Hostite paused, thinking, but Iagin spoke up quickly. “Because Hobart Conselline is so willing to talk—more willing to talk than almost anything else—I have data on these points. He is very concerned about opposition to serial rejuvenation. This is fuelled both by concerns about the profit margin—Conselline Sept’s family investments in rejuv pharmaceuticals are large, and until the Patchcock scandal, these had formed twenty percent or more of the profits—and by concern about the social constraints that might be put on serial rejuvenants. The Consellines introduced and strongly supported the repeal of the law against repeat rejuvenations. He feels that serial rejuvenation, conferring unlimited lifespan, is the earned right of those who have shown their fitness by accumulating the wealth to afford it.”
“Ah—and would he apply this same philosophy to foreign affairs?”
“In all likelihood. He follows up advantages in fencing—and, from what I’ve been able to gather, in other domains as well—with great vigor and intensity. I have observed him at table, and with his family, and would say that nothing is ever enough for him. If he had no access to rejuvenation and advanced medical care, he would eat and drink himself into the grave.”
“Truly, the discipline of the Faith saves more than souls,” the Chairman said, flashing a smile at Hostite. The Chairman, as lean and fit at sixty as he had been thirty years earlier, had not been rejuvenated and would not be: the Church forbade it. But neither would he inflict damage on his own body for selfish purposes. “So . . . Hobart Conselline, who has become the new head of government, is a man of grudges and jealousies, scheming and ruthless, a man who will not feel safe until he controls everything. What, Hostite, will the Barracloughs do when he tries to control them?”
“Viktor will fight, with all the legal knowledge he has—but the Familias Regnant has no formal Constitution. Stefan will start by hoping for the best, but if Hobart angers him sufficiently he will lead his Family in opposition. He is not a man of great vision, however. He counters the obvious attack, but does not see the oblique one that covers.”
“Why, I wonder, did they elect him head of the Family?”
Hostite cleared his throat. “Of the posssibilities, he seemed least likely to interfere with the others’ lives. Lord Thornbuckle was already Speaker, in any case—he did not want the Family leadership as well. His younger brother Harlis was not well-liked. Viktor didn’t want it. And although the Familias is far from strict on the gender issue, few of the great Families have women at the head. None of the Barraclough women were dissatisfied enough to make a run for it.”
“They have no renegade women?”
“They do, but their tastes run to inconsequentials. Lady Cecelia de Marktos, for instance, breeds horses.”
“She was on Xavier,” the Chairman said, with a cold contempt that almost loosened Hostite’s bowels. He should have known that; he had been listening to what her family said about her. “She might be just a horse breeder, but she has been inconveniently near several disturbances in our plans. She was on Sirialis when Lepescu was destroyed—”
“Lepescu was ours?” Iagin asked. The Chairman gave him a look Hostite would not like to have received.
“No. I would not use that filth. It is one thing to kill—even to maim, as a lesson—but quite another to treat an enemy as less than human. No, what I’m remembering is that Cecelia de Marktos was the one who took the Crown Prince back to his father, and meddled. I did not authorize our agent’s attack on her—women are simply not reliable, and I suspect personal jealousy of some sort—but she showed up again interfering with the Patchcock situation. It passes chance that she—a woman never previously far from a horse—should be right at the scene of problems so many times.”
“Heris Serrano,” Hostite murmured. “The commander was there also.”
“Yes. And the Serranos have always had the reputation for neutrality in the Familias. Here they are linked to a Barraclough repeatedly . . .”
“Heris Serrano had resigned her commission; she began her association with Lady Cecelia as a hireling.” That was Iagin.
“Easy enough to contrive that, if one wanted to form a duetto.” A bonded pair hunting together, that meant.
“Thank you both,” the Chairman said then, nodding. “Master, if you will wait a moment . . .”
Hostite backed away from the Chairman’s desk until he felt the ridge in the carpet that signalled the correct distance, then turned to go.
Somewhat to his surprise, he lived to cross the threshold. He and Iagin strolled back to the vesting room, and Hostite felt the languid ease that always followed a moment of mortal danger survived.
The Chairman eyed the Master of Swords. “Hostite is our oldest Swordmaster, is he not?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Unusual for a Swordmaster to live this long. And yet—extraordinary, would you say?”
“In his way, yes.”
“He has a clean stroke,” the Chairman said. “He never misses his mark, and I hear from all sources that he is sober and submissive.”
“That is true, Chairman.”
“Yet—?”
“Yet I cannot warm to him, Chairman.”
“No. And that is why I insist he has not reached his end; I must have one Swordmaster whom the Master of Swords does not like.”
The Master bowed. They both knew this; they had said it before.
“I find the news of Hobart Conselline disturbing, however. Such a man might do anything, if he felt endangered. We thought the discovery that their rejuvenation drugs were so easily contaminated would slow down the rate of rejuvenation . . . why would someone risk insanity, senility, just for the chance of unending life?”
“They fear death?”
“It is not just that. They do it when they are years from death, just for pleasure. I told myself it was their decadent class structure, that rejuvenation would spread to the professionals and workers only rarely and later. But no. They do not want eternal life . . . they want eternal youth. That is not the same.”
“No, Chairman.”
“We did not realize that at first; we had no comprehension of their desires. And without the comprehension of desires, there can be no shaping of policy. It is beyond the understanding even of Holy Father, except as another example of their sinful nature. It poses a great problem for us. The strategy which we prepared for use in one situation may be useless in another . . .” His voice trailed away, and he turned to look out the window. Children. They were aging children, who did not want to earn anything or learn anything, who abhorred the discipline of faith. How could he influence aging children? He had a terrible vision of Hobart Conselline as he appeared in the data cubes, still spoiled and smug a hundred years hence, when he himself was dead and in his grave. His successor’s sucessor might be dealing with that one, and all the rest—and how many there would be by that time.
It would not do. He must find a solution, and soon. His family, his vast extended family, the entire Benignity of the Compassionate Hand, relied on him to keep them safe and prosperous and orderly. It was his duty, and he was Chairman precisely because he had never yet failed in his duty.
“I may need to speak to Hostite Fieddi again,” he said. “Please inform him to remain in the compound. I also need your analysis—is there anyone in the Seated Families who has refused serial rejuvenation, and if so . . . why? Are there any sane members of their Council?”
“Yes, Chairman.”
When the Master of Swords had gone, the Chairman turned to look out the window again. Aging children . . . senile children, if a merciful God limited the number of rejuvenations with even the best drugs. A terrible prospect, that great empire full of aging senile children. And in the interim, all that energy and expertise . . . their great space navy with admirals wiser than his, replenished constantly by commanders wise as admirals. But not enlisted personnel. At least they had taken care of that. Still . . . a grave, a very grave situation.