She smiled. “First we ventured into the Above. Into the realm of those you call gods.”
Iapetus stared at her. His mouth opened and closed once before he found his voice. “I am to believe...that... was...the Golden City?” He looked away, still not fully himself. His usual skepticism melted away along with the remnants of frost on his uniform. “Alright, perhaps,” he whispered. Then, louder, “Why did we leave so quickly?”
“Time moves slowly in the higher realms. In the City it passes much slower,” the woman answered. “This universe would have left you behind, had we lingered there but a bit longer.” She smiled and reached out, caressing his cheek like some wild animal she had domesticated and grown fond of. “Know, though, that the scant seconds you were there represented a far longer time than almost any other mortal has ever spent within the Golden Realm.” She hesitated. “Though I somehow suspect such a distinction is lost upon you.” Her expression darkened. “In any case, you are needed here and now, and so here I have returned you—and a mere three hours of local time after we left.”
“I’m needed?” He was starting to revert to his old self again. He straightened and gave her a skeptical look. “By whom? When? For what?”
“You saw for what,” she said. “You saw the face of the enemy.”
He blanched, recalling the face he had seen—the skull. Its exact appearance was already fading like some half-remembered nightmare.
“Those things—in the ice,” he stammered. “You’re saying they represent a danger to Earth?”
“They represent a danger to anything and everything in their path.”
Iapetus nodded. After what he’d seen, it didn’t take much to convince him of that. “And Earth is in their path?” he pressed.
“Directly in their path. It is their ultimate destination—their primary target.”
He exhaled slowly. He hardly found that news surprising. “What are they? Where do they come from?”
“All in good time, General,” the woman replied. “But as to your question of when you will be needed, I’m afraid the answer is now. You have been gone too long and your crew members are jealous of your absence. They are concerned. They will break through a bulkhead or the hatch here any minute, thinking to save you somehow, from something.” She smiled wanly at him, and for perhaps the first time he could see all of her face beneath the hood. She was beautiful. And terrible. “We have little time left to talk,” she continued. “Your last questions must be well-considered.”
A sudden realization struck him. He snapped his fingers and looked hard at her. “The comets,” he said. “That was one of them. I understand now. We were standing on one of those comets. And they’re...” He frowned, his eyes staring past her at the blank metal wall. “...They’re filled with those...things.”
“Yes,” the woman replied. “They are called many things in many corners of the universe. Most commonly they are known as Phaedrons. You needed to see them. To experience them. To understand the magnitude of the danger they and the comets that carry them represent.”
Iapetus met her gaze and his scowl softened. He nodded once.
“You understand?” she said again, and this time it was clearly meant as a question.
Iapetus’s eyes flicked from the woman in red to the swirling portal that filled the center of the chamber, then back to her. “Yes,” he rumbled. “Yes, I believe you are who you say you are, and I believe what you showed me.”
Teluria smiled a flat, emotionless smile. “Then, if you understand those things, understand this: Soon only you will stand between the Phaedrons and sacred Earth. Your legion is called the Sons of Terra, and you swore a holy oath to defend the homeworld from any and all threats. Will you stand firm against this enemy?” She moved closer to him and her eyes narrowed. “Will you resist all entreaties to move your forces away from Earth and the other inner worlds—to leave them vulnerable—no matter who requests or orders it?”
Iapetus, now fully himself again, snorted. “That you can count on.”
Teluria nodded. “Excellent. Excellent.” She gazed away for a moment, then blinked, looked at him and smiled. “The people of the empire will rest easier in their beds at night knowing that you and your legion protect them from the many horrors this universe has yielded up.”
Iapetus ignored this. He studied the woman in the dark red robes closely, his eyes moving up and down her form.
She appeared to take umbrage at this. “You have other questions, General?” she asked imperiously.
“Yes,” he said. “Many. But later.” He nodded towards the hatch; the lock mechanism was being cycled from outside. “For now, I’d say it’s time for you to go.”
Teluria followed his gesture, saw the hatch being unlocked, and turned back to him. She executed a very slight bow. “Until we meet again, then, General.”
He nodded his head slightly to her and watched as she stepped into the swirling eye. A second later, she and the portal were both gone; gone as if they’d never existed.
The hatch completed its cycle and slid open. A half dozen armed soldiers rushed in, with Colonel Piryu just behind them, her pistol drawn. She seemed particularly exercised.
Iapetus met her and her forces just inside the room. Fully recovered from his experiences, he summoned up his most authoritative voice and seemed to almost loom over the others. “Stand down,” he commanded in a deep, resonant voice. “All is well.”
The soldiers stood ready, glancing from Iapetus to Piryu, uncertain of what to do. The colonel moved to the front of the formation and looked him up and down. “Sir—I’m sorry to barge in like this, but... you were in here nearly three hours with no communications whatsoever.”
“Three hours?” Iapetus frowned at this, then nodded. The woman had spoken the truth. “I appreciate your concern, Colonel,” he said to Piryu, favoring her with a half-smile, “but I assure you I am quite alright.”
“I see that, yes, sir,” she said. She hesitated a moment, then, “If I may ask—what happened, General?”
“You may not,” Iapetus barked, dismissing the question along with the rest of the soldiers. Once the squad had filed back out of the strategium, he turned to the flustered Piryu.
“Contact the bridge, Colonel,” he ordered, his voice exuding authority, and she instantly moved to comply. “We must set a new course, and with all possible haste.”
“Aye, sir,” she said as she accessed the ship’s local Aether link. Then she looked up at him. “For where?”
Iapetus was already moving toward the exit. He had no further need of the strategium. His plans were set. “We travel to where we are most needed. And we will recall the entire legion along with us.”
“Yes, General?”
“Our enemies are closing in on us, Colonel, from all sides. We have been most fortunate—the entire human race has been fortunate—to have received an advance warning.” He glanced back at her, his eyes burning with conviction now. “Set course, Colonel, for Holy Terra.” He smiled, and it was the first genuine smile Piryu had ever seen on his face. “The Sons are coming home. Earth will be defended.”
5
“So you have no idea what has become of Colonel Belisarius, then?”
The holographic, red and blue robed ghost of Governor Rameses spread his arms wide and shook his head. “I understand that you dispatched him some time ago, but he has yet to arrive here on Ahknaton.”
General Tamerlane appeared taken aback by this. “He hasn’t even arrived?” He glanced back over his shoulder at Sister Delain, who stood impassively as ever just behind him within the strategium of the I Legion flagship, Ascanius. Then he looked back at Rameses. “You’ve heard nothing from him?”
“Nothing,” Rameses replied, and now he glanced momentarily off to one side, out of frame of the hologram. A second later he looked back at Tamerlane. “Perhaps he had other duties to attend to along the way—?”
“No,” Tamerlane said. He turned back to Delain again, this time nod
ding once to her; a not-so-subtle signal, delivered using a simple visual cue rather than a thought transmitted across the Aether. Sometimes the simplest ways were still the best, he reflected. A nod can’t be intercepted, recorded, decoded.
Delain closed her dark eyes for a moment and then reopened them, and Tamerlane assumed that meant it was done.
As he watched this, he was struck by the fact that, with Nakamura more or less incapacitated, Stanishur dealing with matters back in the imperial capital, and Agrippa away fighting at the head of his legion, the enigmatic lady Inquisitor was the only person near to him that he felt he could trust. An Inquisitor is the only one I can trust. He shook his head. To think it has come to that.
Delain’s expression remained as impassive as ever. Her thick, blood-red lips were closed and her dark eyes peered straight ahead, giving the appearance that she was seeing right through Tamerlane. Somehow, he suspected she could do just that—among many other things. Beneath the surface, meanwhile, she was very busy.
“Ah,” the holographic representation of Governor Rameses was saying. “Well, we have received no word at all since he departed your ship. We have been growing concerned ourselves.”
Tamerlane turned back to him. “I—yes, I see. Well. Thank you for the information, Governor. I will of course have this investigated immediately.”
Rameses nodded solemnly.
Delain leaned forward and whispered something in Tamerlane’s ear.
“One moment, if you would, Governor,” the general said before Rameses could break the connection.
“Yes?”
Still listening to Delain, the general frowned, then looked back at the flickering image of Rameses standing a few meters away—life-sized, sparkling, floating in the clouds that filled the strategium. He pursed his lips, seeming to appraise Rameses anew.
“Something the matter, General?” the governor asked, the slightest hints of impatience beginning to show.
“I’m not certain,” Tamerlane replied. “You see, I have received conflicting information about Colonel Belisarius.”
“Conflicting? From whom?”
Tamerlane inclined his head. “From Sister Delain here.”
The image of Rameses leaned forward, probably meaning he was looking more closely at the holographic image on his end of the connection, and becoming aware of the figure in black who lurked just behind the general. “Ah. And she is...?”
“A top operative within the Holy Inquisition,” the General replied, “and special assistant to the Grand Inquisitor himself.”
Rameses flicked his eyes from Tamerlane to Delain. For the first time, his confident demeanor faltered. “Oh yes? And what is the nature of this alleged conflicting information, if I may ask?”
“The conflict, Governor,” Tamerlane said, his voice growing suddenly hard, “is that Sister Delain tells me Colonel Belisarius most assuredly did arrive safely on Ahknaton. In fact, he even entered your palace. And spoke with you.”
Rameses’ face grew as red as the trim of the Egyptian-style headgear he wore over his shaved scalp. He stammered an attempt at a reply, then gathered himself. “And why would she think such a thing?” he demanded.
“She knows it because, while we have been conversing, she has been sending Trojan horse files back along the Aether link and into your palace’s automated systems and computer banks. She has already examined many of your records—she is very fast, I assure you!—and has seen that the Colonel did touch down on Ahknaton, did enter the Heliopolis, and did meet with you shortly thereafter.” He paused, allowing the revelation to sink in to Rameses’ mind. “Therefore,” he went on a few seconds later, “as we have now established that the Colonel did arrive, and further that you are lying about that fact, I must ask again—what has become of Colonel Belisarius?”
Rameses had reddened as Tamerlane lay out the case against him. Now his face was nearly purple. His mouth worked soundlessly for a couple of seconds, and then another figure—slender, gaunt, robed in red—leaned in, whispering words in his ear. Rameses nodded.
Tamerlane made a mental note: Find out who that is. Find out who is giving advice to Rameses.
The expression on the governor’s face slowly softened, and within a few seconds it had moved from anger to portraying a look of sympathy. “General,” he said, “I must confess—I was attempting to spare your feelings.”
“What?”
“I know that Colonel Belisarius is close to you, and I knew you would take it hard to learn of what has happened to him. I had hoped that my people here on Ahknaton could help him a bit—have him on the road to recovery, so to speak—before I reported to you exactly what had happened.”
Tamerlane frowned. “And what would that be, Governor?”
Rameses shook his head sadly. “It seems the Colonel went mad upon his arrival here. I regret to inform you... he...murdered...his own party, those who accompanied him. He threatened me and my officials and court. We were barely able to restrain him. You can check the records you have already stolen from me fully; it should all be there.”
Scowling deeply now, Tamerlane glanced back at Delain. Clearly she was doing just what Rameses had suggested, and at very rapid speed, within her mind. She offered Tamerlane only the faintest of expressions, but its message was clear: “There may be some truth to what he is saying.”
“Perhaps it was caused by the stresses of his office,” Rameses went on. “Certainly we are all under enormous pressure, what with the utter failure of your military initiatives on our frontiers.”
Angry now, Tamerlane turned back to the holographic Rameses. “And so you’re holding him?” he demanded. “Giving him some kind of treatment?”
Rameses spread his hands. “We were not entirely sure what to do with him at first, General. Obviously he had to be taken into custody. From there, well...” He trailed off, eyes wide, shrugging.
Tamerlane was about to ask Delain to dig deeper in the Ahknaton records when she leaned forward and whispered, “I’ve lost the connection.”
“You’ve what?”
“Something on their end just severed my connection. I would have said that was impossible—until it happened.”
Tamerlane kept his eyes on the holograph as she was speaking; the slender figure in red had been whispering something to Rameses at the exact same instant Delain had reported the loss of connection. Now Rameses wore a half-smile on his face, and he nodded once. The other figure moved out of frame again.
He thinks he’s getting the better of me, Tamerlane knew. He’s about to have to think again.
“So we will continue to give the Colonel the finest treatments available,” Rameses was saying. “If and when there is any change, I will of course alert you personally.”
“No. I will have a ship on Ahknaton within the day,” Tamerlane replied. “You will hand the Colonel over immediately, and make all of your records fully available to agents of I Legion.”
Rameses reddened again. “I think not.”
Tamerlane almost gasped. “You—you think not?”
“Not yet, at least,” Rameses said. His eyes narrowed as he spoke. “We would like to be certain that this was an isolated incident of a madman, and not, shall we say... imperial policy at work.”
Tamerlane could scarcely contain himself. “I assure you, Governor,” he growled, “I have no reason to wish you or anyone in your court any harm. Thus far. But I also assure you that if ‘imperial policy’ did include your assassination, you and I would not be able to have this conversation right now. You would already be dead.”
Now it was Rameses’ turn to grow angry. “Are you threatening me, General?”
“I am expecting and requiring cooperation from you, Governor,” Tamerlane shot back. “The cooperation I have a right to expect from the head of one of the Empire’s major worlds. Do you not see what is happening around us now? The entire Empire is besieged from every direction, and—”
“Due to the incompetence of our political and
military leaders,” Rameses barked.
Tamerlane bit back a sharp retort and forced himself to remain as reasonable as possible. “The Empire must be protected. We must all do our part, or it will disintegrate beneath our very feet. Surely you see this.”
“And what would you have me do?”
“I know you have been building up your forces in secret,” Tamerlane said, stepping closer to the holograph. “I am well aware that your Sand Kings now in effect represent a fourth legion.”
“As is my right.”
Tamerlane nodded. “And we have tremendous need of such forces at present. You must hand over control of them to central imperial command and—”
“Never.”
Tamerlane’s eyes widened. “What did you say?”
“I will never hand over control of the Sand Kings. Not to you—not to anyone!”
Tamerlane ground his teeth. “Governor, are you blatantly disobeying my orders?”
“Your orders? No,” Rameses replied, “because I have never recognized or acknowledged your authority in the first place.” He snorted. “You and Nakamura seized power illegally; it was nothing more or less than a coup. Everyone knows it.”
Tamerlane had to fight the desire to grab the holograph and strangle it; possibly only the knowledge that his hands would pass harmlessly through the ghost form prevented him from trying it. “We can debate the legitimacy of the Taiko’s regime once the danger to all of the Empire has passed,” he growled. “For now, I cannot be placed in a position of having to fight both the enemies at the gates and my own governors at the same time. It could lead to the death of us all! Surely you can see that.”
Rameses scoffed. “I see only a fool trying to hold onto his own personal power, even as it crumbles away beneath his feet.”
Tamerlane started to shout his answer but a hand gently laid on his shoulder restrained him. It was Sister Delain, he realized and, while the action surprised him, he was suddenly very grateful. There was no telling what he might have said to the rogue governor if she hadn’t interrupted him. One more attempt at persuasion, he told himself firmly. Nice, polite, reasonable persuasion.
The Shattering: Omnibus Page 40
