Ryswyck

by L D Inman

  “Will it matter if you refuse, Admiral?” Stevens said.

  “Yes,” Douglas said. “Otherwise it is not a sustainable concession. As Lord Bernhelm said, we would have to think of something else.”

  Another stillness fell. Marag put his hands to his brow and slowly leaned to support his head with his elbows on the table. His shoulders began to shake, in tiny, convulsive shudders.

  Wallis laid a supporting hand over his friend’s spine and drilled Douglas with his gaze. “The fact that you brought this to us, and did not refuse out of hand, tells me what your opinion is, Admiral.”

  Douglas opened his hands helplessly. “I don’t have a fixed opinion, Captain Wallis. But yes, I did think you should be informed of the opportunity.”

  “Opportunity!” someone hissed, further down the table, and in almost the same moment Beathas said steadily, “And what do the Berenians propose to exchange us in return?”

  Marag stifled a small sob.

  “Lord Commander Selkirk is working out possible counterconditions,” Douglas said. “Du Rau expressed a hope that eventually, a sister institution would be established across the strait, as a continued peacebuilding project. But we’d have to get to peace before we could build it.”

  “And do you trust du Rau when he says this, Douglas?” Stevens demanded.

  “I am certain that du Rau is not above practicing deception,” Douglas said carefully. “I am also fairly certain he does not want to repeat what the bad times looked like in Berenia. And I think the situation is providing enough pressure to make entente more attractive than total mutual destruction. More than that I can’t say.”

  Three people spoke at once, paused to give way to the others, and Hallett went on. “Even our courtesy is not enough to sustain the whole burden of an entente. And could the concept even be replicated over there?”

  There was the sound of people drawing breath, but it was Marag who spoke, his voice hollow as if coming from a stone cistern. “Barklay thought it could.” They looked at him; he had not lifted his head, but he did now, taking no regard for the tears on his face. “He didn’t speak much of it,” he said, swallowing, “but it was the next thing.”

  Wallis was glaring at Douglas from over Marag’s shoulder. “We don’t have Barklay to make that idea live for us.” Which Douglas had known, but the words made his heart hurt.

  Before he could answer, Marag spoke. “No,” he said, “we don’t. But the idea’s still there.” He looked at Douglas, his soul looking out of his face, stripped and helpless. “You didn’t refuse it out of hand,” he said. “You couldn’t.”

  “I couldn’t,” Douglas agreed softly, his gaze clasped with Marag’s.

  An abrupt sound broke the silence. Douglas looked away from Marag to find that Cameron had pushed back her chair and was striding out of the room. She did not touch the door as she passed through it, but the air reverberated as if she had slammed it behind her.

  No one else spoke.

  “Take some time,” Douglas said finally. “Even if you know your own mind already. Anyone who wants can speak with me alone. Let’s reconvene in the early morning. First watch.”

  ~*~

  Still feverish, Speir dozed and woke, bounding between the depths of air and the depths of water. She found that if she kept very still, the pain was just bearable. Even dosed with serum and narcotics, the pain could come alive at any provocation, so she kept her eyes closed and took shallow breaths.

  The next time she opened her eyes, Jarrow was back, his face still livid with burns and resentment. “My friend,” Speir murmured.

  “You see where your courtesy gets you,” Jarrow said, as if compelled to push the worst of his thoughts before her. Did he think he could drive her away? She couldn’t move; some need still pressed him to seek her out. “Without those deadly missiles we’d be overrun by now.”

  “Even with them, we might,” Speir said. Her voice was weak and hoarse in her own ears.

  “Do you still cling to him, after all he did?” Jarrow demanded.

  “What do you want me to say?” she said. “He was my friend. And for one moment he knitted us together across the strait.”

  “You can’t be friends with both of us!”

  “Yes, I can,” Speir said.

  “How can you not understand?” he cried. “Don’t you see that I was not wrong?”

  He had said he wronged her. But still he returned to a craving to be justified. “But you were, my dear,” she whispered. “You had better give it over. The truth can hurt you but it can’t kill you.”

  “Oh, can’t it now?” Jarrow bridled, a desperate gesture. “What about poor John Selkirk, eh? What about—?”

  The truth was, she had been put to torture herself; and it might kill her yet. Speir’s breath was coming in sobs, and her dry eyes smarted. “I don’t know, Jarrow! Why do you ask me?”

  “Because you see me,” Jarrow pleaded. “Who else is there to ask?”

  He was more like Barklay than he would ever admit. Speir said: “I can’t guide you, my friend. But I’m telling you now: outlive your bitterness.”

  His face changed color, blotchily. Speir had never been so tired by a simple argument.

  “Is that an order?” he said, desperation overcoming his sarcasm.

  “A dare,” Speir said.

  ~*~

  An hour passed without anyone coming to see Douglas in his office. He began to wonder, in the ominous quiet, whether he had taken the right approach. Should he have made some sort of stand? Should he have pretended that he had already rejected the proposal and drawn their protests from the other direction? No, he decided; even if it had been more effective as a psychological ploy, Douglas could not dissemble. He had promised his Ryswyckians, and he had promised himself.

  He heard a firm step at the doorway and looked up. Cameron had come back, and with her an anger so potent she did not even tense her body to hold it. Douglas stood up.

  A long silence. Then she said calmly: “You cannot possibly be taking that proposal seriously.”

  Douglas looked at her without saying anything. Waited.

  “It’s a betrayal of us all,” she said, iron in her voice.

  “Courtesy is betrayal?” said Douglas softly.

  “There’s a point where courtesy ends, Douglas! How could you—”

  “What point is that?”

  “Don’t patronize me—”

  He put out an urgent hand. “I’m not. I want to know. Where does it end for you?”

  “How about where it is completely invisible to the people who are torturing you? I saw the intelligence report about what happened to Ahrens. Did you?”

  “Yes,” Douglas said, very quietly, “I saw it.” This, then, was what was eating away at Cameron’s soul. He was not surprised.

  “Then you know that they strung him up and broke him and then shot him like a dog. All his level-headedness, all his humor, all his humanity, didn’t exist for them. His courtesy didn’t matter.”

  “It mattered very much,” Douglas said. His body felt dense with feeling, like the compact intensity of a star, and his voice lowered with the force of it. “It was what brought du Rau here.”

  “So he could graciously condescend to give us Barklay’s body back. After hanging it on a tower to wisdom they haven’t lit for twenty years! And you’d see Ahrens’s own students taking lessons from a Berenian officer. You should be ashamed.”

  “Yes,” Douglas cried, “by all means! Let me be ashamed. I’ll bear any fault before I give up the truth.”

  “The truth is that there is not a soul here who would not love to grind a boot in their faces. That’s where courtesy—”

  “But they didn’t.” Douglas surged on in her sudden flushed silence. “They didn’t. They possessed their own souls and they paid the cost, and none of us would be alive if they hadn’t.”

  “And you’d ask them to spend all they have and more than that. Barklay himself couldn’t do it. And you’re
not Barklay. Barklay isn’t here.”

  Douglas’s whole skin seemed to radiate waves of cold fire. “No,” he said. “Barklay isn’t here. But you are. What are you going to do?”

  Cameron blanched suddenly, and as she did Douglas realized that Stevens had come unobtrusively to the doorway and stood looking in.

  “How dare you—” her eyes glittered with tears— “how dare you lay a burden on me you won’t carry yourself! Those brutes took pleasure in degrading the friend of my soul, and you—”

  “They’ve done the same to mine,” said Douglas, fighting to keep his breath. “She’s lying in a bed at Central Med right now, out of her mind with pain, and I can’t—”

  “That makes it all the worse!” Cameron cried. “You’d liquidate your own soul’s household for this, as if they meant nothing—”

  “Don’t. Ever,” Douglas grated, “tell me that I don’t care.” He would have said more, but he was weeping now too, helplessly, and his hands were gripping the books on his desk ready to sweep them all to the floor. Before he could, Stevens came swiftly in and took Cameron by the shoulders.

  “Seeley,” he murmured, as she glared at Douglas through her tears, “come away. Come away now.” With more soft noises he drew her out of the room, his eyes going over her shoulder to Douglas with an almost pleading look. As if he would divide himself in two to soothe them both. Douglas put his hands over his face.

  Presently he got hold of himself. Well, that was instructive. It was a strangely passionless thought. Perhaps he really didn’t care as he ought. But if so, it wasn’t something he could help. Douglas took his hands away to search for a handkerchief.

  Marag was standing there, steady and quiet, like a reverse image of his own collapse. He was watching Douglas silently. Douglas didn’t have the spirit to say anything. He wiped his face and blew his nose, hoping words would come to him, but they didn’t.

  Very soon, Marag was going to say something, either to confirm or deny Cameron’s arguments. By then, Douglas hoped, he would have some words.

  Marag said: “Have you forgiven Barklay for what he did to you?”

  Douglas made a little noise as if he’d been stabbed.

  Yes, that was the question, wasn’t it? It had not been in Barklay’s power to mend his fault to Douglas. He couldn’t take back the burden he had laid on him, and had known better than to try. But Douglas hadn’t believed him when he said he was sorry; he had sensed that Barklay still hoped to be exonerated after all. Only offerings are acceptable. And in the end Barklay had made one, poor as it was. It helped; but it didn’t make the mending easier. Marag had cut right to the center of it.

  He looked at Marag bleakly, wet-eyed. “Have you?” he said.

  Marag’s mouth moved, acknowledging the point. He nodded, not in answer but in agreement.

  After a moment, Marag touched his closed hand gently to his heart and went away; but he paused in the doorway. “In case there was some question in your mind,” he said quietly, “it’s your gift that’s needed now. Not Barklay’s.”

  Always supposing he had one, Douglas thought, staring desolately across his office.

  ~*~

  A call from Central Command was expected to come in within minutes. Du Rau filled the time signing off on reports. The Executive Committee had proven balky about parleying with Verlac, but were more or less brought around by pointing out that they could negotiate for fair access to water or watch the Southern Consortium sweep in and claim it for themselves. No one trusted Verlac to deal honestly with them, but they seemed to trust that du Rau was not afraid of driving a hard bargain. After all, he had walked into Verlac and walked back out again without turning a hair. Du Rau had delegated to Ingrid the task of coaxing them along toward supporting entente.

  The projection blinked up: it was Alban Selkirk himself. Du Rau allowed himself the touch of a smile. “Lord Commander Selkirk,” he said smoothly. “What a pleasure to see you again after all these years.”

  “Your sentiments are entirely mutual,” he said, with manifest irony. Age had become him; it lent weight to his broad face, traced dignity in the badger-silver at his temples. He looked exactly like what he was not: a harmless, slightly sedentary senior officer nearing retirement.

  “I’m sure,” du Rau said. “So you speak to me directly now, and not through Admiral Douglas.”

  “Admiral Douglas has very little trouble speaking on his own account,” Selkirk said. “Nevertheless, I wanted to speak with you myself, before you talk to him next.”

  No edge could be heard in Selkirk’s even voice, but du Rau knew it was there.

  “You don’t approve of my proposal for Ryswyck,” he said.

  “I am rejecting nothing out of hand,” Selkirk said. “But negotiating a more prolonged ceasefire should not be Douglas’s burden alone.”

  “You fear he would give away too much?”

  “No, actually. He has a clear mind and a just sense of proportion. But he knows it is not his place to pledge his country’s commitment for a parley of this magnitude. That’s my place.”

  In a more petty mood, du Rau would have enjoyed plucking at Selkirk’s patience with a few smirks and jibes. But this straightforward exchange was oddly satisfying in itself.

  “I suppose you have counterconditions to offer?” he said.

  “Well,” Selkirk answered slowly, “provided that Douglas obtains Ryswyck’s consent to your proposal, I should like to see an equal military delegation welcomed to Bernhelm for the duration of any talks.”

  “Army,” du Rau asked, “or navy?”

  “Of officers, both. Of support personnel, a choice selection of army.”

  “How many?” Du Rau narrowed his eyes.

  “How many do you propose to send to Ryswyck?” Selkirk said coolly.

  “Enough to diffuse animosity, I think. Three or four seniors, and twenty-five recruits?”

  Selkirk thought about it. “That would be appropriate, for Ryswyck. But I haven’t established the same security on your soil that you have on mine. I would send my delegation in numbers less vulnerable than that.”

  “No more than fifty all told,” said du Rau, in a voice that would brook no haggling.

  “Mm,” Selkirk said.

  “And,” du Rau said, warming to it, “if you send that many, they are bound to get bored while we parley. They will need something to do. Fortunately, I happen to have a reservoir that needs rebuilding.”

  Selkirk smiled a very thin smile. “I will broach that with Central Command.”

  “By all means, do. Is there any word on whether Douglas will succeed with his Ryswyckians?”

  Selkirk shook his head. “Even Ryswyckians will find it hard to swallow making a home for people who, up to the certain moment, are unrepentantly bent on their conquest. I expect Douglas to have his work cut out.”

  “Is there something that would make the arrangement more attractive?” du Rau asked thoughtfully.

  “Short of actual repentance, you mean?” Selkirk gave him a sardonic look. “Now that is something you will want to discuss with Admiral Douglas.”

  “I look forward to it.”

  No doubt, said Selkirk’s pursed smile. “I’ll be in touch. Selkirk out.”

  ~*~

  Despite all the medics’ care, despite all Speir’s effort at stillness, another pocket of toxin broke and burnt through her exhausted nerves. She did not know if it was that the pain was greater, or that her resistance to it had completely crumbled: but her mind and soul together raveled to a thread of spit, and she lived in a hateful cloud of her own screaming, unable to die though it was all she wanted.

  Her thumb now continually jammed the button for medicine, whether it was time to renew the dose or not; the tiny relief from the narcotic only seemed to heighten the contrast, but she could not stop herself. And she could not give herself over, either to death or sacrifice: the pain was like a monstrous solidity between herself and her own will.

  In this fever
of abject horror, she found Jarrow by her bedside again, his face close, his eyes very wide. “Captain,” he said.

  “Jarrow,” she gasped, her thumb on the button, “please—please. Help me.”

  “What can I do?” His nostrils flared with panic.

  “I can’t. Can’t give it over. Can’t die, can’t pray. Please,” she wept, “please.”

  “I’ll do whatever you want,” he said, trembling in voice and frame. “Tell me, Speir.”

  “Could you. Pray for me. Pray in my stead. Give it over for me—” She lost her voice dragging a scream down to a groan.

  “I don’t know h—Yes. Yes. I will. I’ll do it.”

  “Please….” Her thumb, crushing the button, finally got a response, and the drug began to flood her system. It could not knock her out completely, but her rigor wilted and her vision dimmed. She had a vague sense of a hot, shaking hand touching her face, closing her eyes for her, smoothing back her sweaty hair. Then there was only the dark expanse of nauseous suspension.

  ~*~

  Douglas was up long before first watch. He went to the kitchen, where the first of the breakfast team were puttering about, and retrieved some fresh teacups and saucers. Back in his office, he stacked them neatly and then fiddled with the warmer, cleaning the spigot handle and wiping scale out of the reservoir. It jammed going back in, and he swore at it softly. A movement caught the corner of his eye; it was Cameron.

  “Need help?” she asked, just as the reservoir rammed home. Then, “Evidently not,” with a strained smile.

  He stepped back and gave a small gesture at the station. “Tea?” he offered.