Out on the fringes of the solar system, waiting to receive its commander, was the Warlord's flagship. When it had been determined that the shuttle had broken free of the planet's gravitational pull and was safely away, a beam of laser light shot from a lascannon to the surface of the planet below. The bombardment lasted only seconds, then ceased. The Warlord arrived aboard his ship to find the course to Syrac Seven already plotted. The flagship, Phoenix, sailed into the chartered paths of hyperspace and vanished from sight.
On the planet below, searing flames reduced to ash the university and the beautiful countryside surrounding it, creating a ghastly, gigantic funeral pyre for one corpse.
Chapter Two
Adieu, adieu, adieu! remember me.
William Shakespeare, Hamlet, Act I, Scene IV
The dock foreman snarled impatiently when a shadow fell across his clipboard. The shadow was not caused by clouds obscuring the sun—a rare occurrence on the desertlike Syrac Seven. The shadow was caused by a human body coming to stand between the dock foreman and the sun. And thus the foreman snarled. He was a harassed and busy man. If the day had been a year long on Syrac Seven—as it was, by report, on Syrac Nine—he would not have had time enough to get everything done.
Syrac Seven was at the cross-routes of one of the most heavily traveled shipping lanes in the galaxy. Huge space freighters were either in orbit waiting to dock, on land waiting to be loaded, on land waiting to be unloaded, or on land awaiting permission to get off. Their captains, ever conscious that time is money, were invariably furious over delays—real and imagined. Their crews were always undisciplined—what could you expect of merchant seamen?—and picked fights with the foreman's longshoremen, And, as if the foreman needed any more trouble, the Syracusian government sent officials by on a regular basis to throw everything into confusion.
One such personage had been around that morning, accusing the dock foreman of turning a blind eye to the theft of computer parts shipments en route to underdeveloped planets; planets who were trying desperately to take their places in the Republic, and who had been assured that computers were the answer—provided the planet had electricity, of course. The dock foreman recalled with pleasure his conversation with the government official in which he'd described in graphic terms just what the official could do with his computers. And it hadn't involved plugging them in—at least not where one would normally plug one in.
"Now why would anyone on this blasted rock steal computer parts?" the dock foreman bellowed, raising his head to glare at the person whose shadow fell across his clipboard.
"They wouldn't," stated this person, although he appeared considerably astonished at being thus addressed. "There's no market on this planet for stolen computer parts."
The dock foreman regarded the stranger with more interest and less irritation.
"You can see it. I can see it. Why can't the friggin' government see it?" The dock foreman shoved a large finger into the stranger's chest. "Drugs, landcruisers, spacecraft parts—those get stolen so fast that all you'll find left is the smell. But computer parts?" He snorted.
A captain of one of the lumbering, elephantine freighters leaned over a railing and yelled that he was six days behind schedule and what was the dock foreman going to do about it.
The dock foreman yelled back that his men were working as fast as they could, remarking that he (the captain) would wait his turn like everyone else. The dock foreman then added what he (the captain) could do if he didn't feel like waiting.
The captain issue a threat.
The dock foreman made an obscene gesture.
The captain stomped over the metal deck in a rage, and the dock foreman turned back to discover that the shadow remained across his clipboard. Apparently this stranger hadn't dropped by to commiserate about the government.
"You still here?" the dock foreman growled.
"Yes, I am still here," the man said in a mild voice.
"Why?" the dock foreman snapped, eyeing the stranger irritably.
The man might have been considered tall, but he was thin-boned and stooped and his height—which must have been beyond the ordinary—was considerably reduced. Long wispy hair straggled over his shoulders and hung down his back. Probably in his late forties, he was dressed in faded blue jeans and a blue denim work shirt and appeared at first glance to be a down-and-outer looking for work. But those soft, delicate hands had never done manual labor, the dock foreman noted shrewdly. And there was something about the faded blue eyes—set in a pale, careworn face—which suggested that the stranger's quick appraisal of the computer parts theft had not been casual. This man was accustomed to giving serious, respectful consideration to all matters, and the dock foreman appreciated being taken seriously for once.
"Well, what do you want?" he found himself asking grudgingly.
"I am looking for a man I was told worked here," the man said, speaking almost shyly, as if he weren't used to talking to strange people. His voice matched his hands—refined, delicate, with an off-planet accent. "His name is Mendaharin Tusca."
"You're in the wrong place, mister!" The dock foreman laughed. "I ain't got anyone working here with a silly-ass name like Men Da Ha Rin Toosca!"
The stranger seemed to wilt. A flicker of desperation kindled the faded eyes.
"Wait, please do not go! This is quite urgent. Would there be anyone with a name similar to that?"
The dock foreman, who had started to walk away, turned back. "Well, there's a guy works for me calls himself Tusk. That's close, I guess. You can see him. He's right over there. Black-skinned human." He jerked his thumb in the direction of a group of men and aliens who were loading crates onto a skid. "That him?"
"I do not know." The man sounded embarrassed. "It might be him. You see, I've never met him before. Could I talk to, uh . . . Tusk ... for just a few moments? The matter is serious, or I would not take him away from his work."
The dock foreman scowled, then sighed and shook his head, wondering why he was even wasting his time with this bum, much less calling off one of his men to come chat with him. The stranger stood looking at him apologetically, implying he understood and appreciated the dock foreman's problems and would do his best not to add to them.
"Hey, Tusk!" The foreman's breath exploded in a rumbling roar that bounced over the noise of the forklifts and cranes and the wind that swept across the flat surface of the docks.
The black-skinned human straightened up from cinching a rope around a crate. Staring across the sun-baked cement, his eyes squinting in the bright light, he looked to see who was calling.
The dock foreman made a motion with his arm.
The man called Tusk gave the alien standing next to him a pat on its bony back, then pointed at the foreman. The alien nodded one of its heads, and Tusk sauntered toward the stranger with lazy, easy strides. He was dressed in the working clothes of the dock which—in the heat of Syrac Seven—was practically nothing, and his ebony skin glistened with sweat in the bright sunlight. About average height for a human, Tusk was muscular and well built. His short hair was tightly curled and, when he turned his head, a glint of silver caught the light, sparkling from his left earlobe.
As the young man approached them, the dock foreman glanced curiously at the stranger. Tusk was a rough-looking character—one who easily held his own in the occasional brawls that broke out among the dock workers and the sailors. The ordinary citizenry of Syrac Seven generally crossed over and walked on the other side of the street to avoid the likes of Tusk, and the dock foreman wondered if this gende stranger wouldn't suddenly remember that he had an appointment elsewhere.
The dock foreman was surprised. The stranger's face underwent a subtle change, but it did not register fear or nervousness. It reflected only the quiet sorrow of the faded blue eyes.
"Yeah?" Tusk slouched, hands on his hips, in front of the foreman.
"Visitor." The foreman jerked his head.
Tusk glared at the stranger.
"You're not from the collection agency, are you? Look, man, you guys can't hassle me at my place of employment! That's the law—"
"N-no," the stranger stammered, obviously taken aback. "I am not from a . . . um . . . collection agency." The blue eyes went from Tusk to the foreman and back to Tusk again. "Is there someplace private where we can talk?"
The foreman waved his hand at a nearby empty warehouse.
Why am I being such a nice guy? he wondered. I've been standing in the sun too long. It's affecting my brain.
He watched as the two walked away, heading for the warehouse, and tried for the life of him to figure out what was going on. The sadness on the stranger's face, the flicker of desperation in his eyes, fell across the foreman's thoughts like the shadow that had fallen across his clipboard. The foreman didn't sympathize with others; his own problems were a full-time occupation. But it occurred to him that life was really tough sometimes.
A bellow from the catwalk above broke into the foreman's musing. Looking up, he saw that the ship's captain had returned.
"Ah, blow it out your porthole," the dock foreman muttered dispiritedly. Casting a final glance at Tusk and the stranger, he turned and walked away.
Trudging along beside the stranger, studying him suspiciously, Tusk saw the sadness, but not the desperation. Not yet. The man walked with his eyes averted, his head bowed. The long blond hair was blown back from his face by the wind and it was easy to see from his expression that whatever the strange's thoughts were, they weren't happy.
And whatever this has to do with me can't be good, Tusk concluded, feeling his stomach muscles tense and a tiny shiver prickle the back of his neck.
The two men entered the warehouse. Cool shadows washed over them; the noise of the dock was swallowed by the silence of the huge, empty building. Grimly, Tusk turned to confront the stranger.
"We're here. So talk."
The man did not reply, but gazed intently into the shadows, his head cocked as though he were listening.
"If you're looking for rats, you've come to the right place," Tusk said. "That's all you'll find here."
To Tusk's surprise, the stranger smiled wanly. "I am not looking for rats." He unsnapped the collar of his blue work shirt.
Sunlight streamed through an open doorway. Beckoning Tusk to step into the shadows, his blue eyes on the door, the stranger drew forth an object that hung from his neck on a silver chain and had been hidden by the shirt. No light touched it, yet the jewel—carved in the shape of an eight-pointed star—burned with a radiance that might have come from the flames of a thousand suns.
Tusk stared at it, his hand moving reflexively to touch the small silver object he wore in his earlobe. It, too, was an eight-pointed star. Sighing, he shook his head.
"Damn!"
"You recognize it?"
"Hell, yes, I recognize it. What do you want?"
"Pardon me." The man's voice was gentle but earnest. "I must know for certain. What is your real name? From where do you come?"
"Mendaharin Tusca. I'm from the planet Zanzi where my late father was a member of the Senate. Highly respected, my father. Unlike his son. He was once a Guardian, whereas I'm a—
"Hush!" The stranger grasped Tusk's swarthy arm with a strength the young man found impressive. "That word should not be spoken!"
Glaring at the stranger, Tusk jerked free of his grip. "What? Guardian? Why? Because it tends to lead to nasty consequences?"
The man lowered his eyes. "I heard about your father. I am sorry."
"Yeah, well, he asked for it." Tusk glanced out to where the dock foreman was involved in a heated altercation with a ship's captain. "Look, man. I need this job. Don't get me fired. What do you want? Make it quick!"
The man smiled again at this. "You won't be needing this job, Mendaharin Tusca. My name is Platus. Platus Morianna. How much did your father tell you?"
Tusk frowned. Like the dock foreman, he found himself drawn by this man into doing things he wasn't accustomed to doing. Things like talking about his father ... or even thinking about him.
"Not much. He was in pretty bad shape at the end."
"I understand," Platus said with a sigh.
"Do you? Well, I wish you'd explain it to me!" Tusk rounded on the man and had the satisfaction of seeing him fall back a pace. "By the time I reached home, the Warlord's men had already taken him away. They brought him back a day later—or what was left of him. Name of the Creator!" Tusk swore, his fist clenched. "I wish I'd been there when they came for him!"
"Be thankful you weren't! There was nothing you could have done."
"At least I'd have given them a fight. I had to sit . . .sit there and watch him die!" Angrily, Tusk turned his head from the stranger's sympathetic gaze.
"I know, and I am truly sorry." Platus reached out a hesitant hand that Tusk ignored. "I realize this is painful, but I must know what your father said to you about— That is, I received a message from him—"
"I followed his death promise, if that's what you mean."
"And that was?"
"To use this planet as my base. Check in, every few weeks no matter where I was, to see if there were any messages. Messages! Who from? Who to? What about? I never knew. And for the last five years I've either lived on this hell-blasted planet or, when my line of work took me off it, I've left word how I could be reached. Which hasn't been exactly safe, since I'm a wanted man."
"Yes. I know." Again the wan smile. "I've known, these last five years. You see, I am the one from whom you've been waiting to hear. But now, Tusk, you must vanish. Disappear completely. Obliterate all trace of your ever having been here before you leave."
"Leave? Look, man. I haven't said I was going anywhere!" Tusk pointed out, crossing his arms across his chest.
"No, you haven't." Platus ran a fine-boned hand through his long hair. "I apologize. My mind— I cannot think. I cannot function. Bear with me, Tusca, please."
The blue eyes fixed on Tusk with a pleading look, and the young man saw the desperation. He turned, seemed about to walk off; exasperated, he turned back. Platus reached out his hand. Tusk inched away. "Go on," he said.
"For your protection as well as mine, I cannot tell you why you are doing what I am going to ask you to do. I can only ask you to do it. If you agree, it will fulfill the death promise. You need never come back to this planet again. In fact, it would be better if you did not."
Tusk waited without speaking, his face impassive.
Drawing a deep breath, Platus continued. "I need you to take a young man, my ward, off this planet. Immediately. You must leave tonight, if possible."
"It isn't. I damaged my spaceplane landing on Rinos in the middle of a civil war. I'm not working out here on the dock for the exercise. I need money for parts—"
"That can be supplied!" The desperation was creeping from the eyes into the refined voice. "If you have the parts, how long?"
"A few hours, I guess." Tusk shrugged, squinting out at Syrac's sun. "Working all night, I could leave by moming."
Platus was silent, his face drawn and pale. Tusk kept his expression hard, although he couldn't help but feel sorry for this guy, who was obviously in deep trouble.
Trouble that's being passed right along to me. Tusk realized gloomily.
"I guess that will have to do. But I will bring the boy to you tonight. He will be safer with you than with me."
"Uh-huh. Danger just follows you guys around, doesn't it? A fact I pointed out to my father when he tried to hang that jewel around my neck."
"But you are a mercenary, or so I understand," Platus remarked, the slight smile returning at the young man's vehemence. "You seek out danger—"
"And get paid for it! Well paid. Look, Platos, or whatever your name is, let's get one thing straight." Tusk jabbed a finger wamingly. "I'm doing this for one reason only—to get rid of a ghost that's been hounding me. You see, I was a disappointment to my father. Why? I joined the Galactic Democratic Republic's Naval Air Corps.
The old man blew up. Accused me of siding with the enemy. As if there was an enemy anymore! Or there wouldn't be if guys like him didn't keep waving around a bloodstained crown. The revolution was seventeen years ago! It's all over now. Or it should be.
"Like I said"—Tusk drew an angry breath—"the old man couldn't forgive me for that. And then they murdered him. Then I murdered him, I guess. No, wait a minute"—this as Platus attempted to interrupt—"I don't want to go into it. Let's just say that I'm not doing this for your, precious jewel or the Guardians or your dead king or any of the rest of that romantic crap. I'm doing this because maybe it'll square me with him. You understand?"
"Yes," Platus answered.
"Yeah, well. Just so you don't expect too much from me. There's a bar in town called the Screamin' Meemie. We'll meet there—"
"No!" Platus shook his head. "Too open. Too many people."
Tusk could have cheerfully throttled this bastard. He shoved his itching hands into the pockets of his khaki shorts. "Well, how about here? The docks'll be empty. The night man stays down near the ships. No one comes after hours."
Platus cast a considering look around the warehouse. "Very well."
"Good. Now where am I supposed to take this kid?"
The man's blue eyes widened. A slow flush spread over his pale face. "I . . . really do not . . . know." Platus sounded helpless. "I never thought— You see, I did not expect things to take such a drastic turn this suddenly. I thought at least I would have time to—to make arrangements. But I haven't. I was caught unprepared." He ran his hand through his hair again, combing it back with trembling fingers. "Why did they give this to me? Of all of them, I was most unsuitable!"
Tusk sat down on a crate, staring at Platus in blank astonishment.
"Man! No wonder there was a revolution. You're just like my father. Idealistic. Impractical. I'm a fighter! What the devil am I supposed to do with a kid?"
The Lost King Page 2
