Divine Right

by C. J. Cherryh

  "How long has she been like this?" Dani demanded, professional fury in her voice. "Don't you people have any common—"

  Chamoun raised a hand to silence her. The gesture was so reminiscent of Magruder that Dani stopped in mid-sentence despite herself.

  She must remember that this wasn't some Merovingian fop; this was Chance's protege, chosen out of a huge field for a difficult and dangerous assignment. Whatever Michael Chamoun was, he wasn't stupid, or innocuous, or innocent.

  "Outside," Chamoun suggested, half an order, half a plea. "If you've seen enough?"

  "I have." The patient in question wasn't going to last much longer, left untreated; but a few more hours wouldn't make things that much worse, considering how much harm had already been done. "Somewhere we can talk freely?"

  The balcony, revealed when Chamoun pulled back heavy curtains, was awash in the blazing summer daylight. Out in the heat, under a white sky, Chamoun's face looked as waxy as Dani's felt. She rubbed her cheeks, stiff and tingly from lack of sleep, and wondered when she'd get some, and whether Chamoun had had any, lately.

  "So?" said the husband.

  "So we operate. As soon as I get some sleep."

  "If it's that bad, why can't you do it now?" Chamoun crossed his arms over a chest rising and falling too fast for Dani's peace of mind.

  "Because my hand has to be steady and I haven't even unpacked my instruments yet. You tell her family we'll need lots of boiled water, boiled sheets, and complete privacy.'' Before I do anything more, I've got to talk to Chance, sonny; and so should you.

  "Cassie's the most important one ..." The young agent sounded truly tortured, squinting beyond her into the morning light as he offered advice counter to his objective here, knowing she'd know the significance of what he was saying. "We can always have another baby."

  "Don't be too sure. You two children have got yourselves into quite a mess."

  "We're not children," he flared. "We're prepared to face the consequences."

  "The consequences are going to be a healthy baby and a mother recovering from drug addiction. I'll promise you the one if you'll promise me the other."

  "You'll have to talk to her father, and her uncle, Cardinal Ito, about that. The College gives her the drugs these days, not me." And then he faced her. His eyes were bloodshot. "1 don't know how" much you think you can do, or what the Embassy did to get you here, but I'm truly grateful. Just save her, m'sera . . . Doctor Lambert. Just save her, hear?"

  "You come back with me to the Embassy. I've got lots of questions about her earlier symptoms." You never could tell who might be listening, even on a balcony. "And we don't have much time." And you'd better let Chance brief you, sonny. You're not in line with the program as I've been given to understand it.

  "If you'll just speak with her father, Vega, first. . . Then I can leave with you. He'll want to know when you're going to . . . operate."

  "I told you, I need to go back to the Embassy right away. I want you with me." She sighed. She didn't like being pushed this way; she wasn't sure whether she was talking to a Sword agent or a distraught husband. Maybe both in quick rotation. Chamoun obviously wasn't thinking as clearly as he might. "I'm going to give you something for your nerves," she decided. "And you're not going to argue. As soon as we get to the Embassy. Now, if you must, take me to the father. I'll give him a timetable and tell him what to prepare here." Then she smiled a professional smile, reaching out to squeeze Chamoun's hand. "And don't worry." It's too late for that. "We'll pull them both through, mother and child."

  Chamoun nearly hugged her. She stepped back, out of the light, into the room where Cassie Boregy was muttering to herself in a waking dream.

  How did they get her lucid enough to prophesy? Dani wondered as Chamoun led the way out of his wife's room, stopping only long enough to kiss her clammy forehead and promise that he'd be right back.

  The father was having breakfast at one end of a table for twenty. A massive repast was on the sideboard; on his plate was only a piece of toast.

  Vega Boregy, a black-haired man with translucently pale skin, stood up to greet her. "Your diagnosis, Doctor?" he asked without preamble.

  She spun her tale of exigency carefully: "I'll operate this evening. We want to get moving on this. No drugs whatsoever today. I want a list of what you people have been giving her, and when any medication was last administered. No food or water, either. I'll take your son-in-law with me to the Embassy, and he'll oversee the transfer of what I need from there to here. I'll want a few hours' rest first. This is going to be tricky, I won't lie to you. But we'll do our best to see to it that you have a healthy daughter and grandchild by tomorrow morning. I'd like the notes of the attending physicians sent over to the Nev Hettek Embassy as soon as possible ..."

  Vega Boregy nodded. "Michael, leave us alone. You'll escort Doctor Lambert, give her every cooperation."

  When the Sword agent had left, the father said, "Cassie's welfare is my sole concern in this matter. Do I make myself clear? We Merovingians don't put such a premium on offspring that we'll risk the mother. It's imperative that you understand my position: If there's a choice to be made, there's no question of what choice should be made. I need your concurrence on that point before you touch my daughter.''

  Dani met the piercing gaze of Vega Boregy with her best medical hauteur. "M'ser, I'm a physician. I save life when I can; I'm not a magician. Whatever my choice would be were it up to me, your daughter may die in this operation. Without it, she surely will. I'll do my best to save Cassie; you must give me your word that you'll do yours."

  "Of course. Don't be ridiculous."

  "I'm not being ridiculous. I'm about to be blunt. If I offend, you may of course take that up with my Embassy. I can't and won't be responsible for Cassie's survival and subsequent recovery unless my instructions are followed to the letter. Do you agree?"

  "Certainly. Why else would you be here, a stranger, if we weren't convinced your expertise was the finest we could obtain?"

  "Fine. Thank you for your confidence. Let me be specific. You've allowed your daughter to become a drug abuser. Why isn't my affair. But it must stop or her life will be the price of it. After the operation, she'll be weak. She'll ask for her drugs. No one is to give them to her.''

  "You're unfamiliar with the situation here, Doctor Lambert." Boregy's tone warned her off.

  "I'm Cassie's doctor, and I'm telling you, she can't survive this interval if I'm not given total control of her. I don't want to see her survive the operation and die of misplaced compassion, or political necessity, or whatever you're trying to allude to—and have Nev Hettek take the blame. Are we communicating, here?"

  Boregy rubbed his nose, hiding whatever expression flitted across his face. "M'sera, you'll have our full cooperation. Once the operation is done, if Cassie survives, you'll have our eternal gratitude. And our confidence. Perhaps you'd like to stay at Boregy House with us, where your familiarization with our special circumstances can be accelerated."

  "Perhaps that's a good idea—at least the first few nights, so that I'm here if there's some crisis. I'll give a list of what I'll need to your son-in-law, as I said. We'll have my things sent over." And I'll be right here where you can get your hands on me if anything goes wrong and Cassie dies, don't worry about that. She wasn't accustomed to such blatant threats. As she'd told Karl, this was a different culture, one where responsibility for events fell on everyone associated with those events.

  Vega thanked her. She thanked him, in return, for his kind invitation. It was all very civil, very smooth.

  Michael Chamoun, when he escorted her down antediluvian stairs to the Boregy water-gate and into a speedboat, was shivering visibly as he said, "Well, what do you really think?"

  "I really think," Dani said, "that you're going to have a recovering mother with a healthy baby in her arms by this time tomorrow."

  Let Magruder explain to Chamoun just whose baby that was going to be; and explain to her how they w
ere going to get poor little Hope into Boregy House without anyone noticing.

  Because Hope was going to be the baby. In Cassie Boregy's distended belly, there'd been no fetal heartbeat, not a movement, not a sign that whatever was in there had a breath of life in it.

  Dani Lambert felt as if she might be sick. She hugged herself as the water-gate rose and the speedboat roared to life, waiting for the rush of anger that must sustain her, and make her strong enough to do what she'd been brought down here to do.

  When it didn't come, she summoned it: Give her baby to strangers to raise, on the orders of a man who must suspect he was Hope's father. She was going to make Magruder pay for this, if it was the last thing she ever did.

  Chance had his hands full with Tatiana—literally— when a knock on his salon door and a note slipped discreetly under it told him that Dani was back, with Mike Chamoun in tow.

  It was one thing to keep Kenner waiting downstairs where he couldn't get into trouble and could watch people come and go and get a feel for how the Embassy worked. That was simple tradecraft; an opportunity taken when it arose. But this was just pisspoor timing.

  He was off stroke today, and the daughter of Iosef Kalugin knew him too well for him to be able to cover it.

  He came toward her with the note in one hand, his pants in the other. Their lunch lay untouched on the table; she lay unsatisfied on the couch. "We must have been bad little cockroaches in our previous lives," he said, tossing the note between her most honorable breasts. "What do we do? Finish what we've been trying to start here, or eat some of that lunch we haven't touched, or get the state business out of the way? I've got to tend to the obstetrician we brought down for the Boregys."

  Tatiana Kalugin raised one muscled thigh and looked at it critically, as if it were more interesting than the note he'd thrown her to read. "So that's what's got you distracted. Cassie Boregy again. We can't seem to keep my father out of our sex life, can we?" She was frowning.

  He knew what that meant. He dropped his pants and knelt down beside her. "Tatiana, the governor has me on a short leash here." He touched her waist. She didn't pull away. He let his index finger penetrate her bellybutton.

  She arched against it. "Chance, I hate us not having time for each other like this."

  She wasn't going to let him off the hook. Test of strength, proof of intent. The last thing he needed was Tatiana feeling slighted. He said, "Let's spend the night together," and let his hand run down from her belly to the raised thigh.

  She reached for him with the hand holding the note. "You're incorrigible."

  Just busy, honey. But the outrageousness of continuing on with her while Dani and Chamoun waited, and the risk on every side, excited him more than it worried him. His focus narrowed: it was quicker to do what their bodies were urging than to explain why there wasn't time or what was so troubling that he couldn't. And he could.

  So he must. As he did, he told himself that the governor's daughter knew him well enough to know he could perform in most crises. And it was safer to leave her happy than resentful. Or maybe it was just that he liked combat, and Tatiana was always that. This was a battle of wills, and one of wits, and the prize was control of Merovingen itself.

  In moments like these, with Tatiana more responsive under him than someone with less at stake could ever be, he wondered if it were him she was wrapping her legs around, or the entire Nev Hetteker enemy.

  But he wondered what he was doing with her all too often, playing this most dangerous game. When her father had caught them together, Magruder had thought he'd be packed off to Nev Hettek forthwith. But Ta-tiana's power had shielded him. She was "m'sera Secretary" and lots more. She was Anastasi's real rival for the governor's legacy, now that Mikhail was following Cassie Boregy like a sheep.

  Without Tatiana's support, Magruder couldn't have rammed home the machinist venture, or secured the permits to bring in Kenner and Jacobs, or even acquired the Embassy territory he now controlled.

  One of these days, she was going to ask for more than sex. Right now, giving her his full attention was his pleasure.

  When she gave a tiny gasp and stiffened, quivered, then relaxed under him, he let himself shudder as well. Women faked it all the time. She didn't need to know that he wasn't about to give up a bit of his edge right now.

  She came up on one elbow when he'd slid off her, after looking exaggeratedly deep into her eyes and murmuring, "Yep, that got the job done."

  And she said, watching him dress, "Why are we taking risks like these, Chance?"

  He was buckling his belt. "Because we can't not. We live in a damned fishbowl. Even fish have got a right . . ." Then he looked up at her as he reached for his shirt, realizing that her voice was strange, that now, in the middle of all this, she was about to up the ante. "But that's not the answer you're looking for." It came out of him about an octave too low, sounding too much like a duelist's challenge.

  She said, "Do you think we're falling in love? Because I can't understand it, otherwise." She raked her hair back from her face. Her words had been tremulous. "I don't need all this . . . with you. My life was nicely—"

  "I think we have trouble with that word," he said, knowing he was going to have to declare himself way beyond what he'd always considered the call of duty, or make an enemy. "But yeah, I think you're right, only I'm a foreigner, here on your family's sufferance, and I never could have said it first. Couldn't dare to say it." He took a deep breath and walked over to that couch like he was walking out on a limb he knew was likely to break at any moment. "We're not kids. If I started talking about . . . love . . . and it was unwelcome," he shrugged, "well, you'd have started wondering about ulterior motives and next thing I knew, I'd have been packed off to Nev Hettek as unsuitable, or in a Justiciary cell explaining myself.''

  "Chance . . ." She got up, that whole long nude and beautiful length of her that was his enemy, and in a moment she was in his arms, her belly pressing against his belt buckle. "What are we going to do?"

  "Take our time. Go carefully. We're an item in public. Is it so wrong that there's more to that than convenience?" You know there is, and I do too, and it's whatever you want to make of it, lady. There's no words I won't say and nothing I won't do, as long as it makes you happy and relaxed while I get my work done.

  "I don't mean that. I mean, how are we going to handle . . . everything? Anastasi, my father. . . ?"

  "Whoa. Put your clothes on, first thing. Get out of here and let me look like I'm gainfully employed for the rest of today, next thing. Let's spend the night here, where we can talk. If your schedule permits?"

  "I'll make it permit."

  Great. Perfect timing. You and Dani under one roof. "Then I'll see you for dinner and we'll have all night to convince each other we shouldn't be executed for letting this happen."

  She kissed him on the lips and whispered something. He was almost sure it was, "I love you," but he wasn't sure enough to ask her to repeat it.

  He couldn't imagine what the hell was going on in her head, to open matters up like this. Unless she really was in love and not thinking straight.

  But you just didn't get that lucky. Marrying into the power structure was something that they'd planned for Mike Chamoun, at a nice, controllable level. If he and Tatiana didn't watch themselves, they'd both end up floating facedown in the Grand. Anastasi and his daddy would vie for the privilege of giving the orders to their personal militias.

  When Tatiana was dressed and he'd deemed her presentable, he escorted her out of the salon, through the antechamber, and to the front door himself, all but ignoring Dani and Mike Chamoun.

  If Karl Fon hadn't come down to put Magruder on notice that Fon was watching so carefully, Magruder wouldn't have been so worried about appearances, with so much really wrong.

  Before he went back to his office, he snagged a staffer and gave orders to reset the salon for four and sneak Kenner up the back stairs and in to join them. Might as well have a party large enough that Da
ni couldn't broach anything personal.

  He could tell by the look on her face that she'd examined Cassie and realized he was right about the baby. And he could tell by Michael's face that she probably hadn't told the kid yet, or Chamoun would be angry and resentful, not distraught.

  Well, the privilege of command included the joys of making people hate your guts for their own good. He'd always known that. He'd just never realized that making people love you so that you could destroy them was part of his job. Or that it would feel so confusing.

  He was going to go get drunk with Mike Chamoun, soonest, and compare notes on what it was like to be a revolutionary whore.

  Next to what he had on his plate, sneaking baby Hope into Boregy House and sneaking out whatever Cassie had in her oven was going to be easy. A veritable piece of cake.

  Or so he thought until he saw Dani's face, stony and cold, and she announced that she'd be staying with the Boregys for the foreseeable future. He couldn't imagine why that bothered him the way it did.

  But it did.

  Dani Lambert's hands were shaking like leaves in an autumn gale, now that the deed was done. Thank heavens there'd been no one in Cassie's bedroom during the operation but Michael and the assistant the Embassy had provided.

  Thank heavens, too, that Boregy House had electrics. They'd brought in all they could, and Michael had added a battery-operated searchlight from one of his ships.

  Vega Boregy had suggested taking Cassie over to the College and using an operating facility there, and Dani had brazened her way through it, saying that moving Cassie would be the worst thing they could do.

  She'd blocked Vega's attempts to insert other physicians to help, people from the College staff. She'd said she needed all the room she could get, and the medic from the Embassy was trained in Nev Hetteker procedures.

  Given the tension between the two cultures, and the premium everyone put on trade secrets, and the nervous father, she'd managed to push that through against all reason.

  She cursed Chance Magruder unto eternity as she set to work.