The Lost King

by Margaret Weis

  "But when the process of genetic improvements began, the repressors tried to imitate it, tried to create their own superhumans for their own purposes. The scientists had foreseen this and reacted to keep the process under control. They developed tests that enabled them to determine who was one of the Blood Royal and who was, so to speak, a cheap imitation."

  Dion stirred restlessly, scowling, and Maigrey paused a moment to study him. She knew well enough what he was thinking and he would have his answer. He had to learn to be patient. But it wasn't that which drew her notice. It was the cobalt blue eyes, the flaming red-golden hair that tumbled about the face like a lion's mane, the crease between the feathery reddish brown brows, the high forehead and cheekbones, the sensually curving lips. Looking into his face was to look into the face of another, the face of her one, dear, true friend. Maigrey seemed to see that face against a backdrop of flame and horror. . . .

  Swiftly, she looked away.

  "As time went by, and the process of genetic altering evolved, the Blood Royal began to control itself. They wanted to keep their line pure. Marriages were arranged only after the most rigorous computer searches. A man who was weak in certain areas sought a woman who made up for them. Occasionally, of course, this didn't work. The divine spark, as I said.

  "By this time, the test had become a part of the culture of the Blood Royal, getting mixed up along the way with rites of passage and bar mitzvahs and eventually, in some parts of the galaxy, the test lost all of its original intent. About this time, the Order of Adamant began its rise to power.

  "The Blood Royal were designed to be rulers, but no one foresaw that they would become rulers of the soul as well as the body. Charismatic, strong, and powerful, the priests and priestesses of the Order of Adamant spread the worship of the Creator throughout the galaxy.

  "They brought continuity and conformity into the lives of people of varying cultures, particularly into the lives of the Blood Royal, who were often called upon to leave one world and marry into another that was vastly different. Religion was often the only thing the wedded couple had in common.

  The old test became one of the first rituals to be taken over by the Order. They standardized it and added their own touches, so that, in the time of your uncle, the king"—Maigrey added that little touch to calm the boy and subtly remind him again of the serious nature of what she was saying—"the test had become a true rite of passage, a solemn ceremony that was often attended by prophecies and . . . and such like."

  Maigrey coughed and cleared her throat. One of the guards, with quiet efficiency, brought her a glass of water.

  "Thank you," she said, smiling at the guard.

  The centurion, from his expression, took that smile as a gift. Dion knew how he felt. Cold and proud and strong, the woman seemed at the same time vulnerable and fragile. The boy longed with every fiber of his being to comfort her sorrow, protect her from danger. Yet the idea of putting his arm around her, of touching her seemed appalling, irreverent. He would have as soon embraced a . . . comet. The young man was consumed more by the impulse to offer his body to her as a living shield, to throw himself between her and whatever threatened her. Dion saw on the face of the centurion that same desire. And Maigrey had probably never spoken five words altogether to the man.

  Before Dion knew quite what he was doing, he was out of his chair and down on his knees beside her.

  "My lady, you're so unhappy! Let me— Tell me what I can do—"

  Maigrey smiled at him. Then her lips tightened, the scar flamed red. Reaching out, she took hold of his jaw in her hand and gripped it tightly. Her nails cut his flesh. She turned his face to hers.

  "Look within yourself, Dion! What you are experiencing is the power of the Blood Royal. Someday, the way you feel about me is the way other people will feel about you."

  She shoved him backward, away from her, and curled up in her chair, brooding.

  Catching his balance, Dion rubbed his stinging skin and stared at her. He was half-angry. He'd been brutally rebuffed, his pride had been hurt. He wasn't certain he understood her words. Maigrey didn't glance at him, but sat wrapped in a shroud of dark and bitter silence. Slowly, Dion rose to his feet and made his way back to his chair. He sat down and, drawing back his hand from his chin, saw blood on his fingers.

  "So," Maigrey said abruptly, "that is why Sagan wants you to undergo the rite."

  "What's it like? What happens?"

  "I can't tell you. It's a secret, sacred to God. A curse is said to fall on those who reveal it." Noticing his exasperated frown, Maigrey added, "I can tell you this much: Often the Creator will speak to the priest or give some sign of His will and intent for the life that comes before Him. This is what Sagan's hoping for, I believe."

  "The Creator's will," Dion muttered, wiping the blood on his pant leg, hoping she didn't notice. "I can't believe in some myth." He kept his face averted from her, rubbing his hand back and forth along his jaw where he could feel the scraping stubble of a beard whose golden color rendered it invisible to all eyes but his. "What about me? What about what I want? My own will? You and Sagan seem to think I haven't got one."

  "You have a will of your own, Dion. But that doesn't negate the fact that there is another Will, a Higher Power which says 'You can be more than you are. I know, for I made you.' Often the two struggle together—every child rebels against his parent and the struggle is good, for it's only in questioning and pushing and testing our own limits that we come to know ourselves, that we become strong. And we can fight against it all we want, but there comes a time when man must bow his head and say to God, 'Not my will, but thine, be done. "

  "So how do you know which is which?"

  "I think, eventually, we come to know." Maigrey sighed and looked far away, into another part of the ship, into another heart. "It is for those who know and who continue the fight that the struggle becomes bitter.

  "We like to see ourselves as suns," she added, speaking almost to herself. "We want to be worshiped as life-givers, feared as destroyers. But though each sun possesses an immense, fiery radiance, its light eventually fades over distance and time, and all of the stars together are powerless to illuminate the vast and empty darkness."

  Nevertheless, whispered like an echo in Dion's ears, not my will, but thine, be done.

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Lachende Lowen miissen kommen.

  Friedrich Nietzsche, Die Bergrussung

  As Maigrey had told Dion, the struggle between knowing the will of God and submitting to the will of God was a bitter one. Sagan had followed his Lord's commands because they coincided with his own desires. Now, he was beginning to see that there might be a clash of wills. The Warlord claimed to want to know the mind of God. In reality, he feared he knew and sought to change it.

  When Derek Sagan had completed his mental conversation with the lady, he summoned the captain of his personal guard.

  "When I shut this door"—the Warlord indicated the outer door that led to his chambers—"no one is to pass. No one. For any reason."

  "Very good, my lord."

  "Any messages, no matter how urgent, are to be delivered to you. You will deliver them to me when I ask for them."

  "Yes, my lord." The centurion saluted, fist over his heart.

  Sagan caused the door to slide closed and sealed it from the inside. He shut his computer down, switched off all communications and signaling devices. He took off his armor, packed the bloodsword away.

  There was, in the Warlord's quarters, a secret chamber that, if Captain Nada had known of its existence, would have gained him enormous credit with President Robes and ended the career and undoubtedly the life of Warlord Derek Sagan. It was a small, private chapel, and no one, not even Admiral Aks, was aware of its existence. Those who had supervised its construction believed they were building a vault to hold the wealth of solar systems. So it did, but it was a wealth that had been collected over the centuries and had nothing to do with gold.

 
His body stripped naked, Sagan entered the chamber through a door that was activated by a security device which functioned similarly to the bloodsword. When the palm was placed on five needles protruding from the pad, a virus identical to the one in the sword was injected into the bloodstream. It flowed harmlessly through Sagan's body. Had it entered any other body—Captain Nada's body, for example—the captain would have been writhing on the deck in extreme agony.

  Entering the vault, Sagan caused the door to shut and seal behind him. Certain it was secure, he approached an altar made of a block of obsidian that had been left rough on the sides and was ground smooth to a polished finish on top. It was pitch dark inside the vault; no artificial light was permitted to shine on the sacrosanct. Sagan needed no light to see what was before him. A small dish holding rare and costly perfumed oil, a silver chalice decorated with eight-pointed stars, and a silver dagger whose hilt was an eight-pointed star were arranged on top of the altar. Folded neatly beneath it were robes made of the finest black velvet—a priest-father's only legacy to his bastard son.

  Standing before the altar, Sagan raised his hands and invoked God. He dressed himself in the robes, kissing the cloth reverently before he put them on as he had been taught. Kneeling upon a black silken cushion fringed with gold, the emblem of the phoenix embroidered on it in threads of gold and crimson, he struck a match and lit the oil. A blue and yellow flame illuminated the dark chapel, filling the air with the heady fragrance of incense.

  Sagan stared into the flame long moments, composing his mind. Then he shoved back the sleeve of his left arm, revealing the muscular, sinew-lined wrist and forearm. The smooth skin, always hidden by gauntlets, was marked with numerous ugly scars, all of the same peculiar nature. Long ago, these scars had been the marks of the priests and priestesses of the Order of Adamant. Now they were marks of death, for that order was outlawed and anyone found with these telltale scars was swiftly and summarily executed.

  Sliding his fingers through the openings left between the points of the star that was its hilt, Sagan grasped the dagger with his right hand and, with a swift, deft motion, slashed open the flesh of his left arm. Blood flowed, pumped from the heart. The Warlord held his arm over the chalice. The flame's unwavering light glistened off the pulsating liquid dripping into the cup. When the chalice was full, Derek placed his wounded arm in the fire and whispered a prayer, his lips pressed tightly together to keep from crying out with the pain. The fire seared the flesh, sealing the cut; the bleeding ceased.

  Light-headed from blood loss and the agony of the burn, Derek leaned his elbows on the altar for support, lifted his head, and commenced his argument with God.

  Dion was confined to his quarters, not by any orders of the Warlord's, but on Maigrey's recommendation that he take this time to meditate and think and try to resolve the turmoil in his soul. The young man lay on his bed and stared up at the underside of the metal deck above his head.

  He wished he had his syntharp, but it was aboard Tusk's spaceplane. The young man'd had no choice but to leave it behind. Dion tried to listen to the ship's music, but it was Platus's music he heard, and that made him feel angry and then guilty because he felt angry. He finally shut it off and listened to the silence that wasn't silence in the gigantic battle cruiser but a composite of sounds blended together into white noise which was, he discovered, oddly soothing.

  Lying on the bed, Dion wrestled with questions: Who am I? Why am I here? Where am I going? Does Someone know for certain or I am drifting in chaos?

  "Mankind has pondered these questions for centuries. I'm supposed to answer them in three days?" Dion asked a light fixture.

  The light fixture provided only its own brand of illumination, nothing beyond. Lady Maigrey had been no help either.

  "You have to find the answer yourself, Dion. I can't tell you what to believe."

  "Platus told me what not to believe," the boy countered.

  "Did he? Or did he ask you to study, to question, to seek the truth? Instead of seeking it, perhaps you decided that it didn't exist."

  Dion recalled the hours he and Platus had spent reading the Koran, the Bible, the writings of Buddha. And then there'd been Thomas Aquinas, Jean-Paul Sartre, Descartes, Schopenhauer, Nietzsche. Yes, he realized, they'd been searching for truth—the teacher as much as the pupil.

  Alone in the humming silence, Dion thought he was beginning at last to come to know Platus and, as he did so, his anger started to die. The Guardian had done what he'd thought was right. After all the horror he'd seen, after the tragedy he'd faced, could Platus be blamed for losing his faith? Dion wondered if now, after death, Platus had discovered that for which he was searching.

  The days passed. Sagan struggled with God, Dion searched for God. Maigrey pointedly ignored Him. He'd brought her here for do purpose other than to torment her. He was allowing the kind and innocent people of Oha-Lau to suffer beneath the lash. He'd dropped the boy right into the palm of Sagan's hand.

  She possessed all the touted mystical powers of the Blood Royal—the mental gifts that made locked doors a mockery, guards laughable. She could walk out that door—hell, she could walk through that door—this instant and no one except Derek Sagan could stop her. And he was, she knew, completely preoccupied, locked in battle with a redoubtable foe—her foe. The Foe that had given her the means to escape a prison of steel and then chained her to the walls with a silken thread. She could batter down the steel doors, she could flee Phoenix, flee this solar system, flee the galaxy, but the thread would be impossible to break. It was wound around her soul.

  Maigrey continued reading Little Dorrit.

  For others do I wait ... for higher ones, stronger ones: . . . laughing lions must come!

  The words were disjointed, no longer made sense. Laughing lions. Dion flung Nietzsche across the room. He'd had enough He showered and dressed himself in an Air Corps pilot's uniform Sagan had sent to him to replace his faded blue jeans. The young man dragged a comb through the tangled mane of flamming red-golden hair; having no patience with the snarls, he yanked them out, though it brought tears to his eyes. He smoothed minute wrinkles from the high-collared, black, red-trimmed uniform. Its impeccable tailoring accentuated his height and his lithe, muscular form. Dion studied himself in the mirror and decided that, when all was said and done, he looked like a king. Going to the door, he slammed his hand hard on the control. The panel slid open and he sprang out swiftly, hoping to startle the guards who were standing at relaxed attention on either side.

  Beyond a flicker of the eyelid and the glance of the eyeball his direction, neither man moved a muscle. Dion wondered what would make them respond. The detonation of a nuclear warhead right in front of them, he decided, or the sudden appearance of the Warlord.

  "I suppose," the young man said, shaking back the flame-red hair out of his face, "that there is some sort of recreation lounge on board?"

  "Several," the guard answered. He did not, Dion noticed, say "my lord" or "sir" or even "young sir." The young man might have put such a lack of respect down to the fact that he was a prisoner, except that Lady Maigrey was always "my lady," spoken with almost the same inflection of near reverence that the men accorded to Lord Sagan.

  Dion chafed against his youth and inexperience, but Platus's teaching had taught him enough to realize that such respect must be earned and could not be dictated. Swallowing his resentment, he clarified. "A bar?"

  The guard raised an eyebrow and glanced at his fellow. Dion felt a moment's elation. At last he'd gained a response—even if it was only surprise.

  "I want to go there," he said before the surprise wore off. "I believe Lord Sagan gave orders that I am to have complete freedom of the ship, provided, of course, that you accompany me."

  One of the guards spoke into a commlink. The answer came back almost instantly. "Lord Sagan has left orders not to be disturbed."

  "Come on," Dion urged. "What can it hurt? It's not like I want to visit some classified or restricted area
. I'm seventeen. I've been to bars before."

  Well, he'd been to one bar. Link had taken him (making him swear never to tell Tusk). The place was noisy and smoky, dark, confusing, and exciting—all of which sounded quite soothing to Dion now.

  "The Warlord did say the kid could go where he chose."

  "I can't see any harm in it. You stay with him. I'll go file our daily."

  "Okay, kid. This way." The centurion indicated that Dion was to turn to his left, and the two proceeded down the corridor.

  "What's your name?" Dion asked the guard.

  The centurion appeared reluctant to answer.

  "You can at least tell me your name. It gets . . . lonely . . . sometimes." Dion hadn't meant to admit to that, felt his cheeks burn.

  "Marcus. My name is Marcus."

  Pleased that he'd made a dent in the armor, Dion glanced around at the man. "That name's Roman, isn't it?"

  "All of those chosen to be centurions have names of Roman origin. Lord Sagan awards them to us when we are accepted into the Honor Guard."

  "I notice you're wearing a Scimitar pin. Were you a pilot?"

  "I still am." Marcus appeared amazed that Dion could ask such an inane question. "All Lord Sagan's personal guard are seasoned pilots. The best in the fleet." He spoke with the quiet, unconscious pride of men who know they don't have to boast about their achievements.

  Dion began to realize that these men performed menial tasks—such as escorting a prisoner to a bar—without complaint because they knew that at a moment's notice they might be called to escort their commander to glorious victory.

  The full implication of what Sagan had accomplished struck Dion with such force he nearly stumbled over his feet. The Warlord had provided himself with his own personal army—an army that was intensely loyal to him and him alone. The hell with the President. Damn the Congress. To the devil with the Republic. These men were Sagan's, body and soul.