King's Test

by Margaret Weis

  The captain saluted, left upon his errand.

  Sagan kept his gaze on Maigrey, who sat in a chair directly opposite him. The two were in his private quarters aboard his shuttlecraft. They had been together over half an hour and those were the first words they had exchanged, either aloud or silently.

  The Warlord's talk with God had not gone well, but he saw no need to share it with his lady. Maigrey had her own misgivings and inner doubts to wrestle and was just as willing to confront them alone. Each was extraordinarily sensitive to the other's touch and, like wounded animals, they both kept hidden in the shadows of their own lairs.

  The silence grew loud between them.

  "I was told you haven't eaten anything all day," the Warlord said abruptly.

  "I was told you haven't either, my lord."

  Sagan was about to ask who told her, thought better of it. He knew the answer. His own guards were reporting on him to her now. "I was fasting."

  "I wasn't hungry."

  "I cannot afford to have you fall ill, my lady."

  "When you need me, I will be there. I won't let you down, you know that—" Maigrey recalled suddenly a time when she had let him down. Or vice versa. She dropped the subject, and it seemed to fall with an ungodly crash that sent silent echoes reverberating around them.

  Sagan rose to his feet. Placing his hands behind him, clasping them beneath the folds of the red cape, he stalked over to the steelglass viewscreen and stared outside. It was night and still raining, a slow, desultory drizzle, taskar's lights shone as brightly as ever, more brightly, perhaps, reflecting off the clouds.

  "We could not have saved the king—His Majesty had sentenced himself to death. But we could have saved Semele and the crown prince, Maigrey, if you and I had acted together."

  She was up like a blaze of fire, on her feet, standing behind him. "You can't know that!"

  "Oh, but I do." He turned, gazed remorselessly down at her. "And so do you."

  Maigrey cut short the conversation with a swift knifelike gesture of her hand. "It's pointless to argue. What's past is past, over and done with. What matters is the present. You think Abdiel means to kill Dion, as he killed the others?"

  "I do. The Blood Royal will always be a threat to him. He did his best to wipe them out years ago, those that he could reach."

  "At least Dion's not dead yet. ..."

  "Of course not. Abdiel prefers to use live bait."

  Maigrey shook her head. "I can sense Dion. I know he's alive. but he's indistinct, blurred in my mind. He's drawn very far away from me. From us," she amended belatedly.

  "Abdiel's influence. You can imagine what the mind-seizer is doing to him."

  "All the more reason to save him."

  "First, my lady, it may be necessary to save ourselves. Dion isn't the only member of the Blood Royal the mind-seizer means to destroy. I was always too strong for him to dare to try to touch. He believed you to be dead. Now, the two of us are together again. What greater threat can there be to him? What greater opportunity for him?" Sagan paused. "We are together again, aren't we, my lady?"

  Maigrey stirred uncomfortably. "It seems we have little choice—"

  "Then take the oath."

  "What?" She stared at him in astonishment, uncertain she heard right, the word ringing discordantly in her mind.

  "The oath, Maigrey. Retake the oath."

  She hesitated, considering, regarding him suspiciously. "What about John Dixter? What about Dion? No, there's too much between us—"

  "The hell with Dion! The hell with John Dixter!" Sagan reached out, grasped her tightly, held her fast. "None of that is important now, Maigrey. This is between us—you and me. I learned something last night. Seventeen years ago we betrayed each other, and it wasn't because we didn't trust each other. We trusted too much—in something that wasn't there! Mind-linked, closer than any two beings can come, yet we didn't know each other. Our masters taught us to keep a part of ourselves to ourselves, for the sake of pride. Out of pride, we kept our true feelings—our doubts, our fears—hidden. And that was a mistake. It made us just like any two other humans—never what God intended us to be!"

  Maigrey stared at him, caught and held by his words more than his hands.

  Sagan drew a deep, shivering breath. "We each took an oath once, long ago—just words to us then. It's not surprising we broke what held little meaning for us. I'm asking you to retake the same oath now. But realize, Maigrey, as I do, that this time the oath will bind us fast. This time the oath will be forged out of steel that has been tempered in the fires—not of heaven, as it was in our youth, but of hell."

  She shuddered. He felt her shudder, as though her body had been riven apart. Shaking her head, she tried to pull back away from him. "I can't! Not after . . . not after . . . everything. ..."

  "My lord." The captain's voice came over the commlink. "The two requesting to see you have arrived."

  Sagan regarded Maigrey intently. Then he released her.

  "Send them in," he said coldly, turning away from her.

  Maigrey gathered herself together, picked up the broken pieces, and joined him—momentarily, at least—to meet their guests.

  The door slid open, revealing a black-haired charmer in a sky-blue suit and a raincoated companion. Escorted into the Warlord's chambers by the Honor Guard, Raoul glided gracefully, the Little One shambled along behind.

  "May night's shadows give you ease, my lady, my lord." Raoul bowed, hand over heart, to each.

  "May the moon rise and shed light upon your path." Maigrey offered the proper response among Loti. "Won't you be seated?" But she remained standing, as did the Warlord.

  Raoul was so excessively overcome at the lady's politeness and offer of hospitality that for many moments he soared amid flights of effusive gratitude. Maigrey and Sagan contained themselves patiently, waiting for him to descend and come to the point. He finally did so, declining an offer to be seated.

  The Little One, on entering the room, resembled very much a man who has suddenly walked head-on into an invisible steelglass wall. The large, bright eyes darted from lord to lady and back again, then narrowed in exasperation.

  Raoul, indicating his companion with a fluttering gesture, remarked, "The Little One is considerably impressed at your skill in thwarting his empathic abilities. But then, of course, you are Guardians. The last of the Guardians."

  The steelglass wall quivered slightly, but did not fall, though the muscles of Sagan's right hand twitched involuntarily and Lady Maigrey curled her fingers in upon themselves.

  "I don't suppose you came here to inform us of that," the Warlord said.

  "No, no. Please forgive me. The pleasure of meeting the two of you has rendered me quite overcome. I will hasten on to the purpose of my visit. My lord Derek Sagan"—Raoul bowed—"has received an invitation to Snaga Ohme's Event and has been kind enough to accept. My employer, Snaga Ohme, is honored, my lord, to think that, once again, your presence will grace his humble dwelling."

  The honor is mine in being invited," Sagan returned, but the ice in his voice chilled the polite effect of his rejoinder.

  Raoul bowed again and turned to face the lady. The eyes of the Little One finally focused upon her, never left her, perhaps seeing a tiny crack in the glass. "My employer, Snaga Ohme, regrets exceedingly that he was unaware of the lady's true identity when she last graced his abode. He fears his hospitality on that occasion was deficient—"

  "He tried to have me killed," observed Maigrey, smiling pleasantly.

  Raoul was astonished, appeared likely never to recover from the shock. "Word has reached the ears of my employer, Snaga Ohme, that you believe the foul calumny heaped upon his defenseless head. Snaga Ohme respectfully reminds her ladyship that Laskar is notorious for its bandits and he wishes only to add his sublime joy over the fact that the lady emerged from her terrifying encounter safe and whole. The lady walks with God."

  "And carries a beam rifle," Sagan said coolly. "But please con
tinue."

  Raoul's glittering purple eyes danced in amusement. "Yes. Quite true. However, in order to make amends for his deficiencies as a host, my employer, Snaga Ohme, has issued an invitation to the Lady Maigrey Morianna to grace his Event with her presence." The Loti, with a flourish, proffered a small silver ball.

  "I would be honored." Maigrey accepted the silver ball, laid it down upon a table, forced it to stay down when it would have risen.

  "It is my employer, Snaga Ohme, who is honored, my lady. And now, regrettable that it is to introduce talk of business into anticipation of pleasure, my employer, Snaga Ohme, begs to inform the lady that he would appreciate the prompt return of his property. It is a request with which he is certain she will delight in complying since that property was—undoubtedly quite unintentionally on my lady's part—fraudulently obtained."

  "Fraudulently!" Maigrey repeated. "What does he mean by fraudulently? He has the starjewel—"

  "Ah, my lady." Raoul seemed to retreat before her anger; the empath nearly shriveled up into a ball. "Do not give way to hostile feelings. Snaga Ohme has no doubt her ladyship meant well. But the starjewel, you see, has proven worthless."

  "You don't expect me to believe—"

  "My lady," Raoul interposed gently, "the starjewel has gone black as coal."

  The Little One, eyes on Maigrey, flinched visibly and uttered a small gasp of pain. Maigrey said nothing, made no sound, no movement.

  "My lady cannot be held responsible for that," Sagan said. He was startled to feel her ice-chill fingers dig into his flesh like talons, gripping his wrist for support. "The jewel's value is not diminished—"

  "A matter of opinion," Raoul suggested delicately. "The jewel is now an object most unlovely to look upon. Indeed, my employer, Snaga Ohme, has discovered that he cannot stand to be around it. He hastens through the room where it is kept to avoid the sight of it. Snaga Ohme was wounded by the fraud, but he bids me say that he has forgiven her ladyship and he will be most happy to return the jewel to the lady if she will return his property to him."

  "And you may tell your employer, Snaga Ohme, that her ladyship will see him burn in hell first." Sagan touched the controls, opened the door, summoned the guard with a gesture. "And now I think that you had better leave. Your companion appears to have been taken ill."

  The Little One was doubled over in agony, but the large eyes remained fastened upon Maigrey, a gleam of exultation visible through the pain.

  "I feel it only right to inform you that my employer, Snaga Ohme, does not take kindly to threats." Raoul grasped hold of his companion's coat collar, seemingly prepared to haul him off bodily.

  "I never make threats," Sagan returned, "only promises. My regards to your employer. Inform him that the lady and I will both be pleased to attend his Event."

  "May your repose be blessed," the Loti remarked pleasantly, his current state of drug-induced euphoria apparently impossible to upset.

  "May yours be eternal!" Sagan muttered, slamming his hand down irritably on the door's operational controls.

  Maigrey remained standing near him, her hand grasping the Warlord's arm tightly. She did not look at him. She did not speak. There was no need. He understood. Her soul was laid bare, slashed wide open.

  Slowly, she unclenched her fingers, released her hold. Sagan, glancing down, saw four livid marks on his battle-scarred skin, the imprint of her pain. She turned and left him, walking steadily, but moving blindly as one who travels in the thick shadow.

  "My lady," the Warlord said. "The night of the revolution, I took the starjewel from around my neck and placed it in its rosewood box. I have it still."

  She ceased walking, but did not turn around, stared straight ahead, into the night.

  "Maigrey," the Warlord continued quietly. "My starjewel is black. It darkened that evening."

  "Is that supposed to comfort me, my lord?"

  "Our bond has been forged in the fires of hell. Take the oath."

  Maigrey glanced back at him, smiled wanly. '"Fortune rota volviture; descendo minoaratus . . .' The wheel of fortune turns; dishonored I fall from grace.'" She looked at him straight on, gray eyes meeting his, no trace of color, of life, anywhere in her. "I will take the oath, my lord. "

  She left him.

  Sagan took no notice of her leaving. He should have been exulting in his victory. The oath would bind them fast. What he wanted, she would want. Thinking and acting as one. Yes, he had been victorious. But Maigrey had managed to rob him of his pleasure.

  Her quote had been from Carmina Burana, the songs of the medieval goliards. He had not thought of the songs in a long time, and they came back to him now, suddenly, darkening his heart, the voice of the oracle, speaking words of ill omen. He repeated to himself, softly, the closing verse.

  "'Quod per sortem sternit fortem, mecum omnes plangite!'

  " 'And since by fate the strong are overthrown, weep ye all with me.' "

  Chapter Four

  Questa notte nessun dorma!

  This night let no one sleep!

  Giacomo Puccini, Turandot

  Innumerable dazzling new stars lit Laskar's night sky once the storm clouds had rumbled past. Snaga Ohme's guests were arriving for the Event, and their various shuttlecraft and orbiting ships and planes traced fiery trails across the heavens. Local air and space traffic control was jammed, but they were accustomed, every year, to handling the influx and only the usual amount of crashes and near-misses resulted.

  All major luxury hotels, designed for both human and alien species, were booked solid and had been for a year, there being always those who preferred a cramped room with an inadequate supply of towels to the more comfortable but less exotic quarters of their own shuttlecraft. Prefab homes sprang up like fungi after the rains. RV lots were filled to capacity. The locals all turned out, during the mild Laskarian evenings, to stroll about and gape at the fabulous, gleaming spacecraft, the elaborately uniformed guards, the incredibly beautiful mistresses and/or paramours belonging to the galaxy's rich and powerful.

  President of the Galactic Democratic Republic Peter Robes did not attend, though he was annually invited. Ohme's Event was not an officially sanctioned function and Robes preferred to keep himself aloof, which always looked good in the press. The President never failed, during the Event, to visit a children's hospital on some impoverished planet and have his photo taken with a young alien, preferably of the small, cute, and fur-bearing variety. His citizen generals were in attendance, however, as well as numerous members of Congress.

  In addition came monarchs, military leaders, corporate heads from all sectors. During the night prior to the Event, the rich and the beautiful and powerful graced the streets of Laskar, a veritable walking encyclopedia of anybody who was anybody. Security, provided by both Snaga Ohme and the city of Laskar, was extremely tight. Tourists were not permitted on Laskar during this time. Of the press, only those commentators with the highest ratings were invited to attend, along with their droid reporters and camera crews.

  Monarchs and generals at war with other monarchs and generals (and there were many, given the current political turmoil in the galaxy) were often forced into close proximity, either on the street where it was fashionable to take the Laskarian air or at the numerous private parties and gala balls given on the eve of the Event. The warring enemies passed by each other with icy disdain, each affecting not to acknowledge the other's existence. If trouble flared, as it sometimes did among the more hotheaded, brawls were instantly quelled by Ohme's watchful security force, the combatants separated and taken away to cool off.

  Generally these outbursts consisted of little more than a barrage of shouted insults and a flurry of gloves tossed contemptuously into faces, but occasionally more serious incidents occurred, as when, seven years prior, the chairman of the board of Allied Galactic Steelglass shot dead the corporate head of Allied Galactic Plastisteel during the soup course at a dinner given by the famous actress Madam Natasa Holoscova. Ever since,
party hostesses spent long hours agonizing over their guest lists, scanning the latest computer records to determine who was currently at war with whom and making certain that, if combatants were inadvertently invited to the same party, they were at least seated well out of each other's range.

  Military units stationed at Fort Laskar took no part in the proceedings, leaving matters of security, traffic, and crowd control in the capable hands of the Laskarian officials, augmented by the private forces of Snaga Ohme. It was natural, however, that the base should go on alert, considering the number of dignitaries present on the planet and the potential for trouble.

  The Warlord did not attend any of the many glittering social functions leading up to the Event, though when it became known that the hero of the Corasian invasion was on Laskar, he was much in demand. The guards at Fort Laskar's main gate turned away a steady stream of liveried, invitation-bearing servants.

  Sagan remained on base, inaccessible except to the brigadier general, with whom the Warlord spent an unusual amount of time. Alert status had quietly been upgraded from yellow to red. The base was sealed off to outsiders. All leaves were canceled. Few in Fort Laskar knew precisely what was going on. But it was easy to guess. From the numbers of troops being mobilized and the equipment they were being issued, the soldiers of Fort Laskar were preparing for some sort of jungle assault. That made it easier still to guess their target, though there were many grim mutterings to the effect that it was impregnable.

  Sagan's only other visitor, and the only outsider permitted on the base, was the assassin with the operatic name.

  Maigrey and Sagan had neither seen each other nor communicated in any way since they had parted the night they'd received the invitation. The Warlord had been too busy. The lady had been indisposed. She had borrowed several books from Brigadier General Haupt and shut herself up in her room.

  His lordship, when he inquired what her ladyship was reading, was told—much to his disquiet—a book of the collected poems of William Butler Yeats.