by Sharon Lee
“Kamele is on Surebleak?” Daav repeated.
“How does she go on?” Aelliana asked.
“Kamele is indeed on Surebleak and if I may say so, she blooms. She came seeking her lover, one Jen Sar Kiladi, whom she believed was held against his will by Clan Korval. It was her intention to remove Professor Kiladi from this situation, was it in fact objectionable to him.”
Kamele had left Delgado, and traveled to Surebleak, in order to rescue him. Valiant heart. Daav thought he might weep.
Kareen inclined her head.
“I believe that she would be glad of a meeting with you,” she said simply.
Daav raised a hand.
“Kareen, you are aware that the delm must judge. Please do not disturb Kamele’s peace, until that judgment has been made.”
She sent a sharp glance into his face and sighed lightly.
“Of course not,” she said. “And now, I too, will take my leave. It is come late and I have an early meeting.”
A small bow, between kin, also more cordial than her previous mode.
“Good night.”
“Good night, Kareen,” Aelliana said. “Go well.”
“And you.”
* * * * *
The Uncle and his sister had gone. Kareen had gone.
Miri took a deep breath.
Only one more problem to solve.
Speaking of saving the best ’til last.
She could sense Val Con’s mind working, thoughts clicking like game counters. The delm was obliged to weigh benefit and danger to the clan before every other consideration. And two…clones, she supposed they were, supplied by the Uncle…to house two of the clan’s elders—one previously and comprehensively dead—she didn’t even want to begin to think about all the knots in that tangle, but apparently Val Con was already busy.
“Korval.”
Aelliana Caylon was bowing low before her; Daav yos’Phelium before Val Con, neither one of them looking any older than eighteen Standards.
“Please,” she said to them, “stand.”
They straightened, neither saying a word, waiting for the delm to ask a question, make a judgment, shoot them dead…
Miri took a deep breath, she caught Val Con’s eye.
“I think the delm’s closing up for the night,” she said. “You?”
He hesitated, then nodded, and addressed the two before them in delm-to-petitioners, which was high High Liaden, and not a bit of human warmth in it.
“The delm greets Daav yos’Phelium and Aelliana Caylon, and grants them leave to retire to their suite for the remainder of this night. You will hold yourselves available to the delm, and you will not leave this house. We will have many questions. Tomorrow.”
Aelliana bent her head, and Daav did.
“Korval,” they said with one voice.
Miri shivered. Now she knew just exactly how eerie it looked from the outside, when she and Val Con went into sync.
The two of them had straightened and Miri saw they were holding hands.
“Mother,” Val Con said, very softly indeed, “Father. Words fail.”
Daav smiled his edged smile.
“I understand. My thoughts upon awakening to this situation ought perhaps not have been given to the innocent air.”
“Please,” Aelliana said, “take your rest. Only know that—however the delm judges tomorrow, children, we are happy to have landed home and to see you once more.”
Tears stung Miri’s eyes, and Val Con wasn’t in any better shape.
“Chiat’a bei kruzon,” Aelliana said. “Dream sweetly” that was.
“And you,” Val Con said, and Miri felt his fingers seeking hers.
They watched the clan’s young elders leave the room. When the door had closed, Miri swung around and they wrapped their arms around each other, heads resting on the other’s shoulder.
“We should go to bed,” Val Con said at last, loosening his embrace.
“No,” Miri said, stepping back, and pulling him with her toward the door. “We should go to sleep.”
“A fine distinction, but an important one,” he agreed. “Let us, by all means, go to sleep.”
III
“Indira’s report of the state of your residence was dire in the extreme. She has cleared and destroyed it, as per standing orders.”
Seignur Veeoni nodded, absently, it seemed to the Uncle, as if her mind were far away from Surebleak, Vivulonj Prosperu, and most importantly, himself.
He sighed and made another attempt at engaging her attention.
“Have you any insight into why the security in and around your lab failed to function?”
She looked up at him, eyes bright.
“I disabled those systems.”
“You disabled them,” he repeated neutrally. “I see. It may interest you to know that Indira has identified the intruders as operatives of the Lyre Institute. While they appear to have suffered heavy losses, yet it is apparent that those who lived to enter your laboratory removed every rack, every tile, every grid. While they did not acquire your notes, I am sure you are aware that the Lyre Institute is perfectly competent to back-engineer what they have stolen.”
“Yes, of course,” she said, sitting with her hands folded on her lap and her face calm. “I’m afraid that I did depend upon them being very clever.”
“Ah. It does not disturb you to know that your lifework now resides in the hands of an organization which is criminal at best, while we are left with nothing in hand to bring to Tinsori Light, and a shrinking event aperture?”
“No, Yuri, you are not thinking! Of course, the Lyre Institute did not obtain the racks intended for Tinsori Light. It would be a disaster, indeed, if they had done so.
“What they obtained instead were the sets that I built on purpose for them, in anticipation of just such a move. Of course, I did not leave them the faristo, so they will have to derive and machine a comparable unit, which will occupy them for some little while. When they are able to manufacture their own tiles, I very much hope that they will replicate the errors inherent in their gift sets as often as they are capable of doing so.”
He stared at her for a long moment, wondering at the audacity, at the arrogance of such a tactic…
“Yuri?” his sister said. “It is no more than you have done yourself, you know.”
He inclined his head. “You are correct, of course. I fear that I grow old and less bold.”
Seignur Veeoni, however, was young; she bore the entirety of his memories in the strands she wore against her skin.
“Dare I ask,” he said, “where the true tiles and frames are?”
“I have one complete set, and the faristo, with me,” she said. “I sent M Nator with a complete set only to our research station standing off of Tinsori Light’s space, as there is a faristo there. The third true and complete set, I entrusted to M Benkley, who was to take them to your residence.”
She hesitated.
“I fear that set may be lost. M Benkley was wounded. I…M Traven said she doubted even an M could ultimately survive such a wound, but he did achieve his vessel, and we saw a controlled breakaway before M Traven put my ship into Jump.”
“Absent this one detail then, you would have me believe that matters fell out exactly as you planned.”
“No,” she said baldly. “They did not. I did not plan, for instance, on losing my secondary projects, nor did I plan to lose my child and my hope of rebirth. I did not plan that M Benkley would be so grievously wounded or that M Varia and M Ratu would fail to survive the initial strike against our defenses.”
She took a breath and continued more moderately, “Despite these lapses, I did preserve my work on the primary project, and that, you must agree, Yuri, is a very good thing, because you are correct—our window of opportunity is closing. The last situation reports I received from Andreth plainly indicated that the Light is deteriorating more rapidly than we had projected. We must act quickly.”
The Uncle c
onsidered her. Despite the confusion regarding the Dragon’s lair, when she had—typically, really—expected him to know everything that she knew—despite that one lapse, she was very nice in her choice of words. Quickly, however, required clarification.
“We may file for an emergency lift and be gone in a few hours at most,” he said. “I will accompany you to the Light. Dulsey will follow and await our return at the research station.”
Seignur Veeoni said nothing.
“Well?” he snapped.
“There is a misunderstanding,” she said.
“Elucidate this misunderstanding. Quickly.”
“Yes. There are several levels. Primary is this: I, and my team, will step onto the game board. You—will not.”
He raised his eyebrows.
“Oh, will I not? I will remind you that I built—”
She held up a hand.
“Indeed you did. And thus, so did I. I have those memories. Inside the cloud, there will be no necessity for duplication of knowledge. If I should fail, then you—and the direct knowledge of the builder—will be required, as very few things have been in this universe.”
“Surely, you do not intend to fail.”
Seignur Veeoni glared at him.
“We have lately seen that I can fail. I intend to achieve a certain outcome, and I have been trained my entire life to succeed in this one task. And yet—I may fail.”
She took a hard breath and bowed her head, visibly calming herself.
“That is why I will go and you will stay behind. You are the elder; you are the builder, not merely the memories of the builder; you are the final shield for the universe should I fall short of my intentions.”
She was correct, he admitted. Of course, she was correct. She was not, as she had now asserted twice, his exact duplicate, but she wore the strands—he could see the hint of them, even beneath the sweater and jacket required by Surebleak’s weather.
She was her own unique person, as all of his brothers and sisters were entirely themselves. But one attribute that made her unique was the fact that she…remembered more of his young memories than even he did, here and now. She knew, as a function of her own memory, the old universe. She had his blueprints and plans in active memory; she remembered the construction of the Light; remembered that its original purpose had been as a sanctuary for those displaced by the Enemy’s actions.
It had been stolen—she had that in active memory, too. Stolen by an agent of the sheriekas, subverted to the purpose of the Enemy.
He had survived that event. Most of those he had worked with—and worked for—had not; they had been the first lives that the Light claimed.
The Light had been, so he had thought for centuries, left behind in the old universe, crystallized into perfection in the Enemy’s Great Plan.
And it had been…perhaps not quite…the greatest shock of his very, very long life to learn that it existed still, caught between the old and the new, warping the fabric of two universes; and malignant—yes, it had been malignant, the only one of the Great Works that had seemed to actively take pleasure in betrayal and destruction.
And now, it was not merely evil, but mad. He had sent teams inside to gather data, proving the inevitable. The fractin sets that had informed Tinsori Light, the systems that had supported it—all and each were failing: that was physics. The half-life of timonium was known to the last decimal space. That it was functioning at all must be regarded as one of the wonders of the new universe.
And very possibly its death knell.
“Very well,” he said to Seignur Veeoni. “I shall be rear guard. How do you suggest that we proceed?”
“I will go with M Traven now and she will file for departure. After we have lifted, Dulsey will file for your own departure. Those who always watch us will not be fooled by such a stratagem, of course, but those who do not yet know that they ought to watch us will not be alerted to that fact.”
She stood.
“I will go now,” she said.
“Wait.”
He put his hands on her shoulders—unusual enough—and bent slightly to kiss her forehead.
Her eyes were wide when he stepped back and released her.
“You will not fail,” he told her.
For another moment she stood, perhaps immobilized by shock, then she nodded once, stiffly, and left him.
* * * * *
“Master Val Con, I regret the necessity.”
Val Con opened one eye. He and Miri were tucked beneath the blankets, comfortably spooned, and he felt her stir against him, not quite awake, yet no longer deeply asleep.
“What is it?” he asked irritably.
“I have a call on the clan frequency from Bechimo, on Surebleak approach. Captain Waitley wishes to speak with you.”
Val Con raised his head sufficiently to see the clock, took a deep breath, and resettled on his pillow.
“Pray tell Captain Waitley that I will speak with her at breakfast,” he said.
There was a small hesitation.
“Captain Waitley did state that her business was urgent. I would not have waked you otherwise, sir.”
Jeeves’s tone was chiding, which Val Con supposed he deserved. It was not the messenger who had earned the sharp edge of his tongue.
“I will speak with Captain Waitley,” he said, reluctantly pushing the blankets aside. “Please route her call to our console.”
“Yes, sir.”
Val Con picked his robe up from the bottom of the bed and turned at the sound of blankets being energetically cast aside.
“Sleep, cha’trez. You needn’t cope with Theo at this hour.”
“Couldn’t catch a wink, between you being gone and wondering what it is that Theo might consider urgent,” Miri said, pulling on her robe with a wide grin.
“Certainly nothing to do with her family,” Val Con said grumpily.
Miri laughed.
“Hey, you wanted her to come home!”
“At a civilized hour.”
Miri curled into the wide seat of the chair by the console while he perched on the arm. There was a moment of silence before Jeeves spoke.
“Captain Waitley, Master Val Con,” Jeeves said. “Proceed, Bechimo.”
“Val Con?” Light-voiced, perhaps a shade breathless.
“Good evening, Theo,” he said, “I trust you are well rested.”
There was a pause, no longer than expectable.
“I regret the hour,” Theo said, in very good Liaden, indeed. “Necessity exists.”
“Does it?” he said, answering as he was addressed. “Pray elucidate necessity.”
The pause this time was…somewhat longer than might be accounted for by lag.
“We need to land,” she said in Terran, now. “I request permission to use the field at Jelaza Kazone.”
Miri pressed her fingers against her lips, presumably to prevent herself from giving voice to the merriment he felt bubbling in her.
“The field is a field,” he said to his sister. “Rough work for a ship, though it can be done. Why not find berth at Korval’s Yard? We will send a car.”
“No, negative; that won’t do. We need to land close to the house. Close to you.”
Val Con lifted an eyebrow.
“I am, of course, flattered,” he began…
“It would be useful,” Theo continued, “if you could meet us at landing. Nelirikk, too.”
Val Con sighed.
“I live to be of use to you, Theo,” he said gently. “May one know the reason for these…arrangements?”
“Well…” Theo said slowly, “it’s kind of complicated.”
Miri gave up the struggle for silence and laughed out loud.
Val Con bit his lip until he was sure of his own voice.
“I would be disappointed if it were otherwise,” he said. “Allow the port to know that you are landing at our private field, with permission. Jeeves will provide Bechimo with coordinates and landing assistance.”
> He paused, considering, “Unless you would rather not be listed as a ship on port?”
“Oh, no!” his sister exclaimed. “We want to be listed as on port!”
Miri leaned her forehead against her knees, shoulders shaking.
“Excellent,” he said. “I look forward to seeing you—soon.”
“Thank you!” Theo said blithely. “Waitley out.”
* * * * *
Mrs. ana’Tak had done well, Val Con thought, entering the breakfast parlor in Miri’s wake. Two sealed urns were gently steaming on the buffet—one holding tea, the other coffee—as well as a plate of sandwiches under a keep-fresh dome.
He detoured slightly to place their winter-weight coats on the window seat, while Miri went directly to the buffet.
“Coulda let the cook sleep in,” she said, even as she drew a mugful of coffee.
“Captain Waitley and her crew will certainly require hospitality,” Jeeves said from somewhere above Val Con’s head and to the left. “Mrs. ana’Tak promises a full buffet in time for the landing. She hopes that the sandwiches and beverages do not offend.”
“No,” Miri said, sipping her coffee, “she did good. Please convey my appreciation.”
“I will do so,” Jeeves said solemnly. “Mr. pel’Kana wishes the delm to know that Captain Waitley’s room stands ready to receive her, and that the Southern Suite is being prepared for guests.”
Val Con, who was more familiar than Miri with the Southern Suite, nodded.
“An excellent choice, as we do not know the number of Captain Waitley’s crew, nor how many will accompany her to the ground. They will certainly wish to be with each other, rather than scattered about the house.”
He drew a cup of tea and glanced toward the observation screen on the back wall. Most usually, the screen displayed pleasant images of the gardens and grounds, suitable for viewing with breakfast. Now, however, the display was of a ship—a tradeship, in fact, with one pod mounted.
Bechimo’s lines were…unique was perhaps the best descriptor. The pod mounts, though, were quite modern, able to accommodate the full range of standard sizes. This particular pod, however, sported lines nearly as—
His breath caught. Lines, he thought. Not a pod—a ship.