“I tried that.” He sank back into his chair. “The cyphers are the sign. They mark us as different, as destined, and believe me when I say I understand that burden. You,” he said without accusation, “are famous for your willfulness. You refused everything you had—which was literally everything anyone could want—in favor of only that which you chose to earn.” He sketched a salute. “Kudos to you, princess, but you’ve never understood that we don’t get to choose our lives. We only get to choose what we do with them. You are a Relic Knight, and a responsibility comes with that.” He held out his arm, and Caesar glided gently to him. “It isn’t all power and glory. We all have to pay for it at some point.”
“I earned all I’ve got,” she said almost before she realized it.
“I know,” he replied quietly. “So did I. But these,” he indicated the cyphers, “aren’t rewards. The Peers have a saying, ‘The work does not end with praise; praise heralds more work.’ The esper doesn’t choose you because you helped widows and orphans.”
Kenobo cleared his throat, and Harker nodded.
“Yes, yes, the esper doesn’t technically ‘choose’ anyone. But your cypher and your relic aren’t the fruits of long labor. They’re the tools of still greater work to come. You are uniquely suited to do something momentous in this last, dark chapter of history. You can either run from that,” and now he fixed his gaze on her eyes, “or you can embrace it.”
She blinked again and glanced away. “Once more, and this—” She put her hands up to prevent questions. “This doesn’t mean what you think it does, but I really need to know. Why me?”
He stared for a few long heartbeats. “At first, I didn’t think it needed to be you. The, um, signs, if you will, that I saw were so general that I thought they could apply to almost any Knight, as you’ve said.” He stroked Caesar’s feathers. “That’s why I’ve failed twice before to halt the Calamity. I need at least two other Knights, and apparently I need specific characteristics in each of them.” He leaned back, thinking. “‘Fast enough to outrun life and death, strong enough to accept sacrifice, and pure enough to care nothing for glory.’ I think that’s how it goes.” He smiled at her. “It’s a poor translation of what’s rather good poetry in the original language, but that fits you, I think.”
Malya quirked an eyebrow. “If you say so, but that really could be anyone.” She glanced at her friends, but all of them looked on with speculative, approving expressions.
“No, that’s her,” Rin said, “whether she knows it or not. But what about the other one? You said there was another.”
“Yes,” Harker said dryly. “Also surprisingly specific. That line talks about strength of character and leadership and a spirit so strong that only it could break itself. It’s much less effective poetry, honestly, but as best I can tell it fits only one Knight that I’ve ever heard of.” His forearm comm beeped again, and he regarded the display for a few seconds before tapping it. He glanced back up but at Malya instead of Rin. “Sebastian Cross, First of his Order.”
The princess laughed, just once, harshly. Harker waited, watching placidly.
“Wait, really?”
Harker nodded, and she laughed again.
“You’ve got to be kidding me.”
Harker shook his head.
“The Sebastian Cross. Paladin of the Six Peers. First Paladin of the Shattered Sword.”
Harker nodded.
“The literal poster boy for the galaxy-spanning organization of militarized do-gooders?”
“I see you’ve heard of him.”
“That’s why you attacked us,” Betty said. Everyone looked at her, and she shrank back, but Lug gave her an encouraging push. “I mean, it makes sense. You needed the princess, and maybe you could have asked, but when else would you have been able to get close or even have a hope of convincing her?”
Harker agreed and waved for her to continue.
“And what better way to get the paladins’ attention than to kidnap the Crown Princess of Ulyxis and reigning Cerci Prime champion?” She grinned at the sheer audacity of it. “I mean, who else but Cross is going to come after you?”
“Who indeed?” Harker said, smiling himself.
“You slimy, conniving . . .” Malya said, though even she could not muster much anger.
Harker shrugged.
“There’s a flaw in that plan, though. Whenever Lord Cross figures out where we are, he’s going to come in guns blazing. You won’t have time to convince him that this is all an elaborate scheme to try and save the world.”
“Very true, your highness,” Harker replied, letting Caesar hop up onto the back of his chair. “That’s why you’re going to convince him.”
Malya finally sat, stunned, in the chair beside her. “What?”
Harker shook his head as he stood. “I’m so very sorry, your highness. I had hoped to spend more time on this, to show you the evidence I’ve gathered, to introduce the arguments more slowly. I expected to have at least another week, but events—as I said—have proceeded faster than anticipated.” He spoke an alien word and the hologram shifted again. Their location expanded and a projected flight plan appeared as a ghostly trail extending to the galaxy’s edge with three highlighted points along the way. “We had carefully left rumors and vague hints of our intents, destination, and likely path, all intended for Cross to figure out how to find us. He had to think that we were sincere in our abduction, or he would suspect a trap.”
“He figured it out early, didn’t he?” Malya asked. She glanced at Rin, but the sniper had returned to staring at the dark end of the room.
“He did,” Harker replied ruefully. “I’ll have to remember that about him. In any case, we have detected drag buoys near our course, likely placed by the paladins.” The first highlighted point glowed more brightly. “I had expected that he would not reach us until we had passed one of these points. But . . .” He shrugged and turned to Malya, his expression earnest and appealing. “I know I’ve had no time to actually convince you, so I must again ask you to go on faith. I know you and Cross are the Knights I need. I have details of how the Calamity will reach this galaxy that will give us a chance to stop it. What’s more, I now know where it will appear.”
“But I don’t,” she said. “I know we have to do something, yes. I have to—” She looked away for a second before she could go on. “I’m not arguing that. But I don’t know what you’re planning. I don’t have any idea if it will work. Without more to go on, how can I believe it, let alone convince Sebastian?”
“Because Captain Harker believes it, and he will go with or without you,” said a clear, sibilant voice from the shadows.
Everyone turned as another line of lamps kindled and quickly gained the strength to dispel the shadows. The woman who approached through the growing light wore a richly embroidered silk cloak and hood and a few bits of carefully arranged equipment. Water mixed with amber esper swirled and flowed through the sculpted armor across her chest and the attached apparatus at her throat. It cast an eerie, mottled glow across her face. A long wooden staff, twisted and gnarled like coral, tapped the decking beside her bare feet.
“He has fought and run for cycles upon cycles,” she continued. “But he knows that this is the time to stand. Likely he will fail, if you do not go.” She stopped several paces from them. An amphibious cypher with huge, frog-like red eyes peeked out from behind her cloak. “But he will go, nevertheless. Because he believes.” She cocked her head. The lamplight shimmered strangely off of her pale blue-green skin. “Now you must.”
Harker looked genuinely embarrassed. “Forgive me. Some of my friends and crew have unusual needs, and I do my best to accommodate them. Soliel values her privacy.”
“And I have long and gratefully valued your consideration, my captain,” she said with clear appreciation. Frost-white esper motes floated around her head. “But there is no longer time for reticence.”
Rin spoke Malya’s thoughts. “And just who are you?”
The strange woman cocked her head slightly, regarding the sniper as if she could see through the human’s skin to the sub-atomic things that made her real. “I’m the witch.”
Harker cleared his throat. “Lady Soliel has been many things in her life: scholar, archeologist, navigator, soldier, and that’s just since I’ve known her. Currently she is my councilor. Her connection to the esper is, um . . .” He struggled for a word. “Shifted. Warped is perhaps better. She sees esper and the world differently.”
“And with the correct aid, what I see tells me that Captain Harker can succeed,” Soliel finished.
“I—” Malya hesitated, licking her lips. “I’d like—I want to believe he can. But it sounds like we’ve only got one shot at this.” She glanced at her crew. “And before I put anyone else on the line here, I need to know more. Just one thing,” she said to Harker, almost pleading. “Give me one good reason to believe that we can actually do it.”
Harker pursed his lips, considering, but Soliel answered for him. “Because, highness, he has nearly succeeded twice before.”
Everyone’s heads swiveled first to her and then to Harker. Even Moffet looked surprised.
“And this time, he will have you.”
Malya nodded. “Well. That will do.”
She sighed deeply and saw Mr. Tomn looking at her. He had a smile like she had not seen since she decided to leave Ulyxis. She found herself smiling back.
“Okay. Now we just need to convince the paladin. Don’t know what I’m going to say to him.”
Harker’s comm beeped again, and he glanced at it. “Well, you’ll figure it out, I expect.”
A warning chime echoed through the ship, and Mr. Digby’s voice followed it. “Attention all hands. Attention all hands. Brace for real-space transition in ten seconds. Transition in ten seconds.”
Malya shot a glare at Harker. “Now? Are you serious?”
“I’m afraid so, highness,” he replied, gripping the arms of his chair. “I did say the paladin was cleverer than I thought.”
The Marianne shook and actually lurched as she shifted fully back into reality, likely part of the force from the drag buoys, Malya thought. The holographic display immediately blinked and reappeared with a real-time image of the space immediately around the vessel. Malya watched as the three other corsair ships emerged from slip space around them, represented by golden wedges with ID and telemetry information above them. She noted nearly a dozen sickly green wedges arrayed before them, all positioned to block the easiest run paths to slip space. The largest wedge maneuvered toward them. Without thinking, Malya glanced out of the armored glass to see a true stellar behemoth turning its port broadside on them.
“That,” Moffet said into the silence, “is a Valorous-class battlecruiser. There’s supposed to be only three of them in service and six more in the yards.” She turned to Harker with a look of genuine surprise and, almost, satisfaction. “We couldn’t have pissed them off that much, could we?”
Harker pushed to his feet and moved to the windows. “I wouldn’t have thought so. At least they’re taking this seriously.” His comm beeped again, and he smiled as he glanced at it. “Yes, Mr. Digby. Put him through.”
The holodisplay flickered again and resolved into the upper torso and crossed arms of a serious-looking human man. He wore the paladin’s dusky brown shipboard uniform though the hologram’s strange color tinted it a dull gray, along with his—probably—brown hair. His eyes came through as piercing hazel, and his voice lost nothing of its authority or power in transmission.
“Attention Captain Harker, this is the Shattered Sword ship Inexorable Justice. In the name of the Six Peers and by the authority of the United Planetary Alliance, you are placed under arrest and ordered to heave to. Lock your weapons, power down your engines, and stand by to be boarded.”
Harker rolled his eyes but only slightly. “If I had a half-credit for every time I heard that,” he muttered. “Well your highness, you’re on.”
“What? Me?”
Harker arched an eyebrow, and Malya cursed.
“Fine. Where do I stand?”
He pointed to a spot on the floor and she shifted over. Almost immediately, the holographic paladin blinked and readjusted his gaze.
“Ah, hello,” Malya said. She swore she could hear a slight echo in her voice and wondered where the pickups were hidden. “Hello. Um, this is, I mean—” She cleared her throat, squared her shoulders, and imagined one of the many dignitaries that her father disliked and she loathed on the other end of the transmitters. “I am Malya Ulyxani, Crown Princess of Ulyxis, three-time Cerci Prime champion, and Relic Knight.” She could not have said why she included all of that, but she had, so she soldiered on. “I presume that you are Sebastian Cross, First of the Order of the Shattered Sword.”
A slight pause followed as the hologram pursed its lips, and the transmission delay could not account for all of the time.
“I am paladin Cross,” the man finally said, “and, I must admit, I’m slightly confused. We were told you had been abducted by pirates from the starliner Tranquil Wind. I can’t say I expected to find you answering communications from a corsair vessel or quite so,” he lifted a hand toward her, “formally dressed.”
“Yes, well.” She glanced at Harker, who shrugged. “It’s been an interesting week. I’m sure you’re anxious to blast the Marianne and the rest out of the stars, but I’d appreciate it if you held off on that.”
“I’m sure you’d like to leave the ship first,” Cross said dryly. “And I can assure you and the good Captain Harker that I’m much more interested in prisoners than I am casualties. If he and his crews surrender, I’ll see that they—”
“That—” Malya paused, almost as surprised by her interruption as the paladin. “That isn’t what I meant. Captain Harker did not, exactly, kidnap me.”
Cross evidently refused to be surprised or put off by anything. He simply crossed his arms again and waited.
“I—I came along willingly.” She gestured toward Harker. “He approached me in the middle of the battle—saved my life, actually—and told me he had a way to stop the Calamity from destroying this galaxy.”
“He did,” Cross said in a flat, even tone.
Malya nodded. “Yeah. And then, when we talked it over, he said that he had figured out where that was going to happen and how—well, sort of—and about when, I guess.”
“I see,” Cross said.
Malya licked her lips. “Yeah.” She paused and glanced at Harker again. “It does sound kind of silly when I say it out loud.”
“Did he explain how the Calamity would come or how he would stop it?”
She looked up at the image of Sebastian Cross and noticed that a small head had peeked over his shoulder. A second later, an armored cypher—its face almost completely obscured by a knightly helmet—rose beside the paladin and regarded them intently over the link.
“Well, no,” she admitted. “We hadn’t had a chance to get to that yet.”
Cross nodded slowly and sighed. “Very well. Your highness, I applaud your bravery and desire to aid the galaxy, but I fear that you’re simply too trusting. We and other specialists have long studied the Calamity, and we’ve found no way to—”
Harker snarled, tapped his comm, and stepped to another spot on the floor. “You smug, self-important fool. You think because you and your Doctrine friends don’t know something then no one does. You think—”
“Shut it, both of you,” Malya shouted. She could already see where this was going.
“Your highness,” Cross said, in a measured tone that made her teeth grind, “Captain Harker is a liar and a murderer and not to be trusted. If he claims—”
Malya put her hand up, and the paladin fell silent with a look of mild surprise.
Harker shrugged again. “He’s not wrong. I am a pirate.”
“I know that. I also know,” and she turned back to Cross, “that he’s the only one of the Knights here�
��and there’s at least three of us—actually trying to stop the Calamity.”
“Highness, if he had a way to stop it, don’t you think he’d have attempted it already?”
“My lord paladin,” Malya shot back in the same patronizing tone, “what do you think he’s doing now?”
“Her highness is correct,” Harker said quickly, his hands raised and his voice conciliatory. “I have information that might let us succeed where all others have failed, but I cannot do it alone. Please, let us talk, and I will show you everything.”
Cross frowned, clearly fighting with himself. “I should arrest you all—”
“Oh, grow up,” Malya said. The echo of Harker’s words to her rang in her ears, but she refused to let it stop her. “What you should do is what you know is right, not what you’re supposed to do.”
Cross’s jaw set firm and hard. “What makes you think this is right? You said he never offered proof, so why do you believe him?”
“I—” She took a deep breath. “Proof, no, he hasn’t offered proof. But he’s got a lot of evidence. And it’s pretty compelling, even if I don’t understand all of it.” She pointed to the cypher on Cross’s shoulder. “Sometimes, you go where the esper leads. If there’s even the slightest chance that he can succeed, it would be wrong not to help.” She fixed the paladin with a hard stare. “The least you can do is hear him out.”
The cypher leaned over and whispered into Cross’s ear.
He nodded. “Agreed. Come aboard, and bring all the evidence you have. I’ll send a shuttle.”
“Lord paladin,” Captain Harker said, “you’re more than welcome—”
“You will come aboard my ship on my shuttle,” Cross said with an air of finality. “Your highness will please accompany the good captain, along with any companions you have with you.”
Just in case this doesn’t work out. “Okay, okay. It’s a deal.” She motioned to Harker, who cut the transmission. “I know it’s not everything you wanted, but you got your meeting.”
Darkspace Calamity Page 9