Throne of Stars (74 page)

“Mr. Thomas Catrone?”

“Speaking.”

“Mr. Catrone, have you been checking your mail?”

“Yes.”

“Then are you aware that you and your wife have won an all-expenses-paid trip to Imperial City?”

“I don’t like the Capital,” Catrone said, reaching for the disconnect button.

“Mr. Catrone,” the blonde said, half-desperately. “You’re scheduled to stay at the Lloyd-Pope Hotel. It’s the best hotel in the City. There are three plays scheduled, and an opera at the Imperial Civic Center, plus dinner every night at the Marduk House! You’re just going to turn that down?”

“Yes.”

“Have you asked your
wife
if you should turn it down?” the blonde asked acerbically.

Tomcat’s hand hovered over the button, index finger waving in the air. Then it clenched into a fist and withdrew. He rattled his fingers on the desktop and frowned at the hologram.

“Why me?” he asked suspiciously.

“You were entered in a drawing at the last Imperial Special Operations Association meeting. Don’t you remember?”

“No. They’ve generally got all sorts of drawings . . . but this one is pretty odd for them.”

“The Association uses the Ching-Wrongly Travel Agency for all its bookings,” the blonde said. “Part of that was the lottery for this trip.”

“And I won it?” He raised one eyebrow and peered at her suspiciously again.

“Yes.”

“This isn’t a scam?”

“No, sir,” she said earnestly. “We’re not selling anything.”

“Well . . .” Catrone scratched his chin. “I guess I’d better schedule—”

“There is one small . . . issue,” the blonde said uncomfortably. “It’s . . .
pre
scheduled. For next week.”

“Next week?” Catrone stared at her incredulously. “Who’s going to take care of the horses?”

“Sorry?” The blonde wrinkled her brow prettily. “You’ve sort of lost me, there.”

“Horses,” Catrone repeated, speaking slowly and distinctly. “Four-legged mammals. Manes? Hooves? You ride them. Or, in my case raise them.”

“Oh.”

“So you just want me to drop everything and go to the Capital?”

“Unless you want to miss out on this one-of-a-kind personalized adventure,” the woman said brightly.

“And if I do, Ching-Wrongly doesn’t have to pay out?”

“Errrr . . .” The woman hesitated.

“Hah! Now I know what the scam is!” Tomcat pointed one finger at the screen and shook it. “You’re not getting me that easily! What about travel arrangements? I can’t make it in my aircar in less than a couple of days.”

“Suborbital flight from Ulan Bator Spaceport is part of the package,” the blonde said.

“Okay, let’s work out the details,” Catrone said, tilting back in his desk chair. “My wife loves the opera; I hate it. But you can gargle peanut butter for three hours if you have to, so what the hell . . .”

“What a horribly suspicious man,” Despreaux said, closing the connection.

“He has reason to be,” Roger pointed out. “He’s got to be under some sort of surveillance. Contacting him directly at all was a bit of a risk, but no more than anything else we considered.”

The bunker behind the warehouse had the capability to artfully spoof the planetary communications network. Anyone backtracking the call would find it coming from the Ching-Wrongly offices, where a highly paid source was more than willing to back up the story.

“You think this is really going to work?” Despreaux asked.

“O ye of little faith,” Roger replied with a grin. “I just wonder what our opposition is up to.”

“And how is the Empress?” Adoula asked.

“Docile,” New Madrid said, sitting down and crossing his long legs at the ankle. “As she should be.”

Lazar Fillipo, Earl of New Madrid, was the source of most of Roger’s good looks. Just short of two meters tall, long, lean, and athletically trim, he had a classically cut face and shoulder length blond hair he’d recently had modded to prevent graying. He also had a thin mustache that Adoula privately thought looked like a yellow caterpillar devouring his upper lip.

“I could wish we’d been able to find out what got dumped in her toot,” Adoula said.

“And in John’s,” New Madrid replied with a nod. “But it was flushed, whatever it was, before we could stop it. Pity. I’d expected the drugs to hold back the dead man’s switch longer than they did. Long enough for our . . . physical persuasion to properly motivate him to tell us what we wanted to know, at least.”

“Always assuming it was the ‘dead man’s switch,’” Adoula pointed out a bit acidly. “The suicide protocols can also be deliberately activated, you know.”
And
, he thought,
given what you were doing to him—in front of his mother—that’s a hell of a lot more likely than any “Dead Man’s Switch,” isn’t it, Lazar? I wonder what you’d have done to Alexandra herself by now . . . if you didn’t need her alive even more than I do?

“Always possible, I suppose.” New Madrid pursed his lips poutingly for several seconds, then shrugged. “Well, I imagine it was inevitable, actually. And he had to go in the end, anyway, didn’t he? It was worth a try, and Alexandra might always have volunteered the information herself, given that he was all she had left by that point. On the other hand, I’ve sometimes wondered if she could have told us even if she’d wanted to. The security protocols on their toots were quite extraordinary, after all.”

“True. True.” New Madrid pursed his lips poutingly for several seconds, then shrugged. “I suppose it was inevitable, actually. The security protocols on their toots
were
quite extraordinary, after all.”

The Earl, Adoula reflected, had an absolutely astonishing talent for stating—and
re
stating—the obvious.

“You wanted to see me?” the prince asked.

“Thomas Catrone is taking a trip to the capital.”

“Oh?” Adoula leaned back in his float chair.

“Oh,” New Madrid said. “He’s supposedly won some sort of all-expenses-paid trip. I checked, and there was such a lottery from the Special Operations Association. Admittedly,
anyone
who won it would be worth being suspicious of. But I’m particularly worried about Catrone. You should have let me take him out.”

“First of all,” Adoula said, “taking Catrone out would
not
have been child’s play. He hardly ever leaves that bunker of his. Second, if the Empress’ Own start dying off—and there are others, just as dangerous in their own ways as Catrone—then the survivors are going to start getting suspicious. More suspicious than they already are. And we
don’t
want those overpaid retired bodyguards getting out of hand.”

“Be that as it may, I’m putting one of my people on him,” New Madrid said. “And if he becomes a problem . . .”

“Then
I’ll
deal with it,” Adoula said. “You concentrate on keeping the Empress in line.”

“With pleasure,” the Earl said, and smirked.

“Indian country,” Catrone said as he looked the neighborhood over.

“Not a very nice area for an upscale restaurant,” Sheila replied nervously.

“It’s not so bad,” the airtaxi-driver, an otterlike Seglur, said. “I’ve dropped other fares here. Those Mardukans that work in the place?
Nobody
wants to mess with them. You’ll be fine. Beam down my card and call me when you want to be picked up.”

“Thanks,” Catrone said, getting the driver’s information and paying the fare—and a small tip—as they landed.

Two of the big Mardukans stood by the entrance, bearing pikes—fully functional ones, Catrone noticed—and wearing some sort of blue harness over what were obviously environment suits. A young human woman, blonde and stocky, with something of a wrestler’s build, opened the door.

“Welcome to Marduk House,” the blonde said. “Do you have reservations?”

“Catrone, Thomas,” Tomcat said.

“Ah, Mr. and Mrs. Catrone,” she replied. “Your table is waiting. Right this way.”

She led them through the entrance, into the entry room, and on to the dining room. Catrone noticed that there were several people, much better dressed than Sheila and he but having the look of local Imperial staff-pukes, apparently waiting for tables.

A skinny, red-headed woman held down the reception desk, but most of the staff seemed to be Mardukans. The restaurant area had a long bar at one side, on which slabs of some sort of meat were laid out. As they walked through the area, one of the Mardukans took a pair of cleavers—they would have been swords for a human—and began chopping a long section of meat, his hands moving in a blur. The sounds of the blades thunking into flesh and wood brought back unpleasant memories for Catrone, but there was a small ripple of applause as the Mardukan bowed and started throwing the chunks of meat, in another blur, onto a big iron dome. They hit in a star pattern and started sizzling, filling the room with the cooking noise and an odd smell. Not like pork or beef or chicken, or even human. Catrone had smelled them all in his time. Cooking human smelled pretty much like pork, anyway.

The table they were led to was already partially occupied. A big, vaguely Eurasian guy, and the blonde from the call. When he saw her, Tomcat almost stopped, but recovered with only the briefest of pauses.

“There seems to be someone at our table,” he said instead to the hostess.

“That’s Mr. Chung,” she replied quietly. “The owner. He wanted to welcome you as a special guest.”

Riiiight
, Tomcat thought, then nodded at the two of them as if he’d never seen the blonde in his life.

“Mr. and Mrs. Catrone,” the big guy said. “I’m Augustus Chung, the proprietor of these premises, and this is my friend, Ms. Shara Stewart. Welcome to Marduk House.”

“It’s lovely,” Sheila said as he pulled out her chair.

“It was . . . somewhat less lovely when we acquired it,” Chung replied. “Like this fine neighborhood, it had fallen into disrepair. We were able to snap it up quite cheaply. I was glad we could; this is a house with a lot of history.”

“Washington,” Catrone said with a nod. “This is the old Kenmore House, right?”

“Correct, Mr. Catrone,” Chung replied. “It wasn’t George Washington’s home, but it belonged to one of his family. And he apparently spent considerable time here.”

“Good general,” Catrone said. “Probably one of the best guerrilla fighters of his day.”

“And an honorable man,” Chung said. “A patriot.”

“Not many of them left,” Catrone probed.

“There are a few,” Chung said. Then, “I took the liberty of ordering wine. It’s a vintage from Marduk; I hope you like it.”

“I’m a beer drinker myself.”

“What the Mardukans call beer, you would not care for,” Chung said definitely. “There are times when you have to trust, and this is one of them. I can get you a Koun?”

“No, wine’s fine. Tipple is tipple.” Catrone looked at the blonde seated beside his host. “Ms. Stewart, I haven’t said how lovely you look tonight.”

“Please, call me Shara,” the blonde said, dimpling prettily.

“In that case, it’s Sheila and Tomcat,” Catrone replied.

“Watch him,” Sheila added with a grin. “He got the nickname for a reason.”

“Oh, I will,” Shara said. “Sheila, I need to powder my nose. Care to come along?”

“Absolutely,” Sheila said, standing up. “We can trade our war stories while they trade theirs.”

“Nice girl,” Tomcat said as the two walked toward the powder room.

“Yes, she is,” Chung replied, then looked Catrone in the eyes. “And a fine soldier. I’d say Captain Pahner sends his regards, but he is, very unfortunately, dead.”

“You’re him,” Catrone said.

“Yes.”

“Which one is she?”

“Nimashet Despreaux. My aide and fiancÈe.”

“Oh great!”

“Look, Sergeant Major,” Roger said, correctly interpreting the response. “We were on Marduk for
eight months
. Completely cut off. Stranded. You don’t maintain garrison conditions for eight months. Fraternization? Hell, Kosutic—that’s the hostess who led you over here—was carrying on for most of the time with Julian, who’s now my S-2. And don’t even get me
started
on the story of Gunny Jin. Nimashet and I at least waited until we were off-planet. And, yes, I’m going to marry her.”

“You got any idea how easy it is to monitor in a restaurant?” Catrone asked, changing the subject.

“Yes. Which is why everyone entering and leaving is scanned for any sort of surveillance device. And this table, in particular, is placed by the fire pit for a reason. That sizzling really does a number on audio.”

“Shit. Why the hell did you have to get my wife involved in this?”

“Because we’re on a very thin margin,” Roger pointed out. “Inviting just you would have been truly obvious.”

“Well, I’m not getting involved in treason, whatever your reasoning,” Catrone said. “You go your way, I’ll go mine.”

“This is not treason. I wasn’t
there
. I was on
Marduk
, okay? I’ve got all the proof of that you could ask for.
Marduk
. This is all Adoula. He’s holding my mother captive, and I
am
going to free her.”

“Fine, you go right ahead.” Catrone took a hard pull on the wine; his host was right, it was good. “Look, I did my time. And extra. Now I raise horses, do a little consulting, and watch the grass grow. What there is of it in the Gobi. I’m out of the Empire-saving business. Been there, done that, got
really
sick and tired of it. You’re wrong; there are no patriots any more. Just more and less evil fatcats.”

“Including my mother?” Roger demanded angrily.

“Keep your voice down,” Catrone said. “No, not including your mother. But it’s not about your mother, is it? It’s about a throne for Roger. Sure, I believe you weren’t in on the coup in the first place. But blood calls to blood, and you’re New Madrid’s boy. Bad seed. You think we don’t talk to each other in the Association? I
know
you, you little shit. You’re not worth a pimple on your brother’s ass. You think, even if it were possible, I’m going to walk in and give the Throne to
you?
”

“You
knew
me,” Roger grated. “Yeah, you’re right. I was a little shit. But this
isn’t
about me; it’s about Mother. Look, I’ve got some intel. What they’re doing to her is
killing
her. And as soon as the can is popped, Mom dies. Bingo. Gone.”