“Have you heard from yours?”
“Yes. James has matriculated, finally.”
“Send him my congratulations.”
“I will. He’ll be at the Cheng Ho Academy next term.”
That was the Fleet academy reserved for the highest caste of Terran Peers. Michi and Sula had attended it. Martinez had settled for the somewhat less prestigious Nelson Academy.
Michi’s face darkened. “I’m not sure it’s wise to send him into the Fleet. I don’t know what I’ll be able to do for him, with Tork hovering over our careers.”
“I’ll do what I can, of course.”
“Of course.” He was family; that sort of thing was expected. She turned to him. “What about Lady Sula?”
His heart gave a lurch. “Sorry?”
“Do you think she’d be willing to take James on as a cadet?”
There was no reason to think that Sula would be enjoying a command in a few years any more than he would, but he answered that he was reasonably sure Sula would oblige.
“Though you may not want James’s career to be entirely in the hands of those on Tork’s shit list,” Martinez said. “I’m sure we’d help, but you might want to find James a service patron who’s not in the line of fire.”
“I’ll do that, thanks.” Michi took another sip of her drink.
Martinez began to fret about his son. Young Gareth would go into the Fleet, of course, there was no doubt about that, and being a Chen, he would attend the Cheng Ho Academy. The junior officers who had thrived under Martinez would then be in a position to aid his son. A brilliant career was therefore assured.
Unless some malevolent force intervened. Of course Tork would be dead by then, but Tork would no doubt pick a successor.
Martinez sipped his drink, letting the burning alcohol fire trickle down his throat, and wondered if for the sake of his son he should hope that Sula was right, that there would soon be another war.
“That rifle? That’s an improvised weapon, used in the fighting in Zanshaa City. And the other one”—Sula turned to him—“that’s PJ’s gun. He was carrying it when he died.”
Martinez looked at her for a long moment, then at the long rifle with its silver and ivory inlay. “He got what he wanted then,” he said. “He was trying to find a way to join the fighting.”
“He was in love with your sister till the end.”
She didn’t have to explain which sister PJ loved. Not Walpurga, the one he’d married, but Sempronia, who had jilted him.
Martinez had been invited to dine byConfidence ‘s wardroom. The frigate’s lieutenants hadn’t heard his war stories yet, and he expected to enjoy himself relating them.
He had arrived early to pay his respects to Sula.
And to talk to her.
And to see her.
And to feel his blood blaze at the sight.
“Would you like some tea?” she asked. “I can have Rizal boil water.”
“No thanks.” The fewer interruptions by servants, he thought, the better.
“Sit down then.”
He sat in a straight-backed metal-framed chair acquired on the cheap by some government purchaser. Sula’s bare, small, functional quarters were far removed from his own luxurious, art-filled suite.
“Are guns your only ornament?” he asked. “I’d send you some pictures, but I don’t think Fletcher’s estate would approve.”
“You’ve got an artist, don’t you?” Sula said. “Maybe I could commission something from him.”
“Perhaps a full-length portrait,” Martinez said.
Sula grinned. “I couldn’t put up with looking at myself hours on end, especially in a tiny place like this. I don’t know how you stand it.”
Martinez felt an implied criticism in this statement.
“I admire the artistry of it. The sfumato, for example.” It was one of the technical words he’d learned from Jukes while he sat for the painting. “The balance of light and shade, the arrangement of objects on the table that helps to bring the image into the third dimension—”
There was a knock on the door, and Martinez turned to see Haz,Confidence ‘s premiere.
“Beg pardon,” Haz told Sula, “but the wardroom is happy to offer Captain Martinez its hospitality.”
“I’ll see you another time, Captain,” Sula said, rising smoothly.
As Martinez took her hand to say farewell, his mind finally received the message that his senses had been trying to send him for some time.
Sula’s scent had changed. Instead of the musky scent she had worn since she’d joined the Orthodox Fleet, she was now wearing Sandama Twilight, the perfume that he had tasted on her flesh as, over a year ago now, they lay in the vast, hideous canopied bed in her rented apartment.
He looked down at her in shock, his hand still wrapped around hers. She gazed back, her face deliberately incurious.
He dropped her hand, turned to follow Haz to the wardroom, and felt a flow of sheer emotion as it rolled like a slow, implacable tide through his blood.
She’s mine,he thought.
Sula had decided to roll the dice again, three nights earlier when she’d returned from a cocktail party Michi had given for the officers of her sadly reduced squadron. She’d stepped into her little office, her skin still tingling with the awareness of Martinez that she’d felt during the last few hours, and paused to look at the wall behind her desk, the wall with the two rifles.
There was the keepsake of PJ, she and the keepsake of Sidney.
It was only then that she realized that she had no keepsake of Casimir, nothing but memories of frantic nights filled with the sting of adrenaline, the tang of sweat, and the sound of weapons fire. She had put Casimir in his tomb, and sacrificed theju yao pot to his memory. She had intended to join him, to seek her oblivion in a brilliant, clarifying, annihilating blast at Magaria, but pride had intervened.
Very well, she would let pride dictate her course. She would roll the dice on life, not death. She would roll the dice on love, not exile.
She would let Casimir stay buried, and hope that the fantastic Martinez luck would overcome the curse she carried with her.
In her mind, she bargained with Lord Chen. “I can arrange for the return of your daughter,” she said. “Captain Martinez and I were in love before the marriage was arranged. I can arrange for that love to blossom again. The marriage will end, and you will not be blamed by Clan Martinez.
“In return I require your patronage of myself, and your continued patronage of Captain Martinez. And of course Martinez and I will raise the child, who I don’t imagine you’d care to have around anyway.”
And who I need as a hostage to guarantee your cooperation.
She looked at the matter from Lord Chen’s point of view, and saw nothing to object to.
She knew better than to strike any fantasy bargains with Lady Terza Chen. The Chen heir had been born under circumstances that valued her womb over any other part. She was a bearer of precious Chen genetics, to be mixed with other valuable genetics as her family dictated. That Chen genes had been debased by Martinez plasma was, as far as Clan Chen was concerned, a misfortune of history.
Terza had been born a mere carrier of genes, but marriage had turned her into something more formidable. Her social standing was higher than that of her husband, which made her valuable to the wealthy, ambitious clan into which she had married, and who would be inclined to defer to her. In fact—as Sula was inclined to read the situation—it was Lord Chen who was the pawn now, a pawn both of Martinez interests and of his newly empowered daughter, the mother of the new clan heir.
It was unlikely that Terza would wish to return to her earlier role as a mere breeder-in-waiting. Any such change would have to be decided elsewhere. Her husband and her father would have to be in agreement on these basics.
With these thoughts in mind, Sula shaped her new program. Her policy of pride demanded that she not cheapen herself in any way. She did not pursue Martinez.