by Stephen Hunt
Duncan had no choice but to look at her as she dragged her fingers through the hair at the back of his head. ‘What if I told you I didn’t think this was going to make me any happier?’
She kissed him hotly on the lips, before whispering in his ear. ‘Do I look like that would make the slightest difference to me? I am quite selfish that way.’
By the time Duncan had been finished with, he had to admit, the imperium possessed interesting techniques to compel a slave away from misery. At least for a little while.
Duncan waited with Paetro outside the Castle of Snakes’ largest hall. This was the focus of the conference being hosted for the house’s allies. Lady Cassandra had been allowed to sit in on the preliminary discussions as part of her tuition, but the hour approached when the main meeting would start. No doubt she would be particularly prickly when she had to turn to her dry lessons with Doctor Horvak instead. At the moment, Cassandra was inside, listening to the raised voices Duncan heard arguing. He couldn’t discern any details, but then he didn’t need to. The tone spoke volumes. Self-regarding opportunism dressed up as politics. The corridor outside had filled with dignitaries and their bodyguards. They had been deprived of their ranged weapons and carried short-swords only, but Paetro still appeared ill-tempered with so many strangers allowed into the castle at the same time. He saw threats in every shadow.
‘The airfield must be reaching capacity,’ said Duncan.
‘That it is, lad,’ said Paetro. ‘But there’s one amenity our “honoured guests” won’t find inside the castle that I wager they’ll have in theirs.’
‘What’s that?’
‘A chamber with a harem. And a wise man might ask why that was.’
‘Maybe because silks, perfumes and cushions wouldn’t suit this place.’
‘I’m merely passing the time, is all; chewing the fat. Aye, it’s hardly for old Paetro to gainsay the mistress’s commands, except to point out that in this house, the position of consort tends towards a shorter term than the role of food-taster.’
Duncan shrugged. ‘The role of a slave here seems to involve obeying commands.’
‘Princess Helrena needs to spend more time in the fencing hall, sharpening her combat skills. Not jawing with these celestial-caste aristos… or any other distractions.’
‘She’s sharp enough as she is.’
‘Do you think so? There’re rumours that Circae intends to have one of her allies issue a challenge against our mistress. As soon as they can manufacture a casus belli that satisfies imperial law, it’ll be sabres or pistols inside an arena. You mark my words.’
‘Would the fight be broadcast on the screens?’
‘That it would, lad. The lower castes are mad for it, the chance to see their rulers’ blood spilled in the sand. Two houses going at each other. The biggest riots always break out in the losing district; it’s almost a tradition here.’
‘Why do they run the broadcasts, then?’
‘Draining the boil, lad, draining the boil. You control when trouble breaks out, scoop out the worst offenders with riot tractors, and haul in hardy “volunteers” for the legion on the side.’
‘You served with such men?’
‘Best fighters we ever fielded,’ grunted Paetro, before turning his attention towards a soldier walking up to them. The guardsman bowed, passing Paetro a read out from the castle’s radio room. Paetro read the orders and snorted. ‘Lady Cassandra’s visit to the new power plant this evening has been cancelled… teething problems. I wouldn’t want to be the overseer across there. Find Hesia and tell her she can run some helo maintenance after all.’
‘What if there’s a delivery from the kitchens?’
Paetro jerked a large thumb towards the doorway into the conference, soldiers with rifles standing at attention on either side. ‘Nobody’s interrupting them for food. Head back to the doctor’s laboratory when you’re done. It’ll be science, history and supper for the little Highness, in that order.’
Duncan turned and was about to obey when he saw Helrena sweeping down the passage, exchanging greetings with the crowd of nobles. It was hard to tell who the visitors were more obsequious toward: the princess, or the deadly head of the secret police, Apolleon, trailing by her side. If Duncan felt awkward around Helrena, she showed little of it, acting as though nothing had passed between them. That’s probably because for her, nothing has.
Helrena brushed past Duncan as though he wasn’t there. Unfortunately for him, the pallid, foppish Apolleon showed no such compulsion in avoiding toying with her servants. ‘Ah, our sturdy young sky miner. Still keeping Lady Cassandra safe, I trust?’
‘Such is my duty, sir.’
‘Indeed. And very diverting it must prove for you.’ The way the head of the imperium’s secret police rolled the word around his tongue, he might as well have been an audience applauding inside the Stone Garden. He clasped Duncan a little too warmly on the shoulder and moved off. The false bonhomie meant Duncan was greeted as a duke while leaving him feeling as insignificant as any slave in the capital. That was a definite knack, a skill not easily acquired. You had to work at it. Duncan sighed and left to locate their helo pilot, Hesia.
All afternoon the Castle of Snakes’ passages had been packed with staff busily working – looking after visitors and their entourages, making sure that every corner of the castle was presentable. Duncan headed for the domed hangars overlooking the airfields. Their hangars joined the complex’s eastern side like massive concrete toadstools, sheltered from the sea by a line of defensive towers and bunkers. Duncan could hear the air-slicing thump of helos still landing outside. More of the nobility that suckled on the house’s mining wealth, arriving to argue about carving up the larger pie that would become available along with the imperial throne. Damn, but it’s busy. Visiting pilots escorted in the direction of the military canteens, ground staff dragging cables and equipment pods out, servants waiting to guide new arrivals through the maze of concrete tunnels and guard posts. Duncan moved out of the way as a vehicle hauled a large steel fuel tank past, slowly manoeuvring through the crowds. Someone wanted visiting aircraft to be able to take off promptly. It was a fine idea, growing even more attractive to Duncan when he spotted who had just landed outside. Baron Machus! Helrena’s cousin swept through the hangar accompanied by a full retinue of advisors and soldiers. And the current favourites from Machus’s harem to flaunt his virility in front of his fellow nobles… Adella at the back of the prince’s entourage. As Adella passed through the hangar she was talking with the pilot Duncan had arrived to see. What’s the devious bitch up to now? How does she know Hesia? As Duncan watched, Adella passed what might be a brooch to Hesia, and the pilot pocketed it. He didn’t think he could stomach talking to Adella again, not now he knew that her luxurious dress had been paid for in Weyland blood. Duncan and Carter’s blood, too, for all she had known at the time. He ducked behind a parked helo, ignoring curious looks from a pair of mechanics in brown boiler suits delving inside its engine panel. Duncan observed Adella trail the group. Machus and his retinue disappeared down a passage, and then Duncan headed for Hesia. The female pilot had stopped in front of a helo, talking to its ground crew. It was one of the bigger aircraft, with twin rotors on top, designed to lift a company of house troops. He went up to her and pulled the woman aside.
‘You know who you were just talking to?’ asked Duncan.
‘Hard not to,’ said Hesia. ‘I flew her to Baron Machus’s district the day she arrived here.’ The pilot tapped her flight overalls. ‘She saw me drop my brooch on the field. Clasp’s broken. You’ve heard how the woman got her ticket out of the sky mines?’
‘Yes. And it might have been me the guards executed,’ said Duncan, ‘if I had joined the escape attempt.’
‘Best decision you ever made,’ said Hesia, pushing her long hair back over her shoulder. ‘I’ve flown supply runs across the dead zone. Unless you’re on one of our ships, you’re never getting out, not unless you count be
ing made a corpse as escaping.’
‘You live long enough and everyone betrays you in the end,’ said Duncan, sadly.
Hesia put her hand on Duncan’s chest and landed a quick, passionate kiss against his lips. Duncan glanced around to see if anyone had spotted them. ‘Damn, but is Doctor Horvak testing a special scent in my quarters that I haven’t been told about?’
The pilot smiled, coyly. ‘Just thought I’d taste some of that celestial-caste honey while it’s still on offer. See what all the fuss is about.’
His face flushed red. ‘Is there anyone in the castle who doesn’t know?’
‘Don’t worry, Weylander, it’ll be me that flies you to the slave market after that scent’s novelty has worn off. And it always does.’ She prodded him playfully in the shoulder. ‘Count on it.’
‘You’ve got the rest of the evening to get over me. Cassandra’s flight has been cancelled. Paetro says it’s time to give the helo a full maintenance check.’
‘Lucky me. Stepping out with a grease can and a set of spanners.’
Duncan nodded goodbye to the pilot and walked away.
‘Don’t be too judgemental about your country girl,’ Hesia called after him. ‘You’ve served in the sky mines, so you know how it goes out there.’
Duncan turned back. ‘Would you trust Adella on your crew, if she’d been given a position inside the castle?’
‘Well, I believe Machus deserves her more than we do. They suit each other, don’t you think?’
Duncan couldn’t disagree. Helos still touched down beyond the hangar’s blast doors, the gust from their rotors helping to cool the heat on his cheeks. He left for the doctor’s laboratory before someone assigned him a party of visiting nobles to nanny. Lady Cassandra was already at study by the time he arrived inside the lab, and, as he had predicted, in a churlish mood having being made to vacate the gathering just as the major players replaced the minor nobles around the table.
‘What is the point,’ she complained, ‘of being taught politics and oratory, if when I have an opportunity to see the heads of great houses deploy such skills at first hand, I am sent away like a scullery maid to my books?’
‘I doubt if there are many scullery maids with access to a library as fine as mine,’ said the doctor, sounding a little peeved. ‘And who is to say that there may not be the chronicles of greater politicians than our current crop of leaders buried among your tomes?’
‘My mother,’ said Cassandra, tartly. ‘What do you think, Paetro? Would I not be better in the real world, seated downstairs around the table with my equals?’
The bulky guard winked at Duncan. ‘I think the real world prefers to share their strategies in private. Master patience, little Highness. Your place at the table will come with age.’
‘I may choke on book dust first,’ she muttered.
‘Please,’ said the doctor. ‘You’ve arrived late for your studies. I hadn’t expected you to be allowed to attend the start of the gathering. Time to apply yourself now.’
Cassandra was due a three-hour session of tuition, and Duncan knew that they had reached the halfway point when the food cart arrived from the kitchens. It was fancier than the normal fare delivered during study sessions. Hot fresh crab taken from the bay outside, stuffed with a multi-coloured assortment of cold fish – considered a delicacy in the empire, if a little too slippery for his tastes. Duncan suspected the kitchens were overworked with extra guests and notables cramming the castle. The princess and her staff had been served the overflow from some head of house’s idea of a meal; dished up on engraved gold platters, and with portions that could have fed an entire barracks in the sky mines. Duncan tried to ignore the mixture of guilt and worry over what his sister would be enduring right now. He found it hard to remember how hard and endless working days had been on the station. But he would never forget waking up every bit as hungry as he had gone to bed. Please let Willow be safe. Please let someone back there be looking out for her. But that should have been his job.
Paetro interrupted his thoughts. ‘Come on, lad. Everyone here is hungry. First mouthful… the young Highness needs to check you don’t turn blue and keel over on us.’
Duncan did as he was bid, and when he didn’t expire the others in the room began tucking in. The two lab assistants helping the doctor fell on the meal as though they hadn’t eaten for a week. Duncan wished he had their appetite. He had been off his food of late.
Doctor Horvak leant in towards Duncan, speaking low enough that the others couldn’t hear. ‘Paetro and Lady Cassandra have never been slaves, but I know that look. The ones you had to leave behind?’
‘Yes,’ said Duncan.
‘At least I can comfort myself that my wife and daughters are safe as citizens of my country, even if it is firmly under the Vandian yoke,’ said the doctor. ‘Yours are slaves in the sky mines?’
‘My sister, Willow.’
‘Women are far more resilient than we are, Duncan of Weyland,’ said Horvak. ‘She will survive, I am sure of it. Come with me, young fellow. Honest work is always a cure for melancholy.’
Duncan didn’t say anything. Doctor Horvak might be a serf here, too, but at least the scientist had a country and a family and memories of them worth keeping. What did Duncan have from his old life? It had all been a lie… everything so obvious in hindsight. How the workers at home must have laughed at him behind his back. Adella’s feelings solely towards the Duncan’s title, heir of Hawkland Park. An inheritance he had treated as valueless; wealth and power as empty as his father’s dreams for endless expansion across the north. And when Duncan’s name was rendered worthless, Adella had abandoned him for Carter’s dubious protection, before exchanging the pastor’s son for the infinitely more comfortable and reliable security of Baron Machus’s bed. Maybe it would be better if Willow was more like Adella. At least then he could have more faith in his sister’s survival. Duncan followed sadly after the scientist as they left the others to finish eating. The doctor unlocked a glass door at the far end of the chamber. It led into a short corridor and a second glass door peering into an area that resembled a greenhouse, rows of plants growing tall under bright lights, steam misting the glass. They had come to the back of the castle, windows overlooking towering cliffs and the dark sea beyond, spray thrown up against the hold’s high concrete walls. When the doctor closed the door to the hot room there was a strange hissing noise under Duncan’s feet.
‘The air smells odd in here?’ said Duncan.
‘It’s pressurised,’ said the doctor. ‘In a similar manner to an aircraft’s interior as it travels through thin atmosphere.’
Duncan gazed along the rows of greenery – planting trays drip fed by rubber hoses and the smell of wet vegetation strong in the room. Behind each tray stood a set of glass canisters, coiled tubes feeding multi-coloured chemicals into the soil. ‘Why would you look to grow plants on a merchant carrier? You can send transport planes down to the ground to trade for food more cheaply.’
Doctor Horvak tapped the side of his nose. ‘Ah, but who knows how far we may need to travel one day?’ He pulled a cork clipboard off the wall and passed it to Duncan; a pencil attached to its edge with a length of string. ‘Mark the sizes on the right-hand column as I call them out.’
Duncan complied, the doctor walking the line of vegetation, muttering as he tapped the glass canisters, placing a measuring tape by the side of each plant – everything from cucumbers to cabbages growing in the soil – and then announced heights for Duncan to scribble down. They’d undertaken the exercise for ten minutes when Duncan heard what sounded like a distant thud, panes of glass in the wall rattling and dislodging flurries of dust above his head.
‘What was that?’
‘I’m really not quite sure,’ said the doctor, sounding perplexed.
Behind them the door was thrown open by Paetro, a hiss of escaping air – the outer portal hadn’t been shut properly. ‘My experiments!’ called Horvak.
‘Hang you
r experiments, Doctor,’ said Paetro. ‘That was an explosion.’
Duncan dropped the clipboard. ‘A bomb? The meeting—!’ If Helrena’s enemies had succeeded in infiltrating the gathering, they’d be able to wipe out the house’s leadership and its allies in a single stroke.
But Paetro wasn’t listening to Duncan – he stared in shock at what lay beyond window. ‘Get inside, now!’
They were barely inside the corridor, the burly guard half-dragging, half-pushing Duncan and the doctor forward when a shattering explosion echoed behind them, splinters of glass jouncing down the corridor. Paetro had his pistol out, slamming the inner door shut. ‘Glider chutes,’ snarled Paetro. ‘Carrying at least a company of commandos in on us! There’s an assault ship out at sea.’
Sirens began to wail in the passage outside. Lady Cassandra jumped to her feet. Paetro dipped down into his boot and pulled out a small concealed pistol, tossing it across the room to her. Duncan felt a flash of annoyance that Paetro hadn’t thrown the weapon to him. Wasn’t he meant to be protecting the young noblewoman too? Was he that useless?
‘Why aren’t our air defences shooting them down?’ demanded Cassandra. ‘I can’t hear our guns?’
‘As an educated guess, little Highness, the explosion we heard will have something to do with that.’ One of the doctor’s assistants panicked and scurried towards the door, but Paetro grabbed him by the collar, hauling him away from the exit, shoving the man back towards the plate of food he had abandoned. ‘Nobody goes out there. Some of our so-called allies at the meeting have betrayed us. That’s the only way our castle’s defences are silent.’
‘We need to head down to the shelters,’ cried the lab assistant. ‘We’ll be better protected underground.’
‘Please be quiet, Tarius, I need to think,’ said the doctor, a lot more calmly than Duncan felt. The scientist moved behind the bench where his superconductors floated in an icy mist. ‘Yes, yes, Paetro is correct. If hostile forces have infiltrated the castle, the shelter’s stairwell will be the perfect position to ambush the house’s leadership. We cannot safely retreat below ground.’