Relieved at seeing Taj, the man reported that Zabb was requesting an audience.
Taj glanced at Tis. She nodded wearily. “Let him in.
Zabb entered in his usual sweeping style. “We’ve got trouble. Remember that claimant Baz mentioned? Well, they’re attempting to ram through an elevation before any of us can react. I think we had best react.”
“Curse that motherless Egyon,” Taj said. “I wonder what spooked him.”
“Probably me wandering about the halls,” Zabb said. “And you know a palace, rumors pump like bile through the halls. The word must be out that Tisianne has returned. Either one of us has a superior claim to the Kou’nar line.”
Taj summoned the guard, who wrapped themselves like a protective cloak about the Takisians and the humans and hustled them through the corridors of the sprawling House.
While they walked, Tisianne explained how her entire plan rested on her ability to command the troops of the House Ilkazam. “If I lose the Raiyis’tet, it’s a sure bet that the new Raiyis won’t help me recover my lost body. If he does, he costs himself the throne.”
They kept nodding sagely, but Tis wondered how much they had really grasped. Ideal! She wondered how much she had grasped. It was all happening too quickly. There was no time for her to ease back into the life of a world she had left half a lifetime before.
She didn’t know how to conspire anymore, she didn’t want to. Resentment and weariness chewed at her. She wanted to react to the familiar faces she saw throughout the ranked bodies of her armed guards. She wanted to savor childhood memories brought back with painful vividness by the scent of baking pastries, or a particular tapestry. She didn’t want to be thrust willy-nilly into the battle. She wanted someone to bring her her stolen body and put her back where she belonged. She wanted to be at peace for the first time in forty-four years.
Illyana sent a wave of warmth and love from the womb to her mother’s mind. Tisianne’s breath caught at the overwhelming sweetness of it. At three months the baby had been little more than a sensory sponge. Now at seven and a half months she was becoming an individual. And the problem, you little demon, Tis sent to her daughter, though she knew the ideas were too complex for the baby’s developing mind to comprehend.
I love you and I want you, but I don’t want to birth you. I’m frightened – of the pain, of the entire experience… Ancestors! I don’t have time for these thoughts, I have to preserve my House, my station. I have to be warrior, not woman. No, that’s not right. Cody would be quick to jump down my throat. Women can be fighters. Mother then, my mind more on life than death… Hush, Illyana, sleep, baby, don’t distract me now.
Through the doors, and into an elaborate audience chamber. Tis remembered it being much larger. Had it shrunk or had she somehow grown? A knot of people were gathered about the platform holding the chair of the Raiyis of Ilkazam. It seemed to have been carved from a piece of glacial ice, filigreed with snowflakes. It was in truth constructed of an almost obscene number of diamonds supported on a platinum frame. Such conspicuous consumption on a planet so mineral poor. We’re psi lords, mentats, Most Bred, the Zal’hma at’ Irg, Tis reminded herself. It didn’t do much to assuage the guilt. Too long on Earth, she thought.
The pretender could be recognized by his sulky, disappointed expression. He had been rushed into his festival finery, for the cloak was caught up in the waistband of his ballooning trousers. Tis noted in shock that the boy still wore a mother badge twined about his left wrist. Not yet twenty – a baby! – and someone had made him a target.
Tis raked the rest of the assembly, searching for the Svengali. Egyon, Taj had said. Yes, that would fit. Zabb’s thought concurred with her conclusion. Tis also had to admire Taj’s intelligence sources. The personal guard of the Sennari line well outnumbered the more ceremonial escort protecting the Kou’nar conspirators.
Tis ignored the boy with his spun caramel hair dressed to form two horns rising from above each ear. Instead she addressed his trainer.
“Not yet, I think, vindi. There are still three lives between you and your ambition.”
Egyon pivoted elegantly to face her. He was dressed in fencing leathers dyed in multicolored squares, and his pale brown hair was clasped with a knife-and-sheath barrette. Obviously he had been caught unawares, but Tisianne had to grudgingly admire the speed of his response.
“Three, Tisianne brant Ts’ara sek Halima sek Ragnar? Are you counting that unplanned abortion you’re carrying?” Egyon asked sweetly.
The need to do murder flickered once like a whipping snake’s tail. Tis buried the urge. “Your powers must be failing, Egyon. This is a girlchild. And you forget my father, who is not dead yet.”
“As good as!” flared the pouting child.
“Quiet!” Egyon ordered.
“Yes, quiet, little one,” Tisianne agreed. “I’m trying to save your life.” The boy’s eyes widened slightly. “Yes, consider that. Do you really feel you have the experience to lead this House?”
There was an instant of silence, then Zabb showed his teeth and said softly, “No, that’s not a good idea.”
Her cousin had read the boy’s mind. Tisianne his body language, but she understood nonetheless.
“Zabb’s my heir,” Tis said. “You could put him in command of your troops, but will he fight the Vayawand or usurp you?” She shrugged eloquently.
“We have no proof this is Tisianne,” Egyon said. “Just the unsupported word of the regent. You’re all Sennari seed. You’d do anything to keep the Raiyis’tet from falling to the Kou’nar.”
“Test her,” said Zabb, and Tis took a quick, sidling step away from her cousin. He reached out and caught her above the elbow, held her still. “But not you, Egyon. This poor little human mind can’t protect itself well enough, and I’m not going to have my cousin conveniently die from a brain aneurysm.”
Relief suddenly removed the clog from her throat, and Tis quickly followed Zabb’s lead. “I’ll submit to an examination by the full Ajayiz. That should establish to anyone’s satisfaction that I am Tisianne.”
Zabb threw back his head and shouted, “And you can’t tell me you old beldams aren’t monitoring this little drama. So get in here, and let us do it.”
“Zabb,” said Taj warningly.
“They’d rather be amused than defend the House. Better to sit in the ashes and stir them with the stumps of their arms than miss one moment of emotional turmoil from their descendants.” In a more moderate tone he said to Taj, “Sorry, vindi, but I’ve always thought they were manipulative old spiders.”
“There’s no need to convene the Ajayiz. It was already decided that Onyze should ascend -”
“The situation’s changed, Egyon, you’ll have to do better than that,” Tis said.
Suddenly the House rang with a tone so high that it pained the ears and vibrated in the bones. The exterior manifestation of that call was painful enough – for the telepaths it was almost unbearable. The Takisians staggered, and Taj, who was a powerful and subtle telepath, was driven almost to his knees. Tisianne held up better than any of them because of the feeble abilities of her borrowed human body. But she felt it, drawn like a knife across her nerve endings. Only the Tarhiji guards and the humans were unaffected.
Mark, kind to the last and always concerned, supported Taj, even checked the old man’s pulse. The final aching harmonics died away, and the Takisians recovered. Taj pulled abruptly away from Mark, leaving the ace blinking in hurt confusion. Taj noticed. Glancing back, he said gruffly, “Your kindness was appreciated if unnecessary.”
Mark brightened perceptibly, and Tis was reminded again how much he loved this fine old man. Taj truly was a grand seigneur.