The Ruby Dice (24 page)

Ixpar lifted her arm and spoke in accented but fluent Skolian Flag. "Secondary Najo, this is Ixpar Karn. Have Imperator Skolia's children arrived yet?"

Silence followed her words. Although Kelric was separated from his bodyguards by a wall and enough distance to mute his reception of their moods, he knew them well enough to interpret Najo's response; hearing Ixpar jolted him. His guards had been laudably discreet, given the curiosity he felt consuming them. They had no idea what to make of Ixpar.

Then Najo said, "Their flyer is en route, Your Majesty."

Ixpar blinked as if the comm had sprouted two heads. She touched the mute panel so Najo couldn't hear her. "My what?"

Kelric smiled. "Majesty. It's your title, as my consort."

"Are you one of these, too?"

"Well, yes. I go by Lord Skolia, though."

She regarded him dubiously. "
Majesty
seems rather grandiose. More like a mountain than a person."

"You can use your Coban title if you prefer. Just tell him."

She touched the send panel. "Thank you, Secondary Najo. Also, you may call me Minister Karn."

"Understood, ma'am." He paused. "Are you with Imperator Skolia? I have a message for him."

Kelric had no doubt "a message" was a prodigious understatement. Gods only knew how many people wanted to reach him. He and Ixpar had escaped the coliseum by the roof, where they boarded a flyer. They had spoken with no one. His children had sat below his box in the coliseum, and he had had them escorted to the palace as soon as the Promenade ended. If he had asked them to wait while he came through the tunnel to their box, people would have had time to catch up with them. He had waited twenty-six years for this moment. Maybe his children would accept him, maybe not, but he wanted whatever happened to be private.

He activated his comm. "Najo, tell anyone who wishes to speak with me that I will talk to them this evening."

"Yes, sir. They are rather urgent, though."

Kelric could imagine. "They'll have to wait." Ixpar was watching him, her stately figure silhouetted against the arched window. "Let me know as soon as my children arrive."

Najo answered quietly. "They're here, sir."

Kelric froze. What if they rejected the father they had never met?

After a moment, Najo said, "Imperator Skolia?"

Kelric took a deep breath. "Please escort them in."

An eternity passed for Kelric in the moments before anyone entered. The world seemed caught in another bubble, but this time he wasn't certain if he was within it or on the outside. The door opened, leaving Najo in its archway, a towering Jagernaut in black with a huge gun on his hip. He had a strange look, as if he had gone through a tunnel packed with the unexpected and come out the other end, no less stunned than before but able to accept whatever he found. He stepped aside, into the room—

A girl appeared in the doorway.

In that moment, Kelric
knew.
He needed no DNA, Promenade announcers, or Coban historians to tell him. Like knew like. Her mind glowed like the sun, as it had even before her birth, when she was barely more than a dream. She stared at him with his own eyes. She wore suede trousers and a gold shirt, so much like her mother, Savina; but unlike Savina, his daughter was tall, nearly the height of her namesake, Roca Skolia.

It was several moments before he could speak. Finally the Teotecan words came to him. "My greetings, Rohka."

His daughter inhaled abruptly, as if his voice reminded her that she needed to breathe. She walked forward, and if she knew anyone else but Kelric was present, she gave no sign. She stopped a few paces away from him. "Father?"

Somehow he smiled. "It seems I have that good fortune."

"Cuaz and Khozaar me!" she said, invoking Coba's capricious wind gods.

Her flustered expression so reminded him of Savina, he didn't know whether to laugh or cry. "Your mother used to say that."

Rohka hesitated. "Will you tell me about her?"

His voice softened. "Gladly."

He hadn't spoken about Savina since her death. Perhaps talking to Rohka would help him close the chapter on that terrible loss and truly feel free to love Ixpar. His bond to Ixpar had begun to form that first day he saw her leaning over him like a fire-haired angel, but so much had intervened in the fourteen years between when he met her and married her. Including Savina. It took him a long time to grasp his emotions; he was like a glacier flowing down a mountain. Patience wasn't a common trait of Coban women when it came to love. Savina had burst into his life like a solar flare, melted his reticence, and loved him passionately for five years. Losing her had nearly killed him. Only Ixpar had understood, and given him the time he needed to come alive again.

It finally dawned on Rohka that Kelric was standing next to the leader of her civilization. She flushed, her cheeks rosy, and bowed to Ixpar. "My greetings, ma'am."

Ixpar inclined her head. "And mine to you, Rohka."

A rustle stirred in the doorway. Looking up, Kelric saw Strava enter the room. She gave him a questioning look.

Taking a breath, Kelric nodded. Strava didn't turn around, but lights flashed on her gauntlets, as happened when his guards used their biomech to communicate. Then she stepped to the side of the entrance.

A man walked through the doorway.

Kelric saw him, but his tension was so high, he couldn't focus on the man's face. It was a blur. Then everything snapped into place and his heart wrenched. Jimorla. His firstborn. His heir.

Jimorla's face was achingly familiar, though Kelric had never seen him before today. He had the same violet eyes as Kelric's father. His brown hair curled in disarray, tousled from the wind. A gold shimmer overlaid his skin, but he had inherited his darker coloring from his mother, Rashiva. He also had her exotic beauty and upward tilted eyes, but in him it had the dramatic masculine strength of his desert ancestors.

His son showed no hint of a smile. By custom, men in the desert estates never smiled in the presence of a woman unless only his kin were present. His Oath forbade him to speak to anyone Outside the Varz Calanya. Even knowing that, Kelric hadn't been able to stop himself from hoping Jimorla would speak, for his son had already defied tradition by traveling to Parthonia and walking in the Promenade. But those were breaks with custom, not the Oath. As much as Kelric knew that intellectually, he couldn't help but wonder if Jimorla's impassive silence came from more than his Oath.

Kelric spoke in Teotecan. "I am pleased you are here." It sounded as stilted as it felt.

And his son said, "I am honored."

An ache swelled within Kelric, one hard to define, for he had never understood his own emotions as well as he read those from other people. This came from deep within him, full of warmth, as if it held his heart.

"How is your mother?" Kelric asked.

"She is well." Defiance flashed in Jimorla's eyes. "As is my father, Raaj."

It felt like a punch.
What did you expect?
Kelric thought. Raaj had raised Jimorla. It hadn't been until age thirteen that Jimorla learned the identity of his biological father. Kelric knew he would have to work to become a father to his children. They were part of him, yet they were strangers. Their lives had been so different than his, they had no intersection with him.

Except for Quis.

He couldn't suggest playing Quis to Jimorla; it would be a great offense, especially given that his son had come without the Manager of his Estate. It astonished him that Stahna Varz had let her Calani travel to another world. It went against every tradition, custom, and expectation of her people. It violated Jmorla's Calanya Oath. No Manager would allow such, yet the most rigid of all Coban queens had done exactly that.

"I'm grateful Manager Varz accepted this visit," Kelric said. That sounded so paltry for what he felt.

"It wasn't Stahna who made the decision," Ixpar said.

Kelric stiffened and stared at her.
What had she done?
Started another war?

Whatever Ixpar saw in his expression, it made her smile. "Don't worry," she said. "I haven't kidnapped anyone."

Jimorla looked from her to Kelric, his gaze intent. Then he shrugged off the robe he wore over his shirt and trousers and folded it over his arm. At first Kelric wasn't certain why, except for the room being warm. Then he saw the gold bands in his son's sleeves, partially covered by the loose cloth. Three Calanya rings gleamed on each of his upper arms. The top band showed the rising sun insignia of Haka Estate, where he had been born, and the middle one had the Varz clawcat.

The third ring bore the Karn althawk.

Gods almighty.
His son was a Karn Calani. Ixpar had made him a Third Level, probably one of the few on the planet, and he had achieved it at an incredibly young age. Jimorla had lived in the Calanya at two of the most powerful Estates, Haka and Varz, both adversaries of Karn. That combined with his heritage would make his Calanya contract exorbitantly expensive. It must have put even Ixpar's Estate into debt.

Another realization hit him. His son could have refused the Third Level. That he had accepted it, though it meant leaving his home to live at an Estate he probably viewed as hostile, meant more to Kelric than he knew how to say.

Jimorla was watching him, and Kelric saw the uncertainty in his eyes. He had no more idea how his father would accept him than Kelric did about his son.

Kelric's voice caught. Looking at both his children, he said, "Welcome to my home."

And to my heart.

Jaibriol stood in the Silver Room of the Qox Palace and studied the life-size holo image before him. It showed two military men, but they weren't ESComm officers. No, these were the warlords of his enemies. They were standing on a stage, listening to a speech. The one with steel-grey hair was Chad Barzun, who headed up the Skolian Imperial Fleet. The other was Admiral Ragnar Bloodmark.

A door hummed behind Jaibriol. He didn't need to turn; he saw his visitor's face reflected in the screen behind the holos. Tarquine came to stand at his side, studying the image of the Skolian commanders. Her faint scent drifted to him, astringent and bracing.

"An interesting couple," she said. "Did you know Bloodmark is one-quarter Scandinavian?"

"I didn't realize you were that familiar with ISC." He knew about Bloodmark because he had read the ESComm dossiers on all the top Skolian officers, but he hadn't thought she was interested in military details.

"I make it my policy to know the major players." She indicated Bloodmark. "He may look like a nobleman, but his mother was space-slag poor. Bad economics in that bloodline."

"That may be," Jaibriol said. "But he operates now at the top level of Skolian hierarchies."

Tarquine waved her hand in dismissal. "That can't be too difficult. They are only Skolians, after all."

He raised an eyebrow. "As opposed to, say, Iquars?"

She gave him a half-lidded stare, like a feral cat. "Iquars are in a class by ourselves."

When she looked at him that way, it could make him forget why he didn't like being the emperor of Eube. "So I've noticed."

She tilted her head at the images. "Why are you interested in these two?"

He refocused his attention on less flammable matters than his wife. "Of all the Skolian commanders, Barzun seems the one most likely to support a peace treaty."

"That's hardly saying much," Tarquine said, "given the allergic reactions they all have to the concept."

"I suppose. Bloodmark was more intractable at the talks, though. He carries a great deal of weight with ISC." Jaibriol rubbed his chin. "In fact, he has more seniority than Barzun. But the Imperator promoted Barzun over him. I wonder why."

"I take it you have a hypothesis?"

"I'm not sure." As much as he disliked discussing Kelric with her, she knew the Imperator better than did any other Aristo. "I had the impression during our negotiations that the pharaoh was the only one willing to talk peace. But maybe Imperator Skolia isn't as intransigent as we thought."

"Don't let them fool you," Tarquine said. "The Allieds have a very old saying. 'Good cop, bad cop.'"

"What is a 'cop?'"

"Police officer. When you want something from adversaries, you set two people to work with them. One person is easy on the target. Softens them up. The other is tough. Of course it's never true; they play off each other." She flicked her finger through several holicons on her wrist comp, and the image in front of them changed to one of the Ruby Pharaoh.

Jaibriol almost jerked; the pharaoh looked like a delicate version of his mother. The pharaoh was ethereal rather than robust, and where his mother had been fierce, the pharaoh seemed gentle. But both women had the same large green eyes and heart-shaped face. It hurt to see. He longed just once to talk to his Ruby kin, not about politics or war, but about the family he would never know.

"See how fragile she looks," Tarquine mused. "But she isn't in the least. She is steel."

"I wouldn't know." He kept his gaze on the holo, unable to meet Tarquine's gaze.

His wife spoke in a low voice. "They say the Ruby Pharaoh and her niece—the previous Imperator—were more alike than anyone realized."

Jaibriol felt as if she had caught him with a rope and spun him around. What did Tarquine expect, to hear him admit Soz Valdoria, the late Imperator, was his mother?

"People say many things," he told her.

"So they do. For example, that gold is softer than steel."

Gold? He gave her an incredulous look. "You think the
Imperator
is more likely than the pharaoh to consider peace?"

Tarquine thought for a moment. "I'm not sure. He's every bit the military commander. But I suspect he is less adamant against it than he seems."

As uncomfortable as this discussion made Jaibriol, her interpretations intrigued him. "Pharaoh Dyhianna is the ruler, though. Imperator Skolia answers to her and the First Councilor."

Tarquine gave him a dour look. "What sort of brain-addled decision was that? She deposes that Assembly, a very sensible thing to do. And then what. She gives them back half of the power. Maybe she would give me half if I asked."