Stardogs, page 4
She paused. Her brow wrinkled and she seemed to look elsewhere, on a far vision. She gave a tiny sniff. Eventually she said quietly, “No. Right now, what I really want is to destroy the entire Empire.” She gave a small laugh. “Just me, one girl against the most powerful Empire in history.” She raised her chin, quite unaware that she looked like her great grandfather Vespasian. The charismatic Vespasian who had led his troops from certain defeat to victory at Alresa. “I’d still like to bring the whole rotten structure down, and see the loyal people I loved avenged. No,” she corrected herself, “Not avenged. My Lea didn’t believe in that. Just… to see it couldn’t ever happen again.” She looked him in the eye, “Should I add independence for your Arunchal to the impossible wish-list?”
He bowed. “It is written, Princess, that nothing is impossible in God’s time. We will not be able to do these things right now, of course, but they are noble goals. I pledge myself to them.” He led her out of the shrubbery. “I agree, they will be easier to achieve from within, than from the outside. I will teach you the Arunachal Thuggee way of fighting, which is to use your enemy’s strength against him.”
It wasn’t quite what she’d meant.
Some two miles away, in another arm of the sprawling palace, a nervous but triumphant young Emperor held council with his new Security Chief, Selim Puk. “It’s over then, Selim? It’s all done?”
The almond-eyed man allowed himself a small smile, showing even white teeth. “Almost all… my Emperor.”
The plump blond boy-man swelled like a turkey, revelling in the new title “I am Emperor now, at last, but I still keep looking for my father every time somebody says it, Selim! But tell me now, what do you mean ‘almost all’?”
The Security chief shrugged his willowy shoulders. “A few of your father’s old adherents in security are still being hunted down. Your parents’ assassins have of course been killed… by a jailer who was too incensed by their crime to allow them to live. He will still have to face trial, but I will arrange his ‘suicide’. Oh, somebody botched the elimination of your step-sister. The group I sent must have run into the remains of your father’s old crew. I’ve another assassin in place, one of her servants…”
“Let her live. The silly cow is too scared to do or say anything. Besides, it’s too late now. Another killing will look like a purge. We can always deal with her later,” said Turabi, magnanimous in his moment of triumph.
The Security Chief nodded. “A wise decision. One fitting of an Emperor.” He smiled slyly, “We can even lean on her to corroborate your story. And she’s no real danger to you. She can’t rule of course, being a woman, and being sterile she can’t produce any heirs as rival claimants to the throne.”
“You mean the bitch can’t breed, Selim?”
He nodded. “Your father had her tested when she was thirteen. I’ve seen the records. She was totally infertile. It was why he let her live.”
The boy-Emperor snorted, worldly wise. “Her mother must have been damn close to it too. Only one child in five years. And a girl at that. No wonder the old man had her done away with. Well, you just keep a watch Shari. She may be no danger to me, but I don’t like her. One step out of line…” he drew a finger across his throat.
Selim Puk nodded. “Of course. As I said, I’ve a man in place already. I’ll see to it that she is surrounded by my agents.”
But men can be replaced. Records too can also be replaced, especially when your father-figure and bodyguard had been a highly skilled security agent himself. It helps too if you have a loyal and willing mother-figure-nursemaid who was sterile.
The Princess Shari had not expected God’s time to last nearly twenty years.
She hadn’t even expected to live half that long. But she had not expected the dagger of the Goddess Kali-dewa either, or for him to present her with the list of organizations and societies she was supposed to be patron of. And her official, embossed writing paper, retrieved from a forgotten drawer. He had been very methodical in searching her quarters. He was just as methodical in plotting her future.
“I don’t know who they are, Deo.”
He shrugged “The letters will bear the Imperial seal, Princess.
“But I don’t know anything about those organizations and societies. And to honest I don’t think I want to.”
The briefest of smiles flickered across his impassive countenance. It was the tiger-smile… “You will write as a bored but dutiful Princess. Some will ask for money, some will merely borrow your presence. Your presence outside of this… trap. And money you will have to give too. You can draw from your estates. We will build lines of communication for future use.”
He was right. Days later she leafed through the pile of replies. “Money. They all want money. Or me. Do you know what you have done to me, Deo?” She held up an elegantly curlicue-flourished letter. “Post Post-Modernist Neo-Gothic Opera. Oh joy!” He winced, sympathetically. “A gala event. They would like me to attend.”
“I can obtain some earplugs for you,” said her assassin. “The coiffeuse will contrive suitable hairstyle to hide them, Princess. Consider yourself avenged. I shall have no such luxury.”
“Well, this one is interesting. The Disabled Veterans League want me to open a center on Carab.”
“You will refuse. Politely. They are worthy of being cultivated.”
“Deo, I thought I wanted out of this trap,” she said, plaintively.
“The Emperor would refuse to allow you to go, my Princess. So you will say that with the death of your father so recent you do care to travel far from your brother’s protective hand. In year or two he will send you to something that he does not dare attend himself.”
“I don’t know that I can wait that long. Or that I’ll be allowed to live that long.”
“The hand of Dewa is over you, Princess. And I watch over you too. Now, what other invitations are there?”
“Just this Gala-fund-raiser for the Imperial Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals.”
“Ah. Well, I think you should attend that, Princess. The ISPCA are not likely to be perceived as subversive. They stay out of politics and look after deserted and injured domestic animals, and run adoption shelters for them.”
Which shows how wrong perceptions can be. The ISPCA, which rapidly became her favorite charity, was subversive in the extreme, plotting open revolution, in fact. At first they had attempted to use her as a stalking horse, but she had gradually penetrated their innermost councils, and after five years she was in it up to her elegant neck. Still, she had become a public figure, and thus far harder to dispose of.
Time, and the fact that she apparently supported him, had dulled Turabi’s suspicions, if not his dislike. She was also being useful, and giving the Imperial rule a frothy and acceptable face. He permitted her first off-planet venture, and in time became accustomed to the fact that she spent less than six months of any year in her dingy apartments in the old part of the Imperial Palace, and the rest of her time star-hopping on the elderly imperial barge, engaged in fund-raising for her three pet charities. Turabi didn’t like her popularity, or the entourage she had acquired, but he tolerated it.
He did not notice how she avoided virtually all engagements on Phillipia, and how she attempted to maintain a low profile here. Offworld she was much better known than she was in the Imperial capital. The emperor did not travel. He did not dare. He sat, like a fat spider and pulled the strings in the web of his empire, hidden from all but a few thousand of his people. His step-sister on the other hand flitted to even the most irrelevant of outposts, and was personally known by millions. The Emperor taxed. She gave. He would have had her killed if he had realized this. And her death would surely have sparked rebellion.
As it happened Turabi decided to have her eliminated because of a clumsy attempt at flattery at an Imperial Levee. Here, The Archduke of Tzar had bowed low on his being introduced to the Emperor. “I am delighted to meet Your Magnificence at last” he simpered, “I’ve met your charming royal daughter so often. My people are besotted with her.” He had actually met Shari once, and had no idea that a great many of his people were in fact very attached to her.
The fat, dissipated Turabi had not like that at all. He wasn’t happy that his despised elder sister should be taken for his daughter either. In a later consultation with Selim Puk it was decided that she had to go. Selim, as usual, had several nasty plots brewing. The security chief saw a suitable opportunity to dispose of several birds with one stone, as it were.
“But, Your Highness,” said the rather florid-faced elderly man, peering at the list she’d handed him, “they’re all backwater planets, again.” He shook his head, despairing, “We’d make twice as much money on any one of the Inner worlds!”
She smiled at him, graciously. She’d discovered that her smile was one of her most powerful weapons. “I know, Sir Syrian. But it is important that the people of the smaller places should feel involved too. Some things are more important than money.” It was a difficult concept for the former advertising executive, drafted out of retirement into the service of the cash-strapped ISPCA, to accept. At least two others of her audience also didn’t agree with her, but neither of them was going to voice their opinions. The handsome Viscount Martin Brettan wasn’t going to say anything because his slender stipend depended on staying in the Princess’s good books. The footman who was attempting to surreptitiously read the list that Syrian Brynant was fuming over wouldn’t say anything either. Footmen didn’t.
Syrian Brynant hadn’t received a knighthood for lack of effort. “Well, Your Highness, what about a gala departure event here? I could raise…”
“Absolutely out of the question.” Her voice was arctic.
On the rare occasions Shari snapped like that you could forget further questioning. The fund-raising campaign manager bowed, defeated. “Very well, Princess.” He turned to go.
“Sir Syrian. Do you mind leaving the second copy of that itinerary with us?” Shari’s voice was all urbanity again. “I think some of us would like to peruse it.” She smiled at the froglike, glasses-magnified eyes of the dumpy, oddly made-up woman in the corner. Inwardly Shari seethed in irritation at the clumsy footman-spy. Best to make it easy for the fool. It was, she supposed, some comfort that she was still being spied on by idiots and not competent men. But it was all so futile. The itinerary would be going to Imperial security anyway. And if he was a Wienan League spy, they’d be getting her itinerary as well as her politely-worded-but-brooking-no-refusal request for a Stardog for the imperial barge. The itinerary would cause their usual rash of protests and suggested changes, which she would, as usual, ignore.
Lady Tanzo Adendorff’s badly pinned bun bobbed like a buoy in wind squall with her eager nodding. “Oh yes… I’d love to! I like to get my reading done first, you know.” Tanzo agreed wholeheartedly with the Princess that some things were more important than money. Well, one thing anyway. Xeno-archaeology. Money was only worth having if it could transport you to Denaari sites. But interstellar travel was ruinously expensive, and Imperial interest in archaeological research-funding was non-existent. As part of the Princess’s retinue she at least could sponge free transport to worlds far beyond her modest means. The odd-looking woman was no fool. In return she did what was expected of her, to deflect the intelligentsia from the princess at social gatherings. It was boring, but a small price to pay.
Selim Puk had ensured that the Princess was never quite alone. The bodyguards were, of course, his men. The major domo, Amadeo Cerros, was also, of course, his original plant. The man had also been approached by Wienan League agents and, on Selim’s instructions, passed on certain edited information. Baroness Tanzo he had considered and rejected. He had a generous budget, but really, money spent on watching Princess Shari was wasted. He wished, however, that he could have recruited the Princess’s other foil.
Unfortunately, the stunningly beautiful and amply curvaceous Demoiselle Caro Leyven had two kinds of armor against his wiles.
Firstly, she was the scion of a wealthy merchant house. Her grandfather had bought his title, and then trebled the family fortune, which was still very much intact. Caro had never needed money and found it of no interest. Selim couldn’t buy her.
Secondly, she was just too dim for blackmail, even if he could find or fake something she’d prefer to remain hidden. She’d blurt it out to the first man who smiled at her, and with the effect this woman had on heterosexual males, his blackmailing agent would end up dead. She had no interest in the itinerary. Wherever they went there would be men to be nice to her. She had no idea why her dear Princess had asked her to join the royal retinue. But it didn’t matter, did it?
There was one other within the dingy audience-room, with its half-century out of date wall-paper, that cared even less about where they were going. Otto III, possessor of one of the most impressive moustaches in all of the empire, (despite, or possibly because of his dubious ancestry), didn’t care where the princess went, as long as he went along. He was loyal beyond any possibility of corruption. He also occasionally had fleas, which if you are the animal-shelter-chosen companion of a Princess, meant baths. Otto didn’t mind what his Princess did, or where she went, as long as he was there, and there were no baths.
Standing behind Tanzo Adendorff the footman had managed to make a careful study of the list at last. Phillipia - Abelard - Barhain II - Samburia - Amritsar - New Sahara - Nekrat - Erzulie - New Australia - Prala III - Bretonia - Mali V and then back to Phillipia. Arrival and departure times. He memorized them carefully, not realising how obvious he was being. Still, spotting a spy is one thing. But it is sometimes difficult to tell just for whom the spy may be working.
Prince Jarian stared in horror at the dead man — not because death horrified him, but because it was his own bodyguard. The strangers who had shot the bodyguard, it appeared, had saved his life. And now he was here, without as much as a pistol and entirely without any form of defense, should they want him dead. He’d never seen either man before, and although they’d killed Naylin in the act of turning his weapon on his master, Prince Jarian, neither had put their guns away. Jarian wondered if he was going to be next. “Wh… who are you?” he stuttered.
“The only friends you have in the world, Prince Jarian,” said one of the men sardonically, “Or, should I say, Jarian. Seeing as the Emperor has stripped you of all of your titles and ordered you an unobtrusive death. Selim Puk traced the toxin seller… and found you were the only buyer. You should have tried something less exotic.”
Jarian’s pale eyes darted around the room. He wanted to run. He HAD to run. He should killed the supplier. But his older brother relied on the fool for recreational chemicals, and the dealer was a little too careful. “Friends?” he quavered clining to the last straw.
“The Wienan League have reasons to want to keep you alive,” said the other man. “No one else does.”
Jarian knew why. He knew they’d want a puppet-pretender if they took action against his father. The Emperor Turabi knew that too. He’d kill any son that tried an alliance with the League. But what choice did he have?
“You’ll have to get me out of here.”
The self-admitted League agent nodded. “And offworld. On Phillipia they’ll find and kill you, sooner or later. Not even in the league Dacha would you be safe. But we have hidden facilities elsewhere. We have the perfect vessel to get you out on too. The Princess Royal’s barge. They’ll be searching elsewhere very diligently.”
“Shari… “ he detested his aunt. “She is with the League?” That information could be traded, perhaps for his life.
The league man smiled nastily, obviously guessing his mind. “No. She is above suspicion and search, that’s all. We have someone in her retinue. Viscount Brettan and one of the stewards will see to your welfare, once we have you aboard.”
CHAPTER 4
THE WIENAN LEAGUE
A vine, should it be unpruned, yet given access to water and fertilizer in unlimited quantities will produce poor and watery fruit. The Wienan League is such a vine.
The Upanishad of the Gardener-Dewa Celine
The descendants of the nine powerful political families who had formed the Council of the Space Exploration and Development Control League lived in the kind of sybaritic luxury that even their wealthy ancestors could never have dreamed of. The hereditary councillors of what now openly called itself the Wienan League, skimmed the cream off the interstellar Empire they’d created. For the Empire itself had begun as a puppet, a means by which the Wienan League could repress their former puppet, the Council of Planets.
The new puppet too had begun to become uppity in the last hundred years or so. The League now politely requested audiences with the emperor. A mere 120 years ago they’d sent the man peremonitary orders, which were obeyed with alacrity. Now… the League didn’t like this diminution of its power. The Wienan Oligarchy planned to replace the present ruling house with yet another puppet. But the League remained small, controlling a slowly decreasing pool of Stardogs, and the Empire was vast. And even with their declining numbers of Stardogs the League had been obliged to accept some loyal outsiders into their ranks. Offspring of their own were just too few these days.
The core of power remained with the hereditary-Wienans however. One child of this bloodline was Johannes Wienan XXIII. He could never rise to be League Chairman, because his father had foolishly married outside the League, but he was still a powerful young man in the year 2505. Well, he was not powerful in the physical sense anyway. He was already, at twenty, unfit and rather plump. The power came from his birth, and from his Great Aunt Mariet. She was Chairman of the League Board, and when she summonsed him, even though he was in the middle of a luxurious bath, he responded with commendable alacrity.
“She wants me?” He fumbled for the switch of the mechanical massager. A skilled masseuse-slave would have done a better job, but the antique gadget was a symbol of Wienan wealth and power. People were cheap, machines expensive.
