He was watching my face. "Did you get what you wanted?"
"No." My voice caught. "I don't want this."
"I won't beg for my life." He spoke quietly. "The Assembly has always done what it believes best for our people, Dehya. No, it hasn't been pretty, what the Ruby Dynasty has endured. But the alternatives were even worse."
" 'Hasn't been pretty?' " My anger stirred. "My father and mother died from 'not pretty.' Kurj gave up his peace of mind, his ability to love, and finally his life. Soz died. The Assembly drugged Eldrin and me, threatened and imprisoned us. For what? A son who almost went insane because we should never have had children? What benefit to Skolia was Taquinil's misery? The Traders tortured Althor for two years. They tortured Eldrin." I took a deep breath, stunned at the depth of the rage I had suppressed. "My son, husband, mother, father, Soz, Kurj, Althor, Kelric— how
long
must the list go on? When will we have lived enough hells to satisfy you all?"
Deep lines were etched his face. "I grieve for your losses. But what is more important? What is best for your family or for human survival?"
"That's a cheap shot."
"It is a valid question, Dehya."
"It doesn't have to be an either-or question. The Assembly never gave us a chance to find a better way."
"And you think you can."
I couldn't evade his question, not when he would soon die because of its answer. I spoke slowly. "This much I know: I can best decide myself how I serve Skolia. As long as the Assembly controls my life, everyone loses. Why must we always have a loser and a winner? A way must exist for both to win."
"It isn't this." He pushed his hand slowly through his hair, that one motion telling of a deep-seated fatigue beyond physical exhaustion. "You unnerve people. Gods know, none of us can claim to understand how you think. How did you know Kelric Valdoria still lived? That Delos was important? Or about those foster children on Earth? Then there are the webs. You go anywhere. We've never found a security system that could stop you. As much as you take that for granted, no one else can do it. Saints only know what else you've concluded that you're telling no one."
I froze.
What else you've concluded.
I kept the name Jaibriol III shrouded in my mind. "Barcala, recant your opposition to my government. Go in public and give your support to the Ruby Dynasty. Exhort the former Assembly Councilors to support us. Damn it, let me let you
live.
"
He spoke mildly. "Even if I did all that, you still couldn't let me live. ISC and the noble Houses will demand the execution."
"I don't care. I won't order it. But you have to give me a reason I can support. Otherwise my rule is undermined before it starts."
"I won't dishonor my principles." He took a deep breath. "Not even to live."
The hatch hummed behind us. As we turned, it opened. Kelric filled the entrance. He glanced from Barcala to me. "The shuttle is waiting."
Turning to Barcala, I mentally beseeched him one last time. Aloud I said, "Come with us. Make the statement."
He spoke with regret, and also fear, but his voice remained strong. "I can't do what you want. I couldn't live with myself if I did."
My eyes felt hot. "Then we must, each of us, do what is necessary."
Softly he said, "Farewell, Dehya."
I swallowed. "Good-bye, Barcala."
Then I had to leave, to face the unforgiving future.
32
Light and Air
Golden light bathed the Hall of Chambers, gilding it in antique hues. Media teams surrounded the dais, setting up consoles, arranging holocams, and checking lamps. They would broadcast our speech to Parthonia and also to ships in orbit, which would carry it to other worlds. Telops also prepared to use the newly-birthed psiberweb to send the broadcast. Jagernaut bodyguards paced the hall. Less visible, but more deadly, EI-controlled defense systems kept track of everyone.
Kelric and I stood in an alcove. Techs moved around us, attaching mikes that would carry our voices to whatever recording devices wanted them. I felt numb. Kelric watched me in silence, his gaze questioning, but I couldn't answer.
I thought of Colonel Yamada on Delos, who had dealt with us in honor, yes, but also in fear that Earth's bellicose siblings would lay waste to an innocent world in retaliation for an offense against the Ruby Dynasty. And the Allieds, who had chosen to hold their fire on the racer. Would I have let an Allied racer go free in a similar circumstance? Then I thought of Soz, Jaibriol II, Jaibriol III, of three children who had vanished. Soz had to have died for a reason. I couldn't believe the Radiance War had been in vain.
A tech adjusted a micro-monitor on my collar. It would analyze anyone who came near me and relay data to my bodyguards. I wore a simple blue jumpsuit and had my hair piled on my head. No ostentation. Not today.
The tech spoke into the comm on her wrist. "We're ready here."
"Good." The voice came out of her comm. "Have Pharaoh Dyhianna and Imperator Skolia come out after we finish the anthem."
"Will do," the tech said.
Kelric spoke to me in a low voice. "Are you sure about this? I can still speak."
"It's all right. I don't mind." It didn't surprise me that he had asked that only I speak during the ceremony. He had always loathed public oration.
Our bittersweet anthem floated from the airy Hall, painfully beautiful. Its notes flashed like water in the sun, yet they also sang of pain and loss. When the anthem finished, Kelric and I left the alcove, escorted by techs and bodyguards. The holocams followed our progress through the golden light, which the techs were no doubt enhancing. As we mounted the dais, the media crews moved back so they wouldn't block the cameras. Our bodyguards continued with us to the center of the great disk. Then we waited, gazing at the holocams, aware we were also looking out at billions, even trillions of people.
A low voice sounded in my ear, coming from a comm-button the techs had put there. "We're ready to start, Your Highness."
So. It was time. I took a breath. Then I began. "My people, I greet you. I come before you today with great hope. It has been five thousand years since the height of the Ruby Empire, almost six thousand since the Ruby Dynasty first rose to power. Throughout our history, Skolia has been our heart. Now, today, we honor that heart with the advent of a new and greater era."
I stopped, the words of the speech in my mind, poised like spears ready to fall. The next sentence would start simply:
With a smooth transition to the new government…
Those eight words had caused more debate among my speech writers than the rest of the address. It was the closest I would come in this broadcast to mentioning Barcala's execution.
"With a smooth transition to the new government," I began. The rest waited on my tongue:
The Ruby Dynasty again assumes full sovereignty of the Skolian Imperialate.
I looked past the techs, consoles, and holocams to the people around the edges of the Hall. Eldrin was there, leaning against a column, his arms crossed. He wore normal clothes today, no fairy-tale king for the Allieds, just a normal man in gray slacks and a gray pullover.
You are the sea that carries my ship,
I thought to him.
The currents of wind I ride above the mountains, the air that lets me breathe.
The love he and I shared, it had been enough to pull me across the stars to him at Delos. Harmonics of love. He and I, we existed together, complete in ourselves, but isolated from the rest of humanity. Someday we would have to decide: remain as we were or relinquish our humanity and become something else. Taquinil had made his decision, completing the evolution he and I had started. A day might come when I also took that journey.
But not today.
I still wanted my humanity. I wanted Skolia. But I couldn't do it alone. Just as Kelric's Quis dice needed structures to give them meaning, or spherical harmonics needed physics to define them as more than pleasing shapes, so the Rhon needed the rest of humanity to achieve our full potential. Kelric's dice were exquisite jewels. Spherical harmonics were lovely functions. But what did you do with gems in geometric shapes? What did you do with beautiful functions? They could exist in isolation or they could be more. Kelric's dice created Quis. Spherical harmonics described the physical universe. The Rhon wove the psiberweb.
Less than a second had gone by while I paused. So I spoke again, letting the acoustics of the hall amplify my voice. "We will meld an alliance unlike any Skolia has known before."
Throughout the hall, the techs and media people looked up from whatever they were doing. This wasn't the script.
"Several tendays ago," I continued, extemporizing, "the government of Skolia shifted from the Assembly to the Ruby Dynasty. I stand before you now as full sovereign. During the Ruby Empire, the rule of the Dynasty was absolute."
Techs were talking into comms now, agitated, intent on my words, and also on whatever protests were coming over their comms.
"Skolia identified itself for six millennia through the Ruby Empire," I said. "Yet in this modern day, in the complexities of human life, we chose a representative government instead." I paused for many seconds this time, giving myself one last chance to reconsider. Then I said, "And so it should be."
The techs froze, their comms forgotten. Beyond them, Eldrin lowered his arms and stood upright.
I searched for the right words. Although I had planned none of this, the thoughts had long been in my mind. "The uneasy meld of modern politics with ancient tradition has often rent our civilization. We think of ourselves as an ancient race from Raylicon, yet compared to humanity on Earth, we are incredibly young. We have no history prior to six thousand years ago, only distant memories of our birth world. We are new. Raw. At this crucial time in our growth, we dare not destabilize Skolia. We need
both
the Ruby Dynasty and Assembly."
The techs were moving fast now, making sure they caught every word as I continued. "For that reason, the new government will join old and new." I was guessing now; I had spoken of this with no one. "The Ruby Dynasty and the Assembly will share the governance of Skolia."
If the Assembly accepted my proposal, they would never again control us. But neither would we control them. It wasn't an ideal solution; the traditions of the Ruby Empire didn't allow for partial pharaohs. But if sharing power could give the Ruby Dynasty the freedom to control our lives, I could live with my title being called honorary. The reality mattered, not the names applied by history and tradition.
The noble Houses wouldn't like it. Yet Vazar's responses through all this made me wonder if even some of them would prefer this to a complete overthrow of the Assembly. The new relationship wouldn't be easy, but maybe, just maybe, it would be better.
"So begins our new future." I turned to another holocam, shifting my focus as I had been asked to do at the end of the speech. I was supposed to finish with a rousing tribute to Skolia. But I had a different conclusion in mind, one that had been turning in my thoughts ever since I had heard Jaibriol III speak these words:
We have suffered the ravages of our conflicts. Let us now seek to heal. To the people of the Skolian Imperialate and the Allied Worlds of Earth, I say this: Meet me at the peace table. Let us lay to rest the hatreds that have sundered our common humanity.
I had neither the eloquence nor planning that had gone into his speech, but I did have the authority to respond. All settled space would hear my words, but they were meant for one person. Perhaps he was my nephew, perhaps not, but he still extended the bittersweet promise of hope.
I spoke to the camera. "I accept the offer of Jaibriol the Third, Emperor of Eube, to meet at the peace table. Let us work together— Skolian, Trader, and Allied— to heal the rifts that have divided our common humanity."
So finished my first— and last address— as a full Ruby sovereign.
* * *
We strode down a goldstone corridor, Kelric, Eldrin, and I, in a flurry of motion and a crowd of people, all headed away from the Hall of Chambers. The elevator at the end of the corridor would whisk us to the roof, where we would board a racer and return to
Roca's Pride.
Holocasters sped along with us, both human and robot, keeping up a barrage of questions. Jagernauts surrounded us in a bulwark. Actually, Kelric made a good portion of that bulwark. Although his face remained impassive, I could tell he was enjoying himself.
Harried techs ran with us, giving the same answer over and over to the holocasters: Details would be forthcoming. It was fortunate we hadn't planned to take questions after the speech anyway, because we had no answers. I didn't know if Barcala would consent to my idea. But even if he refused, no one could execute him now. I had become part of a coalition government, one that
included
the Assembly. If Barcala said no, the Assembly could vote him out and pick a new First Councilor.
