I meant every word of it. Does anyone dare to say I acted wrongly? You, Ailann?
If I were in your position, says Ailann, I would have done exactly the same thing.
You’re honest, at least. A good trait in a god.
Forgiveness is a better one, says Dermot.
Are you speaking on my behalf, or your own?
We’re all on the same team now, says Lugh.
Did you sleep through the important bits? asks Lorcan. We’re not on the same team anymore. You’re letting the fact that we got mid-season trades blind you to the fact that two of us thought they could form their own franchise.
Stop it, says Patrick. This isn’t a witch hunt. We’re just recording the facts.
It’s a hearing, says Ross. We can decide if we need a trial later. For now, let’s get at the truth.
Let’s be clear, says Ailann, that we’re not blaming you, Ari.
All right. Then let me tell the story without interruption.
*****
By the time the flagship arrived, the liberation of Dalgherdia was mostly accomplished. We had taken the science station, but a few Terrans had managed to escape into the city. I saw clearly the wisdom of staffing the flagship with SSOps agents. I couldn’t find the missing Terrans – although my senses are perceptive down to the molecular level, there was nothing to distinguish them from the human inhabitants of Dalgherdia City. We would have to do it the hard way, by searching door to door. And the K’ntasari are quite distinctive in appearance. The Terrans knew exactly who to elude.
SSOps agents, however, were trained to uncover crime and sedition. They were perfect for the job, so I left it in their hands and turned to something much more important: Tara.
I had been uncomfortable with the plan from the start. Once again, if only for a few days, she had been left alone. If something had happened, would I have been able to reach her in time? If CenGov had launched an attack from Dalgherdia, General Lemkht’s fleet would never have been able to catch up with Tara’s flagship. And I know that Cillian’s analysis indicated that CenGov wouldn’t have been able to mount a space attack given the resources they would’ve been able to amass on the science station without detection, but it was still a risk.
Why is it so important that the Domha’vei be protected? “Tara’s destiny.” Why is that even a priority? Wouldn’t it be easier to just live with her someplace safe, concentrate on protecting her and allowing her to enjoy life? Why do we have to be Matriarch and Archon, and risk ourselves constantly, and spend our lives in service to people we don’t even know?
Why was I sent to help the K’ntasari when I should’ve been at Tara’s side?
Such a thing was not going to happen again. I would see to it.
I went to meet the flagship. It was aptly named Victorious Tara. But Tara did not have to fight to win. She claimed me with her eyes.
“Ari,” she said. “I’ve been dreaming about you, Ari.”
No words would come. I begged for somebody to give me words. I could hear Manasseh laughing. I know how you feel, he said.
Say that it’s appropriate, since you’ve been created from her dreams, said Valentin.
She put her hand on my chest. She was so small – the top of her head did not reach my chin. How could a creature this delicate be so powerful? “You have,” she said. “All of Ash’s emanations have – but every now and then, he outdoes himself.”
The look in her eyes steals all my strength. “I am at your service,” I said.
“Oh Ari, you seem so formal, almost distant. You don’t have to be like that with me.”
I couldn’t help a slight smile. “I’m afraid my impulses are at odds with the respect I bear for you.”
Our eyes met, a transmission of fire. And I could tell that she was amused as well. No, there could be no pretense about this. I could be no other than what I am. “I think you should follow your impulse,” she said.
I picked her up and threw her over my shoulder.
*****
“Mmmm, you’re as brutal as Cillian,” she said. “But warmer. A warmer brutality, if that makes sense. Or maybe brutal is the wrong word. Animal. The Terrans on Eden called you a wild man. It’s appropriate.”
“Would you prefer me to be refined?” I asked.
“I prefer Evan to be refined. I prefer you to be wild. I like you, Ari. A lot. And you’re hung like an alpha-modified ox, which doesn’t hurt your case. Honestly, I wasn’t sure you were even going to fit.”
Her hand grasped the organ in question, which was quick to answer her desire. She is bold, this woman, bolder even than the K’ntasari, who have no shame in their sex. I do not believe I shall ever understand the coyness of some human women. Directness is best in these matters.
Those were golden days. Together we surveyed the damage and made plans for the city’s reconstruction. I could tell she was tired, but seemed focused on her work, and the work suited her. I knew secondhand that it had not always been so. She was impulsive and not regal in her bearing. But she was successful in defending and uniting the people; her plans bore fruit and brought prosperity. The people had come to love and respect her, while continuing to gossip about her foibles.
The people of Dalgherdia City certainly seemed grateful although there was some grumbling about the K’ntasari. Some blamed the government’s secret experiments for their troubles, saying they had lived in peace with the Terrans for years. “We’re going to have to figure out a way to spin this,” Tara told me. “I wish that we had been able to release the news about the K’ntasari ourselves – they need to be seen as a people, not as weapons. As for CenGov, we’re going to have to make the accusation about the singularity attack based on circumstantial evidence. They’ll deny it, of course.”
“Sooner or later, it would have come to this,” I said. “They are aggressors by nature, and they have no ability to tolerate something other than themselves.”
“We can’t tolerate them, either,” said Tara. “No matter what Clive says. We’ve grown up with the idea that augmenting the body through machinery is disgusting. You know, sometimes I think Clive still wishes he were a Cybrid. He has a nonconforming personality, which cost him his elite status as a child.”
“Rivers is a freethinker. It is his strength and his weakness. Of course he could not be tolerated by the Terrans.”
“He’s barely tolerated by me! He’s the most perverse person I know.”
“He was your lover. And later, he betrayed you.”
“I don’t know why he backed Christolea in that coup. He claims he made a logical choice, that the Archon was unstable. I think it was revenge for dumping him, even after all those years. And also Molly had his ear, and Molly was a xenophobe.”
“But you trust him now.”
“I find him useful. As for trust, the only one I ever really trusted is you, Ash. Even old Lady Madonna who practically raised me – she couldn’t stand under torture, not that I’d blame her. But she’d break. You wouldn’t.”
I nodded. It was simple truth. The Mover needed her to live. We could no more betray her than we could betray water and sunlight.
*****
Dalgherdia City had never been beautiful. It arose from a need to provide the science station with supplies and diversions, but later grew into a hub of underground business. Of course, the whorehouses and casinos supplied another need, but since most of the respectable people of the Domha’vei weren’t interested in associating with Terrans, it was also an ideal place for the less-respectable to keep out of the eyes of authority.
Tara chose for us to stay in her old apartment, part of a personnel annex to the science station. “I lived here for almost a year,” she said. “Clive and I – he was Edom St. John back then – worked at the station together. CenGov had technology that we didn’t, so it seemed foolish not to accept their job offer. And strangely, no one in the Domha’vei seemed interested in studying the Nau’gsh. Well, maybe not so strangely, since those who made significant progress always came to suspicious ends. I wonder why I was so dense – the 5th Matriarch had been suppressing all that research, of course. She had a vested interest in keeping your people’s sentience a secret.”
“I don’t like this place,” I said. It was an enclosed city on a barren asteroid. Unlike Eden, it didn’t have its own atmosphere. There were no native lifeforms, plants only grew in hydroponic facilities. Real meat was expensive – difficult to raise due to space and atmosphere restrictions. The streets had no trees. “I don’t know why anyone would want to live here.”
“For practical reasons, both scientific and political, it was a good place to put a research station. But humans like a challenge. Space travel started because some people obsessively wanted to go to Earth’s moon. I can’t say why – it’s a pretty barren piece of rock. It’s got economic resources, sure, but that wasn’t the reason. They just wanted to go into space. If they hadn’t, we wouldn’t be here. It’s like asking why your people made the grand jeté. Weren’t you happy as trees?”
“I have no insight into that. I came with a set of instructions – help the K’ntasari become a civilization. My life had no meaning before I met you.”
“That’s so backward. By human standards, I mean. Your life had a glorious purpose. How many could do what you did? But instead, you find your purpose in a woman. Ugh, how mundane.”
I stopped in my tracks and stared at her. “There’s nothing mundane about you,” I said finally.
She shook her head. “It’s not that. It’s just a sort of folk wisdom – don’t find the meaning of your life in other people, or you’ll be left with nothing for yourself.”
“I thought humans were social animals.”
“We are. It’s more – walking a line, I suppose. No one wants to be left alone. But you can’t be entirely dependent, either.”
“But we are. Entirely dependent.” I considered the implications. “So humans must believe that the Cu’enmerengi are superior to the Cu’enashti?”
“Oh good grief! Well, they’re certainly less needy, but also less capable. They’re hardly capable of anything at all! I think we see them as rather flighty and insubstantial. Talented and beautiful, yes, but not really to be taken seriously. On the other hand, the Cu’enashti are rather noble.”
“Noble?” I laughed. “A minute ago, we sounded pathetic.”
Tara looked thoughtful. “The line between noble and pathetic has a lot to do with how well you bear your suffering,” she concluded.
*****
My contentment was not to last. I would catch her looking out the window, perhaps at the stars – who would blame her? Dalgherdia was a miserable place. We needed to see about bringing civilization to Eden. The K’ntasari had already made remarkable strides in the months since the CenGov incursion ended; they now had permanent villages. They could do better. They could have magnificent cities with spiraling towers raised above the shimmering blue corn fields. We could look up at the stars, our breaths chill in the freezing air, for Eden was a cold world, but not at ground level. Davy had designed an interior heat-source to make up for the thin sunlight. At night, when the chill got to the bone, we’d seek out the network of convenient caverns in the hilly regions. Davy had designed that, too.
And now, of course, I was prepared to betray him. It would be wrong to say that I was not conflicted. However, my priorities were clear.
If Tara were just thinking about Dolparessa, it wouldn’t have been so bad. But I knew she was thinking about the others, about the Atlas emanations. It infuriated me. So in every way, I tried to prove myself capable – as an administrator, a warrior, a helpmate, a lover. She sought out my company, I sought to distract her, to make her forget.
One day, she came up from behind, embracing me, resting her head against my shoulder blades. “I love you,” she said. “I wish I didn’t.”
How was I supposed to receive this message of supreme joy and ultimate disaster? “I don’t understand.”
“A part of me wants to stay here, stay in love with you. It’s just making it harder to leave.”
“Then stay.” I took her hand. “I’ll do whatever it takes to please you. We all will.”
She said nothing, but turned and looked out the window, down into the bleak, depressing city. I looked too, but saw nothing of interest, nothing that would take her attention from me. I had to do something – something bold. “You shared your wedding wine with Valentin,” I said. “He thought it was because you acknowledged our marriage.”
She turned back and nodded. “Yes. And I will continue to fight the Cantor on it. My true husband is Ashtara, not Atlas. At least, not Atlas alone.”
“Then eat of my apples.”
She glanced at the ground. “You understand what you’re asking of me? How Ailann will react?”
“It isn’t his choice. If you truly accept Goliath…”
She looked up, her eyes meeting mine again. “I have a condition. I’ll eat your apples, if you take Gyre that I have made from the Atlas tree.”
The request surprised me. “I don’t see the point.”
“Maybe you will, maybe not. The offer stands.”
“As you will. I am not afraid of any drug.”
“There’s no need to be afraid,” she said. “It won’t hurt you. You should just see a few things for yourself.”
“I’ll take the drug. Now, if you have it. We’ll have to go to Eden to get the apple.” And once she was on Eden, she’d be much happier, I was certain.
“I can make it. And I promise you, Ari, that whatever happens, I will eat your apple.”
*****
“You had better lie down,” she said. “Doing this upset Chase quite a bit, and Chase is very used to drugs. You’re going to lose contact with Goliath’s other emanations, too. Try not to let that frighten you. The effect lasts a maximum of four hours. They’ll still be here when you get back.”
“I appreciate the warning. It will help me to acclimatize myself. But I don’t scare easily.”
“I didn’t think you would.” She sits next to me. Her smile is warm and a little sad. I didn’t ever want to stop looking at her.
“Will I lose contact with you?”
“Not necessarily. Chase was rather delirious, though. I’ll be here with you the whole time.”
She placed a drop on my tongue. It was slightly sweet, slightly sour, the taste of Nau’gsh apples. I felt the rush of pleasure spread, almost instantaneously in a concentric ring on my tongue and into my body. But a second later, the world fell away from me. I was in a room. It was too organic to be anywhere on Dalgherdia. It was a small room, and crowded with far too many people. Sleeping people.
Bodies on the bed, on the couch, sleeping men curled up on the rug, warmed by the flickering gas fireplace. It was a strange room that looked to be a bedroom, but seemed to be just barely big enough to accommodate chairs and couches and pillows – far more than anyone would seriously put in a bedroom. And somehow, they had managed to cram in a fully stocked bar.
I was inside of Atlas. But what a strange arrangement!
I poured myself a drink. Why not? My hosts did not seem attentive. As I reached for the ice I was startled.
“Boo!”
I spun around, brandishing the nearest weapon I could find – a metal olive pick. I stood face to face with Suibhne, who began to giggle. “Gotcha!” he said.
“Suibhne, that would wake the dead.” Another one. Then I understood. When Chase did this, he could communicate with Manasseh. Then these must be my brothers, Suibhne and Whirljack.
“Fuck this,” said Whirljack. “He won’t wake up.” He was stooped over Blackjack – his brother, but not mine.
“So?” asked Suibhne. “I thought you hated him.”
“I don’t hate him, Suibhne. He’s my fucking brother!”
“You complain about him all the time.”
“That doesn’t mean I hate him. You don’t understand because you don’t have a brother.”
“I do so. I have a brother – him!” Suibhne pointed at me. “And he’s an asshole too, just like Blackjack. Hey Jack, since he’s your brother too, does that mean we’re related now?”
“We’re branches on the same tree, Suibhne. Of course we’re related.”
I knelt down next to Blackjack. He was stiff and cold – more like a corpse than a coma. I could see why Whirljack would be upset. I wanted to change the subject. “How can you all fit in this little room?” I asked. “Where would you ever fit another branch?”
“It gets bigger,” said Suibhne. “There’s always just enough room for somebody new.”
“That doesn’t happen inside of Goliath.”
“I suppose it wouldn’t have to,” said Whirljack. “From the memories in Chase’s branch, it looked enormous.”
“Too big,” said Suibhne. “It creeped me out.”
“Why are you here?” asked Jack. “Did Tara ask you?”
I nodded.
“She wants you to meet us. To strengthen the ties between us.”
I looked away. Once I had started to speak with them, I had begun to suspect something like that. And I couldn’t allow it. I couldn’t allow myself to feel any sympathy for my brothers. Tara’s safety had to be my only concern.
“It isn’t working,” said Suibhne, “is it?”
“No,” said Whirljack. “He’s a stubborn bastard, just like us.”
I had to laugh. I would’ve like them, I really would. But it was a luxury I couldn’t afford.
“Maybe we should try to seduce him,” said Suibhne. “Jack’s into that twincest stuff.”
“I am not.”
“How about those threesomes with Tara?”
“That’s just because Tara is turned on by it.”
“Don’t lie. You’re turned on by it, too.”
“That’s a normal Cu’enashti sexual response. If she likes it, I’ll like it. I can’t help that. It’s not like I go chasing after Blackjack when she’s not around – not like Lugh and Owen.”
“Yeah, they’re really into it. Are you into it, Ari? A little bromance?”
I really did not know what to say. I decided that direct and honest was best. “We’re enemies.”
“But that just adds spice!”
“Suibhne, will you fucking shut up?” said Whirljack. “Ari is on the level. It’s a sad thing, but it’s true. And maybe we’ve got to think like that ourselves.”
“Oh, come on. Cuinn will think of something. Chase promised. A time machine, maybe.”
“A time machine? What good would that do?”
“We could visit Napoleonic France! I could go shopping!” Suibhne spun around. As he did, his top hat and tails vanished, replaced with an 18th century general’s uniform. “I’ve done painstaking research, but given how fucked up the historical records in the Matriarch’s library can be, there’s no way to know if this is 100% authentic.”
“He’s crazy,” I muttered.
“No shit,” said Whirljack.
“I may be crazy,” said Suibhne, affixing his eyes on mine with an intensity only generated by sheer madness, “but I’m not so crazy as to think I can fight against God.”
*****
“You were laughing,” said Tara. “I take it that your experience was not as traumatic as Chase’s.”
“First Suibhne tried to seduce me. Then he wanted to go shopping in Napoleonic France.”
“That sounds like Suibhne. He tried to seduce you? That’s hot.”
I thought I should nip that conversation in the bud. “Tara, I understand what you were trying to do. But it won’t work. I’m not going back to Dolparessa. I can’t allow the Atlas emanations to have control. It’s for your safety, Tara! They left you alone for two years.”
“Now you sound like Ailann,” she said dismissively. “I’m not going to fight you, too.”
“Then we’ll live on Eden together.”
“Someday we will, Ari, but there’s a war on, and even if I wanted to stay with you, I couldn’t. I need to get to Eirelantra before the CenGov fleet arrives. According to Cuinn’s calculations, you would last about half the trip before your body came under the influence of Atlas.”
“You don’t need to be at the front lines. It’s better if you aren’t.”
“Maybe I don’t – but you do! Do you think we can stand against the kind of technology CenGov has, stand against the size of their armada, if Ashtara doesn’t fight for us? We would’ve lost at the battle of Starbright Point all those years ago if Ash hadn’t crippled their fleet.”
“Given the relative positions of the planets,” I said, “They’d take Eirelantra and Skarsia, but Aran could stop them at Volparnu.”
“And all the people who would die in the meantime? Don’t you care?”
“It doesn’t make me happy, but your safety is paramount.”
“Ailann is perfectly capable of taking care of me. You’re just jealous.”
“I am jealous,” I admitted. “My argument still stands.”
“You don’t understand what this is doing to me,” she said. “I love Ashtara. I don’t even know what Ashtara is – a tree, two trees, twenty-five husbands, a being of pure energy – he’s so complicated, and at the core of it, so alien. I don’t even know what I love. How crazy is that? I don’t know. Maybe it’s not crazy at all. Maybe it’s just human nature. How many people go through life in love with a dream? But I’m doing the best I can. I’m trying to love all of him, to understand what he is.”
“But then he sends me you – all of you. And humans are pretty indoctrinated on the paradigm of one lover at a time. And if we marry, and have a secret lover, it’s pretty common, but there’s guilt attached to it. If the original marriage was about love, that is. And then some people string along three, maybe even four lovers, and we hold them in contempt. It’s dishonorable. Because we say then it must be about lust, not about real feelings.”
“And I have twenty-five, no twenty-nine. That’s ridiculous. That’s some sort of bizarre harem! And I understand that Ash can’t help it. When he’s traumatized, he grows a new branch. But he makes each one so goddamn attractive. Each one is a trap for me. He knows my body. He knows my head. And he makes another one that I fall in love with. And some of them have circumstances that bind us – like Daniel, who was first, or Patrick, who has been by my side for so long, helping me to run the government…but essentially, are they any better than Wynne or Dermot, whom I hardly know?”
“And each one of you is different, and human, and has such deep and profound emotions…the only way I can deal with the confusion is to say that you’re all Ash, that I might be in love with so-and-so, but the thing I love is really hidden underneath there, and I can’t lose sight of that. And they all tell me that it doesn’t matter if I play favorites because they all experience it vicariously – except that isn’t true anymore. And now, what am I supposed to fucking do? Ari, I meant it when I said I love you. Right now, I want to just fall into your arms. But I can’t stop thinking about the others…”
She is in such despair; it causes a pain I could not have imagined. I have to make her understand. “It’s simpler than this. It’s simpler than all of this. It isn’t about what any of us feels, Tara. Atlas left you alone for two years. That’s inexcusable. Did you ever think that the Mover realizes that? Atlas makes mistakes because it’s so damaged. Just look at it! Goliath is perfect. Beautiful. Symmetrical. The Mover is trying to start fresh. Atlas isn’t healthy. It’s blackened and twisted and just wrong…”
She hit me. It wasn’t just a slap, either. It was a serious punch in the mouth, and as big as I am, it staggered me a bit.
“Don’t ever insult my tree again! I planted it with my own hands. I love that tree, and billions of people love that tree. They worship it as a god. It’s on my coat-of-arms. It’s a symbol to them. When they look at it, they don’t see some picture-perfect tree like a child could draw. They see the battle-scars and the struggle and the suffering and everything Ash has gone through for me and for all of us. It’s a symbol of our people, and it’s recognized across the galaxy. It’s not about the Nau’gsh, and it’s not about humans, it’s about the Domha’vei as a united system. It’s about how we survive – no matter the odds, no matter the cost – we survive.”
Like a fool, I stood there and said nothing. What could I say? Furious, Tara turned from me and left. When she had gone, I fell to my knees. All I knew was pain. More pain that I could handle, more than I had ever imagined. Now that I can access the branches of Atlas, I can remember what it was like to be uprooted, and this was far worse. I couldn’t move from the spot. I doubled over, wailing, clawing at my hair. Tara didn’t want Goliath. Then Aran was right. We should’ve immolated.
I don’t know how long I was like that. It seemed like forever. After a while, I became aware of the voices of the others. I had been in so much pain, I had ceased to hear them. Madness. Manasseh was trying to soothe me, calm me down. But it was Valentin’s voice I heard most clearly, saying that Tara’s flagship had just taken off.
She really did leave us behind this time, said Aran.
No, said Valentin. She wants us to follow her.
I’ll follow her and bring her back, I said.
You can’t do that, Ari.
I can and I will. She can’t be left unprotected.
Ari, don’t you see? It’s a test. She loves you. She wants you to follow. But you can’t force her. If you try to make her stay, she will go home to Dolparessa and never come back here. If you try to force her, we’ll lose. Sometimes loving is about letting go.
I can’t let go.
I can. I can because I was made from Evan, and he had to let go. He had to let Tara go to Earth, not even knowing if she would ever come back. Aran knows the history, but it’s more than that for me. I don’t remember it, not exactly, but I feel it. Even had to let her go. But you’re half of Jack – and it’s Jack who got her to come home. Not by force. He made her want to come home. You have that strength in you, Ari.
But I’m also half Suibhne. That means I’m crazy and I’ll mess it up again.
Tara never once blamed Suibhne for being what he was. She understood. She loves you. But it’s not about you. It’s not about any of us. It’s about her. If we lose sight of that, we lose everything.
I needed to clear my head, to compose myself. If I transformed into the mothman, I could catch up to Tara within minutes. But if I did – who knows what I would become when I arrived?
I stared out the window, that window where Tara had so often stood. Dalgherdia City was coming to life again. Rubble was carted away, restaurants were re-opening. The streets echoed with the soft hiss of paint-bots touching up the damaged storefronts. I walked down the street that led from the apartments attached to the science complex down into the commercial zone. I found myself in standing in front of a nightclub. It was unfamiliar to me – yet I recognized it. I understood finally what Tara had been looking at all those times – Tom O’Bedlam’s.
It wasn’t open, but I walked in anyway. A woman was at the bar, rearranging the glassware, removing the broken ones from the shelf. She glanced at me. Our eyes met; hers lit with recognition. “That’s a new one,” she said. “Hey Ash, thanks for saving our butts. And say hi to Tommy for me.”
I went up the back stair, to the second floor apartment. No one stopped me. Why would they? I owned the place.
Tommy’s room was a mess. Did he ever change the sheets? In the corner was a pile of skin rags and gardening catalogs. I had to laugh. I don’t know what was funnier – the subject matter, or the fact that they were paper. Rag paper, of course. They had to be enormously expensive. The originals would have been done on the cheapest wood pulp. They were a high-class simulation of tawdry antiquity. It was absurd.
Everything about the room, the entire establishment, was that way. A simulated Casablanca – like a movie set in ancient Hollywood, it was an illusion that masked what was really happening – scores of stage-hands and camera men scurrying at the will of the director. And the actors filming a script – but the ending had been withheld from them. It was going to be a surprise.
It wasn’t fair. Why was I given a will of my own if it was going to be subverted at every turn? Why wasn’t I allowed to know what to do? Why do I have to guess and get it wrong when it would be so easy for the Mover to just push me in the right direction?
“If you are a god, then why don’t you help me?” I cried aloud.