Investments

INVESTMENTS

Walter Jon Williams

Copyright (c) 2004, 2012 by Walter Jon Williams. All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this work in any form.

With thanks for technical assistance to Michael Rupen, Kristy Dyer, Bob Norton.

Investments

The car sped south in the subtropical twilight. The Rio Hondo was on Lieutenant Severin’s right, a silver presence that wound in and out of his perceptions. As long as he stayed on the highway the rental car, which knew Laredo better than he did, implemented its own navigation and steering, and Severin had nothing to do but relax, to gaze through the windows at the thick, vine-wrapped trunks of the cavella trees, the brilliant plumage of tropical birds, and the occasional sight of a hovercraft on the river, fans a deep bass rumble as it carried cargo south to the port at Punta Piedra. Overhead, stars began to glow on either side of the great glittering arc of Laredo’s accelerator ring. The silver river turned scarlet in the light of the setting sun.

The vehicle issued a series of warning tones, and Severin took the controls as the car left the highway. Severin drove through an underpass, then up a long straight alley flanked by live oaks, their twisted black limbs sprawled like the legs of fantastic beasts. Overhead arced a series of formal gateways, all elaborate wrought-iron covered with scrollwork, spikes, and heraldic emblems, and each with a teardrop-shaped light that dangled from the center of the arch and cast pale glow on the path. Beyond was a large house, two storeys wrapped with verandahs, painted a kind of orange-rust color with white trim. It was covered with lights.

People strolled along the verandahs and on the expansive lawns. They were dressed formally, and Severin began to hope that his uniform was sufficiently well tailored so as not to mark him out. Practically all the other guests, Severin assumed, were Peers, the class that the conquering Shaa had imposed on humanity and other defeated species. It was a class into which Severin had not been born, but rather one to which he’d nearly been annexed.

At the start of the Naxid Rebellion Severin had been a warrant officer in the Exploration Service, normally the highest rank to which a commoner might aspire. As a result of service in the war he’d received a field promotion to lieutenant, and suddenly found himself amid a class that had been as remote from him as the stars that glimmered above Laredo’s ring.

He parked in front of the house and stepped from the car as the door rolled up into the roof. Tobacco smoke mingled uneasily in the air with tropical perfume. A pair of servants, one Terran, one Torminel, trotted from the house to join him. The Torminel wore huge darkened glasses over her nocturnal-adapted eyes.

“You are Lieutenant Severin?” the Torminel asked, speaking carefully around her fangs.

“Yes.”

“Welcome to Rio Hondo, my lord.”

Severin wasn’t a lord, but all officers were called that out of courtesy, most of them being Peers anyway. Severin had got used to it.

“Thank you,” he said. He stepped away from the car, then hesitated. “My luggage,” he said.

“Blist will take care of that, my lord. I’ll look after your car. Please go up to the house, unless of course you’d prefer that I announce you.”

Severin, who could imagine only a puzzled, awkward silence following a servant announcing his presence, smiled and said, “That won’t be necessary. Thank you.”

He adjusted his blue uniform tunic and walked across the brick apron to the stairs. Perhaps, he thought, he should have brought his orderly, but in his years among the enlisted ranks he’d got used to looking after his own gear, and he never really gave his servant enough work to justify his existence.

Instead of taking his orderly with him to Rio Hondo, he’d given the man leave. In the meantime Severin could brush his own uniforms and polish his own shoes, something he rarely left to a servant anyway.

Severin’s heels clacked on the polished asteroid material that made up the floor of the verandah. A figure detached itself from a group and approached. Severin took a moment to recognize his host, because he had never actually met Senior Captain Lord Gareth Martinez face to face.

“Lieutenant Severin? Is that you?”

“Yes, lord captain.”

Martinez smiled and reached out to clasp Severin’s hand. “Very good to meet you at last!”

Martinez was tall, with broad shoulders, long arms, and big hands; he had wavy dark hair and thick dark brows. He wore the viridian green uniform of the Fleet, and at his throat was the disk of the Golden Orb, the empire’s highest decoration.

Severin and Martinez had been of use to each other during the war, and Severin suspected that it had been Martinez who had arranged his promotion to the officer class. He and Severin had kept in touch with one another over the years, but they’d never been in the same room together.

Martinez was a native of Laredo, a son of Lord Martinez, Laredo’s principal Peer; and when Martinez had returned to his home world, he’d learned that Severin was based on Laredo’s ring and invited him to the family home for a few days.

“You’ve missed dinner, I’m afraid,” Martinez said. “It went on most of the afternoon. Fortunately you also missed the speeches.”

Martinez spoke with a heavy Laredo accent, a mark of his provincial origins that Severin suspected did him little good in the drawing rooms of Zanshaa High City.

“I’m sorry to have missed your speech anyway, my lord,” Severin said in his resolutely middle-class voice.

Martinez gave a heavy sigh. “You’ll get a chance to hear it again. I give the same one over and over.” He tilted his chin high and struck a pose. “‘The empire, under the guidance of the Praxis, contains a social order of unlimited potential.’” The pose evaporated. He looked at Severin. “How long are you on the planet?”

“Nearly a month, I think.
Surveyor
will be leaving ahead of
Titan,
while they’re still loading antihydrogen.”

“Where’s
Surveyor
bound, then?”

“Through Chee to Parkhurst. And possibly beyond even that . . . the spectra from Parkhurst indicate there may be two undiscovered wormholes there, and we’re going to look for them.”

Martinez was impressed. “Good luck. Maybe Laredo will become a hub of commerce instead of a dead end on the interstellar roadway.”

This was a good time to be in the Exploration Service. Founded originally to locate wormholes, stabilize them, and travel through them to discover new systems, planets, and species, the Service had dwindled during the last thousand years of Shaa rule as the Great Masters lost their taste for expanding their empire. Since the death of the last Shaa and the war that followed, the Convocation had decided again on a policy of expansion, beginning with Chee and Parkhurst, two systems that could be reached through Laredo, and which had been surveyed hundreds of years earlier without any settlement actually being authorized.

The Service was expanding to fill its mandate, and that meant more money, better ships, and incoming classes of young officers for Severin to be senior to. The Exploration Service now offered the possibility of great discoveries and adventure, and Severin— as an officer who had come out of the war with credit— was in a position to take advantage of such an offer.

A Terran stepped out of the house with a pair of drinks in his hand. He strongly resembled Martinez, and he wore the dark red tunic of the Lords Convocate, the six hundred-odd member committee that ruled the empire in the absence of the Shaa.

“Here you are,” he said, and handed a drink to Martinez. He looked at Severin, hesitated, and then offered him the second glass.

“Delta whisky?” he asked.

“Thank you.” Severin took the glass.

“Lieutenant Severin,” Martinez said, “allow me to introduce you to my older brother, Roland.”

“Lord convocate,” Severin said. He juggled the whisky glass to take Roland’s hand.

“Pleased you could come,” Roland said. “My brother has spoken of you.” He turned to Martinez. “Don’t forget that you and Terza are pledged to play tingo tonight with Lord Mukerji.”

Martinez made a face. “Can’t you find someone else?”

“You’re the hero,” Roland said. “That makes your money better than anyone else’s. You and my lord Severin can rehash the war tomorrow, after our special guests have left.”

Martinez looked at Severin. “I’m sorry,” he said. “There are people here concerned with the Chee development, and it’s the polite thing to keep them happy.”

Since the Chee development concerned the settlement of an entire planet, and the special guests were presumably paying for it, Severin sympathized with the necessity of keeping them happy.

“I understand,” he said.

Roland’s eyes tracked over Severin’s shoulder, and he raised his eyebrows. “Here’s Terza now.”

Severin turned to see a small group on the lawn, an elegant, black-haired woman in a pale gown walking hand-in-hand with a boy of three, smiling and talking with another woman, fair-haired and pregnant.

“Cassilda’s looking well,” Martinez remarked.

“Fecundity suits her,” said Roland.

“Fecundity and a fortune,” Martinez said. “What more could a man ask?”

Roland smiled. “Pliability,” he said lightly, then stepped forward to help his pregnant wife up the stairs. Martinez waited for the other woman to follow and greeted her with a kiss.

Introductions were made. The black-haired woman was Lady Terza Chen, Martinez’ wife and heir to the high-caste Chen clan. The child was Young Gareth. The light-haired woman was Lady Cassilda Zykov, who was apparently not an heir but came with a fortune anyway.

“Pleased to meet you,” Severin said.

“Thank you for keeping my husband alive,” Terza said. “I hope you won’t stop now.”

Severin looked at Martinez. “He seems to be doing well enough on his own.”

Lady Terza was slim and poised and had a lovely, almond-eyed face. She put a hand on Severin’s arm. “Have you eaten?”

“I had a bite coming down in the skyhook.”

She drew Severin toward the door. “That was a long time ago. Let me show you the buffet. I’ll introduce you to some people and then— “ Her eyes turned to Martinez.