Princess Valerie's War

by Terry Mancour

  Now, a couple of centuries later, after Tanith’s rebirth, the vast field of ferrocrete rubble provided a home for those too lazy or drunk or hurt to work at Rivington’s busy commercial sector.

  That meant that the Slags made the perfect nest for criminal activity. And the tiny little cluster of huts known as “Slagtown” he was walking through was the natural hub of such activity. Bentfork watched a few destitute, frightened-looking denizens scurrying around, looking with suspicion at the soldiers, and two Rivington cops – mudfoots, he figured – patrolled with older model submachine guns, and waved to him and his men. But there was little other activity.

  Bentfork stopped an old woman carrying a basket of laundry on her head, making her way down to the streamlet at the base of the rubble field. “Pardon, my lady,” he said, as politely as he could in Lingua Terra, “we’re on the business of the Realm. We’re looking for—”

  “Nah dalk da stermin tang, ey,” she said, waving her hand dismissively as she tried to hurry away. She was a native, obviously, and didn’t want to get involved with soldiers or other rough folk, and probably thought she could escape by pleading ignorance of Lingua Terra.

  Bentfork grinned despite himself and answered her in the same dialect, informing her that the demon Spasso might be about, and that he and the soldiers needed to find him before he escaped. That perked the old woman up a bit – apparently she’d originally hailed from one of the villages the crew of the Lamia had sacked, a decade before. She looked around at the empty – well, it was hardly a street, Bentfork decided, more like a promenade, though using such a fancy term for this place seemed ludicrous – before she lowered her voice and spoke.

  “I saw some mercenaries going into Tartar’s Place yesterday,” she confided in a whisper. “Guns. One was bald and had a dark hand.”

  “What is Tartar’s Place?” he asked, although he thought he remembered from the training that the Golden Hand had done here. It proved to be a kind of low-class aleroom where disreputables gathered to drink, plot, and hide from the authorities. It also proved to be only a few hundred yards northeast of them.

  Bentfork tossed a coin to the old woman for her trouble, and as she scurried away he detailed two of his men to circle around the flanks of Tartar’s as well as possible, and informed the combat car overhead of his plans. He received word back a moment later that Tartar’s had three guards outside, and a spotter on the roof.

  Bentfork’s heart sank. If they’d seen the combat car and gotten suspicious, then Spasso might be gone already. He radioed the driver and had him head back towards the city center before turning around and coming back, making it seem as if he’d left. That deprived him of back-up temporarily, but he wasn’t too concerned. That car could be back here in a flash.

  Straightening his cloak and drawing his pistol, he led his remaining two men directly to the front door of the hovel. It was partially made up of cast-off prefabricated panels scavenged from the spaceport, and half rough wooden planks, built up against a pocket of rubble that provided two of the walls. The roof was mismatched local terra cotta tiles, inexpertly installed and wealthy with gaps. It was a sad, miserable place where sad, miserable men could go to hide from the world or plot against it.

  The guards initially started to raise their weapons, until they saw the uniforms. Then they started to have second thoughts, particularly when the other two RAT troopers appeared out of the rubble and covered their flanks, and they raised their hands carefully away from their guns. Bentfork saw these were locals, too – security for the bar, not invading mercenaries. He’d almost started to doubt the old lady’s advice, when he heard yelling from inside.

  Taking a deep breath, he kicked in the rough wooden door, sending it smashing through the room off of its hinges with his big black boot. It was dark as a cellar inside, with only a few electric lights scattered around the makeshift interior. There was a man behind a bar, his eyes wide and terrified, and his hands went up in the air the moment he saw the uniform. The other inhabitants – three disgusting-looking barflies – shuffled into a corner and whimpered.

  “Where is Spasso?” Bentfork demanded of the bartender, his pistol millimeters from the man’s nose. “I’m going to count to—”

  “Tunnel!” the man squeaked. “Back room! It’s under the mat! Don’t hurt me, Sir! I just—”

  “You!” he called to one of his men. “Watch them. If I’m not back in twenty minutes, start shooting them, ugliest first. Corporal, you’re with me!” He didn’t wait to see if they followed his orders; instead he plunged headfirst into the dark passageway the bartender had indicated.

  The passage wound its way chaotically through the rubble, where in places there were spaces large enough between the ancient wreckage to let tiny pinpricks of sun inside. The chamber where it ended was a typical back room to a dive: windowless, smoky, and private. It was also empty, though there was a well-used cot there that suggested the place’s usual use. Bentfork kicked aside the straw mat that decorated the rough floor and found a wooden cover. He pried it up and pulled the door away from the two-foot wide hole. Pulling a pocket torch from his belt, Bentfork examined the entrance.

  “You really think he’s down there, sir?” the corporal asked, doubtfully.

  “It’s the best intelligence we’ve got,” admitted Bentfork. “I’ll go first,” he suggested. “And sling that submachine gun – there isn’t going to be room down there, I think. Side-arms only.”

  He put the light between his teeth, took another deep breath, and lowered himself down into the hole. He descended about ten feet until he found himself standing in ankle-high water.

  “The old sewer,” he observed, as he covered the corporal’s descent. “That explains a lot. This would have been the only part of the building to survive the original blast intact.”

  “Nasty!” complained the corporal as his boots got wet.

  “Oh, don’t be such a baby,” chided Bentfork. “It’s just snow melt. It doesn’t even smell all that badly.”

  “Yes, Sir,” the corporal agreed, wisely keeping his opinions to himself.

  The tunnel led almost two-hundred yards northwest, until they were nearly back under Rivington proper. That’s when Bentfork spied the first guard: a rough-looking mercenary who looked more neobarbaric than any of Tradetown’s people. He had a large bushy beard, a longish coat festooned with ammunition belts, and a carbine leaned up against the wall. In fact, so did the mercenary, who apparently thought that guard duty was the perfect opportunity for a nap.

  Bentfork took advantage of his opportunity by slitting his throat in his sleep with his combat dagger, one hand clamped over the man’s mouth. While the corporal looked on, eyes wide with respect, Nogal waited until the man’s heart slowed and then stopped before he removed his hand. Then he wiped the blood off of the twelve-inch blade on the corpse’s coat before standing and nodding towards the door the man had been guarding.

  Unlike the door to Tartar’s, this was no homemade creation of wood. It was a stainless steel door, thick, part of the original construction of the building that was designed not to rust in this damp environment. Bentfork held his ear up to the smooth surface of the door and listened: he heard hissing, machinery, and some muted voices. There was a strong smell of chemicals in the air, emanating from the room. He looked up to the corporal and nodded as he returned his dagger to its sheath and drew his pistol. The corporal did likewise, and when Bentfork was ready he kicked at the big metal door with his now-soggy boot.

  It opened with a boom and a creak – and revealed five armed men wearing protective masks clustered around a table under one solitary electric light. The smell of chemicals was much thicker, and as the men scrambled around at the intrusion, Bentfork bellowed:

  “You are all under arrest in the name of the Princess and the Realm of Tanith!” He stuck the pistol in the face of the nearest man, who had been trying to draw his side-arm, and was gratified to see him raise his hands. The others tried to find cover
in the surprisingly large room. All except one.

  The one he was hunting.

  “Garvan Spasso,” spat Bentfork, when he recognized the man through his mask. Spasso didn’t look afraid – he looked angry and determined. He wasn’t raising his hands. But he wasn’t reaching for a weapon. As much as he wanted to put a bullet into him the instant he saw him, Bentfork refrained – and saved his own life.

  “Put the gun down,” Spasso barked. “You know what’s in that vat over there? It’s an explosive. The whole air is filled with it. Thermoconcentrate fuel. Highly flammable. And that one’s ether. One spark – and that includes a muzzle flash – and we’re all burned to a crisp.” He leered evilly at the young officer. “Go ahead and shoot, if you don’t believe me, and we’ll both dine in Hell tonight.”

  The other men were nodding frantically – a couple were rough-clad neobarbs, like the guard outside had been, complete with beard and foul-smelling coat. The other three were dressed in Space Viking style, although they didn’t look the type to be pillaging any villages. More technicians.

  “All right,” Bentfork said, not willing to lower his weapon. “So why don’t I want to burn you to a crisp, Spasso?”

  “If you don’t value your own hide, that’s your business,” growled the villain through the mask, who still hadn’t put his hands in the air. “Ghu damn you, you’re one of those blasted Golden Hand troops, aren’t you?”

  “Oh, I’m more than that,” Bentfork said, handing his pistol to the corporal. “I’m Lord Nogal of Bentfork. My father is Noam, Baron of Bentfork. The former King of Tradetown. He’s the one—”

  “Yes, I’m familiar with the name!” Spasso snarled in anger, holding up his prosthetic. “See? Not a day goes by I don’t think of your father, boy. And to see you take my flesh and blood and turn it into some kind of demented regimental standard—”

  “You served as an excellent example of what happens when you try to assail Tanith,” Bentfork continued, drawing his dagger. “Believe me, your hand never had a better use than as a trophy.”

  “Oh, I don’t know about that,” Spasso said, his eyes narrowing to slits. “Seems to me that your mother found it useful enough!”

  It took everything Bentfork had to keep from grabbing his pistol back and shooting Spasso until his trigger finger got tired. The abuse of his father’s second wife was a supremely sore spot for the young man – though she wasn’t technically his mother, she was nearly as beloved. He still remembered the long days when she had been kidnapped by Spasso’s men and used as a hostage for his father’s good behavior – among less savory uses. As enraged as he was by the vile man’s comment, however, the Golden Hand did not allow those who could not keep their temper in extreme situations to bear their sigil. He gritted his teeth and kept to what was proper.

  “Garvan Spasso, I hereby place you under arrest for the abduction of the Heir to the Realm, Princess Elaine, and organizing an attack on the soil of the Realm. Place all of your weapons on that table and surrender.”

  “Hard to do that, y’see,” Spasso drawled. “When your dad went and butchered me, I wasn’t about to settle for just a hook. No style, there.” He held up his prosthetic again, and made a fist with it. Twenty centimeters of sharpened steel sprang out. “Can’t very well just toss it on the table, now, can I?”

  “I’d be just as happy if you chose to resist,” Bentfork assured him, adopting a knife-fighter’s pose.

  “It’ll be an honor to gut you and send your entrails back to your dad,” Spasso reasoned, dropping into a similar stance. “Maybe he can dunk them in bronze, for his collection!”

  “Cover me,” Bentfork ordered the corporal. “And them. If they make a run for it, shoot and don’t worry about the burns – we’re armored.” That wouldn’t protect them from a full explosion, of course, but the thick combat armor would be more protection than the coveralls the mercenaries wore.

  “I just wish I had a camera,” the corporal assured him. “Take him apart, sir!”

  The two men began edging around each other in the cramped space, careful not to overturn the table, on which were spread all manner of plans and equipment, or the vats of chemicals boiling around the edges. Bentfork didn’t know much chemistry, but he knew the bitter tang of volatiles. And just how hot thermoconcetrate fuel burned. It was what contragravity vehicles used to propel them at speeds higher than the contragrav motors could do on their own, and it didn’t take much to fire a jet. There was at least twenty gallons of it in one vat, alone. And only one drop of that stuff . . .

  Spasso lunged almost gracefully, far more at ease with a dagger than he had been against his father with a saber. After three or four passes, Bentfork began to realize that the evil little man seemed adept with the weapon – a weapon that couldn’t be dropped or disarmed. Twice he struck at Spasso’s arm, and both times his foot-long dagger clanked against the shell of the prosthetic – another serious disadvantage.

  But if the blade couldn’t be removed from Spasso’s hand, he realized that it also couldn’t turn. It was stuck protruding from his fist at the same angle, while Bentfork had a lot more range of motion available to him. He studied his opponent’s eyes for some clue to Spasso’s next move, and saw a blow telegraphed. He anticipated the lunge when it came and allowed it to miss his thigh, striking Spasso on the shoulder in return and using the smaller man’s momentum to force him past. He whirled as he did so, changing knife hands and slashing at Spasso’s opposite shoulder en passant from the rear. Mostly the blade only hit armor, but a grunt from his foe showed that he’d at least caused some pain.

  “You blasted neobarbs are all alike,” Spasso swore, darkly, as he struggled to breathe in the tainted air. “Big, dumb, and clumsy.” With that he made another rushed pass at Bentfork, his weapon catching him briefly in the ribs despite his armor, which was designed with bullets in mind, not blades.

  Bentfork paused to assess the damage and decided it wasn’t particularly important – just a nasty scratch. He crouched to prepare himself for the next pass, realizing that he had to end this soon or end up making a mistake. It was hard to breathe in here, and he’d already been in enough combat today to nearly exhaust his adrenaline supply.

  “First blood!” Spasso cackled. “I guess if we were being all civilized, the fight would be over?” he asked, referring to the terms of the duel under which he’d lost his hand to Baron Bentfork.

  “I’ve been cut worse shaving,” Bentfork responded with disdain.

  “You don’t look old enough to shave,” Spasso coughed. “But you’ll make a fine-looking corpse. Maybe,” he chuckled, evilly, as he suddenly upset one of the nearby bubbling vats. The air was suddenly even thicker with fumes, making everyone cough, and the floor was now wet with a highly caustic substance – Bentfork wasn’t sure just what. Indeed, the moment it reached his boots he could feel them start to get mushy under his feet. “There! Now when I leave your lifeless body lying face down in here, your precious Daddy can wail over how bad his boy looks!” With dismay, Bentfork realized that Spasso was wearing industrial boots that would protect him from the caustic spill.

  Bentfork realized he had to counter that damned knife, and quickly, or risk taking another laceration. And if he couldn’t remove it, he’d have to cover it. He glanced at the corporal, who while he was watching the fight was also intent on covering the other prisoners in between coughs, and nodded. The next pass, he had a plan.

  Spasso went for more of a binding move, this time, coming in close and wrapping a surprisingly strong left hand around Bentfork’s wrist, trying to pull it out of the way. That suited the officer’s purposes admirably, even if it exposed him to a strike. Spasso’s right hand came up and the built-in knife punctured the young man’s abdomen twice – but then Bentfork’s left hand, which had gathered up a fold of his cloak, was able to wrap the trailing edge of the garment around the hand to bind it into uselessness.

  It wasn’t a permanent fix, of course, but when the sickening sen
sation of having a knife in his guts was removed, the folds of the cloak effectively kept the hand from being further employed as a weapon. Spasso cursed loudly enough so that Bentfork could smell his foul, whisky-stained breath as he struggled to free himself. The villain pulled and pushed against the bigger opponent, and then he shifted positions and twisted away, sending Bentfork down on one knee in the middle of the caustic spill.

  “Getting tired, boy?” the villain laughed, his mask intact.

  “No,” gasped Bentfork. “Just biding my time.”

  “For what? Reinforcements?” Spasso scoffed. “Let them come. You won’t last that long, without a mask. I’m almost done here, anyway.”

  “Don’t be so sure,” Bentfork choked out. He sprang at the man again, this time deflecting the flashing blade desperately with one arm while he clawed the black rubber protective mask from his enemy’s face. For one brief second they stared at each other from inches away, while they struggled to gain advantage. Then Spasso managed to push away and used a few wild slashes at Bentfork to keep the guardsman at bay.