Chapter 21: Aftermath
The next four days went by in a blur. It was always meetings, meetings, meetings; in the palace and out; with local representatives or world leaders. The full scope of Levana's plans were unveiled and confirmed by every nation's team of experts. During each conference Kai sat in as he was suppose to but never paid much attention to the details, instead he fiddled with the mask, weighing another problem.
How did he feel about Selene? She had led him on, used him, but in the end had save him, his kingdom, and even the world.
How did she feel about him? She was a Lunar monarch and everyone of them had been corrupt and evil. Did she see him as a person or as a thing, an object, a tool to own and wield to her will?
What of her father? He had taken her in and 'taught' her. But what had he taught her, and how well did she learn?
All of these questions could be answered at the lunch he was scheduled to have with the new Lunar Queen and her Father. Dare he want to know the answers?
He would be having this gathering with the Lunar Queen and her father alone, something Torin disapproved of, but Kai held his ground. He would do this alone, he had to.
The day the lunch arrived and Kai was anxious. He hadn't seen the new Lunar Queen since that night, no one had, nor her father. They had spent the last four days in isolation in their embassy, all their statements for the meetings were pre-recorded.
What could they be doing in there, Kai had no idea. Some of the more suspicious populous concluded that the Lunar Queen and the Grand Doge were collaborating too take over the world, just as Levana had done. Kai merely chuckled when he heard the opinions expressed over the net. He didn't think there was anything to them, but he couldn't help but wonder...What were they doing?
Still wondering, Kai stood near the garden's pavilion, watching as the final preparations were made for the lunch. The table had been set the finest assortment of dishes and utensils the Commonwealth had to offer.
Not that it would impress the expected guests, Kai thought turning the mask over in his hands. He had it checked, as he had expected it was masterful work, alone it was worth more than the entire spread set on the table five times over. Such masks were common for the Netherone family, the oldest and richest Belter family. A family that now controlled not only the Belt but Luna as well. What did that mean for him and his kingdom?
"You Majesty," one of the footmen announced, pulling Kai out of his thoughts. "Your guests have arrived." He gestured to the far side of the pavilion. Kai saw the Grand Doge emerge from behind the shrubbery, followed by Selene. The Lunar Queen was dressed in a fairly plain lavender suit with nothing to distinguish her royal status from a well to do commoner except for a small tiara of lunar diamonds on her head. Her father wore a plain suit himself of charcoal grey and a mask. Kai noticed the mask was different from the other masks he had worn, there were no glowing sensor orbs, it was completely smooth as it was reflective. How the Doge could see through it, Kai couldn't say, but the man found his way easily.
Kai approached the pavilion. "Welcome Your Majesty, Your Grace. Thank you for joining me for lunch I hope you will approve of the menu I have selected." Kai motioned to the Doge to take his seat and pulled Selene's chair for her, then he sat down himself. With the snap of his fingers the servers brought their meal.
"Lobster Bisque?" Selene asked, raising an eye brow.
"In honor of the first day we met." Kai explained. "You said you enjoyed it and I arranged for the R.U.R. restaurant to cater our meal. Since you will be leave for Luna tomorrow, this could be the last time you have it for a while. I don't think the Lunar Queen will be getting much of it on the moon." Selene and her father exchanged looks, then burst out laughing.
"Did I say something amusing?" Kai asked when he could figure what was so funny.
"Oh, it's just that, heh, heh, my father owns that restaurant. He's having the chef that prepares it sent with me to Luna." Selene explained.
Kai looked at the Doge whose mask hid none of the amused body language. He leaned back in his chair. "Why am I not surprised? In fact I don't know why I am ever surprised, with everything that has happened in the last two weeks!"
"It has been a very full fortnight, Your Majesty." Agreed the Doge. "Shall we eat?" Kai and Selene proceeded to eat, making pleasant conversation about the weather, since apparently none existed on the moon. Kai kept trying to turn the conversation back to the series of events that had swept him to the present. However, each time he came close he lost his nerve and began to fiddle with the mask hidden in his tunic. Ever present in his mind the nervous thoughts; What does Selene think of me? How does she feel about me? How do I feel about her?
Then he noticed that the Doge had yet to touch his soup nor had he even taken off his mask. "Your Grace," he called attention to the Doge "you haven't touched your bisque? Is it not to your liking?"
"Not at all Your Majesty," The Doge replied. "However I suspect that my lack of enjoying the meal is not the main question you desire to ask." The Doge rose from his chair. "Perhaps His Majesty would like to accompany me on a walk through his beautiful gardens?"
Kai sensed that the Doge was giving him a chance to talk privately away from Selene and took it. When the men had walked far enough from the pavilion not to be overheard, the Doge resumed speaking. "I hear your chief advisor fired you security chief last week."
"Yes, my chief of security failed miserably to set arrangements for my trip to meet the Queen in the park. Had it not been for Iko, she could have been killed." Kai explained.
"Well if I were you, I would rehire the man." the Doge advised.
"Why?" Kai asked with a raise eyebrow.
"Because the incident to which you refer was not his fault, he was glamoured by a lunar deep into your confidence." Kai's first thoughts turned to Levana and Sybil Mira, and his hatred returned.
The Doge divined Kai's thoughts. "I don't speak of the former Queen or her thaumaturge, and before you jump to conclusions nor was it my daughter."
"Then who?" Kai asked.
"Your former head of Letumosis research, Dr. Erland." The Doge's revelation hit Kai hard.
"He was...Lunar?" Kai asked. Another thought formed in his mind and it fueled him with anger. "That traitor! No wonder we never got anywhere with our research!"
"I warned you about jumping to conclusions Your Majesty." The Doge admonished. "you do the doctor a great injustice, calling him a traitor, he was no such thing. He actively pursued a cure for the disease and every advance you made were the result of his loyal diligence. However, he also had another task that led him to frame your chief of security for incompetence."
"You see he also was looking the lost Lunar Heir and come to suspect my daughter and needed a blood sample to confirm it. Since my daughter declined he contrived the whole thing to obtain a sample. I found out and had Cinder confront him at the dinner after the Garan-Tai charity event."
"So that is what they were talking about,...and that's why he left. He'd found her."
"Very good Your Majesty, he did find what he was looking for and now works for my daughter." The Doge chuckled. "In fact he got more than he bargained for, the girl my men retrieved from the surveillance satellite, it turns out that she is his daughter whom he believed dead for these last seven years. Remarkable how the universe works isn't it?" Kai nodded.
"And speaking of daughters I believe you want to discuss mine." Kai didn't respond. "You are nervous, Your Majesty? Speak true for I will know if you are lying."
Kai delayed but a moment to consider the Doge's words. "Yes I am."
"Then I suggest you stop fingering the mask and remove it from beneath your tunic." The Doge said. Kai looked down at where the mask lay under his tunic, he had not noticed that he had begun to fiddle with it again. "Oh, I'm sorry." He apologized as he took the mask out.
"May I?" The Doge asked as he reached for the mask. Kai relinquished the mask into the Doge's hand. The Doge held the mask out in front of him, examining it in the light. "An excellent piece of workmanship by my artisans, don't you agree?"
"Yes, Your Grace," agreed Kai, "it must have cost you a fortune."
"That it did, and Cinder was worth every penny." Kai shot a glance at the Doge at the mention of Selene's alias. The Doge must have seen the look on Kai's face. "You disapprove of me calling Cinder by her name."
"Well it isn't her real name, I thought that once the charade was over and Levana dethroned that everyone would call her by her true name."
"That is what logic would dictate isn't it. That when the mask is cast off the true identity reasserts itself. However, I have found that when one wears a mask long enough the mask leaves its imprint on face of its wearer. The girl that wore this mask has all the potential of the little Princess Selene but over the years has been cast in image of a girl named Cinder." The Doge turned the mask to show Kai the face on it.
"And you, Kai, wish to know who this Cinder truly is, I will tell you. She is my daughter and has known little else."
Kai pondered the Doge's words. "And what you mean by that, I suppose, is she you miniature? Then tell me, Your Grace, who are you?"
The Doge chuckled. "I have found that people are poor representatives of themselves, if you truly want to know who someone is the best way is to take your personal experience and apply it to context of his life. In other words I could give you the context of Cinder's life and she could do the same for me."
"You're saying if I want to understand Cinder, I have to talk to you, but to understand her I have to understand you which means I have to talk to her. That's a paradox, Your Grace!" Kai exclaimed.
"Yes, life is full of them, especially in politics." The Doge replied.
Kai rubbed his temple. "I think my head hurts just thinking about it."
"Good," said the Doge. "that means you're growing. As for a paradox, the only way I have found to deal with those, other than to raze the whole thing, is to start somewhere and then feel your way through. With patience eventually you will unravel the mysteries. The question now is where do you intend to start on the mystery regarding Cinder?" The Doge handed the mask back to Kai, and Kai looked at it for a moment.
"I suppose I can start with you." Kai said. "Since you have made yourself so handy at the moment."
The Doge nodded. "Well then, what would you like to know?"
"First, where has she been all these years? I already know you adopted her only four years ago, that leaves nine years unaccounted for."
"Yes," the Doge mused. "A good place to start, Your Majesty. Would you believe that the Lunar Queen spent the first eight of those years under a barn in France."
"Uh, yes, I guess." Kai replied. "I mean I knew that she was sheltered by someone, probably a woman named Michelle Benoit who is from France and had been to Luna once."
"You were right about Michelle Benoit, and you probably guessed correctly that the princess was hidden in some secret compound for the duration of those years, but what you probably don't know is the fire that took her hand and leg was both more and less severe that people think." The Doge explained.
"Most people are of two schools regarding the fate of Princess Selene. Most believed her dead, burned to ash, a few others believe her alive and well. The truth of the matter was she was never quite dead yet far from truly alive. You remember the vestige Cinder took when she remove her mask at your ball?" Kai nodded, how could he ever forget.
"That is what she looked like, minus the flames. Kept from an inch of death, she was put into a form of suspended animation and left to grow for eight years, much like fungus in a Petri dish. No childhood, no memories, just the deepest form of sleep you can imagine. Fortunately her doctors understood the needs of the mind as well as the body and managed to simulate her mind while in her coma, otherwise Cinder would have immerged as helpless as an infant.
"When she turned eleven she was deemed strong enough to remove her from her vat and the work of repairing the damage and outfitting her with the necessary prosthetics. Then she was used as a guinea pig by a certain Dr. Linh Garan for his prototype Bioelectric Security System implant."
"Yes, Cinder told me about him." Kai commented. "And how he died, but how did you learn of Cinder, if you don't mind my asking?"
"Not at all, Your Majesty." The Doge said. "One of my agents was working undercover when he came across the same of the information you did a little over four years ago. He had a choice to make, complete his mission or follow an absurdly fantastic claim. He chose to abandon his mission and I lost someone very valuable to me, but I gain someone precious as well, from someone that couldn't appreciate her.
"Poor Garan, if he had lived I am sure he would have made Cinder a fine father, but the universe claimed him and Cinder was left in the hands of her bigoted step-mother. That woman of his is a piece of work to be sure, and I paid her quite handsomely for Cinder and her husband's invention, of which I know you will make go use of, Your Majesty."
Kai nodded in agreement. One of the first pre-recorded messages from the Grand Doge was a declaration to grant the Earthen Union full access to the specs and research regarding the BSS implant. Already Kai's own scientists were confirming it to be everything it was cracked up to be and plans were being drawn up for full scale production.
"As for Cinder, I had her and her android 'cousin' brought to Vesta for her own safety and to begin her training. She had much to learn to prepare for her eventual confrontation with Levana and ruling a world. It was a grueling regimen by any account, however, I made sure she had time for fun and to stay connected to the one good thing in her life on Earth. I believed it important that she'd want to stop Levana for a reason more important than claiming a throne. Her relationship with Linh Peony was just the thing she needed to develop the love she will need to be a better ruler than those who came before her. I, myself, have tried being a good father to her." The Doge stopped them and face Kai. "Tell me Kai, what do you feel for your father?"
"I loved him of course, he was everything to me!" Kai answered quickly.
"That is how I hope Cinder feels for me, for it is how I feel for her. She is the child of my heart even if she is not of my blood. These last four days we have spent bonding, doing the little things fathers and daughters do when spending time together, not scheming as many on the net believe." The Doge resumed walking. "This is still, truly a beautiful garden, though changed since I was last here."
"I was not aware you paid a visit to the Commonwealth before." Kai commented.
"Of course not, I wasn't the Grand Doge then, but a young man much like yourself." The Doge clarified. "Excluding the weight of a kingdom and a close call with an evil queen. It was here I met my wife, so many years ago." The Doge said wistfully before returning with a more serious tone. "Which of course brings me to a very important subject, forgive my frankness if I am too direct, but what are your intentions regarding my daughter?"
Kai was speechless, this was direct and he didn't know how to respond. "What do you mean, Your Grace?" Kai asked. "I thought that was just a ploy to get Levana away from Luna."
"You would be right," the Doge confessed, "it was a ploy, but you are wrong if you think it was just a ploy. I have watched you for many years Kai, as I did with your father, and have come to the conclusion that you are a good man as he was. More than that, I believe you to be compatible with my daughter, and beyond the obvious peace that would follow such a union, I think you two could be happy together. I expressed my views on this subject as well as my plans to dethrone Levana with your father before he died, and he agreed. He asked you to pursue a relationship with Cinder, did he not?"
"Yes," Kai grudgingly conceded, the reminder of his own father's death was still a tender spot for him.
The Doge chuckled lightly. "Of course we both agreed that you two were a bit young for marriage and that Cinder's time will be rather limited as she settles in on Luna, but that will change. Your father has granted his blessing and I have granted mine. Nevertheless, in the end it will be your choice and I will abide by it. All that I ask is that you give it a chance."
"I will," Kai consented. "If only to repay you for your service on behalf of my country. But what does Cinder think of the 'arrangement'?"
"You refer to her outburst at the ball. I confess I do not know my daughter's heart regarding this matter as much as I would like. If you wish to know her true feelings towards you I am afraid you'll have to ask her yourself." The Doge declared.
"And what of Levana?" Kai asked.
"What of her?" The Doge returned the question.
"Cinder committed her into your hands for punishment," Kai clarified. "I am curious as to what punishment you deemed worthy of her."
"Exile," the Doge replied. "She and her former thaumaturge have been stripped of their powers and each shipped off to one or another of my countless asteroid mining communities."
"What?!" Kai felt a surge of anger. "You spared her?! What about everything she has done? She deserves to die for all of that!"
"Because there can be no justice without a measure of mercy, Kai." The Doge replied calmly. "We all have done things we are not proud of, I especially. Punishments that only punish will avail no one anything but a desire for more 'satisfaction,' leaving the world blind and toothless. Levana is not entirely responsible for what she has become, and I believe there yet may be a spark of human goodness in her. So therefore, when I have the power to grant mercy and cultivate that spark, without endangering innocence, I take it.
"Nevertheless, do not think that she is not suffering. She will have to live as the lowest of my citizens, learning the most basic of skills, doing the meagerest of tasks. All without the ability to will people to love her, if she wants love she will have to learn to love just as we all do.
"She knows that this is her last chance, I explained all very carefully to her before sending her and Sybil Mira off. My men will watch her and if she proves too far gone, she will be executed. However, she knows that she is free to marry, her less than ideal physical features matter less than a willing heart and a good hand, and there will be many suitable options around her. I expressed to her my desire that she find happiness in a family, with children and the joy they bring. She scoffed at me, but I think I will have the last laugh. I am even willing to restore her power in twenty or so years if she proves herself redeemed, but that is the one thing she does not know."
Kai considered the Doge's point of view. "I don't know if I entirely agree with you, Your Grace." Kai said. "But I can't say you are not among the most remarkable men I have ever known."
"Truly?" The Doge asked, and Kai nodded. "Well that is a welcomed complement, Your Majesty. Thank you. However, before you cement that complement, there is something I would like to show you, but first I'll ask you a question; what do you know of my rise to power in the Belt?"
"Not much," Kai confessed. "I know that only a brilliant diplomat could have united the warring states."
"Yes, I was brilliant, a certified social prodigy, and a brilliant diplomat such as I could have, if he had forty years," The Doge stopped walking and Kai stopped as well." But I did it all in ten, how?"
"I don't know." Kai repeated. The Doge turned to face Kai.
"Then I will show you, but be warned, what you are about to see is disturbing and not for the faint of heart. It has caused the death of more than one. So prepare yourself." Chills went up Kai's back at that statement. He collected himself for a moment, trying to fortify against the unknown.
First what he saw was the reflective mask worn by the Doge changed. It grew transparent and clearer. Soon Kai could see the outline of the man's face, then he saw the face. The Grand Doge was an hideous man, almost as disgusting as Cinder's vestige had been. His face was covered in wicked scars and the color of his skin was mottled in bizarre shades of red, blue, and bruise purple, the same colors of Letumosis.
Kai drew back an involuntary step, but then the Doge changed. He face became brighter, healthier; his body began to glow in the bright summer sun. Brighter and brighter the Doge grew and more god like, until it was like Kai was staring at a sun not two feet from him. He shield his eyes, but it didn't help much, for he could feel the heat and power cascading off the Doge. He backed away further and further but it did him little good, he was being crushed beneath not just the glorious light of a god but the will of a titan. His legs failed, his arms lost their strength, and he fell dumbfounded to the stone path.