With a quick flick of the wrist, Hastet threw the door fully open, pivoted, and walked back to her pillows. It was grudging, it was unspoken, it was an invitation. Jay accepted and entered.
Just as his knees were buckling to drop him onto the pillows, a critter stuck its head straight up out of the cushions and let out a hiss like a tire deflating. It looked like a cross between a ferret and a feathered snake, with teeth that wouldn’t be out of place on a moray eel. Jay dived one way while the critter dived back into the safety of the pillows.
“Please excuse Haupi. She’s a little shy,” Hastet said, her voice catching on a chuckle. Despite his alarm, Jay had to admit that a smile became her. The lines about her mouth and between her brows softened, and there was that dimple again. Jay was a sucker for dimples.
“You don’t get many visitors,” Jay correctly deduced.
“No,” Hastet admitted.
“Takisians just keep getting dumber.”
The presence of so many guards had Jay’s wee-wee trying to run for cover. It was the first time he’d actually entered Rarrana since Tisianne’s seclusion. It was Lillyshit day, or whatever the hell they called it, so supposedly it was okay for him to be there, but it still put him in fear for his dick.
Tisianne was arranging flowers and taking a long time about it. Jay’s idea of flower arranging was a jelly jar and water. He had to admit the results so far were really pretty. Tis picked up one blossom, and the air was filled with a gentle chiming.
“Oh cool, is that the flower?” Meadows asked.
“Yes.” Tis offered it to the ace.
Jay reached out and lifted a blossom from the table. Several of the guards tensed. Jay cringed back into his chair and folded his hands in his lap. There was a smile lurking at the corners of Tisianne’s mouth as she tossed him a flower. Jay hid his embarrassment by studying the lilac and white blossoms. They were hard, and the stamens apparently acted like the clappers of a bell. He noticed wounds on the stem.
“They pulled off the thorns.”
“Yes,” Tisianne said. “They don’t do that for the men who enjoy this art. It’s funny because men are really far more vulnerable than women.” She selected another flower from an overflowing basket. “What news from the wide world, Jay?”
“You’ve heard as much as I have, and it’s all shitty -”
Zabb walked through the doors of the suite, and Jay, Mark, and Tis all stiffened.
“Cousin,” Zabb said, and gave Tisianne a buss on the cheek.
“Is there some reason that you are allowed to annoy me with impunity?” Tis asked in that sharp, snotty tone that always made Jay’s teeth ache.
Zabb smiled sweetly down at his cousin. “I’m the Raiyis. All women are my daughters… potential wives. I can see you whenever I choose in whatever manner I choose.”
“And I may choose to put that grandiose fiction to the test,” Tis challenged.
“Let’s not disturb the beldams again, shall we?” Zabb dropped with a sigh into a chair.
“Then leave me alone. Haven’t you done enough to me?”
“You’re lucky I didn’t -”
“Kill me.” Tisianne selected another bloom from the overflowing basket. Continued in that same sweetly soothing voice. “Yes, every day as I look about me, consider my situation, I am again struck with how much I owe you.”
Meadows stepped in. “Hey, man, it’s like you said. You can visit us anytime. We only get to see Jay once in a while. Why don’t you split and come back later?”
“I need to discuss the Crossing Festival with my cousin.”
“I will not attend,” Tis snapped.
“You will!”
Jay watched as Tisianne’s fingers tightened convulsively at the rap of command in that cold voice, and the delicate stem snapped. She regarded the drooping flower with annoyance.
“He’ll be there. The Ideal knows what he might try,” Tisianne argued.
“It’s Festival, you’ll be safe.” Zabb helped himself to a piece of fruit from the bowl on the table. “And speaking of your so-charming grandson, I want to discuss the speech he delivered.”
“What about it?”
“Taj and I were wondering if this power is a side effect of this jumping power? It is having an electrifying effect on the Tarhiji planet-wide.”
“Maybe because it’s hitting home some truths?” Jay said.
Zabb ignored him. “And you heard what happened at Rodaleh. We cannot fight if we cannot trust the troops at our backs. You said Blaise possesses a powerful mind control. It is possible it can sway thousands? Work across a bounce/cast?”
Tis shook her head. “You are looking for a magic explanation. Jay is right, the truth is he has found our Achilles’ heel and is exploiting it.”
“If you want to hang onto your own people, you better start offering them a mentat in every pot, and a chicken in every garage,” Jay said.
Zabb frowned, confused. Mark stepped in. “You know, how a politician will promise anything just to get elected.”
Zabb was staring at them both as if they’d suddenly begun speaking in tongues. And then it hit Jay. On Takis nobody got elected to nothin’. The art of the stump had never been invented. There was no demagoguery on Takis because there were no demagogues.
That was Blaise’s secret power. Not wild card, not the jumper skill, not his quarter Takisian blood. In a fit of excitement Jay explained his sudden insight. Tisianne looked sick, Mark thoughtful. Zabb was still confused.
Meadows slowly shook his head. “This is fucking awesome, Blaise is bringing down an entire planetary culture with the power of the Lie.”
“Well,” Jay grunted, “he better get a new speech writer. At Rodaleh we heard Roosevelt and Churchill.”
Zabb shook his head like a horse afflicted with flies. “Well, here is my truth. We will not mix our blood with that of the Tarhiji.”
“Then I guess we better start studying Vayet,” Jay grunted.
That pissed him off, and Zabb left with only another reminder that Tisianne would be attending Festival, and he’d send over her mother’s jewels.
Tis sighed and settled into a chair. Meadows fluttered around her nervously. “You okay? He didn’t get to you, did he?”
“No, no. Right now Zabb’s machinations, Blaise’s political posturings, the fate of the planet, and the future of Takisiankind are very secondary to my child.” She laid a hand on her stomach. “Personally I hope Zabb and Blaise beat each other to death with their respective peni.”
“What is this Festival shit?” Jay asked.
“It’s the holiest and most important celebration on Takis. It celebrates our passage through darkness to find and settle the Crystal World.”
“But Blaise is going to be there?” Mark asked.
“Yes. Everyone will be there.”
“What, every House?” Jay asked.
“Every House. Every member of every House.”
“Well, shit.” Jay shoved his hands into his pockets and started pacing. “This solves -” He broke off and looked to Meadows. “You got the jammer?”
“Yeah.”
“Fire it up.” Meadows located the Network device and did so. “So Blaise and the body will be at the hop?”
“Yes. How many times do I have to -”
“So I pop them both here -”
“No.” Tis’s eyes had gone dark with some undefined emotion.
“What do you mean, no?”
“First, you won’t be there. You’re not family.”
Jay waved that aside. “So I sneak in. I’ve got a Ph.D. in hiding in bushes.”
“The Festival is held on the South Pole.”
“Oh fuck.” Jay kicked a chair. “So I stow away.”
“On a living, mind-reading ship?” Meadows asked logically.
There was some sort of internal struggle going on in Tisianne’s soul. Jay could read it in the conflicting emotions washing across that little girl’s face.
“We can’t,” she finally said. “We swear peace at Festival. No one’s ever broken it. I can’t do this. I can’t let you do this.”