by Stephen Hunt
That was a diplomatic way of phrasing it. At an end as in dead, or at an end as in thrown out on my ear? Ambiguity is an art form, sometimes.
‘I will be pleased to lead the way for you, sir,’ hummed Link, ‘or SEVER YOUR FLESHY SPINAL CORD IN TWO!’
‘Well, I certainly prefer the former, given the choice,’ I sighed, raising a hand in surrender and indicating the direction of the exit.
Simenon glanced alarmed around us. The altercation had been noted by stall traders and their customers, but given the onlookers vanishing from this section of the market, I didn’t count on anyone intervening on our behalf.
‘I’m sure we’ll be fine,’ I told the lad with a confidence I didn’t feel. The warriors split into two groups, Link and the major leading the way with a rearguard of warriors behind us to make sure we didn’t try and bolt for it.
‘This is awful,’ moaned Simenon. ‘What do they want from you, Master Roxley?’
‘That, I believe, is what we’re about to find out.’ If we survived. I took in Mozart by my side. His gaze was fixed on the crazed machine stomping out of the market, crowds of shoppers and porters scattering as they saw the giant approaching. I understood how they felt. ‘Can you take him, Moz?’
‘Better if I had a little more time, doctor.’
‘Time for what?’ asked Simenon in almost a sob.
‘Our metal friend prefers to limber up for a fight,’ I said.
‘You can’t take on the Blez,’ pleaded Simenon. ‘Even if you beat these blades, the house would just send all of their soldiers after you.’
I winked towards Mozart. ‘We can’t have that, can we?’
‘They’re not bad, as far as the great houses go, the Blez,’ added Simenon. ‘They care about the people more than most of the Four.’
I guessed that on a dive like Hexator a little noblesse oblige could go a long way. Outside, warriors mounted horses they had left tied up, their numbers swelled by fighters staking out other parts of the market. Many of the riders flourished lances with shaped charge heads capable of penetrating an energy shield. Myself, Simenon and the two robots mounted the back of a large wagon pulled by a pair of shire-horses the size of small elephants. It was quite a parade escorting us to the Blez family’s palace. I guessed they were under orders to make a show of it. Flying the flag to demonstrate their house’s power still held intact after Lord Blez’s assassination. The Blez family’s palace, it transpired, lay on the eastern side of the capital. Spread across a series of hills, dominated by a grand mine-like entrance. Several surface structures on the slopes in the way of turrets with lightning-conductors, walled gardens, battlements, training grounds and stables resting between the fungi woods. Said woodland towered seventy feet tall. Radiating a gentle green glow under the starlight, wavy shapes that put me in mind of out-sized seaweed. Braziers lit the Blez battlements, smoke trailing out into the nebulae-scattered sky. Our honor guard stabled their horses while Major Rolt and a smaller escort – including Link – marched us through the well-guarded entrance. Electric lights flickered erratically inside, as much a symbol of wealth as the tapestries and legions of servants flowing about the palace. Retainers, soldiers, workers, the complete panoply of flunkies expected of one of the ruling families. We passed charcoal-stinking furnace rooms where workers burned combustible fungal wood, creating steam to turn the ancient generator turbines, power men stripped to the waist and dripping sweat. Kitchens emitted the more pleasing scent of baking bread and roasting meats. Through long galley passages where courtiers stood gossiping or sat on nook seats working on embroidery boards. Others reading poetry aloud from heavy leather-bound books. Such was the state of high culture on Hexator.
We ended our march inside a large hall. A boy sat at the end of a long table in a chair much too large for him, perhaps twelve or thirteen years old, pushing lead figures of soldiers around the table-top. The bored child was meant to be eating from the impossibly generous selection of meats, fruits and drinks clustered about him. A group of musicians played for his pleasure in the corner of the hall, performing a piece I didn’t recognize. I would have joined in, but I didn’t have a flute anymore. Only Mozart.
Major Rolt approached the table and bowed before the child. ‘Master Rendor. My Lord Blez. Master Roxley has arrived for you.’
The newly raised Lord Blez looked up at me, peering slightly shortsightedly in my direction. It occurred to me I hadn’t seen anyone wearing glasses on Hexator. His hair was a sandy brown, a soft round face that hadn’t witnessed an inch of hardship in his life. The most notable thing about the lad was the slight tan on his cheeks. From an imported UV lamp, no doubt, to further set him apart from his albino subjects. ‘Have you come to help me with the battle?’
‘Battle, my lord?’ I said.
Lord Blez pushed over a handful of the lead figures. ‘There goes the Derechor’s best troops. Running like cowards. I’ve sent them packing.’
I felt my heart sink. How long would this stripling last in the bloody game of kings fought between the Four Families? It would take more than lead figures to keep him alive when his father’s killers chose to tidy up loose ends. But saving this boy wasn’t my mission here. History had sadly proved me singularly unequal to such a duty. I noted Simenon staring in disbelief at the ruler. Most of Simenon’s life had been spent scuttling clear of brutes from the great houses. And here he was, staring at one of his noble masters – only a few years younger than himself – and little interested in engaging with the harsh practicalities of the darkness outside his palace walls. I noted my guide was trembling. Then I discovered the object of his fear descending a set of stairs behind the grand feasting table.
‘His lordship has finished his breakfast. It is time for him to complete his conquest of the Derechors in his apartment before his tutors turn up.’ It was a woman who spoke with that deep falsetto. What a woman she was. Statuesque, powerful and toned like an athlete. Towering six-and-a-half feet tall, the same tanned skin as the boy. Golden hair tied up high like a Greek goddess. An expensive blue gown which matched her clever eyes. Nothing about her refined tiger-like beauty accidental. I guessed she had an enhanced IQ to match. Whatever sophisticated DNA editing arranged by her ancestors had held true over the generations. Not just born to command. Genetically designed to command. So, this is Lady Alice Blez? I approved.
‘Mother, I can’t beat them that quickly. It will take hours.’
‘Education is not the filling of a pail, but the lighting of a fire,’ said the woman. Rendor Blez was ushered up the stairs – somewhat reluctantly – and out of the hall by a gaggle of servants. Leaving us with the real power behind the throne of the Blez family.
‘Doctor Roxley,’ said the woman. ‘Your passport speaks well of your talents.’
‘As a merchant, Lady Blez?’ I probed. ‘Honest and true.’
‘As an ex-magistrate for Arius. A medical examiner, as well.’
‘I prosper in private service now, my lady,’ I said, tempering my words. ‘A humble trader living out his final years.’
‘A trader who can have his licenses withdrawn,’ smiled the grandee. I was impressed. She managed to pass those words from her ruby lips as though they weren’t a threat. So, where is my carrot? I had to stop myself staring at the noblewoman. I could drink her beauty like a wine all day long. The effect was almost as intoxicating, too. ‘Or benefit from the House of Blez’s favour in the auctions. I don’t need a merchant’s help.’ Ah, there it is.
I bowed towards her, in much the same manner as Drake must have once supplicated himself before an imperious Elizabeth. ‘What do you need, my lady?’
‘Answers, initially,’ said Lady Blez. ‘Follow me.’ She glanced towards Mozart and as a final afterthought took in Simeon’s grubby presence too. ‘I suppose you can bring your people along, too. I was under the impression I owned most of the mechanicals worth possessing on Hexator.’
‘What,’ I smiled, following quickly behind the woman as she s
trode away, ‘this old ruster? Barely functional.’
I heard Mozart’s exhaust fans rattle in irritation at being impugned.
‘Are you sure you won’t sell him to me?’ asked Lady Blez.
‘I would be too afraid he’d steal your silver and claim I’d put him up to it when you caught him.’
Lady Blez snorted and glanced back at her own metal gargantuan. Link trailed after her bodyguard, thumping across the flagstones like a walking bulldozer. ‘Do you know in the early days of our people here, we actually pitted our rusters against each in the arena as sport? Such a waste of resources.’
I was quite impressed how my own “resource” managed to keep his voice-box silent at her admission. Mozart was used to such attitudes out in the Empty, every bit as antiquated as his present body.
We strolled through the Blez palace, full of faded glories from their lost age, as much symbols of the house’s power as the large indoor arboretum we passed. I halted a second to smell the green space; an enclosed botanical garden, a fully stocked fruticetum complete with hydroponic lamps. I was willing to wager that little of the lady’s wine cellar contained aftertastes of mushroom soup. We descended lower into the palace’s hidden levels, before her bruising demolition robot hung back, signalling we had arrived at our destination. A pair of copper-plated doors opened, and another large hall lay beyond.
‘Professor Muilen,’ announced Lady Blez for the benefit of the chamber’s sole occupant as we entered.
This was what passed for a laboratory on Hexator if the tall old loon capering over crowded benches of gadgets and equipment – his green robes bearing the all-seeing-eye emblem of a scienceer – was anything to go by. That single eye stitched inside the light-shrouded pyramid seemed a lot more lucid than the scienceer’s. His gaze flitted restlessly about his lab, settling on myself and Moz with irritated dissatisfaction. ‘Visitors, my lady? Already.’
‘This is Master Roxley. Here with the blessings of the family. You were informed the merchant would be coming?’
‘You, informed. Yes, I was.’ The man trotted protectively to a torpedo-like object in the middle of the lab. A rusting gray capsule, twelve feet long with a transparent top, besieged by black battery packs that reeked of bad eggs. An old suspended animation system ripped out of a ship which predated the foldspace transit era. I touched the crystal surface and withdrew my hand quickly, lucky not to leave behind the skin of my hand. Freezing on its surface, too. Malfunctioning. No sleeper inside, though, not if its control readouts were to be believed. Instead, a corpse barely visible through the frosted top.
‘I do believe this man is dead,’ I announced.
‘Very droll,’ said the Lady Blez.
‘Not your husband?’
‘Of course not. We gave my husband a lord’s burial, not the indignity of being tossed in a freezer like so much meat. This was my husband’s food taster, Enzel Haid. This poor man died a month before the Lord Blez was gunned down.’
A failed assassination attempt made earlier? Interesting. ‘Poisoned, presumably?’
‘We think so, but we haven’t been able to identify the poison used.’
Alice Blez’s manic scienceer, Muilen, paced frustratedly behind the suspension capsule. ‘Yes, yes. I have prayed to Risha for guidance on the toxins behind hyperaemia … I am very close to identifying the agent.’
I heard Mozart snort softly to himself. He was right in his scorn. Risha? The Goddess of Forensic Pathology wasn’t listening, not out here in the Empty. Lady Blez’s scienceer was a one-man member of his own cargo cult. I blamed the scienceer for this lunacy. He had probably jacked too much information into the black-market m-brain knock-off cut into his skull. None of his ingested data clean or blessed. It was a challenge, even back in the Humanitum, with all its advanced medical procedures. Just a sliver of a single scientific field was an ocean so deep that attempting its comprehension could crush your mind. I had once foolishly downloaded the gods’ wisdom on Calabi–Yau manifolds and foldspace topography in an attempt to understand foldship travel, packing my m-brain to its absolute capacity. I briefly appreciated the mysteries while they dwelt inside my mind, but the experience wasn’t worth the months of psychosis following my memory clearance. Each of us could be Icarus, now. Simply select your sun and burn.
I tapped the suspension capsule. ‘I fear in this instance the work of mere mortals must suffice to answer your prayers.’
Professor Muilen tugged at his long white beard and shot me a dark look. He suspected I was muscling in on his racket. In a manner of speaking, so I was. Another enemy made here, then. I intended to create quite a few more before I was done.
‘You speak like a priest,’ observed Lady Blez.
‘I was a priest once, my lady. A long time ago. I retain few active memories of that age, though.’ I could download the recollections from Modd, I suppose. Decompress earlier eras, marvel at how young I had looked and felt. But even active inside my m-brain, such remembrances were like passing around family photos from a party I had been too intoxicated to remember. Forward. Only ever forward. Even a backward glance would prove too painful.
‘So many lives. So many occupations. I forgot some foreigners actually stay alive long enough to need a full memory flush. Not us, anymore. And my husband lies prematurely dead, even by our mayfly standards. As dead as all of this.’ Alice Blez indicated the lab’s tapestry-hung walls. The walls resembled stone. Granite. In actuality, graphene nano-tubes printed in billions of discrete monolayers. The entire chamber was a huge data core for systems which hadn’t been powered or operational for many a long century. I was willing to wager that all the Four Families possessed a sad, empty ex-throne hall similar to this one. Once their ancestors had sat in judgment like demigods, the charge and power of raw information informing their every decision. Now they were rendered mere mortals, blind and blunderingly fallible. Warlords, yes. Top of the heap. But even when you won the rat race, you were still only a rat.
‘You sound bitter, my lady,’ I said.
‘And why would I not? Inuno abandoned our world. Abandoned her followers.’
I had to bite down the obvious reply that jumped into my mind. That if the Hexatorians had put more effort into maintaining and advancing their infrastructure rather than fighting each other for the lion’s share of their new home’s dwindling resources, they might not now be slumming in the dark ages. Our deities of the quantum were symbiotic bacteria; they needed healthy hosts to prosper.
Mozart was obviously thinking along similar lines. ‘Gods are like economic crashes, there’s always another flipping one around the corner,’ he muttered.
I elbowed the robot to silence. Ever was it thus. Outsiders criticized the Humanitum for allowing itself to be ruled through the agency of deities. But when gods abdicated from an area, the suffering from direct rule by the galaxy’s most prolific species of killer ape led to divine absenteeism being considered abandonment. Not liberation. Never freedom. How fitting after humanity had blessed itself with the quantum divine, that our gods’ presence over us should be like Schrödinger’s cat: simultaneously too stifling of our humanity when present, yet too dangerous for us when absent.
‘It’s small consolation for you,’ I told the Lady Blez, ‘but Inuno transcended from the universe a few centuries after leaving this moon. There were billions of followers inside the Humanitum left mourning the withdrawal of her grace.’
‘Probably not quite as mournful as the crowd of beggars starving outside my gates. You shall work for me,’ commanded the imperious Lady Blez in her silk-honeyed tones, ‘uncover the forces behind my husband’s murder.’
‘What about the capital’s Watch?’
‘When we require a boot applied to a poacher’s rear-side we turn to the Watch,’ said Lady Blez. ‘But Hexator is ruled by the Four Families, not the One Family, you understand …?’
‘I believe I do.’ Alice Blez wasn’t the only one suffering from trust issues on this world.
> ‘You can start by identifying the poison used to try to kill my husband,’ said Lady Blez.
‘I will need access to my ship inside port,’ I said. ‘Preferably without the confiscation of my goods every time I pass through customs control.’
Lady Blez nodded. ‘You will be granted free access, doctor.’
‘Very good,’ I said. ‘Then, my lady, I shall do my best to unmask your husband’s murderer for you.’
‘The Feast of Blossoms is due to be celebrated shortly,’ said Lady Blez. ‘All four families will gather at the council chambers at the old cathedral for the festival. You shall attend as my guest. Meet them and judge the wretches I must share power with.’
‘Do you suspect one house over the others?’
‘With the Blez weakened, they all benefit. Especially now, with the spore-spice auctions about to start.’
‘Let’s say I am successful in finding out who ordered your husband killed. How will you seek justice?’
‘Leave the matter of justice to me,’ said the Lady Blez. ‘There must be a balancing.’
Blood for blood, then. And I was expected to write the death warrant for whatever idiots started this feud. ‘You might spark a war, my lady.’
‘Not a war of my provoking. But war will surely follow should I prove too weak to avenge my poor dead Uance. The other houses will presume the Blez is unable to defend its holdings. There will be raids, attacks, then my responses to such effronteries. This world doesn’t need more famine. We don’t need extra troubles on Hexator. It won’t be the households of the Four who suffer, safe and fed behind their walls. It will be our people, and they have already suffered more than I can stand to stomach. The question isn’t is blood to be spilled, it is whose blood and how much? I want an example set, doctor, not a war started. Please do not give me the latter.’
With this dark promise to ponder she dismissed me. I departed alongside Mozart and Simenon. The lad seemed overwhelmed by occupying the close vicinity of the dreaded Lady Blez.