King's Sacrifice Read online

  "You knew," Abdiel said softly, so very softly.

  "No!" Peter Robes cried, clenching his fist. "I swear before God—Listen to me!" He raised an anguished face to heaven. "I'm swearing to a God I don't believe in! Or maybe I do believe in Him! Maybe I feel His eyes on me. Maybe I see in them die same loathing and hatred I see when I look at my own reflection. You've used me, Abdiel. You've used me from die beginning and now"—opening his palm, he stared in horror at the five swollen marks upon it—"now you've sucked my soul dry."

  Abdiel said nothing, waited patiently.

  Robes wiped his face, cast die old man a bitter, haunted look. "I should kill myself," he said in a low voice.

  "You should," Abdiel agreed, "but you won't."

  Robes—haggard, gray—stared at the old man. "You're right. I won't. You won't let me."

  "Someday, perhaps. But not now. You're of use to me, still."

  Spittle frothed on Robes's lips. "I won't do it! I won't go along with you. Not this time!"

  "Yes, you will." Abdiel rose to his feet. Gathering the magenta robes around him, he glided over to where Peter Robes stood, hunched in misery. The old man placed a bony arm, its flesh rotting and scabrous, around the President's shoulders.

  Robes cringed at the touch, shrank within the old man's grasp. The President was in his forties, in good physical condition. The old man was feeble, sickly, bones likely to snap in two if he coughed. Peter Robes had only to speak a word and his security 'bot would kill the old man instantly. The President had only to speak two words and the room would be filled with bodyguards. His muscles leapt in a sudden, convulsive effort to escape. He raised his head, his mouth opened.

  Abdiel placed his hand over the hand of Peter Robes, pressed it gently, caressingly. "There, there, my dear. You're tired. You don't know what you're saying."

  Robes gabbled, but no words came from his mouth. He kept his hand clenched tightly shut over the five scars. Abdiel made no move to force it open, but merely continued stroking the flesh with the tips of his long, tapered fingers.

  "It will be easy, Peter, my dear. So very easy. No one will suspect a thing. All your worries will be at an end. You will take complete and absolute control. And I will be by your side, to guide you. Come, my dear. Relax. Relax."

  Peter shook his head in disbelief. "What can you do against Starfire? He has the space-rotation bomb! He has Sagan and his fleet! He has youth, beauty—"

  "I have his bloodsword. And that," Abdiel added, seeing that Robes was still refusing to understand, "gives me much the same influence over him that I wield over you, my dear."

  Slowly, Peter Robes lowered his head, his shoulders slumped. His hand went limp, flopped down on his leg; the fingers slowly unclenched, opened, revealing the five swollen marks.

  Abdiel gripped Robes's hand tightly, pressed the needles into Peter Robes's flesh.

  The President moaned and writhed. Abdiel held on, increased the pressure, drove the needles deeper.

  Robes sighed. His pain, through Abdiel's skill in controlling his mind, had changed to pleasure: reward for obedience. He leaned against the old man. Abdiel's arm encompassed the President, drew him near, cradled his head on the bony shoulder.

  "And now, my dear, this is what you will do. . . ."

  Chapter Two

  "Most blest believer he! Who in that land of darkness and blind eyes Thy long expected healing wings could see ..."

  Henry Vaughan, The Night

  Tusk waited, fidgeting nervously, at the very edge of the studio set. Galaxy in Depth was still in progress, though winding down. An alien on the floor was wiggling three of its five antennae in what Tusk supposed was a sign to Warden that he had three minutes to wrap up his interview.

  Which meant Tusk had three minutes before he went into action.

  A robotcam hurtled straight at him. Tusk dodged, stumbled over a trailing length of cable, and nearly crashed into a nuke lamp. The steadying hand of a centurion reached out, caught hold of Tusk, and helped restore his balance.

  "Thanks, Agis," Tusk muttered.

  The centurion said nothing; he had, after all, merely done his duty. The iron-disciplined men of Lord Sagan's own personal legion rarely spoke. They acted. Tusk figured that by now he should be used to it, but he wasn't.

  The alien glared at him and made a peremptory gesture. A young human female with what appeared to be a satellite dish, revolving radar, and a battery of anti-aircraft guns protruding from a helmet on her head bore down on Tusk.

  "What are you doing here? Who let you on the set?"

  "No one exactly 'let' us," Tusk began.

  A second robotcam trundled past, narrowly missed running over Tusk's foot.

  The alien wiggled two antennae.

  The young woman glanced up at a dark, glass-encased booth located above the studio. Someone up there was making frantic hand signals. Tusk could hear faint sounds of shouting coming over the various devices in the young woman's headset. She turned to Tusk.

  "Mr. Warden won't like this. You'll have to leave. Go out that door and wait in the hall until the red light—"

  Tusk grinned, shook his head. "No."

  The young woman's face went rigid. James Warden was asking Dion about his stand on education, advising him that he had about thirty seconds in which to give it.

  "Please step out that door!" the young woman hissed.

  "I'm not stepping anywhere and neither are they." Tusk jerked his thumb back at the centurions, standing at attention as they'd been standing for the last hour.

  The young woman glared at him, stomped her foot. "You will be forcibly ejected—"

  The centurion's captain shifted his eyes from Dion for the first time since they'd entered the broadcast studio, focused on the young woman. He said nothing, made no move. He merely looked.

  The young woman gulped, glanced helplessly back up at the booth. James Warden was thanking Dion and informing the audience of next week's guest. The alien director's purple skin had turned a sickening shade of gray. Every antenna on its head wiggled wildly.

  Robotcams swooped down on the two.

  "And that's a wrap," stated the alien through its translator.

  Warden stood up, said something pleasant to Dion. Dion rose to his feet.

  "We'll be heading your direction any minute now," Tusk said into his commlink to the centurions on duty outside the building. "The jet-limo waiting?"

  "Yes, sir," came the report.

  James Warden and Dion were walking companionably off the set. The news commentator stopped, held out his hand.

  "I look forward to following your career, Your Majesty. I don't think we've heard the last of you, by any means. Good luck."

  "Thank you, sir." Dion shook hands.

  Warden walked off, with only a brief glance at Tusk and the waiting centurions. The young woman hastened after him, apologizing volubly for the disruption.

  Dion walked over to Tusk. "How was it?" he asked.

  "Good, kid. You did great," Tusk said absently. His mind was on getting Dion out of the building. "You ready to go?"

  Dion nodded. He was exhilarated. He hadn't come down yet. He knew he'd done well.

  The centurions closed ranks around him. The studio door crashed open, and they were in the hallway. Tusk trotted out in front, comforted by the rhythmic thudding of booted feet behind. "We're on our way," he said into his commlink.

  The hall was empty. All nonessential personnel had been cleared from the area.

  "Keep it moving," Tusk said unnecessarily.

  The centurions would have kept moving through a null-grav steel wall if one had blocked their path. But the distance to the elevators at the end erf" the black marble hallway seemed to stretch on interminably.

  Nola shot out from a side door marked no admittance, authorized personnel only. Tusk scooped her up in his arm as they passed.

  "How'd he look?"

  "Fantastic. As always."

  "What's it like outside?"


  Nola shook her head. "A mob. There've been reports of rioting."

  They reached an elevator bank. Two centurions stood guard, keeping people away. Doors opened. Agis ordered his men forward. Dion followed, stepping into a ring of armored bodies. Tusk and Nola crowded inside. The doors slid closed, shutting out the noise in the hallway. Damnably cheerful music enveloped them.

  "There must be a million people jamming the streets and the route to the spaceport," said Nola in subdued tones.

  The elevator whisked downward. The centurions stood stolidly around their king, eyes forward, faces expressionless.

  "I know how important it is for His Majesty to be seen." Tusk was clearly unhappy. "I know we need shots of this on the nightly news. But all it takes is one nut with a lasgun—"

  "You're doing it again," said Nola.

  "What?"

  "Talking to yourself."

  "No one else'll listen to me."

  "I'll be all right, Tusk." Dion smiled at his friend reassur-ingly from behind the barricade of armor-plated chests and shoulders.

  Tusk saw the smile, but he also saw the pallor of Dion's complexion beneath the makeup, saw the sag in the jaw muscles, the droop of the shoulders. Exhilaration was draining from him. He looked tired, on the verge of exhaustion.

  Hell, he should be tired! He's been running on sheer momentum for a couple of military-time months, now, Tusk thought bitterly.

  Like Warden had said, only a few months ago, Dion Starfire had been a redheaded kid without a last name living on an obscure planet with a poet, pacifist, atheist. Tusk sometimes wondered what that boy might have become, if Lord Sagan hadn't arrived that fateful night? A microchip salesman? Happy at home with the wife and 3.5 kids?

  No. Tusk stole another glance at Dion. Not with the fever of the Blood Royal burning in his veins, the lust for power, the desire to guide, direct, control, protect, the need to rule that had been bred in him over countless generations. It would have come out, one way or the other. Fate. Destiny. A "mandate from heaven."

  Overnight, over one night, Dion had become a "galactic sensation." Romantic, young, handsome, charming, he was the darling of the media. And he was shrouded in mystery, which made him more alluring. The murder of Snaga Ohme, the rumor of a horrific doomsday weapon, the change in Lord Sagan from ruthless exploiter to guiding father figure, the sudden appearance and equally sudden disappearance of Lady Maigrey. The press couldn't quit talking about it all.

  The elevator jolted gently to a stop. A pause before the doors opened. Everyone tensed. Dion straightened his shoulders, shook the red hair out of his face, warmed himself at some inner fire. His jaw tightened, smoothing out lines of fatigue. The charming smile curved hps that must be almost numb from constantly smiling; the flame was rekindled in the blue eyes.

  Tusk, watching Dion force himself to come back to life, could have sat down and wept.

  The elevator doors opened. Dion stepped out, Tusk emerged on one side of the king, Nola at the other. The centurions massed around them. The press surged forward. Nuke Lights blinded them, voices shouted at them. The centurions forged their way through the crowd with practiced skill, having practiced this maneuver hundreds of times under Agis's direction. Keep His Majesty moving, keep him safe, but let him be seen.

  Tusk—jostled and hassled and elbowed and stepped on— thought with longing of his mercenary days, when he'd done nothing more strenuous than dodge nuclear missiles.

  Dion waved and smiled and gave every appearance of having gone deaf as hundreds of questions were hurled at him. Tusk came in for the overflow, replied "no comment" until he was certain his tongue would dry up and fall out of his mouth. He stopped only long enough to extricate Nola from the hands of a reporter who was offering her part ownership in a small resort planet if she'd only give him the "inside story."

  The centurions marched through the marble and plastisteel lobby of the GBC building at double-quick time, trampling only a minimal number of reporters on the way, and thrust open steelglass doors that were letting in a flood of brilliant sunlight.

  The king and his entourage stepped out onto a marble-columned colonnade. A thunderous roar greeted Dion's appearance. Tusk stopped a moment to adjust his eyes to the bright sun, cast a glance around to make certain the centurions were repositioning themselves. Blinking, he looked down the long flight of wide marble steps they'd have to traverse to reach the jet-limo waiting for them on the bottom.

  "Shit," said Tusk, and added a few more epithets for good measure.

  Beside him, he felt Dion's body tense.

  Thousands of people crowded the steps, held back by a living wall of GBC security agents, local police, the local military, and anyone else this planet had been able to draft into service. Thousands more jammed the street in front of the GBC building, thousands more hung out of windows or stood on rooftops of buildings surrounding them.

  Tusk was used to the crowds; they might have been ants for all the notice he took of them, It was the sight of what was on the steps that drove him to use language that would have fried XJ's circuits.

  "How the bloody hell could they have let this happen?" Tusk raved. "They were warned, the bastards! We told them over and over—"

  "Tusk," interrupted Dion. "Stop it. Robes's people arranged this on purpose. It's obvious. They want to see what I'll do."

  "What will you do?" Tusk asked grimly.

  "Walk down the steps," Dion answered.

  On the steps, directly in the path the king must take to reach the limo, lay or sat or stood Misery. The blind, hearing the cheers, stretched out pleading, groping hands. The deaf, seeing their salvation, cried out in voices that they couldn't hear. The mute cried out in voices no one could hear. The crippled raised themselves up from pallets spread upon the stairs. Dying children, pushed forward by frantic parents, held small bouquets of flowers clutched fast in pitifully thin fists. All the unfortunates left behind by the advancements in medical science stood waiting for something larger, something more wonderful.

  Tusk was busy marshaling his forces and his thoughts at the same time. "Here's what we do. We keep moving. We don't stop for anything. Agis, deploy your men on either side of the king. If someone gets in the way, move them. Be as gentle as you can—the damn robotcams are gonna record every second of this—but move them."

  Dion gestured. "Let's go."

  He descended the stairs. The crowd, held back by the police, heaved and surged and roared. Their noise could not drown out the pleas, the wails, the fervent prayers of the sick and the dying who had been permitted (and encouraged) to move near. The king smiled and waved, but Tusk saw the smile had gone tight, rigid, the blue eyes were dark as deepspace. They moved like a funeral procession down the steps. A descent into hell might have been easier.

  The centurions performed their difficult task well. Aware of thousands of electronic eyes that would carry this scene to billions of living eyes, they gently eased the blind out of the way, gently moved aside the beds of the cripples, gently lifted and carried children back to their mother's arms.

  Dion was halfway down the steps. Pleas were changing to wails of bitter disappointment. Prayers to curses. His breathing grew short, he licked his lips. Tusk edged his way near him. They were almost at the bottom. The guards around the limo had the doors open. The driver was set, ready to take off.

  A young woman broke free of the crowd. She darted around the centurions, lunged straight at Dion, came up against Agis's solid, armor-shielded body. He took firm hold of her, but perhaps moved by pity or the feet that she went limp in his grasp, his grip on her eased. She slid out of his hands like quicksilver and flung herself on the cold stone directly in Dion's path.

  "Don't shoot!" he commanded, seeing the centurions' las-guns aimed directly at the woman.

  Wise move, thought Tusk, who could see bow that would play on the vidscreens. Centurions Incinerate Hapless Teenager. But he was shaking so he couldn't get his weapon back in its holster.

  The gir
l knelt at Dion's feet and raised her hands in supplication.

  Tusk took one look at her, felt his insides twist up, and hastily averted his eyes.

  She had a lithe, graceful figure, pretty light brown hair, and a face out of a bad drug trip. Agis hurried forward, caught hold of her by the arm, started to drag her off bodily.

  "Stop!" Dion commanded in a voice that was like no voice Tusk had ever heard come from a living man.

  The captain, startled, stared at Dion.

  "Let her go, Agis," the king commanded.

  The captain obeyed reluctantly. A 'droid reporter remote appeared out of nowhere, glass eyes winking. One of the centurions handled the reporter efficiently, sent it clanging and banging down the marble steps. It rolled into the crowd and was immediately dismembered and scavenged for its parts.

  The girl paid no attention to the reporter or to anyone else around her. What remained of one eye focused on Dion. What might have been her mouth opened. Tusk fought to keep from gagging. And he'd seen it all . . .or thought he had.

  "What happened to you?" Dion asked her gently.

  "My planet was at war. The bombs. The chemicals, the fires . . ." She reached her fingers to claw at her ravaged face. "It wasn't my fault! But not even my own mother can stand to look at me! I tried to kill myself, but they brought me back. And now I know why. You will help me. I see it in your eyes. You're not disgusted by me. You are sorry for me. I was beautiful, once, like you are beautiful. Heal me, my liege. Heal me."

  What the devil's wrong with us? Tusk demanded of himself savagely. Have we all been turned to stone? Changed into statues? He looked at Agis, who knew very well that he should have disobeyed Dion's command and taken the young woman away. He looked at Nola, saw tears streaming down her face. He looked at himself, stricken dumb, limbs gone nerveless. Why can't we move? What are we waiting for?

  For a miracle.

  Dion's skin was so pale it was almost translucent, the flame burning in him was bright and pure and holy. It will devour him, consume him. He lifted his hand, started to lay it on the girl's horribly grotesque face.

  "Your Majesty." Agis spoke in a soft undertone, using the military argot of the barracks that the girl wouldn't be likely to understand, "I would be remiss in my duty to Your Majesty if I did not remind him of Lord Sagan's advice—"