Duchess of Terra (Duchy of Terra Book 2)

by Glynn Stewart

  “This is Ondu Arra Tallas’s house,” Ik!It snapped as he hit the button to open the storage room. “You know our word is good.”

  “I do. That’s why I’m accepting it.” James drew the pistol from his belt and handed it to Ik!It before stepping into the chilled storeroom, watching as several pallets slid aside to reveal the back entrance—and a familiar pair of immense power-armored bodyguards emerged from the shadows.

  Their four legs supported massive, barrel-shaped torsos and squat heads, towering two and a half meters tall in armor as they loomed over James and Pat.

  “You’re clean,” the guard on the left announced. “Thank you, Colonel, Captain. We appreciate the cooperation.”

  “We’re here to do business,” James said. “We’re among friends, aren’t we?”

  The guard chuckled.

  “You made the boss very, very rich,” he replied. “You’re among friends in Ondu’s house, yes.”

  #

  Ondu Arra Tallas did not look well. He’d somehow managed to grow even fatter than his already immensely obese form, the Tosumi’s body now straining against the seams of a suit clearly tailored for his earlier size. He was also molting, feathers flying away in a cloud as he sneezed at James and Pat’s entry.

  “Come in, come in,” he wheezed. “Forgive me if I do not rise. My health is poor, your timing…less than good.”

  “Are you going to live?” James asked, concerned. Tallas might be a fat, somewhat offensive fence and thief, but he’d done fairly and well by Earth.

  “It’s a recurring ailment of my people,” Tallas admitted. “Most of us get over it in childhood; I am not so lucky. I will recover—good doctors help.”

  “And money helps with those,” James replied. “My understanding is that you did very well off working with us.”

  “Incredibly well,” Tallas agreed. “I have never been so lucky as the cycle Ki!Tana brought your Captain to me, Colonel Wellesley. What can I do for you?”

  “We need to withdraw the proceeds from the Lambda Aurigae raid,” James said. He presented a small data stick from inside his power suit’s pockets. “You’ll find the authorization on here.”

  “Fair winds, fair winds,” Tallas said cheerfully. “How much, Colonel?”

  “All of it.”

  The fat Tosumi froze.

  “All of it?”

  “All of it,” James repeated. “We need the funds in a form that can be transported to Earth and used to make payments in an Imperial bank.”

  “Laundering and funneling a few million at a time into the Imperial banking system is one thing, Colonel,” Tallas said slowly. “My resources can handle that with ease, but expanding that… I am already moving as much money to your Duchess as I reasonably can.

  “Even if we fly over any need for hiding our transactions, I cannot ask people to risk themselves. I cannot significantly increase the funding I am already providing from that principal.”

  “Then pay us in cash.”

  “There isn’t that much Imperial cash on Tortuga!” Tallas exclaimed. “If I exercised every resource at my command, I could perhaps come up with enough cash for a twentieth of the amount.”

  James considered the broker for a long moment and then smiled coldly.

  “What did you do with our money, Tallas?” he demanded.

  “Nothing!” the broker snapped. “I have it all, every penny; I can provide a full accounting. Some of it is in investments and assets but all liquid. If you wanted to spend the money on Tortuga, Colonel, I could have every single mark available to you within two cycles.

  “But to take it from Tortuga and return it to Earth for the Duchess to spend it there?” Tallas threw up all four of his arms and sneezed again, his distress throwing molted yellow feathers all over the room.

  “That is an entirely different wind you ask for, Colonel, and I do not have the resources. Give me a five-cycle and I might be able to come up with perhaps a tenth of the sum in transferrable assets.”

  “We could wait a five-cycle,” Pat said quietly as James processed, “but we need a quarter of the money by then.”

  Ondu Arra Tallas seemed to deflate in on himself.

  “I cannot,” he finally said. “If I could pay you out, I would. Holding so much money for people my neighbors hate is dangerous, Colonel. I owe you, but I would happily be done with you.”

  “Do we need to go to the Crew?” James asked. He didn’t want to threaten Tallas, he mostly liked the old bird, but the Crew enforced contracts on Tortuga.

  “I could pay you tomorrow in their systems,” Tallas complained. “They won’t enforce more than that.”

  “But perhaps the Crew has a different answer,” Pat pointed out, and James looked at his husband questioningly.

  “Finish your words,” Tallas said after a moment’s thought.

  “They are the main bank here, aren’t they?” Pat asked. “Wouldn’t they have some way of their own of transferring funds to the Imperial system? Better to pay a percentage and have the money than be owed the full amount and be unable to use it.”

  James inclined his head toward Pat. Apparently, sometimes having spent most of your career as a civilian was useful. James had been thinking more in terms of shaking the money out of Tallas, which clearly wasn’t possible, not in finding the right help.

  “They might,” Tallas finally admitted. “Their fees are not cheap, but…” He sneezed again, more feathers scattering around the room. “I owe you, but I wish to be done with you,” he repeated. “If you have a number you must meet, I will make certain you have at least that much left after the Crew’s fee.

  “Then we are finished, but finished on positive winds. I would have no quarrel with your Duchy.”

  James chuckled.

  “I like that plan better,” he agreed. “If it were up to us, Ondu Arra Tallas, our Duchy would have no quarrel with anyone!”

  #

  Chapter 37

  It only took a single cycle to get an audience—and one with the High Captain, to their surprise.

  Even Tallas appeared surprised by how quickly the process went. The Tosumi was an influential member of Tortuga’s community, but the High Captain of the Laian Crew was a busy, busy being with many claims on his time—very few of which involved the collection of pirates and outcasts who resided in his station.

  They’d asked to speak to the equivalent of a bank manager and been informed they were meeting with the CEO. It was…not what James had expected.

  James and Pat and their escorts spent the cycle in Tallas’s compound, which turned out to be significantly larger than the one bar and meeting room they had seen. The Tosumi lived in one of the sections of hull that had been built as a proper space station, with plenty of rooms for his staff and guests—and a very small number of ways in.

  The compound was secure, and James had no worries about their safety once they made it into the core of the station to meet with the High Captain. The trip between the two, however, made him nervous.

  “All I ask, Colonel, is that your men follow my people’s lead,” Tallas told him as they armed up. “Your people are better fighters and the likely first target, I agree, but my people know Tortuga.

  “We don’t want to start a firefight over a rotten vegetable, after all.”

  “Very well,” James agreed, gesturing Tellaki over to them. “But as soon as we see weapons, all bets are off. I don’t want to damage your reputation, Ondu, but I won’t risk my people, either.”

  “After yesterday, I do not expect further trouble,” the agent told him. “Unless you have more enemies than I know of, most of those who would seek revenge for Orsav will be cowed for now.”

  “What about Kanzi?”

  “There’s some on the station,” Tallas admitted. “There’s always some; why?”

  “I don’t trust them,” James said, unwilling to admit that the blue-furred bastards had been sniffing around Sol. “So, if there’s any here, we will keep a very sharp eye
out.”

  #

  The previous day, the crowds had parted in front of James’s party. Now, having seen the last people to screw with them left as smoking heaps on the ground, the crowds disappeared as they made their way through the stations.

  The stores and restaurants to either side of them were unusually full, but the alleys and pathways themselves were creepily empty around them.

  Ondu’s two massive bodyguards took the lead, with Tellaki and the two armored Rekiki falling into the rear. The empty halls were hitting on everyone’s nerves, and James knew he was sweeping for the attack the back of his neck knew was coming.

  He’d never know what Tellaki saw or heard. Rekiki hearing was better than human, though their sight was worse.

  “Everyone down!” the armored alien bellow, throwing his massive form forward and smashing James and Pat to the ground to make sure they obeyed.

  Stunned from the impact, James almost missed the sound of the gunshots…and it took him several seconds to realize the hot liquid sprayed across his face was Tellaki’s blood.

  The shot, whatever it was, had gone clean through the Rekiki’s power armor and out the other side, punching a fist-sized exit wound through the centimeter-thick defensive layer.

  “Defend Tallas!” another massive voice boomed, followed by the distinctive hiss-crack of plasma weapons—and then a deep-throated scream like a wounded elephant.

  Despite the amount of blood pooling on the ground, Tellaki was still firing his weapon as James rolled out from underneath his subordinate and came up on one knee, his power suit’s scanners seeking the attackers.

  One of Ondu’s massive guards was down, a massive hole blown through his armor. The agent had been thrown behind the corpse, presumably by the other guard, who was laying down heavy fire on the gallery above them.

  Both of James’s human Guardsmen were dead, baseball-sized holes blown clean through them. His Rekiki soldiers were taking advantage of the big alien’s covering fire to take clean, precise shots.

  His suit identified a shooter rising to fire on the big alien and he snapped his pistol to firing position. A triple blast of plasma joined the cascade of fire, answered by a scream as a big rifle tumbled from the gallery, followed by a blue-furred corpse in the same sort of commando armor he was wearing.

  A heavy penetrator slug missed him by centimeters, its impact rippling the heavy metal plating he stood on and sending him lurching to the side—which forced a second miss.

  The third round clipped his arm, tearing open his armor—but not stopping him from finding the shooter and returning fire. Another Kanzi commando fell—only for his sensors to flash another danger warning.

  A Rekiki Guardsman went down, her crocodile-like head shattered like fresh fruit by the penetrator rounds. James returned fire, forcing her killer to duck behind cover.

  Then the Kanzi’s cover exploded as a heavy plasma bolt ripped through it, vaporizing the commando in a single blast. James had pushed the limits with the plasma guns his people had brought, but that was heavier than anyone except the Crew carried…

  More heavy plasma bolts tore into the gallery, the troopers carrying the big guns clearly not caring if they utterly wrecked the deck and the stores on it. Several meters of gallery flashed to vapor under the pounding before the shooting finally, blessedly stopped.

  A dozen Crew, half Laians and half other races but all in dark red power armor, advanced down the empty street with heavy weapons at the ready, sweeping for additional threats.

  “James!” Pat shouted. With the fight over, James turned his attention back to his husband—who was desperately trying to staunch the bleeding from the ugly wound through Tellaki’s torso.

  The Ducal Guard commander was there a moment later, trying to help. The penetrator had blown too large a hole for the armor’s own systems to help…and it wasn’t just blood loss. Even a cursory glance warned James that Tellaki had lost critical organs.

  “It’s too late,” the Rekiki growled. “I’m sorry.”

  “You saved us,” James whispered. “I’m sorry.”

  “No,” Tellaki said fiercely, bloody froth drifting around his teeth. “You remember. You tell…my Duchess…she gave us…back…our honor.”

  #

  The Crew soldiers formed a dark red perimeter around Wellesley and his dead troopers. It took every ounce of his hard-earned and hard-trained British stoicism for the tall, aristocratic soldier not to scream at the aliens and their late arrival.

  “We came as soon as we were aware there was a problem,” one of the beetle-like aliens told him, approaching cautiously. “We did not expect Mahalzi aboard the station.”

  “That won’t bring my back my dead,” he told the alien. “I see Tortuga is a haven for any and all scum as always.”

  “The Mahalzi are not scum,” the alien replied. “They are Kanzi special forces and they are not welcome aboard Tortuga.”

  It paused.

  “I have orders to deliver you to the High Captain. I will make certain your honored dead are returned to your ship, and you have the word of the Crew you and Tallas will also be conveyed safely.”

  James met his husband’s gaze. Pat was looking shocky, but he nodded slowly.

  “Very well,” the Colonel said flatly. “Take us to the High Captain.”

  #

  James Arthur Valerian Wellesley was the descendant in direct line of the original Duke of Wellington, the man credited with the defeat of the Emperor Napoleon. It was hard not to feel the weight of three centuries of aristocrats and soldiers watching his every action, his every word.

  Sometimes, it was intimidating. Sometimes, that weight was the only thing that allowed James to remain calm and maintain the stiff upper lip those ancestors required of him. It might require a mask of overly precise British formality, but it wasn’t like the aliens he was speaking to could register that.

  They’d probably register him screaming bloody murder and death threats.

  He followed the Laian troopers along the gently curving corridors of Tortuga’s inner core, with Ondu Tallas in his own wake. The Tosumi was taking the loss of his bodyguards hard, though it was to the fat alien’s credit that he seemed entirely unbothered by being shot at.

  The corridor terminated at a massive security hatch, a heavy black metal blast door that likely protected either Tortuga’s bridge or a similar nerve center.

  Their exit was about five meters before the hatch, a side door that slid aside to allow them access into a mid-sized conference room that, other than the chairs and the occupants, would have looked perfectly normal anywhere in Sol.

  He recognized the room from Annette’s description of her meeting with High Captain Ridotak and was unsurprised to see that nothing had changed in the layout. Three tables were formed into a rough U shape, and three Laians sat behind the top table.

  The center was the largest of the species he’d ever seen, clad in gold but moving with an exaggerated care James associated with very old humans.

  “Colonel Wellesley,” the High Captain greeted him. “Ondu Arra Tallas. I apologize for your encounter on the way.” The massive beetle-like alien’s pincers were laid carefully on the table, but they twitched angrily as he spoke.

  “We did not expect you to require additional protection,” Ridotak noted. “We did not expect Mahalzi on our station—the Kanzi we see here are more normally smugglers and slavers. Not assassins and commandos.”

  “I am not familiar with these Mahalzi,” James admitted. “Though I now owe them a debt of blood and honor I intend to pay.”

  “They are the Sons of God,” the Laian replied. If James was following correctly, the Laian was expanding the words. Kanzi, after all, meant “Faces of God.”

  “They are elite commandos in the direct service of the First Priest of the Theocracy. For them to strike at you, she must have specifically sent them here to prevent any agent of Dan!Annette Bond from claiming the funds she had stored here.”

  “I
t seems we have made an impression,” James said flatly.

  “Indeed,” Ridotak agreed. “I must note, Colonel, we made no promises for your safety outside the core of the station. While the Mahalzi are not permitted on this station, you remained responsible for your own security.”

  And four of his men and two of Tallas’s were dead. A single Rekiki SSS trooper waited for him at the entrance to the station core, his wounds being treated by the Crew.

  Despite that and Ridotak’s claim of no responsibility, it was the Crew who had saved them. James could be—was!—angry at them, but they had acted.

  “Your intervention is appreciated,” he ground out.

  “Our intervention was self-defense,” the big Laian told him. “We have seen what happens when you Terrans feel threatened, and I did not wish to see the rest of your troops storm my station.”

  “May I summon troops to make certain that Tallas and I return to our respective homes safely?” James asked.

  “You may,” Ridotak allowed. “We will also reinforce your escorts with Crew and have already arranged for your dead to be safely returned to your ship.”

  “Thank you.”

  “Now, you had business with the Crew,” the High Captain noted. “We would permit the Mahalzi at least a partial victory were we to forget. What can the Crew of Tortuga do for you, Colonel?”

  “I am not certain that we needed to speak with you, High Captain,” James told him. “We requested to speak with someone from your banks and were surprised when we were informed we would meet with you.”

  “You are the representatives of an A!Tol Duchy,” Ridotak pointed out. “From our perspective, Colonel, it is far wiser for you to deal with those you already know than for us to allow you to identify others.”

  “We are not here to enforce the Imperium’s laws,” the Colonel replied. “We are here to conclude our business with Tortuga, High Captain, that we may never bother each other again.”

  “You were only permitted to board as your code was valid and you held significant accounts here,” one of the other Laians interrupted. “Any future attempt to visit would be repelled with force.”