up street lamps. So many times he had stood savoring this view from this window.