Diamond Mask (Galactic Milieu Trilogy) (43 page)

Kyle made a bravura gesture with his fork. “As you see, dear Maire, we have quite a collection of treasonous movers and shakers assembled expressly to hear the important communiqué you bear from dear old Tamara. And now, you may ask, why don’t I stop haverin’ and let you deliver it? So I shall!”

The waiter brought Masha’s tumbler of Scotch and went off again. She tasted it and let her gaze rove from face to face, seeking clues to the minds hidden behind them. Only Kyle was readable, leaking semi-intoxicated sedition and renascent lust like a colander. The mental barriers of the others were tightly locked. Only the lingering hints of their suppressed auras betrayed them as stalwart operants—and the most formidable of all seemed to be Castellane’s young henchman. Strange that he was not a magnate. As a professional metapsychologist, Masha kept tabs on the more powerful young minds in the Human Polity and had acted as an advisor when the Lylmik put together the last list of Concilium nominees. How had this remarkable young man escaped her notice? She decided she would have to find out more about Clinton Alvarez when she returned to Earth.

“First I must tell you some very sad news,” Masha began. “Tamara Sakhvadze is dying.”

There were exclamations of distress and sorrow. Kyle dropped his fork and sat stricken while Hiroshi Kodama lowered his head and took out his handkerchief. Only Alvarez seemed unaffected.

“My dear grandmother is a weary woman who fears for the future, and she has declined rejuvenation in spite of all the family’s urging. She is more convinced than ever that we Rebels will eventually have to fight for our freedom, and she says she has had enough of war. She wishes us well and asks me to offer her apologies for being unable to take up the burden of a new lifetime.”

“You must reassure her on our behalf,” Catriona Chisholm said “No one has been a finer exemplar of mental liberty than she. Tamara has earned the right to rest, although we’ll miss her greatly.”

Masha paused while the waiter set a plate of broiled white meat in front of her. It smelled tempting, but she found she had lost her appetite. The others were served their dessert and hot beverages and seemed similarly unenthusiastic—again excepting Alvarez, who tucked into the cheesecake with gusto.

“The second piece of news comes from my mother, Annushka Gawrys. As you know, she is the head of the Institute for Dynamic-Field Studies at Cambridge. Her people at IDFS have confirmed experimentally that Marc Remillard’s enhanced-creativity equipment may indeed be modified to produce the so-called ‘mental laser’ effect.”

“Losh!” exclaimed Calum Sorley. “Does the Concilium Science Directorate know about this yet?”

“Certainly not,” said Masha curtly. “Not even Marc knows. Annushka had Severin Remillard filch the design specs from Marc’s new lab. Severin was once a rather decent neurosurgeon and Marc has been consulting him occasionally on technicalities of brain implantation. A reproduction of Marc’s latest model CE rig was built by Gerrit Van Wyk and Jordan Kramer under conditions of greatest secrecy. Both of them have wide experience with cerebroenergetic enhancement—as well as with unorthodox versions of the Cambridge lie detector. Producing a destructive beam of mental energy required only a slight modification of Marc’s design.”

“Excellent!” Alvarez exclaimed. “There’ll be no stopping us now!”

Masha frowned at him and continued. “Annushka believes that creative CE is a perfect weapon for our self-defensive purposes—compact, mobile, and versatile. However, she asked
me to remind you that the equipment will not be truly effective until numbers of grandmaster creators are able to use it in metaconcert.”

“We’ll get them,” said Jacob Wasserman, showing small teeth in a foxy smile. “Okanagon alone has thirty stalwart creators in the Rebel camp. We’ll get twice that number from the Japanese worlds, won’t we, Hiroshi?”

Kodama nodded. “Most of the powerful creators on Satsuma sympathetic to our cause are still young. But they will mature. Atarashii-Sekai and Ezo have twenty-two stalwarts who may be suitable.”

“Every year more concerned operants join the Rebel party,” Kyle said, his eyes glittering. “When the time comes for the break—”

“It will have to be before the Human Polity attains its Coadúnate Number,” Clinton Alvarez said. He had an actor’s voice, well modulated and deep. “That’s a population of roughly ten billion, which we should reach in the early eighties. At that point, a vast metapsychic complexification will take place—if Milieu Unity theory is correct in assessing the evolution of the Human Mind. Other Milieu races have already experienced this so-called coadunation. It’s not Unity per se. But in some ineffable way, a coadunate race is pressured
internally
to Unify—to make a quantum-style leap to a higher level of socialization. We must attain our independence before this complexification begins.”

“That’s an interesting idea, Clint,” Calum Sorley said, letting his skepticism show. “I’ve studied the pros and cons of Unity rather extensively myself—but I don’t remember running across the notion of an inevitable change in the human mental paradigm. What’s your source?”

Alvarez smiled. “At the moment, it prefers to remain anonymous. I’ve been analyzing the criticality of coadunation in some depth myself. I’ll have a report ready in about fifty Galactic days. If you’d care for a copy, I’ll send one on.”

Jacob Wasserman blinked sardonically from beneath his tam. “I hadn’t realized that Pat Castellane’s new staff included psychophilosophers.”

“The Dirigent is interested in everything that may affect the welfare of our home planet, Intendant General. She’d welcome closer liaison with you and the Assembly on this and … other matters.”

“It’s about time,” Jacob grumbled. “The woman’s spent so much time reorganizing, she’s been practically incommunicado.”

“That’s about to change,” said Alvarez easily. “The transition following the sudden death of the Dirigent’s predecessor presented serious problems, but things are well in hand now.”

“Wonderful,” Jacob growled. “Then what do you say we talk some practicalities? We’re going to have to build these new brain-blasters secretly, train people in their use, and spread them about where they’ll be most valuable. That’ll be expensive and very difficult to keep secret—at least on Okanagon. Even with Castellane and me in the Rebel camp, you have to remember that our cosmop world is a Sector Base for the Magistratum and the home of the Twelfth Fleet. In time, that last may work to our advantage. Owen Blanchard is packing the Fleet with Rebel sympathizers. But at the present Okanagon is simply not a place where clandestine factories or training facilities could operate for very long without being detected.”

Hiroshi said, “I doubt that we could do much now on Satsuma, either, Clint. We are still a newly founded colony with an unsettled economy and serious geophysical problems. Less than a year ago we suffered a devastating earthquake in one of our principal cities, which was inadvertently constructed in a zone of instability. The city is going to have to be moved, at great expense. In addition, seismic analysis suggests that other areas may also be in danger. Satsuma will be swarming with scientists, inquisitive strangers, and exotic Milieu loyalists for a number of years.”

“Plenty of isolated corners on Callie,” said Kyle Macdonald happily. “Plenty of sympathetic folks, too! Now, you take the continent of Beinn Bhiorach, where my son Ian farms. Nearly half a million square kilometers with a total population of less than twenty thousand souls.”

“We don’t dare risk it,” Catriona said, “so long as Graeme Hamilton remains Dirigent. His office oversees high-tech imports and exports. Graeme has vowed to make Callie self-sufficient, and he personally goes over balance-of-trade figures with a toothcomb. Sooner or later he’d twig to the fact that unauthorized manufacture of a sophisticated kind was going on. Building CE rigs isn’t exactly a cottage industry.”

“Hamilton should be persuaded to retire,” said Clint Alvarez. “Then
you
would become Dirigent, and there’d be no problem.”

“We don’t know for certain that the Lylmik would appoint me,” said the First Deputy.

“No,” Calum Sorley agreed. “It’s quite probable that Catriona would get the job—but the Lylmik are notorious for their unpredictability. You would have thought they’d replace Hamilton—but the old man’s sticking like a tick. He can’t take time out for rejuve, though, so he’s bound to kick the bucket sooner or later when one of his dicky vitals craps out.”

“Let’s hope,” Clint murmured, “that it happens sooner. We were more fortunate on Okanagon.”

There was a silence. Operant insiders knew about the rumors that the late Dirigent of the cosmop planet had been murdered, even though the Magistratum had been unable to prove it.

Yes, Masha thought. I
must
find out more about that young man!

“Graeme is a kind and brilliant person,” Catriona said, “and he’s done a splendid job for most of his years in office. But there’s no doubt he’s slowed down. The Intendant Assembly has petitioned the First Magnate as well as asking the Lylmik to replace him. He could be gone tomorrow—or he may remain Dirigent for years. We can only wait.”

Masha said, “There is one other piece of intelligence I have for you. Paul Remillard’s sixteen-year-old son Jon is to be made a magnate at the next Concilium session. He’ll be designated Paramount Grand Master, just as his older brother Marc was. But where Marc has only three metafaculties at the highest level, young Jack is paramount in all five.”

“Och, if we could only recruit either of those superbrains!” Calum groaned. “Especially Marc. If we had that one on our side, we’d win any fight, walking away!”

“Marc may be suffering from multiple-personality disorder,” Hiroshi Kodama said very softly. “And the abnormal persona within him may be a sociopathic fiend—a serial killer of the most atrocious kind.”

“What?” Calum was incredulous. “Are ye joking, Dirigent Director?”

Catriona gave a shrewd nod. “You’re talking about the Fury-Hydra affair, aren’t you, Hiroshi? The Remillard family’s ‘worst-kept secret.’ ”

“Except among the Rebel operants,” Jacob Wasserman commented. “But I thought the killers and their mysterious puppeteer had been dormant for over fourteen years.”

“Hydra is back,” the Satsuma Dirigent said. “It’s killed again and then dropped out of sight, just as it did before.”

“What the hell is a Hydra?” Calum was increasingly impatient.

Hiroshi continued as though the Caledonian IG had not spoken. “Adrien Remillard told me some time ago about the latest murders. I regret I cannot give you any particulars at this time.” He glanced uneasily at Masha, wondering whether she knew the truth about her daughter-in-law’s death. “Adrien’s revelation came as a result of certain … imprudent attempts to recruit Marc Remillard into our Rebel faction. Adrien strongly advised that we avoid doing so, since Fury, the controller of Hydra, must certainly be a prominent member of the Remillard family and Marc is a very strong suspect. If Marc is Fury he could destroy our movement. We would never know whether the sane or insane persona was in control of his mind. Both Adrien and Severin have recommended that we make whatever use we can of Marc’s brilliant CE research, but avoid taking the man himself into our inner circle.”

“What the fuck are you lot talking about?” Calum exploded. “What’s all this Fury-Hydra cack about?”

“Bi ad thosd,” said Catriona, hushing him. “I’ll explain it to you later.” She turned to Masha “The lad Jack: Has he indicated where his sympathies lie on the Unity question?”

“No,” the professor replied. “Annushka says he’s very cagey. Keeps his thoughts to himself and plays the prodigious innocent, skipping all over the map picking up advanced degrees as though he were gathering nuts in May, and spending a lot of time meditating. My mother has heard rumors that there may be some serious physical abnormality in the boy that he masks with his high creativity. She says Severin and Adrien will neither confirm nor deny the matter. Given Jack’s so-called ‘miraculous’ recovery from the genetic horrors of his infancy, some sort of teratism in the remissive state is all too likely.”

“It will be interesting to see how Jack behaves at the next Concilium session,” Catriona said, “when several thousand top-caliber operant minds are focused on him.”

Jacob asked, “Is there any possibility that this totipotent little pisher could be part of the Fury-Hydra combine?”

“Adrien was emphatic on that point,” Hiroshi said. “No member of his family believes Jack is involved in the killings.”

“Then perhaps,” Wasserman murmured, “one of our Rebel mavens who is adept at psychological subtleties might carefully sound the little momzer out.”

Calum’s grin was wolfish. “Go get ’im, Jake.”

Kyle Macdonald had no interest whatsoever in Jack Remillard. He had finished both entrée and dessert and now ogled Masha in a manner that required no mind reader to interpret.

“Has this Jack indicated what profession he plans to follow?” Clint Alvarez asked the question offhandedly.

“Evidently not,” Hiroshi replied. He stirred his tea, tasted it, and returned the mug to the table with a disappointed sigh before addressing Masha. “Kyle has told us that you are here on an exciting family mission, professor. You must be proud and happy that your two grandchildren have spontaneously emerged from latency into the operant state.”

“My happiness is mixed, Dirigent Director. Because Caledonia’s Metapsychic Institute lacks the facilities to train young metas of very high assay, I must take the children to Earth. We’re leaving in two days. This will be especially painful for my granddaughter Dorothea, who is eleven. She’s deeply devoted to her father, who is a widower, and now she’ll have to leave him.”

“Do the youngsters have masterclass potential, then?” Catriona inquired.

Masha hesitated, then finally said, “According to the preliminary test results done here on Caledonia, Kenneth appears to have Grand Master farsensing and coercing abilities. Dorothea … may have all five faculties at levels surpassing that.”

“¡Puñeta!” Clint Alvarez whispered. “Do you mean she might possibly mature to be another paramount?”