"Ah, Krinata, at last. I've been trying to reach you."

She sat up, wondering where he was calling from, but she said with asperity, "I'd have expected better manners from the Sentient of a prince!"

Arlai made a deep obeisance, uttering formal apologies, and kept his eyes down as he spoke. "Onerir Control is trying to isolate me in orbit, and I can't reach Jindigar—they've removed my telemband from him. Krinata, I need help!"

She shoved aside her lecture on overriding household closures and waking people up. Grabbing a robe, she went to the screen. "I thought you'd be nearing Dushaun by now."

"No, Jindigar is being held on Onerir. I've just found out where, only I can't reach him. And now... now," he said, gulping visibly, "I've found that Finemar has been murdered!"

"Murdered!"

"Well, disconnected. But to me it feels like murder. His whole personality is gone forever. He's being broken down for parts, and his centrals are being discarded. All by order of the Emperor. Krinata, it was the Emperor who ordered Finemar reprogrammed to begin with. I think he wanted Dinai and Seum debilitated by their treatment, so he could more easily wring confessions out of them."

"Whoa! Slow down, Arlai. Don't let your imagination run wild." But she shivered at his words. "How could they confess to a plot they never even heard of?"

Arlai sat down, letting the screen fill with his head and shoulders. "I think the Emperor needs an actual Dushau confession to nail all this down tight. He hasn't a single shred of evidence despite all his investigating. He's just letting people think that investigations mean guilt."

"How do you know all this?"

Arlai smiled hesitantly. "I'm one of the oldest Sentients operating. I'm pretty good at my job. If you want to know more, you'll have to ask Jindigar."

She assessed the simulacrum's demeanor as if he were a living being, knowing they went to some pains to master nonverbal communication forms. "You're loyal to him, aren't you?" Many Sentients were owned by people, and regarded them simply as employers, not personal friends. She'd won Fiella's friendship after many years, and she thought she recognized that attitude in Arlai.

"Sentients are supposed to be loyal to their owners," answered Arlai.

She started to say that he seemed more than a Sentient, more even than a worried friend. But he cut her off.

"Krinata, I'm not Kitholpen, to be able to secure a line with diplomatic immunity. I've done my best, but..."

Secured line? The situation must be dire. "Where did you say Jindigar was being held?"

"I know he trusted you," said Arlai as if to convince himself. •'He left you the piol. He was telling me by that just how much he trusted you to help. Krinata, I didn't call you because a Sentient has been murd—disconnected. I called because I just found out that Dinai and Seum have died, in the psychiatric ward of Onerir General Hospital, where Jindigar is being held. Official cause of death: Dushau insanity. I don't believe that, but I can't prove it. They removed my telembands from them before they died. Jindigar's still alive according to the Attending Sentient. Krinata, if isolating him like this after such a loss isn't torture, what is? After they wring a confession out of him, the Emperor plans a public humiliation and execution of a Dushau prince."

She sat in shock, the nightmare coming back full force as rationality shrieked, Pay attention! This is real! The Emperor

Had lied to the Allegiancy, and to his own sworn prince. That was what was real and had to be dealt with.

"I'll get him out," she said, hearing her own voice as if it belonged to someone else.

Arlai slumped, and held one hand to his eyes as if to forestall weeping. "I knew you'd help."

Krinata's resolve hardened. She had failed to warn the three that they were being spied upon in her office. She had seduced Jindigar into that replay of Taaryesh's death that had been called sabotage. She had stood by and let Jindigar and the others be hauled out of her office, too weak to defend themselves. It might not be her fault, but it was her responsibility. Besides, Jindigar was special. If somewhere, some Dushau really was plotting against the Allegiancy, well, every species had its criminals.

She was suddenly sick of sitting on her hands waiting for the Emperor's investigators to swing an ax at her professional neck. She'd seen how they were trumping up false evidence, and Jindigar's "sabotage" had occurred in her office. It was a matter of record that she'd openly resisted imperial troops. Never mind that she was within her rights. If they wanted to get her, they could. And she was sure that they did. There was no point in playing innocent while the Emperor tortured Jindigar into betraying everything he believed in, murdered him, and then came after her as his primary contact on Onerir. If they were going to survive until the Kings put a stop to this, she had to act now.

She went to her wardrobe and summoned Fiella to assemble her toughest hiking clothes and assorted necessities for a long trip, packing it all in a lightcase. Then she ordered up her best court regalia and began dressing to impress.

Arlai said, "I'm stuck up here in orbit, Krinata, but I have developed contacts, and I can sometimes control scurries and other out-runners by fast-talking their Sentients. I'll follow you, and I'll help wherever I can."

She poked her nose around the door of her dressing room and said, "You're great, Arlai. But I hope I won't need any help."

She came out into the room and Arlai stood, nodding appreciatively. "Very, very impressive, Lady Zavaronne." He redressed his image in courtwear of the lowliest rank, unadorned, and made a deep obeisance.

She looked around at her possessions. At least a year's salary's worth of electronics, several years' salary invested in her library, the furnishings, mementos of her parents. "Fiella, if I don't come back, turn all of my personal effects over to Allassi Messentari. Tell her to save anything she thinks might have sentimental value, and sell everything else and keep the money. Transfer my accounts to her name after you settle my debts."

She took her formal leptolizer, and her old one. And she grabbed a pocketful of energy cakes to eat on the way. "Ready, Arlai?"

"Always, Krinata. But Onerir Control is trying very hard to reprogram me. I don't know how much time I have."

There was no distress in Arlai's voice now, but the new threat sent her racing for the carpark.

It was a long ride around the curve of the planet to Onerir General Hospital, renowned for catering to almost every one of the several hundred species. The hospital was located on an island amid a placid inland sea. Great grassy hills rolled up to short, sprawling buildings dotted with functional towers. The installation stretched far underground as well as onto the beaches for aquatics.

Here, instead of nearing dawn, it was just approaching midnight. Arlai was now directly overhead, speaking to her easily through her own leptolizer.

She had been thinking. "Arlai, I don't mean to insult you, but could you—at my command, of course—forge the imperial seal and project me an order saying I'm to remove Jindigar from this place and take him to the Emperor?"

She watched the Sentient on the screen of the car. Chewing one lip, he inspected her anew. The piol was sleeping in her lap—on a thick pad this time, so as not to ruin her outfit. Otherwise, she was Lady Zavaronne.

"Jindigar trusted you. Yes, Krinata, I could do that. I could even create the Emperor's image giving the order."

"Splendid!" she said, not even thinking about what this implied regarding Dushau-shipboard Sentients, or Dushau attitudes toward Allegiancy law. "Do it and squirt it into my leptolizer. I'm going to pull off a show that will go down in history."