The Octagonal Raven by L. E. Modesitt

instructor at Blue Oak Academy before I’d gone east to The College, and we’d kept in touch over the years, as he’d gone in my mind from “old Rosenn” to “ser” and then to “Mertyn.” His insights and advice were usually keen—and applicable, and I needed keen and applicable. And Mertyn refused to talk more than pleasantries on the net. So I needed to visit him.
    Every avenue open to me to track down Elysa or whoever had backed her had come up blank. Gerrat’s information on the Society of Dynae had been interesting, and I’d certainly be looking farther in that direction, but the Dynae were strictly philosophical in their opposition to the nets and the VR worlds and those who controlled them. Never had an action of any sort ever been traced to the organization’s members.
    Once out of the hangar, its doors irising closed behind me, I turned the glider uphill, and it straightened and began to slide above the grass, only the faintest of humming indicating that the magfield inducers were working. I’d left the canopy back, enjoying the crisp and cool air, and the hint of dampness from the night’s rain.
    Blue glare flared over me—glare and heat.
    I could sense my personal field nanites ablating as I ducked down in the glider, even though I had to do that by feel since, with the laseflash, I’d gone blind—at least momentarily, while the nanites floating on the moisture of my eyes opaqued faster than I could have blinked. That would help save my vision.
    The fingers of my left hand toggled the canopy switch, and I could sense the darkening around me as the canopy slid forward. I also grounded the glider, since I couldn’t see to guide it, and wasn’t about to trust the automatics under the circumstances, not until I had a sense of what was going on.
    As the glider settled onto the grass, I could also smell the same scent of flowers and the fragrance I had not been able to identify when Elysa had used the first spray, and that scent filled the enclosed glider. My nose began to run, almost immediately, and my throat was scratchy…but that was all for the allergenic symptoms. My lips quirked. So far Kharl’s special nanites were doing their job.
    My fingers brushed the controls…feeling for the stud that would summon the CAs, much as I disliked the whole idea.
    Nothing happened after I sent the signal, and I waited. The sensor alarms weren’t showing anyone approaching the glider, and I was beginning to get flashes of vision back. So I touched the “house return” stud and let the glider cart me back inside the hangar.
    By the time the hangar door had closed, I was getting back even longer flashes of blurry vision, but I sat in the glider until I could see and feel enough to link with the house security systems. No one was there, and no one was anywhere on the grounds—if I could trust the systems. But they didn’t feel cooked. So after several minutes, I flicked the stud to open the glider canopy.
    Then I made my way back up to the study to wait for the CAs.
    As I sat behind my flat table desk, blinking, and feeling as though I’d been badly sunburned, I considered what had happened. Someone wanted me dead…and this time, it wasn’t someone trying to use me as a way to get to Gerrat or Father.
    Worst of all, I still hadn’t the faintest idea who or why. The heavy-duty nanite personal protection system Father had insisted on when I returned from Federal Service had suddenly become worth the inordinate investment, at least from my perspective. Otherwise I would have been waiting for eye clones to regrow the blistered tissue, and suffering under an artificial epidermis and more.
    The ground alarm system noted the approach of two gliders, and then verified the Civil Authority transponders. The CAs had arrived. I stood slowly, then walked from the study out to the front entry. I was still seeing stars, and there were vacant spaces that crossed my field of vision when I opened the door.
    Two CAs