Rock of Ages

by Walter Jon Williams

  “I’m sorry to say I haven’t,” he said. “My life is rather pressing and I have little time for video. But I’m told that many people prefer you to that, ah, other fellow.”

  “Anaya.”

  “Quite so. My apologies, anyway, for not recognizing you.” Laurence frowned, and his ears were pinned back, but he turned to his friend and made the introduction.

  “This is Deco, my companion.”

  “Pleased to meet you,” Maijstral said. He had discerned by this point that he’d made a gaffe, and in amends gave two fingers to Deco’s one, then mentally sighed at how it did not seem possible to achieve social attunement this afternoon no matter how hard he tried.

  Maijstral introduced Aunt Batty, and then the four stared at each other for a long, uncomfortable moment.

  “It is a most attractive dwelling, is it not?” Batty finally said. “Most underwater environments give one such a sense of confinement, but Prince Hunac has made everything here so spacious that one’s sense of claustrophobia is quite underwhelmed.”

  “True,” Deco said.

  “Very,” said Laurence.

  Silence reigned once more. Aunt Batty concluded that she’d done her best.

  Laurence, it should be observed, did not actually play Maijstral on video. He played a character superficially similar to Maijstral, or at least similar to who Maijstral might have been if he were the hero of a video series—brave, stalwart, chivalrous, handy with his fists, and staggeringly successful with women. The company that made the series had (after the Imperial Sporting Commission) first call on the videos Maijstral made while stealing, and mixed Maijstral’s videos with their own, altering Maijstral’s image to that of Laurence. It was understood that Laurence was playing Maijstral, even if the character had a different name, and it was suggested that all the video adventures; preposterous though they were, were in some sense true, that they all offered details of Maijstral’s life that had not been made public. And since Maijstral could never commit as many burglaries as a character in a weekly series, the producers bought videos from other burglars who were unlucky enough not to have series characters designed after them, and likewise altered the image to that of Laurence—and in the end Maijstral got the credit for a lot of spectacular capers that he had never actually performed.

  “I see you wear a diamond ring,” Maijstral observed.

  “Yes.” Laurence brightened. “It’s just like yours. I use it as a focus, when I’m acting—I look at the ring, and I say to myself, I’m Drake Maijstral, I’m the greatest burglar ever. And then I do my scene.”

  “But you wear the ring when you’re not acting,” Maijstral said. “Doesn’t that cause confusion? When you look down at your plate at luncheon, for example, and see the ring, don’t you say to yourself, I’m a burglar, and then have to fight away a crisis of identity along with an impulse to slip the silverware up your sleeve?”

  “But Laurence is a terrific burglar,” Deco said. “He’s had lots of practice.”

  Maijstral looked at Laurence in surprise. “Do you actually steal?” he said.

  Laurence flushed. “Well, no. My contract doesn’t permit—it wouldn’t do for the star of a series to end up in prison. But I’ve done everything but steal.”

  “He’s got a very good darksuit,” Deco said. “I made it myself—I’ve studied how all the tech is done. Sometimes he flies out at night, just being a burglar, you know.”

  “It’s really helped my interpretation of the role,” Laurence said.

  Maijstral looked from one to the other and decided that, yes, he was intended to be impressed by this. He was trying to decide how to respond when one of Hunac’s servants approached.

  “Sir, a message for you. Miss Nichole. There is a privacy booth in the corner.”

  Maijstral manufactured an apologetic look. “My apologies, gentlemen,” he said, and moved away.

  “Umm,” Laurence called after him. “You know—I really wanted to talk to you about Nichole. . . .”

  Maijstral escaped to the privacy booth and activated the field that sealed him off from any eavesdroppers and lip-readers. At a command Nichole’s face appeared before him.

  She was a tall blond woman located ambiguously on the cusp between mid and late thirties, and she was one of the Three Hundred who were so famous they bore only a forename. She was, technically speaking, an actress, but her real profession was so far above a mere actress, above celebrity, even above star, that only a place in some fairly all-embracing pantheon could probably do justice to her standing.

  When she spoke, entire planets hushed to hear her words. People she had never heard of, and never would hear of, committed suicide at the thought they were unworthy to share the universe with her. Obscure alien races knelt at her image and spit up, with appropriate ritual obeisance, offerings of the very best regurgitated fish-liver wine.

  She was, so to speak, colossal. Even for a member of the Diadem she was big.

  Maijstral had once turned down a chance to join the Human Diadem and live on the same plateau as Nichole. The refusal had made him, briefly, more famous than if he had accepted, but the industry that was Nichole rolled on without him, generating more fame, more glory, more worship, while the comparatively small enterprise that was Maijstral, denied the constant barrage of publicity and glory granted members of the Diadem, was compelled to sneak up on success and win it by stratagem rather than bag it in one grand rush.

  But when Nichole’s image appeared before Maijstral, it was not that of a distant goddess, but rather that of an old friend. It did Maijstral’s heart good to see her. In this crisis, it was good to know who one could trust, and Nichole was a true and tested comrade in adversity.

  “Hello, Nichole,” he said.

  Nichole’s superb eyes glittered with concern. “Drake,” she said, “what’s this I hear about a duel between you and the Prince of Tejas?”

  “I see that I can spare you a certain degree of exposition,” Maijstral said. “How did you hear about it?”

  “Diadem security, of course,” Nichole said. “Background checks on everyone at the party.”

  “Of course,” Maijstral agreed.

  Members of the Diadem floated through existence in their own perfect world, with no stray locks out of place, no buttons unfastened, and certainly no rude interlopers trying to crash the party. Diadem security, smooth, efficient, and all-embracing, was the envy of all people of prominence, including the Constellation’s President. His own security problems were never dealt with in such a seamless way.

  Of course, he didn’t pay his own guards nearly as much. And for that matter he wasn’t nearly as famous as Nichole, something he found just as galling as the difference in service.

  “What in heaven’s name provoked this?” Nichole asked.

  Maijstral told her. Her look softened.

  “Oh, Drake,” she sighed, “and I thought, when we met, that I was going to unburden my problems on you.”

  “This may be your last chance,” Maijstral muttered darkly.

  “Who’s acting for you?” Nichole asked. Maijstral told her. Nichole frowned. “Isn’t she awfully young?”

  “She’s quite mature for her years.”

  “Still, it’s your life that’s at stake.”

  Maijstral winced. He did not need reminding.

  “You have no idea who provoked this?” Nichole went on.

  “No. I’ve been racking my brains, but I can’t think of anyone who would really want to—”

  “I will have Diadem security begin an in-depth survey of everyone you know.”

  Gratification sprang warmly to life in Maijstral’s heart. “Thank you.” A cold little icicle of suspicion touched his thoughts. “Your people keep track of burglars, yes?”

  “More or less automatically, yes.”

  “You might have them concentrate on Alice Manderley. Check the status of her bank accounts.”

  Nichole nodded. “Right away. And I’ll advance my schedule an
d arrive tomorrow morning, so that we can confer,” Nichole said. “I’d come sooner, but there’s a reception this evening I can’t escape—the King of Libya.” A frown crossed her face. “I think it’s Libya. I haven’t had my briefing yet.”

  “I’m sure he will be pleasant, whatever he’s the king of,” Maijstral said. “Kings have every reason to be pleased with their lot. And in the meantime, I will be very pleased to see you tomorrow.”

  Doubt entered Nichole’s voice. “Drake?” she said. “What if they do it again?”

  Maijstral stared, his blood running chill.

  He would have thought of this himself if he’d not been so completely distracted.

  “Why would they?” he asked in desperation.

  Nichole’s ears flickered. “Why did they do it once?”

  “I will arrange for security.”

  “That would be advisable.” She smiled. “Please give my best to Roman, by the way.”

  Maijstral fled to his chambers as soon as the conversation ended, striding past Laurence and his companion, who seemed to want to converse again.

  When Maijstral arrived, the room was empty save for the reef fish under the room’s bubble aquarium dome. Maijstral went to the service place and touched the ideogram for “service.”

  “Roman?”

  “At once, sir.”

  When Roman arrived, Maijstral was shocked at the transformation. Roman was bald, grey-skinned, red-eyed, and he scratched continually, his hands moving, void of volition, from one bodily torment to the next. Maijstral had never seen Roman this bad.

  “It has occurred to me,” Maijstral said, “that whoever planted the pistol on us might well try again.”

  Roman growled, a long, ominous sound. Maijstral smoothed down the hairs that had just risen on his neck.

  “I want maximum security on our rooms,” Maijstral said. “Every alarm and detector we can acquire. Every nasty little surprise that we wouldn’t want to encounter ourselves in the course of our business. Plant them all.”

  A grim light of satisfaction entered Roman’s agate eyes. “Very good, sir,” he said.

  Another cold suspicion lodged in Maijstral’s breast. “You might check all the alarms personally,” he added. “I’d rather you arranged things, rather than Drexler.”

  Roman stiffened. Another low growl rolled from his throat. “Am I to understand that we are no longer trusting Mr. Drexler, sir?”

  “We are trusting no one, Roman. Drexler was working for Fu George on Silverside Station, remember, against our interests. It’s possible, if unlikely, that he may have conceived an elaborate plan of revenge. Or someone may have conceived it for him.”

  “Vanessa Runciter, sir?”

  Maijstral’s brow darkened. Now there was someone for Nichole’s people to look into. “I wouldn’t put it past her,” he said. “So when you have no other duties, you might simply make it your business to keep tabs on Drexler.”

  “Very good, sir.”

  “One other thing,” Maijstral said. “Nichole sends her love.”

  Roman’s ears flattened in pleasure. He and Nichole had always had a most sympathetic relationship.

  “I hope we are still trusting Miss Nichole,” he ventured.

  “Of course we are.”

  Roman’s tongue lolled in a smile. “Very good, sir.”

  *

  Maijstral had just finished dressing for dinner when Roberta called; his insides quailed as he saw the grim expression in her violet eyes.

  “What news?” he said, and hoped his voice didn’t quaver.

  “Joseph Bob continues to insist on the fight, and continues to insist that it be soon. There’s no getting around it, and he’s got the right. Unless you’d rather he called in the cops, of course.”

  Maijstral sat down and suppressed an instinct to swab away the sweat that had just appeared on his brow.

  “How soon?” he asked.

  “The day after tomorrow. The meeting is on an island in the Dry Tortugas. The Prince wanted pistols, then swords, and I said no to both.”

  “Very good.”

  “So we’ve settled on a weapon with which neither of you have any experience. It’s called a dire staff.”

  Maijstral quailed at the very name. He tugged at his throat lace. “I don’t believe I’m familiar with that weapon. . . .” he managed.

  Roberta’s hands waved near the phone’s service panel, and next to her image appeared the staff, a long steel pole with a complicated knot of interwoven steel blades on one end and a blunt protrusion on the other..

  “It was used in ritual combat by the Hennese,” Roberta said. “It has blades at one end and a low-level stunner at the other. The combatants are placed within reach of one another right at the starts so that anyone attempting to use the stunner exposes himself to a possible attack from the bladed end. And the stunner is, as I said, low-level, so it will only slow the target down, not actually drop them.”

  “So the point of combat with this weapon is to slow the enemy with the stunner, then butcher him with the other end once he can’t defend himself.”

  “Apparently.”

  “How charming.” Maijstral was appalled.

  Roberta’s eyes flashed. “Well, what could I do, Drake? We had to settle on some weapon or other. They’ll all kill you very messily one way or another, but at least Joseph Bob hasn’t ever had time to practice with one of these, so you’ll have an even chance.”

  Maijstral took a deep breath. All was not lost. He could still try to fix this somehow, just as he fixed his last fight when he was at the Nnoivarl Academy.

  “I’m sorry if I sounded upset,” Maijstral said. “I am upset, of course, but not by you.”

  Her look softened. “I will have a staff sent to you tomorrow so that you can get the feel of the thing. We’re borrowing some from a collector on Mars. He made it a condition that he witness the fight—he’s always wanted to see the things used.”

  She frowned. “The rules call for an objective witness anyway, so that seems all right.”

  Maijstral’s mind raced. So, he thought, Joseph Bob would be practicing with his own dire staff as soon as it came down from Mars. Which meant that Maijstral could get to it and sabotage it somehow.

  “Who did you say used these things?” he asked. “I didn’t catch the name.”

  “The Hennese.”

  “And what are they? A religious sect of some sort?”

  “No. A minor race. The Empire conquered them a few millennia ago, but they’ve subsequently become extinct.”

  Cold foreboding squatted heavily on Maijstral’s breast. “And why did they all die off?” he asked.

  “Well.” Roberta reddened. “They kept hitting each other with dire staffs, for one thing.”

  “I thought as much. Thank you.”

  Cowards die many times before their deaths, as Shaxpur remarks in Tsar Iulius, his newly translated play, the valiant never taste of death but once. After the conversation ended, Maijstral sat in silence for a long, endless moment, dying many times.

  He could fix the stunner, he thought, but how could he fix a nest of glittering, sharp blades on the end of a stick?

  This was going to take a lot of thought.

  He rose and went to the service plate. “Roman,” he said, “come and unlace me. I won’t be going to dinner after all.”

  He seemed to have lost his appetite.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  The glories of Palancar towered toward the distant sun, layer after layer of coral and sponge, anemone and fans and gorgonia, every form and color in the world piled atop one another and reaching toward the sky. Among all this richness swarmed the fish, as brightly colored as the corals: grouper and barracuda, squirrelfish and angels, trunkfish and parrot fish and triggerfish.

  Nothing was visible that was not alive.

  Turn 180 degrees and there was only one ocean, a clear and perfect Cherenkov blue, reaching straight down a thousand meters and going on all the way
to the mainland. The color was so blue that, looking at it, you could feel blueness prickling all the way along your skin.

  Nothing alive was visible in that blue, nothing at all.

  Nichole and Maijstral floated along the wall, hovering in the interface between the lonely blue and the bright, bustling swarm that was the coral wall. They communicated with one another along a cyphered link.

  It was the only way, given the circumstances, they could achieve any degree of privacy.

  “I wonder if we will find a splendid toadfish,” Nichole said. “It’s supposed to be the best. Quite rare.”

  “You heard that in your briefing, yes?”

  “Yes. Of course.”

  Members of the Human Diadem were briefed before every appearance in order to give them something to view and talk about. They learned about the best people, the best art, the best food, the best architecture, the best sights, and—apparently—the best toadfish.

  At least they were the best in the opinion of the Diadem’s research staff, who were, of course, the best researchers money could buy.

  Maijstral had lived without these briefings for several years now, and found himself perfectly content to exist without his every opinion being scripted ahead of time.

  “I am surprised that the Diadem’s researchers didn’t offer to find a toadfish and tag it so that you could locate it and appreciate it properly,” Maijstral said.

  “They did. But I thought we’d prefer privacy.”

  “Thank you.”

  The two floated along a narrow passageway between two giant coral ramparts. Bright swaying tendrils trailed above them in the strong current like old friends waving good-bye.

  “I have narrowed somewhat your range of suspects,” Nichole said. “Alice Manderley arrived on Earth only yesterday, on a liner from Qwarism, where she was released from prison last month.”

  “I see.”

  “Her bank account has registered a substantial increase which our researchers weren’t able to account for—five hundred novae—but she may have signed some endorsement deal, or been paid for a commission that hasn’t become public. The researchers will continue their efforts.”

  “They may as well not, since Alice is no longer a suspect.”