He had not as yet looked at her.
She crossed the balcony, simultaneously grasping the pistol he offered
her and looking down into the courtyard. There seemed to be nearly
twenty Terrans lying about, in pools of their own blood.
Only one man, a Terran officer of very high rank--was left standing.
His arms were folded somberly across his chest, and he studied the
killer above him almost casually. But when the woman came out, their
eyes met, and he started imperceptibly.
Evelyn Kane felt a horrid chill creeping over her. The man's hair was
white, now, and his proud face lined with deep furrows, but there could
be no mistake. It was Gordon, Lord Kane.
Her father.
The sweat continued to grow on her forehead, and she felt for a moment
that she needed only to wish hard enough, and this would be a dream.
A dream of a big, kind, dark-haired man with laugh-wrinkles about his
eyes, who sat her on his knee when she was a little girl and read
bedtime stories to her from a great book with many pictures.
An icy, amused voice came through: "Our orders are to kill all
prisoners. It is entertaining to shoot down helpless men, isn't it? It
warms me to know that I am cruel and wanton, and worthy of my trust."
Even in the midst of her horror, a cold, analytical part of her was
explaining why the Commandant had called her to the balcony. Because
all captured Terrans had to be killed, he hated his superiors, his own
men, and especially the prisoners. A task so revolting he could not
relegate to his own officers. He must do it himself, but he wanted his
underlings to know he loathed them for it. She was merely a symbol of
that contempt. His next words did not surprise her.
"It is even more stimulating to require a shuddering female to kill
them. You are shuddering you know?"
She nodded dumbly. Her palm was so wet that a drop of sweat dropped
from it to the floor. She was thinking hard. She could kill the
Commandant and save her father for a little while. But then the
problem of detonating the pile remained, and it would not be solved
more quickly by killing the man who controlled the pile area. On the
contrary if she could get him interested in her--
"So far as our records indicate," murmured Perat, "the man down there
is the last living Terran within _The Defender_. It occurred to me that
our newest clerk would like to start off her duties with a bang. The
Faeg is adjusted to a needle-beam. If you put a bolt between the man's
eyes, you may dance for me tonight, and perhaps there will be other
nights--"
The woman seemed lost in thought for a long time. Slowly, she lifted
the ugly little weapon. The doomed Terran looked up at her peacefully,
without expression. She lowered the Faeg, her arm trembling.
Gordon, Lord Kane, frowned faintly, then closed his eyes. She raised
the gun again, drew cross hairs with a nerveless wrist, and squeezed
the trigger. There was a loud, hollow cough, but no recoil. The Terran
officer, his eyes still closed and arms folded, sank to the ground,
face up. Blood was running from a tiny hole in his forehead.
The man leaning on the balustrade turned and looked at Evelyn, at first
with amused contempt, then with narrowing, questioning eyes.
"Come here," he ordered.
The Faeg dropped from her hand. With a titanic effort she activated her
legs and walked toward him.
He was studying her face very carefully.
She felt that she was going to be sick. Her knees were so weak that she
had to lean on the coping.
With a forefinger he lifted up the mass of golden curls that hung
over her right forehead and examined the scar hidden there, where the
mentors had cut into her frontal lobe. The tiny doll they had created
for her writhed uneasily in her waist-purse, but Perat seemed to be
thinking of something else, and missed the significance of the scar
completely.
He dropped his hand. "I'm sorry," he said with a quiet weariness. "I
shouldn't have asked you to kill the Terran. It was a sorry joke."
Then: "Have you ever seen me before?"
"No," she whispered hoarsely. His mind was in hers, verifying the fact.
"Have you ever met my father, Phaen, the old Count of Tharn?"
"No."
"Do you have a son?"
"No."
His mind was out of hers again, and he had turned moodily back,
surveying the courtyard and the dead. "Gorph will be wondering what
happened to you. Come to my quarters at the eighth metron tonight."
Apparently he suspected nothing.
_Father. Father. I had to do it. But we'll all join you, soon. Soon._