#
Chapter 19
The assault shuttle returned to Olympus Mons’s government landing pads roughly fourteen hours before Damien needed to be at the mall in the city below. He had time to sleep and catch up on what progress Samara’s people had made while they were gone.
The sight of the gawkily tall young man standing by the doors into the mountain shattered those idealistic plans. There weren’t many blonds on Mars, but if you changed the hair from gold to silver and added a few wrinkles, Desmond Michael Alexander the Fourth, Des to his friends, was the spitting image of his father.
“Damien,” he greeted the returning Hand, offering a friendly handshake. “It’s good to see you.”
“You too, Des. Getting yourself in trouble again?” Damien asked. The last time he’d seen the youth, Des had been trying to talk himself into Damien’s investigations of the Keepers. Damien had ended up using him as a courier to keep the heir to the Martian throne out of trouble.
“Not today,” the youth told him with an irrepressible grin. “My esteemed father sent me to meet you. He is currently on an RTA call with the Governor of Tau Ceti, but I am to inform you that you are ‘invited and required’ to join the family for dinner tonight.”
“I don’t suppose I can beg off due to work?” Damien replied with a chuckle. He wasn’t actually serious this time. His liege and mentor was not quite a friend, but the Royal Family were…relaxing to be around.
“Dad expected you to say that,” the younger Alexander said. “He said, and I quote, ‘Remind him that he works for me.’ I think you’re stuck.”
“Well, then, I can only obey my liege’s commands,” Damien told him. “I do need to drop some things off and sort out some work, but I’ll be there.”
“Eight o’clock,” the Crown Prince instructed. “Or I’ll send Kiera after you.”
#
Damien’s staff scattered to their own quarters, though, as always, two Secret Service Agents tailed him as he headed to his own apartment. The Marines who guarded the rooms regardless of whether he was home or not greeted him with crisp salutes.
He changed into a fresh suit, tossing the several he’d worn since leaving in a chute that would feed them into the Mountain’s housekeeping systems. Between the ever-present automation and ever-competent staff, his clothes would be returned, cleaned and pressed by morning.
The apartment wasn’t much and he’d done nothing to it in the years it had technically been home. He didn’t feel settled on any planet anymore. “Home” was the tiny room and massive office aboard Duke of Magnificence, not this suite of luxurious rooms buried under a mountain.
Home wasn’t where the heart was—home was where the job was.
If he got to keep it.
Shaking his head to clear his frustrations, Damien linked his wrist computer into the Mountain’s computers, checking to see if any messages that hadn’t been forwarded to Doctor Akintola were still important enough for him to address immediately.
There was a large report from Analyst Daniels on what she’d learned of the Keepers’ activities prior to their effective destruction, but nothing had been flagged as urgent. Useful background, he was sure, but not important enough to be late to dinner over.
With his wrist-comp still linked into the Mountain, he looked up a department in the directory and then linked through to the motor pool.
“Olympus Mons Civil Fleet Ground Vehicles, Melissa Chan speaking,” a cheerful Martian woman answered immediately. “My Lord Montgomery!” she greeted him before he could speak. “How may I help you?”
“Good evening, Miss Chan,” he replied with a smile. “I’m going to need a pair of vehicles in the morning for myself and my detail. Low-profile armored cars by preference, the kind that don’t draw attention.”
Most of the Mountain’s vehicle fleet was made up of black sedans, the standby of governments for over half a millennium. There were a small number of low-profile armored cars of other colors, and given the level of risk for the next morning’s meeting Damien needed to be sure he had them.
“A lot of the low-profile cars are already out or reserved, my lord,” she admitted. “Give me a moment.” She pecked away at a screen he couldn’t see.
“It looks like I’ve got two Ford Runabouts, one blue and one green,” Chan concluded. “They’re pure electrics, utility vehicles, not as heavily armored as some of our cars, but they’re the only low-profile armored ones I’ve got.”
The Runabout would seat six, so two of them should handle a large-enough detail for a quiet meeting in a public place.
“They’ll do,” he told her. “I’ll be down to pick them up in the morning with my Secret Service team.”
“Of course. I’ll have our maintenance team go over them tonight, make sure there’s no problems,” she promised.
“Thank you, Miss Chan.”
“Anything for the Mountain, my lord Montgomery.”
#
Damien arrived for dinner before the Mage-King himself, entering the private dining room the Alexanders used for family dinners, to find only the younger two members of the royal family.
“Dad’s been delayed,” Kiera told him. “Come in; have a seat.”
Obedient to the princess, he took a seat at the simple table—plain but made of oak imported from Earth—across from Des. Like the table, the plates and cutlery were plain but of the highest quality.
Some types of simplicity were cheap, born of necessity. Other types of simplicity were very expensive, born out of a desire for tools that would last forever.
“Will the Chancellor be joining us this evening?” Damien asked.
“No, he’s occupied,” Des told him. “It’s like most of the people Dad invites to dinner are important senior officials in the Protectorate government or something.”
“Just like,” the Hand, a warrior-judge who spoke with his King’s voice, murmured softly.
Further conversation was interrupted by a steward—an armed member of the Secret Service, according to Damien’s briefing—delivering a basket of bread and three bowls of soup.
“His Majesty commed to let us know his meeting has finally wrapped up,” the suited young man told them. “He should be joining you in a few minutes.”
“Thanks, Richard,” Kiera told the steward-guard with a smile.
They dug into the food, and the three had managed to clear the soups by the time the Mage-King himself arrived, walking into the room with the careful gait of an exhausted old man and dropping into the empty chair.
“I’ll have my soup, Richard,” the senior Alexander told the steward with a smile. “Thank you.”
Once the bowl had arrived and the Secret Service man had left, however, the Mage-King of Mars leveled a fierce look on his eldest child and only son.
“Des, how old are you?” he asked.
The Crown Prince swallowed. “Nineteen, Dad. You were at my birthday party.”
“An adult,” the elder Alexander agreed. “So, I understand, Des, that adults have relationships, and that adults of your age especially have drama around them. I trust you to be an adult.
“I also trust you to be the Crown Prince of Mars and be aware when those relationships—and more importantly, the attached breakups—will have political consequences and warn me.”
Des winced.
“I…didn’t think anything recently was going to,” he admitted.
“I thought you were dating Councilor Montague’s daughter? Why am I getting complaints from the Tau Ceti Governor?!”
“Denise and I are…back together,” Des said slowly. “We were on a break. David Granger and I went on a couple of dates and hit it off.” He shrugged. “David got a bit clingy, then Denise and I sorted through some of our problems, so I broke things off with David and got back together with Denise.”
Damien’s university love life, he was grateful to recall, had not been nearly so complicated.
“Apparently, David complained to his father, w
ho complained to his Governor, and I got a twenty-minute spiel on ‘my son’s lack of respect and decorum’ tacked on to a three-hour meeting on financing Project Mjolnir.”
The whole conversation didn’t involve Damien directly, but that made him wince. Project Mjolnir was the Protectorate’s attempt to secretly assemble a new generation of warships in case the Legatans actually did secede and declare war. Since they couldn’t ask the broad Council for money, a handful of the Core Worlds were helping fund the project.
But since that funding was as black as black came, it gave that small handful of worlds outsized influence.
Des sighed.
“I didn’t think things between David and I were that serious,” he admitted. “David apparently thought differently. Sorry, Dad, I’m kind of blindsided by this too!”
“Outside of political complications, I don’t need to know about your love life,” the Mage-King told his son. “But if you’re going to break up with the son of a Councilor, can you at least let me know?” The elder Alexander shook his head. “I wish you didn’t have to, but that’s the reality of dynastic politics, Des.”
“I understand, Dad. I’ll remember.”
“Good. Now that’s settled and my soup has gone cold, I think we should have Richard bring in the main course.”
#
The meal was quiet. After the last few weeks, Damien was content simply to be around people he could trust and stay silent, enjoying the good food.
“How are you holding up, Damien?” Kiera finally asked. “That’s twice now you’ve been hauled in front of Dad’s collection of old fogies.”
“Kiera,” the King warned his daughter in a tired tone. “Whether or not they’re my biggest headache is irrelevant; the Council does speak for the people they represent and are an important part of my government. Please show them some modicum of respect. We all have to work with them.”
“You and Des have to work with them,” the teenager pointed out. “I intend to follow Aunt Jane into the Navy or, well, something not on Mars.”
Damien chuckled. Her Highness Mage-Admiral Jane Michelle Alexander, Princess of Mars, commanded a pair of cruiser squadrons roughly as far away from Mars as it was physically possible to get and still have a command worth a full Admiral. The Mage-King’s sister had been his heir until Desmond the Fourth was born, and remained the regent-designate until Desmond was twenty.
The Olympus Mons Simulacrum would only answer to a Rune Wright, which meant that only a Rune Wright could stand as Regent for Mars. The Charter required that the Mage-King be twenty-one on full ascension to the throne, though none of three so far had been under forty.
“Where you will remain your brother’s heir until he has children,” the King pointed out. “Given that you can both expect to live over a century and a half, having children upon ascending the throne would give us someone who’d been heir for a hundred years!”
Alexander shook his head. “I was heir for twenty, and that was difficult enough to handle,” he pointed out. “The dynasty must be secured, but we are best served by having children older. That is why I have two children. That is why my father had two children.
“I love you both very much,” he continued softly, “and I loved your mother more than life itself, but you must always remember that duty, Kiera. It is unlikely you will be called upon to sit the Throne in the Mountain, but…you must always be ready to.”
Kiera’s expression had turned unusually serious for a fourteen-year-old girl, and she nodded firmly.
“I understand, Dad,” she replied. “I really do. I even promise that I don’t refer to Our Esteemed Council”—Damien could hear the capital letters—“like that in public. But…they are so annoying.”
“They can be, yes,” Alexander agreed. “But we still need to work with them. That said, how are you holding up, Damien?”
“It’s been a rough few weeks, since before Charlotte died,” Damien admitted. This was probably the only room in human space where he’d admit that. “I didn’t expect to find her working for the Keepers. I certainly didn’t expect her to have a dead man’s switch but still choose to save me instead of herself.”
“That’s about the only thing in this mess that didn’t surprise me,” the Mage-King replied. “Charlotte Ndosi was always loyal to her friends and her oaths. That was just somehow turned against us,” he concluded grimly.
“I have…reason to believe the Keepers are all but wiped out,” Damien told his King. “I was contacted via Charlotte’s own codes by someone who claimed to be the final backup. I’m meeting with them tomorrow.
“If we can get them to come in where we can protect them, I think we might finally have some answers.”
“I want to know what secret can turn even my Hands against me,” Alexander said grimly.
“The scariest part to me,” Damien admitted, “is the fact that I think the Hands and the Keepers have always been intertwined from the beginning. The man who bought the land for the Archive was a Hand. This ‘final backup’ appears to have been selected by the Hands.
“And it was a Hand that decided to bombard a world to keep their secret,” he concluded grimly. “I want to know what would make one of us decide that was the best option.”
“It seems we may find out tomorrow,” Alexander replied. “If you need anything, all the resources of my government are at your disposal.”
“I think I have everything in place,” Damien told him. “We shall see.”
#
Chapter 20
Romanov was waiting outside Damien’s quarters with four Secret Service Agents in the morning, falling into step with the Hand in companionable silence as they moved through the Mountain.
Inspector Samara was waiting for them at the garage with another team of bodyguards, and a third team was already standing by the vehicles with the official Damien had been speaking to the previous night.
“Good morning, my lord Hand!” she greeted him. “As promised, two low-profile armored Runabouts.”
The big electric utility vehicles were ubiquitous across the Protectorate and even more so on Mars, high-based six-wheeled vans designed to carry an entire family or a business’s supplies. In their most common setup, which included the two vehicles behind Melissa Chan, they could carry eight.
Romanov had clearly been paying attention when Damien had sent him the specifications of the vehicles, because with all of the Secret Service Agents they’d collected along they way, they had exactly sixteen people for their trip into Olympus City.
“You don’t travel in a small group, do you?” Chan continued, looking around the collection of bodyguards in suits almost identical to Damien’s own.
“I am a Hand,” Damien told her. “I may not contain multitudes, but I appear to bring them with me. Any concerns with the vehicles?” he asked.
“None. They’re both fully charged, should be good for thirty hours or so of driving. Not the most heavily armored vehicles we have, but the Runabout is a sturdy vehicle to begin with. Ford still at least tries for ‘Built Ford Tough’.
“The panels will stand up to anything short of anti-armor rockets. The windows are more vulnerable, but you’d still need one of the penetrator rounds designed to take down exosuits. They’ll keep you safe, my lord.”
“Thank you, Miss Chan,” Damien replied. “Romanov?”
“Massey, Coral, you’re driving,” the head of his detail snapped, sending his Marine Corporals to work. “My lord, Inspector Samara, you’re with me in the second car. Lead car is detail only.”
Chan smiled quickly.
“I suspect I don’t need to know these details,” she told him cheerfully. “Have a safe drive, gentlemen.”
#
The two vehicles emerged from the dark underground of the Mountain’s parking garages into the weak sunlight of an Olympus Mons spring. Carefully calibrated greenhouse-gas effects kept Mars habitable, but the sun was still small and weak compared to most worlds Damien had visited.
Driving into it still wasn’t fun and he was, for once, glad to surrender that task to someone else as he gazed out the window, taking in the city below.
The Mountain itself was an underground complex home to over three hundred thousand souls, but it was a center of government that employed over twice that. There were no fewer than a hundred different garages and entrances, and traffic between them and the city of millions that encompassed the lower reaches of Olympus Mons was always heavy.
There was no problem slotting the pair of electric SUVs into the middle of the flow, the drivers linking the cars into the traffic control net but keeping their hands hovering over emergency overrides.
Despite almost two hundred years of growth post-terraforming, you could still see the denser pockets where the original domes had sat. The rising skylines in each section were still shaped by the memories of those ancient structures.
Of course, the city now sprawled out from those domes, office towers and apartments and houses and suburbs encircling each of the old dome centers and wrapping around the base of the Mountain in an interlinking web of homes, businesses and parks.
Damien had seen bigger cities, on Earth if nowhere else, but Olympus City itself remained stunningly impressive to him.
“We’ve got quite a ways to go still,” Massey reported back. “If anyone needs to catch up on their sleep, now’s the time. We’ll be at least forty minutes to the mall.”
#
Sunrise Mall wasn’t going to break any records in terms of size or crowds—Olympus City alone had a dozen larger malls—but it was definitely a gorgeous shopping complex, a T-shaped structure carved of glass and Mars’s native red rock.
It was tucked into an area of newer office and apartment towers, surrounded on three sides by structures that towered fifty or more stories above it. The fourth side opened out over the mountain, giving the long edge of the T an incredible view.
Judgment of Mars (Starship's Mage Book 5) Page 14