Of Fire and Night (40 page)

100

TAL O’NH

A
fter the faeros had destroyed the watchdog hydrogues in Hyrillka’s sky, Tal O’nh seized the opportunity to continue his rushed deployment of construction crews and equipment. He dispatched more ships to the spaceport, adding to the numerous teams already on the ground. Hundreds of warliners emptied their holds and distributed food, machinery, and raw materials.

Like a swarm of constructor beetles rebuilding a hive after a storm, soldiers, engineers, and many strong workers erected new buildings. The exhausted people were uplifted by the progress all around them, seeing structures rise and fresh rows of crops laid down in the ash-fertilized soil.

The crews managed to work for several days before the next disaster occurred.

The one-eyed commander rode in the near-empty flagship warliner to better survey the activities below. He had barely slept in days; his short gray topknot was frayed, not tightly braided and waxed as he normally kept it. He did, however, take the time to polish his reflective Lightsource medallion and the facets of his jeweled eye. O’nh felt an urgency to get his work done.

Several members of the skeleton crew in the command nucleus sat up abruptly as sensor alerts sounded. “Tal!”

He turned his good eye to the main screens. “Report.”

“They are coming from all sides, on a hundred different vectors. An armada the likes of which we have never seen. Sensor stations are overloaded.”

“An armada of
what
?”

“Hydrogue warglobes—all coming to Hyrillka! We cannot possibly stand against them.”

The alien spheres swirled in from outside the system like a blizzard of diamond chips. They must have been dispatched from numerous gas-giant planets, emerging from transgates deep within and spewing into nearby space.

O’nh stepped up to his place at the command rail. In destroying the three watchdog warglobes, the faeros must have provoked the deep-core aliens. He stared at the tactical screen that showed incredible numbers of oncoming warglobes, far outnumbering the Ildiran ships.

“Prepare for our final battle.”

Given luck and determination, his cohort might cause extraordinary damage to the enemy in a flurry of suicidal attacks. But even if every single warliner destroyed a hydrogue globe, they could never win. The enemy numbers were overwhelming.

He wished Rememberer Vao’sh and his human companion had come up here with him. This would certainly be something for them to observe, for the sake of history. However, they were not likely to survive long enough to record their experiences.

“Should we form a defensive line, Tal? Concentrate our forces above the central city?”

O’nh squinted to watch the blips of enemy ships. “Inform Designate Ridek’h that I will do my best. Have all crews ready to move on my command, but do not overreact. Warglobes have come before and did not attack.”

The alien armada rocketed closer, never slowing. Then, in an endless storm, they streamed
past
Hyrillka and headed toward its blue-white primary sun.

The warliner’s command crew cheered in disbelief, while O’nh watched with his brow furrowed. “They are not after
us
at all. Hyrillka does not matter to them. Even their bargain with the Mage-Imperator has lost its priority because of the faeros.”

“That is good news indeed, Tal!”

Relief lasted only a few moments, and then his suspicions turned to dread, for he had seen a similar thing before. “Not necessarily. This could be even worse.”

Like moths drawn to a flame, the warglobes swarmed around Hyrillka’s main sun, swirled in the corona, and began to attack the star itself.

Flushed out by the sudden barrage, faeros ellipsoids erupted from the roiling plasma seas. Numerous flaming shapes slammed into the hydrogues in a blinding display. The battle was engaged.

With a sick heart, O’nh knew that the faeros were likely to lose. Hyrillka’s primary would be extinguished, just like Durris-B. There was nothing Tal O’nh or his warliners or Designate Ridek’h or even the Mage-Imperator could do about it.

As he stared at the screen, O’nh made a mental tally of the population on Hyrillka, all who had survived the first hydrogue attack and then Rusa’h’s rebellion. He considered the disposition of ships in the Solar Navy, closed his one eye, and visualized which grouping would be closest.

“Send an immediate message to Tal Ala’nh. Summon his cohort to Hyrillka as swiftly as possible. I do not know how much time we have before that sun dies.” He opened his eye and looked again at the bright main sun, where flashes and sparks of the conflict churned through the solar layers. “We will need every one of his warliners and all of mine to effect a total evacuation of this planet. After all our work, Hyrillka cannot be saved.”

101

CESCA PERONI

A
fter Jess left for Theroc and the fourteen Plumas water tankers set off to primordial Charybdis, Cesca went to Yreka hoping to reestablish connections with the dispersed Roamer families. She still thought of herself as the Speaker, though after all the turmoil, she knew it might take some time for Roamers to reestablish their identity and determine their place in the changed Spiral Arm.

Since she flew only a small craft scrounged from Plumas, everyone assumed Cesca was just another clan trader coming to the bustling outpost. Her ship settled onto the crowded landing field, and she stepped out into the dusty air, feeling the energy tingle through her skin. The colors, the noise, the smells, the chatter of cordial conversation! She hadn’t seen so many Roamers together since before the destruction of Rendezvous.

The place looked more like a crowded bazaar than a spaceport. Smiling clan members wore flashy clothes, embroidered jumpsuits, jackets with a multitude of pockets, clips, and zippers. The Yrekans’ serviceable clothes and plain overalls were now embellished with bright scarves and ribbons.

As she scanned the other ships, Cesca’s heart leapt when she recognized the
Dogged Persistence
. Denn emerged from his craft, saw her, and his face beamed. He ran forward, words jetting out of his mouth like engine exhaust. “Cesca! Cesca, what happened to you? Where have you been? Kotto came here and said Jonah 12 was destroyed! I was so—”

She scrambled back up the ramp, holding up her hands to fend off his attempted embrace. “Dad, no! Stop! Stay back.” For the first time she realized how Jess had felt. “I’d love a hug, too . . . but it would kill you. Lots of things have changed.
I’ve
changed.”

He blinked in confusion. “What do you mean a hug would kill me? And what’s that glow about you? Your skin looks—” He caught his breath. “By the Guiding Star, I heard what happened to Jess Tamblyn! Is this the same thing? You’re . . . possessed by some strange life force?”

Her dark hair swirled with static electricity as if alive. “Otherwise I’d be dead right now. Jess saved me. The wentals saved me. But they had to change me.” Even his questions and the obvious strangeness of the circumstances could not diminish Denn’s joy at seeing her. She wished she could wrap her arms around him, but she did not complain. “Oh, it’s good to see you, Dad.”

“People have been asking about you. We’re doing the best we can—which is damned good, if I do say so myself—but the clans need their Speaker. What a mess!”

“And I need them, too, Dad. We’ve got a whole new mission now, our most important task ever. With Roamer help and Roamer ships, Jess and I have found allies that can help us trounce the drogues, once and for all. Across the Spiral Arm, clan ships are gathering to take part. Jess’s water bearers are organizing distribution points at many wental worlds.”

Colonists and Roamer trade intermediaries came toward her ship, eager to take an inventory of whatever she might have to sell. Cesca spotted curly-haired Kotto Okiah, whom she had last seen on Theroc before sending him to investigate the hydrogue derelict. “Kotto!”

The eccentric scientist was clearly happy to see her. “Speaker Peroni! Wait until you hear the new ideas I’ve been working on. We’ve pulled out all the stops, making resonance doorbells and getting ready—”

“Kotto, wait.” His rush of words stopped, and he noticed her expression. She could see the point at which he understood exactly what she was going to tell him. Cesca turned to her father. “Dad, I need to see you and Kotto aboard my ship for a few minutes.”

When the three of them had a moment of quiet, with Cesca standing on the far side of the small cargo chamber, she said, “Kotto, your mother died on Jonah 12. I’m so sorry. We went there after the Eddies blew up Rendezvous. It was just our temporary base of operations, but . . . everything went wrong.”

The engineer nervously kept looking at her, then away. “I went there. I saw the crater, but no signs of life.” He quickly lifted his chin. “But you escaped. Please tell me that some of the others got away.”

Memories whipped past her, cutting like sharp ice chips in the wind. “No, Kotto. Only me. Nikko Chan Tylar came to rescue me, but our ship was shot down by the Klikiss robots. Then Jess saved us, and convinced the wentals to change me before I died.”

And that opened up more and more questions. She explained about the Klikiss robots found frozen under Jonah 12 and how they had destroyed the base in a rampage. Kotto looked as if his whole body was sagging in a heavy gravity well. “So my mother died there, with all of them.”

She shook her head. “Jhy Okiah died peacefully, Kotto. She passed away while resting in the base dome. Purcell Wan and I arranged a fitting Roamer funeral for her and launched her into space. It was afterward that all hell broke loose.” Kotto seemed to take comfort from that.

“I remember when your mother died, Cesca,” Denn said. “Roamers are supposed to adapt to drastic changes, to roll with disasters. But I thought I’d never recover from it.”

“Even so, you did.” Cesca smiled sadly. “She told you to, and you always did what she asked.”

Unlike many Roamers who died suddenly in accidents, killed by equipment failures or the vagaries of space, Cesca’s mother had had time to come to terms with her imminent death. Lyra Peroni had flown her own merchant ship, and because of a failed sensor panel, she didn’t know that one of her cockpit radiation shields had slipped away. Cesca’s mother flew a dozen runs before a routine maintenance check noticed the problem. By then, the dosage she’d received was several times the lethal amount.

Denn had rushed her to Rendezvous for treatment, but there was nothing Roamer doctors could do. Cesca had been there, training to become Speaker Okiah’s heir apparent. Cesca and her father had hovered over Lyra for weeks as her condition deteriorated. The previous time her mother had come to Rendezvous was to help embroider the symbolic Roamer chain and dress her daughter in colorful ribbons for her betrothal to Ross Tamblyn.

A million years ago, and in a completely different universe . . .

Denn had begged his wife to go to a Hansa medical facility, which he believed had better equipment, a better chance of saving her. But Lyra refused. She knew, as did the Roamer doctors, that there was no chance. She had instructed Denn to “get over it.” To live his life. To adapt to the changes. After his wife’s death, he’d followed her last request with great difficulty.

“I guess we’ve got more changes ahead,” Denn said.

“Major changes,” Cesca said. “And we need your help.”

When she went outside again to meet the crowds, Denn and Kotto helped keep a wide perimeter around Cesca. She took nearly an hour to explain the crisis point of the Spiral Arm, and the listeners showed as much awe at hearing her tales as they did from seeing the unearthly changes in her body. Her father was shocked to hear about the tainted-wental nightmare on Plumas, which he had only recently visited. Cesca doubted she would have trouble convincing the Roamers to follow her.

“Tell us where to go, and we’ll do what we have to, Cesca,” Denn said. “Seems a better use of our time than to sit here waiting for the drogues to come to us. I’d rather fight them on their own turf.”

“Give me a chance to show Roamer ingenuity in action,” Kotto said, struggling to find his determination. His two compies came forward carrying rolled-up polymer mats. Kotto took one and spread it out in front of Cesca like a red carpet. “This is one of my doorbells, Speaker. It’s how we mean to fight the hydrogues. With enough of these, we can crack open drogue warglobes like rotten eggs.”

Denn laughed. “We’ve already made over a hundred thousand of these little things, and we expect to double that number within a few days, now that the production lines are up and running. By the Guiding Star, the drogues’ll wish they’d never crawled out of their gas giants.”

Cesca wanted to kiss him. “Excellent work, Kotto. I’m very proud of you.”

He beamed. “You’re the one who gave us the challenge, Speaker. I never stopped thinking of new things that might defeat the drogues.”

“As long as we have minds like yours, Kotto, the Roamers will survive. Keep manufacturing those doorbells. I have to go to Charybdis, where our largest tankers are gathering—and as many of you who can come. The drogues are in for more of a fight than they could ever imagine.”

102

SAREIN

P
rince Daniel’s coming-out banquet was a “private” affair for two hundred of the Hansa’s most important representatives. It was impeccably produced, every dish, every seat, every bouquet of flowers arranged with exquisite care. Sarein hadn’t seen such extravagance since Peter and Estarra’s wedding.

Unlike the royal marriage, however, there were no representatives of Hansa colonies, no Mother Alexa and Father Idriss from Theroc, no governors or dignitaries from planets that were now cut off from EDF protection. Sarein was the only offworld ambassador in attendance.

Hansa-approved camera drones flitted about, transmitting the spectacle to viewers across Earth. The signals were also beamed into space so that soldiers serving in the EDF defensive cordon could watch, though she couldn’t imagine a handful of last-stand fighters being interested in watching a Prince’s banquet.

Sarein took her seat beside Chairman Wenceslas. She maintained her composure, smiling at not-so-clever jokes made by politicians and other notables. It was hard to be near Basil when he’d been so distant lately, increasingly distracted and aloof. He seemed to have lost interest in everything but the continuing disasters. In the back of her mind, she kept thinking about the accusations Estarra had made. . . .

Before the banquet, Sarein had wandered through the conservatory again, mulling over what she had learned. The familiar Theron plants reminded her of how Estarra had loved to explore the wilderness as a little girl. As Sarein pondered, preoccupied, she had glanced down and was surprised to note that the cluster of poisonous fauldur berries was gone. Some gardener must have removed them, though their colors had been fresh, at their peak. She’d thought it odd at the time, but quickly dismissed it. . . .

Now the bearded Archfather of Unison droned through a traditional prayer, and the banquet began. Since Prince Daniel was the center of attention at the feast, servers presented his plate first, a carefully measured portion of appetizer rolls and cheeses. When other attendees received larger servings, the Prince did his best not to let his disappointment show. Though the boy had been overweight the last time Sarein had seen him, Daniel now appeared gaunt. A hollowness haunted his eyes, and he snapped to do everything Basil told him, like a puppy eager to please.

Had he really been kept drugged and out of the way for the last several months, as Estarra claimed?

As the salads were distributed, Sarein glanced at her sister. The King and Queen were seated at an isolated table at the front of the huge banquet hall, where private servants took care of them. Ostensibly, those were the prime seats, with the best view and the most privacy, but Sarein wondered if Basil had put Peter and Estarra there to keep them from speaking to anyone.

Sarein wrestled with her suspicions. Instead of marching to Basil’s penthouse and confronting him with the claims, she had quietly checked as many details as she could, using news databases and classified Hansa memos. Without much trouble, she verified even the least believable of her sister’s claims.

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 before, 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.