The Lost King (15 page)

The citizen generals
were supposed to keep peace with their sectors, but they protested to
the Congress that they wasted time and money putting out minor
flare-ups. The Congress, in response, established intervention
guidelines. Cities, states, corporations, and planets were allowed
their bickerings and squabbles as long as they posed no threat to the
sector or the galaxy at large. Mercenaries could find work in almost
any of these conflicts. Those soldiers of fortune who, like Tusk,
were hot carefully avoided any conflict that might attract undue
attention.

The Warlords knew that
the Congress was never likely to bring peace to the quarreling
systems. The Congress itself rarely agreed on anything, although
their press releases would have people believe otherwise. There'd
been no major system wars, but that was due to the generals, not to
the Congress or the President. And now the generals were eyeing each
other askance—or so rumor had it. Rumor also had it that one or
two major systems were considering pulling their money and support
out of the Republic. Secession. Civil war. Tusk immediately crossed
these off his mental list. Step over the Warlords' unseen boundaries
and reprisal would be swift and deadly.

"Nope." Tusk
scanned the rows of code names and numbers that every mercenary could
easily translate. "Too small. No money. And that one's too big.
Four planets and a moon? Nuclear bombs? Couldn't pay me enough."
He continued to read to the end of the column, thinking that the
military academy might win out by default. Then he whistled. There it
was.

"Here's something,
XJ." Tusk read off the coordinates to the computer. "Vangelis."

"Planetary war,
right?"

"Intraplanet.
Nothing likely to involve the big boys."

"Money?"

"You bet. Guess
who's in charge? John Dixter."

"General Dixter?
Excellent. Well, have you made up your mind? Do I plot a course for
Vangelis or Dagot?"

"Dixter'd be a
good man for the kid to know. He taught me a lot. We could always
take Dion to Dagot later. It's the middle of the semester, anyway,"
he added for the computer's benefit.

Blinking in triumph, XJ
placed the spaceplane on a new heading and returned to its studies.

Tusk sat back in his
chair. Now that they were out of Jump, he could watch the stars. He
considered ordering XJ to make the Jump again—there was a Lane
to Vangelis from this location, he was certain. But, after
consideration, Tusk rejected the idea. Never wise to Jump into a war
zone. Approach cautiously, monitor the transmissions. Vangelis wasn't
that far. Traveling close to light speed, the trip would probably
take them a week or so.

"I've got a lot to
teach the kid, anyway," Tusk reflected.

"Wouldn't do to
land him cold in the middle of a war. Not that he's gonna start
shooting or anything," the mercenary added hastily, going cold
at the thought. "Still, he should know how to use a lasgun.
Maybe I'll give him some lessons on flying." Tusk grinned. This
might be fun. There was nothing more boring than space flight. He and
XJ got on each other's nerves. It would be good to have someone else
to talk to. Someone human.

Tusk yawned again and
stretched. He had another bottle hidden in his locker. "I'm
going to he down," he said, heaving himself out of his chair.
But before he could reach the ladder, XJ-27 began to flash and whir
in as much excitement as the computer was programmed to exhibit.

"Tusk"—it
spoke in a subdued voice, pitched low, apparently, so as not to wake
the sleeping boy—"sit down in front of the vid screen.
You're not going to believe what I'm about to show you!"

"Do I really want
to know?"

"Why do humans
fear knowledge?" XJ demanded irritably.

"Because we've
seen what can happen when we get too smart. We built computers, for
one thing," Tusk said, pleased. He rarely put one over on XJ,
and he considered that he'd scored a point. He thought longingly of
the bottle. "Is this gonna take long? I don't think I can stay
awake."

"Oh, you'll stay
awake all right."

Not liking XJ's tone,
Tusk sat back down and cleared the mag off the computer screen. At
first the screen was blank, then column after column of extremely
fine print scrolled into view.

Tusk groaned. "Come
off it, will you? What is this?" He peered at it closely. "Why,
it's a blasted government document! You expect me to read that?
Condense it!"

With a vicious bleep,
XJ killed the image on the screen. There was a momentary pause, then
several short paragraphs appeared.

"That's better."
Tusk settled back. "Hey, where'd you get this stuff?" He
sat forward suddenly. "It's marked classified!"

"I was tied into
Lord Sagan's central computer for updated mechanical data before we .
. . er . . . departed his service, and while I was there I did some
browsing around on my own. Picked up a few things that interested me,
mostly about the revolution. Never know when that sort of stuff can
come in handy."

"Yeah? For what?"

"Blackmail, for
one," XJ said smugly.

Tusk said something
beneath his breath.

"What was that?"
XJ demanded.

"I said when you
decide to blackmail Derek Sagan, let me know so I can watch him rip
your electronic guts out with his bare hands. Now go on, before I
fall asleep."

"This data you
will find particularly interesting. Much about what truly happened
that night in the Glitter Palace was kept secret for fear of adverse
public reaction. When Robes siezed control, he moved quickly to
present his side of the story to the general populace. One of the
first orders of business, therefore, was to secure all palace
records. Much was destroyed, or at least so the people believe. I'll
bet the press'd be real interested to know how much Warlord Sagan
retains in his files."

"Uh-huh. And you
found it all, right?"

"No, of course
not! The Warlord's got it locked up so tight that even he probably
can't remember how to access it. But there were a few things lying
around that he apparently didn't consider important. Like this. It's
just a file that a data record computer—"

"A what?"

"Data record
computer. Lots of big corporations and all the government offices
have them. In this instance, small cameras and tiny microphones
located in all the rooms of the Glitter Palace fed information to
this central computer. It analyzed all the data it received and noted
down events by date and time. The information recorded is pretty
cryptic. It wasn't meant to go into detail, after all. It was
designed for use by historians and those in charge of budgets. But
you can read between the lines. I've deleted what's not appropriate."

Tusk grunted. He could
hear the boy stir in his hammock and he suddenly realized how truly
tired he was. Rubbing his eyes again, he blinked at the screen. "
'1800 hours. Colonel Derek Sagan, Golden Squadron, arrives at Palace.
1809 hours. Colonel Derek Sagan, Golden Squadron, requests audience
with King Amodius Starfire. 1830 hours. King Amodius Starfire denies
Colonel Sagan.' Hey, hold that a moment." Tusk's interest
quickened. "That's odd, isn't it? Why would Sagan request an
audience with the man he was going to betray and murder?"

"I wondered that
myself. Keep reading.'

"'1831 hours. Cook
removes one side of beef from freezing chamber. 1832. Cook requests
following: one sack potatoes, two sacks flour, two sacks sugar—'
What the hell is this?"

"Sorry. Slipped by
me. Supply list. I told you, this computer recorded everything,
including information on running the household."

"'Salt, mousetraps
. . .'Would you get rid of this? Thanks. Here we go. '1900 hours.
Changing of the guard. Arrival of the Guardians. Guest list—'"

"They were coming
to attend the banquet in honor of their victory over the Corasians,"
XJ said.

"Yeah. Hey, don't
roll that by so fast. There's my father's name. You know, he never
talked to anyone about what happened that night. Not that I ever
asked him. I was a stupid, blaster-happy kid. What did I care about
the old man and his war stories? Now I wish I had. It might have
helped me understand why they did . . . what they did to him."

"The Guardians
were all in attendance," XJ told him. "That was why the
rebels chose that night to attack."

"'2200 hours.
Enemy forces launch assault against Glitter Palace. 2229 hours. Enemy
forces invade palace."' Tusk shook his head. "Read between
the lines, you said. This is spooky. Think about this machine, calmly
recording all this while hundreds of people fought for their lives."

"The battle was
hopeless from the beginning," XJ said. "Robes had
everything under control. His plan was brilliant. The only ones who
could have possibly hoped to stop the revolution were the Guardians.
They alone had the influence with the people to prevent the coup from
succeeding—or at least make it pretty tough. And here they
were, locked in a banquet chamber—weaponless as befitted a
ceremony of state. All but one of them, of course.
He
had his
weapon—"

"'2230 hours.
Death of Aladais Arocus Amodius Starfire. 2230.15 hours. General
chaos.' This machine had a gift for understatement, didn't it? How
many of the Guardians died that night?"

"Hundreds. The
true count was never known, of course. Robes put out orders to find
any who escaped and bring them to trial—the last of the
supporters of the tyrannical monarchy. The most famous of all those
who escaped alive were the members of the Golden Squadron. That
included your father—"

"I sometimes think
he wished he hadn't. He was a changed man when he came back. I was
only nine, but I remember.

That's when things
started going wrong between us. Damn it!" Tusk slammed his hand
down on the arm of the chair. "I didn't understand! Why didn't
he take the time to tell me, to explain? But no. He was so blasted
proud—"

"All right, all
right. You can spend the night kicking yourself. We're coming up on
what I want you to read. Where was I? Oh, yeah. The Golden Squadron.
You know the old story that went around about them. How they had
supposedly agreed to go along with their commander, Derek Sagan, and
lead the revolt, but they betrayed him at the last moment. Because of
that, he's been making this notorious 'hunt' for them for the past
seventeen years—royalists, enemies of the people, and all
that."

"That was why he
murdered my father."

"But why torture
him?"

Tusk stood up. "This
is stupid. I don't want to read any more—"

"Listen to me!"
XJ insisted. "If this search for the Guardians was politically
motivated, as the Congress keeps insisting, then why take your father
off and torture him? Why not a public trial and execution? No,
they're after something . . . or someone."

"And you think
we've found him? A seventeen-year-old kid? Why?"

"Read on!" XJ
was triumphant. "I have the answer."

Tusk lowered himself
back into the chair. "I'll give you five minutes, then I'm gone.
This better be good. Let's see, 2230 hours, death of Aladais Arocus
Amodius Starfire and so on . . . '2230.30 hours. Child born to
Princess Semele Starfirem, Son.'"

Tusk flexed his hands.
His fingers had gone numb with cold, though there were beads of sweat
on his upper lip. "Did you turn down the heat again?"

"Put on a
sweater." XJ's screen went blank for a moment. "We're
conserving fuel. It costs, you know. Enough of the data computer.
Look at this."

"A genealogy!"
Tusk wiped his hand over his mouth. "First supply lists, now
begats and begots."

"Shut up and
read."

"Okay, so the lady
had impressive relatives. So what?"

"Lady Semele
Starfire. A direct descendant of the Royal Family—on both
sides. Father and mother were cousins. And she was the king's
sister-in-law. Her husband was the younger brother. Now look at
this."

"A death list. Oh,
wonderful. We're going from bad to worse."

"All those in the
Glitter Palace whose deaths were recorded during that night," XJ
said. "I'll bet this is one of the only accurate lists to have
survived. You'll note the names of Guardians. This is, of course, how
Sagan knew who was alive and who wasn't. One of his staff members
must have made this list before the palace was destroyed. Scan down.
There you go. 'Semele Starfire.'"

"Poor woman. I can
imagine—"

"Keep reading!"

"All right!"
Tusk snarled. "There, I'm finished. So what?"

"What about her
baby?"

"What about the
baby?"

"It wasn't
listed."

"So." Tusk
heaved himself out of the chair. "It's too friggin' cold in
here. Something's wrong with the life-support systems—"

"Tusk—"

"Look, you could
easily miss a dead baby in all that confusion. I'm going to bed. You
trash this stuff and work on life-support—"

"The computer
listed dead servants, janitors. Here's the cook and her helpers. It
wouldn't miss a baby, Tusk," XJ continued relentlessly.
"Especially a direct descendant of the Royal Family.
Especially
a child who was, at that moment, heir to the throne!"

The computer hummed to
itself in satisfaction.

Snorting, Tusk slammed
his hand down on the controls, erasing the screen. "Not a word
to the kid, understand?"

"Sure." The
computer began shutting itself down for the night.

Tusk climbed the ladder
slowly. His legs felt heavy, his feet were numb. Probably from the
cold. Pulling himself up into his living quarters, he started to
activate the lights, then remembered. The kid was asleep. Fumbling
around in the dark, Tusk found his locker, opened it, and retrieved
the bottle. He swung himself into his hammock, lay back and swallowed
a mouthful of the intoxicant known as jump-juice because its effects
were supposedly similar to those experienced making the Jump to
hyperspace. Tusk sighed as the soothing liquid slid down his throat,
leaving a warm glow behind.