The colored turbulence faded into the gray of hyperspace;
five hundred hours to Tanith. Guatt Kirbey was securing his
control-panel, happy to return to his music. And Vann Larch would go
back to his paints and brushes, and Alvyn Karffard to the working
model of whatever it was he had left unfinished when the _Nemesis_
had emerged at the end of the jump from Audhumla.
Trask went to the index of the ship's library and punched for
_History, Old Terran_. There was plenty of that, thanks to Otto
Harkaman. Then he punched for _Hitler, Adolf_. Harkaman was right;
anything that could happen in a human society had already happened,
in one form or another, somewhere and at some time. Hitler could
help him understand Zaspar Makann.
By the time the ship came out, with the yellow sun of Tanith
in the middle of the screen, he knew a great deal about Hitler,
occasionally referred to as Schicklgruber, and he understood, with
sorrow, how the lights of civilization on Marduk were going out.
Beside the _Lamia_, stripped of her Dillinghams and crammed with
heavy armament and detection instruments, the _Space Scourge_ and
the _Queen Flavia_ were on off-planet watch. There were half a dozen
other ships on orbit just above atmosphere; a Gilgamesher, one of
the Gram-Tanith freighters, a couple of free-lance Space Vikings,
and a new and unfamiliar ship. When he asked the moonbase who she
was, he was told that she was the _Sun Goddess_, Amaterasu. That
was, by almost a year, better than he had expected of them. Otto
Harkaman was out in the _Corisande_, raiding and visiting the
trade-planets.
He found his cousin, Nikkolay Trask, at Rivington; when he inquired
about Traskon, Nikkolay cursed.
"I don't know anything about Traskon; I haven't anything to do with
Traskon, any more. Traskon is now the personal property of our well
loved--very well loved--Queen Evita. The Trasks don't own enough
land on Gram now for a family cemetery. You see what you did?" he
added bitterly.
"You needn't rub it in, Nikkolay. If I'd stayed on Gram, I'd have
helped put Angus on the throne, and it would have been about the
same in the end."
"It could be a lot different," Nikkolay said. "You could bring
your ships and men back to Gram and put yourself on the throne."
"No; I'll never go back to Gram. Tanith's my planet, now. But I will
renounce my allegiance to Angus. I can trade on Morglay or Joyeuse
or Flamberge just as easily."
"You won't have to; you can trade with Newhaven and Bigglersport.
Count Lionel and Duke Joris are both defying Angus; they've refused
to furnish him men, they've driven out his tax collectors, those
they haven't hanged, and they're building ships of their own. Angus
is building ships, too. I don't know whether he's going to use them
to fight Bigglersport and Newhaven, or attack you, but there's going
to be a war before another year's out."
The _Goodhope_ and the _Speedwell_, he found, had gone back to Gram.
They were commanded by men who had come into favor at the court of
King Angus recently. The _Black Star_ and the _Queen Flavia_--whose
captain had contemptuously ignored an order from Gram to re-christen
her _Queen Evita_--had remained. They were his ships, not King
Angus'. The captain of the merchantman from Wardshaven now on orbit
refused to take a cargo to Newhaven; he had been chartered by King
Angus, and would take orders from no one else.
"All right," Trask told him. "This is your last voyage here. You
bring that ship back under Angus of Wardshaven's charter and we'll
fire on her."
Then he had the regalia he had worn in his last audiovisual to
Angus dusted off. At first, he had decided to proclaim himself
King of Tanith. Lord Valpry, Baron Rathmore and his cousin all
advised against it.
"Just call yourself Prince of Tanith," Valpry said. "The title won't
make any difference in your authority here, and if you do lay claim
to the throne of Gram, nobody can say you're a foreign king trying
to annex the planet."
He had no intention of doing anything of the kind, but Valpry was
quite in earnest.
So he sat on his throne, as sovereign Prince of Tanith, and
renounced his allegiance to "Angus, Duke of Wardshaven, self-styled
King of Gram." They sent it back on the otherwise empty freighter.
Another copy went to the Count of Newhaven, along with a cargo in
the _Sun Goddess_, the first non-Space-Viking ship into Gram from
the Old Federation.
* * * * *
Seven hundred and fifty hours after the return of the _Nemesis_,
the _Corisande II_ emerged from her last microjump, and immediately
Harkaman began hearing of the Battle of Audhumla and the destruction
of the _Yo-Yo_ and the _Enterprise_. At first, he merely reported a
successful raiding voyage, from which he was bringing rich booty.
Oddly varigated booty, it was remarked, when he began itemizing it.
"Why, yes," he replied. "Secondhand booty. I raided Dagon for it."
Dagon was a Space Viking base planet, occupied by a character named
Fedrig Barragon. A number of ships operated from it, including a
couple commanded by Barragon's half-breed sons.
"Barragon's ships were raiding one of our planets," Harkaman said.
"Ganpat. They looted a couple of cities, destroyed one, killed a lot
of the locals. I found out about it from Captain Ravallo of the
_Black Star_, on Indra; he'd just been from Ganpat. Beowulf wasn't
too far out of the way, so we put in there, and found the
_Grendelsbane_ just ready to space out." The _Grendelsbane_ was the
second of Beowulf's ships, sister to the _Viking's Gift_. "So she
joined us, and the three of us went to Dagon. We blew up one of
Barragon's ships, and put the other one down out of commission, and
then we sacked his base. There was a Gilgamesher colony there; we
didn't bother them. They'll tell what we did, and why."
"That should furnish Prince Viktor of Xochitl something to ponder,"
Trask said. "Where are the other ships, now?"
"The _Grendelsbane_ went back to Beowulf; she'll stop at Amaterasu
to do a little trading on the way. The _Black Star_ went to Xochitl.
Just a friendly visit, to say hello to Prince Viktor for you.
Ravallo has a lot of audiovisuals we made during the Dagon
Operation. Then she's going to Jagannath to visit Nikky Gratham."
* * * * *
Harkaman approved his attitude and actions with regard to King Angus.
"We don't need to do business with the Sword-Worlds at all. We have
our own industries, we can produce what we need, and we can trade
with Beowulf and Amaterasu, and with Xochitl and Jagannath and Hoth,
if we can make any sort of agreement with them; everybody agrees to
let everybody else's trade-planets alone. It's too bad you couldn't
get some kind of an agreement with Marduk." Harkaman regretted that
for a few seconds, and then shrugged. "Our grandchildren, if any,
will probably be raiding Marduk."
"You think it'll be like that?"
"Don't you? You were there; you saw what's happening. The barbarians
are rising; they have a leader, and they're uniting. Every society
rests on a barbarian base. The people who don't understand
civilization, and wouldn't like it if they did. The hitchhikers.
The people who create nothing, and who don't appreciate what others
have created for them, and who think civilization is something that
just exists and that all they need to do is enjoy what they can
understand of it--luxuries, a high living standard, and easy work
for high pay. Responsibilities? Phooey! What do they have
a government for?"
Trask nodded. "And now, the hitchhikers think they know more about
the car than the people who designed it, so they're going to grab
the controls. Zaspar Makann says they can, and he's the Leader." He
poured a drink from a decanter that had been looted on Pushan; there
was a planet where a republic had been overthrown in favor of a
dictatorship four centuries ago, and the planetary dictatorship had
fissioned into a dozen regional dictatorships, and now they were
down to the peasant-village and handcraft-industry level. "I don't
understand it, though. I was reading about Hitler, on the way home.
I wouldn't be surprised if Zaspar Makann had been reading about
Hitler, too. He's using all Hitler's tricks. But Hitler came to
power in a country which had been impoverished by a military defeat.
Marduk hasn't fought a war in almost two generations, and that one
was a farce."
"It wasn't the war that put Hitler into power. It was the fact that
the ruling class of his nation, the people who kept things running,
were discredited. The masses, the homemade barbarians, didn't have
anybody to take their responsibilities for them. What they have on
Marduk is a ruling class that has been discrediting itself. A ruling
class that's ashamed of its privileges and shirks its duties. A
ruling class that has begun to believe that the masses are just as
good as they are, which they manifestly are not. And a ruling class
that won't use force to maintain its position. And they have a
democracy, and they are letting the enemies of democracy shelter
themselves behind democratic safeguards."
"We don't have any of this democracy in the Sword-Worlds, if that's
the word for it," he said. "And our ruling class aren't ashamed of
their power, and our people aren't hitchhikers, and as long as they
get decent treatment they don't try to run things. And we're not
doing so well."
The Morglay dynastic war of a couple of centuries ago, still
sputtering and smoking. The Oskarsan-Elmersan War on Durendal, into
which Flamberge and now Joyeuse had intruded. And the situation on
Gram, fast approaching critical mass. Harkaman nodded agreement.
"You know why? Our rulers are the barbarians among us. There isn't
one of them--Napolyon of Flamberge, Rodolf of Excalibur, or Angus of
about half of Gram--who is devoted to civilization or anything else
outside himself, and that's the mark of the barbarian."
"What are you devoted to, Otto?"
"You. You are my chieftain. That's another mark of the barbarian."
* * * * *
Before he had left Marduk, Admiral Shefter had ordered a ship to
Gimli to check on the _Honest Horris_; a few men and a pinnace would
be left behind to contact any ship from Tanith. He sent Boake
Valkanhayn off in the _Space Scourge_.
Lionel of Newhaven's _Blue Comet_ came in from Gram with a cargo of
general merchandise. Her captain wanted fissionables and gadolinium;
Count Lionel was building more ships. There was a rumor that Omfray
of Glaspyth was laying claim to the throne of Gram, in the right
of his great-grandmother's sister, who had been married to the
great-grandfather of Duke Angus. It was a completely trivial and
irrelevant claim, but the story was that it would be supported
by King Konrad of Haulteclere.
[Illustration]
Immediately, Baron Rathmore, Lord Valpry, Lothar Ffayle and the other
Gram people began clamoring that he should go back with a fleet and
seize the throne for himself. Harkaman, Valkanhayn, Karffard and the
other Space Vikings were as vehement against it. Harkaman had the
loss of the other _Corisande_ on Durendal to remember, and the others
wanted no part in Sword-World squabbles, and there was renewed
agitation that he should start calling himself King of Tanith.
He refused to do either, which left both parties dissatisfied. So
partisan politics had finally come to Tanith. Maybe that was another
milestone of progress.
And there was the Treaty of Khepera, between the Princely State of
Tanith, the Commonwealth of Beowulf, and the Planetary League of
Amaterasu. The Kheperans agreed to allow bases on their planet, to
furnish workers, and to send students to school on all three planets.
Tanith, Beowulf and Amaterasu obligated themselves to joint defense
of Khepera, to free trade among themselves, and to render one another
armed assistance.
That _was_ a milestone of progress, and no argument about it.
* * * * *
The _Space Scourge_ returned from Gimli, and Valkanhayn reported
that nobody on the planet had ever seen or heard of the _Honest
Horris_. They had found a Mardukan Navy ship's pinnace there, manned
entirely by officers, some of them Navy Intelligence. According to
them, the investigation into the activities of that ship had come to
an impasse. The ostensible owners claimed, and had papers to prove
it, that they had chartered her to a private trader, and he claimed,
and had papers to prove it, that he was a citizen of the Planetary
Republic of Aton, and as soon as they began questioning him, he was
rescued by the Atonian ambassador, who lodged a vehement protest
with the Mardukan Foreign Ministry. Immediately, the People's
Welfare Party had leaped into the incident and branded the
investigation as an unwarranted persecution of a national of a
friendly power at the instigation of corrupt tools of the Gilgamesh
Interstellar Conspiracy.
"So that's it," Valkanhayn finished. "It seems they're having an
election and they're afraid to antagonize anybody who might have a
vote. So the Navy had to drop the investigation. Everybody on
Marduk's scared of this Makann. You think there might be some tie-up
between him and Dunnan?"
"The idea's occurred to me. Have there been any more raids on Marduk
trade-planets since the Battle of Audhumla?"
"A couple. The _Bolide_ was on Audhumla a while ago. There were a
couple of Mardukan ships there, and they had the _Victrix_ fixed up
enough to do some fighting. They ran the _Bolide_ out."
A study of the time between the destruction of the _Enterprise_
and _Yo-Yo_ and the appearance of the _Bolide_ could give them a
limiting radius around Audhumla. It did; seven hundred light-years,
which also included Tanith.
So he sent Harkaman in the _Corisande_ and Ravallo in the _Black
Star_ to visit the planets Marduk traded with, looking for Dunnan
ships and exchanging information and assistance with the Royal
Mardukan Navy. Almost at once, he regretted it; the next Gilgamesher
into orbit on Tanith brought a story that Prince Viktor was
collecting a fleet on Xochitl. He sent warnings off to Amaterasu
and Beowulf and Khepera.
A ship came in from Bigglersport, a heavily armed chartered
freighter. There was sporadic fighting in a dozen places on Gram,
now--resistance to efforts on the part of King Angus to collect
taxes, and raids by unidentified persons on estates confiscated
from alleged traitors and given to Garvan Spasso, who had now
been promoted from Baron to Count. And Rovard Grauffis was dead;
poisoned, everybody said, either by Spasso or Queen Evita or both.
Even with the threat from Xochitl, some of the former Wardshaven
nobles began talking about sending ships to Gram.
Less than a thousand hours after he had left, Ravallo was back
in the _Black Star_.
"I went to Gimli, and I wasn't there fifty hours before a
Mardukan Navy ship came in. They were glad to see me; it saved
them sending off a pinnace for Tanith. They had news for you, and
a couple of passengers."
"Passengers?"
"Yes. You'll see who they are when they come down. And don't let
anybody with side-whiskers and buttoned-up coats see them," Ravallo
said. "What those people know gets all over the place before long."
* * * * *
The visitors were Lucile, Princess Bentrik, and her son, the young
Count of Ravary. They dined with Trask; only Captain Ravallo was
also present.
"I didn't want to leave my husband, and I didn't want to come here
and impose myself and Steven on you, Prince Trask," she began, "but
he insisted. We spent the whole voyage to Gimli concealed in the
captain's quarters; only a few of the officers knew we were aboard."
"Makann won the election. Is that it?" he asked. "And Prince Bentrik
doesn't want to risk you and Steven being used as hostages?"
"That's it," she said. "He didn't really win the election, but he
might as well have. Nobody has a majority of seats in the Chamber of
Representatives but he's formed a coalition with several of the
splinter parties, and I'm ashamed to say that a number of Crown
Loyalist members--Crowd of Disloyalists, I call them--are voting
with him, now. They've coined some ridiculous phrase about the 'wave
of the future,' whatever that means."
"If you can't lick them, join them," Trask said.
"If you can't lick them, lick their boots," the Count of Ravary put in.
"My son is a trifle bitter," Princess Bentrik said. "I must confess
to a trace of bitterness, too."
"Well, that's the Representatives," Trask said. "What about the rest
of the government?"
"With the splinter-party and Disloyalist support, they got a
majority of seats in the Delegates. Most of them would have
indignantly denied, a month before, having any connection with
Makann, but a hundred out of a hundred and twenty are his
supporters. Makann, of course, is Chancellor."
"And who is Prime Minister?" he asked. "Andray Dunnan?"
She looked slightly baffled for an instant then said, "Oh. No.
The Prime Minister is Crown Prince Edvard. No; Baron Cragdale.
That isn't a royal title, so by some kind of a fiction I can't
pretend to understand he is not Prime Minister as a member of
the Royal Family."
"If you can't ..." the boy started.
"Steven! I forbid you to say that about ... Baron Cragdale. He
believes, very sincerely, that the election was an expression of
the will of the people, and that it is his duty to bow to it."
He wished Otto Harkaman were there. He could probably name, without
stopping for breath, a hundred great nations that went down into
rubble because their rulers believed that they should bow instead
of rule, and couldn't bring themselves to shed the blood of their
people. Edvard would have been a fine and admirable man, as a little
country baron. Where he was, he was a disaster.
He asked if the People's Watchman had dragged their guns out from
under the bed and started carrying them in public yet.
"Oh, yes. You were quite right; they were armed, all the time. Not
just small arms; combat vehicles and heavy weapons. As soon as the
new government was formed, they were given status as a part of the
Planetary Armed Forces. They have taken over every police station
on the planet."
"And the King?"
"Oh, he carries on, and shrugs and says, 'I just reign here.' What
else can he do? We've been whittling down and filching away the
powers of the Throne for the last three centuries."
"What is Prince Bentrik doing, and why did he think there was danger
that you two would be used as hostages?"
"He's going to fight," she said. "Don't ask me how, or what with.
Maybe as a guerrilla in the mountains, I don't know. But if he can't
lick them, he won't join them. I wanted to stay with him and help
him; he told me I could help him best by placing myself and Steven
where he wouldn't worry about us."
"I wanted to stay," the boy said. "I could have fought with him.
But he said that I must take care of Mother. And if he were killed,
I must be able to avenge him."
"You talk like a Sword-Worlder; I told you that once before." He
hesitated, then turned again to Princess Bentrik. "How is little
Princess Myrna?" he asked, and then, trying to be casual, added,
"and Lady Valerie?"
She seemed so clearly real and present to him, blue eyes and
space-black hair, more real than Elaine had been to him for years.
"They're at Cragdale; they'll be safe there. I hope."