Hell's Gate-ARC

by David Weber

  Shamir Taje swore aloud. Andrin didn't believe she'd ever heard the First Councilor use profanity before, and the sizzling intensity of the one short, pungent phrase he permitted himself was an eye-opener. Then he glanced quickly at her, blushed, and shook his head in mute apology before he looked back at his older colleagues.

  "I'll just bet Chava would be willing!" he said sourly. "Give that man a foot through the door, and he'll put an army in your bedroom!"

  "Patience, Shamir," her father said gently. "Fifteen hundred extra men that close to the danger zone is nothing to sneeze at, whatever the source. And Orem Limana knows how to deal with heads of state who overstep their authority. Especially those who try to tread on his. Besides," he gave the First Councilor a cheerful grin, "under the provisions of the Founding Charter, no head of state may assume direct command of the Portal Authority's military forces without an authorizing majority vote by the rest of the Conclave's members. Do you really think Uromathia is popular enough to win that particular contest?"

  Rather than the chuckles or smiles Andrin had expected, the Privy Council greeted their Emperor's droll assessment with grim scowls and mutters of "Thank Marnilay." That was interesting. There had always been a certain traditional wariness on Ternathia's part where Uromathia was concerned, but the Council's reaction appeared far more pointed than she would have expected, and she made another entry in her growing list: Find out why Uromathia isn't trusted.

  "Your offer is greatly appreciated, Emperor Chava," First Director Limana said. "I'll put Division-Captain Raynor in touch with your General Staff. And that brings up precisely the point I wished to discuss next. I'm a civilian administrator, not a military officer. Division-Captain Raynor is currently Commandant of the PAAF, and he has plenty of field experience, as well as a thorough familiarity with our current troop dispositions, forts, and supplies. His appointment, unfortunately, is due to expire in two months, at which time he will return to the Republic of Tadewi in New Farnalia. Division-Captain Inar Alvaru of Arpathia is scheduled to hold the Commandant's post for the next two years. I mean no offense to Division-Captain Alvaru, or to the Septentrion, but it seems to me that replacing a man who is thoroughly familiar with our current military strengths—and weaknesses—with someone new, right in the middle of a major military crisis, would be . . . unwise. I believe Division-Captain Alvaru would add valuable voice to our planning, but I strongly recommend keeping Division-Captain Raynor in place as Commandant, at least until Division-Captain Alvaru can familiarize himself with our current troop dispositions."

  "An extremely wise suggestion," Andrin's father murmured. "Orem Limana's no soldier, but he obviously understands the realities."

  Captain of the Army chan Gristhane nodded his agreement from his place, table, and Yanamar cleared her throat once more and continued Limana's transmission.

  "And that brings up another important point," the First Director said. "I'm not at all comfortable making military or political decisions that may affect the very survival of Sharonian civilization. I don't have the training to deal with this kind of emergency. I'm an administrator. I run portals. That's a demanding enough job as it is, and it's going to get immeasurably tougher, trying to move enough men and war materiel to guard our frontier across thousands upon thousands of miles, through portals that will bottleneck our efforts, and through universe after universe of total wilderness.

  "I hate to see the Portal Authority militarized, but there are some decisions I'm simply not qualified to make. I need your guidance, so that we don't fumble and open ourselves to the enemy's guns, or whatever it was they were using to blow our people to hell. Tubes that threw fireballs and hurled honest-to-gods lightning balls. We must decide which portal forts to strengthen first, which universes may be safely left unguarded, what kind of equipment to move first, what our construction priorities should be—building railroads to transport weapons and men, building troop transports to cross the water gaps . . . or freighters to haul raw materials and freight across them. Felling timber or building cement factories to construct emergency forts. The list is endless, and, frankly, I have no idea what we should concentrate on as our immediate and long-range priorities.

  "We need the sort of military expertise which can identify and assign those priorities. But that's only a portion of what we need, and this Conclave—or the next one—must decide how to operate the Portal Authority on a full wartime footing. Who will have the military—and political—authority to make the necessary decisions? Who will direct me—or whoever ends up running the Authority—in prioritizing the Authority's tasks? Who will give militarily and politically appropriate orders for the defense of our people in the field? Nothing in the Authority's existing charter or any of the enabling treaties which created and authorized that charter gives me or any of the Authority Board the power to exercise that sort of authority. Yet someone is going to have to do it, so I'm asking you to implement an emergency chain of command, as well as to suggest long-term solutions to the problems of command and control."

  "My gods," Shamir touched muttered, running both hands through his silvered hair, and Andrin's father whistled softly.

  "Now there's a can of worms, if ever I saw one," the Emperor said.

  "You're not just kidding," Taje growled. He's talking about a fuc—"

  The First Councilor caught himself—this time, at least—glanced at Andrin, turned even redder than before, and cleared his throat loudly. Someone chuckled softly further down the conference table, but Taje carefully didn't notice that as he returned his gaze to Zindel.

  "He's calling for an honest-to-gods world government," he said. "And who the devil is going to head that?"

  "Not Uromathia," Captain of the Army chan Gristhane growled. "I will be dipped in sheep sh—"

  It was his turn to break off mid-sentence and glance sheepishly at Andrin, who tried very hard not to giggle at the harassed expression on the grizzled old warrior's face.

  "I'll go to my grave before I take orders from the likes of Chava Busar," he said after a moment. "And I'm not exaggerating, Your Majesty. I won't tolerate that man giving orders to put our soldiers under his command."

  The Emperor's lips quirked.

  "I rather imagine this exact same conversation is being repeated in every throne room and president's office in Sharona. 'Nobody but us, by the gods!' That," he added in a voice as dry as winter static, glancing at Andrin, "is why it's such a can of worms. As to the, ah, reluctance to swear in front of my daughter, a lady who stands in line for Ternathia's throne will certainly hear a good deal worse than a few off-color remarks. We do her no favors trying to shelter her, or by treating her as though she were delicate. It won't be easy for her, but she's a very strong young woman. I have every confidence in her ability to survive the occasional . . . burst of colorful self-expression, shall we say."

  Several of the Privy Councilors chuckled of this time, and that gave Andrin the courage to ask her first question since the Conclave had begun.

  "Thank you, Papa. But may I ask why everyone distrusts Uromathia so intensely?"

  chan Gristhane barked a humorless laugh.

  "Give me about twenty years, Your Grand Highness, and I ought to be able to give you a fair basis for it."

  "Now, now, Thaylar," her father said mildly, "just because Chava VII has violated every treaty he's ever signed, attempted to confiscate Ternathian shipping while trying to enforce illegal import duties and outrageously inflated harbor fees, been caught red-handed trying to bribe Portal Authority officials, and been linked repeatedly to shady business practices by Uromathian survey crews in half the universes so far discovered, is no reason to threaten suicide. You have my word that Ternathia will decline to sign any treaty on world governance if the nations of Sharona are temporarily insane enough to elect Emperor Chava as Sharona's military or political commander during this—or any other—crisis."

  Someone snickered further down the table. Captain of the Army chan Gristhane glowered for
a moment, then relented and gave his Emperor a sour grin.

  "Oh, very well, since you put it that way, Your Majesty." He met Andrin's wide-eyed gaze. "Young lady, if Chava Busar ever offers you a gift, do whatever it takes to politely decline it. His gifts have a way of attempting to destroy their recipients."

  "I see," she said faintly. "Thank you for the warning, Captain."

  chan Gristhane gave her a tight smile, and her father leaned forward.

  "I want to add one further, important point, Andrin. For the most part, Uromathia's subjects are honest, hard-working people who simply want to make a decent living and give their children a good legacy. Uromathia's banking industry has been utterly critical to the development of new universes, and on the whole, Uromathian banks are aboveboard and scrupulously honest. They use fair business practices, they don't discriminate against non-Uromathians, and they don't favor Uromathians over other clients. It's almost always a mistake to blame a whole society for the bad decisions of its rulers."

  Andrin thought about that for a moment. Then—

  "Even the society that slaughtered our survey crew?" she asked quietly, and her father frowned.

  "That remains to be seen. Sharona's own past includes societies that were guilty of rabid xenophobia, which led them to commit what we would consider atrocities by today's standards. I regret to say that some of the worst examples of that xenophobia occurred long after the emergence of the Talents, too.

  "We won't know what we're dealing with out there until we learn more. I've always tried to keep an open mind, but I have to admit things look pretty damning at the moment. Whether they remain so is a question only time and additional contact with them can answer."

  His face tightened for just an instant with what she knew was an echo of the Glimpses of war and slaughter both of them had Seen. Then he inhaled deeply, harshly.

  "My personal gut reaction is to wade into them, guns blazing in retribution." His voice was iron, yet he shook his head at the same time. "But that's precisely why I distrust that reaction. A ruler responsible for hundreds of millions of lives who indulges a personal desire for revenge is a disaster. That sort of response is a surefire recipe for killing a lot of our own people, and squandering the lives of courageous men—and women—selfishly, often for no good or justifiable reason, makes you a mass murderer."

  Someone down the table hissed through his teeth.

  "If, on the other hand, I believed, really believed, Andrin, and had the hard evidence to prove to my total satisfaction that the only way to ensure the survival of Ternathia—or Sharona—was to wage genocide, I would do exactly that. It would rip my soul to shreds, but I would, by all the gods, do it. Just as I would fight to the death to stop others from committing genocide, if I believed them to be wrong morally and politically. That is what it means to rule. Don't ever forget it, Andrin."

  His gaze was so intense she felt as if she were on fire. She met it through sheer willpower, scared to the bottoms of her stockings. Scared of the man inside her father's clothes—a man she'd never met before. A man capable of ordering the deaths of millions . . . and implacable enough to stand up to anything and anyone under the gods' heavens who opposed any decision he made.

  I can't fill those shoes! her mind gibbered in terror. I don't even understand the man wearing them!

  Then the blazing intensity in his eyes gentled, and he gave her a sad smile.

  "I hate frightening you, 'Drin. But it's better for you to know the truth, however brutal, now, not months or years down the road, when a misstep on your part could bring catastrophe to the Empire. Janaki has already faced the weight of the crown I wear—that one of you will wear in the future. Would to all the gods that I could have let you remain a child just a little longer."

  The terror in her breast turned into an ache that made breathing impossible and clogged her throat. The tears she couldn't hold back broke free, filling her with shame for letting them show, for her lack of control . . . for making her father's pain even worse. She wanted to say "I'm sorry," but her throat was too tight, too raw. So she only nodded, hoping he would understand, or at least stop looking at her through eyes filled with remorse she couldn't bear. It cut like a blade, that remorse, yet it came without a hint of apology for the necessity of what he'd said. He couldn't have not said it and continued to be worthy of his crown. She understood that, too . . . and couldn't find the words to tell him that, either.

  She had never felt like such a wretched failure in her entire life.

  Without a word, he pulled a handkerchief from a coat pocket and passed it down the table. She clutched the square of white linen as though it were a lifeline, drying her eyes and ordering the faucet behind them to stop leaking. Fighting her whole body, which ached with the need to put her head down and bawl like a lost child. Instead, she stiffened her spine, gulped several times, and got herself under control. She very carefully did not look at the distress and sympathy in the faces of the Privy Councilors, for her emotions were too precarious to risk seeing it. Instead, she met her father's gaze head-on once more, and as she did, she felt a new and special kinship with him.

  He had experienced exactly this same moment, she realized suddenly, seeing the Emperor inside the father . . . and the boy who had become the man so long ago. He knew exactly what he was doing to her, what she was enduring—must endure—because his father had done the same thing to him, and that understanding made it infinitely worse for the father who loved her. And as she looked into his eyes, saw that memory and that pain merged in their depths, she loved him more deeply than she ever had before.

  "I'm sorry for disrupting the Conclave yet again, Father," she managed to croak. "It won't happen again."

  He didn't embarrass her further by assuring her that it was quite all right, because she knew it wasn't. She desperately wanted her mother . . . and knew, without hope of regaining what she had lost, but she would never again be able to hide her face in her mother's shoulder and pretend the world wasn't waiting to hurt her again. In a roomful of people, she felt more alone than she had ever felt in her life as her father nodded and asked the Privy Voice to continue transmitting Director Limana's address.

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  The train finally cleared the congested city of Gulf Point, situated at the base of the Finger Sea, where the Gulf of Shurkhal connected that sea with the Harkalan Ocean. Even with the Crown Prince's prized locomotive, the journey had required almost ten hours, and the Voice conclave had been over for over an hour by the time they reached the city. Halidar Kinshe felt drained and exhausted, although he'd actually said very little during the conclave itself. Wilkon had kept him and the Crown Prince fully informed, and, if he was going to be honest, Kinshe had to admit that it had gone far better than he'd feared. But the generally ugly mood of the attending heads of state had not filled him with optimism. Worse, they'd resonated with his own grinding sense of responsibility and blazing need for retribution, and his mood was heavy as they approached their destination at last.

  The Gulf's busy shipping lanes carried freighters laden with goods from around the globe, making Gulf Point one of the busiest ports in the world. It took time to thread their way through the jammed city, swinging around the southwestern-most point of land to head east toward the little town where Shaylar had gone to school. It lay only thirty miles farther down the coast, but the sun had settled well into the west as the special train pulled into the small local station at last and the prince's carriage was unloaded.

  It took a little longer to get the cavalry escort's mounts off-loaded, as well, before they could set out to be Institute, and they drew curious stares from the townfolk, who recognized the royal crest on the carriage. Kinshe could see excited conversations springing up in their wake as people speculated about this unannounced royal visit, but they rode in absolute silence as they followed the road through town and out beyond it. The Cetacean Institute was visible now, another three miles ahead.

  Kinshe hadn't visi
ted this part of Shurkhal in years—decades, to be more exact. He'd stood on this shoreline as a very junior member of Shurkhal's Parliament, celebrating the opening of Shurkhal's own Cetacean Institute—the Kingdom's sole cetacean translation facility. Part embassy, but mostly research station, the Institute had been founded by Dr. Shalassar Kolmayr-Brintal. Although Shalassar was not a native-born daughter of Shurkhal, she had built a legacy in which the entire Kingdom could take pride.

  Thanks to her work, the dolphins had led Shurkhali divers to rich pearl beds which might have lain undiscovered for centuries, otherwise. Shurkhali pearls fetched excellent prices on the world market, famous for their size and luster, and Shurkhali explorers had laid claim to those to those same pearl beds in other universes, as well, increasing the Kingdom's prestige while providing income to establish Shurkhali colonies.