So why was he smitten? What was it about the young queen's open and friendly countenance that seemed somehow dazzling? What was it about her certainly-healthy-but-that's-about-it figure that was producing hormonal reactions way more powerful than any he'd ever experienced gazing upon the voluptuous figure of Cousin Jennifer?
Part of the explanation was simply that Berry Zilwicki was the first unknown young woman that Brice Miller had ever encountered, aside from brief views of slaves being transported or the slavers overseeing the process, some of whom were also female. One of the many drawbacks of being raised as he had, part of a small clan of people very isolated from the rest of the human race, was that by the time boys reached puberty, they already knew every girl around. And vice versa, for the girls. There were no mysteries, no unknowns. True, the fact that some girls—for Brice, it has been Jennifer Foley—had suddenly developed in such a way as to stimulate new and primitive reactions from the opposite sex (or, sometimes, the same sex—Ganny's clan wasn't at all prudish or narrow-minded about such things) helped a bit. Still, while Cousin Jennifer's ability to stir up fantasies in Brice's mind was new, the cousin herself most certainly was not. He still carried a small scar on his elbow from the time she'd struck him there with a handy tool, in retaliation for his theft of one of her toys. And she was still holding something of a grudge for the theft itself.
They'd been seven years old, at the time.
The queen of Torch, on the other hand, was really new. Brice didn't know anything at all about her, except for the bare facts that she was several years older than he was—irrelevant, at the moment—and commanded legions of armed and dangerous soldiers. Also irrelevant, at the moment. Everything else was unknown. That, combined with her friendly demeanor, opened the floodgates of fourteen-year-old sexual fantasies in a way that Brice had never encountered and against which he had few defenses.
But there was more involved. Dimly, Brice Miller was beginning to grasp that sex was a lot more complicated than it looked. He was even verging on the Great Truth that most men were quite happy even when the Significant Other in their life was not especially good-looking. So perhaps Brice was not destined for a life of chastity after all. Given that his heretofore stratospheric standards seemed to be crumbling by the minute.
"—the matter with you, Brice? And the two of you also, Ed and James. It's a simple enough question."
The genuine irritation in Ganny El's tone of voice finally penetrated the hormonal fog.
Brice jerked. What question?
Thankfully, James played the fool, so Brice didn't have to. "Uh . . . what question, Ganny? I didn't hear it."
"Have you suddenly gone deaf?" Butre pointed at one of the men standing not far from the queen. He was on the short side, and so wide-bodied he looked a little deformed. "Mr. Zilwicki wants to know if you'd be willing to spend a few months—"
Zilwicki cleared his throat. "Might be as long as a year, Ms. Butre."
"Twelve counts as a 'few,' when you're my age, young man. To get back to the point, James—and you too, Ed and Brice—Mr. Zilwicki has a job for you." She gave Zilwicki a beady stare. " 'Somewhat' dangerous, he says. A word to the wise, youngsters. This is one of those situations where the phrase 'somewhat dangerous' is a lot closer to 'a little bit pregnant' than it is to . . . oh, let's say the version of 'somewhat dangerous' that a conscientious playground attendant says to a mother when her child is heading for the seesaw."
That began dispelling the hormonal fog. For the first time since he'd laid eyes on the queen, Brice focused on someone else in the room.
Zilwicki. He was the queen's father, or maybe step-father. And his first name was Anthony, right? Brice wasn't entirely certain.
Good fortune struck again. Thandi Palane frowned—the frown helped clear away still more of the hormonal fog—and said: "Are you sure about this, Anton?"
"They're awfully young," added the queen doubtfully.
That was a dash of cold water. She'd said "awfully young" in the manner that a protective adult refers to children. Not, sadly, in the way that . . .
Well. That Brice imagined sophisticated older women spoke of young men to whom they were inexplicably attracted. Admittedly, he wasn't sure of that, either. Seeing as how the situation had never actually happened to him.
One of the other men in the room spoke up. He was a lot less striking than Zilwicki. Just an average-sized man, with a very square face. Very wide shoulders, too.
"That's the whole point, Your Maj—ah, Berry. Add them into the mix, as young as they are, and with neither the ship nor anybody on it having any connection to either Torch or the Ballroom—or Manticore or Beowulf or Haven—and they'll be about as invisible as anyone can be, where we'd be going."
"And where it that, precisely?" demanded Ganny. "I can't help but notice that you've made no mention of that so far."
The square-faced man glanced at Zilwicki. "Mesa. To be precise."
"Oh, well. And why don't we sodomize all the demons in the universe, while we're at it?" Elfride Margarete Butre glared at him. "What do you want us to do for an encore, Cachat? Circumcise the devil?"
Good fortune again. Brice had forgotten that man's name too. His first name was Victor, and he was from the Republic of Haven.
Ca-chat. Silently, Brice practiced the name a few times. It was pronounced in the Frenchified way that Havenites often spoke. KAH-SHAH, rhyming with "pasha," except the emphasis was on the second syllable instead of the first.
It finally dawned on him to wonder what a Havenite was doing as part of Queen Berry's inner circle. Especially given that Zilwicki—more memories came flooding back in, as the hormonal fog continued to lift—was from the Star Kingdom of Manticore. The somewhat haphazard and always intensely practical education given the clan's youngsters didn't spend much time on the fine points of astropolitics. But it wasn't so sketchy as to have overlooked the most hard-fought, bitter and longest-running war in the galaxy.
Haven. Manticore. And now . . . Mesa.
Suddenly, Brice was excited. Excited enough that he even forgot for a moment that he was in the presence of the universe's most wondrous female.
"We'll do it!" he said.
"Yeah!" and "Yeah!" came the echoes from James and Ed.
Ganny's shoulders sagged a little, but her glare at Cachat didn't fade in the least. "You cheated, you bastard."
Cachat looked more curious than offended. "How did I cheat?" Then, he shrugged. "But if it'll make you feel better . . ."
He looked now at Brice and his two friends. "The mission we'll be undertaking is in fact very dangerous. I don't think you'llbe in much danger, yourselves, at least until the very end. You might not even participate in the 'very end' at all, for that matter, since you'll mostly be there just as a backup in case things go wrong. Still, it can't be ruled out—and the fact that something will have gone wrong if you doget involved means that it's likely to be pretty dangerous."
"And when he says 'pretty dangerous,' " Zilwicki chimed in, "he means 'pretty dangerous' in the sense that you've gone into the den of the most ruthless and evil people in the world and yanked on their collective beard, not 'pretty dangerous' in the sense that you've picked a fight in the schoolyard with some kids who are a bit bigger than you."
"So there's no hard feelings if you decline," concluded Cachat.
"We'll do it!" Brice said.
"Yeah!" and "Yeah!" came the echoes from James and Ed.
"You dirty rotten cheaters," hissed Ganny. She point a finger at the three boys. "You know perfectly well their brains haven't fully developed yet."