Across a Star-Swept Sea

He cut in, and the courtier departed. Persis’s eyebrows drew together. How did he get here before his flutter? Were they too close to the fire? Flutters would melt in high heat conditions. She danced a little way from the flames.

“I don’t like arguing with you, Persis,” said Justen as he spun her around. He still hadn’t learned the moves of the fire dance. His motions were too large, his hands too rough.

She found she didn’t really mind. “And I don’t like you sending love notes to other girls right in front of me.”

He gave her a wry smile. “What makes you think it’s another girl?”

What makes you think it isn’t? She almost asked him aloud. Common wisdom held the Wild Poppy was an Albian aristo, and to the Albians, that meant he must be a man. But the Galateans had been ruled by queens for centuries. Women there had as much power as men. Yet even Justen, whose friend Vania was a revolutionary captain, whose own grandmother had invented the cure, took the story at face value.

His flutter sunk into her palm.

I understand now that you are the reason Noemi won’t tell me where she’s moved the refugees, as I am the reason they have probably been moved. And I don’t blame you, either. I can never forgive myself for what I have done to my countrymen. I will spend the rest of my life trying to reverse the pain and suffering I’ve caused and to atone for the shame I’ve brought to a family name that once symbolized hope to all New Pacifica.

I give you this information so you can take it to Noemi, who will confirm that I’m telling the truth. I do not yet know how to heal those regs who have been damaged by Reduction, but I believe I know how to prevent anyone else from being hurt. The answer lies in the Helo Cure.

A few days ago, I offered the cure to one of the visitors, though he is a natural reg. He feared he might have made his offspring vulnerable due to his primitive gengineering. In the old days, it was thought that the cure had no effect on those who were not Reduced, but now I think it’s something more. The cure won’t heal a Reduced brain, which is why it doesn’t fix the Reduced who take it. But it will prevent the damage of Reduction from ever taking place. In natural Reduction, this damage occurs in utero, in the developing brain of the fetus. The Helo Cure prevents that from happening. It will also, according to my models, prevent it from happening when one is given the Reduction drug.

Persis gasped. Could it be that simple?

“Are you all right?” Justen asked.

She nodded, swallowing. Justen’s message continued.

Take this information and guard your friends and allies, here and in Galatea. It might take a while to produce enough of the Helo Cure to protect the entire nation, but if they all take it, they will be able to defend themselves, aristo and reg alike, from the revolutionaries’ terrible weapon.

With your help, I can begin to atone for the harm I’ve caused my countrymen and keep anyone else from being hurt like this again. Once, Persistence Helo was the hope of all New Pacifica. I’d hoped to follow in her footsteps, but I recognize now that you are the one who will save us.

You are the hope of every true patriot of my homeland.

Persis tightened her hands on Justen’s shoulders and buried her face against his chest.

“You’re not all right,” he said. “Too near the fire?”

“Justen,” she breathed. There was no question he was telling the truth. There was no possible purpose his lie would serve. Noemi could easily verify or dismiss his claims. She fluttered the medic at once, to be sure, but not a doubt remained in Persis’s mind. Everything fit—it fit what she knew of what was happening in Galatea; it fit with Vania’s befriending Andromeda and Tomorrow; it fit with the way Justen had been tied to his grandmother’s oblets and his nanorector models for the last day and a half; and it fit, most of all, with what she knew about Justen—what she’d known all along, if she’d been completely honest with herself.

And maybe it was time to be honest with him, too. She took a deep, shuddering breath. I’m the Wild Poppy. I’m the Wild Poppy. I’m the Wild Poppy. “I’m—”

Another flutter slipped into her palm.

Persis,

Your mother is ill. Bring Justen at once.

Love and duty,

Torin Blake

Her head shot up. “We have to find my parents.”

Thirty

IT TOOK THE BETTER part of an hour to make sure Heloise was stabilized. Sedation would have been easier, but Torin was desperate to avoid it.

“Please,” he’d said to Justen. The three of them were in Isla’s private chambers, where Heloise could rest among the white pillows and swaying palm fronds. “This may be her last party. If there’s any way I can let her have a final glimpse . . .”

These aristos sure had their priorities screwed up.

When he was done, Persis was nowhere to be found.

“She left a while ago,” Torin explained. “Actually, I’m relieved. There are things she doesn’t need to see.”

“She’s seen them,” Justen argued, remembering the night Heloise had almost clawed her daughter’s lovely face off. “You can’t keep them from her. And you can’t let her go on like this, either, pretending it’s not happening. Do you know she hasn’t even been tested?”

“Actually,” said Heloise from the chaise, her voice so hard for once, the woman reminded him of her daughter, “we do know that. And I strongly believe she should be given that right. If she is to die like me, then she doesn’t need to know at sixteen.”

Torin didn’t respond, but his lips were pressed in a tight line. Justen could imagine his fear—that both his wife and daughter would die young, leaving him alone in Scintillans. If the Wild Poppy got Tomorrow back, Justen would make sure that never happened.

“She has too much life right now to dampen it with diagnoses,” Heloise went on. “Look at her, young and beautiful and in love!”

Justen looked away. She wasn’t in love. She was playing a game. A silly, stupid game to keep the peace on her island. She deserved more than that.

Torin took his wife’s hand. “I am glad that she found you right now, Justen. You’ve been such a blessing to our family. Such a help to Heloise and, well, I think you’re good for Persis, too. Before you came along, I was so worried for her. She’s too smart for most of the boys in Albion, you know. They won’t ever love a wife as clever as she, even if they’ll take her for the estate. They won’t love her, and she won’t love them, either. She can’t, with a mind like hers. She needs someone who will understand how brilliant she is, and love her for it.”

Justen bit back his bark of laughter. Brilliant? Persis was occasionally witty with a bit of poetry, but—

“It got to the point that I worried this new phase of hers—the parties and the gossip and the dresses—was her way of trying to prove that she wasn’t the smartest woman of her generation. Like she could be the perfect Albian socialite if she tried hard enough. And, God help me, I indulged her in it. I even let her drop out of school, since at least it meant she’d spend more time home with us. I didn’t want the last—” Here Torin broke down.

Heloise drew his hand to her chest. “It’s all right, my love.”

“Persis is very sweet,” Justen said automatically. But “sweet” seemed somehow insufficient to describe her. She was beautiful and fun loving. She was kind and fiery. She’d been there to help him and to comfort him.

She’d even been the one to give him words to use against Vania.

He found he could not agree with Torin. Many men would fall for a woman like Persis. He might, if he didn’t value more seriousness in his partners. Actually, it was quite touching to see a set of parents so smitten with their