Кристофер Банч - The Return of the Emperor

"We've got Scotch from Earth. Real Scotch. What they call a single-malt. Not that clottin' imitation I read our late and lamented Emperor poured.

"My own lager for you, Kilgour. Not that you'll appreciate it."

Ida Kalderash was a Romany—a Gypsy. The race/culture still existed, and still thrived, living as they did outside conventional society and its rules with a very keen eye for the credit—acquired as an individualistic Rom might see fit. Instead of caravans they used spaceships—for trading, smuggling, or just traveling for adventure and profit. Their customary laws—kris—required them to respect fidelity, their family, and returning favor for favor. Within the Rom. And even then, the customs were hardly commandments.

It was unheard of for a Rom to serve in the military, let alone the supersecret Mantis Teams. How and why Ida ended up on Mantis Section 13, under the command of Lieutenant Sten, was an even bigger and even less answerable puzzler. She had been carried on the rolls as pilot and electronics specialist. She was also their unofficial banker, gambler, and "investment" specialist. At the end of a mission the "investments" would be liquidated, and the team members would be flush enough for truly exotic leaves.

When Mantis 13 had been broken up and Sten transferred to the Imperial Guard, Ida had refused reenlistment and vanished back to her culture.

She had surfaced—in absentia on a fiche—after Sten and Alex had escaped from the Tahn prison at Koldyeze and returned to Prime. The surfacing had been the announcement that she had accessed their pay that had been held while the two were POWs and invested. And invested. She had not explained—but both men became fabulously wealthy. They had been… and might be again if the privy council were destroyed and they were no longer fugitives.

Ida had found a unique finale for the announcement: she had turned and hoisted her skirts at them.

As Alex had observed, "Th' lass still dinnae wear knickers…"

"My family will join us for the feast," Ida said. "They're curious to see how much I lied about you two gadje. Don't clot it up, Alex." She led them to a sideboard and poured three drinks into crystal goblets. "To the dead past… and a prayer this clottin' present will soon join it."

Ida had turned somber.

"Your message was welcome, Sten," she said.

"I didn't think it would have as large an effect."

"You expected just me—or me and my vita—my family?"

"That was the best I had hoped for."

"Times've changed for all of us. You're an admiral. I am now Voivode, chieftain of my band. Other voivodes have been known to listen to me, even if I am a woman."

"There's more to this many of your people showing up than just you being a heavyweight, Ida. Gypsies, from what I know, what you taught me, don't get together on anything," Sten said skeptically.

"No. That is what we are—and there've been terrible tragedies because of this in our past. And another tragedy is on the wind." Ida explained. The gypsies may have been outsiders, but they maintained careful intelligence contacts beyond their culture.

"That clottin' council that killed the Emperor's decided that we're lice on the body politic. Mainly 'cause we still have enough AM2 to hold together. They think we've got more'n we actually do—they don't know when a gypsy can't wander, he dies.

"So there'll be an open order on us. Seize our ships. Seize our cargoes. Seize the fuel. What happens to the people on board… not mentioned."

"Th' Guard'll nae honor that ."

"The Guard's changed. Some of them won't. But some of them will. And how many systems think the universe'd be better without us stealin' their chickens, gold, and daughters? Too clottin' many.

"We are not going to wait this time. We are not going to try to turn invisible or hide.

"Your Tribunal's a damn slender reed, Sten. But it's the only one we can see in this clottin' swamp that's risin' up on us.

"So there'll be feasts an' speeches an' debates an' prob'ly a clottin' knifin' or two. Don't mean drakh. You'll end with us swearin' eternal fealty. Or anyway until the privy council's dead meat or you happen to leave the barn unguarded.

"Enough of that." Ida forced herself into cheerfulness. "So I'm takin' this clottin' tub on a recruitin' drive, eh? You housebroke yet?"

"Nae, lass. Tis nae healthy. Drink i' one end, piddle oot th' stern. Keeps th' system on-line."

"You'll fit right in," she said. "Fill the glasses, Admiral. Damn, but I like that! Clottin' gadje Admiral for a barkeep!"

Sten poured. "Don't mind bartending at all, Ida. By the way, two sets of thanks. First for taking care of our money… now this."

Ida and Alex drained their glasses. Sten just sipped at his. Ida frowned.

"I can't stay long," he explained. "I've got my own little trip to take."

"And where, Admiral, does it say in the clottin' regs you can't travel with a crawlin' hangover?"

Sten considered. No, it didn't.

And so, yes, he did.

Sten landed on Prime World with two covers: a livid scar and an Impossible Quest.

The scar was a benign parasite, surgically transplanted onto his face. Nearly two centimeters wide, zigzagging artistically from his scalp line to the corner of his eye and down to his chin, it was part of the "Great Lorenzo" dicta: The best disguise is the simplest, and one that won't blow off in a strong wind. Anyone looking at Sten would see only the horrible scar, no matter how carefully he instructed his mind to be polite. Sten had used versions of the gimmick before, from a alk-ridden nose to partial baldness to a simple, completely shaven head. It worked—almost all the time, at least.

Sten's main concern was that when he extracted from Prime, the parasite might have decided it had found a home everlasting. Kilgour reassured him.

"Dinna fash, lad. I' thae happens, we'll score y' a wee eyepatch an' y' kin join th' pirates."

The Impossible Quest was equally simple. Truth: At the close of the Tahn wars one David Rosemont had appeared on Prime. A flashy, loud-talking, loud-living entrepreneur, he announced his newest business-converting Imperial spacecraft, particularly the tiny, evil tacships, into luxury yachts. Regardless of the inherent absurdity of the premise, Rosemont prospered. For a minute and a half.

Prime's Fraud Squad had taken an interest in Rosemont—his company, yet to produce a single yacht that anyone could find, looked very much like a con game. And then Rosemont vanished, leaving bare bank accounts and a warehouse with three tacships inside. All of that was true.

The harried but friendly—and badly scarred—man appeared on Prime.

False: His name was Elijah Braun. Sten/Braun was credentialed as a private investigator, working for a law firm located on a faraway world between Lost and Nowhere. Rosemont had an heir, who wanted whatever estate existed. Braun knew that the man had not been declared legally dead yet, but the heir was convinced that Rosemont was a victim of foul play, rather than a con who had skated with the swag. Braun was convinced that the heir, already rich, was drug-addled. But a case was a case. Besides, he prattled to the official issuing him his sixty-day visa, it would give him a chance to see Prime, the center of everything and the universe's Most Glamorous World.

"You've seen too many livies, Sr. Braun. Or else you're a history buff. Prime ain't what it was, and it's getting less like it every day."

The official glanced hastily over his shoulder to make sure that his innocent statement had gone unheard. But Sten filed that glance. Unsurprisingly, the privy council's internal security was in full.

Sten noted them everywhere: street cleaners who ignored litter but noted passersby; inept waiters with big ears; clerks who never clerked but listened; block wardens; concierges who asked questions far beyond what was normal. All precautions by the privy council against a largely nonexistent threat. And they were expensive precautions—the council was spending money for all those informers, money it simply did not have.