Unto Zeor, Forever

by Jacqueline Lichtenberg

  Digen shook his head, a quirk of a smile at the corner of his mouth. “Sugar frosting.”

  The warm leap of understanding between them bewildered the other channels in the room. He’s an outcast, thought Digen. I’m not supposed to feel for him at all. As Digen cooled his emotional nager toward the man, Hayashi ached with such loneliness that Digen almost cried. Then that too was wiped away, as if it had never been. Zeor discipline.

  They could work together only under the Tecton.

  Im’ran said into the uncomfortable silence, “Digen, I think maybe you ought to leave.”

  Digen shook his head. “You didn’t tell me this Jesse Elkar was my Jesse ambrov Zeor. He’s my friend, Im’, and one of my members. I can’t—just leave.”

  “I’m glad of that,” said Ilyana. “I was beginning to think this place peopled by ghouls and soulless devils, as if friendship counted for nothing.”

  Hayashi said, “Friendship doesn’t count for much, Ilyana, not where transfer is concerned.”

  Digen, still stationing himself beside Elkar to manage the fields for him, said, “I want to know what you’re planning.”

  Im’ran said, “I got him into this. I’m going to use Ilyana to get him out. Mora will balance and monitor to keep him from going after me again. Rin is here because he won’t let Ilyana out of his sight.”

  Digen nodded. “Good idea. Who controls?”

  Im’ran said, “Jesse, of course.”

  “Tricky,” said Digen; then he looked to Ilyana. “You agree?”

  Wretchedly, she said, “Have I any choice?”

  It was then that Digen noticed, through the veil of Hayashi’s field control, just how overcharged Ilyana’s field was. He was stunned that she could stand there, rational not fifteen paces from her transfer partner. Hayashi was shielding her but was unable to damp her production rate as Digen had done when they had first met.

  Im’ran said, “There’s no danger. They’re not within thirty-eight per cent of being matched. No danger of a lortuen at all. I calculated it myself.”

  Doesn’t trust Mickland’s figures? Every day Digen discovered something new he liked about Im’ran. “I believe you,” said Digen. “But in a straight transfer…” he said, turning to Elkar. “What do you think? Can you hold on to her?”

  Elkar shook his head. “She’s more than I could ever require. But—I don’t know. This thing has such a grip on me. I’m afraid I’m going to abort.”

  “I know what that’s like,” said Digen. He turned to Im’ran. “You know what a null backcurrent is?”

  Im’ran shook his head, searching his memory. “Some Zeor technique—you establish a new dependency to nullify another, and in the end, if you balance it just right, you end up with no dependency?”

  Hayashi said, “Hajene, you can’t! Not while you’re in such Need. Not with Ilyana!”

  Digen kept his gaze on Elkar. “Jesse is ambrov Zeor. Legally it’s permissible—within Zeor. And it’s time Jesse learned the technique. It could have saved him a lot of trouble already.”

  Ilyana said, “Wait a minute. Nobody told me anything about breaking into a dependency. I wouldn’t cut into somebody’s transfer mating.”

  Hayashi took her aside into a corner while Digen went on discussing the fine points with Im’ran and Elkar. Im’ran stood with one arm around Mora Dyen, well away from Elkar and Digen. As he talked, Digen realized just how much deep affection there was between Im’ran and the woman.

  Im’ran said, “I don’t know. If we’re not careful, Jesse could end up in a dependency on Ilyana!”

  Digen nodded. “That’s why it’s not a general Tecton method. It requires a monitoring channel with the kind of performance ratings that can be built in only by Zeor training. That’s just too much work for most people.” He looked significantly at Elkar, wondering why the man had chosen to use his family name instead of the “ambrov Zeor” he was entitled to. Obviously Elkar had kept up his routine practice exercises. Digen could see that in the nager.

  “So,” said Digen to Im’ran, “I will take Mora’s place opposite you.”

  Hayashi came to the group then, Ilyana a little behind him. “Hajene Farris, Mickland will be very upset if you’re exposed to Ilyana in a transfer situation. You’ve already had too much exposure to her.”

  “I’m not worried about Ilyana. I’m worried about Jesse. I’m going to have to ask you and Mora to wait outside. We’ve only got a couple of minutes left to set this up.”

  Both channels began to protest. But there was really nothing they could say. Legally, Digen had the right of it. And he was the ranking channel, not only in that room but in all of Westfield District. He even ranked Mickland, if it came to a showdown. And as long as he didn’t get involved in a lortuen with Ilyana, nobody could really say anything.

  Reluctantly, Hayashi and Mora Dyen left. Digen said, “Im’, I’ve got to apologize for doing this to you. I don’t doubt that you could handle it—honestly I don’t. But it would be awfully hard on Jesse.”

  “It’s all right. I understand.” Im’ran was wholly professional, distanced from the situation.

  Ilyana came toward Elkar, who had leaned back on the lounge as the others left, knowing his time was almost there. Digen admired his control as Ilyana approached and he didn’t move a muscle. Ilyana said, “Do you really like Im’ran so little that you want to break off with him?”

  Elkar shook his head. “I like Im’ran fine. But I don’t want any sort of dependency. That’s the law here, Ilyana.”

  Ilyana shook her head. “I don’t understand how they can make laws governing such a personal thing as transfer.” She sat down beside the channel, reaching for his arms, where his laterals were trembling uncontrollably. Digen and Im’ran moved, then, to opposite sides of the lounge. Digen put his own hand out to intercept Ilyana’s touch, and her fingers closed on the back of his hand. His own laterals vibrated in response to her but he had himself under firm control, functioning wholly in the channel mode, using his secondary system to manage the fields.

  “Not yet, Ilyana.”

  “I thought you wanted me to give him transfer.”

  “In a minute. Do you know how to link in trautholo?”

  She flashed contempt at him. “You think I’m a child?”

  “Just link with him as deeply as you can,” said Digen.

  She fell easily into that special state of pretransfer readiness, which was handled with such dread respect by Tecton Donors. Elkar relaxed instantly, all the driving pressures of Need removed by the linked readiness of his Donor.

  Digen said, “Now, Jesse, be ready to initiate selyn flow on my signal. Ilyana, you remain wholly passive in this—can you do it?”

  Contempt again, but she didn’t answer verbally. Digen coached them through it, gauging the time spent in trautholo against Elkar’s affinity for Im’ran. When he had an exact match, he called in the transfer, which went as smoothly as any he’d ever monitored. Elkar didn’t flinch or waver, drawing his satisfaction in one smooth sweep, with no sign of abort.

  When it was over, Ilyana drew back, giving Elkar time to dismantle the contacts. Then, standing, her body now low enough in selyn that she didn’t feel sick, she looked at her arms, then at Im’ran. To Digen she said, “When I helped you heal the little girl whose stomach had been cut open, I felt good about it. I thought maybe the Tecton wasn’t so bad after all. But now—I feel soiled!”

  Even with her reduced field, the self-disgust and loathing filled the room, overpowering both Digen and Elkar. Ilyana turned then and fled out the door, slamming it behind her. The two Simes exchanged glances, sharing a big sigh.

  Digen said, “If word ever leaks out-Territory about us harboring a Distect Gen, vigilantes will storm the walls or burn the Sime Center down.”

  “Oh, Digen, this isn’t a Householding, it’s a Tecton Center. The days of raids and such are gone a hundred years.”

  Digen laughed. “It’s a good thing Gens can’t read fields.
With her temper, we’d never keep her a secret.”

  Im’ran came over from the bar carrying a tray of trin tea glasses. “Digen, would they really be so upset? One Distect Gen? I mean, a Distect Sime working as a channel, I could understand them being upset—but she’s not even working as a Donor. Jesse controlled that transfer, first to last, didn’t he?”

  “He did,” said Digen. “She let him. Let him, mind you. If she’d wanted to, she could have taken it away from him at any point, and he’d have had no choice in the matter. It’s not just her selyn field strength, Im’, it’s something about the way she—conducts herself. She’s used to dominating Simes.”

  Im’ran said, “They don’t have channels in the Distect. So I guess all the Gens are Companions.”

  “Any way you figure it,” said Digen, “Ilyana is something very—special.” He was beginning to feel the ineffable fatigue as his systems strove to recover from the high-focus functional mode he had been operating in. “Move over, Jesse, I’m going to lie down for a moment.”

  Elkar moved, and Digen slid down onto the lounge, letting Elkar take his glass of tea from his tentacles. Elkar touched Digen’s left arm with the tip of one tentacle, sensing how the scar tissue was impeding the selyn flows and slowing Digen’s recovery.

  Digen, sensing that this, more than anything else, was what had been bothering the channel, gripped Elkar’s wrist and extended his laterals, using one dorsal to point at the scar on the left outer lateral. “It’s healed nicely, see? I can do everything I could do before. Some things I’m even better at. My only problem is this fatigue. My limit is about three class-A functionals a day.”

  It was like a professional ballplayer now confined to a wheelchair saying bravely, “I can even play on the paraplegic team.” Elkar reached for contact with Digen’s laterals. “Oh, Digen…I shouldn’t have let you.…”

  Digen permitted him the contact. “See, it’s not so bad.” But he knew Elkar remembered too keenly the time when Digen had measured his recovery time in seconds, when he’d carried a hundred class As, seventy Bs, plus dozens of minors every day for weeks on end without showing signs of fatigue. The channel couldn’t face Digen’s debility.

  And Digen suddenly realized that this was why Elkar had not come to see him during his long convalescence. He’d been afraid. The healthy often fear the crippled in a peculiar way.

  Im’ran said, “Let me get in there, Jesse.”

  Elkar relinquished his place to Im’ran. Digen felt the fanir’s strong beat sink into him and sort out all the kinks and eddies in his selyn flows. Elkar said, “Do a good job for the Sectuib.” And then he was gone, leaving them alone.

  After a while, Digen sat up. “I don’t know how you did it, but I feel ready to go to work.”

  “No,” said Im’ran. “Actually, you feel rotten. It’s just been so long since you felt even mediocre that you’ve forgotten what it’s like.”

  “Well, relatively great, then. You really do have a magic touch, over and above being fanir. Who trained you?”

  “My father. He made First Order on his fourth transfer.”

  “Is he training anyone else?”

  “He died years ago.”

  “I’m sorry. I would have liked to meet him.” Digen swung his feet to the floor. “I feel privileged to be allotted so much of your time.”

  “Privileged? After the way I’ve botched this dependency thing? If I’d handled it right, I wouldn’t have had to resort to using Ilyana—and you wouldn’t have had to expose yourself to her—again.”

  “If you’d told me it was my Jesse you were working with, I could have saved you a lot of trouble.”

  “He never uses the ‘ambrov Zeor’—doesn’t even wear the Householding ring.”

  “I thought I knew Jesse pretty well. I’d never have believed him afraid to face people like Mickland with his Household affiliation—or I’d never sponsored him for Zeor in First Year camp.”

  “You’ve known him that long?”

  “You saw—he doesn’t even think of me as Sectuib Farris. I’m just ‘Digen’ to him. In fact, I haven’t even seen him since I became Sectuib.”

  “I don’t like to gossip,” said Im’ran. And it was true. Digen had never heard Im’ran say anything personal about another. “But—well—Mora knows the girl who Jesse is going with. A renSime—Rona ambrov Zeor.”

  Digen nodded. “I know her parents. Good for Jesse.”

  “The big argument between them is whether you’re going to perform the wedding in Zeor or whether it will be a civil wedding. Any wedding the Sectuib in Zeor performs will make the newsreels in theaters across the continent. Jesse apparently doesn’t want a Zeor wedding-because he doesn’t feel worthy of it.”

  “Not worthy? What’s he done that I don’t know about?”

  “Nothing. The man’s a model channel! I’ve never worked for better. The whole dependency mess was my fault, you know that. But Jesse feels it’s his fault.”

  Now Digen nodded comprehension. “I should have guessed. He was always that way, even when we were kids. I’ll have to have a talk with him.”

  “Don’t let on I said anything. Mora would murder me. Besides, Imil doesn’t carry tales.”

  Im’ran’s right hand was resting on Digen’s left arm, just over the lateral scar. As they had been talking, the Gen had been working. Digen admired Im’ran’s smoothness in splitting his attention. He put one dorsal tentacle of his left hand on the Gen’s crest ring, bearing both the seal of Imil and the Tecton Donor’s identification. “You feel very strongly about your House, don’t you, Im’?”

  “Well, about being a Householder, yes, but about Imil in particular—no, not anymore. Did you know I’m First Companion now? And I can’t stand—you won’t tell anyone I said so?—I just can’t stand Asquith.”

  Digen laughed. He laughed so hard and long that Im’ran said, “What’s so funny? A First Companion who can’t stand his own Sectuib?”

  “No, no, that’s not funny at all. You don’t know, do you? About Wyner and Asquith? You’re—what—my age? You should remember.”

  Im’ran, bewildered, shook his head.

  “Before Asquith’s father died and she became Sectuib in Imil, she wanted to trade into Zeor and marry my brother Wyner, who was heir to Zeor at that time. The bargain was that she would come to Zeor and I would go to Imil to become Sectuib in Imil. The bargaining went on for months, until Wyner told me that he just couldn’t stand Asquith. But Wyner—he couldn’t defend himself. And one time Asquith and I met at some changeover party, and—I don’t remember what happened, but I got so mad at her I threw a pastry at her. There are newspaper photographs to prove how redfaced I was—I screamed something obscene to the effect that I’d rather be fourth channel under Wyner than Sectuib anywhere—no offense to Imil, you understand.”

  Im’ran joined Digen’s laughter then, gasping out that he remembered the incident now but had thought it was Digen’s other brother, Nigel, who had been involved. “Now I understand,” said Im’ran, “why Asquith is always saying that if it hadn’t been for you, she would have become Sectuib in Zeor.”

  Digen wasn’t sure about that. The process of choosing the best channel in a Householding was often long and complex. “She might well have ended up Regent if not Sectuib.”

  “As far as world prestige is concerned, the Regent in Zeor is far more powerful than any mere Sectuib of another House.”

  Digen chuckled, shaking his head. “As a politician, I make a pretty good surgeon.”

  Im’ran started to answer, then stopped himself. “Uh-oh.”

  “What?”

  “Asquith is arriving on the night train, it says on today’s schedule.”

  “Really?” said Digen. “Well, all that was a long time ago. We’ve both grown up some.”

  “You maybe, but I’m not so sure about her.”

  “I don’t intend to go out of my way to see her. But if I do see her, I shall merely extend Zeor’s greeting in a fo
rmal way. Don’t worry, the world has yet to see the Sectuib of one House being rude to the Sectuib of another—at least not in public.”

  Im’ran fell silent, brooding. Digen was beginning to be able to read the Gen’s nager. “Im’, is there something you want to tell me?”

  Im’ran shook his head. “This isn’t the right time.”

  “It may not be the right time,” said Digen, “but the way life is around here, it might well be the only time. How long has it been since we’ve sat over a glass of tea together? You know, the only reason I’m still sitting here is that I didn’t turn on my light on the roll board when I came into the building. The page doesn’t know I’m here yet.”

  “You’ve got a point.” Im’ran sighed. “Digen, I—I have a secret ambition.”

  Digen listened.

  “I would—I want to be adopted into the House of Zeor. There. I’ve said it.”

  Digen considered gravely before he answered. “Im’, you are good enough, no doubt about that. But—there is the matter of Jesse’s dependency. Zeor is even stricter than the Tecton when it comes to carelessness—not that I believe you were careless, but—look, let’s put it off until after our transfer. After that, I’ll know you better than you can be known on paper. But—if that’s all clear, and I don’t see why it shouldn’t be—I’ll talk to Asquith about it. Tell me, how does Mora feel about all this?”

  “Mora?”

  “She means a lot to you. Is it mutual?”

  Im’ran twirled his glass nervously between his palms. “I keep asking her to marry me, but she keeps putting me off.”

  “Zeor doesn’t marry outsiders, and I take it she isn’t a Householder at all. Is that why she’s putting you off?”

  “No.”

  “You can be so positive?”

  “I know why. She has something she wants to do first.”

  “Hm? What’s that?” It was an impertinent question, but Im’ran’s request for adoption put their relationship in a new light.

  Im’ran said, “I think she’d rather tell you herself. It’s really more between you and her, I think.”