CHAPTER NINETEEN

THE GREAT FLEETS of the rebellion rendezvoused in intersteller emptiness near a monstrous whirlpool galaxy. Emptiness—but emptiness very close to Prime World and the heart of the Empire.

There were thousands of ships. Zaginows. Cal’gata. Honjo. Bhor. Other ships from beings, cultures, worlds, even star clusters, Sten had never heard of. Systems’ entire navies had joined the rebel forces.

Squadrons had “deserted” en masse. Other ships, and even in some cases individual beings, had found their solitary way to the rising.

Sten sometimes wondered at their motives. Gold? Gods? Glory? Perhaps sometimes a burning, inchoate sense of injustice, a desire to end the Empire’s tyranny. It had taken generations and centuries, but at last the hammer had lost its velvet padding.

The indicator lights in the battle chamber of the Victory now represented fleets instead of ships.

But less than one-tenth of the Empire was now in open revolt.

Sten thought that might be enough.

The orders went out. The rebellion would move into the Empire’s heart, ostensibly making an attack on Prime itself. Before they could attack the Empire’s capital, Imperial fleets would certainly come out to stop them.

That would be, Sten prayed, the final battle.

The real objective was not Prime at all, but the fleets themselves. Once the Empire’s ability to wage war was crippled, Prime and any other world could be easily attacked, seized, isolated, or ignored.

It would be, his own sense as well as his staff’s analyses, a near-run victory. Estimates were, given the present level of forces and that the rebellion had thus far maintained a tactical edge, 61 percent to 39

percent, favoring a victory for Sten. Expected casualties would be a staggering 35 percent of the rebellion’s forces.

But blood was the argument, and there appeared to be no peaceful alternatives.

So be it.

“So the traitor is moving,” the Eternal Emperor said. What might have been a smile moved his lips, then disappeared.

“Yessir,” Admiral de Court said. “Just as your estimate and our progs said.” De Court was one of the seven computer-brained admirals that the Imperial Times said had taken early retirement. In fact, they had been detached for special duties and were serving as a shadow general staff directly under the Eternal Emperor himself.

Their role would never be known, of course. None of the seven would be disloyal enough to mention that the final obliteration of Sten came from the brilliance of anyone besides the Emperor.

They were not disloyal… or suicidal.

Admiral de Court did not appear pleased that the anticipated events were, in fact, occurring.

“What are the numbers,” the Eternal Emperor asked.

“Fifty-one percent chance of Imperial victory.”

“That is all?” The Emperor was startled.

“Yessir. Too many Imperial elements lack real battle experience. Or else they’re relatively new formations.”

“I ordered the secret mobilization months ago.”

De Court was silent. Not even the Eternal Emperor could create Weddigens or Golden Hind’s simply by the laying on of hands.

“Anticipated casualties?”

“Well over 70 percent.”

A long silence. Then, “Acceptable.”

De Court licked dry lips. He’d been chosen, as the most diplomatically gifted of the technocrat-admirals, to handle this presentation.

“One other thing, sir. We have two single progs, not entirely quantifiable, but a probability estimation of approximately 82 percent, that the traitor Sten will be killed in this battle. And— and yourself, as well.” The Emperor was very quiet.

“Sir.”

Still nothing. Then, finally, “Thank you,” the Eternal Emperor said. “You’re dismissed.” Scoutboats, then destroyers, then light cruisers met between the galaxies in a sudden snarl of blood.

Ships swirled, launched missiles, took hits, died.

The engagement was all the bloodier because it was unexpected.

“So the bastard mousetrapped us,” Sten hissed.

“I wouldn’t put it that baldly,” Preston said. “But the Emperor hasn’t just been sitting there waiting for us.”

Kilgour was in a glower of rage.

“Skip,” he said. “Ah dinnae ken whae’s th‘ matter wi’ our Intel. But Ah’ll hae some gonads frae breakfast kippers. Later. A‘ th’ mo, Ah dinnae hae time frae ‘crim’nations. Th’ sit’s as follows:

“Th‘ Emp’s got its fleets already mob’lized, aye? I’s nae a total disast’r, unlike th’ Emp mos’ likely thinks it’t‘ be. But it’ll noo be a bonnie prog.”

“GA,” Sten said.

“We’ll trash th‘ clots. Est 80 percent a’ th‘ Imps’ll nae see home again. But wi’ a price. We’ll take 75

percent hits ourselves. I’s a Kilkenny cat’s war, lad.

“But we’ll mos’ likely kill th‘ Emp i’ the bloodbath. An‘, same prob’ility, die i’ th‘ doin’t.” Sten nodded.

He stared at, but did not see, the screens as he ran his own set of numbers.

He would probably die in this battle in the galactic dark. Very well. Sten was surprised he could accept that with a certain equanimity—or at least he had fooled his mind into thinking that.

At least the Eternal Emperor would die, as well.

And the Imperial forces would be shattered.

But a navy could be rebuilt.

Especially if—and he’d completely accepted Haines’s verification of Mahoney’s improbable theory—the Emperor would return. Return, and be handed the throne in exchange for the resumption of AM2.

The Emperor would be gone for at least three, possibly six, E-years. During which time the “civilized” universe would sink further into chaos. And then a madman would return, slashing out to regain his kingdom. A fifth horseman of the apocalypse.

How long would it take for another rebellion? A rebellion that wasn’t aimed at the New Boss replacing the Old Boss? A rebellion unlike the Tahn war or the Mueller Rising before that?

No.

Sten issued orders, then retreated to the solitude of the Victory’s admiral’s walk. The rebels were to take a defensive posture. He could not—would not—allow the projected orgy of mutual destruction to occur. Not when it would be unlikely to completely excise this tumor that called himself the Eternal Emperor.

No. If necessary, they could retreat. Regroup. Rethink. Or, in a worst-case scenario, follow the example of countless liberation forces through the centuries—dump arms, go to ground, and try again.

Hell, Sten thought. If this is where it ends, I can disappear into the woodwork. Change my face, change my name, and try again.

The next time, by myself.

The next time, with a bomb or a longarm.

No surrender, Sten promised himself. But now it’s time to keep the beings who followed you from dying.

Inaction, his mind told him. Retreat. Passivity.

No other options occurred.

He thought of alk, or stregg. Neither was acceptable. He slumped into a chair. Stared out at the kaleidoscope that was hy-perspace.

Seconds… minutes… hours .. centuries later, the com blatted at him.

Sten slapped the switch and started to growl. Stopped himself. It was Alex onscreen, his face and voice carefully bland.

“Com ‘cast frae th’ Imperial forces,” he said, without preamble. “Tightbeam. On a freq thae Freston says is exclusive’t‘ th’ Emperor. An‘ th’ Victory’s one ae th‘ few ships wi’ th‘ capability’t’ receive it. Y‘

recollect the Emp built this ship frae his own use?”

“Do you have a point of origin?”

“Ah dinnae, Sten. Noo frae any listed world. Frae a ship, Ah reck. Wi‘ th’ Imperial forces, Ah’d guess.

“An… i’s en clair. Vid an‘ voice. Wi’ a card sayin’t it’s f r y’r eyes only.” Sten started to order it to be transmitted to his com, then caught himself. No. Even at this time, at this moment before the storm, it would not be unlikely for the Eternal Emperor to transmit something meaningless—and then leak the story that the message contained private instructions from the Emperor to one of his double agents.

“Hang on,” Sten ordered. “I’m on my way down. Set it up for projection on the bridge.”

“Boss? Are y‘ sure?”

“Hell, yes. I’m getting too old to play games. Stand by.”

The screen showed the Eternal Emperor. He was standing alone on the awe-inspiring bridge of a warship. The Durerl He wore a midnight-black uniform with his symbol in gold on his breast—the letters AM2 superimposed over the null-element’s atomic structure.

“This message is intended for Sten, and only for him.

“Greetings.

“Once you were my most faithful servant. Now you have declared yourself my most deadly enemy. I do not know why. I thought you served me well, and so I made you ruler over many things, and thought that would bring you joy. Evidently it did not

“And I have seen, to my great sorrow, that some of my sub-jects believe themselves to be ignored, believe they have been somehow slighted, in spite of my efforts to help them as best I can in these troubled times.

“I could reason, I could argue, I could attempt to present a larger view of the chaos that looms before all of us in the Empire.

“But I shall not. Perhaps some of my satraps have enforced their own immoralities under the cover of my rule, which has always been intended to provide the maximum benefit to all beings, human and otherwise, a rule of peace and justice that began before time was recorded and, with the goodwill of my fellow citizens, will continue until time itself must have a stop.

“Beings—many of them my good and faithful servants— have died. Died in this murderous squabble that history will not even dignify with a footnote. It shall not be remembered because I propose a solution, a solution that no one could argue with.

“You, Sten, say that my rule is autocratic. Dictatorial, even. Very well.

“I invite you to share that rule.

“Not as a co-ruler, because you, or those who rose in rebellion with you, could well define that as a cheap attempt at bribery. At co-option.

“No. I propose a full and complete sharing of power between myself, my Parliament, and you and your chosen representatives, in whatever form we agree to be the most representative and just.

“I further propose an immediate truce, to avoid further bloodshed. This truce will be of short duration, so that neither side can argue it is being used as a device to seek an advantageous position to destroy the other. I would accept two E-weeks as an outside figure.

“At the end of that time, you and I should meet. We should meet with our best advisers and allies, to prepare the grounds for this new and promising time for the Empire.

“I further suggest that our meeting ground be on Seilichi, the home planet of the most respected, most neutral, and most peaceful beings this universe has ever known, the Manabi. I would also ask that their most honored savant, Sr. Ecu, mediate our negotiations.

“I ask you, Sten, as an honorable being, to accept my most generous offer.

“Now, only you can keep innocent blood from showering the stars.” And the screen went blank.

A blast of babble on the Victory’s bridge. Then silence, as ev-eryone turned to look at Sten. Son of a bitch, he thought. He has us.

And there’s no way out. No way whatsoever.

CHAPTER TWENTY

STEN RUBBED TIRED eyes and tried to think. He hadn’t gotten a lot of sleep in the past two weeks.

What little he’d had time for had been constantly interrupted by messengers, corns, and delegations arriving from his allies. Even his thoughts, when he was alone with Cind, yammered at him.

Cind had run everyone out twenty hours ago, and forced Sten to take a sopor. He had slept hard, but not well.

Now, he was in his final briefing. His allies had presented what they wanted and expected in this Brave New World of Powersharing, a certain percentage of which was either wishful thinking or else shouldn’t be mentioned until the transition was complete. And that last assumption was well up there with prog-ging the belled cat…

The briefing, like everything else about Sten and the rebellion, was irregular, consisting less of those with the clout than the old guard. Himself. Kilgour. Cind. Rykor. Even Otho, who at least could be counted on to provide the nonsubtle touch.

Sten wished Sr. Ecu could have been present, or could at least have monitored this session. But no one could chance even the vague possibility the Emperor would discover the Manabi and Sten were in collusion.

The Victory, escorted by five cruisers and eleven destroyers, was orbiting an unpopulated world less than twenty light-years from Seilichi.

Not that there was much to say in this meeting—it’d all been gone over time and again. Sten wondered about Alex, who’d been unnaturally quiet for the past few days, keeping his own counsel.

Sten poured a glass of herbal/protein drink, and sipped. He shuddered at its taste. Why were things that: were supposedly good for you so frequently abominable?

“I wonder,” he said, “just how long it will be before the Emperor double-crosses us?”

“It will depend,” Rykor said, “on how we handle the first crisis after the Emperor grudgingly moves over on his throne to allow your presence, whatever it might be. If our solution coincides with the Emperor’s, and in no way detracts from the perception that he alone really holds the reins of power… two E-years from that date.

“If there is a divergence of views, and ours becomes the plan operated on… three cycles.

“In any event, there will be an attempted counterrevolution within five E-years, either planned by the Eternal Emperor himself or, possibly, honestly mounted by his loyalists.

“But we should be, given foresight and proper planning, as well as an ocean and a half of pure luck, able to survive the first attempt to destroy the new government”

“All those estimates,” Sten said dryly, “give the coalition more time than we would have if we’d accepted battle. Time enough to figure how we’re going to RF the Emperor before he does it to us.” Kilgour shook his head. “Ah’ll noo be rain’t on th‘ marchpast, but Ah’m sittin’ here rec’lectin‘ a place called Glencoe, a clan called Campbell, an’ a pol named Dalrymple.”

“Which means?” Otho rumbled.

“Naethin” ‘cept m’ own buddin’t fears, lad. Whae dealin’t wi‘ a madman, y’ cannae use logic.“

“We’ve gone through this before,” Sten said. “The Emperor is hardly going to try a double cross now.

He proposed the meet in the first place, so it’d be his flag of truce that’d be dishonored. Of course he’s mad, and of course he wants my skin for his drumhead—but he certainly would not try anything while we’re all under the protection of the Manabi.”

A com whispered, and Alex crossed to it and read the message onscreen. He keyed an answer and blanked it.

“Ver‘ well,” he said. “Y’r ride’t’ th‘ conference’s inbound.”

“And why will we not descend from the Victory!” Otho asked. “Should Sten arrive like a beardless one?

Perhaps on a trading ship?”

“Close,” Alex agreed. “He’ll be usin’t a transport. Ah‘ bor-row’d a liner frae th’ Zaginows. An‘ dinnae be sayin’t ’we,‘ less y’ think Sten hae a mousie i‘ his pocket. Sten’ll be descendin’ ae a man of peace, which i‘ whae we want ae th’ perception frae all. Aye, Rykor?” Rykor wallowed in her vat, considering.

“How dimwitted of me,” she said. “And I am the being who prides herself on not automatically making assumptions. Yet I’ve always taken for granted Sten would land from the Victory, properly escorted by his allies.

“However… what exactly do you propose, Sr. Kilgour?”

“Sten arrives on Seilichi wi‘ but one aide. M’self. We’ll hae a tightbeam frae th’ liner’t‘ the Vick, which we’ll hae offworld, an’ well awa‘ frae th’ Emp’s fleets.

“We’ll nae look like bloody-handed rebels, but ae wee an‘ Ah do mean wee, peacelovers, i’ y‘ ken.

Dav’d agin’ th‘ Phar’sees, or howe’er thae tale goes.

“It’ll make a braw point, frae th‘ livie crews, Ah wager.”

Rykor closed her eyes and ran the visuals. Yes. It would look impressive. Sten, one small man standing victoriously against the Emperor.

“Rykor, we’ll hae y’rself oop here, listenin’t‘t’ all thae haps, an‘ keepin’t ae clear mind.” Cind was on her feet. “Sten isn’t going down there without any escort.”

“Well spok’t,” Alex said. “But he will. Y’r Bhor an‘ th’ Gurks cannae stand up’t‘ a laserblast frae a battlewagon. An’ thae’s noo point i‘ a martial show, solely’t’ be showin’t th‘ size ae our claymores, noo is there, lass?”

Cind was about to go on—but Alex moved his head slightly to the side. She stopped cold.

Sten, too, was looking at Kilgour. Alex just stared back, expressionless. Ah, Sten, thought. And is there any harm if he’s right?

“We’ll do it Alex’s way,” Sten said, before Otho could come in with a bellowed rejoinder.

‘The Emperor wears plain dress whites when everybody else is in full dress uniform. We’ll play another version of the same card.

“Somebody grab one of my dogsbodies, and make sure I’ve got a Boy Virgin Outfit. Now, I’m going to run everyone out. I

want something disgustingly dull to eat and some more sleep. We’re ready.“ Sr. Ecu hovered in the center of the huge landing field within the “crater” of the Guesting Center. His senses were at their finest tune. This meeting, and the subsequent series of conferences, could be not just the culmination of his own life, but that of the Manabi as well.

His race had always viewed the Emperor, and Empire, with skepticism and a measure of dislike. His authoritarianism brought continuity, a degree of peace, and a degree of plenitude, to worlds beyond worlds. But at a price. The price of tyranny. Sometimes it had been somewhat benevolent, sometimes it had been otherwise, such as the terrible conflicts like the Mueller Rising and the Tahn war, which, when all the rhetoric died, had been only fought to guarantee the rule of the Emperor. Ecu had long wondered whether it could be possible to correct the Eternal Emperor’s excesses and still maintain the benefits.

Could this be the chance?

How romantic, his brain said. This, from a being whose life has been spent in the labyrinth of diplomacy, trying to ferret out true meaning from babble.

You expect Eternal Peace to come from a meeting between a being you believe to be quite mad and a young rebel who not many years ago was that madman’s assassin? Who—knowing the nature of humanity and its lust for power—will take only a short time before he sees himself as the Emperor?

But still.

The livie cameras scattered along the “rim” of the Guesting Center had gotten tired of the nearly dead air—motionless footage of the Manabi’s red-and-black bulk hovering over bare tarmac—and had returned to a pursuit they seemingly never tire of—interviewing themselves as to what anything and everything meant.

A sonic lash broke into their circle game, and, overhead, the Eternal Emperor’s ship lowered toward a landing, with a small scoutboat as its landing guide. Ecu recognized the Normandie— the Emperor’s old, heavily armed secret transport. How odd. Ecu would have expected him to make as impressive an appearance as possible, and arrive aboard his new superbattleship, the Durer. He knew that overhead, just offplanet in a geosynchronous orbit, hung a full Imperial battlefleet as cover.

Ecu felt a flicker of hope. Perhaps the Emperor didn’t want to present a warlike image.

But that was not the case, he realized seconds later, as a landing ramp sliced out and heavily armed Internal Security humans in their black uniforms doubled out in squad formation and took up position around the ship.

No one else came down the ramp.

Overhead, a whine, and Sten’s ship—the civilian liner Ecu had been told to expect—lowered down toward the field. It shifted from Yukawa drive to its McLean generators, and grounded on its sponsons.

A wide portal yawned in one of them, and two beings stepped out. Sten and Alex Kilgour.

Kilgour wore the full regalia of an Earth Scots laird, from bonnet to cloak to kilt to sporran. But there was no sgean dubh in his stocking, no daggersheath at his belt, and the scabbard for his great broadsword was empty. Kilgour did not even have a pistol concealed in the sporran worn over his crotch.

Sten wore a pale blue tunic that buttoned to his neck, and trousers of the same color. He was bareheaded and wore no decorations.

No security beings followed them. The two walked out into the soft sunlight and waited.

Across the field, bootheels clashed and weapons crashed as the IS troops came to attention.

The Eternal Emperor and his entourage came down the ramp. As expected, he wore a plain black uniform with the Imperial Emblem on its breast. Around his neck was one decoration—one of the liviecasters correctly identified it, in a hushed voice, as the Giver of Peace decoration that he’d received at the conclusion of the Mueller Rising.

The ‘caster went on to identify the Imperial dignitaries: Avri, his political chief of staff. Tyrenne Walsh, figurehead ruler of Dusable and the Eternal Emperor’s usual stalking-horse in Parliament. And so on down, from Count This to Secretary of Protocol That. The liviecaster misidentified one being, but Ecu knew him well: Solon Kenna. The Eternal Emperor was bringing his sharpest political minds to this meeting. Ecu felt that horrible stir called hope move in his soul once more.

Best of all, Poyndex was not part of the throng. Once more, a favorable sign that perhaps this conference was intended to bring a measure of peace to the Empire.

Sten and Alex moved to greet the Imperial troupe. The entourage stopped, and the Eternal Emperor walked forward alone.

“Sten.” It was a completely neutral acknowledgment.

Sten, foolishly, had to stop himself from saluting. The habit of years died very hard.

“Your Highness.”

“Shall we begin?”

Sten forced a smile to his lips and nodded.

Sten and the Eternal Emperor were alone on a balcony near the crest of the Guesting Center. The balcony appeared to be just a ledge on the outer near-vertical slope of the volcano-styled Center.

After the conferees had been shown to their quarters, the Emperor had asked Ecu if he might have the pleasure of talking to Sten alone for a few moments. The meeting was not to be recorded.

Ecu asked Sten, who hesitated, then agreed.

It was just twilight, and purple drifted across the sky above them, coloring the wide valley around the Center. The young Manabi who escorted them to the balcony told them it was screened against anyone, especially a liviecaster, who might be indiscreet enough to focus a parabolic microphone on the two of them. Sten and the Emperor looked at each other, and Sten half smiled. No one would be that indiscreet, he knew.

There were two chairs and a large cart equipped with a McLean generator at the rear of the balcony.

The Emperor walked to it and opened the doors.

“Scotch. Stregg. Alk. Pure quill. Beer. Teas. Even water. The Manabi certainly worry over dry throats.” He turned to Sten. “Would you like a drink?”

“No,” Sten said. “But thank you.”

The Emperor picked up the flask of stregg. Turned it back and forth. “I used to drink this,” he mused.

“But I found I’ve lost my taste for it. Isn’t that unusual?” He looked directly at Sten, then his eyes shifted back and forth. Sten found the gaze uncomfortable, but did not allow himself to look away. After a few seconds, the Emperor looked elsewhere.

He walked to the edge of the balcony and sat on the low railing, looking out at the valley.

“Unusual beings, the Manabi,” he mused. “The only real trace of their civilization is underground. I would feel unsettled, bothered, that if I vanished in the night, there would be no sign whatsoever that I had ever existed… no mark of my own on the face of the planet.”

Sten had no answer. Again, the Emperor looked at him, his eyes doing that mad dance.

“Do you recall our first meeting?”

“Formally, sir?”

“No. I meant the night of Empire Day. When you were head of my bodyguards. I assume you have heard that I dismissed the Gurkhas. Romantic as they are, I found their capabilities limited. Anyway, that night was when I asked to see your knife. Do you still have it, by the way?”

“I do.”

“May I see it again?”

Now Sten smiled. “I hope there are no security types out there who might misunderstand,” he said. He curled his fingers and let the weapon slip down into his fingers. He passed it across to the Eternal Emperor, who looked at it curiously and handed it back.

“Just as I remembered it. You know, I have dreamed about this knife from time to time. But I don’t remember the circumstances of the dream. Yes. I should have realized its symbolism to you back then.” It took a moment for Sten to understand what the Emperor meant. Before he could protest, the Emperor went on: “That was an interesting night. You introduced me to stregg, as I recall. And I cooked. I don’t remember—”

“It was something you called Angelo stew.”

“Oh yes.” The Emperor was silent for a moment. “That’s something else I find I don’t have much time for any more. Cooking. But now that this… disagreement… will be cleared up, I’ll be able to return to my old ways. Who knows? Maybe even think about trying to build a guitar again.” His expression hardened.

“It’s good to have a hobby in your twilight years, isn’t it?” Sten thought it best to remain silent.

“Empire Day. That, I suppose, is where the dry rot set in. Hakone. The Tahn. Mahoney. The Altaics…

Christ!”

The Emperor peered intently at Sten. “You don’t know what you have asked for, Sten. How all this goes on, and on, and it never slows and no one ever is grateful.”

“Sir. I did not ask for anything. This powersharing is—”

“Of course you didn’t ask,” the Emperor said, a note of pet-tishness in his voice. “But after all these centuries, don’t you think I know? Give me credit, at least, for not being a fool.”

“That is something I have never thought, Your Majesty.”

“No?” The flickering gaze turned away, back to the darkening landscape far below. “How bare,” the Emperor mused. “How barren.”

He rose. “I plan on eating in my quarters,” he said, and smiled. “I would think that any banquets or public feastings might well wait until we have reached an arrangement. Don’t you?”

“It doesn’t matter to me,” Sten said. “But I’m not particularly inclined to ten courses and having to come up with polite toasts.”

The Emperor’s smile became larger. “That was one of the reasons I respected you at one time. Even, perhaps, liked you. You had no truckle for pretense. I sometimes wonder how you found yourself capable of this.”

He nodded, and, still smiling, went inside.

Alex Kilgour saw Sten to his chambers, and, yawning mightily, went to his own rooms.

Once inside, he doffed the outfit he mentally referred to as th‘ Laird Kilgour drag and shrugged off the pretense of exhaustion. He took from the lining of his valise a phototropic camouflage suit and zipped it on. The valise’s straps became a swiss seat, and he took a small can of climbing thread from his sporran.

An“ noo, he thought, we’ll ken i‘ th’ luck ae th‘ spidgers appliet’t’ all Scots, or solely’t‘ Bobbie th’

Brucie.

The problem was that he was not sure exactly what luck would be defined as.

The IS technician ran and reran his tapes. He was trying to figure out just where an annoying buzz on a low freq was coming from. Not from the Normandie, nor from any of the Imperial staff. Nor from any of the liviecasters’ equipment.

He had tracked the static to the Guesting Center itself, but it wasn’t from any of the Manabi’s electronics.

The tech had finally nailed it. The buzz was coming from the portable com that the rebel’s aide was carrying. Typical, he thought. Can’t even use a handitalki without mucking it up.

But it was annoying. Sometime, during this conference, he would ask one of his superiors to talk to the clot and tell him to get a new chatterbox.

He went back to his main task, ensuring that the link between the picketboat and the newly installed apparatus aboard the Normandie was functioning perfectly.

The Eternal Emperor took Avri twice, in the manner that pleased him most. The woman bit hard into the pillow. A scream at midnight would be ignored by sensible beings if it came from the Imperial quarters in Arundel, but here on Seilichi an unnecessary and foolish alarm might be raised.

The Emperor went to the fresher, then stopped by a case and took a tiny object from it. He returned to the bed, ran his hand down Avri’s close-cropped hair in what might have been a caress, and, as the injector’s tip touched the woman’s medulla oblongata, he pressed the bulb.

Avri slumped into deep unconsciousness.

It would be her last sleep.

The Emperor rose and put on a black coverall from his baggage, a coverall that had built-in climbing harness bonded into it, and thin, rigid-sole rock-climbing shoes. He pulled a mesh vest over it and closed its fastenings. He wished again for a pistol, but he knew that there had been little chance of getting a firearm through the Manabi’s automatic security devices. This would be enough.

He flexed his knees. He pushed the double windows onto the balcony open. Far below him, in the crater’s center, was Sten’s ship, his own Normandie, and the picketboat. It was very dark, and very quiet. He thought he saw die single sentry posted at the Normandie’s ramp walk out into the open, about-face, and pace back. He didn’t matter. The day the Emperor could not slip past a gate guard was the day he was ready to admit to being the fool that Sten, and it seemed the rest of the Empire, considered him.

To either side of this apartment his aides and supposed confidantes slept. Dream on, my servants, he thought. For now you are performing the finest duty to the Empire you could dream of. And your sacrifice will not have been in vain.

He looked at the naked sleekness of Avri. A slight feeling of pity crossed his mind. But not for long. The only way for a sacrifice to be convincing is when something important is really given away.

Besides, she had started to bore him.

He had already begun to consider other, more skilled women who had drawn his eye.

He unclipped a can of climbing thread from the vest, touched its nozzle, and the end of the single-molecule chain bonded to the edge of the balcony. The Emperor slipped his hands into special jumars—trying to climb down the thread barehanded would be exactly like trying to climb down a flexible razorblade.

The Eternal Emperor slid over the edge of the balcony and, nerves thrilling and blood singing as had not happened in years, went down into the night.

Kilgour was quite comfortable. He had one toe on a firm stance almost three centimeters wide, a safety loop around an outcropping, and one arm around it as well.

He could have danced.

He kept watch, a great spider, invisible, as his phototropic uniform was now on exactly the color and pattern of the false rock the Manabi had built the Guesting Center from.

A bit below him, halfway across the crater, he saw movement. He focused the night glasses more exactly and zoomed in.

Th‘ Emp’s apartment, aye. And one lad comin’ oot.

Luck, eh? P’raps th‘ worst. Good luck—an impossibility— would have been Alex spending a cramped night out here with nothing happening, and the conference beginning as expected.

Noo. Who’s th‘ wee lad danglin’ frae th‘ rope o’er there? Th’ Emp his own self?

Alex frowned, reanalyzing his various progs of possible Imperial blackguarding.

He had anticipated some kind of double-dealing here on Seilichi, but none of his plans matched what seemed to be occurring.

Back aboard the Victory, following the final briefing with Sten, Alex had led Cind and Otho to his own quarters. That was the only place on the Victory that he knew was unbugged by anyone, not Preston, not Sten. Especially not Sten. Although, from the look the boss had given him, Kilgour was pretty sure Sten knew what was going on.

“Whae we’re on th‘ ground,” he’d started, “Ah’ll wan’ you’t‘ be standin’t by. On command frae me, or frae Sten, or i’ th‘ event com is lost wi’ us, y’re’t‘ take th’ bridge, an‘ read an’ follow th‘ orders Ah’ll hae gie’en y’ afore we depart. E’en i‘ thae means relievin’ Cap‘ Freston i’ he gets arg’ment’ive.

“Ah knoo ‘tis a hard thing’t’ ask, but Ah’ll hae’t‘ request y’ to oath me thae y’ll follow th‘ ’structions wi’oot fail. Trustin‘ me thae Ah hae noo but th’ best ae intentions frae Sten, an‘ frae this clottin’ rebellion thae’s likely’t‘ cause th’ death ae us all.

“I‘ y’ trust me, I‘ y’ trust Sten… y’ll do as Ah’m desirin’t.” Cind and Otho had considered. Cind had been the first to nod. Besides, she had suspected that Alex was planning for what had become Cind’s worst nightmare—a nightmare she saw herself not being able to end, save in a suicidal battle royal. Then Otho had grunted. He, too, would obey.

Kilgour expressed pleasure in their confidence. Sent them out.

He had reflected… Glencoe… An eerie, narrow, rain-dripping desolate valley on old Earth, whose laird had delayed taking an oath of allegiance to the usurper king until the last minute, and then had been further prevented from an unpleasant if necessary duty by winter storms.

The laird had not considered that the usurper would have a pol named Dalrymple who wanted to make an example of someone who’d failed to sign, nor that there was a treacherous clan named the Campbells, all too willing to garner favor from the sassenach William.

Campbell soldiers appeared in the glen, and were given traditional Highland hospitality. Treachery was in their heart, treachery they did not wait to implement. That night, fire and the ax came to Glencoe, and women and children went howling into the snow and ice and frozen death.

Glencoe, Alex had thought. Aye. Sometimes, contrary to whae all th‘ finest planners think, treachery dinnae wait till th’ perfect mo, i‘ th’ dark ae th‘ moon whae th’ raven rattles its deathcry.

And so he came to Seilichi prepared for the Emperor to double-cross them, from the moment the liner he’d cozened from the Zaginaws landed, till now, when he saw that man in black, who appeared to be the Eternal Emperor himself, abseil out the window.

He already had the corridor outside the Imperial apartments covered with a mechanical sensor, and Alex knew any movement from any of the Emperor’s retinue would be met with alarms from the Manabi who, though no warriors, kept a cautious watch through the night.

Alex puzzled one more moment, wishing desperately he had somehow been able to wangle a sniper rifle onto Seilichi—an‘ then we’d ken whae a real expert ae duplic’ty’s capable of, aye? Then he thought he had figured the Emperor’s scheme and touched a switch at his wrist. Then Alex went back up his own climbing thread like a spider fleeing the flame, a flame Kilgour knew would be real in moments.

The Internal Security technician was sound asleep, far from his instruments. He never knew that the annoying static, that buzz, stopped the instant Alex touched his handitalki. The static was a deliberate broadcast.

There are at least two ways to broadcast a warning. The first and most common, is to start a commotion when trouble threatens. The second, and sneakier, is to have a commotion stop at the sign of danger.

Like Sherlock Holmes’s famous dog, which did nothing in the nighttime, the end of the deliberately generated static from Kilgour’s com was a tightbeam alarm linked to two spaceships.

The GQ alarms yammered aboard the Victory. The ship, already at standby, went to full combat readiness.

Cind, Otho, Freston, and Lalbahadur had not been asleep, nor had they intended to go offshift until Sten returned, even if they’d had to progress to stimulants and cold showers.

“All stations ready, sir,” the officer of the watch reported. “No external signs of GQ readiness apparent.”

“Very good,” Freston said. He turned to Cind. “My orders from Mister Kilgour in the event of alarm were to place myself under your command, and obey your instructions absolutely. Take over.”

“Thank you.” Cind took a deep breath, and keyed her pore pattern into the small fiche holder Alex had given her when they left the Victory.

The instructions were simple:

WAIT IN PRESENT ORBIT UNTIL THREATENED. DO NOT, REPEAT DO NOT, ATTEMPT OFFENSIVE MOVES AGAINST EMPIRE. DO NOT, REPEAT, DO NOT

ATTEMPT TO CLOSE PLANET OR MAKE PLANETFALL. MAINTAIN WATCH ON

FREQ QUEBEC THIRTY-FOUR ALPHA. IN THE EVENT IMPERIAL COMBAT

ELEMENTS ATTEMPT TO ENGAGE, BREAK

CONTACT, MOVE COVERTLY TO [a set of coordinates]. THIS WILL

BE RENDEZVOUS POINT. IF NO CONTACT MADE AT SECONDARY RV, VICTORY IS TO REVERT TO INDEPENDENT COMMAND AND TAKE WHATEVER

ACTION OR ACTIONS IS DEEMED CORRECT AT THE TIME. GOOD LUCK.

… and the squiggle that was Kilgour’s signature. “We just wait,” Otho interpreted.

Cind growled—a noise that dignified her Bhor training—and then gritted, “We wait.” The Emperor’s feet touched down, and he slid down to his knees. He broke the climbing thread off and discarded the jumars.

A few guardspots glared around the three ships on the landing field. Once again, there was no movement except for the single sentry at the Normandie’s ramp.

Crouching, he made for the picketboat.

The broken static-buzz signaled to yet another ship.

Hannelore La Ciotat was awake, feet out of her bunk and on the tacship’s deck. Her tacship’s GQ alarm was a civilized bonging, the synthesized sound of a bell. It was more than loud enough to cover the cramped crew area.

La Ciotat sealed the front of her shipsuit and damned near physically threw her onwatch weapons officer/XO out of the command seat.

“I relieve you, Mister.” Her fingers were like fluid across the panel. POWER… UP… SYSTEMS

STANDBY… CREW READY…

WEAPONS READY…

She touched keys, and the tacship lifted clear of the ground on McLean drive, ripping away from the camouflage net that La Ciotat and her crew had staked over the tiny ship a day earlier.

The tacship was hidden just inside the first twist of one of the canyons leading to the great valley the Guesting Center was in the middle of.

La Ciotat ghosted the ship around the bend.

“I have the center on visual,” she told her XO.

“Roger. All screens show same.”

“Drive status?”

“Drakh-hot, Hannelore.”

And she, too, waited.

“Up, lad! Th‘ Emp’s movin’!”

Sten’s mind groped out of a disremembered, terrible dream, and Kilgour was pulling him up.

“What’s the—”

“Shut up!”

Alex tossed him a phototropic suit, and Sten pulled it on. He looked around for some boots.

“No time, Sten! Move!”

Kilgour shoved him toward the door that yawned into a deserted open corridor, light glaring, and Sten was in a stumbling, nightmare run, not sure if he was still asleep and dreaming, but the rough carpet hurt his feet, and Alex slung him around a corner and up a ramp, toward the top of the crater.

“Which way—”

“!‘ y’ speaki’t again, Ah’ll coldcock y‘, Ah swear! We’re i’ th‘ eye ae th’ storm!” A great door, barred, that led out onto a balcony on the outer wall of the crater. Alex, without slowing, crashed into the door and sent it pinwheeling away. Some sort of alarm—fire, intrusion, it didn’t matter—began sounding.

The Eternal Emperor came in the picketboat’s port. The duty officer jerked in surprise, even though he’d been briefed.

“Lift ship,” the Emperor snapped, as he turned and slapped the PORT CLOSE switch.

“Broadcast as ordered!”

“Yessir.”

The officer lifted a security cover, and slid the port of the recently installed control across, and the machine across the field, in the Normandie, began ticking seconds.

Overhead, in space, the signal yammered the Durer and its escorts and sailors into combat alert.

The McLean drive brought (he tiny picketboat clear of the ground Across the landing field, the sentry at the Normandie’s portal came fully awake, his willygun coming up in his hands. What the clot was going on? Nobody told him anything? Clottin‘ corp of the guard hadn’t said anything—

A predawn wind whistled across the balcony, a wind Sten never felt. Alex had his com up.

“Pickup! On this station!”

“Got you,” came a calm, unhurried woman’s voice that Sten thought he recognized. “On the way.”

“So you were right,” Sten recovered.

“Aye. The bastard’s ducking out the back door. Solo.”

“Oh, Christ. We’ve got to alert the Manabi,” Sten said, knowing futility.

“What can they—” Kilgour winced as the com screamed at him, as a transmitter aboard the Normandie obediently began jamming cast on all freqs.

Across the valley, they saw a tiny miniature sun. La Ciotat’s tacship, blazing toward mem.

The Imperial picketboat’s commander lifted his ship onto its tail, and kicked in full Yukawa drive, shooting the craft straight toward the stars. Barely clear of the crater, he went to stardrive, and the picketboat vanished into space.

A relay closed aboard the Normandie.

The whine/roar of the picketboat shattered Ecu’s sleep. His sensors came instantly aware, forcing him from that other universe he inhabited in times of differing consciousness, a universe of soft-chiming crystal in mild winds where thought itself was sentient, beautiful and visible, a universe of nonflesh and forever widening horizons.

He had drifted toward one clear panel in his alternate state, a panel looking out on the center of the Guesting Center. His sensors picked up the flash as the Imperial picketboat went into space.

Ecu felt the wings of his mind spread, spread like his own great lifting sails, and that other universe open to him, welcoming him, like a silken bridge.

La Ciotat bashed the com into silence when the jamming started its screech.

“Ma’am, I lost—”

“Shut it!” She had the balcony on visual. La Ciotat brought the tacship screaming toward the Guesting Center, flipped it end for end, McLean antigrav lagging far behind trying to define down, braked on Yukawa drive, and skidded down on the balcony, backward, fins grinding at the synthetic stone.

Her bosun had the port open, just as Sten came through it—in the air. Alex had picked him up and hurled him five meters as the port opened. A second later, the bosun was ground zero as Kilgour impacted on her. The woman wheezed, sure that ribs were broken. Kilgour rolled off, not noticing, hit the port-closing switch, shouting, “Get out of it!”

La Ciotat hit the Yukawa switch, spitting the tacship off, into the air. Her thumb was stretching for the STARDRIVE panel when

The final switch closed.

The Emperor had chosen the Normandie not only because he was reluctant to sacrifice the Durer, but because the yacht/liner had great galleries and banqueting rooms.

Great rooms that had been stripped and filled with AM2. And now, on command, they detonated.

An unanswerable question: Was Sr. Ecu “dead”—by conventional beings’ definition of the word—before the blast, or when the kilotons of Anti-Matter Two, the single mightiest power known, were detonated?

When the Emperor’s bomb went off, it would have looked from deep space, for nanoseconds, as if the Guesting Center were a real volcano that had erupted.

Then the valley itself vanished in a sympathetic explosion, a blast moving faster than the eye could see, catching and obliterating its own debris.

Perhaps half of the Manabi died in that instant holocaust, as a quarter of their planet ripped and tore in a quake beyond all measurement.

And then, from the Durer, a planetbuster was launched, a nearly destroyer sized missile, or rather two-stage missile, given a stardrive generator, Imperium X armor, and more tons of AM2 as a warhead.

The first stage impacted directly where the Guesting Center had been, and the second stage was set off, driving at full power, toward the planet’s core.

It did not need to break through the mantle before the main charge detonated to function, but, given the head start of the Anti-Matter Two blast from the Normandie, nearly did.

For a moment the Manabi home world looked like a holiday lantern, as if its landmass were clear and a viewer could see directly to the planet’s molten core. It bulged… grew… and exploded.

Seilichi rocked and shattered, pitching its land, its oceans, and its atmosphere up, out into space, and then the planet itself broke, magma spilling like the liquid center of a child’s candy.

In space, battlescreens blanked, then secondary power went on.

The Eternal Emperor looked at the boil that had been Seilichi without expression. “Do you have contact with the DurerT

“Affirm.”

The Emperor took the proffered microphone.

“This is the Emperor,” he said without preamble. “Were any transmissions or ships picked up from Seilichi after we lifted?”

“One moment, sir… No sir. One minor transmission, intended receiver unknown, no response found, from the Center itself. Nothing else.”

The Emperor gave the microphone back to the picketboat officer.

Very well, he thought. It is over. There will be a certain amount of housecleaning and damage control necessary. But the problem has been solved.

It was almost a pity Sten hadn’t had a chance to know he’d never been a serious threat to the Empire or the Eternal Emperor. No one had, really. Not ever.

Not from the beginning.

And when, his mind rambled, was the beginning?

Perhaps…

Perhaps on the island of Maui.

Thousands of years ago. When time’s measurement dated from the birth of a dead god.

Maui…

And a shatter of broken glass…