an excerpt from Vale (c)2020

Chapter One

“The real issue is how to bomb them to pieces without causing even more martyrs to spring up for their cause.”  The voice of the only woman at the table was heavy with disgust.  She slid her tongue along sharp teeth, biting the tip.   She was heavy handed in setting her glass down, blood sloshing up the sides and running down the inside in slow, uneven legs.  “Besides, it’s not as though they have a real chance of winning.”

The room murmured in quiet agreement, but all eyes were on Alexander Vale, the man who stood with his back to the table.  He looked from the floor-to-ceiling windows of the Commission onto the darkened streets below. “No,” he said at last, turning.  His voice was strong and controlled with the gentle lilt of a country long before destroyed.  “The real issue is how to eradicate the terrorists without damaging the innocents.  Unless you want to create more revolutionaries than we could easily subdue, bombing the cities and towns indiscriminately is always off the table.”  The tone of his voice left no room for discussion.

 “Of course, Commissioner.”  His words and tenor returned her to her place and she folded her hands, lowering her gaze to the table.

“If there is nothing else?”  Alex panned his eyes around the room and, in the silence, nodded.  “Then, let’s be dismissed.  We will have the gathering with the Protevon in a few days to finalize these discussions and move forward.”  The eight vampires around the table stood and, in turn, each said, “Good evening, Commissioner,” as they moved towards the door.  Alex lingered by the window, still watching the people in the Square below, when, at last, the remaining member of the Committee came to stand beside him.

The Dominion’s General of the Unified Armed Forces adjusted his tie and straightened his uniform.  “You can’t blame them for how they feel.”

His friend was right; Alex almost couldn’t blame the members of the Intelligence Committee for wanting a full-blown war against the humans.  They had all been promoted to their positions since the Great Rebellion, the last revolution twenty-five years before, when the bloodshed had been rampant.  Archontes had been slaughtered in their beds.  Every person at that table had lost someone they cared for.  For their part, the Esnes had been subjected to the worst genocide of their collective memory.  It had been atrocity after atrocity until one faction had risen to victory.  Part of that victory had come at Alex’s hand.  However, he wasn’t a warmonger; the Cabinet knew that, just as much as he would uphold the status quo, he also wouldn’t kill mortals without cause.  Not only would it encroach upon the Concordia, but it would violate what he stood for as Commissioner. 

Alex had taken an oath to protect the City and the towns of the Dominion.  To him, that oath included the Esnes, even if they were secondary denizens.  “Zeraphim, it will never end if we don’t stop the reasons for the rebellions.  The southern and western borders are always more willing to fight; they are too inspired by their fellow Esnes in the other Dominions.  But killing towns of innocents who might be harboring a half-dozen Rebels?  That doesn’t quash those who fight us- it merely creates legions of them.”  He faced the General.  “Victoria knows that.  She has been a soldier long enough to know better than to wage war with tactics that will only breed more resentment than fear can contain.”

“Old friend,” Zeraphim chuckled, “Victoria may indeed know better; but how else to get you to even speak her name?”

Alex furrowed his brow and shook his head.  “Don’t.”

“All I am saying,” the General laughed again, “is that you are alone.  Every woman of a certain rank is trying to garner your attention- even some of the married ones.  If not by your approval, then perhaps they can do so by requiring remedial education.”  When Alex turned back to the window, his friend sighed.  “At this point, training a pet would be a step up from being a bachelor.”

“That’s appalling.”

“We are agreed!  But you are a powerful man and powerful men cannot bear the weight of the world without a helpmate.  Choose from among the many who would be fit to stand by your side.”

“Is this truly how you wish to close a meeting that discussed ending a thousand lives?  With whether or not I dine and sleep alone?”

“Someone must sacrifice himself on your altar.  Better your old friend than the Protevon.”

A voice came from the darkened hallway outside of the conference room.  “Should I bring the car around, Sir?”

Alex turned away from the window and picked up a portfolio from off the conference table, putting distance between Zeraphim.  “Yes, thank you, Asher.  I’ll meet you downstairs momentarily.”

Asher, a towering black man with deep set eyes and a bald head, nodded once before disappearing through the open conference door.  Alex slipped his files into the leather case by his chair and logged out of the computer that had been projecting images from the Intelligence Bureau.  “On that note, General, there will be no bodies left behind on my altar here tonight.”

Clearly dismissed, Zeraphim gave a bow of his head with a small smile and walked towards the door.  “Have a good night, Commissioner.”

Alex looked around the empty room for a moment to gather his thoughts, unsure of which left him more disturbed: the idea of killing a border town full of innocents or having the Protevon assign him a match.  Both thoughts made him shudder.  He left the remnants of the meeting behind, knowing that a cleaning squad would have the room back to standard within the hour.

In the ride down the elevator, he forced his mind to clear.  There would be plenty of time for work once he was home.  Alex would pour over the documents to prepare for the meeting with the Protevon of the North Eastern Dominion.  If luck was on his side, he would come up with a result that would please everyone.  It was no secret that he was in the minority when it came to preserving human lives and towns, but he was also the most respected Commissioner in the Unified Front.  The North Eastern Dominion had the fewest uprisings of any other Dominion, and there was a measure of peace for the Esnes who lived there.  So long as he successfully continued to make a case for his position, Alex didn’t fear a change in protocol.  No mortal wanted the constant wars that the Western Dominion was known for or the near servitude of the Southern Dominion.  While the immortals in each place still held the reins of power, their authority always struck Alex as tenuous at best.  He wouldn’t trade the lifestyle he had helped create for that.

He stepped outside into the night.  Vampires moved all around him with the occasional human, head lowered, scattered through.  Esnes hated to be out after dark and, even in a moderately safe state, it was common for them to be harassed and bullied, especially by the Subalterns.  Mortal work days ended at four o’clock so that they could easily be in their homes by sunset.  Their curfew, however, was not until ten and, although Alex didn’t understand it, some humans were willing to risk the danger to be out after dark.

The black town car came to a stop in front of him and Alex waved Asher back inside to open the door himself.  He was about to step off the curb when the breeze blew the sound of a woman’s voice to his ears and he froze.  In that instance, he couldn’t breathe and his heart thumped so strongly in his chest that he thought it might burst through.  The sound was clear, with a light organ punctuating the notes of her crisp voice in accompaniment.  Alex was a soldier.  A commander.  A vampire.  An Archon.  Yet, in that moment, he was a slave to the voice.  His entire body threatened to collapse under the whip it lashed with each melodic note.

“Is everything alright, Sir?”  Asher stepped from the car and looked at Alex with concern.

Swallowing only further knotted the lump in his throat, but Alex regained his composure.  “Hold the car for a moment.”  He put his briefcase in the backseat and closed the door.  The sound was coming from the City Church, situated across the street from the Commission.  “I’ll be right back.”

After waiting for a break in traffic, Alex sprinted across the pavement and stood at the foot of the stone steps while the voice continued to filter through the open windows.  He had no business going inside the sacred building, but he couldn’t deny the pull.  It was as though the Ancient Spirit held a rope around Alex and was dragging him towards the entrance.  He had no control- he had to enter.  The Concordia forbid the immortals from traveling any farther than the narthex of a church and, as he slowly mounted the steps outside, Alex promised himself that, even if he couldn’t see the owner of the voice, he would avoid leaving the outer hall of the only human sacred space left.

In truth, there weren’t a lot of people who still clung to the faith of their ancestors.  Most believed that the Ancient Spirit had forsaken them long before the Great Siege of the eighteenth century when the Archontes secured their power throughout the world.  For hundreds of years now, humans had been under the thumb of relatively strict and, at times, harsh rulers.  Although the Concordia that was reached to stop the human bloodshed maintained that the humans could continue their religious worship, after centuries of struggle and servitude, most had abandoned the practice.  Other than a handful of lay people, the only regular attendees were the priests who still managed to find the strength to recite their prayers and the monastics who kept convents and monasteries to help the poor and record the town histories.

Alex’s own faith had been murdered alongside his wife, nearly a thousand years before.  But even now, with his anger and his pain, he couldn’t deny the sanctity within the stone walls and the peace that covered him when he pulled back the heavy doors and stepped inside.  It caused an ache inside of the soul that he was no longer sure he even possessed.

He breathed deeply of the incense-laced narthex and the familiar smell transported him back to a different life: a life where he was a husband, a man of faith, and a simple legionnaire.   Hearing the woman’s laughter before she sang through the refrain a final time gave him chills.  He remembered his own wife, singing prayers to honor that in which she had so devoutly believed.

He peered between the baroque  carvings on the door and, almost out of sight, he saw the girl.  She stood straight but not rigid, and she didn’t read the music she held, her eyes nearly closed.  The organ released its sacred music, and her body visually responded to each intention held within the prayer to a Spirit that she undoubtedly believed still heard her.  When she ended, her eyes opened and the organist gave a comment about the piece.  Alex was unnerved and he stepped back with a gasp.  The girl wasn’t even looking at him, but he saw himself pierced through.  Hearing the ruffling of papers as the duo in the church walked towards where he stood, he staggered out the exit.

Asher had already moved the car to the curb and now stood ready.  “Your car, Sir?”

Unable to speak, Alex shook his head and kept his back to the City Church, his ears picking up even the slightest sound of movement within.  The woman walked outside and said goodbye to the organ playing priest who disappeared when the wooden church door banged shut.  Alex looked up as the woman walked beyond him in the opposite direction his car was parked, oblivious to his gaze.  He turned to Asher once she was several feet in front of him, his voice low.  “Follow me.  Slowly.”

Asher asked no questions, instead nodding before he slipped into the car.  He made a u-turn when the traffic cleared before he followed Alex, who now walked several paces behind the stranger.

Alex could see that she wasn’t from the City in the way that she moved.  Her head was bowed, as was appropriate, but she looked up almost as much as she looked down, as though fascinated by her surroundings.  She wore no uniform and, although she kept her hair covered beneath a long veil, he could see that it wasn’t braided in the custom ordained to the Esnes.  She was from one of the villages that hadn’t yet been coded and Alex surmised that she was walking the few blocks to the train station. 

She seemed not to notice the Archontes or Subalterns who watched her. Confidence in humans was so ill-fitting in the City; most scurried like roaches in the sun, afraid they would be stepped on and squashed if seen.  But not this woman.  She knew the rules- she covered and averted her eyes- but she walked with a purpose, as though she deserved to be on the streets as much as the immortals who watched each step, waiting for her to make a mistake that would cost her every ounce of the confidence that terrified them of an inner rebellion. Where they found fear, Alex found hope and, in this moment, he was as desperate for that hope as a thirsty man was for a drink of water.

It was Alex’s job as Commissioner to make sure that the City and towns of the Dominion were safe, but he couldn’t stop ill from befalling a human out after dark.  He watched the threat emerge while she walked: a group of younglings, walking a few paces away on either side.  Trailing in the space that separated him from the woman, they began to surround her.  To follow the Concordia, Conversion of a human was only possible with full consent of both the mortal and the Government; murder was an offense punishable by lashings or, possibly, death.  Unfortunately, the crimes rarely left witnesses and the killings were often without prosecution. 

Alex watched the four thugs close their gap.  The woman stood a bit taller and he realized that she, too, had noticed the Subalterns.  There was little she could do.  The vampires were incredibly fast, so she couldn’t outrun them; the parlor tricks of holy water and crosses were worthless theatrics; and he doubted she had the skills needed to fight even one of them off, assuming she could somehow outmaneuver him before his sheer strength overpowered her. 

Instead of walking faster, as Alex assumed she would do, she stopped moving altogether and slowly turned around.  Her eyes were wide but, somehow in her fear, they settled a few feet behind the gang on him.  Even in the darkness with only dim lights illuminating the street, he could see their brilliance.  He had often called Cara’s eyes cerulean, a mixture of the greens and blues that colored the seas near their village.  Tonight, he saw that ombre again; instead of the joy Alex had seen in them as she sang in the church, he saw terror.  Had she thought, for a moment, that she could outsmart her stalker?  Had she understood, once she had seen all of them, that she was a prey with no hope of survival?

When one of the men took a step towards her, Alex spoke.  “I wonder what the penalty for attacking an Esne is.”

At the sound of his voice, the four men turned to face him, ready to fight for their prize.  In seconds, their arrogance turned to angst.  His status among Citizens was well known and he needed no introduction.  There would be no trial; his word alone could execute those who broke Dominion law.  One of the men near silently exhaled, “Commissioner”, with fear as he dropped to the ground.  The other three followed his example, and Alex slowly walked forward.  He weaved between their statue-still bodies towards the woman.

She made no step to move, glued to the sidewalk.  Asher rolled the car to a stop beside them and Alex opened the rear door.    Those eyes that had inspired him to follow her looked at him as though they truly saw him.  “Get inside, please.”  He opened his hand and gently touched her shoulder.  She jolted as though he had electrocuted her.  “Please,” he whispered again.  “No harm will come to you.  You have my word.”  She finally moved around the kneeling man who blocked her path to the door and Alex said,   “Drive up a block, Asher.  I’ll meet you there.”  Asher waited until the door was closed and then inched forward into the light evening traffic.

“Commissioner-”

Alex cut off the man who had spoken before.  “The Law is very clear, is it not, on the attack or Conversion of a human?”

“We weren’t going to- ahh!”  The man clutched at Alex’s strong hands as they surrounded his neck and lifted him from the ground.  He tore at them with his nails, which only made the Commissioner tighten his grip.

“Lying carries its own penalty.”   While the man gasped for air, Alex panned his gaze around the other three, one of whom looked on in horror while the other two kept their heads bowed to the ground, their eyes tightly closed.  “Now, who wishes to tell me the truth?”  In response to their silence, he used his free hand to make a call on his wrist band.  “Commandant: send a car to the corner two blocks from the train station, between A1345 and A1346.”  Disconnecting, he looked at the man struggling in his arms.  “You Subs…  Do you really believe your own predatory status?    That you are the top of the food chain?”  Alex threw the man to the pavement with such force that his body recoiled, leaving a sickening thud in its wake.  “Talk now or talk later, I don’t care- but you will talk.  I have a feeling this isn’t your first action against the Dominion, although it may well be your last.”

A Criminal Transport Van stopped at the curb and an armed guard stepped out from the front cab.  “Corporal,” Alex said in greeting.  “These four Subalterns stalked an Esne for attack and lied when questioned.  Death sentences for all but the first one who not only confesses but also details their crimes before this night as well.”

“And for the repentant?”  The guard threw the men into isolated compartments in the back of his vehicle.  “Public scourging?”

“Sounds about right.”  Alex assumed that the men would be talking before a Sub-Commissioner had the chance to employ one of their many interrogation techniques.  The lights from his car flashed in the distance.  He said goodbye and made large strides to get to his car quickly.  Pulling the door open, the woman swallowed down a scream, her body pressed as far against the other side of the car as possible.   “It’s alright.  I’m not going to hurt you.”  Her hand was clutched against the handle on the door that she hugged with her body.  “There’s no reason to be afraid.”

“Who are you?” She looked out the rear window to where the Commandant’s van still waited.  “What did you do to them?”

“Only what the Law permits.”  He settled into the car and closed his door before he tapped the back of the front seat.  “We can go, Asher.”

“You’re Government?”

It was rare that he had an opportunity to introduce himself and, in that second, Alex wished for any other identity.  Who he was would change everything.  “I’m the Commissioner.”

“The Commissioner.”  She quietly repeated the words.  Her hand released the door and she bowed her head, breaking eye contact with him immediately.  “Commissioner, I’m so sorry.”  Alex touched her hand and her voice skidded to a halt.  Her eyes opened widely when she looked up at him.

He hoped to put her at ease.  “You have nothing to apologize for, although I don’t recommend Esnes be out on these roads after dark- even if they are only walking to the Depot.”

“How did you know?”

He presumed that she thought he could read her mind, but that was one of the many unfounded fears Esnes had; the only true way to read a mortal’s thoughts was by drinking their blood.  It was the fear of such things that helped control the populace, and immortals did little to dispel the views.   Instead of feeding into her discomfort, Alex shrugged noncommittally.  “You aren’t a Citizen.  No uniform or coding.”  He lifted her hand and turned it over to reveal her bare wrist.  With his free hand, he raised the veil and let it fall around her shoulders, the thin fabric slinking into the seatback and revealing a tumble of waves that he couldn’t help but touch. “Your hair isn’t braided as Esne females here are required.  This road leads out of the metropolitan and there is nothing of consequence out here, save the Depot.  There is nowhere else you would risk going at night in the City.”  She nodded once as though to confirm his beliefs.  She gently removed her hand from his under the guise of smoothing her hair and lowered her gaze again.  “What village do you come from?” Alex asked.

“42N71W.”

“Asher: 42N71W, please.”

Her head whipped up as she exclaimed, “That’s fifteen klicks from here!”

“I have the time,” Alex answered.  The truth was that he could drop her at the train station and know with near certainty that she would make it back home, but he didn’t want to.  In her eyes, he saw a life he could barely remember and a time he longed to have back.  It hurt nothing to continue the fantasy a little while longer.  “What’s your name?”

She was silent, afraid to answer him.  Many of the uncoded villages still allowed autonomy in human names, a combination of a name with a number.  Some had begun to follow the structure required in the City with the addition of the location code, but he secretly hoped that she would have something unique that he could think about long after he had dropped her back home.  When she looked at him, her mouth parted and Alex found himself desperate to reach out to touch her soft flesh.  He thought it might take all of his strength to avoid doing so again.  She licked her lips before whispering, “Maire.”

Her name rhymed with Cara’s and it was hard to avoid wincing at the similarity.  “No number or identifier?”

“There are no other Esnes in the Dominion with my name.”  She shook her head and then explained, “I’m the 42N71W Archivist.  I have found no records of my name in the database.”

“The Archivist?” Alex was stunned.  Mortal Archivists were Religious.  An Order was housed in the village where she lived, however the woman in front of him was not in the uniform of a female monastic.   “But you aren’t a nun.”

He was slightly relieved when she said, “No, I’m not… I’m not a Sister.”  Maire seemed to struggle with holding his gaze and she looked outside before turning back to him.  “I was raised at the Convent as an orphan.  When my time of age came, I chose to stay for an additional year of service…”  Her voice trailed off before she smiled nervously, her fingers fidgeting in the folds of her skirt.  “Four years ago.”

That made Maire a mere twenty-five human years.  At twenty-one, she would have been matched and married.  Staying behind at the Convent and not taking a mate seemed an odd choice for an attractive young woman;  not to mention, it was illegal.  Marriage was not a matter of romance or love.  In addition to being used to track and populate according to the needs of the Dominion, the mortals being forced to match so young was a key method of discouraging rebellion.  While single people might be willing to risk martyrdom for treachery, those with families had much more to lose.  Alex watched her continue to fidget with the fabric of her skirt and he tried to pry for more information discretely.  “I don’t know that I’ve met a woman who didn’t attend a coming of age.  Are you pursuing a vocation to religious life?”  There really could be no other explanation.  All people were required to register, which then triggered an automatic matching; the only exception was for the monastics.

The fear in Maire’s eyes that had never really left was back.  Her pupil’s dilated and Alex could sense that she was uncomfortable.  She had known that she had broken the Law and now she was face to face with the hand of that law.  Her voice shook, but she admitted the truth.  “I have never felt called to the religious life, nor did I feel morally able to marry a man of another person’s choosing.”  By her confession, she was at risk for a public whipping and a year of imprisonment before the matching she had alluded was forced upon her.

Alex couldn’t disagree with her reasoning.  His wife, even so many lifetimes before, had been of his own choosing.  The humans now had no say in the matter; even the immortals were eventually forced to pair.  For the Esnes, men and woman came of age and were genetically screened; an automated system assigned them a mate that would, from a biological sense, be a match.  There was no chance, no spark, no love.  After the report came back, a representative from the Human Services Administration would be dispatched, and the eligible men and women would be married.  Ceremonial traditions, while not illegal, were widely viewed as pointless expressions.  Couples simply moved into homes together to begin their lives as a unit so that they could be better managed by the HSA, with codings that shared unique identifiers.  While Maire’s town was farther behind in the coding than other villages, the procedures up to that point would have been identical.  Had she not hidden herself away, Alex would be longing for another man’s wife.  He shifted uncomfortably in his seat.

What could she possibly be wondering?  Did she think he would tell Asher to stop the car and take her back to the City for imprisonment?   There would be no trial: she had confessed to the Commissioner directly.  It would be his sentence to impose and there would be no appeal.  He met her eyes, still wide with fear and perhaps even shock that she had told him her secret.  “I suppose I would feel the same way,” he said, finally.  Her lips made a small circle; his response had caught her off guard.  He acknowledged the Convent in the village.  “The Great Rebellion left many orphans for the Sisters of Perpetual Hope to raise.”

“Yes,” she stammered.  “I was left in infancy, after the Rebellion’s end.  The Archivist became ill a few years ago; I had apprenticed her for the year prior to her death and took over in her absence.”  Maire looked at her hands and apologized.  “I’m sorry.  You didn’t ask for that information.”

He may not have asked, but that didn’t negate how much Alex wanted to know.  What could he say without causing her additional worry?  What would keep the conversation in a zone that she would feel able to answer without the nervousness he saw in her?  Her fear radiated and filled the energy between them in the back seat, and Alex needed to touch her.  It was disquieting, this compulsion to reach out and take her hands in his.  Even as he told himself to leave her alone, it was the same pull that had drawn him into the City Church.  She kneaded her fingers together and Alex put one of his manicured hands on top of hers.  He felt the smooth skin of the top of one and the rough palms of the other as she held her hands in an unsymmetrical prayer and trembled beneath him.  He slipped his hand back onto his own knee.  “And archiving?  Do you enjoy it?”

Humans worked in jobs selected for them by the HSA.  Alex couldn’t imagine that most of them would use the word “enjoy” to describe their feelings about their employment, but they were grateful.  Without work, they would be relegated to the physical burdensome tasks of agriculture to provide for the needs of the Dominion.  Unemployment was forbidden and there was no welfare system to speak of.  Even in the uncoded regions, each person was accounted for and expected to maintain productivity. 

“Enjoy?  I, um, I suppose I do.”  Maire was still nervously fidgeting her hands in her lap and he noticed that, as she worked the skirt of her dress, she was inadvertently lifting it.  Alex grinned as he watched first her ankles then her calves become visible.  Following his gaze, her face flushed and she dropped the skirt, her fingers linking together instead.

“You seem nervous.”

“Slightly,” she muttered.  “I’m sorry, Commissioner.”

“Alex,” he corrected.   “For tonight, sharing my car allows you to call me by my given name.”  What was he doing?  When was the last time a mortal had called him anything other than a title or Sir?  When was the last time anyone but a higher Archon had been close enough to him to use his first name? 

“I-I cannot,” Maire stuttered.  “It’s forbidden.”

Alex couldn’t directly tell her to ignore the Law any more than he could knowingly allow her to remain unmatched.  He was dedicated to his job and served it without bias.  Still, he wanted to hear her breathe his name as effortlessly as she said her own.  This stranger had somehow sparked feelings that were long dead.  They drew closer to her destination, and Alex knew he didn’t want to let her go into the night.  “Tell me why you’ve stayed with the Sisters.”

“It’s my home,” Maire said, simply.  “They are my family.”

“Why not have a family of your own?  A husband? Children?”

She was quiet for a moment before she squared her shoulders and looked at him.  There was something more than fear in her eyes.  She may have been afraid of the repercussions, but she wasn’t afraid of Alex, be he Government or pauper, and she said with defiance, “I take full responsibility for what has transpired at the Convent over these last four years.  Please do not punish the Sisters or Mother for the indiscretion; it was fully my willful disobedience of the Law, not theirs.”

Her fear was completely erased, replaced by newfound bravery.  Her compassion and love of those she cared for was the secret to removing her anxiety.  “You were matched, weren’t you?”

“Yes.”

She was unrepentant in her answer and, in that moment, Alex wanted to know everything about her.  He wanted to tell Asher to stop the car so that he could spend the evening hearing every mundane detail of her life.  “Why did you remain at the Convent?”

Her hands were no longer fidgeting; instead, they were fists in her lap.  “I refused to be married to a man who beat his property into submission.”

Abuse was not permitted but, just as human murders were often left unprosecuted, so was domestic violence.  Esnes rarely trusted the Archontes with enforcing even the laws that protected them from one another.  How, however, had Maire known who her match was?  That information was closely guarded until the HSA made the match in person.  “Tell me.” 

“I stumbled across the match report when I was apprenticing.  I was looking for a different record and clicked on the unknown link.”  Her voice cracked.  “I knew that my only option was to inform the Convent that I wished to pursue a vocation.  So… I lied.”  She looked down at her hands but then back at him.  Fear flashed but was quickly replaced by the look she had given him when she confessed her crime.  “But it was my lie; neither the Mother nor any of the Sisters were privy to my deceit.”

Alex knew the Mother Superior.  He doubted what Maire said was true, but he said nothing to imply that.  “And then the next year?”

“The system… I found…” Maire exhaled a long breath and the fidgeting began again.  “I found a way to remove my name from the roster by making the vocation permanent.”

Now Alex knew without question that Maire was lying to him.  The only person who could denote a person as seeking a vocation was the supervisor of the monastery.  For that vocation to be made permanent, the request would be made and approved by the HSA.  There had been no requests in over a decade.  By hand, someone was going into the system and selecting Maire as a Seeker, year after year.  It would not be possible through the archival database; it would be in the Convent’s mainframe.  The Mother Superior was not only aware of Maire’s choice- she allowed it.  He would wager that Mother MaryAnne would be incensed if she knew Maire was taking the blame, regardless of whether or not the young woman had initially seen the match report.  Did Alex tell Maire that now or later?  “And your match?”

“To my knowledge, he only knows that I am a Seeker and that I have not matched.  He has not matched either, so perhaps there is another type of glitch in the system- not that I would wish him on another.”

“What evidence do you have of his unsuitability? Has he raised his hand to you?”

“No.” Maire looked out the window, clearly remembering an encounter she had no desire to relate to him.  “He has not raised his hand to me.”

“Still, you are so fearful of his behavior if you were to match that you’ve committed treason.”

“May I ask you a question?”  Maire turned back to him, emboldened, he could only presume, by her confessions.

“By all means.”

“Do you value your freedom?”

“How free, truly, is any man?”

“Asks the man on whom the freedom of all other men rests.”

“You give me too much credit.”

“And you malign the question you agreed to answer.”

Alex shifted his weight, biting back a smile.  She not only favored Cara in appearance but in her willfulness and deference to her own view.  Rather than create pain, it sparked the same passion that his young wife had ignited in his teenage self.  “Yes, Maire.  I value my freedom.”

“Would you value your freedom as much if you lived at the mercy of another’s whims?”

“No,” he acknowledged.  “Probably not.”

“I have lived as an Esne in the Dominion for my entire life, and that life has been one of relative peace.  I have a measure of happiness and I would rather be put to death in that state of contentment than imprisoned in a marriage with a man who views all within his grasp as his property, who abuses the animals who work the land and the slaves for whom he has been chosen to oversee.  My limited freedom has made me value what I would lose.  I have weighed the options and have chosen the one that my soul can live- and die- with.”  She returned her gaze to the outside once the car exited the thoroughfare for village roads.  “And I accept the Commissioner’s consequences for that choice.”

“What consequences should I impart?  Accessing and modifying Government records is treason and is a primary offense.  Failure to match, dishonesty in vocation- these are both secondary offenses.  I suppose we could rectify the secondaries by simply retroactivating your match.”   Alex folded his hands and watched the color drain from her face when she faced him.  “But treason and lying to the Commissioner...”  He let the implication of a harsher punishment linger.

The car slowed to a stop outside a stone fence and before Maire could answer or Asher could exit, Alex opened his own door and walked around, waving his driver back into the front seat.  He opened Maire’s door and offered her his hand, which she tentatively accepted.  He had walked up the cobblestone walkway to the Convent many times in his life, but this time he purposely slowed to a near crawl, knowing, no doubt, that Mother MaryAnne was watching.   The first few steps were silent until Maire spoke.  “Thank you for saving my life.”

“You’re welcome.  Although,” he added with a smirk, “I would look incredibly irresponsible if you had been killed while I was walking only a few paces behind you.”

“Well, I wouldn’t want your reputation impugned on my account.” Maire matched his speed and let a few moments pass before she asked, “What will you do?”

“About your offenses?”  She nodded and he answered evasively, “I make it a habit to do nothing without a full scope of information, something denied to me without the truth.”

“I’m telling you the truth.”

“Perhaps part of it, but surely not all of it.  And, just as surely, tinged with something less than.”

Maire made no attempt to refute his assertion, instead saying quietly, “This was not how I foresaw this night when Father asked me to cantor the upcoming Liturgy.”

“Nor I.”  Alex stopped at the door.  “I can’t say that I’m upset by the change in my plans.”  He could hear the rustling of a nun too careful of her charges to go to bed while one remained outside the Convent walls.  He doubted that Maire knew there were ears on the other side of the door.  “Goodnight, Maire, Archivist of 42N71W.”

“Goodnight, Commissioner.”  She placed her hand on the handle of the door.

“Alex.”  He chuckled the correction and turned to leave before her whisper of his name made Alex look back at her with a raised eyebrow.  Maire’s shy smile etched itself into his memory and she pulled her bottom lip between her teeth with reservation before she disappeared behind the heavy door.  He watched the light behind the door cast shadows on the high window and heard the muffled voice of the Mother Superior.  He debated listening to how much of his evening would be relayed, but instead he walked to the car door that Asher held open and let his driver take him home.