“Here she is,” Montrose said, his voice sounding husky with relief to Omilov.
The hatch slid open and the captain appeared, tall and composed. “Lokri has disabled his locator,” Vi’ya said, her accent very marked.
“There’s worse.” Montrose moved to the console. “Listen. I just talked to Marim.” He touched a control.
“Have you seen Lokri? He’s gone and so is the Arkad.”
“What?” The shriek made the console crackle. “And I just told him why that was dangerous—”
‘Told him why and what?” Montrose’s recorded voice sharpened.
“I got it from Rex off the Tantayon—what we guessed is true! Eusabian knows that the Arkad is alive, and he’s got the biggest reward ever posted hanging over his head. But I told Lokri not to do anything, because you know what will happen if anyone tries to collect—”
“Where do you think Lokri would be?” Montrose cut in.
“Galadium, of course. I’ll go myself,” came Marim’s voice. “And when I’m through with him, you’ll have to put him back together with specimen tongs. Him and that chatzing nick!”
Montrose ended the recording.
Vi’ya turned her black gaze Omilov’s way. “Did you know about this?”
“No,” the gnostor said.
“Marim told Lokri about the reward,” Montrose rumbled, his ugly face fierce with anger. “He could be doing anything—”
But Vi’ya made a slight, impatient gesture, cutting Montrose off: she didn’t care about Lokri. “According to Jaim, Arkad being alive is not yet general news,” she said. Her eyes narrowed as she stared down at the deck.
Omilov studied her, trying to see if she carried the Heart on her person. Frustration kindled a helpless anger in him. There was nothing he could do.
Osri sat down next to his father. “If Brandon left,” Osri said softly, “we may very well never see him again.”
“I don’t believe it,” Omilov murmured. “I think he will return, and I think—” He let the sentence die when Vi’ya looked up.
She went to Montrose’s console and hit some keys. Her face did not change, but her stance altered slightly, from tense to still, and then she hit more keys.
No one spoke. She killed the console, murmured something in Dol’jharian, then left.
Osri leaned toward his father. “You studied Dol’jharian. What was that?”
“So it begins,” Omilov said.
Montrose rose with an effort and crossed to the kitchen annex. “Shall we have a second try on the coffee?” he suggested.
o0o
The Urian communicator was even weirder than Lyska-si had expected. She walked over to the red-glowing melted-looking machine and gingerly laid a hand on it, then snatched her hand back: it felt like flesh, blood-warm, slightly yielding. “Ugh!”
Nistan just grinned at her as she sat down. He was her age, and in spite of the adults in their respective Syndics being currently in the midst of a silent struggle, Nistan’s rat-pack and Lyska-si’s were allies.
They spent the first hour or so just watching the feed. The uncoded chatter—bragging sessions, really—between Rifter ships and the images that came over the hyperwave were entertaining, and sometimes chilling.
Nistan grinned at her, his slanty face making him look wicked. Weird. She didn’t like wicked, but she liked his look. “Shall we record this slag? I want to try to pick it apart later.”
“Good,” Lyska-si said.
Several streams of coded messages came through, and then nothing; Barrodagh, the unseen Bori slug who handed out Eusabian’s orders, was busy this day. For fun, they tried to crack the codes, but of course they couldn’t. Lyska-si did make a copy of the message-distribution log, which noted which mail drops they went to. That was one of the primary reasons for the rotating watch on the comm: to monitor this traffic. Any Syndicate that received more than its share of coded messages from Dol’jhar, even though their content couldn’t be known, would fall under suspicion of having cut a deal.
As time wore on, the interest wore off, and several times Lyska-si almost suggested cutting the recording. They’d get into big trouble if any of the chiefs came in and caught them. But then another brief code-burst came through, and when it ended she gasped, hitting the playback. “That’s Snurkel’s mail code.”
“Who’s the message from?” Nistan said, squinting down at the console.
“I can’t tell. Could be from anywhere.”
“Let’s make a chip,” Nistan suggested. “I can take it to Korbis later—he’s the best I know at codebusting. In fact,” he said, tapping at the console jury-rigged to the Urian device, “let’s dump everything and have him run statistics on it. Might be some interesting patterns.”
“We’ll owe you,” Lyska-si said formally. It was a risk—she knew her mother was mad at the Y’Mereds now, and might not want to back her up. But Lyska-si couldn’t quite make it personal, for reasons she didn’t really understand.
Nistan flushed. “Accept,” he said. He turned back to the console and wiped his long hair back from his face. But Lyska-si could see that he was smiling.
o0o
We do not hear the one-who-hides or the one-who-gives-fire-stone.
You will have to come out of the great sleep, and walk among the single entities.
We will walk among the single entities. The world-mind says this is instructive for Eya’a. We will locate the one-who-hides and the one-who-gives-fire-stone.
Vi’ya opened her eyes, rubbing her hand impatiently across her temple to banish the vertigo. She went out into her own cabin to find the Oblate robes and face masks. If anyone could find Lokri and Brandon Arkad, it would be the Eya’a. And then...
And then the wisest thing would be to get out of Rifthaven, fast. Much of the repair and enhancement work could wait. that which had been ordered was now paid for, thanks to the sale of one of one of the costly but common artifacts Vi’ya had taken from the Arthelion palace. And the two which were very rare were safely stored. But—
She pulled the silver ball from her pouch and hefted it in her hand. She’d almost gotten used to its inertialessness.
Without warning the Eya’a were in her head again: The world-mind wishes to understand the eye-of-the-distant-sleeper. The world-mind celebrates Vi’ya joining the sleeper to the eye-of-the-distant-sleeper.
‘Wishes to understand.’
Vi’ya shut her eyes, almost dizzy with the impact of this realization. She had never been able to determine whether they were in contact with their world mind or not, as their concept of tenses was as shaky as their grasp of gender. But the world mind could not have known about the Heart of Kronos.
Vi’ya stared at the enigmatic artifact on her palm. It seemed to enable the Eya’a to reach her at a distance, rather than only face-to-face—maybe it was also helping them reach their world mind. She could experiment with that later, but right now, she needed to find out as much about it as known to humankind. Since Omilov was unwilling to share what he knew, she would go elsewhere.
Decision reached, she slipped it back into her pouch. The orders concerning the ship could be given quickly. Once the Eya’a located Lokri and the Arkad, and the two were safely on their way back to the ship—with the Eya’a as guards—she would make a fast visit to the one person on Rifthaven who could possibly tell her more about the Heart of Kronos.
And then they’d leave.
She opened a com channel and asked to talk to the head tech.
o0o
Lokri led Brandon down a dim corridor.
The doors slid open and they entered a plain foyer.
“Signe’s Garden, this is called. You’ll like this place. If we have anything to celebrate we usually come here. this is where we held Markham’s wake.” He touched the lift console.
When the lift opened, they were met by a young woman in discreet gray clothing. “Welcome, genz. Would you like to join the company?”
“Private,” Lokri said. “But with access to the performance.”
She bowed and led them up some shallow, curving stairs over a spectacular garden. Breathtaking mosaics lined one wall. The other looked out on brilliant stars—or the semblance of same. They could have been deep within the structure of the station, but the domed wall gave the illusion of vast space.
She stopped before a door, palmed it open, and they entered a tiny room with low couches and a gleaming black table.
‘The furnishings are controlled here,” she said, touching a small console on the side of the table. “You can be served by one of us, or you can use the monneplat.”
She bowed and disappeared.
Brandon sat down on one of the couches, looking around in open appreciation. Tianqi units vented air subtly scented to remind one of verdant gardens. The lighting was indirect, the walls painted with highly stylized figures in shades of gray, black, and bronze.
Lokri flicked one of the controls on the table and one wall slid away silently, affording a view of a stage. Several musicians played soft music, their costumes artfully designed to blend with the decor.
“Drink?” Lokri asked.
Brandon stripped off his mask and dropped it on the table. “Vilarian Negus,” he said with a sudden smile.
Lokri took off his mask, fingering the gems just to keep his hands busy. “Expensive tastes. Luckily we can afford it.”
Brandon grinned. “I’ve only heard of it. Its use is not encouraged where I’ve been living.”
“Well, I’ve had it once. Here. Markham found the place, not long after he took over Telvarna. I’d never heard of Vilaria or their dream-dealing Negus until he and Vi’ya had it brought out: apparently they release very little of it each year, but the owner here has a standing order.”
Lokri tapped out an order code. The cabinet below the window to the stage slid open. on a tray sat two tall, gently steaming drinks.
“It’s better if it warms up a little,” Lokri said, taking them out and handing one to Brandon.
Brandon took his, but made no attempt to drink. “Its dreams are reputed to be addictive,” he said, staring down into the milky liquid.
Lokri could not quite place his tone. “It’s highly addictive. And if you’ve had any of a long list of drugs within the last standard day, it’ll kill you, though it is supposed to be a pleasant death. They use it for religion on Vilaria, for ritual suicides—and for executions.”
“What shall I expect?” Brandon asked, looking up.
“The effect is supposed to be different for everyone. But you’ll dream well,” Lokri said, “when you do go to sleep. And don’t try to put off sleep too long—the Negus won’t be denied.”
Brandon said, “I wouldn’t have thought this kind of thing something Vi’ya would drink.”
“She told us the Negus mutes the psi-waves here.”
“Rifthaven?”
Lokri nodded. “She hates the place.”
Brandon’s brows lifted in surprise.
Lokri grinned. Closing his eyes halfway, he said with a fair imitation of her austere voice, “So many people crowded in so small a space, broadcasting hatred, greed, murder, anger.”
Brandon said, “If she doesn’t like those things, why is she a Rifter?”
Lokri laughed in delight. “Just the question I asked her.”
“And she said—?”
Lokri leaned forward to tip his glass against Brandon’s. The crystal rang, and Lokri sipped deeply of the creamy, very cold liquid. “Like clouds... herbs and clouds.”
Brandon took a sip, his head canted. “She said that?”
“I did.” Lokri set his glass down. “She just laughed at me. Markham answered for her. said it was the only job going for an Dol’jharian ex-slave.”
“She was a slave?” Brandon repeated, one brow aslant as he idly turned the signet ring on his hand.
“Her mother found out she was a tempath before the local lord did—she would apparently have been killed out of hand, and Vi’ya was able to disguise her talent by posing as an animal handler.”
“I’ve seen how good she is with the dogs,” murmured Brandon.
“And Lucifur. Anyway, that not only saved her life but made her a valuable commodity. She was sold to a rock-quarry owner. Could be her mother even bought her own freedom with Vi’ya’s price.
“She spent the rest of her childhood managing huge rock-lifting saurians. Then she was sold to a lord on one of the Quarantined Dol’jharian worlds, smuggled there by Rifter slavers. Markham said she wouldn’t talk to him about that voyage at all, but anyone could tell how much she hated slavers.”
Lokri smiled. Was he really that ignorant about Dol’jhar? Only an Arkad could be that insulated, Lokri thought. “It was Markham who got it all out of her and one night he told me. She’d never told us anything about her background. Oh, maybe Jaim, a little. But he’s worse than she for closed jaws.”
Lokri paused. Brandon’s expression was enigmatic as he continued to twist the ring. Lokri caught a glimpse of the signet: not the expected Phoenix, but an ebony-faced charioteer.
Lokri went on. “Life for any but the lords is cheap on any Dol’jharian world. She couldn’t get into trouble—she was too valuable—but her friends could be used against her, so she learned not to have any. When she was in her late teens someone organized a slave revolt. She escaped along with the others, but her talent for ‘hearing’ pursuit kept her from being caught and tortured to death. She learned to stay alive in the city.
“Markham thinks the slave revolt was funded by the Rifter commander who later put out a hiring call on Rifthaven. Markham joined up with the little ship he’d recently taken from some jacker. They raided the city—”
“Rifter raid against a Dol’jharian-held planet?” Brandon said.
“Exactly. Markham told us that he was certain the Panarchic navy looked the other way when Rifters dared raids against Dol’jharian holdings.”
“Ah.” Brandon smiled humorlessly, gazing downward through his drink. “Go on.”
“Little else to tell. It was Markham’s first raid as a captain. By the time the local lord’s forces scrambled, Markham got away with a cargo big enough to start him on the crew you saw at Dis. Somewhere during this raid he came across a tempath who was fast with her hands—a dead shot. If you think a tempath ever ‘comes across’ anyone. She’s never said how she found him.”
Brandon sat very still during the relation, his gaze on the performers below. “Why did Hreem want Markham’s death?”
The question was strange, especially uttered in that tone of indifference.
“He had seven reasons, all seven having to do with us jacking him when he carried slaves,” Lokri said. Suspecting the impact of the word again on Brandon, he dug at the sore spot. “There’s a thriving market out-octant where you nicks can’t, or won’t, enforce the Unalterables. One thing about slavers: they rarely carry just one illegal cargo. Markham made plenty selling the subsidiary cargoes.”
“What did he do with the slaves?”
“Turned them loose, usually on some out-octant world. Jakarr and others were getting tired of the cost of his ethics, especially as the last Hreem jack we jumped turned out to be high-end nicks. Jakarr thought the ransoms would buy us half Rifthaven.”
“Would have bought you the attentions of a battlecruiser, more like.”
“That’s what Markham said, shortly before he died. Vi’ya agreed. You saw the end of that particular argument when you first arrived on Dis.”
Brandon transferred his gaze from the stage to Lokri. “But you approved?”
Lokri shrugged. “As long as the take is good, I don’t care where it comes from.”
Brandon’s next question, still uttered in that soft, indifferent voice, took Lokri by surprise. “You were at the other base when Markham was murdered?”
How did he know that?“I was.”
The musicians on the stage below had been replaced by masked players who mimed a highly stylistic play. Old anger awakened, Lokri waited for Brandon to contemplate these events outside his control. Your Panarchy is dead, Aerenarch. As dead as Markham and his ideals. Do you see it yet?
When Brandon finally spoke, it was again a sidestep. “So is this a wake, or a performance?”
Lokri glanced at the stage and then at the Arkad, whose mouth twisted with irony. “Meaning?”
Brandon finished off the Negus and set the cup in the exact center of the table. “Meaning what else do you do for fun?”
Lokri drank the last of his own Negus, his mind running the more rapidly in spite of, or because of, the dream images lapping at the edge of his awareness. Too late he understood that the Negus had been a mistake. the dreams were not deadening the old memories, but reawakening them.
His expectations changed from moment to moment, but his intention remained: he wanted to see the Arkad’s mask shatter, just as his Panarchist world had shattered. Nick morality and mercy were gone, ripped apart by weakness, greed, lust, and revenge. Markham was gone—and everything he’d believed in.
I want a fleet to take to Gehenna to rescue my father...
Hatred twisted Lokri, for a system that didn’t work, and for this handsome scion of wealth and power who persisted in believing the illusion.
Lokri would demonstrate to him his powerlessness. And then... And then...
Memory-desire merged unsettlingly with the immediate. His thoughts, driven by the Negus, spiraled.
He was sure of only one thing: he’d made a tactical error.
His mistake had been in choosing the finest places, the ones that compared with nick establishments. To the Arkad this was just home.
It was time for something different.
He smiled. “There’s a lot more to see.”
Brandon said, “Lead on.”
Lokri threw a stack of AU into the hopper, which closed up and disappeared. “Put that mask back on. If Vi’ya does catch up with us, that’ll keep me alive. Maybe.” He laughed.
No one hindered them when they walked out.
o0o
“Look here,” Nistan said.
Lyska-si abandoned her own work and glanced at his terminal.
“I’ve broken some of it out. The sender code for Snurkel’s message is almost the same as these other messages. And some of the other Syndics are getting messages from the same source.”
Lyska-si whistled. “Has to be Arthelion.”
“Weird thing is, the only ones getting these new messages are seconds.”
Lyska-si got that zing of memory. “Is Nuub one of them?”
“Yeah. And Zafid Rouf—”
“Water,” Lyska-si whispered.
“And Gurpahee—”
“Weird! The Kug hate the Rouf. I thought.”
“And Tir down in Hydroponics.” Nistan looked thoughtful. “Who else on Arthelion is working for Eusabian?”
Lyska-si shook her head. “Far as I know, Barrodagh is the only one speaks for him.” They looked at each other.
“Then there’s someone there working against him,” Nistan said.
“And they might be allied with old Giffus and those other seconds,” Lyska-si said. “Maybe a cross-Syndicate coup by those impatient to succeed their firsts. That’s it. Trouble or no, I’ve got to tell my mother.” She tapped the copy code on her boz’l and loaded Snurkel’s and the other messages in. “I won’t tell your part,” she said. Then she signaled her mother, but got no answer.
Nistan’s grin was twisted. “Trouble on Rifthaven,” he predicted.
o0o
The Eya’a paused, and Vi’ya cast a swift look around, struggling with her emotions. She was getting too angry, though she did her best to damp it. The Eya’a were close enough to protective action already. Furious as she was with Lokri, she did not want them to fry his brain as soon as they located him.
She started walking again, the Eya’a shuffling behind in their shrouds. They continued to scan and sort the myriad mental energies surrounding them, their nearly incomprehensible emotions a strange hybrid of joy and terror that seared Vi’ya’s nerves.
We hear the one-who-gives-fire-stone, the Eya’a said again.
They veered. She ran ahead, guiding them toward a lift. They shuffled on, paying no attention to humans. A huge spacer, obviously expecting everyone to give way before him, stepped directly in their path. Before Vi’ya could act, the Eya’a walked directly into the man, who shoved impatiently at the nearest of the pair.
The Eya’a’s face mask shifted, and the other promptly lifted her mask.
After a shocked look at the faceted eyes and blue mouths, the spacer turned the color of dog vomit. “Are those what I think they are?”
“Brainburners,” someone else said, jamming at the lift door control.
Vi’ya, desperate to keep the Eya’a from being associated with the Telvarna, said, “Haven’t you heard? A ship full of them docked here two watches ago.”
The entire assortment of hard-faced spacers stampeded hastily out.
o0o
“There’s something going on,” Lyska-si said. “I know it. The way Snurkel was gloating at the caucus today, and now these messages. And some of the others were rasty, too. Chatz! It could be starting now. Why won’t Lyska answer?” She tapped her boz’l again, but her mother did not respond.
“Do a locate?” Nistan kept his attention on his console.
“She always has that disabled, even for me,” Lyska-si answered. “Ever since that bomb plot against old Willem—”
“Here, look at this,” Nistan said. “I knew Korbis was the one to ask. So happens he’s on the Defense desk right now, so he can do stuff for us.”
Lyska-si moved to his console and leaned next to him. Her mind was distracted between the console and Nistan. Eyes the color of Yolen nightbirds, those straight shoulders, and he smelled good.
But he was a Y’Mered, and anyway, there was biznai at hand.
What she saw made her forget everything else. “Korbis wired the shop!”
Nistan grinned up at her. “Snurkel took over an old Sybarad luxury yacht. Had it welded right onto Falkowitz Street. Korbis built a model back in our pack days, and he knows ‘em down to the bolts. He’s gonna activate us a spy-eye, right in Snurkel’s back room, and pipe it over to us. We’ll owe him big, since Snurkel’s next security sweep’ll catch it and blow Korbis’ setup on Falkowitz for good, but for now we can watch Snurkel right here for the rest of this shift.”
Lyska-si grinned. “Then move over.”
He shifted slightly, but not too far away.
o0o
“This is Marim’s favorite place,” Lokri said. “Or one of them.”
He blinked, trying to clear his eyes of the halos around every light. He was very drunk. The screams of an excited crowd smote their ears when they entered the stands high above a bright-lit platform. On it two Tikeris androids—man-sized creatures dressed in swirling, brightly decorated robes—postured with eerie grace, their stylized movements belying the keen edges of the long, curved swords they wielded in each hand.
On each side of the platform stood their Barcan handlers, swathed in shanta-silk, wearing red-tinged glasses even in this dim light, their absurdly large codpieces waggling as they stumped about excitedly, waving their arms and wailing hoarsely. Two players labored at consoles, modifying the emotions and response patterns of the Tikeris in an attempt to overcome their opponent’s android. The air was heavy with a mixture of sweat, drug haze, and an unfamiliar spicy scent.
A flurry of movement caused a shriek of mixed delight and frustration from the crowd; the swords flashed and one of the figures spun away, blue fluid splattering from a deep slice across its chest. Its expression did not change, but a piping howl of agony keened from its lips as it returned to the attack.
Faces reflected the mixed guilt and pleasure that was part of the attraction of the Tikeris and their obscene near-trespass on the Ban.
Brandon grunted, his upper lip crimping in disgust. At last the mask was broken, and Lokri dissolved in laughter.
Brandon whipped around, his pupils so tiny they were nearly swallowed by the sapphire blue that reflected every light in the place. Is that a lambent gaze? Lokri thought. He could not stop laughing.
“So you’ve recognized a campaign at last.”
“I thought the tour was to be instructive.” Brandon’s light voice was almost drowned by the howls of the crowd. “But you haven’t finished telling me: who set Markham up?”
He thinks I did it. Pain shot through Lokri’s head. Memory almost overwhelmed the present. He struggled to speak, giving up when a shadow appeared at his side.
“This fool wanted Markham to himself, not dead,” said Vi’ya.
Lokri blinked upward, but Vi’ya ignored him, black gaze meeting blue.
“And you?” said the Arkad.
Vi’ya’s teeth showed in a not-quite smile. “I had him to myself.”
Brandon was not smiling. Time seemed suspended as they stood on either side of Lokri, neither moving. Lokri understood that he had lost the duel, that he’d never had a chance. Brandon had played him instead, in order force a duel with Vi’ya on neutral territory.
Lokri looked from one to the other, feeling as if he’d been cast into the midst of a river and there was nothing to hold onto, a sensation augmented by the Negus and alcohol haze. “She didn’t set him up,” he croaked, his voice coming from somewhere outside his head. “It wasn’t that at all—”
Vi’ya glanced at him once. “Two crew members sold us out. Both are dead. Lokri’s only mistake was to try to supplant me with Markham.”
“So you weren’t just Markham’s lieutenant,” Brandon said. “You were—”
“Mates,” Vi’ya stated.
Brandon didn’t move or speak, but it became possible to look elsewhere; Lokri felt it as a physical release, and so must have Vi’ya, for she gripped his shoulder. “Both of you. Back to Telvarna. Now. The Eya’a will take you there.”
She walked out.
One of the Eya’a brushed a twiggy finger over Lokri’s arm. He got up fast, lurching outside.
When he reached the causeway he paused, and was thoroughly and unequivocally sick.