The Faeman Quest

Forty-Seven

‘Can you suggest an alternative?’ Blue asked coldly.

Henry hated it when she was in this mood, although he had to admit it went with the territory. Above everything else, above being his wife, his lover, his very best friend in two worlds, Blue was Queen. Her prime responsibility was the welfare of the Realm (along with the welfare of Hael, but he didn’t like to think of that too often) and just now the Realm was threatened as it had never been before.

‘Not as such,’ he said carefully. ‘But that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t examine the proposal carefully. It’s an extreme course of action.’

‘It’s an extreme situation.’

‘I don’t like it,’ Pyrgus said. ‘They’re innocent animals.’

‘They’re military weapons,’ Blue said shortly.

The proposal had been voiced by Madame Cardui, promptly backed by General Vanelke, who, Henry suspected, was still irritated about the abortive plan to save Mella without involving his soldiers.

‘Look,’ Henry said, ‘I think we should concentrate on Mella. We still -’

Mella’s disappearance was driving Blue crazy, not that Henry would have expected anything else: mother love always beat father love hands down. It would be killing her that there was nothing they could do for Mella until they had new information on her whereabouts. But Blue’s way of handling it was to go on the attack.

‘You know we have no way of finding Mella yet,’ she snapped. ‘So perhaps you could stop wasting everybody’s time and -’

Henry avoided conflict whenever he could, but that didn’t mean he was afraid to push when it was necessary; and it was definitely necessary now. He held Blue’s gaze and said firmly, ‘It’s no waste of time where our daughter’s safety is concerned. Can’t you reactivate your follower?’ He caught the startled glances in the Situation Room. Followers might no longer be illegal, but they were considered extremely bad form among Faeries of the Light. The thought that the Queen of Faerie might actually use one was as unthinkable as the idea that the Queen of England might appear on Horse Guards Parade dressed in frilly knickers. He knew Blue wouldn’t thank him for mentioning the follower in public, but he was getting desperate.

Blue glared at him. ‘All right,’ she said angrily. ‘Since you insist on shouting from the rooftops, my follower was never deactivated. It finally found her as she entered Haleklind.’ She hesitated, but only barely. ‘At which point it fell foul of Haleklind’s advanced magical securities. The follower is dead, Henry. I sent its body back to Hael for cremation an hour ago.’

‘Oh,’ Henry said, chastened. But he couldn’t afford to stay chastened for long. ‘All right, scrub the follower. So we don’t know where she is and we don’t have a quick way to find out, but we can be reasonably sure she’s still in Haleklind. How sensible is it for us to start a war against Haleklind while she’s still there?’

‘We’re not starting a war,’ Vanelke grumbled. ‘They are.’

‘We’re not starting a war,’ Blue echoed. ‘We’re making a pre-emptive strike. The whole idea is to stop a war.’

‘We’re discussing Madame Cardui’s suggestion of a pre-emptive strike,’ Henry corrected her.

‘And I don’t like it,’ Pyrgus put in fiercely. ‘Not that sort of a pre-emptive strike.’ He snorted bitterly. ‘It’s obscene.’

‘It involves the least loss of faerie life,’ Madame Cardui said mildly.

‘And the slaughter of thousands of innocent animals!’

Pyrgus had gone red in the face now, as he often did when talking about animal welfare. In another couple of minutes he would lose his temper, as he often did when talking about animal welfare. That made him likely to shout at his sister, shake Madame Cardui and quite possibly bop Vanelke on the nose.

‘There are political implications to a neutron spell,’ Henry said to turn the discussion in a different direction.

There was silence for a moment. They all knew about the political implications of a neutron spell. It had been outlawed in warfare by international treaty for more than a century. The spell was officially listed both as black magic and a weapon of mass destruction. You could lay it on an entire population if you had a big enough power source. It killed living creatures, but left property intact for looting. Henry shivered. Pyrgus was right about one thing: neutron spells were obscene.

He looked pointedly from one face to another. The first – and prime – provision of the treaty was that neutron spells should never be used against fellow faeries or allied races in warfare. The second was that neutron spells should no longer be manufactured. The third was that all existing stockpiles of neutron spells should be destroyed. Since the signing, in Blue’s great-grandfather’s day, the first provision had held, more or less. (There had been some small-scale use of neutron technology in the Battle of Inkcap, but the claim was that it had been accidental and less than a score of people died.) The second and third provisions had been resolutely ignored. Most countries maintained secret laboratories where neutron spells and other banned magics were created. Most countries maintained clandestine stocks of the weaponry. What stopped their use, frankly, was fear. Nobody wanted to be the first to cast a neutron spell in case the enemy had sufficient power reserves to strike back in kind. Until now, that was.

Madame Cardui, who’d made the suggestion in the first place, said, ‘My calculations are that there may be fewer implications than one would imagine.’

‘How do you make that out?’ Pyrgus demanded, his voice still angry.

‘Firstly,’ Madame Cardui said coolly, ‘all our intelligence on the matter suggests there are very few countries with the power resources to do us much damage. They have the spells, of course, but not enough power reserves to drive them to anything like their ultimate potential.’

‘Haleklind has the resources,’ Henry interrupted. Haleklind’s reserves of magical power were massive, exceeded only by the combined reserves of the entire Empire.

‘Haleklind does,’ Madame Cardui nodded. ‘But the question is whether Haleklind would wish to be seen to be the first to break the prime provision of the treaty.’

‘Yes, but they wouldn’t be the first, would they?’ Pyrgus snorted. ‘We would.’

This time Madame Cardui shook her head. ‘No, we would not,’ she said firmly. ‘The treaty specifically bans the use of neutron spells against faeries or allied races. It says nothing about manticores or other animals.’

‘Well, it should do!’

‘That may be so, Pyrgus,’ Madame Cardui told him, ‘but at the moment it does not. If we specifically target the manticore herds -’ She gestured towards the viewglobes, ‘- the effects will be isolated from all the main population centres and there should be no collateral damage whatsoever. Once we make the strike, we will announce that the Haleklinders had developed breeding manticores as weapons for military purposes and that our aim in removing these weapons is purely to preserve peace. Legally, the Haleklinders have no grounds to strike back at us and if they were tempted to strike anyway, even they do not have sufficient power reserves to wipe us out completely. We, on the other hand, have sufficient reserves to remove every living being in Haleklind.’

It was the fact she said it so calmly that chilled Henry so much. ‘That’s what I mean,’ he told her soberly. ‘Every living thing in Haleklind includes our daughter at the moment.’

It had a chastening effect on Blue. He knew that, even though she tried to hide it. She started to say something, but Pyrgus cut across her. ‘Listen,’ he said, ‘do we have to act at once? This very minute? Can we wait a day or two before wiping out the manticores?’

Blue glanced towards Madame Cardui and General Vanelke, who were standing together – like newfound allies, Henry thought – near the edge of the Operations Table. Vanelke glanced in turn at the viewglobes. ‘They’re not positioned for an immediate attack,’ he said. ‘But they’re positioned to be positioned.’

‘How long?’ Blue asked.

‘The ones closest to our border… half a day… twenty-four hours at the most.’ Then he added unexpectedly, ‘But if you take the whole strategic situation into account, it would be longer – somewhere between forty-eight and seventy-two hours, I would estimate. They’re not stupid. They know what they’re facing and they’d want to make sure of every detail. That takes time.’

‘Cynthia?’ Blue asked.

Madame Cardui shrugged. ‘I have no specific information that an attack is imminent. What worries me is the very existence of the manticores. As the General says, we could have a border incursion in half a day.’

Blue turned back to her brother. ‘All right, Pyrgus, what did you have in mind?’

‘Two things,’ Pyrgus told her. ‘I’m more familiar with Haleklind than anybody here. I suggest I go back there. Prime objective to find Mella and get her to safety. I have contacts who could be helpful. Secondary objective, to find out if there’s any way to defuse the situation. Call it a diplomatic mission. At very least I might be able to buy time. With Mella still in Halkelind somewhere, time may be the most important thing.’ He stopped and stared at her expectantly.

Henry opened his mouth to support Pyrgus, then closed it again. Blue could get stubborn if she thought they were ganging up on her. He waited. After a long moment, Blue said, ‘Yes. Yes, Pyrgus, that’s a good idea. Can you go at once?’

Pyrgus nodded. ‘ Yes.’

‘Alone or with back-up?’

‘Alone,’ Pyrgus said.

‘I’ll come with you,’ Henry told him hurriedly.

But they both turned towards him.

‘Not a good idea,’ Pyrgus said.

‘I don’t trust the Table of Seven,’ Blue said soberly. ‘It’s bad enough to risk a Crown Prince. I’m not prepared to risk my King Consort.’

‘It would also be bad politics,’ Madame Cardui put in. ‘We would be acting at too high a level.’

‘Pyrgus,’ Blue said.

‘Yes?’

‘I can give you two days – at most.’

‘I understand.’

Blue said, ‘That’s assuming there’s no change in the present situation.’

‘I understand,’ Pyrgus said again.

But Blue clearly wanted to make absolutely sure he really did understand. ‘If there is any evidence – any hint or suggestion – of an attack by the Haleklinders, or Madame Cardui brings me any intelligence that such an attack is imminent, I shall order the immediate use of neutron spells specifically targeted to wipe out the manticores. All the manticores…’ She turned to Henry with a bleak smile. ‘At least we can be sure Mella will be safe. Whatever she’s up to, there’s no way she will be anywhere near a manticore herd.’