Change of Command

Chapter Three

Two uneventful transits after leaving Zenebra, Cecelia was in Castle Rock’s nearspace, confirming that Miranda was still onplanet and still in residence in the Old Palace. When she called, the staff person who answered reported that Miranda would indeed be willing to see her. Cecelia made her shuttle reservation while waiting for the station tug to bump her gently into the docking harness. The paperwork necessary to clear the Rockhouse Major Dockmaster and Customs seemed to take forever (had Heris really coped with this much, or was it worse because of the assassination?) but she made her shuttle with a few minutes to spare. She saw no one she knew on Rockhouse Major, and no one familiar on the down shuttle. That suited her; she was in no mood to talk to any of her acquaintances.

But when she came out of the shuttleport entryway, looking for a hirecar, she saw one of the long black official cars, with the Familias seal on the doors, and the driver clearly recognized her.

“Lady Cecelia?”

“Yes?”

“Lady Miranda sent us for you. Your luggage?”

“In the dump,” Cecelia said, handing over the ID strip. The driver nodded to his second, who took the strip and went off toward the dumps. Belatedly, Cecelia wondered if she should make sure of their identity and authorization—Heris, she thought, would be scolding her if Heris were here. But the driver was now holding out a flat packet.

“Lady Miranda wanted you to have this first,” he said.

Cecelia opened it. A note from Miranda, and a flatpic of the driver and assistant. “You may not be worried,” the note said, “but we have learned we must all take precautions. I look forward to seeing you.”

In minutes, the assistant was back with Cecelia’s few pieces of luggage, all marked with the striped tape that meant they’d passed Customs. Cecelia got into the car and wondered, as it shot forward into traffic, if they were taking the same route Bunny had followed the day he was killed. She didn’t ask.

At the Palace, everything seemed normal at first. The same uniforms at the gate, at the doors. The same quietly efficient staff who guided her first to her guest room overlooking a small garden, and then, when she had showered and changed, to Miranda’s suite. It was hard to remember, in this quiet gracious place, that Bunny was dead, and all their peace in peril. She found herself expecting to see him coming down the corridor, his pleasantly foolish face lighting with a smile.

Until she came face to face with Miranda, and saw the devastation of that legendary beauty. Cecelia wondered how the same exquisite curves of bone, the same flawless skin, could now express a wasteland. After the rituals of greeting, when the staff had placed a tea set on the low table and withdrawn, Cecelia could wait no longer. No need, when the porcelain surface had already shattered.

“Miranda, what have they told you about it—about who did it?”

“Nothing.” Miranda poured a cup of tea and handed it to Cecelia; the cup did not rattle on the saucer. “I know the news media say it was the New Texas Militia, in retaliation for the executions. I know that the former head of security is on administrative leave. But they have very gently let me know that investigations are in progress, and I will be informed when it is time. Do have a pastry; you always liked these curly ones, didn’t you?”

Cecelia ignored the offered pastry. “Miranda . . . I don’t think it was the NewTex Militia.”

“Why?” Miranda’s face had no more expression than a cameo.

“I think it was someone . . . inside.”

“Family?” Her voice was cool. Why wasn’t she upset? Why wasn’t she frightened? Had she been through too much?

Cecelia waited a moment, then went on. “Pedar said . . . that Bunny broke rules.”

Miranda’s mouth twitched; it might have been grimace or grin. “He did. He was so . . . so quiet, so . . . compliant, it always seemed. But from the first time he brought me a tart he’d filched from the cook, when we were children, and showed me where we could hide from our governesses . . . he broke rules.”

“More important than that,” Cecelia said.

“I know.” Miranda stared past Cecelia’s left ear, as if she saw something a long way away, but was too tired to pay much attention.

“Miranda!” Even before Miranda turned her eyes back, Cecelia had bitten back the rest of it, all that she wanted to say. You can’t give up now. You have to keep going. You have a family—

“I have a family,” Miranda said, in that cool level voice. “I have responsibilities. Children. Grandchildren. You don’t want me to forget that.”

“Yes . . .” Cecelia had lowered her voice, and strove to sit quietly.

“I do not care.” Miranda turned that cameo face full on Cecelia. “I do not care about the children—not even Brun, whom I most desperately want to care about. I do not care about the grandchildren, those bastard brats forced on my daughter—” Her breath caught in a ragged gasp, giving the lie to that do not care. Cecelia said nothing; there was nothing she could say. “I do not care,” Miranda went on, “about anything but Branthcombe. Bunny. Whom, in this day and age, and in spite of rejuvenations and genetic selection and everything else we invented to spare us the pain of living . . . I loved. All my life, from the time he brought me that cherry tart, and we ate it in alternate bites, sitting on the back stairs . . . I loved him. It was a miracle to me that he loved me. That he survived the hunting season we still make our young people go through, that he remembered me after my years in seclusion at Cypress Hill, that he married me. And fathered my children, and no matter what stayed loyal and decent and—” Her voice broke at last, in a gasp that ended in sobs.

“My dear . . .” Cecelia reached out, uncertain. Miranda had been, for so long, another exquisite porcelain figurine in Cecelia’s mental collection of beautiful women—like her sister, like all the women of that type—and she had never touched any of them for more than the rituals of class affection—the fingertips, the cheeks. But Miranda didn’t recoil, and leaned into her as if Cecelia were her mother or her aunt.

The sobs went on a long time, and Cecelia had a cramp in the small of her back from twisting to accommodate Miranda’s position, by the time Miranda quieted.

“Damnation,” she said then. “I thought I was over it.”

“I don’t think you can get over it,” Cecelia said.

“No. Not really. But over it enough to function. You’re right, I have to do that much. But I really do not know how.”

“Your advisors—”

“Are vultures.” Miranda gave Cecelia a sideways glance and pulled back a little; Cecelia took that hint and stood, stretching. “You, never having married, may not realize just how complicated the situation is. Your estate is all yours, and you have the disposal of it—”

“When my ham-fisted relatives don’t interfere,” Cecelia said. She had tried, and failed, to put out of her mind her sister’s interference in her will. The legal repercussions had dragged on for several years.

“True. But what I have is Bunny’s legacy in several separate realms, some of which I stayed out of. The political—”

“Surely no one expects you to take over as Speaker—”

“No.” Miranda’s voice was sour. “Everyone is sure that the political realm is the one I know least about. More’s the pity—since I actually do understand it, and could take over, if they’d only let me.”

Cecelia managed not to gape, by a small margin. Miranda politically minded? Then she thought of Lorenza, who certainly had been, and repressed a shiver. She sat down again and poured herself a cup of tea.

“Lorenza,” Miranda said, in another uncanny echo of Cecelia’s thoughts. “Now there was another case of backstage expertise. She and I used to play the most delicate games of power . . . it would bore you, Cecelia, unless you could think of it in equestrian terms, but . . . if you could imagine yourself on a very, very advanced horse, which despised you but had, for some reason, agreed to obey exactly your commands.”

“I had one like that,” Cecelia said, hoping to divert Miranda onto a more congenial topic. Miranda’s hiss of annoyance stopped her.

“We are not talking horses. Did you ever fence?”

Fence. Possible meanings ran through Cecelia’s mind, the most recent out of her Spacepilots’ Glossary of Navigational Terms; she couldn’t imagine Miranda as a jump-point explorer probing into unknown routes.

“Ancient sport,” Miranda said. “Derived from an ancient method of warfare. Swordfighting, also called fencing.”

“No,” Cecelia said, feeling grumpy. She had just spent a half hour comforting a woman in collapse, and now she was being questioned like a schoolgirl about a sport she had always considered supremely silly. For one thing, it had nothing to do with fences that horses could jump over. “I don’t . . . er . . . fence.”

“You should,” Miranda said. She stood, and moved restlessly around the room, touching the surfaces as if she felt her way, rather than saw them with her eyes. Curtain, curtain, bureau, chair . . . “It’s an excellent discipline, and apt for use aboard spaceships, for instance.”

“Swords?” Cecelia could not quite keep the astonishment out of her voice. Was Miranda losing her mind? Tears, then politics, then swords?

“They do less damage to bulkheads,” Miranda said. “If your only purpose is to kill people, why destroy the ship?”

She must be crazy. It must be, Cecelia thought, an effect of whatever had kept her so lovely for so long. Could she have been given bad rejuv drugs?

“Cecelia, I am not crazy. Well . . . not very crazy. Distracted with grief, and frustration, and anger, but not in the way we usually mean. Fencing—if you knew anything about it—is the ideal metaphor for what Lorenza and I did, just as Bunny and her brother Piercy—but no. You don’t know the terms.”

Cecelia felt her temper gathering like a boil behind her eyes. She squeezed them hard shut, and spoke with them closed. “Miranda. I know you’re grieving; it was good for you to cry. But please quit treating me like a silly horse-crazy schoolgirl—”

“But you are,” Miranda said, in that same flat cool voice. “You always have been; you refused to grow up—just like Brun, that way. It was ridiculous of Bunny to send Brun to you, of all people—”

“You—blame me? For Brun?”

“Not really . . . I mean, intellectually I know we chose her genetic type, we chose to increase the risk-taking and the responsiveness. But there you were, such a model for such a girl—every hunting season, egging her on over bigger fences, as if horses were all that mattered. And what did it get her, to take someone like you for a model? That . . . that degradation!”

Astonishment had blown out anger for the moment. “She isn’t like me,” Cecelia said, feeling her way.

“She’s not horse-crazy, no. But that—that stubborn insouciance, that willingness to shed responsibility—”

Cecelia felt the anger gathering again just beyond her vision. “I didn’t know you considered me irresponsible,” she managed to say quietly.

Miranda’s hand tilted quickly, a diminishing gesture. “Not in everything, of course. But no sense of family, no loyalty to the Familias—” Her head swung away; the bell of golden hair swung wide a moment, then stilled into new perfection. “And she pulled that harebrained stunt to rescue you—she could have been killed then—”

“I didn’t ask her to,” Cecelia said. Something tapped at the alarms in her brain, a tiny hammering. “I couldn’t. She just—”

“Loved you,” Miranda said. Under mint-green silk, her shoulders rose and fell; Cecelia could not hear the sigh but knew it had been given.

“She loved her family,” Cecelia said. “And you didn’t need rescuing.”

“No.” Miranda turned back, face composed as usual. “No, I never did.” For a long moment, she stood motionless, silent. Cecelia found it hard to breathe. Miranda shrugged again. “Kata Saenz said we provided the wrong models for Brun; she told Bunny that, in the planning for Brun’s rescue. I was glad of it at the time; I knew we’d done something wrong, though our other children turned out well. And the shock of being told it was partly his fault got Bunny out of his fury with the Suiza girl, and in the end she saved Brun’s life. I just can’t understand her, though she’s my child.”

“How about the rest of the family? Buttons and Sarah . . . ?”

“Are wonderfully helpful, as far as they can be. Buttons, of course, expected to take over as his father’s heir. But Bunny’s younger brother Harlis—you remember him?”

Cecelia nodded. Harlis had all the arrogance, all the faux-aristocratic foppery, and a third less sense, than Bunny had had. Bunny could always go in an instant from the foolish foxhunting lord of the manor to the sensible, practical, and very capable politician. Harlis was Harlis—all surface and no substance.

“Harlis is challenging the Family structure, and I’m not sure Buttons can stop him. I did tell Bunny three years ago that he ought to clarify the situation just in case, and he and Kevil were looking into it, but then Bubbles—Brun—disappeared.”

“And of course Bunny wasn’t thinking of it then.”

“No, nor of anything else. Harlis managed to convince some of the distant relatives that Bunny’s mind had gone, and that any of Bunny’s children were likely to carry the trait. And some of them accepted that, and have thrown in their influence with Harlis. He’s acquired an astonishing amount of stock in several of the corporations; even old Trema left him her shares—”

“Will you be all right?”

“Probably, but I’m going to lose a lot. And I wanted it for Brun—for her and the twins. She needs a safe place; Sirialis would have been perfect—”

“Harlis isn’t taking Sirialis . . . !” Cecelia’s first thought was that Harlis had never liked foxhunting and might end the annual hunting season; she slapped that thought down, ashamed of herself. Maybe she was as selfish and narrow-minded as Miranda thought.

“He’s trying.” Miranda dropped her voice, mimicking Harlis’s. “ ‘Oh, you’ll always be welcome, Miranda, of course. You’ll always have a place. But it was family property, not Bunny’s alone.’ As if I would go there to lurk in the apartment he so generously offered, while he strides about pretending to be lord of the manor!”

Cecelia forbore to say that he would be the lord, and no pretense, if he had his way. “And what are you doing about it—I assume you have some plan.”

“Yes. But I haven’t decided . . . it would mean tearing up much that Bunny built . . . family relationships, friendships, alliances. I can call on my family—” Of the founding Families, Miranda’s had been known first for information management, and later for the development and manufacture of a variety of devices that were to the ordinary computer as a top event horse was to a child’s pony.

“But it’s—it was Bunny’s, and it’s rightfully yours—” Inheritance had been the one immutable aspect of law; concentration of assets within a Family, the foundation of Family power. Angry as Cecelia had been with her sister for questioning her will, she knew that if she had left her assets within the family, even to a distant relative, the will would not have been challenged.

“Cece—you don’t understand how threadbare the fabric has become, since you exposed Kemtre and Lorenza. I suppose it had begun before, but that’s when it became obvious.” Miranda paused, frowning a bit in thought. “Bunny and I, and Kevil, were holding an alliance of Families by the skin of our teeth. All those years of social connections, business connections, and Kevil’s legal skills and intuition. I swear he knew more about the ragged skeletons in Family closets than anyone had ever guessed. Bunny would talk them around, and I would smile and be gracious and work through the wives and mistresses. We were holding it together, just, but the crises kept knocking it out of balance. Kemtre’s abdication, that Patchcock mess—the scare about bad rejuvenation drugs, and the Morelline/Conselline Family collapse, and then Brun’s abduction . . .” Her voice trailed away.

“And I went back to Rotterdam to play with horses,” Cecelia said.

“Yes. I understand it, in a way. Venezia Morrelline had her pottery, and you had horses, and Kata Saenz had her research. Most people do have their private interests, and that, after all, is what a good political system is supposed to do—leave you free to do what you are best at, whatever it is. People want to do the work they love, marry and have children, have some fun. But if too many people do that, Cecelia, it leaves gaps for people who want power for its own sake, and who may use it in ways that later degrade your life.”

Like Bunny using Fleet resources as if they were personal, to rescue Brun. She didn’t say that; she knew that Miranda knew what people thought. “How is Kevil?” she asked instead.

“Alive.” From her tone, Cecelia couldn’t tell if Miranda were pleased about that or not. Then she sighed. “I can’t wish Kevil dead, only Bunny alive as well. Kevil was badly hurt—days in the regen tank, and then the head injury—he’s still not himself. He may never be, the doctors say. And without Bunny—or me, if I could only find a way—he doesn’t have the backing to do what he did for us before.”

“I should visit him,” Cecelia said.

“Yes, you should. You should tell him what you told me, with all the names you know. He might know something useful, something that would give us leverage.”

“And Brun?”

“Brun . . . has a crazy notion of changing her identity. Going to the Guernesi and getting a rejuv and biosculpt that will make her a new person from the bones out. I think she got the idea from the prince’s clones.”

“She doesn’t want the children,” Cecelia said, not asking.

“Would you?” Miranda shivered, then sighed. “No, she doesn’t want them. I don’t want them myself, really. Bunny did. Bunny had some crazy idea that they could grow up to prove their existence wasn’t a disaster, but it is.”

“That’s a lot of burden on them.”

“Yes. Unfair, too. I know that. But nothing can make them other than they are: bastards, Brun’s ruin, the ruin of all our hopes for the Familias. They are the lit fuse, poor little brats.”

“What are they like?”

“Babies. Toddlers, really, at this point. Neither looks like anyone in our family, and they aren’t identical. One has the brightest red hair I ever saw, and the other’s is brown. Brun says one of the men was a redhead. . . .”

Cecelia noticed that Miranda had not used names; before she could ask, Miranda went on.

“The gene scan showed up some interesting anomalies—according to one geneticist, who’s also looked at the women and other children, these people were seriously inbred, with a lot of undesirable recessives concentrated. They had noticed that children born of captured women were less likely to be disabled, but considered that as proof of their God’s blessing on capturing women. Of course, we had the boys treated at once, although it was too late for a complete washout.”

“What do you call them?” Cecelia finally got a word in.

Miranda blushed. “We don’t actually . . . have names. Brun never did, and she refuses to talk about it. Their nurses call them Red and Brownie. I know—” She held up a hand. “Those are names for dogs or ponies, not boys. Nicknames, at best. I just don’t—Bunny and I had been talking about it when he was killed.” She moved her cup restlessly. “Would you like to see them?”

“Of course.” Cecelia stood.

Down the hall, past several doors and now she could hear the crowing of a happy child, the chuckle of another. Miranda paused just before the open door. Cecelia looked in. Two young women in colorful smocks, a floor strewn with toys, and two sturdy toddlers. One, the redhead, was bouncing up and down, clapping his hands. The other, sitting in a scatter of blocks, looked quickly toward the door, grinning.

They were normal children, not monsters. Happy children, not monsters. Children who were more than “lit fuses”—who were potentially normal, if only they didn’t grow up burdened with a past they had not made.

“You have to send them away,” Cecelia said, surprising herself. “There are people who want children and don’t have them; there are places where these boys will be treasured as they should be.”

“Bunny said—”

“Bunny’s dead. They’re alive. They can have a good future—and the universe is big enough that they need not be anyone’s pawns in some power game.”

“And you know who—?” A tone suspended between sarcasm and hope.

“No, but I can find out. Will you let me do that? Find them homes where they’ll have a chance?”

Miranda sagged. “I . . . don’t know.”

“Miranda. You have other grandchildren, and will have more. Children you can love naturally. Children whose political importance, if any, comes with a family commitment. You haven’t even given these boys names—you know yourself that’s wrong. Give them up; give them a chance.”

“Brun wants to . . .” Miranda said. “She said . . . she doesn’t want to hate them, but she can’t live with them around. But neither of us can face the thought of an orphanage.”

“She’s right,” Cecelia said. “You said we were alike—we may be, that much. If I had borne them, in her circumstances, I’d have to give them up. It’s a big universe; they need never know.”

She left Miranda in the doorway and went on into the room, nodding to the nurses, and sitting on the floor. Red, his hair an orange flame, put a fat thumb in his mouth, but Brownie grinned at her. Cecelia pulled out the ring of keys from the stable and jingled it. His grin widened, and he came to her, grabbing for the keys. Though he looked little like Brun, his boldness and the sparkle in his blue eyes suggested Brun’s attitudes.

Cecelia did not think of herself as a religious person, but she found herself praying to something, somewhere, to give these boys a better life than their beginning.

“Lady Cecelia!” That was Brun; Cecelia turned.

“You look well,” she said. Brun looked well physically—her tall body trim and fit, her tumbled gold curls in a riot around her head. But the clear gaze was shadowed, darkening when she looked at the boys.

“I’m fine,” Brun said. “Considering everything.”

“I agree with you and your mother,” Cecelia said. “These boys need a proper home, not to mention names.”

Brun’s face stiffened, then she grinned. “Still tactful, I see.”

“As ever,” Cecelia agreed. “My dear, I’m almost ninety, and rejuvenation did nothing to soften my personality. Why don’t we do it today?”

“Today?” Both Miranda and Brun looked shocked; so did the nurses.

“They’re starting to talk; they understand even more. Every day you wait makes it harder on them.”

“I . . . want to be sure they have good homes . . . that they lack for nothing . . .” Brun said.

“A good home is a loving home,” Cecelia said, with all the confidence of the childless. “And right now they’re lacking the most basic needs of all—a name, a parent—”

“But what will you do with them?”

“Take them to a safe and loving home. Brun, you’ve known me all your life. Have I ever lied to you?” Brun shook her head, tears rising in her eyes. Miranda started to speak, but Cecelia waved her down. “I have told you the truth, even when it wasn’t what you wanted to hear. I tell you the truth now—if you let me have these boys I will see to it that they find a good home. I will do it myself. . . .”

“But your schedule—”

“Is my own. Miranda, you were twitting me with my self-indulgence. This is what self-indulgence is good for. I can help you, right now, because I have no other obligations in the way.” She softened her voice. “Please let me.”

Brun looked down, then nodded. Cecelia could see the gleam of tears in her eyes.

Miranda stared at Cecelia a long moment, then said, “All right. And I still have money for them—a start in a new life—”

“Good.” Cecelia tried to think what next. She had said today without really thinking what that would mean, but now the two nursemaids were watching her, waiting for orders. She had no idea how long it took to pack up two children, or where to take them, but she knew she must not hesitate. She spoke to the nursemaids.

“Are you full-time employees, and would you be able to travel for a month or so?”

“Yes, ma’am,” said one of them. “We’re from Sirialis, originally, but we thought we’d be staying for years . . .”

“Then will you please start packing—or have someone help you pack—the boys’ things? I need to talk to Miranda and make some arrangements—” She would need a bigger ship—a momentary pang, when she thought of how easy it would have been with Sweet Delight, and Heris Serrano, to take the twins and their nursemaids anywhere. Reservations on a commercial liner? No, too much chance of publicity. She’d have to lease a ship and crew. No, to start with she’d need another room—set of rooms—in her hotel. She’d made reservations for one. Or perhaps another hotel. Ideas whirled through her head like leaves before a wind. “Miranda, let’s go to your suite—we have business.”

“Yes, Cecelia.” Miranda nodded at the nursemaids, already beginning to gather toys. “I’ll send a maid in to do the packing; just be sure the boys are clean and dressed. And I’ll take care of your salaries and references.”

Then she led the way to her suite. Brun came along with them, her face once more stiff with misery.

“Do you have any notion where you’re going with them?” Miranda asked, when they were again in her sitting room.

“Yes.” The thought had come as she walked down the passage. “I know the perfect planet, and probably the perfect couple. Do you want to know?”

“Not . . . now. Later, maybe.” Brun sat hunched, her eyes on the carpet.

“Fine, then. Miranda, I’ll need the use of your comset—”

“I’ll just call Poisson—”

“No. I’ll make the reservations myself.” Only as far as the first hotel, she told herself. From there, she would arrange transportation. And she wanted no records in the Palace computers, where reporters might already have a tap.

“I have resources—”

“You said you were feuding with Bunny’s brother—”

“In my own right. At least let me help.”

“Of course.” Cecelia turned politely to Brun as Miranda opened a line to her bank. “Brun—have you heard from that girl—Hazel, wasn’t it?—lately?”

Brun looked up. “I worry about her. She seems to be doing fine, for someone who’s been through so much, but she never has admitted how bad it was. She keeps wanting to get me to meet with that Ranger’s wife—Prima Bowie.”

“Why?”

“I don’t know.” Brun shifted restlessly. “Hazel liked her, I think. Says she was kind. Hazel feels sorry for her, being a stranger in our society. But she chose it; she wasn’t abducted.”

“Are they all still together, all those women?” asked Cecelia.

“As far as I know. I don’t . . . really care.”

Miranda broke in. “I’ve deposited a lump sum in your account, Cecelia; I can send more later if—”

“Don’t worry about it,” Cecelia said. “Tell me—do the maids take the boys out to play? In a park or anything?”

“Not off the grounds. The news media are bad enough as it is.”

“Then—how about palace employees with children? Are there any?”

“I’m sure there are, but I don’t know who. . . .”

“Perhaps the maids will. We don’t want publicity when we take the children out.”

The little crocodile of children from Briary Meadows Primary School being herded through the public rooms as part of their field trip acquired a short tail. They didn’t pay much attention; they were tired of glass-fronted cases full of trophies, letters, gifts to this or that famous person by another famous person, the rooms of interesting furniture which they could not touch, the silken ropes on which they were not supposed to swing, the constant admonitions to pay attention, be quiet, quit straggling or crowding.

The children had been promised a stop at Ziffra’s, the famous ice-cream parlor, if they were good, and only a steady murmur of commands kept them from trampling one another on the way out the door. The nursemaids, now wearing the green smocks of adult helpers in the school, complete with dangling nametags, brought up the rear, each with a toddler on her hip.

Outside, the remaining media scavengers waited for any sign of Brun or her children, but ignored the confusion of piping voices and busy adults. They had seen bright green buses with the school name arrive, and crowds of obvious schoolchildren arrive, teachers hustling them into neat lines and adult volunteers scampering to catch the inevitable escapees. At least one such field trip arrived every day; the Palace had always been a favorite tourist site, and busloads of children, retirees, and convention attendees showed up so often that no one in the press corps paid them any mind.

Now, as the chattering youngsters piled into the buses, and the harried adults counted, compared notes, and shut the doors, they ignored the confusion, keeping an eye out instead for the return of Lady Cecelia, whose limousine waited at the other end of the car park.

A half hour later, Cecelia left, smiling into the holo lens and accepting congratulations on her win in the Senior Trials. She fielded a couple of questions about her breeding program, expressed sympathy for Bunny’s family, and stepped into the waiting limousine, which took her to the medical center where Kevil Mahoney was still listed in critical condition.

And later that afternoon, the two school volunteers whose green smocks and nametags had been borrowed for a time walked out the service entrance with other Palace staff who lived offsite. No one paid attention to them, either.

Miranda listened to the silence and felt something shift inside her mind. She had not really been able to hear the twins, but knowing they were not there, that she could not hear them even if she walked down the hall, tipped her toward some distant horizon. She glanced at the clock. Was it still so early? Surely Cecelia had not been able to get them offplanet yet. She could check . . . she stopped, her hand outstretched to the comunit.

No. As if it were a robotic arm she were operating, she concentrated on her hand, and brought it back to her lap.

They were gone. They were gone forever.

Lightness filled her, as if she were a transparent husk of herself. She might blow away . . . but of course that was nonsense. She was tired, very tired, and—

“Mother?”

Weight and darkness returned so suddenly she could hardly breathe. “Yes, Brun?”

“You do think they’ll be all right.”

“Of course.” Miranda took a deep breath. “Cecelia is reliable, in her own way, and she will make sure of it.”

“Good.” Brun came into the room tentatively, as if she were unsure of her welcome. “I feel . . . strange.”

Of course she felt strange. No one could survive what she had survived, and not feel strange, the moment life gave time to stop and notice.

“Sit down,” Miranda said. “Have some tea.” Cecelia had not even finished hers. Brun sat as gingerly as she had come in. They nibbled pastries in silence for awhile, then Brun set down her plate.

“What’s going to happen with the family holdings?”

Not the question Miranda had expected, but one she was glad to deal with at the moment. “It’s going to be very difficult,” Miranda said. “When your father mobilized the Fleet to go after you, he antagonized a lot of people, his own family included.”

“Too much for one person,” Brun murmured.

“It wasn’t their daughter,” Miranda said. “And it wasn’t your decision; it was his. But Harlis gained ground with the rest of the family then—he’d already been working on it, claiming that Bunny was spending too much time and energy on Council business, and neglecting the family interests. He said Buttons was too young and inexperienced; he started demanding silly, time-wasting reports, and nitpicking everything. Buttons has had a lot to learn in only a few years, but he’s doing very well. It’s just that Harlis promises he could do better. And now—well, he’s determined to get Sirialis.”

“That’s stupid,” Brun said, with some of her old arrogance. “That’s not profit; the place has never made a profit—”

“That’s partly Harlis’s point. He claims it could, if it were managed properly. Which does not, of course, include foxhunting . . . or only as a commercial enterprise. He’s strong on commercial enterprises. I don’t know if you’ve kept track of the branches he manages—”

“No,” Brun said.

“You can look it up later, then. He thinks Sirialis would pay as a mature colony prospect—”

“Bring in colonists!?”

“Yes. In his view, the planet is full of wasted space that ought to be put to profitable use. Buttons pointed out the agricultural areas, but he insists that this is not enough, and he’s claiming that Bunny’s title was only a life one. Kevil had been working on this, before the attack, but—but now he can’t help either.”

Brun scowled. “I wonder if dear Uncle Harlis had anything to do with the assassination.”

“No, dear. It was not Harlis.” That came out with more emphasis than she intended, and Brun looked at her with dawning comprehension.

“Mother—you know something? You know who did it?”

“I know it wasn’t Harlis.” Damn, she’d have to figure out something, or Brun would go charging off, straight into danger again.

“You don’t believe it was the NewTex—?”

“No. Although that’s still the official line, I do not.”

“Then who?”

“Brun, I am not having this conversation with you. Not now, at least. We need to talk about your father’s family, and their probable actions, and some of the other economic matters. These things must be dealt with now. Your father’s murderers . . . can wait.”

“The trail—”

“Will never be too cold. Brun, please. For once in your life listen to me—we must be careful.”

Brun had blanched at that; the muscles along her jaw bunched. “I want to go to the Guernesi Republic.”

“No. I need you here.”

“For what, an exhibition?”

“No, for an ally. If we are to defend our position, we must all help. Your sisters are already busy—up to their eyeballs in their family responsibilities, but trying to line up support. Buttons and Sarah are both working flat out. I need help, someone whose loyalty is undoubted—I need you.”

“Oh . . .” Brun looked past her, into some distance Miranda could not imagine.

“You were willing enough to help Cecelia,” she said, and hated the sharpness in her voice.

“You really need me?” Brun asked.

Miranda gave her a sharp look. “Of course—no, let me say that more precisely. Yes, I need you. No one else can do what you can; no one else in the family has the training and experience.”

“You’re serious . . . but you’ve never needed me. I’m just the troublemaker . . .” Still, an uncertain note had come into her voice.

“No. You’re the one who can survive trouble. Brun, please—help me.”

Brun’s face twisted. “I don’t know if I can . . .”

“You can if you will,” Miranda said firmly. “I want to find who murdered your father, and who is trying to dismantle the Familias Regnant, and for what purpose. I am not sure they are the same person or organization, but they might well be.”

Brun watched her perfect, serene, immaculate mother with amazement. For her whole life, she had seen her mother as the icon everyone thought her. Her father was the active one, the doer and maker and shaper of events. Her mother smoothed his way by smiling and standing by.

Now she saw the real person behind the label of “mother” and “Bunny Thornbuckle’s wife” . . . a woman as intelligent, tough and knowledgeable as her father had ever been. As dangerous, perhaps, as Lorenza had been. From the gleam in Miranda’s eye, her mother had just noticed that recognition, and was enjoying the surprise.

“I made no mistake, picking Brun Meager for my nom de guerre,” Brun said, testing her hypothesis.

Her mother smiled. “Quite so. I’m glad you recognize it. Now—are you with me?”

“Yes. If I can . . .”

“You can. Not all at once, but—let me go on here. I warned your father, after that disgraceful affair on Patchcock, to beware of his relatives doing what that Morrelline woman did. Granted, her brothers deserved it, but others could do the same with less reason. He was sure he had it taken care of, in part because old Viktor Barraclough had always been his friend and mentor. But about the time of the Xavier invasion, he and Kevil found irregularities . . . purchases of company shares they couldn’t put a name to, changes in some of the boards of directors which didn’t make sense. The military crisis had to come first, of course; and after that, with proof of traitors in Fleet, they were far more concerned with that, and with Grand Council business. But what it’s come down to is that Harlis has enough shares, and enough votes in various boards, that he can make a plausible case that much of your father’s estate was actually not his personally. I think he’d fiddled the files, but I haven’t had time to work on it. And I can’t do it here.”

“Could you do it at Appledale?”

“Not really . . . I need to go to Sirialis; that’s where we stored the backup data. Your father thought I was paranoid, sometimes, but I insisted that we take a complete readoff every half-year, and just archive it. I think that’s why Harlis is so determined to get Sirialis; he suspects that the data are there somewhere.”

“Then you should go to Sirialis,” Brun said. “He can’t keep you away, can he?”

“Not yet. But I couldn’t leave you alone here—”

Brun interrupted. “You wanted my help; let me give it. Nothing’s likely to happen at the next Grand Council meeting anyway; they’re probably still in shock, and they’ll waffle for days.”

“I’m not so sure; that Conselline fellow got himself elected interim Speaker—”

“Whatever happens can’t matter as much as stopping Harlis. Go on. I’ll attend the Council meeting, and let you know what happens. Promise.” Brun reached over and patted her mother’s arm. “We aren’t going to let Harlis take everything, and we aren’t going to let some idiot Conselline ruin the Familias. If that’s what’s happening.”

Her mother gave her an appraising look. “Sometimes, Brun, you are remarkably like your father.”

“Sorry . . .”

“No. Don’t be. All right—first we’ll clear out of this—” With a wave of her arm, she indicated the entire Palace. “Then I’ll go to Sirialis.”

Cecelia stopped on the way to the hospital to contact her hotel, and reassure the front staff that the two young women and two children were the individuals she had authorized to register in her name. Another two bedrooms? No problem. Cecelia grinned to herself; she had been so wise to invest in a hotel here on Castle Rock, rather than depending on the hospitality of friends.

When she got to the hospital, she was told that she had just missed George. She went upstairs, and stood in the corridor outside Special Care, looking at the motionless form in the bed.

He looked wretched, she thought; she wondered if she had looked as bad. He wasn’t conscious, they told her; they were still struggling to control the pressure on his brain, and he was deeply sedated except for weekly checks of neurological function. Cecelia blinked back tears, remembering herself in that drug-induced coma . . . wondering if Kevil were more conscious than they realized . . . and silently promised him she would return and get him out of there, no matter what. She found it hard to leave, but she had something even more urgent to do.

At the Laurels, she stopped at the concierge’s desk to ask for assistance in leasing a yacht. The Laurels expected such requests; it took only a moment for the concierge to connect Cecelia to the booking agent for Allsystems Leasing.

Her inspiration had been her nephew Ronnie. Ronnie and Raffaele, as newlyweds, had taken off for the frontier—to Excet-24, a world newly opened to colonization. Cecelia hoped it would have a more euphonious name before it qualified for full membership in the Familias. At last report, Ronnie and Raffa had no children yet, but were “hoping.” Cecelia wasn’t sure who was hoping—the young people or their parents—but she remembered Raffa’s problem-solving abilities, and was sure that Raffa could find the boys a good home if she didn’t want them herself.

But this meant a long trip—six weeks at least. She discussed the route with the leasing agent, and ordered the Premium Platinum package of consumables. She didn’t mind doing Bunny’s family this service, but why should she suffer for it? She wanted fresh food again.

On Miranda’s advice, Cecelia hired three more nursemaids. One wanted to emigrate, and was glad to accept a colony share in lieu of salary. She brought along her own children, a two- and a four-year-old. Five people to care for four children might be overdoing it, Cecelia thought, but she herself didn’t intend to wash a single diaper or wipe a single drippy nose.

By midnight, Cecelia had arranged everything. The yacht would not be ready immediately, of course; even with the assurance of large sums of money, it took time to prepare a large spaceship for a luxury voyage. But Cecelia had arranged for one of the nursemaids from Miranda’s to take the boys to a park with the newly hired maid and her children, leaving the suite clear for at least some hours of the days. No one had seen pictures of them for months; no one, Cecelia was sure, would notice two more young women with children in a park full of young women with children. She had discussed with the nursemaids what clothes would be needed for the voyage and for six months afterward; she didn’t know how easy it would be to find children’s clothes on a colony world. She set up credit lines so that purchases by the nursemaids would not be traceable to her or to Miranda.

Then she fell into bed with a glow of conscious virtue. When the twins woke, bawling, at two in the morning, she pulled a pillow over her head and went back to sleep. That part of it was someone else’s problem.

By the time they boosted from Rockhouse Major, Cecelia felt sure that no one had suspected anything. As far as anyone outside the Palace knew, the twins were still there. The news media had shown no more than normal interest in her doings, and seemed to accept her offhand comment that she had leased the big yacht because she was tired of doing all the work in her little one, and wanted someone else along to cook and clean.

The two boys thoroughly enjoyed the company of other children; Cecelia pored over their medical records in her stateroom, and came to the same conclusion as the doctors and psychologists. Normal children, who could expect to have normal lives. The real question was . . . should she tell Raffaele and Ronnie who they really were? In her own mind, the boys should not know—that they were adopted, yes, but not that their fathers had raped their mother and kept her captive. Of course they must have access to their medical records someday; advances in therapy might make it possible to finish cleaning up their genome.

She saw moral and emotional shoals in either direction.