Rules of Conflict (11 page)

“But enough about me.” Lucien fixed her with an angry stare, every
trace of good humor extinguished. “You never even said good-bye.”

“I’m sorry.”

“I had your escape route all planned. I also had interested
parties to answer to for your disappearance. What happened, didn’t you trust
me?”

Not completely.
“You know I don’t trust easily.”

“I thought you understood me well enough to make an exception.” He
tugged at his outpatient band. “Hell of a lot of good your secrecy did you.
They still caught you.”

“If you came here to cheer me up, you’re doing a good job.”

“I came here to deliver a message.” To Jani’s surprise, Lucien slipped
into Middle Vynshàrau, complete with posture and gestures. “
The chief
propitiator of the Vynshàrau bids the glories of the day to his most excellent
Eyes and Ears
.”

“You—” She stopped. Counted to ten. Twice. “You’re working with
Nema?”

“Attached to the idomeni embassy—security liaison,” Lucien said in
English. “I’m under arms at all times”—he lifted the flap of his belt holster,
revealing an empty compartment—“except when I enter the loony bin and need to
check my shooter at the front desk. Can’t let the crazies get their hands on
the weaponry, can we? They might take over, and then where would we be?”

“About where we are now. Who do you report to?”

“All embassy staff report to the Xeno branch of Justice. So, not
only am I in constant contact with your most powerful ally, I also have an in
at the ministry that’s building the case against your old boyfriend.” He
grinned wolfishly. “Kind of makes you want to treat me nicer, doesn’t it?”

“What else did Nema ask you to tell me?”

“Is that an apology?” Lucien held a hand to his ear. “I can’t tell
with all this interference.”

“
Lucien.
” Jani tried to stare him into submission, but he
glared back in sullen stubbornness. He could get testy when he felt
unappreciated, but in this case he had justification. He had earned Exterior
Minister Anais Ulanova’s enmity when he forsook her patronage to throw in with
Jani, and the animosity of a Cabinet Minister could destroy more than just a
career.
Right, Evan?
“I’m sorry I bolted.”

“Apology accepted.” Lucien’s smile bloomed anew.

“So what else did Nema say?”

“That you must watch and listen, as is your way. He also wanted me
to ask you if the ring fits yet?” He ended with a teeth-baring grimace, an
imitation of Nema’s version of a smile.

The red-stone ring. Her Academy graduation gift from her esteemed
teacher. Each of the six special students who had received their degrees in
documents examination from the vaunted idomeni university had received one.
Everyone else’s had fit, but when Jani had tried hers on, she couldn’t push it
past her second knuckle.
Not anymore.
Several nervous sizing tests in
Felix Majora confirmed the now-comfortable fit. “Tell him no.”

“He told me that ring’s a monitor. When it fits, you’ll be
hybridized enough to begin training to become his successor. Is that true?”

“Lucien, I’m human.”
Officially. For now.
“That mitigates
against me becoming the religious leader of a whole other race, don’t you
think?”
That and the fact the Service will have come to their senses and
shot me by then.

“But he said—”

“The hell with what he said. Just because he says things doesn’t
make them fact!”

“Keep your voice down!” Lucien looked toward the sunroom door, on
the alert for eavesdroppers. “You know, he wanted me to rig myself so I could
record you. He said he wanted to hear your voice. I don’t think I’d want to be
in the room with him after he heard
that
.”

“Oh, it wouldn’t be bad. He’d disregard it as unimportant.” She
was only the Eyes and Ears, after all. A tool. Her thoughts and fears didn’t
matter.
And I have thoughts and fears, you bet I do.

Lucien rose and walked across the room to the holoVee display.
“Keep your mouth shut until I set up some interference.” He activated the unit
and flipped through the programs, stopped at an opera broadcast, and jacked up
the audio until the swell of voices filled the room. “What’s the matter with
you?”

“Ask my doctor—he keeps the running tally.” Jani watched Lucien
stroll back to his chair. Part of her could have watched him forever. The part
with the brain wished he’d go away. “What’s happening with Evan? What sort of
plea bargain has Justice offered him? What’s he given them concerning me?”

“Slow down.” Lucien sprawled unServicelike and picked at his nails
in irritation. “His attorneys are worried—they don’t like the publicity this
case is drawing.”

“They need publicity. They need to show what a great guy Evan was
and what an evil influence I was.”

“Well, that’s not what they’re getting. The Earth news services
aren’t carrying anything about you. The colony services are another story. On
FelNet, Felix is complaining about the arrest of colonials with insufficient
evidence. In the smoke-filled rooms, the Felician governor called your capture
kidnapping and filed a formal complaint against the Service. She’s threatening
to cancel the landlease for Fort Constanza. She can’t do that, legally, but
that doesn’t seem to concern her. Acadia and
toute La Manche
back her
up. They’re threatening to boycott the Commonwealth Cup—”

“
What!
”

“—but they’ve been sweeping the prelims, so they may decide
defeating the Earthbound teams serves their cause better.” Lucien chuckled.
“Nema takes a different tack. He asks about you in meetings with the PM,
usually after she inquires after rights to use the idomeni GateWays near the
Outer Circle.”

“That doesn’t answer my question about Evan.”

“If he attacks you, he has to admit the part he played in your
transport explosion.”

“That’s the point of the plea bargain. He tells them how much I
hated Neumann, and they let him off the hook for ordering the bomb to be planted
on my transport.”

“His pride won’t allow him to admit what he did. That being the
case, he’ll sit in his little house forever.”

It can’t be that easy.
“They haven’t charged me with
Neumann’s murder yet.” Jani rolled up the magazine and whacked herself on the
thigh. “I shouldn’t be here. I should be in a brig infirmary waiting to get
scanned and strip-searched.”

But instead, colonial governors were lodging protests on her
behalf.

What the hell is going on?

Lucien looked at his timepiece. “Test time—I have to go. Then it’s
off to the city. I’m in charge of an advance team checking out Chicago
Combined. Nema will be meeting with their botany professors. They’re going to
discuss the possibilities of idomeni-humanish hybridizations. For plants.” He
stared down at his shoes.

“Lucky you,” Jani said, ignoring his allusion. “Has he been
behaving himself?”

“No.” Lucien looked up with a smile. “He left the embassy without
his guard the day before yesterday. They corralled him in a park. Some kids
were teaching him how to use the seesaw.” He stood, then pulled her to her feet
as well. Before she could react, he leaned down and kissed her on the cheek.
His lips felt warm and soft; he smelled of soap and clean clothes.

Jani backed away. When he tried to pull her to him again, she
placed her hands against his chest and pushed.

“That’s OK, I thrive on rejection.” He hunched his shoulders and
kicked at the floor. “The least you can do is walk me to my appointment.”

The halls were filled with people, including two colonels and a
major, all mainline. The sight of all that red-striped brass compelled Lucien
to behave. Somewhat.

“If you still feel strongly about that strip search after you get
out of here, let me know.” He walked down the hall toward the testing labs.
“I’m an expert in that sort of thing.” He paused to wink at her before
disappearing around the corner.

Jani leaned against the wall for a few minutes and recovered her
blond-addled wits. Then she wandered back to the sunroom.
The colonial guvs
are making a stink
. And if the tension over the Shenandoah Gate was any
indication, Service solidarity in a colonial crisis was not guaranteed.
And
Nema’s raising his own brand of hell.

But in the end, what good would their interferences do? She traced
the Pathen Haárin word for garbage on a wall with her finger.
Their protests
and a vend token, Lucien.
Or a Vynshàrau ring.

Pimentel placed a drop of her blood on a cartridge tester.
“The only reason John Shroud is still walking the streets rather than occupying
a prison cell is because he’s convinced certain people he’s closing in on the
secret to eternal life.”

Jani sat on the edge of her bed.
I hope he won’t be drawing any
more blood
. The crook of her right arm already looked like a dartboard and
stung to the touch. “What happened to your open mind? He saved my life.” She
waited for Pimental to reply, but he continued to manipulate testing materials
and capillary tubes. “Cal Montoya from Neoclona Chicago treated me about five
months ago,” she said as she settled back against her pillow. “He prescribed
enzyme supplements to help my digestion. He didn’t say anything about
porphyria.”

Pimentel returned the testing equipment to his crammed carryall.
“What else would you expect? Can you imagine the damage to Shroud’s reputation
if it got out that he had inflicted a genetic disorder on his legendary
patient? That ‘word from the mountaintop’ aura is the main thing Neoclona has
going for it. Service Medical has never bought into their mystique. Our
physicians all receive their training in unaffiliated schools. And even Shroud
will admit, if squeezed hard enough, that our people can hold their own against
his by any measure you can think of.”

Jani squirmed beneath her covers. She would be the first to admit
her feelings for John had never made sense. In the months they’d been
sequestered together, he’d treated her as either goddess or entitlement,
depending on his mood.
Galatea to his Pygmalion one minute, oyster to his
pearl knife the next.
For her part, she’d exploited his affection even as
she ached for his touch; as the years passed, she’d come to resent him mightily
for the things he had done to her. Every time her gut cramped or her muscles
spasmed as though torn, she cursed him, yet when someone attacked him, she felt
compelled to jump to his defense. “He thought he was helping me,” she said,
knowing how weak it sounded, to her ears as well as Pimentel’s.

“He helped you, all right. I’ve spent the morning studying your
tissue scans.” He straightened her blanket with a sharp tug. “It amazes me you
can speak kindly of him, considering what he did to you. He treated you like an
experimental culture. Genius he may possess—unfortunately for you, he lacks the
judgment and ethics to go with it. Every half-baked hypothesis that stewed in his
brain concerning the benefits of human-idomeni tissue hybridization, he tried
out on you. And now here you are, forced to cope with the consequences of his
criminal negligence.” Pimentel picked up the carryall and regarded her levelly.
“You need sound medical care. You don’t need John Shroud or one of his acolytes
trying to fix you with the same useless tools with which he broke you in the
first place.”

Friesian breached the Morley-run defenses at midafternoon
break. The enforced downtime had done him good. His fresh summerweights fit
crisply, with not a pucker to be seen. He had gotten a haircut as well, and had
shaved so closely his cheeks shone like a baby’s.

“It felt good to sleep in a grounded rack.” He led her into a
vacant office located around the corner from her room. “All my friends live for
ship duty, but I’ll take a nice, solid planet any day.” He closed the door, sat
down at the desk, and pulled file folders and loose papers from a black-leather
documents case.