brand new colony

It's rare for Aloth to call any of the boys to his study unless they're in trouble; in fact, Gadriet has been there most often of late, and tends to leave pale-faced and uncommunicative. So when he orders the two eldest to meet him, first one and then the other, there's some reason to be concerned.

But Gwalchmai seems to get off all right, though there's not much time for any hurried conferences. As soon as Soredamor escorts him out, she turns to Medraut.

"He's ready for you."

Gadriet arrives back in Temple Bay as the night is finally starting to give way to the first suggestion of light. His fear of and his urge to defy his mother have been struggling in him ever since he got the call, and the first thing he did when he got out of stasis was to take a shot of general anesthetic; his eyes are cloudy and distant, but he seems relatively steady when he gets off the bullet train at the country estate.

A maid lets him into the house when he knocks, and he goes up to his old room, where everything is as he left it when he went to vetacad. In here it's as if time has been keeping still. He lies down on top of the soft blue coverlet of his bed and stares up at the ceiling.

He's glad he gave himself the shot. If he hadn't, he thinks, he'd be screaming.

When he signs off it's well past midnight, and even in Til Tomeil it's gotten late. Medraut goes to bed, for what sleep he can manage, and in the morning sends word to Galman that he's going to be late today. Then he takes a deep breath, and sits down with the comm. It's going to be a long day.

It takes the better part of the day to get things sorted -- the physician takes care of Aloth's body, following Anna's specifications, and Anna reads through Aloth's will and instructions. She steers clear of Marguel, though she does take part of the afternoon to sit with Clarissant (who seems as unfazed as ever). Eventually,late in the afternoon, she gets a few minutes to herself and although it's getting late in Bredigan she doesn't want to put this off any longer. She puts the call through to Medraut.

Anna arrives on New Britain with little fanfare, in security almost as tight as that which surrounded her departure, if considerably less hostile. Three of her sons meet her at the spaceport -- Medraut and Gadriet are still in Bredigan, they say; they're expected within the week -- and conduct her to the Hall. It's been refurbished, built onto, weathered; there's not much trace of the near-derelict Alliance building that it was when Arthur moved his people in. He's there to greet her, late as it is by planetary time, and Gwenore beside him. That interview is mercifully brief.

Medraut turns up the next morning, a little before noon, at the door of the suite allotted to her. He hasn't bothered to tidy up; he's in battered jeans and work shirt, dust on his heavy shoes, his hair too long and windblown, unshaven since yesterday; in which state he only resembles Athyr all the more.

"Mama," he says by way of greeting, mildly.

Gahereth hasn't seen his brothers since the burial; he's been at home, and the most any of them have heard from him in the last three days has been through Lianor. But this morning he's up early, and after breakfast he turns up at Medraut's door.

Though he's finally had a decent night's sleep, he's still got dark circles under his eyes and looks a little drawn. But he smiles thinly at Lenomie when she opens the door, and when Medraut comes into the room he's settled in and sipping coffee.

They've been in the Hall for weeks now, longer than they've ever stayed at a stretch. It's almost the first time they've had the opportunity -- Bredigan up and functioning after the first long wave of intense development, Lamwell keeping track of things at home -- but they all know that isn't the reason. It's as if they're afraid to look away. Even Melian is tense and subdued, keeping a watchful eye on his parents as if either of them might be the breaking point.

But Melian is in bed, and presumably asleep, in the corner they've screened off as his own, when Medraut comes in toward midnight. The door shuts quietly behind him, shutting out the yellow light from the hallway; he darts a quick look behind the partition, before slipping past into the bedroom.

At the end of the week Medraut takes Saigremort back to the capital, and after the most cursory of check-ins immediately leaves again for Til Tomeil. He's had time, on the flight back, to realize exactly what's just happened; and on the second and longer trip he has more than enough time to figure out what he's going to do about it.

Not that he ever has any real doubt.

It's late afternoon when he reaches, on foot, the little house on the outskirts where he and Lenomie have been based for a year now. He swings lightly up the steps, hesitates a moment, and then lets himself in.

Gwalchmai is in one of his soaringly good moods, the kind where he has to concentrate to keep from running everywhere he needs to go and everywhere he doesn't need to as well. All his brothers are here now, within his reach, and he wants very much to run off and make much of Gadriet, show off his brother to his world, show off his world to his brother -

But he has work to do and he is, by dint of considerable effort, bending all that excess energy to necessary paperwork, sitting at his desk in his office instead of running all over creation like some undisciplined puppy.

It's the day before Medraut's fifteenth birthday, and Anna's pleased to see that there's a break in the weather. It's been cool and wet for the last several weeks, but today it's toleraby warm and there's even something that might be mistaken for sunshine. Anna is not superstitious, but she'll take whatever good omen she can get today.

She's been thinking about this for more than a year. In the last few weeks, it's been just about all she can think of. It's time, she knows it's time, and she knows her son, knows that he's got it within him to take this in stride.

Tomorrow, there will be the same quiet family 'party' there always is -- dinner and cake and this time wine for the older boys. Today, though, she wants Medraut to herself. So she sends a note down to his room in the morning -- dress for walking, meet your mother in the courtyard in fifteen minutes. And then she goes to wait for him.

She's only a little nervous.

The trip to Manassah is the first time she's ever been off-planet, and she spent the transit time anxiously pacing back at forth in the berth of their room on the ship. Medraut keeps telling her it's all right, but Lenomie is finding it hard to believe him on this front: she finally caved and let Divdan take her clothes shopping, in a last-minute fit of panic that all his comments about her grey dress might be true.

But the first night at his parents' house went well enough, it's true. She wore the pink gown Divdan bullied her into getting, and felt stupid and out of place, but at least nobody said anything about it and she didn't get soup on it or anything. Still, the meal was reserved, and she's used to Medraut's dry, stinging wit and Divdan's boisterous amusement -- and she's sure not used to scrubbing her skin raw and clean every day and leaving her hair down so it looks nice. Hell, she's not used to spending this many hours consecutive not mucking around in the engine of a skimmer or transport.

In the morning Medraut's old man hauls him off to look at something that Medraut swears is boring as hell, so Nomie's all right just to stay in their room. Which is where she still is, flipping restlessly through the tapes in the case on the wall, looking for something she can stick in the console until Medraut gets back. Honestly she's still nervous, but there's no real cure for that.

Saigremort hasn't seen Medraut since he returned to Camallate--hasn't, in fact, seen him since he took his leave quite a few years back. It's not as though he's forgotten, but he doesn't know what to say or do so he hasn't pressed the issue yet.

But the day's an unexpectedly beautiful one and Saigremort can't bear to stay indoors. It's been a long time since he went around the market and the Hall and exploring has always been something of a passion with him, so he dresses up and heads out. The afternoon is a pleasant one, and he wanders around pointlessly for quite a few hours before he meanders back in the direction of docks where his shuttle is settled.

For the first time in a long time he feels perfectly carefree, his hands tucked in the pockets of his trousers as he strolls. It almost wouldn't matter if he were all alone here, he thinks fleetingly.

Almost. But for now it's fine.

Of the things the average married woman has to discuss with her husband, Lenomie is willing to bet that 'while you were away the Queen decided I should overhaul the fleet maintenance crew and make sure everything is in good working order, and while I was by myself in town I met a horribly charming single writer who swept me off my feet and made me adore him and I want to know if I can sleep with him while you're away' is not near the top of the list. But she's fiercely of the opinion that there should be plenty of communication in her marriage, and the unhappiness she's been unable to define for the last year or so eases off when she's with Divdan.

So she makes him promise to come around in an hour or so, and meanwhile waits for Medraut's meeting in the Hall to be over. She's wearing the shapeless grey dress that constitutes dressing up for her, and her hair is pulled back and up in an uncharacteristically complicated style. Also she is biting off her nails. She's very practical and usually not nervous at all with Medraut, but this is different, honestly, and she's not sure how it's going to go.

If he were someone else, nursing this sort of infatuation -- his brother Geffreyn, for instance -- he might find excuses to go back to Til Tomeil and see her. But he's Medraut, and that means the more he looks forward to it the more severe he is with himself. He sticks to the schedule, and it's another two months before he heads out that way again, in the dry cool of early autumn.

Dry until he gets there, in a sudden pouring rainstorm, turning the streets to pure mud where they still aren't paved, which is most places. He stands disconsolately under the eaves of the stable, with his travel bag over his shoulder, trying to work up the nerve to make a dash across the street. It's not like he can get any wetter.

It's been a long time since Medraut came to visit him, longer still since the visit was for anything more than slightly awkward conversation. Saigremort spends at least three hours beforehand moving anxiously around his small apartment making sure everything is in its place.

He takes everything that's a little too opulent, the occasional gift from clients or thing from Arden that caught his fancy because it cost the credits of three or four customers, and hides it all out of a sudden fear that Medraut will be made uncomfortable by the display of solvency. This has the effect of leaving the apartment looking very pleasant and welcoming, and he allows himself the indulgence of buying a small flask of some very expensive liquor that he sets on the low table in the sitting room along with his plainest pair of crystal glasses.

His job requires forethought and planning in all aspects of his home, his way of dressing, his manner of speech, but his training at the Academy and years of working in the same profession have left him able to make those decisions with very little difficulty. Now he feels like a novice again, fretting over what to wear and whether or not to offer food.

Eventually Saigremort settles on the couch, dressed in jade green (it's always been his best colour) and sipping economically on a glass of heavily watered cointreau to soothe his nervousness.

Anna has always run the estate on Manassah with a kind of firm, formalized particularity. Everything runs like clockwork, and there's usually hell to pay if it doesn't. The truth of it is that when she first arrived here -- when she was first told that she wouldn't be practicing medicine, not while there were children to be had and raised -- she set to organizing the household in much the same way as she had once set to her studies. Focused, orderly, no room for error. It's kept her busy, at least; and it makes Aloth look good.

So it's to be expected, then, that when Medraut visits he's usually informed on his second day at home that he has a meeting with his mother, in her study. She's always done this, since he left home; she generally refuses to conduct any kind of real conversation with him in front of her husband, and she'd rather see Medraut alone anyway.

When Medraut arrives, he'll find her going over accounts at her desk.

Their lives are as complicated as ever, Medraut and Lenomie moving on their separate tracks between the Hall in Camallate, the little ranch house in Til Tomeil, and the temporary lodgings in Bredigan; the presence of a small son is a relatively minor wrench in the works. While they're both busy in the capital they trade off shifts, with Divdan occasionally relieving them.

Today it's Medraut coming down the passageway from the admin offices with a four-year-old streaking ahead of him. "Walk," he says severely, and the boy, to his credit, slows to a trot.

Now that his primary occupation is Bredigan, Medraut doesn't have a great deal to do while he's in the capital. On the other hand he can't leave, at least not with an easy conscience, until he's given a proper report to the King; and what with the extended wrangling with Esmeree as well as the usual daily business, there hasn't been an opportunity. Nor is he inclined to socialize, after what's just happened.

So for the last few days he's been staying in, nursing his black eye, catching up on his mail and trying to ignore the fact that the place doesn't feel like home without Lenomie, all of which occupations he is heartily sick of by now.

Lanselos is in a fine mood. So fine, in fact, that he's changed his usual plan for the day around to accommodate a lunch in the mess hall with everyone else -- he's in a mood to be around people. Then maybe after that, he'll take himself back down to the range and shoot things.

Once he's got his food, he heads for the first open spot he sees. Which just happens to be next to one of those Lloyds; sometimes, he can't keep a few of the nephews straight, he can admit. He swings into the seat & claps the other man on the shoulder, with a cheerful, "Hey there, man."

The hospital is shiny-new, only finished in the past couple of years, and the room where they've moved Gadriet still looks as though it's never been occupied before, though of course it has. All the colors are soft blues and greens, all the corners rounded, the fixtures gleaming in the low light.

This time when he comes to, it's Medraut sitting in the chair beside the bed, looking out of place in all that smoothness, his usual grays and muted blues replaced by the stark white of mourning. He never looks very happy anymore, but at the moment, watching his brother, there's something in his eyes that's close to desperation.