Ross pressed both palms flat against her desk top. “There is one other thing of which you should be aware, Sar Born.”
Eric held himself still. “Which is?”
“Two unifiers, good people, friends of mine, died when the Vitae kidnapped your kinswoman.”
Eric almost said “she’s not my kin,” but he stopped himself in time.
“There are Trustees and Board members here who want to publicize what those two died for. Do you have any idea what will happen to you, and to your world, if I let them?”
“I am sure, Madame Chairman, you will do exactly as you see fit whenever you see fit,” said Eric. “And that there is nothing I could do or say to stop you.
“May I go now?”
He had to give her credit; she had obviously prepared herself for this possibility. She did nothing more than lean back in an attitude of resignation and wave toward the door.
“You are a free individual, Sar Born, you may come and go as you like. I have no claim on you. Especially since you say you will pay for what you use. One of my clerks will see that your debts are totaled and sent to your room.”
Eric left. Behind him, Ross must have given notice that he was coming out, because the security man was waiting to remove his patches and the floor indicators were lit up with the way back to the courtyard clearly marked. An auto waited for him with the door raised.
He climbed in. The door closed. It was then he realized he had no planet ID to enter to make the thing move.
Eric leaned back in the seat, closed his eyes and began to curse. He did it slowly and methodically, using all the blasphemies in all the languages he knew. He even added some he hadn’t heard since he’d been a student in the Temple. By the time he was finished, the entire complement of the Unifiers, and the Rhudolant Vitae, and their ancestors back seven generations had been manned, rendered impotent, ripped away from the shelter of any divinity, accused of bestiality, and blasted headfirst into the marshes the Notouch used for toilets.
A slight vibration trembled the soles of his shoes and the car began to move.
Eric’s head jerked up. A voice spoke over the intercom. “Can’t leave you alone for a moment, can I?”
“Dorias.” A wave of relief washed over him followed fast by a wave of anger. “Dorias, were you listening to what your Madame Chairman said?”
“I was. We’ll talk when we get to your room. I’m making it safe for us now.”
They gave me a bugged room? Eric began cursing through his teeth. The Vitae first, now the Unifiers. Who do these people think they are?
The car traveled three kilometers’ worth of tidy city blocks and finally parked itself in front of a three-story, brown brick building built like an abstract sculpture made of uneven blocks. The silver cables of access elevators stretched between its widespread wings. The car door raised itself and Eric picked up his bundle. As soon as he stepped onto the pedestrian walkway, the car door closed itself up and the vehicle drove itself away.
A second car pulled up in the spot his had vacated. Eric looked back automatically and saw Schippend heave himself out of the vehicle.
“Sar Born,” he puffed. “I have your IDs, Sar.”
Schippend held out four flat squares of shiny polymer embossed with his name, the location of his ship, and his arrival date. One was labeled for access to public transportation, one for the libraries and other public buildings, one for automatic access to communications networks outside his ship, and one for drawing on the credit he’d been required to transfer to a May 16 account.
Eric tucked the squares into his tunic pocket and sealed it. “Thank you for your help, Sar Schippend.”
“I apologize for the delay.” Schippend’s eyes glittered. “Madame Chairman frequently makes things difficult for people who don’t give her her own way.”
“Does she?” said Eric carefully.
“And if she is making things difficult for you, Sar Born, I’ll be glad to help you leave May 16. Immediately.”
Eric’s back stiffened and he wasn’t able to keep his surprise from showing. He also couldn’t help noticing the greedy look in Schippend’s little blue eyes.
“Thank you for the offer, Sar Schippend,” Eric said. “I’ll have to consider it.”
“I am on the public lines, Sar Born. One is open for you.” Schippend climbed into his car and was gone.
Garismit’s Eyes! Eric rolled his own toward the heavens. “Anyone else?” he demanded. The street remained quiet, except for the traffic rushing past.
The hotel did not have a main doorway. Instead, the hatches for six separate access elevators faced the sidewalk. Eric slid his ID card into the labeled slot and a door opened to let him inside. He watched the shiny, gold walls as the elevator rose for about thirty seconds, glided sideways, then forward, then rose again. He did not touch the key that would have turned the cabin translucent and allowed him to see the panorama of the City of Alliances spread across its perfectly flat field.
When the door opened, it led to a comfortably furnished room, about twice the size of the common room on the U-Kenai. Instead of a window, the outer wall was taken up by an elaborate comm center, with all its keys labeled in three different languages.
“Very nice.” Eric dropped his pack on a table.
He sat in the comm screen’s chair and tried not to squirm while it adjusted to fit the contours of his body. He opened the line to Dorias’s home space.
The screen filled with the blur of shifting colors cut by rippling, horizontal lines that was Dorias’s idea of a self-portrait.
“Hello, Teacher Hand,” Dorias said, and the lines jumped, matching the frequency and intensity of his voice. Dorias had never completely dropped Eric’s title. You taught me I could make my own choices, Dorias had said. I choose to remember your earned name.
“Hello, Dorias. I hope you’re doing well,” he added with more than a trace of irony to his tone.
“Quite,” replied Dorias blandly. “Better than you are, I think.” He paused. “Eric, I’m sorry. I didn’t know this would happen.”
“I’m sure you didn’t.” Eric slumped and the chair undulated against his spine. “I’m sure Madame Chairman didn’t give you any reason to be alarmed about what might happen once I got here.”
“Teacher Hand, that is unfair.”
“Is it?” asked Eric bitterly. “Your friend is a schemer and a fanatic, Dorias.”
“Of course she is,” replied Dorias calmly. “It’s fanatics who get caught up in events like this. Normal people know when to give up and go home.”
“Thank you very much,” Eric muttered.
“You were the one who told me the power gifted were trained to be fanatics in the Temple.”
“I know. I know.” He sighed. “What are you doing here, Dorias? What could you possibly want with these people?”
“They’re the only ones around who have even a small chance of making an effective block against the Vitae. They are interested in establishing a permanent, open communications network. If I help Ross with…Family matters…she works on making sure that network is one I can use and the more space there is, the more chances there are that there’ll be others like me found, or made.”
Eric blinked. “Does Madame Chairman know about this grand scheme?”
“Of course she does.”
“Dorias.” Eric leaned forward. “I don’t know how safe you are here. I don’t think Madame Chairman approves of people who are either not Human or not under Family control.”