“We wait. And when it’s time for us to leave, we go.”
“In a lifepod?”
“No,” said Ransome. “That’s why we’re waiting: we’re going to need a ship. Sooner or later the Mages will give us one.”
Captain Gretza Yevil had been through worse months than the one just past—there’d been a few weeks during her thirteenth year that could still reduce her to bloody-minded despair if she dwelt on them for too long at a stretch—but nothing lately.
Interplanetary war … Mageworlders holding Galcen Prime … the Domina under arrest and Suivi Point a millimeter away from switching sides … and now this. Stuck on board a crippled ship bound for an unknown destination. I might as well have been kidnapped for all the say I had in anything.
And I hate playing cards.
Nevertheless, the games of kingnote and double tammani she’d played with Ignac’ LeSoit had been the only distractions available during the time that Warhammer spent in hyperspace. LeSoit had resisted all her efforts to find out where they were going—when, in desperation, she’d made that information the kingnote forfeit, he had responded by cheating so blatantly that she gave up in disgust. They went back to playing double tammani for pocket change instead.
Finally there came a ship’s-morning when LeSoit told her to strap down on one of the common-room couches and get ready for hyperspace dropout.
“Time for us to meet your mysterious buddies?” she asked.
“If we’re lucky. But trust me, Captain—you don’t want to take official cognizance of these people.”
“So you keep telling me.”
LeSoit just shrugged and headed for the ’Hammer’s cockpit. Yevil found a place on one of the couches and strapped the safety webbing in place.
The dropout wasn’t as smooth as it could have been; the queasy sense of dislocation lasted for several seconds. But for an old ship with bad structural damage it wasn’t bad, and Yevil had to give Ignac’ LeSoit several grudging points for his skill at shiphandling.
The ’Hammer continued its run in realspace, but not for long. Soon Captain Yevil felt the vessel settling down into a landing—beam—assisted, which usually meant a small enclosed bay like the one they’d broken out of on Suivi.
Not an orbital yard, then, she thought, and probably not a major field like Prime or Telabryk.
Ship’s gravity went off a few minutes later, confirming her guess. Wherever this place was, it had a pull only about half of the Galcen-based Space Force standard.
A moon of some kind, or an asteroid.
She unstrapped from the safety webbing, but didn’t bother going in search of LeSoit. The Domina’s number-two gunner was certain to show up with new instructions before long. When he did, his expression was an odd mix of relief and worry; relief that the place was still here, Yevil guessed, mixed with worry about his reception.
“Captain Yevil,” he said. “We’ve reached our destination. The repairs won’t be a problem, but I have to leave the ship for a while, and I have to request that you not leave the ship or enter the cockpit. It wouldn’t be safe for either of us.”
“Understood. Where are we, anyway?”
LeSoit shook his head. “I can’t tell you that.”
“I’m not surprised,” said Yevil. She tried again. “Is this some kind of criminals’ haven, or a pirate base?”
“You know I can’t answer that either.”
Yevil shrugged. “It was worth a try. But there’s one thing I have to know before I put on the blinders. Will what you’re doing here touch either the Domina’s honor or mine?”
“No,” said LeSoit. “My word on it. I’d never harm Beka—the Domina; and if you stay where I told you to, nothing’s going to compromise you either.”
“I won’t lie,” Yevil said. “There’s a funny smell to all this stuff about secrecy and looking the other way. But not so funny I can’t live with it.”
LeSoit went off on his mysterious errand. Yevil played a game and a half of solitaire kingnote during his absence. Then the Domina’s gunner returned, still looking nervous. They spent another week or so playing double tammani while Warhammer’s hull and deckplates resounded with the noise of heavy repairs.
The clanging and the vibrations finally stopped, but LeSoit made no preparations for getting underway. Instead he grew steadily more restless and uneasy—almost, Yevil thought, as if he were waiting for someone—until after several more days there came a ship’s-morning when she woke up and found the door to her berthing space sealed from the outside.
The air in the docking bay was thin and cold. Ignaceu LeSoit shivered a little where he stood at the top of Warhammer’s ramp. He had already sealed the cockpit doors and locked Captain Yevil into her cabin; now he toggled on the entry force field behind him and looked about.
The size of the bay continued to impress him, even after the weeks the ’Hammer had already spent there undergoing repairs. Off in the shadowy distance, low-power glows illuminated arched doorways in the bay’s metal walls; closer by, the worklights cast harsh white circles on the blast-scarred deckplates. Away to the right, amid a fountain of blue and pink electric sparks, a welder was working on a battered scoutcraft.
Coming here had represented a serious risk, especially with Yevil on board, but with the Domina’s money out of reach on Suivi Point, this place had been the only choice. LeSoit could get the necessary work done here without monetary charges, something which was both good and bad—good, for the obvious reasons; bad, because the people here usually wanted payment anyway.
How many repair bases and stores depots like this one there were in the civilized galaxy, LeSoit didn’t know. He suspected that there might be others, but he knew that he’d never find out for sure. This base was the only one for which he knew the coordinates. He had memorized them long ago, and then had hidden them so deeply by the techniques he had been taught that not even a mind-scan could have brought them forth against his will.
A messenger waited for him at the foot of the ramp—a short, dark-haired woman in scuffed boots and plain brown fatigues. She spoke to him in badly accented Galcenian.
“Come. You’re wanted.”
“He’s here?”
“Yes.”
She didn’t say anything more. LeSoit wondered if she was just naturally taciturn. Or was he listed as dangerous to talk to these days, because of the company he kept?
He followed the woman across the open deck—through the tangle of ships, power lines, gas cylinders, and crates of supplies—to one of the arched doors leading out of the bay. They went on down the plain metal corridor, past the sickbay and through a maze of narrow passages where more men and women in brown fatigues hurried about their business. At length they came to a large room, empty except for a table and two chairs.
“Wait here,” the guide said, and left him.
A moment later the inner door opened, and another man entered. LeSoit went down on one knee.
“My lord sus-Airaalin,” he said.
PART TWO
I. REPUBLIC SPACE: ERAASIAN BASE
SUIVI POINT: ADMINISTRATIVE DISTRICT; MAIN DETENTION
“I EKKENAT,” SAID sus-Airaalin. To LeSoit’s relief, the Grand Admiral smiled as he said the name; and he spoke in Eraasian, the proper language of trust and fellowship. “Iekkenat Lisaiet. Until I heard the message I hadn’t dared to hope. Stand up, man—it’s a good omen, seeing you again after so long a time.”
LeSoit rose. “I feared that I had failed you, my lord.”
“Not so. You’ve done honorable service, these past ten years and more.”
“My heart is glad to hear it,” LeSoit said. It felt good to use his birth-tongue again, after a decade and a half spent in speaking and thinking Standard Galcenian. “When I learned that the young Domina was dead on Artat, I thought I could do nothing further, except to settle my personal debts in the matter.”
“But she lives, lekkenat, and the reports I have received show that you were in no litt
le way responsible.” sus-Airaalin smiled again. “Others may not commend you for that, but their thoughts are not necessarily mine.”
LeSoit bowed his head. “I’m honored by your trust, my lord.” He paused, gathering his thoughts. “I must confess that under the present circumstances, I’m not certain what I ought to do next.”
“Return to the Domina,” sus-Airaalin told him, without hesitation. “Serve her as you would serve me; report to me—and me alone—those things which I might find of interest; and above all, keep her alive.”
“Still?” LeSoit didn’t bother to hide the relief he felt. Orders to protect could become orders to destroy, if it served the Resurgency’s purpose; years ago he had left the Sidh, and Beka Rosselin-Metadi, because he feared that he would no longer carry out such an order if it came. sus-Airaalin nodded. “At all cost. If the Domina lives, lekkenat, then whatever else may happen, some of us at least will have accomplished what we set out to do.”
“You’ve seen it, my lord?” LeSoit asked eagerly. Grand Admiral Theio syn-Ricte sus-Airaalin was a great personage among the Masked Ones—and like all those who worked in the Circles, he could speak, if he chose, with the force of prophecy. “Is it truly so?”
“I desire it,” sus-Airaalin said. “And what I desire, I will bring to pass, in spite of all opposition.” The words fell with the absolute certainty of stones; for a moment even the Grand Admiral seemed oppressed by their weight. Then he let out a long breath and straightened his shoulders. “Now go quickly—there is much to do. You have business at Suivi Point.”
“My lord,” said LeSoit, and bowed again.
He kept his eyes lowered until the closing of the inner door told him that the Grand Admiral had left. Turning, he palmed the lockplate for the outer door. It slid open. Outside in the passage the messenger who had brought him waited to guide him back to the ship.
Warhammer was still there, balanced on landing legs in an open part of the big docking bay. The clutter of lines and scaffolding that had surrounded the ship during most of her stay had vanished sometime during LeSoit’s talk with the Grand Admiral. With the ship’s hull clear, the finished repair work showed up plainly. LeSoit noted with satisfaction that the base’s technicians had done as good a job as those in any Republic yard outside of Gyffer or the Central Worlds.
We have the stars again, he thought, and let himself remember, for a moment, the long years spent in reclaiming the lost knowledge and technology—stealing it back, part by part and manual by manual, from the ones who had destroyed it.
He went up the ’Hammer’s ramp and palmed the security lockplate to bring down the force field. Inside, the ship appeared quiet and undisturbed. He brought up the ramp and sealed the entry, then went through the common room to the cockpit and unsealed that area as well. Once the ship was in hyper, he decided, would be the right time to unlock Captain Yevil’s cabin; less chance that way of having her notice things that nobody—Yevil included—really wanted her to see.
He strapped himself into the pilot’s seat. A red light was flashing on the comms panel; keying on the link brought up a crackly voice speaking again in bad Galcenian.
“Warhammer, prepare to depart.”
He replied in the same tongue, though with a considerably better accent. “Warhammer, departing.”
Nullgravs hummed and hydraulic systems sighed as the ’Hammer lifted from the deckplates and brought her landing legs back up into their housings. LeSoit touched the controls again, putting the ship into a slow turn to the launch path. As the cockpit swung around, a glance through the viewscreens showed him Lord sus-Airaalin watching from the rear of the bay.
The Grand Admiral raised a hand in salute Then Warhammer finished her turn, and all that LeSoit could see was the straight empty deck of the launch path, with the blackness of open space at the end.
He took Warhammer out on a long run-to-jump, then put the ship through a series of short jumps in random directions—enough, he hoped, to confuse anyone who might try to backtrack him from his final dropout—before putting the ship into hyper one more time for the long run to Suivi Point.
The shifting grey pseudosubstance of hyperspace filled the cockpit viewscreens. LeSoit watched it for a few moments. The swirls and flashes of iridescence always gave him a headache, but at the same time they held an odd fascination. Then he stood, stretched, and slid back the cockpit door. Time to go let Yevil out of her locked cabin, and hope for the Domina’s sake that the Space Force officer was disposed to forgive the insult.
Nyls Jessan had lost patience with Suivi Point.
Beka’s arrest on trumped-up charges had come as a surprise to him—although the captain herself, who’d been on Suivi before, had seemingly half-expected something of that nature. “Turn over enough flat wet rocks,” she’d said, “and you’ll find out which one the slime is under.” If the Suivans had kept on playing by their usual rules, the knowledge gained would have been worth most of the indignity and expense.
But something more was going on here than the usual games of bribery and harassment that made up justice in the Suivan mode. Under normal circumstances, an arrested party could buy out of all charges by matching or topping Contract Security’s fee. A direct petition to the Steering Committee for someone’s summary execution was not, however, considered normal circumstances. Only a member of the committee could make such a petition, and only a committee member could lodge a counterpetition to block the process.
Membership on the Steering Committee, unfortunately, appeared to be the only thing on Suivi Point that wasn’t for sale to the highest bidder.
After meeting over the course of several weeks with a long series of Contract Security representatives and committee officials, and dispensing a surprising amount of money in tips, honoraria, and bald-faced bribes, Jessan was forced in the end to admit defeat. He tightened his lips on one of Beka Rosselin-Metadi’s favorite oaths, then turned to the clothes locker at the Entiboran Resistance Headquarters and dressed himself in a Khesatan afternoon coat of subdued black with a charcoal-grey lining. He put a single-shot needler in one pocket and a miniature blaster in the other, in addition to the knife in his boot, and went to ask the favor of a counterpetition from the banking firm of Dahl&Dahl.
In her initial off-the-record assessment of various local companies, Beka had rated Dahl&Dahl as a moderately dependable ally. The firm had cared for the remaining scraps of House Rosselin’s private treasure—including the original and genuine Iron Crown of Entibor—and had also handled the late Professor’s much greater personal fortune. When Ebenra D’Caer and his masters on the other side of the Net had arranged the assassination of Domina Perada, they’d tried to put the blame on Dahl&Dahl, which should have given the firm and the Resistance an enemy or two in common.
Which is a hell of a big assumption, Jessan thought, as he finished his speech to the company’s underpresident in charge of listening to strangers. These people are barely going to admit that they know her name.
The underpresident leaned back in his cushioned chair. “We will examine your claims, of course. And if it makes good business sense … then we will make a decision on that basis.”
Jessan didn’t like the sound of that. In his experience, when you heard people talking about how sound and businesslike their decisions were, it usually meant that somebody’s partner was about to get sold out.
He suppressed a sigh. Caring too much—even the appearance of caring too much—could be deadly. His best chance now was a studied disinterest. “May I know when the decision is likely to be made?”
The underpresident nodded. “We will inform you.”
Jessan rose. “I’ll call on you again, if I may. One must keep current with these things.”
The man from Dahl&Dahl inclined his head. “Of course.”
Jessan bowed, and allowed himself to be escorted back to the outer offices, and thence to the lobby. A jowly, heavyset man dressed like a free-spacer pushed himself up from one of the recepti
on area chairs and followed him out onto the glidewalk. Several minutes later, with the man still trailing him just outside of vocal range, Jessan decided to force the issue. He stepped off the glidewalk into a brightly lit restaurant that appeared to specialize in sweet and savory pastries, and took a seat where he could see the front door.
His new shadow followed him in and slid into the other side of the booth. Jessan nodded a pleasant greeting—this was, in fact, the sort of establishment where strangers might find themselves sharing a table during a busy hour—and put his left hand into his coat pocket underneath the table. The miniature blaster was charged and ready in case of need, and at close range the lack of a chance to aim wouldn’t matter.
He smiled politely at the heavyset man, taking note of the free-spacer’s droopy brown mustache and the shadow of stubble along his jaw.
“Is there some way I can be of assistance?” he asked.
“Maybe,” said the other. “Folks portside tell me you’re the one who can find Beka.”
Jessan kept his features schooled to amiable good will. “Do they? That’s nice.”
“Yeah.” The free-spacer didn’t seem impressed by Jessan’s efforts. “Carry a message to her, okay?”
“What kind of message?”
“Tell her that I’ve come ’cause I saw her announcement—picked it up on hi-comms while I was running the Web out of Pleyver—and I want to join her.”
Finally, thought Jessan. Somebody. “In that case, it would help if you let me know your name.”
“She’ll know who I am.”
“No doubt,” Jessan said. “But I don’t, I’m afraid. And she’ll want me to tell her.”
The free-spacer hesitated for a moment, as if struggling with his own suspicions, and then said, “Tell her that Frizzt is here. Frizzt Osa. I’ve got Claw Hard in waiting station. No Point berths open, they say. I took the local shuttle down as soon as we got here.”
By Honor Betray'd: Mageworlds #3 Page 12