Primary Inversion (30 page)

      
“Raped?”

      
He gave me a startled look. “Yes.”

      
The puma reformed into an image of two people. But neither was Ur Qox. The man who stood on the left was Kryx Quaelen, the Highton Trade Minister.

      
The speaker, the man at the podium, was Jaibriol.

      
Jarith got out of bed and pulled on his pants. “I can’t watch this. Not here. I’m sorry. I’ll wait for you in the living room.”

      
Why did Jaibriol have to trespass into my life again, just when I had a chance to forget him? I got up and went to the closet, grabbing the first thing I touched, a simple shift. “You don’t have to go.” I pulled the dress over my head. “I’ll leave. You can stay here.”

      
“Why don’t we both go into the living room?”

      
I understood then. He didn’t want the Hightons in the place where we had made love. “All right.”

      
I sat on the sofa watching the holoscreen while Jarith made himself a drink. Jaibriol’s speech had little substance, just the usual Trader business about how wonderful they all were. It didn’t sound like him. That wasn’t what chilled me, though. To someone who didn’t know him, which meant most of the galaxy, he probably appeared like a normal Highton. But I had seen him from the inside, that night on Delos. The man giving that speech was drugged.

      
Jarith sat next to me, holding his drink. Whiskey. He took a long swallow, watching the screen like a man in a trance, unable to look away. But he hardly noticed Jaibriol. It was Quaelen who mesmerized him. What power did the Hightons have, that they could terrorize us even through a broadcast? Was it the language of their bodies, the cadence of their voices, the flexing of their hands? At some level, we
recognized
them. Seeing Quaelen chilled me. Why was he with Jaibriol?

      
A horrible thought came to me. Maybe Ur Qox put Jaibriol in Quaelen’s care. The Emperor of Eube, the monstrous leader of the Traders, carried the recessive genes of an
empath.
He was half Rhon, inheriting the DNA only from his mother, so none of his traits manifested. But he had every gene unpaired. Did he feel some trace of empathy, enough to have compassion for his son? Perhaps he gave Jaibriol to Quaelen because he couldn’t make himself to force his son into the role he had sired Jaibriol to play.

      
I didn’t want to imagine Jaibriol’s life with Kryx Quaelen as his “mentor.” I could guess what happened; Jaibriol refused to give the speech and Quaelen drugged him into compliance, maybe using threats or physical force as well. The worst of it was that Quaelen didn’t need drugs or threats. He could easily record enough data to create a convincing simulation of the Highton Heir that would give whatever speech Quaelen wanted—if it were only Jaibriol’s words he desired to control.

      
Jarith sat next to me, his face ashen as he downed his drink. Finally I said, “Pako, turn off the broadcast.”

      
As the screen darkened, Jarith glanced at me, relief washing out from his mind. “You have to watch every speech they give?”

      
I grimaced. “Unfortunately. ‘Know your enemy’ and all that.”

      
“It was bad enough when Qox had no heir. At least we could hope he would be the last of his line. But with his son materializing out of nowhere—” Jarith shuddered. “I wonder if it will ever end.”

      
I didn’t see how it could. If Qox hadn’t produced an heir, another Highton would have claimed the title. The new Emperor would be just as bad. The Hightons would never evolve into a gentler people. Aristos were genetically programmed to be Aristos. Nor would time dilute their gene pool. Their obsession with the purity of their bloodlines came from far more than arrogance. They truly were a pathological strain of life; when they reproduced in a way to expand their gene pool, having children with their providers, they bore offspring they were driven to destroy.

      
Now Jaibriol stood there, drugged and vulnerable, the one person in this star-spanning war of hatred who could end it, either by coming to the peace table—or by bringing Imperial Skolia to its knees.

XI

A Time To Speak

“Many people survive far worse,” I said. “I only lived through three weeks of it.”

      
Tager regarded me. “You think three weeks instead of three years makes your emotional scars any less valid?”

      
I regarded him from the safety of my post near the bookshelf. In the three times I had come to see him, I had never sat down. It made me feel vulnerable. He usually stood as he did now, near his desk, neither crowding nor pressuring me.

      
“Look,” I said. “Most providers live their entire life in captivity. What happened to me was nothing.”

      
He came over to me. “You’re wrong.”

      
“I’m trained to—”

      
“Bullshit.”

      
I blinked, startled as much by his intensity as by his reaction. Both were out of character. “Why do you say that?”

      
“No training in the universe could make that ‘nothing.’ Yes, your armor is strong. But a human being lives underneath that armor. You were tortured and sexually assaulted, and the fact that you’re a Primary, that you’re trained to endure hardship, that other people have experienced it over a longer period of time—
none
of that lessens your injury.”

      
“It was ten years ago. I should have been over it a long time ago.”

      
“Why?”

      
Why? That maddening question again. “Because time heals wounds.”

      
“Only if you treat the wound.” His voice gentled. “Repressing the experience is a survival mechanism, a way to keep functioning. But no matter how much you deny it, it will affect you. It can hurt your self-esteem, hamper your ability to function, make it hard to maintain relationships.”

      
“You think I have problems relating to people because of that?”

      
“It’s possible.”

      
I stepped back from him, feeling crowded. “I’m just overly sensitive.”

      
“Why do you say that?”

      
I snorted. “I saw a holomovie last month. It was one of those ‘Jagernaut goes amok’ things. It made me furious. I walked out and ruined it for the people with me. Then I almost busted someone in the face just because he said my attitude annoyed him. You don’t call that overreacting?”

      
“No,” Tager said. “Not given the combat experiences you’ve had.”

      
“The people with me thought I was crazy.”

      
“The fact that they didn’t know why you reacted that way doesn’t invalidate your response.”

      
Why couldn’t I make him see? “I almost stabbed a man in the heart just for being obnoxious.”

      
“You almost stabbed him,” Tager said, “because he reminded you of a hideous experience where you were repeatedly and violently brutalized.”

      
Did he believe Hilt had triggered my memory of Tarque? I didn’t want a dead Highton to have so much power over me. “That can’t be true.”

      
“You had no control over what happened when Tarque kidnapped you,” Tager said quietly. “If you were robbed of material possessions, you could replace them. If you’ve been robbed of your self-respect, of your sense of worth and security, where do you get those back?”

      
“I knew the danger when I went to Tams. I should have been more careful.” I voiced the thought that had pressed on me for so long. “What happened was my own fault.”

      
“The problem was never yours.” He regarded me steadily. “It’s not your fault. No matter what he said to you, what he called you, what anyone has ever said—it’s not your fault.”

      
I was testing mental ground I had avoided for years. “Why would it all stir up now, when I’ve been fine for so long?”

      
“What makes you think you’ve been fine?”

      
“Of course I’ve been fine.”

      
“Then why,” Tager asked, “was it seven years before you could have a serious relationship with a man?”

      
“You mean Hypron?”

      
He nodded. “Seven years is a long time for anyone to stay alone. For an empath it’s almost unheard of.”

      
I almost objected. I had always avoided large groups or situations where I had to deal with the emotions of people I didn’t like. But I knew what Tager meant. In love, empathy was a gift, especially with another empath. The lack of that intimacy created a loneliness that hurt like a wound. Jarith and I shared a bond that fulfilled me on a level I couldn’t reach with a normal person. I thought of the locked file in my mind, festering in the dark. I knew what had shaken it, releasing this barrage of memories I wanted to hold back. Jaibriol Qox.

      
All I said was, “It can’t all be Tams.”

      
For once Tager didn’t disagree. “Going into combat against Aristos, feeling people die—it has to be a nightmare.” He regarded me with that compassion of his that seemed to have no limit. “You’ve lived through hell a thousand times. That you’ve survived, psychologically intact, is miraculous.”

      
I stared at him. Nothing about me was miraculous. I was a mess. “Everyone has troubles. They don’t go around pointing Jumblers at their head.”

      
“Primary, it’s a—”

      
“Soz,” I interrupted.

      
“Soz?”

      
“That’s my name. Soz.”

      
“Well. Good. Soz.”

      
That was his only outward reaction, a pleasant nod. But I caught his true response even though he thought he masked it. His pulse leapt. He had made a breakthrough with me, a big one. And that mattered to him. It
mattered.

      
“Why?” I asked.

      
He blinked. “Why is your name Soz?”

      
“No. Why do you care what happens to me?”

      
“Because you’re a remarkable person.”

      
“How can you think I’m remarkable? You hardly know me.”

      
He smiled. “I’m trained to understand people.”

      
“It’s more than training.”

      
He regarded me curiously. “Why do you say that?”

      
I searched for the right words. “You naturally care about people. I’m not used to that. I’m used to Traders. Or ISC politics.” I grimaced. “Both get pretty vicious.” I thought of Rex, Hypron, my first husband Jato. “When I do find love, it doesn’t…stay.” I winced. “The only person I’m capable of maintaining a relationship with is a boy half my age who has no political opinions and looks as different from an Aristo as is humanly possible.”

      
“What’s wrong with that?”

      
“It’s not normal.”

      
“Why not?”

      
Why did he always ask me that? “I should have a more mature lover.” Like Rex. But Rex didn’t want me anymore.

      
“Why?”

      
“I don’t
know
why. Because it’s embarrassing when doddering Jagernauts fawn over beautiful young boys, that’s why.”

      
Tager actually laughed, as if I had made a joke. “I would hardly call you doddering.”

      
“I’m almost forty-eight.”

      
“I would have guessed younger.” He regarded me. “Even forty-eight is young for your rank.”

      
I shrugged. “I’m good at what I do.”

      
“Why does that make you angry?”

      
“Angry? It doesn’t make me angry.” That was a lie and I knew it and Tager knew it. Yet until this moment I had never consciously thought that my rank made me
angry.
Why should it?

      
I spoke slowly, as if I wee reading a book I had owned for years but never summoned the courage to open. “He sent me to Tams knowing what could happen. He sent me out there on the front lines, for years, far longer than most officers, and he sent out my brother Althor, and he sent out my brother Kelric.” I forced myself to go on. “And Kelric never came back.”

      
Tager spoke quietly. “Who is ‘he’?”

      
“My brother.”

      
“Althor?”

      
I shook my head. “No. My half-brother. Kurj. The Imperator.”

      
Tager paled. I had more than shaken him this time, I had thrown him into an earthquake. But he was right. I was angry.
Angry.
The words came, breaking the dam I had put around them.

      
“I lost my first child,” I said, “The only child I’ve ever conceived, because Kurj told me that if I left active duty, I abdicated my claim to his title. I lost my first husband because of it, I lost Rex because he didn’t want to be my crippled consort, I lost my baby brother to death and my older brother to distrust, I lost my ability to relate like a
normal
human being—” My voice shook. “Kurj would take my
soul
if he could.
He has no right.
”

      
It was a long moment before he answered. That he spoke at all was a marvel. His position was the nightmare of every heartbender, knowing he could bring down the Imperator’s wrath with one wrong word. I never intended to tell Kurj I had seen Tager, but Tager couldn’t know that. Yet he didn’t back down, not even now, when he knew the danger. And in that he earned my respect forever.