Sula looked at the vase. “How did you know I liked Guraware?”
“Innate good taste, I suppose. I saw it in a shop and thought it should belong to you.”
“If you ever feel a similar impulse, don’t restrain yourself. This is some of the best porcelain ever made on Zanshaa.” She ran the pads of her fingers over the curves of the vase, and Martinez felt a shiver run up his spine at the sensuality of the protracted caress.
“I’m getting decorated and promoted tomorrow,” Martinez said. “09:01, Zanshaa time, at the Commandery. Will you come?”
She returned her attention to the video. “Of course. If they’ll let me in.”
“I’ll add your name to list of guests. I’ll be in the Hall of Ceremony.”
“It’s a nice room.” She smiled. “You’ll like it.”
“There will be a celebration tomorrow evening here at the palace. Will you come?”
“Your kind sisters already invited me, though I wasn’t aware of the party’s purpose.” She looked thoughtful. “I hope you don’t think I’m greedy, but…”
“You want a matching vase.”
“Well,yes. ” She laughed. “What I meant to ask was whether you were free tonight.”
“I’m not. Sorry. And besides…” He looked into her green eyes. “I’m not yet at my best.”
She held his gaze for a moment, then looked away. “And tomorrow night?” she asked.
“You be the judge.”
At that moment the thick teak door thundered open and Sempronia entered screaming.“What did you do to him?”
Martinez turned to Sempronia and tried to speak around the heart that had just leaped into his throat. “What?” he said. “Who—?”
Anger flushed Sempronia’s cheeks and fury blazed in her eyes.“I’m never going to forgive you for this! Never!”
“Well,” came Sula’s cautious voice from the display, “I can see you’re busy…”
Martinez’s attention whipped from Sempronia to Sula and back, in time to avoid being brained by his own Golden Orb, which Sempronia had just flung at him. He cast Sula a desperate look.
“See you later.”
“Comm,” said Sula, “end transmission.” The orange End symbol flashed on the screen, and then it darkened. By that time Martinez was on his feet, fending off a hairbrush, his shaving kit, and a bottle of cologne, objects that Sempronia found atop the bureau and sent his way.
He snatched the cologne out of the air and dropped it to a soft landing on the bed.
“Will you tell me what this is about?” he shouted in an officer’s voice calculated to freeze a member of the enlisted class in his tracks.
Sempronia was far from frozen, but at least she ceased to throw things.“What did you do to Nikkul!” she cried. “What did you do to him, you rat!”
Martinez knew precisely what he had done to him. Into Shankaracharya’s record he had written:
This officer possesses great intelligence coupled with imaginative gifts of a high order. He has demonstrated an ability to solve complex technical problems, and would be of outstanding utility in any position requiring expert technical or technological knowledge, or any position in which abstract reasoning or scientific skills are required.
This officer participated as communications officer in the Battle of Hone-bar. Based on his performance therein, it is not recommended that this officer be employed in any capacity in which the lives of Fleet personnel depend on his effectiveness in action against an enemy.
Shankaracharya had frozen in action not once but twice, first at the initial sighting of the enemy, and second when the first missile barrage had gone off and spread its hellfire plasma through the reaches of space. Martinez hadn’t given him a third chance.
It was possible that Shankaracharya would have overcome his shock and surprise and given exemplary service for the rest of the battle, his career, and his life. But Martinez, with the lives of hundreds of people under his immediate care, had not been able to take that chance.
After the battle, in the days that followed, he had asked himself the same sort of question he’d asked concerning Kamarullah: Would I feel safe knowing that I had to depend on Shankaracharya in combat?
With Martinez’s comments on his record, Shankaracharya would be put in charge of a supply depot or a laundry or a data processing center till the end of the war, and then his career would be over.
“Whathappened, Proney?” Martinez shouted in reply. “Can you just tell me what happened?”
Sempronia clenched her fists and shook one of them in Martinez’s direction. “Nikkul had it all arranged! Lord Pezzini arranged it for him—he had a place on one of the new cruisers they’re building in Harzapid. He and the other officers were going to leave in twelve days’ time. And this afternoon the captain called him and told him that his services would no longer be required, and that his place was going to someone else!”
She narrowed her eyes. “Nikkul said his captain must have read your report. Sowhat did you write in it to wreck Nikkul’s career?”
“What didNikkul say was in it?” Martinez countered.
“Hewouldn’t say, ” Sempronia raged. “He just said you’d done the right thing.” Her lower lip trembled. Tears began to fill her eyes. “He wasashamed. He turned away. I think he was crying.” Anger returned, and again she brandished a fist. “You were his hero! He pulled strings to get on your ship!” Tears burst out again, and her voice became a wail. “You promised to look after him.You promised. ”
“He shouldn’t have pulled strings,” Martinez said softly. “He shouldn’t have got Pezzini to put him over the heads of more experienced officers. He was too young and he wasn’t ready.”
Her voice was a soft, anguished keen. “You said you’dhelp him. You should havehelped him.” Sempronia took a step toward Martinez, but her knees wouldn’t support her and in slow motion she coiled down onto his bed, turning away, her fair hair falling into her face. Sobs shuddered through her. Martinez, his mouth dry, put out a hand to touch her shoulder. She shook it off.
“Oh, goaway, ” she said. “Ihate you.”
“It’s my room,” he pointed out. “If anyone leaves it’s you.”
“Oh shut up.”
There was a moment of silence, and then Martinez decided that he wasnot going to shut up. “Shankaracharya is a good man,” he said. “But he’s not an officer. He can succeed in any path but the one he’s chosen. Help him choose another path.” He made a helpless gesture. “Youhave to help him now. I can’t.”
Sempronia rose to her feet and ran for the door, hurling over her shoulder one last blaze of anger. “You bastard! You’re souseless!” And then the heavy door slammed shut behind her.
Martinez stood for a moment in the sudden thundering silence, then sighed.
He looked at the bed. He decided it was unlikely that he was going to get back to sleep, so he put on his shirt and trousers and civilian jacket, and the half-boots that Alikhan had polished to a mirror gleam just that morning. With proper military concern he tidied the objects that Sempronia had flung about, then went downstairs to the ground floor.
The parlor and drawing room were deserted. Perhaps everyone was in a back room discussing Sempronia’s explosion.
In the parlor Martinez poured some Laredo whiskey into a crystal tumbler, and he sipped it as he continued his search. He found Roland just outside his office, dragging a piece of furniture down the hall toward a storage room.
Martinez looked at the specialized couch that would hold two humans comfortably enough but which was better adapted to a reclining four-legged body the size of a very large dog.
“You’ve just had a visit from Naxids?” Martinez asked in surprise.