Back | Next
Contents

Chapter Eighteen
Rezerval

There were, of course, innumerable details to take care of. There were so many details that Annemari was seriously tempted to retreat into geek mode and write a program to handle it all.

"No computer program could possibly handle all the ethical and legal issues involved," Evert Cornelis told her when she voiced this threat. They were back in the Rezerval park, seated on Annemari's new favorite bench. Unlike the one in front of Hans Joriink's statue, it did not have such a good view of the central pond. But it had an excellent view of the new memorial statue of Orlando Montoyasana.

"Oh, I'm not so sure," Annemari said. "We humans haven't been doing so well with the issues, you know. A good neural network with intelligent heuristics . . . all right, all right, I'm just kidding!"

"Breed a better bacteriomat to solve problems," Evert suggested, and then, when Annemari looked interested, "No! Lorum van Vechten's brainchild has caused enough havoc already."

Remembering what van Vechten had done with his black-market 'mats, and how he'd cultured them, sobered them both. The full number of victims of the faulty 'mats would probably never be known; most families rich enough to buy illegal neurosurgery were also rich and powerful enough to conceal the disasters that followed. Annemari would never know for sure just how many cases like Tomi Oksanen's were discreetly locked away in closed wards for "nervous problems." But the ones who'd surfaced so far were enough fuel for a lifetime of nightmares. The 'mats were indeed adaptable far beyond the imaginations of anybody who'd worked with them. Given living human brains as a culture medium, they absorbed and replicated not only the basic structure of the brain but the experiences and feelings processed by that particular brain while the 'mats were growing on it. Fear, terror, sensory hallucinations, despair, fever, and insanity were carefully cultured in Udara's limestone caverns, carefully harvested and transported and eventually transplanted, with exquisitely careful neurosurgery, inside the skulls of those desperate enough to pay any price for the promise of a repaired nervous system. And once the 'mat was fully adapted to its new habitat, it set about enthusiastically reproducing its store of raw emotions and insane hallucinations for its new home.

"Pundarik Zahin threw himself over a cliff, when he realized the 'mat transplant was making him insane," Annemari said. "He must have been a brave man." With no knowledge of the medical science underlying his "cure," he had decided that Lorum van Vechten had implanted actual demons in his head. He had clung to life through agonizing days of insanity and uncontrollable muscular twitches, using his ever-briefer periods of clarity to write down what was happening to him and why. Only when the document was copied and safely deposited with two of his most trusted friends did he allow himself the release of death.

That document, together with the eyewitness testimony of those who'd been in the "cave of minds," provided enough information to justify the full Federation involvement that Annemari had asked Calandra to demand. The subsequent inquiry had brought on a wave of suicides, disappearances, and arrests of those not quick enough to take one of the other two ways out. The governing structure of the Barents Trading Society was decimated; four of the High Families that "owned" Rezerval had fallen; careers had been made and broken; and the claim of Barents to the world of Kalapriya had been unconditionally revoked.

"More exhausting than terrible, really," Annemari said now, thinking back over the cataclysmic changes her attempt to get a transplant for Niklaas had brought on.

"But when you found out about Zahin, you must have been terribly worried about Niklaas. After all, you'd left him at the clinic to get one of those same bacteriomat transplants—and I loaned you the money for it! I would never have forgiven myself if they'd done that to him, Annemari."

"Oh, I wasn't the least bit worried," Annemari told him. "You see, I didn't want them operating on Niklaas while I was away."

"Yes, but how could you be sure they wouldn't do just that?"

"I blocked the funds transfer. You see," Annemari explained, "you're quite right, I couldn't trust the Cassilis Clinic to abide by my wish for them to delay surgery. But I felt quite sure I could trust them not to do an operation that hadn't been paid for. After all, they weren't exactly in a position to recover the cost from my Federation health insurance package."

"No tickee, no washee?"

"Something like that." Actually Annemari had been almost suicidally worried about Niklaas once she found out about the effects of the black-market 'mats; what if her funds block hadn't worked for some reason? But if she confessed that to Evert, he'd just go all protective on her again, and that was the last thing she wanted. "So you see," she told him with a smile almost brilliant enough to disguise her secret sadness, "everything worked out all right. Niklaas didn't get a black-market 'mat, and I can give you back your money."

"Leaving you exactly where you were before all this started," Evert pointed out. "Don't you think you deserve better than that, Annemari? For personally bringing down a three-world criminal smuggling, torture, and prohibited-technology ring?"

Annemari shrugged. "I also broke a few rules along the way, and nobody's said anything about that either. I sort of figured the Federation had decided it all worked out all right—I don't get any rewards but I'm also not going to get busted down to datatech for bringing flitters and other pro-tech to Kalapriya."

"They could not logically punish you for that," Evert pronounced, "given that Lorum van Vechten and his colleagues in the Barents Trading Society were engaging in mass smuggling of far more destructive pro-tech devices."

"Dear Evert. And when has any government, anywhere, been logical?"

"This one certainly isn't," Evert said, "but with a little discussion in the right quarters, the right people can occasionally see reason. It has been decided that you are to receive the Hero of the Federation award."

"Oh?"

"It's a little silver star on a cobalt-blue background," Evert told her, "with the Federation logo in holographic rainbow silver over it."

"That sounds very nice," Annemari said, "I'm sure I have some evening outfits it'll go with . . ."

"Annemari, don't you ever ask the obvious question?"

"Always, when I can think of it," Annemari said. "I'm afraid this time the question escapes me."

"Aren't you interested in what goes with the award?"

"A ceremony, presumably."

"Better than that."

"A pension?"

"Better than that." Evert was openly grinning now. "Do you realize there have been only nine Hero of the Federation awards given in all of history? You're the tenth. And the other nine, like you, have been the kind of insanely disinterested people who can't really be rewarded by meeting the rich and famous, or being granted a pension, or being given a sinecure diplomatic position, or any of the other plums a government likes to hand out as minor favors. So instead, the Federation, in its infinite wisdom, decided that a Hero of the Federation gets one free pass."

"One what?"

"If, for instance," Evert explained, "you should ever want to murder someone, you could trade in your silver-and-blue dress accessory for an acquittal—in fact, you wouldn't even have to go to trial. Or if you wanted to get a dearly beloved relative off a quarantine world, or . . ."

Annemari felt something warm and beautiful glowing within her, bubbling with promise. "Tell me, Evert: do you think a Hero of the Federation could get somebody moved to the top of the 'mat transplant list with her one free pass?"

"I should think that would be well within the bounds of the rewards envisaged by the Federation," Evert said solemnly. "In fact, they will probably feel you are asking for too little. After all, the fifth Hero of the Federation, Hans Joriink, asked for sole possession of one of the moons of Daedalus . . . and got it."

"I don't want the moon and the stars," Annemari said. "Only a chance for Niklaas."

"Who, me?" Chulayen Vajjadara repeated.

"You cannot seem to say anything else these days," Madee commented. "Yes, Chulen, we want you to take temporary care of the Ministry for Lands and Properties. There will be some significant changes in the way the Ministry is organized, and somehow I doubt that the previous Minister and his subordinates have the necessary . . . er . . . flexibility of mind."

If those changes were anything like those that had swept over Udara in the weeks since his return from the Jurgan Caves, Chulayen doubted that anybody was flexible enough to deal with them. The confiscation of the Bashir's prohibited weapons had left his army powerless to resist revolts in Thamboon and Narumalar. While he was reeling from those blows, the Rohini resistance had risen and quickly toppled his regime. The Bashir and several of his ministers had fled, not quite believing in the Rohini promises of amnesty for anyone who surrendered. And the old lady he'd first known as a beggarly pancake vendor was currently in charge of organizing an interim government to keep essential state services running until elections could be organized for the new People's Democracy of Udara.

Chulayen had a strong feeling that the elections wouldn't make much difference to Madee's plans. If she had half as strong an effect on the general Rohini populace as she had on him, she would simply tell them who they wanted to vote for and the Ministers she had chosen would be confirmed in office by an overwhelming majority. The Rudhrani were too few to make a difference in a state with suffrage for all adults—and they grew fewer every day, as prominent families quietly disappeared from Udara to live in careful retirement on some distant estate.

Which meant that if he accepted this "temporary" appointment he would be in charge of the Ministry for Lands and Properties while the entire Udaran land ownership system was dismantled and rearranged to give every Rohini—and those Rudhrani who chose to stay—a working plot of cultivable land somewhere on the terraced hillsides of the mountain realm. Chulayen couldn't see Madee settling for anything less. And the magnitude of the task staggered him. The paperwork alone—

"Grandmother, you want somebody older and more experienced for a position like that," he protested.

Madee nodded. "This is true. Unfortunately, we do not have anybody older and more experienced. For some reason, very few Rohini have any experience at all with government work. I'm afraid it'll have to be you, Chulen."

"If you can call our fine Rudhrani gentleman a true Rohini," put in Sonchai, who was, as usual, lounging in a corner to provide a sarcastic counterpoint to Madee's comments.

Sonchai's little sister slapped his face and ran to take Chulayen's hand before her brother could retaliate. "And who are you to say who is a good Rohini, brother?" she demanded. "He has lost more to the Ministry for Loyalty than you can even imagine. Why do not you take a wife, and get children, and see all but one murdered for your part in the resistance, and then perhaps you can talk about Rohini and Rudhrani!"

Sonchai's face reddened where Khati had slapped him. "You mean to hold it up to me that I could not protect you from the Bashir's lusts—"

"I never asked for your protection," Khati interrupted him. "I served the Resistance, and I am proud of it, even if you think our family shamed forever."

"You will please remember that it is now my problem to find a decent marriage for you, and if you think that will be easy now—"

"Children!" Madee clapped her hands once and they fell silent, glaring at her like sulky children indeed. "Enough of this foolish squabbling. You are both putting words into one another's mouths. Khati, go to the outer rooms; somebody needs to amuse Chulen's little daughter while we are settling this matter of the Ministry. Sonchai, if you were doing your job as my recording clerk, you would not have time to make so many sarcastic comments. Now get to work, both of you!"

Khati left, muttering things better not said clearly about her brother, and Madee turned to him. "Sonchai, record Chulayen Vajjadara as Minister pro tem of Lands and Properties, and—"

"Wait a minute," Chulayen began. "I have not—I cannot—Grandmother, at least give me some time to settle my personal life! You know what long hours this position means; I must find somebody to watch over Neena if I am to take it up. She has . . . nightmares," he finished lamely.

Madee cocked an ear toward the sounds of a clapping-and-singing game in the outer room. "Oh, I think Khati will do well enough to take charge of Neena. After all, she is out of a job now."

"Somebody must be with Neena at night, and if I am to be Minister pro tem—"

"So Khati will live in your house." Madee lifted an eyebrow. "Surely the Minister for Lands and Properties has a household big enough to accommodate one small girl-servant?"

"Her place is in my mother's house, with me," Sonchai protested.

"Absolutely not," Madee told him. "Do you forget that I live next door to your mother? Do you think I wish to be disturbed by your childish quarreling all day and night?"

She quashed Chulayen's remaining protests without mercy and sent him away to begin the monumental task of sorting through the previous Minister's records, which had been left in some disarray.

"Khati living in his household, caring for his daughter," Sonchai brooded. "I don't like it. You will have those two married before they know what happened to them."

"Weren't you just complaining about the difficulty of finding a husband for her? Stop looking at the dark side of everything, Sonchai. Khati needs some time with a gentle man who can help her forget the Bashir, and Chulen needs a girl to protect to help him forget Anusha. Trust Mother Madee, she knows best."

"That sounds," Sonchai commented, "remarkably like a campaign slogan."

Madee smiled.

Elsewhere, similar rearrangements were taking place with similar complications and protests.

"Isn't this slightly illegal?" Calandra Vissi asked.

Evert Cornelis shook his head. "Kalapriya is now a direct protectorate of Rezerval. It is definitely the Federation's job to provide liaisons with each of the independent tribal territories. And do you have any idea how hard it is to find people who know anything about Kalapriya, have some concept of Federation law, are willing to work under primitive conditions, and have no ties whatsoever to Barents?"

"What makes you think you've found one now? I'm a Diplo, not a bloody administrator. I don't know anything about running a state!"

"I don't have to ask you," Evert said simply. "You took the Diplomatic Oath to serve where assigned."

"As a Diplo, not as a Resident or Liaison or whatever you call it!"

"The oath doesn't say anything about choosing your role. Annemari has ceded your services to my office on account of the emergency, and I'm assigning you to Udara." Evert smiled. "Don't fret, Calandra, you won't be the only Diplo stuck on Kalapriya. Anybody with a language download chip who isn't presently engaged on work of Federation security is in danger."

"I don't see why you can't use Barents Trading Society people. They weren't all involved in the 'mats-for-arms plot, you know."

"Officially," Evert said, "no member of the Barents Trading Society may act in any role whatsoever on Kalapriya, public or private, until the special commission has officially investigated and exonerated them. Unofficially, we're reassigning the ones we're sure of to administrative posts wherever we can slot them in, appointments to be confirmed and back pay made up only when the inquiry has finished. So if you think you have it bad . . ."

"No pay until a Federation Special Commission completes its inquiry," Calandra said. "That could be years."

"They should have cleaned their own house when they had the chance," Evert said. "A few years on Kalapriya without pay or offworld luxuries beats a Federation prison."

"I'm not so sure of that," said Calandra, "and anyway, what makes you think they're going to have to do without offworld luxuries? It seems to me that the Federation needs to rethink its entire position on cultural contamination. What did we learn from Kalapriya, anyway? That some Barentsians are greedy and corrupt and not to be trusted with power? Give me a break. Some of every group will be greedy and corrupt and not to be trusted with power. Most, probably. I think the real lesson is that you can't have contact with primitive cultures and not have an effect on them. You can't quarantine technology like a communicable disease. The primitive cultures of the Dispersal are going to have culture shock and a giant technical leap forward. The only question is whether the Federation exerts some control over the flow of technology, or puts down a blanket ban and leaves it to the criminals and smugglers."

Evert's smile grew broader. "And I thought you didn't know anything about governing? As soon as you're settled in Udara I want a position paper from you on that very subject."

"I haven't agreed yet," Calandra warned him. "Would you rather have a cooperative Diplo-Resident or one who does the absolute minimum required?"

"That," Evert said, "rather depends on the price of the cooperation, doesn't it?"

Calandra told him exactly what it would cost.

Gabrel and Maris were still on Kalapriya, in Valentin. As one of the few Barents Trading Society members who was known to be absolutely clear of any involvement with the 'mats-for-arms trading ring, Gabrel was temporarily filling three different executive positions and consulting daily with Federation committees on the reorganization of Kalapriya as a direct protectorate. And he hadn't made a move toward Maris since they got back, which was extremely frustrating. It seemed as though getting back to Valentin had reactivated all his proper Barents officer-and-a-gentleman training.

Granted, they didn't have a lot of privacy, but she could have stayed with him in his quarters, couldn't she? Instead, Maris was living at House Stoffelsen, now a sort of elegant boarding house for Federation employees; the Stoffelsens had departed Valentin rather hastily and without filing travel plans after Tasman. A number of their fellow Society members had followed suit; Valentin was notably empty of traditional colonial types, and notably full of Rezerval bureaucrats whose climate-controlled suits kept disappearing, requiring them to indent for replacements on a continual basis.

"The Kalapriyans are taking to outworlder technology like a Rudhrani bureaucrat to graft," Gabrel observed of this trend one evening when they were taking a decorous walk down the long shaded avenue that led from House Stoffelsen to the streets of Valentin. "What do you suppose they'll do when the power packs run down?"

"They're solar-powered," Maris told him. "They won't run down. And if they did, I expect the Kalapriyans would find a way to steal new power packs too. They don't seem to be sufferin' from whaddyacallit, cul-something?"

"Culture shock?"

"Righto. Except it is something shocking the way they get hold of them climate suits. Good thing the climate control unit for the office buildings ain't portable."

Gabrel coughed, seemed about to say something, then stopped.

"What is it?"

"I—oh, nothing."

Maris regarded him with exasperation. "It's been 'oh, nothing' for days now. If you've come to your senses and repented getting involved with a Tasman scumsucker, why don't you come right out and say so?"

"If I didn't want to be here with you, I wouldn't have to," Gabrel pointed out. "I could be too busy with work. Actually I am too busy with work; you can't imagine how many lies I have to tell before I can sneak off to spend an hour with you."

"Good practice for you," Maris said heartlessly. "Anyway, why do you work so hard to get a free hour or two if we're going to spend it walking up and down in the park like this?"

Gabrel went dark red. "I'm trying to treat you with respect. Maybe you aren't used to that, but—"

"Huh. I thought it wouldn't take you long to remember what I was."

"I—" Gabrel took a deep breath and stopped. "Maris, are you trying to pick a quarrel with me?"

"No! Well, maybe. Sort of." She was trying to break through the formal Barents courtesy that had separated them since they got back to Valentin. Quarreling wouldn't have been her preferred way to do it, but she had to do something to find out how he really felt—and to break her news to him. Come to think of it, Gabrel wasn't the only one who'd been unnaturally reserved. She'd been keeping a lot back too. But she couldn't keep it back any longer, not now that Calandra had confirmed it for her; the news was about to bubble out of her. "I . . . I'm not sure what you want."

Gabrel regarded her with exasperation. "I want to marry you. I want everybody in Valentin to see that I respect you and am treating you like my promised wife. I've just been waiting until I knew what position I could offer you."

"Do you think I care about that?"

"Well, I do!" Gabrel stopped shouting and controlled himself with a visible effort. "And I just got confirmation of it today. If you happen to be interested. I can support a wife now."

"You don't need to support me. I'm getting a position too, so there!" Oh, the God of Major Fuckups was sure on the job tonight. This wasn't the way it was supposed to go. She had meant to tell him her news, cry on his shoulder a bit about having to be separated for a while, get him to promise to wait for her. Having a fight wasn't on the agenda at all.

Gabrel went on as if he hadn't heard her, which was probably a good thing . . . or was it? Maybe the Valentin Gabrel couldn't hear the words "job" and "girl" in the same sentence. That would be a more serious problem than the years of separation that lay ahead of them. "I've just had formal confirmation that when the Federation completes its takeover here, I'm to be posted as assistant to the new Resident in Udara. The post carries a liberal allowance for lodging and dependents, so we can be married as soon as my orders are cut."

"Well . . . there's one problem," Maris said. "It looks like I'm going to have to go away for a while."

"Not back to Tasman?"

"Of course not, I couldn't go back to that life even if I wanted to. They were gonna kill me, remember?"

"Yes, well. Your—um, 'friends' aren't operating out of there anymore, you know. You'd be perfectly safe."

The upheavals of the 'mats-for-arms scandal had caused a much more thorough shaking up of Tasman than the search for a disappeared Diplo would have done. The disused tunnels that Johnivans' gang had made their home were mapped now, and filled with foam sealant. Johnivans and Keito had spaced themselves rather than be arrested; most of the rest of the gang were serving lengthy sentences on distant prison worlds. Maris had been unable to find out what had happened to Nyx; she hoped the computer hacker had hacked herself a new identity and vanished into the databases of the Federation.

"Well, where are you going, and for how long? I need to tell my family and set a date. They'll want to come here for the wedding. Or maybe we should be married on Barents," Gabrel mused. "My mother would like that, and it would be cheaper for us to go there than for the whole clan to come out to Kalapriya . . ."

"We've got time to work that out," Maris said uncomfortably.

"Not all that much. I expect my posting will be finalized within a few weeks, and I'll be expected to go right on upcountry when that happens. Good thing, really, my mother won't have a chance to make a Big Society Deal out of our wedding. There won't be time."

"Um . . . I expect she'll have plenty of time," Maris said in a small voice.

"Why? How long are you going to be gone for, anyway? And you never did tell me where you're going."

"I'm going," Maris informed him, "to Rezerval. I got a scholarship to Diplo School."

"You what? Why didn't you tell me?"

"I been tryin' to tell you, but you kept interrupting! The Calandra Vissi Diplomatic Scholarship," Maris said dreamily. "Imagine, me, a Tasman scumsucker, learnin' all that stuff about other worlds and unarmed combat and political science and astrogation and diplomacy and languages and . . ."

"But you said you were going to stay here and marry me."

"I want to go to school first."

"I thought you loved me!"

"I do love you! But I don't hardly know who 'I' am, Gabrel, don't you see? First I was what Johnivans wanted me to be, then I was trying to be Calandra, and now . . ." Maris couldn't find words for it. "I never had no real education, you know? And I never seen anywhere but Tasman and Kalapriya. And not even the upper levels of Tasman. Now I got a chance to learn something and be somebody. To be a real person. With an ID that ain't a forgery, and skills that count for something. And . . ." She was out of words to convince Gabrel. If he hated her for going away to school, it would break her heart. But she would go anyway.

"And you're only seventeen," Gabrel said gently. "I keep forgetting."

"Nice Barents girls get married at seventeen," Maris argued against herself.

"And you," Gabrel said, "are definitely not a 'nice Barents girl.' That's one of the things I love about you." He took her by the shoulders, holding her very gently, as if he were afraid she might disappear if he held on too tightly. "You need to fly, and I'm trying to clip your wings. Go to Diplo School, Maris. I can wait."

"You want me to go?"

"Gods, no! I want to drag you back to my quarters and ravish you until you change your mind."

"Okay by me." Maris glanced at her shiny new chronocalculator, a parting gift from Calandra. "Like you said, I'm not a nice Barents girl. And after going off upcountry with you, I don't think I got much reputation left to ruin. We got three days before me shuttle leaves. How much ravishing you think you can get in by that time?"

"Enough to change your mind about going away to school?" Gabrel said.

Maris grinned. "I don't think so. But if you want to try, I think it's only fair to give you a chance!"

Back | Next
Framed

Back | Next
Contents

Chapter Eighteen
Rezerval

There were, of course, innumerable details to take care of. There were so many details that Annemari was seriously tempted to retreat into geek mode and write a program to handle it all.

"No computer program could possibly handle all the ethical and legal issues involved," Evert Cornelis told her when she voiced this threat. They were back in the Rezerval park, seated on Annemari's new favorite bench. Unlike the one in front of Hans Joriink's statue, it did not have such a good view of the central pond. But it had an excellent view of the new memorial statue of Orlando Montoyasana.

"Oh, I'm not so sure," Annemari said. "We humans haven't been doing so well with the issues, you know. A good neural network with intelligent heuristics . . . all right, all right, I'm just kidding!"

"Breed a better bacteriomat to solve problems," Evert suggested, and then, when Annemari looked interested, "No! Lorum van Vechten's brainchild has caused enough havoc already."

Remembering what van Vechten had done with his black-market 'mats, and how he'd cultured them, sobered them both. The full number of victims of the faulty 'mats would probably never be known; most families rich enough to buy illegal neurosurgery were also rich and powerful enough to conceal the disasters that followed. Annemari would never know for sure just how many cases like Tomi Oksanen's were discreetly locked away in closed wards for "nervous problems." But the ones who'd surfaced so far were enough fuel for a lifetime of nightmares. The 'mats were indeed adaptable far beyond the imaginations of anybody who'd worked with them. Given living human brains as a culture medium, they absorbed and replicated not only the basic structure of the brain but the experiences and feelings processed by that particular brain while the 'mats were growing on it. Fear, terror, sensory hallucinations, despair, fever, and insanity were carefully cultured in Udara's limestone caverns, carefully harvested and transported and eventually transplanted, with exquisitely careful neurosurgery, inside the skulls of those desperate enough to pay any price for the promise of a repaired nervous system. And once the 'mat was fully adapted to its new habitat, it set about enthusiastically reproducing its store of raw emotions and insane hallucinations for its new home.

"Pundarik Zahin threw himself over a cliff, when he realized the 'mat transplant was making him insane," Annemari said. "He must have been a brave man." With no knowledge of the medical science underlying his "cure," he had decided that Lorum van Vechten had implanted actual demons in his head. He had clung to life through agonizing days of insanity and uncontrollable muscular twitches, using his ever-briefer periods of clarity to write down what was happening to him and why. Only when the document was copied and safely deposited with two of his most trusted friends did he allow himself the release of death.

That document, together with the eyewitness testimony of those who'd been in the "cave of minds," provided enough information to justify the full Federation involvement that Annemari had asked Calandra to demand. The subsequent inquiry had brought on a wave of suicides, disappearances, and arrests of those not quick enough to take one of the other two ways out. The governing structure of the Barents Trading Society was decimated; four of the High Families that "owned" Rezerval had fallen; careers had been made and broken; and the claim of Barents to the world of Kalapriya had been unconditionally revoked.

"More exhausting than terrible, really," Annemari said now, thinking back over the cataclysmic changes her attempt to get a transplant for Niklaas had brought on.

"But when you found out about Zahin, you must have been terribly worried about Niklaas. After all, you'd left him at the clinic to get one of those same bacteriomat transplants—and I loaned you the money for it! I would never have forgiven myself if they'd done that to him, Annemari."

"Oh, I wasn't the least bit worried," Annemari told him. "You see, I didn't want them operating on Niklaas while I was away."

"Yes, but how could you be sure they wouldn't do just that?"

"I blocked the funds transfer. You see," Annemari explained, "you're quite right, I couldn't trust the Cassilis Clinic to abide by my wish for them to delay surgery. But I felt quite sure I could trust them not to do an operation that hadn't been paid for. After all, they weren't exactly in a position to recover the cost from my Federation health insurance package."

"No tickee, no washee?"

"Something like that." Actually Annemari had been almost suicidally worried about Niklaas once she found out about the effects of the black-market 'mats; what if her funds block hadn't worked for some reason? But if she confessed that to Evert, he'd just go all protective on her again, and that was the last thing she wanted. "So you see," she told him with a smile almost brilliant enough to disguise her secret sadness, "everything worked out all right. Niklaas didn't get a black-market 'mat, and I can give you back your money."

"Leaving you exactly where you were before all this started," Evert pointed out. "Don't you think you deserve better than that, Annemari? For personally bringing down a three-world criminal smuggling, torture, and prohibited-technology ring?"

Annemari shrugged. "I also broke a few rules along the way, and nobody's said anything about that either. I sort of figured the Federation had decided it all worked out all right—I don't get any rewards but I'm also not going to get busted down to datatech for bringing flitters and other pro-tech to Kalapriya."

"They could not logically punish you for that," Evert pronounced, "given that Lorum van Vechten and his colleagues in the Barents Trading Society were engaging in mass smuggling of far more destructive pro-tech devices."

"Dear Evert. And when has any government, anywhere, been logical?"

"This one certainly isn't," Evert said, "but with a little discussion in the right quarters, the right people can occasionally see reason. It has been decided that you are to receive the Hero of the Federation award."

"Oh?"

"It's a little silver star on a cobalt-blue background," Evert told her, "with the Federation logo in holographic rainbow silver over it."

"That sounds very nice," Annemari said, "I'm sure I have some evening outfits it'll go with . . ."

"Annemari, don't you ever ask the obvious question?"

"Always, when I can think of it," Annemari said. "I'm afraid this time the question escapes me."

"Aren't you interested in what goes with the award?"

"A ceremony, presumably."

"Better than that."

"A pension?"

"Better than that." Evert was openly grinning now. "Do you realize there have been only nine Hero of the Federation awards given in all of history? You're the tenth. And the other nine, like you, have been the kind of insanely disinterested people who can't really be rewarded by meeting the rich and famous, or being granted a pension, or being given a sinecure diplomatic position, or any of the other plums a government likes to hand out as minor favors. So instead, the Federation, in its infinite wisdom, decided that a Hero of the Federation gets one free pass."

"One what?"

"If, for instance," Evert explained, "you should ever want to murder someone, you could trade in your silver-and-blue dress accessory for an acquittal—in fact, you wouldn't even have to go to trial. Or if you wanted to get a dearly beloved relative off a quarantine world, or . . ."

Annemari felt something warm and beautiful glowing within her, bubbling with promise. "Tell me, Evert: do you think a Hero of the Federation could get somebody moved to the top of the 'mat transplant list with her one free pass?"

"I should think that would be well within the bounds of the rewards envisaged by the Federation," Evert said solemnly. "In fact, they will probably feel you are asking for too little. After all, the fifth Hero of the Federation, Hans Joriink, asked for sole possession of one of the moons of Daedalus . . . and got it."

"I don't want the moon and the stars," Annemari said. "Only a chance for Niklaas."

"Who, me?" Chulayen Vajjadara repeated.

"You cannot seem to say anything else these days," Madee commented. "Yes, Chulen, we want you to take temporary care of the Ministry for Lands and Properties. There will be some significant changes in the way the Ministry is organized, and somehow I doubt that the previous Minister and his subordinates have the necessary . . . er . . . flexibility of mind."

If those changes were anything like those that had swept over Udara in the weeks since his return from the Jurgan Caves, Chulayen doubted that anybody was flexible enough to deal with them. The confiscation of the Bashir's prohibited weapons had left his army powerless to resist revolts in Thamboon and Narumalar. While he was reeling from those blows, the Rohini resistance had risen and quickly toppled his regime. The Bashir and several of his ministers had fled, not quite believing in the Rohini promises of amnesty for anyone who surrendered. And the old lady he'd first known as a beggarly pancake vendor was currently in charge of organizing an interim government to keep essential state services running until elections could be organized for the new People's Democracy of Udara.

Chulayen had a strong feeling that the elections wouldn't make much difference to Madee's plans. If she had half as strong an effect on the general Rohini populace as she had on him, she would simply tell them who they wanted to vote for and the Ministers she had chosen would be confirmed in office by an overwhelming majority. The Rudhrani were too few to make a difference in a state with suffrage for all adults—and they grew fewer every day, as prominent families quietly disappeared from Udara to live in careful retirement on some distant estate.

Which meant that if he accepted this "temporary" appointment he would be in charge of the Ministry for Lands and Properties while the entire Udaran land ownership system was dismantled and rearranged to give every Rohini—and those Rudhrani who chose to stay—a working plot of cultivable land somewhere on the terraced hillsides of the mountain realm. Chulayen couldn't see Madee settling for anything less. And the magnitude of the task staggered him. The paperwork alone—

"Grandmother, you want somebody older and more experienced for a position like that," he protested.

Madee nodded. "This is true. Unfortunately, we do not have anybody older and more experienced. For some reason, very few Rohini have any experience at all with government work. I'm afraid it'll have to be you, Chulen."

"If you can call our fine Rudhrani gentleman a true Rohini," put in Sonchai, who was, as usual, lounging in a corner to provide a sarcastic counterpoint to Madee's comments.

Sonchai's little sister slapped his face and ran to take Chulayen's hand before her brother could retaliate. "And who are you to say who is a good Rohini, brother?" she demanded. "He has lost more to the Ministry for Loyalty than you can even imagine. Why do not you take a wife, and get children, and see all but one murdered for your part in the resistance, and then perhaps you can talk about Rohini and Rudhrani!"

Sonchai's face reddened where Khati had slapped him. "You mean to hold it up to me that I could not protect you from the Bashir's lusts—"

"I never asked for your protection," Khati interrupted him. "I served the Resistance, and I am proud of it, even if you think our family shamed forever."

"You will please remember that it is now my problem to find a decent marriage for you, and if you think that will be easy now—"

"Children!" Madee clapped her hands once and they fell silent, glaring at her like sulky children indeed. "Enough of this foolish squabbling. You are both putting words into one another's mouths. Khati, go to the outer rooms; somebody needs to amuse Chulen's little daughter while we are settling this matter of the Ministry. Sonchai, if you were doing your job as my recording clerk, you would not have time to make so many sarcastic comments. Now get to work, both of you!"

Khati left, muttering things better not said clearly about her brother, and Madee turned to him. "Sonchai, record Chulayen Vajjadara as Minister pro tem of Lands and Properties, and—"

"Wait a minute," Chulayen began. "I have not—I cannot—Grandmother, at least give me some time to settle my personal life! You know what long hours this position means; I must find somebody to watch over Neena if I am to take it up. She has . . . nightmares," he finished lamely.

Madee cocked an ear toward the sounds of a clapping-and-singing game in the outer room. "Oh, I think Khati will do well enough to take charge of Neena. After all, she is out of a job now."

"Somebody must be with Neena at night, and if I am to be Minister pro tem—"

"So Khati will live in your house." Madee lifted an eyebrow. "Surely the Minister for Lands and Properties has a household big enough to accommodate one small girl-servant?"

"Her place is in my mother's house, with me," Sonchai protested.

"Absolutely not," Madee told him. "Do you forget that I live next door to your mother? Do you think I wish to be disturbed by your childish quarreling all day and night?"

She quashed Chulayen's remaining protests without mercy and sent him away to begin the monumental task of sorting through the previous Minister's records, which had been left in some disarray.

"Khati living in his household, caring for his daughter," Sonchai brooded. "I don't like it. You will have those two married before they know what happened to them."

"Weren't you just complaining about the difficulty of finding a husband for her? Stop looking at the dark side of everything, Sonchai. Khati needs some time with a gentle man who can help her forget the Bashir, and Chulen needs a girl to protect to help him forget Anusha. Trust Mother Madee, she knows best."

"That sounds," Sonchai commented, "remarkably like a campaign slogan."

Madee smiled.

Elsewhere, similar rearrangements were taking place with similar complications and protests.

"Isn't this slightly illegal?" Calandra Vissi asked.

Evert Cornelis shook his head. "Kalapriya is now a direct protectorate of Rezerval. It is definitely the Federation's job to provide liaisons with each of the independent tribal territories. And do you have any idea how hard it is to find people who know anything about Kalapriya, have some concept of Federation law, are willing to work under primitive conditions, and have no ties whatsoever to Barents?"

"What makes you think you've found one now? I'm a Diplo, not a bloody administrator. I don't know anything about running a state!"

"I don't have to ask you," Evert said simply. "You took the Diplomatic Oath to serve where assigned."

"As a Diplo, not as a Resident or Liaison or whatever you call it!"

"The oath doesn't say anything about choosing your role. Annemari has ceded your services to my office on account of the emergency, and I'm assigning you to Udara." Evert smiled. "Don't fret, Calandra, you won't be the only Diplo stuck on Kalapriya. Anybody with a language download chip who isn't presently engaged on work of Federation security is in danger."

"I don't see why you can't use Barents Trading Society people. They weren't all involved in the 'mats-for-arms plot, you know."

"Officially," Evert said, "no member of the Barents Trading Society may act in any role whatsoever on Kalapriya, public or private, until the special commission has officially investigated and exonerated them. Unofficially, we're reassigning the ones we're sure of to administrative posts wherever we can slot them in, appointments to be confirmed and back pay made up only when the inquiry has finished. So if you think you have it bad . . ."

"No pay until a Federation Special Commission completes its inquiry," Calandra said. "That could be years."

"They should have cleaned their own house when they had the chance," Evert said. "A few years on Kalapriya without pay or offworld luxuries beats a Federation prison."

"I'm not so sure of that," said Calandra, "and anyway, what makes you think they're going to have to do without offworld luxuries? It seems to me that the Federation needs to rethink its entire position on cultural contamination. What did we learn from Kalapriya, anyway? That some Barentsians are greedy and corrupt and not to be trusted with power? Give me a break. Some of every group will be greedy and corrupt and not to be trusted with power. Most, probably. I think the real lesson is that you can't have contact with primitive cultures and not have an effect on them. You can't quarantine technology like a communicable disease. The primitive cultures of the Dispersal are going to have culture shock and a giant technical leap forward. The only question is whether the Federation exerts some control over the flow of technology, or puts down a blanket ban and leaves it to the criminals and smugglers."

Evert's smile grew broader. "And I thought you didn't know anything about governing? As soon as you're settled in Udara I want a position paper from you on that very subject."

"I haven't agreed yet," Calandra warned him. "Would you rather have a cooperative Diplo-Resident or one who does the absolute minimum required?"

"That," Evert said, "rather depends on the price of the cooperation, doesn't it?"

Calandra told him exactly what it would cost.

Gabrel and Maris were still on Kalapriya, in Valentin. As one of the few Barents Trading Society members who was known to be absolutely clear of any involvement with the 'mats-for-arms trading ring, Gabrel was temporarily filling three different executive positions and consulting daily with Federation committees on the reorganization of Kalapriya as a direct protectorate. And he hadn't made a move toward Maris since they got back, which was extremely frustrating. It seemed as though getting back to Valentin had reactivated all his proper Barents officer-and-a-gentleman training.

Granted, they didn't have a lot of privacy, but she could have stayed with him in his quarters, couldn't she? Instead, Maris was living at House Stoffelsen, now a sort of elegant boarding house for Federation employees; the Stoffelsens had departed Valentin rather hastily and without filing travel plans after Tasman. A number of their fellow Society members had followed suit; Valentin was notably empty of traditional colonial types, and notably full of Rezerval bureaucrats whose climate-controlled suits kept disappearing, requiring them to indent for replacements on a continual basis.

"The Kalapriyans are taking to outworlder technology like a Rudhrani bureaucrat to graft," Gabrel observed of this trend one evening when they were taking a decorous walk down the long shaded avenue that led from House Stoffelsen to the streets of Valentin. "What do you suppose they'll do when the power packs run down?"

"They're solar-powered," Maris told him. "They won't run down. And if they did, I expect the Kalapriyans would find a way to steal new power packs too. They don't seem to be sufferin' from whaddyacallit, cul-something?"

"Culture shock?"

"Righto. Except it is something shocking the way they get hold of them climate suits. Good thing the climate control unit for the office buildings ain't portable."

Gabrel coughed, seemed about to say something, then stopped.

"What is it?"

"I—oh, nothing."

Maris regarded him with exasperation. "It's been 'oh, nothing' for days now. If you've come to your senses and repented getting involved with a Tasman scumsucker, why don't you come right out and say so?"

"If I didn't want to be here with you, I wouldn't have to," Gabrel pointed out. "I could be too busy with work. Actually I am too busy with work; you can't imagine how many lies I have to tell before I can sneak off to spend an hour with you."

"Good practice for you," Maris said heartlessly. "Anyway, why do you work so hard to get a free hour or two if we're going to spend it walking up and down in the park like this?"

Gabrel went dark red. "I'm trying to treat you with respect. Maybe you aren't used to that, but—"

"Huh. I thought it wouldn't take you long to remember what I was."

"I—" Gabrel took a deep breath and stopped. "Maris, are you trying to pick a quarrel with me?"

"No! Well, maybe. Sort of." She was trying to break through the formal Barents courtesy that had separated them since they got back to Valentin. Quarreling wouldn't have been her preferred way to do it, but she had to do something to find out how he really felt—and to break her news to him. Come to think of it, Gabrel wasn't the only one who'd been unnaturally reserved. She'd been keeping a lot back too. But she couldn't keep it back any longer, not now that Calandra had confirmed it for her; the news was about to bubble out of her. "I . . . I'm not sure what you want."

Gabrel regarded her with exasperation. "I want to marry you. I want everybody in Valentin to see that I respect you and am treating you like my promised wife. I've just been waiting until I knew what position I could offer you."

"Do you think I care about that?"

"Well, I do!" Gabrel stopped shouting and controlled himself with a visible effort. "And I just got confirmation of it today. If you happen to be interested. I can support a wife now."

"You don't need to support me. I'm getting a position too, so there!" Oh, the God of Major Fuckups was sure on the job tonight. This wasn't the way it was supposed to go. She had meant to tell him her news, cry on his shoulder a bit about having to be separated for a while, get him to promise to wait for her. Having a fight wasn't on the agenda at all.

Gabrel went on as if he hadn't heard her, which was probably a good thing . . . or was it? Maybe the Valentin Gabrel couldn't hear the words "job" and "girl" in the same sentence. That would be a more serious problem than the years of separation that lay ahead of them. "I've just had formal confirmation that when the Federation completes its takeover here, I'm to be posted as assistant to the new Resident in Udara. The post carries a liberal allowance for lodging and dependents, so we can be married as soon as my orders are cut."

"Well . . . there's one problem," Maris said. "It looks like I'm going to have to go away for a while."

"Not back to Tasman?"

"Of course not, I couldn't go back to that life even if I wanted to. They were gonna kill me, remember?"

"Yes, well. Your—um, 'friends' aren't operating out of there anymore, you know. You'd be perfectly safe."

The upheavals of the 'mats-for-arms scandal had caused a much more thorough shaking up of Tasman than the search for a disappeared Diplo would have done. The disused tunnels that Johnivans' gang had made their home were mapped now, and filled with foam sealant. Johnivans and Keito had spaced themselves rather than be arrested; most of the rest of the gang were serving lengthy sentences on distant prison worlds. Maris had been unable to find out what had happened to Nyx; she hoped the computer hacker had hacked herself a new identity and vanished into the databases of the Federation.

"Well, where are you going, and for how long? I need to tell my family and set a date. They'll want to come here for the wedding. Or maybe we should be married on Barents," Gabrel mused. "My mother would like that, and it would be cheaper for us to go there than for the whole clan to come out to Kalapriya . . ."

"We've got time to work that out," Maris said uncomfortably.

"Not all that much. I expect my posting will be finalized within a few weeks, and I'll be expected to go right on upcountry when that happens. Good thing, really, my mother won't have a chance to make a Big Society Deal out of our wedding. There won't be time."

"Um . . . I expect she'll have plenty of time," Maris said in a small voice.

"Why? How long are you going to be gone for, anyway? And you never did tell me where you're going."

"I'm going," Maris informed him, "to Rezerval. I got a scholarship to Diplo School."

"You what? Why didn't you tell me?"

"I been tryin' to tell you, but you kept interrupting! The Calandra Vissi Diplomatic Scholarship," Maris said dreamily. "Imagine, me, a Tasman scumsucker, learnin' all that stuff about other worlds and unarmed combat and political science and astrogation and diplomacy and languages and . . ."

"But you said you were going to stay here and marry me."

"I want to go to school first."

"I thought you loved me!"

"I do love you! But I don't hardly know who 'I' am, Gabrel, don't you see? First I was what Johnivans wanted me to be, then I was trying to be Calandra, and now . . ." Maris couldn't find words for it. "I never had no real education, you know? And I never seen anywhere but Tasman and Kalapriya. And not even the upper levels of Tasman. Now I got a chance to learn something and be somebody. To be a real person. With an ID that ain't a forgery, and skills that count for something. And . . ." She was out of words to convince Gabrel. If he hated her for going away to school, it would break her heart. But she would go anyway.

"And you're only seventeen," Gabrel said gently. "I keep forgetting."

"Nice Barents girls get married at seventeen," Maris argued against herself.

"And you," Gabrel said, "are definitely not a 'nice Barents girl.' That's one of the things I love about you." He took her by the shoulders, holding her very gently, as if he were afraid she might disappear if he held on too tightly. "You need to fly, and I'm trying to clip your wings. Go to Diplo School, Maris. I can wait."

"You want me to go?"

"Gods, no! I want to drag you back to my quarters and ravish you until you change your mind."

"Okay by me." Maris glanced at her shiny new chronocalculator, a parting gift from Calandra. "Like you said, I'm not a nice Barents girl. And after going off upcountry with you, I don't think I got much reputation left to ruin. We got three days before me shuttle leaves. How much ravishing you think you can get in by that time?"

"Enough to change your mind about going away to school?" Gabrel said.

Maris grinned. "I don't think so. But if you want to try, I think it's only fair to give you a chance!"

Back | Next
Framed