Sebastian of Mars (4 page)

“To apologize again for tripping me up? I’m
still limping, as you can see.” I took a few steps, exaggerating my
affliction.

“Not that.”

“Then stop staring at me like you’ve never
seen me before! You had the same stupid look on your face this
afternoon!”

“That was when I found out. But I didn’t know
who to tell, who I could trust.”

“What is it?” I lost my flippancy, and walked
slowly forward, facing her across the bed. “Tell me what’s wrong.
Perhaps I should summon Thomas –”

“No! I mean, please don’t. I don’t want
anyone to get in trouble. But I had to tell you that you’re in
danger.”

I almost laughed, thinking that perhaps Amy
had put her up to pulling a trick on me after all. But something
about the seriousness and terror in her face stopped me.

“Then if you won’t tell anyone else, tell
me.”

“You must promise me that my father won’t get
into trouble.”

“Your father! What has Senator Misst
done?”

“Nothing! But I overheard . . .”

She lowered her voice, and I thought again of
Thomas’ warning that things in this room could be overheard. Was I
the only one who didn’t believe it?

We leaned across the bed toward each other,
and she whispered, “Yesterday, after I was scolded for tripping
you, my father said a curious thing. And it bothered me.”

“What did he say?”

“He said, ‘Soon we will not have to apologize
to anyone from the J’arn Clan.’ And when I asked him what he meant
he got very angry and told me not to repeat what he had said.”

“That’s it?”

She nodded. “But it was the way he said it.
And I saw him talking to Regent Parum later, and thought perhaps
they were plotting against you –”

She looked down.

“You
thought
perhaps they were
plotting against me! And heard your father make an off-hand remark
about our two clans, which have never gotten along anyway? That’s
it
?” I laughed. “You would have me put your father on trial,
or thrown him in a jail cell, for this?”

“No!” She looked up at me again, her eyes
very wide. “I would never want my father to get into trouble. But
Amy is always seeing plots, and this was such a strange thing for
my father to say, and if anything ever happened to you I would die
because I love you –”

She gasped, and put her paws over her mouth.
“Oh! I didn’t mean to say that!”

I was stunned. I stood up straight, and
stepped back from the bed. Suddenly I didn’t know what to do. I
felt self-conscious and awkward.

“Perhaps you should go,” I said.

“Sebastian, please, don’t tell anyone!”

And then she turned and fled, waking the
guard in the hall, who woke up with a snort.

It was a long time before I got back to
sleep. The guard was replaced and reprimanded, and I sat staring at
the book of the Old Ones without further interest in it. Finally I
put it back in its hiding place. I lay back in bed with my paws
behind my head, the lamp off, and stared at the ceiling.

So Charlotte, my sister’s playmate, a rowdy,
loud presence in my life since I was a kit, who, just the day
before, had strung a wire across a hallway to trip me up, was in
love with me. This was a startling and interesting development.

Those huge brown eyes, that fierce
playfulness, that devilish demeanor, were all hiding a burning
passion for the royal runt, Sebastian of Argyre.

And she wanted to marry me, not for political
purpose, but for love!

And if our union was made, it would unite the
two most historically contentious clans on Mars, and possibly seal
a wound that had festered for centuries, and caused many of the
problems on the planet.

It was an interesting political question,
made all the more intriguing by the fact that I had been madly in
love with her ever since I was small, and thought her absolutely
unattainable.

An interesting question . . .

Finally, as dawn was nearly breaking, I
slept, a smile upon my face.

T
he first meeting of
the Council I presided over, a week later, was quite eventful.
First there was the reaction of Parum, who entered the room like a
whipped dog to see not only that the throne had been removed but
that he sat in an exalted position beside me, his gavel still
before him. He lost most of his sour look immediately.

And then there was Senator Misst, whose face
nearly imploded when I announced at the end of the meeting that his
daughter Charlotte and I were betrothed, and would be married the
following year, when we were both six. The shock on his face, I
must admit, gave me a secret pleasure, though I did my best to hide
it. After all, this cantankerous, sly eel would soon be my father
in law. For his own part, he quickly doused his ire, though he did
not smile.

“So be it,” he said, and his face went as
blank as a chalk board, as if he was ready to move on to other
things.

And we did. Thomas read a wireless dispatch
from Newton, who reported that things were quiet in the west but
that there was much talk of coming trouble. I could tell from his
words that he was irked with the imprecision of what he reported –
though the very fact that he did report it proved to me that he was
worried.

Next Parum reported that all was calm in
Wells, which was of course foolishness. The same sort of unease
that Newton commented on was all too evident in our capital city,
if Thomas and others of my acquaintance, who actually bothered to
roam the streets, were to be believed.

In the North, Xarr said, things were more out
in the open.

“I wouldn’t call it open rebellion just yet,”
he said slowly, reading from a paper which he held painfully close
to his squinting eyes – it was now that I noticed with a shock just
old he had grown. After tripping over a few words he threw down the
paper with a snort and drew a set of spectacles from his tunic
which he set on his nose. Again he squinted, and again he dropped
the paper impatiently. “Wrong damned spectacles!” he announced in a
voice that challenged anyone in the room to make comment, and then
the old warrior produced yet another pair of glasses. This time
they must have had the desired effect, because he continued: “As I
said, no open revolt but more trouble in the streets than usual. In
my home city of Burroughs, which as you know was callously bombed
by the F’rar in the last war; there have been lynchings of
businessmen and tourists in the streets of F’rar.” He locked eyes
with my future father-in-law and said, “This of course has no
bearing on the cordial relationships which exist in this room, nor
does it in any way condone these heartless and foolish acts.
Atrocities, as we know, can be traced to all clans.”

Senator Misst nodded slightly, and Xarr went
on.

“Republican forces have been dispatched, and
martial law has been declared. Parum of course gave consent, in the
name of Sebastian. There is much unrest in other areas as
well.”

“It is as if they are all waiting for
something,” I said.

Xarr stopped speaking, and all eyes were on
me. “I’m sorry,” I said, “I don’t know why I said that. Please
continue, general Xarr.”

The old general said, “There is nothing more
to say. And what you blurted out is true. There is something in the
air, though we don’t yet see it.”

“Perhaps,” beautiful Rella, leader of the
Assembly, offered, “we have all caught just a bit of this war
fever?” She smiled, but it was a weak one. “Perhaps we are looking
at shadows?”

“One shadow in particular,” Xarr growled.

There was silence, which Parum finally broke
with a tepid knock of his gavel. “Let’s move on to other
matters.”

We did. There were reports of bills before
the Senate and Assembly, announcement of the completion of an
aquifer project in Hellas which would greatly help that water
starved region, tens of other matters great and small. I enjoyed
listening to all of them, and found that I had not only a good
memory but occasionally had something to contribute.

Then, finally, we came to another matter:

“We should now discuss the coming
coronation,” Parum said, and the words sounded like they stuck in
his throat.

Rella showed a beautiful smile now and said,
“It will be the privilege of the Assembly to provide ceremony and,
afterward, celebration, as per the constitution. It will be a
special privilege because this will be the first time on Mars this
has happened.”

“Here! Here!” Xarr shouted, banging his fist
on the table. It was a louder sound than Parum’s gavel, which the
regent used to return order.

The next half hour, plans in preparation were
discussed, until finally Parum ended the meeting. To my surprise,
as the others filed out he turned to me and said, with what sounded
like genuine feeling, “One week from now you will lift a heavy
burden from my shoulders. I thank you for it, Prince.”

Then he turned and, before I could
acknowledge his statement, he was gone.

Little did I know that very soon, before that
burden could be lifted, he, as well as others much more dear to me,
would be dead.

C
oronation day
dawned cloudy, with rain threatening.

I had barely slept. As the sun pushed up into
a pink sky it was swallowed by a swiftly moving bank of morning
clouds from the west. Soon the day was brown and dank. I stood at
the window studying the Assembly Hall which my mother had helped
design. A beautiful structure of sandstone, it almost made the day
look bright despite the weather.

Then I felt a drop on my hand, and another,
and before long there were cold sheets of water splashing the
streets below me.

“Brother!” Amy said, throwing herself into
the room ahead of the servant who bore my breakfast tray. She tore
the linen cover away and studied the food, taking what she wanted
and pushing the rest aside.

“Yech! I can’t believe you still eat dog for
breakfast, after all these years. It’s not fit for a . . .
dog!”

She laughed at her own joke, and went on
ravaging my breakfast even as the servant placed the tray on my bed
and went out, shaking his head.

“Our mother used to eat dog. It was taught to
her by Great One, the legendary fighter from the north.”

“Bah! Why do you always speak about Mother as
if we knew her! I’m sure she was quite wonderful – but she might as
well be out of a book, like this Great One!”

“Amy, don’t you ever miss mother?”

“How can I miss what I’ve never known?”

“I suppose you’re right. . .”

Her mouth full of cereal, Amy threw her hand
in the air and cried, “And today you are King!”

I regarded her stoically, and suddenly she
ran to me and threw her arms around my neck. “Oh, how I love you,
Sebastian! And someday I will be your greatest general, greater
even than Xarr, and you will be proud to be my brother!”

“I’m already proud to be your brother – I
think,” I said, and then I laughed.

She turned back to the breakfast tray,
drinking the juice that was there. “It’s too bad Charlotte cannot
be at the coronation today.”

I was turning back to the window, but her
words made me freeze. “What do you mean?”

“Didn’t you hear? Senator Misst had to return
to the east last night. Some crisis or other. And he dragged
Charlotte with him – kicking and screaming, I’m sure. You know how
much she’ll miss me. Who wouldn’t?”

Something froze in me. “Where is Thomas?”

She shrugged. “Out and about.” Suddenly she
ran for the open door. “I’ll see you later, brother King!”

“Wait!” I shouted. “Amy!”

Her goodbye echoed down the hallway, and she
was gone.

As if on cue, thunder
broke the gloomy sky outside my window, and a flash of deadly
blue-white lightning lit the room as if it were full of ghosts.

T
he guard outside my
door had not seen Thomas, and when he was sent for he was nowhere
to be found. Neither was Xarr. The palace was eerily quiet, which
was understandable since many of the staff were elsewhere, making
preparations for the day’s ceremony and subsequent festivities.
Even Brenda, the fat cook, who was always good for a joke or at
least hearty conversation, was not around.

Feeling lonely and a little fearful, with a
dread I could not put a name to, I drew a servant’s cloak from its
rack by the kitchen entrance, drew its hood up over my face against
the rain, and walked out of the palace.

The few citizens I passed on the street
looked preoccupied and hurried. I tried to stop one woman but she
only hugged the kit she carried and would not talk to me.

“I must get home!” she said.

I made my way to the Hall of Assembly and
passed unnoticed inside. It was strangely empty and quiet. Bunting
for the ceremony had been hung. The throne lay empty and waiting.
My footfall sounded hollow, unwanted.

I turned and left, passing back unnoticed
through the kitchen, replacing the cloak I had taken.

As I entered my room I heard a chorus of
voices in the hallway behind me.

Suddenly there were guards everywhere. In the
midst of them was Thomas, looking frantic. When he spied me he
rushed forward into my room with purpose.

“Are you all right?”

“Yes, of course. What –”

He looked frantically around the room as if
he expected assassins to rush from every corner.

“Thomas, what is happening?”

“I will tell you later.” There was a new look
on his face, a mixture of determination which tempered his obvious
fright. “Sebastian, you must come with me immediately,” he
said.

“But –”

“Please! I must insist on no discussion. We
will talk of it later.”

“I must say –”

“
Say nothing!
” he nearly shrieked.
“Already there were felines streaming into the room behind him – my
manservant Fotrel, the fat cook Brenda, many guards with grim
visages. I was lifted like so much baggage, and even my yelp of
pain when my ankle was put in an uncomfortable position as I was
wrapped roughly in my bedspread and spirited away did not slow
their determined flight. I was carried roughly down stairs, and
through corridors, and, finally, into a tunnel beneath the palace
that I did not know existed. When I tried to speak I was ignored.
Finally I was dumped into some sort of carriage, placed into a
compartment beneath the seat which was closed on top of me. It was
close and hot in the constricted space.