Their eyes met and locked. His shame flooded hotly through her, shame that he had failed to protect her from his nager. His yearning to touch her, to ease her need, was as sharp as her own. For a split instant, she felt englobed by the shell of scintillating nageric fragments that seemed to fluoresce in every color. It cut off awareness of Mairis and the whole world. They were alone in featureless space, and though they never touched, Laneff could feel Shanlun's expressive fingers resting on her sensitive lateral sheaths, turning her whole forearm to golden fire.
Shanlun's nager sank deeply into her body, making her feel as if her own cells produced selyn as a Gen's did, instead of merely using it to stay alive. Her laterals strained to emerge, to seek Gen skin and take the selyn her body now craved, though she knew it was too early in her cycle. It would only leave her discontent now.
Mairis, showing a bright and powerful field, intervened, denying her urge, shattering the bubble of privacy with his intrusion. Laneff’s heart thundered in her ears.
Long ago she'd given up the kill—given up all hope of ever taking selyn directly from a Gen again. To be tempted, even mildly, was to risk losing control during need and killing the nearest Gen. Only channels were allowed to assuage need directly from Gens—specially trained Donors such as Shanlun who could not be killed– because channels couldn't function otherwise.
"Are you all right, Shanlun?" asked Mairis, and simultaneously, Laneff was aware of Mairis's attention focused on her, soothing the jangle of her nerves.
In the space of two breaths, Shanlun had steadied down to a parti-colored fluorescent shell, neutral in its effect on her. "My apologies, Sectuib," said Shanlun, his voice schooled to a colorless, emotionless distance.
Mairis waved that aside. "My fault. I hadn't realized just how much of a strain you were under." He glanced at Laneff. "Your personal relationship doesn't make it any easier."
Zeor doesn 't marry out of Zeor. The words echoed in Laneff’s mind as Shanlun stood with balanced poise under the scrutiny of his Sectuib. Here was the only man who'd understood what she was doing and who, from the first moment they'd met, had truly believed she could do it. Taking her moments of despair in stride, he had grown to cherish her as she loved him. Yet now, he didn't dare even look at her. If I had any sense, I'd cut him out of my life. But I can't. She didn't think she could walk away from Shanlun now, even if she didn't have to work with his Sectuib. How can I tell Mairis I dare not stand with him and Shanlun today?
Catching Mairis's attention, Shanlun said, "There is another consideration. All the other Householding cloaks on that podium this morning will be Zeor. The other Householdings might be jealous if you favor Sat'htine with the entire world watching."
"I hadn't thought of that!" said Mairis.
"You're going to offer to lead the world into a step as big as Klyd's Unity Proposal or the signing of the First Contract between Sime and Gen governments. Either Zeor leads—alone—or all Householdings lead together," said Shanlun.
Mairis nodded. "And even Klyd could never get them all to agree." He was zlinning Laneff carefully.
"I wouldn't want to create jealousy among the Householdings," said Laneff. "Certainly not now, when we are trying to create a Unity." It really would be best if I weren't there.
As if echoing her very thought, Shanlun said, "It really would be best if Laneff could speak from some other location."
"It might be more dramatically effective—more visually interesting if Laneff is in the guest box. There will be all kinds of House-holding colors among the guests, and there is a low-field zone established there for the renSimes in need. I'll have them rig a microphone. Get Kadi to let the camera crews know they'll have a reason to cover that area closely—but don't tell them what it is."
Mairis was off making plans, mentally rewriting his speech and shaping his campaign. Laneff felt a weight lift from her spirit. She could accomplish everything she had to in order to get the funding for her project—and not suffer.
As Mairis talked, Laneff noticed that out on the rotunda floor the small knot of gypsies had reached the bier, directly in the beam of the brightest lights, and at a point closest to where she was standing. Four gypsy Gens and a gypsy channel created a hole in the ambient nager, a pale hole of ghostly stillness that shimmered. Despite the lack of similarity to Shanlun's fluorescent effect, there seemed some indefinable kinship there.
As she watched, the gypsy channel paused over Digen's casket and gazed fixedly at Shanlun. Shanlun had his back turned to the bier, but he raised one eyebrow as if he'd heard a curious noise, and then he turned.
The gypsy channel was an old man with startlingly dark blond hair, abundant and cut short and stiff. A thin weatherbeaten face, bushy eyebrows, long vertical laugh lines, and no frown lines bespoke an innate good humor.
Mairis followed Shanlun's gaze. "Someone you know? Come greet them. We must get back there now, anyway."
The gypsy channel's attention seemed to be calling to Shanlun, and he wavered. Laneff felt that call, while at the same time a wash of cold needles raised the hairs all over her body. Despite that warning, though, she knew she'd fight to get assigned to that channel for a transfer. But gypsies aren't on the rotation rolls.
Shanlun turned back to Mairis, wrapping himself again in the impenetrable cloak of his nager. "I—have no business with them."
As he said that, the gypsies turned and left, but Laneff sensed a throbbing of regret in them—and in Shanlun.
Mairis assigned Laneff a security guard and told them where to wait as he and Shanlun were escorted back to the bier. Laneff had to put the attenuator rings back on when the powerful channel and Donor left her. Before long, there was a booming clang as temporary barricades cut off the flow of mourners. The end of the line snaked toward the bier.
She had seen Digen die and knew in her heart that he was gone. But she was impelled to grab this last chance—before it was too late. She drew her hood up around her face, trying to become just another Householder, and, trailed by the guard, she joined the end of the line beside the glass case of the Unity Proposal. Only if we know which children will be Sime can we bring Klyd's–and Digen's– dream into reality.
She had known that in her very bones ever since she'd visited the prematurely erected Monument to the Last Berserker during her first year after changeover. She'd cried during the ceremony when her name had been added to the end of the list carved there and a prayer had been said that she should indeed be the Last Berserker– the last child to go through changeover unexpectedly and kill in First
Need. Silently, she'd vowed to be the one to put an end to berserkers. But Digen Farris had to die under her care to make it possible for her to succeed.
Ridiculous.
Yet as she gazed into Digen's face, young in repose, she recalled all he'd suffered to bring the world this far. As she drank in the last moments of the sight of his face, they lowered the coffin lid.
In some odd way, under the hushed shadows and echoing vaults of the Unity Gate, it really seemed to her that he'd sacrificed his life to give her the chance to keep her vow. The weight of that responsibility came over her, and her heart cried, lean do it, Digen. I can give up anything I have to, even Shanlun. We're going to make your dream come true.
CHAPTER 2
FUNERAL
From her vantage in the visitors' box, Laneff watched Simes and Gens throng into Householding Square. Most of them, men and women both, wore formal capes displaying their Householding colors. All around the edges of the square, the banners of the Houses were on display, flapping in the brisk spring wind, illumined by the rising sun.