Palace (68 page)

‘Vida, I’m sorry,’ Leni’s image said. ‘Wan asked me to call and let you know that he’s going out to the swamps. It’s a hunting trip. We’ll be back in three days.’ Leni glanced furtively over his shoulder, as if he’d been leaving the message when Wan was out of the room. ‘I’ll make damn sure it isn’t any longer than that. He didn’t tell me why we were going. I guess he’s just being - ah well, see you soon.’

The message ended. Vida turned and hurled the jacket onto the sofa.

‘You coward, Wan!’ she snapped. ‘Yeah, go off and kill something! Maybe it’ll make you feel better.’

She could call Rico, if she dared. What if Se Hivel was wrong, what if Rico wanted nothing more to do with her? It took her a long five minutes before she got up the courage to call him, and while she waited, watching the screen pulse, she felt cold all over. At last the comm flashed a ‘received’ message, and Rico’s face appeared on the screen.

‘Oh, it’s you,’ he said. ‘What do you want?’

Vida sank into a chair. She could say nothing, merely stared at him while he stared back. With shaking hands she switched the comm off and laid the unit back in its slot.

‘I couldn’t have signed your contract,’she whispered. ‘I guess you can’t see why.’

Outside the window the fog swirled grey and dark. She watched it, unmoving, until the door alarm beeped. She heard Jak answering it, heard his voice, heard Rico’s voice in turn and twisted round in her chair just as Rico strode into the gather. Jak turned bland eyes Vida’s way, then retreated back to the eatery. Rico waited until he heard the door close.

‘I’m sorry I hurt you,’ he blurted. ‘Forgive me?’

‘Sure.’ She stood up and held out her hand. ‘Of course.’

He crossed to her, caught her hand in both of his, and drew her close for a kiss. She slipped her arms around his neck and felt him trembling against her.

‘Wan’s gone,’ she said. ‘For three days.’

His arms went slack around her waist. Vida leaned back and looked at him, suddenly distant, suddenly cold.

‘Oh stop it!’ she snapped. ‘I’ll bet you haven’t been faithful to me, either.’

‘So what?’ Rico let her go and stepped back.

‘What do you mean so what? Or is that supposed to be different?’

‘Well, no, but -’

‘Oh besides! Last night, you know? He couldn’t even do it.’

‘You’re just saying that to make me feel better.’

‘Am not. He’d been drinking all day, and he couldn’t.’

Rico grinned, a slow spread of sheer malicious delight.

‘But Rico? I’m going to have to, sooner or later. The whole point of this is to restore the L’Vars. I’m going to have to have a child, and that means -’

‘Yeah, sure. But I’m not going to have to know about it. Last night - I mean - oh forget about it.’

‘Okay. I still love you. Do you still love me?’

‘Yeah.’ He caught her face between his hands. ‘Vida, maybe you’re right about that hundred and fifty years, but I’ll never love anyone again the way I love you.’

When he kissed her, the passion in that kiss convinced her that he spoke the simple truth.

‘Then I’ll never love anyone the way I love you,’ she said. ‘I promise.’

After a brief legal challenge by the government of Ri, the Palace courts set Vi-Kata’s execution date for Nineteen Timber. Bidding for the rights went too high for Pansect Media. Once the eventual winner, Grid TransPalace, scheduled the execution for the prime evening hours, Kata’s attorney filed an appeal on the method of death. The structure of the Lep neck made hanging such a hideously inhumane death that the courts had ordered a lethal injection. Kata wished to die by the ritual of the slow cuts, as befitted a man and a warrior. The courts rejected the appeal.

Zir forced herself to watch. Crouched in her upstairs room she clutched a pillow in her lap and let her claws shred it as her hands dug. She’d been thinking that guards would march Kata out to some sort of ceremony, but to her horror they wheeled him into a room that looked like an infirmary-upon a bed that looked like a hospital gurney. He was strapped down, and he raged, throwing himself against the straps, struggling and fighting, screaming at them in Lepir.

‘Not this coward’s death!’ Over and over he shouted it aloud. ‘Kill me like a man!’

Zir felt her back arch in shared agony, and she moaned. Two human doctors stepped forward, each with a syringe. Only one held the drug; the other, merely distilled water, so that the cowards would never know which one of them had killed him.

‘Kill him like a man,’ she whispered.

She turned her head away at the last moment and dug her claws deep into the cushion. When she could force herself to look at the vidscreen again, Kata was already dead, limp under the straps.

‘Oh my love,’ she said aloud. ‘I’ll keep fighting. I’ll keep the flames burning. I’ll do it for the sake of our people, but I’ll do it in your name.’