“Because I am a Minister of the Eighth Rank, and you are a Director,” Yuur snapped, finally displaying his exasperation, his pique. At least enough for the camera to pick it up and relay his feelings. “The Holding is a function of Scholars, not Warriors. I am willing accommodate you, but only so far. There are limits and you have reached one of them. Am I clear?”
Yuur did have to credit the Director with some measure of sense. Rather than continue to push, as most naval types probably would have, Xi Derag Ahma Kier nodded, face sour and anger simmering. Recognizing when sheer stubbornness was apt to become counter-productive to her mission.
He had never before met the Director of the great warship Steadfast at Dawn. The vessel itself had never had cause to even consider a visit to Trusski, ere now. But it was here, orbiting overhead geo-synchronously, a greater tool of firepower and destruction than even Red Admiral Keller had brought.
Judging by the image on his screen, the Director was a woman small of stature, but large of spirit, doubly so as she had been awarded command one of the border fleet’s anchorships. Skin darker than burnished gold, perhaps with just enough bronze mixed in to exhibit resilience. Large eyes, out of proportion to the rest of her face, expressive and currently unshielded. Expressing her inner thoughts.
Thus, a Warrior and not a Scholar.
“I hear and obey, my Khan,” she said. Graciously, even.
Yuur suspected the woman was angry enough to chew nails. Not many people would ever tell this Director no. Fewer still, in a situation like this one.
“Thank you,” Yuur replied, allowing the situation to fully defuse. The woman meant well, after all. “Let us make this a late-morning social event tomorrow, followed by a working lunch. I find the Ambassador quite adept at holding her own before a potentially hostile audience, as well as a personally-charming conversationalist. That leaves us the afternoon to follow up, and perhaps a state dinner. Or gives us all a chance to separate and have a quiet meal, if necessary.”
There was the threat under his words. That this strange Director would behave herself while on his planet, or find herself banished from his presence. And she appeared to finally understand that.
Previously-irresistible force meeting ominously-immovable object.
“I will make arrangements to be on the surface not long after dawn, my Khan,” Director Xi said simply.
Yuur nodded and cut the circuit. Their two staffs would organize everything from here on, leaving him time in the morning to watch a shooting star resolve itself into yet another invader landing. Another come to threaten the quiet progress he had achieved on this farming world over the last decade.
This one would not bring a wooden spear with a metal head. And certainly not one dipped previously in blood, according to the ancient rites.
He banished the gloominess from his mood, almost a physical act. The Holding was a structure of Scholars. That was what he had told the Director. It was what the Eldest had told him, when he was last on Winterhome, visiting the great, golden pearl orbiting overhead, the vision of strength and eternity that housed the Lord of Winter himself. In the time before Yuur had crossed depth and darkness to arrive at this place.
Yuur sighed. Trusski was not important enough to be a significant factor in the machinations of great empires.
And yet.
History would record his name prominently. Perhaps as a hero. Perhaps a villain.
Probably just as a fool. Or worse, a victim.
He brought himself back to the room around him, aware that his focus was still intent on the now-blank screen linking him to Steadfast at Dawn.
It was a spare space, as suited his nature. There is no permanence in man, so he retained very little sentiment in place. A few knick-knacks from his much younger days, mementos of a woman he had been allowed to mate with on four separate occasions. She had born him children that no doubt grew up to uphold the best of The Holding with their strength, for she had been a formidable woman.
The rest of the place was contained in raw, wooden walls, polished to a comfortable finish and sealed adequately for the simple needs of the man occupying them.
He cycled the communications unit live again and pressed the button to summon Gan. The wait was less than two minutes, most of which was probably spent walking from a quiet bench with a good sun-facing. Gan liked to bask in solar warmth, given any chance.
The door opened on silent hinges.
“Minister?” his aide inquired.
“Locate Scholar Bhattacharya and summon her to my presence in the Lesser Hall, Gan,” Yuur said. “I would provide her as much warning and time to prepare as possible.”
Yuur rose as Gan closed the door with a nod. Trusski had never seen the war. Until the barbarian Keller had arrived, he hadn’t even realized his world was listed on Imperial navigation charts as inhabited. There was nothing here of value to steal, and ships were too infrequent for marauders to profitably lie in wait. And even then, what value had a mega-ton load of grain, except on a mining colony?
Yuur adjusted his Ministerial robes, and then changed his mind and stripped them off. He would meet Fribourg’s Ambassador in his lesser robes. She would note the difference. Perhaps she would appreciate the informality.
Unlike Steadfast at Dawn, Bhattacharya and Keller had arrived quietly, and acted with respect but not diffidence. Sought to understand, rather than brusquely issuing orders.
Yuur had, after all, always hoped that something interesting would happen, to break up the monotony of the seasons.
He feared he might come to regret those sentiments.
Yuur sat on a bench along the side wall of the Lesser Hall, letting the light that spilled through stained glass windows overhead paint fanciful patterns on his skin. He could only imagine what the colors looked like on his bald head, considering the odd looks on the faces of the half-dozen Scholars in silent attendance. But they were seated farther away on the same bench, or hovering nervously nearby.
One of the perks of his job were the little practical jokes he could play on himself, and by extension, his staff. Quirks such as meeting the Ambassador in an informal chamber, and sitting quietly in the reception area awaiting her arrival.
The little things he did to pop the bubbles of pomposity that persistently inflated around him.
Gan escorted the woman into the chamber with a fierce gaze at the room. And the faintest blush when he realized why everyone was out of position. Gan would make a fine Minister, one day soon, but he occasionally still had rough edges that needed sanding down.
Yuur smiled serenely at the twosome and patted the bench beside him.
“Ambassador Bhattacharya,” he called out. “Please join me.”
Her look was even more revealing, a momentary panic that she had unknowingly said or done something improper and had thereby brought embarrassment on herself, or perhaps upon him. A welcome change from the Director and her harsh bluntness.
Bhattacharya recovered instantly, though, and strode closer with élan and flair. He had checked her schedule this morning, approving the curriculum his staff had prepared, intended to educate this so-called barbarian with culture and grace.
Today, she had been visiting a zoological research facility. A fancy name for a pig-breeding farm. Many ethnologies had inherited the ancient, European mutation that allowed them to process the milk of a bovine, and thus consume such exotics as cheese. But that allele was rare in The Holding, and almost unknown on Trusski, so the breeders focused on pigs and sheep, for the most part.
Sheep were easy to modify over time, producing wool of great strength combined with luxurious texture. Trusski had even recently begun exporting it, having developed a market on Ninagirsu, clear across the gulf. Yuur secretly harbored the ambitious goal of opening the way to the rest of the Altai sector within another generation. Pigs would require some effort yet.
The Fribourg woman sat carefully, willing herself perfectly upright, leaving too much weight on her toes, rather than relaxing back into the cool stone of the bench and wall as he did.
“A ship has arrived from Samara,” Yuur began simply, rewarded by the faintest flinch quickly obscured. “A warship. The Director originally demanded that you be handed over into military custody.”
He enjoyed the way this woman nodded, slowly and with calm assurance, as if that had been her expectation from the day she arrived. Perhaps it had.
What else should one expect, leading an invasion of an alien world with less than two hands of staff? And only two of them qualifying as warriors, beyond the Scholar herself.
“Originally?” Bhattacharya inquired carefully.
Yuur smiled. He would refashion this woman into a proper Scholar yet.
“You are an Ambassador, Scholar Bhattacharya,” he replied. “While we do not hold to the barbaric folly of your so-called Laws of Recognized Warfare, there are certain immutable customs and standards of behavior that mark civilized societies.”
“I see,” she said with a perfect nod. “Thank you.”
Truly, an amazing woman to have grasped the many fine layers of subtlety in his words.
Keller had chosen well. Yuur hoped that this woman had a mate at home who appreciated her.
“Tomorrow morning, you will join me in the Great Hall,” he continued, making it more of a request than an order with his tone. “The Director of the vessel Steadfast at Dawn and her staff will arrive approximately two hours after sunrise. There will be a brief reception, and then we will retire to a meeting room and then you will be forced to repeat to her everything you have already told me.”
He paused, and then grinned at her.
“This woman being a warrior, a military officer of some renown, perhaps some level of crudeness and profanity might, of necessity, be helpful.”
Bhattacharya grinned back, two teenagers at the back of the crèche classroom sharing an inside joke when the teacher’s back was turned.
“So, a formal ceremony first?” she asked abruptly. “Diplomatic robes and full uniforms sort of thing?”
Yuur nodded with sudden wariness. This woman had a mischievous look in her eyes he found powerfully attractive. A grand practical joke seemed imminent.
“With your leave, I will need to prepare my staff for the coming battle,” she said, eyes hooded with a wicked gleam.
“Battle?” Yuur hesitated. “You have one bodyguard on your staff, plus a handful of clerks.”
“And a tailor, my Khan,” she replied demurely. “First-Rate-Spacer Harmaajärvi has been preparing for tomorrow his entire life.”
Yuur blinked, suddenly sensing an entirely new field of diplomatic warfare that did not exist in The Holding, where fashion was severely proscribed. He had only heard stories of this Tailor but he had no doubts that the man was a warrior of the first rank. He had rearranged the entire political and social structure of the staff sent to assist the Ambassador, with but a look.
A thought struck him. Yuur ran his hand across his bald pate and along the sides where the two-centimeter ring of gray was kept at bay each morning with a sharp blade.
“Would it be appropriate for me to dispatch a specialist in the styling of your hair?” he asked carefully, almost shyly.
The way her eyes lit up almost frightened Yuur for a moment, until he realized what effect she could have on the visiting strangers, and how it was likely to reflect well on him if they found her that much more formidable.
He had come to like this alien woman.
“Please?” she replied.
He turned to Gan and the man nodded with the seriousness normally reserved for sending someone into permanent exile.
“Done,” Yuur said.
She rose suddenly, a fluid unfolding with no middle ground.
Seated. Standing.
What looked like a heartfelt bow followed.
“My Khan, I thank you again,” she said with a merry smile. “Until the morning?”
“Until the morning.”
It was amusing, watching her sweep Gan up into her emotional wake. He led her from the room, attempting to maintain proper and decorous, but it was obvious that he was just an ornament on the hood of her unstoppable machine. A teacup Chihuahua with his head out the window of a vehicle, tongue wagging in the wind.
Rarely had Yuur looked forward to dealing with those overbearing representatives from Samara, or the military.
Tomorrow would be priceless.
Dawn was still some time away. Yuur found himself on a second-story balcony with a good view of the city and the night sky. He contemplated a future that would no longer forget he ever existed, as had been his chief purpose in originally coming to Trusski.
Only in an abject failure had he expected his name to be noted anywhere, except perhaps on a dusty list of the many interchangeable Khans of this world.
That would change, after today.
In a way, he missed that never-to-be future. He was a Scholar. A Minister of the Eighth Rank as a reward for a lifetime of careful, capable service to the Eldest. Quiet competence should have been the hallmark he left behind.
Bhattacharya and Keller had rendered that immutably impossible now, but he could forgive them.
Oddity overhead drew his eye. There was an extra star in the few visible, if he chose to look for it. Steadfast at Dawn. It was a calming thought, the first light of morning having always been the thing that brought him his greatest peace.
A shooting star appeared overhead now, moving with a deliberate grace that gave lie to a transitory nature. The Director was coming, a Warrior come to challenge the Scholars of this world.
Yuur sighed, but only internally, aware that even here there would be an attendant or three striving to be invisible, on-call for any unexpected need their Khan expressed. They meant well, but this was one of the days when he considered the possibility of just retiring rather than having to face whatever traumatic ordeal the war with Fribourg was about to visit on his people.
But then, he would miss whatever prank Amala had planned. And the one that would come after it. He had no doubt that the woman had striven to hide her irrepressible nature until now, but the change in uniforms had apparently brought it to the surface.
It would probably never be hidden again.
Thus were even Warriors capable of transforming themselves into Scholars.
It was to be the Great Hall.
Anything less would most likely be construed as some level of subtle insult to the visiting Warrior, however little he might disguise it. Yuur would have instructed the Director to call on him beside a duck pond in the neighboring park if he really wanted to insult the woman in a way she would comprehend. And still be unable to do anything whatsoever about it.
Perhaps he should take to meeting with Bhattacharya at the duck pond. They could make themselves useful and feed the waterfowl and be entertained by them. Or the other way around.
He had worn his finest robes today, the ones reserved in storage for exactly this level of diplomatic endeavor. Starkest black. Somber, sober, precise.
Feeding ducks would be a better use of his time, but this was one of those times when such an option eluded him.
Diplomacy had the engagement set with a concision most would find foreign. The visitors first. The Ambassador would then be summoned to the Presence. And finally the games would begin.
Hungry, waddling ducks.
Yuur glanced once around the chamber. Everyone was in their place, in their finest robes.
Standing, because Yuur’s knees had grown stiff with age and kneeling or sitting in a lotus for hours would leave him in so much pain he would be grouchy for days afterwards.
A signal from the entry that the visitors had passed the building’s outer door and would approach now.
Yuur placed all thoughts outside of himself and found his focus in the lessons of the Eldest.
The Mandarins led. Ministers guided. Scholars provided the hands of the Ministers. Technicians kept the machinery of civilization running smoothly. Warriors protected The Holding. Merchants and Artisans used their commerce and wits to keep society itself flowing and entertained.
Yuur had been greatly amused when Scholar Bhattacharya had introduced her Tailor on that first Landing as an Artist, and then put him in charge of the Ambassador’s Mission. Certainly, many of the staff he had assigned to aid her had been deeply offended…Scholars forced to obey an Artisan! Amala had apologized later, proffering the excuse that it had been sheer ignorance on her part, rather than a calculated insult.
And having seen the man’s work, that Tailor, Yuur mentally marked Harmaajärvi as the first Scholar of Fashion that Yuur had ever met. Perhaps the first The Holding had ever known.
Shadows at the door. Yuur transformed himself into a Minister of the Eighth Rank and projected his authority off the very beams that upheld the roof of the Great Hall. The effect was not lost on his attendants, who suddenly seemed to grow in size with him.
Gan appeared, a step ahead of the Director, rather than leading her by an arm, as he did with the Ambassador.
“Xi Derag Ahma Kier,” he announced in a formal cadence. “Director of the warship Steadfast at Dawn.”
Gan stepped in and to one side, his duties over until called upon again for the next act in this belligerent farce.
The Director was as short in stature as Yuur had guessed. But she burned with an intensity he recognized from his own mirror. She had not forgotten his words, but had chosen to obey rather than withdraw and lose all chance of meeting the barbarian.
As all Warriors, Xi wore her outer-most robe black with a white obi tied in an intricate knot. Each of four layers inward faded, but only to a modest gray, rather than the white of mourning. Yuur could envision her with both the great and short blade tucked into her obi, shoulder length hair pulled up into a topknot, rather than down and loose, as it was today.
Fierce and martial to the core. She advanced eight steps, trailed by one other man, who was subtly wrong in ways Yuur could not identify at first glance.
Yuur smiled, to put the Director at ease. All the forms were being properly obeyed, so any issued would be resolved at the Court of the Lord of Winter, perhaps by the Four Mandarins themselves. But that would be tomorrow.
“Director, be welcome to Trusski,” he said in a conversational tone void of all emotion except careful diplomacy.
She bowed at the waist, straightened, and came to rest.
“How may we serve you?” Yuur continued, playing the role fate had cast for him.
“We are given to understand that an Ambassador from the lands known as Fribourg has arrived,” Xi replied, following the script carefully.
“Indeed,” Yuur replied. “We find her credentials acceptable and have Accredited her as such, a servant of this Court.”
“Scholars and Ministers at the Court of Samara bade me come here,” Xi volleyed the script deftly. “They would know what threat this woman might present to The Holding.”
“It is well,” Yuur concluded. He turned and found Gan by the door. “Scholar Ve, summon Ambassador Bhattacharya to our Presence.”
Gan bowed with mechanical precision and departed soundlessly.
Yuur took a moment to study Xi’s attendant, seeking that which was troubling.
The robes were correct. The obi tied with spare perfection.
Something was still off.
Yuur found Xi’s eyes and asked a silent question, aware that they had a few minutes before Amala would join them.
“My Master of Spies, Minister,” Xi replied. “Recently returned from an extended period on Osynth B’Udan, the capital world of the imperial sector of space facing Samara.”
Ah. Years of deep cover then, pretending to be one of them by subverting himself within a role, much like Yuur did when he needed to be a serious Scholar instead of a philosopher poet, but with far greater risk and tolls on the psyche.
Yes, the man was off because the robes were foreign to him after so long among the barbarians. Assigning him to intelligence duty aboard a warship would be a good way to quietly return him to the world of his youth.
And he would be a good assistant to Director Xi, able to pick up subtleties that would be missed by others. Yuur wondered if he was to be the interrogator, or the scribe. Recordings of this day’s interaction were likely to provide years of entertainment.
The room lapsed into silence. Comfortable, but not companionable.
An attendant signaled the Ambassador’s approach. Scholars made more noise than Warriors, something that might mark her out, but Yuur had been unwilling to volunteer many details about the visitor with Director Xi.
Perhaps if Xi had chosen to be polite from the outset…
And perhaps the two of them would have to meet while feeding the ducks at some point.
Amala Michelle Siddhartha Anne Yuey Bhattacharya appeared at the door.
Even from a crowd of Scholars and Warriors expecting diplomatic skirmishing, there was a tiny, collective gasp of shock. Yuur might have contributed.
As a Scholar specializing in history and government administration, Yuur lacked the vocabulary at the time to describe her. Afterwards, in the privacy of his room, his notes had taken several days to research and record accurately.
Unconsciously, he had been expecting her in full Warrior attire, the black and green outfit she had worn exactly once before, at his express request, to establish her barbarian credentials. Every other time they had met, she had been in more relaxed clothing.
Mufti, as she classified it. As shaped by the Tailor, the Scholar of Fashion attached to her mission.
Today, she had gone the other direction from martial splendor. Her Tailor truly had indeed been preparing for this moment for his entire life. Yuur hoped they awarded the man a medal.
Perhaps he would write a letter of recommendation tomorrow.
Bhattacharya wore a cheongsam that had been done in plum silk, with a short, standing collar and embroidered with mystical symbols and numbers in a deeper eggplant purple that drew the eye in harder to stare at her body rather than her face. From here, Yuur was not sure she wore anything under the bodice, an effect heightened by the fact that the gown was slit to just above her hipbones, and she appeared to be wearing nearly-transparent tights under them. Only the fact that her legs were darker than her hands gave that away, but he had to look three times to be sure. And even then…
The top of the cheongsam had what he later discovered were called raglan sleeves, in a nearly-transparent, lavender mesh-like fabric, with eggplant-colored loong dragons that each rested a tail on her shoulder and their jaws at her wrist.
Across her chest, just about at the level of her collarbones, a fine, silver chain stretched between two rings just large enough for one of Yuur’s fingers. Each of those rings were connected to ten more loops of chain, some larger and some smaller, with the half-dozen larger ones cupping the points of her shoulders rather like pauldrons, and the smaller ones dropping down to almost her elbows.
Someone had pulled her black hair up and to one side underneath a severe-but-utterly-understated box hat, with a silver band around the bottom instead of a brim and holding a gauzy strip of black mesh over her eyes and nose in a manner that only suggested obscuration, without actually committing. She could eat and drink without moving it.
Amala wore no other jewelry today than the chain, even though Yuur had seen her with such in her ears, and she only had the most minimal makeup, done to subtly highlight her eyes and cheekbones without calling attention. She had no need for anything else, the effect was simply exquisite.
For the briefest moment, he regretted that this stunningly-beautiful woman was the enemy, and not someone whose closer acquaintance the Eldest would permit him to make on a more…personal level. All of the men and probably most of the women in the room were most likely thinking along similar lines.
She entered on slippered feet, placing her at the same height as much of the room. Yuur knew she owned shoes with terrible elevation in the heels, but this effect was more subdued and demure. A dainty artisan, perhaps a dancer, called to the company of the higher powers, rather than an Ambassador of a foreign power come to assert her dominance.
Yuur was not fooled, but he suspected that others might be. Woe unto them.
She arrived at the center of the room and bowed deeply, sparkling. There was no more-accurate term that suggested itself.
“My Khan, how may I serve?” she asked in a bright, almost seductive voice as she rose, studiously ignoring Director Xi and the shocked faces only now beginning to settle themselves into more appropriate expressions.
He could have warned them. Would have, in other circumstances. The ducks might still have paid better attention.
Yuur gestured to his latest visitors.
“Xi Derag Ahma Kier,” he named her. “Director of the warship Steadfast at Dawn.”
Yuur was amused when Amala turned and offered a bow that was almost as deep as the one he had rated, but not quite.
Utterly precise, according to protocol she should not have mastered so quickly. He wondered if Gan had suggested it.
“Director Xi, I am known here as Bhattacharya Yuey Anne Siddhartha Michelle Amala,” she said. “Scholar and Ambassador to the Khan of Trusski. Forgive my ignorance of your ways. Would Director more closely equate to the Imperial naval rank of Admiral, or Captain?”
Yuur found it amusing, the way Xi was visibly derailed as she had to stop and calculate the finer points in her head before speaking. He was rewarded with images in his head of bulls and china shops.
“Admiral,” Xi finally replied, voice as unsettled as her face. “Commander of Buran’s field forces on this frontier.”
“Ah. Thank you.”
Amala surprised them both by bowing a second time. The look of innocence on her face when it was visible again was probably calculated to fool everyone but him. It probably would. This was a woman of heretofore-unseen depths of wry silliness residing within the shell of a serious Scholar.
It reminded him of someone he knew, and possibly saw in the mirror regularly.
“What is your mission?” Xi asked gruffly, now that the proper forms had been obeyed.
Close enough to proper, anyway. He would let the two of them define their own go-board.
Amala’s face turned serious without ever moving.
“I am a personal representative of Keller Marie Jessica,” she said simply. “Imperial Admiral of the Red, Republic Fleet Centurion, Queen of the Pirates. She had commanded Trusski to become an active warzone, under the Laws of Recognized Warfare, and has tasked me with interfacing with the local population.”
“She is not here,” Xi growled in a rough tone. “And would have no standing to threaten, were she.”
“The Red Admiral is not making war on civilians, Director Xi,” Amala countered in a voice hiding a blade under a silk kerchief. “Only the Immortals, the Sentient Systems, conducted orbital bombardments of civilian worlds in ancient times. And more recently.”
Yuur gasped along with everyone else at the audacity of the observation. But he could not challenge it, for she spoke the exact and honest truth, and that was proof against any accusation of libel.
It was still a telling blow.
Keller had actually been at St. Legier when one of Buran’s warships dropped nuclear explosives on it. The death of hundreds from the attack, rather than millions, was a matter of scale, not intent. Keller could have just as easily sat above Taymyr and wrought total devastation, were she of a mind to even the scales.
Her forbearance, and more especially going to such extremes of preparation as to cast a Fetial’s Javelin literally into his back yard, were some of the reasons he had been so keenly interested in meeting the so-called Red Admiral’s Ambassador.
That Bhattacharya Amala had turned out to be who she was had just made the entire project easier. And she would enjoy feeding and entertaining ducks.
Xi looked like a woman willing to throw protocol to the wind and challenge the Ambassador to a personal duel. Having read Amala’s credentials, Yuur knew she could probably hold her own against all the Scholars in the room if it came to that. And possibly his guards at the same time.
A person did not reach a senior field rank as a Fleet Marine by merely being good at paperwork. Administrative acumen had probably helped, but Yuur had read and understood her other combat certifications.
That she could become a credible Scholar had been his own personal greatest surprise. Possibly hers as well. Combat was the woman’s forte.
Amala smiled in a way that seemed to invite such a desperate failure of decorum, as long as she could not be blamed for instigation.
Telling, that.
Director Xi apparently came to the same conclusion. She controlled her breathing and ground her teeth, but refused the bait.
Yuur looked intently at the others in the room, drawing them all back into his orbit with the weight of his gaze.
“Are there any others who would speak to this Court?” he demanded in a way that suggested drastic punishment for anything that could not wait until the morrow.
No one spoke.
“I declare this assembly closed,” he continued. “Scholar Ve, clear the chamber. Director Xi, Ambassador Bhattacharya, you will attend me.”
Yuur did not wait for their assent. He turned on his heel and strode from the chamber to the conference room that had been prepared. There, he would host his three visitors with the assistance of a handful of his staff.
And then things would get interesting.