A. van Vogt - The Empire of Isher

It was convincing. This was going to be harder than he had thought, and it was just possible that, dangerous though it was, he might have to come out into the open. Gonish said slowly, “You are mistaken in assuming that you are the only reliable sources of information. There is a man, probably the greatest man now living, whose extraordinary abilities we of the Weapon Shops are just beginning to appreciate. I am referring to Robert Hedrock, who holds the rank of Captain in Your Majesty’s army.”

To Gonish’s amazement, the Empress leaned toward him. Her gaze was intense, her lips parted breathlessly, her eyes shining.

“You mean,” she whispered, “the Weapon Shops consider Robert—Captain Hedrock—as one of the world’s great men?” She did not wait for a reply, but turned to Prince del Curtin. “You see,” she said. “ You see!”

The prince smiled. “Your Majesty,” he said quietly, “my opinion of Captain Hedrock has always been high.”

The woman faced Gonish across the table, said in a strangely formal tone, “I will see to it that Captain Hedrock is advised of your urgent desire to interview him.”

She knew! He had that much. As for the rest—Gonish leaned back in his chair ruefully. She would advise Hedrock, would she? He could just imagine Hedrock’s sardonic reception of the information. Gonish straightened slowly. His situation was becoming desperate. The entire Weapon Shop world was geared to act on the results of this meeting. And still he had nothing.

There was no doubt that these people were as anxious to get rid of the giant as the Weapon Makers were to get hold of Hedrock; and the irony was that the death of Hedrock would simultaneously solve both problems. With an effort, Gonish mustered his best smile, and said, “You seem to have a little mystery among yourselves about Captain Hedrock. May I ask what it is?”

Surprisingly, the question brought a puzzled stare from Prince del Curtin. “I should have thought,” the man said finally, politely, “that in your fashion you would long ago have put two and two together. Or is it possible that, of all the people of the solar system, you are not aware of what happened tonight. Where have you been since 7:45?”

Gonish was startled. In his desire to keep his mind clear for this meeting, he had come early to Imperial City. At 7:30 he had gone into a quiet little restaurant. Emerging an hour and a half later, he had attended a play. That ended at 11:53. Since then, he had wandered along sight-seeing. He had ignored the news. He knew nothing. Incredibly, half the world could have been destroyed and he wouldn’t know. Prince del Curtin was speaking again:

“It is trae that the identity of the man in such a case is traditionally withheld, but—”

“Prince!”

It was the Empress, her voice low and tense. The men looked at her, startled, as she went on, more grimly, “Say no more. There is something wrong. All this questioning about Captain Hedrock has an ulterior motive. They’re only partly interested in the giant.”

She herself must have realized that her warning was too late. She stopped and looked at Gonish, and the look in her eyes brought pity welling up in him. Until this moment, he had never regarded the Empress Isher as quite human. But there could be no pity. With a jerk, Gonish brought his hand up near his mouth, tore back the sleeve, and said ringingly into the tiny radio that was strapped there:

“Captain Hedrock is in the Empress’ personal apartment—”

They were quick, those three men. They bowled him over in one concerted rush; and then they were on top of him. Gonish offered no resistance, but submitted quietly to arrest. After a moment, he felt relief that he, who had been compelled by inexorable duty to betray his friend, would now die, too.

The ruins consisted of a breakthrough into a main corridor of the palace, and of gaping energy holes along the corridor itself where the fighting had taken place.

Beside the Empress, Prince del Curtin said anxiously, “Hadn’t you better get some sleep, Your Majesty? It’s after four. And, as the Weapon Makers have not answered our repeated calls, there is nothing more that can be done tonight about your husband…about Captain Hedrock.”

She waved him away, vaguely. There was a thought in her mind, a thought so sharp that it seemed to have physical qualities; so painful that every moment it existed it was a bit of hell. She must get him back; no matter what the sacrifice, she must have Hedrock back. Strange, she thought finally, how she who had been so cold and steely and calculating, so almost inhumanly imperial—strange how in the ultimate issue she should prove to be like all the women who had ever become emotional over a man. As if the first shock of committing herself to one man had literally changed the chemistry of her body. When Hedrock had been announced at six o’clock the night before, her mind was already made up. She thought of her decision as intellectual, product of the need for an Isher heir. Actually, of course, she had never thought of anyone but Hedrock as the father. In the first audience she had granted him eight months earlier, he had coolly announced that he had come to the palace for the sole purpose of marrying her. That amused, then angered, then enraged her, but it had put him in the special category as the only man who had ever asked for her hand. The psychology involved had always been plain; and she sometimes felt, acutely the unfairness of the situation for other men who might have the ambition or desire. Court etiquette forbade that they mention the subject. The tradition was that she must ask. She never had.

In the final issue she had thought only of the man who had actually proposed; and, at six o’clock he had come in response to her urgent call and agreed instantly to an immediate marriage. The ceremony had been simple but public. Public in that she took her vows before the telestat, so that all the world might see her and hear her words. Hedrock had not appeared on the telestat. His name was not mentioned. He was referred to as “the distinguished officer who has won Her Majesty’s esteem.” He was a consort only, and as such must remain in the background.

Only the Ishers mattered. The men and women they married remained private persons. That was the law; and she had never thought there was anything wrong with it. She didn’t now, but for nearly ten hours she had been a wife, and during those hours her mind and metabolism adjusted. The thoughts that came had no relation to any she had ever had before. Curious thoughts about how she must now bear the chosen man’s children, and mother them, and of how the palace must be transformed spiritually so that children could live there. After six hours she had told him of her appointment to meet Edward Gonish. And went off with the memory of the odd expression in his eyes—and now this ruin, and the gathering realization that Hedrock was gone, snatched irresistibly from the heart of her empire by her old enemies. She grew aware that someone, the court chancellor, was recounting a list of precautions that had been taken to prevent leakage of the news that the palace had been attacked.

No reports had been permitted to be broadcast. Every witness was being sworn to silence under strict penalties. By dawn, the repair work would be completed without trace, and thereafter any story that did come out would, seem a barefaced rumor, to be laughed at, and ridiculed. It had been, she realized, fast, effective suppression. Very important, that. The prestige of the House of Isher might have been dealt a damaging blow. But the success of the censorship made it all remote, secondary. There would be rewards and honors to dole out, but what mattered now was, she must get him back.