“Well, tell me about it, son. It isn’t anything about you and Olva, is it?”
Rod was fourteen; the little Princess Olva thirteen. They would be marriageable in six years. As far as anybody could tell, they were both quite happy about the marriage which had been arranged for them years ago.
“Oh, no; nothing like that. But Olva’s sister and a couple others of mother’s ladies-in-waiting were to a psi-medium, and the medium told them that there were going to be changes. Great and frightening changes was what she said.”
“She didn’t specify?”
“No. Just that: great and frightening changes. But the only change of that kind I can think of would be…well, something happening to you.”
Snooks, having eaten three wafers, was trying to lick his ear. He pushed the little dog back into his lap and pummeled him gently with his left hand.
“You mustn’t let mediums’ gabble worry you, son. These psi-mediums have real powers, but they can’t turn them off and on like a water tap. When they don’t get anything, they don’t like to admit it, and they invent things. Always generalities like that; never anything specific.”
“I know all that.” The boy seemed offended, as though somebody were explaining that his mother hadn’t really found him out in the rose garden. “But they talked about it to some of their friends, and it seems that other mediums are saying the same thing. Father, do you remember when the Haval Valley reactor blew up? All over Odin, the mediums had been talking about a terrible accident, for a month before that happened.”
“I remember that.” Harv Dorflay believed that somebody had been falsely informed that the emperor would visit the plant that day. “These great and frightening changes will probably turn out to be a new fad in abstract sculpture. Any change frightens most people.”
They talked more about mediums, and then about aircars and aircar racing, and about the Emperor’s Cup race that was to be flown in a month. The communications screen began flashing and buzzing, and after he had silenced it with the busy-button for the third time, Rodrik said that it was time for him to go, came around to gather up Snooks, and went out, saying that he’d be home in time for the banquet. The screen began to flash again as he went out.
* * * *
It was Prince Ganzay, the Prime Minister. He looked as though he had a persistent low-level toothache, but that was his ordinary expression.
“Sorry to bother Your Majesty. It’s about these chiefs-of-state. Count Gadvan, the Chamberlain, appealed to me, and I feel I should ask your advice. It’s the matter of precedence.”
“Well, we have a fixed rule on that. Which one arrived first?”
“Why, the Adityan, but it seems King Ranulf insists that he’s entitled to precedence, or, rather, his Lord Marshal does. This Lord Koreff insists that his king is not going to yield precedence to a commoner.”
“Then he can go home to Durendal!” He felt himself growing angry—all the little angers of the morning were focusing on one spot. He forced the harshness out of his voice. “At a court function, somebody has to go first, and our rule is order of arrival at the Palace. That rule was established to avoid violating the principle of equality to all civilized peoples and all planetary governments. We’re not going to set it aside for the King of Durendal, or anybody else.”
Prince Ganzay nodded. Some of the toothache expression had gone out of his face, now that he had been relieved of the decision.
“Of course, Your Majesty.” He brightened a little. “Do you think we might compromise? Alternate the precedence, I mean?”
“Only if this First Citizen Yaggo consents. If he does, it would be a good idea.”
“I’ll talk to him, sir.” The toothache expression came back. “Another thing, Your Majesty. They’ve both been invited to attend the Plenary Session, this afternoon.”
“Well, no trouble there; they can enter by different doors and sit in visitors’ boxes at opposite ends of the hall.”
“Well, sir, I wasn’t thinking of precedence. But this is to be an Elective Session—new Ministers to replace Prince Havaly, of Defense, deceased, and Count Frask, of Science and Technology, elevated to the Bench. There seems to be some difference of opinion among some of the Ministers and Counselors. It’s very possible that the Session may degenerate into an outright controversy.”
“Horrible,” Paul said seriously. “I think, though, that our distinguished guests will see that the Empire can survive difference of opinion, and even outright controversy. But if you think it might have a bad effect, why not postpone the election?”
“Well—It’s been postponed three times, already, sir.”
“Postpone it permanently. Advertise for bids on two robot Ministers, Defense, and Science and Technology. If they’re a success, we can set up a project to design a robot emperor.”
The Prime Minister’s face actually twitched and blanched at the blasphemy. “Your Majesty is joking,” he said, as though he wanted to be reassured on the point.
“Unfortunately, I am. If my job could be robotized, maybe I could take my wife and my son and our little dog and go fishing for a while.”
But, of course, he couldn’t. There were only two alternatives: the Empire or Galactic anarchy. The galaxy was too big to hold general elections, and there had to be a supreme ruler, and a positive and automatic—which meant hereditary—means of succession.
“Whose opinion seems to differ from whose, and about what?” he asked.
“Well, Count Duklass and Count Tammsan want to have the Ministry of Science and Technology abolished, and its functions and personnel distributed. Count Duklass means to take over the technological sections under Economics, and Count Tammsan will take over the science part under Education. The proposal is going to be introduced at this Session by Count Guilfred, the Minister of Health and Sanity. He hopes to get some of the bio-and psycho-science sections for his own Ministry.”
“That’s right. Duklass gets the hide, Tammsan gets the head and horns, and everybody who hunts with them gets a cut of the meat. That’s good sound law of the chase. I’m not in favor of it, myself. Prince Ganzay, at this session, I wish you’d get Captain-General Dorflay nominated for the Bench. I feel that it is about time to honor him with elevation.”
“General Dorflay? But why, Your Majesty?”
“Great galaxy, do you have to ask? Why, because the man’s a raving lunatic. He oughtn’t even to be trusted with a sidearm, let alone five companies of armed soldiers. Do you know what he told me this morning?”
“That somebody is training a Nidhog swamp-crawler to crawl up the Octagon Tower and bite you at breakfast, I suppose. But hasn’t that been going on for quite a while, sir?”
“It was a gimmick in one of the cooking robots, but that’s aside from the question. He’s finally named the master mind behind all these nightmares of his, and who do you think it is? Yorn Travann!”
* * * *
The Prime Minister’s face grew graver than usual. Well, it was something to look grave about; some of these days——
“Your Majesty, I couldn’t possibly agree more about the general’s mental condition, but I really should say that, crazy or not, he is not alone in his suspicions of Prince Travann. If sharing them makes me a lunatic, too, so be it, but share them I do.”
Paul felt his eyebrows lift in surprise. “That’s quite too much and too little, Prince Ganzay,” he said.
“With your permission, I’ll elaborate. Don’t think that I suspect Prince Travann of any childish pranks with elevators or viewscreens or cooking-robots,” the Prime Minister hastened to disclaim, “but I definitely do suspect him of treasonous ambitions. I suppose Your Majesty knows that he is the first Minister of Security in centuries who has assumed personal control of both the planetary and municipal police, instead of delegating his ex officio powers.
“Your Majesty may not know, however, of some of the peculiar uses he has been making of those authorities. Does Your Majesty know that he has recru
ited the Security Guard up to at least ten times the strength needed to meet any conceivable peace-maintenance problem on this planet, and that he has been piling up huge quantities of heavy combat equipment—guns up to 200-millimeter, heavy contragravity, even gun-cutters and bomb-and-rocket boats? And does Your Majesty know that most of this armament is massed within fifteen minutes’ flight-time of this Palace? Or that Prince Travann has at his disposal from two and a half to three times, in men and firepower, the combined strength of the Planetary Militia and the Imperial Army on this planet?”
“I know. It has my approval. He’s trying to salvage some of the young nonworkers through exposing them to military discipline. A good many of them, I believe, have gone off-planet on their discharge from the SG and hired as mercenaries, which is a far better profession than vote selling.”
“Quite a plausible explanation: Prince Travann is nothing if not plausible,” the Prime Minister agreed. “And does Your Majesty know that, because of repeated demands for support from the Ministry of Security, the Imperial Navy has been scattered all over the Empire, and that there is not a naval craft bigger than a scout-boat within fifteen hundred light-years of Odin?”
That was absolutely true. Paul could only nod agreement. Prince Ganzay continued:
“He has been doing some peculiar things as Police Chief of Asgard, too. For instance, there are two powerful nonworkers’ voting-bloc bosses, Big Moogie Blisko and Zikko the Nose—I assure Your Majesty that I am not inventing these names; that’s what the persons are actually called—who have been enjoying the favor and support of Prince Travann. On a number of occasions, their smaller rivals, leaders of less important gangs, have been arrested, often on trumped-up charges, and held incommunicado until either Moogie or Zikko could move into their territories and annex their nonworker followers. These two bloc-bosses are subsidized, respectively, by the Steel and Shipbuilding Cartels and by the Reaction Products and Chemical Cartels, but actually, they are controlled by Prince Travann. They, in turn, control between them about seventy per cent of the nonworkers in Asgard.”
“And you think this adds up to a plot against the Throne?”
“A plot to seize the Throne, Your Majesty.”
“Oh, come, Prince Ganzay! You’re talking like Dorflay!”
“Hear me out, Your Majesty. His Imperial Highness is fourteen years old; it will be eleven years before he will be legally able to assume the powers of emperor. In the dreadful event of your immediate death, it would mean a regency for that long. Of course, your Ministers and Counselors would be the ones to name the Regent, but I know how they would vote with Security Guard bayonets at their throats. And regency might not be the limit of Prince Travann’s ambitions.”
“In your own words, quite plausible, Prince Ganzay. It rests, however, on a very questionable foundation. The assumption that Prince Travann is stupid enough to want the Throne.”
He had to terminate the conversation himself and blank the screen. Viktor Ganzay was still staring at him in shocked incredulity when his image vanished. Viktor Ganzay could not imagine anybody not wanting the Throne, not even the man who had to sit on it.
* * * *
He sat, for a while, looking at the darkened screen, a little worried. Viktor Ganzay had a much better intelligence service than he had believed. He wondered how much Ganzay had found out that he hadn’t mentioned. Then he went back to the reports. He had gotten down to the Ministry of Fine Arts when the communications screen began calling attention to itself again.
When he flipped the switch, a woman smiled out of it at him. Her blond hair was rumpled, and she wore a dressing gown; her smile brightened as his face appeared in her screen.
“Hi!” she greeted him.
“Hi, yourself. You just get up?”
She raised a hand to cover a yawn. “I’ll bet you’ve been up reigning for hours. Were Rod and Snooks in to see you yet?”
He nodded. “They just left. Rod’s going on a picnic with Olva in the mountains.” How long had it been since he and Marris had been on a picnic—a real picnic, with less than fifty guards and as many courtiers along? “Do you have much reigning to do, this afternoon?”
She grimaced. “Flower Festivals. I have to make personal tri-di appearances, live, with messages for the loving subjects. Three minutes on, and a two-minute break between. I have forty for this afternoon.”
“Ugh! Well, have a good time, sweetheart. All I have is lunch with the Bench, and then this Plenary Session.” He told her about Ganzay’s fear of outright controversy.
“Oh, fun! Maybe somebody’ll pull somebody’s whiskers, or something. I’m in on that, too.”
The call-indicator in front of him began glowing with the code-symbol of the Minister of Security.
“We can always hope, can’t we? Well, Yorn Travann’s trying to get me, now.”
“Don’t keep him waiting. Maybe I can see you before the Session.” She made a kissing motion with her lips at him, and blanked the screen.
He flipped the switch again, and Prince Travann was on the screen. The Security Minister didn’t waste time being sorry to bother him.
“Your Majesty, a report’s just come in that there’s a serious riot at the University; between five and ten thousand students are attacking the Administration Center, lobbing stench bombs into it, and threatening to hang Chancellor Khane. They have already overwhelmed and disarmed the campus police, and I’ve sent two companies of the Gendarme riot brigade, under an officer I can trust to handle things firmly but intelligently. We don’t want any indiscriminate stunning or tear-gassing or shooting; all sorts of people can have sons and daughters mixed up in a student riot.”
“Yes. I seem to recall student riots in which the sons of his late Highness Prince Travann and his late Majesty Rodrik XXI were involved.” He deliberated the point for a moment, and added: “This scarcely sounds like a frat-fight or a panty-raid, though. What seems to have triggered it?”
“The story I got—a rather hysterical call for help from Khane himself—is that they’re protesting an action of his in dismissing a faculty member. I have a couple of undercovers at the University, and I’m trying to contact them. I sent more undercovers, who could pass for students, ahead of the Gendarmes to get the student side of it and the names of the ring-leaders.” He glanced down at the indicator in front of him, which had begun to glow. “If you’ll pardon me, sir, Count Tammsan’s trying to get me. He may have particulars. I’ll call Your Majesty back when I learn anything more.”
* * * *
There hadn’t been anything like that at the University within the memory of the oldest old grad. Chancellor Khane, he knew, was a stupid and arrogant old windbag with a swollen sense of his own importance. He made a small bet with himself that the whole thing was Khane’s fault, but he wondered what lay behind it, and what would come out of it. Great plagues from little microbes start. Great and frightening changes——
The screen got itself into an uproar, and he flipped the switch. It was Viktor Ganzay again. He looked as though his permanent toothache had deserted him for the moment.
“Sorry to bother Your Majesty, but it’s all fixed up,” he reported. “First Citizen Yaggo agreed to alternate in precedence with King Ranulf, and Lord Koreff has withdrawn all his objections. As far as I can see, at present, there should be no trouble.”
“Fine. I suppose you heard about the excitement at the University?”
“Oh, yes, Your Majesty. Disgraceful affair!”
“Simply shocking. What seems to have started it, have you heard?” he asked. “All I know is that the students were protesting the dismissal of a faculty member. He must have been exceptionally popular, or else he got a more than ordinary raw deal from Khane.”
“Well, as to that, sir, I can’t say. All I learned was that it was the result of some faculty squabble in one of the science departments; the grounds for the dismissal were insubordination and contempt for authority.”
“I always thoug
ht that when authority began inspiring contempt, it had stopped being authority. Did you say science? This isn’t going to help Duklass and Tammsan any.”
“I’m afraid not, Your Majesty.” Ganzay didn’t look particularly regretful. “The News Cartel’s gotten hold of it and are using it; it’ll be all over the Empire.”
He said that as though it meant something. Well, maybe it did; a lot of Ministers and almost all the Counselors spent most of their time worrying about what people on planets like Chermosh and Zarathustra and Deirdre and Quetzalcoatl might think, in ignorance of the fact that interest in Empire politics varied inversely as the square of the distance to Odin and the level of corruption and inefficiency of the local government.
“I notice you’ll be at the Bench luncheon. Do you think you could invite our guests, too? We could have an informal presentation before it starts. Can do? Good. I’ll be seeing you there.”
When the screen was blanked, he returned to the reports, ran them off hastily to make sure that nothing had been red-starred, and called a robot to clear the projector. After a while, Prince Travann called again.
“Sorry to bother Your Majesty, but I have most of the facts on the riot, now. What happened was that Chancellor Khane sacked a professor, physics department, under circumstances which aroused resentment among the science students. Some of them walked out of class and went to the stadium to hold a protest meeting, and the thing snowballed until half the students were in it. Khane lost his head and ordered the campus police to clear the stadium; the students rushed them and swamped them. I hope, for their sakes, that none of my men ever let anything like that happen. The man I sent, a Colonel Handrosan, managed to talk the students into going back to the stadium and continuing the meeting under Gendarme protection.”
“Sounds like a good man.”
“Very good, Your Majesty. Especially in handling disturbances. I have complete confidence in him. He’s also investigating the background of the affair. I’ll give Your Majesty what he’s learned, to date. It seems that the head of the physics department, a Professor Nelse Dandrik, had been conducting an experiment, assisted by a Professor Klenn Faress, to establish more accurately the velocity of subnucleonic particles, beta micropositos, I believe. Dandrik’s story, as relayed to Handrosan by Khane, is that he reached a limit and the apparatus began giving erratic results.”
The H. Beam Piper Megapack Page 104
