Endgame (34 page)

“It's not your fight, Dathim.”

“I was his suborn as well as you!”

“I was his student. He was my teacher.” Jani slipped off her bloody overrobe, handed it to Niall. “If he kills me, use it. Break him with it.” She turned toward the circle. Blood
sang in her ears. Sweat tingled her scalp. She sensed the room as brighter, thought for a moment that the illumination had intensified.
No—this is how it feels to fight as Haárin.
An augielike focus. A sharpening of the senses.

He will kill you.

“Then I will see his face.” She started to walk toward the circle, found her way blocked by a male bornsect. Taller than Cèel, and even more scarred. She stared him in the face, and he looked to the side, revealing a gnarl of an ear, half of it sliced away. He pushed a tray of blades at her and pointed to the one she should take, the one that Cèel as the challenged had chosen. A curved Sìah, a sleek crescent with a barbed tip. She picked it up, then walked past him and stepped inside the circle.

Cèel waited on the other side. The scarred male took his place behind him, whispered in his ear.

Jani saw a propitiator out of the corner of her eye, gesturing prayers and invocations against demons. Sànalàn, Tsecha's suborn, who betrayed him.

Keep your prayers.
She said her own. To Ganesh. Remover of obstacles.
Guide my hand, Lord.

She crouched as Dathim had taught her, bent forward at the waist, one leg ahead of the other, arms outstretched to take the hacks of her opponent's blade. Then she tucked her arms in a little to protect her sides, her ribs, and stood on the balls of her feet so she could move more quickly. As if it would help.

He will kill you.

Knife fights never lasted long, especially mismatches.

Cèel moved in first. A short stab that nicked Jani's left wrist, sent rose-pink carrier dripping to the floor. She stepped in it as she tried to parry, felt her boots slide.

Another quick move by Cèel. Another hack, to her right arm this time.

Jani brought up her blade as Cèel backed off, caught his right wrist, sent the blood spraying to the tile. Heard no cries
from the assembled. No cheers. Because this was not that sort challenge. Because sometimes knives slipped, and all knew that this would be one of those times.

Another circling. Another thrust parried. Another. Another.

Then Cèel stepped in. Brought his blade arm around just as Jani brought her knife up. Struck her wrist hard, metal on skin and nerve and bone.

Jani's hand flew open as pain sang up her arm. The blade flashed flame as it tumbled through the air.

Cèel closed in. Gripped her around the waist with his free hand as though they danced. Jani brought up her knee to strike him in the groin, but he lifted her like a doll, shifted her so she struck his thigh instead. She looked him in the face to find he looked in hers as well, eyes like new grass frozen in ice. Then he bared his teeth—

—and sound receded—time—each heartbeat a year—

—and drove in the blade—

—warmth flowing through her skin—spreading—pressure—no pain—her heart—heart—

“Nìa!”

—looked past Cèel—outside the circle—saw a figure—shorn head—bared teeth—

“Nìa, you must—”

I must.

Her hand brushed her pocket—she felt the hardness of the broken blade—drew it out just as Cèel released her and stepped back and—

—she stepped forward—brought up the knife—sliced down—sliced back—

Heard Cèel howl. Felt his blood splash over her. Watched him fall back, hand clutching his thigh, blood flowing like a river, spreading across the circle.

Looked down. Saw one knife in her hand. Saw the other, in her gut.

“Nìa!”

Yes, inshah?

Stepped forward into the tunneling black—

 

That is most stupid, nìa, and I want to hear no more.

Inshah?

Yes, nìa?

Someday you'll be the death of me.

Breathing…breathing…

Pain.

Jani opened one eye, then closed it as the room light battered her. Heard movement off to the side. “Hmm…”

“Jani.” A deep voice. A voice of bedsides and cloudy nights. “Don't try to move.”

“No—” She paused to summon saliva and lick her lips. “—prollem.” She raised a hand that weighed at least a hundred kilos and rested it atop her chest. “…Heavy.”

“Yes.” John lifted her hand and placed it back atop the bed, squeezing it before releasing it. “Cèel stabbed you in the abdomen. The blade curved up—he nicked your left lung, and your heart.” A pause. Sounds of shaky breathing. “You're healing now.”

“I got him…too…” Jani nodded. Tried to nod. “What…happen…?”

“Not now. Get some sleep.”

 

Sounds of a chair being dragged across the floor. The creak of old ergoworks.

Jani pried one eye open, then the other, saw a shape backlit by the glare of a bedside lamp.

“Let me adjust this—” Niall ramped down the brightness, then leaned close. “Shroud doesn't know I'm here, so I need to make it fast.” He looked at her stomach, the padding of sensors and bandages, and winced. “He said that you're far from a hundred percent, so you weaken fast and can't catch your breath and feel like an elephant's sitting on your chest.”

Jani held up two fingers.

“Two elephants.” Niall grinned. “Has anyone talked to you? About the fight?”

Jani tried to shake her head, stopping when the room spun. “Cèel—stabbed me. I stabbed—him. It was—a tie.”

Niall's breath caught. “One of the news services got it all. Don't know how they snuck a relay past bornsect security, but they did. The gel who imaged it spent the next hour in the can throwing up everything down to her shoes, but—she did good. It's a bloody damned thing to watch—the son of a bitch grinned like a skull right before he—” He pressed a hand to his mouth, then slowly lowered it.

Jani reached out, touched Niall's arm with the tip of her finger. “I hit him—” She paused to breathe. “—too.”

“Yes, yes.” Niall glanced back toward the door as he took her hand and patted it to try to settle her down. “The thing is, Jan, you…hit him in the groin, his femoral artery and—” He squeezed her hand. “—he bled out in the circle. In a minute, he bled, and it was—” Another shaky breath. “He's dead, Jan. Cèel's dead.”

 

“I would just like to state for the record that this is bullshit.” Val held Jani around the shoulders, propping her upright until the bed headrest rose up to meet her. “It's only been two days. We told you that she needed at least a week.”

“Doctor, if this wasn't so important, we wouldn't intrude.” Scriabin sat at the foot of the bed. He wore full diplomatic rig, Commerce green tunic bearing every medal and award he'd ever received. “Hurt much?”

“Only when I laugh.” Jani tried to sit up higher, and
stopped when the elephants began to tap dance across her rib cage. “Judging from the expressions on your faces, I doubt we'll be doing much of that, so I'm—probably safe.”

“Niall admitted that he told you.” Mako shook his head. “He thought someone should have told you in the operating room. He thought you'd be able to hear, and it would cheer you up.” He clucked his tongue. “My Niall…can be the bloodiest of bastards.”

“Which is why he'll be your Niall until the stars go out.” Jani brushed off Mako's glower. “So I went into the circle with a second knife.” She touched her thigh where her trouser pocket would have been, where the blade would have rested. “I remember pulling out a knife. I remember stabbing him. Nothing particularly lucid.”

“I can't say I'm surprised.” Val sat on the end of the bed, opposite Scriabin. “I wasn't particularly lucid afterward, and all I did was watch.”

“Did Council lodge a protest?” Jani looked from one face to the next, sensed the need to speak combined with the reluctance to say what needed saying. “It wasn't exactly a fair fight, was it?”

“No, it wasn't.”

Everyone turned to the door.

John filled the entry like a pale guardian, his med-whites rumpled, his face a mask. He glared at Mako and Scriabin, but saved his sharpest look for Val, who started to grumble an explanation before deciding silence the better course.

Then John looked at Jani, and his expression warmed, a little. “Cèel was the better, more experienced fighter. He did not enter the circle in the spirit of challenge, but with every intention of killing you. Everyone who witnessed that fight knew that.”

Jani detected the jittery undertone in the so-familiar bass. “How much did you see?”

“Everything.” John hesitated, then walked to one of the analyzers that ringed her bedside and studied the readout.
“Niall contacted us as soon as you offered challenge. We saw…everything.”

Jani waited as the silence stretched. “Are you going to tell me what else happened, or do I have to bribe an orderly to snag a copy of the image?”

“I would wait a few years to look at that, if I were you.” John remained fixed on the readout. “Cèel's physician-priest wasn't there. We found out later that Rilas had killed her during her escape from the Temple hospital. There were other physician-priests present, but half a minute or more passed while they shook out their hierarchical underwear, and that was a half a minute or more that they didn't have. Our best trauma people would have had their work cut out for them. You couldn't have struck a better spot if you'd aimed.” He shot her a look filled with wonder and the barest hint of cold-blooded admiration. “Then they started on the prayers. I think I recall someone cutting away Cèel's trouser leg to look at the wound, but I confess that my attentions were fixed elsewhere by that point.”

Jani watched as the physician who had pieced her together from char and ashes, who had brought her back from the brink any number of times, returned to his pondering of readouts. “John, did they…?”

“Do I think they let him die?” John raised his head, his eyes bright. “Good God, is there any doubt?” He jerked his chin toward Val, who nodded. “They went through a few of the motions, but they didn't do a damned thing that mattered.”

Scriabin cleared his throat. “Well, there was the issue of Wholeness of Soul—”

“As convenient an excuse as any. If pressed, I'm sure Temple can justify every move they made. And every move they didn't.” John laughed. “He went too far. The other sects wanted him out without matters getting too messy. Saw an opportunity, and made the most of it. Assassination by medical negligence. The history scrolls of the idomeni are no doubt filled.”

Jani looked from John to Val and back to John. For all their professional disdain and outrage, there was one point they continued to skirt. “Could you have helped?”

The silence radiated like cracks in old glass. Man and hybrid looked at one another, decades of closeness whittling down hours of discussion to the arch of an eyebrow, the twitch of a lip.

“You weren't much better off, you know. We had our hands full.” Val looked at the floor and shrugged. “They wouldn't have let us near him anyway.”

“Besides, it's not as though he'd have thanked us. Saved by a humanish and a hybrid—I'm sure if you'd have set out the choice before him, he'd have chosen death.” John turned back to the analyzers and concentrated on touchpad entries. “But it's a moot point. As Val said, we had our hands full with you.”

The room seemed to chill as the truth revealed itself in the humanish manner. In veiled looks and words left un-said. In the arch of an eyebrow and the twitch of a lip.
Yes, we could have tried, but we didn't. Because you came first. Because we saw the look on his face when he drove in the knife. Because he had Tsecha killed. Because the bastard deserved it.

Mako walked to a side table and poured himself water from a carafe. “Remind me to never get on your bad side, Shroud.” He lifted the glass in Val's direction. “That goes for you, too, Parini.” He drank, his stricken expression broadcasting that he would have preferred vodka and even that might not have helped.

Jani waited until the shockwaves settled to the occasional ripple. “So what happened after they carted away the bodies?”

“A firestorm.” Scriabin stood and paced. “The Pathen strong-armed a Council vote with a speed I didn't believe possible outside of Chicago. Aden nìRau Wuntoi is the new Oligarch. The Pathen have ascended to
rau
.”

“I didn't think a bornsect could ascend to
rau
on a vote.”
Val moved to the window and perched on the sill. “What happened to the civil war part?”

“Peaceful transfer of power isn't the norm, but it has happened.” Jani picked her muzzy brain for appropriate bits of idomeni history. “The sect that ascends needs to have built one hell of a consensus, but we knew the Pathenrau had been working on that for a while.”

“After Council refused to allow Cèel's suborn the right to ascend, they kicked all Vynshà out of Council and Temple.” Scriabin stood and paced at the foot of the bed. “Some of the Temple dominants are arguing that Cèel's planning of Tsecha's assassination was so profoundly antithetical to all that is idomeni that it taints all Vynshà.” He slowed. Stilled. “And that all Vynshà must pay.”

“Pay how?” Jani heard the dread in her voice. “How are they supposed to pay?” But she knew the answer. One night twenty years before, she had witnessed the answer.
The sin of one is the sin of all—

Then her gut clenched and she doubled over, slumping to her side as the spasms started and her heart skipped.

“I'm going to have to ask you all to leave.” John turned her over on her back, fingers flicking over the sensors. “
Now.”

 

It was a still night, the moon obscured by cloud—

Jani sat in the hospital's small garden and watched the fish in the ornamental pool, the melodramatic phrasing of the
Colonial Times
playing in her mind's ear like the narration it was. The story had begun with the last days of the War of Vynshàrau Ascension. The reporter had mined every accessible archive and even a couple that technically should have been out of bounds.

Bornsect tradition held that all members of a sect shared in the decisions of their dominants. Therefore, when it became evident that Laumrau dominants had conspired with members of the Commonwealth government and Service to imprison humanish in the hospital-shrine located at Knevçet Shèràa and to subject them to mind control experimentation,
the sin of the few became the shame of the many, and the many accepted that the sin was theirs as well.

“And since all the Laum sinned, all the Laum paid.” Jani worked to her feet, one eye on the relays that studded her right arm and transmitted her vital signs back to the handhelds that John and Val carried with them at all times. “I think there are a few isolated settlements left. A few Laum left alive to pass along the tale, and the warnings.”

“Teaching idomeni history to the fish?”

Jani turned to find Lucien standing in the garden entry.

“I wanted to visit earlier, but Val warned me off.” He walked in, brimmed lid tucked under his arm. “I figured my best bet would be to sneak in and take my chances.” He stopped just beyond reach. “It's sheer insanity outside these walls, you realize that? Vynshà are gathering in the streets and Wuntoi is ready to send out the Haárin to bottle them up.”

Jani lowered back into the chair. “No one tells me anything. Scriabin and Mako were here yesterday, but John ordered them out after—” She patted her chest just over her heart. “They're going to slaughter the Vynshà. It'll make the Night of the Blade look like a skirmish.”

Lucien took a seat on a nearby bench. “What did you expect?” He picked up a branch that had fallen from one of the dwarf weeping willows and poked the water, sending the fish scurrying for shelter. “That's how they've operated for thousands of years. It's insane. A dominant commits a crime, and the entire sect gets thrown over the side. If humans did that, we never would have lasted long enough to make it out of the caves.” He hit the surface hard enough to make a splash, then tossed the branch into the water and watched it bob and float.

Jani watched him out of the corner of her eye.
Duplicitous bastard.
Yet here he was, the only one who seemed willing to tell her what went on beyond the hospital gates. “What's the official Commonwealth position?”

“That it's an internal idomeni matter.”

“Like hell it is.” Jani heard her cardiomonitor emit a warning
beep
, and breathed slowly until it settled. “What happens to the Vynshà Haárin?”

“That's still being discussed.” For the first time, Lucien seemed anxious, clenching his hands and shifting restlessly. “Dathim's under a sort of house arrest until they decide.”

“What do you mean, ‘sort of'?”

“I think they were afraid to come out and tell him.” A quick smile, which soon vanished. “They finally settled on having Meva suggest to him that he should remain within the confines of the enclave. She's technically under house arrest as well. Feyó is trying to intercede for them, but she isn't having much luck.” Lucien clapped the tips of his fingers together. “They'd kill Dathim and Meva because they're Vynshà, even though they're Haárin?” He made a drifting gesture with one hand. “If you'd kept your mouth shut and let me handle it, none of this would have happened. Rilas just would have disappeared.”

“You couldn't have gotten to Cèel.”

“He rode in a skimmer on occasion, didn't he? Idomeni tech isn't all that different.” Lucien sat back, smoothing his hands over his thighs, then dragging his brimmed lid onto his lap and tracing a thumbnail over the gold braid. “That's what they're all saying. That you had to get in everyone's face. Again. You had to broadcast. Again. Everyone knew you were coming. Everyone knew what to expect. You said things that should have been kept quiet. You did things that upset people. And now everyone's stuck. Because it's all out in the open, they have to act in certain ways. Instead of an easy transfer of power to a Vynshà who would have been more amenable, millions are going to die. Because you couldn't keep your damned mouth shut.” His hands stilled. “That's the difference between you and me. I do the job, and I know how to keep my distance. I don't get involved. I don't get emotional.” He paused, eyes fixed on the fish, which had begun to emerge from beneath stones and logs and swim about again. “I just do it.”