Starfire Saga, page 50
“You can ask Jasin Lebec,” I said, “when you see him.” My own voice suddenly shook, and I gathered and controlled it.
He tensed briefly when I mentioned Jasin Lebec. Then he raised himself on one elbow, watching me. “What just happened?”
I debated what I really wanted to say. “Sandalari keeps talking about ‘going back to the Com’ as if it’s some sort of adventure. She’s looking forward to it. And I know I’m going because I’m oath-bound to. Jemeret, I think I can go to the Com, but I don’t think I can go back.”
He smiled. “If you can’t go back, love,” he said, “then go forward instead.”
Sheridar was almost completely well when we left the Gendals at the Forge, and Henion and his people had already returned to the Nedi. I had healed my wound completely after all my strength was back, and was able to help Sheridar see how to continue with his own healing. I was beginning to learn not to try to do everything myself, just to guide and teach, as I had Shantiah at Midwinter Song. Jemeret watched me, but said nothing. Sometimes I thought Tynnanna watched me, too.
Only the Boru and Sandalari made the long run north. She’d taken leave of the Genda before we departed and was now an incipient Boru herself, though we would have no time for a formal induction ceremony before we went off-world. Another Severance Storm was due, and we raced it the final days, doing the steep climb into the valley that sheltered the home of the Boru at a speed that made footing treacherous. Tynnanna raced along ahead of us, his fur ruffled by the rising wind. He was capable of traveling much faster than we were; indeed, he could have gotten to the top in a fraction of the time it took us. He stayed with us, however, sometimes running up the nearly vertical walls beside the flatter track and then returning to pace us again. I expected him to peel off from us before we reached the village proper, for he never spent the storms with us, but this time he stayed close to my stirrup.
Jemeret had called ahead, stinging Tuvellen, his second-in-command, and Sejineth, the tivong keeper. In the face of the storm, which was nearly upon us, they met us in the deserted village. Everyone else was locked in their homes or at their assigned tasks, sheltered from the violent weather. Wordlessly, the two men took the tivongs from us and went to put them away. Venacrona spoke to both of them quickly before he, Coney, and Sandalari ran to the temple, closer to the tivong barns than our house was. The guards split off for the house of men, and Gundever ran for his home. Even before the guards and Gundever reached their destinations, Jemeret and I had stung them carefully to eliminate the memory of our skirmish with the Honish and implant the false memories of returning to Stronghome alone, of seeing the four of us departing with Venacrona toward the cove containing Ashkalin’s ship.
When we reached the porch of our house, my lord paused for a moment in the face of the powerful wind and made certain that Tuvellen and Sejineth had understood Venacrona’s swift orders to say nothing about our return. He was, I knew, ready to sting them as well, but he seemed satisfied by what he learned. I didn’t try to probe them along with him, because I wasn’t at all certain what he was looking for.
He signaled me to get inside just as the wind was threatening to push me over, and Tynnanna, who had, surprisingly, accompanied us all the way to the house, used his powerful body, his shoulder the height of mine now as he reached his full growth, to block the strongest gusts. Nevertheless, I was still almost lifted off my feet and slammed into Jemeret. My lord caught my arms and jerked me back upright as he swung the door open for us. Tynnanna followed us in.
Numima wasn’t there tending the house. She, like the others in the village, had not known when we would return; if we worked our visit here correctly, no one would know we’d been here at all except for Tuvellen and Sejineth. Somehow, Jemeret and Venacrona would make certain that they told the same story Gundever and the guards did: that Gundever had come back with the guards but without the rest of us—Venacrona would be returning from the Genda later, and Jemeret and I had gone in search of the fabled Isle of the Wise at the request of the starfire.
We left our boots and cloaks by the door and Tynnanna settled on the hearth, waiting for someone to light the fire for him. We went into our bedroom to change into dry clothes while the house shivered in the wind. Jemeret pulled on a loose pair of leggings and his robe, then watched me brush my travel-tangled hair in front of the polished metal mirror above the trunk in our dressing room. For a few minutes I brushed vigorously at the light brown mass, but then my motions slowed. I stared at his reflection, burnished by the mirror as he lounged negligently in one of the fireplace chairs, his eyes on me.
“What?” he asked when I stopped moving, the hairbrush cradled in one palm.
I turned toward him. “I was just thinking how happy I am to be back here, that I finally have someplace I can call home, and it’s ironic that just as I feel that way, we’re leaving.”
I expected him to say we’d be back, but he didn’t. Instead he shifted in the chair and swung one of his legs over a chair arm.
“We need to talk a little about that, Ronica. If I know the Com at all—and I think I do—there’s a strong possibility that once we get there, they’ll try to separate us.”
The words thrust a stab of fear through me. I thought that I could face anything at all if he were with me. Alone, I wouldn’t be his Class A any longer, and then who would I be? But I knew he was right. We were both Class A’s. It was government policy to use talent on separate assignments once their training was complete, except of course for Sinet and Lage. “We can’t let them separate us,” I said as steadily as I could.
“I agree.” He nodded once. “I’ve thought of a number of different scenarios, and I believe our most effective approach will be to tell them we’re married.”
Knowing the reputation of the Honish institution of marriage among the tribes of the Samoth, I was vastly surprised, but it did make sense. Braceleting was unique to the Samothen, and it was a largely spiritual and emotional bond. Neither of those qualities was valued by the Com politicians or the MIs. Spirituality was to be publicly tolerated and privately disparaged by those in power. The MIs found such feelings disruptive rather than valid, viewing them as a problem to be overcome, not a factor to be weighed in the forecasting models. Marriage, on the other hand, was a legal bond with economic overtones and political consequences, and that the Com understood very well.
Jemeret watched me conclude that he was right, then went on, his voice a little gentler. “And since you’re under oath to the Com, and I’m not, I believe I’d better be the husband.”
I felt a smile pull at the corners of my mouth. “I used to wonder if I’d ever marry,” I said, a little apologetically, “and I’d always conclude I wouldn’t, but if by some chance I did, I was certain I’d be the husband.”
He smiled back, his expression slightly amused. “I guessed that,” he said. “And for anyone except me, man or woman, you probably would have been. For purposes of what we want to try to do in the Com and this marriage, however, you have to agree to be the wife.”
In a second or two I’d considered all the arguments, all the options, and I knew he was once again right. I lowered my head and went back to brushing my hair. “Yes, all right,” I said. “I suppose I do already think of you as my lord; you might as well be my husband, too.” I tried not to sound grudging.
He got to his feet and came to put his arms around me, taking the hairbrush from my fingers and brushing the last tangled section of my hair. His hands were gentle, and I felt that he was trying to master a sadness I hadn’t previously been aware of. He felt my inquiry.
“At the border,” he said, “I lost my temper, and I used an unmodulated stroke of the sting. I may have killed one of those soldiers. I was too tired to control it, but if I hadn’t been so tired, I might have killed more. And Medio died, too.”
I recognized all the symptoms. “Jemeret, you did the best you could, and you know it. You’ve taught me to try and forgive myself when I do something—” I searched for the right word. “—flawed. Don’t tell me I have to remind you.”
“No,” he said, still smiling, his hands moving steadily over my hair. “I just need to stop at the temple before we actually leave for the spaceport. I want to perform the starfire ritual for expiation. It’s a sure antidote to sorrow over the misuse of power, and when talent dies as well as the untalented, it’s absolutely necessary.”
In the mirror, I met his gaze. “You mean there’s a ritual I can use to help me say I’m sorry I killed Kray?”
“If you’re so inclined.” He gathered my hair into his left hand and held it. “Just decide what you’re really sorry about before you perform the ritual.”
I thought about that as he put the hairbrush down and let go of my hair. I wasn’t sorry I had defended myself against the attack or tried to keep the rape from happening. I wasn’t sorry I had recovered from the suicide attempt, and I would never need to ask for expiation for that. But I had known, somewhere inside, the moment I hit Kray with the sting, that my action was inappropriate, even immoral. A physical kill was something entirely different; other people could do it, too. It was not so shameful an act. Killing with the sting was an abuse of power unlike any the human race had ever seen. I had to think more about that, so I filed it at the back of my mind.
Memory nudged me. I turned to face Jemeret, unwilling to look only at his reflection. “You killed Kowati with the sting without falling into this kind of remorse.”
“Kowati betrayed the tribe,” Jemeret said evenly, “and the tribe is more important than any individual.” He paused for a moment, but I sensed he wasn’t done, so I waited. “And there was another reason. You hated yourself because—at least in part—you believed no one else had ever used the sting to kill. I knew it would help you to accept your action if you knew I’d done it, too. But I did the expiation ritual for it later.”
Once again his wisdom came as a surprise to me. I said, “I think it’ll be an interesting experience to be in the Com with you, even as your wife.”
From the other room there was a crash, and we went out to find the scattered pieces of a large bowl in which Tynnanna had hoped to find something to eat. We took some meat from the cold storage box, whose small openings admitted air from outside, put it in another bowl, and let the klawit retire to the hearth with it. He was large enough now so that his body blocked half the fireplace, and he was not gentle about devouring his dinner. While he ate we picked up the pieces of the first bowl.
“We ought to have some food, too,” I said.
He nodded, and Tynnanna snorted in our direction and went on eating, adjusting the meat between his paws.
Jemeret fished up some dried fruit and biscuits. “Sit down and take some of this,” he said. “Then I have to make a call.”
The eftel was right in our house, in a recess beside the main room fireplace, disguised as part of the wall. There was something entirely incongruous about the sight of my lord easily holding an example of the best and most expensive technology the Com had to offer, a symbol of the strongest empire in millennia. It put me back in touch with everything I thought had been lost to me forever, and neither the storm nor the distance was an obstacle to it, as they were to so many other things. “There’s a storm here now,” my Lord Jemeret said to whomever was on the other end of the connection, up on the station. “Confirm it on your tracers, and when you see it move away, send a lander with room for four.”
Some instinct prodded me unexpectedly. “Six.”
He glanced at me, not understanding.
“Six,” I repeated. “Please tell them that.”
He hesitated a moment, then said, “Correction. Room for six.”
I felt immediately better, confirmed.
“Excuse me,” Jemeret said abruptly, in the kind of tone that implied he was impatiently overriding some sort of stupidity, “but I wasn’t asking you for anything. I’m telling you to send down a Line-2 lander when the storm is over.” He broke the connection, shaking his head, and sealed the eftel back into its compartment. “Six?”
“You, me, Coney, Sandalari, and Tynnanna, who needs room for two. He saved my life when the Honish guards shot at us. We’re going into a situation where I want that kind of loyalty with me.” He smiled, nodded a slow agreement, took my hand in his. I didn’t add that where Tynnanna went, the voice of the starfire went also.
The cat was washing his face, fastidiously unconcerned. Jemeret kissed my wrist, moving on from there. I put aside the thought of being his wife in the eyes of a Com whose only real knowledge of me was not to my credit, and slid closer to him.
The storm lasted five days, and when it broke, Jemeret left the house at once to speak with Tuvellen about his approaching absence. The cover story Venacrona would tell, of our sailing to find the Isle of the Wise, he and Sejineth would reinforce; Gundever and the guards would also stand as proof. We believed our tribe would want their leaders to discover the ancient secrets; it would cement our leadership of the Samothen as little else could have. It might have given the tribes additional leverage with the Honish, as well. I thought that they would probably have found it hard to believe the truth of the secret we already knew, but it bothered me that we were not willing to trust our people well enough to tell them that truth.
“When I’ve finished with Tuvellen, I’ll go on to the temple,” Jemeret said. “It’s still early enough so that most of the tribe won’t be awake, and we can be away before there’s much activity to stifle. Coney’s out walking around—Venacrona couldn’t stop him—and he should get here before I get back. You two meet me over there.”
Tynnanna rose and stalked out after him. The klawit had gone out every day of the storm, in any stray lulls, but he’d always returned quickly, and by the last day we knew he was as careful about not being noticed as if he knew that we didn’t want it known we’d returned to Stronghome.
“I keep feeling that I should pack things, but then I wonder what,” I said as Jemeret fastened his cloak. “I think it would probably be ill-mannered to take the crowns.”
He smiled. “Just the nomidars and Tynnanna,” he said. I was pleased we were taking the stringed, sympathetic instruments with us. I smiled back at him. “Dress warmly. It’s hours to the spaceport.” Then he and the klawit were gone, Tynnanna’s huge shoulders momentarily threatening to push out both sides of the door frame.
I was alone in our house. I dressed in thick leggings and a laba-fur tunic that made me feel a little like a child’s bugbear. I draped my hooded cloak over one of the couches, put the two nomidars on top of the cloak, and then I had nothing else to do.
We were really going to the Com, leaving Caryldon, the wilderworld I’d grown so used to. Leaving home. I wandered from room to room, running my fingertips lightly over the surfaces, impressing on myself the dimensions and textures of the place. It felt safe, and I nearly laughed. I’d always thought my safety would be automatic, coming from my own talent and from the esteem in which the Com held Class A’s. Now I knew it had to come from deeper within me than talent alone, and I was infinitely grateful that Jemeret was coming with me.
Coney rapped on the door and opened it as I was coming out of the kitchen. He was dressed much as I was, his cloak already fastened. He had never looked entirely comfortable in the clothing of Caryldon, and he was a little uneasy now. I kissed him lightly on the cheek. “Even when I knew there was a way off this world, I didn’t think it would actually come to this,” I said.
“I did,” he said. “Trying to make it happen more quickly was the only real doubt I had. When you set foot on Markover Station, I’ve completed my first Class C assignment.”
“Congratulations.” I didn’t mean it to sound sarcastic, but he flushed, and I looked down at my cloak and the pair of nomidars. “I suppose they’ll give you another, and that will take you away from us.” I had to look up at him again.
His light brown eyes went thoughtful. “Perhaps,” he said slowly, “but I think there’s a chance that they may want to use me to try to influence you. And Jemeret. If that’s the case, they’ll send us on the same assignments.” He glanced at the door, as if expecting Jemeret to come in. “Or they may want me with you, and Jemeret somewhere else.”
I shook my head. “I’m his wife,” I said deliberately. “I accepted the role, and he would have to relinquish his authority. He won’t do that.”
Coney smiled. “Clever,” he said appreciatively. “I suppose Sandi and I could do something along those lines. The Com’s a big place.”
“Sandi?” I repeated.
“It went with ‘Coney,’” he said. “Are you nervous?”
I was, and I saw no reason to deny it, not to him. “Some. I know more about the Com and the government than I used to, and I’m beginning to feel that may be a detriment.”
He nodded once. “I know what you mean.” His mouth twitched a little. “I keep telling myself that I know how to do this. I know how to deal with the people, at any rate, and I don’t have to deal with the MIs.”
“Except for Mortel John.” It was out before I realized I’d said it.
Coney shook his head in disbelief. “I still can’t accept that, even though I’m sure it’s true.”
“Oh, it’s true. No wonder he could hold out so well against my sting that time I stung him. Next time I’ll pathfind him and be done with it.” I must have sounded angry.
Coney said softly, “Easy, Ronnie. I think you’d better hold back—at least at first. They don’t have any reason to believe you’re personally hostile to them, and I’ve seen how they act around Jemeret. The dislike is mutual, so they’re very wary. It’s a measure of how much they want you back that they’re willing to deal with him at all.”
I felt a rush of the old pride in my self-importance, the feeling the government completely encouraged in me the whole time I was in training. Now I laughed at myself.
