by David Gunn
One arm is draped over the back of the seat.
The fact he’s watching to see if I’ve noticed doesn’t help. Although it’s the fact his other hand rests lightly on Aptitude’s wrist, and she’s sitting very still indeed, and pretending not to mind, that makes me want to wring his neck.
Only he is Debro’s guest. She’d object. People like Debro always do.
‘Going for a walk,’ I tell them. ‘See you in a minute.’
Pushing back a rattan chair, I check my pockets for cigars and sling my holster over my shoulder rather than belt it round my waist. The SIG stays silent. But you can bet it’s got an opinion on everything that’s happened so far.
‘I’ll join you,’ the Wolf says.
Anton and Debro look at each other.
‘It’s a free world. Sir.’
Actually, it isn’t. But to point that out is treason. So I smile, while he pretends to take my comment at face value. And I stand back; to show the steps down to the gardens are his. A quick push and we’d have the problem solved.
‘Sven . . .’ says Debro.
Yes, I know.
Behave.
*
Luc takes a cigar and my offer of flame without comment. Leaning against the back of a bench, in the shadow of a twisted cork tree, he manages to look both relaxed and dangerous. He has the confidence of someone who’s never lost a fight.
I have.
I’d like to say I learn from mistakes. It’s probably bullshit. The only thing I learn is to repeat them more inventively next time. Turns out the Wolf wants to talk about my losing my arm.
At least, that’s how he starts our conversation.
‘What happened?’
‘A ferox, sir.’
General Luc checks I’m not mocking him. ‘You escaped from the clutches of a ferox?’
‘Killed it.’
Now he’s really looking.
‘It was old,’ I say. ‘Almost dead. It took my arm and I took its head. Carried the damn thing back with me through the desert. Needed proof I hadn’t injured myself intentionally.’ Self-inflicted injuries are a capital offence in the Legion.
‘You were a sergeant?’
That tells me he knew who I was before Anton introduced us.
‘Ex-sergeant, sir. I got busted for punching an officer.’
Another capital offence. So now he knows there’s more to the story than I’m saying. Otherwise I wouldn’t still be alive. ‘Out there,’ the Wolf says, ‘is a crashed cargo carrier.’
‘So you said.’
‘Unlicensed. You know the penalty?’
‘Death, I imagine. That’s the penalty for everything round here.’
General Luc scowls. ‘Exactly. Could you protect a family who found themselves charged with such a crime?’
‘Without question.’
‘How?’ he demands.
‘Kill the man who accuses them.’
On our way back, he stops to point to the horizon. ‘That’s where my land starts,’ he says, indicating a low line of hills. ‘A thousand square miles of high plain, canyon and scrubland. Five towns, one city and a hundred villages. Lady Aptitude will inherit eight hundred square miles of—’
General Luc pauses.
‘You know,’ he says, ‘Debro never said how you met.’
He’s right. She didn’t.
‘We met on Paradise, sir. That’s—’
‘I know what it is.’
Yeah, he would know. I had to be sent there to discover it’s a prison planet.
‘I heard you traded OctoV’s gratitude for their freedom. What did they do, save your life?’
It was the other way round.
Three dozen exiles, dissidents and failed revolutionaries meet a common criminal. Who turns out to be the only thing keeping them alive. And then he’s a common criminal they need. That’s liberals for you.
‘Well?’ General Luc demands.
‘Something like that, sir.’
It’s the answer he expects. ‘So you only met Lady Aptitude recently?’
‘I arrived here yesterday.’
‘Avoiding General Jaxx.’ The Wolf bares his yellow teeth. As if he’s just said something clever. But you’d have to be an idiot not to realize General Jaxx is unhappy with me. I don’t know what makes Jaxx hate Anton or Anton hate him.
Anton will tell me if he wants me to know.
And General Jaxx? Indigo Jaxx isn’t the kind of man you ask personal questions. He isn’t the kind you ask any questions at all.
‘I hear you saved his son.’
I don’t answer.
‘That’s what they’re saying. You’re the real hero of Hekati.’
He names a campaign that got more publicity than it deserves. Hekati was a minor ring world. It got destroyed. As did an Uplift mother ship. I had something to do with its destruction. Colonel Vijay Jaxx was the ranking officer so he took the credit.
‘Supposed to be the only thing keeping you alive.’
I can see the hills over the Wolf’s shoulder. A long streak of purple that edges the horizon. They’re as impressive as ever. But I no longer feel the same about them. Now I know who they belong to.
‘Don’t you have anything to say?’
‘No, sir.’
His laugh is sour. ‘Silence,’ he says. ‘A good quality in a staff officer.’
And here I am thinking the qualities needed are cowardice and self-interest. Must just be the ones I’ve met.
The Wolf pretends to reconsider something.
I’m not fooled for a minute.
‘You’re an interesting man, Sven. Someone who could go a long way in the right company. Or have a very short career indeed. If his choices are wrong. You understand what I’m saying?’
I could say yes. But that would be a lie.
So I hold my tongue. Something that comes easily to me.
‘Jaxx has no family.’
Yes, he has, I think, before realizing what the Wolf means.
General Indigo Jaxx is not high clan. I didn’t know that. The Wolf must see the surprise in my eyes, because he smiles darkly. ‘What he has,’ he says, ‘is OctoV’s favour. This can be . . .’
He doesn’t bother completing that sentence.
People like me are so used to thinking of Indigo Jaxx as all-powerful, the idea he might be vulnerable to the emperor’s whims comes as a shock. The Wolf is waiting to see how I’ve taken his suggestion.
Unfortunately, I’m not quite sure what it is.
Grinding his cigar under his heel, General Luc turns to go. I think our talk is over until he turns back. ‘Interested?’
‘In what, sir?’
‘Didn’t you listen to anything I said?’
Yeah. Doesn’t mean I understood it, though.
‘Jaxx is overreaching himself,’ he says. ‘And Debro’s a doubter. As for Anton . . . he married money. Then was stupid enough to divorce it. What Anton thinks is irrelevant.’
He sighs heavily.
‘They saved your life. You had them freed. You’re quits. Find yourself a better patron.’
‘Debro’s a friend.’
Loyal to the point of stupidity. That’s from my shredded psych report.
‘Sven,’ the Wolf says. ‘Don’t make mistakes you’ll regret.’
‘Is that a threat?’
Wrong question.
He’s offered me his patronage. To piss General Jaxx off probably. I’ve just rejected it. A part of him wants to say he doesn’t need to threaten scum like me. The bigger part wants to take out my throat.
It shows in his eyes, which narrow when I smile.
‘We’ll meet again,’ he tells me.
‘I’m counting on it.’
Anger locks his shoulders as he stamps up the stairs ahead of me and kicks open the door. It’s obvious to Debro and Anton that something is badly wrong. Bowing stiffly, General Luc tells them he’s taking his leave. When he turns to Aptitude, it’s to discover she’s not even l
istening.
‘I’m off,’ he says.
Aptitude nods, absent-mindedly.
The Wolf’s scowl turns into something darker. He’s just realized that he could abandon the roof terrace and she’d never even notice. The girl is staring across the tiled roofs of the village to the road beyond. There is something hungry and naked about her gaze.
Chapter 6
‘EXPECTING SOMEONE?’ THE GENERAL’S VOICE IS MILD.
Way too mild.
And Aptitude has her back to him. So she misses the anger in his eyes. ‘There’s a gyrobike,’ she says. ‘Coming through the hills.’
In three steps the general stands beside her.
‘An Icefeld 38.’
The Wolf’s eyes must be augmented to see that distance. He glances back. ‘Your regiment uses Icefelds,’ he says, looking at me. ‘Don’t they?’
‘Most regiments use Icefelds.’
‘Perhaps your general wants a word.’
Aptitude opens her mouth to disagree. It’s all Debro can do not to tell her to keep it shut. But she doesn’t want to draw General Luc’s attention. Mind you, there’s no need. He’s seen for himself.
‘Or are you expecting someone?’ he asks, voice silky.
Aptitude blushes.
About the worst thing she can do.
Six months she lived in Farlight at Golden Memories. That’s my bar below Calinda Gap. Yet every street smart we taught her vanishes the moment she finds herself home. Even now, she can’t smell trouble brewing.
‘Who are you expecting?’
‘Vijay Jaxx,’ Aptitude says. ‘Well, not Vijay himself. He’s off-planet. But he said he’d be sending—’
‘A message?’
Aptitude’s blushing again.
‘A little present? Some love token?’
General Luc is grinning. Like this is the funniest thing he’s heard.
‘Your beloved is the son of the man who wants to kill Sven?’
‘Wants to—?’ Aptitude is so busy being shocked by the bit about General Jaxx wanting me dead that she misses his reference to Vijay as her beloved. I don’t. The Wolf and I are unequal in rank, birth and wealth. But we share one habit. We use words sparingly.
When Aptitude doesn’t deny it, something goes flat behind the general’s grey eyes. ‘So,’ he says. ‘This is what your mother didn’t mention. Your heart belongs to Colonel Vijay Jaxx, hero of the battle for Hekati?’
Aptitude stares at the tiles.
‘Well?’
She nods.
‘And his heart belongs to you?’
This time she looks up. ‘Yes,’ she says, walking straight into his trap. ‘My heart is his. And his is mine.’ She sounds about twelve, and in need of a good slap.
Debro puts her head in her hands.
‘Mine is his and his is mine . . .’ Sweeping Debro’s daughter a low bow, General Luc says, ‘In that case, it would be my pleasure to deliver it to you . . . On a plate.’ A second later, he disappears.
*
I’m out of my seat when Anton grabs me. Breaking his grip, I flip him round and slam him into a wall.
‘Sven.’
‘Sorry . . .’
Debro nods towards Anton. She’s right; he’s the one I should be apologizing to. Hauling him up from the tiles, I check he’s steady on his feet.
‘That was a pretty good block.’
Anton smiles ruefully. When he puts a hand to his mouth his fingers come away bloody. ‘Not good enough,’ he says.
Debro is looking between me, Anton’s split lip and her daughter’s face which is frozen in shock as she finally realizes what General Luc intends.
Her look is one I will never forget.
Debro’s a liberal. People like her believe everything can be made right if only you talk nicely or understand what the other person wants.
People like me know that’s shit.
You make the rules. If someone doesn’t like them, you break that person or they break you. I saw the darkness in the Wolf’s eyes. He’s going to do exactly what he promised. Deliver Vijay’s heart to Aptitude.
Unless one of us stops him. And that has to be me.
‘Sven,’ says Debro, when I yank the gun from my belt.
For once I ignore her.
My SIG-37 wakes instantly. This just proves it can when it wants.
Beneath us, doors grind open as General Luc’s combat car exits from Palazzo Wildeside. Damn thing’s wolf grey. A long hood and short trunk, a turret like an upturned cup.
Looks like someone smashed the cup and glued it back with the missing pieces replaced by bombproof glass. Seems no logic to what shape or where the windows are. It’s probably coincidence the vehicle looks like a wolf’s skull on wheels. Then again, maybe not.
‘What’s with that turret?’
‘Better deflection of pressure waves.’ The SIG obviously regards this as a personal insult.
‘OK. Where’s its weakness?’
‘Blast bucket design, post-blast roll-back, high-protection crew capsule. Apart from that shitty colour scheme, you tell me.’
‘How good’s the roll-back?’
My SIG admits that might be a weak point.
We’re planning to explode an airburst at ground level in front of the car, and use the lift to explode a second airburst a quarter of a second later, with a third a quarter of a second after that.
If I can flip the vehicle . . .
‘More to the point,’ the SIG says, ‘if you can keep it flipped.’
Yeah, then I can shoot General Luc when he crawls from the wreckage. Alternatively, we can build a huge bonfire round his car if he refuses to come out.
The SIG and I are good at improvising.
‘Sven . . .’
I’m sighting when Debro puts her hand on my wrist. Very slowly she pushes my hand towards the ground and I let her.
‘Thank you,’ she says.
‘Debro—’
‘Etiquette won’t allow it. The general was our guest.’
‘And he’s lieutenant governor. Commander of the Wolf Brigade. While you’re on remand and liable to be sent back to Paradise . . .?’
‘That too,’ she says.
Anton is promising his daughter that the Wolf doesn’t mean it. Aptitude knows it’s a lie. There’s no way General Luc will see
reason when he calms down. The Wolf made a promise. It’s a promise he will keep.
‘Sven,’ my gun says. ‘You might want to check this out.’
‘What?’
It tells me to take a look at what the Wolf’s doing now.
Seems that vowing to deliver Colonel Vijay’s heart to Aptitude on a plate isn’t enough. The Wolf intends to stop her getting Vijay’s message as well.
His scout car parks across our entrance.
The gyrobike is going to find its way blocked. Its rider will have other problems. A ragged crowd is filling the dusty square that squats in front of Debro’s compound. Provincial militia, village police, guards from the local jail, even a pair who look like bailiffs. The Wolf is calling up cannon fodder.
Must mean he has a plan. Otherwise, all he need do is shoot the Icefeld’s rider when he enters the square. A second later I hear a whine of gyros, and four police bikes enter the square from one direction, stop to talk to a police sergeant, and then peel away from the crowd to head out of the village.
The bikes are as ragged as their riders.
The sergeant strides across to the Wolf’s vehicle and I see a hatch drop on the turret. Don’t know what General Luc says but the sergeant nods. A second later, he talks to a couple of other officers.
They begin erecting a roadblock where the main street, such as it is, enters the square. ‘What are the odds of him involving himself?’ I ask Anton.
‘Luc?’
‘Yeah.’
Anton sucks his teeth. ‘Slight.’
More is the pity . . . General Luc won’t get his hands dirty. He’s going to watch while
others do it for him. Although you can bet he’ll kill Vijay Jaxx himself. That’s different, clearly.
The police bikes are ex-combat issue, painted dirt grey and almost invisible against the scrub and withered groves beyond the village.
‘Recognize their riders?’ I say, handing Anton my field-glasses.
He shakes his head.
‘Not friends of yours?’
‘No,’ he says sharply.
‘You’re sure?’
‘Sven!’
‘Just checking.’
‘No,’ says Anton. ‘Not friends.’
‘And not recent guests either?’ the SIG says.
He grins, seeing where this conversation is going. ‘No,’ he says. ‘Definitely not recent guests.’
‘So Debro’s not going to object if I kill them?’
Anton shrugs, as if to say, who knows what Debro will object to . . . And follows me down the stairs before she has time to notice we’re gone.
Chapter 7
HIGH-PITCHED AND WHINING. CHEAP GYROS AND WORSE maintenance. That’s the militia for you. Probably the same everywhere.
Combat comes with its own set of rules.
These are put into books and made into rhymes. So even idiots like me can remember them. But basically they come down to: Kill early, kill often. (That’s our motto in the Aux.) And about as true a saying as any I know. Along with Make every bullet count, because I’m going to be counting them. This lot, however, are strictly Spray and pray.
‘Guard the doors,’ I tell Anton.
‘No guns,’ he says. ‘If you can avoid it.’
Can’t believe he wants me to keep the noise down.
‘Sven,’ he says.
I turn back, a scowl still on my face.
‘Thought you could use this . . .’ He unhooks something
from the wall and tosses it in my direction. I catch it from instinct, although it’s so light I can barely see it against the arch beyond. Turns out to be a length of clear monofilament, carefully wound into a loop. You could drag a broken scout car from Wildeside to Farlight with this stuff. It has other uses too . . . My scowl becomes a grin.
‘Rat bike incoming,’ the SIG announces.
Diodes flicker along its side.
‘Make that two. Trash heaps on wheels. And those are just the riders. Can’t begin to describe the machines.’
