King's Test

by Margaret Weis

  The shot told. Maigrey's hand went to the empty place on her breast, clasped the starjewel that wasn't there. The pain seared, burned. Tears stung her eyes, blinding her. Turning on her heel, she retraced her steps, headed back to her plane. Sagan made no move to stop her. He didn't have to. The Honor Guard closed ranks, ranged around her, blocking her path. Maigrey came to a halt, hair falling over her face, cursing him, cursing herself. His hand closed on her upper arm.

  "Come, my lady," he said softly. "You are not well."

  The Warlord's shuttlecraft was parked on the outskirts of the base, far from any buildings, surrounded by a vast expanse of concrete. The area was restricted. The fort's military police had it cordoned off, the Honor Guard stood watch, a ring of steel banded around the craft. Inside, the ship was dark; the only lights permitted were those necessary to the systems that were operational on the ground. The shuttle's crew moved about their duties efficiently and in silence.

  Sagan and Maigrey proceeded through the craft to the Warlord's private chambers. Courteously, he stood aside, admitted her to his quarters with a bow which Maigrey acknowledged with an inclination of her head. Gliding past him, she stepped inside a room lit by only a pinpoint of bright white streaming down from a spotlight in the overhead.

  "I am not to be disturbed, Captain," the Warlord said, the white light shining full on him, causing his shadow to expand up over the bulkheads, fill the room, close around her. "Except for the half-breed."

  "Yes, my lord."

  The door slid shut. Sagan sealed it.

  Maigrey moved away from him, to the center of the small room that did its duty efficiently and without nonsense, serving in the capacity of office, communications room, and sitting room. Through another door, she could see a bedroom furnished without regard to comfort: cold, Spartan. Or perhaps not Spartan. More like a monk's cell.

  The door to the bedroom slid shut. There was no escape, no way out. The two of them were isolated, alone, cut off from the rest of the world, the rest of the universe.

  Nothing new. It seemed to her they had been like that from the very beginning, when the mind-link had first been forged, when he was thirteen and she was six and they were trying to rescue Stavros from that ridiculous statue. . . .

  "And now, my lady," Sagan said gently, coming to stand very near her, "let us talk about the bomb."

  "I won't give it to you. You must know that." Maigrey slumped down wearily in a chair beneath the bright light, her hand shielding her eyes from the glare. "Why didn't you try to stop me from taking it?"

  "Try to stop you?" Sagan removed his helm, ran his hand through the thick black hair that was thinning at the top of the forehead, tinged with gray at the temples. Damp with sweat, it glistened purple in the light. He laid the helm to one side on a stand, unfastened his cloak, and draped it across the helm. Seating himself in a chair opposite Maigrey, he stretched out his long body, settled himself comfortably. "I couldn't have hired anyone to serve me better!"

  The light shone between them, not on either directly. Their faces were masks—black shadows for mouth and nose and eyes, white cheekbones, white lips, a white scar.

  "Abdiel—" Sagan began.

  Maigrey stirred restlessly. "Must we continue this nonsense?"

  The Warlord continued, unperturbed. "Abdiel would not have permitted me to acquire the bomb, my lady. He couldn't. He would have done everything in his power to destroy me."

  "If we admit his existence, which I don't—why?"

  "Because he knew I would use it."

  "And therefore Abdiel let me acquire it—?"

  "—because he assumes you won't."

  Maigrey was silent. Her hand went to play with the chain around her neck, the chain that wasn't there. She glanced at him, fearful that he'd seen, moved her fingers to touch the wound. She drew them hack, saw them dark with blood. It had broken open again. She looked across at the Warlord. "I think perhaps he underestimates me."

  "I think perhaps he does, too." Sagan rose to his feet, came toward her. "Let me look at that cut."

  Maigrey shifted in her chair, turned away from him, from the light, her pale hair falling forward over her shoulders. "It's nothing, I tell you—"

  "Let me see it. Tilt your head back. Move into the light."

  Maigrey sighed, bit her lip, and obeyed, sitting forward on the chair, holding her head back and at a slight angle. The Warlord bent over her, brushed the pale hair aside, his fingers deftly and dispassionately probing the wound on her neck. She flinched, gritted her teeth.

  "Did that hurt?" he asked coolly.

  "No." She lied, though it wasn't the wound that pained her.

  Sagan smiled, the shadows around his mouth deepening. "The cut is superficial. I doubt if it will even leave a scar." He lingered on the word, his gaze flicking swiftly to her right cheek.

  Maigrey sensed battle, tensed.

  "It needs cleaning, however, antiseptic to prevent infection." The Warlord straightened, crossed the room, disappearing into the shadows. A panel slid aside, revealing a compartment. He removed and opened a metal box marked by a red cross.

  "What's this? No dressings! Dr. Giesk has been neglectful in his duty, it seems. We shall have to make do"—Sagan reached into the broad belt of his Romanesque armor, drew forth a scrap of cloth that caught the light, seemed to burn in Maigrey's sight with a white flame—"with this handkerchief."

  Light reflected off a plastiglass bottle; the Warlord dashed a pungent-smelling liquid onto the cloth. He turned, moved back toward her, the cloth held in his outstretched hand. Kneeling down, his body cut off the light, threw a shadow over her. He started to lift the cloth to the wound.

  Maigrey's hand closed over his wrist, fingers digging into his flesh.

  "Where did you get that?" She spoke without a voice.

  "What? This handkerchief?" He opened his hand, revealed it to her. His smile deepened, darkening his eyes. "I took it from a prisoner, aboard Defiant."

  Maigrey clasped hold of his arm more tightly. not in an attempt to hurt him—that would have been impossible—but because she suddenly needed the support. He gently disengaged her clutching hand.

  "Sit back, lady. This is going to hurt."

  Furious, she snatched the handkerchief away from him, tried to rise. He blocked her with his body. Clamping his hands over her wrists, pinning them to the armrests of the chair, he held her fast.

  "John Dixter is alive ... for the moment."

  Maigrey froze at his touch, made no further move except to close her fingers more tightly over the handkerchief. She stared at him in silence, dark and impenetrable.

  "I knew you'd be pleased to hear word of him," the Warlord continued implacably. His mental hold on her was strong; he eased the physical, his hands resting lightly on her forearms. "I was able to give him news of you . . . when the drug wore off long enough to permit him to distinguish reality from hallucination."

  She couldn't breathe. His presence enveloped her, sucked the air from around her.

  "I respect John Dixter, my lady. He is a strong-willed man, a man of honor and of principle, and he has the misfortune to love you dearly. ..."

  Maigrey struggled to draw breath; her lungs burned. A single tear slid down the scarred cheek, stopped halfway as if turned to ice, glistened in the harsh light.

  "I think you might be interested, my lady, to know how John Dixter is spending his time aboard Defiant. At the moment, perhaps, he is lying on a steel table, stripped naked. Dr. Giesk is attaching the electrodes to various sensitive places on his body—the head, the chest, the groin, the fingertips, the soles of the feet ..."

  Maigrey's eyes lost their focus, stared not at him but through him, beyond him into a darkness only she could see. "So this is how it is to be," she murmured, fingers twisting the handkerchief.

  "Yes, my lady," he answered softly. "Unless you return my property."

  Maigrey thought a moment, then slowly shook her head. "No. my lord. I will not give it to you.
Not until he is set free. "

  "And I will not free him unless I have the bomb." Sagan rose to his feet, moved away from her, seeming to leave a vacuum where he’d been. The air surged in to fill it. Maigrey inhaled deeply. The rush of oxygen made her dizzy.

  Sagan took a turn about the small room, paused, and glanced back at her over his shoulder. "I don't suppose I could simply kill you and take the bomb."

  Maigrey smiled faintly, shook her head. "No, my lord."

  "Of course. Visual identification, voice pattern—that sort of precaution."

  "Among others, my lord." Maigrey started to rise from the chair. Sagan politely extended his hand. She accepted his assistance, her chill fingers closing over his. He saw the livid marks his hands had made earlier on her wrists, darkening to bruises.

  "It seems we are at an impasse, my lady." He kept hold of her hand, drew her near. "I have time. You have time. So, unfortunately, does John Dixter. Stavros lasted only three days, but then I was in a hurry. I can make Dixter's suffering last as long as it takes. Perhaps"—the Warlord released her hand, turned toward a communications center—"you would like to speak with him—"

  "No!" She had gone deathly pale. Her restraining hand on his arm was rigid as a corpse's.

  "The game is over, lady. Check and checkmate. You played well. " The Warlord came to stand beside her. Reaching out his hand, he brushed it lightly, almost caressingly, over her scarred cheek. "But I played better. Shall we take a walk, over to your plane? Once I have the bomb in my possession I will give the order—"

  "It won't do you any good," Maigrey interrupted.

  Sagan's face darkened. "I warn you, my lady, John Dixter will suffer—"

  "Then he must suffer," she said softly. The tear's twin slid down her face. Angrily, she dashed it away with the back of her hand. "What hope do the people of this galaxy have, what hope does Dion have, if you hold this flaming sword in your hand?"

  "I would make the boy a king—"

  "A king of straw! The prince of iron rules behind his back!"

  Sagan advanced on her so suddenly and so swiftly that she was trapped in a corner before she could escape. "You didn't do this for the boy, Maigrey! You didn't risk your life to gain this 'flaming sword' for Dion!" The Warlord caught hold of her arms, held her fast, his body pressing hers against a wall of steel. "You forget, lady, I see through you like flawed crystal! You want the weapon for yourself. You sold everything you had, including your honor, to obtain it. And you're willing to let a man who loves and trusts you die a terrible death so that you can keep it—"

  The metal was cold against her back. She began shivering. Crossing her arms, she huddled in upon herself, lowering her head, hiding behind a curtain of pale hair. "No," she whispered, and shrank away from him as far as possible. "No." If she said no over and over, repeated it like a chant, a litany, it might gain power, it might come to be true.

  His hands suddenly eased their hurting grasp and were gentle, persuasive, drawing her near. He was warmth and strength and sanctuary. She could hide in his darkness and be completely forgotten and she herself could forget. . . .

  "Lord Sagan." The voice boomed over the commlink.

  Sagan smoothed his hand over the pale, fair hair. He brushed his fingers over the scar on her face, felt the trace of the tear, wet and chill on her skin.

  "I left orders not to be disturbed."

  "Yes, my lord. But you also told us to inform you if the half-breed contacted—"

  "The half-breed?" Sagan glanced toward the commlink, as if the voice speaking had suddenly taken shape and form and become visible.

  "He's here, my lord, and demands to speak to you at once."

  The Warlord fell silent, stood looking down at Maigrey, not seeing her. His hands released her, he turned away from her, but not before she'd felt his body stiffen, tense.

  "Send him in," Sagan commanded,.

  "So," Maigrey said, following him as he crossed the room, advancing as he retreated, "the game isn't over yet, is it, my lord?"

  "For you it is, my lady," he said coolly, with a sidelong glance.

  You may hold my king in check, my lord, Maigrey told him silently, but not checkmate. The queen has one more move left. . . .

  Sagan switched on more lights. The room was brilliantly illuminated, and Maigrey blinked, blinded by the glare. The panel glided aside. A figure emerged from the darkness, shuffling with cringing shoulders into the light as if possessed of an aversion to the radiance. It shambled and hunched its way into the room, a pile of slovenly rags.

  Maigrey caught a quick glimpse of Marcus, standing guard outside, his stern face twisted in aversion, fingers on his weapon obviously itching to rid his Warlord of a pest.

  The door slid shut; Sagan sealed it. The figure straightened in a graceful, fluid motion, alarmingly like the uncoiling of a snake.

  "My lady," the Warlord said, "may I present Sparafucile."

  A malformed head lifted from the hunched shoulders; a misshapen face turned to Maigrey, misaligned eyes glinted, leering.

  She caught her breath, took an involuntary step backward. "You!"

  "Ah, yes," the Warlord remarked. "I had forgotten that you two have already met."

  "Not formally, Sagan Lord." The half-breed, grinning, rested strong hands on the weapons belt at his waist.

  He brought back to Maigrey the horror of the creatures who had attacked her, brought back her inability to think, to react. The dark curtain in her mind trembled, stirred by a disquieting breeze. She reached out her hand, groped for something solid, reassuring, and leaned against the arm of an unyielding couch. The other two in the room talked, but for long moments she couldn't hear them.

  "Visitors? From Snaga Ohme?" Sagan was saying to the half-breed when Maigrey was once again able to attend to the conversation. "Surely the Adonian must know by now that the double-crosser has become the double-crossed."

  "No, Sagan Lord, these people come not from Snaga Ohme. I know his men by sight and these are not them, though one is pretty enough to be, I think. "

  A shadow darkened Sagan's face. The same shadow fell over Maigrey’s heart, though she couldn't give a name to her fear or see it clearly.

  "Describe him," was all the Warlord said.

  "A human boy, Sagan Lord, well made with fair skin and hair the color of blood and fire. Abdiel himself come to meet him. He take him by the hand, call the boy Dion."

  "The hand," the Warlord murmured, opened his own right hand, stared down at the five scars on the palm, his face grim.

  Remembered pain jolted through Maigrey's arm. She clasped one palm over the other. "Give it up, Sagan! I won't fall for it. Abdiel is dead! All the mind-seizers are dead. I read it in your files—"

  "It is no trick, lady," the Warlord cried, losing his patience.

  "Look inside me! See the truth! Abdiel is alive. He is here on Laskar and somehow he has managed to get hold of Dion . . . just as he got hold of us so many years ago!"

  Maigrey had no need to look inside him. She had only to look inside herself to know the truth ... or to admit it. Terrible memories of their captivity came to her, of the torture, more horrible because it was of the mind, as well as the body.

  We were strong, we were prepared. We knew what to expect. We fought him, we escaped. But not Dion. He doesn't know. . . . He doesn't know.

  The game board had been upended, the pieces scattered all to hell. Maigrey rubbed the scars on her palm, but the pain did not abate.

  Chapter Thirteen

  So spake the Seraph Abdiel, faithful found, Among the faithless, faithful only he . . .

  John Milton, Paradise Lost

  The old man took Dion's right hand in his own right hand. Abdiel's flesh was chill and clammy to the touch, the skin of the fingers and palm astonishingly smooth, as if it had been sanded. Dion returned the pressure of the strong grip, though he found it difficult, looking at the patches of rotting skin on the back of the hand, to repress a shudder of revulsion. The old ma
n kept his left hand concealed in the long, flowing robes he wore wound around his thin body.

  Dion didn't like the man's touch, tried to withdraw his hand, though he forced himself, out of courtesy, not to make the gesture seem hurried. Abdiel kept hold of him, however, and turned the boy's right hand palm up. Shrewd eyes noted the five scars, darted to the bloodsword Dion wore at his side.

  "I see that you have been blooded. Quite right. Quite proper, my king. Though sometimes very dangerous. My name is Abdiel, did I mention that? The old. We forget things so easily. I don't suppose my Lady Maigrey spoke of me to you? Or your mentor, Platus, perhaps?" The voice was smooth and sanded as the flesh, warm and arid as the desert around them. "I heard of his death. I am sorry, deeply sorry."

  Dion managed, finally, to free himself of the old man's grasp. "Where is the Lady Maigrey?" he asked coldly, and heard, behind him, Tusk's grunt of approval.

  Abdiel heard it as well. The eyes shifted from the boy to the mercenary and to the young woman, both standing protectively just behind and to either side of Dion.

  "Mendaharin Tusca," said Abdiel, with a bobbing motion of his body.

  "Sorry." Tusca shook his head. "You must have me confused with someone else."

  "Oh, your secret is safe with me, my dear Tusca. Quite safe. I knew your father. A pity. A pity. I did what I could to prevent his terrible death, but I was too late. It seems that I am always late."

  Abdiel's gaze switched back to Dion, who noticed that the old man's eyes had no lashes, seemed to have no lids. The eyes themselves appeared never to close. If they blinked, the movement was so rapid that it escaped observation. When he looked at you, he seemed to be always looking at you.

  The old man sighed. Shivering, he slid his hand back inside his robe, huddled deep within the heavy fabric.

  Sweat trickled down Dion's forehead. He kept his expression stern. "I received a message from the Lady Maigrey. We either see her now or we're leaving."

  "You will see her, my king." Abdiel reached out his hand again, plucked the sleeve of Dion's cotton, short-sleeved shirt (purchased with their poker winnings on Vangelis). "Perhaps not as you expect, but you will see her." The old man bobbed again. "Will you honor my humble dwelling with your presence, Your Majesty?"