Attempting to conceal the presence on Tanith of Prince Bentrik's
wife and son was pushing caution beyond necessity. Admitted that
the news would leak back to Marduk via Gilgamesh, it was over seven
hundred light-years to the latter and almost a thousand from there
to the former. Better that Princess Lucile should enjoy Rivington
society, such as it was, and escape, for a moment now and then, from
anxiety about her husband. At ten--no, almost twelve; it had been a
year and a half since Trask had left Marduk--the boy Count of Ravary
was more easily diverted. At last, he was among real Space Vikings,
on a Space Viking planet, and he was trying to be everywhere and see
everything at once. No doubt he would be imagining himself a Space
Viking, returning to Marduk with a vast armada to rescue his father
and the King from Zaspar Makann.
Trask was satisfied with that; as a host he left much to be desired.
He had his worries, too, and all of them bore the same name: Prince
Viktor of Xochitl. He went over with Manfred Ravallo everything the
captain of the _Black Star_ could tell him. He had talked once with
Viktor; the lord of Xochitl had been coldly polite and noncommittal.
His subordinates had been frankly hostile. There had been five ships
on orbit or landed at Viktor's spaceport beside the usual
Gilgameshers and itinerant traders, two of them Viktor's own, and a
big armed freighter had come in from Haulteclere as the _Black Star_
was leaving. There was considerable activity at the shipyards and
around the spaceport, as though in preparation for something on a
large scale.
Xochitl was a thousand light-years from Tanith. He rejected
immediately the idea of launching a preventative attack; his ships
might reach Xochitl to find it undefended, and then return to find
Tanith devastated. Things like that had happened in space-war. The
only thing to do was sit tight, defend Tanith when Viktor attacked,
and then counterattack if he had any ships left by that time.
Prince Viktor was probably reasoning in the same way.
He had no time to think about Andray Dunnan, except, now and then,
to wish that Otto Harkaman would stop thinking about him and bring
the _Corisande_ home. He needed that ship on Tanith, and the wits
and courage of her commander.
More news--Gilgamesh sources--came in from Xochitl. There were only
two ships, both armed merchantmen, on the planet. Prince Viktor had
spaced out with the rest an estimated two thousand hours before the
story reached him. That was twice as long as it would take the
Xochitl armada to reach Tanith. He hadn't gone to Beowulf; that was
only sixty-five hours from Tanith and they would have heard about
it long ago. Or Amaterasu, or Khepera. How many ships he had was
a question; not fewer than five, and possibly more. He could have
slipped into the Tanith system and hidden his ships on one of the
outer uninhabitable planets. He sent Valkanhayn and Ravallo
microjumping their ships from one to another to check. They returned
to report in the negative. At least, Viktor of Xochitl wasn't camped
inside their own system, waiting for them to leave Tanith open
to attack.
But he was somewhere, and up to nothing even resembling good, and
there was no possible way of guessing when his ships would be
emerging on Tanith. The only thing to do was wait for him. When he
did, Trask was confident that he would emerge from hyperspace into
serious trouble. He had the _Nemesis_, the _Space Scourge_, the
_Black Star_ and _Queen Flavia_, the strongly rebuilt _Lamia_, and
several independent Space Viking ships, among them the _Damnthing_
of his friend Roger-fan-Morvill Esthersan, who had volunteered to
stay and help in the defense. This, of course, was not pure
altruism. If Viktor attacked and had his fleet blown to
Em-See-Square, Xochitl would lie open and unprotected, and there
was enough loot on Xochitl to cram everybody's ships. Everybody's
ships who had ships when the Battle of Tanith was over, of course.
He was apologetic to Princess Bentrik:
"I'm very sorry you jumped out of Zaspar Makann's frying pan into
Prince Viktor's fire," he began.
She laughed at that. "I'll take my chances on the fire. I seem to
see a lot of good firemen around. If there is a battle you will see
that Steven's in a safe place, won't you?"
"In a space attack, there are no safe places. I'll keep him with me."
The young Count of Ravary wanted to know which ship he would serve
on when the attack came.
"Well, you won't be on any ship, Count. You'll be on my staff."
* * * * *
Two days later, the _Corisande_ came out of hyperspace. Harkaman was
guardedly noncommittal by screen. Trask took a landing craft and
went out to meet the ship.
"Marduk doesn't like us, any more," Harkaman told him. "They have
ships on all their trade-planets, and they all have orders to fire
on any, repeat any, Space Vikings, including the ships of the
self-styled Prince of Tanith. I got this from Captain Garravay of
the _Vindex_. After we were through talking, we fought a nice little
ship-to-ship action for him to make films of. I don't think anybody
could see anything wrong with it."
"This order came from Makann?"
"From the Admiral commanding. He isn't your friend Shefter; Shefter
retired on account of quote ill-health unquote. He is now in a quote
hospital unquote."
"Where's Prince Bentrik?"
"Nobody knows. Charges of high treason were brought against him,
and he just vanished. Gone underground, or secretly arrested and
executed; take your choice."
He wondered just what he'd tell Princess Lucile and Count Steven.
"They have ships on all the planets they trade with. Fourteen
of them. That isn't to catch Dunnan. That's to disperse the Navy
away from Marduk. They don't trust the Navy. Is Prince Edvard
still Prime Minister?"
"Yes, as of Garravay's last information. It seems Makann is behaving
in a scrupulously legal manner, outside of making his People's
Watchmen part of the armed forces. Protesting his devotion to
the King every time he opens his mouth."
"When will the fire be, I wonder?"
"Huh? Oh yes, you were reading up on Hitler. That I don't know.
Probably happened by now."
He just told Princess Lucile that her husband had gone into hiding;
he couldn't be sure whether she was relieved or more worried. The
boy was sure that he was doing something highly romantic and heroic.
Some of the volunteers tired of waiting, after another thousand
hours, and spaced out. The _Viking's Gift_ of Beowulf came in with
a cargo, and went on orbit after discharging it to join the watch.
A Gilgamesher came in from Amaterasu and reported everything quiet
there; as soon as her captain had sold his cargo, with a minimum of
haggling, he spaced out again. His behavior convinced everybody that
the attack would come in a matter of hours.
It didn't.
* * * * *
Three thousand hours had passed since the first warning had reached
Tanith, that made five thousand since Viktor's ships were supposed
to have left Xochitl. There were those, Boake Valkanhayn among them,
who doubted, now, if he ever had.
"The whole thing's just a big Gilgamesher lie," he was declaring.
"Somebody--Nikky Gratham, or the Everrards, or maybe Viktor
himself--paid them to tell us that, to pin our ships down here.
Or they made it up themselves, so they could make hay on our
trade-planets."
"Let's go down to the Ghetto and clean out the whole gang," somebody
else took up. "Anything one of them's in, they're all in together."
"Nifflheim with that; let's all space out for Xochitl," Manfred
Ravallo proposed. "We have enough ships to lick them on Tanith,
we have enough to lick them on their own planet."
He managed to talk them out of both courses of action--what was he,
anyhow; sovereign Prince of Tanith, or the non-ruling King of Marduk,
or just the chieftain of a disciplineless gang of barbarians? One of
the independents spaced out in disgust. The next day, two others
came in, loaded with booty from a raid on Braggi, and decided to
stay around for a while and see what happened.
And four days after that, a five-hundred-foot hyperspace yacht,
bearing the daggers and chevrons of Bigglersport, came in. As soon
as she was out of the last microjump, she began calling by screen.
Trask didn't know the man who was screening, but Hugh Rathmore did;
Duke Joris' confidential secretary.
"Prince Trask; I must speak to you as soon as possible," he began,
almost stuttering. Whatever the urgency of his mission, one would
have thought that a three-thousand-hour voyage would have taken some
of the edge from it. "It is of the first importance."
"You are speaking to me. This screen is reasonably secure. And if
it's of the first importance, the sooner you tell me about it...."
"Prince Trask, you must come to Gram, with every man and every ship
you can command. Satan only knows what's happening there now, but
three thousand hours ago, when the Duke sent me off, Omfray of Glaspyth
was landing on Wardshaven. He has a fleet of eight ships, furnished
to him by his wife's kinsman, the King of Haulteclere. They are commanded
by King Konrad's Space Viking cousin, the Prince of Xochitl."
Then a look of shocked surprise came into the face of the man in the
screen, and Trask wondered why, until he realized that he had leaned
back in his chair and was laughing uproariously. Before he could
apologize, the man in the screen had found his voice.
"I know, Prince Trask; you have no reason to think kindly of King
Angus--the former King Angus, or maybe even the late King Angus,
I suppose he is now--but a murderer like Omfray of Glaspyth...."
* * * * *
It took a little time to explain to the confidential secretary of
the Duke of Bigglersport the humor of the situation.
There were others at Rivington to whom it was not immediately
evident. The professional Space Vikings, men like Valkanhayn and
Ravallo and Alvyn Karffard, were disgusted. Here they'd been
sitting, on combat alert, all these months, and, if they'd only
known, they could have gone to Xochitl and looted it clean long ago.
The Gram party were outraged. Angus of Wardshaven had been bad
enough, with the hereditary taint of the Mad Baron of Blackcliffe,
and Queen Evita and her rapacious family, but even he was preferable
to a murderous villain--some even called him a fiend in human
shape--like Omfray of Glaspyth.
Both parties, of course, were positive as to where their Prince's
duty lay. The former insisted that everything on Tanith that could
be put into hyperspace should be dispatched at once to Xochitl, to
haul back from it everything except a few absolutely immovable
natural features of the planet. The latter clamored, just as loudly
and passionately, that everybody on Tanith who could pull a trigger
should be embarked at once on a crusade for the deliverance of Gram.
[Illustration]
"You don't want to do either, do you?" Harkaman asked him, when they
were alone after the second day of acrimony.
"Nifflheim, no! This crowd that wants an attack on Xochitl; you know
what would happen if we did that?" Harkaman was silent, waiting for
him to continue. "Inside a year, four or five of these small
planet-holders like Gratham and the Everrards would combine against
us and make a slag-pile out of Tanith."
Harkaman nodded agreement. "Since we warned him the first time,
Viktor's kept his ships away from our planets. If we attacked
Xochitl now, without provocation, nobody'd know what to expect from
us. People like Nikky Gratham and Tobbin of Nergal and the Everrards
of Hoth get nervous around unpredictable dangers, and when they get
nervous they get trigger-happy." He puffed slowly on his pipe and
then said: "Then you'll be going back to Gram."
"That doesn't follow; just because Valkanhayn and Ravallo and that
crowd are wrong doesn't make Valpry and Rathmore and Ffayle right.
You heard what I was telling those very people at Karvall House, the
day I met you. And you've seen what's been happening on Gram since
we came out here. Otto, the Sword-Worlds are finished; they're half
decivilized now. Civilization is alive and growing here on Tanith.
I want to stay here and help it grow."
"Look, Lucas," Harkaman said. "You're Prince of Tanith, and I'm only
the Admiral. But I'm telling you; you'll have to do something, or
this whole setup of yours will fall apart. As it stands, you can
attack Xochitl and the Back-To-Gram party would go along, or you
can decide on this crusade against Omfray of Glaspyth and the
Raid-Xochitl-Now party would go along. But if you let this go on
much longer, you won't have any influence over either party."
"And then I will be finished. And in a few years, Tanith will be
finished." He rose and paced across the room and back. "Well, I
won't raid Xochitl; I told you why, and you agreed. And I won't
spend the men and ships and wealth of Tanith in any Sword-World
dynastic squabble. Great Satan, Otto; you were in the Durendal War.
This is the same thing, and it'll go on for another half a century."
"Then what will you do?"
"I came out here after Andray Dunnan, didn't I?" he asked.
"I'm afraid Ravallo and Valpry, or even Valkanhayn and Morland,
won't be as interested in Dunnan as you are."
"Then I will interest them in him. Remember, I was reading up on
Hitler, coming in from Marduk? I will tell them all a big lie.
Such a big lie that nobody will dare to disbelieve it."