by David Weber
"Roger... wouldn't do that," Despreaux said positively. "No one who was on the March is ever going to be anyone he would fire. Or not listen to. He might not take the advice, though."
"And the armed forces swear an oath to the Constitution and the Emperor. He's their commander-in-chief. He can do quite a bit of fighting even without any declaration of war, and if we manage to succeed in this... this—"
"This forlorn hope," Kosutic supplied.
"Yes." The chief of staff smiled thinly, recognizing the ancient military term for a small body of troops sent out with even smaller hope of success. "If we succeed in this forlorn hope, there's automatically going to be a state of emergency. If a civil war breaks out, the Constitution equally automatically restricts citizens' rights and increases the power of the sitting head of state. We could end up with... Roger, in his present mental incarnation, holding as much power as any other person in the history of the human race."
"You sound like he's some bloody-handed murderer!" Despreaux shook her head. "He's not. He's a good man. You make him sound like one of the Dagger Lords!"
"He's not that," Kosutic said. "But what he is is damned near a reincarnation of Miranda MacClintock. She happened to be a political philosopher with a strongly developed sense of responsibility and duty, which, I agree, Roger also has. But if you remember your history, she also took down the Dagger Lords by being a bloody-minded bitch at least as ruthless as they were."
"What he is, effectively," Eleanora continued in that same gentle voice, "is a neobarbarian tyrant. A 'good' tyrant, perhaps, and as charismatic as hell—maybe even on the order of an Alexander the Great—but still a tyrant. And if he can't break out of the mold, putting him on the Throne will be as bad for the Empire as disintegration."
"What's your point?" Despreaux demanded harshly.
"You," Kosutic said. "When you joined the Regiment, when I was interviewing you on in-process, I damned near blackballed you."
"You never told me that." Despreaux frowned at the sergeant major. "Why?"
"You'd passed all the psychological tests," Kosutic replied with a shrug. "You'd passed RIP, although not with flying colors. We knew you were loyal. We knew you were a good guard. But there was something missing, something I couldn't quite put a finger on. I called it 'hardness,' at the time, but that's not it. You're damned hard."
"No," Despreaux said. "I'm not. You were right."
"Maybe. But hardness was still the wrong word." Kosutic frowned. "You've always done your job. Even when you lost the edge and couldn't fight anymore, you contributed and sweated right along with the rest of us. You're just not..."
"Vicious," Despreaux said. "I'm not a killer."
"No." Kosutic nodded in acknowledgment. "And I sensed that. That was what made me want to blackball you. But in the end, I didn't."
"Maybe you should have."
"Bullshit. You did your job—more than your job. You made it, and you're the key to what we need. So quit whining, soldier."
"Yes, Sergeant Major." Despreaux managed a fleeting smile, though it was plain her heart wasn't in it. "On the other hand, if you had blackballed me, I would have avoided our little pleasure stroll."
"And you could never be Empress," Eleanora said.
Despreaux's new indigo eyes snapped back to the chief of staff, dark with dread, and Eleanora put a hand on her knee.
"Listen to me, Nimashet. What you are is something the opposite of vicious. I'd call it 'nurturing,' but that's not really right, either. You're as tough-minded and obstinate—most ways—as anyone, even Roger. Or can you think of anyone else in our happy little band who could argue him to a standstill once he gets the bit truly between his teeth?"
Eleanora looked into her eyes until Despreaux's innate honesty forced her to shake her head, then continued.
"But whatever it is we ought to be calling you, the point is that with you by Roger's side, he's calmer. Less prone to simply lash out and much more prone to think things through. And that's important—important to the Empire."
"I don't want to be Empress," Despreaux said desperately.
"Satan, girl," Kosutic laughed. "I understand, but listen to what you just said!"
"I'm a country girl," Despreaux protested. "A sod-buster from Midgard! I'm no good, never have been, at the sort of petty, backbiting infighting that goes on at Court." She shook her head. "I don't have the right mindset for it."
"So? How many people do, to start with?" Kosutic demanded.
"A hell of a lot more of them at Court than there are of me!" Despreaux shot back, then shook her head again, almost convulsively. "I don't know how to be a noblewoman, much less a fucking Empress, and if I try, I'll fuck it up. Don't you understand?" She looked back and forth between them, her eyes darker than ever. "If I try to do the job, I'll blow it. I'll be out of my league. I'll do the wrong thing, say the wrong thing at the wrong time, give Roger the wrong piece of advice—something! And when I do, the entire Empire will get screwed because of me!"
"You think Roger isn't thinking exactly the same thing?" Kosutic challenged more gently. "Satan, Nimashet! He has to wake up every single morning with the piss scared out of him just thinking about the job in front of him."
"But at least he grew up knowing it was coming. He's got the background, the training for it. I don't!"
"Training?" Eleanora flicked one hand in a dismissive gesture. "To be Emperor?" She snorted. "Until Jin told us what's been happening on Old Earth, it never even crossed his mind once that he might ever be Emperor, Nimashet! And, frankly, his mother's distrust of him meant that everyone, myself included, was always very careful to never, ever suggest the possibility to him. To be honest, it's only recently occurred to me how much that may have contributed to his refusal—or failure—to recognize the fact that he truly did stand close to the succession."
She shook her head again, her eyes sad as she thought of how dreadfully her one-time charge's life had changed, then looked back at Despreaux.
"Admittedly, he grew up in Court circles, and he may have more training for that than you do, but trust me, he didn't begin to have enough of it before our little jaunt. I know; I was the one who was supposed to be giving him that training, and I wasn't having a lot of success.
"But he's been much more strongly... motivated in that regard recently, and you can be, too. You've seen how much he's grown in the last half-year, probably better than anyone else besides me and Armand Pahner. But nobody's born with that 'mindset'; they learn it, just like Roger has, and you've already pretty conclusively demonstrated your ability to master combat techniques. This is just one more set of combat skills. And, remember, if we succeed, you're going to be Empress. It's going to take either a very stupid individual, or a very dangerous one, to cross you."
"Our kids would be raised in a cage!"
"All children are," Eleanora countered. "It's why no sane adult would ever really want to be a child again. But your kids' cage would be the best protected one in the galaxy."
"Tell that to John's kids!" Despreaux exploded. "When I think about—"
"When you think about the kids who just up and disappear every year," Kosutic said. "Or end up a body in a ditch. Or raped by their uncle, or their dad's best friend. Think about that, instead. That's one thing you'll never have to worry about, not with three thousand hard bastards watching anyone that comes near them like rottweilers. Every parent worries about her child; that comes with the job. But your kids are going to have three thousand of the most dangerous baby-sitters—and you know that's what we are—in the known galaxy.
"Sure, they got to John and his kids. But they did it by killing the entire Empress' Own, Nimashet. Every mother-loving one of them. In case you hadn't noticed, there are exactly twelve of us left in the entire frigging Galaxy, because the only way they could get to the kids, or John, or the Empress was over us—over our dead bodies, stacked in front of the goddamned door! And there's been one—count 'em, one—successful attack on the Imperial
Family in five hundred fucking years! Don't tell me your kids wouldn't be 'safe'!"
The sergeant major glared at her, and, after a moment, Despreaux's gaze fell.
"I don't want to be Empress," she repeated, quietly but stubbornly. "I swore to him that I wouldn't marry him if he was going to be Emperor. What would I be if I took that back?"
"A woman." Kosutic grinned. "Didn't you know we're allowed to change our minds at random? It comes with the tits."
"Thanks very much," Despreaux said bitingly, and folded her arms again. Her shoulders hunched. "I don't want to be Empress."
"Maybe not," Eleanora said. "But you do want to marry Roger. You want to have his children. You want to keep a bloody-minded tyrant off the Throne, and he'll be far less bloody-minded if he wants to keep your approval in mind. The only thing you don't want is to be Empress."
"That's a pretty big 'only,'" Despreaux pointed out.
"What you want is really beside the point," Kosutic said. "The only thing that matters is what's good for the Empire. I don't care if you consider every day of the rest of your life a living sacrifice to the Empire. You swore the oath; you took the pay."
"And this was never part of the job specs!" Despreaux shot back angrily.
"Then consider it very unusual duties, if you have to!" Kosutic said, just as angrily.
"Calm down—both of you!" Eleanora said sharply. She looked back and forth between them, then focused on Despreaux. "Nimashet, just think about it. You don't have to say yes now. But for God's sake, think about what refusing to marry Roger will mean. To all of us. To the Empire. To your home planet. Hell, to every polity in the galaxy."
"A person's conscience is her own," Despreaux said stubbornly.
"Heaven's bells, if it is," Kosutic said caustically. "We spend most of our lives doing things because we know they're the right things to do in other people's eyes. Especially the eyes of people we care about. It's what makes us human. If he loses you, he'll do anything he pleases. He knows most of us won't give a damn. If he told us to round up every left-handed redhead and put them in ovens, I would, because he's Roger. If he told Julian to go nuke a planet, Julian would. Because he's Roger. And even if we wouldn't, he'd find someone else who would—for power, or because he has the legal authority to order them to, or because they want to do the deed. The only person who could have kept him under control was Pahner, and Pahner's dead, girl. The only one left that he's going to look to for... conscience is you.
"I'm not saying he's a bad man, Nimashet—we're all agreed on that. I'm just telling you that he's in one Heaven of a spot, with nothing anywhere he can look but more boots coming down on the people the Emperor is responsible for protecting. Just like he was responsible for us on Marduk. And do you think for one moment that he wouldn't have killed every other living thing on that planet to keep us alive?"
She half-glared into Despreaux's eyes, daring her to look away, and finally, after a small, tense eternity, the younger woman shook her head slowly.
"Eleanora's spelled it out," Kosutic continued in a softer voice. "He's learned a set of responses that work. And he's learned about responsibility, learned the hard way. He'll do anything to discharge that responsibility, and once he starts down the slope of expediency, each additional step will get easier and easier to take. Unless someone gets in the way. Someone who prevents him from taking those steps, because his responsibility to her—to be the person she demands he be—is as powerful a motivator as his responsibility to all the rest of the universe combined. And that person is you. You're it, girlie. You leave, and there's nothing between him and the universe but the mind of a wolf."
Despreaux bowed her head into her hands and shook it from side to side.
"I really don't want to be Empress," she said. "And what about dynastic marriages?" she added from behind her hands.
"On a scale of one to ten, with your stabilizing effect on him at ten, the importance of holding out for a dynastic marriage rates about a minus sixty," Eleanora said dryly. "Externally, it's a moot point. Most of the other human polities don't have our system, or else they're so minor that they're not going to get married to the Emperor, anyway. Internally, pretty much the same. There are a few members of the Court who might think otherwise, but most of them are going to be shuffled out along with Adoula. I have a list, and they never will be missed."
"But that does bring up another point you might want to consider," Kosutic said.
Despreaux raised her head to look at the sergeant major once more, eyes wary, and the Armaghan smiled crookedly.
"Let's grant that with the shit storm coming down on the galaxy, or at least the Empire, there might even be some advantages to having a wolf on the Throne. Somebody the historians will tag 'the Terrible.' At least we know damned well that he'll do whatever needs doing, and I think we're all pretty much agreed he'll do it for the right reasons, however terrible it is. But someday, one of his children is going to inherit the Throne. Just who's going to raise that kid, Sergeant? One of those backbiting, infighting Court bitches you don't want to tangle with? What's the kid's judgment going to be like, growing up with a daddy smashing anything that gets in his way and a mommy who's only interested in power and its perks?"
"A point," Eleanora seconded, "albeit a more long-ranged one." It was her turn to gaze into Despreaux's eyes for a moment, then she shrugged. "Still, it's one you want to add to the list when you start thinking about it."
"All right." Despreaux raised a hand to forestall anything more from Kosutic. "I'll think about it. I'll think about it," she repeated. "Just that."
"Fine," Eleanora said. "I'll add just one more thing."
"What now?" Despreaux asked tiredly.
"Do you love Roger?"
The soft question hovered in Kosutic's stateroom, and Despreaux looked down at the hands which had somehow clasped themselves back together in her lap.
"Yes," she replied, after a long moment. "Yes, I do."
"Then think about this. The pressure of being Emperor is enormous. It's driven more than one person mad, and if you leave, you'll be leaving a man you love to face that pressure, all alone. As his wife, you can help. Yes, he'll have counselors, but at the end of the day it will be you who'll keep that strain from becoming unbearable."
"And what about the pressure on the Empress?" Despreaux asked. "His prosthetic conscience?"
"Roger's sacrifice is his entire life." Kosutic told her softly. "And yours? Yours is watching the man you love make that sacrifice... and marching every meter of the way right alongside him. That's your true sacrifice, Nimashet Despreaux. Just as surely as you would have been sacrificed on that altar in Krath, if Roger hadn't prevented it."
"This takes some getting used to."
Julian fingered his chin. His hair was light brown, instead of black, and his chin was much more rounded. Other than that, he had generally European features, instead of the slightly Mediterranean ones he'd been born with.
"Every day," Roger agreed, looking over at Temu Jin, the only human aboard Dawn who hadn't been modified. The IBI agent had perfectly legitimate papers showing that he'd been discharged from his post on Marduk, with good references, and now was taking a somewhat roundabout route back to Old Earth.
"Where are we?" Roger asked.
"One more jump, and we'll be at Torallo," Jin said. "That's the waypoint the Saints normally use. The customs there have an understanding with them."
"That's pretty unusual for the Alphanes," Roger observed.
"One of the things we're going to point out to them," Julian replied. "It's not the only point where they've got some border security issues, either. Not nearly as bad as the Empire's problems, maybe, but they're going to be surprised to find out that they have any."
"Is the 'understanding' with humans?" Roger asked.
"Some humans, yes," Jin said. "But the post commander and others who have to be aware are Althari."
"I thought they were incorruptible," Roger said with a fro
wn.
"So, apparently, do the Altharis," Jin replied. "They're not, and neither are Phaenurs. Trust me, I've seen the classified reports. I'm going to have to avoid that particular point, and thank Ghu I don't have any names of our agents. But we have agents among both the Altharis and the Phaenurs. Let's not go around making that obvious, though."
"I won't," Roger said. "But while we go around not making that obvious, what else happens?"
"Our initial cover is that we're entertainers, a traveling circus, to explain all the critters in the holds," Julian said. "We'll travel to Althar Four and then make contact. How we do that is going to have to wait until we arrive."
"Aren't the Phaenurs there going to... sense that we're lying?"
"Yes, they will," Jin said. "Which is going to be what has to wait. We have no contacts. We have to play this entirely by ear."
The Alphanes were everything they'd been described as being.
The Althari security officer at the transfer station—a male—wasn't as tall as a Mardukan, but he was at least twice as broad, not to mention being covered in long fur that was silky looking and striped along the sides. The Phaenur standing beside him was much smaller, so small it looked like some sort of pet that should be sitting on the Althari's shoulder. But it was the senior of the two.
The entry into Alphane space had been smooth. Although Emerald Dawn had visited Torallo several times, the Saint-friendly customs officials at Torallo had scarcely glanced at her papers, despite the fact that they now identified her as the Imperial freighter Sheridan's Pride. They'd simply taken their customary cut, and the ship had proceeded onward with nothing but a cursory inspection that didn't even note the obvious combat damage.
Two jumps later, at the capital system of the Alphane Alliance, the same could not be said. Docking had been smooth, and they'd presented their quarantine and entry passes to the official, a human, sent aboard to collect them. But after that, they'd been confined to the ship for two nerve-wracking hours until "Mr. Chung" was summoned to speak to some "senior customs officials."
