Balister?”
“Yeah.”
“House Ten-Ar?”
“Nay.”
Lord Horatio stood proudly, “The ‘yeahs’ have it. Resolution against argene mining dismissed six votes to three. There will be no further debate on this matter.”
Shock filled Cara’s heart – shock and foreboding as she quietly left the council chamber unnoticed. The Great Council would not even hear her evidence! How could they care so little for the poor, for the suffering? Knowing she was used by the king to undermine her credibility, a thought crept into her mind: what if the greater power for change lay not in her position as the leading healer for her world – but in the bedroom of the king himself? Though she did not love King Gareth and resented his lustful temperament, her heart quivered. Could it be that her best chance to serve might be in sacrificing herself to his lust in order to attain the power she needed to change her world? Saddened by her vision, a single tear fell – for her people, for her future as the king’s de facto whore – and for all the suffering she knew would come of this vote.
------
“What happened to you, Your Grace?” cried Lady Healer Gwyneth of the healers of Gurun.
“The king,” answered Cara simply, collapsing onto a diagnostic bed.
Dutifully Lady Healer Gwyneth scanned the abbess, “How did he?”
“You really need to ask that?”
“Your Grace – Cara – how much longer must you tolerate this?”
“He is the king! He does it because he can. If he decides to marry me or make me his official mistress, even in that, I do not have the right to refuse. I must comply.”
Lady Healer Gwyneth raised a soothing laser regenerator over Cara’s injuries, “Resistance is not futile, Your Grace. There has to be a way to put an end to this – before he kills you!”
Cara sighed, “How fares the research at Nan-li Central Healing Center? Please tell me the plague is under control!”
“You are planetary expert in these cancers and in brown-eye syndrome in particular, Your Grace. Long before this tyrant Gareth came to the throne, you lead the way in studying this. Without you directing the teams on site, the research suffers.”
“Idiots! Do not they understand that unless we stop this epidemic our entire government is at risk? The people will not tolerate inaction while they suffer.”
“Then perhaps we can make it the king’s problem…” alluded Gwyneth.