"Jacob in Engineering," came Rena's voice. "Everything looks good."
Judith resisted an urge to snap at her. Procedure was to report only problems. Then she forced herself to relax. After all, she was glad to know.
"Moses here. We'll be shifting to full flight mode. Ready?"
"Ready," came Rena's confident response.
Dinah commented almost casually, "We've been noticed. There are men running out onto the tarmac."
"Odelia, warn them back," Judith ordered. "I'm shifting for take-off."
Odelia touched her throat mike, and Judith knew that possibly for the first time since the Faithful had come to Masada the amplified voice of a woman giving orders—even if masked—was sounding.
She didn't have time to think about this, though, but concentrated on remembering the take-off and orbital boost sequences. The computer could have done it, but she wanted to prove to herself that she was more than back-up for the automated systems.
Her delight when the ship obeyed and launched gracefully from ground to sky, then began climbing was so enormous that she cheered aloud. The surprise on the other women's faces was such that Judith momentarily felt embarrassed, but she forced herself not to apologize.
"We have angel's wings," she said instead, letting them share her joy. "According to the computer, we'll rendezvous with Aaron's Rod right on schedule."
There was a palpable reduction in tension, and Odelia relayed the information back to the passenger cabin and cargo hold. They weren't home free yet, but although Masada did have intercept vehicles, the rights of Elders were so firmly established that any domestic air traffic enforcement would waste valuable time before interfering with a vessel belonging to Ephraim Templeton.
Odelia had a file of appropriate responses to use if they were queried and an appropriate male dummy to fill her screen. Oddly, nothing came from the surface but an automated confirmation of their course and reassurance that there were no impediments.
"Could it be," Odelia asked, breaking the listening silence in the cockpit, "that everyone is so busy watching the Manticorans that they have slacked off on domestic traffic control?"
"I suppose so," Judith agreed, but she didn't feel at all confident.
The next strange thing happened when they approached Aaron's Rod. Judith was about to command the shuttle bay doors to open, when they slid apart on their own.
"Sisters," she said, checking and double-checking the angle and cutting back on the shuttle's speed. "Something isn't right."
Chief Elder Simonds of the Faithful of the Church of Humanity Unchained was without a doubt the oldest looking man Michael had ever seen. His face was deeply lined. The skin sagged on his neck, but had drawn tight around the swollen knuckles of his hands. Eyelids drooped, but did not conceal a penetrating gaze.
Despite his appearance, Simonds was not the oldest man Michael had ever met—not by far, since the Faithful had decided that the use of prolong was an abomination against God—and so Simonds was quite likely younger than many of Michael's instructors at Saganami Island. Unlike them, however, Simonds had aged without even the slowing of that process that those first generation prolong recipients could expect.
For the first time in his life, Michael realized that there was a strange power that came with the physical trappings of age. In Simonds' wizened face numerous deeply graven lines proclaimed not only his years, but made one imagine some wisdom must have been gained in his long life. It was an interesting lesson, and Michael suddenly understood why Quentin Cayen had tinted his hair to create the appearance that he was graying. Cayen knew the Masadans would respect the signs of age and had sought to acquire them.
For a fleeting moment, Michael wondered if he should have tried something similar. Then he rejected the idea out of hand. He was a prince of Manticore. Nothing would change that, and no cosmetic alteration would make him any more himself.
Greetings were framed in praise of God and His wisdom, but Michael had not grown to maturity in Mount Royal Palace without learning to hear the notes of self-congratulation in a man's voice—nor were they especially hard to detect here. Chief Elder Simonds was a man very pleased with himself.
With what Michael hoped would be taken for the modesty of youth before age, he set himself to listening silence while Ambassador Faldo and Mr. Lawler said the appropriate, flattering things to the Chief Elder, his attendant Senior Elders, and the very few mere Elders who had been permitted to attend this first private conclave.
He was doing very well until the doors slid open to admit a small contingent who were most definitely not Masadan. Like Ambassador Faldo's diplomats, they wore civilian clothes, but the styles were not Masada's flowing robes. Instead they were in the neat, trim-lined tailoring currently in fashion in the People's Republic of Haven.
As Ambassador Faldo handled introductions, Michael remembered that the Peeps also were wooing the Masadans. Chief Elder Simonds was too canny a politician to ignore this opportunity to show his other suitor the presumed mark of favor Michael's presence was assumed to be. Michael remembered the Moscow and forced his lips to keep from twisting into a cynical grin.
We see your heavy cruiser and raise it by one Crown Prince, he thought, but he let nothing of his amusement touch his manner as he replied to introductions.
Indeed, that was easy enough to do. Michael was one of a bare handful of people who knew that King Roger III's death had not been an accident, but an assassination—an assassination planned by and paid for by the People's Republic of Haven. Beth had been convinced against her own inclinations to keep the matter secret, and so Michael must do the same, but his tone was cool as he accepted Ambassador Acuminata's congratulations on his completing Saganami Island.
"I understand you are specializing in Communications," Acuminata continued. "That's an interesting choice. I would have thought Tactics, or perhaps Engineering would be more the Winton way."
Michael pressed his fingernails into his palm, well-aware that he was being accused of cowardice and lack of ambition. Acuminata was only echoing what some of the more obnoxious newsies had been saying for years.
He forced a smile.
"Communications are very valuable. You wouldn't believe what you can learn if you only listen and watch, then draw the obvious conclusions."
Acuminata blinked, but what he might have said in reply was lost when Chief Elder Simonds, aware he was no longer the central focus of the gathering, coughed.
"Shall we adjourn?" he said, and without waiting for a response swept out of the room.
The conclave was being held in an enormous hall where, to Michael's relief, the Havenite contingent was seated some distance away. To keep himself from glowering at them, Michael sought to distract himself by studying those individual Masadans who stood out from their fellows. The Faithful largely wore their hair and beards long, after the model of Old Testament prophets. Their formal wear continued the motif, consisting of flowing robes enhanced with heavily embroidered arm-bands and belts that almost surely marked achievements in individual careers.
Here and there, however, were men who wore their hair shorter, shaved their beards, and seemed less at ease in the long robes. Michael knew from Lawler and Hill's exhaustive briefings that Masada had a large navy, enhanced by a civilian merchant fleet. Doubtless these men had sacrificed their hair out of the practical considerations of space travel.
Michael's dark Winton complexion had drawn more than a few stares ever since they left the shuttle. Here he understood why. It was one thing to read that the bulk of the original members of the Church of Humanity Unchained had come from a limited segment of Earth's population. It was another to see it so openly demonstrated. Not only had the Masadans come from one stock, unlike the Manticorans, they clearly had not encouraged any immigration.