The Lost King (32 page)

The men dashed up with
the blanket and gently transferred Dion from the concrete to the
makeshift stretcher. The general covered him well, to keep him warm,
and managed at the same time to slip the blanket up over his mouth. A
startled Bennett ushered the men into Dixter's inner office, shoving
maps and files off an old battered couch that occasionally doubled as
a bed. Laying the boy down on the couch, they made him comfortable,
and Bennett cleared the office of those who would have been more than
happy to hang around and wait for the kid to either come to or kick
off. Dixter sent Bennett on a search for a medic and locked both the
door to the outer office and that to the inner when his aide had
left.

"He's coming to
himself, sir," Tusk reported.

Dixter returned in time
to see Dion shove aside Tusk's restraining arms and try to sit up.
The red-golden hair burned like flame. The boy's eyes were a
startling blue against his pale face. Looking up at Dixter, he
reached out clutching hands.

"Leave! We've got
to leave! Sagan knows!"

"What the hell—"
Tusk stared at him.

"Hush."
Dixter gently pried loose the fingers that seemed to be trying to rip
his shirtsleeve from his arm and sat down beside the boy. "Steady,
son. You're not making sense. Tell us what happened."

"There isn't
time!" Dion glanced around fearfully. Sweat trickled down the
boy's face. "We've got to leave! Sagan's coming. Didn't you hear
her, sir?"

"The kid's been in
the jump-juice again," Tusk muttered.

"Shh. Calm down,
Dion. Everything's under control. The Warlord isn't coming yet and
we'll be ready for him when he does."

"Where is she?"
the boy demanded. "Did you send her away? I was going to ask
her—" he paused, frowning, "ask her something. I
can't remember. Get her back! Get her back here!"

"Sufferin' Crea—"

"Tusk, keep quiet
and get him some water."

Dion glared at the
general angrily. Dixter was firm, his face grim. "Here, Dion,
drink this." He held out the water and the boy finally did as he
was told and seemed calmer when he'd drunk it down.

"Now listen to me,
son. Look around you. Don't you remember what happened? You were
standing outside the hangar. You asked Tusk about going into town
with Link—"

Dion's eyes widened; he
stared around confusedly. "Yes, that's right. How'd I get—
What—"

"You passed out.
The boys carried you in here. But you didn't faint, did you? You
weren't really unconscious."

"No." Dion
felt limp and drained. He lay back on the couch, his head propped up
on a roll of maps. "Then you didn't see her? She wasn't here?"

"Who, son?"

"The woman! I was
talking to Tusk and . . . then . . . she was standing right in front
of me! She was ... so real! She was as close to me as you are now,
sir. She said, 'Sagan knows where you are! He's coming after you. If
you need help, you can trust John Dixter. God be with you. "
Dion frowned. "But then you couldn't have seen her, or she would
have told you herself instead— Sir, are you all right?"

Dixter sat back on his
heels. The general's face muscles were rigid, his skin was gray, the
eyes staring at Dion were like the eyes of a corpse—wide open
but unseeing. Tusk jumped up.

"Sir, are you all
right?"

Dixter ignored him.
Tusk, glancing from the general to the kid, muttered, "I think
we could all use a drink," and headed for the bottom drawer of
the general's battered desk.

"What did she look
like?" Dixter's question was almost unintelligible. His mouth
barely moved. Dion answered it only because he heard it more with his
heart than his head.

"She was dressed
in a blue gown—a blue that kind of shimmered when she moved.
She wore a beautiful jewel, shaped like a star. Her hair was long and
straight and fell from a part in the center of her head down either
side of her face."

"What color was
her hair?"

"Damn! Where's the
bourbon?" Tusk was banging drawers. "Brandy. That'll do.
Here, sir!" He sloshed a thick viscous green liquid in a glass
and handed it to the general. "Drink it, sir. You don't look
good."

Dixter didn't touch the
glass, didn't even look at Tusk.

"Her hair's hard
to describe, sir. It wasn't golden, it was lighter than that. But it
wasn't pure white. It was—"

"Sea foam,"
Dixter said so softly that the boy leaned forward to hear. "The
color of sea foam against blue water."

"I don't know,
sir," Dion murmured, beginning to shiver. "I've never seen
the sea."

"Go on."

"There . . . was a
scar on her face—"

"General, sir!
Where the hell's Bennett!" Tusk leapt for the door.

"No!"
Gritting his teeth, Dixter stood up and made his way over to his
chair. He lowered himself into it and closed his eyes. "I'm
fine. Don't call anyone, Tusk. Don't let anyone in." He motioned
for the brandy. "I'll take that now."

Tusk, looking dubious
and half-determined to disobey, shoved the tumbler across the table.

Lifting the glass to
his lips, the general managed a twisted smile. "The pain's an
old one." He swallowed the fiery green liquid, gulped, and drew
a deep breath. "The scar. Did it run . . . like this?"
Slowly, as if he were inflicting the wound on himself, Dixter drew
his hand along the right side of his face from the cheekbone to the
corner of the lips.

"Yes!" Dion
threw off the blanket and sat up. "Who is she? Do you know her?
I have the feeling I should. There was something familiar about her,
but—"

Tusk motioned him to be
quiet.

Dixter was staring at
the glass in his hand. For a moment, he rolled the glass around
between his fingers, watching the green brandy coat the sides, then
he tossed the rest of the liquor down the back of his throat.

"I know her. Or
rather, I knew her. She's dead. She's been dead these seventeen
years."

Rising from behind his
desk, Dixter walked over to stare out the window of his mobile
headquarters. It was cooler, down in the flat bottom of the mountain
bowl that he'd selected as their new site of operations. The fans no
longer kept the maps rustling. But the maps seemed to stir anyway, as
if whispering to themselves.

"Shit," Tusk
said and reached for the brandy bottle. "Begging your pardon,
sir."

Dixter drew a
handkerchief from his back pocket and wiped chill sweat from his
face. Turning, he sat back down at his desk. Tusk passed the bottle.
The general studied it, as if wondering if it was real or a figment
of his imagination. He looked at Dion.

"And you
recognized her. You thought she looked familiar."

"She reminded me
of someone—"

"I'm not
surprised. Platus. Your mentor. I never thought they looked that much
alike. But other people did. She was his sister."

"Maigrey
Morianna!" Tusk coughed and blinked back tears. The green brandy
of Laskar was potent stuff. It made jump-juice taste like lite beer.
"My father talked about her some.

Uh, I hate like hell to
ask this, sir, but just how sure are you that she's dead?"

"I didn't see the
body, if that's what you mean," Dixter answered with a wry
smile. "But I was sure, all the same." The eyes, from their
web of wrinkles, looked at the wall and saw right through it, clear
back through space and time. "She was scared, and I'd never seen
her scared of anything. She disappeared in the night. She gave me the
slip, stole a plane, and tried to get off-planet. The press reported
that she'd been shot down over Minas Tares." Dixter poured and
drank brandy. "I never heard from her again. Yes, I believed she
was dead. Why not? Everybody else was."

"Then, sir, do you
think there's a chance that she's alive? Maybe what the kid saw
wasn't a ghost. Maybe she was using that telepathic projection stuff
that the Blood Royal used to use on each other. And if that's
true"—Tusk peered nervously out the window—"then
shouldn't we be doing something? Like leaving?"

"Where would you
go?" Dixter's words were glazed with liquor. "If Sagan
knows where we are, you can bet that he's waiting somewhere up there
for you, probably just out of range. That bombing run. I wondered
about that. Why bother? Unless you want the quail to leave the
thicket."

Tusk got to his feet,
heading—somewhat unsteadily—for the door. "That
reconditioned Scimitar. I'm taking it. C'mon, kid. We can make
Mannheim XI by 0600—"

"Not you, Tusk.
Sagan's made you. Link. Send the boy with—"

"Link! That
ego-inflated blob of hair gel? He's not a Guard—" Tusk
stopped, his tongue asking his brain if he really wanted to continue.
"Thanks for the suggestion, sir, but Link didn't make the
promise to the kid's dead friend. I did. It's my responsibility."

"Not anymore. She
made it mine. Send the boy with Link, and that's an order—"

"It doesn't
matter, either of you," Dion interrupted coolly. "I'm not
going anywhere. Not till I get some answers."

"Kid—"

"I mean it, Tusk.
Don't argue with me. You don't understand."

"Goddam right I
don't! Dead ladies talking to you. Sagan coming to haul us off and
shove us in the disrupter and you and the general sittin' here on
your—"

"That'll do.
Tusk," Dixter interrupted. The boy's right. We're all in this
too deep to wade out now."

"I just hope like
hell the water doesn't close over our heads in the meantime,"
Tusk muttered. He stood near the door to the office, irresolute and
unhappy.

The boy's intensely
blue eyes were wide and clear and glittered with an unholy radiance.
The red-golden hair, swept back from the forehead, was like a cascade
of flame in the cold sunshine that filtered through the trailer
window. He sat forward, staring at Dixter, his lips slightly parted
as if to take a deep, long, and satisfying drink.

"This proves it,
doesn't it, sir? It proves who I am! Beyond all doubt."

"It doesn't prove
anything, son, except that you're of the Blood Royal." The
general poured himself another brandy.

Dion looked downcast,
but gamely tried again. "That promise you talked about making—to
'someone very dear. Someone who was dying.' That was to her, wasn't
it? To Lady Maigrey? Now don't you see, sir? She's absolved you of
that! She isn't dead. I know she isn't. Please tell me what you know,
sir!"

"I'll tell you,"
Dixter said, staring into the glass. "But I warn you. It isn't
much."

The general was quiet.
There was no sound except the whispering of the maps. Tusk, still
standing near the door, shifted from one foot to the other, gazed
longingly outside, and finally threw himself back into his chair.
"Link!" He said in disgust and reached for the brandy
bottle.

"What do you know
about comets?" John Dixter asked.

Go and catch a falling
star .

John Donne, "Song"

"Comets? Sir, you
were talking about ..." Dion paused.

Dixter hadn't heard,
hadn't even looked up. Rolling the brandy on his tongue, he
swallowed. "They're made of ice, you know. Flaming ice, they
streak across the sky, touch you with fire, and then disappear. You
ever been to Laskar, Tusk?"

"Where they make
this stuff?" Tusk upended the bottle. "Yeah, sir, I've been
there."

Dixter, reaching into a
drawer, pulled out another bottle, uncapped it, and poured himself a
generous glass.

"A hell-hole,
Laskar. A planet where any sin known to human and alien is for sale
at any price. I haven't been there in years, but I don't suppose it's
changed."

"Worse, sir,"
Tusk said. "The cities are wide open. No law. But the casino
owners and such pay their taxes, if you know what I mean."

"I heard as much.
Well, in the old days we used to try to keep the place in order—taxes
or not. We had a base near the capital—"

"It's still there,
sir. That's where they collect the taxes. " Tusk swigged brandy.

"The king's army
used to assist the locals if things got out of hand, which things did
on a pretty regular basis. It was a great place for B and R, one of
the hot spots in the galaxy."

"Off-limits now,
General. Has been ever since pirates hijacked that naval destroyer,
murdered the crew, took off with the ship, and started attacking the
commercial fleets. There was a big public outcry. People wanted the
President to shut Laskar down or maybe just drop a couple of nukes on
it but all that happened was to declare the planet an official, no
man's land. 'Citizens, go there at your risk. The government will not
be responsible.' Like I said, Laskar pays its taxes."

"Somebody's
paying, that's for sure. It'd be interesting to know who and for
what. Still, that's neither here nor there. Another drink, Tusk? Sure
you won't have one, Dion?

"Well, where was
I? Laskar. Yeah. I was on Laskar. Stationed there, when I was a
colonel. Thirty-two years old, by my planet's calculations. I was due
for reassignment and it couldn't come fast enough. Some men liked
that tour. I knew guys who volunteered for it. I hated Laskar. It's
got a green sun. Something about the atmosphere. Turns everything you
look at green. You learn to sleep days. First because you can't take
the sight of everything bathed in a sickly gangrenous glow. Second
because you're up all night anyway. Life on Laskar begins at dusk.
Life ends at night, generally alone, in an alley.

"Lovely place,
Laskar. You never went to the grocery store without one hand on your
lasgun and a friend walking behind to make sure you weren't stabbed
in the back in the frozen food aisle."

Dixter watched the
brandy swirl in the glass.

"My orders for
transfer came through, finally. I was scheduled to ship out on a
battle cruiser orbiting on routine patrol. Some buddies and I went to
celebrate in a bar we'd found that was relatively civilized—for
Laskar. We were standing around the bar when some of the Royal Air
Corps pilots from this cruiser swaggered in. We knew there'd be
trouble. A lot of the base soldiers were in that bar, and ground
troops've got no use for hotshot fly-boys. My friends left. They were
officers and had their stripes to think about. But I was getting off
that stinking planet and I just plain didn't give a damn. Besides,
the owner was a good guy. I'd done him a few favors and I knew where
the back door was and the combination to the lock that opened it. I
decided to stick around and see the fun.