The Net shell dispersed outside the Council building, and he strode within, his footsteps echoing in the vast, pillared marble hall with its crystal statues and verdant atriums. The guards outside the Council chamber’s doors opened them for him, indicating that the Council was eager to hear his report. The members were embroiled in a muttered discussion when he entered, and fell silent as he approached. Vargon straightened and smiled, his dark eyes eager.
“Commander Tallyn. I trust you have good news for us?”
“Not exactly. We captured a man, but I don’t believe it’s the Shrike. He’s just another decoy; a slave.”
Vargon frowned. “Have you questioned him?”
“It won’t do any good. He’ll say he’s the Shrike.”
“Then he must be made to tell the truth. We have drugs for that, don’t we?”
“Yes. Will he be spared if he admits that he’s not the Shrike?”
Vargon shook his head. “He’s still guilty of killing two soldiers and breaking into an Atlantean facility.”
“Then I don’t see the point in questioning him if he’s going to die whether he’s the Shrike or not. If he is the Shrike, allowing him to wake up will be dangerous. He’ll call for help.”
“We need to know, Commander, so we can announce the execution of such a notorious criminal. We’ve been tricked too many times. It’s embarrassing, and we don’t like to be embarrassed. This time we must be sure.”
“There is a foolproof way to find out the truth, sir, that won’t require waking him up.”
“What’s that?” Vargon asked.
“Allow Rayne to see him, and have a telepath read her mind.”
“The last time we tried that, it didn’t work too well.”
“Yes sir. I’m not suggesting another memory probe. All we need is to read her surface thoughts when she sees him. She won’t even be aware of it.”
Vargon glanced at the other Council members, who shrugged or nodded. He faced Tallyn again. “Very well, do it, Commander, then report.”
“Yes, sir.” Tallyn spun on his heel and marched out.
Rayne drifted into wakefulness through the fading mists of sleep, and stretched with a sigh. A pang of alarm made her heart flutter and her eyes spring open as she remembered the hospital orderly spraying something in her face. She sat up and looked around. She lay on a broad bed, clad in a silken nightgown, in a dimly lighted room decorated in soft pastels. Becoming aware of someone close to her, she turned and gasped as she found Tarke lying beside her. He seemed to be asleep, and he was not wearing the neural dampener. She glanced around again, her uneasiness growing at her strange surroundings and the bad taste in her mouth. Her head pounded and her stomach growled. What was Tarke doing here? What had happened after the orderly had sprayed her? Where was she?
Shifting away from him, she said, “Tarke… wake up.”
Normally he would have snapped awake at the slightest sound. Even her movement should have woken him. He wore a grey shirt and trousers, which she had never seen him in before. There were too many unfamiliar things about the situation, and her suspicion and unease grew.
“Tarke!” Rayne hesitated, then touched his shoulder. Alarmed by his lack of response, she shook him. “Tarke? Wake up! Tarke!”
Thoroughly panicked, Rayne shook him with growing desperation. Tears stung her eyes and a sob closed her throat as an awful sense of foreboding filled her. The last thing she remembered was visiting Rawn in hospital on Atlan, but Tarke could not be on Atlan. If he was, all hell was about to break loose. What had happened while she was unconscious?
“Shadowen!” she whispered, but no calm, reassuring voice answered her. “What the hell is going on?”
The door opened and Tallyn entered, looking disgruntled, or perhaps worried. It was hard to tell, with him.
“Tallyn? What’s going on? Where am I?”
He stopped beside the bed. “I’m sorry, Rayne. We know who he is. Our telepath just confirmed it. This is the Shrike, isn’t it?”
“No! He’s… one of the Shrike’s men. What the hell is he doing in bed with me?”
He shook his head. “It’s no use denying it now. Sorry.” Tallyn turned and nodded, and two men entered with a floating stretcher.
“What are you going to do with him?”
“Execute him, of course.” He sighed. “It’s a shame, really. I’m surprised he’s an ex-slave. I guess he liked doing to others what was once done to him.”
“No, you don’t understand.” She tried to cling to Tarke’s hand as the orderlies lifted him onto the stretcher. “He’s not a slaver! Where are you taking him? What’s wrong with him? Why can’t I call Shadowen?”
“He’s being taken back to his cell, and he’s drugged, obviously. Your implant has been deactivated; that’s why you can’t talk to your ship.”
Rayne climbed off the bed, swaying, and tried to reach Tarke, but one of the orderlies pushed the stretcher out of the door, and the other one stepped closer to her at Tallyn’s nod. An air syringe hissed against her arm, and Tallyn took hold of her elbow and helped her onto the bed as a wave of dizziness made her reel. She gazed up at him, tears blurring her vision.
“What have you done?”
“We’ve finally captured the Shrike, and soon his reign of terror will end.”
“You fool,” she whispered. “He’s not a slaver. He saves slaves. If you kill him… you’ll all die. The Slave Empire will strike back, and it won’t stop until the last ex-slave is dead. Don’t you understand? They love him. They’ll die for him… All of them.”
“Not once he’s dead.”
“Especially if he’s dead! They will utterly destroy Atlan out of vengeance, because he saved them, and without him they’re doomed. They need him… He’s their Dalreen…You’ve got to persuade the Council to let him go!”
Tallyn shook his head. “Impossible. Sleep now. It will all be over soon.”
“You’re killing a good man who has saved hundreds of thousands of slaves from misery; the man who saved me from the Envoy and the Draycons and even you… How could you, Tallyn?” Tears spilt down her cheeks. “I love him, and you’re going to be so sorry if you kill him. Or maybe you won’t, because you’ll be dead.”
“The Shrike’s empire is no match for Atlan.”
“He may not have as many ships as you, but Vengeance stood no chance against Shadowen and Scimarin, did she? And they’re the least of Tarke’s ships. I’ve seen his flagship… Empire… She’s twice the size of Vengeance and could reduce this planet to rubble on her own. Millions are going to die…” Her eyelids drooped, and she tried to cling to consciousness as her words became slurred. “Millions will die…”
Vidan sat back, cold with shock. Shadowen’s distress message, relayed through Scimarin, repeated over and over from the speakers on the coms console, and the men and women who manned the control centre on Ironia sat as frozen as he.
“Atlan has captured the Shrike… I repeat, Atlan has captured the Shrike. This is Shadowen. Atlan has captured the Shrike… I repeat, Atlan…”
The message was being broadcast on Tarke’s personal frequency, with his personal identity codes, which meant every ship in the fleet was receiving it. Mere moments after the message started, replies overlaid Shadowen’s calm voice.
“This is the frigate Sunray, responding... This is the troopship Starlight, responding, nine hours away… This is the destroyer Fire Blade, responding… This is the battle cruiser Invincible, responding, eight hours away… This is the battleship Guardian, responding… This is the destroyer Fearsome, responding, ten hours away … This is the battle cruiser Star Blade, responding… This is the battleship Dreadnaught, responding… This is the flagship, Empire, responding…”
Vidan buried his head in his hands as the control room crew leapt up and ran for the doors. “It’s going to be a bloodbath,” he muttered.
The incoming responses continued, and now other, stranger replies mixed with the warships’ respon
ses that even surprised Vidan, but not a lot.
“This is the freighter, Brigand, responding… This is the leisure yacht, Lancer, responding… This is the ore carrier, Juggernaut, responding… This is the asteroid miner, Pulsar, responding…”
The control room crew, Vidan knew, had run for the hangars to board any vessel it could find, as were most of the people on all of Tarke’s other bases and planets. A flotilla of unarmed civilian vessels, shuttles, freighters, luxury yachts, liners and any other vaguely space worthy vessel that could make the trip to Atlan, was on its way. They would do whatever they could to aid Tarke’s warships, from ramming Atlantean vessels to rescuing the crews of disabled ships and shielding them from enemy fire. Others would land to disgorge tens of thousands of ex-slaves armed with anything they could lay their hands on, from laser cannons to kitchen knives.
Yet despite their fierce retribution, which he did not doubt would be bloody and final, his beloved friend and leader, whom they all loved so much, would die. Vidan jumped up and followed the control room crew, hoping he was not too late to find a ship.
Tallyn gazed down at the man on the execution block, surprised by the regret that filled him. The Shrike had been his enemy for as long as he had been commander of Vengeance, yet, in all that time, they had only crossed swords once, on the day Rayne had almost died. Dressings covered the wounds in the Shrike’s shoulder, thigh and forearm. He had not been allowed to wake since he had been captured, for fear that he would signal his fleet. Tallyn was sure his ship had already done that. There was going to be one hell of a battle, but he did not think it would last long.
The Council had rushed through the Shrike’s execution so he would die only an hour from now, a mere nine hours after he had been captured, before his ships could reach Atlan. The Shrike’s territory, where most of his fleet was located, was at least twelve hours from Atlan, according to the experts. Tallyn hoped they were right; he had chased a few of the Shrike’s ships in the past, and had never been able to catch one. Once the Shrike’s people were informed of his death, they would abandon their futile attempt to save him. Perhaps some would attack out of vengeance, but the majority, the Council was sure, would turn away. Tallyn was not so sure about that, either. Rayne’s words still echoed in his mind. What if she told the truth? What if they were wrong about the Shrike? What if his empire really would fight to the last man? It would be a disaster. How many ships were on their way here, he wondered.
The execution stage was a vast, floating platform whose gold ceremonial pillars were hung with banners bearing Atlan’s various emblems. The bluish shimmer of a stress shield surrounded it, the oscillating, alternating layers of charged air molecules a barrier to lasers, solid objects and locator beams. The Council sat at one end, on three tiers of seats, and the priesthood occupied three tiers on its left, while other high-ranking dignitaries filled another three tiers to the right of the Council. The well-dressed, high-caste men and women chatted and laughed, sipping drinks that wandering servants handed out. The shaven-pated members of the priesthood abstained, their faces grim above gold-trimmed orange robes. The Council members looked smug, basking in the acclaim they received from the world leaders, who toasted their success. Today, they celebrated the end of a slaver empire that had defied and defeated Atlan’s attempts to end it for five decades, and everyone was in a jolly mood.
Rayne sat on a chair in front of the VIPs, closest to the execution block. She wore a shimmering white ankle-length gown, and her eyes were half closed. She was so full of drugs she was hardly aware of what was going on, and that was a mercy, he reflected. The despair in her eyes had torn his heart. She really loved the Shrike, he could tell. How could the Golden Child love a slaver? Yet, he reminded himself, for all her strange ability to kill the Envoy, she was just a human girl from a now-dead planet. She had no special powers other than her empathy. She was not a seer, but her words to him earlier had had a prophetic ring.
An officer approached him. “Sir, we’ve received messages from some of our outposts and scout ships. There are thousands of ships heading for Atlan. Most of them are the Shrike’s.”
“Thousands?”
“Yes, sir. About a thousand are warships, and the rest are civilian vessels. The space line chatter we’re tapping is unbelievable.”
“Where are they coming from?” Tallyn asked.
“Quadrant Fifty-Two, or thereabouts.”
Tallyn nodded. “The Shrike’s territory. Sounds like retribution is on its way.”
“Sir? What are your orders?”
“Recall the fleet. Defend Atlan, Lieutenant.”
The officer marched off, and Tallyn gazed at the man on the execution block again, pondering. If Rayne was right about his people, it boded ill for Atlan. There were perhaps two hundred Atlantean warships within a few hours travel of Atlan, and a hundred and fifteen in orbit. If the Shrike’s civilian vessels were filled with soldiers, or at least fighters, it would be a formidable invasion. The shadow on the ceremonial sundial crept closer to noon, when the executioner, a large, hooded man who waited at the far end of the platform, would step up and cut out the Shrike’s heart with a surgical laser blade.
The procedure was, apparently, fairly painless and relatively bloodless, but satisfied ceremonial tradition. His thoughts flew back to the approaching flotilla of enemy vessels. Rayne had mentioned Empire, and he knew the flagship quite well. It was indeed a formidable ship, one he had shied away from engaging on several occasions. It would decimate the destroyers and cruisers in orbit. Perhaps executing the Shrike was not such a good idea. If there was an element of doubt about his criminality, his sentence should be reconsidered, perhaps even commuted. Then again, the approaching ships were unlikely to break off their attack if they learnt that the Shrike would be imprisoned for life. Somehow, Tallyn did not think the Shrike would stay in prison long, in that case.
Tallyn approached Rayne, whose head drooped. She was supposed to be a witness, and her presence a show of support for the Shrike’s execution, but anyone could see the girl was drugged out of her mind. He squatted beside her chair and gripped her arm, shaking it.
“Rayne! Hey, snap out of it. Rayne?”
Her eyes opened a little wider, but remained glazed, and she licked her lips.
“Rayne, can you tell the Shrike’s people to turn back if I give you a com-unit? He’ll be dead long before they get here.”
Rayne raised her head, and despair seeped into her eyes as they focussed on the Shrike, stretched out on the slab. “Oh… god.” She sobbed, and two tears ran down her cheeks.
Tallyn gripped her arm. “Will you tell them?”
“Who? What are you talking about?” She tried to stand up, discovering that her wrists were strapped to the arms of her chair. Tallyn had not known about the restraints, which her sleeves hid.
He frowned. “His ships. Tell them to turn back.”
“They won’t listen to me. And why should I? I hope they annihilate you all.”
“That will include you.”
“You think I care? You’re murdering the man I love!”
Tallyn nodded and rose. Rayne stared at the Shrike, tears running down her cheeks. Tallyn turned as the officer approached again.
“Sir, two outposts have been destroyed, and three scout ships and a cruiser that were in the flotilla’s path. It’s estimated that there are over three thousand ships in that armada.”
Tallyn grunted. “Tell the Council members, Lieutenant. They’re the only ones who can stop this now.”
“Sir.”
Rayne’s eyes glazed again, and her head bowed. The sundial’s shadow crept towards noon. The executioner raised his curved instrument and fingered it. Out in space, a vast flotilla of ships converged on Atlan. On the execution block, the Shrike lay spread eagled, ready for slaughter. Although he was sedated, his wrists and ankles were shackled to the block in the ceremonial way. Tallyn had a really bad feeling about this day. Only about half an hour remained befor
e the sundial’s shadow vanished. Rayne raised her head with an obvious effort, her eyes still glassy. Her lips worked, and he leant closer to try to hear what she was saying. At first it sounded like nonsense, but she repeated a word he had heard before, although it was slurred now.
“Scrysalza,” she whispered.
Chapter Fifteen
Rayne sailed the infinity of space in a world she had found behind one of the doors in her mind. She had been hunting through them for what seemed like an eternity, closing the ones behind which she found the Envoy’s howling darkness. It terrified her, but she had braved it to find a way to reach the Crystal Ship. If anyone could save Tarke, it was Scrysalza. His fleet of warships would not reach Atlan in time. The executioner would slice out his heart, and then all there would be was revenge. Maybe, just maybe, the giant crystalline entity could save him. After all, it could bend space and time. It was a gentle creature, though, and she was not sure what it could do to help. Perhaps snatch Tarke from the slab, or take control of the executioner. The oscillating stress shield that surrounded the platform would not stop the Ship, she knew from experience. She jerked at the bonds on her wrists, cursing the Atlanteans with all the virulence she could summon up.
Rayne drifted towards a vast, hot nebula crammed with giant young stars and clouds of cosmic dust. This was the ships’ home; she remembered it from Scrysalza’s memory. She could not be here in reality, though. This was just her imagination, surely? Perhaps it was just a way to escape the harshness of reality, so she did not have to witness Tarke’s death. Anything would be better than that. She longed to save him, but she could barely keep her eyes open. She closed them and gulped, searching through the nebula in her mind for the distant, sparkling stars that were the crystal ships. They had to be here. She had to find them. Tears ran down her cheeks. Summoning all her mental strength, she sent forth a desperate cry, a plea for help that she hoped someone would hear, and answer.
Slave Empire III - The Shrike Page 25
