Kate Elliott - An earthly crown

"It is time for Tess to return," said Charles, sounding cool. "It has been four years, Marco. Four years, since she left Earth. I would have come sooner, but how was I to know it would take two years to finalize the Keinaba alliance? Damned chameleons. One needs the patience of Job to deal with them."

Marco chuckled. "Which you have. I'd much rather deal with barbarians. Quick to anger, quick to friendship. Not this years-long game playing the Chapallii love. Years? Hell. Decades-long, centuries, for all we know of them. Still, I say you're better off letting me talk to Tess first."

The footfalls ceased. The curve of the wall, and the twilight, still hid them from the two men. Alone, David would just have gone to join the others, but Diana looked utterly embarrassed. And anyway, he was curious about the tenor of their conversation.

"No."

"Charles-"

"No. In any case, the rendezvous is already arranged. We sail in two weeks. Baron Santer will act as regent until my return. I'll leave him the scepter of office, although I'll keep the signet ring and the prince's chain just in case he gets ambitions. Tess will meet us at Abala Port in about six weeks."

"And?"

"And the Company can travel on into the interior with the jaran, if that's still their wish."

"And you?"

"We'll see."

"Yes, we'll see because you have every intention of turning straight round and coming back here with Tess, don't you? Merde, Charles, don't do anything rash."

Charles laughed, short and sharp. "When was the last time you've known me to do anything rash?"

"A damned long time ago, as you well know. Let me say it this way. You're getting used to things going your way. This may not be your choice to make."

"Tess has a duty-"

"Yes, I know all about her duty, and I'm sure she does as well. In any case, it's not Tess I'm thinking of now. In the words of that ancient song, I think an irresistible force is about to meet an immovable object, and I'm sure as hell going to get out of the flash zone."

"I'll think about it," said Charles Soerensen. David was shocked to hear such coldness in his voice; this was Charles, who always listened, who could always be counted upon to be open-minded. Diana clutched a fistful of cloak in one hand. Footfalls sounded again, but moving away from them, and they were left in silence but for the sea surging below and the distant sound of carriages leaving the palace.

"Curiouser and curiouser," said a woman's voice beside them.

David gasped, starting round. Diana sagged back against the wall.

"I beg your pardon. I didn't mean to startle you." The woman smiled.

"Cara!"

"Oh, not you," said Cara Hierakis dismissively. "I meant Diana."

"Dr. Hierakis," said Diana in a small voice. She glanced guiltily toward the right and then back. "Oh. I _

"

"Yes, we were all eavesdropping, weren't we?"

"Speak for yourself," said David, affronted. "We came here by accident.''

"Oh, not on purpose, I know," said the doctor mildly. "Or at least, not on your part, Diana."

"Thank you," said David, but he laughed.

"Is she really alive?" Diana asked. "Terese Soerensen, that is? We heard rumors, but I didn't know if they were true."

"Yes, she's alive."

Whenever he heard Tess mentioned, just that simple fact set against the official announcements proclaimed by the Chapalii Protocol Office, David felt a warm glow start up inside him. Tess was alive, and he would be seeing her soon.

"But why did she come to Rhui?" Diana asked. "Oh, I know I shouldn't ask, but…" She trailed off, and David turned to look at Cara Hierakis because it was a question he had never gotten a satisfactory answer to.

Cara laughed. The breeze off the bay stirred her black hair and she squinted out at the distant islands that rimmed the western horizon like glass beads shot through with the last red fires of the sun. The barest trace of crows-feet showed at her eyes. Her face looked not young, yet not old, that mature mask that most humans between the age of forty and ninety now wore: ageless, smooth, and healthy. That David himself wore, although it was by now an ancient joke that folks with the darkest skin stayed the youngest looking for the longest time; there was not four months in chronological age between Charles and David and Marco, but people often mistook David for younger.

"But," echoed Cara, smiling at Diana. "You'll ask anyway. I must say you're looking pert, David, after that impossibly boring audience and ceremony.''

"I left."

"Of course. You could. Tess is doing linguistics research, Diana."

"Linguistics research? That seems so mundane, somehow. I thought maybe she was kidnapped by a dark warrior and swept off into a life filled with hardship and passionate lovemaking. Oh, well."

There was a pause. David chuckled.

Cara regarded Diana with an expression of amused indulgence. "And a bastard every year? Or do you suppose she was married in some primitive ceremony?"

"Oh, certainly," said Diana with conviction, pushing herself away from the wall. "Barbarians are prudes, aren't they? Of course there was a ceremony. She's probably scarred for life."

David laughed.

"How long have you been an actor?" Cara asked.

Diana smiled in a way that showed her dimples to perfection. David sighed and shook his head, feeling very old. "My first performance was at age four as the changeling in A Midsummer Night's Dream."

"That must explain it," said Cara, but David knew her well enough to see that she liked Diana. "In any case, Tess is gifted with languages, and I suspect she saw Rhui as an excellent laboratory to study human evolution in parallel to our own."

"Like Owen?"

"Perhaps. It's not a bad analogy."

"You have a laboratory here, too, don't you? A medical one."

"Yes." Cara cast a glance at David.

"She's studying aging," he said.

But Cara was only angling for an opening, since it was her favorite subject. "As grateful as we may be for the longevity treatments the Chapalii gave us, allowing us to live out our full one hundred and twenty year life spans with good health and a long period of relative youth, I suspect there's something we're missing. Something they didn't tell us, or something, perhaps, that they don't know."

"What do you mean?"

David had seen Cara's lecture mask before. It slipped firmly into place now. "Aging is a two part process. One is a breakdown of the vitality and regenerative abilities of the tissues and the metabolic system, that's what the Chapalii treatments deal with. But the other is a genetic clock that switches off the organism at a set time. We're still stuck at one hundred and twenty years. I think we can do better.'' The mask slipped off, and she suddenly looked cautious. "Perhaps. We'll see."

"It's a delicate and peculiar issue," put in David, since Cara had left him his opening. "We don't talk about it much."

"Oh," said Diana. The sea faded into darkness behind them, and the massive bulk of the palace rose against the stars. "Is that why you have your laboratory down here, on an interdicted planet? Where the Chapalii aren't allowed?"

What need to reply? The wind coursed along the parapet and the sea dashed itself into foam on the rocks below. The fecund moon lay low, bordering the hills. A shoe scraped on stone, and Marco emerged from around a curve of wall. He smiled at Diana and leaned casually against the wall beside her.

To David's surprise, it was Diana who broke the silence. "But, Dr. Hierakis, are the Rhuian humans really the same species as we are?"

David almost laughed, seeing how disconcerted Marco looked, as if he thought that once he arrived, Diana would not be able to think of anything but him.

"Oh, yes," said Cara. "By all the biological laws we know. Identical." She appeared about to say something else, but did not.