And the two empires remained at peace. These were simple missions of assistance, weren’t they? Terra had Mount Narpa by treaty with the Tigeries of Ujanka, Merseia sat in Kimraig by treaty with whoever lived there. (Time out for laughter and applause. No Starkadian culture appeared to have anything like an idea of compacts between sovereign powers.) The Roidhunate of Merseia didn’t shoot down Terran scouts. Heavens, no! Only Merseian militechnicians did, helping the Seatrolls of Kimraig maintain inviolate their air space. The Terran Empire hadn’t bushwhacked a Merseian landing party on Cape Thunder: merely Terrans pledged to guard the frontier of their ally.
The Covenant of Alfzar held. You were bound to assist civilized outworlders on request. Abrams toyed with the notion of inventing some requests from his side. In fact, that wasn’t a bad gambit right now.
“Maybe you can return the favor,” he said. “We’ve lost a flitter in the Zletovar. I’m not so rude as to hint that one of your lads was cruising along and eyeballed ours and got a wee bit overexcited. But supposing the crash was accidental, how about a joint investigation?”
Abrams liked seeing startlement on that hard green face. “You joke, Commander!”
“Oh, naturally my boss’d have to approach you officially, but I’ll suggest it to him. You’ve got better facilities than us for finding a sunken wreck.”
“But why?”
Abrams shrugged. “Mutual interest in preventing accidents. Cultivation of friendship between peoples and individual beings. I think that’s what the catchword is back home.”
Runei scowled. “Quite impossible. I advise you not to make any such proposal on the record.”
“Nu? Wouldn’t look so good if you turn us down?”
“Tension would only be increased. Must I repeat my government’s position to you? The oceans of Starkad belong to the seafolk. They evolved there, it is their environment, it is not essential to the landfolk. Nevertheless the landfolk have consistently encroached. Their fisheries, their seabeast hunts, their weed harvests, their drag nets, everything disturbs an ecology vital to the other race. I will not speak of those they have killed, the underwater cities they have bombed with stones, the bays and straits they have barred. I will say that when Merseia offered her good offices to negotiate a modus vivendi, no land culture showed the slightest interest. My task is to help the seafolk resist aggression until the various landfolk societies agree to establish a just and stable peace.”
“Come off that parrot act,” Abrams snorted. “You haven’t got the beak for it. Why are you really here?”
“I have told you—”
“No. Think. You’ve got your orders and you obey ’em like a good little soldier. But don’t you sometimes wonder what the profit is for Merseia? I sure do. What the black and red deuce is your government’s reason? It’s not as if Saxo sun had a decent strategic location. Here we are, spang in the middle of a hundred light-year strip of no man’s land between our realms. Hardly been explored; hell, I’ll bet half the stars around us aren’t so much as noted in a catalogue. The nearest civilization is Betelgeuse, and the Betelgeuseans are neutrals who wish emerods on both our houses. You’re too old to believe in elves, gnomes, little men, or the disinterested altruism of great empires. So why?”
“I may not question the decisions of the Roidhun and his Grand Council. Still less may you.” Runei’s stiffness dissolved in a grin. “If Starkad is so useless, why are you here?”
“ Lot of people back home wonder about that too,” Abrams admitted. “Policy says we contain you wherever we can. Sitting on this planet, you would have a base fifty light-years closer to our borders, for whatever that’s worth.” He paused. “Could give you a bit more influence over Betelgeuse.”
“Let us hope your envoy manages to settle the dispute,” Runei said, relaxing. “I do not precisely enjoy myself on this hellball either.”
“What envoy?”
“You have not heard? Our latest courier informed us that a … khraich … yes, a Lord Hauksberg is hitherbound.”
“I know.” Abrams winced. “Another big red wheel to roll around the base.”
“But he is to proceed to Merseia. The Grand Council has agreed to receive him.”
“Huh?” Abrams shook his head. “Damn, I wish our mails were as good as yours … Well. How about this downed flitter? Why won’t you help us look for the pieces?”
“In essence, informally,” Runei said, “because we hold it had no right, as a foreign naval vessel, to fly over the waters. Any consequences must be on the pilot’s own head.”
Ho-ho!
Abrams tautened. That was something new. Implied, of course, by the Merseian position; but this was the first time he had heard the claim in plain language. So could the green-skins be preparing a major push? Very possible, especially if Terra had offered to negotiate. Military operations exert pressure at bargaining tables, too.
Runei sat like a crocodile, smiling the least amount. Had he guessed what was in Abrams’ mind? Maybe not. In spite of what the brotherhood-of-beings sentimentalists kept bleating, Merseians did not really think in human style. Abrams made an elaborate stretch and yawn. “ ’Bout time I knocked off,” he said. “Nice talking to you, old bastard.” He did not entirely lie. Runei was a pretty decent carnivore. Abrams would have loved to hear him reminisce about the planets where he had ranged.
“Your move,” the Merseian reminded him.
“Why … yes. Clean forgot. Knight to king’s bishop four.”
Runei got out his own board and shifted the piece. He sat quiet a while, studying. “Curious,” he murmured.
“It’ll get curiouser. Call me back when you’re ready.” Abrams switched off.
His cigar was dead again. He dropped the stub down the disposal, lit a fresh one, and rose. Weariness dragged at him. Gravity on Starkad wasn’t high enough that man needed drugs or a counterfield. But one point three gees meant twenty-five extra kilos loaded on middle-aged bones … No, he was thinking in standard terms. Dayan pulled ten per cent harder than Terra … Dayan, dear gaunt hills and wind-scoured plains, homes nestled in warm orange sunlight, low trees and salt marshes and the pride of a people who had bent desolation to their needs … Where had young Flandry been from, and what memories did he carry to darkness?
On a sudden impulse Abrams put down his cigar, bent his head, and inwardly recited the Kaddish.
Get to bed, old man. Maybe you’ve stumbled on a clue, maybe not, but it’ll keep. Go to your rest.
He put on cap and cloak, thrust the cigar back between his jaws, and walked out.
Cold smote him. A breeze blew thinly under strange constellations and auroral flimmer. The nearer moon, Egrima, was up, almost full, twice the apparent size of Luna seen from Terra. It flooded distant snowpeaks with icy bluish light. Buruz was a Luna-sized crescent barely above the rooftops.
Walls bulked black on either side of the unpaved street, which scrunched with frost as his boots struck. Here and there glowed a lighted window, but they and the scattered lamps did little to relieve the murk. On his left, unrestful radiance from smelters picked out the two spaceships now in port, steel cenotaphs rearing athwart the Milky Way. Thence, too, came the clangor of night-shift work. The field was being enlarged, new sheds and barracks were going up, for Terra’s commitment was growing. On his right the sky was tinted by feverish glowsigns, and he caught snatches of drumbeat, trumpets, perhaps laughter. Madame Cepheid had patriotically dispatched a shipful of girls and croupiers to Starkad. And why not? They were so young and lonely, those boys.