A Matter of Oaths (30 page)

“The question did not warrant hysteria.”

“I’d explain the joke,” Rafe said, sobering abruptly, “but
as I remember, you’ve no sense of humour.”

“And yours, I remember, is odd in the extreme. And fails you
eventually.”

Julur came out of the shadows, his appearance no new shock
because Rafe’s newly intact memory had primed him. Blond, blue-eyed, slightly
plump, even for his unusual height, and his face alarming in its apparent
youth. A thousand years or more older than Ayvar, he looked as if he had been
frozen as a gauche adolescent while Ayvar looked like a… a forty-six year old
Webmaster.

Let nobody tell me the gods have no sense of humour, Rafe
thought bitterly.

“You do remember me, I see,” Julur remarked, watching Rafe
intently. “And how much else?”

“All of it,” Rafe said flatly. A denial would do him no
good.

“That would be surprising, since you were hardly coherent
for much of your time with me. I take it that you mean you remember your life
as Lin.”

“Which you took so much trouble to erase. Yes.”

It gave Rafe perverse pleasure to think of that wasted
effort. There was no other success he could claim against Julur, no information
about Ayvar or the Guild that he had withheld, no information about himself
that Julur had not drawn from him. He flinched from remembering how easily he
had answered questions at the end, answered them before they were asked,
volunteered information out of fear of the pain, out of terror of what the
drugs did to him. The other choice had been to submit to the pain and the
drugs, to pay a higher price for providing the same knowledge with the same
scant dignity. His choice had not eventually mattered; Julur had used the drugs
anyway, had vindictively inflicted the pain. And in a final, grotesque and
unseen gesture to Ayvar — who surely could not know — he had destroyed Lin and
given the Oath-breaker Rafe to the Guild.

“Was I supposed to be grateful that you left me alive?” he
asked rashly.

“You are asking whether I intend to repeat my generosity,
are you not? I do, but not perhaps in the same form.” The Emperor stretched his
damp lips to show his teeth. “It is unfortunate that the identity-wipe failed. The
alternative is more drastic, forfeits more of the original and there are
aspects of the original worth preserving. The intelligence, for example.”

“Has anybody ever accused you of being subtle?”

“Humour, I believe, is an inevitable casualty of personality
disintegration.” Julur returned to the shadows and Rafe heard the whisper of
his clothes as he sat down. “Before that, however, I shall discover why the
identity-wipe failed. It would be a pity to destroy you so thoroughly when
something less might serve.”

Silence would be interpreted as capitulation; a defiant
response as desperation. Neither was far from the truth, Rafe thought miserably,
choosing silence. A tactical problem for you, Commander Rallya. You are the
prisoner of a mad Emperor — a paranoid Emperor who wears armour-cloth for every
hour of the day, who has not left his palace for over a thousand years, a
palace infested with fanatically loyal guards trained from birth. You are
unarmed and unable to move. Discuss methods of escape. He sighed wryly,
reckoning that even Rallya would not get far with the problem.

What was she doing now? Probably gathering support against
Carher. Lin had known Carher by reputation, an ambitious woman, elected to the
Council half a year before he had his "accident". Her record as a
patrolship Commander was solid, not outstanding; she had won her place on the
Council largely by virtue of being unopposed by anyone better qualified. He
felt a flash of guilt over that. The councillor elected for the New Empire in
the same election had been equally undistinguished. He — Lin — had been urged
by his friends and by Ayvar to fight that election; he had refused, not ready
to give up the joy of commanding
Janasayan
for the responsibilities of a councillor.

Not that it would have been long before Julur relieved him
of those responsibilities, he reminded himself angrily. And if he had joined
the Council, he would always have been open to accusations of being influenced
by Ayvar, of being the New Emperor’s passport to control of the Guild, as
Carher had been intended to be Julur’s. At least Rallya would prevent that, and
the scouring she would undertake would be thorough enough to leave Julur — and
Ayvar, he acknowledged dryly — no possibility of replacing their pawns for
several years.

“What do you intend to do about Carher?” he asked boldly. Better
to concentrate on that than on his own predicament, about which Rallya could do
nothing, primarily because she did not know about it.
Bhattya
probably thought he was dead, he realized with a pang of
grief for Joshim. When Ayvar learnt the cause of the conflict within the Guild,
he would know that Julur was involved, but by then it would probably be too
late…

“There is no need for me to do anything. Lady Carher will be
dealt with by her opponents within the Guild.”

“It’s unlike you to neglect an opportunity to be vindictive.”

“You seem to be feeling better.” Julur was moving about;
Rafe could hear the rustle of armour-cloth, the chink of metallic items being
gathered together. “Lady Carher has a certain utility in distracting interest
from you. If she outlives her usefulness, Braniya will arrange her execution.”

He moved out of the shadow, began to arrange the items he
was carrying on the table to Rafe’s left. Rafe refused to turn his head to
watch. “You should not use my interest in you to judge my interest in mortals
like Lady Carher. You have a certain quality that makes you uniquely rewarding.”

Or a certain relationship with the only person you care
about, Rafe thought bleakly. The only person who is real to you. Gods, Ayvar
could be strange at times, when he talked about somebody a thousand years dead
as if he had spoken to them only yesterday, when he wore that haunted
expression that told of the events around him having been played out before by
the same characters wearing different faces… But at least he knew that mortals
were real. Real enough to take one as a lover, to bind him with a mixture of
fierce possessiveness and brusque insouciance, so that he would hold Lin
bruisingly tight all night as if he were the one person who would never leave
him and then send him back to his ship at the end of his liberty with a joke
about the queue to share his bed when Lin was gone. Sometimes, Rafe thought
ruefully, it was a struggle not to be swallowed whole by the man and at others,
it was impossible to get close to him…

“Do you remember the effect of this?” Julur inquired,
showing Rafe a injector. “Gadrine. Not unduly unpleasant, but effective.”

Not unduly unpleasant if you had no objection to losing
control over your tongue, to spilling out the contents of your head for Julur
to pick through. Rafe remembered Joshim’s support during his arthane trances,
the anchor to reality that he had provided. Julur would not be so concerned for
Rafe’s sanity, for the necessary distinctions between past and present.

“We’re going to explore the failure of your identity-wipe,”
Julur continued. Rafe felt the injector enter his arm. “The stimuli that caused
it, the speed with which it progressed.” He smiled as he withdrew the needle. “If
you are fortunate, the failure will not be inherent in the process, but will be
due to something in your environment. If that is so, I may not resort to
personality disintegration…”

Gods, Rafe thought frantically. Joshim. Of all the factors —
his work in the web, Commander Rallya and
Bhattya
— Joshim must be the most significant, his likeness to Ayvar the essential
trigger. And Julur did not know about him yet. When he did know, how much
danger would Joshim be in? If Julur took pleasure from destroying somebody who
had been Ayvar’s lover, how much would he enjoy destroying somebody who wore
Ayvar’s face? It was painful enough that Rafe had unconsciously used Joshim as
a substitute for Ayvar — and that was what he had done, he realized in a tide
of raw guilt — but now he was going to expose him to the danger of Julur’s
hatred, and he knew that he could not avoid it.

…And the Emperor Ayvar came in haste to Khirtin, bringing
with him such of his establishment as were loyal to him, and on Khirtin they
abided for a year. But Khirtin is a poor world and so Boronya Lady Buhklir came
to the Emperor Ayvar and offered him her homeworld of Buhklir to be his home
for all time and he was gracious to accept, raising her family high in his
affections…

…And a great assembly was held at Lhorphenir and the Empire
was divided…

 
“So that’s what’s
happening now,” Joshim said wearily. “Every ship assigned to Ayvar for the
Disputed Zone is coming here. The Stationmaster is going grey watching them come
out of jump and praying they all get their calculations right.”

“I don’t blame her,” Vidar said feelingly. “Five minutes
after us, a courier arrived so close we could read the markings on its hull
unmagnified.”

“Stop complaining. At least
Bhattya
’s got a place in dock. The couriers and the supplyships are
stuck in a holding pattern. The priority is getting the patrolships
battle-ready.”

“Uh huh.” Vidar stood up. “Back in a minute,” he promised.

He was, with a mug of alcad that he put into Joshim’s hands.
“Sounds like you need that.”

“I’ve been talking my throat raw. Every Three that comes in
wants to hear the story from the source.”

“I’ll take that on,” Vidar offered. “After six days in those
damned dust rings with nothing else to do, this ship is in better condition
than when she left the construction dock.”

“I expected as much.” Joshim gave him a tired smile of
gratitude. “We won’t see much of Rallya before the fleet leaves here. When she
isn’t talking tactics with the other Commanders, she’s arguing with Ayvar.”

Refusing to accept his priorities; refusing to commit
herself to anything beyond ridding the Guild of Carher, least of all an assault
on Julur. Balancing possibilities and costs: the future of the Guild, the
future of the Empires, the lives — all of them, not just Rafe’s — that could be
lost if the upheaval she started got out of her control. And Ayvar was
insistent on Rafe’s safety, at any price. Gods knew what was driving him:
injured pride perhaps, a determination not to yield anything to Julur. Not even
an immortal could love Rafe so fiercely that he was willing to sacrifice the
peace of both Empires for him. Or maybe I won’t allow anyone to love Rafe more
than me, Joshim thought wryly.

“Is the Emperor here at Khirtin?” Vidar asked.

“That isn’t public knowledge,” Joshim warned. “Officially,
Lord Dhur, the Emperor’s representative is here. Confusing the hell out of
anybody who’s met me.”

“How close is the resemblance?”

“It’s frightening. Like looking in a mirror.” Joshim blew on
his alcad to cool it down.

“No wonder…”

‘…Rafe fell for me. Yes.”

“No wonder Rafe started remembering,” Vidar contradicted
him. “What’s he like as a person?”

Joshim shrugged. “I’m not the person you should ask. I’m
trying not to like him.”

Vidar grunted. “How many ships will we have at Central?” he
asked, changing the subject.

“Twenty patrolships, if they all get here in time. Five
armed couriers. The supplyships are staying here.” Joshim yawned. “That reminds
me. We’re leaving the apprentices behind too.”

“They won’t like that.”

“Fleet Commander’s orders. Says they’ll only be underfoot.”

Vidar laughed, knowing as well as Joshim that Rallya wanted
the apprentices out of danger.

“She’s expecting a fight then?” he queried.

“She’s ready for one. Although Carher might run for it,”
Joshim said hopefully. “She must know that, even if she wins, Julur will still
want her hide. It depends on how good she thinks her chances are of making
peace with him.”

“What opposition will we be facing?”

“Open a book on it,” Joshim suggested, yawning again. “If it
hasn’t already been done.”

“Not this time,” Vidar said somberly. “You should…” He
stopped, held up a hand to silence Joshim while he listened to his messager. “There’s
a visitor for you,” he reported. “Lord Dhur.”

“Tell him to go away,” Joshim said. “Tell him I’m asleep.”

“You should be,” Vidar agreed. He relayed the message,
listened to the reply. “He’s already on his way up,” he reported.

Joshim swore.

“I’ll keep him out,” Vidar offered.

“No.” Joshim found a strained smile. “Let’s not all three of
us get on the wrong side of him. Not until Rallya’s got no use for him anyway.”

There was a tap on the rest-room door, characteristically
Fadir. “Come in,” Joshim called.

“Lord Dhur, sir.” The apprentice’s eyes swivelled from Ayvar
to Joshim and back again, looking for differences.

“Thank you, Fadir,” Ayvar said, smiling slightly.

“Sir.” Fadir backed out, still comparing.

“You have a fine ship, Captain Vidar,” Ayvar said. “Don’t
let me keep you from your work.”

“You’d better let the web-room know what’s happening,”
Joshim said resignedly. “And break the news to Fadir and Rasil that they don’t
get to join in.”

“You need some sleep,” Vidar said pointedly. “I’ll be back
in an hour to make sure you get it.”

“Thank you for seeing me,” Ayvar said when Vidar had gone. “I
won’t keep you long. But we ought to talk about Lin — Rafe, if you prefer —
while we can.”

“Before we know he’s alive?”

“Trust me,” Ayvar said gravely. “I know Julur. He won’t kill
him.”