by Sara King
“And our slaves are all obtained legally?” Victory demanded.
“Of course.” Then his eyes flickered to the Emp and he said, “Well, most of them.”
Victory ignored that. “There are only a hundred million people on this planet, brother.”
“So?” He seemed perplexed. “The planet is in a state of rebellion. Has been since the occupation.”
“Forty years have gone by since Father landed with his Imperial fleet,” Victory said. “It takes most new Imperates four years to restore order. A few have taken six. Why would the planet still be rebelling after so long, unless there was a root cause behind it?”
Matthias sighed and slumped back into the sofa, staring out over the valley. “That’s what I’ve been trying to figure out.” She knew he was the General Commander of the Imperial Fleet, acting as her father’s right arm in everything military ever since his father had forced him to take the job when he was fourteen.
She also knew that the war had been wearing at him. While his sigil was a sword—chosen for him by his father—and while he inspired a loyalty in his troops that most leaders would give their firstborn children to obtain, he much preferred to wield a pen.
Victory stood up. “I’m going to go figure it out. If you see Father before dinner, give him my warmest regards.”
“Wait!” Matt said, jumping to his feet with her. “It’s been so long since I’ve talked with you. Perhaps you would walk through the gardens with me—”
“Not now,” Victory said. “I have business that needs attending to.”
And then, despite Matthias’s protests, she stalked from the room, dragging her slave with her.
She found the office of the Constable of Numbers deep within the bowels of the palace, near the treasury. When she stepped to the door, the soldiery guarding it stepped quickly aside, their eyes round as they watched her and her entourage pass. This deep in the palace, they probably only saw a Praetorian a few times a year, from a distance. They gave her a wide berth, which was probably a life-saving measure for them, considering Victory’s mood.
The Constable himself was a large, flushed fat man, sitting behind a desk stacked with sheets of numbers and built-in computers. When he saw her, he straightened rigidly, sweat breaking out on his overly-red brow.
“I want to know why my request was not fulfilled,” she growled.
The Constable of Numbers licked his lips and glanced down at the reports on his desk. “Request?” he asked. “What request, Princess?”
“The one that Kiara made at my behest,” Victory snapped, tired of the games.
“Oh, I’m sorry,” he said, looking genuinely perplexed. “There must have been some mistake. I never received a request from your staff.”
“Then do it now,” Victory said. “I’d like to see tax documentation for the native populace of Mercy.”
“I’m sorry, milady,” he said, making a nervous chuckle. “Such a monumental task takes time.”
She smiled at him, though Victory didn’t need the Emp to tell her the man was lying. “How much time?”
“Weeks,” the man said. “Months.”
Victory cocked her head at the Constable, then at the electronics on his desk. “I was under the impression that the numbers I seek are all in electronic format. Burn me a chip. I will take them back to my chambers and sort through them myself.”
He balked, his jowls quivering. He opened and closed his mouth several times before sputtering, “Would that I could, milady, but they are so scattered… What is it you would like to know?” He tried to smile, but his eyes were flickering between her and her Praetorian uneasily.
What is it I want to know? Victoria thought. Was she here simply to prove to herself that the slave had been lying? Or was it something else? She remembered again the scarred man in the hall, who had looked so much like the man who had boarded her ship…
Then she noticed the Constable’s nervous look, the piggish eyes of a cornered boar. He’s hiding something. She narrowed her eyes. “I’d like to see the tax documentation on the native populace of Mercy. Right now.”
His blubber seemed to shake around him with the strain that was working its way across his smile. “I understand your impatience, Princess—I find myself having to wait months for even the preliminary numbers. I assure you—”
Victory took a step closer, squinting down at the papers on his desk.
Then she saw the man lick his scarlet lips, saw him glance at the paperwork on his desk, saw him start to sweat. As if she could not see him, he began slowly sliding the papers aside, slipping them into a folder. “I might be able to find you some taxation records, now that I think about it,” he said slowly. “Let me check my computers.”
“Praetorian,” Victory said softly, “Move him aside.”
“No!” the man jabbered, his jowls jiggling with the effort. He snatched up the folder and held it to his chest. “The records are very sensitive documents, Princess. I would be happy to guide you through them…”
As the man babbled and pled, the Praetorian pulled him away from his workstation.
“And bring me the folder,” Victory said.
The man cried out and tried to fight the Praetorian, which was his mistake. A swift knee to the stomach and he was on the ground, choking. Lion appeared a moment later, the folder in her mailed fist.
Victory took it and opened it.
“Nooo,” the man on the ground wailed to the floor.
Inside, Victory found a sheaf of numbers that immediately made her frown. Most, she knew, couldn’t have read it, because it was in a crude form of code. Her enhanced Royal blood, however, allowed her to analyze and translate the document in a matter of seconds. It showed one of the chef’s assistants due an eight-hundred-thousand credit lump payment—eight times the yearly wage of the Cook himself—the date set for fourteen days hence. The money was to be transferred from the Adjudicator’s personal account, along with fuel and staff costs for a six-day pleasure cruise, to begin in one week.
Father doesn’t take pleasure cruises, she thought, frowning. He was constantly at work, an insomniac who spent all day and night running over facts and figures in his chambers.
“What is this?” she asked, peering at the papers like she was absolutely confused. “These numbers make no sense.”
“It’s just some notes on various accounts, milady,” the man said. “Nothing you would understand.
Victory narrowed her eyes but pretended she hadn’t heard him. Why did her father’s men all seem to underestimate her? The way they acted around her, she was nothing but a feather-headed dimwit who liked to wear emeralds and dress pretty. She looked again at the employee identification number for the eight-hundred-thousand credit payment. She sat down at the Constable’s system and, reading from the paper, put in a search query for the same number.
The last payment to that particular employee had been five years ago. Then another, six years, three months ago.
Victory’s heart began to pound.
“What are you doing?” the Constable cried, trying to wriggle around to see the screen.
“I’m looking up taxation amounts for the native populace of Mercy,” Victory lied, trying to look as calm as possible. “But I’m having trouble… This system is so confusing.” She attempted to open the employee’s file, but when she did, the screen was empty. No picture, no finger-prints, no vital statistics.
“You say you never received a message from Kiara?” Victory asked, backing out of that search and starting a new one.
“No, majesty,” the man whimpered. “I swear she never came to me.”
And Victory believed him. When she opened Kiara’s file, the woman was receiving a stipend far and above anything a butler should make, being paid directly from her father’s account. It had begun approximately one month before Victory’s scheduled flight to the Imperial Academy.
Victory thought again of the day she had found out that Kiara would not be flying with her to t
he Academy, but instead taking another, later flight to rendezvous with her once she had had time to settle in. “It’s my mother,” Kiara had said, tears in her eyes. “She’s dying. Cancer. The doctors tell me it’s incurable, at least for our means. I need to be with her for a month or two, before she goes.”
A growing dread beginning to well up within her, Victory checked the files for Carrie and Jolene.
Both of them were receiving stipends from her father’s account.
Disturbed, furious, Victory searched her brother’s manservants’ accounts. All of them were at least eight years in service, and all of them were receiving monies strictly from her brother’s account.
“If you would only tell me what you’re looking for,” the Constable of Numbers babbled, “I could make your search much easier, Princess.”
Victory did a search for native accounts.
She found four hundred and sixteen registered native taxpayers, all with vast holdings in the several millions of credits.
Frowning, she searched for Imperium citizens.
She found six hundred forty-two thousand and sixteen.
For some time, Victory could only stare at the screen. Thinking perhaps that the peasant accounts were in another section of the system, she initiated another general search by monetary income, starting at the lowest and working her way up.
The list started with Imperium citizens. She found not a single native account within the first three minutes of scrolling down the list.
This can’t be right, she thought. “Tell me, Constable,” she said, “How do I access the native accounts for this planet?”
Quickly, he gave her the method she had already used to obtain the four hundred and sixteen files.
Frowning, Victory said, “And where is the rest of them?”
Silence.
When she looked back, the Constable of Numbers was pale and sweating, slumped between two Praetorian, looking as if he wanted to slink into the wall. “I was ordered not to waste my time with the smaller accounts, Princess. The Imperium collectors are too few and too well-paid to waste their time traveling to villages that might produce, say, a cow, or a handful of chickens. We have to manage our resources, Princess.”
“You have no accounts for natives, aside from these four hundred and sixteen?” she demanded.
“The natives are poor,” the Constable whimpered. “It costs more to record them than they can offer up in taxes.” The tension in his deathly-pale face, however, told her he was lying.
Scowling, now, Victory did a search for the last slave freighter destined for auction on the core planets. Thirty thousand souls. Under each name was the demarcation, DELINQUENT ACCOUNT. Time and time again, the same reason. There were no criminals, no self-bonded men. Regardless of age, sex, or stature, it was ‘Delinquent Account.’ Three-year-olds were cited for tax evasion. Even slaves whose entry under the NAME column was ‘NAME UNKNOWN’ were cited for years of tax fraud.
Eventually, Victory closed the file. To the Constable, she said, “Thank you, I found what I was looking for.”
He hesitated in his babbling, giving her a perplexed look. “You did?”
“Of course,” Victory said, frowning at him. “I was looking for the largest native revenue-center on Mercy. I would like to schedule a visit, to evaluate a possible troop increase that my brother has proposed.”
The man’s relief was so stupidly vivid on his face that it made her gut clench in anger. “Oh, well, why didn’t you say something?” he chattered, his fleshy jowls jiggling. “I could have supplied you with that information without even looking it up.”
So could I, Victory thought, disgustedly. I am of Royal blood, a Second Generation mutogenetic anomaly. I have eleven times the acquisition and storage capacity of your cholesterol-blotted cranium. Not only that, but she had been tutored for fourteen years by the empire’s best historians, scientists, linguists, and accountants. She could probably do this man’s job with more efficiency than he himself could, with decades of experience. The fact that he had underestimated her so thoroughly made a new rage uncurl within her gut. She was the next ruler of Mercy, yet so many of the officials at the palace had treated her as if she were just a poor, delusional kitten. She began to wonder if that, too, was part of her father’s doing.
Still, she smiled pleasantly. “I enjoy being able to do things on my own, though I have to admit all the numbers were so horribly perplexing… I think I found the right one, though. Merephit?”
“Yes,” the Constable cried, his relief thick in his voice. “Merephit. You were looking for Merephit.” He almost sounded like he was reassuring himself.
She cocked her head politely. “Why? What did you think I was looking for?” She smiled through her teeth, still burning with fury at the man’s insulting stupidity.
“Nothing,” the man babbled quickly. “Nothing, Princess. It’s just so odd that you would arrive so soon after…” He caught himself, reddening. His eyes flitted to the desk, then away again, too quickly.
“So soon after what?” she asked. She glanced down at the papers on the desk. She saw her father’s royal seal on the blank remains of a courier message—a ribbon and a wax stamp all that was left of a self-erasing missive. She glanced again at the folder, considered the numbers therein.
A cold chill began working its way up her spine.
“So soon after your return,” the man said. “I was told you were so very sick after your capture…”
Victory felt her mind sharpen. The only ones who are supposed to know that she never made it to the Academy were her Praetorian, her father, her brother, and her maids. The latter, she was told, had given vows of silence on pain of death to keep her secret.
“Yes,” she said slowly, yawning, “I’m still very tired.” She got up, leaving the folder haphazardly open on the desk. She paused, gesturing at the folder. “What did all that mean? It was all very confusing.”
“Your father is scheduling a celebration for your return,” the Constable said. “A pleasure-cruise across the continent.”
Victory forced a smile through the cold feeling in her gut. “How sweet of him! It must be a surprise.”
The man hanging between her Praetorian nodded, panting. “A very nice surprise, very nice, so you cannot tell him or he would simply kill me for ruining it.”
I’ll bet he would, Victory thought darkly. But she made a delighted giggle. If there was anything she had learned from her mother, it was how to act like the stupid airheaded princess in order to relax minds and loosen tongues. “I’ll be sure not to say anything,” she said. “Thank you for your time, Constable.” She gestured at her Praetorian to release him and walked from the room.
Once they were into the hallway, well out of earshot, she told Lion, “I believe there is going to be another attempt on my life, sometime within the next two weeks.”
Still walking at her side, the Praetorian stiffened. “Another, milady?”
“From what I just found in the accountant’s files, my capture was not an accident. A nameless individual was paid, very handsomely, days after my disappearance. That same individual was paid about four days after my mother passed. And the Constable of Numbers is planning another payment to him, fourteen days hence.”
Lion stiffened and turned, obviously intent on going back and arresting the Constable.
Victory caught her arm. “He takes his orders from my father. The money came directly from his personal accounts each time.”
Lion went pale. Then her face hardened. “I will increase the guard. You will not leave your room. You—”
“My father has already paid for a pleasure-cruise in my honor,” Victory said. “I will be ordered to attend, I’m sure.”
Lion frowned. “I have not been told of a pleasure-cruise.”
Remembering the royal missive on the Constable’s desk, Victory said, “It was scheduled today, immediately after my chat with him.”
For a long moment, Lion looked torn between se
eking out her father and ending the problem and going back to the Constable anyway and arresting him for interrogation.
“You will act normally,” Victory said.
“I will be increasing the guard,” Lion said stubbornly. “Eight on at a time.”
“It must not look as if I suspect,” Victory said, “or he will merely set a different date.”
Lion’s face was hard. “I will come up with some plausible excuse.” Then she hesitated. “But milady… If the Adjudicator wants you dead, you are not safe in this building.”
Victory gave a disgusted snort. “If he wants me dead, I’m not safe anywhere within the Imperium.”
“Then what will you do?” Lion asked.
“The Adjudicator is a criminal,” Victory said. “I’m going to stay alive long enough to prove it.”
She ate dinner at her father’s table, and ordered a bowl of pig slops for her slave. To her surprise, he didn’t complain. When he wrinkled his nose and asked for help to eat it, however, she ignored him. It was the delight of many of her father’s dinner-guests to watch his antics as he tried to bend over far enough to eat his slops without falling into it, face-first.
She watched the slave’s face burn, watched his body stiffen at their laughter, but throughout it all, he never complained. He simply ate his dinner, then sat back, staring at the floor, waiting for her to finish.
Several times throughout the night, Victory caught her father watching her. Each time, the darkness in his face left a cold spot in her soul before she pretended to turn her attention to a nearby conversation.
By the time Victory finally made it to her room, her anger had all but washed away under her father’s ominous stare, and without its strength to propel her, she felt deflated, hollow.
He’s going to kill me, Victory thought, the cold truth settling into the pit of her stomach like a stone. Just like he killed Mother.
Suddenly, the enormity of what she had done came crashing down around her, and her world seemed to collapse under its weight. She looked to her slave, who had quietly stood near the center of the room in silence, then to the door and the Praetorian beyond, the only things standing between her and an assassin in her sleep.
