Uprising, page 11
Anjuli shook her head.
“Then why have you been so angry with me?”
“Irin asked me that. Frequently. I had a different answer every time, and they all made sense then. They still made sense half a hantick ago.” She slowly spun the bracelet, taking comfort in the smooth slide of metal. “I’m not angry with you. I’m angry with Shantu. But he’s not here.”
It was a monumental confession, yet Lancer Tal simply nodded.
“I’m sorry,” Anjuli whispered. “I didn’t know that until now.”
“I’m glad you know.”
“I’m not. It was easier being angry with you. Now I’m—”
“You’re what?” Lancer Tal asked when she didn’t finish.
She let her hands fall to her lap, bracelets jingling at the impact. “Heartbroken. Furious with a man I can never speak to again. When that fight started, I knew I was going to lose no matter which of you won. You walked away, but—”
“I was carried away.”
Anjuli looked up, startled. How could she forget that? She was haunted by the vision of Shantu falling to the floor, never to rise again. Yet she had forgotten Lancer Tal’s collapse shortly after.
The memories flooded back: The days Lancer Tal spent in the healing center as thousands kept vigil outside. The constant stream of worshippers in Blacksun Temple, burning offerings for Fahla’s Chosen. The way all of Alsea held its breath while she recovered.
Then she reappeared in the State House, looking as if the fight had never happened—and Anjuli’s pain and rage found its target.
“Goddess above,” she murmured. Without her impenetrable shield of anger, the truth bit into her conscience. Lancer Tal had done precisely what Alsea needed. She had proven that the crisis was over, that both the government and its leader were intact. Anything else would have been political negligence, yet it was the very thing Anjuli had punished her for.
“I know you understand the pain of loss,” she said, trying to defend the indefensible. “But you can’t understand the pain of loss that’s unspoken. That I’m not even allowed to have.”
“After all this, you’re still making assumptions about me.” Lancer Tal reached for her cup. “The only thing worse than that kind of pain is suffering it alone. Trying to look as if nothing is wrong when all you want to do is curl up in a dark room.” She sipped her shannel with a casual air, as if she hadn’t just described Anjuli’s experience with perfect accuracy.
“Who did you lose?”
“Someone I wasn’t allowed to have. But it got better when I could finally speak of it.”
Anjuli ran her fingertip along the bracelet. “Good for you. I’m not that lucky. There’s no one I can talk to.”
“Yes, there is.”
“Who, a templar? No thanks, I don’t—” She gaped at Lancer Tal’s expression. “You? Why would I—no, never mind that, why would you want to hear it?”
Lancer Tal tapped her fingertip on the side of her cup. “I’m angry with him, too. We were never friends, but I could always depend on his honor. Until he lost his damned mind and forced me to kill him in front of the whole world.” Her finger tapped again, two quick beats before she looked up. “I don’t want to spend any more time being angry with a man who will never hear my reasons. Do you?”
Anjuli shook her head. Anger had done her no good at all. It had nearly cost her everything.
“Then tell me about the Shantu I didn’t know. Remind us both of who he used to be.”
“I wouldn’t know where to begin.”
Lancer Tal leaned back, hands wrapped loosely around the cup in her lap. “How about at the beginning? When did he start to become more than a friend?”
“We shared midmeal after a High Council meeting,” Anjuli said slowly. “He told me that no one made him laugh the way I did.”
“Or smile. I noticed that a long time ago.”
“You did?”
“Shantu always smirked at the rest of us. He smiled at you.”
It didn’t seem reasonable that such a simple observation could elicit such happiness. But she had never thought anyone else noticed. Knowing that Lancer Tal had, and that she was listening—it was as if a solid wall had suddenly sprouted a door.
“He was so different, away from here. I suppose we all are, but he truly was.”
“Did you always call him Shantu?”
“He preferred it. I tried to use his first name once.” Her cheeks warmed at the memory. “That ended in a wrestling match. I lost.” She glanced up, looking for judgment, but Lancer Tal seemed intrigued.
“It’s difficult to imagine a playful Shantu.”
“Oh, he played. In that vexing warrior way.”
Lancer Tal’s smile allowed the door to swing wide open.
The stories bubbled up then, crowding for space now that they had an outlet. They filled the places previously occupied by anger and grief, and for the first time since his death, thoughts of Shantu did not suffocate.
The conversation lasted for a hantick, her words and memories coming easier with every tick. Lancer Tal seemed genuinely reluctant to end it, citing an appointment she could not reschedule. If it was political theater, it was the best performance Anjuli had ever seen.
After their cordial parting, she walked through the antechamber in a dreamy daze. Her title was safe, yet that was not the main source of the relief that lightened her steps and made the corridors seem more brilliantly lit.
Not until she entered the familiar space of her office did she understand what Lancer Tal had engineered. Had anyone told her to expect it, she would have laughed at the impossibility. But she felt better than she had in eight moons, because she had finally been given the freedom to speak of her lover.
To his killer.
MONSTERS WITHIN
13
Last resort
Andira Tal bid good-bye to her guest, walked back to her couch, and fell into it with a groan. “Spawn of a fantenshekken,” she whispered, hands over her eyes. “That’s it.”
She dragged her hands down her face and blinked at the empty shannel cup left behind by the Prime Builder. Salomen had given it to her a moon ago, one of a set of six. Now there were five.
Anjuli Eroles had no idea how close she had come to being as shattered as the sixth cup. But she had known enough to be petrified with fear. The strength of her terror had fed the monster, and Tal had needed every last shred of her will to hold it back. She was a piptick away from losing when Salomen’s calming influence flowed through their bond.
So many times over the past two moons, Salomen had pulled her back from the brink. Tal hated the fact that she needed help, but Salomen had the same response every time: Who gave birth to that monster?
This time, even Salomen’s aid was barely enough. They fought with all of their combined empathic strength, Tal’s fist shaking in the air as the three of them did battle in her mind. At last the monster drew back just far enough for her to slam the door on its cage once more. With the snarling ringing in her ears, she had summarily ended a political partnership that Alsea could ill afford to lose.
Eight moons she had spent trying to save that partnership. Eight moons of tolerating everything the grieving Prime Builder threw at her—and she had set it all on fire in a single moment.
It took a great deal to surprise Tal, but she was truly shocked when Anjuli came back.
“Never let it be said that warriors have all the courage,” she murmured, letting her arms fall limply to her sides.
After five ticks, she felt recovered enough to take the used cups to her sideboard. From the cupboard beneath, she pulled out a bottle of spirits and popped off the tab. A heavy blue mist flowed out and down the neck of the bottle, caressing her hand with its cool touch.
She poured a healthy serving, drank half of it, refilled the glass to its prior level, and carried it over to her desk.
One tap activated her Gaian pad in its stand. A second called the Phoenix. Never mind the matter printers or the space elevator; she thought quantum coms were the true miracle of Protectorate technology. It had been one of the greatest adjustments to her thinking, the idea that the speed of light was slow.
She was no longer limited by Fleet rationing of personal quantum com time. Since the Phoenix was assigned to Alsea, calls between its captain and the Lancer were considered business. The com officer was used to her calls and routed them straight to their destination, which was wherever Captain Ekatya Serrado happened to be on her ship.
Today it was somewhere in the engineering section, judging by the equipment Tal could see behind Ekatya’s smiling face.
“Andira, how are you?”
“Not that well. Are you busy? Can we speak privately?”
Ekatya’s smile dropped. “Hold on, I’ll go kick my chief engineer out of his office. He doesn’t need it anyway.”
The pad went blank for half a tick, then blinked to life again. “This man needs to clean his office,” Ekatya grumbled. “I had to shove a pile of tools off the chair before I could sit in it.” She pushed a lock of black hair behind her ear. “What’s wrong?”
“Before I tell you that, how is Rahel Sayana doing?”
Her expression said she recognized the delay tactic but would go along with it. “Just fine, all things considered.”
“That doesn’t sound like a rousing affirmation.”
“No, it is. She’s everything you said she would be. But there were bound to be some settling in issues. We ran into one yesterday. I’m ashamed to say that seven of my security crew tried to bully her.”
“What happened?”
“Mayhem happened. Those idiots attacked her while she was practicing with her stave. She took them down in less than half a tick. Every one of them, Andira. Broken bones all over the place, and she didn’t have a mark on her.” She shook her head with a soft laugh.
Tal found herself smiling, both as a reaction to Ekatya’s mirth and her own pride in an Alsean warrior, even if it was that warrior. “Why is that funny?”
“Because . . .” Ekatya chuckled again before sobering. “There’s a lot of gossip floating around about why I accepted her. I needed her to prove herself, but I hadn’t figured out a way. She took that out of my hands.”
“You wanted her to take down your crew?”
“Well, it wouldn’t have been my first choice. But the whole ship is already buzzing with it. She took down security crew. Trained fighters. Seven of them at once. Honestly, I can’t think of anything she could have done that would have been more effective. Oh! Here’s a story you’ll enjoy.” Her face lit up again. “She’s been through her first exit transition from base space. Dr. Wells tested foramine on her brain chemistry and said it wouldn’t do any harm, but she couldn’t guarantee it would help, either. Rahel got it into her mind that she’d go without. I told her that was a bad idea. She said real warriors don’t need drugs to get them through physical discomfort.”
Tal wished Salomen were hearing this. “How long did it take her to realize she was insulting you?”
“About two pipticks. You should have seen the look on her face. She fell over herself trying to explain, but every word just dug that hole deeper.” Ekatya’s lips were twitching. “But I was a good captain. I said I thought the same thing my first time, so I didn’t take my foramine. And when we came out of base space, I spent the next hantick vomiting so hard I thought my toenails would come off.”
A chuckle rumbled up Tal’s throat. “Graphic personal illustrations; I salute your teaching methods. Then she took the foramine?”
Ekatya gave her a look of exasperation. “Apparently, all Alsean warriors are stubborn.”
“So judgmental. How long did she vomit her toenails off?”
“That’s the irritating part. She spent the transition in the medbay. Dr. Wells said she sounded like a child on a thrill ride, and when it was all over, the first thing she wanted to know was when we could do it again.”
Tal would never have believed she could laugh so soon after her encounter with the Prime Builder, but Ekatya always brought it out of her. “So much for the captain’s infallibility.”
“I know! Now she’ll never believe me when I give her advice. And Dr. Wells thinks Rahel is my personal gift to her. She’s running ten different studies. I’ll need more Alseans just to fill her data set.”
Tal sat back in her chair, more relaxed than she had been since getting out of bed this morning. “If Rahel makes it through with her flag still flying, we’ll see about getting you more.”
“Good.” Ekatya watched expectantly, her job done. There would be no more delays.
“Thank you for letting me ease into it.”
“Any time. What happened?”
She rubbed her forehead ridges. “I have a confession. I didn’t tell you everything about why we chose Rahel for this program.”
For a piptick, Ekatya looked hurt before a cool mask slipped into place. “Another lie of omission? I thought we were past that.”
“Ekatya, no—shek.” She hated that expression. “It doesn’t have anything to do with her service to you.”
“But it has to do with you.”
“And Salomen. If it were only my secret . . . Fahla, you have no idea how much I wanted to tell you.”
The mask fell away as quickly as it had appeared, replaced by open concern. “You’re protecting her.”
“Yes.”
“Is she all right?”
“Better than me,” Tal muttered. She took a fortifying drink and set aside her glass. “What I’m about to say could blow up my administration.”
“Could you just tell me? I’m starting to think I need to turn this ship around.”
After the last hantick she’d had, this simple gesture of support nearly unwound Tal’s control. She swallowed down the tightness in her throat and said, “Salomen didn’t just use empathic force on Rahel.”
Ekatya’s eyes rounded. “Didn’t just? Meaning something worse? What’s worse than that?”
“Remember when we were strategizing for the Voloth invasion, and you suggested we have our high empaths make the Voloth kill themselves?”
“Yes, but you said that wasn’t possible because self-preservation is the deepest instinct . . .” She trailed off, her mouth hanging open. “No.”
Tal nodded. “We didn’t know how strong she was before. We do now. She’s the strongest empath in our history. There has never been an Alsean who can do what she did.”
After a heavy pause, Ekatya said, “Well, Rahel is alive and happy on my ship, so it didn’t work.”
“It did. She was two pipticks away from shooting herself in the head. Lead Guard Vellmar stopped her by putting a knife through her hand.”
“That’s how she got that injury? How is she normal? Why isn’t she like—”
“A broken Voloth?” Tal finished for her. “I don’t know. Somehow, Salomen managed a perfectly targeted attack. Lanaril says there’s no damage. None. Those Voloth were shattered by the empathic equivalent of war hammers. Salomen went in like a surgeon.”
“How? She’s not even trained.”
“Pure instinct. This might sound unbelievable—” As Ekatya raised her eyebrows, Tal added, “More unbelievable than usual.”
Ekatya rested her chin atop her fist. “I’m listening.”
It was a relief to tell the whole story; to explain how Salomen’s mindstorm had flattened eight Guards and nearly killed Rahel while infecting Tal with the same lethal instinct.
“Salomen purged herself of that instinct by acting it out. I never got the chance,” she concluded.
“So you still want to kill her.”
“With every fiber of my being. It’s not rational. I know they’re friends now. I know it would hurt Salomen if anything happened to her. But I could cheerfully tear her apart with my bare hands.”
“And yet you touched her palm at the departure ceremony.”
“I wanted to wrap my hand around her throat,” Tal said flatly.
“I’m impressed. I was right there and never noticed a thing. If you ever retire from politics, you’ve got a second career in acting.”
“I had help. Salomen was feeding me some, ah, distracting emotions.”
Ekatya sat up straight and snapped her fingers. “That’s why you chose Rahel for this program. You wanted to get her off the planet.”
“She’s qualified,” Tal assured her. “I wouldn’t have put someone on your ship who wasn’t. But yes, we were hoping that would cure me. Ekatya, that instinct—it’s taken over my life. Salomen and I call it the monster, because it feels like I have one living inside me. I didn’t know what was happening until I broke a promise to Vellmar and gave her such a dressing down that she still doesn’t move the same way around me. A lifetime of living by my word, and I tossed it away without a second thought. That’s when we started trying to control it, but nothing works for long. And anything can set me off, especially if it has to do with Salomen.”
She saw the realization in Ekatya’s face.
“Shipping her out with me didn’t work, did it? What happened today?”
It was remarkably difficult to say, even to a friend who understood.
“I, ah. I almost killed Prime Builder Eroles.”
They stared at each other in silence.
“You’re not being hyperbolic, are you?”
She shook her head.
“Whew. That’s not good. What did she do to set off your monster?”
“She insulted Salomen.”
Ekatya waited, then frowned. “That’s it?”
“You see the problem.”
“Fucking Hades!”
Tal had learned enough Common to know what that meant. “Yes. That does sum it up.”
“But you didn’t kill her. You’re still in control.”
“By the edge of my fingernails. Ekatya, it was too close.”
“But you didn’t do it,” Ekatya insisted.
Tal appreciated her stubborn faith. “No, but what happens next time? I’ve fought this for two moons, and I just lost my last hope. I’m breaking the law now. It’s illegal for a Lancer to conceal an illness that may affect her governance. I either resolve this or resign.”
