by Sales, Ian
“And that is?” Ahasz was intrigued. He had relied on the Electorate’s powers to prevent the Emperor. It had cost him—a great deal of money, and a great many favours and promises to be fulfilled once he took the Throne.
“Funds, your grace. The Imperial Throne has no funds. Or rather, it has no reserves. Each year, the amount raised by Tithe, the Emperor’s Allocation, Duchies Bank dividends, and other means only just covers the regnal government’s expenses. The Emperor could not afford to match your bribes to win influence in the Electorate, he could not afford to outfit an army of knights stalwart, and he could not afford to pay the bill the Imperial Navy would present him for doing his work.”
“The Throne is penniless?” Ahasz did not believe it. Evidence to the contrary was all about him: the Exchequer, the Imperial Palace, the Imperial Household District… Areas of the Palace were frequently remodelled and refurbished; Emperor Willim IX was as fond of spectacle as his forebears had been. The duke could not credit the entire edifice was founded on debt.
Druzh said: “This is what my clerks are trying to prove. The vault below contains little but a few ancient treasures. No huge piles of crowns, fit to be spent.”
Ahasz returned to the window and gazed out into the darkness. He saw past the Knot, the line of Palace Road and, to its right, the bunched clusters of lights that were his army’s camp. But for those lights, it could have been any night in the Imperial Household District. Just to his left, the pale stone façade of the Chancery shone spectrally under spotlights. The Imperial Palace itself could not be seen—blocked by the Chancery and the curve of the steep valley wall. As he watched, a bolt of brightness speared down at his camp. The Palace Artillery were firing again.
“No money…,” he said wonderingly. He looked back at Druzh. “How long has this been true?”
“It’s impossible to say for certain, but I suspect the Throne has been operating on credit since the Imperial Treasury was created.”
“That was during the Second Century!” Over one thousand years ago. Incredible.
“It’s probably why they introduced Tithe shortly afterwards.”
“What of the Shutans themselves, the Imperial Family?”
“Their personal fortune is kept separate. They’re too canny to allow the Electorate to sequester it a second time.”
Ahasz clasped his hands behind his back, glanced down at the floor, and frowned in thought. “It changes nothing,” he said. “I still want the Throne. In fact —” He looked up—“it makes my task so much easier. Willim cannot buy himself help. I have the Imperial Navy’s purse-strings in my hands, so not even Edkar’s Promise will sway them.”
“The Promise has never been honoured, although it has been asked,” Druzh said. “Many times throughout the centuries.”
This surprised Ahasz. “It has? Not once?” The Imperial Navy had only gained its independence from the Throne on swearing it would come when called by the Promise.
He said, “What other surprises do you have for me, Sofia?”
She left her clerk’s side, strolling across to the duke with her hip-swaying walk. “None, your grace,” she admitted with a tight smile. “Although I believe we can use our knowledge of this conspiracy to hide the Throne’s indebtedness. Those who must already know of it could be perhaps ‘swayed’ to your cause.”
“True.” Ahasz nodded. “It would make us stronger in the Electorate.”
“But…”
He looked at her.
“A penniless Throne is to the Electorate’s advantage,” she said. “They’d not willingly swap it for a rich one.”
“Sofia, you know full well my own fortune could never finance the regnal government. And my personal reserves are likely no greater than the Shutans. I’ll be stepping into penury as much as the Emperor already rules in it.”
Druzh accompanied Ahasz back to his command car. As they descended the steps to the floating vehicle, the duke asked, “Sanduk?”
“I will see he does not talk, your grace. His troopers know nothing of our findings.”
Ahasz glanced at her, but could read nothing in her face. Did she mean to rely on orders, or kill him? The latter, he decided. Despite her unassuming appearance, she was not unafraid to spend lives when the need arose. He had never quizzed her on the matter, but he had heard from members of her own staff that she had struck killing blows herself.
Regimental-Major Urnagi waited patiently at the rear of the command car. He straightened as Ahasz rounded the vehicle, and jerked a quick bow. His smile congealed in puzzlement on seeing Druzh, but he said nothing. The duke acknowledged the major’s greeting with a nod, left Druzh without a farewell, and clambered through the hatch. As he settled into his seat, he said, loudly enough to be heard outside over the apparatus whispering and thrumming within:
“Sofia, do not spend too long in the Exchequer.”
Urnagi filled the hatch. He turned, still stooped, pulled the armoured door to, and dogged it shut. Giving the duke a tight smile, he climbed up into the commander’s cupola. Moments later, the command car jerked into motion, swinging queasily about. Ahasz twisted to peer out of the slit window by his shoulder. He saw the lit frontage of the Exchequer recede, losing shape and identity as the distance increased. And climbing the wide steps to its entrance, a figure in a dark dress with a pale helmet of hair.
The Imperial Throne forever on the edge of bankruptcy… It explained much. The knights stalwart and knights militant had chapterhouses on hundreds of worlds, but never deployed in forces larger than a couple of cohorts. The Sutlers, the Order of Replenishers, held a monopoly on the transport of bulk foodstuffs… and yet operated a fleet in sore need of replacement. The Imperial Throne must be sucking away most of the Order’s profits. And the regnal government itself was notoriously dilatory at the paying of bills. A year or more was not unheard of. Ahasz had put that down to incompetence and corruption—not unlikely in institutions in which the upper management gained their positions as sinecures or through influence and favour.
The pavilion fell silent as Ahasz entered. Urnagi slipped in behind him, and crossed to his lieutenant-colonel. The duke walked up to the battlefield-consultant and looked down at the map displayed on its glass. In the midst of a city of eight millions, the Imperial Household District’s deep-cut valley provided seclusion and privacy for the Imperial Family. It was also a trap. Other than by aerocraft, the only entrance was via the Imperial Mile. While Ahasz controlled that, he controlled access to his battle-ground. But now, his swift assault had ground to a halt. There was no taking the Imperial Palace while it remained so well-defended.
No matter that other parts of his plan had gone as expected. Or, in the case of the Exchequer, better than expected.
He asked: “Did Ashma’s men gain entrance to the Admiralty Fort? And is the Navy Accounting Mechanism in their control?”
Tayisa replied: “Yes, your grace. Lieutenant Marutama signalled not ten minutes ago. Lieutenant-Commander Skattia has fed in the protocols he’s written. At your command, the entire wealth of the Navy can be made to ‘disappear’.”
Ahasz nodded in acknowledgement. He now held a threat to offset that of Triumphant in orbit, but it meant nothing unless Commodore Magwagi were informed of it. The duke had no intention of bankrupting the Navy—he possessed a great deal of respect and admiration for the service, for its accomplishments and its personnel. Their discipline was commendable, and he appreciated the science they had made of ensuring officers and crew were skilled in their responsibilities. That dedication to training and excellence he had even imposed on his own household troops.
Conversation had started up again amongst his officers. He tuned into it. They were discussing approaches to the entrance, means of getting the most men alive to the fountain basins and up the steps. No one had yet to suggest a method or route that did not entail more than fifty percent casualties.
“Are there no other entrances to the Palace?” ask
ed a young Housecarls lieutenant-colonel.
Colonel Tayisa replied, “Two: a landing deck for boats on the east flank of Mount Yama, and a secure tunnel leading to Gahara from the lower levels of the Palace. We have a company holding down the exit to the tunnel. They’ll not escape that way.”
Ahasz gestured dismissively. “Neither route need concern us,” he told the officers. “The Emperor will not desert his Throne. He feels himself invulnerable.”
Chuckles sounded about the pavilion.
Ahasz wondered at the motivations of the officers gathered around the battlefield-consultant. The household troops owed their allegiance to the Vonshuan family and were fiercely loyal. If he ordered them to attack Syrena, his home world, they would do so. The Housecarls Ahasz had suborned through bribery, promises of great rewards and a perceived necessity for change. Here they stood, eager for battle, displaying no qualms that their enemy was their emperor, the liege they had sworn to ultimately obey.
He circled the battlefield-consultant, peering intently at the map displayed on the glass. Housecarls and household officers moved silently out of his way. The disposition of his force, Ahasz decided, was not good. He knew the Imperial Palace Artillery would not be permitted to move their cannons into the Imperial Apartments… But something more defensible, less vulnerable to cannon-fire, was needed from which to prosecute his attack.
“I want,” Ahasz said, putting a finger to Palace Road and dragging it along the highway’s length from the Knot to the Pacification Campaigns monument, “a trench dug along here. A sturdy trench. Make it deep and revetted, with a solid parapet. One of the sappers will know a good plan. We can bring workers in through the railway.”
Ahasz’s planned lightning assault had proven untenable the moment a bolt of directed-energy had hit one of his troop-wagons. This was now a siege, a war of attrition. His army controlled the entrance to the District, and there was no force on Shuto to breach it. While that remained true—and so it would if the Imperial Navy did not intervene—he needed only to whittle down the knights stalwart, knights militant and Cuirassiers… and the Imperial Palace would be his.
But would the “sword” he held at the Navy’s purse-strings be enough to prevent their intervention?
CHAPTER SIX
Casimir Ormuz could not find his underpants. He hunted about the Admiral’s sleeping cabin, but there was no sign of them. His amusement turned to annoyance. Trousers, then. He would go without underwear. No, they were missing too. His shirt? Also gone. Now he was well and truly awake. And, embarrassingly, he could see the cabin had been tidied. By the Admiral? Ormuz had been asleep when she left, but he could not imagine her cleaning the room.
At a loss, he wandered nude to one bulkhead, where a photograph had caught his attention. A family, richly dressed, and posed on and about a spindly settee before an enormous ornate fireplace. The father, flanked by son and daughter, stood behind the settee, mother and daughter sat upon it. Ormuz focused on the standing daughter. Dark-haired and strong-jawed, she wore an Imperial Navy dress uniform, the two bars of a lieutenant on her epaulets. The Admiral: Princess Flavia umar Shutan. Ormuz judged her age to be in her mid-twenties.
He studied the rest of the Imperial Family. They were an unprepossessing bunch. He had never seen a family who appeared less happy at being photographed. His Imperial Highness Emperor Willim IX, dressed in a uniform liberally garnished with medals and plaques, glowered at the camera. His wife—the Admiral’s mother!—the Imperial Consort Ivadne, was clearly uncomfortable, squeezed into a corset in an attempt to give her something approaching feminine curves. Ormuz wondered if the Admiral would look the same when she was her mother’s age.
No, he thought.
The Admiral’s brother, Prince Hubret, the heir to the Imperial Throne, with his heavy-browed scowl, presented as dour a demeanour as his father. The sister, Auspica, however, was a complete contrast: shining chestnut hair, pretty, a sunny smile and clear blue eyes.
So this was the Admiral’s family.
It was, he reflected, an odd choice of memento. Most would prefer a photograph which evoked happy memories. Not this grim and cheerless posed diorama. Or was that the only time the Admiral was happy while in the bosom of her family? She appeared as forbidding as her parents and siblings. So perhaps not.
He stepped back from the photograph and looked about him. He had taken in few details last night—his attention had been on other things. The sleeping cabin was dominated by the double bed centred against the starboard bulkhead—no naval cot for the Admiral. There was a narrow door beside it, so he pulled it open—
And immediately recoiled at the sight of three heads on a shelf.
No, wig-stands. Three wigs on featureless heads of polished wood. Ormuz was reminded of his visits to the nomosphere. Himself, his mysterious blue helper, and the Serpent all manifested in that mysterious realm without features. He turned away, stopped, turned back. Wigs? Why would the Admiral need wigs? Two were dark-haired, one blonde. They were good wigs, fashionably styled and—he fingered the tresses of one—real hair. He tried to imagine the Admiral with hair.
He couldn’t. He knew her with a shaved head. She had hair in the photograph on the bulkhead, but that might as well have been a picture of a stranger.
Beneath the wig-stands, clothes hung from a rail. A full dress uniform with the insignia of a post-captain. Several pairs of the plain black coveralls the Admiral habitually wore. And… Ormuz reached forward and took the sleeve of a dress of lustrous red fabric. Fine stitching in silver decorated the cuff. There were other dresses, just as rich, as expensive. Some were long, some short. High-necked, low-cut. He had not known the Admiral wore such clothing. Except…
The night before… Struggling to remove his clothing, only to look up and see the Admiral peel off her coverall to reveal lacy figure-hugging lingerie. Its unexpected sensuality had both shocked and delighted him.
He stepped back and sat on the bed, smiling at the memory. He remembered these last ten weeks of waiting for ships to appear in dribs and drabs, for captains to swear on Edkar’s Promise… He had come to know the Admiral better, had spent an increasing amount of time in her company. Such a strange and contradictory woman.
After the assassins’ attack of two days ago, she had changed. She had been so very angry—but he had not seen her heated rage until afterwards, until they had been alone in her office aboard Vengeful. Henceforth, he must be escorted everywhere off Vengeful by a boat-squad of her marines. He was too valuable—to their cause? or to her?
But he would not be thought useless, he’d insisted on it. That was why he’d accompanied Marine-Lieutenant Kiserö aboard Arnabyad. Whatever was necessary, whatever was needful.
Her anger had abruptly cooled, but some warmth still remained. Something in his response, he now realised, had reminded her of Ahasz, some element of the duke’s character had asserted itself in him. He thought perhaps she saw him now in a new light.
How else to explain his current situation, naked in her cabin?
Last night, she had invited him to a valedictory dinner with Finesz, who was leaving for Shuto. The Admiral was not being gracious; she wanted the inspector to carry messages to the Imperial capital. They were addressed to various members of the Electorate—prompting Ormuz to wonder what allies the Admiral possessed on Shuto, and what part they had played in her “rebellion”.
After their guest had departed, Ormuz and the Admiral chatted idly over a post-prandial brandy. Her hand lingered on his thigh… She drew closer. An invitation offered and accepted, with no words spoken. She had led him from the lounge into this chamber, where they hurriedly removed their clothes.
He stroked the bed linen beneath him. It was not the navy issue his own bunk boasted, but sheets fit for a… well, a princess. The Admiral might present as an ascetic, with her shaven head and insignialess uniform. But her bed linen, the contents of her closet, her underwear even, gave the lie to that. This slee
ping cabin might be considered spartan—its only furniture the double bed, a ladder-back chair in one corner, a dressing-table and mirror (its top bearing a neat arrangements of pots and compacts); the only décor the photograph of the Imperial Family.
The willpower she must possess, to maintain this fiction of the Admiral, to keep her inner nature hidden. He had learnt something of her history in the last few weeks: late nights in her lounge, swapping anecdotes of past life. There was one particular incident he recalled her mentioning:
Princess Flavia had, as had all members of the Imperial Family, attended the Swava College Annex on Podboi, the most prestigious university in the Empire. She had become an officer of the Society of Gold, a student anarchist group. There was, to Ormuz, something risible in these scions of the high and powerful agitating for a state free from their class’s rule. The Admiral had freely admitted her involvement was chiefly motivated by desire for the charismatic leader of the Society. She masterminded several actions by the group—her first indication of a gift for tactics—and only escaped arrest by the College proctors because she was the Emperor’s daughter. The Society’s leader was not so lucky. She visited him in gaol… only to listen in shock and humiliation as he told her he’d seduced her because he believed her connections would safeguard him and his cronies. Shortly afterwards, the Admiral had left Podboi. The university later awarded her a diploma, although she had never completed her studies.
The parallels with their present situation were plain. Ormuz had assured her he had no plans to seduce her in order to protect himself from reprisal for his arrogation.
“You have seduced me already,” she replied.
Flustered, Ormuz said, “I have?”
With an imperious wave of the hand: “I refer to Ariman.”
Ariman umar Vonshuan, Duke of Ahasz: the man Ormuz knew as the Serpent. His enemy.