Sweep of the Heart

14

The First Trial is about to begin. Will Gertrude Hunt rise to the challenge of hosting? Will we survive the candidates’ wit? Let’s listen in.

“Do you think the data is real?” Sean asked.

We were walking through the short dim hallway side by side. Beast trailed me, and Gorvar trotted by Sean’s side. The two animals had decided to ignore each other’s existence, concentrating on guarding us instead.

“Kosandion is Caldenia’s nephew, so he’s devious enough to manufacture this energy reading and use it to manipulate us. But why bother? He could’ve simply asked me to hand the ratings off to Caldenia. I would do it because he is a guest. Instead, he felt that there was a value attached to me running this errand, and he compensated me for my effort.”

Sean’s frown deepened.

I had taken the data to Caldenia right after my conversation with Kosandion. I found Her Grace enjoying a lovely breakfast on our back patio. I’d placed the cube on the table and told her Kosandion wanted her to have it. She raised her eyebrows and said, “He did, did he?” She scanned the cube with her reader, and then she smiled with all her teeth, and I’d been low-key haunted by that smile ever since.

We stopped before a dark wall blocking our way. Sean’s eyes were still grim. I reached over and squeezed his hand. “I’m sorry.”

He blinked.

“We don’t know anything and it’s eating at you.” It was eating at me. “I know that you really want to go and look for him, and instead we have to do this.”

“It’s not that.”

“Then what is it?”

“I don’t like surprises. And I don’t like being lied to. This was supposed to be straight forward: keep the candidates from killing each other. We were told that Kosandion would ignore Caldenia’s presence. Instead, the candidates are trying to kill him, and Kosandion and Caldenia are scheming, either together or against each other.”

“Nothing really changed,” I said. “When we took this job, we knew we had to keep Kosandion safe. This assassination plot doesn’t alter that. We also knew that Caldenia and Kosandion have a complicated history. Predictably, their present relationship is complicated.”

He made a low growling noise in his throat. Gorvar’s ears twitched.

“And that’s exactly what I find surprising. What is the nature of their relationship? Is she plotting to kill him?”

“I don’t think so?” I didn’t sound very convincing.

“Of all the places in the universe, Kosandion picked our inn. Is he planning to punish Caldenia for the murder of his father? If I were him, I would provoke her until she snaps and does something unwise. It doesn’t matter if she succeeds. As soon as she acts against him, you and I will have to expel her from the inn. She would be done. The bounties on her head are still sky-high. I checked.”

I knew how he felt. One small mistake, and everything we’ve built could come crushing down. We couldn’t lose Gertrude Hunt. We just couldn’t.

“This could be made much simpler if we just locked Caldenia up until it’s over,” Sean said.

“Sometimes you say things that make me wonder about you.”

“No need to wonder. I’m a simple man. I love you and I will protect you. And the inn. Even if I have to murder Caldenia and everyone else to do it.”

I stood on my toes and kissed him. “What if we don’t murder anybody?”

The corners of his mouth curved. “No promises.”

“Are we ready?”

“As ready as we’re going to be.”

I touched the wall in front of us with my broom. Glowing dots of light pulsed from the broom, drawing an outline of a huge double door in the wall. The once-solid surface split down the middle, and the two halves of the door swung open, letting a flood of sunshine bathe us.

A large empty arena spread before us, bordered by a raised amphitheater divided into fourteen sections, one for each delegation, one for Kosandion and his retinue, and the last for the observers. Each section was freestanding, raised thirty feet above the arena’s floor, and separated from the adjoining sections by a thirty-foot gap. A short safety wall secured the sections. We had shamelessly stolen the idea from the Old Arena at Baha-char.

Ideally, I would have encircled each section by an impenetrable barrier, the same way I had secured Kosandion’s balcony. Unfortunately, maintaining that many barriers simultaneously was beyond Gertrude Hunt’s capacity. They also caused a distortion in Orata’s cameras, and since the whole thing had to be recorded, I settled for the wide gaps and bringing Gertrude Hunt to high alert. If the delegates as much as twitched toward each other, the inn would pluck them right out of their seats and toss them back into their respective quarters.

In the center of the arena, I had raised a stage. Perfectly round and exactly 25 yards across, it sat about ten feet above the arena floor. When the candidates would need to enter it, I would make a ramp from their section directly to the stage.

“What about the moderator platform?” I asked.

We needed a moderator for the debate, and Sean had volunteered to make a special platform for him.

“I’m working on it,” Sean said.

He raised his head to the brilliant blue sky and squinted at the sunshine. In reality, the arena was deep inside the inn. I had done some serious damage to dimensional physics. The sky above us was real, but if someone flew a drone over the inn, they would find only the worn roof of an ordinary ornate Victorian.

Even a year ago, expending that much energy would have been impossible for me. Each inn had a finite capacity for energy storage. A steady flow of guests was much preferable to the feast or famine scenario Gertrude Hunt had to endure for the last couple of years. Our reputation was spreading, and we’d had more visitors in the past few months than ever, each of them more troublesome than a typical inn guest but very much welcome. These guests allowed our inn a chance to grow, but its energy reserves were still insufficient to contain the massive influx of this event. Gertrude Hunt was overflowing with magic. It was a use-it-or-lose-it situation, so I used it to give the trials a wow factor.

Tony had shaken his head at the arena and told me I was working too hard. According to him, a college auditorium would’ve done the job. But the Dominion was broadcasting the spousal selection across multiple star systems. Their neighbors were tuning in, and the Innkeeper Assembly was watching it and evaluating our performance. Gertrude Hunt’s reputation was on the line. As Caldenia once told me, life gave us few opportunities to put our best foot forward, so when a chance to shine presented itself, it was best to take it. A little bit of showmanship didn’t hurt.

A chime pealed through the arena. It was time.

Sean tapped his spear on the floor. Huge screens descended from the clear sky, offering each section a chance to view the action up close.

I planted my broom on the stone tiles, formed a tunnel between the closest section and House Meer’s quarters, and opened their doors.

“Greetings, my fellow beings!”

Gaston cut a striking figure in the middle of the stage. He’d changed into a stunning white and gray outfit, embroidered with silver-blue thread that complemented his silver eyes. It fit him like a glove while still projecting the air of what he called “gentlemanly menace.” He had looked like a space pirate before. Now he looked like a space pirate prince who had done very well for himself.

His voice matched his new for-TV persona, resonant and smooth, as it blasted from the hidden speakers. It took him exactly four words to get everyone’s attention. Sean, a few yards away at the edge of the stage, might as well have been invisible, despite his robe, his spear, and his tendency to loom.

“Welcome to the First Trial!” Gaston announced.

The 12 delegations cheered, stomped, and made species-appropriate noises. Even Kosandion in the chair to my right clapped politely. Gaston clearly missed his true calling.

“I know all of you have been waiting to find out how our contestants will showcase their talents today. Are you ready?”

The delegations roared to indicate they were most definitely ready.

“He’s turning it into a spectacle,” Resven murmured.

“It is meant to be one,” Kosandion told him. “People love a good show.”

“Today’s challenge is…DEBATE!”

The alien equivalent of “wooo!” was rather loud.

Gaston waved them on, inviting more noise, then made a sweeping gesture that somehow brought instant silence.

“Our spousal candidates will face off in randomly selected pairs. Both candidates will be asked the same question. One will respond first, and the other will reply. The winner will be determined by a combination of popular vote, the Sovereign’s opinion, and the feedback from our esteemed debate moderator.”

He gave them a moment to digest and went on.

“Our debate moderator is truly a scholar of great renown. He has devoted himself to contemplating the mysteries of the universe. Beings from every corner of the galaxy travel thousands of light years to seek his advice.”

The floor behind Gaston split, and an SUV-sized stone egg positioned on its side with the narrow end toward the center of the arena rose from under the floor on a metal stalk.

He didn’t.

The metal stalk carried the egg up and stopped about fifteen feet above the stage.

Yes, yes, he did.

“Recipient of the Starlight Quill, Sage of the Great Tree, Vanquisher of the Sphinx, the First Scholar Thek!” Gaston roared.

The stone egg split in half lengthwise. The top half retracted, revealing the First Scholar in all his glory, holding his teaching stick, his hat firmly on his noggin with the glittering white feather attached to it. His two assistants dutifully stood behind him, looking down and playing the part of modest disciples.

“An egg?” I hissed into the mike.

“It’s funny.”

Ugh.

“He thought it was appropriate.”

The arena greeted the First Scholar with resounding applause. He nodded to them, waving his hand-claw benevolently.

The original moderator had encountered unexpected travel delays because his second wife kidnapped him, and now his other four wives were having their own debate on the merits of rescuing him. We needed a substitute in a hurry, and the First Scholar Thek was the talk of the galaxy after the Sphinx escapade. Orata practically drooled when Sean suggested him.

They didn’t have to twist Thek’s wings. He demurred at first, but I had a conversation with Orata prior to her visiting him, and once she told him that it was a chance to illuminate millions of minds with the wisdom of his scholarship, he was all in.

“I keep waiting for his hat to slide off,” Sean murmured.

He was right, the headdress should’ve slipped off his feathers by now. “Whatever his disciples did, it seems to be working.”

“Maybe they glued it.”

“I hope not.”

The First Scholar preened at the show of support and waved his teaching stick. His voice rolled out of the speakers.

“Let us begin.”

A line of delicate glass flowers sprouted from the stage floor below the egg. They looked like three-foot-tall dandelions, each topped with a white sphere the size of a basketball swirling with white and gold. One orb per candidate. When a candidate’s name was called, their orb would descend under the floor so they couldn’t accidentally choose themselves for the debate.

I bounced the white light between sections, highlighting their retaining walls, and stopped on Team Frowns. A small section of the front wall slid aside, and a ramp unfurled from the gap leading down to the bottom of the arena.

Ellenda rose. She wore a black robe with an elaborately pleated, deep hood. It was an odd choice. I’d noticed it when their delegation took their seats. The fabric of her garment was plain, almost coarse. It looked out of place compared to everyone else’s formal wear.

The Uma woman descended the stairs, approached the orbs, and lowered her hood. Kosandion became very still. Her face and neck were splattered with gold paint.

I had encountered only three Umas counting Ellenda, and one of them had stayed at my parents’ inn. He also wore the gold paint. I was six years old back then, and I told him he looked very pretty. My father apologized and later explained things to me. The Uma wore that gold paint when they were in mourning. Someone either died or was about to.

It was a safe bet that nobody in the arena recognized the gold for what it was. The Uma guarded their culture very closely. But Kosandion would know. They were his mother’s people. Why was she here if she was in mourning?

“Choose your opponent,” the First Scholar Thek prompted, indicating the orbs with a sweep of his wing. They looked identical.

Ellenda put her hand on the closest orb. Its transparent shell popped like a soap bubble, releasing a swarm of glowing golden insects into the air. They surged up, turned, streaked to the Murder Beaks’ section, and hovered around Pivor.

Pivor rose with a big smile, bowed to the left, bowed to the right, grinned again, displaying even, white teeth, and made his way down the stairway that formed from his section. He crossed the arena and stood opposite Ellenda. They faced each other with ten feet between them. Tiny blue sparks by their ears announced their mikes being activated.

“The question the two of you must contemplate today is…” The First Scholar paused dramatically. “What is more important, happiness or duty? You have one hundred moments to consider your answer.”

The arena fell silent. Seconds ticked by.

The First Scholar’s egg turned white. The time to prepare ran out.

“Daughter of Uma,” Thek said, “The floor is yours.”

“Duty,” Ellenda said.

The First Scholar turned to Pivor.

“Happiness,” the Murder Bird candidate said.

Silence.

The First Scholar waited for a couple more breaths and turned to Ellenda. “You must defend your answer.”

“Happiness is fleeting, subjective, and selfish. Submitting to and successfully carrying out your duty ensures the continued survival of society.”

“Duty is equally subjective,” Pivor answered. “If I see a child being chased by a predator, is it my duty to intervene?”

“Yes.”

“But, by intervening I put my own survival at risk. I’m an adult who survived diseases and the perils of my own childhood. If I’m killed by the predator, would my death not be a greater loss to society than a child who has yet to mature? Could that child take my place and assume my obligations? What of my duty to my clan and family who depend on me?”

Ellenda didn’t answer.

Pivor kept going. “You say that duty exists to ensure the survival of society. I say that the purpose of society is to create individual happiness. Every law of a successful society is designed to help its members attain that goal. We seek to guarantee safety, access to resources, individual rights, and we even guard mandatory leisure. Therefore, the pursuit of happiness is supreme over carrying out one’s duty.”

“I would save the child. I have nothing more to say.” Ellenda pulled her hood over her head.

The First Scholar waited a few seconds, but the hood remained up.

“Very well,” he announced. “Thank you both. You may return to your seats.”

The two candidates rejoined their delegations. The white light bounced again.

One of the twelve delegates was an assassin. I was hoping for a peek at their cards during this debate. Some clue, something that might identify them as a killer. So far, Ellenda clearly didn’t want to participate, and Pivor came off as selfish. Not particularly illuminating.

The light stopped on House Meer. Bestata rose, her black syn-armor swallowing the light. She had attached a white cloak to it, made of lightweight fabric. I angled the air current circulating through the arena toward her, and the cloak billowed behind her as she marched down her ramp. It was such a pretty cloak. It would be a shame to waste it.

“Dramatic,” Kosandion murmured.

“Vampires often are. One time they visited this inn in secret, but they still had to introduce themselves, so they forcefully whispered their house creed at me.”

Kosandion smiled.

Bestata reached the orbs and planted her hand on one of them without hesitation. It burst, and the glittering swarm veered to the Dushegubs and settled on Unessa’s hair like a crown.

“Nice touch,” Kosandion approved.

“Thank you.”

Unessa sashayed her way to the arena floor. She wore a brilliant green gown that moved with every step, giving hints of the pale skin underneath.

“I pose the following question for your consideration,” the First Scholar announced. “What is the purpose of your existence and why is your purpose superior to your opponent’s? You have one hundred moments to consider your an—”

“Procreation!” Unessa said. She turned to look at Kosandion and smiled.

Bestata stared at her for a stunned second and looked at the First Scholar. “I am supposed to debate that?”

“Do your best,” the First Scholar told her.

“There are other things besides procreation. Devotion, the pursuit of personal excellence, learning, gaining expertise, passing it on to next generation.”

Knowing the First Scholar, that answer earned Bestata all the brownie points. She was talking about martial prowess, and he was thinking in terms of academic wisdom, but knowledge was knowledge.

“Honor,” Bestata continued. “Pride in accomplishments. The glory of your house. A death that would be remembered. All of these are more important than simple copulation and reproduction.”

Unessa smiled. She was likely going for sweet, but there was a rotten edge to it. She looked slightly reptilian, like a lizard about to snatch a grub.

“And if your people stopped breeding, who would do all those things?”

“My people haven’t stopped breeding for thousands of years. It is an instinct. I do realize you’ve been brought up by logs but do try to think less like a stump.”

Ouch.

A long shoot slithered out from the large Dushegub in the front row of their section.

Bestata kept going. “It is unfortunate that you have been raised for the sole purpose of trapping a male with your looks, but you don’t have to be just pretty fruit on the vine.”

She was killing it with puns.

The shoot coiled on itself in a tight spiral.

“At least I’m pretty,” Unessa said.

“Thank the gods for that,” Bestata snarled. “Nature had to give you something to compensate for your boiled egg brain.”

The shoot snapped out, launching a projectile into the air. Sean and I moved at the same time.

A pit appeared in the middle of the arena floor, sucking the projectile into itself. Long flexible tentacles erupted from inside the pit, grabbed the Dushegub, wrapped him up like a mummy, and pulled him into the hole.

The arena went silent.

A single breath passed, and then the stands erupted.

The Donkamins made a weird ululating noise. The otrokar stomped their feet. House Meer stood up and clapped, roaring. The oombole section turned into a 4^th of July fireworks show with colors and fins flashing in a dizzying display.

The Dushegubs hissed and creaked in unison. Unessa wrinkled her nose and hissed at Bestata. The vampire knight sneered and bared her spectacular fangs.

Sean slid the pit toward the killer trees, the tentacles hovering straight up, waiting to snatch the next troublemaker.

I rolled my voice through the arena. I didn’t scream, I didn’t raise it, but it sounded loud, and it was everywhere.

“No interference with the trials will be tolerated.”

The Dushegubs fell silent.

The First Scholar spread his wings, calling for silence. When the arena complied, he leaned forward and spoke to Unessa. “Do you have a rebuttal?”

Her eyes narrowed. “I wasn’t told I had to bring one with me.”

Bestata spread her arms and looked around at the audience.

“Very well,” the First Scholar said. “This debate is concluded.”

Unessa raised her chin and shot a triumphant look at the Dushegubs.

“You didn’t win, idiot!” someone yelled from the otrokar section.

Kosandion covered his face with his hand, hiding his expression.

Unessa turned toward the First Scholar.

“While crudely voiced, the assessment is undeniably accurate,” he told her. “Neither of you will be the winner of this debate.”

She spun on her heel and marched back to her section, her hands clenched into fists.

Neither Unessa nor Bestata seemed likely to assassinate Kosandion. Subtlety wasn’t their strong suit. If either of those two targeted the Sovereign, it would be a direct assault. The way he spoke about it suggested a cunning hidden enemy.

“Instead of attacking the question, the knight attacked her opponent,” Resven said.

“She holds her in contempt,” Miralitt said.

Resven raised his eyebrows, but Miralitt didn’t elaborate.

Kosandion glanced at me. He was Caldenia’s nephew, so he knew perfectly well why Bestata reacted the way she did, but he wanted a public explanation. Perhaps it was for the viewers at home.

“The Holy Anocracy prizes personal excellence,” I told them. “They strive for a life of individual achievement. Bestata had to train and fight since she could walk. She knows she can kill Unessa in individual combat without even raising her heart rate. Now she also knows that Unessa’s thinking is underdeveloped. From her point of view, the Dushegub candidate is a useless, pretty thing unworthy of her sincere effort. She refused to dignify her with an actual debate.”

“What is your opinion of Unessa?” Kosandion asked me.

Put me on the spot, why don’t you? “The way she speaks and what she says indicates that she was raised by the Dushegubs from an early age. Anyone who can survive that shouldn’t be underestimated.”

Bestata was confusing education and cleverness. Unessa might have had limited exposure to the humanoid society and its complexities, but she had rebutted Bestata’s argument, even if she didn’t know the proper word for it, while Bestata had nothing to counter with and resorted to insults.

Where did the Dushegubs find a humanoid child? Did they buy her? Did they steal her? Were there more like her?

It was time to bounce the light again. I stopped it on the Kai. Prysen Ol rose, swept his layered robe back with an elegant gesture, and descended the ramp. He always held himself with a quiet dignity. Even as he was walking now, his steps were small, and his right arm was bent at the elbow and held across his body. It was all very deliberate and restrained.

Self-control would be an excellent quality for an assassin.

Prysen Ol touched an orb. The insects spiraled out, floated over to the Gaheas, and danced around Nycati’s purple hair, matching the golden diadem on his head. The Gaheas candidate stood up, a flawless movement, and took the ramp to arena floor.

An appreciative murmur spread through the spectators and died down.

“Interesting,” Resven observed. “Those two appear well matched.”

I had looked through the footage from yesterday’s dinner, and something caught my eye. On paper, Nycati came from a scholar family, aristocratic, but mid-ranking, and all appearances indicated that he was selected to be their candidate for his merits and achievements. The head of the Gaheas delegation, Naeoma Thaste, was the equivalent of a duke, one step removed from the royal family. He outranked Nycati by a mile.

Yesterday at dinner, Naeoma made a disparaging remark about the Donkamins. Nycati looked at him for a moment, and the duke looked down. The Gaheas were psionics. They dueled by staring at each other. To look away was to back down, but to lower your gaze to the ground was like kneeling with your head bowed. Complete submission.

Only a prince could stare down a duke. Nycati was Gaheas royalty. I was sure of it.

A Gaheas prince, even if he had been raised in secret, would have survived dozens of attempts on his life. Most of them became efficient killers by adulthood, or they died. His delegation lied about who he really was. They could have done it because they secretly wanted to tie their bloodline to the leadership of the Dominion, or they could have done it because Kosandion was their target. Either way, Nycati’s chances of being the assassin had shot up into the stratosphere.

The First Scholar surveyed the two men. “The question before you is as follows: Why are you here?”

“Before I can answer,” Prysen Ol said, “would the Honored Scholar be so kind as to define ‘here’?”

“Indeed,” Nycati agreed. “It is a fair request. Does ‘here’ designate a physical location or a fixed point in time? Does it refer to our presence or our purpose?”

“How can we be sure that we are ‘here’ at all?” Prysen Ol added.

The First Scholar puffed to twice his size, looking positively giddy. His eyes sparkled. “The interpretation is entirely up to you. You have a hundred moments to compose your thoughts.”