Sir Dominic Flandry: The Last Knight of Terra

by Poul Anderson

  "Of course," he reminded her, "we need proof. I've left my suspicions in the appropriate data bank, in case we don't return, but saw no point in telling Fenross just yet. He'd surely consider them fantastic; he has an exaggerated opinion of our aristocracy. Besides, if I'm right, the Taurian divisions of the Corps are riddled with Alfred's agents; you don't start a coup like this on the impulse of a moment. So you and I are here to infiltrate right back."

  She nodded, mute, and hugged herself as if caught in a winter wind. He rose, went to her, urged her gently to her feet, held her close and stroked her hair. "I'm sorry," he murmured. "I needn't have repeated all this to you, eh? It only told you once again what an utter bastard I am, using a beautiful young girl for a chess piece. What can I say except that I'm on the board too, and—"

  She lifted her countenance toward his. Moonlight glimmered off tears, but somehow she smiled. "Y-y-you're a nice bastard," she said.

  He laughed, a bit wistfully, before he completed his sentence: "—and we ought to have several hours ahead of us to spend as we like. Hmmm?"

  —Afterward they stood watch and watch. It was good that they did. Between midnight and morning, Ella shook Flandry awake. Silently, she pointed at the optic wall. A flitter was landing on the roof.

  He glided up and sought the weapons laid nearby. "Quick reaction," he said low. "I did expect his Grace would wait to receive me first. Let's hope this means he's rattled."

  Ella cradled a slugthrowing rifle in her arms. Slowly moving, the moon still cast her into white, unreal relief. Her tone was steady. "Could they be innocent?"

  "If so, they haven't had the courtesy to call ahead, which by itself makes me dislike them," he answered. "Here, take the rest of your gear. Come on back to the corner. Be ready to use the sofa for a shield."

  Three murky forms emerged and approached the wall. Moonbeams glittered on metal in their hands. "They look like hirelings, not regular militiamen," Flandry observed. He felt quite cool, now that action was upon him. "Well, the underworld always has been a recruiting source for revolutionaries. Let's see what they do."

  One man bore no gun, but a thing that Flandry soon recognized as a high-powered portable drill with a head of synthetic diamond. On his back was a tank. The bit made the lowest of whines as it went through the wall. He retracted it and brought a hose around from the tank. "Sleepy gas," Flandry said. "They want us for interrogation. But we'd never live to dine out on the experience afterward."

  He and Ella had masks against the contingency, but he saw no point in donning them. Nor was he in a position to conduct a quiz himself. He gave the woman her instructions and aimed his blaster. As the nozzle of the hose came through the hole, the weapon cracked. A blue-white lightning bolt pierced the wall and the intruder went down. Ella's rifle barked next to his ear, dropping the one on the right at the same time. They never knew which of them took the third, a second later; both shots struck home.

  The flitter did not stir. Flandry clicked his tongue. "Nobody left at the controls," he said. "Rank amateurism."

  He went outside to make sure the three were dead and to search for any clues. There were none to speak of, though he strengthened his impression that these had been civilians. Returning, he found Ella motionless, staring down at her weapon. "I never fired at a sophont before," she said thinly. "I never killed a man before."

  He kissed her. The lips beneath his were cold and dry. "Don't let it bother you," he counselled. "Occupational hazard in their profession, as in mine. Remember, we're trying to head off the killing of millions of innocents." He moved toward the phone. "It'd be in character for an officer of Intelligence not to want the police in, and I have the authority to order that." He punched a key. "Night manager, please.... Hello. I'm afraid we've a bit of a mess in our place. Can you have somebody come clean up?"

  The audience hall was cathedral-vaulted and ornate. Its present master had not changed it, but his more austere personality showed in the relatively streamlined ceremonies at court, and in the black-uniformed guardsmen who stood ranked along the walls. Flandry's dress garb, like the gown and veil of the young woman who followed him, outshone the appearance of the man on the throne.

  Duke Alfred was big, his frame running to paunchiness in middle age but still basically muscular, his blocky, gray-bearded face devoid of humor but alive with pride. His dossier had given Flandry a distinct idea that here was a dangerous person. Yet when the latter had snapped a salute and identified himself, Alfred said graciously enough: "At ease, Captain, and welcome in your own right as well as on his Majesty's service. Who is your company?"

  "A token of esteem for your grace," Flandry replied. Alfred's glance dropped to the control bracelet on Ella's wrist which marked and sealed her status as property. "Ella is her name, and I've found her satisfying. Now—well, I may have to trouble you a fair amount in line of duty, and wouldn't want you to feel I was being arrogant, so—" He spread his palms and grinned his smarmiest grin.

  "Well. Well, well." Alfred stroked his beard. "Let us see." Shyly, Ella lowered her veil. Appreciation kindled on his countenance. "Very good, Captain. I thank you indeed." He gestured. "Let her be well quartered." With a leer: "We'll soon get acquainted, girl, you and I."

  She smiled and curtsied in half frightened, half servile fashion. She was quite an actress, as Flandry had learned when he tested her on the trip here. A gigantic, four-armed Gorzunian slave led her out, toward the harem.

  "And what is your errand?" Alfred asked Flandry. "I've heard of you. You wouldn't be sent on any trifling matter."

  "The details are for no ears but your Grace's and your most trusted officers'," was the reply. "However, thus far I have no details, and see no harm in confessing before this assembly that I'm on rather a fishing expedition." He went on to spin a plausible tale of Merseian agents, some of human race, at large in the outer provinces for the purpose of reviving discord, and the need to track them down. Having described the incident of the previous night, he attributed it to the machinations of the opposition, implying quite clearly that his role was partly that of decoy. The bodies were now in charge of the local Corps office, in hopes that they could be identified and thus provide a lead. Nowhere did he mention Varrak, or Ella's marksmanship.

  "I've no direct knowledge of subversive activity," Alfred said after expressing appropriate shock, "but you shall certainly have every cooperation we can give you. What are your immediate needs?"

  "Nothing at once, thank you, your Grace. I'll just be sniffing around. If something comes up—" Et cetera, et cetera, until dismissal.

  The ducal palace was part of a castle, a fortress within an outer wall of fused stone, raised during the Troubles. By the time Flandry got to the outer gate, his spine was a-tingle. Alfred was not about to let him go freely hither and yon. There would surely be another attempt to capture him for hypnoprobing, to determine what his mission really was. When he disappeared—forever—the Merseian agents he had invented would be the obvious culprits. And this time the Duke would scarcely trust hired thugs.

  Flandry checked with the commandant of Intelligence for Vor, since he knew Alfred's men would verify whether or not he did. He was unsurprised, though saddened, to hear that no progress had been made on tracking down those who dispatched his attackers. So here, at least, the dry rot had entered his own service.... Back in the penthouse, he changed into loose civilian dress. It concealed the weapons and kit he secured under its blouse.

  In the hotel restaurant he ate a solitary supper, thinking much about Ella, and dawdled over his liqueur. Two men who had entered soon after him and taken a corner table idled too, but somewhat awkwardly. He studied them without seeming to do so. One was small and clever-looking, the other big and rangy and with a military bearing—doubtless from the household guards, out of uniform for this occasion. He would do.

  At last Flandry got up and sauntered out to the ground-level street. A good many people were around, afoot, under gaudy lights and luminescent elways. (He
remembered how moonbeams washed across Ella.) His shadows mingled with the crowd. He would have shaken them easily enough, but that wasn't his intention. Let him give them every break instead; they were hard-working chaps and deserved a helping hand.

  He hailed a flittercab. Such vehicles were not autopiloted in Gloriana. "Know any good dives?" he asked fatuously as he climbed in. "You know, girls, dope, anything goes, but not too expensive."

  "I wouldn't be much of a cabdriver if I didn't, would I, sir?" the man replied, and took off for a less respectable part of town. He landed on the twenty-fifth flange of a tall building, beneath a garish flickersign. Another taxi came down behind his.

  Flandry spent a while in the bar, amused at the embarrassment of his followers, and then picked a girl, a slim creature with an insolent red mouth. She snuggled against him as they went down the corridor. A door opened for them and they passed through.

  "Sorry, sister," Flandry murmured. He pulled out his stun pistol and let her have a medium beam. As she collapsed, he eased her onto the bed. She'd be unconscious for hours. He tucked a decent sum of money into her bodice and stood waiting, weapon in hand.

  It was not long before the door opened again. The two men were there. Had they bribed the madam or threatened her? In any event, this had looked like an excellent opportunity to carry out their assignment. Flandry's stunner dropped the smaller one.

  The big fellow took him by surprise, pouncing like a cat. A skilled twist sent the gun clattering free against the wall. Flandry drove a knee upward. Pain lanced through him as it hit body armor. The guardsman got a hold which should have pinioned him. Flandry broke free with a trick he knew, delivered a karate chop, and added a rabbit punch. The guardsman fell.

  For a moment Flandry hesitated, panting. He had no use for the short one, whom it might be safest to kill. However—He settled for giving both a calculated jolt which ought to keep them unconscious for hours. Thereafter he opened the window and stepped out onto the emergency landing. With his pocket phone he summoned another cab. It came to hover before him on its gravs, and the driver looked out into the muzzle of a blaster.

  "We've three sleepers to get rid of," said Flandry cheerfully. The girl must be included, since her slack body—after she was much overdue for reappearance—would raise an alarm, as her mere absence would not. "Give a hand, friend, unless you want to add a corpse to the museum."

  He had the appalled man lug his victims out into the vehicle and fly him well beyond the city. They descended on a meadow in a patch of woods. Flandry stunned the driver and laid all four out under a tree. He tucked a goodly tip in the cabbie's tunic.

  Now to work! He stripped the guardsmen naked and tossed the clothes of the smaller one into the taxi. The big one he measured in detail with his identification kit, and bundled up the garb of him, complete with wallet and documents. Wildflowers grew round about, long-stemmed and white-petaled. Flandry folded all four pairs of hands on breasts and put a flower in each. "Requiescant in pace," he intoned. The sleepers wouldn't wake till perhaps noon, and had a long hike to the nearest place where they could call for help. The nakedness of the guardsmen would probably cause further delay. By the time they could report in, the affair ought to be finished, one way or another.

  Flandry returned in the cab. At the edge of town, he abandoned it and got a different one, which brought him to the spaceport. He was sure that a ducal agent or two would be watching his spacecraft. If so, that person saw him go aboard, presumably without seeing the bundle under his cloak. He got immediate clearance from the portmaster's office and lifted into space. His idea was that the opposition would guess he'd been scared off and was at least going to conduct his business from a safe distance. If so, splendid; he always preferred to be underestimated.

  Once in orbit, he and Chives got busy disguising him. Much can be done with responsiplast on the face, contact lenses with holographic retinal patterns, false fingerprints, and the rest. Possibly more can be done by sheer theater, and Flandry had paid attention to the ways his man walked and sat and gestured. The effect wouldn't pass a close examination, but he was gambling that there wouldn't be any. When he got through, he was Lieutenant Roger Bargen of the ducal household guards.

  Chives took the boat planetside again, deftly evading Traffic Control's monitors, and landed near a village some fifty kilometers from Gloriana. Dawn was not far off. Flandry walked in and caught the morning monorail to the city.

  When he entered the castle, he did not report to his colonel. That would have been what he mildly termed a tactical error. It was pretty clear, though, that Bargen's assignment had been secret, none of his fellows aware of it. Therefore, if they saw him scurrying around the place, too busy for conversation, they wouldn't suppose aught was amiss. To be sure, the deception could last only a few hours; but Flandry didn't think he'd need more.

  In fact, he reflected, I bet my life I won't.

  Ella the slave, who had been Ella Mclntyre and a free hillwoman of Varrak, was shocked to her guts by the harem. Incense gagged her, music scratched at her nerves, velvyl hangings in gloomy colors seemed to close in everywhere around. She prayed the Duke would not send for her that night. If he did—well, that was part of the price. However, he did not.

  The inmates had a dormitory, a suite of rooms for games and relaxation, and nonhuman servants. They numbered about a score, and few of them said much to the new arrival as she prowled about; she sensed wariness in some, hostility in others, outright dread in a few. Among the worst horrors of slavery is what it does to the spirit of the enslaved.

  But she had to make friends, fast. The harem, where seclusion and secrecy were the natural order of things, was the logical place for hiding a female prisoner. Within its own walls, though, it must be the most gossipy of little worlds. She picked an alert-looking girl with wide bright eyes, wandered up to her, and smiled shyly. "Hello," she said. "I'm Ella."

  The other arched her brows. "Well. How did you get here?"

  "I'm......resent. What's it like here? Please."

  "Oh, nothing too dreadful, dear. Terribly boring most of the time." Ella shuddered at the thought of years lost thus, but smiled in meek gratitude. The other girl wanted to know everything she could tell about the outside—everything, anything—and this took several hours. Meanwhile several more women gathered to listen and comment.

  Finally conversation drifted the way Ella had hoped it might. Yes, she was told, something strange had lately occurred. The entire western end of the suite was now closed off, with household troopers keeping watch. They were normal males, but television monitors kept them proper, damn it. Somebody or something new must be housed there, and speculation ran wild as to the who or the what or the why.

  Ella masked her tension with an effort that only her muscles could measure. "Have you any ideas?" she asked brightly.

  "Many," said her first acquaintance. "They're all wrong, I'm sure. His Grace has funny tastes. But you'll find that out, my dear."

  Ella bit her lips.

  That night she could not sleep. The blackness was thick and strangling. She wanted to scream and run, break free, run among the stars until she was back in her loved, lost greenwood hills. A lifetime without seeing the sun or feeling a wind kiss her cheeks! She thrashed wearily about and wondered why she had ever agreed to Flandry's proposal.

  But if he lived and came to her, she could now tell him what he needed to know. If he lived. And even if he did, this was the middle of a fortress. He'd die under hypnoprobe and she under nerve-lash. God, let me sleep. Only for an hour.

  In the morning, fluorotubes gave her a cold dawn. She used the swimming pool without pleasure and ate breakfast without tasting and wondered if she looked as haggard as she felt.

  When she left the mess, a scaled hand touched her shoulder. She whirled about with a little shriek and looked into a scaly, beaky countenance. Somehow it made the question sibilant: "You are the new concubine?"

  She tried to answer but her throat tighten
ed up.

  "Come." The being turned and strode off. Numbly, she followed. The chatter in the harem died as she went by, eyes grew wide and faces pale, here and there a finger traced a furtive religious sign. She was not being summoned for the master's sport.

  At the end of a hall was a door, where two men stood uniformed and armed. She thought in her fear that they glanced at her with pity. The door opened at the nonhuman's gestures. He waved her through. As he also passed by, the door closed behind him.

  The room beyond was small and nearly bare. It held a chair with straps and wires and a switchboard; she recognized the electronic torture machine which leaves no marks on the flesh. In a chair more peculiarly shaped crouched another being that was not human. Its small hunched body was wrapped in gorgeous robes, and great lusterless eyes regarded her from a hairless bulge of head.

  "Sit down," the creature ordered. A thin hand waved her to the electronic seat. Helpless, she obeyed. Through the stammering of her heart, she heard: "I want to discourse with you. You will do best not to lie." The voice was high and squeaky, but there was nothing ridiculous about the goblin who spoke. "For your information, I am Sarlish of Jagranath, which lies beyond the Empire, and his Grace's chief Intelligence officer. Thus you see this is no routine matter. You were brought here by a man of whom I have suspicions. Why?"

  "As... a gift... sir," she whispered. Her tongue felt like a block of dried wood.

  "Timeo Danaos et dona ferentes," remarked Sarlish surprisingly. "I did not learn of it until an hour ago, or I would have investigated sooner. You are a slave born?"

  "N-no, sir. For debt—He bought me and—"

  "Where are you from?"

  I must not tell! "I was born on... on Freya—"

  "Unlikely, I think. It is unfortunate that I cannot hypnoprobe you at once. That would leave you in no fit state for his Grace tonight, should you be innocent. However—" Sarlish stroked his meager chin contemplatively. "Yes. Sufficient pain will disorganize your mind until questioning will bring out inconsistencies. Should there be any, we can go on to the probe. Let us get you secured." He gestured to the other, different alien.