“I don’t understand why she wanted to get married in those clothes,” Soz said. “They’re so drab.”
“After the life she’s been forced to live,’ Jaibriol said, “it wouldn’t surprise me if she never wanted to be looked at again.” He started to say more, then stopped.
“What is it?” Soz asked.
“I wonder if it’s fair to Cirrus for Althor to marry her. Or fair to him.”
“Why do you say that? They like each other.”
“Like, yes.”
Soz tilted her head. “I think she wants exactly what he has to offer—companionship, gentle affection, and a protector. It’s the symbolism too. As a provider she was forbidden to marry.” She paused. “As to my brother, he can go either way. He seems genuinely happy with her.”
Down in the meadow, Althor was talking to Cirrus. Kai ran up to them, said something, and took off before they could answer, leaving Cirrus and Althor laughing.
“They will be parents to my brother,” Jaibriol said. “I would like to be sure he is well taken care of.”
“Althor is a wonderful father,” Soz said. “And you’ve seen Cirrus with Kai. It’s like magic.”
Jaibriol curled his fingers around hers. “We should get down there. Everyone looks ready to start.”
They stood up together, hand in hand, and walked to the future.
* * *
“I don’t understand,” Mik Fresnel said. “It sounds like you’re asking me to be your bodyguard.” He sat on his bed in the room he shared with Jay Rockworth in the inn on Delos and listened while Jay moved around in the bathroom, getting dressed after his shower.
“I just want you to come with me,” Jai said. “I’d rather not go alone.” He came out of the bathroom toweling his hair. Instead of his usual jeans and sweater, he had on black trousers and a black shirt, both with a cut as severe as it was expensive.
“Where did you get those clothes?” Mik asked.
“At a store. On the Arcade.”
“They look like Aristo clothes.”
Jay sat on his bed, across from Mik. He pulled away the towel—revealing hair that glittered in the light, like black diamonds.
Mik stared at him. “Have you flipped out? You look like a Highton.”
Jai reached into his shirt pocket and took out a small case. With his eyes downcast, he removed a lens Mik had never known he wore, then repeated the procedure with his other eye. Then he looked up.
With red eyes.
Mik spoke uneasily. “What the hell are you doing?”
“I want you to remember something,” Jay said. “No matter what happens, no matter what you hear, know that I will never forget what we’ve seen.” He stood up. “Come with me, Mik. Stand as my friend.”
Still puzzled, Mik rose to his feet. “You know I’ll always stand by you.”
Jai swallowed. “Thank you.”
Together they went out into the drizzle that saturated the city of New Athens on Delos.
* * *
Corbal Xir stood at the window and watched the Delos rain. He still hadn’t made his decision.
The formal Highton language the boy had used in his message had made it possible for the note to reach him despite the various spies who intercepted it. They probably smirked over the content, a lost son claiming Xir blood. Ah well, bastard children have a tendency to show up, or so their thoughts would go. Corbal wondered if anyone had taken a strand of the hair to analyze. It didn’t matter. None of them had access to the right genetic files for verification.
Corbal had seen beyond the obvious message in that letter. With a sophisticated innuendo worthy of the most adept Highton, the boy told another story between the lines. So Corbal analyzed the hair himself.
The DNA match was exact.
Corbal was tired. He had lived a long time. He didn’t want to rule Eube. Even with the potential for glory, vengeance, and sheer power, he didn’t want the throne. Now a new voice had spoken. No doubt existed: that message had come from one of his relatives. But this was no illegitimate son of the Xir line.
Jaibriol II had left an heir.
It would invigorate Eube. With Jaibriol III on the throne, a vital young emperor just beginning his ascendance, victory was complete. Corbal had checked pictures of the boy. He was the image of his father, even taller and more classic of feature, with a robust quality most Highton bloodlines had lost. Eube needed him. The decimated empire crawling on its knees needed this miracle.
However, Corbal also knew the rest.
Corbal had given up what made him Highton. He made the choice when he could no longer justify taking his pleasure at the pain of others. He knew the changes in his DNA, knew them well. And so he recognized the anomalies in the boy’s gene map. When he realized the magnitude of what he was uncovering, he tried ever more obscure tests, going far past what was needed for proper determination of the youth’s heritage. He pulled out the records of past emperors and tore them apart. Many had been tampered with. It took him a long time to uncover the truth.
Eube Qox had been pure Highton.
Jaibriol I had been pure Highton.
Ur Qox had been half Highton.
Jaibriol II had been one-fourth.
Jaibriol III was one-eighth.
In Corbal’s darker moments, he suspected the identity of the boy’s mother. It didn’t matter. A Highton mother could be created. What mattered now was his decision.
I can walk away from this, he thought, watching the rain. I can assume the throne and start over.
Or I can even the balance.
And there lay the crux of the matter. Jaibriol III hadn’t come to claim the throne. Corbal sensed the boy had even less interest in it than he. In the oldest tradition of Eube, Jaibriol III had come to trade.
Corbal knew his limitations. He had told Calope the truth. He liked owning slaves. He liked his providers, even loved some of them. Eldrin Valdoria pleased him no end. That Eldrin loathed him made no difference; Corbal was the owner and Eldrin the owned.
Yet Corbal questioned his actions. It had taken him a century to learn compassion. He lived now with the guilt for what he had inflicted on his providers before he changed himself so he could never again transcend. What would he learn in another century? How long would it take to reach whatever enlightened state waited the final evolution of the Highton mind? Centuries? Millennia?
And what would the Hightons have done to humanity by then?
Perhaps his guilt was misplaced. Perhaps he and Calope, in their doddering old age, had lost their intellectual acumen. Maybe in making it impossible to transcend, he had made himself less than human and as a result confused weakness with compassion. He didn’t know the answers.
No Highton had ever before asked such questions.
* * *
Jai was halfway across the plaza when a group came out of the Eubian embassy. Through the drizzle and distance, he couldn’t see their faces. What did they come to say? Yes or no? He prayed the answer was no and hated himself for that hope.
He stopped in the center of the plaza with Mik. The Traders walked toward them, six men total. Four were large, bodyguards it looked like, probably Razers. Watching them, Jai wished he had brought more people. He had been naive, assuming that regardless of the answer, it would be given with honor. What if he was wrong?
He could make out the tallest man now. Corbal Xir. It wasn’t until the Traders reached him, however, that he recognized the sixth man. He knew then that his life had changed forever.
Eldrin Valdoria stood with a numb expression, arms locked behind his back, a collar glittering around his neck. He watched Jai with no sign of recognition. Corbal spoke to him in a low voice, and Eldrin tilted his head as if unsure whether or not to believe whatever he heard.
Corbal turned to Jai. “I suggest we make a simultaneous exchange. You and Prince Eldrin walk forward at the same time.”
“Very well.” Jai turned and offered Mik his hand. “Thanks for coming.”
/> Mik shook his hand. “I’m not sure what you’re doing with this, but I’ll remember what you said.”
Jai nodded. Then he turned and saw his uncle watching him. Jai could feel his mind. Until this moment no one had given Eldrin an inkling of the offered trade. He hadn’t even known he was on Delos.
“Are you ready?” Jai asked.
Eldrin took a breath. “Yes.”
They walked forward, passing each other on the right. It took six steps, and then Jai was among the Traders. He turned and saw Eldrin join Mik. As his uncle looked back at him, the Razers closed around Jai. Then they and Corbal Xir started for the Eubian embassy, taking him with them, cutting him off from his former life forever.
Jai set his shoulders and faced his unwanted future. He knew he had a great deal to learn. Self-protection. Intrigue. Deception. He had no desire for the title he had just accepted, but he meant to be sure of one thing. He would be no puppet emperor.
It never struck him as a self-sacrifice that he gave up his life, his happiness, perhaps even his humanity, to make possible the dream of peace humanity craved. Knowing the legacy of the Hightons who had produced him, he felt as if he carried a guilt so deep it crushed him. At least with this trade, he could ensure one thing.
His parents hadn’t died in vain.
* * *
With the psiberweb gone, Roca and Eldrinson had no way to attend the ISC funeral service, even as simulacrums. But they saw a recording later. ISC gave full military honors to Soz, with all the pomp and ritual due an Imperator. So too they honored Althor. Leaders from across the free worlds attended. Cannons thundered and music played.
Eldrinson and Roca held a private ceremony in Sweden. Accompanied by their daughter-in-law Ami, her two-year-old child Kurjson, the soldiers in the United Nations peace-keeping unit that guarded them, and Tiller Smith, the Allied Liaison to the Ruby Dynasty, they went to a wind-torn section of coast on the Gulf of Bothnia. On a cliff lush with trees, above an isolated beach with icy rolling waves, they spoke for their children, quiet words drifting on the wind. Tiller also gave a eulogy for Soz, who had been his patron when he was the only Allied citizen ever admitted to the Skolian institute that trained psions.
So the parents mourned their children. Eighteen years ago Kelric had died, their beloved youngest. Twice they had mourned Sauscony, the grief no less the second time than the first. They lost Althor, first to Eubian violence and then to death. They lost Kurj just as they had begun to find the complex man beneath the hardened exterior. They lost Dehya and Taquinil to a void neither understood and Eldrin to the hell of Trader slavery.
Most of all they mourned the death of hope, represented by their children who had envisioned a universe better than they knew and died for it. Had the deaths realized that dream, they could have endured the grief. But that was not to be.
After the ceremony, they returned to the countryside estate where they now lived. Feeling at a loss, Eldrinson wandered into the web room. A telop was there, plugged into a control chair. Eldrinson went over and watched lights flicker on the console in front of her.
He spoke in Skolian Flag, the only language they had in common. “It almost looks as if you’re linked into the psiberweb.”
She smiled. “I’m trying to re-form the link we had here.”
Eldrinson nodded. It was a way to rebuild, link by link. With only one person in the Triad, and he forbidden the use of a Lock, rebuilding even a limited psiberweb would take years. But this was better than nothing. Perhaps he could help. It would give him something to do, to stop him from dwelling on the knowledge that he had outlived so many of his children.
The telop was watching him. “I’m off duty now,” she said. “You’re welcome to use it if you would like.”
“I might sit for a while,” he said.
She disengaged herself from the chair, then bowed to him and withdrew, leaving him privacy.
Eldrinson settled into the chair. Open Ψ gate, he thought.
Nothing happened.
He let his mind soak into the tenuous space the telop had created and tried again. Open Ψ gate.
No response.
Ah, well. It had been worth a try.
A voice came from across the room. “Eldri?”
He turned to see his wife, a golden sight that soothed him. “My greetings, beautiful lady.”
Her face gentled at the nickname, but then her smile faded. “A starship landed in London with a recording of the funeral ceremonies from Glory. It’s on the news now.”
“All right.” Eldrinson detached himself from the mesh. As he slid out of the chair, he glanced at the console screen in front of it, which showed a record of his commands:
Open Ψ gate.
Open Ψ gate.
He was about to turn away when he saw a third line. For an instant he froze. Then he touched the screen, wonder filling him.
“Eldri?” Roca came over. “What is it?”
“They’re here.”
She smiled. “Who?”
He felt a curious sensation. Given what he had been feeling lately, it took a moment to identify. Joy. He pointed to the third line on the screen:
I exist.
“What did you mean?” Roca asked.
“I didn’t input it.”
“Who did?”
“Someone in psiberspace.”
“There is no one in psiberspace.”
“There are. Two people.” His voice caught. “Once Dehya said to me, ‘In the future I predict I cease to exist.’ Then later she said perhaps she would exist again.”
“You know how Dehya talked.” Roca took his hands. “She rarely made sense.”
“She always makes sense. You just have to figure her out.” He tilted his head toward the screen. “It’s her.”
Roca sighed. “It would be strange indeed, wouldn’t it, if Dehya and Taquinil were in there, lost forever?”
He grinned. “Ah, but Roca my love, when have you ever known your exasperating, charming, brilliant, and hammer-headed sister to stay lost when it came to solving a computer problem?”
She patted his hand. “It is a pleasant hope, yes?”
Eldrinson knew she didn’t believe him. But he had no doubts. He knew Dehya. The joy washed over him, sweet after so much grief.
They went to the house amphitheater and joined Tiller Smith to watch the recording from Glory. Made originally in the Hall of Circles, the three-dimensional image replayed here on the holostage. The ceremony consisted of various Hightons giving speeches, the longest and most ornate for the emperor, then the Empress Mother Viquara, then her consort Kryx Quaelen. Corbal Xir surprised them and gave Sauscony a eulogy, a short one, but still a speech in honor of his late Skolian counterpart. The Aristos clicked their cymbals twice for Jaibriol, once each for Viquara and Quaelen, and not at all for Sauscony.
When the rituals were done, Corbal stood before the Carnelian Throne and looked out at the Aristos. But instead of stating his claim to the throne, he spoke as if he were beginning yet another speech.
“A new age has begun for Eube,” he thundered.
“Oh, get on with it,” Eldrinson grumbled. “Why do they always say that?”
“Many of you have heard rumors of negotiations between my office and the Allieds,” Corbal said. After a well-timed pause, he added, “These rumors are true.”
Cymbals whispered in the Hall. When they quieted, he said, “The Allieds had in their custody a man. A Highton man. A trade was arranged, this man for a prisoner in my possession.” As cymbals whispered, Xir held up his hand. “Eube has triumphed! As we will always triumph.”
“Do you have any idea what he’s talking about?” Roca asked.
“Not a hint,” Eldrinson said.
Tiller turned to them. “Apparently the pilot who brought this in was so worked up he started to transmit before he landed.”
“Do you know why?” Eldrinson asked.
Tiller shook his head. “Not yet.”
“
And so it was agreed between the Allied Worlds and Eube,” Corbal said. “Our Skolian captive for their Highton captive.” He paused. “That Skolian was Eldrin Valdoria.”
An angry discord of cymbals filled the hall. Roca put her hand over her mouth and Eldrinson stared at the stage. His son? Free?
“It’s a lie.” Roca’s voice cracked. “They’re taunting us. No Highton alive would be worth giving away their Key when they have a Lock.”
“I can check on it,” Tiller said. “The ship that brought this in should know.” When Roca nodded, he bowed and strode out of the amphitheater.
Corbal waited. Finally the Aristos became silent, watching him with cold marble faces, waiting to see what he could possibly offer to atone for what he had given away.
He raised his arm to the great arched entrance of the Hall and said: “I present to you, His Honor, Jaibriol Qox the Third, Emperor of Eube.”
For the first time in her life, Roca heard voices come from the Circles. As one, the heads turned to the entrance.
Jaibriol III strode into the Hall. Barely more than a child, he walked with confidence, the image of his father, yet taller, larger, stronger, more regal. Razers surrounded him, but in the force of his personality their presence faded.
He reached the dais and climbed its steps. Corbal bowed to him, then withdrew to the front row of the Circles. So the emperor stood alone, looking out at the assembled Aristos. And he began to speak.
His voice resonated, with surprising authority for someone his age. As he lauded a new era for Eube, Eldrinson watched—and saw what no one else would see, because it was too incredible. He knew the way Jaibriol tilted his head, knew that cheek structure, which looked Highton but had subtle differences, knew the power in that voice, having long ago heard it himself from another seventeen-year-old.
In Jaibriol III Eldrinson saw his own daughter.
The emperor praised his Highton mother, a woman secluded with her son, following what had become a tradition for the Qox line, to hide their heirs. Born almost nine months after his father disappeared, Jaibriol III had lived during all the years of his father’s assumed death in secret, with his mother who had only recently passed away. Eldrinson recognized the woman Qox described, knew the nuances of behavior he lauded. She was no Highton.