by Victor Milán
Yet I live, she thought with the bright hot joy of a bird of prey, and my enemies are dead. A sense of invincible purpose filled her. Thrilled her.
They cannot stand against me! They cannot deny my destiny!
‘‘Hazen,’’ a voice said suddenly in her ears. It was a familiar voice, and not one she expected to hear, driven through the white-noise jamming by a fusion generator far more powerful than her own. ‘‘Galaxy Commander Beckett Malthus aboard Bec de Corbin calling Galaxy Commander Malvina Hazen. Malvina, answer!’’
‘‘Hazen here,’’ she replied on the same wavelength. Between her own fusion powerplant and the DropShip’s huge receiving antenna array she had no doubt of being heard. ‘‘What is it, Malthus? What occurs?’’
‘‘Treachery. Rebellion.’’
‘‘I knew that.’’
‘‘Not all, Malvina. A JumpShip out of Blair Atholl has emerged from a LaGrange point near the planet’s second moon. The entire Vau Galaxy is inbound on DropShips. They are less than an hour out. Already their fighters enter the atmosphere. Had Watrous’ fools not been so fearful of you, and thus impatient to kill you, the blows would have struck us as one. We would surely have been overwhelmed.’’
‘‘Have they challenged?’’
‘‘Galaxy Commander Erik Chistu broadcast a batchall for a Trial of Annihilation. He intends to exterminate you and all who follow you.’’
‘‘They dare not presume so much! They dare not!’’
‘‘They dare presume plenty, my Khan. Our WarShip orbits at the system’s far end. Eight days away at standard thrust. And they come in unanswerable force.’’
Malvina laughed. ‘‘Then we must prepare a mordant answer.’’
‘‘No, Malvina. We must leave. The laborer rebellion was no ruse: Watrous himself raised the lower castes against us as renegades and bloodfoul. Not even your genius can prevail: our enemies far outnumber us. And they are Falcons. We must withdraw while we can bring away most of our assets.’’
‘‘Flee before these fools?’’ Malvina screamed.
‘‘Yes. Flee. Now, for they will grant no hegira. Or your dream dies here on Graus. We must go someplace we can gather our forces to strike back.’’
For a moment she sat, glaring unfocusedly at the skies, breathing hard through flared nostrils.
‘‘I come for you,’’ Malthus said. ‘‘At least another Binary advances to attack you. Enemy VTOLs are on their way from south of the city, and already our fighters engage advance Peregrine aerospace assets as well as local craft.’’
A white flare and pillar of white smoke appeared above the tree-clad hilltop that masked the landing pit from Malvina’s view. As Bec de Corbin hove into sight, rockets flashed off against its armor-plated hull. Heavy autocannon roared reply. A tilt-rotor Skadi fell to the landing field in a ball of orange flame.
Warning tones sang shrill in her ears. Her computer threat assessment had identified the leading attackers. At least four more BattleMechs approached, including a 65-ton Rifleman IIc. Given Black Rose’s brutalized condition, she could never match them.
The Bec de Corbin swept low above the vehicle yard. A hatch yawned black and wide to receive her.
Uttering a final falcon scream of defiance, Malvina jumped. Her BattleMech rose ungainly into the sky on sputtering jets of flame. The waiting hatchway swallowed it up and closed behind it.
As an aerial battle broke out all around, the DropShip lit its three great primary drives and, ascending rapidly through a scrim of smoke, left the world of Graus behind.
15
Approaching Antares Orbit
Jade Falcon Occupation Zone
29 October 3135
‘‘I should have brought the Talon back to Graus and laid waste that rookery of bloodfouls. And the damned Peregrines!’’
‘‘If you devastate the Jade Falcon Occupation Zone world by world, Malvina,’’ Beckett Malthus murmured in a deep and honeyed voice, ‘‘what will you rule?’’
As she spun, blue eyes mad-hot, he went on: ‘‘More to the point, without all the resources you can lay hands upon, how will you ever extend your rule over the other Clans, not to mention the teeming trillions of the Inner Sphere? Even you must have a power base; even you cannot conquer single-handed—my Khan.’’
‘‘Damn you, Beckett Malthus!’’
‘‘Should the archaic superstitions retained by many in the Inner Sphere possess some validity,’’ he said, undeterred, ‘‘doubtless it is already accomplished. Nonetheless I am yours to command, O Chingis Khan.’’
At that she could only laugh.
Before them rotated a tawny ball. They stood on the darkened bridge, surrounded by low-murmuring crew, as the Emerald Talon approached orbit around the red-giant sun Antares’ lone habitable world. It had declared for Malvina when she assumed the khanship.
‘‘We do not lack wholly for resources even now,’’ Malvina said. ‘‘Dompaire has declared for me.’’
‘‘And Antares remains subordinate to you,’’ Malthus said smoothly, ‘‘or so they say, with the Emerald Talon approaching like a killer comet. Yet neither planet felt inspired to send actual reinforcements to Graus, quineg?’’
‘‘Neg,’’ Malvina said.
‘‘Our defeat there shows that the weight of Jade Falcon opinion lies against us. Ours is a conservative people. We have started a civil war. That is an intrinsically unpopular course.’’
She turned sharply toward him. He steeled himself to weather the onslaught—especially since he had used the forbidden phrase. Instead she asked levelly, ‘‘Do you think we have lost, then?’’
‘‘If I did I would have advised you to order Star Admiral Binetti to take us outside the occupation zone,’’ Malthus said. ‘‘Possibly into the Periphery. We have not lost. Yet. But our next moves will determine whether we can win.’’
Malvina looked at him a moment longer. Then she smiled a strange smile. She walked to the ferroglass viewport and pressed her nose against it. She reminded Malthus uncomfortably of the Inner Sphere child she unaccountably continued to carry along with her.
‘‘Our next movement must be something bold,’’ she said almost breathlessly. ‘‘Is that what you tell to me, Beckett Malthus?’’
Despite alarm rising within him, Malthus said, ‘‘It is, my Khan.’’
She let herself lie almost sprawled against the great viewport, that artifact of arrogant power. Then she rolled to put her back against the ferroglass.
‘‘Then bold shall I make it.’’
‘‘Impossible.’’ Khan Jana Pryde fetched the wooden frame a mighty kick. It flew across her crafts studio in the Falcon’s Perch and shattered against a ferrocrete wall. ‘‘Not even that little stravag would do such a thing.’’
Heinz-Otto von Texeira stood leaning on his cane with an eyebrow upraised. ‘‘It would appear that she has, my Khan,’’ he said equably.
‘‘We have her,’’ Loremaster Julia Buhalin said smugly. ‘‘Surely Clan opinion will turn upon her now.’’
‘‘Undoubtedly you are wise, Loremaster,’’ von Texeira said. She gave him a furious violet gaze. She wasn’t buying it. He didn’t sigh, but he wanted to. I hate it when I make beautiful women angry at me, he thought. That’s one reason I agreed to leave home. ‘‘Forgive me, a poor foreigner far less steeped in your Clan’s noble traditions. I thought that up until very recently freebirths of appropriate heritage were permitted to test for full warrior status within Clan Jade Falcon.’’
Jana Pryde had walked to the wall and picked up a splintered piece of what had been a wooden loom. A swatch of loosely linked yarn in several drab colors dangled from it. She regarded the wreckage with a certain gloomy satisfaction, then let it drop.
‘‘You are correct, Margrave,’’ she said. ‘‘I proscribed the practice. I did it primarily to appease our more conservative Clansfolk.’’ This with a narrowed eye cast in Buhalin’s direction. ‘‘And also because we found ourselves with too ma
ny warriors and too little war. It is a volatile combination. ’’
‘‘Whereas Malvina has need of nothing so much as warriors, ’’ he said. ‘‘Which explains why she chooses to appeal to young candidates fresh out of the sibkos who have yet to pass their Blooding and become true warriors. And more than that, please correct me if I misperceive.’’
‘‘She permits those who failed their first Trial of Position to try again,’’ Jana Pryde said grimly. ‘‘Our Clan rulership has grown soft and corrupt, she says—meaning me, of course—and therefore the entire system has become perverted. The little witch goes so far as to suggest that the trials themselves may have been compromised!’’
‘‘So she offers all a chance to redeem themselves,’’ von Texeira said. ‘‘By battle, of course. I understand there is some precedent among the Clans, in isolated units or even Clans whose warrior ranks have been over-thinned by battle loss.’’
‘‘There is,’’ Jana Pryde said grimly.
‘‘Chalcas,’’ said Buhalin. It sounded like a curse. From the lips of a Clan loremaster, von Texeira knew, it was— perhaps the direst imaginable, except for coward. Which no one not madder than Malvina Hazen herself would ever accuse Malvina of being. ‘‘In this case it is chalcas.’’
Von Texeira beamed at her as if she had just invented reading. ‘‘Precisely, Loremaster!’’ he exclaimed. ‘‘Not that I presume to compare my poor comprehension of Clan ways to your peerless own. It seems to me you have hit upon a perfect means of turning Malvina’s tricks against her. Khan Jana can now appeal to your Jesses as well as your, ah, Slips, to lay aside their differences until the war is over. For all the lip service Malvina pays traditional Falcon values, she commits chalcas. Or acts which can be seen that way, certainly. Even your Jess faction loudly deplores chalcas, does it not?’’
‘‘Loudly,’’ Jana Pryde said dryly.
Von Texeira held up his palms. ‘‘And so: Malvina presents you, Khan Jana Pryde, with a golden opportunity to lead a glorious Slip-Jess coalition to fight evil chalcas. Yes?’’
The khan laughed silently. ‘‘Cynical yet succinct,’’ she said. ‘‘Spoken like a true Lyran merchant.’’
Von Texeira performed a mock bow. ‘‘I thank you, Khan Jana.’’
‘‘A strong khan has no need of coalitions and backroom dealings!’’ Buhalin flared.
‘‘With all respect, Loremaster,’’ von Texeira said, ‘‘is your Remembrance so selective?’’
Jana Pryde could not restrain a snort of laughter. ‘‘Close. Not quite.’’
Buhalin pressed her full lips to a line. Her glare suggested he was not making her like him any better. ‘‘I should better have said, for a strong khan to use such means is not the Falcon Way.’’
It was Jana Pryde’s turn to narrow her eyes. ‘‘Do you suggest that I am not a strong khan?’’
‘‘Neg, my Khan! Rather, I say it is a . . . a perversion of Turkina’s Way and of your destiny that you should be required to adopt such expedients. And I perceive this situation offers us opportunity not to coddle the factions but to put an end to their machinations for good and all.’’
Jana Pryde brushed a lock of hair that had wandered loose from her taut ponytail off her forehead. ‘‘You interest me strangely, Julia,’’ she said. ‘‘Go on.’’
The loremaster leaned forward, eyes aglow with passion. Von Texeira willed himself to look away from the front of her green robe, which tended to hang open, revealing interesting depths. He was of course a man of Recife, and though he got on in years and weight, a viper’s cold blood did not yet flow through his veins. But he was also on service to his archon. To get caught ogling the cleavage of the loremaster of Clan Jade Falcon, however impressive . . . inconceivable.
‘‘You have no need of these Jesses anymore, my Khan,’’ Buhalin said. ‘‘You may openly side with those who espouse the truest and purest virtues of Turkina. The Jesses must go along or be seen for what they are: weak-willed Wardens willing to countenance even challenge to our sacred caste system!’’
Jana Pryde stood with her arms crossed tightly beneath her breasts and her chin down on her clavicle. Her narrow green eyes flicked from her loremaster to her ad hoc advisor from the Inner Sphere.
‘‘The loremaster’s suggestions do credit to her zeal,’’ von Texeira said, thinking, If not to her bloody bedamned sense. ‘‘And is it not likely that in the extremity of a Rending, the khan has need of all the most eager support she can get? Will not the Jesses’ enthusiastic support serve the Falcon better than the consent of grudging silence?’’
‘‘Our guest appears sincere in his desire to assist us in these matters,’’ Buhalin said. ‘‘Since the interests of his people seem to run along the same lines as ours in this instance, I feel inclined to trust him—so long as they continue to do so. But not even a Lyran is infallible. Need I remind my Khan that the Margrave suggested you mobilize the entire touman to crush Malvina Hazen? And did not the Vau Galaxy of Galaxy Commander Erik Chistu, deployed on his own initiative, suffice to drive her in disarray from Graus?’’
‘‘To be sure,’’ von Texeira said, trying to keep his smile from looking too impaled. ‘‘It did not, however, suffice to put an end to Malvina herself.’’
‘‘True,’’ Jana Pryde said. ‘‘Too damned true.’’ She was looking very sour now. Buhalin had outmaneuvered herself by bringing up Chistu’s failure to kill or capture the unspeakable Malvina or even her current, and Jana Pryde’s quondam, gray eminence.
And there’s something else here, von Texeria thought, something I can’t quite see.
Jana rose from her chair, stalked across the chamber. She shied slightly like a startled horse when her foot bumped a chunk of what had recently been the loom’s framework. With a silent snarl she kicked it. It split in two.
She smiled. ‘‘You know, you Spheroids are onto something with these hobbies of yours,’’ she said. ‘‘They can be most wonderfully relaxing.’’
16
Hohenzollern, Zoetermeer
Jade Falcon Occupation Zone
25 November 3135
Ground-car-sized muzzle flame ripped the orange twilight from a parking structure a block ahead. Twenty-centimeter autocannon shells slammed against the left side and arm of Malvina Hazen’s borrowed Thor. Concussion started the heavy BattleMech falling to its right.
With consummate skill, and with alarms going off all around her, the diminutive MechWarrior got her machine’s right knee beneath her, plunging a meter deep into the pavement but preventing the ’Mech from sprawling helplessly across the broad roadway. The covers blew off the CASE in her left arm as the ammunition for her own autocannon exploded. Despite the cellular storage system venting the force of the blast away from both the BattleMech’s torso and structural components of the arm, the heavy shells had fatally weakened it. The arm containing the LB 10-X sheared away just below the shoulder actuator and crashed to the street.
From her cockpit on the Thor’s right shoulder she fired back with the right-hand particle-projector cannon. A seven-meter oval segment of cement wall near the parking garage’s ground-floor entrance exploded outward into dust and sparks and smoke. Malvina smiled. The crew must think I am even more inept than they are, to miss them so badly.
The burst had come from the fourth floor; no mistaking that, the way yellow muzzle flare had billowed into the early-evening gloom like dragon’s breath. Her battle computer was repeating the obvious: she had been ambushed by an SM1 tank destroyer. There weren’t many other platforms in the JFOZ that could carry a weapon as potent as its monstrous autocannon into such a constricted space. She was lucky. Had the gunner kept his nerve long enough to hold fire until she was even with the garage he could have blasted the BattleMech’s cockpit point-blank.
The Jade Falcon defenders of Zoetermeer were few and second-line. There wasn’t much here for them to defend.
She fired her LRMs and hit the jump jets. The Thor rose off the street at a c
razy angle. A doubled rate-of-fire burst of twenty-centimeter shells shattered the whole width of the street where she had rested an eyeblink before. The tank destroyer crew was cagey enough to fire from some distance inside the building; structural steel had prevented her sensors from picking it up, and she still could see no more of it than the flickering tip of the cannon flame.
It made no difference. Her fifteen-rocket volley snaked into the huge opening Malvina’s PPC had blasted in the front of the building. They took out three concrete support columns and weakened the floor overhead. With a grinding crunch of fracturing cement and squeal of failing rebar the ceiling buckled and dropped.
The rest of the structure promptly pancaked on top of it, leaving the parking structure collapsed in the center like a failed cake.
As Malvina fought the seventy airborne tons of BattleMech under control, the red symbol for the enemy SM1 winked out on her threat display. An instant later blinding white shafts of light stabbed out through the rubble as the hovertank’s fusion bottle let go.
She was already looking for more targets as the ’Mech touched lightly down. Solahma infantry with laser rifles moved past her in quick fire-and-move pulses along the building fronts to either side, eager to win distinction and a chance to gain—or regain—full warrior-caste status. Elementals leapfrogged along the rooftops to either side of the street on pencils of blue fire.
The Thor rocked forward into a deliberate walk toward the center of the town of Hohenzollern. Past the hollowed-out parking structure the road crested a hill. At the top Malvina saw a flurry of activity and explosions beyond. The SM1 crew had been professional enough to permit her scouts, a Point of hoverbike infantry with the rather nominal support of a 20-ton Asshur hovercraft, to pass unmolested. They may or may not have known its pilot was the terrible White Virgin, Malvina Hazen, but the Mongol raiding force’s largest BattleMech was clearly a target worth blowing their cover for.
