“Good question,” Stonehenge muttered. “At least he didn’t say ‘bleat.’” When Ming gave him a sharp glance, he held up his hand as if to fend her off.
“ ‘Plight unto thee my troth,’” she told Althor. “It means you pledge to marry her. You put the ring on the third finger of her left hand.”
Althor slid the ring onto my finger. “With this ring, I pleat unto thee my truth.”
I put my hand over my mouth, trying not to laugh. Ming gave me a second ring, one made from soft gold metal. Eighteen-karat gold, as it turns out. I swallowed, stunned by these beautiful gifts they were giving us.
“Thank you,” I said. Althor nodded his thanks as well, a curl of hair falling in his eyes.
I slid the ring onto his finger. He wiggled his hand, hinging it back and forth, examining the gold band. When he finished, Ming read the Mass, and more blessings and prayers. As the station rotated, Athena moved past our view like a stately goddess. It all had a dreamlike quality, as if We were floating through stardust.
When Ming started the final blessing, Althor must have realized she was almost done. While she was in the middle of a sentence, he turned, put his arms around my waist, and kissed me. For a moment, I was too starded to react. Then I kissed him back.
“Don’t mind us,” Stonehedge said.
Ming laughed softly. “I guess we can skip the rest. You may kiss the bride.”
After that, everything blurred. Stonehenge introduced us to the guests: scientists, administrators, colonists, military personnel. All the time the stars wheeled by outside the bubble, their glorious parade hypnotic in its immensity. The haze from Althor’s. uniform blended with the golden haze of exhaustion my mind created, until I was moving through a dazed golden fog.
Eventually Kabatu rescued us, spiriting us off to a quiet chamber with a bench running around the wall and a console table in the center. After he left, we sank down on the bench together.
“Finally,” Althor said. “I never know what to say at formal things like that.”
I laughed. “You didn’t need to say anything. They all just wanted to look at you.”
His voice softened. “When I first saw you, with Nancy Ming, the light from the doorway behind you was making a halo around your body.” He rubbed the lace of my dress. “And the way this sparkles—it was unreal. You looked like an angel.”
“I thought the same about you.”
“That I looked like an angel?” He laughed. “I’ve been called many names, but never that.”
I smiled. “That you look like a hero.”
“Hardly.”.
“You do to me.”
“That’s why they make us wear these clown suits.” He motioned at his clothes. “ISC uses computer simulations and psychologists to design our dress uniforms.”
I traced the curve of his sword. “Even this?”
“Actually, that’s mine. I inherited it. It’s a ceremonial sword from the Abaj Tacalique. They gave it to my grandfather at his wedding to my grandmother.”
I stared at him. “Abaj Takalik? That’s a Maya city. Near Guatemala. Its ruins are two thousand years old.”
“A city?” His mouth opened. “The Abaj I know is a fraternity formed six thousand years ago to guard the Ruby Dynasty. Now they’re sworn to protect my family.”
“Bodyguards?”
He nodded. “It’s primarily a ceremonial position. My parents have Jagernauts as bodyguards. But the Abaj still swear fealty to the Ruby Dynasty.” Dryly he added, “Even though we haven’t ruled anything for five thousand years.”
“The Jag told me about the psibernet, how it needs your family.”
“It takes three Keys to power it. My mother is the eldest, liaison to the Assembly. My Uncle Kelric is the military Key. He also commands the Imperial fleet.” He paused. “The third Key, my grandfather, died about fifty years ago. My father should have taken his place. But the Traders captured the third Lock.”
“How can you capture a lock?”
He smiled. “It’s a control base, actually. My father would link into the power center of the web there. The Traders can’t use it because they have no Rhon psions, but they don’t want us to have it either.”
At the time I didn’t connect what Althor was telling me with what Ming had told me earlier about the exchange of prisoners that freed Althor’s father after the last war. That exchange took place before the Trader officials involved knew their military had captured a Lock. I’ve often wondered what they would have done had they realized they possessed both a Lock and a Key. Would they have refused to give up Althor’s father, even though the youth they were trading him for was their future emperor? “You should build another Lock,” I said.
“How?” He spread his hands. “My ancestors took the technology from the ruins on Raylicon. We’ve figured out the star drives, but we still don’t understand their psibertech.”
“I don’t understand. Why is the psibernet so important?”
He leaned forward, elbows on his knees. “It lets us communicate almost instantaneously across any distance. The only alternatives are to send interstellar messages-via electromagnetic waves, which travel at light speed, or via starship, which brings in relativistic effects. With relativity, you are never sure when messages will arrive. Inversion is the worst. During inversion, signals you send to other inverted ships can arrive any time, even before you send them, or not until the end of the universe.” He turned over his wrist, showing me its socket. “The psibernet bypasses all of that. As fast as I can form a thought, any telepath in the net can pick it up. The speed at which information moves through a military machine is vital. Imagine a large, slow warrior and a small, fast opponent. The Traders could crush us if they could catch us. But they are too slow. So we survive.”
“David and Goliath.” I smiled. “It’s a story about a boy who defeated a giant.”
He exhaled. “I wish we could defeat them. Now that they have a Lock, all they need is a Key and the giant will have his speed. There are eleven of us in the Rhon. Eleven potential Keys. Four women and seven men.” He suddenly looked like a boy caught with his hand in the cookie jar. “I am the youngest. The most insignificant.”
“Jailbait, huh?” I smirked. “Maybe you’re not old enough for me to marry.”
As he laughed, a knock sounded on the door. Kabatu looked in. “Commander Selei? Max wondered if you wanted to get the contract specifications done now.”
“I’ll be right there,” Althor said.
After Kabatu withdrew, I said, “Are you going to work on the treaty?”
He shook his head. “That will take months of negotiation between the Allied Congress and Imperial Assembly. We and the Allieds have been dancing around this for decades. All four Rhon females are married, so both sides have long expected to arrange the marriage of a Rhon male with an Allied woman having a high Kyle rating.” He gave me a guilty look. “Given my minor status compared to my uncles, my name never came up seriously. No one expected a Rhon marriage this way, unplanned, unannounced, un-everything.”
I began to understand why he had pushed so hard for it. If Ming was right, that my rating could be as high as a five, I had value to Althor’s people despite my low social status. Any children he and I had would be Kyle operators, probably even telepaths. My genes came from a different pool, a different universe even, so a good chance existed that the Kyle alleles he and I carried differed enough to minimize unfavorable traits.
In retrospect, I also see why he insisted I take no other husbands: Imperial law allows polygamy. And Althor was last in line for any arrangement with a Kyle woman. So he leap-frogged the hierarchy and made sure he would have no competitors.
“Right now I want to ensure that certain provisions are in place,” he said. “I have a few lands, a little wealth, a minor civilian title. All that goes to you if—” He paused. “If anything happens to me.” Fatigue creased his face. “I have to get word to my family. Meanwhile, I’m going to leave you wi
th the Abaj on Raylicon. They will protect you.”
“No!” I stared at him. “You can’t leave me alone.”
He put his arms around my waist. “I don’t want you exposed to this. I’ll arrange with Stonehenge to secure our contract here until I send for it.” In a subdued voice-he said, “If I’m killed, he will forward it to both the Assembly and Allied Congress.”
“No. Althor, don’t say that. No one will kill you.”
“I hope not.” His expression softened. “Especially not now, when I have so much more than I did before.”
After Althor left, I returned to the Observation Deck to look at the stars. It was quiet now, the people and remains of the wedding gone. In the wash of starlight, I prayed for Althor. Don’t let him die, I thought. I petitioned the meld of Maya and Spanish deities I had learncfd as a child: the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost; the Vashakmen, who hold the world on their shoulders; the Totilme’iletik, our ancestors; Ix Chel, both the moon goddess and the Virgin Mary. I had no incense to offer, but white candles still burned in the chamber. I asked the spirits to forgive my poor showing for the rituals and prayed that they let no lightning knock out parts of Althor’s soul.
Lightning and thunder: it was how I saw Althor. So I also prayed to Yahval Balamil, the Earth Lord, who uses a landsnail’s shell to hold powder for his thundering skyrockets. His essence lives in water holes and caves, including around Nabenchauk, my home, Lake of the Lightning. I added a prayer to ’Anheletik, who seeps out of caves as a mist, or comes as lightning; and to ’Anhel, god of thunder and rain. For good measure I ended with a prayer to Thor, the Norse god of thunder and war. Granted, it was out of place, but it seemed like a good idea.
Eventually I left the Observation Deck and walked through the park. The mirrors outside the station had rotated to reflect sunlight into other areas of the torus, leaving this section in night. Starlight shone through the windows, as bright—and as hard—as gems.
13
White Lace Abduction
Someone shook my shoulder. I opened my eyes, seeing a gold blur. Gradually it resolved into Althor. Behind him, holos gleamed on the walls in our bedroom, red and gold desert scenes, soothing images that had dimmed when I lay down earlier.
I spoke drowsily, my eyes closing again. “Are you finished with Stonehedge?”
“As done as we can be for now.” He lay next to me. “You and I have maybe six more hours before we leave.”
“Ummm…” I rolled close to him. “Good.”
He pulled at the tie at my neckline. “I think I can do this one without a manual.”
I laughed, sleepy and warm. I couldn’t get my eyes open, though. So I lay against him, half asleep. His cheek slid down my shoulder, and his mouth clbsed around my breast, suckling, warm and sensuous. I tried to wake up, but I couldn’t focus. It felt like cotton filled my brain. So I let my thoughts drift. No need to think.
’ After a while, Althor slid his hand under my dress and pulled off my panties. I drifted in a half dream, vaguely aware of him trying to stir a reaction from his new bride.
Finally he laughed. “Tina, wake up! It’s our wedding night.”
“Hmm…” I made an effort to open my eyes. “You switched modes again.”
“I did?”
“Your accent came back.”
“I thought the Jag stabilized it.” He kissed me. “I guess not.”
“Maybe it—ouch!” My eyes snapped all the way open. Althor pushed up on his elbows. “What’s wrong?”
“The hilt of your sword just jabbed me in the stomach.” Now that I had my eyes open, I realized he was still fully dressed. I laughed. “You haven’t even taken off your boots.”
He grinned, sitting up as he tugged his pullover over his head. He dropped it on the floor, then undid the sword and set it down on the pullover. When he lay down again and began kissing me, it felt wonderful. But… something was wrong. Something was missing. Or muted.
Then it hit me. The golden haze created by my exhaustion was gone. I still saw the sparkling effect of his dress uniform, but that was all. My own naturally produced light show had disappeared.
I stopped kissing him. ‘Althor, did you hear a thud outside?”
He lifted his head. “What?”
“A thud. Outside.”
“No, I hear no—”
We both heard it that time. Someone had opened the door to our house.
Althor jumped off the bed and grabbed the sword. Heavy footsteps thudded in the living room. As I got off the bed, pulling down my dress, he nudged me toward the back wall. “Stay behind me.”
The door he faced was the only entrance. He moved toward it, pulling his sword out of its sheath as the footsteps came closer—
And an arm brought a gun around my body, a weapon bigger than any assault rifle, made from mirrored metal. The stock lay against my abdomen and the barrel jutted up my body, between my breasts, its tip resting under my chin. I felt something behind me, human-shaped, but larger and hard like metal.
“Althor,” I whispered.
He turned, and as soon as I saw the look on his face, I knew we had run out of luck.
The door opened, revealing four giants, each over two meters tall. They resembled robots, human-shaped but heavier. The flexible mirrored surfaces of their bodies reflected the room’s holoart. Their heads were ridged metal helmets with screens where a nose should have been. Each giant wore a metal waistband with a power pack and boots with six-inch treads. Three of them carried guns that looked the way the one pressed against my body felt.
They had Stonehedge. A bruise purpled his face and more covered his arms where they showed through the torn cloth. The right sleeve of his uniform had been ripped completely off and a patch was fastened to the inside of his elbow.
I know now that the mirrored giants were mercenaries wearing armor, but at the time I had no idea what they were, other than terrifying. Because they look like robots, people call them warrior droids, or just waroids. Although they have neither the speed nor agility of a Jagernaut, they have more power, and the advantages of being a walking fortress.
Althor stood in the middle of the room holding a ceremonial sword made from soft gold, facing metal giants with guns that could, in one shot, do more damage than fifty case-hardened swords. He looked at the waroids, at me, back at the waroids. Then he dropped the sword.
“Lord Selei.” The voice came from a waroid across the room. It sounded eerie, as if it were filtered to remove identifying nuances.
“Don’t hurt her,” Althor said.
“We have no interest in your wife,” the waroid said. “Cooperate and she will live.”
“What do you want?” Althor asked.
“Turn around. Put your arms behind your back.”
As Althor complied, the waroid opened a compartment in his armor and pulled out a cord with lights flickering on it. He didn’t come near Althor; he simply let go of the cord. It fell to the ground, snapped across the floor to Althor, and climbed up his legs to his wrists. Then it unraveled into a mesh and bound his hands together. I thought it was alive. In truth, a binding mesh is as insentient as a rock. It works on nano-bots with sticky molecules that either cling or slide on surfaces, depending on then-state.
When the mesh was in place, the waroid approached and prodded Althor forward by pushing his shoulder with the tip of his mammoth gun. The one behind me removed his gun and moved to my side, taking hold of my arm. Its footsteps were silent as it walked, instead of thudding, but other than that it was identical to the others. It led me forward, following the others, who were bringing Althor and Stonehedge.
The waroid who had spoken appeared to be the leader. As we walked, he touched a panel on his armor and his boots became silent. I understood then: they had deliberately made noise when they came in, drawing Althor to the door while they sliced through the back wall, probably with black-market nano-bots that dissolved metal.
Outside, it was still night; the line of dawn that
moved down the curving plain of the torus wasn’t yet visible. We walked through the starlit parks in silence. Nothing moved. We passed a man and woman sprawled unconscious on the ground next to a bench, then a dog sleeping under a tree, then a dead mouse.
When we reached the spoke, the leader pressed a pattern into the elevator panels. Nothing happened. He tried again, with no success. Turning to Stonehenge, he said, “What is the combination?”
Stonehedge just looked at him, his face set in firm lines.
The leader raised his arm and backhanded Stonehenge across the face, slamming him into the waroid behind him. “What is the combination?”
“Go to hell,” Stonehenge said.
The leader motioned to another waroid. As it approached Stonehenge, the director tensed. But the waroid only examined the patch on his arm, the material that sheathed its fingers flexing like a mirrored skin. Then it straightened up. “Try now.” The leader regarded Stonehenge. “What is the combination?” Stonehedge spoke in a clenched voice, as if fighting the words. “Triangle, square, four, circle, circle, red, four, three, eight, green.” The leader entered the combination and the spoke doors opened. After the nine of us crowded inside, the doors closed and the car began its journey to the hub.
We later determined that the moment Althor had contacted Epsilani, a message had gone out, sent by a sleeper virus that infected their web. The sleeper didn’t awake until Althor’s message came in, and after performing its function it destroyed itself. It didn’t succeed in removing every trace of its existence, though, either at Epsilani or elsewhere. It had infected all of the nets, Allied and Skolian, even Trader.
As we rode inward, our weight decreased. When we were weightless, the doors opened onto the passage that circled the hub. We floated to the decon chamber, through the hub, past the drifting bodies of unconscious colonists.
I felt the Jag now, or more accurately, I felt its absence. It was quiescent, like a sleeping beast. I understood then why my brain was like cotton. The waroids had shut down the Jag, and because of my link to it, they had unknowingly affected my brain as well. When we entered the decon chamber, the holomap by its console showed a pod moving from a large ship outside the station toward the Jag’s docking chute.