The V'Dan (53 page)

In the eyes of Terran law, that granted him more leniency, and so she had bartered with the Empress to have Lieutenant First Class Brad Colvers tried under Terran military law. The Empress, with some reluctance, had agreed to that, in exchange for trying Shi’ol Nanu’oc under Imperial law. She had even attended the solemn, grim ceremony in the Terran zone’s modest auditorium, where the black-and-white-clad members of the Peacekeepers arranged for an angled platform, a mouthguard for the lieutenant, and a grim-faced fellow who precisely measured out the punishments one blow at a time to the man strapped to that angled platform.

Corporal punishment regulation number one. Committing a civilian crime. For a felony-level crime, the punishment was four strokes of the cane. Regulation number fifteen. Colluding
with an enemy. Two strokes of the cane. Attacking a superior, regulation twenty-two—and Jackie
was
still his superior in the chain of command, even if she was no longer a commissioned colonel, since she was authorized to fill in for the Premiere and Secondaire in terms of their being commander-in-chief and lieutenant-in-chief—was four strokes of the cane. And finally, treason, the second regulation. For not only nearly killing Jackie, but nearly killing the eldest son of the V’Dan Empress. Five strokes of the cane.

A total of fifteen blows. There were limits in the Peacekeeper rules and regulations on corporal punishment for how many were to be delivered at one time, gauged on the physical fitness of the accused, but fifteen was deemed a bearable number in this case. And because it was now military law that every soldier had to witness at least one disciplinary caning, every Terran ship currently out there in space was ordered to stand down and watch, and the entire military complement of the embassy zone was ordered to either attend in person alongside Jackie and the Empress, or watch from any duty stations they could not in good conscience leave unattended.

It was not pleasant to watch. Or to listen to. Or to contemplate ever happening to oneself. It also took about as long as the actual trial and was over within a quarter of an hour. When it ended, Admiral Nayak pronounced the rest of Colvers’ sentence: to be returned to Earth to be remanded into military custody for incarceration of no less than ten years even with parole for good behavior, and twenty years without it.

He would be attached to a particular gardening patch for those ten-to-twenty years, too, forced to slave away making food for the rest of the Terran population. Never again would Brad Colvers fly an OTL ship. He had achieved the fame of face that the precognitives back on Earth had predicted, and had associated with all those images of interacting with aliens . . . but not in any way Brad himself had predicted.

As soon as it ended, and the crying ex-lieutenant had been strapped onto a gurney and floated off, Jackie accompanied the Empress and her Elite Guards out of the North Embassy Wing and over to the Imperial Wing. Not to visit any private parlors, but because she was going to stand with them on the
Imperial Tier of the Inner Court—it was raining too hard outside to bother with a public trial in the Plazas—while Countess Nanu’oc was dealt with under V’Dan law.

Caning Brad had been judged far more lenient and suitable for his accidental manslaughter than letting him be tried under Imperial law, where even accidental manslaughter ran the risk of the death penalty when it came to the ruling bloodline. Shi’ol . . . deserved what she was about to get, one way or another. Jackie had an idea about that “other.”

The waiting area was more pleasant than all the fancifully carved and gilded furniture should have suggested. Not that Jackie’s stomach could handle any of the food laid out buffet-style on one of the tables, though she did drink a little juice. Seeing her former crewmate screaming and writhing against his bonds with each hard, precise stroke had spoiled her appetite.

As far as discipline measures went . . . from the pallid faces of her fellow Terrans, it was going to be a very strong incentive to keep their soldiers in line, enough officers or not. Jackie made a mental note to suggest strongly to the Command Staff that they ensured the regulations insisting on required viewings of corporal punishment have those viewings take place during Basic Training. That way, Terran soldiers would start out knowing exactly what would happen to them. She suspected that, had Brad known in advance, he would have been able to better resist Shi’ol’s temptations leading him down the path of his prejudices to hatred’s own hell.

Finally, a servant entered and announced that Master of Ceremonies was ready to begin. Coached on where to sit—between Hana’ka and Li’eth, once again at his father’s insistence they not be parted—and where to stand, Jackie joined the queue of red-and-gold-clad bodies. She herself was a sober raven among the scarlet cardinals and gilded parakeets of the Imperial Family. A foreigner in their midst.

As one of the persons who had been directly harmed alongside the Imperial Prince, she had a right to co-preside over the sentencing. It was one of the few cases in V’Dan caste-segregated culture where someone of even the Fifth Tier could have the right to stand on the Imperial Tier without somehow managing to marry into it or becoming a Consort Imperial.

To get there, they had to file through the temple-like room
with the actual sarcophagus-thing in it. The doorway to the Plazas was sealed shut against the rain, a heavy blast-door arrangement, but the interior was still well lit by that pool of crystal-focused light. Jackie had been instructed not to touch the giant stone block and not to break formation, but while the line of people did not move at a shuffle, she did have enough time to stare at the lettering carved into its ageworn surface.

Terranglo letters.

Ashes to ashes, dust to dust,
the first line read. That line was the same as the images Rosa had brought back from her visit to the most holy site on all of V’Dan, the Necropolis of Dawn, legendary entry point of the
d’aspra
of the original V’Dan refugees escaping from the Before World of Earth to this world.

The Necropolis of Dawn was a vast set of canyons in a semiarid landscape. Most of those valleys had had their waters rerouted because the ravines were filled with niches stuffed with the bones of anyone and everyone who thought they should have their ancestor’s remains carted to the sacred place. But the one point that irrefutably pointed to the legends of the Immortal High One coming from the future had been the exact same lettering carved into the vast archway that V’Dan legend said was the site of the portal between the two worlds, allowing those refugees to literally step from one world to the other somehow.

Jackie didn’t know if that meant the Immortal had used Grey technology or something else. She did know, because Rosa had showed her several pictures of the Arch of Dawn, that this sarcophagus had a line the archway did not.

The first of my lives, the last if I must.

(
Legend has it there are bones inside, and that they are those of the body of the Immortal’s first beloved, from the dawn of time itself. Or at least from roughly five thousand years before the
d’aspra
,
) Li’eth murmured in her mind. (
Mostly, the inscription—which is written in V’Dan as well, though it does not rhyme in our tongue—was believed to be a ritual the Immortal would undergo every two years to prove her immortality to her followers, by literally stabbing herself in the heart with a knife and dropping dead, only to somehow burst back to life a few moments later.
)

Jackie nodded mentally since she did not want to confuse the somber quality of the moment physically. The Inner Court was crowded, with people on their feet as well as occupying every bench, padded stool, and seat. Even the Terran communications robots had been allowed to attend, so that the Terran government could witness Shi’ol’s sentencing.

Standing long enough for everyone to be introduced, Jackie sat when Hana’ka gave the little hand signal that said they were allowed to sit, and listened to the opening rituals and protocols of the trial. Like the modern Terran version, the trial was succinct and to the point and not bogged down in procedural chicanery. Accusations were made and evidence presented. Witnesses were brought forth to make brief statements.

The accused was questioned and attempted to plead she had not meant to endanger any lives. The V’Dan chief prosecutor pointed out how their version of the Laws of Robotics—robots were not allowed by their programming to harm sentient lives through any action, nor to harm those lives through inaction if they could help it—had been deliberately circumvented. Shi’ol tried to protest that she hadn’t thought the robots would shred clothing without those laws being broken, and the prosecutor stated that tests had proved that model of robot was quite capable of doing that while under the coding of those laws.

When she tried to protest again, Eternal Empress Hana’ka cut in. “
Enough.
You lie, and you lie again and again in my Court. You deliberately acted to harm an ally of the Empire in wartime. That is treason. Whether or not you meant His Imperial Highness to be a secondary target is immaterial. You attacked his holy partner, and
that
makes Grand High Ambassador Jacaranda Maq’Enzie a member of the Imperial Tier.”

Out of the corner of her eye, Jackie noticed Vi’alla stiffening in her seat on the far side of her mother. Her fingers clenching on the armrests, she sat like a displeased statue. Li’eth’s eldest sister did
not
like her mother claiming Jackie had the protection of her caste level.

Too bad. You’re not in charge. Yet.
That was a headache for a later moment.

“The attack on a member of the Imperial Tier was deliberate, even if the Grand High Ambassador is not of the Blood.
The damage done by those robots is irrefutable. The evidence linking Shi’ol Nanuoc, 373rd Countess S’Arrocan, to all of these crimes is undeniable. The only thing left is to sentence her. V’Daania, how do you vote?”

“Death,” Balei’in stated from his seat to the far right. “The
Book of the Immortal
states that one should not permit a
sinjit
to make its nest in even the most remote corner of the grounds of the Temple of Eternity. Never mind within its actual walls.”

Jackie almost laughed inappropriately, for in that exact same moment, she had spotted the face of a certain Dr. To-mi Kuna’mi. She clenched her fingers around her own carved and gilded armrests, stomach muscles tensing against that urge, to keep her expression calm.

“Death,” Te-los declared flatly from his position on the far left. “Her schemes injured my son and nearly killed his future wife.”

“Death,” the next-eldest sister, Mah’nami, said. She spoke from her seat between her youngest brother and their eldest sister. “The evidence adds up flawlessly. Her intentions are clear.”

“Death,” Li’eth stated grimly. “She served under me as one of my officers. She
betrayed
the trust implicit in that.”

“Death,” Vi’alla said. “She has shamed the blood of her ancestors.”

It was her turn to pronounce judgment. “
I
have a different punishment in mind. A far more cruel one.”

That
made every member of the family V’Daania twist and crane in their seats to look at Jackie. Empress Hana’ka blinked and frowned, but said, “Go on.”

“Her actions are undeniable. Countess Shi’ol Nanu’oc deliberately sabotaged the safety programming of those robots so that they would destroy any
source
of the DNA they were ordered to seek out and rend. Not just the evidence shed onto my clothing, my carpets, my bedding, but
my own body
. But it is her
motive
I speak of punishing, not her actions,” Jackie explained. “Death is too gentle. Too swift. It teaches her nothing.

“I’ll admit even we Terrans admit that death as a punishment for certain crimes can serve a purpose. It is like cutting out a cancerous growth when that cancer resists treatment,” she continued. “No matter how far medicine progresses,
sometimes all you can do is remove an infected or excessively injured limb to save the rest of the patient. But in this case, Shi’ol would get off far too easily if her life was ended now.

“The Psi League trains its telepaths, its mind-speakers, in all manner of techniques,” Jackie explained. “One of those is something we call a mind-block. It is the act of a highly skilled telepath deliberately going into someone’s head and
altering
how their thought processes work. It is not done lightly, but my government has agreed that this situation does warrant its legal use. As the person most directly harmed by her deliberate, murderous attacks, as her
intended target
 . . . I advocate the right to go into Shi’ol Nanu’oc’s mind and remove her ability to see the
jungen
marks, of which she is so proud. Including her
own
.”

Her words stirred a rustle of murmurs and whispers and questions throughout the Court. Vi’alla found her voice first. “. . . What kind of punishment is
that
?”

“One which even
you
could learn from, Your Highness. Shi’ol has consistently considered herself superior because of her spots,” Jackie explained, looking past Vi’alla to her frowning mother. “She—and
most
V’Dan—have consistently considered we Terrans to be
inferior
because of our lack thereof. Including some
very
insulting remarks made by not only one of the medical professionals called in to tend my wounds in the aftermath of Shi’ol’s deliberately plotted attack, but made by some of the
Elite Guards
who were supposed to be guarding us in the highest of respect.

“We Terrans will no longer put up with
any
disrespect over the matter of our lack of
jungen
,” Jackie asserted, leaning forward in her seat to pin the whole audience with her glare. “My government has therefore authorized me to lay the following ultimatum upon the negotiation table: We demand the right to place mind-blocks upon
any
V’Dan from this point forward who continues to insult our sovereign and separate citizens as though we were markless V’Dan juveniles instead of treating us with the respect of the Terran adults we
are
.”