Recognition by Ann Herendeen

sworn
yesterday to protect me, to defend my choice, although so far I had
not been offered any alternatives.
    Dominic stood up. “Viceroy,” he said, “I
repeat that I am willing to act as Ms. Herzog’s guardian—”
    “Sit down!” Lord Zichmni said. “I refuse to
go over this again.”
    The others jeered openly at Dominic. “The
wolf guarding the sheepfold,” they laughed. “The bull guarding the
heifers.” Unlike Sir Mikal’s indiscretion, these insults were
apparently part of the debate, as Dominic endured them in silence,
clenching his jaw but not answering back.
    In the suspenseful atmosphere of a trial
awaiting the judge’s pronouncement of the sentence, Lady Ertegun
approached Lord Zichmni. “Then I, too, will repeat my request,” she
said, glaring out at the Assembly, daring anyone to challenge her.
The others deferred to her position. There were impatient mutters,
but no open threats. Lord Zichmni signaled his permission.
    The sibyl reworked her frown into a
surprisingly warm smile as she addressed me. “You have great
potential,” she said. “I can say unreservedly that should you wish
to train at La Sapienza Seminary and Signal Station you will be
welcome.”
    There, that was what Dominic had mentioned
yesterday. A
signal station
. But what exactly was that? I
knew more or less what a seminary was, enough to realize I had just
been offered something of great value, like winning first prize in
a competition. I must at least acknowledge the honor the sibyl did
me.
    As I searched for the right words, a man
jumped up shouting. He was Lord Singh, the same man who had been
convinced I was a Terran spy at yesterday’s meeting. “Then I’ll
repeat myself, too!” he bellowed. “How can you even consider
letting a Terran into La Sapienza? In a week they’ll have their
machines all over the ‘Graven Realms, grubbing for minerals,
cutting down the forests, building roads.”
    Other voices came in supporting him until
Lady Ndoko, replaying her part from yesterday, interposed. “You
left out one thing, Landgrave Singh. At La Sapienza, at least for a
while, Ms. Herzog will be unavailable for sexual companionship, and
certainly for childbearing. Isn’t that bothering you more than
these other hypothetical considerations?”
    Lord Singh scowled, but he didn’t answer. His
supporters were quiet as well. Lady Ndoko’s authority, that I had
noticed yesterday, was, if anything, stronger here in Assembly, in
front of an audience consisting entirely of her peers.
    While debate was temporarily at a standstill,
Lady Ndoko thought to me directly, answering my questions.
A
signal station is the applied or practical section of our
seminaries, like the laboratory at one of your research
universities. It is devoted to the use and study of
crypta
. The work is not dangerous to us, but the amplified
energy from the large prisms we use with our gifts can harm a baby
in the womb. Young women in a seminary avoid pregnancy, just as you
do. If they wish to have children, they must leave
.
    You see
, she concluded,
there
are some options for us, even birth control
. She opened her
mind still further, letting me in for a brief moment of communion,
a great intimacy from someone in her position, and accomplished,
through her skill, without physical contact. I learned that she was
in her twenties, Landgravina of the Ndoko Realm in her own right,
and Sibyl of Netrebko Seminary. She was unmarried by choice, and
would wait until she was ready to produce the heir to Ndoko.
We’re not so different, are we?
she thought with a soft
laugh as she disclosed this much, before she lowered a mental
barrier, shutting me out from her thoughts, just as the burqa she
wore hid her face.
    I thanked her silently as the mental
barricade descended. She had shown me a way to escape my past, had
given me a taste of a promising future. I bowed my head, trying to
deliberate, to reach a considered decision, instead of rushing
impulsively ahead as I