The Serrano Connection (100 page)

Where was this leading? Esmay wasn't sure she was following whatever chain of logic the old woman was forging; she was still too shaken at having admitted—to a stranger—that she loved Barin Serrano. She was hardly aware that the emotional atmosphere had changed, that the old woman wasn't as hostile as she had been.

"Tell me that Brun Meager has
no
morals, and I find myself defending her. But tell me that she cast covetous eyes on your young man, and I am not only willing to believe it, but not even mildly surprised. She's been that way since she first discovered boys."

Was that supposed to excuse her? Esmay felt the familiar stubborn resentment. The old woman paused; Esmay said nothing.

"If you're thinking that making a habit of stealing other women's men is even worse than happening to fall in love with one of them, which is what your face looks like, that's true. She collects them like charms on a bracelet, with reprehensible lack of concern for anyone's feelings. Or she did. Raffa said she'd been more . . . er . . . discreet in the past few years. Apparently someone she took a fancy to refused to have a fling with her."

"Barin . . . didn't," Esmay said. Then, realizing how many ways that could be taken wrong, she tried to explain. "I mean, he wasn't the one, but he also didn't. He said . . ." Her voice failed her. After a miserable pause, during which she wished she could evaporate, the old lady continued.

"But what you should know is that while Brun's moral qualities are certainly immature, the girl had the right instincts about many things. She's been wild, heedless, rebellious—but she's not wittingly cruel."

"She said things to me, too." That sounded almost childish, and again Esmay wished she could just not be there.

"In the heat of an argument, yes. She would. Both of you sound rather like fishwives in the tape." The old lady picked up and put down a datawand and a memo pad. "Suppose you tell me how you met her, and what happened then?"

Esmay could see no reason for doing so, but she felt too exhausted to protest. Dully, she recounted the story of her first sight of Brun arguing with her father, and what followed, up to the point where Barin arrived.

"Let me see if I have this right. Brun admired you, wanted to be your friend, but you found her pushy and uncomfortable."

"Sort of. I'd seen her throw that tantrum with her father—"

"That sounds like her—and like her father, for that matter. Stubborn as granite, all that family. Back when her father was a boy, he had almost that same argument with
his
father. But since he was only ten years old, it was easier to deal with. So, from the first, Brun impressed you as spoiled and difficult, and you wanted no part of her."

"Not exactly," Esmay said. "If I hadn't been so busy, taking double courses, I might've had time to talk to her. She kept wanting to go off somewhere and have a party, when I had to study. But that doesn't mean I wanted her to get hurt."

"And knowing Brun, she would've counted on her charm—she probably couldn't figure out why you weren't being friendlier. A natural ally, she would have thought—ran away from a repressive home and made a career for herself, and
her
family isn't interfering."

"I suppose . . ." Esmay said. Had that been what Brun was thinking? It had not occurred to her that Brun could ever think of them as having much in common.

"And then, on top of that, she made a play for your man. I wonder if she was serious about that, or if she just thought he could help her get to you?"

"She asked him to sleep with her," Esmay said, angry again.

"Ah. Unwise of her, at best. And you suddenly thought of her as a rival, a sneak, and a slut, did you?"

"Mmm . . . yes." Put like that, it made her seem even more naive than she was. If that were possible.

"And you got mad and reamed her out for it. But, my dear, had you ever bothered to tell her you were in love with the man?"

"Of course not! We hadn't made any promises . . . I mean . . ."

"Have you told
anyone
?"

"Well . . . only when I went home for Great-grandmother's funeral, I told my cousin Luci."

"Who is how old? And what did she say?"

"She's eighteen . . . and she said I was an idiot." Esmay blinked back sudden tears. "But she—she's had those years at home, and her mother—and no one ever told me—"

The old lady snorted. "No, I don't suppose how to conduct a love affair is one of the courses taught at the Academy or the prep school."

"What they said was not to become involved with people above or below in the same chain of command, and avoid all situations of undue influence."

"That sounds like a recipe for confusion," Marta commented.

"In the professional ethics segment at Copper Mountain," Esmay said, "there was more about that—and I started worrying about what I might do to Barin—"

"Professionally, you mean?"

"Yes—I'm two ranks senior, he's just an ensign. It seemed natural at first—and we weren't in the same chain of command—but maybe I shouldn't, anyway. I told myself that," Esmay said, aware of the misery in her voice. "I tried to think how to talk to him about it, but—but
she
was always there, and I didn't have time—"

"Oh . . . my. Yes, I see. She had the experience, and you didn't. She had the time, and you didn't. And you would not see her being concerned about her effect on his career, either, I daresay."

"No. It was always 'Barin, since Esmay's being no fun, let's go into Q-town for a drink or something.'"

"I've met the young Serrano," Marta said. Her finger traced a line on the built-in desk. "Handsome boy—seems very bright. His grandmother thinks rather well of him, and tries not to show it."

"How is he?" asked Esmay, her whole heart waiting for the answer.

"Thriving, I would say, except for the woman he's got on his trail. One Lieutenant Ferradi, as slickly designed a piece of seduction as I've ever seen. I wonder who did her biosculpt. He's at that age, Lieutenant Suiza, where young men of quality are full of animal magnetism and some women behave like iron filings. Tell me, if you will, who noticed whom first between the two of you?"

"He—came to me," Esmay said, feeling the heat in her face.

"Ah. No iron filing tendencies in you, then. Typical—the magnets prefer to join other magnets: like to like."

"But I'm not—"

"A magnet? I think you misjudge yourself; people often do. The most distressing bores are most sure they fascinate; the least perceptive will tell you at great length how they understand your feelings; every hero I ever knew was at least half-convinced of his or her own cowardice. If you were not a magnet, so many people could not be so angry with you."

Esmay had never looked at character that way, and wasn't sure she agreed. But Marta went on.

"You're a born leader; that's clear from your record. That, too, is a magnet quality. You repel or you attract . . . you are not, as it were, inert. Brun's the same—and when magnets aren't attracted, they're often repellent to one another. You got, as it were, your like poles too close together."

"I suppose . . ."

"Tell me, if you hadn't been working so hard, and if Barin hadn't been there, do you think you'd have found anything to like in Brun?"

"Yes," Esmay said after a moment. "She could be fun—the few times we had a few minutes together, I enjoyed it . . . I could see why people liked her so much. She lights up a room, she's bright—we were on the same team for the E&E class exercises, you know. She learned fast; she had good ideas."

"Good enough to get herself out of her present predicament?"

"I . . . don't know. They wouldn't let her take the field exercise—that's one thing she blamed me for, and I had nothing to do with it. But against a whole planet—I don't think that would've helped. What worries me is that they aren't paying attention to her character in the planning—"

"I thought you said she had none—"

Esmay waved that away. If this woman, even this one woman, would listen to what she'd worked out, maybe it would help Brun. "I don't mean sexual morality. I mean her personality, her way of doing things. They're talking—they were talking—as if she were just a game piece. Unless she's dead, she's planning and doing
something
—and if we don't know what, we're going to find our plans crossing hers."

"But the Guernesi said there's no way to communicate with her—that pregnant and nursing women are sequestered, and besides, she can't talk." Still, Marta's eyes challenged Esmay to keep going.

"She needs to know she's not forgotten," Esmay said. "She needs to know someone thinks she's competent—"

"You sound as if you thought you understood her," Marta said.

"They silenced her," Esmay said, ignoring that invitation. "That doesn't mean she can't think and act. And—did they tell you about the children on that merchant ship?"

Marta frowned. "I . . . don't know. I don't think so. What does that have to do with Brun?"

Quickly Esmay outlined her new theory. "If they didn't kill those children, if they were taking them, they'd have put Brun in with them. That might be enough to keep her alive—if she thought she had a responsibility to the children. And she'd be planning some rescue for them, I would bet on it."

"I suppose it's possible . . ."

"And besides, for her to come out of this in the end, even if she is rescued, she needs to feel that she had some effect. It's one of the things they taught us, and Barin knows from experience . . . a captive who is just rescued like a . . . a piece of jewelry or something . . . has a much harder time regaining a normal life. She was not just captured; she was muted, and then raped—made pregnant. All her options closed. They should be thinking beyond getting her out, to getting her out with some self-respect left."

Marta looked at her with a completely changed expression. "You're serious . . . you couldn't have come up with that if you didn't really care. That's good thinking, Lieutenant—excellent thinking. And I can tell you that you're right—the planning group is not considering any of those things."

"Can you get it across to them?"

"Me? It's your idea."

"But I don't know how to get anyone to listen to me. They're so convinced I wanted something bad to happen to her, none of them will let me near the planning sessions, let alone speak. If you tell them, maybe they'll consider it."

"You're not asking for credit—"

Esmay shook her head. "No. Brun's the one in critical danger. Of course, I'd like to be the one to come up with the best solution . . . but it's better that someone comes up with it, than have it ignored."

"I'll . . . see what I can do," Marta said. "In that and other situations."

Admiral Serrano frowned as the door opened, but her expression eased as Marta Saenz swept through. "Marta! I heard you were back from downside. We missed you the past few sessions. Lord Thornbuckle was actually making sense when you left, but he's foaming at the mouth again."

"I was prowling amongst the troops, as you'd put it. And I just had a little conversation with your Lieutenant Suiza," Marta said.

"Her." The admiral frowned again. "A very disappointing decision, encouraging her switch to command track. She's not working out at all."

"You've got the bull by the wrong leg," Marta said. "Did you know the girl was besotted with your grandson?"

"I know they formed an attachment on
Koskiusko
, which I'm glad to see is no longer important."

"Oh, but it is," Marta said. "The silly child fell madly in love for the first time in her life, and nothing in her background told her what to do when a rich, beautiful, charismatic blonde moved in on her love life."

"But she's—what?—almost thirty."

"She's also Altiplanan, lost her mother when she was five, and apparently no one told her about anything to do with love. So when she finally fell, she fell like the side of a mountain. Something she heard in a class on professional ethics started her worrying about whether she should have—as if rules ever affected gravity or love—and while she was fumbling around trying to put her emotional affairs in order, Brun started playing come-hither with your grandson. Who resisted, by the way, but Esmay didn't know that when she blew up."

"I can hardly believe—"

"Oh, it's true. And your grandson is equally besotted with her, though he's tried to fight it. He was angry and hurt that Esmay didn't trust him, and—since he wasn't the one feeling unsure and jealous—he was appalled at her attack on Brun."

"Where did you get all this . . . inside knowledge of my grandson's head?"

"His heart, not his head. By poking around being a nosy old woman and then a more . . . er . . . traditional grandmother than you are. He could hardly confide his guilty passion to you, now could he? Not when his lady love was in your black book and he knew your position was shaky, with dear Admiral Hornan doing his best to grab your command."