"As I'm sure you're all aware, with the exception of the Sharona Chain itself, this is the longest single transit chain we've explored so far. What none of you are aware of, since the newest developments have occurred since our last Board meeting, is just how much longer it's about to become."
He turned from the map to watch their faces.
"Over the past several months, survey teams fielded by the Chalgyn Consortium have discovered and claimed five new portals at the end of what we are now designating the Karys Chain."
Mouths dropped open, and Irthan Palben knocked over a water glass. He swore in sudden dismay as it soaked his notes and suit, and Orem grinned.
"Chathee, could you find a towel to mop up that spill?"
Chathee Haimas, his perpetually efficient assistant, was already halfway across the room, having apparently conjured a towel out of thin air. Sympathetic chuckles broke the silence as she handed it solemnly to Palben.
"That's a suit you owe me, Orem," Director Palben muttered, smiling despite the irritation in his voice. The massive blond Farnalian ordered his suits custom-dyed as well as custom-tailored, and silk wasn't known as a forgiving fabric when doused with water.
"Put it on your expense account, Irthan. I'm sure we can persuade someone to glance the other way just this once, since I did drop that on you with a certain, ah, relish, shall we say?"
That produced more laughter, and Limana allowed himself a smile of his own. But he wasn't quite done, and the laughter gradually ebbed as the men and women assembled in that Board room realized he wasn't.
"I probably will put it on my account," Palben said. "But before I do, suppose you drop the other half of your little bombshell, whatever it is. Just in case the damage gets worse."
"I doubt it could get much worse," Limana replied, examining his colleague's sodden state. "However, you're right. There is one other small discovery involved."
Every eye was fixed upon him, and the temporary relaxation of their laughter was a thing of the past.
"In addition to the five portals Chalgyn has fully explored, proven, and claimed," he said quietly, "their crews have also discovered what appears to be the first true cluster in the history of our exploration efforts. At present, it would appear that the cluster in question consists of a minimum of seven portals, including their entry portal, all within a very, very short distance of one another."
Stunned silence greeted the announcement, and Orem Limana hid a huge mental smile behind his own solemn expression. Chalgyn Consortium was going to make perfectly obscene amounts of money in the very near future, and that delighted him more than he could say.
It was his job to see that everyone had a fair and equal right to use the portals which had already been discovered, but it was also his job to protect the financial interests of any group which discovered a new portal. That was true for every exploration company, but it gave him considerably more pleasure and personal satisfaction in some cases than in others, and this was definitely one of the former. Chalgyn worked hard, on a shoestring budget, and it said something important that the best and brightest field crews had been flocking to Chalgyn's banner over the past several years anyway.
Including, he thought smugly, the brightest rising stars of all: Jathmar Nargra and his lovely wife. Limana had had his doubts, at first, but Halidar Kinshe's belief in Shaylar had been more than justified, and the risk of putting her into the field had paid off. Not only were she and her husband performing top-notch work, but she'd become a multiverse-wide celebrity. And it didn't hurt a thing that she was one of the loveliest young women he'd ever met, the First Director thought even more smugly.
No institution as powerful as the Portal Authority could be uniformly beloved, however rigidly honest and scrupulously fair its management might be. And while the Authority was supposedly above politics, no one with the intelligence of a rock believed that. Given the realities of human ambition, greed, and the hunger for power, it had no choice but to pick its course through waters frequently troubled by political tempests, and that required a constant?if subtle?battle for public opinion and support. Its First Director had to have the honesty of a saint, the fortitude of an Arpathian warrior-priest, the showmanship of a patent-medicine salesman, and the political instincts of a rattlesnake. Orem Limana had all four of those, and he and his public relations people had jumped on the chance Shaylar offered with both feet.
Shaylar Nargra-Kolmayr had become, in many ways, the human face of the Authority, and not just for the Kingdom of Shurkhal, either. Hers was one of the half-dozen or so most widely recognized faces in the entire multiverse (thanks in no small part to the efforts of one Orem Limana's PR flacks), and even Sharona's colony worlds adored her. Shaylar Nargra-Kolmayr was the best thing which had happened to the Portal Authority since the very first portal had popped into existence eighty years ago. She was shaking things up, in exactly the way they needed to be shaken, and he was delighted with her.
Then Director Ordras Breasal surged to his feet. Breasal was a thin, hatchet-faced man, habitually found near the back of any room in which he sat. His chin was shaped like the sharpened point of a bearded ax and jutted outwards, perpetually daring the world to break its fist against that thick, pointed bone. Now he thrust that chin right at Limana and pitched his voice in a tone designed to etch steel.
"First Director! I demand an explanation!"
"Breasal's arse would demand an explanation for having to let out the contents of his bowels," someone muttered behind Limana.
Orem Limana's cold stare had been known to make even Arpathian septmen break into a cold sweat. Now he turned it on the whisperer, Djoser Anzeti, who?as it happened?was an Arpathian septman. Anzeti didn't break into a sweat, but he did have the grace to flush red, although it was a pity to censure him, since Limana was in complete agreement with his sentiment. Director Breasal was the largest pain in Orem Limana's professional life … and that took some doing.
He gazed at Anzeti for a heartbeat or two, then turned his attention back to Breasal, who represented Isseth, one of the independent kingdoms sandwiched between the jagged mountains northwest of Harkala and south of Arpathia's wide and arid western plains.
"What, precisely, did you wish explained, Director Breasal?" he asked through teeth which were carefully not clenched, and Breasal drew himself up, basking in the attention he so seldom received?and even less frequently deserved?from his fellow board members.
"How is it that this Portal Authority has spent eighty years exploring new universes, finding new ones at the steady rate of one every two years or so, yet this upstart, brash little fly-by-night Chalgyn Consortium is about to lay claim to twelve?twelve, curse them!?in less than six months? Chalgyn's gotten away with its dirty work long enough, slipping teams into universes claimed by other companies and cheating honest organizations, like Isseth-Liada, out of their hard-earned profits! I demand an explanation! I demand an audit of their corporate records! I demand an investigation for collusion and conspiracy and fraud, and?"
Director Anzeti slammed to his feet and brought both hands down so hard the heavy conference table jumped.
"How dare you? If anyone deserves to be audited for collusion, conspiracy, and fraud, it's Isseth-Liada! The Septentrion's exploration teams have filed complaint after complaint about terror tactics, intimidation, wrecked equipment, threats?"
"Enough!" Limana roared.
Silence fell like broken shards of ice against a stone flagging. Breasal curled his lip, his eyes cold and contemptuous, while Anzeti glared murderously.