Walter Williams - The Praxis

It was a polite group altogether, Sula thought.

“The problem,” she said, “is I’m not likely to see the end ofMidnight Runner for some time. I’ve had to give a deposition for the court of inquiry, but I’ve been contacted by advocates representing Lord Blitsharts’s insurance company.They want to prove it was suicide.”

“It wasn’t, was it?” Lady Amita asked.

“I found no evidence one way or another.” Sula tried not to shiver at the memory.

“However complicated it gets,” Lady Amita said, “I’m so glad it was you who got the medal, and not that dreadful man.”

“Dreadful man, my lady?” Sula asked, puzzled.

“The one who talked all the time during the rescue. The man with the horrible voice.”

“Oh.” Sula blinked. “That would be Lord Gareth Martinez.”

“That’s what the news kept insisting, that he was a Peer.” Lady Amita made a sour face. “But I don’t see how a Peer could talk like that, not with such a horrid accent. Certainlywe don’t know any such people. He sounded like some kind of criminal fromThe Incorruptible Seven. ”

Lord Durward patted his wife’s arm. “Some of these decayed provincial Peers are worse than criminals, take my word on it.”

Sula felt a compulsion to defend Martinez. “Lord Gareth isn’t like that,” she said quickly. “I think he’s kind of a genius, really.”

Lady Amita’s eyes widened. “Indeed? I hope we never meet any such geniuses.”

Lord Durward gave her an indulgent smile. “I’ll keep you safe, my dear.”

The point of the evening, it turned out, was to demonstrate Lady Terza’s accomplishments before a select group of Lis and their friends. After supper, which was served on modern Gemmelware with a design of fruits and nuts, they all gathered in a small, intimate theater. It was built in the back of the Li Palace in the form of an underwater grotto, with the walls and proscenium covered with thousands of seashells arranged in attractive patterns, and blue-green lighting to enhance the effect. All listened as Lady Terza sat before a small chamber ensemble and played her harp—and played it extremely well, so far as Sula could tell. Terza’s concentration on the music was complete, her face taking on an intent look, almost a ferocity, that belied the serene exterior she had shown with her family and friends.

Sula knew next to nothing about chamber music, and had always dismissed it as the kind of music where you have to make up your own words. But Terza’s concentration led her into the piece. From the other woman’s expressions—the way Terza held her breath before a pause, then nodded her satisfaction at the chord that ended the suspense; the way her eyes grew unfocused as she made a complicated attack; the way she seemed to relax into the slow passages, her movements growing dreamy, evocative—Sula felt the music enter her, caressing or stimulating or firing her nerves, dancing in her blood.

After the music ended there was a pause, then Sula helped to fill it with applause.

“I’m glad to have a chance to hire an orchestra,” confided Lady Amita, her hostess, during the interval. “Musicians aren’t going to be in very great demand during the mourning period.”

This aspect of mourning hadn’t struck Sula till now. “It’s good of you to give them work,” she said.

“Terza suggested it. She has so many friends among the musicians, and she’s concerned for them.” Her face assumed a touch of anxiety. “Of course, once she’s married, we don’t imagine she’ll be spending so much time with—” Tact rescued her in time. “With those sorts of people.”

The interval ended, and the orchestra began to play again. Sula watched Terza’s long, accomplished fingers as they plucked the harp, her intent face hovering near the strings, and then Sula glanced across the aisle at Maurice Chen and Lord Richard, both gazing with shining eyes at the graceful woman on stage. Sula suspected her own accomplishments would never gather quite that level of admiration—she was a good pilot and a whiz with math, but she’d already destroyed any hope of a relationship with the one person who had ever shown appreciation for that particular blend of skills.

Not that she would have had a chance with Martinez anyway, not in the longer term, and certainly not with someone like Lord Richard. She had long ago discovered that her looks attracted eligible men right up to the point where their parents found out she had no money or prospects, after which the young men were dragged off to look elsewhere. Strangely, however, this made her attractive to their fathers, men who had married once for the sake of procreation and family advantage, and who now, widowed or divorced, were looking for fun in their declining years, and someone beautiful on their arm for other men to admire.

If she’d been interested in older men, Sula supposed she could have done very well for herself. But she would have been lost in the complex, intricate world that those men lived in—she hadn’t grown up in it the way they had, or had a fraction of their experience—and she didn’t fancy being in the position of a pampered, addled, half-imbecile doll, trotted out for show or a romp in bed, then sent off to the boutique or the hairdresser whenever anything important went on.

The Fleet, for all its frustrations and disadvantages, was at least something she understood. Given a chance, perhaps only the merest breath of a chance, the Fleet was a place where she could do well.

After the concert, Sula complimented Terza on her playing. “What instrument do you play?” Terza asked.

“None, I’m afraid.”

Terza seemed surprised. “You didn’t learn an instrument at school?”

“My schooling was…a bit spotty.”

Terza’s surprise deepened. “You were taught at home, Lady Sula?”

Clearly no one had told Terza about Sula’s past. “I was in school on Spannan,” she said. “The school wasn’t very good and I left early.”

Something in Sula’s tone perhaps suggested to Terza that the matter was best left unpursued, and so it was.

Sula raised her coffee cup. “This is the Vigo hard-paste, isn’t it?”

Which led to a discussion of porcelain in general, and a tour of some of the family’s collection, led by Lord Richard.

It never hurts to know a genial senior officer, Sula told herself, and exerted herself not to tell him he was an idiot when he got something wrong.

The vote appointing Akzad as Lord Senior of the Convocation was unanimous. The choice had been obvious. Lord Convocate Akzad was a member of an exemplary and dignified Naxid clan that had provided scores of distinguished civil servants and high-ranking officers of the Fleet, he had served in the Convocation most of his life, and he was a prominent member of the previous Lady Senior’s administration.

There was a certain amount of speculation concerning why Akzad hadn’t retired or committed suicide along with his contemporaries. Privately, the convocates admitted to one another that Akzad wanted the highest office in the empire more than he wanted his ashes to rest with the Great Masters. But it was also admitted that he deserved the office, and that his administration would be run smoothly and be free of innovation. The Convocation was not in favor of innovation, especially not now, when citizens were uneasy after the death of the Shaa and continuity was most to be desired.

Maurice, Lord Chen rose from his seat when the vote was called, then remained on his feet and applauded as Akzad took his seat at the dais and with great ceremony was cloaked in the stiff, brocaded robe of the Lord Senior. He was then presented with the overlong wand, burnished copper with silver bands, that he would use to call the Convocation to order, to recognize speakers, and to command the audio pickups that would broadcast the speaker’s words to the 631 members of the Convocation.