Poul Anderson - The Rebel Worlds

“The whole Imperial fleet can’t ever come against us. It has too many other duties. If we work fast and hard, well be in shape to throw back whatever does attack.

“Beyond that — I can’t predict. I’m hoping we’ll have a well-governed region to show. I’m hoping that will underline our message: an end to corruption and tyranny, a fresh start under a fresh dynasty, long-overdue reforms … What we need is momentum, the momentum of a snowball. Then all the guns in the Empire can’t stop us: because most of them will be on our side.”

Why a snowball? jeered his mind. Who knows snow on Aeneas, except a thin drift in polar winter?

They rounded a cluster of trees and spied the castle. Windhome stood on what had once been a cape and now thrust out into air, with a dizzying drop beneath. Lights glowed yellow from its bulk, outlining dark old walls and battlements. The Wildfoss River brawled past in cataracts.

But McCormac did not see this immediately. His eyes had gone to the flat Antonine horizon, far below and far away. Above a last greenish trace of sunset, beneath a wan flicker of aurora, burned pure white Dido, the evening star.

Where Kathryn worked, xenologist in its jungles, till that time I met her, five years ago (no, three Aenean years; have I really been so long in the Empire that I’ve forgotten the years of our planet?) and we loved and were married.

And you always wished for children of your own, Kathryn, dyuba, and we were going to have them, but there were always public troubles that ought to be settled first; and tonight — He thanked his iron God that the sun of Llynathawr was not visible in those latitudes. His throat was thick with the need to weep. Instead, he spurred his horse to a gallop.

The road crossed cultivated fields before it reached Windhome’s portal. A caravan of itinerants had established itself on the meadow in front. Their trucks were parked aside, lost in gloom; light from the castle fell only on gaily striped tents, fluttering flags, half-erected booths. Men, women, children, packed around campfires, stopped their plangent music and stamping dances to give the lord of the manor a hail as he rode by. Tomorrow those tatterdemalion wanderers would open their carnival … and it would draw merrymakers from a hundred kilometers around … though the fist of the Imperium was already slamming forward.

I don’t understand, McCormac thought. Horseshoes rang in the courtyard. A groom caught his reins. He jumped to the ground. Guards were about, the new-come Navy personnel and the liveried family retainers strutting with jealous glances at each other. Edgar Oliphant hurried from the keep. Though McCormac, as Emperor, had raised him to admiral, he hadn’t yet bothered to change the captain’s star on either shoulder. He had merely added a brassard in the Ilian colors to the tunic that snugged around his stocky form.

“Welcome back, sir!” he exclaimed. “I was ’bout to dispatch a search party.”

McCormac achieved a laugh. “Good cosmos, do you think my boys and I can get lost on our ancestral lands?”

“N-no. No, sir. But ’tis, well, if you’ll ’scuse me, sir, ’tis foolish for you to run loose with not a single security escort.”

McCormac shrugged. “I’ll have to endure that later, on Terra. Leave me my privacy a while.” Peering closer: “You’ve something to tell me.”

“Yes, sir. Word came in two hours ago. If the admiral, uh, the Emperor will come with me?”

McCormac tried to give his sons a rueful look. He was secretly not sorry to have his awareness taken from the orbit into which it had fallen — again.

The ancient dignity of the Firstman’s office had vanished of recent weeks in a clutter of new gear: communication, computation, electronic files and scanners. McCormac sank into a chair behind his battered desk; that at least was familiar. “Well?” he said.

Oliphant closed the door. “The initial report’s been confirmed by two more scouts,” he said. “The Imperial armada is movin’. ’Twill be here inside three days.” It made no difference whether he meant the standard period or the 20-hour rotation of Aeneas.

McCormac nodded. “I didn’t doubt the first crew,” he said. “Our plans still stand. Tomorrow, 0600 Nova Roma time, I board my flagship. Two hours later, our forces depart.”

“But are you certain, sir, the enemy won’t occupy Aeneas?”

“No. I would be surprised, though, if he did. What gain? My kinfolk and I won’t be around to seize. I’ve arranged for the enemy to learn that when he arrives. What else can he make a prize of on Aeneas, till the fighting’s past? Whoever wins in space can mop up the planets soon enough. Until then, why commit strength badly needed elsewhere, to grip a spearwasp’s nest like this world? If he does occupy, then he does. But I expect hell leave the Virgilian System the instant he discovers we aren’t trying to defend it, we’re off to grab the real trophy — Satan.”

“Your screenin’ forces, however—” Oliphant said dubiously.

“Do you mean protection for offplanet bases like Port Frederiksen? A light vessel each, mostly to guard against possible casual destructiveness.”

“No, sir. I’m thinkin’ of your interplanetary patrols. What effect ’ull they have?”

“They’re just Darthan mercenaries. They have no other purpose than to mislead the enemy, gaining time for our fleet,” McCormac said. Have I really not made it clear to him before now? What else have 1 overlooked since the avalanche hit me? — No, it’s all right, he’s simply been too engaged with administrative details on the ground, “ A few vessels posted in local space, with orders to attack any Josipist craft they may spot. Those’ll be scouts, of course, weakly armed, easily defeated. The survivors among them will carry the news back. I know Pickens’ style of thinking. He’ll be convinced we intend to make a fight of it at Virgil, and proceed ultra-cautiously, and therefore not detect us on our way off to Beta Crucis.” Oh, good old Dave Pickens, who always brought flowers for Kathryn when we invited you to dinner, must I indeed use against you the things I learned when we were friends?

“Well, you’re the Emperor, sir.” Oliphant gestured at the machines hemming them in. “Plenty of business today. We handled it how we could in Staff, but some items seem to require your attention.”

“I’ll give them a look-over right away, before eating,” McCormac said. “Stay available afterward, in case I need to consult.”

“Aye, sir.” Oliphant saluted and left. McCormac didn’t retrieve the communications at once. Instead, he went out on a balcony. It opened on the cliff and the rich eastern bottomlands. Creusa, the inner moon, was about due to rise. He filled his lungs with dry chill and waited.

Nearly full, the satellite exploded over the horizon. The shadows it cast moved noticeably; and as it hurtled, he could watch the phase change. Drowned in that living white light, the Antonine appeared to get back its vanished waters. It was as if phantom waves ran across those reaches and surf beat once more on the foot of Windhome ness.

You used to say that, Kathryn. You loved these moments best, in the whole year of our world. Dyuba, dyuba, will you ever see them again?

When Virgil showed a perceptible disc without magnification, Asieneuve went out of hyperdrive and accelerated inward on gravs. Every sensor strained at maximum receptivity; and nothing came through save an endless seething of cosmic energies.

“Not so much as a radio broadcast?” Flandry asked.

“Not yet, sir,” Rovian’s voice replied.

Flandry turned off the intercom. “I should be on the bridge myself,” he muttered. “What am I doing in my — your cabin?”