Chapter 101: Beneath Thirteen Lights

Marek waited until Venielle had returned to the courtyard before asking Rhovan how strong she was.

The question had been sitting in his head for most of the last two days. At first, he had dismissed it as something he could ask later, until he started noticing what happened whenever Venielle entered the same room as Rhovan.

Rhovan was never afraid. If he was, Marek would have noticed that. After all, Rhovan had always been quite vocal about what he was feeling. It was just that... he became less theatrical with that woman.

That was more concerning.

They stood in the side corridor overlooking Mara’s training area, where pale fabric had been stretched over the damaged windows to keep the wind out. Below them, the fading light stretched across the courtyard while Mara reset two mirrors under Venielle’s supervision.

Rhovan had been examining a cracked window frame with more interest than it deserved when Marek finally asked, "How strong is she?"

Rhovan did not look away. "Strong."

"You estimate nearly everyone we meet."

"Newly Awakened Cycle I Astrants are easier to read."

"She’s stronger than you."

That made him glance over. After a moment, Rhovan looked back toward the courtyard. "Yes."

Marek immediately wanted a number.

"Cycle VI?"

No answer.

"VII?"

Rhovan continued studying the window.

"VIII?"

Rhovan finally turned. "Oh, Dear Ophiarch, stop trying to make me confirm a number by becoming progressively more annoying."

"IX?"

"You are using the Cycle ladder as harassment," Rhovan complained.

"It is efficient."

Rhovan exhaled and leaned one shoulder against the wall. Some of his usual amusement remained, but it did not reach his eyes when he looked down at Venielle. "She is high enough that if she decided to remove everyone in this institute through one of her correspondences, I would prefer not to discover whether I could stop her."

Marek opened his notebook.

"Do not write that as fear," Rhovan quickly said.

"Risk assessment."

"I said I would prefer not to discover the answer."

"Same category."

Rhovan stared at him, then gave up. "There is something else you should be more interested in. She is not behaving like someone sent here merely to collect an interesting Gemini child."

Marek lowered the pen. "Why?"

"Too much independence."

The answer came without humor.

"High-Cycle House officials usually arrive with staff, credentials, established support, and enough institutional presence that everyone knows which House is responsible for what they do. Venielle is personally moving several minors, avoiding systems most officials would normally use, and relying on older correspondences that do not report cleanly into ordinary registries."

The wind pushed lightly against the cloth over one broken window.

"Meaning, she may be hiding Mara from the House of Gemini."

"At least partly," Rhovan said.

"Because of the Pisces record?"

Rhovan paused. "Likely."

Marek turned fully toward him. "You know that record."

"I know fragments."

"Then, explain them."

"No." Rhovan said it so simply that Marek stared until he raised one hand. "Before you become irritated, I do not know which version Venielle is using. Pisces dream records survive translation, interpretation, political editing, and generations of people adding certainty where the original wording had none."

"Give me the parts you can defend."

Rhovan considered that. "A lost day after a completed year."

"Day 367."

"Likely."

"And a Gemini girl?"

"Hmm... also likely."

Marek looked toward Mara. She had moved one mirror slightly and was listening while Venielle corrected the angle.

His voice lowered. "Two valid references."

Rhovan’s expression became careful. "Something about two truths that remain true even when someone tries to force them into one answer."

Marek remembered the words True One. Hearing another fragment from Rhovan made the record feel less like an old Pisces curiosity and more like something several people had been circling long before Earth entered the Prime Continuum.

"Anything about Ophiuchus?"

Rhovan did not answer immediately.

Marek stepped closer. "Rhovan."

"One damaged fragment mentions an empty coil."

Warmth gathered beneath the skin around Marek’s right shoulder. "What does it say?"

"Not enough. The lines before and after it are missing, and I refuse to turn missing words into the prophecy I want."

Marek stopped himself before answering. The refusal was irritating, but he understood the reasoning too well. A missing boundary did not become useful simply because he wanted an answer inside it.

"What did you want it to say?"

For once, Rhovan did not smile. "Proof that history was wrong about Ophiuchus."

"And now?"

"Now... I would prefer to know why a nineteen-year-old from a Newborn World keeps drawing boundaries that old Ophiuchus records treated as foundational."

Marek frowned. "You make me sound important."

"You hate that."

"Yes."

"Good. Important people who enjoy being important become exhausting."

Marek glanced at him. "You are Leo."

Rhovan’s smile returned. "A separate tragedy."

Below them, Mara failed an exercise and swore. Venielle corrected her immediately because the Prime-language phrase she had used apparently insulted someone’s grandmother instead of the mirror.

Marek almost laughed. Rhovan did not bother hiding his amusement.

Mara looked up. "Are you two talking about me?"

"No," Marek said.

"Yes," Rhovan answered at the same time.

Marek turned toward him.

Rhovan shrugged. "She asked."

"I like him more," Mara called.

"Poor judgment."

Rhovan placed a hand over his chest. "Finally, appreciation."

Venielle looked up from the mirrors. "Do not encourage him."

"Too late," Mara replied.

The exchange loosened some of the tension that had been building since Rhovan mentioned the damaged fragment. Once Mara returned to the mirrors, Rhovan’s expression settled again.

"There is another problem. If the Twelve Houses send formal representatives while Mara’s significance remains unresolved, people may begin asking questions Venielle would prefer delayed," Rhovan said.

"The House of Gemini?"

"Not only the House of Gemini. Records attached to Newborn Worlds become political very quickly, even among people who insist they do not believe in prophecy."

Marek glanced at Mara again.

Fourteen years old, annoyed by mirrors, still convinced something was wrong with bottled water because it tasted like metal, and now connected to a record older than Earth’s knowledge of the Prime Continuum.

"Then keep the information from the Houses."

"That may already be Venielle’s intention."

"Can she?"

Rhovan looked beyond the courtyard. "Nothing remains secret from the twelve Houses forever."

Marek tightened his grip around the notebook. "Then... long enough."

"Long enough for what?"

Mara reset the mirrors without waiting for Venielle to tell her where to place them.

"Long enough for her to decide what she is before they decide for her."

Rhovan did not answer immediately. After a while, he said, "One other fragment describes an empty place beneath thirteen lights. That is all I can defend."

"Empty place?"

"The surviving wording is damaged. It might mean a seat, a position, a gap, or something else entirely. I will not choose whichever translation makes Ophiuchus sound grandest simply because I prefer it. Besides, my memories are not exactly... perfect."

Marek studied him. Rhovan looked more frustrated by the missing evidence than by Marek’s questions, and Marek understood that feeling well enough not to push further.

Beyond the corridor, reports about approaching House delegations had continued to grow. No one seemed certain which representatives would arrive first or what authority they would claim. Somewhere beyond Earth’s broken Veil, institutions older than any government on Earth were already deciding what this Newborn World meant before most people on Earth had learned what questions they were supposed to ask.

Marek preferred that Mara be given the chance to decide what she meant first.

He watched the courtyard before closing the notebook. He did not trust prophecies, but he trusted incentives. Once the Houses arrived, Mara would stop being only a fourteen-year-old Gemini Astrant with an unusual response to old mirrors. To the wrong people, she could become evidence for a record, leverage between Houses, a jurisdictional problem, or a symbol useful to people who had never spoken to her.

That possibility bothered him more than the dream itself.

"If someone tries to claim jurisdiction over her because of the record," Marek said, "what does Earth law matter to a House representative?"

Rhovan took longer to answer.

"More than you think and less than you would like. A Newborn World’s institutions do not disappear simply because older institutions arrive. Earth still has laws, governments, borders, and people who will object to being treated as though none of those things matter."

"But power changes the argument," Marek said.

"It changes how comfortable people become while making it."

Marek looked down at Mara. Venielle had moved one mirror less than the width of a hand, and Mara was already arguing that the original position had been better.

"So the answer is politics."

"Unfortunately."

"Then I prefer medicine."

Rhovan glanced at him. "Medicine has politics too."

Marek looked over. "Do not ruin the comparison."

Rhovan offered a brilliant, entirely unrepentant smile. "A burden I would bear beautifully."