"So nature rebelled, first on Earth, then all her colonies. Except in one place, where our technology couldn't reach."
"Virga." She thought about it. "So who are you, in this new world?"
He looked ruefully at his plate. "We're mice in the walls. You know, all things being equal, human beings aren't that competitive--I mean, as a species. But things haven't been equal for the past hundred thousand years. We've had technology, society, and the ability to plan. Other life-forms haven't. Artificial Nature gives all those things to anything that wants them. All things are equal now."
"Look, Argyre, there's no 'us versus them' thing happening here. They don't really exist. The morphonts are just mindless forces that have been given an industrial base. Something we made got away from us, and we're starting to get it back. The only question that's of any relevance is whether you're on your own side here, or on the side of blind forces that are against you. Your choice."
Antaea looked down, her arms crossed, then said, "Thanks. Enjoy your meal."
She made to leave, and he said, "Talk to me any time. I'm not just here for the food."
* * *
"I WISH I could tell you who to trust," she told Airsigh, "but I'm as confused as everybody."
The Last Line captain seemed to accept this. As she flew Antaea back to her hotel, however, she said, "What about Slipstream?"
Antaea pretended to think about the possibility. "I have ties there. I know they're deeply concerned about the same issues ... If you'd like, I can set up a meeting between some of your people and the admiralty."
"That would be good. I'll give the address of our drop box."
As she climbed out of Airsigh's little jet and watched it soar off into the flocking traffic of the city, Antaea knew she should be feeling a sense of triumph at how things had turned out. She'd made exactly the contact Chaison had hoped. Why, then, was she so troubled?
And, of course, she knew why: Holon. He'd not been what she'd expected. She remembered the blank thing her sister had become after being possessed by something from outside of Virga. Holon wasn't like that.
If anything was like the monster her sister had become, it was this emissary Leal claimed as her friend.
Deeply disturbed, she flew to her hotel to tell Richard that she'd been successful.
* * *
ANOTHER COUNTRY, ANOTHER palace, and another dinner party. They had long since blurred together in Keir's mind, yet he found himself smiling tonight as he, Leal, and Venera made their way back to this city's dockyards. Their military escort saluted and left them on the inner curve of the cylindrical dock. Leal waved to the soldiers, but Venera dismissed them with a sniff and, in the microgravity, bounded in long slow steps in the direction of their ship.
A cowled figure waited in the shadow of the yacht. Leal saw it only when Venera suddenly stopped and put her arm across Leal's chest. As Keir bumped into Leal, Venera reached for an absent sidearm; they'd been required to leave their weapons on the yacht.
"Please, I'm a friend," said a woman's voice. The gray-cloaked shape bobbed through the dock's minuscule gravity to perch before them, and as Venera said "Who--" it threw back its hood.
Leal recognized the face; this young woman had been at the banquet. She'd been seated at the first table to the right of the main table, which meant she was a person of high standing. Leal carefully bowed, and didn't quite have to kick Keir in the shins before he did, too. Venera held her head high--but of course, Venera bowed to no one.
They all stood in half-shadow, but the young woman clearly thought that this wasn't discreet enough; she windmilled her arms and sailed a few feet back, into the darkness. "Please, I can't be seen here," she called softly.
Venera glanced up at the well-lit main hatch of the yacht. "There's another way in," she said curtly. "This way." She led them under the belly of the yacht. To the left were the lights, gantries, and piled crates of the docking ring that rode at the central axle of the town wheel; to the right was a sheer drop-off, and night skies.
Venera fished a key out of her belt, then reached up into blackness. "Keir, give me a boost," she said. He knitted his fingers together and she stepped up to push an unseen door aside. She clambered in, and a moment later let down a rope ladder.
When they were all inside--in the yacht's cramped storage locker, as it turned out--Venera turned to the stranger and said, "You can speak freely in front of my companions. What is this about?"
"My name is Thavia. I'm the satrap's niece." She eyed Leal and Keir suspiciously, but then found a perch on some boxes and without further hesitation said, "You are not the first to come to us with talk of an invasion from the outside universe. The viziers made a big show tonight of sending a delegation to your grand colloquy, but according to my father, our government has already committed our loyalty to a different faction."
Venera scowled. "Who were they?"
Thavia described two foreigners who had visited court. She had been pale-skinned, pale-haired, her lips a red slash across her beautiful face. Her name was Inshiri Ferance, and though Thavia had never heard of her, the mere mention of her was enough to make the satrap and his viziers turn as pale as her. Thavia had always feared the viziers, who were known to be capricious and judgmental, and she had never seen them afraid. They were afraid of Inshiri.
She offered the satrap power and new riches if he would ally with her against that upstart pirate sun, Slipstream. The Slipstreamers would arrive soon, spreading their lies, and Inshiri advised the satrap to imprison them at once. Her friends would be grateful if that were to happen. But as she spoke, she kept her head turned, ever so slightly, in the direction of the silent, bronze-skinned man who had accompanied her here. He was never introduced, but merely stood in the background with his arms crossed and watched Inshiri's performance. No one in the room, Thavia swore, had doubted who was really in charge here.
"They made a deal," Thavia told Venera. "I wasn't party to it, but whatever it was, my parents were supremely uncomfortable with it. After they left, I was told I was being sent to some city named Fracas, as a 'special ambassador' of some sort. I don't want to go..."
Venera stroked the scar on her chin. "Fracas? Would any of the people there recognize you?"
"Surely not."
Venera smiled. "In that case, I have a plan."
* * *
JACOBY SARTO CLOSED the door to his hotel room, and then had to lean on it heavily as a wave of pain and nausea overtook him. He looked up and down the hall, but there was no one to see his weakness. With a muted curse he walked carefully to the stairs, keeping his head high despite the almost overwhelming urge to simply lie down and curl around his maimed hand.
She had left his hotel room half an hour before. Theirs had not been a romantic rendezvous. The least of it had been the interrogation she'd subjected him to. He'd expected that, of course; how could she know he could be trusted, since she didn't even know where he'd been and what he'd been up to since they had parted ways.
That had been humiliating, but nothing compared with what had happened next. Inshiri still didn't trust him; she needed a guarantee of his loyalty.