Musketeer Space

by Tansy Rayner Roberts

  If he loved anything at all, it was his ship.

  The Matagot was a masterpiece of hidden depths. He was a dagger-class raven scout, polished black and gleaming on the outside. If you weren’t paying attention – and people rarely did pay sufficient attention – he looked like any other messenger ship.

  If you knew what to look for, you might notice how well preserved the ship was, without the usual wear and tear of anything piloted by a Raven. The hull was glossy and smooth, and the engine purred like the cat of legend from which the ship had taken his name.

  A lot of money had been spent on keeping this ship in the kind of prime condition that a Raven messenger could never afford.

  Officially, Milord and his sister-in-law were staying at the Julien, a five star hotel on Lunar Palais. Bee spent most of her time there, with her irritating friends as they indulged in their usual riot of gaming, carousing and competitive sports. She had a suite on Paris Satellite itself for easy access to the rec centres and TeamJoust tanks.

  Bee’s friends were not the only reason that Milord avoided both hotel suites. The Matagot provided all his needs – including a double office that allowed he and his assistant Kitty to work in separate spaces so that her cheerful chatter did not drive him up the wall.

  Milord liked his office – it was less spacious than the one he used back on Valour, but it had a desk and a comfortable couch and access to every comm frequency in the solar system. There was even room to pace back and forth, when his nervous energy got the better of him.

  The dagger-class scout was roomier than most variations of this kind of ship. There were several cabins, a basic kitchen and a gym. More than most hotels had to offer, even if you were prepared to pay top credit.

  Kitty’s office was – something that Milord suffered, because good assistants were hard to find and while Kitty was bossy, overly talkative and high-pitched, she would also work twenty hours non stop if he needed her to, she never asked stupid questions, and she did a good line in sarcastic banter which was, he had to admit, a great weakness of his.

  In exchange for Kitty’s relentless work ethic, her ability to remind him to eat and sleep at regular intervals w, and the fact that she had worked for him for five years without reporting any of his more illegal activities to the Crown, Milord paid her very well and allowed her to decorate her own office to her own taste.

  If he kept his eyes straight ahead and walked very quickly on his way to his own office, he did not have to look at the bright pastel wall decorations and the collection of flying glitter pony toys that littered her desk.

  The whole thing had become more tolerable once he installed a second coffee printer in his own office. No one should be faced with rainbows and sparkly plush space unicorns when they were in search of coffee.

  Today he was in the gym, using the treadmill while answering correspondence from the office back on Valour when Kitty’s bright, cheery voice broke in on the music in his headphones. “Your smoking hot 1500 appointment is here early, Milord. Shall I show her to your office, or can I flirt with her while you make yourself ready?”

  “Whichever my guest prefers,” he said, maintaining the usual affable charm that he used around his assistant. It was good practice for him, the illusion of an intense but kind-hearted politician. Kitty’s perception of him influenced how others saw him, and the cover of Milord Vaniel de Winter was too useful to risk. Vaniel de Winter found Kitty amusing, and allowed her to push him around because it made her feel useful. Milord hoped he would not have to kill her some day, because how the hell did one discreetly dispose of that many glitter ponies?

  “Any word from the Marquise de Wardes’ people?” he asked.

  “She has taken up the Regence’s offer to stay in residence at the Palace for some time,” said Kitty. “Still working on that personal appointment, though. Everyone wants a piece of her. Might take more than a bunch of flowers and a pair of designer heels in a gift box, if you know what I mean.”

  Milord felt his mouth press into a thin line. The Marquise de Wardes would be a fascinating political ally to add to his collection, but so far his overtures had been met with polite reserve.

  If he couldn’t win her with gifts and conversation, he might have to invest the time and energy into a seduction.

  Milord took a brief sonic shower and dressed in business clothes for the appointment. As he straightened his tie in the mirror, he shifted his hair from comfortable silver-blond back to brown. This guest knew both sides of him, but it was a code to him as much as to her. Silver meant flirting, espionage and pretending to be equals. Brown meant Valour politics, New Aristocracy, and business all the way.

  Kitty was alone in her glitter pony paradise when Milord strode past her desk. Slurping her way through a foaming green tea frappe the size of her forearm, she waggled her fingernails at him in greeting.

  Special Agent Rosnay Cho waited in Milord’s office, her boots propped up on his desk and a cup of black coffee balanced on the arm of her chair. “Not interrupting anything, am I?” she asked.

  Milord was unsettled by her early appearance. Appointment times should be as sacrosanct as contracts. “What’s so urgent that it couldn’t wait an hour?”

  Ro surveyed him from beneath her dark sweep of hair. Her flight suit today was a bright musk pink, frivolous as always. It was one of many techniques she employed to make people underestimate how dangerous she was; Milord appreciated that about her. There were times when he wondered if Kitty, with her purple hair and sugared drinks and pony obsession, was doing the same thing. Possibly she was an assassin in disguise.

  “I was at a loose end, and there’s a lot to do today,” Ro said carelessly. “Don’t you know there’s a war on?”

  Milord rolled his eyes at her. He allowed a certain amount of teasing, for the same reason that Ro wore candy-coloured flight suits. It didn’t hurt to let other people think you were fair game. Intimacy was like anything else – a tool to be carefully distributed, and then exploited. “How can I be of use to the Cardinal today?”

  Ro blinked steadily at him. “I’m not here on behalf of her Eminence today. The Regence has given me a mission, and I thought you might have useful intelligence.”

  Interesting. It wasn’t unlike Ro to roll where the weather took her, but it surprised him that the Cardinal allowed her loyalties to be shared. Milord let his voice drop into a low, amused drawl. “I’m honoured. How can I help the Regence?”

  “I’m on the lookout for an asset that the Prince Consort is upset to have lost.”

  He laughed at that. “Not the little tailor?”

  “He’s been kidnapped.”

  “He makes a habit of that.” Milord raised his eyebrows at her. “Usually it’s you.”

  Ro scowled. “Not this time. Do you know where he is?”

  “I couldn’t begin to imagine. But I promise I’ll keep an eye out on my travels. People often turn up in the strangest places.”

  “The reward is very generous.”

  “I’ll keep that in mind. Anything else?”

  The stare he got from her was intense and thorough, as if she was trying to pull the knowledge of Conrad Su’s whereabouts directly from his mind. “D’Artagnan,” she said, after a moment.

  Milord batted his eyelashes at her. “Who?”

  Ro was impatient. “She’s a new favourite of Prince Alek, and by extension, the Regence. Hangs around with Musketeers. Gets into trouble like it’s her superpower.”

  “I don’t know anyone by that name,” Milord replied with his sweetest smile. It was true, to a point. The woman he had met on that train back on Valour had used a different identity.

  “The Cardinal doesn’t want anything to happen to Dana D’Artagnan,” Ro said in a firm voice. “Not in retaliation for – recent events, or anything else. Her Eminence is all for a unified front with the Crown for the duration of the war. D’Artagnan is off limits.”

  Neither of them mentioned diamonds, as the reason someone might
wish to retaliate against the young pilot who had made herself so very difficult lately.

  “D’Artagnan is off limits,” Milord agreed. “Got it.” He continued to smile, his gaze fixed on Ro’s beautiful scarred face until she took her leave of him.

  “Always a pleasure, Milord,” she said tiredly.

  “You too, sweetness,” he replied, and they kissed the corners of each other’s mouths in polite pretence that they weren’t now on opposing sides of a game that was getting interesting.

  Milord waited until Ro was gone, and then chimed through the comm to Kitty. “Any more appointments this afternoon?”

  “No, Milord de Winter,” she said cheerfully.

  “Let’s take a joyride. File a flight plan for the Tower asteroid. I want to check on our guest.”

  “Whatever you say, boss. Will we be back by tomorrow evening? That’s Karaoke night in the South quarter, and some very cute engies offered to buy me drinks.”

  “You know how I hate to interfere with your social life. This will be a short trip.”

  “Right you are, boss.”

  Milord closed the door between their adjoining offices and examined at himself in the mirrored surface. He straightened his tie and the collar of his shirt. Ro knew him too well. The only reason for her to arrive early was to rattle him.

  He would not allow it. “Kitty, scratch that,” he called through his comm. “We’ll stay with the original plan. Our guest can wait a few more days.” The last thing he wanted was to be tracked to the holding location of his prisoner. “Order a security sweep of the Matagot, from top to tail. Let’s be sure Special Agent Cho didn’t leave us any small, blinking gifts.”

  “Isn’t she a friend of yours, Milord?” Kitty said in surprise.

  “Oh, she is,” he agreed, gazing at his reflection. He stretched his neck casually and let himself fall for a moment into his natural shape. Red blossomed across his skin, highlighting his cheekbones and the soft creases in the corners of his eyes. His eyes darkened to blown black pupils with tiny darts of golden light flecked through them. His skin flooded with the warmth that smelled like home.

  In this moment, he was not Winter or Vaniel or Milord or Auden or Slate or Gray or any of the other names he had worn in service of his long career of pretending to be human. For a few precious seconds, he was gloriously himself.

  Then he blinked back to Milord Vaniel de Winter, Secretary of the Interior on Valour: political obsessive, absent father, loyal brother-in-law and all around good person to have in your corner. Tousled brown hair, pale skin, grey eyes.

  “Rosnay Cho is a very good friend of mine,” he assured Kitty, adjusting his cuffs and smoothing out the soft lines of his jacket. “That’s what makes her so dangerous.”

  He would allow himself no more personal indulgences. There was a war on, after all.

  A war against the human race, and the solar system they held so dear.

  Part II

  A Miracle of Spaceships

  You loved me once

  Laid your hands on me and broke my skin

  (I let you in)

  You peeled apart my metal doors

  (Thought I was yours)

  Shattered my plexiglass

  And when there was nothing left of me to fly

  (Watch me try not to cry)

  You built yourself a brand-new miracle

  And sailed away into the sky

  I remember you

  A spaceship never forgets

  “Meditations on Heartbreak,” Collected Poems of the Musketeer Aramis © Solar Imperial 39835.paris

  32

  Chasing Spaceships

  This was not the first time that Athos had lost a spaceship he loved.

  It was not even the third time.

  He always promised himself he wouldn’t get attached. Avoiding intimacy was something he found easy when it came to people (most people), but spaceships had a way of getting under his skin.

  It didn’t help that he always refused to get a bland factory settings ship. Oh, no. He had to go hunting for one with personality.

  Here we go again.

  “Where old spaceships go to die,” he said aloud.

  This was the storage yard that time, space and Musketeers forgot. It was full of salvaged ship debris: a low-ceilinged treasure trove beneath the Musketeer space dock. Engies came here from time to time, rummaging for spare parts. Finding enough scrap to assemble a complete dart was a pipe dream.

  He still intended to try.

  “I can’t believe Treville made you come here for a replacement for the Parry-Riposte instead of printing you a new ship,” said Porthos from where she sat on the hull of a beautiful dart that had once been called the Saucy Nancy, but had been sliced into four separate pieces during a laser battle.

  Athos remembered that battle. The Musketeer who piloted her had ended up in three pieces.

  “I can,” said Aramis, poking at the rubble of a broken tail fin with her boot. “She threatened to, after he lost the Balestra last year.”

  “That was one time, and I found her again!” Athos protested.

  “I can’t see how that redeems you for literally losing a spaceship.”

  “At least when he blew her up, it was in service to the Crown,” Porthos teased.

  “I did not – I hate you all.”

  D’Artagnan’s laugh, loud and enthusiastic, rang above their bickering. It was her first visit to the land of broken spaceships, and she looked like a wide-eyed child at Joyeux. She always looked like a child to Athos.

  He had to keep reminding himself that she was twenty, not twelve, and that the three of them didn’t actually have to feel guilty that their friendship was going to corrupt her irretrievably.

  Well. Maybe they should feel a little guilty.

  “Why do they hang on to this stuff?” asked D’Artagnan, whose spacer mentality had trouble computing that so much yardage on a space station might be reserved for slabs of steel and spare parts, instead of dissolving it down to its atoms to be re-used as freshly printed parts.

  “You can’t print personality,” said Athos. “Who wants a ship without any scratches on the hull?”

  “Me, I do, my ship is perfect,” Porthos said, waving a hand as if she was volunteering in class. “You take too much pride in saving broken things.”

  Athos refused to respond. He didn’t want anyone to start assuming metaphors where none existed.

  Grimaud emerged from behind a stack of cables and hatchways, her usual headphones slung around her neck instead of clamped over her ears. “Treville offered him a new ship,” she said. “He refused to accept until he was sure there wasn’t something down here that could be salvaged.” With that betrayal, his engie stood there and smirked.

  Athos calmed himself by imagining several ways that he could kill her, silently, with no one ever suspecting him.

  Aramis and Porthos shot identical looks of delight at Athos.

  “You ROMANTIC,” Aramis howled.

  “I might swoon,” Porthos agreed.

  D’Artagnan grinned all over her baby face.

  Athos growled at them all.

  “Speaking of,” said Grimaud, and crooked her fingers. “Found something, boss.”

  He might be furious at her ganging up on him with the other women, but he still trusted her implicitly when it came to spaceships. Athos followed Grimaud deeper into the yard, with the others trailing behind.

  “This one is a possibility,” said Grimaud, tapping a silver dart with most of its side attached as she walked past it. “Someone’s stripped out the internals, but the hull is sturdy enough to save.”

  “And?” Athos said patiently. He knew a red herring when he saw one.

  “And then there’s this fellow.” Grimaud stopped, and everyone else bumped into Athos, craning their necks to see.

  “Oh,” said Aramis in a baffled sort of voice.

  “Seriously?” said Porthos. “Is that even a dart?”

  D’Art
agnan clambered around all of them, half-tripping over her own pet engineer, whose name Athos could never remember. Pigtails? Pigtails spotted what they were all looking at a few seconds before D’Artagnan and responded with a shrill sound and a clap of her hands.

  Athos did his best to ignore them all as he took in the sight. It was an old musket-class dart, practically an antique.

  “He’s even older than the Buttercup,” breathed D’Artagnan, which meant nothing to Athos.

  “He’s so ugly,” said Porthos, sounding giddy.

  He was old and bulbous and an odd greenish colour that Athos had never seen on any ship ever. He was so far from a modern dart that Athos wasn’t sure that the designation fit. He wasn’t streamlined and elegant like the Parry-Riposte had been.

  Athos was in love already.

  “It’s a classic, I suppose,” D’Artagnan said doubtfully, trying to be polite.

  “It’s amazing,” Pigtails said, punching Dana lightly on the arm. “I’d love to get my hands on it. So jealous, Madame Grimaud.”

  “Please,” said Aramis heavily. “Please tell me you’re not taking him home, Athos. He’s not a stray cat, he won’t benefit from a little food and attention…”

  Athos held his hand up to silence them all. “I’m being seduced,” he informed them. “Don’t spoil our moment.”

  Grimaud gave him one of her rare, dazzling smiles. “Guess what he’s called?”

  “I can’t even,” said Athos, slowly circling around the hull. This marvel was even ugly from behind. He had never seen such an awkward-looking ship.

  “The Pistachio.”

  “I am not going to be seen in public with you in that ship, war or no war,” Porthos threatened.

  It was too late. Grimaud smiled, and Athos twitched his mouth back at her. Pigtails was already begging them both to let her help with the restoration.