and his pilots strode into the Outer Court of the Royal Residence, where
they'd had their reception the first night, the crowd assembled there voiced
an appreciative "ooh" that was music to Wedge's ears. He raised a hand to wave
jauntily to the crowd, his smile projecting confidence, not betraying the
slight queasiness he felt as the court's miasma of perfumes began to assault
him.
"I feel fat,"Hobbie said.
'You're not fat," Janson said. "Exceptnever mind."
" What? "Hobbie said.
"Nothing."
"No, tell me. I've been working out. I've been good. You just can't work
on everything."
"That's right," Janson said. "It's scarcely noticeable."
"Where?"
A womanalready tall, her height amplified by the way her brown hair was
piled atop her headmoved up beside Wedge. "I found out who that other room
belongs to," she said.
Wedge looked at her, then peered closer. "Hallis?"
She looked exasperated. "Yes, Hallis."
"Sorry, you still look different with only one head."
"Men always tell me that..."
"What other room?"
"I'm delighted to oblige," Wedge said. When he took her hand, he felt
something crinkle in his palm. Iella withdrew her hand and departed with her
minister, leaving Wedge with a scrap of flimsi in his hand and a happy memory
of her dazzling smile.
As inconspicuously as he could, he glanced at the flimsi. On it was
written a notethe name "Rogriss," followed by a series of numbers,
recognizable as a specific communications frequency.
Wedge nodded. That would be the frequency the admiral kept one personal
comm unit tuned tosomething only his executive officer and one or two others
aboard Agonizer should have known. Wedge couldn't begin to guess how Iella had
come by the knowledge; he was just glad she had. He pocketed the scrap.
As the introductions and handshakes continued, he scanned the assembly.
He caught sight of Turr Phennir and pilots, standing in a tight little
quartet, all in Adumari dress. Phennir was scowling, definitely unhappy, and
Wedge grinned at him. It was possibly the most minor of victoriesWedge and
pilots had upstaged the Imperial flyers with their distinctive uniforms and
entrancebut Wedge was happy to accept any victory he could get.
More invitees crowded into the hall and began to segregate themselves
into large groups. Wedge tried to puzzle out what the divisions meant.
The perator, once again in gold, was surrounded chiefly by ministers and
other courtiers; that group was easy to define. Tomer Darpen hovered at its
edges, prevented by his alien status from moving closer to the center and
hearing what the perator was saying, prevented by his own nature from moving
farther away.
Wedge saw in two other groups pilots he'd flown against in simulations
training. Most seemed to be on the periphery of one group of thirty or so
well-dressed nobles, while a couple were with a different group of similar
size. Wedge noted that the garments of these groups tended to be slightly
different in cut and style than those he was used to, and realized that the
pilots he recognized were all from nations other than Cartann. That was it,
then; these were delegations from other nations.
Another group was of Cartann noblesWedge saw Iella and her minister
among them. Iella noticed his attention, gave him a smile; then she was back
in character and responding to something said by one of the men in her
vicinity. Most of that crowd constituted men and women dressed in similar
stuffy fashion, which suggested that this was a crowd of ministers, but the
fact that they were well away from the perator said that they were a group the
ruler had no particular need to consultminor functionaries.
Turr Phennir and his pilots were at the center of their own knot of
people. One of Phennir's pilots, a tall redheaded man, had his hand out before
him as if grasping a TIE fighter's yoke; his hand shook as though he were
firing on a target, and his eyes were wide, animated. The group around him
made noises of admiration. Phennir was not paying attention; his gaze was on
Wedge.
"Before the day's events begin," called a courtier, "a diversion. Ground
Champion Cheriss ke Hanadi accepts a title challenge from Lord Pilot Eneboros
ke Shalapan."
"That explains where Cheriss is," Tycho said, and craned his head for a
better look.
The crowd in the vicinity of the perator moved back to make an open
circle; Wedge headed that way.
Cheriss was already in the center of the circle, stretching, going
through a few practice thrusts and lunges with her blastsword's power off. Her
appearance was different from the way it had been in the previous blastsword
match; her intensity was there, but she wore no predatory smile. She also
looked tired, a little disheveled, not her meticulously neat self.
Into Wedge's ear, Hobbie said, "She's wearing the same clothes from
yesterday."
Beside him, Janson nodded. "Not like her. Such a clean girl. Even when
she's stabbing people."
"Quiet," Wedge said. "There's something wrong here."
Her opponent, at the edge of the crowd, was very tall and lean, with an
elaborately curled brown mustache and a goatee that tended more toward blond.
Friends or assistants to either side of him were binding up his flowing
sleeves so they would not interfere with his motions. When he was ready, he
nodded to the speaker, who in turn caught Cheriss's eye. She thumbed on the
power of her blastsword and its tip began leaving blue trails through the air.
Her challenger also flourished with his blade, its tip leaving traces of a
more purple-blue behind.
The announcer called for salutes to the perator, then signaled for the
fight to begin.
It didn't take long. The challenger moved in with a thrust that was
little more than an initial probe. Cheriss swept it aside and, in the same
motion, threw herself forward, a daring counterstrike that left her exposed...
but caught her enemy in the rib cage. There was a crack and a flash of blue
light, and with a cry her challenger went down.
Cheriss looked to the perator.
The ruler of Cartann shrugged and put his hand out, palm downthe signal
that the defeated man should die.
Cheriss slowly shook her head and turned her back on the defeated man and
the perator. She moved into the crowd, leaving the fight behind. The audience
parted for her, many of its members offering a low noise of surprise.
"Did she just do what I thought she did?" Wedge asked. "Give the perator
the choice on what happened to her opponent, and then defy him?"
"That's what I got out of it, boss," Hobbie said.
The perator was scowling now, but lost the expression when a minister
stepped up to him and began talking. In moments, the ruler had apparently
forgotten the fight, and friends of the challenger picked the injured man up
to carry him from the hall.
Wedge moved through the crowd in pursuit of Cheriss. When he caught up to
her, she was speaking to the man who
had announced her fight. "... standard
acceptance for ke Seiufere," she said. The man nodded.
"Cheriss, a moment of your time?"
She glanced at Wedge, and he was taken aback by what he saw in her
expression. Before she had always been so animated, so full of energy and
cheer; now her eyes seemed dull, lacking passion or interest. "A moment, yes,"
she said.
"What are you doing?"
She offered an indifferent shrug. "While I have been acting as your
guide, I have let other duties pile up. Such as attending to the many
challenges I receive. I am merely clearing some of those away now." She
suppressed a yawn.
"You haven't changed since yesterday. Have you slept?"
She shook her head. "I don't need sleep to deal with these pretenders."
She looked over Wedge's shoulder and her expression became even more mournful.
"You'd best go. Someone might grow suspicious... for no good reason at all."
She turned her back on him and moved into the crowd.
Wedge turned to look. Immediately behind him was Tycho, alert and intent
as ever. That didn't make sense; why would Tycho "grow suspicious"?
But over his shoulder, a few meters back, doing a very good job of
looking innocuous, stood Iella.
Wedge froze and continued to scan the crowd in that direction. Who else
could have provoked such a response from Cheriss? He noted and dismissed a
double dozen faces. No, she had to have been referring to Iella.
But she shouldn't have known Iella's face. To know it, she had to have...
Wedge calculated the times any of the New Republic pilots had been in contact
with Iella. No, Cheriss had to have seen it last night. She had to have been
the quiet stalker Janson had heard. She must have been outside Wedge's
quarters when he and Janson returned from the Allegiance last night, must have
followed them to their meeting with Iella, must have later gotten a look at
Iella's face by some means.
And now she was
"We are doubly blessed," called the announcer. "Ground Champion Cheriss
ke Hanadi, not content with a single victory this day, accepts a title
challenge from Lord Pilot Phalle ke Seiufere."
The crowd moved out to open another circle, and there stood Cheriss, this
time opposite a squat plug of a man who looked as though he had tremendous
upper body strength. Blond, with shoulder-length yellow hair and a mustache
that trailed and swayed limply, the new challenger stared at Cheriss with real
anger in his sea-green eyes.
Wedge swore to himself. The fight was already under way by the time he
was able to maneuver himself to the front of the crowd. Nor was this a quick
and easy battle like the last one; Wedge saw Cheriss and her opponent exchange
assault after assault, each time deflecting blast-sword blows with deft
parries or by the more punishing method of catching the explosive blows on the
guards of their swords. Within moments the air was thic k with the delicate,
colorful traceries of the movements of blast-sword tips and with the acrid
smell of blaster impacts, which became almost strong enough to overpower the
perfumes.
Cheriss's opponent, strong and fast, seemed to have no problem swatting
aside Cheriss's assaults before her blade point endangered him. Some of her
thrusts, breathtaking in their speed and intricacy, snaked around the guard on
his left-hand dagger, but these he took with equal skill on his blastsword
guard, always disengaging immediately and moving forward in aggressive attack,
driving Cheriss into retreat. Soon both Cheriss and her opponent were
breathing heavily, sweat running from beneath their heavy and elaborate
clothing.
Cheriss, slowing, swept her opponent's point aside with the knife she
still held in her distinctive reverse grip and leaped forward into a lunge.
Her opponent riposted, his blastsword moving her tip out of line while his
remained in linebut her lunge took her body lower than it customarily did,
and suddenly she was skidding past him on her knees. Cheriss struck backward
without looking and her blastsword point took her opponent behind the left
knee. He yelped loud enough to drown out the blaster sound of impact, and
collapsed onto one leg; before he could begin to recover, before he could
force his body to work through the pain and shock of blast impact, Cheriss
rose, spun, and tapped him once on each arm. He shrieked once more and slammed
to the floor. Smoke rose from his wounds and the air filled with the smell of
burned flesh.
The audience applauded. Cheriss, looking far more tired and shaky than
Wedge had ever seen her, bowed her head to the crowd, then looked to the
perator.
This time the ruler did not bother to give her a cue. He turned his back
on Cheriss and her downed opponent. The crowd uttered a rippling noise of
surprise. Cheriss turned her back on her opponent and moved into the crowd.
Wedge headed for her. But before he could take half a dozen steps through
the milling crowd, the announcer called out, "Attend! Before this day is given
over entirely to demonstrations of the blastsword art, the perator wishes to
address us, and all the world, on the matter of today's gathering."
The crowd went into motion again, its elements dividing by what looked
like random motion into its earlier groupings. Wedge lost track of Cheriss and
later.
"Nice timing with the New Republic uniforms," Tomer said. "It turns out
the perator's going to broadcast worldwide. And the Imp pilots, in local
dress, don't even stand out in the crowd. You couldn't have done better."
"Nice to know I've accomplished something on a diplomatic level," Wedge
said.
Tapestries high up on two of the walls drew aside, revealing the
flatscreens Wedge had seen on the night of his arrival on-planet. The screens
showed confused, wavering visions of a crowdthis crowdand then settled in on
the face of the perator, who was smiling, golden, looking as perfect and
imperishable as a statue. The perator was looking off to the side, talking to
someone; he received some sort of cue, for he turned directly into the flatcam
view and his smile broadened, became dazzling.
"On this historic day," the perator said, "I address all of Adumar
something I find I will be doing often.
"We have now had time to see that Adumar does not exist in a void.
Rather, we share the universe with other worlds, and collectives of worlds.
Hidden for centuries by distance and forgetfulness, we find ourselves now
within easy reach of new friends who would embrace us as equalsexcept for one
important manner in which we are not their equals."
A murmur rose in the ranks of the audience, and many of its members
looked at Wedge and his pilots, at Turr Phennir and the Imperial flyers. The
expressions of some were curious; those of others graduated toward resentment
or suspicion.
"I find," the perator said, "that we lag behind these united worlds in
only one characteristicone which is easily corrected. We are a world divided
by ancient borders, national identities that serve only to keep us apart and
to fragment our ability to make wise decisions affect - ing all Adumar. I am
grateful to our visitors from other worlds and their gentle manner of
demonstrating this to us."
"We haven't demonstrated anything," Wedge whispered. "We haven't been
able to talk to him."
"True," Tomer said, also in hushed tones. "But he's been absorbing
information we've passed on to him. Records, histories, encyclopedias."
"In consultation with the rulers and representatives of other nations,"
the perator said, "we have come to an agreement that the establishment of a
unified world government for Adumar will allow us to interact with outside
worlds more effectively, permitting the establishment of trade and exchange of
knowledge."
"This is good," Tomer whispered. "This is excellent."
The perator drew himself more upright, and his expression turned from
cheerful benevolence to a leader's awareness of history and import. "So," he
said, "on this memorable day, I hereby establish the government of the world
of Adumar. With both humility and trepidation I take the reins of command of a
united world." There was a stirring, a growing murmur, from one portion of the
audience, but he continued, "This new government will be structured as an
outgrowth of the government of Cartann, and will be centered in the city of
Cartann to allow for an instantaneous and effective implementation of rule."
He bowed his head in humility.
Portions of the audience applauded. But a riot of noise erupted from one
large cluster of the audiencethe one, Wedge saw, that was dominated by
foreign dignitaries. "Wait!" cried one dignitary. He surged ahead, out of his
cluster of crowd and toward the perator's, waving his hands, his flared
sleeves rippling with all the colors of the rainbow. "There has been no vote"
"Liar!" That was a shout from a deep-voiced representative wearing muted
greens; even his hair and beard were green. "You cannot unilaterally" The
rest of his shout was drowned out by the rising volume of applause and shouts
from elsewhere in the audience.
Not one of these angry declamations was broadcast over the flatscreens on
the walls. Wedge supposed that a directional voice pickup was being used so
that the perator's words, and only his words, would be broadcast.
Wedge glanced at Tomer. "Is what I think is happening actually taking