by Stefon Mears
“That doesn’t mean there are no weapons.”
“It means that there are no items legally classified as weapons, or whose purpose is primarily offensive.”
Tunold grimaced. He hated when Machado reported through his familiar. It gave precise replies, but never expanded the information it provided. Tunold wanted to press further, but knew the spirit would add nothing. Machado must have felt confident in his assessment.
“Very well. Dismissed.”
The panther vanished in a swirl of smoke. Only one left to hear from...
Tunold could hear the rapid-fire click of Goldberg’s boots coming up the ceramic stairs. Then Goldberg came into view, as crisp and official as the chief ever got: wrinkled, but shirt tucked and all buttons buttoned.
“How’s it look, Chief?”
“Clean enough to make me nervous.”
“Come again?”
“Well half of those ‘assistants’ have combat experience or I’m a cleaning lady from San Jose.” Goldberg smiled like a wolf watching another predator take down a deer. “But they aren’t my problem. Pros I can deal with. It’s the executives. Get a bunch of proud, accomplished people together and half of them treat us working folks like their servants’ servants. And we got that attitude here. I can see it in their eyes. Especially the moon money woman...”
“Romanov,” said Tunold, checking the list.
“That’s the one. Gave me a two minute speech about the history of her court sword and its importance to her family, as though if she didn’t I might use it to clean the grout in my shower.”
Goldberg shook his head in disbelief. “But after all that she handed it over without question. No argument. Just like the others.” He held up his checklist for emphasis. “All their weapons are safely tucked away, where only the captain and I have access to them, and not one of these fancy folk makes a peep? It’s creepy.”
“Who the hell said they can bring weapons at all?”
“We allow dueling weapons on all flights, and this one—”
“This is hardly a normal flight, and the last time we carried Mancuso—”
“We can’t ask them to go to Venus unarmed unless we want to guarantee their safety when they arrive. We’re already denying them bodyguards in transit.”
“So let them have weapons waiting for them.” Tunold could feel his jaw jutting forward as though of its own accord.
“Believe me, Tai Shi and I went round and round about that.” Goldberg slapped his memopad with the back of his hand. “But damn it, she was right about this one. We can’t leave them drifting if something happens to their arrangements on the other side.”
“Wait.” Tunold took a step back.
“That’s right,” Goldberg said through clenched teeth. “They get weapons, and they get a guarantee that if their welcoming committee isn’t friendly, they get to stay aboard the ship under our protection until we get them someplace safe.”
“Does the captain know about this?”
“The captain okayed it.” Goldberg must have seen the fire flare in Tunold’s eyes, because his voice got firm. “Come on, Ex Oh. This is no guaranteed safe port we’re taking these people to. We’re accountable for their safety. Why did you think I requisitioned the extra people and weapons?”
“Thought you were expecting another Mars run.”
“I wish.” Goldberg cracked his neck. “Fighting conspirators on our own ship is nothing compared to fighting a prepared enemy on land. Worse, our enemies would know the territory and we don’t.”
“This is insane.” Tunold could hear the growl reaching his voice. He didn’t fight it.
“I had to guess about what we might need.” Goldberg did not sound any happier than Tunold felt. “What the hell kind of way is that to go into a fight?”
“Fuck this.”
Tunold turned and sprinted to the nearest comm pad, on the wall near the bubble, and slapped it hard enough to sting his calloused hand. With his other hand, he yanked the lever to call the bubble.
“Bridge, this is Executive Officer Tunold. Hold lift off, on my authority. Repeat, hold lift off. I’m coming to the bridge.”
Tunold slapped the pad again to cut the connection before even receiving acknowledgment. He knew the ship’s communications officer, Ms. Jefferson, would relay the order, and he did not want to be patched through to the captain.
Tunold tapped his closed fist against the ward that sealed the water tube as he waited for the bubble.
No, this was a talk Tunold wanted to have in person.
◊
Show time.
Jacobs perched in his command seat, high above the ring of duty posts that formed the bridge, looking outward through the transparent dome at the port hangar as it opened above him. Right on time. As always.
Below him his crew buzzed with activity as they went through last minute checks and prepared for liftoff.
He spun back to face the illusory replica of the Horizon Cusp, a tiny gryphon floating above his station. By placing his finger on the location of the engineering section he saw a display form above the gryphon with the latest numbers on the Deception Drive: current, all systems go.
Jacobs knew he had no reason to check the security report. He knew that Goldberg was amid his final check right now, and Jacobs would see nothing but the status as of about five minutes ago.
And yet it was a speculation he could not resist confirming.
No updates. A brief blue glow between the wings on the gryphon’s back, in the position of the bridge, signaled that all passengers and cargo had been accounted for.
Jacobs spun his chair back to his bridge crew. “Helm, report.”
“Moderate traffic,” said Mr. Burke, “but they’ve given us a clear lane, Captain.”
“And the pilot?”
“Ready for duty, Sir.”
Burke had to know that his captain would keep a weather eye on him, and his performance during lift off would determine whether or not he got to land the ship on Venus. The boy had taken ships in and out of port without the modern mandated thaumaturgic guidance, but nothing the size or power of the Horizon Cusp.
Jacobs moved on to the next report before any hesitation could be noticed. “Scanners, report.”
“All systems go, Captain.”
“Damage Control, report.”
“Five by five across the board, Captain.”
“Then as soon as we get the final word from the port, we’re ready for space.”
At the communications station, Jefferson slipped her fingers through the pale blue, glowing web strands of the ship’s communications network, receiving a communiqué. Certain this would be the go signal from port, Jacobs spun his chair to face Mr. Burke and drew breath to give the order.
“Captain,” said Jefferson, “Mr. Tunold is ordering that we hold the launch.”
“On what grounds?”
“He’s cut the line, sir. He said he’s on his way to the bridge.”
“Prepare for launch as normal,” said Jacobs, before his bridge crew could register confusion. “I want air under me the second I give the order, and space around me on schedule.”
Jacobs turned to face the low, curved door that led down to the next deck by a sloping passage. Any moment now his ex oh would thunder onto the bridge.
Jacobs drummed his fingers on his console, but that was not enough activity. He came down the spiral stairs from his station to pace the circular walkway surrounding the duty stations, just inside the transparent bulkhead, waiting.
Tunold did not keep him waiting long. No more than a minute after Ms. Jefferson relayed his words, the door opened and Jacobs saw the light sheen of perspiration that told him that Tunold had double-timed it the whole way.
“I trust you have a good reason for this,” said Jacobs, in a dangerous tone.
“Captain, what the hell is this about us allowing passengers weapons?”
“Stow that attitude, Mister.”
Tunold slammed the side of one fi
st against the bulkhead, and Jacobs noted the eyes of the entire bridge crew on their executive officer. Tunold raised his hands wide, like the spread paws of an angry bear standing upright, then gushed out a breath, half-tipping forward.
He straightened himself out and said, his huge jaw scarcely moving, “Captain, as executive officer, why was I not informed that our passenger complement would be armed?”
“They’re not armed,” said Jacobs, his own words level and cool. “But we are allowing them to transport the weapons they might need on a potentially hostile planet with little government and less law.”
“Captain, these people brought us trouble last time—”
“One of them brought us trouble, not the others. And I’ve already arranged their security with Goldberg. Keep current on your reports, Ex Oh.”
“This will concern the ship in transit. I should have been informed.”
“If it affects the ship in transit, then our passengers have managed to breach the best security we have just to get to those weapons.” Jacobs did not try to resist the smirk he felt quirk his lips. “If that happens, I promise you’ll be informed.”
“Captain,” said Jefferson, and Jacobs understood the slight tremor in her voice, “port has given us the go sign.”
“Take her up, Mr. Burke,” Jacobs said without looking away from his executive officer. “And you return to your duties, Ex Oh. I have a ship to run.”
Jacobs turned away from Tunold to give his ex oh the chance to let his frustrations out without the risk of offending his captain, and hustled back up the stairs to his station. Jacobs refused to let himself hover over Burke at this key moment, but failing to oversee liftoff was an impossibility.
Burke guided them up flawlessly, and minutes later the Horizon Cusp was at space once more, roughly three days from whatever passed for a port on Venus.
A lot could go wrong in three days.
◊
Donal knew that once he started graduate school, he would miss one thing about these special deliveries: they always came with the best accommodations. On his last regular delivery — to the moon and back — he had been cramped into the sort of restricted passage he could have afforded for himself. But for a custom job like this?
First of all, it smelled fresh. Like clean clothes. Not like the efficiency cabins, which always smelled a little like the past occupants, no matter how good a job the cleaning crews did.
And talk about spacious!
Donal spun in a circle in the middle of the main room of his suite, his arms spread wide. Something he could not have done on many flights. And this was just the sitting room, with its huge, plush couch and matching recliners — each bigger than Donal’s first college bed — that rotated for a view of either the room or of space outside through room’s three-meter-wide porthole. Not that there was much to see right now, except the port.
Across from the couch was an interactive entertainment display that looked more expensive than any Donal had ever been close to. This room even had its own bathroom, over near the door, next to the coat closet.
Subtle privacy spells woven into the walls, ceiling and floor kept the suite quiet in both directions. A marching band could have gone past the front door and Donal would not have heard it. And Donal could have screamed his head off without disturbing the neighbors on either side of him.
The other bathroom was in the bedroom behind him, next to the walk-in closet. Walk-in closet. Even Donal’s apartment didn’t have a walk-in closet. And that bathroom had a tub wide enough and long enough that Donal could stretch out any direction he wanted. And a misting shower that let the user move the main jets anywhere in a three-hundred-sixty-degree sphere.
The bedroom’s huge, real-wood chest of drawers hardly seemed worth mentioning, or even the second porthole (the same size as the first), compared to the emperor-sized bed.
Donal didn’t know if that was the official designation for the over four square meters of comfort that allowed for variable firmness, heat, and soothe, but it seemed to him to be fancy enough for an emperor. It has a soothe control. Not just elemental spells unwinding the sleeper’s tension, but a grid panel that controlled the intensity and location of the relaxation magic.
Donal could not resist glancing at the spells when he first discovered the bed, but quickly realized puzzling through them would take weeks. And he only had the suite for three days, until the helioship reached Venus. Three short days to savor this luxury before he delivered his package and had to sleep in whatever passed for a hotel in a colony that had not yet opened itself to tourist traffic.
At least he would have the flight home to look forward to.
Donal heard a canine rumble, as of a throat being cleared, and he had the feeling that his familiar had been trying to get his attention for several minutes now.
“Come on, Fionn, you have to admit that this place is amazing.”
“You have not spoken to me since we dismissed your would-be assassin. But we have much to discuss.”
“You said I should kill him.”
“I said that you would have been better off had you killed him.” The emerald deerhound sat, its head tilting at an angle that Donal had come to think of as Fionn’s professorial expression. “Your reticence to take life pleases me. I hope you do not lose it. But I never wish to see you underestimate a threat. And that man represents a threat that has not yet expired.”
“You think he’ll really try to kill me if I don’t murder for him?”
“I think that whatever comes of this voyage, you should not relax until the matter of your would-be assassin has been ... resolved with certainty.”
“I’ll tell Li Hua.”
Fionn flicked its ears, a slight ruffle weaving through its fur.
“While I do not approve of your association with her, I admit that in this case she is well qualified to tend to this for you.”
“What else is bothering you?”
Fionn sat, impassive.
“Something’s been bothering you since Ms. MacPherson joined us for lunch.”
“You are surrounded by promises, but no one discusses their price.”
Leave it to the fae to think of the price of favors.
Donal sank down into the couch, felt it cradle him from beneath and had to resist the urge to lay his head back and revel in the comfort. He drew a breath to bring his mind back to the subject at hand.
“I think she made her price rather plain. If I kill Mancuso, she’ll take care of me.”
“Rowan MacPherson never spoke directly of killing, and as she was direct in other matters, this may mean that she foresees several options for you. But that is the effect, not the price.”
Donal thought for a moment. “The price is the removal of Mancuso from 4M, and the ripple effects that causes.”
“If Donatello Mancuso is all that some say, then removing him from power may be the best option. But removing him would create a vacuum. And the question of what would fill that vacuum remains unanswered. And it must be considered.”
“Can’t I just enjoy my new room for a little bit?”
“Very well. Take this night for enjoyment, but pay attention. I will remind you of this conversation.”
As Donal felt the ship lift off, he had the feeling that Fionn’s reminder would come sooner than he wanted.
◊
Within the workshop that doubled as his office, Machado sat within the largest and most intricate of three magic circles inscribed in the floor. The room also had his small alchemy lab behind him, his extensive library to his right, and his desk to his left. Before him, on the deck outside his circle, his censer trailed the scent of goldenrod and dried holly into the air.
But Machado could perceive none of those things at the moment.
Machado’s mind floated within the thaumaturgic patterns of the ship, the center of a network of spells that knit together Fredrickson’s alchemy, the hull’s carterite and ceramics, the elementals bound into key systems, the
relatively few spells Jang had cast, and the vast number of enchantments he had woven himself.
Over the ten years Machado had served aboard the Horizon Cusp, he had found cause to remove and re-cast every single spell of its construction and maintenance.
Captain Jacobs might refer to the Horizon Cusp as his ship, but in a very practical way it belonged to Machado.
At the moment he waited, studying the lines and flows of power all about him. Soon the ship would lift off, and every system would experience stress beyond anything easily replicated for testing purposes. Machado expected to catch any current or potential trouble spots before the ship hit space.
Some magicians favored viewing interwoven spells as a web, but Machado preferred the image of tapestry. More artistic, and it helped him color-code and pattern-code systems and subsystems for ease of reference.
The projection of Machado’s attention chuckled in a way that would have shaken his belly, had the laugh reached his seated physical form. If non-magicians ever learned how personal and idiosyncratic were the spells that supported their daily lives, they might try to resurrect technology.
Machado wondered for a moment whether they could.
While Machado kept an eye on the whole thaumaturgic tapestry, his familiar Saravá prowled the spells nearest the Deception Drive, the ship’s engine. Jang might have been the most competent Initiate Machado had ever known, but he would not trust space travel entirely to the perceptions of an Initiate. His spirit onça would warn him of any problems requiring his immediate attention.
Then Machado felt it; flares swirled along the superstructure, keying the wings and legs of the great gryphon that was the Horizon Cusp as the helioship took to the air.
Once airborne, the sylphs that supported the ship within the Earth’s sky pulsed information from the atmosphere to the crew about location, speed, and everything nearby.
Machado’s attention drifted like a ghost past the bindings that held the air elementals in place and kept them about their assigned tasks: tight and harmonious. ‘Ship shape’ as Jacobs would say. Machado followed the links and ensured that the vibrations of the bindings harmonized with those that kept yet more sylphs supplying and refreshing the air within the confines of the ship.
