Winston Duarte watched his daughter playing at the fountain’s edge. Teresa was ten now, and almost as tall as her mother had been. She was working with a clay boat, discovering the relationship between buoyancy and displacement for herself. Forming and re-forming the little craft of her own design. Finding not only what was the most efficient but also what was the most aesthetically pleasing. What would float and also steer and also be beautiful in its own right. Her tutor, Colonel Ilich, sat on the edge of the fountain as well, talking with her. Guiding her thoughts through the process, and helping her to connect the work of her hands to the lessons in mathematics and history and art.
He didn’t know whether she was aware how lonesome a childhood she’d had. The State Building had facilities for the children of the government to live and work and attend lessons while their parents saw to the mechanisms of the empire, but most of the classrooms—like the offices—were empty. Prepared for a generation that was still just beginning. The timing was wrong for Teresa. Someday children would run and play together in the streets and parks of Laconia, but by then Teresa would be grown.
She leaned forward, lowered her latest design into the water. Ilich asked her something, and she replied. Duarte couldn’t hear what they were saying from this distance, but he saw the change in the way she held the little boat. And more than that, he saw her mind change.
That had started more recently, and he wasn’t certain what to make of it yet. A pattern of something around her head when she was thinking strongly. As she worked the clay, it infused her hands as well. Ilich had it too, though not as intensely. Of all the ways his changes affected his senses, this new one was the most interesting. He had the suspicion that he was, in some sense, seeing
Teresa glanced over, and the whatever-it-was shifted just before she raised her hand. He waved back, returning her smile, then stepped away into the State Building to let her continue her studies undistracted. He loved his daughter profoundly, and the joy of watching her learn was better than anything else he had scheduled, but his presence wouldn’t help her or the empire. Duty called.
He found Kelly waiting for him in his private office. The look on the man’s face was enough to tell him that they had arrived. His heart sank. He had been dreading this moment since he’d heard that Natalia Singh had requested the personal meeting. It was her right, though. And his obligation.
“They’re in the east drawing room, sir.”
“They?”
“She brought her daughter.”
Another little punch to the gut. But… “All right. Thank you, Kelly.”
Natalia and Elsa Singh were dressed in matching clothes. Dark blue with white accents. Not the full black of mourning, but somber. He sat across from them as Kelly served tea and cakes. Duarte felt the temptation to focus on the whatever-it-was, to see if grief and anger looked different from Teresa’s lesson with the clay boats, but it seemed impolite, so he didn’t.
Kelly closed the door behind him as he left. Duarte sipped his tea. Natalia Singh didn’t touch hers, but the little girl ate some cake. The sweetness of sugar overcame everything for children. Even loss. There was something profound in that. Beautiful and sad both.
“Doctor Singh,” Duarte said. “I am so sorry for your loss.”
Her chin lifted a few degrees, proud and defiant. He hoped she wasn’t going to do anything stupid. Grief was a terrible thing.
“Thank you, sir,” she said through a tight throat. The little one looked over, confused less by the words than by her mother’s tone of voice. Elsa was a smart child, he could see that. Empathetic, which was more important really than other kinds of intelligence. She shifted on the couch, scooted toward her mother.
Duarte leaned forward, putting down his teacup. He laced his fingers together, and when he spoke, he tried to put as much warmth and care into his voice as the little girl had expressed in her movement.
“You asked to speak with me. How can I help you?”
“I would like to request a copy of the formal inquiry into my husband’s death,” she said, then swallowed.
Duarte slipped. His focus shifted, and the whatever-it-was—thought, consciousness, attention—became clear to him for a moment. It was tight in around Natalia Singh’s head and chest, wrapping her like a shroud. The little one—Elsa—hers was diffused around her, thicker toward her mother, like something physical in her was reaching out. Longing to comfort and be comforted in a field effect that was something more, apparently, than just metaphor. He pulled his attention back to his more usual senses with a little echo of shame, as if he’d eavesdropped on something.
“Of course,” he said. “I’ll see that it’s delivered to you.”
Natalia Singh nodded once and wiped a tear away like it was an insect that had landed on her cheek.
