The Dragon Never Sleeps

— 111 —

Turtle looked at Provik. Provik looked back. "This is it, isn't it, Kez Maefele? Your hour."

"Yes." He did not just have to go into that next room and sell those dour Outsiders a strategy for killing Starbase, he had to go in having sold himself. And he had not yet conquered Doubt, the devil that gave him no peace.

He had been too long among humans, or not long enough. He understood them too well. Their thinking had infected his own. But he did not yet understand them well euough to become one of them. Those grim old torturers beyond that door had more in common with Lupo Provik than Kez Maefele ever could.

"I can do it," Turtle said. "I will do it. But I could do it more easily if I believed I was doing the right thing for the right reasons. The motive is as important as the deed. Have you never done the right thing for the wrong reason?"

Some shadow of memory darkened Provik's eyes. "Sure. And the wrong thing for the right reason. But that was then and this is now. Why lose sleep over it? You want more motivation, remember they put a price on your head."

Was that a threat?

"No. Wrong choice of words. We weren't smart when we started. People on Prime know your name. Some are the type who would try to collect the reward. Be hard to avoid them all. Unless you spend your life locked up in the Pylon the way the Chairs do."

"Or I can go out there with the Outsiders and fight back?"

"You know their conditions. We go through that door and we're committed till they turn us down or turn us loose. The Valerena and Blessed can dodge it. You and I can't."

"Can't you?" Turtle eyed Provik narrowly.

Provik was startled. And understood. "How long have you known?"

"Since they tried to kill you, Blessed, and Valerena. They did kill you. It was on that tape. But it was you who brought the tape, and a female with impossible reaction times."

"And you never used that."

"I'm not human," Turtle said, which he suspected Provik would take to mean that he had not yet found a reason to draw the bolt from his quiver.

"I owe you one."

"Not necessarily."

One of the female Proviks appeared, escorting the chosen Valerena. She raised an eyebrow. "Another moral crossroads," Lupo said. "We're going to survive it, I think. Where's Blessed's Other?"

"On his way. Says he'll be a few minutes late. I think he wants to be the last to arrive."

Provik grumbled something. "Well, Kez Maefele, there's the final curtain. Can you bring yourself to save this House?"

"You go to save your House, Mr. Provik. I'll go to raze the dragon's lair."

There were few Ku left. A few thousand were scattered across Canon. A few tens of thousands lived on the old homeworld, their backs resolutely to the stars and yesterday. And beyond the Rims there were tiny, scattered guest colonies and a few nomadic ships surviving by carrying whatever cargoes they could acquire. In all, surely, fewer than a hundred thousand Ku, fading from the stage faster than their conquerers, lacking any real will to survive.

Provik had let him spend a fortune to find out how hopeless his people were.

There was not a one of those Ku who did not know the name Kez Maefele. Maybe if they heard that the legend lived and had stormed the fortress unvanquishable, the spark of will might be breathed back to life.

Most especially if he got himself killed. Most especially then. All the best heroes did.

The Ku loved their martyrs.

He wore a replica of the uniform he had been compelled to give up the day of the Surrender, a gift from those scruffy volunteers hiding out at Blessed's castle. "Come follow me through the final curtain."

There were twenty-eight of the bastards in the room and none were like any Outsider who had come before. Those had been soldiers, necessarily flawed. These were masters. These were perfect. One wished he had let one of his brothers come instead.

Four felt the chill, too. She moved a step closer. The Valerena did the same. The Ku did not seem affected. One wondered if anything intimidated him.

These were the real bosses of the Outsider empire. These were the men who talked to the things that talked to the Destroyer. These were the men who decided what words the Destroyer had put into the Godspeakers' minds.

One had no doubt that, however much and whatever they might believe, these men had their high priests saying whatever they thought it was best for them to say. These were the true creators and rulers of the Outside empire, however servile they might be in the presence of the Godspeakers.

He stepped to a rostrum. His companions seated themselves. He looked around. Everything had been set up right. The Ku's gear, sideboard with food and refreshments enough to sustain a siege, toilet facilities which allowed privacy but no egress.

"Good day, gentlemen. I'm told you've provided yourselves with an adequate translation system. If not, we have a good programme...."

"Proceed," said a gray box occupying a front row seat. "We note the absence of one ordered to appear here."

"Maybe I'd better bring in our system. I see a problem with yours already. You don't ‘order' us. Mistranslation could cause misunderstandings. But we'll keep your system's flaws in mind. For the record, Blessed was detained but should arrive momentarily."

"Get on with it."

Their speaker was the man he expected, a skinny, leathery, wispy-haired old character who looked like a mummy wrested from its tomb and reanimated for the event. His ornate title boiled down to First Speaker. He came without a personal name. He was a generation older than his companions and dead set against any alliance of convenience. He was so old and so near death, the last of his contemporaries, that he could afford doctrinal intransigence.

One said, "Life extentions approaching a thousand years are not impractical in Canon space." Sowing a seed of temptation just for the hell of it.

"Our agents visited yours in the Hemebuk Neutrality. They found the payments offered generous and sufficient." Five, Six, Seven, and Eight had taken Kez Maefele's commandos and a dozen armed Tregesser ships. They had seized the treasure convoy to forestall the treachery planned by these wicked old men, who did not yet know that. The treasure had been awesome in magnitude.

"We've decided to accept your commission. We'll take Starbase. Providing you approve. Kez Maefele will outline how he expects to accomplish the impossible."

Blessed made his entrance.

Damn!

He had brought Midnight. Which made one thing absolutely, incontestably clear. This was not the Blessed Tregesser Other, this was Blessed himself.

The damned fool!

No wonder he had arranged to be late. There would be no arguing with him now, in front of the Outsiders, who believed they were getting the real things as hostages.

The damned fool! For the sake of an artifact!

Two darted into Lupo's office. "Cue up the meeting. Blessed pulled a fast one."

Provik did it, saw the artifact, cursed, called Cable Shike, Nyo Bofoku, and Tina. They were scattered everywhere, the former two sent out on business by Blessed. All three claimed ignorance. The Blessed Other, from the Fuerogomenga Gorge castle, said, "He wanted to get away. He wanted to spend more time with Midnight."

Lupo disconnected angrily. "That damned artifact. I knew she'd be trouble."

"What're you going to do?"

"What can I do? Live with it. Hope for the best. Too late to change it. The sneaky bastard."

Turtle glared at Midnight. She seated herself primly, undaunted. She was too happy. This madness brought her closer to what she wanted, Blessed all to herself. She did not comprehend what it meant to the House. And did not care.

And maybe the universe would be a better place if more people shared her priorities.

Turtle activated his star chart and presented a fifteen-minute outline of his strategy.

It was incredibly complex, would require every ship the Outsiders possessed, and battalions of Godspeakers, without whom it could not be coordinated. It would span the Sixth and Second Presidencies and nothing would be done the way it usually was. The first strike against Starbase would be made not by warships but by a flight of constructed projectiles with the mass of moderate asteroids. The battle fleet would approach from a direction the Guardships could not anticipate, after making a prolonged starspace crossing. The operation, once launched, would take ninety-six days to complete.

"Mr. Provik will distribute copies of the detailed proposal. It examines the operation at several levels of ambition. It proposes four result scenarios, including worst case, best case, median, and most probable. These were generated using data available through House Tregesser's intelligence services. You will find them promising."

It was a seductive report. Not that these men would need much seducing. They were desperate.

Provik distributed documents, insisting each visitor sign for his copy. Turtle explained that only thirty existed, one belonging to Provik, another to himself. Each was numbered. Its whereabouts had to be known at all times.

One found the silence unnerving. The Outsiders showed no more animation than robots. They accepted their documents, signed in a strange but perfect cursive, began reading.

Did the Ku suspect that Lupo possessed a thirty-first, unnumbered copy, to be used or not as he thought would best serve the House? He might. The bastard was too damned smart.

One settled beside Four, waited while the Outsiders read. She touched his hand. If they survived, it would be years before they would be with their family again.

For a while there was no sound but the rustle of pages or the soft clink of dinnerware at the sideboard. The Outsiders stayed away till their mummylike captain finished reading and helped himself to a spare lunch. He selected portions only from those dishes his hosts had sampled.

Suspicious old jerk! Wouldn't do him any good. Everything was spiked with just enough Jane to put everyone in a better mood.

When everyone had eaten the old man said, "There are critical data missing from this report."

One responded, "Operational details only. We can't give the thing away."

The mummy scowled at the Ku. "I note that some phases would be directed by yourself and your lieutenants."

"We have no doctrinal or political axes to grind. We have no personal ambitions or enemies to cause us to take false steps in order to make someone look bad. We have one enemy and one goal.

"You have no trained, competent commanders. You have men who carry out their orders. Your book on strategy contains two pages. Attack till the objective is achieved, no matter the cost. Defend to the last man. The Guardships love you. You get in line to be killed. Given the resources you commanded, I could have conquered Canon by now."

That got them.

That got One, too. The Ku was not given to exaggeration.

The mummy man glowered. "We will confer." He switched off the translator.

Lot of good that would do him.

Two told Lupo, "They're going to buy it. The Ku got them with a crack about how he could have conquered Canon with what they had."

"I wonder how."

"He did say Canon, not the Guardships."

"Any guess why they're being easy?"

"Desperation. And the notion that if the Ku comes through, they can get him to win their war."

Provik nodded. Kez Maefele had become a mythic character. "He won't win for them. He's decided the Guardships serve a useful purpose."

"And Blessed's little game?"

"We lay back and let T.W. front. And take a strong interest in guarding and educating Placidia. It's not likely we'll ever see Blessed again."