Deathstalker Coda (30 page)

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Authors: Simon R. Green

BOOK: Deathstalker Coda
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“Comm officer,” he said, in a really quite steady voice. “Try Mistport again.”
“We’re broadcasting continually, Captain. They must be listening; they’re just not saying anything.”
“Very well, put me on. Attention, Mistport, this is Captain Price of the starcruiser
Havoc
, flagship for the rebel fleet. We have personally witnessed the return of the blessed Owen Deathstalker, and other legends of the past. Our eyes have been opened to the truth, and we have broken away from the false Emperor, the usurper Finn Durandal. We come as friends, in search of allies to join us in battle against a mutual enemy. Please respond. Or we’ll tell everyone else you were too scared to get involved.”
The world on the main viewscreen was abruptly replaced by the head and shoulders of a dark, square-faced man. His eyes were angry and his mouth was a grim, flat line. He was dressed in battered and greasy furs, and had a pentacle tattooed on his forehead.
“This is Port Director Ethan Tull. You can assume high orbit, but not that you are in any way welcome. We know how to deal with Imperial starcruisers, so behave yourselves. Is it true you have a Deathstalker on board?”
“Lewis Deathstalker is with us,” Captain Price said carefully. “And his . . . companions. All of whom have been declared Outlaw.”
“We know, we get the news feeds out here too, like everyone else. No Owen?”
“He has gone to face the Terror.”
“Yeah, that makes sense.” Tull’s scowl deepened. “Word is, you have John Silence with you.”
“He is on board, yes.” Price looked deliberately vague. “Did you wish to speak with him?”
“No one here wants to speak with John Silence. The Deathstalker and his companions may descend to Mistport, to talk. No one else. This world is no longer a part of the Empire, ever since Finn Durandal murdered our Paragon, Emma Steel. We are rogue again, and we will choose our allies very carefully. Send down a pinnace; we’ll guide it in. Any other ship even points in our direction, and we’ll do terrible things to it. You don’t want to know how.”
“Probably not,” Price agreed, but Tull’s face had already disappeared from the viewscreen. Price looked back at Silence. “Well, Admiral. I think that went about as well as could be expected. Perhaps you’d like to take the command chair back, while I go and change my trousers.”
And so it was that Lewis Deathstalker, Jesamine Flowers, Brett Random, and Rose Constantine went down to Mistport in an unarmed pinnace, feeling distinctly vulnerable all the way. Brett actually sat on Rose’s lap when the weather made the trip a bit bumpy. But the descent was otherwise uneventful, and the Mistport control tower brought them down onto the landing pads with practiced skill. Everyone in the pinnace then waited patiently until they were given permission to disembark.
The cold hit the four of them hard the moment they left the pinnace, freezing air numbing their faces and burning in their lungs. They pulled their cloaks about them, and huddled together for warmth and comfort. Mistport was shrouded in fog, like the rest of the world; a slowly swirling thick gray blanket that cut Lewis and his companions off from everything around them. The other ships on the pads were just great hulking shadows, and the tall control tower showed only as the vaguest of glows. It was like being at the bottom of the ocean; cold and silent and very alone. It was always winter on Mistworld, always snow and ice and mists under a pale red sun. There was no sign of life anywhere. Brett blew on his hands, and rubbed them together fiercely.
“I hate the cold. It’s unnatural, in these civilized days of weather control. I can feel my balls shriveling up.”
“Altogether too much information, Brett,” said Jesamine.
Brett carried on anyway, never one to let anything get in the way of a good moan. “I thought Silence would be coming down with us. Why isn’t Silence here? Does he know something we don’t?”
“He was here before, over two hundred years ago,” said Lewis, peering distractedly about him into the curling mists. “He was part of the Iron Bitch’s invasion force. Mistworlders have long memories, and they bear grudges. Don’t you know your history?”
“School was a sometime thing for me,” Brett admitted.
“Well, color me surprised,” said Jesamine. “Pay attention, scumbag. Back when Silence was still just a captain in Lionstone’s fleet, the military invaded Mistport, slaughtered hundreds of thousands of people, and laid waste to much of the city. To us, John Silence is a legend. To the Mistworlders, he’s a war criminal who got away with it. Why do you want Silence down here anyway? You know very well he can’t stand the sight of you.”
“Never hurts to have a legendary fighter on your side,” Brett said darkly. “Especially when it comes to negotiating.”
“Two hundred years since Silence was last here,” Lewis said thoughtfully. “You tend to forget just how old he is, really. All the things he saw, and all the things he did . . . For him, our legends are memories. He’s probably the only man left alive who actually talked with the Iron Bitch herself. He was
there
, during all the history that Robert and Constance had suppressed. I’ll bet he could tell some incredible stories, if we could just get him to open up a little.”
“I don’t think he wants to remember,” said Jesamine. “I don’t think he likes the man he used to be. The things that man had to do.”
“There is that,” said Lewis. “Legend makes him out to be an honorable man, but even legend couldn’t disguise the fact that he did . . . questionable things.”
Brett sniffed loudly. “Then he should be right at home here on Mistworld. They’ve made an entire culture out of being thieves, thugs, and outlaws.”
“They know a lot about killing, too,” said Rose.
“You are not to start anything, Rose,” Brett said sternly. “Lewis, tell her she’s not to start anything.”
“I wouldn’t dare,” said Lewis.
“Rose is your problem, Brett,” said Jesamine. “You’re the one who’s sleeping with her, which to my mind is the bravest thing you ever did.”
“You have no idea,” said Brett.
They stood together in the cold some more, stamping their feet hard on the landing pad to keep the circulation flowing. They were all wearing heavy furs supplied by the
Havoc
, but the cold cut right through them like a bitter knife. Brett was also wearing lizardskin boots, while Rose had a fine new lizardskin cape. None of them ever mentioned their erstwhile companion and proven traitor, the reptiloid called Saturday.
“What’s the holdup?” Jesamine said angrily. “They knew we were coming. Hell, they landed our ship.”
“They’re probably checking us out from a safe distance, with scanners and espers,” said Lewis. “Making sure we are who and what we claim to be, with no hidden weapons or forbidden implants. Mistport has reason to be wary of trojan horses; a long time ago a brainwashed esper called Typhoid Mary came very close to wiping out the whole city.”
“I’ll bet you were a real swot at history classes,” muttered Brett. “Look, they’re keeping us waiting because they can. To rub it in that they’re in charge, and we’re the ones begging for an audience. It’s all about putting us in our place.”
“I have never known my place!” Jesamine said immediately. “The only place I’ve ever accepted is the one I made for myself.”
“They must have forgotten you’re a star,” Brett said cunningly. “Why don’t you blast them with an aria, just to remind them?”
“For once, the squalid person and I are in agreement,” said Jesamine. “I may be a rebel, but I am still a diva. How dare they treat me this way? And after I performed a special charity concert for them, only nine years ago, in that toilet they called a theater. If they don’t show their miserable faces soon, I’ll sing them an aria that’ll shatter every window in their control tower, and make all their fillings vibrate for a week.”
“Someone’s coming,” said Rose.
Everyone straightened up and looked in the same direction as Rose. The mists swirled slowly, with no sign of anyone approaching, but they all trusted Rose’s instincts.
“I can feel something,” Lewis said suddenly. “Can you feel . . . something?”
“Yes,” said Jesamine slowly. “Like cobwebs drifting across my mind. What is that?”
“Esper probes,” said Brett. “Telepaths trying to peek into our thoughts. Not that they stand a chance against our strengthened minds. I doubt anything short of the oversoul could pry open our defenses these days. Still, we shouldn’t be able to feel the probes. That is unusual.”
“So are we, these days,” said Lewis. “No doubt we will discover other . . . abilities, as we go on.”
“Strangely, I don’t feel at all comforted by that thought,” said Brett.
“Shut up, Brett,” said Jesamine.
Dark figures finally began to appear out of the drifting mists before them, forming slowly out of the endless gray. Rose’s hand rested easily on the gun at her hip. A dozen men and women drew to a halt before them, anonymous in thick fur wraps and hoods. What little could be seen of their grim, unrelenting faces didn’t seem in the least welcoming. They were all heavily and conspicuously armed.
“Our espers couldn’t make any sense out of your minds,” one of them said abruptly. “They couldn’t even confirm you were human. They said it was like staring into the sun.”
“We’ve all been through the Madness Maze,” said Lewis. He tried hard to say it calmly, without boasting. “We’re undergoing changes. Next time, ask. Now, whom do I have the honor of addressing?”
“I’m Manfred Kramer. City councillor, and head of Mistport security. And with grammar like that, you’ve got to be the Deathstalker. I recognize the diva, and the Wild Rose, but who’s the short arse?”
“Hey!” said Brett. “I’m a Random’s Bastard!”
“So is practically everyone else in Mistport,” said Kramer. “If the professional rebel had sired as many children here as he’s supposed to, he’d never have got around to leaving. You behave yourself here, Random.”
Just for that,
thought Brett,
I’m going to steal your undershorts. While you’re still wearing them.
Lewis studied Manfred Kramer thoughtfully. The security head was a large, muscular man with dark, suspicious eyes and a sulky mouth. He had a death’s head tattooed on one cheek, and heavy black eye makeup.
“Well,” said Lewis. “Here we are.”
“If it was up to me you wouldn’t be,” Kramer snapped. “Nothing good will come of this. Nothing good ever comes of Mistworld getting involved with the Empire. But what do I know? I’m only head of security . . . Follow me. The rest of the city Council is waiting to talk to you.”
“Hold it, hold it, Manfred,” said a woman at his side. She pressed forward to stare intently at Lewis with cold gray eyes. “I’m Councillor Jane Goldman. Are you really a Deathstalker? We’d heard they were all dead. Murdered.”
“I’m Lewis. Once Paragon of Virimonde, now the last of Clan Deathstalker.”
“Yes, I saw you once, in the Coronation broadcast, when the King made you Champion. I thought you’d be bigger, in person. And God, you really are an ugly bugger, aren’t you?”
“Diplomacy is alive and well on Mistworld,” muttered Brett.
“I think you’ve pulled, Lewis,” said Jesamine.
“Never mind all that!” said another man, pushing past Goldman to stare right into Jesamine’s face. “It is you! It’s her! It actually is
the
Jesamine Flowers!” He lowered his eyes, suddenly bashful. “Ms. Flowers, I’m your biggest fan. I’ve got all your recordings. And your vids, and a whole bunch of your posters and . . . I, I brought this vid along, it’s my favorite. Would you be so kind as to sign it for me?”
“Of course, darling,” Jesamine said graciously, as the fan searched inside his furs with both hands. “Always happy to meet a fan. Do you have a pen?”
“What? Oh, yes! Yes, of course!”
Other men and women began to produce things for her to sign, only to put them away again as Kramer glared fiercely about him.
“Council business comes first! What’s the matter with you?”
“Later, darlings,” said Jesamine. She stared coldly at Kramer. “And you don’t get
anything
.”

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