Miraborg's chest swelled with outrage. "Who are you to question me? Your history of disrespect for authority and lack of responsibility is disgraceful. You were thrown out of the Nagelring for dereliction of duty and you have logged more violations of the curfew and quarantine restrictions on this planet than everyone else in your unit combined."
Miraborg leaned back, steepling his fingers. "I'm glad you liked teaching cockroaches tricks, Kell, because you'll have plenty of time to do it."
Phelan scoffed at the older man. "We're leaving today."
The Varldherre shook his head. "The Kell Hounds are leaving today, but you'll not be with them. You'll be bound over for trial."
"No!" Tyra's voice filled the room and shocked both men to silence. "No, you will not bind Phelan over for trial."
Betrayal threaded through Miraborg's voice. "How dare you speak to me in that tone?"
Tyra took a deep breath and approached the man in the wheelchair. "I dare, Father, to prevent you from doing something that would disgrace you and Gunzburg."
Muscles bunched at Miraborg's jaws. "How could I be more disgraced than to have my daughter sleeping with the same scum that crippled me?"
Tyra's slap rocked Tor Miraborg's head back, and she stood staring down at her father. How could you? How could you imagine that I would intentionally do anything to hurt you?She turned and walked away from him, immediately aware that Phelan had taken several steps in her direction. Though she desperately wanted to feel his arms around her, she held out a hand to keep him back.
Her father's voice, softer and uncertain, reached out to her. "I'm sorry, truly sorry, Tyra. I didn't think."
Inside her, it was as if a dam broke, but somehow she held back the torrent of emotions. "Phelan, please leave us." She did nothing to keep the strain from her voice.
Her father's tone had regained its edge, too. "Yes, Kell, leave us. The charges against you will be dropped," he said, reaching into a desk drawer. "Oh, and I believe these are yours." The clatter of plastic and metal bouncing across the desktop brought Tyra around to see Phelan's sunglasses roll to a stop beside the monitor.
Phelan's hands convulsed into fists. "You bastard! The people who attacked me took those from me last night. You know who they are."
Miraborg shook his head nonchalantly in a sham denial of the charge. "I know nothing about that. These were turned in to me by a good citizen wanting to make sure you left nothing behind here on Gunzburg." He gave the glasses a push in Phelan's direction.
Phelan glanced at Tyra, then shook his head. "No, Miraborg. You keep them. To the victor go the spoils. You've won this round, but someday I'll come back for them."
Miraborg laughed harshly. "You do that."
The mercenary turned, then rested his hands on Tyra's shoulders. "I'm sorry the way things turned out, but I'll never regret what we had." He kissed her on the forehead and then was gone.
As the door shut behind Phelan, her father smiled coldly. "Good. Now things can return to normal around here."
Despite her pain and hurt, Tyra kept her voice even. "I don't think so, Father." She felt a great sense of relief, knowing she was doing this for herself, not to hurt him. "I will be leaving Gunzburg."
"What!" He shot a horrified glance at the door. "I thought ... You cannot go with them, Tyra. I will not allow it! How could you do this to me?"
With each word, she saw her father growing smaller and smaller. You've been living with hatred for so long, Father, that it's become part of you, like something in your blood that rules you."Not to worry, Father, the great Tor Miraborg did not lose a contest of wills with a mere mercenary. I am not joining the Kell Hounds, though their offer did sorely tempt me. I am too much your daughter to do that."
Miraborg's eyes narrowed. "If that were true, my daughter, you'd not have taken up with him in the first place."
She stared at him in disbelief. "You still don't understand, do you? I met Phelan at the Allt Ingar the night Lars Pehkonin played there. Neither of us knew anything about the other. And if we had, our prejudices would have made us bitter enemies from the start. How could a mercenary let himself be attracted to the daughter of Gunzburg's Iron Jarl? Especially someone like Phelan? He and Lars talked about music and about building synthesizers and whole universes of things that being here on Gunzburg denies me. I only learned his first name that night, but I thought of him often until we met again.
"It wasn't until two weeks later, when the Kell Hounds were formally introduced to the Eagles, that I learned Phelan's real identity. Neither one of us expected things to develop the way they did, but neither did we try to prevent it. When Captain Wilson offered me a place in the Kell Hounds, I knew that I couldn't accept it. What surprised me, though, was the intensity of my desire to leave Gunzburg."
Her father's face had gone ashen. "Why? I've always tried to make things good for you."
Tyra looked at her father sympathetically. "Yes, Father, you have, especially after mother died. You've been loving and considerate, but you've also changed."
Miraborg caressed the steel chair that served as his legs. "I had to adapt after the incident."
Tyra nodded. "I know, but that was only the beginning of the change. You became stronger, accepted more authority and responsibility."
"Someone had to do it." He turned to look out the glass wall behind him. "Chaos came with independence. With the Kurita administrators gone, every half-wit with a vision of Utopia staked out a new nation and declared himself emperor for life." He took in all of Stortalar City with a wave of his left hand. "There were constant food shortages and riots. I had to do something."
"I remember, Father. I remember being proud of you when you went out one morning saying you would restore order. People rallied around you, as well they should have, and you reestablished order ..."
Miraborg cringed and said the next word for her: "But ..."
"Yes, but,"Tyra repeated. "You became a symbol. People looked to you to lead them and they adopted your cares and concerns. Because they thought you hated mercenaries, they hate mercenaries. No, don't look away. I remember, Father. I remember that you didn't blame allmercenaries for your wounding, and once you even told me that Colonel Vinson had been right to pull his Vigilantes out when the terms of his contract had been met. There was once a time when you recognized that fact."
Tyra shook his head. "You're smart enough to know that a leader must be attuned to his people, but you let their feelings and impressions affect you. Because of their hatred of mercenaries, your own hate seemed to become even greater. You championed the necessity of sacrifice in the name of our fledgling nation and you became a model anyone would be proud to follow. Unfortunately, you also revel in perversions of that symbol."
She pointed to the scar on the left side of his face. "Young men and women maim themselves to look like you and proclaim their willingness to sacrifice themselves for Gunzburg as you did." Her right hand brushed a tear from her unblemished left cheek. "I have never done it because I hoped you already knew how much our world and our nation mean to me without any melodramatic display."
An air of defeat hung over Tor Miraborg as he nodded slowly. "I didthink that before all of this."He turned his chair and faced her. "Now you say you are leaving. How will it look to the people that my daughter has deserted me?"