Christopher Nuttall - Democracy's Light

“He couldn’t,” Tiberius protested. What was it about her that made him obedient? It wasn’t just her legend, or the covert support she could call on from the most surprising places, but something else. She reminded him of Joshua, but older and sharper… and perhaps more ruthless. “What could he find to offer me?”

Daria shrugged. “It hardly matters,” she said, absently. “Have you and Alicia finally set a date for the wedding?”

The sudden change in the subject caught Tiberius by surprise. “Two weeks,” he said, finally. He hadn’t wanted a fancy wedding, knowing that almost all Family weddings ended in divorce, but Alicia’s Family had insisted. It was important, more than ever, to give the Cicero Clan a Heir, but it would also create a weakness in his defences. If one of his enemies took his child and used him or her against him… the result could be disastrous. “I trust that Daria, Leader of the Freebooters, will be attending?”

“I have my own matters to attend to,” Daria said. As Empress, she would be expected to attend such weddings, but until she took her throne back, she could avoid them at will, even though Tiberius could send her an invitation. It was going to be the most cosmopolitan wedding of the decade, with hundreds of commoners who’d found places in the new government, including the MPs, invited to attend. He even hoped that Colin and Cordova would attend. “Perhaps the wedding would make a suitable moment to assassinate Colin?”

Tiberius flinched slightly. “I thought you liked him,” he protested. “How can you cold-bloodily contemplate his death?”

“I do like — and respect — him,” Daria said, an odd note in her voice. “I also know that he will bring down the Empire if he continues to push forward his reformation program, with or without the threat from Admiral Wilhelm. That cannot be allowed. Colin may be operating from the best possible motives, but he cannot be continue with the Empire itself at stake. I thought that he could be controlled, given time, but he’s decided to be his own man. We have no choice, but to remove him.”

“I see,” Tiberius said. He thought of Alicia, an innocent insofar as any of the Families were innocent, and felt an odd pang. If he didn’t know better, he would have thought it was love… and guilt. “You can’t use my wedding as an assassination venue.”

“Why not?” Daria asked, dryly. She looked up at the chart of the High City that had been placed on one wall. “The only way to get at Colin in the High City relies on luck or extreme force… and neither are guaranteed. A single shipkiller would destroy the entire city — and most of the surrounding continent — but launching one and getting it through the defences would be tricky. It would also tip our hand, while slipping an assassin through the security network would be almost impossible. The Marines are, after all, very good at their job… and loyal to Colin. We cannot subvert one of them without revealing our presence.”

Tiberius scowled. “Marines are human, aren’t they?” He said, remembering Joshua’s straight-faced assertion that Marines ate nails for breakfast and chewed raw iron for lunch and dinner. “They can be conditioned to obey us…”

“Not without breaking the implants they have inserted into their brains, designed to prevent someone with a few bright ideas from doing just that,” Daria said, flatly. “The only way to get a conditioned Marine into the Corps would be to condition the person before they started their training and that would take time we don’t have. Most of the original High City staff were cleared out when Colin’s forces took over the city, so we don’t even have access to them.”

“A pleasure slave?” Tiberius asked. He didn’t know how Daria controlled them — it should have been impossible and, had it not been for the death of Lord Roosevelt, he would have thought that it was impossible — but she did, somehow. “Why can’t one of them be used to assassinate Colin?”

“He doesn’t use any of the ones assigned to the High City,” Daria said. There was an unmistakable note of frustration in her voice. “I don’t know if he doesn’t use them because he finds them creepy, as many people do, or because he feels that he shouldn’t be taking advantage of his position, but he never lets one close enough to him to do anything nasty to him.” She scowled. “Besides, it’s hard to slip them specific instructions.”

Tiberius considered it thoughtfully. He’d had all of his pleasure slaves studied carefully after Lord Roosevelt’s death and they’d found nothing. They’d just been pleasure slaves… but the Roosevelt Clan’s security agents would have studied the remains of the assassin after she’d been killed, and compared it to their security checks before accepting her into the household. They hadn’t found anything either, but the death had broken the Roosevelt Clan. Daria’s admission that it was hard to slip them specific instructions meant… what?

“I see,” he said, shaking his head. It was time to be honest and open. “I don’t like the thought of using a wedding as an assassination venue.”

“ A wedding or your wedding?”

Tiberius winced. “My wedding, yes,” he admitted. “Your Majesty, I don’t like the thought of exposing either myself or Alicia to an assassination attempt.”

“The attempt will be aimed at Colin, not you,” Daria assured him. Her voice softened slightly. “Besides, can you think of any better time to take a shot at him?”

“No,” Tiberius admitted. As long as Colin was careful, and he had two very competent security officers looking out for him, he would remain fairly safe. The wedding might be the only chance to take him out of the game before it was too late to reform the Empire on their terms. “Are you sure that we can move at once to take control?”

Daria nodded, without going into specifics. “Yes,” she said, flatly. “We can take control at once.” She leaned forward. “And you have my word that neither yourself nor your wife will be in any real danger. The only person targeted will be Colin.”

“How reassuring,” Tiberius said. He claimed no special expertise at military matters, but Joshua had taught him how quickly matters could spin out of control. An inch of prevention, he’d said, was far better than a mile of cure. “If you believe that there is no choice…”

Daria smiled like a little girl. “There is none,” she said. “Believe me, if we fail now, the Families will be swept away and destroyed, along with most of the Empire.”

“Unless Admiral Wilhelm takes control of Earth,” Tiberius said grimly. “Are you sure that we can best him if we have to fight him?”

“Admiral Wilhelm doesn’t have either the past legitimacy of the Thousand Families — and me, of course — or Colin’s democratic state,” Daria said, flatly. “He may have united four Admirals under his banner, but that won’t last if they do take Earth, not when they could fall out and make a grab for the throne themselves. It’s what happened to Angus, a long time ago; his grab for the throne and a chain of successors was eventually defeated by your own ancestors. They chose to share out the booty rather than win or lose it all.”

Tiberius nodded slowly, taking her point. Admiral Wilhelm would only drag the Empire further down into disintegration and chaos, even if he won the war, which would only shatter the Empire and destroy humanity’s unity once and for all. Colin’s plan for a federal Empire would be preferable, even if that risked a power struggle between Earth and the outer worlds that would tear the Empire in two. No, the Empire needed a strong man — or woman — at the helm, who could instigate a process of reform while preventing it from spinning out of control.