Last of the Immortals (The Jessica Keller Chronicles Book 3) (37 page)

“Do ya gots to leave immediate–like?” Moirrey asked plaintively. Disappears ferever? Hardships in the brush had forged a special thing to be lost so quickly.

“I can stay for a bit,” Summer said with a warm smile. “There’s a good burger and beer joint we found in town that would love to host the
Hero of Ballard
.”

“I’m not sure about that, Summer,” Jessica said sharply, the razor’s edge of her tongue for the first time Moirrey could remember. “We failed.”

“No,” Summer replied, just as sharp. “Nobody died on the station. Suvi will return. The Red Admiral had his squadron broken by a woman half his size and half his tonnage. In their moment of darkness, Jessica Keller and
Auberon
were there. Knights on shining steeds. You will be remembered.”

Moirrey could tell her sister wanted to argue the point, so she gave her a secret hug, just the two of them.

“We done it, Jessica,” she said simply.

It were enough.

“Yes, pipsqueak,” Jessica replied with a warm smile. “We did.”

Epilogue: Jessica

Date of the Republic June 24, 394 Above Ballard

Jessica came to attention before the door. It wasn’t the dragon’s den at Fleet HQ, but it was close enough. Nils Kasum awaited her within.

RAN Athena
was a flagship in every sense of the word. Her flag bridge was huge, designed for a staff of people to have staff of their own. And her crew facilities were expected to support a raft of dignitaries and ambassadors in high comfort. First Lord had an entire suite to himself, having left Kamil Miloslav back home to tend the fireplace.

Marcelle fussed over her uniform one last time, flattening invisible wrinkles and wiping away microscopic specs of dust that had landed in the ten minutes since they had walked down the ramp from
Cayenne
.

Marcelle knocked, initiating the ritual.

The door slid back into wall silently.

“Come,” Nils Kasum said formally.

As always, Marcelle preceded and stepped to the right.

Thus do we bring order to our lives
.

Jessica followed and stopped in the middle of the room at rigid attention, two steps from his desk.

“Marcelle,” the First Lord said quietly. “We probably won’t be long. Could you do me the favor of a few minutes of privacy with Jessica?”

This was the First Lord of the Fleet. He could have easily ordered her steward out. Or teased her, as he often did. Today was formal, taciturn. Almost dour.

How bad had it gotten
?

Marcelle disappeared silently. The door clicked faintly when it closed.

Silence passed between then, like a table game.

Jessica and the goddess of war could out–wait entropy itself today.

“Jessica,” he began. “I’m sorry.”

Huh
?

“First Lord?”

“Please, call me Nils today. This needs to be personal, not professional.”

“How can it be anything but professional, Nils?”

That might have been a touch sharper than it needed to be.

And perhaps not.

“I sent you here to die.”

“I know that, Nils. We knew that at the time. This mission was always a forlorn hope.”

“Emmerich Wachturm played me, Jessica. He set me up. This was all part of his grand plan.”

“Me standing before you on
Athena
’s deck, while he limped home missing several teeth, was never part of his plan, Nils.”

She could feel the anger light, deep inside. The goddess of war growled hungrily.

“I’ve had a lot of time to think about how things have played out,” Nils said after a beat. “I think it would be appropriate for me to step down as First Lord and retire.”

In her soul, the goddess of war drew blades.

It wasn’t lust for blood or battle.

It was that place she had been when Suvi and Moirrey were at risk. When Ian Zhao was poised to conquer all of
Petron
. When the Red Admiral’s fighters appeared at
Third Iger
.

Defender of the faithful. Protector of the realm. Harbinger of Order.

“I won’t allow it,” she said, giving mouth to the words the goddess of war howled inside.

“I beg your pardon, Keller?”

Jessica took a step forward, leaned over the desk top and stopped, lurking over the man close enough to breathe on him.

“I. Will. Not. Allow. It.”

The words took on the solidity of stone, tainting the air with a hint of ozone.

“Explain,” he replied, not leaning back, not giving an inch.

Jessica stood upright again.

“This was not just an attack on a backwater Republic world, Nils,” she said forcefully. “This was a man blinded by his anger, seeking, however unconsciously, to repeat the original sin. Of burning the first Library at Alexandria. According to the research I’ve seen, it was named
Alexandria Station
because it was intended to recreate the original Library on the Homeworld, during the ancient Roman Empire. Before the barbarians destroyed it.”

Her heart was pounding hard enough to drive nails.

Burgers with Moirrey and Suvi, no,
Summer
, had turned into an entire evening of storytelling between the four women, generally left alone by the locals after a round of autographs and photos.

It had gotten very, very personal.

“This was an attack on the very foundation of the Republic itself, Nils,” Jessica softened her tone. “Suvi is part of Henri Baudin’s founding legend. This was an Imperial attack on Baudin himself.”

There was too much energy. Jessica let herself pace, as if she were back on her own bridge. In a way, she was. This was her quest, her windmill, her white whale.

“Nobody died aboard the station except the assassin,” she continued. “But all that wreckage has been falling out of the sky, all that stuff that we couldn’t catch or slice into pieces small enough to burn up. It has been a week of aurora borealis and shooting stars and meteors for the people of this planet and all the visitors from the university.”

She stopped square in front of him and turned.

“Do you have any idea what that has done to the people of
Ballard
, Nils? To the scholars that represent every world in the Republic and half a dozen other nations?”

He mutely shook his head, eyes almost as serious as the goddess of war in her now.

“It has made them furious, First Lord of the
Republic of Aquitaine
Fleet. The
University of Ballard
was attacked by the
Fribourg Empire
without any provocation. None. Not the
Sentience
aboard her. Not Suvi. The university itself. They are angry. Raging. There are fussy little shopkeepers in Ithome baying for Imperial blood right now.”

She paused to breathe, amazed at how hot her skin had gotten in such a short period of time.

“If you resign, you’ll be telling them that it was all a mistake. That we shouldn’t have been here. That you’re sorry it came to this.”

Her face curled up in a snarl better suited to a predator spying a chicken, but she couldn’t help herself.

“You sent me to the
Cahllepp Frontier
to poke
Fribourg
with a sharp stick, Nils. I succeeded. So Karl sent the Red Admiral to
Lincolnshire
and
Petron
. We stopped him there. Tomas Kigali has apparently been telling people stories and lies about the battles at
Sarmarsh IV
and
Petron
. One of the hottest things you can buy in the marketplace right now is a set of action figures, First Lord. Me in that black royal combat uniform,
Furious
commanding The Queen’s Own, and Kigali himself as Mercury, Messenger of the Gods.”

She bored into his soul with her look

“Nils, you didn’t send us here to die. You sent us here to stop the Red Admiral. Dying was the risk. It’s a risk every day I serve, every time I get out of bed.”

She found herself pounding the desk with her finger in rhythm with her words. Even his semi–smile at recognizing his own habits in her barely tempered her rage, focused far away, on
St. Legier
and an emperor she had never met.

“You sent us here to win, Nils. We won. Now what?”

All the energy fled. Jessica almost staggered to the seat behind her and collapsed into it, regardless of decorum.

They had already gone well past that point anyway.

“What’s your squadron’s status, Jessica?” Nils asked quietly, finally seeing the mad tide ebb.

“You will have to decommission
Rajput
in place and scrap her right here in orbit. She’ll never make Jumpspace again.”

Again, the tapping.

“
Brightoak
will need a complete engine rebuild, but she’s otherwise relatively intact.”

Tap.

“
Stralsund
will be in dry–dock back home for six months before she can fight.”

Like nails in a coffin lid.

“
CR–264
is almost new–in–box, although Kigali has some mad ideas to lengthen her frame and add an interchangeable weapons module with missiles or primaries or something.”

“Would that work?” Nils asked, intrigued.

“I have kept Tomas Kigali well away from Moirrey and Oz, thank you very much.”

“What about
Auberon
, Jessica?”

She had known the question was coming. It was still a punch to the gut.

Not as bad as losing Daneel, but very, very close.

The pain must have shown.

Nils waited patiently while she tried to pull her soul back together. Even the goddess of war helped sweep pieces up.

“
Auberon
is a broken sword, First Lord.”

Retreat into formality. Keep the pain at bay. Something. Anything.

Her soul lay smashed nearby in a close orbit, too painful to even think about.

Nils surprised her when he stood and started pacing himself. Another thing she had apparently learned from the man.

Three long strides placed him at a porthole. He got her to look by tapping the glass and pointing.

“All swords, all warriors, break, Jessica,” he said, barely above a whisper. “It is the nature of things in what is a very hard business.”

He studied her closely, every door open to the world.

“I am concerned about the warrior, not the sword. Is she broken?”

And there it was. The question that haunted her dreams. Her nightmares. Her soul. The thing she could not answer, she, the girl with all the angles studied and all the contingencies planned.

How much had she lost when Daneel died aboard
Supernova
? How much more of her had died in orbit when the station disintegrated while
Auberon
tumbled away, powerless to save it? How much had she lost thinking Moirrey had died there?

And yet.

Moirrey had survived. Had succeeded.

Had gone so far above and beyond her duty that neither of them could ever tell anyone without being executed as traitors to the species.

Suvi had survived. Had escaped. Had told them stories over beer and burgers about men and women from their history lessons. Men and women she had known, had taught. Had loved.

And she had survived. The Red Admiral had thrown everything he had in his mad quest to kill Jessica Keller. And failed.

That was the very definition of victory.

The goddess of war reached out and hugged her no less fiercely than she had Moirrey. Poured power and warmth back into a soul that had gone hollow and cold.

Jessica breathed. It was enough to break the spell.

She felt the chains fall away from her mind, her soul. She rose from the chair, unable to be contained by it any longer, and came to attention before him.

“Auberon is a broken sword, First Lord,” she announced quietly, firmly, finally. “It is one more debt the Red Admiral owes me.”

“You will not collect it yet, Jessica.”

“No?”

“No,” he said with a harsh smile. “It will take a year or more of hard preparation, but as you have said, he is going nowhere. And you have damaged
Fribourg
already more than you know. The Battle of
Ballard
will simply drive that stake in deeper.”

“And then?”

He pointed out the window again, encompassing the corpse of her warhorse, her people.

Her life.

“Like
Rajput
, she will be decommissioned in place. I can think of no better place for her to serve as a museum, than at the site of her final battle, Jessica. But her name, her battle flags, her
legend
, that will be reborn. And you will take the war to
Fribourg
. I have plans for you.”

The goddess of war nodded. It was a beginning.

And maybe, just maybe, Jessica would be able to sleep again without nightmares.

Last of the Immortals Cast List

Auberon