"Mariel? My wife?"
Lione let out a slow breath. Clearly he thought he was as good as dead. That being the case, there was no point in withholding exactly what he believed, what he thought. "We are not fools," he told Durla with a nervous sneer. "Your obsession with her was known to all. Did you think that I was unable to tell? That none of us would figure it out? And then you wound up acquiring her in some pathetic game. What a startling coincidence."
"It was no coincidence," Durla replied hotly. "If you must know, Lione, the woman was attracted to me. Vir Cotto had no desire to try to hold on to her, since all she spoke of was me, and he was more than happy to see me secure her."
"Oh, was he now. And how very convenient for him. The chances are that he played you for a fool."
"Impossible. Cotto is nothing."
"He was in a position to give you that for which you hungered. He must have been something."
"He is nothing, I tell you. The Lady Mariel wanted me..."
"Let us say that she did. The reason is obvious. She wanted to be able to manipulate you. She was a spy in my employ, Durla, or have you forgotten that? I know just how much information that woman was capable of acquiring. She likely learned of your fixation with her and decided to use it to her advantage. Women, after all, have no power in our government. What better way for a clever and ambitious woman like Mariel to gain influence than by sinking her claws into a man who would accede to her every whim."
"Mine is the vision, Lione," Durla stated flatly, his considerable aplomb beginning to erode. "Mine is the direction for Centauri Prime..."
"Right, right. Your dreams, from which you garner impressive scientific developments. How likely is that, Prime Minister? As opposed to the thought that they are being fed to you by your beloved wife, who in turn is acquiring them from contacts she has managed to cultivate. We all know you dote on her, fawn on her. She is your sense of self-worth, your inspiration, your image, all rolled into one. You are nothing without the Lady Mariel."
"I had already achieved greatness before she ever became my wife," Durla reminded him. He was barely managing to keep himself from leaping across the room, grabbing the sword, and dispatching Lione himself.
"You achieved it in the hopes of impressing her. How pathetic a life is that?"
For a long moment, Durla said nothing. He fought mightily with himself not to betray a shred of the emotion roiling within him. Then, in a hoarse, choked voice, he said, "General Rhys..."
Lione braced himself for the killing stroke.
"Thank you for your assistance. Wait in the outer office please."
If Rhys was at all disappointed that he was not going to have the opportunity to lop off Lione's head and thereby provide some excitement to what was otherwise a fairly dull day, he did not show it. Instead he simply sheathed his sword, bowed slightly, and walked out.
Minister Lione sat there, clearly not quite knowing what had hit him. When Durla slowly came around to him, he automatically flinched as he saw a hand move toward him. But all Durla did was pat Lione on the shoulder, and say, "I appreciate your candor." He touched the pale, reddish liquid on Lione's throat. "You'll probably want to have that looked at." Then he walked out, leaving a dumbfounded Lione to wonder what had just transpired.
The Lady Mariel was most surprised to see her husband. He strode into their sumptuous quarters unannounced and unexpected. He had not been around much lately during the day; indeed, he had not been around that much at night, either. It was a situation that offered both pluses and minuses. Not having him around was, of course, rather nice, due to the fact that she did not love him. Oh, she feigned it masterfully. Then again, it wasn't hard to fake something when someone else desperately wanted to believe in it.
But if she wasn't a party to his goings-on, it made it that much more difficult for her to get information for her beloved Vir.
Vir, who was back on Babylon 5, putting the information she fed him to good use. She didn't know for sure, but she would not have been surprised if her wonderful Vir was somehow involved with the rebels who were causing so much trouble for Durla and his plans. This, of course, was something she would never let on to Durla. First, it would mean betraying the incomparable Vir, and second, her own duplicity would become known. It would mean death. Her death would be unfortunate enough, but Vir's death – that she simply could not risk. He was too glorious, too magnificent.
Not for the first time, she wondered why she felt that way about him.
Some part of her understood that she had not always embraced such depth of feeling for Vir. On some level, she knew the change had simply come over her, and she could not comprehend what had prompted it. Ultimately, though, it made no difference. Her Vir was her Vir, and that was all. However she came by her feelings, she knew they were honest and true, and every time she was with Durla, only her thoughts of Vir sustained her. At those times, things didn't seem as bad as they were.
"My husband," she said quickly. She had been carefully braiding the long lock of hair that was the fashion with her generation. She did not rise from the chair where she sat, in front of the makeup table. Instead she stayed where she was and watched herself in the mirror as she meticulously continued creating the braid. "Would you forgive me if I did not get up?"
"I will try not to allow it to put a strain on our marriage," he said, in an oddly stiff tone. "You look lovely today."
"And you, strikingly handsome, milord husband," she responded. She knew he liked it when she addressed him in the formal manner, and used it whenever she thought he might be in an expansive mood. It was usually enough to get him talking and spilling choice nuggets of information. "To what do I owe the honor of this appearance?"
He regarded her thoughtfully for a moment, and then said, "Do you love Vir Cotto?"
She allowed the question to appear to catch her off guard. In truth, she had anticipated his asking that at some point. Indeed, the Lady Mariel made it a point to try to anticipate as much as possible, so that – should the eventuality transpire – she would be able to react with a carefully crafted reaction and response.
At least, that was the theory.
"Vir Cotto," she said. "The ambassador? From Babylon 5?"
"Your previous lover," Durla said. There was a slight edgy sharpness to his tone. "I'm sure you have some familiarity with him."
"Yes, of course. But do I love him?" She knew full well that Durla fancied himself a true student of psychology. Often had he boasted to her of his ability to simply gaze into someone's eyes and, by that method, determine the veracity of what they were about to say. So she had long known that the only way she could glide past a potentially awkward situation such as this would be to look him right in the eyes and lie with confidence.
The thing was, the best way to get through the lie was to use as much of the truth as possible. "To be perfectly candid, my love, Vir was simply a means to an end. I used him as a means of establishing diplomatic contacts in order to supply information to Minister Lione. Certainly you must have known that. You were aware that I was in Lione's employ."
"Yes. I was aware of that," he replied slowly. She continued to braid her hair. "You have not directly answered the question, though."
"I thought I had," she said carelessly. Once more she met his gaze, and this time she said flatly and with no lack of conviction, "No. I do not love Vir Cotto. I love only you, my great visionary."
It was the hardest thing she had ever said. Because the truth was that she did love Vir Cotto. The passing of years, the marriage to Durla... none of that had altered her thinking. Vir continued to be her sun, moon, and stars. She had agreed to the sham of Vir's "losing" her to Durla, had pretended that she had always secretly harbored a fascination for the prime minister, all because Vir desired it. She wanted to help Vir, to serve him in any way she could.
She hadn't lied about her original purpose for associating with Vir. Things, however, had changed. She had come to realize the full wonderfulness that was Vir Cotto. One treasured day, with a sudden burst of clarity, as if her previous life had been merely a dream, she abruptly had understood that Vir was the only man for her in all the universe.
She never doubted for a moment that, sooner or later, something would happen to Durla. Something nasty. Something final. Until that time, she would play the dutiful wife and think of Vir and provide him with whatever information she could garner. Because that was what Vir wanted.
Durla nodded and smiled at her affirmation of her love for him, as she had suspected he would. "You know of my dreams ... my great visions," he said.
"Of course I do. Everyone on Centauri Prime does."
"Believe it or not, my love ... in my dreams ... it is you who comes to me."
"Me?" She laughed. "I am most flattered."
"As well you should be. It is not every woman who can serve as inspiration to the prime minister of Centauri Prime." He was walking slowly around her, his hands draped behind his back. "However... there are some who mistake this 'inspiration' that you provide me."
"Mistake? How?"
"They think that you control me. That I have some sort of..." He rolled his eyes and shook his head. "... some sort of obsession that unmans me in your presence."
"Ridiculous," she said vehemently, even as she finished braiding her hair. "You are Durla, prime minister of Centauri Prime. You answer to no woman."
"You know that. I know that. But they," and he pointed in the nebulous direction of the all-present "they," "they believe differently. And I fear that I must do something about it."
"I will support whatever actions you decide to take, beloved." She turned in her seat and smiled her most glowing smile.
He hit her so hard that he knocked her clear out of her chair.
Mariel fell back, striking her head on the floor. She lay there, stunned, feeling the blood welling up from between her teeth and trickling down from her nose. Her lower lip was already swelling, and her upper lip had gone numb.
She tried to stammer out something, anything, and then Durla hauled her to her feet. She tried to push him away but he was far too strong, and then he swung his hand around and struck her again. Her face reddened where he slapped her, and then he backhanded her and she went down again. Her lungs seized up with a coughing fit, and she spat out blood.
"There," Durla said.
"There? " She couldn't believe it. "Wha-what did I do? How did I displease you..."
"You haven't. Unfortunately we live in a world that is shaped by perception," he said sadly. "If the others think that I am unmanned by you ... that I let you manipulate me in any way ... then it can have a very negative impact on me and my fortunes. Even though it is not true. Therefore we need to make clear to any and all who are interested that I am my own man."
He kicked her in the stomach while she lay on the floor. She doubled up, curling almost into a fetal position, and then, with the side of his boot, he struck her in the face. Mariel, sobbing, rolled onto her back, her legs still curled up. She felt something small and hard in her mouth. She rolled it around on her tongue. It was a tooth. She spit it out and it made a faint tik tik noise as it bounced across the floor.
"Yes," he said with satisfaction. "Now any who see you will know that Durla is no woman's servant. No woman's slave. You may be my inspiration ... but I have no compunction about treating you in the same way that I would treat the lowliest of the low. I do not play favorites. For you see, nothing, and no one, is more important than Centauri Prime. And only if I am strong can I help our beloved world attain its true destiny."
"Vir," she whispered, very softly, very hoarsely.
He hadn't quite heard her, because she said it just under her breath, and while he was still talking. "What did you say?" he inquired.
"Dear ... I said ... dear ... please ... don't hurt me ... any more ..." She didn't even recognize her own voice because it was so choked with pain.
"I need the full backing of all the ministers for the full military program that we have planned," he continued. He crouched next to her, and he spoke as if from light-years away. "Picture it, Mariel. Picture powerful warships, poised, ready. Needing only the final go-ahead from me to sweep across the galaxy like a black cloud of strength, reordering all the known worlds and uniting them under our rule. But it can only happen if the Centaurum is fully committed. To me. No hesitation, no reservaln no signs of weakness. I can take no chances that anyone think me soft. You understand, don't you?"
"Yes ... I... I do ... I..."
"Good."
Then he really began to hurt her.
And the thing that kept going through her mind was, Vir... Vir will help me... he will save me... Vir... I love you.
C
HAPTER 5
Vir Cotto felt the world spinning around him, and he sagged to the ground, staring up in disbelief.
He was just outside the palace. The sun was hanging low in the sky, the rays filtering through the haze as the twilight approached. As a consequence, there wasn't much light with which Vir could make out the head on the pike in the garden. But there was just enough light to see, and the head was just familiar enough to recognize.
Rem Lanas stared down at him lifelessly. And yet, even in that lifelessness, there was accusation. Why weren't you here for me, he seemed to say. Why didn't you help me? Why didn't you save me? I trusted you, became a part of your cause ... and this is what happened to me... because of you ... you...
He hadn't expected such a sight. He had been told to wait in the garden, that someone would be along to escort him in for his meeting with the emperor. But he'd been caught completely off guard.
He wasn't sure how long Rem's head had been up there. The weather had not been kind to it.
Then a bird landed on it. To Vir's horror, it pulled experimentally at Rem's cheek, trying to dig out what it apparently thought was a particularly appetizing bit of flesh.