Sebastian of Mars (22 page)

“I will –?”

“She is . . . very special . . .” he
added.

I was suddenly tired, and he sensed it.

“Rest now, sire, and we will speak again. We
have much to discuss.”

“Yes, we do.”

“One thing,” Newton said, pausing in the
doorway. “When Xarr and his men found you, there was a young
fellow, his fur almost albino white, who was nursing you. He
refused to come back to Olympus Mons with Xarr, but said he had
business to attend to first –”

“
Darwin!
”

I felt a sudden pang, and missed the little
fellow very much.

Newton nodded. “He said he had promised to
bring you the one thing you needed most of all . . .”

“I wish he hadn’t left me.”

“You will tell me of these things?”

“In time,” I said. “It is nothing you need to
know of, now. But it could end this war.”

“You are being enigmatic, Sire.”

I nodded. “For the time being, I must
be.”

And then Newton left me, and I was left
feeling better and worse – better in body, but hurting in spirit,
missing the two felines in the whole universe who meant more than
anything to me, and were out of my reach.

I
healed, and, as
promised, Newton had my new telescope mounted on the plain outside
our fortress on Olympus Mons.

It was a beautifully cool evening. Winter was
coming, and the stars, sensing it, rode in a crisp clear sky as
sharp as pinpoints.

As Newton had said, the instrument’s
objective glass was excellent, and with the help of a star atlas we
had soon examined countless wonders, including clouds of what
looked like luminous gas, some of them formed into whirlpools.

“There is a theory that some of those gas
clouds are actually huge collections of stars like our own, held
together by central gravity,” Newton said.

I took my eye from the eyepiece and stared at
him in wonder. “Could it be?”

He shrugged in the darkness. “I do find it
intriguing that some of these gaseous objects are so structured,
with spiral arms and such. They are almost too elegant to be mere
clouds of particles. But no one in the Science Guild has been able
to resolve individual stars in any of these objects. At least not
yet. If there were peace, we might be able to build a large enough
instrument, using mirrors instead of glass. There is a book of the
Old Ones that will help us.” He chuckled, a low rasping sound not
usual to his serious demeanor. “In fact, these mirror telescopes
were invented by my Old One namesake. I have the feeling the Old
Ones resolved this question of nebulous clouds long ago.”

I angled the telescope toward another object
listed in the atlas, this one in the midst of the constellation
Kit’s Kite – it was a tiny smoke ring sitting in space, and looked
beautiful.

“Sire, regarding One . . .”

His voice had taken on a strange tone, and I
looked up from the eyepiece, but he only stood silent, pursing his
lips.

“You were going to say something?”

“This is not the time, Sire. It seems I must
be enigmatic about certain things.”

He took up the star atlas, and began to study
it.

“There are two nebulae
in the Big Pot that can be seen in the same field of view,” he
said, helping me swing the instrument around in the direction.
“Then, I think, we should study Jupiter, and then Earth.”

I
did not attend the
execution of Lieutenant Jift. He was not worthy of my presence. He
was worse than a traitor to his people – he was a traitor to his
planet and had sent an innocent woman to her death only to cover
his own cowardly tracks. This was the worst kind of treachery, and
after General Xarr had confirmed my accusations, the former
military commander of the Olympus Mons region was unceremoniously
hanged. I was told he did not go quietly, which gave me no
pleasure.

My first council meeting was a contentious
affair. It was not my insistence that the F’rar be engaged in
battle that was in dispute, but rather my insistence that I lead
the troops myself.

“Sire,” General Xarr proclaimed, “you are
barely healed and, if I might be so bold as to say, you have never
been in battle.”

“Then this will be the first time.”

“But Sire –”

I pounded the table with my fist. “I will
hear no more of it, general. I’ve heard stories that the same
arguments were used with my mother. I will give you her answer. How
can my people respect a leader who hides behind his own army? I
will be at its front. We will ride out tomorrow, and finish this
thing. How many troops do we command?”

Xarr threw up his paws in frustration and
answered, “About four thousand.”

“And the F’rar? I estimated at least ten
times that when I was among them.”

“Not anymore. They’re scattered, and many
have turned tail or just gone home. Frane –”

I interrupted him. “Is Frane still among
them?”

“Yes. As long as she holds a chance of
beating our army, she will not flee. And now we know how she
escaped the last time.”

“How?”

“Underground. There are tunnels and caves
throughout this entire area, just as there are outside of
Burroughs, where Frane eluded your mother.”

I nodded.

“We will be ready for her if she tries to run
this time.”

“Very well.” I looked to Newton, who had been
sitting quietly, studying me, stroking his chin.

“And what magic can we expect from you?” I
asked him.

“We have airships, which have been busy on
Frane’s army in the hills, breaking it up, and will be there for
support. She was very foolish to rely on that one weapon. We have
similar weapons, in reserve, but I trust you have your mother’s
feelings on this, too.”

I nodded. “They are evil. We will destroy
Frane, but on the battlefield, just as my mother did.” I looked
around the table, at Newton, at Thomas, at Xarr, at the other
military generals I would command tomorrow. The attention they gave
me was far different than what they had accorded me when I sat at
my first council meeting, barely a kit, with a sprained ankle and
no experience of any kind.

“Very well,” I said, adjourning the meeting.
“We will ride out at dawn. It will take half the day just to get to
the plains below.”

Thomas stayed behind, and when the others had
left he said, “You are sure about this, Sire?”

“About what?”

“Leading the army yourself.”

“It is what I must do, if we are in hope of
reinstating the republic once this is over.”

He was nodding, but not really listening.

“What’s wrong, Thomas?”

Now he looked at me, and there was a
wistfulness in his eye. He looked suddenly old. “Nothing’s wrong,
sire. It’s just that you’ve changed. Grown up. I miss the kit that
relied on me, I suppose.”

I grasped his arm with my paw. “You will
never stop being a great friend, Thomas. And I will always rely on
you.”

“Thank you, sire.” His smile was genuinely
warm. “And now I am to tell you that there are visitors waiting for
you near the front entrance.”

I laughed. “Visitors?”

“One claims to be an old friend of yours, and
a king himself. He is a vagabond . . .”

I ran as if I were a kit again, and found the
King of the Gypsies, waiting for me.

“Radion!” I cried out, taking him firmly in a
bear hug.

He growled a laugh in his deep basso
voice.

“Where are Miklos, and the rest?” I asked,
puzzled.

“Camped with the caravan on the ridge
outside. I will join them soon, too. We gypsies must be out under
the stars when we get the chance. We will fight with you tomorrow,
just as I promised.” He laughed again, a low rumble. “And by the
way, I found two stragglers on the way and let them ride with
us.”

He called out, and Darwin entered, with
Charlotte behind him.

“Little fish!” I cried, picking Darwin up and
turning him around. His pure white fur stood out starkly against
the red of the cave entrance.

“As promised,” he said, bowing toward
Charlotte, who I took in my arms.

She kissed me, and laughed. “Darwin wouldn’t
let me out of his sight for a moment! He spirited me out of
Robinson City as if I were a ghost!”

“A wonderful ghost,” I said, looking into her
eyes, and then kissed her again.

“How are things in Robinson City?” I asked
Darwin.

He shrugged. “Crazier than when we were
there,” he reported, and Radion added, “In Darwin we found the dogs
who murdered my kinsman and his people.”

The way he said it left no doubt that he had
dealt with them accordingly.

Charlotte added, “Once word of Frane’s
failure reached the city, there was an uprising. My father is now
in jail. Many of the F’rar, now that they aren’t afraid of Frane’s
thugs, just want a return to what we had before.”

“When you and I marry,” I said, “it will
restore order, and will end forever the enmity between our two
clans.”

“But what about you and I? Will it end the
enmity between us?” She laughed. “Perhaps I will still string wires
across the hall to trip you up!”

“I think perhaps we should marry tonight, for
the good of all our people.”

Her eyes brightened, and she nodded. “And for
the good of you and me.”

“Then so be it!” I turned to Radion. “You
will attend, of course, as well as Miklos and the rest?”

He bowed. “It would be an honor, sire.”

“Good!”

I took Charlotte in my
arms, and our kiss was so long this time that Darwin and even
Radion, embarrassed, looked away.

T
he wedding was a simple affair, with only four
thousand or so guests. I insisted on little ceremony, and that all
of those I would command in battle attend. There was much wine but
not too much, and dancing, and Darwin stood up on a table in the
hushed hall and sang in a reedy voice which made him sound entirely
too solemn:

Come now and celebrate

Before the hour grows too late,

A love made for the ages!

For Queen and Sire

In fine attire

Will now turn many pages!

I call you here,

Raise wine and beer

And toast a love for
the ages!

There was much cheering, and Darwin took a
theatrical bow, and then Xarr made a speech which was fine and
fierce, and then Newton spoke and then Thomas, and there was more
wine and then a fine feast put on by my old cooking teacher Tyron
and Brenda, who informed me with tears in her eyes that she had
done the same for my mother and father, and there was more dancing
and singing, much of the best of it by Radion and his people, and
as Miklos, much taken with wine, was tossing Darwin into the air,
higher with each toss, Radion took my arm and steered me away into
a quiet corner.

“I see you have gotten over your distaste of
the grape,” he said, gesturing toward my goblet.

“Somewhat. I see you don’t fast yourself!”
and I tapped his huge flagon, filled nearly to the rim, and not for
the first time, with a deep red wine he had provided for the
festivities himself.

His smile was sly, but then it vanished.

“To business, then, sire,” he rumbled. “You
understand that tomorrow I will die.”

Perhaps it was the wine, but I could not help
blurting out a laugh. “That’s nonsense! Surely you don’t still
believe what the cards said! The F’rar army is melting away from
underneath Frane. By tomorrow she’ll have barely enough troops to
fight with.” I shook my head. “It won’t be much of a battle I’m
afraid, Radion. Perhaps you will die in my service, like the cards
predicated, but it surely won’t be tomorrow.”

He shook his head, and studied his wine
before drinking it, as if perhaps looking for more portents on its
flowing crimson surface.

“No. Tomorrow it will be.”

A slight shiver went through me, and it must
have showed on my face.

“I’m sorry to darken your wedding night thus,
sire,” he said, and put a heavy paw on my arm. “But these things
must be.”

“Then you will not fight! Stay here, and
represent your clan at the council table!”

His laugh was a snort. “If I were to do that
the ceiling would fall on me, or some such other disaster. I made a
vow to ride with you in your last battle, and no gypsy has ever
broken such a promise.”

“But surely –”

He shook his head, and his eyes told me that
it was useless to argue with him further.

“And now,” he continued, after taking another
drink, a deep one, we must talk of your final card.

Again I felt like laughing – I couldn’t help
it.

“Beware your new wife, sire,” he said, his
voice sinking to even a lower register than normal, and now I knew
why he had needed the wine.

“That’s ridiculous!”

Again he shook his head ponderously. “The
last card showed love and death for you, at the hands of a F’rar
woman.” He looked away, as if embarrassed. “After all, Charlotte is
F’rar . . .”

I stood up. “I won’t hear any more of this,
Radion! You’ve met her! I’ve known and loved her all my life. Do
you really think she’s capable of murdering me?”

He shook his head. “No, I do not.” He drank
more wine. “I do not. But the card . . .”

“Please! You’re drunk, and it’s my wedding
night, and I cannot refuse you anything. But let’s not have any
more of this!”

He looked up at me, very drunk now, and gave
a heavy sigh. A smile washed over his lips, but I could tell he was
forcing it to be there. “Please forgive me, sire. I am a foolish
gypsy. And perhaps the cards are wrong after all.”

Charlotte joined us, then, and pulled me away
to dance a reel, and when I looked back at poor Radion again he was
studying his flagon, and them employing it to great purpose. A
little while later he was found asleep, and carried to his wagon
outside and put to bed, gently, at my orders.