“You’re sure of that?” I demanded, feeling myself on unsteady footing.
“The Corindar and his Church would prefer it otherwise,” he replied, smiling tightly in Jeras’s direction, “as would we all, of course.”
He set the glass down, lifted a stylus from the map table before him, spun it idly in his fingers.
“But I am a soldier, son,” he went on. “I cannot afford to engage exclusively in wishful thinking, or rely on prayers alone. I have to prepare for the worst.”
The Corindar nodded slightly to him, then looked back at me.
“It will not be some sort of nostalgic affection for a long-dead government that brings those seven back together in harmony,” my father continued. “It will be the one world strong enough to assert authority over all the others, to bring each of them into line. If none can do this, we will surely find ourselves plunged into civil wars for years—decades—to come. Or worse.”
My father, apparently having made his point, sat back and drank the rest of his wine in one long swallow, then set the glass aside, waiting.
Corindar Jeras was perched on the edge of his chair, looking at me anxiously, as if fearful that I had been told too much, too soon.
And then it started to make sense to me. I would have seen it earlier, except that part of me—most of me—did not want to believe it. In addition, I had been deluged with information from the time I had arrived on Victoria; with world-shaking revelations I had never expected to hear in my lifetime. But I could not overlook our current situation any longer, not in the light of what I had heard so far. I had to ask the question openly. I had to hear it directly and honestly from my father.
“This all ties together somehow, doesn’t it? This is why our ships, our armies, are here, readying for action. You aren’t just preparing for the potential of conflict. You’re going to precipitate it.”
I gestured broadly, to indicate all the activity that buzzed silently about us.
“This is no drill.”
My father smiled at me, and then the full extent of it all came out.
“There must be a new order, Gaius,” he said, slowly and deliberately, as if instructing a child. “Beyond our own world, only on Verghas and on Trinity has some semblance of the imperial government endured. But in both cases it has been corrupted and distorted beyond real recognition.”
“So you intend to unify the worlds,” I said, “by force.”
And there it was, on the table.
“If necessary,” my father replied after a moment.
“You plan to conquer them,” I said. “All of them.” I knew it was true as soon as I said it.
My father poured himself another glass of wine.
“Hopefully not all at once,” he said finally. “That would prove much more difficult. Hence the secrecy.”
None of us spoke a word for several seconds, as I continued to stare at my father, incredulous. Then I turned to the corindar.
“And you? The Church?”
He shrugged.
“The other worlds would not willingly join with Majondra to restore the old Empire,” he said. “They would not submit to what they would perceive to be outside rule. The Church is in agreement with your father on this point.”
“The Church?” I frowned at him. “The entire Church? Or just our own branch of it?”
The corindar hesitated, glancing at Constantine, then looked back at me, biting his lip for a moment, seemingly struggling for the right words.
“The…Church…is in accord,” he said finally, almost painfully. “All of it. We… we have already spoken at some length with the leaders of the branches on all the other worlds, and…”
“And you all agree on this?” I prompted him. “You support military conquest?”
“We…the seven branches are in agreement with one another on everything. Everything.” His mouth flattened into a thin smile, and he bowed his head. “The Church is restored. It is whole again.”
My eyebrows rose involuntarily.
“How can that be? Surely…surely, in six hundred years, some differences must have arisen.”
Jeras appeared even more pained, and looked plaintively at my father.
At that moment, the ground trembled violently. One of my father’s electric lanterns fell from its shelf and went out. I bent down to pick it up, while the rumbling only increased. Seconds later, it faded.
A ship taking off, nearby, I realized. A big one—probably a troop transport. Not a hell of a lot Dad’s distortion field could do to cover that up. And it reminded me, once again, of the sheer size of the force he had assembled here. He really meant to do this.
Rising, I set the lantern back on the shelf and looked over at him, waiting.
He frowned, glanced at the corindar, and made a quick dismissive gesture at me.
“The Church’s internal workings aren’t pertinent to what we’re about, Gaius,” he said. “We can address whatever specific questions you have on that score later.”
Jeras seemed wet with relief.
I nodded, still trying to absorb all of what I was hearing. The ramifications, in so many different directions, were simply huge. What was I missing? Something…
“What of our own government?” I blurted out suddenly. “What of our regent, Maxillus? Has he approved all of this?” I paused a moment, thinking it all through. “Do you intend to set him up as a new emperor of all the Seven Worlds?”
Again Jeras looked nervous, his eyes darting back and forth between us.
“Maxillus is a non-factor,” my father replied coolly. “He is nothing. He lacks the vision, the understanding, the capacity to seize this opportunity for all it is worth, and to prevent the terrible alternative, should we not push forward with all our efforts and resources at once.”
“A non-factor,” I repeated slowly. “How can that be? He is the regent!”
“Not anymore,” Corindar Jeras said.
I looked at him, then back at my father.
“What?”
“Your uncle, Justinian, is moving against him now,” Constantine said. “I made certain that the forces most loyal to him were here with us on Victoria, where we can control them. Justinian commands a large garrison back home that is completely loyal to us. To me. We should be getting word from him tonight. Once that is settled, and the Church has the Gates open, we will be completely free to act.”
I blinked, stunned beyond words.
“Ah, yes, I was waiting to tell you,” Jeras said to my father. “I made a discreet inquiry on my way here. The corindar at the capital said that all appeared to be going extremely well. Maxillus’s government is folding up, collapsing with scarcely a shot fired. This was roughly two hours ago,” he added.
I gaped at them. I simply could not believe it.
“A coup?”
My father shrugged.
“It is not as if Maxillus is of direct lineage to the old emperors,” he said. “The man has scarcely a drop of royal blood in him. His ancestors merely happened to be the highest ranking imperial officials on Majondra when the Gates failed.”
Still surprised, I looked at the corindar.
“And you approve of this, too?”
He closed his eyes and nodded once.
“The Church does not recognize Maxillus’s legitimacy, and he will find no support among my order. We agree that your father is the logical choice, the most effective leader to restore and preserve some semblance of the old Empire.”
“I will do my best.”
Jeras smiled and nodded to him.
“And the Church will bless you for these actions, Constantine.”
“You’re sure of that?” I shook my head. “They don’t know you, father. They can’t have learned much in so short a time. How can they possibly support you in so grave, so consequential a matter? I do not understand it, and thus I do not trust it.”
My father paused for a moment, frowning, regarding me, and then he stood. The corindar and I both did li
kewise. My father turned to Jeras then and smiled. He moved to the tent flap and pulled it aside, ushering us both outside. The roar of spacecraft, aircraft, and ground vehicles all around washed over us.
“Thank you for the good news, my friend,” he said to the corindar.
Jeras bowed.
“Bless you, Constantine. It will not be long now.”
“Indeed.”
My father watched as the priest shuffled away into the star-spackled darkness of the camp. Then he gestured for a junior officer to come over, and whispered a few words to the man that I could not make out. After the officer saluted and hurried away, my father turned back to me again, motioning for me to go back inside. He followed me in and closed the flap. The sounds fell away once more, and I became conscious of the fact that he had not yet turned off the distortion field around us.
“You said,” he began, his voice deep but gentle, “that you do not trust the Church’s actions.”
I had worried about admitting something so radical, so blasphemous, to my father. But I could not back down from it. I straightened, moving to face him directly.
“Yes, I—”
“Good,” he said. “Neither do I.”
My eyes widened, and then the air went out of me as I felt myself relaxing. Then you haven’t become their creature, I thought to myself, immensely relieved.
“But I—we—do need them on our side,” he continued. “We need their support and their good will.”
He walked back to his chair and dropped heavily into it.
“The operation is already underway. The orders have been given. The Gate here, above this moon, will be open before the night is over. The moment it opens, our forces will strike.”
He gestured at the maps and diagrams before him.
“In general terms, once out the other side, we will make a feint toward Sarmata, but actually continue on through their gate and hit Verghas, which we consider the greater threat. Perhaps the greatest of all. Once the Verghasites are defeated, the others should prove much more manageable. Even Earth itself, if the intelligence we’ve received from the Church is accurate.”
I nodded, looking over the papers.
“We are ready,” he said, leaning back in his seat. “As long as there are no surprises.”
“You trust what the Church has told you?”
“If I had not felt we could win either way, I would not have embarked on this operation,” he said. Then he shrugged. “All of it has come to me via Corindar Jeras. And Jeras has been a friend for many years. I trust him completely.”
“All right,” I said, nodding. “But we don’t know if the information they have given to him has always been accurate, or complete.”
“What we could verify for ourselves has always proven accurate,” he said. “Beyond that, though…”
He shrugged, then climbed to his feet again and moved around next to me, placing one hand on my left shoulder, speaking softly.
“And that brings me to you, son. I want you to look into them. Quietly, carefully, and very discreetly, I want you to investigate the Church.”
His lips formed a tight, flat line as he studied me, my reaction. Apparently satisfied with what he saw, he continued.
“After tonight, if all goes well, you will have access to more than just our own branch on Majondra. Jeras claims the Church’s views and policies and agendas are uniform across all the Seven Worlds. I agree with what you said before—we cannot take such a claim at face value. Even if the Church on Majondra does fully support us, we cannot be certain the other six branches will. Look into all of them. Find out what they are hiding from us.”
He stood there for a few more seconds, then turned away and leaned against a support, waiting.
And there it was, I thought. My own role in his coup, in his campaign of conquest. For five years I had served only as his assistant, essentially doing his paperwork and keeping up with his appointments and the like. But now I’d been given an actual, meaningful job—and a crucial one.
The thought of it scared me to death.
As much as I hated men like Commander LaToy, often I feared that they were correct about me, when they whispered behind my back—or said things to my face. They all believed the only reason I held any rank at all in our military was due to the influence and power of my father, and outwardly I rejected such views utterly. In private, however, such doubts gnawed at me. Part of me longed to prove them wrong; to be given the opportunity to excel on my own merits. But another part of me honestly believed them. That part of me had hoped I might never be placed in a position where the truth about myself, for good or ill, would be forced out into the light.
Now it seemed I had no choice. My father was placing an awesome responsibility on my shoulders.
Now we would see what we would see.
I met his eyes again and nodded, and the weight of the heavens descended upon me.
“Alright,” I said. And I resolved to do the best I could do.
He looked back at me and smiled, and it was a warm and confident smile, and that weight on my shoulders lightened ever so slightly. If he truly believed in me, how could I do any less?
My father surely read all of these thoughts on my face, and he probably knew my mind as well as I did—or better—in these matters. He simply returned my nod and moved to sit down again, pulling his maps out once more, dismissing me if I was so inclined.
I was not, not quite yet.
“There’s just one thing,” I said.
He looked up again, surprised.
“You said before that our forces were gathered here because you believed in preparing for the worst. But that wasn’t true. You aren’t preparing to react to something—you’re acting yourself, launching that very conflict. I will of course support you and our family and our world. But understand that by doing this you are crossing a line here—the line of open war—and taking the rest of us with you. Whether we like it or not. I hope you know what you are getting us into. Because there is no going back.”
My father looked back at me, pursed his lips, and nodded slowly.
“You are right, son. You are right.”
“So you had better win,” I said, smiling.
He laughed once, sharply.
“I intend to.”
I nodded, then walked out of the tent and did not look back.
This momentous night was not over yet, though. In fact, it had scarcely begun.
I resolved to get moving on my assignment immediately, rather than waiting around on Victoria or Majondra to observe the start of the campaign. From this vantage point, after all, one merely would see our ships accelerating away through the invisible Gate, the moment the Church managed to activate it. The real action would be on the other side, when they attacked the unsuspecting and unprepared defenders of Trinity and Verghas and the rest of the Seven Worlds that lay along the line of Gates, stretching out across the galaxy.
My work would have to begin on Majondra, at least until my father secured the route through to one of the other worlds. I knew, though, without doubt, that my mission soon could take me well beyond my homeworld. I found I was anxious to begin the work. Frankly, I was relieved that my father harbored as great a suspicion of the Church as I did. And so I rushed across the darkened camp, heading toward the shuttle that had brought me to the moon earlier.
Hurrying around a parked personnel carrier, I bumped into a figure rushing back the way I had come. He stumbled and I caught him by the arm before he could fall. We looked at one another.
It was Jeras. He looked feverish, almost wild-eyed, his hair mussed and his robes somewhat disheveled.
“Oh, Corindar,” I said. “I had thought you had already left the camp.”
His eyes focused on me momentarily, then he looked away again. Sweat ran down the side of his face.
“No,” he mumbled. “Not just yet.”
“Are you alright?”
He stumbled to one side, and I was unsure whether he w
as having difficulty standing or was trying to get away from me. Equally concerned and curious, I grasped him by the upper arm again. He appeared to me as if he needed the support.
His eyes met mine again, this time in a flash of anger that passed quickly. He inhaled deeply and exhaled.
“I remembered some other business I have with your father,” he said evenly then, pulling away from my grip.
“I see.”
“Good evening,” he said breathlessly, before rushing on into the night.
I nodded after him, started to continue on, then hesitated. Around me, the sounds of our shuttles and cargo vessels grew louder, as more of them launched into the night sky.
The Jeras I had always known was a careful, deliberate, fastidious man. If he intended to seek an audience with my father in that state, something had gone terribly wrong. And I needed to know about it.
Turning, I walked back in the direction Jeras had gone, in the direction of my father’s command tent.
The rumblings all around grew even louder. It appeared as if most of our forces would soon be airborne, on their way up to positions near the gate, awaiting the time to strike.
I had just rounded the last corner and was about twenty yards away from the tent when I heard the scream, coming from inside it.
Jeras’s voice.
Then my father’s voice boomed out, the words indistinct but forceful, even angry. Obviously he had turned off the distortion field after I had left. As I reached for the flap, I could hear what they were saying.
“—do you mean, a trap?”
“I—I’m sorry, Constantine! I did not want to do this, but the others, the corim—”
I jerked the flap aside and took one step inside, then froze.
Jeras appeared to have my father pinned up against the far side of the tent. The corindar’s clawlike hands were dug into my father’s shoulders, and he exhibited strength I would not have thought he possessed.
“Father, what is this?” I demanded.
Constantine looked past the priest and saw me.
“Get back, son. He—”
Jeras became aware of me then, turning halfway to look back, and he cried out once more.
“No! You were not supposed to—” He gasped. “Stay back! I—”
Baranak: Storming the Gates (The Above Book 2) Page 2