Carnival

The total assembly was about twenty‑five. Five males other than the servants, counting Robert and an older man to whom he deferred, two boys, three girls, and the balance made up in teen and adult women, with the addition of Cathay, Shafaqat, Vincent, and Kusanagi‑Jones himself. Michelangelo noticed that the female and what he presumed were gentle male servants sat between the stud males–recognizable by their scars and the street licenses worn on leather cuffs at their wrists like barbaric jewelry–and the children, and the males largely conversed among themselves.

He also noticed that the same dark‑complected boy of about six or seven New Amazonian years–who had been riding Robert around the courtyard earlier–slithered out of his seat as soon as the cook’s back was turned, scrambled into the big man’s lap, and no one seemed to think much of it.

The table arrangements had left Kusanagi‑Jones seated next to Katya Pretoria on one side, and another woman–Agnes Pretoria, who he gathered was something like the household chatelaine or seneschal–on the other. “Is that your brother?”

Katya followed the line of his gaze. He looked down and continued ladling food onto his plate. Someone had apparently asked the cook to take pity on them, because the food on offer included legume curry, rice, bread with a nut butter, and a variety of other animal‑free choices. He’d have to find out to whom to send the thank‑you note.

“Julian.” Katya’s quick glance at Lesa gave away more than she probably knew. “Yes. He’s the last of Mother’s obligation. I don’t think she’ll marry until he starts the Trials, though, and finds a position. Unless…”

Kusanagi‑Jones caught her eye and then looked down, waiting her out while applying himself to the curry.

Her hesitation became a shrug. “Mother hopes he’s gentle,” she said. “He’s very smart.”

Kusanagi‑Jones washed his food down with a mouthful of wine. The consideration of a good meal itself was enough to lower his defenses. “Like his father?”

“You noticed. Yes. Robert’s special…” she paused, and picked up her fork. “Julian and I are full siblings. The third, Karyn–” The fork clicked on the plate. “She was older. Mother’s first. She died in a duel.”

“And do you duel?” he asked, because she didn’t seem to wish her discomfort noted.

She twirled her fork. “No,” she said, glancing up to locate her mother before she spoke. “It’s a stupid tradition.”

After di

He didn’t flinch away from the contact–a small positive sign–and served himself from the indicated plate with tongs. “Thank you for this afternoon,” he said.

She snorted. “Just doing my job.”

“Any word on who might have been behind it? Or what the goal was?”

She shrugged and slid a pastry onto her own plate. “We’ll know soon enough. I wounded one of them. As for what they wanted–a hostage? To open negotiations of their own? To demand a Coalition withdrawal in return for your life?” She lowered her voice and obscured her mouth behind her hand as she ate. “It all depends what faction we’re talking about.”

Which was a code phrase, one that should have identified her as his contact, based on the information in the chip he’d slipped Robert. But he just rolled his eyes and sipped his wine, far too relaxed for her to believe he had made the co

“No more slipping through the streets incognito,” Lesa agreed. She glanced at Elena; Elena frowned and tilted her head. Back off. Yes. Lesa thought she’d know if Vincent were dissembling. He might be just as good as she was, but he wasn’t any better. Instead, Lesa leaned around Vincent and caught Robert’s eye, beckoning with a buttery finger. “Would you like to meet my son, Vincent?”

He followed the line of her attention. “Very much,” he said. “You have two children?”

“The obligation is three,” she answered. “My eldest died, but I’ve met it, yes. I could start my own household, become an Elder in my own right.”

“If you wanted?”

“There’s a male whose contract I want to buy. Until it’s available, there’s no point.”

“You wouldn’t have to breed to get married if New Amazonia accepted the Coalition,” he said, dryly.

She smiled. “And you wouldn’t have three sisters and a brother if Ur had fallen into line a few years sooner.”

The look Katherinessen gave her was ever so slightly impressed. It was public record, and Katherine Lexasdaughter’s conceit in naming each of her five children–Valerie, Victoria, Vivian, Vincent, and Valentine–made the bit of data stand out in Lesa’s recall. As Robert came around the table holding Julian’s hand, she smiled at them and scooted back, opening a gap. Her son tugged loose of his sire’s grip and came to her, plopping himself onto her thigh. It wouldn’t last, of course. Any day now, Julian would decide he was too old for sitting on laps and listening to Mother, and not long after that, he’d enter the Trials. If he lived, he’d earn a contract in some other woman’s house.

Unless he beat the odds, of course. And grew up gentle. “Julian,” she said, when he had wiggled himself comfortable and Robert had settled down cross‑legged, not far away. “I’d like you to meet Vincent Katherinessen. He’s a diplomat like me.”

“He’s a male,” Julian said, with childish solipsism. “He can’t be a diplomat. That’s for girls.”

Whatever he thought of Vincent, he held out his hand anyway, and Vincent accepted it. “Pleased to meet you, Julian.”

“Vincent’s gentle,” Lesa said. She met Katherinessen’s golden‑brown eyes, noticing the splinters of blue and yellow around the pupils. “He can be anything he wants.”

Their hands interlaced, Julian’s smaller and darker and more callused, and Julian winced. “You got burned.”

“I did,” Vincent said. “My sun protection failed.”

“That was silly. You need a sunpatch.” He pointed to the shoulder of his jerkin, craning his neck so he could see what he was pointing at–a small patch in colors that matched the one Robert wore on his wrist cuff. “It changes color when you get too much UV. So you know to go inside.”

“I think I do need one of those. May I look?”

Julian nodded, but Vincent had been looking at Lesa when he asked. She slid her hand against her son’s neck and lifted his hair aside, tacit permission. Julian wriggled; the touch tickled. But he sat mostly still as Vincent leaned forward to inspect the sunpatch, oblivious to Kusanagi‑Jones watching from farther down the table with an expression that even Lesa found unreadable adorning his face.

“Where do you get one of those?” Vincent asked. He addressed Julian directly again, and Julian, charmed, smiled shyly and looked down.

“House,” he said.

“Do you think House would make me one?”

Julian ducked further, still smiling, and nodded, his courage for strangers exhausted.

“If you asked,” Lesa supplied.

Vincent leaned back, a half‑second after Lesa would have, and let Julian tug away. He drew his knees up and buried his face against Lesa’s shoulder, hands in front of his mouth. He was a warm compact bundle of muscle and bone, and she closed her eyes for a moment, leaning her chin on his hair. “He likes astronomy,” she said. “And computers.”

Vincent picked up his wineglass and leaned back, raising his eyes to the slow gorgeous burn of the Gorgon transmitted to the ceiling overhead. “Bad planet for getting to look at the stars from,” he commented, without audible irony.

“I know,” Lesa said. “Are anyof them any good?”

12

THROUGHOUT DINNER, KUSANAGI‑JONES WAS AWARE OF AN increasing level of noise from the street. Vincent gave him an arch look at one point–the invitation had been for food and Carnival–but Kusanagi‑Jones answered it with a sidelong shake of his head. I’ll chain you to a wall if you even suggest going out there.