“Ah,” Abacha said as he looked at the design. “Nice boat. That was one of Exalted Flower’s corporate yachts, built to shuttle their executives around their mineral concessions in the system. Nicely appointed. Said to have an excellent kitchen. A pity you won’t have one of their chefs aboard.”
The boat, which had retained its original corporate name ofDaffodil, had docked with the ring station two days earlier and discharged what no doubt had been a highly relieved crew of four. After routine maintenance that would complete in four days,Daffodil would be available for further use, which would include taking Martinez to Michi Chen’s flagship.
“I’ll take this one, then,” Martinez said. “Thanks very much for giving me the choice.”
“Think nothing of it,” said Abacha. “I’m happy to help out a friend from the old days.” An expression of distaste crossed his face, and he leaned closer to Martinez. “All sorts of new people here now,” he said. “Rude, useless, ignorant…always bustling about and ruining one’s day. Do you know, since the war’s started, some days I’m here eighteen hours straight!”
Martinez widened his eyes. “I’m shocked.”
Abacha’s eyes grew fierce. “And now that we’re evacuating, it’s going to get worse. I’m only allowed three trunks and one servant! Regulations clearly state I’m entitled to five trunks and two servants!” He gave the table an angry thump. “I’ve finally got my two boys trained to starch my collars exactly as I want them, and to serve me a Hairy Roger at just the right temperature, and now I have to let one go. Who knows what the Fleet will do with him? Turn a fine valet into a machinist or something.”
“I’ll take your extra,” Martinez said. His rank entitled him to four servants, but he’d never had more than Alikhan. Since his escape withCorona, his life had been speeding so fast that he’d never had time to search the ranks for servants, and if he were to serve on a flagship he should probably acquire someone more polished than his ex-weaponer.
Abacha looked disapproving. “I promised my boys they’d never have to do ship duty.”
“If they’re evacuating,” Martinez pointed out, “they’ll have to spend time on ships anyway. Unless they’d rather stay on Zanshaa and wait for the Naxids.”
Abacha sipped his drink and made a face, as if he’d just tasted lemon juice. “I’ll ask them. But whatever happens, they’re going to be vexed.”
“Tell them they’ll be on a flagship. That’s something.”
Abacha only shrugged, but then he cheered. “By the way, Gare, we’re having some rare parties these days. Since we can’t take it with us, everyone’s drinking up their finest stock. You’d be welcome to join us in our revels, if you like.”
“My calendar seems to be quite full these days,” Martinez said.
“Oh yes!” Abacha beamed in approval. “Newly married and all. You’ve got quite a catch in the Chen girl.”
“Thank you,” said Martinez.
“You know,” Abacha laughed, “I thought that Lady Sula would be your next conquest.”
Martinez felt a counterfeit smile cleave to his face. “You did?” he asked.
“I was duty officer in Operations, remember…I saw the logs that showed all those messages you were sending each other during the Blitsharts business. I felt certain you were…” Abacha searched for a word. “… building an intimacy.” He shook his head. “I guess nothing came of it. Pity. She’s a lovely girl—very suited to you, I thought.”
“As you say,” speaking past the tension in his jaw, “nothing came of it.”
“Still,” Abacha said, “it ended happily, yes?” He gave an appreciative smack of his lips. “Lady Terza Chen! How perfect for you! You’re a lucky man, you know it?”
“Yes,” Martinez said. “I’ve been told.” He reached for his drink, and a cool frumenty fire poured down his throat.
Ari Abacha was still in a contemplative mood. “You and Caroline Sula,” he mused. “Who’d have thought that you’d become so famous? You have to wonder how such a thing could happen.”
“War,” Martinez said into his glass. “All it took was war.”
A cold wind was blustering around the High City, carrying with it the smell of rain, so Martinez took a cab from the Commandery to the Shelley Palace, where he would join Roland and Walpurga for dinner. He was spending the day without Terza, who was joining her parents on the ride to the skyhook, and wouldn’t be back till late.
This was the day fixed for the Convocation’s evacuation. Though no announcement had been made and there were no reports in the media, all the High City seemed a part of the secret. The Boulevard of the Praxis was filled with trucks taking household goods into storage, and several of the larger palaces were being shuttered. Another element that made up so much of the capital’s distinctive style was abandoning Zanshaa, and no one knew what would come, with the Naxids, to take its place.
Shutters weren’t going up on the Shelley Palace yet, but it was only a matter of days before they would. Personal possessions were being packed, to be shipped up the skyhook and received aboard theEnsenada, the Martinez family yacht, to be carried to Laredo along with the family. They would leave as soon as Martinez brought his honeymoon to an end by leaving for his appointment with Michi Chen’s squadron. Martinez supposed it was nice of them to wait, but he thought it was asking a lot of Terza to endure three months’ daily exposure to Roland, Walpurga, and PJ.
Daffodilwould be ready in four days, which meant Martinez’s marriage would be seven days old before he and Terza were parted, certainly for many months, possibly a year or more. Conceivably forever, if things went wrong.
The first days of marriage had been tranquil: the serenity that seemed to surround Terza had embraced Martinez in its calm, scented arms. He and Terza spent most of their time in the hotel suite, having their meals brought in, and aside from chance encounters on their short walks they saw no one.
They opened their wedding presents. Martinez managed to conceal his shock when the Guraware vases were unwrapped.She hates me, he thought, in sudden desolation.
He sent the vases straight into storage, where he hoped they would remain forever.
They sent thanks to wedding guests. Fresh-cut flowers had been sent to the room every day, and Terza arranged them into gorgeous displays that radiated color and scent in every corner of the apartment. Thankfully she never remembered Sula’s gift, and Martinez never had to look at Terza’s flowers arranged in Sula’s porcelain.
Terza and Martinez discovered a mutual liking for the plays of Koskinen: Terza enjoyed the sophisticated portrayals, and Martinez the cynical epigrams. They called upThe Sweethearts Divided onto the parlor’s video wall and watched it with great pleasure.
Martinez missed the intensity he’d shared with Sula, the way their minds had seemed to leap suddenly into the same channel, the intense, often unspoken mental collaboration they’d shared when they devised the plan for the evacuation, or even—the minds leaping across star systems—when they’d created a new system of tactics.
Terza was all tranquillity and excellence—self-possessed, considerate, alert to his wishes, efficiently arranging their time together. But there was an unearthly quality to this tranquillity, and sometimes Martinez suspected he was watching a performance, a brilliant performance of the highest order, and he wondered what it concealed.
Martinez found something of an answer when he watched Terza play her harp. As her fingers drew music from the strings the habitual calm and serenity were replaced by an intensity that bordered on ferocity—Here is fire.Martinez was intrigued.Here is passion. He saw her breathe with the music; he saw the determined glitter in her eye, the throb of the pulse in her throat. Her engagement with the music was total, and the sight of it a revelation.
Martinez tried to carry the music with them to bed, to kindle the same passion there, in the bower she filled with rainbows of flowers. He flattered himself that he was successful. In the music of limbs and hearts Terza soon found her rhythm. Her trained musician’s fingers, sensitive already to nuance, learned to caress him and draw forth any timbre she desired, piano to fortissimo. She was not shy. In between moments of love there was a sweetness to her that he found touching.
But somehow his time with Terza failed to equal other, recent experience. With Sula the play of love had
