The rest was sheer intoxication.
There was always this moment during which the Homochon elements sank back into quiescence and the machinery of the body began to realign itself to the dictates of the mind. Lim drifted in an ebon nothingness, a limbo in which he sensed strange memories and unlived situations-scraps of overflow from other intelligences, the discarded waste of other minds.
A taste of the heaven he hoped to achieve.
Volodya said, "This is it. Go through that door and wait." He hesitated then held out his right hand, palm upward. "If we don't meet again-"
"You did your duty." Dumarest touched the proffered palm with his own. "Have no regrets."
The man had done what he could and more than what he had needed to have done. Dumarest stepped from him toward the door, hearing a shout from down the passage where a small group stood blocked by guards.
"Give the word, Earl, and we won't let you go!"
Medwin? The face was lost as others surged forward and Dumarest sensed the rising hysteria. A moment and they would break through the cordon. A word of encouragement and they would defend him with their lives.
And Zabul would be destroyed.
"Hold it!" Dumarest faced them, both hands upraised. "Everything's under control," he said. "Just relax and stop worrying. I'll be fine. Just break up and get back to work." He added, to give greater reassurance, "I'll be back."
"You promise?"
Medwin again? Dumarest couldn't be certain but he felt the impact of Volodya's eyes.
"You want me to sign it in blood?" Dumarest smiled as he asked the question. "Just break it up now. Trust Volodya."
As he had trusted Althea-had she let him down?
The room was what he had expected: a chamber with a door at the far end, a table in the center now bearing a tray of wine and cakes with matching goblets. Dumarest looked at them, then at the empty chamber. Empty but, he guessed, not unobserved. Someone, somewhere, would be checking his every move and he would be making a fatal mistake to forget it.
The far door, as he'd expected, was locked and he returned to the table to pour himself a little wine and to pick up one of the cakes. He was clumsy and it fell from his hand to land on the floor. Stopping, he picked it up, throwing a quick glance at the underside of the table, feeling relief as he saw a familiar object held by a wad of gekko-plastic at the far end.
His knife-Althea had not let him down.
Dumarest rose and sat at the table, sipping his wine and slowly eating the cake. Casually he lowered his hands beneath the table, found the knife, pulled it free and let his fingers drift over the comforting metal. The blade with its curves, razor-sharp edges, the needle point, the scarred guard, the worn hilt which ended in a pommel held by a narrow line of weld. Holding the hilt in one hand, Dumarest twisted the pommel with the other, a surge of energy carefully masked, and the pommel spun free to expose the hollowed interior of the hilt to his questing fingers.
The two halves of the affinity twin fell into his palm.
He held them beneath his thumb while he replaced the pommel and thrust the knife back against the clinging plastic. It was hard to hide his relief. He had hidden the weapon in the one place Althea would be certain to know, throwing the gun he had snatched from the guard into the reclamation plant as a decoy. That seemed to have worked-Volodya hadn't mentioned the missing knife.
Why was he being left alone so long?
The cyber would be eager to have him safe and he had delayed as long as he could, telling Volodya it would make things easier for Althea to quiet the crowd but in reality to gain her time to recover the knife and plant it beneath the table. To get her to do other things, too, but they were of less importance.
"Earl!" Nubar Kusche entered the room through the door which had been locked. "I heard-man, why do it?"
"I've no choice."
"We could fight-no." Kusche scowled, deep lines marring the round plumpness of his face, the space between his eyes. "They'd wreck Zabul and you'd still be taken. But there must be something we can do. That bomb?"
"Isn't going to work." Beneath the edge of the table Dumarest fingered the two ampules. Each was tipped with a hollow needle and one was red while the other was green. Colors he couldn't see but the red had a ridged surface while the green was smooth. "But you know that already."
"I know-what the hell are you talking about?"
"I checked the detonator," said Dumarest. "Is that enough?"
"You should have died," said Kusche bitterly. "Gone out in a puff of glory and taken that damned ship with you. As soon as you primed the bomb it should have been over." He frowned, realizing the significance of what he was saying. "You checked," he said slowly. "That means you didn't trust me."
"No."
"But-"
"You put on a good act," said Dumarest. "But as I told you you're an entrepreneur, not a gambler, and following that casket was nothing but a gamble. And you were too vague about having been knocked out with gas while in your bunk-why should the Huag-Chi-Tsacowa have gone to that trouble? They have ethics. They would never have betrayed their client like that."
"The Cyclan-"
"Yes," said Dumarest. "The Cyclan." The green ampule was against his wrist and he pressed, feeling the needle bury itself into his flesh. A tiny spark of pain which told of the dominant half of the affinity twin entering his body to move through it and settle at the base of his cortex. "A chance," he said. "One you took for pay and the prospect of high reward. But if the Cyclan had been on Caval and known I was in that casket it would never have been shipped out."
"You bastard! You smart, cunning bastard!" Kusche paused, fighting his anger. "I could have sold you," he said. "I would have sold you but you took care of that. The Cyclan will never believe I don't know the secret and they'll kill me for a reason I'll never know. So you have to die, you can see that, can't you? The bomb would have done it clean but there are other ways. No!" He stepped back, his right hand lifting as Dumarest reached for the decanter. "Back off-I mean it! Touch that wine and I'll burn you! I know how damned fast you are!"
Dumarest halted the movement of his hand, lifted the other to scratch idly at his scalp-thrusting the red ampule deep into his hair. How to reach Kusche without inviting death from the laser in his hand?
Dumarest looked at it, small but lethal at short range, a sleeve-gun favored by gamblers and women of a certain kind.
But Kusche had owned no such weapon. Where had he got it?
"Does it matter?" The man shrugged when Dumarest asked. "Zabul is a world full of odd things. Now stand up. Up, damn you! Step from that table! Move!"
He made the mistake of gesturing with the weapon and Dumarest snatched his chance. The wine spilled in a golden stream from the decanter as it spun whirling through the air. A missile Kusche dodged, firing as he sprang to one side, the sear of the laser leaving a scorched patch on a wall. He fired again as a goblet smashed against his forehead, small shards creating minor lacerations. A third time as, ducking, Dumarest snatched at his arm.
It was like grabbing a rod of steel.
The plumpness held muscle, as he had guessed, and Kusche was fighting for his life. Dumarest had no chance to snatch the red ampule from his hair, to use it, to take over Kusche as he'd intended. He ducked again as fingers stabbed at his eyes, struck back in turn, twisted to avoid the knee which smashed upward toward his groin, feeling the impact against his thigh.