Charles Stross - The Merchant’s War

Brill sighed. "No, it's Helge. We've located her. While I was flailing around in Boston doing the breaking and entering bit, she mailed me a letter via the New Britain office at Dunedin. The duty clerk caught it in time, opened it, and faxed the contents on: meanwhile we identified her aboard a westbound train that's en route for Northern California. I need to find her before the New Britain secret police arrest her. So I'm taking a shortcut."

"Huh. Much as I like her, isn't finding Matt's plaything a slightly higher priority?"

"Not when she's carrying the heir to the throne, Olga." She waited for the explosion of spluttering to die down. "Yes, I agree completely. You and I can have a little talk about professional ethics with Dr. ven Hjalmar later, perhaps? Assuming he survives the current unpleasantness, I'd like to make sure that he needs a new pair of kneecaps. But you've got to admit that we'll need a king-or queen-after we nail Egon, won't we? And if he really did artificially impregnate her with Creon's seed, and if we have witnesses to the handfasting, then it seems to me that... well, which would you rather deal with? Egon trying to have us all hanged as witches, or Miriam as queen regent with Uncle A pulling the strings?"

"I'm not sure," Olga said grimly. "She'll be furious." She paused. "Gods, that's why he sent you, isn't it? She trusts you. If anyone can get her calmed down and convince her to play along, it'd be you. But if not..."

"Uncle A wants her back in play," Brill said, mustering up what calm she could. "But if she's left loose, she's as dangerous as that lime bomb you're hunting. Isn't she?"

"Yes," Olga said, sounding doubtful.

"She was getting too close to James Lee, the hostage," Brill added.

Olga's voice went flat. "She was?"

"We don't need another faction on the board," Brill said.

"No. I can see that." Olga paused. "You'll just have to charm her, won't you?"

"Yes," Brill agreed. "Now, if you don't mind, I'm going back to sleep. Give my regards to Uncle."

"I'll tell him. Bye..."

Quietly closing the boardroom door behind her, Brill padded back to her first-class chair. She paused at the storage locker next to it, and opened it briefly: the specialized equipment was undisturbed, and she nodded, satisfied. It was the biggest single advantage of flying on the Clan Committee executive jet, in her opinion-in the course of her business she often required access to certain specialized items, and commercial airlines tended to take a dim view of her carrying her sniper kit as hand luggage. She sat down and strapped herself in, then tilted her chair back and dimmed the overhead lights. Tomorrow was going to be a long day, starting with arranging a reception for a train at a station she didn't even know the precise location of, and trying to make contact with Miriam one jump ahead of the Homeland Security Directorate goon squad who'd surely be waiting for her when the train arrived.

It was a good morning for flying, thought Rudi, as he checked the weather station on the north tower wall. No, make that a great morning. After all, he'd never flown over his homeland before. It would be a personal first, not to mention one in the eye for the stick-in-the-muds. Visibility was clear, with a breeze from the southwest and low pressure, rising slowly. He bent over the anemometer, jotting down readings in the logbook by the dawn light. "Hans? I'll be needing the contents of both crates. Get them moved into the outer courtyard. I'll need two pairs of hands to help with the trike-make sure they're not clumsy. I'll be down in ten minutes."

"Aye, sir." His footman, Hans, gave him an odd look, but hurried down off the battlements all the same. He clearly thought his master was somewhat cracked. Well, he'll change his mind before the day is out, Rudi told himself. Along with everyone else. Just as long as nothing goes wrong. He was acutely aware that he hadn't kept his

flying hours up since the emergency began, and there were no luxuries (or necessities) like air traffic control or meteorology services over here.

In fact, he didn't even have as much fuel as he'd have liked: he'd managed to squirrel away nearly twenty gallons of gas before some killjoy or other-he harbored dark suspicions about Erik-had ratted out his scheme to Riordan, who'd had no option but to shout a lot and notify the duke. Who in turn had threatened to have him flogged, and lectured him coldly for almost half an hour about the idiocy of not complying with long-standing orders...

Rudi had bitten his tongue while the duke threatened to burn the trike, but in the end the old man had relented just a little. "You will maintain it in working order, and continue to practice your skills in America, but you will not fly that thing over our lands without my explicit orders, delivered in person." Eorl Riordan wasn't the duke, but on the other hand, he was in the chain of command: and that was enough for Rudi. Flying today.

It took him closer to half an hour to make his way down to the courtyard, by way of his room-his flying jacket and helmet were buried deeper than he'd remembered, and he took his time assembling a small survival kit. Then he had to divert via the guardhouse to check out a two-way radio and a spare battery. "Where do you think you're going, cuz?" asked Vincenze, looking up from the girlie magazine he was reading: "A fancy dress party?"

Rudi grinned at him. "Got a date with an angel," he said. "See you later."

"Heh. I'll believe it when I see it-" But he was talking to Rudi's back.

Down in the courtyard next to the stables, he found that Hans had enlisted a couple of guards to move the crates, but hadn't thought to bring the long tubular sack or the trike itself. "Come on, do I have to do everything myself?" he demanded.

"I didn't know what you wanted, sir," Hans said apologetically. "You said it was delicate..."

"Huh. Okay. Come here. Take this end of the bag. I'll take the other. It's heavy. Now! The courtyard!"

Half an hour later, performing in front of an audience of mostly useless gawpers (occasionally he'd need one of them to hold a spar in position while he tightened a guy wire), Rudi had the wing unpacked and tensioned. At eight meters long and weighing fifty kilos the Sabre 16 had been murder to world-walk across-it was too long to fit in the Post Office room-but it was about the smallest high performance trike wing he'd been able to find. At least he'd been able to unbolt the engine from the trike body. "Go get the trike," he told Hans and the guards. "Push it gently, it'll roll easily enough once you get it off the straw."

Another half hour passed by in what felt like seconds. By then he'd gotten the wing mounted on top of the trike's mast and bolted together. The odd machine-a tricycle with a pair of bucket seats and a petrol engine with a propeller mounted on the back-was beginning to resemble a real, flyable ultralight. He was double-checking his work, making sure there was no sign of wear on any of the cables and that everything was secure, when someone cleared his throat behind him. He glanced round: it was Eorl Riordan, along with a couple of sergeants he didn't recognize. "How's it going?" asked Riordan, his tone deceptively casual.

"It's going all right, for now." Rudi glanced up at the sky. Partial cloud cover, at least five thousand feet up- no problem for the time being. "Thing is, I'm about to trust my neck to this machine. There's no backup and no air traffic control and no help if something goes wrong. So I want to make sure everything is perfect before I lake her up."

"Good." Riordan paused. "You've got a radio."