Hero!

by Dave Duncan

  That one would have to go.

  Amused to note that his pulse rate showed no signs of diminishing, Vaun threw away his towel. How would he be reacting to her if he’d had his usual dose of stiffener? There was an awe-inspiring speculation. Ninety-nine percent probability! Thrusting his fists in his pockets, leaving his shirt unbuttoned, he hobbled out onto the sunbaked flagstones.

  Neither Blade nor Feirn heard his barefoot approach. He leaned on the lichen-dappled stone at her side. Oh, those freckles! All over everywhere visible—arms, legs, shoulders. Logical that they would be all over everywhere presently invisible also. He would count them all if it took him a year.

  “I am very happy that you came,” he said softly.

  Like a bent spring released, Ensign Blade spasmed into a vertical posture, stamped, and saluted. Feirn jumped and turned.

  “Admiral! You took me by surprise.” She tried to smile, but at the same time a strange pallor suffused her translucent skin, turning her face chalky-white and showing up all her freckles like coarse sand on a porcelain plate.

  Astonished, Vaun clasped her hands. They were slim, cool hands. He had rarely seen eyes so pale a blue, like sky above the sea. He knew his own eyes must betray his longing. “You would rather be taken by storm?”

  Feirn licked her lips and took a moment to find her voice. “That’s what heroes are for, isn’t it?” She glanced sideways, as if trying to appeal to her companion, but Ensign Blade was behind her, immobile as a marble statue, not even blinking.

  Vaun was disconcerted. She was even smaller than he had remembered, and now she seemed so frightened and…vulnerable.

  “Feirn? Is something wrong?”

  She flinched, and glanced briefly at the house. “No! No, of course not! I’m delighted to be here. I’ve always dreamed of coming to Valhal and what are those gorgeous things down on the grass there?”

  “Orchidoforms. This is their mating display.”

  “Plants or animals?”

  Her hands were shaking. He lowered them without letting go, admiring the fine copper hairs of her eyebrows, the cryptic effect of the almost-invisible lashes. Why the tremor, though? And everyone knew about orchidoforms.

  “Both. Neither. Mostly animal at this time of year. They take root over the winter.”

  “Oh, they’re lovely, it’s all lovely.”

  “You will stay a long time?” He wanted to put his arms around her and hug her. That was understandable, except that somehow now he felt more protective than lustful, and that was certainly not his normal reaction to a redhead.

  She licked her lips again. “It’s a heavenly place!”

  “It’s the finest place on the planet, and finer by far now that Feirn is here…That’s a lovely name! I want you to stay on in Valhal and enjoy it. I want to show you all of it, day by day, one corner at a time, so that I can see it all anew through your eyes.” But he noticed those sky-blue eyes flicker a sideways glance again and he was baffled. “Tell me you will stay a long time!”

  She nodded several times quickly. “I hope…I would love to see all of Valhal, and I’d be proud if you’d give me the tour yourself, Admiral.”

  Freckle by freckle. “Vaun.”

  “Vaun.”

  He gazed appraisingly at the petrified figure of Ensign Blade and decided it could wait awhile yet. Raising Feirn’s hands to his lips, he kissed a first freckle, but he glanced up just in time to notice her attention still wandering. There was nothing where she was looking except the house itself, and it was empty. She couldn’t have brought anyone else with her, or Security would have told him.

  Soon he would start to feel slighted.

  He wanted to see her smile. Impulsively he decided to give her the interview she wanted. It wouldn’t matter that an unknown could command only a small initial audience—Admiral Vaun announcing the end of the world would be a blockbuster story no matter who broke it, and every station in every country in the world would pick it up at once. In fact, it was astonishing that word of his remarks at Maeve’s party hadn’t hit the newscasts already, but Jeevs would have told him if the networks were calling.

  “We’ll get our business over as soon as poss—”

  “Bandor!” she said quickly. “That mountain is Bandor, isn’t it? It’s beautiful. And the sea is so blue—and all those trees! Like the world used to be.”

  Puzzled, he said, “You really do work for…‘See-It-All,’ was it?”

  “‘Show-It-All’! It’s the best news program—but let’s not talk shop, Vaun! You invited me and I’m here, and I’ve come, and it’s all I’ve ever dreamed of.” She was babbling, smiling with ashen lips. What in the galaxy was wrong with her?

  “Sorry. ‘Show-It-All.’ ’Fraid I don’t watch pubcom much. But I promise you that you’ll stun the lot of them with this one.”

  Still flustered, Feirn turned her head as if to speak to Ensign Blade, but of course he was still in a state of suspended animation, awaiting the admiral’s pleasure. When she looked back to Vaun she seemed even more worried than before. Her fingers were icy.

  Shadows of suspicion darkened the sunlight for him. He gazed around the terrace with its flowers and shrubs and carved benches. He saw nothing that should alarm her—or him. The big windows and glass doors were shaded against the sun, and the huge house was inhabited only by machinery. The nearest entrance led to his own quarters, the adjoining set to hers, the Pearlfish Suite. Everything seemed to be in order.

  “I’m awfully new at it,” she said. Her laugh was almost shrill. “And it doesn’t matter. I only took the job because I was bored while Blade was away at Doggoth and Petly is a friend of Mum’s and I thought it would be fun. I don’t do it well at all, you know. I’m no good at getting the right answers, because I get flustered if the subject talks back…”

  “Well, we can plan the questions together,” he said, thinking that there were many other things he would rather do together. “Start with Q ships in general—”

  “Oh, nothing so dull, Admiral! I’m sure you’ve done hundreds of interviews more than I have, and know all the best things for me to ask. The life of a world-famous figure…your favorite sport, and—”

  Either this little miss was raving mad, or she was trying to divert him—but why? Because of Blade?

  “You tell me your favorite sport, Feirn. Here we have everything—hunting, gill fishing, hang gliding, ashkinaling, surf walking, skiing, hiking, sky buzzing, archery, fooping, bungie jumping, falconry, chess, skating, golf, honeymoon bridge, leapfrog…”

  That worked. The long catalog steadily widened her smile until she laughed and her laugh was all the joys of love and childhood, music and poetry and life itself. “Oh, I know hardly any of those! You’ll have to teach me.”

  He paused a moment and then said, “I will gladly teach you.”

  She closed her eyes and said, “Oh yes!” with apparent relief.

  He was completely baffled now. She was putting out very contradictory signals.

  Needing time to think, Vaun turned his attention to the rigid Ensign Blade, who had not moved an eyelash since completing his salute. His eyes were a pale mauve that suggested Umbarian ancestors, but they stared out from the bony face as unvarying as glass. Looking him over, Vaun could find nothing to criticize in his appearance. Grudgingly, he concluded that this one would pass inspection by the meanest petty officer in Doggoth. On Admirals’ Day Parade, even.

  “At ease, Ensign,” he said, trying to sound as if he had been guilty of an oversight.

  Blade snapped into position, and he still made the stonework look flaccid—a typical Doggoth-made robot.

  “Relax, boy! We don’t stand on ceremony here!”

  “Thank you, sir,” Blade said politely, looking down to meet Vaun’s eye for the first time, but not moving anything below the neck. Apparently his back was always poker-stiff, and it was hard to imagine even a trace of a smile on those intense features.

  “I don’t expect my guests to addre
ss me as ‘sir’.”

  The mauve eyes flickered nervously.

  “Is ‘Admiral’ permissible?”

  “Why not ‘Vaun’?” Vaun asked, but it was like torturing a mushroom. He wondered how long he would need to have Ensign Blade posted to some ice-mining station in the Oort Cloud. About four hours before the orders came through, likely, which felt too long under the circumstances.

  “With all respect, si—” The mauve eyes seemed to brim over with sincerity. “With respect, I have admired you so greatly all my life that I feel unworthy to address you as an equal, Admiral.”

  If that was studied insolence, it was superbly done. And if it was sincere, it was somehow even more infuriating. Vaun recalled Maeve’s catty dislike of Ensign Blade and it now seemed eminently understandable. All his life? How old…young…was this gangling upstart?

  “How long since you left Doggoth, Blade?”

  “Ten weeks, Admiral.”

  Vaun glanced at Feirn and was annoyed to see amusement in her jewel-blue eyes. “Most people show some signs of recovery by then,” he remarked.

  The twinkle vanished, and she shot yet another worried glance toward the windows. “I asked Blade to fly me over here, Vaun,” she said. “He was going to leave, but—”

  “Feirn!” said Blade.

  “But?” Vaun demanded, and the prickles of suspicion were back again, stronger than ever. Blade’s expression was impeccably blank and innocent, but the girl had understood whatever message he had conveyed, and her worries were back.

  “Blade has a long-standing ambition to hunt strealers,” she said hastily, “and of course Valhal is one of the few places—”

  “Certainly! Nothing easier, but you’ll have to do it before you eat, lad. Service!”

  The gawky Jeevs sim imaged in instantly. “Admiral?”

  “Ensign Blade wishes to go strealer spearing. They are still running?”

  “Yes, Admiral.” The sim writhed its long lip ruminatively. “There is a small school in the bay at the moment. And also gaspons.” The nasal Kailbran accent made the word twang like a harp string.

  A tentative snigger from Feirn’s direction showed that she knew who was being caricatured. Blade did also, for his face was registering a slight frown, the first emotion it had shown.

  Vaun ignored that reaction. “There you are, then, Ensign! Have you ridden a gaspon, before?”

  “No, Admiral,” Blade said calmly.

  Vaun swung back to the sim. “Find him suitable attire, show him the way to the jetty, and be sure he understands the emergency procedures to follow when, I mean if, he gets carried out to sea.”

  “Yes, Admiral.” Jeevs became two identical Jeevses. “Come with me, sir.” one of them said.

  Vaun liked a boy who knew when he was beaten. If Blade felt anger or resentment, he did not show it. If he truly did have a suicidal ambition to attempt one of the roughest, most taxing sports on Ult, then he did not show that either. “This is extremely kind of you, Admiral,” he said serenely. With an almost imperceptible nod that somehow suggested a smart military salute, he spun around and went marching off after the sim, swinging his arms.

  Vaun addressed the other sim. “Pick the liveliest gaspon you can find and let me know before you send out the floater.”

  The sim vanished with a hint of a sneer.

  Feirn was staring after Blade. Then she felt Vaun’s eyes on her, and turned to him with a quizzical grin that slid a stiletto of guilt between his ribs.

  “He can swim, I hope?” he said.

  “Like an eel.”

  “Then he is in no danger.” Not too much, anyway.

  She smiled understandingly. “He never is, except the danger of provoking homicide. He drives a lot of people to gnashing and clenching.”

  “But you…” Vaun demanded before he could stop himself.

  Feirn glanced at the house briefly. “I trust him,” she said softly.

  But that was a lot less than what her eyes had said earlier, and again Vaun felt confused by this desirable minx. It was not unknown for female randoms to throw rival lovers together and watch the conflict, but to set an ensign against an admiral was absurd. Just what was she up to?

  “And you, Feirn? What do you want? Really want?”

  “I’d really like to see the paintings first, I think, and—”

  “Stop!” He gripped her shoulders, thrilling at the cool smoothness of her skin. “Don’t demean both of us with hypocrisy. I know what I want of you, and I haven’t tried to conceal it. You owe it to yourself and to me to be equally honest.” He watched the scarlet blush drowning the freckles again, and desire throbbed in him like a fever.

  She gazed up at him for a long moment, big blue eyes wide. “I was told that Valhal is lacking a hostess,” she whispered.

  So Jeevs had been right! “Yes?”

  “All my life I’ve dreamed of being hostess at Valhal for Admiral Vaun. It’s my life’s ambition! I know I’m very young, but—”

  Now he understood those stupid twinges of protectiveness he had felt. “Feirn! How old are you?”

  She dropped her eyes. “Almost seventeen,” she whispered. Then she looked up again with an attempt at assertiveness. “But I’ve studied very hard! Mother’s taught me everything! I know how to talk to a bishop, and how to judge a wine, how to divert a conversation when it gets onto dangerous ground and…”

  Sixteen! But old enough! He tightened his grip on her shoulders, wondering if she could feel how sweaty his palms were. He knew that he was blushing now also. A chattering, inexperienced child, dreaming of being consort to a world hero…Only sixteen—why did that information excite him so?

  “I just want a chance to try!” she said. “Don’t you think I’d make a good hostess?”

  I think you’d make a really sweet fuck, he thought. A sixteen year old running the estate of a world celebrity? It was a ridiculous notion.

  “There’s more to being a hostess than conversation,” he said hoarsely.

  She paused a fraction of a second, then nodded a solemn acceptance. “Of course!”

  Ensign Blade was not going to be coming back for quite a while…“Now!” Vaun demanded, pulling her hard against him. Ninety-nine percent going on a hundred…

  She slid her arms around his neck. She was warm and vital and thunderously exciting.

  He tried to kiss her. She evaded the kiss and pressed her cheek against his. He felt, rather than heard, the whisper in his ear. “You have visitors.”

  The shock was paralyzing. That was what had been bothering her all along? She had started to tell him and Blade had shut her up…They had been ordered not to tell, of course.

  No one could enter Valhal without Vaun being informed—except the top officers of the Patrol, who could override his Security.

  There was only one who would dare.

  Fury displaced desire.

  Like the cold breath of an onrushing avalanche came certainty—plus an insight that told Vaun he had been subconsciously expecting this.

  History was repeating itself. As he had done once before, Admiral Roker had come in person to enlist Vaun and send him into battle against the Brotherhood.

  SUMMERTIME IS THE rainy season at Doggoth, because the rest of the time it snows. At least once every summer, the trainees are sent to trek up Bludraktor and plant flags on the summit. A permanent hurricane rips the flags away immediately, but the spirit is what counts, say the instructors. The round trip is supposed to take five days and never takes less than ten, which means short rations or none at all on the way back. Usually that does not matter much.

  Vaun has made the trip eight times, and considers he has seen the summit of Bludraktor more often than anyone else in the history of the planet. This ninth trip is turning out no worse than any of the others. In fact, the night raging outside is almost pleasant by Doggothian standards—meaning that the tent may stand till morning and a boy can go outside for a few minutes without being battered to pulp by hai
l. That does make the tent more pleasant than some Vaun has known, because it is a very small tent for eight adults, all with full equipment and seven with dysentery.

  He lies on his back in the dark in soaking clothes and listens to seven bellies gurgling and three boys groaning. The four girls, for some reason, never even whimper. He thinks this will be his last trip to Bludraktor. By next summer he will be gone from Doggoth, dead or alive. The Q ship is coming.

  Everyone but the green hands knows that the rations are spiked on the Bludraktor jaunts, but regulations forbid throwing them away, and very few human beings can resist food after two or three days of strenuous exercise without it. The Bludraktor Trot, they call it, a hallowed Doggoth tradition. When one in a tent gets it, they all get it.

  Except the mudslug. He never does, as his gut seems to be immune to the worst bugs the lab gnomes dare inflict. It’s his delta upbringing, of course; lucky stiff.

  Vaun isn’t sure that he wouldn’t rather be ill than healthy in this tent. His nearest neighbor is thrashing around in a near-delirium, and someone else is struggling to climb over two or three more and reach the door before it is too late. Then, over the howl of the storm comes the sound of a torch, and the girl fighting with the flap says, “What the shit?”

  Minutes later a brutal light pours in through the doorway, and a male voice bellows, “Oh, Joshua! K. Krantz! You’re a foul brood, you are! Crewboy Vaun?”

  Vaun sits up, heart pounding with excitement. “Sir!”

  “Get your ass out here, mister. You’re wanted back at the base.”

  “Sir!” Vaun starts to gather his gear. The others all groan enviously. This is it! The ordeal is over and he will be leaving Doggoth. Dead or alive.

  When he reaches the torch, they put him in a plastic bag and tie it around his neck so that only his head protrudes. He doesn’t bother to explain that he is a safe cargo—he smells like the tent, and that is enough. He is dragged inside and left on the floor. The torch leaps up into the dark fury of the night.