The Devil and Deep Space (24 page)

What Girag had done was perhaps not so unusual a thing for a man with power over prisoners to demand. Andrej had not been naive then; he was not naive now. But whenever Andrej stepped into a prison, he expected to have absolute control over what abuse his prisoners were to be required to endure, and Girag had violated the sole right of an Inquisitor to inflict atrocity under cover of Law.

“I very much wanted to deliver him to those same prisoners, Mister Stildyne, but it would have been inappropriate. I found willing recruits among station Security instead. I am ashamed to explain what I did to him, Chief, but I don’t think I’m ashamed of having done it.”

Certainly compared to other things that he had done, his afternoon’s sport with Haster Girag paled into all but absolute insignificance. Except for Haster Girag, perhaps. Perhaps he
was
ashamed.

Perhaps the imposition had been excessive. Something had clearly shattered Girag’s life; perhaps confronting his own hunger and being forced to admit it for what it was had been too much for him. It had been too much for Andrej, after all, if the specific nature of the thirst was not the same. He had never recovered from the realization that he was a monster.

After a moment’s thoughtful silence Stildyne spoke.

“Well. You should know, though.” There was an unusually grave note of deliberation in Stildyne’s voice, as though he faced the Court. “My previous acquaintance. We used to have parties. We used bond–involuntaries for entertainment. You would not have approved of my own conduct. Sir.”

Andrej stared up into Chief Stildyne’s ruined face with shock and horror. He knew perfectly well that prior to his arrival on the
Ragnarok
Stildyne had been in the occasional habit of exploiting his access to bond–involuntary troops for sexual purposes. He couldn’t change any of what Stildyne had done; only what Stildyne did ever after, as long as he was responsible to Andrej for the welfare of those troops. It was unthinkable that Stildyne would revert to previous abusive behavior once Andrej was gone. So why was Stildyne telling him this?

“To you I would trust my child in a heartbeat, Chief.” He knew perfectly well why Stildyne was telling him such things. And he had no cause to scorn Girag as diseased. His own hands were far more deeply soiled than Girag’s had been, though his sin was sanctioned by the Bench in support of the Judicial order. What were the games of pain and sexual dominance that Girag had played, compared to gross and unjustifiable murder? “But Girag has cause to bear a grudge. I cannot risk him next to my child.”

Stildyne looked skeptical. “I see. Thank you, your Excellency. But if you did. Trust me with your son, I mean. What would he call me? Chief? Or Mister?”

The question made no sense. Too much had happened today, and it was still short of mid–meal. Andrej needed to go into a dark quiet room, and think. It was the wrong time to tell Stildyne that Andrej was not going back to the
Ragnarok
.

“He might very well mistake your worth, and call you Brachi,” Andrej admitted. “Being a child. And not understanding the respect due to a man in your position.”

There was a flicker of surprise in Stildyne’s eyes, but it went very quickly. Stildyne bowed. “I’ll see about Lek, your Excellency. And ask the house–master to send your cousin Stanoczk, when he can be found.”

Yes, that would be good. Andrej sat down at the great desk in the library and buried his face between his hands. This had been unexpected. Unnecessary. And he had not told his people. He would have to tell them. Soon. Not now. It would raise too many issues of judgment and abandonment if he told Stildyne now, in the face of Stildyne’s painful revelation about his past.

“Thank you, Mister Stildyne. I will sort myself out between now and mid–meal.” It was going to take him much longer than that; so there was no time like the present to be started.

What could have possessed Haster Girag to elect the Malcontent? What could have possessed the Malcontent to accept him? Who had made the decision to permit Haster Girag to come to the Matredonat and cultivate Anton Andreievitch, and who was Andrej Ulexeievitch to judge?

But Anton was his child. And the thought that Anton should admire such a man as Andrej knew Girag to be was more than he could rationalize, even him.

###

Ferinc bent his head and made for the escape of the library doors with all deliberate speed, struggling to maintain control of himself. Koscuisko was furious with him; Koscuisko had a right to be.

But Ferinc was Malcontent. He could not be threatened; the degradation of his status as a slave of the Saint gave him immunity. No casual punishment assessed by any layman could compare to the humiliation of the red halter.

He was not even legally a person, but an object. Slavery was illegal under Jurisdiction, but there were exceptions for religious observance, and the Malcontent was one of them. Koscuisko could not touch him. He was an object belonging to the Saint.

And yet it was his doom — as Stanoczk had regretfully suggested — to remain outland and fundamentally un-Reconciled in his heart of hearts, because one black day years and years ago Andrej Koscuisko had mastered him, and he had been a slave ever since. Not to the Malcontent.

I can explain
, Ferinc signaled to Stildyne, as he forced himself to walk across the room rather than running. He had not used the finger–code for years, but he was confident that Stildyne could still understand his accent.
No threat to the officer. Truth, Stildyne
.

Stildyne need not be angry at him for being here — he was no threat to Koscuisko or to anything that was Koscuisko’s, and among the things that were Koscuisko’s were the woman and the child that he had grown to love for their own sakes, and no taint of Koscuisko about them. Koscuisko himself had disappeared from Ferinc’s mind here, years ago. He had been almost at peace, and now he was damned.

Cousin Stanoczk would be disgraced in Chapter. Ferinc had been disobedient, undisciplined, but worse than that had revealed by his behavior that despite the most concerted efforts Stanoczk had made on his behalf he was still fundamentally un-Reconciled. What would become of him?

He cleared the threshold and gained the outer hallway, but Koscuisko’s Security were not stepping away. The bond–involuntary Lek Kerenko had one hand to his elbow, but very gently, as if to give support; the woman cocked her head at him, gesturing down the hall.

“Chief’s room down this way, Cousin,” she said, and she used a Standard word for
cousin
that sounded oddly in Ferinc’s ears. “Come on. You can have a drink. You look as though you might not mind one, if I can say so without giving offense.”

Of course. They read finger–code as well. It had been bond–involuntaries who had invented it, after all, as a means of communicating between themselves without compromising their discipline. Ferinc had bullied the knowledge out of bond–involuntaries, knowing how to exploit their vulnerability to their governors; that was how he’d learned it. Lek’s fellows clearly had the knowledge, as well, but Koscuisko would not have permitted his Bonds to be coerced into teaching it.

It was a telling detail that spoke of the exceptional trust Koscuisko had earned from his Bonds, more evidence to Ferinc of what he’d lost. He couldn’t speak. He let them escort him down the hall to a room near the end of the corridor, where the house–master had placed Koscuisko’s chief of Security. He knew these rooms. There was more familiar here than not.

Lek poured out a drink for him, fully half a glass of cortac brandy; Ferinc took it with a nod of thanks and had drunk half of it down before he realized that the house–master had given Stildyne the good stuff. The really good stuff.

The liquor calmed his nerves. He took the balance of it with more respect and consideration, listening to the voices in his mind drop off one by one into a drugged stupor. After a while, Stildyne came into the room, and the Security left.

Stildyne sat down. Ferinc looked up at him a little stupidly, feeling the liquor. He didn’t usually drink. “What did you tell him?”

Stildyne looked thoughtful, and much older than Ferinc remembered him. “You and me. Parties. Bond–involuntaries. He would have tortured himself, trying to guess and never just corning out and asking.”

Ferinc shook his head, regretfully. “You needn’t have, Stildyne. You owe him no explanations. Surely.” Even as he said it, he knew better. He knew things about Stildyne that he had not guessed before Andrej Koscuisko had come into the library. It was only more evidence of the fact that Koscuisko was a terrible and corrosive sort of metamorphic agency. Stildyne. Of all people.

“You’re right, of course.” Stildyne’s agreement was amused — on multiple levels. “But it doesn’t make any difference. You’d better leave. He doesn’t want to see you.”

Ever again. “Let me have a word with his lady, Chief,” Ferinc asked humbly. “Just so she knows. In case there’s gossip. I had leave from Cousin Stanoczk to make sure she was all right, not to spy on Koscuisko. I wasn’t to have been caught skulking in the garden.”

Stildyne nodded. “If you do it now, you should be all right. Himself is in a state; he’ll not be stirring. But I don’t understand, man. Why are you here?”

“I truly mean no harm, Stildyne. I came looking to make up a lack, years ago. I thought that I was doing well, really. Stanoczk says that he has failed me, but it’s not his fault.”

Nor was it Koscuisko’s.

What Koscuisko had done to him had not made him the moral cripple that he was. He had always been a moral cripple. Koscuisko had only put the fact in front of him, where he could not avoid recognizing the truth of it. That was all. For that, Koscuisko deserved his thanks; and yet Ferinc could not imagine trying to explain any such thing to him.

Maybe to Stanoczk. Maybe. If Stanoczk would speak to him. If the Malcontent did not send him away from Cousin Stanoczk forever, and try some different approach to the reconciliation that was his right — even though he was a slave.

“Some lacks are never going to be made up,” Stildyne said, in a voice that was almost sad. Almost. But this was Stildyne. On the other hand, Koscuisko had Stildyne, too. “The dogs in this house are cherished more tenderly than I ever was, Haster. Ferinc. Sorry.”

As if Stildyne was thinking about his past, and not his present.

“I’ll be away.” Ferinc needed to see Marana, and then he needed to run. He would go to the chapter–house at Brikarvna. Stanoczk would know where to find him there. “I’m sorry for the trouble I’ve caused you, Brachi. I should have known better than to try to steal a glimpse.”

It was an echo from a long time ago. Warrant to warrant. Stildyne smiled. “Yes,” he agreed. “You should have. But it’s lucky for the troops that they caught you, all the same, or I’d have had them on remedials for months.”

And he could have been in Stildyne’s place. He could have been Stildyne. Chief Warrant Officer. Trusted and valued, and rejoicing in the care and tutelage of professional Security troops, only one step short of the Ship’s First Officer.

To be Stildyne, he would have had to have been Stildyne all along, though. Stildyne hadn’t ever minded taking advantage of opportunities. But he’d taken much less advantage than Ferinc. Stildyne had always been a practical man. Ferinc had been a bully — he knew that — and bullies were trying to conceal the fear within themselves, and Koscuisko had opened him up and laid it bare in front of the entire world.

So he could not have been Stildyne. There was comfort in that realization that Ferinc took with him to go to see Marana, and say good–bye to her.

###

Someone came quietly into the room, closing the great double doors behind them. That was odd. Andrej hadn’t heard anybody ask for permission. Maybe he’d been too caught up in his own misery to have noticed.

“For one day merely I leave you to your own devices,” someone said, in a deep voice that was both distressed and bantering at once. “And what do I return to find? You have ruined my poor Ferinc, Derush, and I particularly wanted to beg you to forgive him, and grant him peace.”

Cousin Stanoczk.

Andrej raised his head from his palms and blinked, trying to focus. What time was it?

“Have you called for rhyti, Stoshik?” Andrej was thirsty. It was probably past mid–meal. “Sit. Talk to me. I need to speak to you. But what is this of so–called Cousin Ferinc, first of all.”

He couldn’t keep the disgust out of his voice. The shock had been too great. Stanoczk went back to the doors and let the servants in to lay the table; Andrej watched the process dully.

Stanoczk poured a flask of rhyti and sweetened it with a liberal hand. The servants left. He brought the flask of rhyti over to where Andrej sat behind the desk and set it down at Andrej’s hand; seating himself on the desk’s surface beside it.

“He is a deserter, Derush. He came five years ago, no, six years ago, about a year after you had taken his discipline on yourself, and spared him legal sanctions. We intercepted him on his way into Azanry as a tourist. Fleet said that we might keep him or send him back. And we had learned the story from him, or as much as he was capable of telling us.”

It was good rhyti. Andrej took another drink, and his mind began to sharpen. “Why deserter?”

Stanoczk shrugged. “His life had become intolerable to him, Andrej. You proved him to himself all too effectively. We considered that it was your intervention that had sent him to us, and made the offer, and were accepted.”

An outlander, taken into the embrace of the Malcontent. It was unheard of. “Nothing that was done to him was worse than he had done, Stoshik. The Saint owes him nothing. He is a corrupt man.”

Cousin Stanoczk shrugged again. “Yes, but it was you, Derush, and you are so much better at it than he ever was. Your impact was all the more shattering. And the Saint’s proper business is with damaged goods. It is our holy charge, you know that; those who are pure and uncompromised have their choice of Saints, but for Ferinc there is only the Malcontent or to be damned.”

Andrej couldn’t argue with him on that. Cousin Stanoczk was the expert, after all. So instead Andrej said the thing that troubled him most deeply about finding Girag here at the Matredonat.