Chapter 6
The Triad, Tharkad
Protectorate of Donegal, Lyran Commonwealth
14 March 3024Max had spent little time with Simon Johnson before and the head of LIC was notoriously hard to read - an excellent quality in a spy. Today he had no doubt that the man was furious, and he was quite glad not to be the target.
“Whatever else is going on, losing a prisoner from the Triad’s own detention center is unacceptable,” Johnson grated.
There was a distressed sound from Melissa, who was still rubbing her arm where blood had been drawn earlier.
“If that is indeed the Archon, that is much worse,” he admitted, blue eyes a little apologetic as he glanced at the girl. “At least we can be reasonably sure that you and your cousins have not been compromised.” The first orders that Johnson had given were to identify and detain everyone who had had access to the cells since Ardan was locked up there, and to have fresh blood samples taken from Melissa, from Ryan and from their mutual cousin Ivan who was currently serving in the Second Royal Guards as a junior officer. “I’ll arrange a blood test for Hermann as well, but that will require more discretion as he isn’t under my authority.”
Melissa’s great-uncle had been deputized to carry out the ceremonial duties of the Archon during Katrina’s absence. Together with acting command of the Royal Guard, that left him in a position of considerable power. While Max didn’t think a man who would have renounced his titles and rank entirely to avoid a power struggle in the other timeline would yield to temptation in this one, he’d also been resistant to Morgan’s persuasion over Sortek. Either he’d been compromised or he was so blindly loyal to Katrina’s orders that he was a liability right now.
“That’s all very well, but until we can test the current Archon we don’t know if the Commonwealth is in the hands of an imposter,” he pointed out.
“And if she refuses to be tested?” Johnson asked. “Oh, it would be suspicious, but short of force we can’t make her. She could claim a mismatch meant that her daughter had been abducted and replaced. Alessandro had many failings as an Archon but even he had enough support that he could have forced a civil war rather than abdicating. Sparing us that was perhaps his wisest decision, but Katrina is far more trusted and if you’re right that she’s been replaced by an enemy agent that could be a goal.”
Ardan leant forwards. “So you need absolute proof to act.”
“I am acting.” The spymaster glared at Sortek. “You have my sincere apologies that the Tamar situation led to my negligence over your care. I will do everything in my power to resolve this, but we can’t afford a civil war. As we speak, the Norns are combing every record we have about the detention wing and interrogating the staff. More people are digging into this than are investigating Tamar right now.”
“My brother is taking the bulk of the Kell Hounds there,” Morgan informed him.
Johnson nodded. “I’m aware.” He paused. “And given the deep trust that Katrina has in you, unless the Archon asks specifically, I won’t volunteer that information.”
“You already had suspicions?” Max asked speculatively.
“The Archon and I have disagreed more than once over the years. Sometimes she has been proven right, sometimes not. I won’t directly disobey her, but since she isn’t on Tharkad I’m acting on the basis that forgiveness will count for more than permission in providing support to her sister.” Pain flickered in Johnson’s blue eyes. “Dozens of Bondians have paid with their lives and I’m going to expend more in the weeks to come to buy time for Nondi Steiner. And now, to buy you time as well.”
“Bondians?” Ardan asked in a low voice.
“Active agents outside the Commonwealth,” Melissa told him, equally quietly.
“You knew there was an imposter,” Morgan pointed out, ignoring the byplay. “Even if you thought she’d been caught, you must have explored where she came from.”
“The Federated Suns research program was an obvious lead - perhaps too obvious.” Johnson spread his hands. “Outside of that, the Canopians could likely do the same.”
Max grunted. “Or Terran medicine.”
The spymaster gave him a dry look. “You have a reason to suspect ComStar?”
“It isn’t paranoia if they really are out to get you,” he replied. “But I have nothing specific here.”
Eyes narrowed in thought, Johnson continued: “Investigating the Suns’ scientists has only muddied the waters - someone has compromised their security already. Both the Maskirova or the ISF would target anything in the Suns and I can’t say that their parent realms aren’t benefiting from the current situation.”
Max closed his own eyes for a moment in thought. There had been another Capellan doppelganger beside Hanse - a short story had detailed an attempt by the Maskirova to replace Tormano Liao with one of their agents, to allow the appearance that Maximilian Liao had a more compliant son. While the agent had claimed Maxmilian had ordered it, that meant nothing - it could have just as easily been a power play by Chandra Ling, director of the Maskirova to create a puppet heir.
But the Capellans were definitely a possibility.
“So we don’t know anything?!” Melissa exclaimed.
“We know that…” The comm on Johnson’s desk cut him off and he picked it up sharply. “Johnson.”
The four of them watched with silent frustration as the head of LIC responded to the caller with nothing more than faint encouraging noises, giving them no clue as to what was being said on the other end. The discretion of a life-long spy, Max thought.
“Alright, good work.” Having tripled the number of words he’d contributed to that conversation,” Johnson lowered the handset. “And now we know more. Since the detention wing was not being used, sometimes the associated storage was made available for other purposes. Not the cells themselves, but it’s close enough.”
“And?” demanded Melissa.
“And a cryocapsule was being stored there prior to Colonel Sortek’s arrest, a capsule large enough that someone could have been placed inside it. With the facility now being used, it was removed and the storage cleared for use supporting your detention.”
“What the hell was a cryocapsule doing in the Triad?” Ardan asked, gesturing to one of the windows of the office. Outside, snow was visibly coming down.
“Duke Aldo Lestrade was a guest in the Triad as he made his appeal against Margaret Aten’s succession to the throne of Skye,” Johnson told them. “He’d supposedly brought it to ensure his beer stayed cold as he travelled from Summer.”
“He needed a cryocapsule for that? Did he think there was no beer on Tharkad?”
Melissa rubbed her hands together nervously. “That’s not the craziest thing people have brought here, Ardan. One of mother’s guests had a pet elephant.”
Johnson sighed heavily.
“In this climate?” Max asked, incredulously.
“Many of the Lyran nobility have the wealth to take eccentricities to extremes,” the spymaster said heavily. “The Triad staff tries to be accommodating. As Lady Melissa says, bringing your own beer is hardly the most extreme behavior they’ve dealt with.”
“If we’re looking from someone who is benefitting from the current situation, Aldo Lestrade is on the list,” Morgan said grimly. “Did he take the cryocapsule to Skye?”
“To Summer. Even if he then took it to Skye, he went via Lestrade Castle.” Johnson drummed his fingers on his desk. “The capsule wasn’t intended for a human occupant but it could have been used that way. Other than medical monitoring equipment, the technology is the same.”
“And Lestrade could keep a prisoner at Lestrade Castle easily,” Max murmured. “It’s the center of his power.”
Johnson nodded. “It’s not much of a lead, but it’s all I have.”
“Then we need to follow it,” Max decided. “Unless anything else turns up.”
Morgan nodded. “And we need to be discreet. A Kell Hounds dropship arriving would raise flags so we’ll have to lean on you to arrange an alternative, Simon.”
“I can help with that.”
“Will there be room in your transport plans for my Victor?” asked Ardan. “You didn’t take that apart or anything, did you?” he enquired, looking suddenly at Simon Johnson.
“It was stored at the Suns embassy,” the spymaster replied. “I believe it was returned to the Suns when the ambassador was replaced though.”
“They took my ‘mech home without me?” The mechwarrior seemed appalled.
“And all your personal effects, I would assume.”
Ardan groaned. “So we’re on a rescue mission to save the Archon and I don’t have so much as a toothbrush to my name.”
“I can lend you my week’s allowance to get kitted out,” Melissa offered impishly.
Max was fairly sure that the Archon-Designate’s weekly allowance would have paid for Ardan to get a commercial ticket all the way home, never mind bought him a toothbrush. It probably wouldn’t cover getting him a ‘mech though.
“When do we leave?” the girl added.
“You aren’t going,” Max and Morgan said in unison, then exchanged amused looks.
“We’re talking about my mother!” she protested.
Johnson cleared his throat. “I can’t cover for your absence, Ladygravine Steiner,” he pointed out. “I’m afraid that staying on Tharkad while others act in your name is one of the burdens you’re going to have to get used to.”
“But…”
Max cleared his throat and broached the topic no one had voiced yet: “Lady Melissa, if something permanent has happened to your mother… then you are the Archon now.” He felt bad about saying that, and worse when the teenager started to cry.
Imperial City, Luthien
Pesht Military District, Draconis Combine
2 April 3024It was the silence that alerted Tomoe that something was wrong.
All of the Otomo were hand-picked by the Coordinator, which was the only formal requirement. However, most had proven themselves in the ranks for five years before being vetted by the ISF and having their names submitted to Takashi as potential candidates. Theodore’s first selections had been to replace the Otomo members killed alongside his father in the dropship crash on Rasalhague and he’d brought his entire command lance in.
No one questioned the Coordinator’s right to do this, but at the same time there was a degree of friction expressed in hazing from the veterans and a drive to prove themselves by the new recruits. In Tomoe’s case, she had been assigned quarters near the entrance used for infantry patrols and the sentries made a point of stamping their feet briskly outside her room - disturbing her sleep.
She’d gotten used to it though, and instinct brought her to wakefulness when it didn’t happen. It wasn’t until she heard the sound of boots shuffling past her room in the same quiet steps that the Otomo infantry used in other parts of the palace that she was able to put her finger on why.
Slipping out from under her bedcovers, she had the pistol kept under her pillow ready before her feet were under her. As a mechwarrior she didn’t keep body-armor ready, but her cooling vest was kevlar lined and it slipped on almost silently.
Drawing the wakizashi from the scabbard on the stand, Tomoe used her right hand to carefully slide the bolt on her door. She found herself wishing for a third hand - she was holding her pistol in the same hand, but might need every weapon she could carry if this was what it might be.
The door was as well-oiled as the bolt, opening silently and Tomoe saw two soldiers right outside her door, eyes looking further down the corridor. It took them a critical heart-beat to register that the door next to them had opened - the last heart-beats of two lives, because she didn’t recognise the faces beneath the stylised helmets of the Otomo and drove her wakizashi into one, the sharp blade finding the gap between chinstrap and upper jaw.
The sharp retort of her pistol blowing the brains out of the other soldier woke the entire dorm but there were other soldiers at every door on the corridor. Her comrades woke, unwarned and all of them outnumbered two to one.
Still, they were Otomo and when doors crashed open, screams mixed with gunfire as the Coordinator’s elite guards went from sleep to violence in the blink of an eye.
Tomoe emptied the magazine of her pistol down the corridor, landing four of the six shots in men a fraction too late to enter their target rooms.
Then two more soldiers turned from the barracks entrance and she flung the pistol into the face of the second before side-stepping the bayonet of the leader.
Her wakizashi, still slick with blood from her first target was just a fraction off target, the edge striking the edge of the helmet and snapping the blade. What was left didn’t strike as deeply as she wanted, but it was enough to open his eyes and the bridge of the man’s nose.
Screaming in agony, he plowed into her and knocked the young woman to the floor, her cooling vest muting the impact only slightly.
Seizing the rifle, Tomoe coiled her legs beneath her burden and kicked out, heaving the man aside and giving his back-up a clean shot at point blank range.
She should have died in that moment but a shot from further down the hall went over her head a moment before the soldier’s finger could tighten his trigger. Chu-i Sebastian Monroe used a needler as his side arm and razor sharp flechettes made a nonsense of the flexible armor covering the soldier’s throat, almost decapitating him.
Tomoe rolled over in time to see Monroe, perhaps the most vicious of the hazing participants, lurch forwards, blood and fragmented bullets bursting through him as battle rifles chattered at fully automatic rates.
Her own fingers confirmed her captured rifle was in semi-automatic before she pulled the trigger twice and both of Monroe’s killers hit the ground.
Scrambling up, bare feet finding slippery blood on the floor, Tomoe jabbed the bayonet into the thigh of the man she’d blinded, ripping open his femoral artery. He’d be dead quickly, but as sounds died down along the corridor, she might follow if more of the attackers had survived than her comrades.
Bounding from door to door, she fired again and again at anyone wearing armor, taking advantage of the momentary disorientation natural to soldiers who had expected a slaughter of helpless sleeping men and women. There were a dozen rooms on either corridor, though some had not been opened - their occupants absent and presumably this was known to the attackers - and only two of the open rooms had both of the intruding soldiers still standing before she corrected that… but none had Otomo fit to join her either.
At the second to last doors she had to duck inside for cover when another of the attackers opened up down the corridor with his rifle.
Dropping her own almost empty rifle, Tomoe lifted one from one of the soldiers on the floor (a knife in his throat, thrown by Mechwarrior Omi Suhasi before she was gunned down by the second soldier through the door, a part of her mind noted, automatically deciphering the map of combat). Dropping to one knee, she waited a instant and heard the telltale of a magazine emptying.
Rolling out, she was about to fire, but with a twang, a yard of steel-tipped wood drove itself through both her target and the second soldier about to point his own rifle down at her.
Tomoe stared at the arrow that was connecting both men for an instant and then traced it back to the door facing the one that these soldiers had used.
A black shape emerged, carrying a bow and already nocking a second arrow. “Chu-i Sakade,” the voice of Tai-i Minobu Tetsuhara greeted her as politely as if this was just another day of guard duty.
“Tai-i.” Tomoe rolled to her feet. “This can’t be the only attack.”
The black man nodded sharply. He was also barefoot, wearing only exercise pants. “Your warning was timely. We need boots and information.”
Tomoe nodded and half-ran, half-scrambled down the corridor cluttered with bodies back to her own room. As much as she wanted to run onwards, Tetsuhara was correct. WIthout footwear she might render herself useless for further battle.
Besides her boots, she picked up her radio but the Otomo channels were full only of static - jammed.
Hopping down the corridor as she pulled first one boot on and then the other, she found Tetsuhara had also taken the time to don his sword belt. “Nothing on the radio,” she reported.
He nodded thoughtfully. “Our first priority is the consort and the young lord.” He pointed out the window. “If we go across the roof, we have less chance of being intercepted before we reach the imperial apartments.”
“Hai.”
The windows weren’t really intended to allow someone to enter or exit, but a little more property damage didn’t matter now and Tomoe shattered one with the butt of her rifle before climbing out onto the slanting tiles outside. Fortunately it hadn’t been raining, so they weren’t slick beneath her boots, and the curved lip at the bottom of the roof gave slightly better footing. Tetsuhara followed, still carrying his bow and a quiver of arrows.
Tetsuhara gave him a questioning look and the older officer held one finger against his lips. She grasped his point - while a bow wasn’t silent, it would certainly be quieter than her borrowed rifle.
The two Otomo crossed the roof at a trot, not fast enough to make significant noise or to risk their footing, but they weren’t taking their time either. The Otomo occupied barracks attached to the main residence by covered walkways, and the duo were able to use the roof of the walkway as a route directly to the second floor of the main palace.
Ahead, Tomoe could hear the sound of gunshots, suggesting that the attack had reached the guards around the imperial apartments. As much as she hoped that their comrades would be able to hold off the attack, the fact that his had got so far suggested that they would send as many men after the heir and his mother as they felt would be necessary.
Minobu was about to try opening the window facing them but Tomoe caught his shoulder. “Give me a leg up to reach the lip of the roof above us,” she asked. “It’s the level we need to be on.”
The Tai-i nodded and set down his bow, cupping his hands. She put her foot on it and as he heaved her up, she was able to get both hands on the edge of the roof above them. With practiced effort she got her elbows over, swung and then managed to hook a leg over the edge as well.
Pushing her rifle over, she caught the bow and quiver, pushing the weapons along and out of the way before Tetsuhara also leapt up, catching her hand and - once she pulled with all her might - getting his own grip up on the roof.
A moment later and they were up and armed again. The windows would be harder to break open from the outside, but Tomoe knew of a balcony and they reached it right as the rattles of gunfire ended and the lights went on in the room behind it.
Illuminated obviously by the electric lights, Tomoe prayed that the door was unlatched and gave it a kick.
Her prayer was answered and the armored glass panels swung open, giving Tetsuhara a clean shot at the nearest soldier, the arrow punching through chest armor intended to resist lighter and less archaic projectiles.
There was a cry of pain - a child’s, she thought - as someone fell to the ground and out of sight behind a couch, then Tomoe opened up - short bursts at anyone in body armor. If the attack had got this far then every Otomo on guard was dead.
Two rounds hit her in the chest, distinct impacts, and sent her sprawling, head very nearly smacking into the rail of the balcony. She saw Tetsuhara bound inside, the crescent arc of his katana blade reflecting the electric lights as he swept it around.
Rolling over, Tomoe managed to get view of the dark-skinned samurai cutting down one soldier just as two more burst in. Her shots cut the legs out from one of them and the last - an officer - gained a third eye as a laser pistol’s bolt caught him squarely in the face, right at the bridge of the nose.
The pistol was in the hands of a hyperventilating Anastasi Kurita, the barrel wavering so much it was a miracle she’d hit the officer at all, much less with a killing shot.
“Lady Kurita,” Tetsuhara reported crisply. “We need to evacuate the apartments until the situation is clearer.” He walked past her and kicked the doors open.
“Who-who… Martin! Father!” The coordinator’s wife dropped the pistol and ran to the couch.
A tearful wail went up as the woman pulled the infant heir to the Combine up from the floor. She was crying almost as much as the boy.
Tomoe followed her and saw Otto Sjovold face up on the floor. Blood was pooling beneath him, no wounds visible on his front.
“He - he was on top of Martin.” Anastasi exclaimed.
Well, having a fully-grown man on top of a small child wasn’t ideal, Tomoe thought. But better shots hit the grandfather than the grandson. “He gave his life for Lord Martin,” she declared solemnly and looked around the room. Right, this was where she thought it was.
“What are you doing?” the mother asked as Tomoe went to a cabinet in the corner and opened the lower of its two doors.
Feeling it was easier to show that tell, the Otomo member found the hidden switch and the floor beside her popped up, revealing a stairway less than half a meter wide. “A hidden escape route,” she explained. “There are several in the apartments. This leads to a secure bunker beneath the palace.”
She had to take the lead, Tetsuhara wasn’t familiar with the route so he took up the rear behind Anastasi, who was crying almost as much as the son she carried. But for all her tears, Lady Kurita didn’t hesitate to trust and obey the orders, which was as much as Tomoe could have hoped for.
It wasn’t an easy route, particularly in the pitch darkness, but at last Tomoe found the metal door she needed and it swung open - into an alcove just wide enough to allow it, revealing a well lit room behind, part of a larger complex.
“I had no idea there was anything like this beneath the palace,” Anastasi admitted. Then she showed her first hint of suspicion. “How did you know, Chu-i?”
Theodore told me, Tomoe thought. “I served Lady Florimel for a time,” she said instead.
“Are there communications here?” asked Tetsuhara.
She nodded and indicated one of the doors. “A hardline connects us to the main planetary commnet. It shouldn’t be cut even if the main palace links are - and tracing it back to us won’t be easy.”
“Given the number of soldiers sent here, I imagine contacting the palace security would be a waste of time,” he murmured. “But those soldiers weren’t good enough to have been with the Sword of Light.”
Tomoe followed him into the room, seeing the computers already set up. Rather than checking a directory, she set a channel she knew by heart. “Candle,” she reported.
No reply.
“Candle,” she repeated after a moment. Tetsuhara watched her.
“Water,” a slightly familiar voice responded.
A thread of tension went out of her. “Udon.”
“Archer.” The woman on the other end also seemed relieved. “Tomoe-chan, I’m glad you’re alive. What’s your situation?”
“I’m in a safe place with the nest and the egg,” she replied - Anastasi and Martin, in other words. “Can I speak to the heart?”
“I am the heart now,” Constance Kurita replied sadly. “My predecessor died getting word out to the Sword of Light and they are loyal. They are on their way, and nothing Elias can bring to bear will stop them.”
Tomoe slumped slightly, Lady Florimel was dead? That was a savage blow. “Understood. Please update me within twenty-four hours or I will assume things are not going to plan.”
“Of course. Be safe, and protect the egg.”
The line cut out and Tomoe dropped the handset.
“I got part of that,” Tetsuhara said. “But…”
“What is going on?” demanded Anastasi.
Tomoe straightened. “Warlord Elias Kurita is attempting a coup, my lady. The Keeper of the House Honor is dead, but before dying she alerted the First Sword of Light.”
“The Ivory Dragon,” Anastasi mused. “Yes, they would take her guidance, wouldn’t they?” The First Sword of Light was closely tied to the Combine’s religious practises, meaning they had the closest ties to the Order of Five Pillars, which Florimel headed… had headed, Tomoe corrected herself. Now that fell to Constance.
“Our duty now is to wait,” Tomoe concluded. “The Sword of Light will crush the coup and Lady Constance will alert us as to when it is safe to leave the bunker.”
“I see.” Anastasi rocked her son gently, trying to stop his tears. “I assume we have no shortage of supplies here.”
“There are stores here sufficient for years if absolutely necessary.”
“Good.” The consort looked at Tetsuhara. “Be so good as to find me a stiff drink, Chu-i. Take one yourself if your duty allows.”
Tomoe blinked but the other Otomo simply bowed and departed.
Anastasi waited until he was out of easy earshot and then asked matter-of-factly: “Is this one of the places Theodore sneaks off with you to?”
She froze. Oh hells…
“I’ll take that as a yes,” the consort continued after a moment. “Just tell me which room you use so I can avoid it. I…” Fresh tears formed and she held her son one handed. “I just lost my father and you saved my life. I just… I don’t want to sleep on a bed my husband shared with you.”
Jumpship Bifrost, Chukchi
Protectorate of Donegal, Lyran Commonwealth
4 April 3024The jumpship Bifrost didn’t maintain a formal dining hall - if passengers on dropships being carried wanted that experience they’d have to look to the dropship facilities. As a result, the three passengers hidden in one of the small onboard cargo holds could eat alongside the crew without running into anyone from the dropships being ferried along the busy route between Tharkad and Skye.
There was nothing suspicious at all in the Bifrost making the run. While it had been working the Skye to Robinson for a few years, the current problems had led to many Lyran-flagged jumpships deciding that operating in the Suns too risky. And not having diners from off the ship meant no one asking why there were more than forty diners (eating in shifts) when the normal operating crew of a Merchant-class jumpship was only twenty-one.
Max had been waiting to get a good feel for the captain before asking the question that was on his mind when they were several jumps away from Tharkad.
“I hope you don’t mind my asking this,” he said diffidently as they finished a rather decent lasagne. “But given our quest, to dignify it a bit, takes us to Summer - might we impose on your local knowledge?”
From the way Danica Holstein’s shoulders tensed, she did mind him asking. She picked up a napkin, wiping her mouth in a transparent way of buying herself time. “I thought you were working up to another question, with the way you’d been watching me.”
“If you mean what I think, I’m probably a bit old for you.”
She gave him a thoughtful look which he wasn’t sure how to interpret. “I’m sorry to disappoint you, but I’m not from Summer.”
Max didn’t know Captain Holstein’s tells, but her son Clovis was a teenager and much much easier to read. She was lying and her son knew it. “I lived there for a couple of years, starting right after the Kurita raid in 3005,” he observed. “I can understand wanting to leave it behind.”
“I don’t appreciate being called a liar, Baron Mustermann.”
He placed his own napkin on the table and watched her quietly, ignoring the way the crewmen were bristling at the confrontation. The captain met his gaze with a brittle expression. “I’m sorry to bring up what I’m sure are unpleasant memories, Captain Holstein. But the stakes are such that being rude is perhaps necessary. We may even have crossed paths in those two years, although I don’t recall it.”
“We wouldn’t have,” Clovis said snappily. The boy’s limbs were shorter than they ought to be, something that didn’t matter much in zero gravity but here on the gravity decks it made him a little short-tempered. “How did you know?”
“Clovis,” his mother snapped.
“He knows. But we wouldn’t have met a baron. We lived in the slums.”
“So did I - Curitiba’s, which unless I miss my guess is where you were until you got off world.” He looked at the boy. “I wasn’t always a baron, that came later. It wasn’t an easy couple of years, and I wasn’t a fugitive. Much less a fugitive with a new baby to care for.”
“Max, is this a conversation we want to have?” Morgan Kell asked firmly. “This is obviously a subject the captain doesn’t want to discuss.”
“I’m aware,” he admitted. “But I believe the good captain knows Lestrade Castle better than any of us. I’ve never even been inside.”
“Damn…” Holstein buried her face in her hands. “How much do you know?”
Clovis moved closer to her, looking angry and defensive.
“Very few details. I’m not trying to bait you into telling me more, or looking for any form of leverage.” Max sighed. “But if I’m right then Aldo Lestrade has a very important prisoner, one who might give him the keys to controlling the entire Lyran Commonwealth. I lived under his rule for two years and I don’t like the idea of him ruling the Commonwealth from behind the scenes - my guess is that you know far better than I what it’d be like to be under his thumb again.”
“I don’t have good memories of Curitiba,” Clovis said when his mother didn’t speak.
Max nodded and pushed himself back from the table. “I appreciate you hearing me out, Captain. I’m sorry to rouse those demons. If you change your mind, you know where to find me. If not… well, I can’t blame you.”
Morgan frowned but backed up to let Max get past him to the door.
“I don’t…” the elder Holstein said slowly as Max reached the door, “Have good memories of Aldo Lestrade.”
He paused and waited.
“The old duke did not keep prisoners,” she continued. “Unless you count the staff. Most of us were proud to work for him.”
“You were one of the staff?” asked Ardan cautiously.
“In Aldo Lestrade’s eyes, the staff were part of the estate. His to do with as he wished, unless his father objected. At the time, I believed the old duke knew and did not object. Looking back, perhaps I just lacked the confidence to try.”
Morgan tensed. “You mean he…”
Holstein nodded, sharply. Those of her crew present looked horrified. She looked aside at her son. “I didn’t want you to know.”
“I figured out the names you got called back then,” the boy told her. “It’s not your fault. It’s his.”
The woman sighed. “I won’t go back. I’m not sure I could. But if what you say is true… I wouldn’t want him to have that power. He has too much already.”
“If he’s done what we think, he’s a dead man walking,” Morgan promised her, eyes flat and dangerous.
“I’ll tell you what I can.”
“And I’ll help too,” Clovis promised boldly. “I know computers. If you need information, you’ll need to crack his systems.”
“Clovis, no.”
“Mom, they’re Heimdall. They got us off Summer, gave us a new life here.” The dwarf put his arms around his mother’s shoulders. “You taught me to pay it back or pay it forward.”
“It’s good of you to offer,” Ardan said diplomatically, “But this is going to be dangerous.”
“I’m short, not a little kid,” Clovis shot back sharply. “What do you know about encryptions? About computer memory and the ways you can hide that databases even exist, or how to stop them wiping themselves.”
The soldier turned to Danica Holstein who closed her eyes. “Clovis is very gifted,” she admitted. Her lips twisted. “He got that from his father. The only thing he got from him.”
Morgan lent his weight against the door frame. “You’ll need to take orders, Mr Holstein. We do this together, and to a fixed plan. No crazy revenge plans, you understand?”
“My weapon is here,” Clovis said, tapping his brow. “If I want revenge I’d need you to take it for me. I’ll behave.”
“Are you happy, Baron Mustermann?” the captain asked. “You’ll have my information and a new recruit for your crusade.”
“More than I bargained for,” he admitted.
“If my son comes to harm, I’ll drag every secret you have out into the light and see how you like it.”
He scratched the bald part of his scalp. “I’d be fascinated to see what you find, captain. My secrets are all questions that I don’t have the answers to myself.”
