Shiva in Steel

by Fred Saberhagen

  "The distinguishing characteristic of cult members is likely to be fanaticism. If Julius now commands a holy war against berserkers-well, we could use a little of that on our side."

  The only contribution that the general historical database could make was to suggest "His Imperial Highness" as the proper form of address for an emperor. "Your Magnificence" was listed as an alternate.

  It seemed noteworthy that the database had nothing at all to say about this particular emperor, or his supposed empire-it contained biographical information on only about a billion contemporary people, less than one out of a thousand of the Solarian citizens of the settled Galaxy.

  Within an hour or so of the arrival of the battered courier, a lone vessel whose live pilot identified it as the flagship of the imperial navy was picked up by the local Hyperborean defenses and went through the usual routine of being intercepted by one of Commander Normandy's patrol craft and taking a Space Force pilot aboard. The stranger was not much bigger than a patrol craft itself, though measurements taken at a distance had indicated she was somewhat too stout to be able to slide herself in through the hangar doors.

  The commander's eagerness to obtain help had not yet caused her to discard caution. Only when she was solemnly assured that everyone on board the Galaxy was a bona fide volunteer for military service did she grant the vessel permission to land. And then she insisted on putting her own pilot aboard to carry out the maneuver.

  An hour or so after the battered robot courier had delivered its surprising message, the emperor's ship, the only unit of his supposed fleet that had so far appeared, and bearing the volunteers' imperial insignia, was on approach for a landing on Hyperborea.

  Soon the people on the ground were able to get a good video image. The insignia on the emperor's ship was of a large and rather clumsy design, featuring curved lobes that might have been intended as the Galaxy's spiral arms. It looked like a collection of stock shapes, borrowed from whatever source happened to be handy and stuck together without much thought.

  When Commander Normandy got her first good look, by holostage, at the mob of volunteers Julius had jammed aboard his ship, her first impulse was decisively confirmed-she would send all of them, or nearly all, right back to Good Intentions. Discipline, not to mention experience, seemed almost totally lacking.

  When she had first heard this group was coming, her imagination had leaped ahead to picture a horde of rigid fanatics who, even if inexperienced, would be ready to charge forth and do battle in any direction that their emperor aimed them. She'd been envisioning Templars on steroids, with nuclear grenades clipped to their belts, howling for a chance to die in battle.

  The reality was something of a disappointment.

  Instead of Templars, fate seemed to be landing on the little rock a collection of misfits, marginal incompetents, people who had probably joined the emperor because they were not particularly welcome anywhere else. As fighters, they could be assumed to be almost useless. The extra scores and dozens of unskilled hands and useless mouths, if allowed to remain, threatened at once to become a problem on the small station. At the very least, they would be getting in the way.

  Once the Galaxy was down, a quick laser scan of her measurements confirmed that she was too big to fit in through the hangar doors. The imperial flagship would certainly have to remain parked out on the field.

  The Emperor Julius didn't just walk through a door, he made an entrance. But one watcher at least, Harry Silver, who'd seen some other famous entrance-makers in his time, had the impression that this one was just going through the motions, that the man's heart wasn't in it any more.

  "Have you more ships on the way?"

  "I regret not." Julius remained serene in his regret, though it was undoubtedly sincere.

  "I thought perhaps your followers in some other solar system…"

  "I regret that there will be no additional ships."

  Events confirmed the sad admission. Unfortunately, the two admirals-or admiral and commodore-had almost nothing to command. However large the emperor's fleet might once have been, it now consisted of the one ship only, under a flag that no one on the station could remember ever having seen before: the same design as on the hulls, of clumsy curves that might have been intended as the Galaxy's spiral arms. The crew was top-heavy with rank. Almost everyone seemed to be a commissioned officer.

  Marut was at a loss. He had never encountered anything of the kind before. Berserkers hadn't stopped him, but human folly could.

  Marut, or one of his people, asked one of the Julian officers: "How large is the emperor's domain?"

  "His Imperial Highness reigns over the entire Galaxy." The claim was made straightfaced, with a calm demeanor-though the admiral would have to be crazy to expect anyone here to believe it.

  "I see." Then how is it some of us never heard of him until two days ago? The question wasn't asked aloud. There didn't seem to be much to add in the way of comment. The commander had been nursing hopes that maybe there was a whole planet, somewhere… but even if there was, of course what counted were people and ships that she could put on the line before the inexorably approaching deadline.

  "But most of the people in the Galaxy have never heard of him!"

  There was no crack in the admiral's serene demeanor. "Now that he has assumed active leadership in the holy war, first billions, then hundreds of billions, will rally to his banner, and to his name."

  "Sure they will-I hope they bring some ships and weapons with them."

  Harry had formed no idea of what the emperor was going to look like, and was startled by what he saw. Julius, somewhat shorter than average, had some natural resemblance to Napoleon Bonaparte, one of the great conquerors of pre-space Solarian history, who had also made himself an emperor, placing the crown on his head with his own hands. The modern version was obviously aware of the likeness, and cultivated it at least to the extent of arranging his scanty, dark hair into a lock that fell over his massive forehead. Silver wasn't sure that many of his followers would have recognized that name.

  It was probably all wasted effort, or it would have been if the object was to impress the folk on Hyperborea, but the man kept trying. Harry had to admire that, in a way. And he wondered if he, Harry Silver, was the only one on the base who got the point.

  The emperor made his first appearance on the station wearing a rather special uniform, decorated with a sash and many medals. But the most eye-catching feature was the ceremonial sword at his belt-on a second look, it might have been a real sword. The long blade was hidden in its sheath, and some observers, who had never heard of swords before, weren't sure what the unfamiliar object was.

  The latest rumor, as unconfirmed as rumors usually were, said that Julius himself, and one or two of those with him, were the only members of his group who claimed to have bona fide combat experience-and there were some grounds for suspecting that the records indicating that experience had been falsified.

  One of the first things Julius said on disembarking was that he wanted a meeting on strategy, face-to-face with Commander Normandy, as soon as possible. Sadie, the adjutant, put him off with diplomatic phrases; he was quietly angry at being forced to deal with a mere program.

  Actually, the commander was somewhat relieved that this visitor's ship could not fit into the hangar, because she would not have allowed it entry anyway now that she'd had a look at Julius and his crew. But she had not yet despaired of finding among them some of the people that she needed.

  The emperor, after debarking from his ship and leading a portion of his flock through the temporary tunnel to the hangar, unerringly picked out the person who was in charge, even though Commander Normandy was in her combat armor, which didn't ordinarily display much identification.

  Julius, wearing what Harry could easily believe was an emperor's full-dress uniform, went straight to her, followed by several of his motley band of refugees, and bowed lightly.

  "Commander Normandy, I place myself and my forces
under your command."

  Hearing the same little speech from almost anyone but the Emperor Julius, Harry Silver would have been disposed to laugh at it, and to favor the commander with a pitying look because she had to put up with such garbage. But when Julius spoke the words, no one seemed impelled to snicker.

  Nor did Commander Normandy seem in need of pity. It was ridiculous, but something in his voice, his look, stirred even in her a surge of hope. Instinct said that this was someone who could be relied upon. "Thank you, er, uh, Emperor Julius." And she offered a handshake.

  Julius accepted both hand and title with a gracious nod. The latter was, after all, no more than his due. And if there was just a hint of gracious condescension in the way he took her hand, well, it was not so marked that anyone could have objected to it.

  And the first impromptu conference between the leaders necessarily took place in the hangar.

  The commander said: "I had hoped to have a small welcoming ceremony-in the lounge. But… how many of your people have come with you?" The inside end of the rescue ramp was still disgorging cultists, unarmed people blinking at the scene around them and smiling nervously.

  "Almost a hundred."

  The base was simply not prepared to receive or house that many, eager volunteers or not.

  My own people are almost going to be outnumbered, was Commander Normandy's immediate private thought. But not for long-because she had already decided that most of the emperor's folk were going home again, before they had time to unpack.

  They would not even be leaving in the ship they came in. "That stays here. It looks like it might be very useful."

  But some means of getting people off the ship had to be worked out when it developed that there were only two space suits-and very few of the hundred knew how to use a suit. An enclosed, pressurized tube-ramp used years ago in construction was dug out of a deep locker, and when extended, served to establish a connection between ship and hangar. The mass of cultist volunteers were brought in by that means to normal air and gravity.

  Also, it appeared likely that only a few of them possessed the talent or training to do anything useful in a military way. These, the emperor insisted firmly, were going to serve as the Galaxy's crew. With surprising willingness, he gave in on another point-the great majority of his hundred, however eager they might be to enter battle, were going to have to turn around and go right home.

  To persuade his followers of the need for this withdrawal, Julius had to put in some minutes of serious effort, first cajoling and then ordering them to do so. Hundreds of other cult members had begged and pleaded with the emperor to bring them with him when he ascended into the heavens to do battle, but he had insisted that they stay behind. There appeared to have been a thorough kind of screwup at embarkation. Originally, only those who met the Space Force qualifications were to have been allowed aboard his ship-but somehow, a few exceptions had been made, and then a few more.

  The lounge, or wardroom, was not, by a long way, the biggest interior space available on the base-but it was the only area of sufficient size, apart from the hangars, to which the commander was willing to admit a collection of eccentric strangers, particularly at this crucial time. She'd even been nervous about letting the cultists hang about in the hangars, virtually empty as they were, but there hadn't been any good way to avoid letting them pass through.

  Anyway, the lounge offered a far more welcoming environment than those stark caverns. The high, arched ceiling, especially when augmented with a little virtual tinkering, suggested a noble grove of trees, a close approximation of Earth's native sunlight twinkling from above leafy branches, stirred now and then by a gentle breeze. Here the emperor and as many as a dozen of his entourage could be received, with equal numbers on the other side, to provide something like dignity and public ceremony; and Commander Normandy had asked that the emperor and no more than a dozen of his immediate party, or entourage, be brought there.

  A small delegation of Commander Normandy's own officers appeared, some of them grumbling and yawning, still fastening their tunics. Dress uniforms at the ceremony instead of coveralls. People who were off duty at the moment, and Who would otherwise have been asleep, had been drafted into a kind of welcoming committee.

  Whether Julius and his entire following were all insane or not, they were at least sincere volunteers, and Claire Normandy remained determined to offer them a welcome and a heartfelt thanks-even if her next move was going to be to send most of their hopeful shipmates right back home.

  Arrangements for the welcoming were hastily cobbled together: "Flags will be displayed, and something like a ceremony attempted-we're going to have to work with him, and with his people. At the very least, I'm going to have to take his ship."

  Examination by the commander's techs had confirmed that the emperor's ship was really a pretty good one-at least it was undamaged, and it did carry some weaponry. It could make the difference in the planned assault on Summerland. But even had it been a clunker, she would have commandeered it.

  "Get the people off her and figure out some other way to send them home."

  "On what? We may have to house them for several days."

  "I know. Put up cots in the hangar."

  "We don't have that many cots."

  "Then put sleeping bags on the deck, dammit. Improvise something. There's plenty of space in there. We must be polite, but they are not to be allowed to wander."

  "Yes, ma'am."

  When the emperor, and a small party he had personally selected from his associates, appeared in the doorway of the lounge, Harry Silver was already on hand, having taken his position at a table on the far side of the room, about fifteen meters from the door through which the latest visitors must enter. First he heard a door opening and closing in the distance, way down a corridor somewhere outside the imitation forest glade, and then a muted babble of voices, all bright with mutual politeness, gradually coming closer. He was trying to pick out the emperor's voice without ever having heard it before, and not having a whole lot of success.

  Silver wasn't looking forward with enthusiasm to the announced ceremony, but he'd be damned if he was going to let a pack of cultists run him out of the only watering hole available. He took up an accustomed, and for him, easy position, standing on the fringe of events, left out of the ceremony altogether, with a drink in his hand and his gaze that of a detached observer, cynical and sour.

  There was no doubt at all about which man was Julius, shorter than almost every other male in the room. His uniform was impressive; worn by a smaller personality, it would have looked gaudy and over-elaborate. "Jaunty" would not be quite the right word for the emperor's attitude-it was more serious than that. Certainly "ambitious." Maybe "grandiose." He was a man who radiated… something. Exactly what was hard to say, but definitely something. All eyes went to him as iron dust to a magnet.

  Meanwhile, in front of Julius, beside him, after him, flowed the expected escort of aides and hangers-on, now reduced to a reasonable number, looking worried and trying to be haughty. All of the high-ranking officers in the cult's nonexistent navy wore odd uniforms and guarded expressions. The others, mostly in civilian clothes, were a handful of strangely assorted people, including-

  Becky.

  Harry Silver's drink fell from his grasp, and in the next instant, his hand, making a reflex grab for recovery, knocked the glass off the edge of the table, thudding and splashing to the floor-but not until later did he remember that he had dropped it.

  Fierce demons of emotion-elation, anger, outrage-flared up inside him like explosions, with the result that he nearly fainted when a second look and a third look assured him that yes, it was really she, the woman he had thought dead, who was standing there with the others, a beam of virtual sunlight lighting up her hair. Just a person, a living person, like everyone else. What really made her stand out from the rest of the emperor's entourage was that Becky was about the only one who had the class to look uncomfortable.

 
Two or three enlisted people from the station's crew-and one or two from Marut's-standing near Harry were looking at him and at the glass he'd dropped, shaking their heads slightly. No doubt they were positive that he was drunk. Whether or not Harry Silver had been on the verge of getting drunk a minute earlier, he sure as hell was sober now.

  He moved a couple of steps to one side, to get a better look at Becky over someone's shoulder. The lounge was full of people now, and she hadn't seen him yet.

  Her hair was done up in a different way than he remembered, and it seemed also to be a different color, though he couldn't really be sure-how many nonessentials he'd forgotten! He supposed she must be wearing different clothes than when he'd seen her last, though he was damned if his mind could show him a clear picture of any set of garments that she had ever worn. Otherwise, the years had hardly changed her at all from the picture presented by his memory.

  He heard one of the other women who had entered the lounge with Becky call her "Josephine." In the next moment, it was the emperor himself who turned his head and spoke to her, saying something that Harry couldn't hear, in a casual and familiar way; and suddenly what she'd written in her last letter, about starting a new life, took on a whole new meaning.

  Commander Normandy, entering the room from another direction, had how launched into her brief formal speech of welcome. Everyone in the room was standing, in the universal attitude of people prepared to endure speeches in respectful silence. In the background, soft but stirring music played; someone had thought to enliven matters that way.

  Silver stood watching, unable to think, unable to move, until eventually her eyes came around to him.

  TEN

  Becky's eyes met his at last, and Harry saw her small start of recognition. But it was plain that the impact on her was nothing like the hammer blow he'd just experienced. Well, she'd had no reason to believe that he was dead.