The Summer Queen (59 page)

Gundhalinu had dealt more directly with Pernatte’s wife,
though not in the flesh—CMP Jarsakh held the controlling interest in the
shipyards which were endeavoring to build the new faster-than-light fleet. She
was looking back at him now, showing the recognition her husband lacked. It was
widely, if privately, held that she was the mind behind the ever-growing
success of their already vast mutual holdings, that she put into Pernatte’s
mouth the words that he spoke before the Council. Having dealt with her
himself, Gundhalinu could see where there might be truth in it. His experience
with his own brothers had made him painfully aware that being the firstborn
child of a Technician family did not necessarily confer intelligence along with
inheritance; but he would not make the mistake of underestimating either of the
Pernattes.

He gathered himself to make the expected bow as the couple
stopped before him and Vhanu began to formally present them. Vhanu was a
relative of the Jarsakhs, not close, but not too distant to use the familiar
form of address or to speak with them easily and comfortably.

Gundhalinu caught himself just in time, as the Pernattes
bowed first to him, extending him the greater honor. He returned the bow, and
touched each proffered palm.

“A great honor, Gundhalinu-eshkrad,” Pernatte murmured.

“The honor is mine, Pernatte-sadhu,” Gundhalinu answered,
more sincerely than he had said anything in public in a long time. He was
secretly pleased that of all the assorted titles he now bore, Pernatte had
chosen the one which marked him as a scientist. He sometimes found himself
groping among the complexities of honorary titles in Sandhi for the correct
forms of address for his peers, after having spoken nothing but foreign
languages for so long; just as he had almost forgotten the use of the personal
thou, after so long among strangers. But then, he had not used thou with anyone
since he had returned, either. Most of his old school friends were scattered among
the stars; the few he might hope to see tonight he probably would not even recognize.

“You look splendid in your rightful uniform, Commander,”
Jarsakh said, looking him up and down, her eyes assessing his assortment of
honors, medals, and crests with an almost predatory interest. “It’s much more
gratifying to see you in the flesh ....” She raised her eyebrows, and smiled.

“Thank you, Jarsakh-bhai.” He nodded in self-conscious acknowledgment,
keeping a straight face and using her family name, as he had become accustomed
to doing when he dealt with her as an industrialist. It was an unexpected side
effect of his position that when he wore his full military uniform and honors—or
sometimes just spoke his name—women he had never met or who had barely
acknowledged his existence suddenly began undressing him with their eyes. He
found it more embarrassing than flattering. “It’s an honor and a relief to hold
a conversation in such magnificent surroundings.”

The Pernattes exchanged a look of mutual satisfaction that
might even have been fond. They both wore the uniforms that were their right
and duty as the heads of two important lineages; but no expense had been spared
on subtlety of design, use of color and embellishment, to transform the spare
lines of a robe and slacks into something unique and beautiful.

Gundhalinu found his own eyes glancing from one youthful,
perfect face and fit, flawlessly dressed body to the other in helpless
fascination as he went on making small talk. He deftly answered the kinds of
questions about his career and discoveries that everyone seemed to ask, feeling
vaguely surprised that even the Pernattes would ask the same things.

While he was growing up his family had been well-off financially,
the bearers of a family line whose ancestry was unimpeachable and whose
contributions to technological progress stretched back through Kharemough’s
history for countless generations. But the Pernattes were rich; so rich that
they had been able to afford the water of life. Their bodies wore the
unmistakable proof of it as unselfconsciously as they wore their clothes—Pernatte
was at least as old as Gundhalinu’s father, who had married late and been an
old man when Gundhalinu was born; but he looked scarcely older than Gundhalinu
himself. Pernatte’s wife looked younger; her skin, a glowing mahogany color
dusted with pale freckles, was almost completely unlined.

“... and my wife says that you are progressing very well
with the new technology,” Pernatte said.

“Yes.” Gundhalinu glanced at Jarsakh; she smiled a professional
smile at him this time, meaningless and full of steel. They had collided often
enough over his impatience with errors and delays in production. “There have
been some setbacks in getting our new equipment up to specs, but there is no
question that we will have our feet, and the base for equipping all the
Hegemony’s ships with stardrive units within the decade.”

“The sooner the better, eh?” Pernatte said. “We must
maintain our rightful place as leaders of the Hegemony—and we will, thanks to
all you’ve done. As well as establishing permanent ties with our ‘lost colony,’
Tiamat. We’re not getting any younger, you know.” He laughed, with the casual thoughtlessness
of someone who assumed the listener would both get and sympathize with his
jest.

“You served on Tiamat in the Hegemonic Police, didn’t you?”
Jarsakh asked.

Gundhalinu nodded, with a meaningless smile of his own. “Until
the final departure.”

“That must have been a sight. Did you see the sacrifice of
the Snow Queen?”

“No.” He glanced down. “I was in the hospital with an
illness, at the time.”

“Dreadful, backward place—you’re lucky you didn’t die.” She
shook her head. “That would have been a terrible tragedy for all of us.”

Gundhalinu made no comment.

“Young Vhanu here tells me you’ve expressed an interest in
entering politics, once the starship technology is fully established,” Pernatte
said.

“Yes, in fact I have been considering that.” Gundhalinu
glanced at Vhanu, letting his pleasant surprise show, and Vhanu smiled, looking
down. “My family has never been active in politics, however. I’m afraid I have
a lot of process to learn ....”

Pematte’s smile widened, as Gundhalinu had been hoping it
would. “It would give me great pleasure to serve as your mentor. As you know, I
have more than passing knowledge of the occupation.”

Thank you, gods! Gundhalinu bowed once more, to hide the
unseemly rush of elation rising inside him. “I would be most grateful,
Pernattesadhu.”

“Then you must allow CMP and myself to guide you to some of
our more influential acquaintances tonight. It would be a shame to waste such
an occasion on gossip and hero worship. Have you given thought to what sort of
service you would be interested in? Something in the world government, perhaps,
or the Hegemonic Coordinating Council. Even an Assembly seat would not be out
of the question for a man of your reputation and family, if there was an opening
....”He touched Gundhalinu’s arm, guiding him with the motion.

Gundhalinu gave a faintly incredulous laugh and shook his
head. “My aspirations are more down to earth. Actually I had thought of
something in the judicial branch or the foreign service ... in fact, perhaps
the Chief Justiceship of Tiamat, when it’s reopened to contact.”

Jarsakh’s luminously calculating eyes widened with a
surprise that looked genuine. “Father of all my grandfathers! You actually want
to return to that backward, unfortunate world? But you said you almost died
there—”

He remembered saying nothing of the kind, although actually
it was true enough. “Perhaps that’s why I want to go back, bhai .... To oversee
its development into a modern society, one which can be a full, contributing
partner in the Hegemony, seems to me to be a worthy career, and one that ought
to take a lifetime—” He smiled carefully, not sure himself what the words
meant.

“Modernize those barbarians?” Pernatte shook his head. “A
selfless goal, but I daresay it’s a hopeless task, trying to uplift a people
who practice cannibalism—”

“Human sacrifice, best beloved,” Jarsakh interrupted gently,
“not cannibalism.”

“Whatever,” he murmured, annoyed. “Better simply to find
more permanent ways to control them, I should think. After all, the damn world
is all but uninhabitable anyway, by anything but savages. All they have that’s
worth the trade is the water of life.”

“But of course that’s worth the ransom of worlds,” Jarsakh
said dryly.

Gundhalinu bit his tongue. Vhanu was still at his side,
gazing at the Pernattes as if he were hearing the voices of his ancestors—which
he was, in a way, Gundhalinu supposed. “All the more reason to have someone in
charge who can monitor the safety of the supply,” he said, choosing his words
with the painstaking care of someone picking up shards of glass. To see the
path of Light dearly, they said on Four, you must walk in the shadows. “I’m
very interested in undertaking a thorough study of the water of life. I have a
theory that it may function by the same technoviral mechanism as the stardrive
plasma. And now that we are learning how to deal with that—”

“You mean you might find a way to reproduce it?” Jarsakh
said, meeting his gaze almost hungrily. “An unlimited supply—?”

He glanced down. “That would be my hope .... It’s certainly
within the realm of possibility.” He had no idea whether it was possible or
not. But if it would save Tiamat, he would try ... he would lie, he would—

“Forgive me—” a voice interrupted, in a tone that was deferential
but not to be denied. “I couldn’t help overhearing your discussion of Tiamat,
Commander Gundhalinu.”

Gundhalinu turned, found himself looking down into the face
of a frail-looking old man in a sedate ceremonial uniform. “KR Aspundh,” the
man said, offering his hand.

Gundhalinu met Aspundh’s dry palm briefly with his own; felt
a shock of recognition that was almost subliminal. He had known the Aspundhs
slightly, years ago—he would not have recognized KR without an introduction,
after so long. But there was something else: an odd bright bit of random
memory, in which a native girl named Moon told a Kharemoughi Police inspector
named Gundhalinu tales of her visit to his homeworld, “... and we visited KR
Aspundh, and we drank lith, and ate sugared fruits ....” The vision almost kept
him from noticing the brief, hidden fingersign that told him suddenly why
Aspundh had had the temerity to interrupt this conversation. Aspundh was
Survey. Gundhalinu’s eyes registered the sibyl trefoil the other man wore, the
only visible symbol of status besides an unobtrusive family crest. “Yes,”
Gundhalinu answered. “I served there for several years.”

“He wants to go back there, if you can imagine, KR,” Jarsakh
said, apparently not offended by the interruption. KR Aspundh was a
first-generation Technician; his lineage was irrevocably Nontech ... but his
father had been posthumously raised up, due to the creative innovations in
long-distance EM sensing apparatus that had come out of his independent work
with production methods. He had not gotten the credit he had deserved in his
lifetime, but his children had benefited from it.

KR Aspundh was respected by Techs of old lineage because of
the sibyl sign he wore, but also because it had been their decision that he was
deserving of respect—unlike nouveau riche upstarts who bought their way into respectability
by purchasing the estates and ancestors of deserving highborns who had fallen
on hard times. KR Aspundh, as far as Gundhalinu knew, was a staunch supporter
of the status quo that had put him where he was. And yet, his interest in
Tiamat could hardly be casual curiosity .... “Have you ever known anyone who
would willingly give up Kharemough for a lifetime on Tiamat—?” Jarsakh asked,
bemused.

“Only one person,” Aspundh said mildly, glancing at Gundhalinu.
“And that was years ago.”

“And did she?” Gundhalinu asked, trapped again inside a moment
of double vision.

Aspundh looked back at him in sudden surprise. His gaze
turned measuring, and his face became expressionless. “I believe she did. But
then, she was not, of course, a Kharemoughi.” He smiled slightly. “I have never
been to Tiamat myself, but I’ve felt a fascination with the place ever since,
wondering what could have obsessed her so about it.”

“It does get under your skin, somehow,” Gundhalinu said, feeling
a faint smile turn up the corners of his own mouth. “I had always wanted to see
the place, when I was young.”

“Where are you staying while you are planetside, Commander?
At your family estates?”

“He’s staying with us,” Pernatte said. “Right, BZ? I may
call you BZ—?”

“Please.” Gundhalinu nodded and his smile widened, barely
covering his surprise. He wondered whether Vhanu had forgotten to tell him
about his accommodations, or whether he had merely forgotten that he had heard
about them. He glanced at Vhanu, whose own expression looked slightly
disoriented.

“Call me AT, then,” Pernatte said, and his wife echoed him, “CMP—”
When the Pernattes took an interest in someone’s life, their interest was, it
seemed, peremptory. He took a deep breath, remembering that it was not BZ Gundhalinu,
a complete stranger with a past they would find reprehensible and future plans they
would consider treasonable, whom they were taking into their lives like an orphaned
child; it was a construct, an image, a Hero of the Hegemony—a glittering, fame-encrusted
shell, bright enough to blind even them. Ride it, just ride it.

“... is not so far away, then,” Aspundh was saying. “I
realize your schedule must be extremely tight, Gundhalinu-ken,” using the title
that marked him as a sibyl, “but perhaps you might find space in it for a quiet
meal at my home? I would very much like to talk more with you about our mutual
interest.”

“Thank you, Aspundh-ken.” Gundhalinu nodded, reading what
lay in the older man’s eyes. “I would enjoy that.” He glanced at Vhanu. “Make
rearrangements, will you, Vhanu?” He smiled apologetically. There seemed to be
no natural breathing spaces in his life at all, anymore.