Braxi-Azea - In Conquest Born Part 51

DETONATION SEQUENCE STAGE THREE, the computer warned.

FISSION.

"Is it done yet'.'" Zatar asks.

97% PROBABILITY. The House isn't anxious to commit itself, but the figure it gives is promising. He'll have to wait until news of it reaches Braxi to be certain, but that shouldn't take long now. Something like this can't be kept secret.

It's a good thing I planted that trap when I did. he tells himself.

Which is a part of his journey to Azea that he's shared with no one, not even Ni'en. Now he is glad, very glad, that he took the risk, and glad that he kept it a secret. The Inst.i.tute is gone, the psychic community ruptured, and Anzha lyu Mitethe will be blamed for the destruction. He'll see to that.

His vengeance and her purpose, combined: the neatness of it pleases him.

I am ready for you, my vendetta-mate.

Viton: The true k'airth is a complex and dangerous sport, in that it forces one's enemy to continually improve his skills. The most successful partic.i.p.ant is he who can manipulate this factor. To cause the enemy to over-extend himself, or to channel his energies down paths that will ultimately destroy him, is often the subtlest and most pleasing of all strategies.

Twenty-eight The planetary governor of Do Kul was a portly man, red-faced and swollen-eyed and clearly fond of luxury. He walked the halls in robes of irridescent watersilk, hems sweeping the floor in regal waste, and the clatter of precious stones against crystalline tiles spoke volumes for his wealth, his willingness to spend it, and his desire to have it noticed.

"I've had your things brought to the Master Suite," he told Zatar, plump hands clasped before him. "I think you'll be more than pleased with it."

The Pri'tiera was too distracted to respond, which was just as well; it was doubtful the governor was listening for his answer.

The fleets were due. Overdue, if one took for granted their success. For nearly four years now he had managed to push that situation to the back of his mind, telling himself over and over again, There's nothing you can do. You sent them out-they're beyond all contact-you can only wait. But now, finally, zero-day had pased. A messenger might return at any moment, bringing him news of his success. Or of his failure. How could he play the diplomat with that hanging over his head?

"A fine example of Do Kullad workmans.h.i.+p," the governor was saying, "unequaled anywhere in the galaxy-save perhaps on your own planet." Briefly Zatar wondered how the man had gotten appointed to such a post, and he longed for the days when a moment of anger was cause enough to execute such irritants.

But he was Pri'tiera now, and if he wanted his throne to endure there were certain games he needed to play-for a while longer, at least.

"I'm sure they will be adequate," he answered.

They came to a door, silverstone and crystal set in gleaming white forceform.

"Observe," said the governor, and with a flourish he dissipated the forcefield; the ornaments which remained, strung on fine silken lines at varying heights, swayed in the open doorframe.

He turned to Zatar, his face aglow, but saw something there which sobered him rapidly. "With your permission, Pri'tiera." He bowed, and there were no more expansive gestures. Holding aside the curtain of strung crystal, he waited until Zatar had entered, then followed him into the Master Guest Suite of Do Kul's Floating Palace.

"You see, we've used Aldousan flexicrystal. but in a manner uniquely our own."

Beaming with pride, the governor indicated their surroundings. And yes, the antechamber was magnificent. Filaments of finely drawn flexicrystal stretched from ceiling to floor along three of the chamber's four walls so delicately, and so lightly bound in place, that any disturbance in the room's scented air set them to stirring in ripples and starts, much like the surface of water. Zatar observed their motion with a look that might pa.s.s for approval, nodded, and muttered a word or two of commendation. But his mind was elsewhere. "The fourth wall?"

"A display screen, Pri'tiera." With a touch he made it active-and stars set in blackness filled the wall's confines, with a hint of Do Kul's sun at the lower edge and Nabor, a natural satellite, rising. But that was not what arrested Zatar's attention. There, in the constellation the locals called the Dancer: black in the night, a streak of darkness that hid the stars behind it, the Dancer's Veil.

Somewhere beyond that were his fleets, and a war. And his enemy.

"You approve?" the governor dared.

He nodded slowly, savoring the sight. So: his rooms in the palace faced the Barren Zone-all the better. He was obsessed with the region anyway, he might as well live with it in plain sight. "Excellent," he said softly. "This will do."

The governor's rapid movements were mirrored by crystalline undulations as the stout man saw to the lighting, adjusting the controls so that crystals embedded in the ceiling sparkled with rainbow fire. "The furniture is all forceform," he told Zatar, "and can be adjusted for temperature, texture, kinetic activity-"

"I'm familiar with the type." He wondered just how to get rid of this man, who had given him a grand tour of the palace and now seemed determined to stay with him. Whim Death was tempting, but it seemed a bit extreme. "I imagine the Museum is unloading about now." He used a speech mode which implied great personal concern: to serve the Museum is to serve me. "Many of the items in the Grand Exhibit belong to my House; I would be greatly rea.s.sured if someone of noteworthy station would oversee this operation."

It took the governor a moment to catch the hint, but when he did so he bowed deeply, imagining himself honored. "Say no more, Magnificent One." A wave of his hand was mirrored in silver shock-waves on the wall. "I will see to it myself. If you will but excuse me-"

"Of course." He watched with some amus.e.m.e.nt as the governor bowed extravagantly and left, leaving a wake on the surface of the walls that was some minutes long in fading. Only when the motion had stopped did Zatar feel truly alone.

Soon . . . it would be soon. It had to be. They would have sent a message to him as soon as triumph was certain. And triumph was certain-wasn't it? The best of the Braxin fleets against a single, quasiprimitive planet?

And her, he thought, with a cold twisting in his gut. She could defeat them. He had no doubt of that, though all logic was weighted against it. She was no longer wholly human in his eyes, but some demonic creature midway between woman and the essence of War; she embodied all the variables that he could not predict, all the tricks of fate that were wont to bring a warrior to his knees. She and she alone could reduce his offensive to chaos; he had no doubt of that. Only Feran could stop her. . . .

But could he? The Probe was weak, and even under Zatar's firm control he was likely to break under the strain of his current a.s.signment. Zatar had no illusions about that. He had planned the best that he could, but now his strength depended upon the work of others-and the waiting was killing him, slowly but surely.

Turning away from the starscreen, he forced himself to pay attention to his surroundings. Walls that followed his motion- the ultimate in egocentricity- with a tinkling sound like that of some crystalline rain, and rainbow forceforms that might or might not be furniture. Elegant, yes, but not to his taste. He preferred a solid world, a Braxana universe of earth and steel and women. Armed women, who could stand in battle with their men and bathe in the blood of the Pale Tribe's enemies, glorying in their destruction. Women like the Starcommander. . . .

Stop that.

Needing to distract himself, he pa.s.sed through a large archway at the far end of the antechamber and found himself in what might be considered a conference chamber. The walls were the same as in the antechamber, the huge central table and twelve attendant chairs of the same forcefield construction, but here there was one thing different. Against the far wall, s.h.i.+elded in black plasic, there was a blot upon the ethereal substance of the crystalline surroundings. As tall as a Braxana male, as wide as Zatar's arms could be spread: the portrait from Berros, awaiting exhibition.

It never left his possession; he valued it too much to entrust it to common hands, even those of the Central Museum's staff. Now he stroked its case, resenting the circ.u.mstances that had caused him to bring it here. He would much have preferred to keep its existence a secret, using it as the bait with which to lure his treasured-quarry back to Braxi . . . but rumor had leaked out of Berros somehow, and he had had to adjust his plans accordingly. Rather than let common gossip shape her preconceptions, he had chosen to unveil his secret at the Central Museum, on Braxi. The public reaction was one of astonishment, more so when it was explained that the second figure in the portrait-the dark- skinned, round-eyed female, who differed from any race currently in existence- was Azean.

Now they were on Do Kul, jewel of the yerren frontier; in the morning the portrait would make its second appearance. And he would be beside it, presenting it, his name thus linked with that of the man who'd had it painted in the first place. Harkur the Great. They would travel through the Holding together, he and his treasure and the Museum's grand exhibit, The Birth of Braxi.

But this was the closest they would ever come to the great nebula which masked his victory. The closest they would come to her.

Banis.h.i.+ng that thought, he left the conference room for a connecting chamber.

-And stopped suddenly in the archway that joined the two rooms, stunned by what he saw.

The s.p.a.ce beyond must have been meant as a bedroom, for a large rectangular slab of rainbow light hung suspended above the floor at such a height that it could serve as a mattress. In each corner of the room a cylinder rose from floor to ceiling, glowing with a faint white light that offered additional illumination. But neither these nor the ubiquitous flexicrystal wallfleece was what had stunned Zatar into immobility.

There was a person lying on the bedfield.

Loosening his Zhaor in its sheath, Zatar approached. It was hard to tell, what with the glow of the forcefield mattress, but the body seemed to be bound in some sort of stasis field- which not only indicated that it was dead, but implied that it had been dead for quite some time. He leaned closer and swore, and his hand trembled where it touched the Zhaor, in a way it had never trembled before.

The body was Feran's.

He whipped around, his sword sliding free of its sheath even as he moved. Steel glinted in the dim, irregular lighting and he brought his own blade up, guarding his face from the coming thrust. Contact: a strong arm-an able enemy-and purpose like electricity flowing through his blade, through his hand, into his body.

He stepped back, managing to turn his attacker's blade aside as he did so. It whistled past his ear and swept into a graceful recovery.

By her side.

She looked at him for a long, long time before speaking. She was thinner than he remembered her-or had his hunger for her added weight to her in his imagining, providing curves where there had been none, making her flesh reflect the s.e.xual richness of her inner self? What did she see when she looked at him?

An older man, with the weight of his unprecedented responsibility just starting to make itself evident. There was silver in his hair now, a few slender strands to adorn the black; did that surprise her? What changes had her own imagination wrought in the long, empty years of her absence?

She stepped back, eyes fixed upon him. "Any slower, Pri'tiera, and you'd have died."

He picked out the confiding modes in her undertone and smiled. Who else could do his language such justice? "Any slower," he told her. equally scornful, "and I'd have deserved to die."

Against his better instincts, he sheathed his sword.

She had changed, true, but not in any way that mattered. Her hair was black and her eyes had been stained to match, but there was no mistaking that energy beneath. It was as if she had never left him-as if mere moments had pa.s.sed since she had pulled free of his grasp, leaving his palm streaked with blood.

"You have the portrait?" she asked abruptly.

"Of course." With a nod that bade her follow him, he turned and led her to the conference room. His back was to her; it was a calculated risk. Feran had given him the formula for her defeat- after many days of argument, to be sure- and he knew that he could not afford to delay in applying it.

He brought her to the painting and stripped off its case. He had not dared to antic.i.p.ate this moment. But her reaction was all he could have hoped for.

She stepped back as though she had been struck. "Hasha. . . ." The color drained from her face for a moment, then was restored as her self-control was reestablished. He hungered to reach inside her as she had once done to him, to know the truth of her emotions and to share the violence of his.

"You believe it?" he challenged her.

"You do," she whispered. "That's enough."

She stared at it a while longer. "Hasha!" she repeated. "Braxin?" She must have known the truth for some time, but not until now had she believed it. She shook her head slowly, amazed. "Li Pazua would have given his life for this." she mused.

He smiled. "He did."

She fixed her eyes upon him, black with the essence of gray beneath-the gray of stone, the gray of steel. "I have seen men kill before, Zatar. Many times. But never to win my favor." She laughed softly, mirthlessly. "How Braxana. And most effective-in ways I'm afraid poor Feran was not equipped to appreciate."

"You killed him," he said, in the speech mode of inquiry.

She darkened. "You did that. By sending him out there. By being what you are, and expecting him to come back to you. He chose death, Pri'tiera, rather than face you."

"Or you."

"Perhaps. But we made our peace, so I can't take full credit. He undid what he could of his early work within my mind, and gave me the key to deal with the rest; that freed him from the bulk of his guilt. You may therefore take credit for his suicide."

He undid what he could. . . .Was she free, then? Had the s.e.xual traps been removed from her psyche, that a man might indulge in her pleasure without risk of death? A terrible jealousy possessed him, an unfamiliar emotion to his Braxana soul. "And you? What next, for a Braxin warrior?"

"You've scattered my kind. Killed their teachers. My obvious course would be to help them." He laughed. "Not likely." 'They're my people," she snapped. He shook his head. "No. Your people are here."

"I mean the world of psychics."

"And I mean the Holding." He was pus.h.i.+ng her, he knew, but he had to make the ident.i.ty stick. "You're Braxin, and you know it. You've always known it. This find merely confirms the truth." Feran had given him key words to use and he did so. "What home will you make among Azeans? You're as alien to them as a non- human would be, and more threatening. Here, you're an enemy, but Braxi reveres its enemies. Here they'll accept you. Did Azea ever offer you that?"

It was a telling blow; he could see how shaken she was. "That isn't the point."

Quietly: "No?"

"I'm a telepath, Pri'tiera, that's all that matters. You and I may share a heritage, but those people are my kind. I understand them. I-" (she hesitated) "-share their pain."

He considered a long shot, decided to chance it. "What about your crew?"

The look she gave him was one of burning hatred, but the thoughts that accompanied it tasted strangely of guilt. "You killed my psychics when you killed that planet, Zatar. They couldn't absorb the death of five billion people and sustain their personal integrity."

"But you managed."

She would not voice it, but he heard the thought: That's because I'm different.

"Very true," he agreed. She seemed startled; was he picking up on thoughts she did not mean him to hear?

"They died in droves on Llornu," she said bitterly, "not only the ones you struck down yourself, but others who shared their pain. And for those that remain, death would be a kindness. They were innocents, most of them-more naive than you can imagine, when it came to things like war and politics. Content to live a dependent life, under li Pazua's wing. You killed their protector. You threatened them with death. You drove many of them into actual madness, and the rest have fled to far corners of the Empire, even beyond . . . they won't gather, and non- psychics won't take them in. They're afraid, Zatar. Of madness. Of killing. My people." she said, and her voice was filled with hate. "That's what you've done to them. They need my strength."

"But will they accept it?"

"Why shouldn't they?"

"You attacked them," he reminded her. "The a.s.sault on Llornu was your doing."

"They don't believe that!"

"Don't they? I think they will, given the 'evidence' I've left in the Empire.

She stiffened. "They won't believe it-not the ones who knew me."

"How many knew you?" he demanded. "How many were close to you? How many could taste the essence of your mind and not cringe before its violence?

You're fully capable of doing what I did, and they know that. If it had served your purpose to destroy Llornu, you would have done so years ago, without a moment's hesitation. The true warrior isn't swayed by death, Anzha, his own or anyone else's."

"You know me well," she muttered, clearly shaken.

"You're Braxin. I know my people."

She shut her eyes, said nothing.

"Stay."

"I would kill you, first."

Now: to risk all in order to master her, using the key that Feran gave him-to play her against her conditioning. He drew his sword out, glanced at its blade, then cast it aside. Across the room, and out of reach.

"Then do so," he dared.

Her dark eyes narrowed, and the intensity of her loathing seared his foremind; he was relieved to feel it, for it meant his safety. "Would that I could!" she hissed.

"But if you die, the Holding will fall-and it may just be that I can't be the cause of that."

"Why not?"

"Don't toy with me, Zatar! You know d.a.m.ned well-" She stopped herself.

"Maybe you don't. Maybe Feran never explained. Maybe even he never understood what it was he was doing." There was scorn in her voice, but also pain. "I was programmed to search for the key to my heritage." She indicated the painting. "For this. But that's not all. No, not nearly enough humiliation to please li Pazua. There are subsidiary programs. Having found this race, I must now accept it as my own-exactly what you're trying to get me to do. That means accepting you as my ruler-an unlikely prospect, to say the least. One that I can resist. But to kill you, to defy my conditioning outright, that I can't do. The price is too high."