The Rifter's Covenant

by Sherwood Smith

  The Kelly extended their head-stalks again. Was that embarrassment?

  “Wethree have nothing more.” The Intermittor bowed gracefully toward Elena Agenes. “But you have another question?”

  She had the grace to look abashed. “You have always been carefully neutral in our affairs. Why change now?”

  “We forbore to interfere because we dared not give offense to any group of humans, lest they, gaining power in your polity so strange to us, should turn against us. Your history shows that humans have often exterminated other humans who differed slightly from them. How much more had we to fear, being so very alien? Had it not been for the Blessed Three, First Contact might have meant the end of Anamnesis. But now we see a human ungoverned by morality, grasping power; we have heard him speak of us as ‘beasts;’ we have seen the fate intended for us. From the Panarchy we might have fled. From the power of the Suneater there is no refuge.”

  The Kelly trinity moaned again, a heart-rending sound. “We have no choice.”

  Bonxer’s head came up: the others clearly comprehended the emotion, but only he understood that simple we, unlike the wethree that Kelly for individual trinities, as representing the entire Kelly race. “And nothing will ever be the same again.”

  “True.” Cameron lifted his voice, drawing everyone’s attention. “And right now, we have to decide how we’re going to collect the bonus chips on Hreem the Faithless and Neyvla-khan, which is why my cousin and her mates are here.”

  He tabbed his console and lit up the plot-pane with a view of the Barca system, zooming in on the planet and its two moons, Shimosa and Avasta. “Cousin,” he said, stressing the word, “we’ve just gotten Siglnt back from Barca. Tell us what you know and how we can exploit it.”

  She stood. “One thing first.”

  Cameron suppressed a smile. Lochiel might be nearing fifty, but she still had the habit of sticking out her lower lip, a habit from their childhood that signaled the stubbornness that had caused her so much trouble.

  She looked around the room. “We’re Rifters. That’s not going to change, even after this is all over. We don’t fit into your neat, ordered world, and don’t want to. But we played fair, and you left room for us. Dol’jhar doesn’t and won’t. If the Lord of Vengeance wins, there will be no Rift Sodality, for he recognizes no limits on his power.” She stepped up to the plot-pane. “That’s why we’re doing this. It’s not a betrayal—it’s simply the only way we can remain loyal to who we are. Are we understood?”

  The officers—not a few stealing glances at the Kelly—signified agreement.

  “Then here’s what we know.”

  FLOWER OF LITH: BARCA SYSTEM

  “Shuttle away, Cap’n,” announced a voice from the portside lock.

  Norio observed from the aft hatch, unnoticed as yet by anyone on the bridge, as Hreem acknowledged the report with a grunt and slapped the comm off. A shiver of anticipation wormed deep inside Norio.

  Dyasil scratched his raspy chin. “You figure that little trog’s really got a chance down there?”

  “If he doesn’t we’re no worse off, and we get to watch him bloat,” Metije said, the deathsnake tattoo on her neck rippling as she grinned.

  Hreem grunted again, flexing one foot to extend the heel-claws of his boot. That silenced the crew. Norio breathed in Hreem’s irritation and the corresponding anxiety of the crew and stepped onto the bridge, relishing the unease and even fear his presence engendered in everyone except Hreem. Power was the best aphrodisiac of all.

  Hreem looked his way, briefly distracted, then returned to brooding. His mood had been grim ever since the destruction of the unfinished battlecruiser in the Malachronte Ways. The Barcan Riolo had promised to convince the Matria to give Hreem Ogres, the battle androids used with such fearsome effect against the Shiidra, but he was beginning to doubt that promise.

  If the little Barcan with his absurd codpiece didn’t deliver, the poison collar would finish him off, and furnish a bit of amusement into the bargain. Hreem liked contemplating that, and—sensing his emotions—Norio hoped that if that were to be Riolo’s fate, he would make it back to the Lith before the collar killed him. The rest of the crew might enjoy watching his death throes on a vid, but to Norio, that would be as tasteless as a verbal description of a fine meal, and Hreem would feel cheated.

  The fiveskip blipped again, changing the Lith’s position randomly to avoid giving the Barcans a fix on them. Hreem’s tension peaked, then relaxed as Metije reported, “Fiveskip holding, Captain.” The frequent short skips were hard on the engines.

  The captain grimaced at the viewscreen as it cleared from skip. The Lith was a few thousand kilometers outside the orbit of the outermost moon of Barca, which hung gibbous to one side of the screen. The moon vanished as the stars skewed across the screen, stopping with a needle of light dead center, the real focus of the Rifter captain’s emotions.

  As if summoned by his regard, Dyasil’s console bleeped.

  “Signal incoming from Scorpion.”

  “Scorpion?” Hreem repeated.

  Dyasil’s shoulderblades worked under his thin shirt. “New destroyer. But it’s him.”

  Hreem’s mouth quirked, and Norio’s nerves flashed in echo of Hreem’s flash of amusement. The crew had learned not to mention Neyvla-khan’s name around him, especially since his arrival here at Barrodagh’s orders had locked them into a paralyzing three-way balance of terror, with the heavy weapons the Barcans claimed to have on the moons balancing the two Rifter fleets.

  “That stinking slug Barrodagh,” Hreem had said to him the previous night as they lay together in the aftermath of passion. “I wonder if Eusabian’d trade him for the Ogres?” Norio shivered deliciously at the thought: there was so much he could do with the Bori, survivor of years of political struggle on Dol’jhar. What a feast of emotions his downfall would be!

  Hreem started to speak, but Erbee interrupted.

  “Cap’n, Scorpion’s accelerating. I think he’s heading lower.”

  Trying to get the inside orbit, of course. And no doubt worried about the shuttle. The situation in circum-Barcan space was enormously complicated, especially with the moons now approaching opposition. The two opposing Rifter fleets constantly maneuvered for lower orbits between the two moons, outside the resonance field that interdicted fiveskip. In those orbits, ships passed between the outer moon and the planet more often, where the Barcans would have to put the Shield up before firing at them from either moon. That would give ample warning of their intentions—both the fleets feared an alliance between Barca and their rival.

  Worse than that was the growing doubt that there were such weapons; but neither Hreem nor Neyvla-khan could afford to put that to the test. The result was a tension that increasingly blanketed all other emotions on the Lith, making Norio twitchy.

  “Put him on, Dyasil,” said Hreem.

  The screen blinked, and there was Hreem’s deadly enemy, Khamhat Neyvla-khan. Hreem’s jaw muscles bulged at the unctuous smile already on the other man’s face. Norio breathed in Hreem’s hatred, an emotion heightened, he knew, by the other’s neat, close-trimmed beard and pale, narrow face that gave him the appearance of an aristocratic ascetic.

  Neyvla-khan had not waited for the cee-lag of the tight-beam—neither of them wanted Barrodagh listening in on their conversations via hyperwave, coded or not. “Brother Hreem. I thought we had agreed to take no actions without consultation.”

  “Brother Shiidra-Suck,” Hreem muttered. Neyvla-khan’s use of Sodality formality merely underscored the long-standing feud between them. Hreem forced an equally false smile. “We agreed to take no offensive action, pending the Barcan negotiations with Dol’jhar. Unfortunately one of my crew was a fugitive from Barcan justice, and I judged it wise to surrender him as they demanded.”

  Norio used the ensuing delay to step behind the command pod and lay his hands on Hreem’s shoulder, probing for the shakrian points. The captain’s muscles had set to the rigidity o
f stone. Norio smiled at the screen.

  “Hmmm. Hah. I see.” Neyvla-khan’s skeptical twitch of the upper lip said liar. His gaze slid away from Norio’s. “Well, then, surely you will not object to a minor course adjustment?”

  Hreem’s jet of amusement warmed Norio, who hummed at the slight relaxation in the muscles under his hands. The captain had noticed Neyvla-khan’s discomfiture as well. “Not at all, Brother. In fact, it would be our honor to escort you.”

  Hreem forgot Norio as he tabbed off the communicator and began issuing orders. The Lith skipped again, and the main viewscreen gradually filled with windows, echoing the complicated tactical moves he’d ordered to maintain the balance of exposure to the Barcan weapons, without yielding the superior position of an inner orbit to his rival.

  He began to relax under Norio’s steady massage as the new tactical position of his fleet took shape without incident. They hadn’t gained anything on Neyvla-khan, but they hadn’t lost anything, either—and the two fleets were evenly matched.

  Hreem tensed, remembering unfinished business. “Where’s that chatzing Lochiel?” he grumbled. “She’s two days overdue.” With another destroyer, the balance of power would be his, especially with the advantage of surprise. “Dyasil!”

  “I’m squirtin’ pulses outsystem whenever I can without any of Neyvla-khan’s gang seeing ’em. But it’s gonna be hard for her to tightbeam us back with all the skipping we’re doing.”

  Hreem pounded his fist lightly on the command pod. That was the weak spot in his plan, which he’d overlooked when he dispatched Lochiel to Charterly’s cache to pick up what weapons she could. If she contacted him via a ship, Neyvla-khan would get suspicious. But how would she manage to signal him? The Lith was never in one spot very long, and its course was random—it had to be. A tightbeam would probably miss them, and Neyvla-khan would see a broadbeam com—it wouldn’t matter that he couldn’t read it.

  Norio’s narrow hands probed harder at the pressure points in his shoulders, and Hreem tried to relax.

  “You will find a way, Jala,” the tempath said softly. “And perhaps Riolo will come through for us.”

  On the screen, a last, solitary ship passed the orbit of Barca’s outer moon, heading inward. Now both fleets were within its compass.

  Hreem issued more orders, more to have something to do than out of any tactical necessity.

  Norio felt him relaxing further, then two blips of light ignited on the screen. No, three—a red light blinked on the outer moon as well. They formed the apices of an equilateral triangle, centered on the planet.

  Hreem sat upright with a startled oath. “What the chatzing hell is that?” He poised his hand over the skip pad, but the light in it died. Erbee’s skinny hands blurred on his scan console.

  “Metije! Where’s the skip?” Sweat prickled on Hreem’s brow.

  “Resonance pulse, Captain,” Erbee interrupted. “They just popped the resonance field out to the outer moon.”

  “Chatzing generators—why didn’t you—” Hreem began,

  Erbee shook his head violently. “Nobody knew about ’em. We got no skip. They got us. They got us all.” Erbee’s voice scaled up high and raw.

  Norio vibrated harshly as he breathed in the mountain of terror on the bridge. Hreem shook him off, a pulse of irritation at Norio’s pleasure. He is what he is. “Carcason!” Hreem glared at the navigator. “Get us out of here!”

  As the Flower of Lith accelerated, turning away from the planet and heading back toward translunar space, Dyasil’s console bleeped again.

  “Message incoming from Barca.”

  Hreem bit down on an oath. “Put the chatzers on.” When the head and shoulders of a Barcan troglodyte windowed up, Hreem snarled, “The Lord of Vengeance’ll slag your chatzing planet down to the core for pulling something like this. We’ll—”

  The Barcan had not waited for the light-speed delay to begin speaking. “Captain, we mean you no harm, but during our negotiations with the Lord Eusabian, we cannot permit ships armed with skipmissiles to remain in orbit around Barca. So, since you cannot leave . . .” Here Hreem’s tirade reached him and he held up his hands placatingly without pausing “...being under the orders of the Avatar as we understand, we have disabled your skipmissiles.” He smiled thinly. “And your fiveskips. Do not, I beg you, attempt to leave the resonance field. The consequences will not be to your liking.”

  The window blanked and dwindled away, revealing a view of space once more. A faint dot of light denoted a ship racing for the edge of the resonance field.

  “Scourge of God,” Erbee said, identifying it as one of Hreem’s ships, posted to him from the remnants of Charterly’s fleet.

  A thread of light lanced from the outer moon and transfixed the fleeing ship, which vanished in a glare of light that overloaded the screen. When it cleared, the view revealed a misshapen clot of flaring plasma fleeing into translunar space.

  “Hell,” Erbee breathed, his buck teeth prominent as his mouth hung open. “Cap’n, the aperture on that lazplaz must’ve been at least ten meters.”

  Hreem’s shoulders slumped. Only a battlecruiser could stand up to a weapon that size; a destroyer’s shields would be precisely as effective as a used ass-wipe. “Carcason,” he said heavily, “maintain an orbit within the resonance field. Keep us away from the edge.”

  Norio dared not touch him in this mood; anything could trigger a volcanic rage that even he himself might suffer from.

  Dyasil’s console signaled another message.

  The screen windowed up Neyvla-khan, his eyes angry, but a hard, tight smile of triumph curling his thin lips. “My condolences on the loss of your ally, Brother Hreem. I sincerely hope—”

  Another window popped up. It was the Barcan again. “Captain Hreem, we would not have you think we play favorites.”

  Another slug of near-lightspeed plasma, its energy focused by a coaxial beam of coherent light, reached out from the moon, and Neyvla-khan hissed with rage as one of his ships vanished in a flare of light.

  Norio felt Hreem’s joy at his enemy’s discomfiture suddenly push him back into the familiar anger he used to energize himself. “Dyasil, get me Barrodagh,” Hreem yelled, as on the viewscreen, Neyvla-khan turned away from the image and issued a similar command. Then the com from Scorpion cut off.

  He drummed on his pod arm, ignoring Norio’s tentative touch, until the sallow, lined features of Eusabian’s lieutenant appeared.

  Hreem started shouting. Barrodagh winced. “Shut up,” he said flatly. His cheek twitched, pulling one corner of his mouth up momentarily.

  Startled by Barrodagh’s strange demeanor and the utter lack of respect, Hreem fell silent.

  After a few terse questions, Barrodagh brought his coded link to Neyvla-khan into another window, and demanded the Barcan official be linked into the conversation, too. A strange, lop-sided conversation ensued, the combination of hyperwave instantaneity between Barrodagh and the two Rifter ships combining with the differing light-speed lag to Barca via tight-beam from each ship creating a confusing echo effect.

  Hreem leaned out to demand that Dyasil filter the channels to make the four-way, five-link conversation less confusing, but Norio’s hands dug into his shoulders with surprising force.

  The tempath bent close to Hreem’s ear, whispering softly. “He’s letting you see all of this to keep you off-balance.”

  Hreem leaned back stiffly and seethed as Barrodagh questioned the Barcan. He didn’t dare cut off Neyvla-khan’s channel to kill the echo lest his foe slip something past him to Barrodagh. That’s just what the ugly little chatzer wanted.

  “But you see, serach Barrodagh, that we targeted only two ships, and those the smallest, that we judged least likely to be equipped with your Urian weapons. If we erred in that, we will pay reparations upon the conclusion of our negotiations.”

  Barrodagh dipped his head. “Hreem, Neyvla-khan, maintain your positions. I will notify you of our decision.”

 
His face vanished. The Barcan smirked before cutting his tight-beam.

  Hreem and Neyvla-khan stared at each other. Hreem wasn’t about to spar with his enemy over the hyperwave, and he was too tired to re-establish a tight-beam.

  It was going to be a very long orbit.

  FIVE

  GROZNIY

  “Emergence.”

  The navigator’s voice blending with the emergence bells brought Captain Margot Ng out of memories that she was as glad to abandon.

  “Ares primary plus 8 light-minutes, system 80 mark 32. Velocity point-zero-one-five, vectored on Ares.”

  Already sitting straight-backed with tension in the command pod, Ng forced her shoulders to relax. “Communications, pulse Ares with our arrival code.”

  At the communications console Sub-Lieutenant Ammant tapped at the send key, his handsome profile conveying a controlled ferocity that expressed the tension gripping the bridge.

  Despite the almost continuous whirlwind of danger, tragedy, and triumph that Ng had lived through in recent months, the next few minutes seemed the longest of her life. In twelve hours she would be delivering the new Panarch of the Thousand Suns to his last remaining stronghold, Ares Station. But Ares was no longer the smoothly functioning pole of power it had been before the Dol’jharian attack that had overthrown the government and blasted the Thousand Suns into chaos. Refugees from every octant had flooded in, transforming Ares into a maelstrom of intrigue and deceit as Douloi and Polloi alike struggled to maintain their positions, or profit from the downfall of others. It could only have gotten worse in the weeks they had been away.

  “Even fewer degrees of freedom than Gehenna system, eh?” Startled, Ng turned to her executive officer, Commander Krajno.

  “Am I that obvious, Perthes?”

  The commander’s craggy face creased in a smile. “Any XO who can’t read his captain’s mind isn’t worth a pitcher of warm spit.” He gestured at the screen, now showing a view of the distant war base, a glint of light above the limb of a red giant star. “You’re going to be in the middle of that, and even more constrained than we were against the Samedi.” He grimaced. “Precious short on precedent, as well.”