Of Fire and Night

by Kevin J. Anderson

  Save for the well-guarded meeting with the Ildiran Adar, the King and Queen had not been allowed outside the Royal Wing since the compy revolt. They were truly under house arrest. Sarein even tracked down a medical order signed by Basil and then rescinded, instructing a doctor to perform an abortion on Estarra.

  And, as Estarra had indicated, the pet dolphins were gone, though Sarein could not confirm that they had been slaughtered. Their saltwater tanks were empty, scoured out and left to dry. She found a maintenance worker who would say only that the dolphins had died.

  Next, with growing dread, she reviewed the tapes of the procession around the Royal Canal, paying particular attention to Basil’s expression. She saw his clear anticipation, his building tension . . . then noticeable frustration, though nothing obvious had changed. After being close to him for so long, she knew how to read the Chairman’s emotions. He had been expecting something to happen. An explosion? Sarein also confirmed that a Roamer trader named Denn Peroni had been detained on some trumped-up administrative matter exactly during the time when the alleged thermal bomb would have killed the King and Queen.

  Everything fit, just as Estarra said. How could Sarein disbelieve her own sister? How could she argue with so many facts?

  After the second course, Basil stood, straightened his impeccable suit, and called for attention. The Chairman rarely made speeches in public; Sarein took it as another sign that he didn’t want King Peter to utter a word.

  Basil rested his hand on Daniel’s shoulder. “Previously, out of deference to the King, Prince Daniel has maintained a low profile. However, given the current crisis, King Peter has urged us to use every possible advantage. We need Daniel’s strength and energy.” While Peter remained conspicuously silent, Basil nudged the young man to his feet. “I give you the Prince. Note his face well. Recognize him. You’ll be seeing a lot more of Daniel in the future.”

  She shot a quick glance at Peter and Estarra while all attention was turned to the Prince. The two sat close together, clapping politely but without enthusiasm. Basil was obviously setting up for a clean transition of power.

  Nodding to acknowledge the applause, Daniel appeared jittery. His clothes had been tailored to fit him perfectly, but he did not seem accustomed to wearing them. He blushed at the attention, and Sarein thought it added a perfect touch.

  Daniel cleared his throat and thanked his supporters. “Every person on Earth knows that we must pull together if we are to survive. I’d like to offer my personal commendations to the research team working on the hydrogue derelict.” He motioned toward a side table where the group of scientists seemed out of place, surprised by all the media imagers that turned toward them.

  “Even without Dr. Swendsen, these researchers succeeded in activating the hydrogue engines. In several test flights they have demonstrated they can maneuver the derelict.” He glanced down at his hand, as if looking for notes, then snapped his head up again, glanced at Peter, and turned abruptly away. “The team also managed to power up the transportal, even if they have not yet deciphered the hydrogue coordinate system. It is only a matter of time.”

  He looked as if he was finished, ready to sit down, but then remembered to add, “And how does this help us fight against them, you ask? Once we understand the engines, we can identify their vulnerabilities. But getting the hydrogue transportal working will be the best part. If we could open a transportal inside any of those warglobes, we could drop a big bomb right into their laps! We wouldn’t even have to send EDF ships against them.”

  Good thing, since we don’t have many ships left, Sarein thought.

  After Daniel finished his speech to more applause, he sat down and called for the main course. Sarein remained puzzled. The news about the hydrogue derelict was interesting, but it didn’t merit having the new Prince issue it in such a dramatic forum. Maybe it had been nothing more than a test to prove that the young man could follow instructions and do his duties.

  While plates of food were distributed, the conversation hummed with both hope and skepticism over the promises from the Solar Navy. “The Ildirans will be like the cavalry . . . if they ever get here,” said a florid-faced energy minister.

  “It’s only been five days,” said the Hansa’s transportation secretary around a mouthful of pheasant drizzled with savory sauce.

  “Right, but he implied the hydrogue attack was imminent.”

  Sarein ate her food but did not taste it. Every time she glanced across the room at Estarra, she noted that Peter was holding his wife’s hand. If Estarra’s suspicions about the Chairman were true, then the King and Queen had good reason to be deeply worried. Now that Daniel had been reintroduced to the public, their time might be short indeed.

  But what did they plan to do about it? What should she do about it? Despite her placid public face, Sarein’s thoughts were in turmoil, her stomach knotted. Twice during the meal Mr. Pellidor came to whisper something in the Chairman’s ear, before the expediter faded back to his own table.

  Finally the dinner plates were cleared. Though he was not talkative, Basil seemed satisfied with the banquet. Servers came in with the dessert course, a sculpture made of whipped fruit that had more artistic merit than flavor. After everyone had complimented the elaborate confection, a compy strutted in with a special pot of cardamom coffee for Basil. Rich aromas wafted up from the pot with a sweet sharp bite of exotic spices. The compy poured a cup for the Chairman.

  Sarein had never developed a taste for the beverage, but Basil rarely drank anything else. It was one of the quirks she had found endearing about him.

  When Basil reached for his cup, Sarein noticed that the King and Queen were intensely interested in his every move. Estarra and Peter were convinced that the Chairman would kill them, if they didn’t find a way to stop him first. Both of them focused on the cup of coffee. Cardamom coffee. A beverage that no one else drank.

  The missing fauldur berries!

  Before Basil could take a sip, Pellidor interrupted him yet again; after listening to the whispers, the Chairman scowled.

  Sarein’s thoughts raced, her emotions clashing like thunderclouds. She feared for Basil, but she could not deny the evidence of the terrible secret things he had already done. He is my lover! Her muscles locked. He tried to kill my sister! She wanted to knock the cup out of Basil’s hand, wanted to shout at him, warn him that the coffee contained poison.

  But that would be condemning Estarra to death. Even if Basil hadn’t actually made up his mind to kill the King and Queen, he would certainly do so if they tried to poison him. She couldn’t implicate Estarra. She couldn’t!

  But she also loved Basil. She had been with him for years. He had taken Sarein under his wing, taught her Hansa politics. She couldn’t just look the other way and let him die. Thoughts raced through her mind in a flash. She was reluctant to cause a scene, but how else could she prevent this? Overreaction was an unforgivable sin in Basil’s eyes. Years of political training restrained her for an instant.

  Suspecting nothing, he lifted the cup to his lips. Sarein shot to her feet. “Don’t drink that!”

  Conversation died. Basil looked at her with a flare of annoyance, and she had to think quickly. Every excuse that came to her mind sounded ridiculous, and, knowing Basil’s stubbornness, she realized he would insist on drinking the coffee, in public, just to prove her wrong. Oh, he would punish her for this—if she had made a mistake.

  “I saw . . .” Sarein refused even to glance at Estarra and focused her gaze instead on Mr. Pellidor. The expediter was a cold and often rude man; she knew he must have carried out many of the terrible deeds Estarra had described, like planting the thermal bomb, and even butchering the dolphins. His hands were as bloody as the Chairman’s.

  Basil frowned at her. “Yes, Ambassador Sarein? What is it?”

  “I saw Mr. Pellidor doing something with your coffee. He seemed very furtive about it.”

  Basil looked at her in surprise. She had never overreacted befo
re, had never done anything to make him question her. “That’s a rather strange thing to say.”

  She held her breath, forced herself to nod. “I’m aware of that, Mr. Chairman. Perhaps it was just my imagination, but it certainly looked suspicious.” She swallowed hard. “Isn’t it wiser to be safe than sorry?” She desperately wanted to search the faces of the King and Queen for guilt or anger, but she kept her eyes fixed on Pellidor’s now-indignant face.

  “This is ridiculous, Mr. Chairman. I never touched your coffee.”

  “I saw what I saw,” Sarein insisted.

  Someone from down the table commented loudly enough to be heard in the intrigued silence, “Isn’t he the one who refused to believe the King’s warning about the compies? The man who told us all there was nothing to worry about!”

  Since the uprising, media clips had run and rerun Peter’s brave speech in the compy factory, when he’d demanded that the operations be shut down until the Klikiss programming modules could be checked. Pellidor had featured prominently as a man whose refusal to listen had cost countless lives.

  Hearing the loud muttering, Basil glared at Sarein. “I have no reason to believe my expediter would do me harm.” He held up his cup, sniffed it, then extended it toward the blond man. “However, if it makes Ambassador Sarein happy—Mr. Pellidor, please drink this coffee and prove to us that there’s nothing wrong with it.”

  The other man frowned. “I don’t care for coffee, Mr. Chairman.”

  “And I don’t care for baseless suspicions. Do it!”

  Glaring at Sarein, Pellidor accepted the cup, took a sip of the coffee, grimaced, and gulped the whole cup down. He looked defiantly at Sarein, who felt a wash of relief mixed with confusion.

  Pellidor’s fingers spasmed, and he dropped the cup on the floor, where it shattered. His face twisted with amazement. He turned toward the Chairman and collapsed, groaning and gasping. Basil scrambled away from him. Pellidor made a choking sound. His face writhed, his tongue swelled, his eyes bulged . . . and he fell slack.

  Pandemonium erupted in the banquet hall. Media crews rushed forward. Royal guards stormed in. The appalled Chairman stood unmoving, and Sarein grabbed his arm and yanked him away from the table.

  Captain McCammon barked orders at his men, and royal guards rushed to form a protective circle around Peter and Estarra. “Get the King out of here! There’s been an assassination attempt.” Moments later, as an afterthought, guards came to protect Prince Daniel as well.

  Basil attempted to recover, swiftly raising his voice, aware that the media would be showing these clips for the next several days. “Yes, take the King and Queen to the Royal Wing for their own safety—and guard them well.” His voice grew harder. “There may be other assassination attempts.”

  Peter and Estarra looked suitably stunned, and Sarein didn’t think it was an act. Just before the two were rushed away, the Chairman gave Peter a hateful glare. No matter how she had tried to divert suspicion to Pellidor, Sarein could see that Basil knew exactly who the real culprit was.

  103

  KING PETER

  With urgent steps, the royal guards rushed the King and Queen out of the banquet hall. Captain McCammon led the way with his twitcher drawn. “Isolate them in their quarters as swiftly as possible!” His maroon ceremonial beret was askew on his bleached-white hair.

  Royal guards folded protectively around Peter and Estarra. Although their functions were frequently ceremonial, the gaudily uniformed men moved with gratifying precision. The Queen’s pregnancy hindered her movement, but she kept up. If she slowed, Peter was sure the guards would pick her up and carry her in their arms.

  “This way! Clear the halls.” McCammon raised his voice to a bellow. Functionaries and Palace workers scattered into side rooms. “You two, head to the next intersection. Keep watch. Highest alert!”

  Estarra stumbled, and Peter caught her. They kept running. Both of them knew the implications of what had just happened. Peter had seen Basil’s glare. “That’s it, then,” the Queen mumbled to him, her voice bleak. “We’re dead.”

  “Not if I can help it, Your Majesty,” McCammon called back over his shoulder. “No need for talk like that. We’ll keep you safe.” The royal guards had no idea what was at stake. Or maybe, Peter thought, they actually did. . . .

  There would be no safety for the two of them in the Whisper Palace.

  The lead pair of guards stopped at a junction of corridors up ahead, drew their weapons, and blocked access so that the group could hurry the royal couple through without pausing. Palace District security squads had closed off the banquet hall. The two hundred guests would be held for questioning, grilled over and over again about any possible involvement with Franz Pellidor. The Palace would be in continuous chaos for many hours.

  Peter ground his teeth together. The Chairman knew damn well there were no other accomplices, that Pellidor had nothing to do with the attempt, yet he had to go through the motions. Media imagers had broadcast the reintroduction of Prince Daniel. Much of Earth’s population had seen Sarein accuse Pellidor and watched him fall dead, supposedly a victim of his own poison.

  Why had Sarein ruined everything? If she’d guessed about the poison, she would also have known that Pellidor was not involved. Peter wasn’t particularly sorry that the murderous expediter was dead. Long ago, it had been Mr. Pellidor who kidnapped an unsuspecting boy named Raymond Aguerra and then arranged for the conflagration that had killed Raymond’s—Peter’s—family. Pellidor deserved a death far slower and far more painful than fauldur poison.

  Sarein had chosen to save Basil, even if it meant death for her own sister. It wasn’t likely Estarra would ever get a chance to talk with Sarein now. In fact, they might never see her again.

  But the clumsy failure had accomplished one important thing: If the Chairman killed them now, even the most gullible media reporter would sense something was wrong. In a roundabout way, exposing the assassination attempt had bought Peter and Estarra some time. Maybe that meant he and his Queen would stay alive for the next few days.

  When they finally reached the Royal Wing, Captain McCammon remained tense and alert. He sent several guards ahead to sweep the bedchambers and waiting rooms. “All clear, Captain.” After the King and Queen had passed into the private quarters, McCammon stationed four of his men outside the main entryway, and Peter believed these royal guards would actually do their best to protect him and Estarra.

  The captain cautiously followed the two into their suite, double-checking every corner for an unexpected threat. Tendons stood out on his neck. “I always knew something was wrong with that Pellidor. A bit too full of his own importance. I’ll never forget how he thought he had the authority to prevent you from seeing Chairman Wenceslas.” He made a disgusted sound. “If you ask me, that man got himself involved in some shady business and paid the price for it.”

  Peter nodded, careful not to speak.

  “If Pellidor had listened to you about the Soldier compies in the first place, Your Highness, the Hansa wouldn’t be in such a mess.” McCammon shook his head. “If the hydrogues come, like the Ildirans say they’re going to, we could be looking at the end of the human race.”

  Peter was unsettled by the man’s passion. For the past few days he’d been so focused on survival, trying to dodge Basil’s political knife thrusts, that he had gotten distracted from the big picture. McCammon was right; this could indeed be the end of the human race.

  Taking a seat, Estarra gathered her breath to ask obvious questions so she could gauge the guards’ reactions. “But if Pellidor poisoned the coffee, then he must have known it would kill him. Why would he drink it voluntarily?”

  “Most likely to protect his accomplices. A fanatic. This plot is probably much bigger than we think.” The captain straightened his beret. “In fact, I’ll have my guards install poison scanners in your quarters. From now on, I insist that you test your own food.”

  “Even so, we can’t assume that we’re s
afe,” Peter said. He took an unexpected chance. “Captain McCammon, give me your sidearm.”

  The guard blinked. “There’s no need, Your Majesty. We will protect you. Nothing’s going to happen to you or the Queen on my watch.”

  Peter stared at him, hard. “I don’t doubt your ability, Captain. But don’t underestimate these ruthless assassins. They tried poison this time, and no doubt they will use a different method when they try again.” He held out his hand for the weapon. “At least give me a chance to protect my wife and unborn child if the worst happens.”

  McCammon drew his twitcher, looked at it, adjusted the charge, and nodded. “You know how to use this?”

  “I fired some weapons in my younger years.” That had been in another life, struggling to survive the tough streets. “And it is your job, Captain, to make sure that I don’t need it.”

  Peter concealed the weapon in his robes, while McCammon went to check on his guards. Feeling the twitcher’s reassuring weight, Peter looked meaningfully at the Queen. Now at least they were armed against whatever Basil intended to do to them.

  104

  NIRA

  In accordance with the hydrogue demands—and the Mage-Imperator’s plan—Adar Zan’nh dispatched hundreds of “protective” warliners to Earth. Nira clung to the hope that Jora’h would be true to his word and do all he could to save both of their races. She wanted to trust him again, but he hadn’t yet earned her unquestioning faith. She knew he was still keeping secrets from her.

  Smiling uncertainly, Jora’h led her up into the skysphere. Courtiers, guard kithmen, and pilgrims waited in the audience chamber below, but the Mage-Imperator had already spent hours with them and ordered them to wait longer. He needed some private time with Nira. “Come with me. I have something to show you.” Together they ascended the ramps into the overarching terrarium, past the exotic plants on display for the glory of the Mage-Imperator.