Sands of the Solar Empire (The Belmont Saga)

by Ren Garcia

  The girl smiled. “I see. Well, this is a wonderful day, as our Star intended. I am Nefia, and we are a humble band of traveler Merians from Westwood, seeking to offer good news to the people. May I ask your name, sir, so that I may properly thank you?”

  “Stenstrom, Lord of Belmont-South Tyrol. I suppose that I am in the market for a little good news.”

  “Lord Stenstrom, we are at your service for the unexpected kindness you have shown us.”

  “I was also hoping I might catch a ride with you. Are you heading west, by chance?”

  “We head in no particular direction. The Star has sent you to us with purpose and speed. We will take you west, all the way to the sea if need be.”

  * * * * *

  With the money Stenstrom gave them, the Merians repaired their meager float wagons and gladly made their way out of Calvert. Safe with the Merians, an unlikely bunch, he was free of his out-worldly pursuers, his Holystones remaining quiet. He had out-foxed them and his mother to boot.

  The caravan made its slow way west, up the coast, through St. Edmund’s, around the bay, and into the wild lands of southern Zenon. To the south was the rocky, sea coast and to the north were the towering pillars of clouds covering the vast stretch of LakeMonama where the pale people lived.

  Two days into the trip, he found the Merians had an old Maxim-style Com screen in one of the wagons. It had been over two weeks since his graduation and flight from Bern. He felt homesick and wanted to at least let his mother know he was all right. With this old Maxim Com unit, he could probably send word to her, and she wouldn’t be able to trace him.

  She appeared on the screen in bed. Her face was haggard and spent. Her breakfast on a tray was sitting off to the side, barely touched.

  “Bel, is that you?” she said trying to squint into the screen.

  “Yes, Mother, it’s me.”

  “I’ve been so worried about you. How could you do this to your mother?”

  “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to worry you. As you can see, I’m fine.”

  She smiled a little. “Bel, why did you not come home after your graduation? Your sisters and I had had a lovely reception planned. Lyra and Virginia were so very disappointed. They had prepared a wonderful celebration for you.” Her voice was tired and thin.

  “I will apologize to them when I can. I have some business to attend to, Mother. I’m trying to accumulate my accreditations so that I might ply the trade you and father paid for me to learn.”

  His mother seemed so tired. “I’m glad you are embracing your schooling.” She appeared pained for a moment. “You always talked of the Fleet and of the stars. I see you, even now in my dreams, as a boy wearing the little clothes your father sent home. I always see you as a little boy in my dreams. What have I done, Bel? Have I robbed you of what you wanted most?”

  Stenstrom thought about his answer. “What’s done is done, and I am no worse for it.”

  She smiled. “I’m glad. If I had it to do over again, I would have let you do whatever you wanted. Are you coming home soon?”

  “When time allows; again, I am pursuing a lead.”

  Jubilee leaned back and sank into her pillows. “I … really think you should come home for a bit … to visit and catch up. It won’t take long, I promise. Then you may pursue your matters in earnest.”

  “Why, is there anything the matter? Why do you look so tired?”

  “No, Bel, no … nothing’s the matter. I was worried, and I simply miss my son, and would like to see you.”

  “I’ll be home when I can. I have some matters to attend, and then I’ll be home.”

  Lady Jubilee gazed at her son through the Com. “All right then. But please, when you’ve concluded your business, will you promise to come home and see your old mother?”

  “I promise Mother, yes.”

  It struck him as he concluded the Com that his mother was uncharacteristically timid and accommodating. He had expected her to be frothing with rage, full of recriminations and threats. He was used to speaking boldly to his mother; otherwise, she might have had him twisted in knots.

  Perhaps she was mellowing, or possibly trying a different tactic.

  As he rode the hovering wagon across the Zenon lowlands with the vast, cloud-shrouded plume of LakeMonama to the north, he began noticing something. In the far distance, he saw four thin figures in shroud-like robes following his procession.

  The Black Maidens. They were slowly zeroing in on him. He’d almost forgotten about his mother’s determination to forcibly bring him home.

  Seeing them in the distance reminded him of the dire contest his mother insisted he play: Resist. Be your own man.

  Very well—be it so. The game was on, Mother. She almost had him fooled.

  * * * * *

  Once in Mercia, the Merians dropped Stenstrom off at the local office of IBBAANA—the Inter-Stellar Brotherhood of Barrs, Attorneys, Actuaries, Notaries and Accountants, a modest red-brick structure in the center of town. He got out of the wagon with his chests. He bade the Merians a fond farewell and went inside the office.

  He announced he wished to join the Brotherhood. Getting a stern eye, he was taken into a backroom, and his qualifications were reviewed.

  As it turned out, it was his membership in the Bones Club that got him into the IBBAANA brotherhood, for the fellow reviewing his papers spotted them as fabricated at once. However, he, like Stenstrom, was a proud member of the Bones Club, so, after a bit of chit-chat and a healthy “entrance fee” was collected, Stenstrom was at last made an official member of the brotherhood, no further questions asked. Chosen Occupation: Paymaster, Status: Active.

  So, he had come to Mercia and gotten what he came for—he was now an IBBAANA. As he exited the building, he saw four tall women in black standing at the end of the street waiting for him.

  His mother—the Black Maidens. He had a quick thought that this game was becoming rather silly, that he was getting too old for such things. If he had had a more timid nature, he would simply go home and see his mother.

  But, she herself had drilled into him: Though I am your mother, consider me your enemy. I shall attempt to confound you and set you to my will. I want you to resist—to confound me in turn. Thus, using your wits, I shall make you strong. Nothing more than your best effort I expect of you.

  Not wanting to disappoint her, Stenstrom determined to get the better of this situation. Avoiding the front door, he found a convenient window out the back and bore away from the building through the craggy allies leading to the side-streets of Mercia.

  With the Black Maidens dogging his heels, he waited in town, never allowing himself to stay stationary for more than a few hours at a time. He also avoided being alone as he bought one courtesan after another to stand with him. The Black Maidens couldn’t get to him if he was in constant company. Female company was best. He would need to be careful. These Black Maidens appeared to be showing no sign of giving up.

  Two days later he received a message from the Brotherhood. A Fleet vessel, the Sandwich, a small frigate making berth in Atalea, was in need of a replacement Paymaster at once, for theirs had died.

  What was the reason for the man’s death, Stenstrom wanted to know.

  The official word was food poisoning.

  With the Maidens close at his heels, he accepted. Courtesan in hand, he immediately booked passage to Atalea and met up with his first charge, the Fleet Frigate Sandwich. If he could get on that ship, he would be victorious.

  23 The Sandwich

  He had to admit, he was a little disappointed when he first saw the Sandwich. She was little more than a flying wreck. An ugly Mermidon-class frigate assigned the lowly role of hauling Fleet freight, refuse, and assorted goods back and forth across the League, the Sandwich was squat and saucer-shaped and in desperate need of both a painting and a fumigating. She was at one time white, but was now a patchy, unidentifiable red with the outer few millimeters of her thick, tough hull rusted. The capsule-like bridge
sitting atop the saucer looked like a virus implanting its DNA into some unsuspecting bacteria cell.

  Still, she was a Fleet ship and was going to the stars. After taking a moment to get used to her meager shape and rusty hull, she became like a magic carpet, ready to speed him away to adventure.

  The Boatswain of the Sandwich, an untidy man named Pike, was waiting for him on the gangway. He was terse and unpleasant from the get go. “You shall confine yourself to the areas of the ship assigned to you, namely, your office, your quarters and the crew’s mess. You are forbidden from entering the bridge, period. You shall not, under any circumstances, enter or dine in the officer’s mess, nor shall you eat in the crew’s mess during peak dining hours, unless you choose to take your chow to your office or your room. You shall be allowed on the boat deck for two hours a day at times so designated by myself or the captain. You shall be assigned one crewman as an aid when their duties allow. You shall not fraternize with the officers or the crew, and you shall not be permitted to sit in at the nightly film. Just remember, you are on this ship, but you are not a part of it in any way. Do your job, make sure we get paid, hide our expenses if you can, and be quiet about it.”

  And with that warm welcome, Stenstrom boarded the ship, walking up the bouncy gang plank. He could smell the heavy salt water in the air by the wharf, and he could almost hear the Sandwich’s foot-thick duraplate hull rusting.

  He looked back over his shoulder—the Black Maidens were just arriving on the dock, sniffing the air and swaying slightly.

  * * * * *

  Moving through the small, poorly lit corridors of the ship, Stenstrom found himself a bit appalled. The ship was a mess—dirty walls, peeling paint, marred floors, and the crew was motley in the extreme: mismatched uniforms in various stages of serviceable repair, filthy shoes, tarnished buckles, paunched bellies, and unshaven faces. The crew, full of dirty looks and second glances, were also inked up in an assemblage of gaudy 4-D tattoos in the images of naked ladies, obscene gestures, grotesque body parts, and varied, profane verbiage spelled out (and occasionally misspelled) on arms, shoulders, faces and necks. As he descended farther into the ship, he was painfully reminded of the two times he’d been on his father’s ship, the Caroline, and the difference between the two was night and day. His father’s warbird was a brightly-lit paradise of gleaming metal, spotless appointments, ram-rod crew, shaved faces, and rigid discipline.

  In comparison to his father’s ship, the Sandwich was a veritable cave populated by a squad of unwashed, stinking cavemen. He found his tiny cabin, which appeared to have been a bathroom at some point in the past, and he went inside and wondered if he really wanted to be here. He could de-ship, avoid the Black Maidens, and return to IBBAANA and announce his desire to wait for another more serviceable vessel.

  The thought passed through his mind several times.

  There was a knock at his door. A young lady stood there. “Hi!” she said in a cheery voice. “I’m Crewman Kaly! I’ve been assigned to help you!”

  Stenstrom was pulled from his gloomy thoughts. He regarded her for a moment—again, as with most things on this ship, here was a lady standing in the doorway, presumably a member of the crew, without an ounce of military bearing or protocol that he had assumed was a staple of the Fleet, no matter the ship. She could have been a lady walking down the street, a co-ed at school, a waitress from Onaris, or an urchin from Calvert, anything but an active crewman in the Fleet aboard a commissioned ship.

  Still, unlike the dirty looks he got from the other members of the crew that he passed, this Crewman Kaly smiled in an inviting and genuine way.

  What the heck; he stood and held out his hand. She shook it. “Wow, strong grip,” she said. “I like that.”

  Kaly sat down on his small bed and began talking—she appeared to be a real yapper. “I man the forward sensing station on the bridge, day bell. Between ten and twelve bells after my shift, I’ll be down to help you out.”

  Kaly studied him intently. “You’re a lot taller than our last Paymaster, and a lot more handsome.”

  “Thanks,” he said, not expecting the compliment.

  “So, you’re a Great Lord from Kana?”

  “I am,” Stenstrom replied.

  “What House? Not that I’ll know what you’re talking about or anything, I’m just curious.”

  “Belmont. Officially, Belmont-South Tyrol, an off-shoot branch.”

  Kaly’s eyes lit up—she had fascinating green eyes. “I have no idea what that means. We don’t see many Great Lords on this ship. Our last Paymaster was just some guy—I didn’t know much about him. I think he was an attorney—I don’t like attorneys much. Oh … you’re not an attorney, are you?”

  “No.”

  Kaly was relieved. “That’s great! So, what do I call you? I’m not well-versed on Kanan customs and such. Do I call you Lord or Sir, or Great Lord? I really don’t have a clue.”

  “Call me Bel. All my friends do.”

  “Okay, Bel, I’ll do that. You’re sort of alone on this ship—no other Great Lords around, I mean other than Dunks. Do lords from Planet Fall count, in the social scheme, I mean? Planet Fall is where Dunks is from. We’re pretty much all Browns here. I’m from Fig on Onaris.”

  “Who’s Dunks?”

  “Oh! He’s our commander. Sorry.”

  “How long have you been in the Fleet?”

  “Five years. I … didn’t score too well in my exams and got stuck with ship duty on a frigate. When they don’t know what to do with you, they put you on one of these ships. S’ok, it pays the bills, I guess, and we’re pretty informal around here, if you haven’t already guessed—that’s a perk I imagine. I’m told every ship is in the image of its commander—Dunks is an informal guy, and so are we. I’ve got a big family to help support back home on Onaris, and a deadbeat ex-husband whom I have to pay for by court order—I guess that’s why I don’t like attorneys. Yeah, I think I’m going to like you; you’re a heck of a lot better looking than the last guy. Did I already mention that?”

  Stenstrom was mystified. “I believe you did. Um, will my superior pulchritude be a plus in your assisting me in the ship’s financial matters?”

  “Oh, yeah.”

  “I hear tell the previous Paymaster died of food poisoning. Is that correct?”

  “Well, yeah, I guess so.”

  Stenstrom tried to make sense of that as Kaly chirped away. She seemed a happy-enough person, smiling; she had those stunning eyes and a piled-up head of messy brown hair held in some bit of order with a pink hair band. Her skin was a pearly shade, and she had nice bone structure.

  She saw his chests full of books.

  “What are those?” she asked, looking at the old brown covers.

  “Just old books.”

  The pipes overhead made a loud hissing sound, and Stenstrom could hear many doors clanging shut. His lights flickered for a moment.

  “Oh,” Kaly said, “looks like we’re about to take off. You want to come to the boat deck and see?”

  “The boatswain said I was forbidden to go to the boat deck except at designated hours.”

  “Don’t worry about him; he’s a knob. Come on. Taking off is always my favorite part.”

  She led him down the cramped corridor, up a gangway, and up two decks. There was the Sandwich’s modest boat deck, just a long corridor lined on one side with windows. They went to the glass and looked down on the wharf. There was a jarring clank coming up from the bowels of the ship.

  “Any moment now, the engineer is just building up pressure,” Kaly said as people on the wharf began to back away from the ship.

  Stenstrom looked around and felt weak. He remembered his father and the stars and the trips to Onaris, he and Lyra running through the manor halls playing with their models of the Caroline.

  He remembered the knife in his chest, the clothes burning in the fountain. So, here he was at last, standing on a Fleet ship, ready to blast off.

  The journey h
e’d taken to arrive on this rusty old vessel …

  He leaned against the glass.

  “Hey,” Kaly said looking up at him. “You okay?”

  He smiled. “I’m fine. I’m just fine. I’ve waited a long time for this.”

  “Yeah?” she said. “Well, welcome aboard, Bel, Lord of Belmont. I really think I’m going to like you. I’m glad you’re here with us.”

  And the ship lifted away from the wharf and slowly soared into the heavens.

  * * * * *

  Stenstrom stood there on the boat deck for hours. Kaly had left sometime back, and he stood alone, the occasional crewman passing by idly. He watched the sky turn to black and Kana fade away. He stared at nothing but little speckles of distant stars, barely able to take it all in.

  Footsteps came clanking in approach.

  A slender man in a Fleet coat was walking down the corridor holding a triangle hat under his arm. He saw Stenstrom and stopped.

  “Are you our new Paymaster?” he asked.

  Stenstrom turned. “I am.”

  The man smiled and held out his hand. “Well then, glad to know you. I’m the captain of the ship, though my official rank is lieutenant. Lt. Dunkster’s my name. I’m from the House of Carew on Planet Fall. Just call me Dunks.”

  Stenstrom took his hand and shook it. “Stenstrom, Lord of Belmont-South Tyrol. Please call me Bel.”

  Lt. Dunkster thought a moment and tapped the felt of his hat with his fingertips. “Isn’t there a Lord Belmont in the Fleet? Yeah, Captain Stenstrom, of the Caroline, right?”

  “He’s my father.”

  “A warbird captain’s your father, and here you are, a Paymaster? What’s the story on that?”

  “No story—I just never joined.”

  Lt. Dunkster looked a little dubious. “Hmmm, well, I’m certain we’ll be fast friends in no time. It’s a good ship here, good crew. Might not look like much, but we manage a decent service. Frigates—you know in ancient times a ‘frigate’ was a term that meant warship, a small warship, but a fighting vessel none the same. In our modern Fleet, however, a frigate is nothing more than a small ship relegated to small duties. But, somebody has to do this job, and I might say, we do it pretty well, and I pride myself on always managing to get my mates a little extra come payday—our Fleet earnings are a travesty. You’ll see. Have you met Kaly? I assigned her to you.”