Horizon Storms (13 page)

Basil growled. “Can you come up with another solution?”

“Let me think about it. By the way, I understand that several transport 64

ships are bringing the warglobe wreckage found on Theroc. Will it arrive in time for the upcoming Ptoro victory celebration?”

“It is on the schedule.” The Chairman got to his feet. “Presenting the wreckage should be another morale booster.”

“Not much more than window dressing, Mr. Chairman.”

A cynical smile quirked the corners of Basil’s mouth. “Don’t underestimate the importance of window dressing, Eldred. Why do you think we have a King?”

205KING PETER

It was good to have a genuine reason to celebrate again, after so many tragedies. King Peter stood warmly beside his Queen on a high balcony overlooking the gathering dusk of the festival square. Though they were in public, and partly because of it, he and Estarra shared quick communicative glances, brief touches, very close and comfortable in each other’s space.

The royal couple were welcomed with a resounding cheer; Peter’s face wore its first genuine smile in recent memory. He and Estarra clasped hands, raised them together in greeting to the people.

Bright music skirled over the huge crowd. Street singers and instrument players skipped about with an obvious need to show their joy. Revelers loosed phosphorescent balloons that floated into the air, then popped, spraying shimmering sparkles. Boats cruised the Royal Canal, and tourist-filled zeppelins drifted overhead.

Down in the plaza, the Archfather of the official religion, Unison, stood like a kindly old saint in gaudy voluminous robes, leading groups in ritualized prayer and hymns of thanksgiving. Young Prince Daniel, Peter’s supposed brother, was not in attendance “for security reasons,” and the

King was glad that the unspoken threat of his replacement would not sour the day. Chairman Wenceslas thought he had intimidated the young King into meekly accepting his subordinate role, but Peter was merely biding his time, guarded and careful.

“I’d almost forgotten what it felt like, Estarra. It was necessary to remind the hydrogues that we are not helpless, that we won’t just stand by and be slaughtered.”

She hugged him. “Now they certainly aren’t going to forget.”

He ran his hand over the soft skin of her shoulder, loving just to touch her. Unfortunately, because he so obviously cared for her, Estarra’s safety had become a nasty bit of leverage for the Hansa. Peter knew it, and so did Basil.

Moving silently, the Chairman stepped up behind them, as silent as gathering dust. “The cargo haulers have started their descent. They should be visible in the sky within ten minutes, so it’s time for you to begin your announcements.”

“You and your schedules, Basil,” Peter said with a wry smile. “Are you nervous about giving your little speech today?” Though he rarely appeared in public, the Chairman had chosen to give an address of his own; perhaps Basil wanted to bask in the optimistic news for a change. A bit of rare pride?

“Nervous? No.”

On cue, a loud fanfare stunned the background murmur into silence.

Unnecessary spotlights shone down on the three of them, dazzling Peter’s eyes and blinding him to the descending spacecraft—but he knew where they were scheduled to be. “Behold, everyone!” Peter shouted, pointing into the air. “This proves that our enemies can be destroyed!”

Six EDF cargo haulers dropped into view from high orbit. Beneath the heavy lifters, blackened fragments of a gigantic diamond eggshell dangled from powerful tractor beams. Two haulers worked in tandem to carry the largest piece of the shattered warglobe from Theroc, while each of the other ships brought a smaller fragment to the Royal Plaza.

Estarra squeezed his hand, grimly pleased to see for herself the broken hydrogue ship that her sister Celli had found. Just standing beside his wife, Peter felt stronger, able to help the human race get through this crisis.

General Lanyan had originally demanded that the wreckage be brought 66

to the main EDF base on Mars for a full analysis, but Chairman Wenceslas had disagreed. “You can look at it later, General. For now, there are considerations beyond military necessity. I’d rather let the people see this instead of having it hidden in a military research lab.”

Fuming at being countermanded, Lanyan had insisted on military security. “Security?” Peter had asked. “If our scientists find any weakness in the hydrogue design, who would we possibly want to keep it secret from?”

From the balcony now, he and Estarra watched the cargo haulers deposit the broken warglobe in the plaza, like a knight delivering the head of a slain dragon to his King. As the first large burned section settled onto the flagstones with a clanking thud, the audience and even the royal guards stepped back in awe.

The next part of Peter’s speech was full of warm confidence. “Our scientific teams will analyze the warglobe’s components and search for any vulnerability we can use against our hydrogue enemies.”

Down below, one tall blond, Engineering Specialist Swendsen, was the first to hurry forward to touch the hull, running his hands along the blistered surface. When he looked up toward the Whisper Palace, Peter could see the man was grinning. The sudden cheers were deafening.

Basil tapped his chronometer and spoke softly. “Time for you both to go to the bridge. Keep on schedule.”

The King and Queen walked side by side in a brisk procession from the Whisper Palace into the flagstoned plaza. When they moved together, absorbed in each other’s presence, they could almost forget all the pomp, guards, and spectators. A contingent of royal guards snapped to attention.

Court musicians who had waited for just this moment played yet another fanfare.

Ahead, the metal webwork of the Royal Canal bridge gleamed under reflected light. Its main posts were dark, though other bridge spires and all the cupolas of the Whisper Palace blazed with shimmering torches, each of which symbolized a world that had signed the Hansa Charter.

Eight years ago Old King Frederick had been forced to extinguish four of those newly lit torches after the hydrogues had destroyed four moons slated for terraforming and eventual colonization. Now, even though Ptoro was a flaming ball and utterly uninhabitable by any humans, the Hansa had

decided to claim it as a moral victory. If humans could not settle there, at least they had made it impossible for the hydrogues to remain.

Estarra’s older sister Sarein, the official ambassador from Theroc to Earth, stood waiting among the representatives and important guests. The Queen smiled and nodded to her, then returned to her formal pose beside Peter.

Hansa pyrotechnics experts watched on monitor screens inside the Whisper Palace. It was all a spectacular show. Peter stood in front of the tall pillar like an ancient priest invoking fire from the gods. “At Ptoro we have hurt the hydrogues, as they have done so many times to us.” The crowd cheered on cue. “In the name of the Terran Hanseatic League, this torch will stand as a symbol of what we have accomplished. Let it also be an eternal flame to memorialize those soldiers and civilians who have fallen in eight years of a war that we did not want.”

He gestured dramatically and, as planned, the pyrotechnics experts ignited the blazing ball atop a bridge tower, which burned brighter than all the others. Fuel lines were opened further, and every one of the dazzling flames from the turrets, spires, and cupolas of the Whisper Palace brightened, feeding on the growing light of victory.

The crowd responded with an indrawn breath, then applause and cheers. Sarein exchanged a meaningful glance with her sister, as if both were remembering the damage done to their home on Theroc. Spontaneous music drifted to the sky.

Peter put his arm around his Queen; she felt so warm and real next to him. Her face filled with delight. “I’m glad I could finally do a positive thing,” he whispered to her.

After savoring the heady rush for a moment, he introduced the Chairman and stepped aside. The applause was automatic. The Chairman’s smile appeared almost genuine as he stood next to Peter. Most people actually believed the manufactured reports that the two men were the best of friends.

Basil waited for the audience’s full attention, then spoke. “The Hansa offers you a fine opportunity with our new colonization initiative. Klikiss technology has already given us one irresistible weapon to use against the hydrogues, as we just demonstrated at Ptoro. Now the Klikiss instantaneous transportation system gives us a new method for settling many un-

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touched worlds. It’s a new start for us—both for the Hansa and for yourselves. Think about the opportunity.”

Basil didn’t have to give many details. The colonization initiative had been much discussed in the news ever since the discovery of the functioning Klikiss transportals, but this was the first time any formal plan had been announced to the public.

“On behalf of the Terran Hanseatic League, I am proud to extend a remarkable offer. Is anyone brave and ambitious enough to seize this chance?

Are you willing to take a crack at colonizing an empty Klikiss planet? To pack up the family and your possessions and move to a virgin world? Think of the challenge! Be pioneers! If you accept this challenge, the Hansa will provide you with free land, certain services and supplies, even amnesty from several forms of debt.”

Basil sounded as if he was addressing a board meeting, laying out details like a bullet-point presentation. Peter remembered all the motivational skills the Chairman had taught him, and suddenly wondered if Basil was intentionally downplaying his speaking abilities, so as not to upstage the figurehead King.

Hansa experts, economic analysts, and civic simulators had developed this scheme as a viable method of pumping fresh capital and popular excitement into the Hansa, which might otherwise have faced a slow death through stagnation caused by limited space travel.

Smiling, Basil continued. “The hydrogues may squeeze us in one direction, but we will grow in another. Will any of you take this offer? Can any of you afford not to? Full details will be available at local dissemination stations.”

During the expected applause, Peter gave the Chairman a wry look. He said in a voice too low for the amplifiers to detect, “Basil, if you enjoy the limelight, then I’ll be out of a job.”

Maintaining his false smile, Basil gave him a hard glance. “Just be sure you don’t give me a reason to, and everything will be fine.”

215ORLI COVITZ

Gray and cloudy Dremen had been her home since before the hydrogue war, but Orli Covitz felt that anyplace would be better than here. At fourteen years old she had few points of comparison.

Her father had pulled up stakes and brought her here, following a dream, when she’d been only six. Jan Covitz maintained an unflagging reserve of optimism, but Orli had slowly come to realize that her father’s grand aspirations did not amount to much, despite his good intentions.

She loved him anyway, knowing that he actually believed he would find the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow if he chased long enough and hard enough.

Blowing on her cold fingers to warm them, Orli stood with her father in the slushy fields they had claimed. All this land had been there for the taking, because few other Dremen farmers wanted it. That should have been their first hint, but her father was sure the two of them could do something with it. Jan and his daughter were a team.

They’d been latecomers here. The first families had arrived a hundred and ten years earlier and staked their claims. Many of them already acted like snobs, considering themselves genuine bluebloods after only a few generations. Her father had ignored the snobbery, however, accepted the available land, and made the best of it. He diligently forged ahead without much of a plan, but with a great deal of exuberance. For eight and a half years he had worked hard while insisting, “Next year will be better. We’ll make it then for sure, Orli.”

This year, though, the mushroom field was a disaster.

The ground was wet and mulchy, with standing pools of peaty brown water. Many of the giant mushrooms had been hacked down, the tender caps harvested, but most had opened their rills and dumped spores, which darkened the fungus meat with inky residue and lent it an unpleasant taste.

Now Jan shoved his spade into the soft, cold muck and flashed a bright smile at her. “We’ll salvage some of this, Orli. Fifteen percent at least.”

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She smiled in response to his chipper attitude. “We can maybe push it to twenty percent if the weather holds.”

But on Dremen, the weather would not hold.

She wiped her forehead, pushing her dark bangs aside. Though she wanted to let her brown hair grow out like some of the colonists’ uppity daughters did, she knew that with her pointed chin, pert nose, and large eyes, long hair would make her look identical to pictures of her mother. Jan never talked about his faraway wife—she had left them long ago, after one of her husband’s previous schemes had failed. But Orli didn’t want to remind him, so she kept her hair short and simple.

She didn’t know why her father had chosen to come to Dremen, of all places. It was a cool world with dim skies. The variable sun waxed over the course of decades, warming the planet and making life nearly tolerable.

Dremen had plenty of water; its continents were dotted with large shallow lakes that evaporated easily, keeping the air in a clammy equilibrium of fog and frequent rain showers. Woody plants had not evolved here, and the ground was covered with cold bogs, mossy groundcover, and sheets of leathery lichen.

But Orli and her father had arrived during the variable star’s waning phase, and year after year the climate had only grown colder until the variable-phase winter had set in hard. During previous waning cycles, the Dremen colonists had depended on relief supplies from Hansa merchant ships. This time around, though, the hydrogue embargo changed everything.