Tides of Maritinia (16 page)

Out of breath, Sali leaned through the hatchway and searched the room with wide eyes. “Oh, thank Falal,” she said upon spotting me, then her father.

Despite my frustration at the interruption, my heart swelled with the knowledge that she cared for me.

“You heard the explosion from Maringua?” asked Mnai.

“Y-­yes,” she said, her eyes starting to mist. “I thought the Ministry was under attack.”

The admiral was out of his chair, walking to her, his hands held wide. “Come, child.”

She ran to him, and he swallowed her in his embrace. He closed his eyes and buried his nose in her hair. “Shush, child. We're fine. The missile platform was sabotage-­ed, but we were perfectly safe down here.”

With a twist of her head, she found daylight through the crook of his elbow, her teary eye finding me. To keep from upsetting her further, I hid my bloodstained hands below the table and told her everything was okay with a smile.

Mnai released his hug and put his big hands on her shoulders. “If you thought the Empire was attacking, why did you come here? You should've stayed away.”

“I was worried,” she said.

“That's my brave girl. Have you eaten? How about we go to the kitchen, and I'll cook something for you like I used to?”

She nodded and wiped water from her eyes.

He led her to the hatchway. I stayed in my seat, my mind trying to reconcile the two men, ruthless tyrant and tender parent.

“The responsibilities of fatherhood are calling,” said the admiral. “This meeting is over.”

Mnai followed her out and disappeared for a few seconds before returning to fill the hatchway. He leveled a grin so cold it felt like icy fingers had gripped my soul. “You should take a lesson in courage from my daughter, Colonel. We will not abandon our ­people like loathsome cowards. Talk like a traitor again, and I'll cut your tongue from your mouth.”

 

CHAPTER 21

“Someithmes you choose your fate. Other timeas fate choouses you.”

–
J
AKOB
B
RYCE

T
he computer screen said my message had been sent. In a few hours, the Empire's new contingent would receive the encoded datagram:
all's clear.

I looked through the communications-­room door to the partly flooded control room. Blinking lights reflected on the floodwater. Dugu sat at a computer terminal by the water's edge. Blank-­eyed, he stared off to nowhere. Behind him, Kwuba technicians pretended to work. They tapped their screens and pointed fingers at numbers they didn't understand. One urgently stood and went to hover over a different terminal as if it were capable of something the others weren't. It wasn't.

I couldn't blame them. I'd be doing the same thing if I'd failed to stop the attack on the missile tower. Like them, I'd be feverishly jumping from terminal to terminal, hoping the mirage of productivity could save me from the admiral's ire.

I looked down at the box sitting next to my chair, a stash of comm units piled inside. To this point, nobody had noticed one was missing. If I'd known I was going to land such an easy opportunity as this to return the comm I'd stolen, I wouldn't have left it to be destroyed by the explosion. Not that it mattered. The techs were so flummoxed, I doubted they'd ever realize a device so small could control a system as big as the missile platform.

Entering the in-­box, I found a message waiting. I opened it and stared at the coded message until Pol had time to memorize the seemingly random string of characters.

I closed and deleted the message.

I turned off the interplanetary link, and Maritinia returned to hushed silence. I logged out and stretched my arms over my head, muscles groaning like ropes pulled taut.

Pol was right. I'd easily conned them into letting me use the communications-­room computer by telling them I would try to locate the source of the security breach.

The words slipped out too fast to pull back. So fast I didn't even know such a revelation existed in my mind. But the staggering truth was incontrovertible. The Empire was spread so thin, it couldn't withstand a concentrated attack without consolidating forces and ceding immense swaths of territory.

The Empire was on the verge of a massive contraction. I was sure of it. I'd seen how these ­people regarded the Empire with suspicion and defiance. How many other worlds felt the same way? How many others were ready to rise against their perceived oppressors? The Empire's total collapse might even be possible. Kell understood that, or he wouldn't have dared to rebel.

That was why Maritinia was so critical. It had to be tamed or remain a symbol to all who believed revolution was possible.

Pol stayed silent. Eerily silent. Unease slithered around my spine. Had I actually put voice to such a dangerous thought? How could I be so stupid? I knew better, dammit.

The E
3
didn't tolerate seditious attitudes. Careers and lives had been ruined for much less. Say too much, and even my father wouldn't be able to protect me. The silence dragged on, my nerves tingling, my face flushing.

Finally, he spoke, his words slipping into my mind with the incisive precision of a scalpel.

My heart drummed wild beats. I told myself to stay cool. He couldn't read my mind. Couldn't see the panic gripping my psyche. If I spun this right, I could salvage the situation.

I spoke firmly into the rabbit hole. No hint of fear.

I said, amping up the indignation.

I held my breath waiting on the response.

he said. I listened close as he continued.

I couldn't detect any lingering suspicion in his voice. I let out my breath as quietly as I could. He was always listening.

he said.

Which I understood to mean the generals were already moving forces to the inner rings.

I said.

The fear quickly washed away, and I sank into the sands of exhaustion. With Pol, I always had to be the proper spy. The perfect loyalist. I had to play the part.

But I was so damn tired. I already had to dress in the false identity of Colonel Kell. I shouldn't have to wear another mask under that mask.

I put my elbows on my knees and dropped my chin on closed fists. Four more weeks. Four more weeks, and I would be delivered from this tortuous existence.

The admiral appeared with Sali on the far side of the dome. The technicians leaned in close to their screens as if the key to avoiding a death sentence was avoiding eye contact.

Sali hadn't noticed me. Neither had the admiral. They'd spent the entire afternoon together. He put an arm over his daughter's shoulder. I watched to see if she was happy to receive the overdue attention, but I couldn't read her face from this distance. If I could, I'd expect to see dread chewing on her delight. She knew the Empire was coming. She knew she'd lose her father.

She'd lose me, too.

And I'd lose her.

3
plants its spies. We must protect our methods at all costs.>

I knew I should continue to deny it, but I couldn't bear another pretense. Just this once, I decided to admit the truth.

Pol didn't speak, but I heard disapproval in his silence.

Sali rose on tiptoes to peck her father's cheek before he stepped away. Left alone, she turned her contented face to the wall of video screens, most of them displaying camera feeds of the topside cleanup. One screen focused on Jebyl workers sweeping debris into the water with brooms made of dried sea fronds. Other screens tracked soldiers who patrolled the ringed island in groups of three and four.

Another screen showed the line of bodies laid out like butchered fish.

Her spine stiffened, as did her arms and shoulders, her carefree bearing hardening into rigid lines.

I was the cause of her anguish. I was the one who murdered those ­people. I was the one who murdered Colonel Kell. I was the one who had doomed her father to die at the hands of the Empire—­no, to be fair, Mnai had done that to himself the moment he decided to lead this rebellion. Still . . .

The compulsion to unburden my soul burned inside. I didn't know how much longer I could stand to hold it all inside. I needed a release. Looking at the box of comm units again, an idea blossomed in my mind.

I gazed up at the ceiling, so Pol couldn't see my hands. I let out a loud sigh to cover any noise as I reached down into the box and nabbed a comm unit. Standing up, I slipped it into my back pocket.

T
he hatch clanged closed behind me, and heavy with thought, I took my usual seat on the steel floor. I had so much news to share, I didn't know where to start.

The Falali Mother paced across her cell. Stopping a half step from one wall, she about-­faced and marched three paces to the opposite wall before spinning around to march back again. Pace, pace, pace, turn. Pace, pace, pace, turn.

“You know,” I said, “I've seen caged animals at the zoo who do the same thing.”

“Zoo.” Turn. “Tell me what a zoo is like.” Turn.

“The Sire's Zoo on Korda is gigantic.” My voice was flat from fatigue. “It's very close to the palace. It takes at least a week to see the whole thing. They have many thousands of species from all over the Empire.”

“And they pace like I do?”

“Just the feisty ones.”

She stopped for a moment to give me a wry stare. “Tell me more.”

“It's beautiful. So many animals, you wouldn't believe. Birds as colorful as the brightest silks. Bugs that build massive castles out of sand.”

“How massive? As big as one of the Ministry domes?”

“Bigger,” I said. “As big as a Maritinian city.”

“Fascinating,” she said, and sat in her chair, eyes twinkling with wonder. “What about large animals? Do they have wild cats?”

“Of course they do.” Infected by her enthusiasm, my voice lost its monotone listlessness. “Cats almost as long as mammoths. They have your mammoths and squids, too. There's an entire exhibit dedicated to the creatures created for the technology-­restricted worlds.”

“Create-­ed?”

“Children come to the exhibit to learn about genetics and biology.”

“Create-­ed?” she repeated.

I gave her a puzzled frown. I didn't understand what she was asking.

Leaving her sandals on the floor, she pulled her knees up to her chest, her robe hanging off the chair like the sheet of an unmade bed. “The natural world and everything in it springs from Falal. The Sire's claim for credit is a lie.”

I opened my mouth to refute her claim, but her claim was so far from reality, so far out in the clouds, I had no place to set my foot.

“The Sire is just a man,” she said, “one of a long line of extremely powerful men whose technology can do things I can hardly imagine. But creating life itself? I think not. That is the realm of the divine.”

said Pol.

I took a deep breath before giving a history lesson. “The squids and mammoths were engineered to perform specific tasks, and they were brought here by the Empire two thousand years ago. The Empire brought your ancestors, too. They took the poor and starving and gave them this world, like hundreds of other worlds. The Empire assigned some ­people to the worker class and others to the aristocracy, the Jebyl and Kwuba as you call them now.”

She waited for me to finish, an amused expression on her face. “The Empire is most adept at indoctrination.”

This was an argument I couldn't win. I didn't know if there was a point to winning anyway. “Tell me,” I said, “how do
you
think ­people arrived on this planet?”

“Really, Colonel, we've been through this before. Maritinia is the living manifestation of Falal. She drinks the sea. She breathes the sky. And she populates both the aquatic and terrestrial planes with spirits. We Kwuba and Jebyl are the terrestrial manifestations of these spirits, while the sea creatures like the squids and cuda are the aquatic.”

I rubbed my chin, hand scraping across whisker stubble. “Have you ever told me how you became the Falali Mother?”

“Souls move from life to life.” She lifted her hands and aimed her fingertips at herself. “Currently, the Falali Mother's soul occupies my life.”

“But you weren't always the Falali Mother, right? What did you do before you took that title?”

“I was a young girl when I went to live with the sisters. Until then, I did as most young Jebyl do. I dove for crab and urchins. I learn-­ed how to manage the squids. I learn-­ed how to sew and how to patch a boat.”

“How old were you?”

“My father fell ill and die-­ed shortly after my ninth year. My mother die-­ed giving birth to me. Like many orphan-­ed girls, my village sent me to Selaita to become a Falali sister. It had been nineteen years since the previous Falali Mother pass-­ed. The Council of Interpreters had been seeking the reappearance of her spirit, and they recognize-­ed her spirit in me.”