The Ruby Dice

Prologue
I
Hall Of Circles
II
A Debt To Life
III
The Guards
IV
Viasa
V
Scholars' Dice
VI
A Court Of Rubies
VII
The Gold Die
VIII
Sunsky Bridge
IX
Plaza Of Memories
X
King's Spectrum
XI
Hawk's Queen
XII
The Last Band
XIII
Space-Time Enigma
XIV
Cathedral
XV
The Bitterfruit Tree
XVI
Pillar Of Light
XVII
Pillar Of Darkness
XVIII
The Ward Of Lives
XIX
A Chilling Blue
XX
Dyad Quis
XXI
The Broken Pillar
XXII
The Path Home
XXIII
The Lost Covenant
XXIV
A Father's Debt
XXV
The Fountain
XVI
Tides Of Sorrow
XXVII
The Hall Of Providence
XXVIII
Mists Of Discourse
XXIX
Refuge And Fire
XXX
A Brace Of Kinsmen
XXXI
The Meld
XXXII
Stained Glass
XXXIII
Mists Of Jaizire
XXXIV
A Choice Of The Ages
XXXVV
Quis
XXXVI
Duet
Characters and Family History
About The Author
 

This is a work of fiction. All the characters and events portrayed in this book are fictional, and any resemblance to real people or incidents is purely coincidental.
Copyright © 2008 by Catherine Asaro
A Baen Books Original
Baen Publishing Enterprises
P.O. Box 1403
Riverdale, NY 10471
www.baen.com
ISBN 10: 1-4165-5514-5
ISBN 13: 978-1-4165-5514-8
Cover art by Alan Pollack
First printing, January 2008
Distributed by Simon & Schuster
1230 Avenue of the Americas
New York, NY 10020
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data: t/k
Printed in the United States of America

Sunrise Alley
Alpha
The Ruby Dice

I would like to thank the following readers for their much appreciated input. Their comments have made this a better book. Any mistakes that remain are mine alone.

To Aly Parsons, Kate Dolan, Sarah White, and Maria Markham Thompson for their excellent reading and comments on the full manuscript; to Aly's Writing Group for insightful critiques of scenes: Aly Parsons, Simcha Kuritzky, Connie Warner, Al Carroll, J. G. Huckenpöhler, John Hemry, Bud Sparhawk, and Bob Chase. To my editor and publisher, Toni Weisskopf; to Hank Davis, Marla Anspan, Danielle Turner, Mary Ann Johanson (copy editor), and all the other people at Baen who did such a fine job making this book possible; to my excellent agent, Eleanor Wood, of Spectrum Literary Agency; and to Binnie Braunstein for her enthusiasm and hard work on my behalf.

A heartfelt thanks to the shining lights in my life, my husband, John Cannizzo, and my daughter, Cathy, for their love and support.

The Emperor of the Eubian Concord ruled the largest empire ever known to the human race, over two trillion people across more than a thousand worlds and habitats. It was a thriving, teeming civilization of beautiful complexity, and if it was also the greatest work of despotism inall history, its ruling caste had managed to raise their denial of that truth also to heights greater than ever before known.

Lost in such thoughts, the emperor stood in a high room of his palace and stared out a floor-to-ceiling window at the nighttime city below. The sparkle of its lights created a visual sonata that soothed his vision, if not his heart. At the age of twenty-six, Jaibriol the Third had weathered nine years of his own rule. Somehow, despite the assassination attempts, betrayals, and gilt-edged cruelty of his life, he survived.

Tonight the emperor grieved.

He mourned the loss of his innocence and his joy in life. His title was a prison as confining as the invisible bonds that held the billions of slaves he owned and wished he could free.

Most of all, he mourned his family. Ten years ago tonight, his parents had died in a spectacular explosion recorded and broadcast a million times across settled space. In the final battle of the Radiance War between his people and the Skolian Imperialate, the ship carrying his parents had detonated. He had seen that recording again and again, until it was seared into his mind.

Jaibriol's father had descended from a long line of emperors, every one of them dedicated to the destruction of the Imperialate. On that day, the Skolian Imperator had captured his father. Rather than see him imprisoned, his own people had destroyed the Imperator's ship. So had come the death of Jaibriol's father, the Emperor of Eube.

And so had come the death of Jaibriol's mother—the Imperator of Skolia.

How two interstellar potentates ended up in the midst of a battle, Jaibriol would never know. Perhaps they had been fleeing into exile, seeking a place where the hatred between their peoples couldn't destroy them. Whatever the truth, they had taken it to their graves. Now both were ten years dead, and Jaibriol sat on the Carnelian Throne. His mother had ruled the empire of his enemies. He carried the secret of his heritage like a bomb ready to detonate within him.

He kept his bedroom darkened as he gazed at the city below, Qoxire, the capital of his empire. He could no longer see the lights that glistened on the lofty towers, nor could he see beyond the city to the thundering waves that crashed on a shoreline of dazzling black sand. The scene's luster blurred into luminous washes of color, for tonight the emperor wept.

A door hissed across the room. He tensed, knowing it could be only one person. His bodyguards would stop anyone else. Unless they were dead and this was an assassination attempt. He felt more sorrow at the thought of their possible deaths than of his own. He continued to gaze out the window. If an assassin had come upon him tonight, perhaps he should let the killer free him from the agony of his so- called glorious reign.

Footsteps whispered on the deep-piled rug. Someone stopped behind him, and he heard breathing.

"If you have a knife," Jaibriol said. "I would suggest placing it between my third and fourth ribs."

A woman spoke in a dusky voice. "I never carry knives. They're too obvious."

Jaibriol turned around. The woman stood at nearly his height, her leanly muscled body taut with coiled energy. Glittering black hair brushed her shoulders, and her upward-tilted eyes were as red as gems. Her high cheekbones underscored her aquiline beauty, giving her the profile that graced several Eubian coins. Her black jumpsuit resembled a uniform, except that it fit snugly, accenting her sultry, pantherlike sensuality. She could have passed for thirty-five, but Jaibriol knew the truth. His wife was more than a century in age.

"You don't need a knife," he said. "You cut to the bone without it."

Her lips curved upward. "I thank you for the compliment."

"What would you consider an insult?" he asked dryly. "If I called you sweet and accommodating?"

She raised her sculpted eyebrow at him. "For what possible reason would you say such a thing?"

Perhaps because just once,
he thought,
I would like a wife who showed even one of those traits.
She didn't catch his thought; she had no telepathic ability. Although she wasn't an empath, either, she was far more attuned to his moods than he would have thought possible for a member of the Highton Aristo caste. Of course, he was supposedly Highton as well. He had the shimmering black hair, red eyes, and alabaster skin. No one had any idea he possessed the forbidden abilities of a psion.

"I was curious to see your reaction," he said. It was even true.

"No games, Jai. Not tonight." She sounded tired. Or more accurately, she let her fatigue show. Although she presented a perfect, cool exterior to the world, he knew her too well to be fooled.

"Why not tonight?" he asked. It was refreshing to ask a straight question. In normal discourse, Hightons never did. Direct speech was an insult, for Aristos used it only with their slaves. Except, of course, between lovers. He had long ago decided not to dwell on the implications, that they used the same form of speech with lovers and slaves.

His wife, Tarquine, walked away, across the dimly lit room. "It's the mercantile Lines," she said, sounding distracted.

Well, hell. If Tarquine decided some group posed a threat, she could do a great deal of damage. As Finance Minister, she wielded far too much influence over the economics of the Eubian empire; her reach could affect even the other two civilizations that shared the stars with them, the Skolian Imperialate and the Allied Worlds of Earth.

"Merchants in general?" he asked. "Or one in particular?"

She turned to him. "The Line of Janq."

"They're the ones who own so many export corporations in Ivory Sector, aren't they?" As Diamond Aristos, they dealt with Jaibriol less than his Highton Aristo advisors.

"If this consortium they are putting together succeeds," Tarquine said, "they will own all of them."

Jaibriol frowned. That would give one Aristo Line a lock on nearly one quarter of the empire's most lucrative export institutions. "Can you get me a report on what you know?"

"A report." She watched him, her eyes dark in the dim light. "So you can prepare for a meeting with them that will allow us to negotiate this situation in a reasonable manner."

His jaw ached, and he realized he was clenching his teeth. He forced himself to relax. "That's right."

She came back over to him. "Of course, Jai. I will provide you with a report."

He hated it when she agreed that easily; it almost always meant trouble. She unsettled him as much today as when he had met her, perhaps even more now that he knew her better. Nine years ago, his joint commanders of Eubian Space Command, or ESComm, had conspired to kill him and nearly succeeded twice, including on his wedding day, though no proof existed. In the end, they had both died by assassination. Three civilizations believed they had arranged each other's deaths. How could it be otherwise? No one could touch those two warlords who led the massive, relentless military machine of the Eubian empire.

Except Tarquine.

She would never acknowledge it, but Jaibriol knew. She had arranged the death of the admiral through the explosion of his ship, making it look as if the other commander killed him. The retaliation of the admiral's kin had been fast; before Jaibriol knew even one of his commanders had died, both were gone.

"Tarquine," he warned. "Keep out of it."

"I am the Finance Minister," she said mildly. "I cannot 'keep out of it.'"

"You know what I mean."

"You worry too much," she murmured.

"When you say 'don't worry,' I get hives."

She laid her finger on his cheek. "It will be fine."

He folded his hand around her fingers and moved them away. He was no longer the naïve youth who had married her out of desperation, because he was safer with her as his empress than as his enemy. He was still young compared to his advisors, hardly more than a boy by Highton standards, but he had learned a great deal over the past ten years. And if it meant he had lost his innocence, it also meant he kept his life.

Jaibriol had never lost his dream—to make peace between his people and the Skolians. He would never have the chance to know his family, the Ruby Dynasty who ruled Skolia. Their Imperator, Kelric Valdoria, would never know he was the uncle of Eube's emperor. That secret would remain locked within Jaibriol. But perhaps they could meet at the peace table. It was the only way he knew to honor his mother and father, who had dreamed of ending the hostilities between their two peoples.

He didn't want his parents to have died in vain.

The night mourned with silence, as if it were a sonata with no music left to play. More than ever, tonight Kelric Skolia—Imperator of the Skolian Imperialate—felt his age. The years weighed on him.

He sat on the bed, in the dim light, and watched his wife sleep. White hair curled around her face. Her skin was smooth, with only a few wrinkles, but it had a translucent quality. Her torso barely rose and fell with her shallow breaths. The crook of her nose, broken decades ago, shadowed her cheek. She had never wanted it fixed, though he could have given her anything, anything at all, any riches or wealth or lands or gifts.