"The Sundering" - читать интересную книгу автора (Williams Walter Jon)

SIX

Sula walked to Martinez amid the throng in the Shelley Palace and watched his eyes go wide as she offered him her congratulations.

“I’ve never seen you out of uniform,” he said as he took her hand.

Clattering in her blood was the anxiety that drew her smile taut. “I thought I’d give you a surprise.”

“I hope it won’t be the last surprise you’ll give me tonight.” He put her arm in his and drew her toward the refreshments.

Sula had worn a uniform all those years because she hadn’t been able to afford to do otherwise. To compete with the women of the Peer class, each raised from the cradle in obedience to laws of beauty, of fashion, and of courtesy, with wardrobes that changed every season to conform with rules that were understood but were never written down…her allowance would never have permitted it, and in any case the idea was too daunting. The danger of making a mistake was always present, and fortunately a uniform was always correct attire for Fleet personnel.

Once she’d been at the center of a kind of whirlwind of modish style. She’d had a lover—a linkboy, the sort of person described in melodramas as a “crime lord,” though of a minor kind—and he’d enjoyed dressing her in the most outrageous and expensive stuff he could find. He’d bought a new outfit every few days, and her closets overflowed with clothing. She’d given a lot of it away to her friends just to make room for the new. And then another person had come into her life—a person she didn’t want to think about—who also enjoyed dressing her. She’d abandoned almost all of the clothing when she became Lady Sula and left Spannan for the service academy, and since then confined herself to Fleet-approved uniforms.

The binges in the boutiques of Spannan would in any case have been of little use on Zanshaa. The clothing here was richer, more expensive, and worn in accordance with a different notion of style.

For the evening she had purchased a black dress of the kind described as “timeless.” She dearly hoped that was the case, since by the time she’d added shoes and a matching jacket she was scandalized to discover she’d spent a little over one-twentieth of her entire fortune. At this rate her simple black dress was going to have to last a good many years.

Certainly it didn’t compete with the peacock colors she saw about her, the ruffles and flounces and brocade. Fashion was going through an ornate phase, perhaps in defiance of the grim standards of war. Even the Torminel, who were heavily furred and wore little clothing in order not to fall to heatstroke, sported vests and shorts heavily encrusted with beadwork and gems.

She should have looked out of place, but she’d received several compliments on her appearance from people since she’d arrived, some of them from people who had no motive for pleasing her.

And the look on Martinez’s face when he’d first seen her had been priceless.

“Are those beads porcelain?” Martinez asked, his gaze straying to her neck.

She tilted her head to let him see them. “Blown glass.” Layered with brilliant color, each bead an individual, swirling masterpiece of art, and inexpensive compared to the rest of her turnout.

“Very nice.” His nostrils flared, just a little. “And is Sandama Twilight another part of tonight’s ensemble?”

“It is.”

He smiled happily. “I’m so pleased you could attend my party, Lady Sula.”

She gave a formal nod in acknowledgment and felt the tension flutter in her chest like a caged bird. “I’m pleased to be here,” she said.

For the party, pocket doors had been rolled into the walls, turning two parlors, a drawing room, and a formal dining room into one long reception room. Martinez took her the length of the room to the buffet and offered to fill a plate for her. Sula was too nervous to have an appetite, but she managed to swallow a pair of the little bow tie—shaped pastries.

Do not destroy this night, she told herself. Remember that this one actually likes you. Remember that he’s giving you a second chance after you wrecked the last one.

Martinez brought her sparkling mineral water.

“I laid in a stock of this just for you,” he said as he poured from the violet-colored bottle.

“You think of everything.”

“Yes.” A tight little self-congratulatory smile. “I do.”

Martinez wore the viridian dress uniform of the Fleet. At his throat was the badge of the Golden Orb, a circular sun disk on a gold-and-black ribbon, which he wore instead of carrying the heavy baton. His two decorations sparkled on his chest, the Medal of Merit First Class, for his part in rescuing Captain Blitsharts, and the Nebula Medal with Diamonds, for the Battle of Hone-bar.

She had watched Lord Chen pin the latter on his tunic that morning. Lord Tork, the chairman of the Control Board who had presented to Sula her own medal, had not been present, and neither had any of the other board members. She presumed they were occupied with urgent meetings concerning their fellow board member Lady San-torath, who had been arrested the previous night on charges that she had conspired to suppress information concerning enemy movements at Hone-bar. She had been subjected to a midnight trial before a judge of the High Court, and sentenced to die at the exact moment at which Martinez was being decorated.

Die screaming.Sula remembered the satisfaction in Lord Ivan Snow’s voice when they met two days before. He had already known what San-torath’s fate would be—to have her fragile, hollow arms and legs broken with steel bars, after which her limbs were amputated with a special hydraulically operated cutting tool and the still-living torso thrown off the acropolis from a site near the great granite dome of the Great Refuge. The new laws specified being flung from a height as the punishment for treason, in imitation of the Naxid convocates who had been thrown off the terrace of the Convocation after proclaiming the rebellion. Executions were no longer performed on the terrace, presumably because it might put the Lords Convocate off their feed, and the Shaa who had once inhabited the Great Refuge were dead, and could hardly object.

The news of the conspiracy, released that morning, also gloated over the fate of the conspirators captured at Hone-bar, who were thrown from a greater height—they were to be stuffed into vacuum suits and hurled with some force from Hone-bar’s accelerator ring. Their air supplies had been carefully calculated: they were to burn alive in the atmosphere before they could suffocate. It would take a little over three days for the video images to reach Zanshaa, after which they would be broadcast repeatedly on the news programs and on the channel reserved for punishments.

All very imaginative, Sula thought. If only the imagination applied to torture and executions had been applied to the running of the war.

Sula stood with Martinez’s family on the gallery overlooking the Hall of Ceremony, and applauded as Lord Chen took Martinez’s hand and murmured some carefully chosen words while a pair of aides strapped on Martinez’s new captain’s shoulder boards. After which Dalkeith, Martinez’s premiere, received the Medal of Merit Second Class, and her step to lieutenant-captain. Other officers likewise received recognition or promotion.

Quite a number ofCorona ‘s crew turned up for the ceremony. There was a little blond lieutenant, very young, a half-dozen cadets, and a number of senior petty officers with truly magnificent mustachios. Sula noticed that Lieutenant Captain Kamarullah, who had wrested command of the squadron from Martinez, was not present and was not receiving awards. Also absent, more oddly, was Lady Sempronia Martinez.

While Fleet officers were receiving their promotions and while conspirators died in pain and terror, on his flagship in orbit around Zanshaa’s primary the official victor of Hone-bar, Do-faq, was decorated and jumped two grades to senior squadron commander. Various of his officers were likewise honored. The whole circus, trials and deaths and glittering medals, had been carefully staged to maximize the value of the news to the government. With the video of Do-faq’s promotion coming in from five light-hours away, and the video of the executions on Hone-bar coming in three days, the honors of the righteous and the degradation of the corrupt would occupy public attention for some time to come.

Sula reached a hand to Martinez’s chest and adjusted the sparkling new decoration. “It looks good on you,” she said.

“It does, doesn’t it?” Martinez said, pleased. He took her hand, and his expression changed. “Your hand is cold,” he said.

“Yes. I’m—” She took a breath. “Very nervous.”

Concern entered his face, and again he put her arm in his and walked away with her, toward the hall. “Let me take you to a place where we can be private,” he said, and then he looked at her. “Unless that would make you more nervous rather than less.”

“I think…I’ll be fine, whatever you decide.”

She had decided to surrender to the man with more experience. Martinez adopted an air of firm authority that kept others from approaching him while he marched off with Sula. Suddenly she could imagine what Martinez had been like in command ofCorona — incisive, intense, and very stern. He led her out of the reception room, then down a hall, through a parlor, and through another hall to a small room, quietly furnished.

“Roland’s office,” Martinez said. With the back of his knuckles he brushed the walnut desk’s gold inlay and silent inset, the access to the palace’s various cyber systems, then he sat on the edge of the desk, took her mineral water from her hand and placed it on the table. Drew her to him. She could feel the warmth of his body on her bare shoulders and face.

“Will it help the nervousness if I just kiss you now?” he asked.

An anxious titter escaped her lips. “It wouldn’t hurt,” she said.

He drew her closer and touched her lips with his lips. They were pliant and not too insistent, both qualities that she appreciated. Her jangled nerves began to ease.

Martinez drew back. “I’m beginning to see what’s so special about twilight on Sandama,” he said.

She barked another nervous laugh. The brown eyes beneath his heavy brows were half veiled, frankly appraising, but somehow appraising without the insolence she saw in the eyes of other men. A nice trick, she thought.

“You are the most beautiful thing here tonight,” he said, breath warming her cheek. “And I’m the luckiest man in the empire—which you once pointed out to me, I remember.”

Sula felt herself flushing. She looked at her feet. “I never know what to say at these moments,” she said.

“You could try working up some praise ofmy looks,” Martinez said, “but if the insincerity would be too challenging, you could just say ‘thank you’ and blush as prettily as you’re doing now.”

“Thank you,” she said in a small voice.

He folded her in his arms and kissed her again. Her skin seemed to blaze with heat. On sudden impulse she cradled his head in her hands and drove her kiss against his, and felt his surprise and pleased response. Fire scorched her veins. He gasped free of the kiss and buried his head at the juncture of her neck and shoulder, and Sula felt a shudder run up her spine at the touch of his lips in the hollow of her shoulder, just above the subclavian artery with its pulsing blood. She ran her hands through his wavy brown hair.

He gasped again, then drew back and looked at her. “There’s a private door in this room,” he said. His voice was urgent and feverish. “Let’s leave the party and go somewhere. We don’t have to go to that famous bed of yours, not if you’re not at ease, but for all’s sake, let’s get away and be together. Anywhere you like.”

She looked at him in dawning surprise. “I can’t take you away from your party. You’re the guest of honor.”

“If it’s my party, I can leave anytime I want.” He began to kiss her throat again, and she gave another shudder and held him there against him for a long moment. Then she placed her palm against his chest and firmly pushed him away.

“No,” she said. “You’re not going to be rude to your guests.”

“They’re notmy guests!” Martinez protested. “They’reRoland’s guests! And Walpurga’s guests, and Vipsania’s! I hardly know any of these people.”

“Stick with them a couple hours,” Sula said, “just for politeness. And then,” she took the disk of the Golden Orb between her fingers and drew him close to her, “I want a hundred percent of your attention for the rest of the evening.”

“You’ll have it,” he said. “I’m feeling at my absolute best, I want to assure you.”

“In two hours or so,”when I can’t stand the suspense anymore, “I’ll thank you politely for a good time, and then leave. I’ll expect you at my apartment within the hour.”

His face took on a hopeful look. “Suppose I get thereahead of you…”

“No.” Sternly. “For once follow the operational plan without improvising.”

“But—” His sleeve comm chimed. “Damn it!” he said, and answered as Sula released his medal and stepped back out of range of the camera button.

Roland’s voice came out of the display. “Where are you? I’ve got an important announcement to make.”

Martinez sighed. “I’ll be right there.”

Sula wanted to laugh at his chagrin. As soon as he switched off the comm she stepped to him and kissed him fiercely. When his arms came up to embrace her, she stepped back and began the adjustments to her appearance that would allow her to appear once more in public without embarrassment. Martinez cleaned her cosmetic from his face with a handkerchief.

“I’m glad I was able to help with that nervousness problem,” he said. “I see you’ve got it under control again.”

For the moment.“Thank you. That was very well…handled.”

He gave her a look. She picked up her drink and Martinez took her arm and led her back to the party. No sooner had they stepped into the reception room than the crowd opened up and revealed the one person who could send Sula’s renewed confidence draining out of her like stuffing from a torn rag doll.

Sula didn’t know the woman’s name, but she recognized the glossy chestnut hair and the spectacular hourglass figure. The newcomer had solved the problem of what to wear to a gathering of high-caste Peers by wearing practically nothing, just a shining, shimmery, form-fitting sheath that restrained her in certain dimensions while allowing her to blossom in others. She was taller than Sula, and her shoulders were tawny while her smile was brilliant and white.

Sula had seen her once before, with Martinez at the Penumbra Theater, shortly after Sula and Martinez had their explosive parting. Sula remembered the wrenching jealousy she’d felt at that moment, and the envy she’d felt at the other woman’s abundant charms. Martinez was reputed very successful with women, and she couldn’t imagine him not being successful with this one.

The duty cadets at the Commandery, with whom Sula had once served, had been dismissive of Martinez’s luck with women, claiming that he preyed exclusively on women from the lower orders. Whatever order this dark-haired goddess was from, it didn’t seem lower exactly, more like another plane altogether.

Martinez was smilingly correct. “Warrant Officer Amanda Taen, may I present Lieutenant, the Lady Sula.”

“Oh,” said Warrant Officer Taen, eyes widening, “you’refamous. I’ve seen you on video. I think you’re wonderful!” Sula felt her skin prickle, as if in answer to the pheromones that seemed to pour off Amanda Taen in waves, like warm surf rolling off some lush tropical shore.

“And where are you stationed?” Sula managed.

“Zanshaa ring,” said Amanda Taen. “I command a cutter that does satellite repair and maintenance.”

“Command?” Martinez said. “You got your promotion?”

“I’m Warrant Officer/First now.” Smiling brilliantly.

“Congratulations.” The word forced itself from Sula’s tightening diaphragm.

“But I should be congratulatingyou, ” Amanda Taen cried. “Theboth of you. AllI did was pass an exam, butyou — you’re brilliant! You’ve done great things!”

A gong sounded, and Sula gave silent thanks that she wouldn’t have to continue to manage conversation with this living, breathing incarnation of gonadal male fantasy. Everyone turned to where Roland stood with a mallet in his hand. He rang the broad antique gong again, enjoying the effect, and then hung the mallet from its thong and turned smiling to the crowd.

“I realize that we’ve all assembled here in honor of my brother, Gareth”—with a glance at Martinez—“and of his brilliant exploits against the Naxid rebels. But I’d like to briefly take the spotlight from my brother in order to make another announcement of importance to the family.”

He gestured toward Vipsania, who stood in her beaded gown next to a smiling man in the dark red coat of a convocate. “I’d like to announce the forthcoming marriage of my sister Lady Vipsania to Lord Convocate Oda Yoshitoshi.”

Yoshitoshi was a broad-shouldered, glossy-haired man with temples going spectacularly, theatrically white. He smiled and took Vipsania’s hand as the audience broke into applause.

Sula sensed Martinez‘ surprise. “You didn’t know this was coming?” she murmured.

“Not a clue,” Martinez said. “I don’t even know who he is, precisely.”

Sula didn’t, either. There was a Senior Captain Lord Simon Yoshitoshi who had died at Magaria commandingThe Revelation of the Praxis, one of the bigPraxis — class battleships, but that was as far as her knowledge of Clan Yoshitoshi extended.

Martinez might have been baffled by the nature and even the existence of his proposed brother-in-law, but when the applause died he nevertheless raised his glass and was the first to offer a toast to the couple. Sula sipped her mineral water. More toasts followed, and then a rush to congratulate the pair.

When the mob around Vipsania and Yoshitoshi finally cleared, Sula found herself across the room from Martinez, and seemingly attached to Martinez was the abundant figure of Amanda Taen. The two were talking to one another and displaying every nuance of intimacy.

Profoundly cast down, Sula found herself in a corner of the room talking to PJ Ngeni, who was leaning against a bronze statue of an armored warrior maiden, and who seemed depressed himself. “Where’s Sempronia?” she asked. “I haven’t seen her tonight.”

PJ contemplated the floating ice in his highball glass. “She’s been ill for the last two nights, and has confined herself to her room. I haven’t even been allowed to pay her a get-well visit.”

“It must be serious, then.”

He gave her a doleful look. “Quite.” He returned his attention to his drink. His face was a mournful image of what Sula felt in her own despondent heart. “I must say that engagement to Sempronia hasn’t worked out quite the way I intended. I thought, well, a lively girl like that, she’d be fun to take around the city, we’d have weekends in the country, we’d be seen in all the clubs. And instead I see her only rarely, and when Ido see her there are suchcrowds, it’s hard to get her alone.”

Sula cast a glance at Martinez, still with Amanda Taen wrapped around his arm. “I know what you mean,” she said.

I was the one who insisted on returning to the party. This is what I get for not seizing the moment.

PJ surveyed her gloomily. “You’re looking very well, if you don’t mind my saying.”

“Thank you.” She glanced toward the buffet and the open bar. “I’m considering drinking myself unconscious.”

“That would be splendid,” PJ said. “I think you should. You have theright. ”

Sula realized that PJ was himself colossally drunk, and if the bronze maiden weren’t holding him up he would probably be sprawled across the marble tiles.

“You’ve earned the right to do anything you want, my girl,” PJ said. “Anything at all. Not like me—I haven’t earnedanything. I haven’t killed any Naxids, I haven’t managed to become a spy, I haven’t even had a jumble sale.”

Sula suspected that she would have to be drunk herself to follow this train of thought. “It’s not too late,” she said hopefully.

“I trust not,” PJ said fervently. “I trust not. I desire nothing so much as to be worthy.”

He followed this with a rambling monologue on the subject of wanting to participate in the war, and of his general unworthiness until this occurred. He praised Sula extravagantly. He praised Sempronia. He praised Martinez. He spoke of his own misery.

“All I do is give lunches!” he cried. “And what I really want is to be an informer!”

Sula was unable to follow the lurches of PJ’s misery, so she confined herself to making the occasional remark and sharing the all-round despairing atmosphere. Somehow Sula got through the next two hours, trying not to watch Martinez as he got Amanda Taen a drink, as he introduced her to other guests, as he laughed at something she said in his ear. Eventually she gathered the shreds of her dignity and gave her thanks and goodnights to Roland and his sisters. Then, heart in her mouth, she approached Martinez to tell him she was leaving.

“Wonderful meeting you!” said Amanda Taen, her eyes bright. “I hope I see you again!”

He won’t come, Sula thought as she turned the corner that led to her apartment. Why would he? She was irascible and difficult and uncertain—she wasn’t even the person she pretended to be—and Warrant Officer Taen was…was sothere. Soavailable.

Nevertheless when she reached her apartment she lit the scented candles she had ready and adjusted her hair and her cosmetic, actions performed with a growing sense of unreality, as if these rituals were unconnected with her or with anything else.

How pathetic am I? she wondered as she walked through the silent, scented room with the light of the candles fluttering on the walls like nervous butterflies.

He won’t come, she thought. Her nerves were so taut they seemed to sing.

And then there was a chime on the comm from the Daimong doorman, informing her that a Captain Martinez had arrived to see her.

A moment later he stood in her doorway. His tunic collar was unbuttoned and the ribbon of the Golden Orb hung from his breast pocket where the decoration had been casually stuffed.

Sula wondered if she could possibly manage words. “That wasn’t very long,” she said, by way of experiment.

“I waited three minutes. That was all the time I could stand.” Martinez stepped into the room and revealed what he’d concealed behind his back, a mate to the Guraware vase he’d given her the previous day, filled with a tangle of daffodils.

“You said you wanted another one,” he said. “I had it sent from a shop in Tula. I pinched the flowers from the party.”

Sula stepped forward, put her arms around him, and pressed her cheek into his shoulder. His warm scent surrounded her. The anxiety poured out of her in a long sigh.

“Three minutes was too long,” she said. “I kept picturing you with Miss Taen.”

He stroked her back with his free hand. “Amanda’s a jolly girl, but when I’m with her I see you. When I’m withany woman I see you.” He gave a rueful laugh. “I’m glad my mother isn’t on this planet.”

She choked back laughter. He kissed her nape. His fingers brushed the delicate hairs over her spine, and she shivered.

“May I come in?” he said. “The carpet in the hall is distracting.”

“Wait till you see the bed,” she said, and drew him inside.

In the darkness of the front room he placed the vase on the first horizontal surface he came to. Wanting his taste, she opened more of his tunic buttons and licked his neck. His large warm hands enveloped her scapulae. He bent to her lips, kissing her forcefully, and she remembered the last time she’d been with a man. It had not been rape exactly, but it had been violent. Sula remembered Lamey’s stunning slap against her cheek, the fist sunk into her solar plexus, the frantic business on the bed afterward. The money pressed into her hand.

“What’s wrong?” Martinez asked suddenly. He had felt her tension. His eyes were wide in the flickering darkness.

“Nothing,” she said quickly, and then, “Bad memories.”

“We should go slow,” he said. His hand traced the outline of her shoulder. “I don’t want you to have those memories when you’re with me. I don’t want you to run away.”

She took his hand in hers, raised it to her lips. “You’ve been patient enough. I’m the one who’s been unfair.”

“I—” He began a protest, but she silenced him with fingers on his lips. She took his hand and pulled him into the bedroom. His eyes took in the Sevigny bed, the dark wood pillars carved with capering primitive figures, each dancing with perfectly rounded parted lips and spiky hair; the four arching figures, two with bulbous breasts and two with erect carved phalli, that held up the canopy of woven grass.

“The apartment came furnished,” Sula said.

“Good grief,” he said, “they’regoing to be watching us all night?”

“Keep your eyes shut and you won’t see them,” Sula said.

“Ah,” he said, his eyes returning to her, “but then I won’t seeyou.”

Her veins ran with flame at the intensity of his glance, but she forced a more practical mood. Methodically she disrobed him, revealing the long, powerful torso balanced atop the shortish legs, the features which, with his big hands and long arms, had caused the duty cadets in the Commandery to nickname him “Troglodyte.”

The jealous bastards.

With her tongue she tasted Martinez again. This was not Lamey’s taste. This was not Lamey’s scent. These were not Lamey’s hands caressing her, or Lamey’s lips on hers.

She felt his hands unfastening the collar of her dress, and still in her practical mood she said, “You know, I’m not wearing much under this dress. Just stockings and—”

“You can keep the stockings on,” he said a little forcefully, and she felt a spasm of wicked glee at having, so early, triggered one of his fetishes.

Sheets crackled beneath them as they lay on the bed, Martinez unclad and she in her stockings. She pressed herself to him, kissing moistly, ardently. His hands floated over her flesh.

This is not Lamey’s bed, she thought. These are not his lips. These are not his hands.

It was becoming impossible to ignore the concrete evidence of Martinez’s arousal.

And this is not Lamey’s either, she thought.

“I should warn you.” There was evidence of strain in his voice. “You should know that there will be a point beyond which I can’t stop.”

“Oh.” Sula looked into his eyes, a shimmering diamond brilliance in the candlelight. “I was hoping we’d passed that point ages ago.”

Martinez groaned and threw himself on her. His lips devoured her throat, his tongue licked along the flesh of her shoulder. His hands kindled fire as they touched her. She gave a gasp and thought, against the throb of panic that beat in her chest, this is not Lamey.

And he wasn’t. His hands brought her first pleasure, then joy, then wild acceptance. This was unlike anything she had experienced in her old life. Lamey had been a boy, a wild desperate savage boy, but this was a grown man, certain of his powers, with a sharp, calculating mind and with experience and a willingness and a desire to bring pleasure…

And yet a boy after all, after the percipient mind sank beneath the tide of lust—and Sula felt the joy of command, that she had brought him helpless to this state. But then her own power vanished, poured away like dust streaming into the ocean of desire, and need claimed her and sent her crying aloud into the starry pavilion of night.