"All right."
"So, I ask you again why you have decided to ruin Ter Roshak's career—and your own?"
"Anything is worth the risk if the ultimate prize is a Bloodname."
"Whatever happens on Ironhold, you will not earn a Bloodname. You will never get that far."
"There is always a poss—"
"There is no possibility! You and Ter Roshak have broken Clan law, violated Clan custom. And I, by being a cog in Ter Roshak's plot, will be dragged through the muck along with you. And I have been dragged through enough muck lately, thank you."
Aidan smiled, a rare event for a Clansman. "Yes, I heard you nearly drowned in the swamp. Joanna, I truly regret what is happening now. If I had thought that you would be—"
"Ifyou had thought. That is your problem. You do not think, you act. Back in your first trial, you went for too much, and in your second, you were lucky with some improvised tactics. So this time, you overreached in another way. First, you announced your candidacy at the wrong time. You should first have determined whether you could legitimately compete for the Bloodname."
"I did not, as you say, overreach. Every move I made today, everything I said, was planned. Calculated. I have every right to compete for the Bloodname. And I will."
They fell silent. Aidan turned away from Joanna to gaze out the small window of the cell at the compound. Nothing was moving out there. Pershaw's council must still be in session.
"At any rate," Joanna said, "now Ter Roshak must answer for his deeds. I wonder if he will reveal his motives. There is much I would like to know. Although I could pass on learning the information if it meant I would not be executed."
"You will not be executed. You were merely an accessory. "
"Practicing the words to be used before the council, are you?"
Again the two fell silent for a while, then Joanna said, "You have not learned, Aidan, that deceit is the real sin among the Clans. Your second chance, your life as a freebirth, your assumption of someone else's identity—it is all deceit. They have a good case against you."
She laughed harshly, a true sign of her mirth. "Perhaps the name shouldbe yours," Joanna said. "Who else would find the name Pryde so eminently suitable?"
* * *
Horse and Aidan sat together while they and Joanna were being transported to the shuttle area. "I wish you victory in all things, Aidan," Horse whispered.
"Your support means much, Horse."
"Support? Please do not call it that. I do not support you. I am ashamed of you."
"Ashamed?"
"You renounced your freeborn identity for the sake of competing for a Bloodname. Deep down you were trueborn after all. Deep down you hold us in contempt just as the others do."
"That is not true, Horse. It is—"
"No. If you really respected us, as you claimed, you would not have renounced your freeborn identity. You are like the real jade falcon, which flies everywhere but always comes back to the mountainside where it was born. You may have flown as a freeborn, but now you return to your trueborn nest."
"Horse-"
"Or should I say trashborn?"
"Do you not wish me to win a Bloodname, to contribute to the gene pool?"
"Truthfully, I do not. I do not care what happens to you now. I will be your comrade in all things, but I do not care what happens. Freeborns do not demean themselves for Bloodnames, nor would they wish to contribute to the gene pool. You may win this contest, or you may die. Whichever, I will be by your side if you wish it. But I amashamed."
"It is the Bloodname, Horse."
"I know that. And it is no excuse. You have more respect from me as Jorge than you will have as Aidan Pryde."
The conversation ended there, but for the rest of the trip, Aidan savored the sound of the name: Aidan Pryde. An almost lustful surge of will went through his body. The name had such a natural ring to it. How could he not succeed in winning it? In spite of the turmoil he had stirred up with his desire for it. In spite of the agony he would have to endure to fulfill the desire. In spite of the dangers on the long road to the Bloodname.
23
Joanna decided the game was up as soon as the Jade Falcon council members filed in. BattleMechs charging and firing in the midst of combat looked friendlier than these Bloodnamed warriors. There were so many of them, most arriving on Ironhold from far-off outposts, answering the call to council. Some Clansmen, as was their right, claimed duty prevented their attendance at the trial. Many more, however, chose to come and sit in judgment on this unusual case. Joanna had heard that nearly 475 of the 960 qualified warriors (well, two less, with Ileana Pryde's demise and Ter Roshak on trial) were on Ironhold now, and more might arrive during the course of the trial. Video cameras would record every bit of testimony for examination across all the Jade Falcon worlds. The crime involved was so unusual, so grotesque that council members were flocking to Ironhold to be, perhaps, a part of Clan history.
She had also heard that one major reason for the ardent interest in this trial was the stature of the Bloodname in question. Its original holder, Aeneas Pryde, had been a member of Aleksandr Kerensky's command staff even before the Exodus. As a Star League officer, he had distinguished himself in battle as a member of the 131st Battle Division, the so-called "Hercules Division." So daring were the celebrated exploits of the 131st that they had been compared to the arduous tasks of a mythical hero named Hercules.
Joanna did not know of this Hercules, but on the trip to Ironhold Aidan had explained that he was a fabled hero whose feats of prodigious strength went beyond normal human prowess. Though she scoffed at Aidan for accumulating such useless knowledge, she was secretly impressed. Something had undoubtedly happened to him during his years pretending to be a freebirth, for intelligence had not been an outstanding trait of the Aidan she had once known. What might have changed him she could not guess, nor did she care. One trait, however, had not changed a bit. The fact that he planned to compete for a Bloodname without anyone's approval showed him to be as determinedly stubborn as a warrior as he had been as a cadet. However, even Aeneas Pryde would probably have felt revulsion to see Aidan presuming to win his name.
Ileana Pryde, the previous holder of this version of the Bloodname, might have been more sympathetic to Aidan's cause, for she was known for a similar stubborn persistence and fortitude.
Joanna had known her, a warrior no better or worse than many others. Tall and beautiful, with a regal manner, Ileana was already famous as a warrior when her path crossed Joanna's. She had tried to engage Joanna in a discussion about specific strategies that led to a wasteful, bloody skirmish between the Ice Hellion and Mongoose Clans. Ileana's ideas were precise and insightful, but Joanna would not give her the satisfaction of agreeing. Soon the two were arguing in a way just as wasteful as the strategy in question. When they reached an impasse and agreed to abandon the argument, Joanna noticed that Ileana glowed from the intensity of their talk. Guessing that Ileana might be just as mean as she was, her respect for the noted warrior increased.
Joanna and Aidan sat together at a table near the center of the massive Council Hall. From her vantage point, the tiers occupied by Bloodnamed warriors seemed endless. Dressed in their ceremonial masks and garb, each with its particular resplendent flourishes, the effect was of an enormous patchwork quilt spread unevenly across one side of the room. At the main table sat the