The Gathering Flame (18 page)

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Authors: Debra Doyle,James D. Macdonald

BOOK: The Gathering Flame
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He stretched and sighed. All the others were probably sacked out by now, and he was almost as tired as Errec himself. After the adrenaline charge of the Web-run, though, he’d need a mug of cha‘a in order to wake up enough to get to sleep. He headed for the
’Hammer‘
s galley, where the cha’a pot should have a few drops left in the bottom.
Nannla and Tilly were waiting for him in the common room. “Boss,” Nannla said, “we’ve got to talk.”
“Now?”
The two gunners looked at each other. He thought he saw Tilly nod slightly at her partner.
Then Nannla nodded at him. “That’s right, boss.”
“It’s important,” Tilly added.
“Let me get some cha’a first, then.”
He moved past them to the galley nook and poured the last of the cold cha‘a into his favorite mug, a rough piece of blue-glazed pottery from a Mageworlds tradeship. He’d taken the ship years ago, on
Warhammer’
s first privateering foray, and had sold all the loot but that. He carried the cha’a back to the mess table and sat in his usual chair.
“All right,” he said. “Tell me what’s up.”
This time Nannla nodded at Tilly, and Tilly spoke. “It’s about the Domina.”
“What about her?” Jos asked. “Is it bothering you that she’s from Entibor?”
“It’s not that. It’s—Captain, she’s pregnant.”
Jos took a careful sip from the blue-glazed mug. He’d hate to drop it and break it, after all this time … it was a lucky souvenir, almost … “What do you mean, ‘pregnant’?”
“The usual, I suppose,” said Nannla. “You know, going to have a baby. Roughly nine standard months after we left Waycross.”
“Nine,” said Jos.
“Give or take a week or two.”
He put the mug down on the table, and his hands down flat to either side of it. He didn’t need to ask why the gunners thought he might be interested in the news. But there were still questions.
“How did you find out?” he asked. “If it’s true.”
Tilly produced an envelope from her jacket pocket and dropped it onto the table. “She sent us a formal announcement, that’s how. And before you ask me why—it’s because that’s the way things are done on Entibor.”
“We’re standing in for the female relatives you haven’t got,” Nannla explained. “That’s what Tilly says, anyhow, and she ought to know.”
“Right.” Jos shook his head slowly. “Would you believe me if I said I asked … and she said I didn’t have to worry about it? Otherwise, I would have—”
“We believe you,” Nannla said.
“She was telling the truth,” Tilly added. “You
don’t
have to worry about it. She’s the Domina of Entibor.”
Jos gave up and put his head in his hands. “I’m missing something,” he muttered. “Tilly, you’re going to have to tell me what it is that I don’t get, because I can’t figure it out for myself. I think the Web must have scrambled my brains.”
Tillijen sighed. “I’ll do my best, Captain, but it’s complicated. The first thing you have to know is that the old Domina—Veratina—didn’t leave a direct heir. Not for lack of trying, either. But she couldn’t. Nothing ever lasted more than a couple of months, if it got that far.”
“Barren as a brick, in other words,” said Nannla. “Which Tilly claims is seriously bad luck for Entibor in general.”
Jos looked at Tilly. “I didn’t know you believed in luck.”
“I don’t. But a lot of people on Entibor do believe in it. And if people
think
that a thing is so, they’re going to
act
like it’s so. Public morale on Entibor’s been twitchy as hell for, oh, the last twenty-five or thirty years, maybe more—and now here comes a brand new Domina, right when the Mageworlds raiders are starting to show up in force. If this new Domina turns out to be barren, too …”
“Riots in the streets,” said Nannla. “Sabotage in the factories. Dry rot in the roofbeams—sorry, I got carried away there.”
“What’s important is that people are worried,” Tilly said. “And the best way for the new Domina to reassure them is to come up with an heir … or at least a—the closest word for it in Galcenian would be ‘placeholder,’ I suppose—a firstborn who doesn’t inherit for some reason … as soon as possible. But she needs to prove that she can reproduce.”
 
As soon as Metadi came into the captain’s cabin, Perada knew that the gunners had told him everything. She felt a certain amount of relief and satisfaction—she’d thought that Tillijen could be relied upon, and was glad to see herself proved right—but more than that, she felt worried. Metadi was a Gyfferan, after all; even if he understood what had happened, that didn’t mean he understood why it had to happen according to the proper form.
She’d been lying on the bed, letting her stomach settle after the long, tense run through the Web. When the door snicked open, she sat up, curling her legs under her. Metadi let the door close behind him and stood with his back to the metal panel.
“Well,” he said finally. “What is it I need to do?”
She swallowed. This was going to be harder than she’d thought. Jos Metadi wasn’t Nivome, whose ambition kept his mind focused on his own advantage to the exclusion of everything else, and he wasn’t Garen, who had been her friend for so long now that some things didn’t need explanation at all. She would have to proceed very carefully.
“Nothing. I said that you didn’t have to worry.”
“That doesn’t matter. I can’t just leave you to it.”
“Didn’t Tilly explain? Entibor and House Rosselin take care of their own; there’s no obligation on you.”
She watched his face intently as she spoke. The relief that she half-expected to see never came; instead, Metadi’s eyes darkened.
“No obligation. And no claim, I suppose.”
“No,” she said, watching him. Now his face showed no expression at all, not even the watchful but slightly amused detachment he’d presented to the world while he masqueraded as her silent bodyguard. “Nothing. Except what you choose.”
“Oh. I have a choice, then.”
“Yes.”
“Tell me about it.”
Perada was reminded, suddenly, of their first conversation in the private room at the Double Moon. Jos Metadi had been wary and unrevealing then, too, though not as rigidly self-controlled. And she had been more sure of herself then. She wished she had the black velvet mask back again; the effort of keeping her face from betraying anything made her whole body ache from the tension.
“I am the Domina of Entibor,” she said. “No child of mine will ever need anything that Entibor can’t provide. But what Entibor needs …” She let the sentence hang unfinished.
He picked it up almost at once. “What
does
Entibor need?”
“A strong hand in the Fleet,” she said. “And more ships than the raiders—many more.” He hadn’t expected that, she could tell; the glint of curiosity came back into his eyes. She went on. “We worked it out, Garen and I, while we were at school: what the raiders would have to do in order to win effective control over the civilized galaxy. And then we looked closer, and saw that they were doing it already.”
“Strike and then retreat,” he said. He was looking interested in spite of himself. “Never attempt open battle against a larger force than your own. Break apart the galaxy a planet at a time.”
“You’ve seen it, then. You understand.”
“Dom’na, I’ve been fighting them ever since I got my own ship. If I didn’t see it, I’d be dead by now.”
“That’s
exactly
what I mean!”
In her excitement, she forgot herself enough to bounce on the mattress of the bunk for emphasis. She caught herself at it, and felt her face redden. The corners of Metadi’s mouth curved upward for a moment.
She took the slight change of expression for a good sign and continued hastily, “Nobody at Central Command thinks that way. I’ve heard the reports, and I know. Even if I could find them more ships somehow, they wouldn’t understand the right way to use them.”
“And you think I might.”
“I know that you would.
He chose to ignore her last statement. “Where do you count on getting more ships from? You can’t build a fleet from scratch in less than a couple of years, even if you fill every construction dock from here to Gyffer.”
“I know,” she said. She hesitated, then decided to tell him something more of the truth. “That’s why I had to talk with Garen. With his share of the money from Tarveet Holdings, and the money belonging to House Rosselin, I think I can hire the privateers out of Innish-Kyl. Regular pay plus whatever prizes they can take. What do you say, Captain?”
Again he almost smiled and then seemed to think better of it. “I say that we’ve come back around to our talk in the Double Moon. Why should the privateers give up making their own decisions and put themselves under some chairbound fossil?”
“They shouldn’t. That’s why we need you. The privateers will come and fight for you when they won’t come for anyone else. And whether they fight for you or not, they
all
believe in taking the war to the enemy.”
“That’s a lot of faith to put in someone you don’t even know.”
“I told you before, I’ve seen the reports. You may not own more than one ship yourself, but you’ve been leading fleets against the raiders for two or three years now.”
He made a sharp, dismissive gesture with one hand. She would have felt discouraged, except that it was the first time he’d moved since taking up his position inside the closed door. “Believe me, Dom’na, it’s not my pretty face that brings them along. When they go with me, they come back rich if they come back at all.”
“And what if you could offer them a guaranteed profit—
plus
a chance of coming back rich? Would they go with you then?”
Metadi laughed. “For a bargain like that, most of them would probably sign on with the Lords of Death.”
“You understand me, then.”
“I understand why you want me to do it. But I don’t know why I should bother.” He paused and looked at her narrowly. “Unless it has to do with those choices you mentioned.”
She drew a long breath. “If you like—if you agree—I can name you Consort, and General of the Armies of Entibor.”
“You put a high price on me, don’t you?” There was an edge to his voice that she couldn’t identify. “What does all that involve, besides the obvious stuff?”
“‘General of the Armies’ is a courtesy title,” she said. “But it would give you rank, if you needed it. ‘Consort’—”
“That’s the one I want to know about.”
“I thought it might be.” She wet her lips. This was even more difficult than she had expected. Galcenian was a stupid language; it was hard to translate the formal words. “As Consort, you would be father to any children I might have, and would give me your aid and support in whatever should be necessary, until I should say otherwise.”
“‘Aid and support,’ eh?” The edge had left his voice, replaced by a note of grim amusement. “That’s a phrase for it I haven’t heard before.”
Again she felt herself blushing. “Captain, you are incorrigible.”
“Everybody needs a hobby.” He pushed away from the door, and half-turned to set his hand on the lockplate. Over his shoulder, as the panel slid open, he said, “You drive a hard bargain, Dom’na. But this time I’m going to take your deal.”
 
The Armsmaster to House Rosselin sat in his chambers overlooking greater An-Jemayne. So far, the city outside his workroom window had stayed calm and free of civic unrest—though the longer the interregnum stretched on, the shakier that calm became. Fortunately, he reflected, the Palace had not fixed a date on the public calendar for the new Domina’s arrival from Galcen; the populace in general remained unaware that her prolonged absence was something that nobody—except, perhaps, for the Domina herself—had intended.
Hafrey frowned slightly. It should have occurred to him that Perada Rosselin might have ideas and plans of her own. The time she had spent on Galcen had made her half an outworlder in her thinking, and less predictable on that account than Veratina had been. He himself was a flexible man, capable of changing when the situation demanded change; but not all the members of the palace staff or Central Command could say as much.
The door to his private workroom chimed in a familiar pattern, and Ser Hafrey abandoned his meditations.
“Come,” he called.
The door opened to admit the dark-haired young woman in Fleet uniform who had visited his workroom before.
“I have news,” she said. “Interesting developments at Central Command—two of the commanders from the Parezulan sector have shown up at Central uninvited. They insist on speaking with Admiral Pallit.”
“Ah.” Hafrey allowed himself a bit of private amusement. He had dealt with Pallit before. “And how is the fleet admiral reacting to this … irregular procedure?”

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