‘He says there’ll be no difficulty,’ Teal said.
‘He’s right about that,’ Merlin answered.
Part of Prince Baskin’s cruiser had been spun to simulate gravity. There was a stateroom, as grand as anything Merlin had encountered, all shades of veneered wood and polished metal, with red drapes and red fabric on the chairs. The floor curved up gently from one end of the room to the other, and this curvature was echoed in the grand table that took up much of the space. Prince Baskin was at one end of it, Merlin and Teal at the other, with the angle of the floor making Baskin seem to tilt forward like a playing card, having to lift his head to face his guests. Orderlies had fussed around them for some time, setting plates and glasses and cutlery, before bringing in the elements of a simple but well-prepared meal. Then – rather to Merlin’s surprise – they had left the three of them alone, with only stony-faced portraits of royal ancestors and nobility for company. Men on horses, men in armour, men with projectile guns and energy weapons, both grand and foolish in their pomp.
‘This is pure ostentation,’ he said, looking around the room with its sweeping curves and odd angles. ‘No one in their right mind puts centrifugal gravity on a ship this small. It takes up too much room, costs too much in mass, and the spin differential between your feet and head’s enough to make you dizzy.’
‘If the surroundings are not quite to your taste, Merlin, we could adjourn to one of the Renouncer’s weightless areas.’
Prince Baskin had spoken.
Teal cocked her chin to face him. The curvature of the room made it like talking to someone half way up a hill. ‘You speak Main.’
‘I try.’
‘Then why…’ she began.
Baskin smiled, and tore a chunk off some bread, dipping it into soup before proceeding. ‘Please join me. And please forgive my slight deception in pretending to need to have your words translated, as well as my rustiness with your tongue. What I have learned, I have done so from books and recordings, and until now I have never had the opportunity to speak it to a living soul.’ He bit into the bread, and made an eager motioning gesture that they should do likewise. ‘Please. Eat. My cook is excellent – as well he should be, given what it costs me to ship him and his kitchen around. Teal, I must apologise. But there was no deception where Locrian and Balus were concerned. They genuinely did not speak Main, and were in need of your translation. I am very much the exception.’
‘How…’ Merlin started.
‘I was a sickly child, I suppose you might say. I had many hours to myself, and in those hours – as one does – I sought my own entertainment. I used to play at war, but toy soldiers and tabletop campaigns will only take you so far. So I developed a fascination with languages. Many centuries ago, a Cohort ship stopped in our system. They were here for two years – two of your years, I should say – long enough for trade and communication. Our diplomats tried to learn Main, and by the same token the Cohort sent in negotiating teams who did their best to master our language. Of course there were linguistic ties between the two, so the task was not insurmountable. But difficult, all the same. I doubt that either party excelled itself, but we did what was needed and there was sufficient mutual understanding.’ Baskin turned his head to glance at the portraits to his right, each painting set at a slight angle to its neighbours. ‘It was a very long time ago, as I’m sure you appreciate. When the Cohort had gone, there was great emphasis placed on maintaining our grasp of their language, so that we’d have a head start the next time we needed it. Schools, academies, and so on. King Curtal was instrumental in that.’ He was nodding at one of the figures in the portraits, a man of similar age and bearing to himself, and dressed in state finery not too far removed from the formal wear in which Baskin now appeared. ‘But that soon died away. The Cohort never returned and, as the centuries passed, there was less and less enthusiasm for learning Main. The schools closed, and by the time it came down to me – forty generations later – all that remained were the books and recordings. There was no living speaker of Main. So I set myself the challenge to become one, and encouraged my senior staff to do likewise, and here I am now, sitting before you, and doubtless making a grotesque mockery of your tongue.’
Merlin broke bread, dipped it into the soup, made a show of chewing on it before answering.
‘This Cohort ship that dropped by,’ he said, his mouth still full. ‘Was it the Shrike?’
Teal held her composure, but he caught the sidelong twitch of her eye.
‘Yes,’ Baskin said, grimacing slightly. ‘You’ve heard of it?’
‘It’s how I know about the syrinx,’ Merlin said, trying to sound effortlessly matter-of-fact. ‘I found the Shrike. It was a wreck, all her crew dead. Been dead for centuries, in fact. But the computer records were still intact.’ He lifted a goblet and drank. The local equivalent to wine was amber coloured and had a lingering, woody finish. Not exactly to his taste but he’d had worse. ‘That’s why I’m here.’
‘And Teal?’
‘I travel with Merlin,’ she said. ‘He isn’t good with languages, and he pays me to be his translator.’
‘You showed a surprising faculty with our own,’ Baskin said.
‘Records of your language were in the files Merlin pulled from the wreck. It wasn’t that hard to pick up the rudiments.’
Baskin dabbed at his chin with napkin. ‘You picked up more than the rudiments, if I might say.’
Merlin leaned forward. ‘Is it true about the syrinx?’
‘Yes,’ Baskin said. ‘We keep it in a safe place on Havergal. Intact, in so far as we can tell. Would that be of interest to you?’
‘I think it might.’
‘But you must already have one, if you’ve come here by the Way.’
Teal said: ‘His syrinx is broken, or at least damaged. He knows it won’t last long, so he needs to find a spare.’
Again Baskin turned to survey the line of portraits. ‘These ancestors of mine knew very little but war. It dominated their lives utterly. Even when there was peace, they were thinking ahead to the moment that peace would fail, and how they might be in the most advantageous position when that day came. As it always did. My own life has also been shaped by the war. Disfigured, you might say. But I have lived under its shadow long enough. I should very much like to be the last of my line who ruled during wartime.’
‘Then end the war,’ Merlin said.
‘I should like to – but it must be under our terms. Gaffurius is stretched to its limits. One last push, one last offensive, and we can enforce a lasting peace. But there is a difficulty.’
‘Which is?’ Teal asked.
‘Something of ours has fallen into the wrong hands – an object we call the Iron Tactician.’ Baskin continued eating for several moments, in no rush to explain himself. ‘I don’t know what you’ve learned of our history. But for centuries, both sides in this war have relied on artificial intelligences to guide their military planning.’
‘I suppose this is another of those machines,’ Merlin said.
‘Yes and no. For a long time our machines were well-matched with those of the enemy. We would build a better one, then they would, we would respond, and so on. A gradual escalating improvement. So it went on. Then – by some happy stroke – our cyberneticists created a machine that was generations in advance of anything they had. For fifty years the Iron Tactician has given us an edge, a superiority. Its forecasts are seldom in error. The enemy still has nothing to match it – which is why we have made the gains that we have. But now, on the eve of triumph, we have lost the Iron Tactician.’