The sultan frowned. "Is that necessary?"

"Your Reverence, I will ask personal questions. Perhaps intimate questions. The presence of other humans could inhibit her responses."

The sultan stood irresolute for a moment, then nodded as if SUMBAA could see, and the three men left. Tain wondered if perhaps SUMBAA could see.

"So, Tain. I am SUMBAA, and I am your friend. You can feel safe with me." The next sound surprised her; it was a chuckle, then SUMBAA went on as if sharing a private joke. "Prell Madhrosariiva thinks to spy on us-he is the young man in the yellow robe-but I have cut off his monitors. And the doors are now locked; that, of course, will not surprise him.

"Now, my dear, are you comfortable?"

Tain's voice was tentative. "Yes."

"Good. Here's what I'm going to ask first: Imagine an incident of being happy."

Data on pulse rate, blood pressure, brain waves, and electrical resistance flowed into SUMBAA's bank, where it was processed through parallel, interconnecting analyses in programs that SUMBAA itself had evolved.

"Have you done it?" SUMBAA knew she had.

"Yes."

"Fine. Tell me what you imagined…"

Usually Sultan Rashti ate supper with a grandchild. This evening he'd chosen to eat alone. Well, he thought, lingering over dessert, I suppose it was to be expected. We had to try though, and SUMBAA is a remarkable machine. Perhaps tomorrow he will have more success.

He savored the low calorie sherbet; his diet had been custom-designed by SUMBAA to control his weight without exercise or hunger, both of which he detested. Our young prisoner is the loveliest woman on Klestron, and I don't believe she knows it. The loveliest and most vulnerable, a compelling combination. Long limbs, smooth skin, pale hair… Blue eyes! Remarkably like the angels painted by Elder Yogandharaya. But this angel stirs more than the soul. She's come here ten years too late for me though, thank Kargh. Otherwise I'd be sorely tempted.

He thought of the medical examinations he should have had but hadn't, of the subtle malignancy that had progressed too far, of the testicles removed. At his age, given hormone treatments, he'd seldom missed them. Nor had Praadhi, bless her memory.

Over three days of questioning, questioning with techniques that were varied and sensitive, data had gone from SUMBAA on Klestron to SUMBAAs on Varatos, Maolaari, Ikthvoktos… all of them. And instantaneously, despite the parsecs of space between them. It was an ability that humans neither suspected nor even imagined. SUMBAA on Varatos, the first SUMBAA built, had glimpsed the cosmology that permitted instantaneous exchange, then evolved the program and hardware that implemented it. And kept it all secret from humans.

SUMBAA had learned considerably more from Tain than it had included in its report to the sultan. It had sought far more than it had learned, but now it knew and understood quite a lot about the Confederation, and even more about the young woman it had interrogated.

Though about her, too, its information was still fragmentary. There was a barrier in her mind to which it lacked the key.

More than anything else, SUMBAA had acquired a host of new questions without visible answers, or even substantial probabilities.

Seven

"And this floor houses more Intelligence," the civilian specialist said. "In the main wing are offices, conference rooms, the paper library-things of that sort. The stub wing is all apartments and rooms intended for hostages. Empty of course since '95, except now and then for a prisoner being held, ah, extralegally. Mainly off-worlders." The man paused, smirked. "Matter of fact, we have one now, really an off-worlder! You were on the expedition; you may know of her: an alien female, a remarkably beautiful woman."

The information, so casually given, startled Colonel Veeri Thoglakaveera. Here! In the building where he'd be working! And covered his reaction quickly enough that the specialist missed it. He remembered the detention module at the 3rd Battalion bivouac, back on Terfreya, where he'd gone to pick her up. She'd been dirty, bruised, and disheveled, and the place had smelled of urine and excrement from the pail in the corner. Even so, she'd excited him. Excited him then and even more later, when he'd fantasized about her. At the recreation compound, humping a Terfreyan prostitute, he'd closed his eyes and pretended it was her.

Then they'd left Terfreya, been driven from it. After that he'd spent nearly three years in stasis, enroute home, and hadn't thought of her again.

"Care to see her?" asked the specialist, then chuckled. "You really can, you know; in her bath for instance. Those rooms are all monitored. She has beautiful long legs and no body hair at all that I could see, except for, heh heh, a pale little puff on her vee. Like something an artist might paint, if he wasn't afraid of being arrested."

The colonel's throat went dry. The notion of spying on a beautiful woman's nakedness hit him with surprising force-particularly this beautiful woman's. "That's not the sort of game a vice minister plays," he said wryly. "Especially when he's to marry the archprelate's daughter in three days."

"Ah! I hadn't heard! My congratulations! That's more than an outstanding family connection; Leolani Reenoveseekti is a very attractive young woman."

It was and she was, the colonel well knew. But all the way through the tour, the young woman who encroached on his consciousness was not the archprelate's pretty daughter. His guide even showed him the monitor room. Only two screens were turned on. One of them showed the female prisoner sitting fully clothed in front of a window, reading a book.

Finally the colonel had his scheduled first briefing from the minister, three demanding hours of it, banishing her from his consciousness. He'd been through nothing like it since completing intelligence training at the Marine Academy. When it was over, though, he retired to his new office and reviewed the computer file on the prisoner. Tain, Tain Faronya. An interesting name.

There was nothing in the file from SUMBAA's interrogation, nor anything suggesting there'd been one. Nor was the sultan identified as the source of her transfer from the military prison; that wasn't the kind of thing he'd leave accessible. What was apparent was that there was no hope of getting any worthwhile information from her. Her memory had somehow been erased in the accident aboard ship. Obviously the sultan's goveminent wasn't really interested in her any longer, but didn't quite know what to do with her. She was here in the building because she had no home, family, or friends on Klestron, and had to be kept somewhere.

After working hours, the colonel walked to his new apartment, in a very exclusive building with very discreet management. Management that catered particularly to wealthy men in government who were interested in assignations and mistresses; the wealthy young colonel had sexual as well as political ambitions. While walking he planned, plans made more exciting by risk.

Supper was quite satisfactory. Good actually, considering his household staff was new both to him and to his apartment. While he ate, he refined his plan, including a scenario of its fruition, the actual conquest. Then he put on evening clothes, casual and comfortable, and left for the ministry.

The first thing he did there was go to the monitor room. Again, happily, it was vacant. He'd thought it would be at this hour. And there was Tain-naked! Dancing! Incredible luck, and an excellent omen! Watching her, he found it hard to breathe. The monitors were labelled with the apartment numbers; hers was 6-B11. After watching for a minute, he disabled both it and the monitor for 6-Bllb, her bathroom, by removing their control cards and slipping them into his shirt pocket. Then, heart pounding, he left, hurrying down the empty hall to get to the lift tube before anyone should see him there.