Chapter 6: The Periphery
“You’ve not completed the dance once without tripping, missing a step, or generally making a mess of the whole damn thing,” Rowan commented as Zara placed another pin in the dress hanging off of the headless sewing form, “You are, generally, a dancing disaster.”
“Please stop reminding me.” She knew Rowan was right. It would take an absolute miracle for her to make it through the dance without causing a scene.
“You should have Trisla learn the dance and go instead. She’s at least graceful. And who is going to notice?”
“Rowan, stop, you’re upsetting Lady Zara,” Trisla signed. She picked up a small pillow from one of the armchairs and bopped Rowan in the face with it. “Anyway,” she continued after dropping the pillow again, “Lady Astrid would know, and she’d definitely not just let it slide.”
“Lady Nastrid,” Xaz added mournfully, “Nasty Nastrid.”
“At least we didn’t find any Adjudicant spy devices in the house. If we did, they’d definitely be here to arrest you for hazardous dancing without a license,” Rowan noted.
“Hm.” That was all Zara could say, as she had put a couple of pins between her lips to hold while she moved around the sewing form. The dance would be a disaster, yes. But social humiliation could be weathered. A bit of embarrassment was nothing compared to the discovery of Lady Noralina’s journal. They’d attempted to look the woman up on the core-net, to find out what they could about who she was, and what had become of her. But, her entry on the corepedia had all the hallmarks of something redacted by imperial decree. Little remained except a notation of when she’d entered and when she’d “left” the service of the Emperor. It didn’t even mention her homeworld, and all of the entries of the concubines, past and present, contained links to read more about their homeworlds. The concubine was the physical representation of their planet or moon or asteroid upon Viverides, an avatar of a whole people. The implications of the entry not being linked to a homeworld were nothing less than chilling.
What secret had Lady Noralina discovered that had led to her…death? Was she dead? Imprisoned? Sent away? Lady Kessandra mentioned she believed the woman to have been executed, but said she’d seen so many executions in her years that she just couldn’t recall the reasons for that particular one. But, she also admitted it was possible she had misremembered and the woman had just been imprisoned.
Zara didn’t like Lady Astrid, but also didn’t want to believe her capable of something so cruel as ruining a person’s entire life. Not just a single person, but potentially an entire world. What secret could be worth so many lives?
The sudden rap on the front door startled Zara so thoroughly she almost sucked the final pin into her mouth and down her throat. Thankfully, avoiding that fate, she plucked the pin out and poked it into the sewing form as Trisla went to answer the door. When she returned, Adjudicant Edi trailed along behind her. Trisla stepped aside, announcing “Adjudicant Edi to see you, Lady Zara” via a quick series of signs.
“Ah, Adjudicant Edi. How pleasant to see you. I assume you’ve come to give us instructions regarding the Night Blossom Festival? Won’t you sit?”
“I am not an organic entity, and thus have no need to change positions for comfort,” Edi pronounced, remaining right where he was.
“Right. Of course,” Zara replied. Sometimes the strangeness of the Adjudicants still unnerved her. “We were just speaking of Lady Noralina, the previous occupant of Begonia House. Were you acquainted with her?”
Zara saw the small glance between Trisla and Rowan. They, of course, knew that nobody had been speaking of any such thing, but understood Zara’s attempt to gather more information.
“Why do you wish to know about someone who has left the Emperor’s service? The past does not concern you.”
“Yes, well…” Zara knew she had to think fast. The Adjudicants were always touchy about anything that might make it seem like there were problems on Viverides. “I heard a rumor that she was dangerous. And since I now live where she lived, I am worried the danger might linger. I can hardly sleep at night with the worry that someone might come for vengeance upon Lady Noralina and think that, because I live here, I am her.”
Edi’s quiet lingered for several seconds, and Zara assumed that the robot had taken to processing the concern, weighing it against thousands of years of rules and edicts, cross-referencing it against data about Lady Noralina’s situation. Eventually, Edi pronounced, “Lady Noralina was confirmed to be in contact with the Spiral Alliance, and plotting an assassination attempt against the royal family. However, she was only temporarily at Begonia House for less than a month due to her original dwelling, Hydrangea House, having been found to be infested with Cherka Mites. Begonia House was cleared for rehabitation, and it is confirmed that all of Lady Noralina’s allies have been eliminated. By my calculations, there is only a .004% chance that any lingering danger from this event remains to affect you, Lady Zarathenia.”
A number of glances were exchanged during Edi’s explanation by the occupants of the house, but Zara did her best to look shocked, and then relieved, at the appropriate moments. She didn’t believe any of it. Noralina’s last journal entry had placed the danger as coming from the Astors. Could… Could Lady Astrid be a Spiral Alliance spy? No, it just didn’t make any sense. Astrid fighting for the freedom of a far part of the galaxy just…didn’t track with what Zara knew of her personality. Lord Astor, though? Maybe. She knew less about him. “You’ve put my mind at rest, Adjudicant Edi. Thank you.”
“Now that you are at ease, let us begin a review of the protocols regarding the Night Blossom Festival.”
“The morning after next, a closed carriage will arrive to convey you to the Forbidden City. As there will be a large number of galactic dignitaries and imperial allies attending from off-world, all Hostage Concubines will travel by land to decrease spaceport traffic and security checks. You may take one unarmed attendant with you. Due to previous incidents arising from conflicts over shared conveyances, each concubine will travel separately. Travel will take two days, and your evening’s rest after the first day has been planned at one of the many inns or hotels along the way.
On the second day, you will arrive in the Forbidden City. It will take some time for you to pass through the security and health scans. Afterwards, you will be taken to one of the many royal residences in the Periphery and given a room. You may enjoy your time at the festival in the streets of the Periphery until the day of the dance. On that day, shortly before sundown, you will enter a royal hoverbarge and be brought into the Outer Court. Adjudicators will direct your formation and the details of performing the dance. After the dance, you will be led to the Night Blossom Feast, where you may eat and socialize. At midnight, a gong will be sounded and the Hostage Concubines must return to the hoverbarge to be taken back out of the Outer Court. The next morning, carriages will arrive to return you to Ebonrue.
During the entirety of this process, you must behave with the highest level of etiquette and decorum. Adjudicants will be watching every step of the way. The eyes of many worlds will be watching the procession, and there will be numerous recording devices in the Periphery, though of course, not within the Outer Court. As a representative of the Emperor, all you do must reflect well upon His Galactic Majesty and the palace planet. Do you understand all I have told you today?”
Although it was a lot of information, Zara knew she had no choice but to comply, “Of course, Adjudicant Edi. I understand completely.”
-*-*-*-
The trip was largely as Adjudicant Edi had explained. Although the carriage looked as if it hailed from a bygone era, the driver, a jolly man named Kersel, had two sturdy augmented horses, and had done a great deal of work to the carriage to make the ride smooth. Zara and Trisla took turns looking out of the small tinted window at the passing landscape of Viverides. Close to Ebonrue, the pastoral villages were surrounded by lush crop fields and copses of trees. As they approached the Forbidden City, buildings began to cluster, and villages gave way to the tall buildings of the vibrant outskirts of the Forbidden City. Everywhere, signs or decorations welcomed travelers, and their money. Impromptu stalls littered the roadsides, selling everything from fine fruit and flower crowns to puffed candy and Leonara incense.
The Night Blossom Festival celebrated the beginning of the month-long blossoming of the Leonara trees, which bloomed only at night. Once, there had only been less than a dozen Leonara trees left in existence, but the Dowager Empress had them cultivated and planted all over the Forbidden City, after which they became a royal symbol. The blossoming coincided with the end of the spring season in Viverides, as well as the birthday of the Dowager Empress, so all of these things became wrapped into a single celebration not just on Viverides, but across dozens of the central planets. Many rich women paid good money for a single dried blossom from within the Outer Court, for it was said the Dowager Empress bathed in these blossoms while pregnant with the Emperor. They would keep dried petals under their pillows while with child, in the hopes of their own babe becoming someone important and strong.
The Periphery was not considered officially a part of the Forbidden City, but really, the Forbidden City could not have existed without it. Around the exterior of the black repulsion dome that covered the entire royal city, throngs of people had built up an additional city. Here travelers to Viverides could find shelter in inns and hotels, shrines had been built, prostitutes plied their wares, and imperial craftsmen and apprentices not high-ranked enough to live within the Outer Court kept shops and residences. Here were markets of produce brought in from far beyond Ebonrue, even from off-world. The entire fashion industry of the Central Planets revolved around the fashion houses of the Periphery, not just of clothing, but of perfumes and colognes, and aesthetic augmentations. Musicians flocked to the Periphery’s clubs and bars, hoping to be heard by someone important and launched into fame. Rich offworlders came to schmooze and party and demanded high-quality service and lodgings. Zara had heard that almost a billion people lived in the Periphery or one of its suburbs, and now seeing it as the carriage navigated one of the streets in the Historic District, she believed it.
She felt overwhelmed. Ankali didn’t even have a billion people on the entire planet. But here, they were packed so densely she felt as if she could barely breathe.
Above the glow of the festival lanterns, a rain of twinkling holo-blossoms, and a thousand viewscreens and neon signs, stood the enormous repulsion dome, black as night. It occasionally would sparkle, here and there, as particles in the air or leaves blowing in the wind, or even Leonara petals, impacted with it. Otherwise, it remained monolithic and black, a strange dark presence looming over both the Periphery’s high rises and the smaller historic buildings.
They were taken to Skyblade Palace, a silvery building looking much like a knife cutting into the night against the backdrop of the dome. With its two hundred and fifty floors set aside for imperial guests, royal personages, families of the Noble Ministers, and so forth, Zara found it to be the most elegant and incredible building she’d ever seen, much less been inside. No expense had been spared to make the guests feel at ease. The staff manning the front desk even had language augments, including Galactic Sign Language, enabling Trisla to easily check them in. The rooms on the eighty-sixth floor overlooked much of the city, allowing a view of the incredible size of the Periphery and the enormous magnitude of the Night Blossom Festival’s influence on the city.
On the first day, they explored the festival from the streets, trying out a number of fried delicacies and playing some games. Trisla won a pair of mittens with knitted Leonara blossoms on them, and Zara won a Leonara blossom hairpin, though for all the money they spent on playing the games, they likely could have just bought each of the items several times over. When the sunset, fireworks erupted all over the city, and soon the scent of the blossoms washed over every corner of the Periphery. The pair walked back to Skyblade Palace along the Leonara-tree-lined canal, marveling at the intricately carved wooden boats that ferried romantic couples up and down the waterway.
Exhausted, Zara fell asleep the moment she hit her bed. She dreamed of spinning gaily underneath a rain of Leonara blossoms, only to realize that dozens of passersby had stopped to gawk and laugh at her uncoordinated dance. Even though she tried to ignore them, the sinking feeling of shame and dread could not be banished.
Zara woke in the night to flashing lights and muffled sounds of sirens. Groggily, she sat up and shuffled over to the window, pulling aside the curtains to peer into the night. Across from the Skyblade Palace stood another skyrise, though not as grand, and not owned by the Royal Family. Nonetheless posh, it was the sort of place inhabited by rich offworlders who wanted to brag that they “kept a residence” in the Periphery. Zara watched as an elite Korkudai team in an armored shuttlecraft raided an apartment on a slightly lower floor from where she stood. Faint pops could be heard as the Korkudai and the apartment’s residents traded gunfire. The sound of and sight of battle immediately gripped Zara with a feeling of such nostalgic terror that she slid to her knees and tried to make herself much, much smaller in case of stray bullets.
The panic of being separated from her parents at the beginning of the war on Ankali came flooding back, and her lungs began to burn as she forgot to breathe, making the remembrance of the searing conchem all the more vivid. The bombing had begun whilst her parents were away on business, and Zara had to flee the capital city in the middle of the battle with the Kalimat staff. The exodus had not gone well. Many died. Their gruesome screams and pleas still haunted her. Zara climbed over bodies of those she knew, trying not to be seen. She relived the horrible dread of watching her beloved Governess, Madame Felice, take off her gas mask to place it on Zara, knowing that she herself would die without it… Helplessness. The utter helplessness. Madame Felice gasping… Croaking with one of her last breaths, “Run, Zara, run!”
Something touched Zara’s shoulder and she screamed in abject terror, the bloodcurdling noise piercing the night. But it was only Trisla. The noise had woken her. Kneeling beside Zara, she put an arm around her and rubbed her back slowly. It had been a long time since Zara had such a night, though in her youth the terror had been much more prevalent. As Zara began to breathe easier, and her heart rate returned to normal, the two of them silently watched the miniature battle unfolding at the building across from the Skyblade Palace.
Guns and laser pistols were not generally allowed on Viverides, and not allowed at all within the Forbidden City’s repulsion dome. The one exception was the Korkudai, who had special permission to obtain any type of weapon necessary in order to best protect the palace planet. How the people fighting them obtained such weapons, Zara didn’t know. Eventually, one man was dragged out of the building onto the landing in cuffs. Streaks of blood covered his face and clothes. He looked to Zara like a banker, like the sort of man you’d expect to have a respectable job, respectable spouse, and respectable children. As the Korkudai communicated with each other and the battle appeared to be at an end, the man stared blankly off into space. For a moment, Zara thought he might see them, as he glanced upwards. But she knew that the windows of Skyblade palace were mirrored, and it would have been utterly impossible for him to have seen her. He appeared docile. At ease. Unconcerned about whatever might have brought on this police action against his apartment and the others inside, now likely dead. And then, without a moment of hesitation or even the faintest change in expression, he jerked free of the Korkudai officer holding him, ran less than a dozen steps, and with a step up and leap, flung himself off of the building.
In shock, Zara’s noise of surprise caught in her throat as she watched the man plummet, head first, his arms locked behind him in cuffs. Trisla gripped her silently, unable to make any sound. They neither saw nor heard the man hit below, it being too far to see. But, it did not stop their minds from filling in the noise, and the likely state of the man upon impact.
-*-*-*-
Zara did not sleep well after that. Thankfully, they had another full day before the dance. This time, they did not go out into the streets to enjoy the festival, but instead stayed in the room and tried to get the terrifying image of the man jumping to his death out of their minds. Both Zara and Trisla scoured the Periphery core-net to try to find any mention of what might have happened, but there were no reports. Nothing. Not even a mention of a disturbance. As always, the Adjudicants were doing their job to keep the core-net free of anything that might make Viverides, or the Royal Family, look bad.
On the third day, finally, it was time to get ready for the dance. Zara’s alterations to the dress allowed it to fit wonderfully, and Trisla put her hair up in the way prescribed by Edi. Nervous energy kept Zara’s stomach upset most of the day and was made all the more intense on the way to the hoverbarge as several festival-goers set off firecrackers in the street. Zara’s lungs burned as she gulped down huge breaths of air to try to steady herself.
Decorated with long garlands of Leonara blossoms, the hoverbarges each could contain almost a hundred concubines apiece. The whole scene was frantic, with a large number of Adjudicants directing each concubine where they should go. For the first time, Zara began to realize the incredible variety of concubines within the Emperor’s service. Many of them were augmented, or displayed genetic variances more commonly termed ‘mutations’. She had assumed all of the Emperor’s concubines would be female, but some appeared to be male, or even of the nor gender, like Rowan. Zara supposed it made sense. If the Emperor would likely never personally meet these Hostage Concubines, it mattered little to him how they looked. They simply needed to be important to their homeworld, in order to effectively be Hostage Concubines.
“You must be the illustrious Lady Zarathenia,” a male voice said from beside her. Surprised, Zara turned and found herself looking at the most fiery red hair she’d ever seen in her life. The man’s vibrant hair made Zara almost completely miss the strange red marking that swept along one side of his face. It looked vaguely like a burn mark, except it had faint tendrils and lines within it that made it also resemble a ruffled feather or some sort of leaf, with more of the pattern trailing along the man’s jaw. “I’m Tython.”
“A pleasure to meet you, Lord Tython,” Zara said, doing the best bow she could on the crowded hoverbarge. “But how did you know my name?”
“Oh no, not a lord. Just plain Tython.” He turned, leaning against the railing as he looked up at the higher levels of the barge, “I mean, most of Lady Astrid’s friends are scowling at you, and I am pretty sure one stuck out her tongue as you passed, so I just assumed. She doesn’t like me, either, that Astrid.”
Tython’s build reminded Zara somewhat of farm boys she used to see when she’d travel into the countryside with her father before the war. He didn’t have the regal or erudite bearing of the nobility and instead looked like he did chores under the sun most of the day. The outfit of the male concubines resembled the female one, except instead of a dress, they wore long robes tied with a sash, and loose satin pants underneath. Zara could tell that absolutely nobody had altered Tython’s to make it fit him better. Specifically, his pants were way too long. They bunched at the bottom, and Zara could already imagine the young man tripping over them and falling smack on his face during the dance.
“This your first Night Blossom dance?” Tython asked.
Zara held up one finger and then slid into a crouch. She ignored the looks that many of the concubines gave her, seeing her in that position in front of Tython. “It is my first, yes. Ah, do you mind, Tython? I think I can fix your pants real quick.”
“I…think the Adjudicants would laser me in half if I took my pants off in public, Lady Zara.”
“Oh, no problem. You can leave them on.” How glad she was, then, that she always kept a few extra safety pins on her, just in case of burst zippers or small tears. “How is it I’ve never seen you before?”
“Oh, I live in Ward 39 with some of the other male and nor concubines. It’s more towards the south side of Ebonrue. Is it true you have a whole basement full of cheese in your house?”
“Goodness gracious! That cheese is more famous than I’ll ever be!” Zara began folding the hem of Tython’s left pant leg inwards. She did her best to place the safety pin so that it hung off of a seam and couldn’t be seen from the outside. After working on the other leg, she stood up. “There, now shake your legs a bit? Let me make sure they won’t come undone?” Tython did exactly that, and as a testament to Zara’s prowess, the pants now hung straight and didn’t look like Tython would be likely to step on them as he danced. “There. Better?”
Tython nodded and turned back around to grab the railing as the hoverbarge began its procession through the city. “Thank you, Lady Zara. This is my fourth year, by the way. If you want, I can help you navigate through the evening. I remember my first year. It was very lonely.”
“I would appreciate that…more than you know, Tython.” It put her mind slightly at ease, even though she knew she shouldn’t trust Tython immediately. Concubines could be tricky, pretending to befriend you just to learn things about you and stab you in the back later. “May I ask… Two nights ago, did you see the Korkudai raid the building across the street from the Skyblade Palace? We saw some sort of police action, but I couldn’t find anything on the core-net about what happened there.”
“No, Lady Zara,” Tython murmured quietly as he stared into the distance, lifting his hand to give a small wave to the crowds lining the street to watch the hoverbarge procession, “I didn’t see anything. And, take my advice… Neither did you.”
