The girl nodded, then looked aside where Jolene was shuddering and wincing as she worked to expel the afterbirth. “That looks like it really hurts, doin’ all that. I’ll never have to do that, will I, Ma?”
Yolande spared a hard glance at Marya; what had the wench been saying to the child?
“No, of course not,” she said to her daughter.
“No, Missy Gwen,” Marya said, in her usual cool tone. “Your serf brooders will bear your eggs for you, just like this.”
Gwen nodded, and Yolande rose and bent over Jolene. The serf was still panting, exhausted. She flinched slightly as the attendants cleaned her, slid a fresh sheet beneath her and wiped away the sweat before drawing up a coverlet and setting the controls to convert the birthing table into a bed; she would be moved later. Still, she smiled broadly as Yolande brought the small bundle near, reaching out her arms. “Can I?” she said.
“Of course,” her owner replied, laying the infant gently on her abdomen. Yolande kissed her brow, then looked up to meet Gwen’s eyes. “Remember we owe Jolene a lot, daughter. We have to look after her always.”
Gwen nodded solemnly, then gave her mother’s hand a squeeze before she ran over to Marya; standing, her head was nearly level with the seated serf’s.
How swiftly they grow, Yolande thought. Her daughter reached forward and hugged the American.
“Thank you, Tantie-ma Marya,” she said earnestly. “I didn’t realize how hard you worked, havin’ me. Thank you.”
Marya returned the embrace, the other Draka were smiling at the entirely proper show of sentiment. The serf stroked the red head resting on her bosom.
“You are welcome, Missy Gwen,” she said. Then looked up, met Yolande’s gaze, looked down at the child. “You are welcome.”
Yolande felt a slight chill, then cast it aside. Hearing things, she decided, looking down at her son. A rush of warmth spread up from belly to throat, so overwhelming that her head swam with it. She was conscious of her family gathering around her, her father and mother’s arms over her shoulders. John was popping a champagne bottle in the background, and someone pushed a glass into her hand. She sipped without tasting, watching the baby lying quietly with the dozing serf. Wondering, she stroked his cheek, and his head turned toward the touch, mouth working. “Why, he’s an eager little one,” Jolene said. “Mistis, help me?”
Yolande pulled down the sheet to bare the swollen breasts, and curled the infant into the curve of her arm so that he could take the nipple. He sucked eagerly, and Jolene closed her eyes with a sigh. “They been so sore an’ tender. That feels good.”
There was more quiet conversation as the infant nursed, and then the midwife cleared her throat. “Mastahs, Mistis, this not a good place for a party. An’ this wench and the bambino, they needa their rest.”
Thomas Ingolfsson rumbled a laugh. “True enough. Out, my children.”
Chapter Sixteen
CENTRAL OFFICE, ARCHONAL PALACE
ARCHONA
DOMINATION OF THE DRAKA
NOVEMBER 10, 1991
“That will be all,” Eric von Shrakenberg said.
“Excellence,” his aide replied, bowing and leaving.
Damned insolence of office, he thought with amusement. The Domination’s chief executive was selected for a seven-year term, with no limits on reelection. Hence the Archonate staff tended to become used to an incumbent, set in their ways; he was still running into problems with that, except with the people he had brought in himself last year. The serf cadre were even worse . . .
“Five minutes,” the desk said.
He sighed and seated himself, feeling a little out of place. This shape of carved yellowwood and Zambezi teak . . . how many Occupation Day addresses had he seen it in, from the other side? On film back during the Eurasian War, on screens of gradually increasing clarity since. Wotan, fifty years! he thought, looking around the big room. Not overwhelming, although the view was spectacular, when the curtains were open; the dome of the House of Assembly was about half a kilometer away. History-drenched enough for anybody, he supposed, thinking of the decisions made here.
And now I sit here and hold the fate of the human race in my hands, he thought. If anyone’s listening at the other end of these communicators. Having people obey when he spoke was the difference between being a leader and an old man in a room. A fact not commonly known, and it’s better so.
“Incoming signal,” the speaker said.
“Receive.”
A spot of light appeared at head-height beyond the desk. A line framed it, expanding outward until it outlined a rectangle three meters by three; the central spot faded, and then the rectangle blinked out of existence. Replacing it was a holographic window into the interior of Donovan House. Eric knew it was an arrangement of photons, as insubstantial as moonbeams, but still wondered at the sheer solidity of it. Genuine progress, for a change, he thought. You could get the true measure of an opponent this way, the total-sensory gestalt read from every minute clue of stance, expression, movement. The same applied in reverse.
“Madam President,” he said, inclining his head.
“Excellence,” she replied, with meticulous courtesy.
She may have been added to balance the ticket, but I don’t think the Yankees lost when Liedermann slipped on the soap, Eric decided. President Carmen Hiero was the second Hispanic and the first woman to sit in the same chair as Jefferson and Douglas; before that she had been a Republican jefe politico in Sonora, still very unusual for a woman in the States carved out of Old Mexico. Fiftyish, graying, criolla blueblood by descent, mixed with Irish from a line of silver-mine magnates: that much he knew from the briefing papers. Old haciendado family, but not a shellback by Yankee standards; degrees in classics, history, and some odd American specialty known as political science, whatever that was. A contradiction in terms, from the title.
“I regret that I can’t offer hospitality,” he continued.
She shrugged. “Debatable whether it would be appropriate, under the circumstances. I hope you realize how much trouble with my OSS people I had to go through to allow Domination equipment here.”
“And the political capital I must expend to let Yankee electronics in here,” he added dryly. “Our Security people are still more paranoid than yours, not least because it is a field in which your nation excels us. Still, we can now be reasonably sure nobody is recording or tapping these conversations.” He paused. “Why did you agree, Senora?”
The black eyes met his calmly. Almost as much body-language control as a Draka, he thought with interest. Better than some of us do, actually. I wonder how deep it runs.
“I suspect my reasoning was much like yours, von Shrakenberg. The convenience of dealing with essential issues without the circumlocutions essential where things are said in public, without the necessary lies of party politics. In addition, the chance of gaining personal insight into my enemy, set against the risk of him doing likewise. Well worth that risk. Always it is better to act from knowledge than ignorance.” Eric nodded, spread his hands in silent acknowledgment as she continued. “Although, por favor, why did you not request such a link with the Alliance Chairman?”
Eric chuckled. “For much the same reason that you would not have agreed, had Representative Gayner’s nominee been sittin’ in this chair.”