Assassinorum kingmaker, p.26
Assassinorum Kingmaker, page 26
YUMA: Let’s move away from Rakkan. Because I want to know – you had suspicions about Sabban’s man… you let him in? Some gatekeeper.
HAWTHORN: I admit the snare backfired. I accept–
KRAINE: Where are you going, Hawthorn?
HAWTHORN: Oh, nowhere. Merely to tell House Stryder that the court has been part of a coup against our beloved monarch, that they imprisoned him and tied his hands as an uprising ravaged the hinterland and Imperial spies infested the planet. I think it would convince the fence-sitters to take a greater interest in the Imperial question, don’t you?
[Pause: 2 seconds]
[AUDIO: Door opening, sealing.]
TESSELL: You can’t do that.
HAWTHORN: My, what sharp ears you have, Arch-Maintenancer. And why exactly can’t I? Because it would start a civil war? We would win the war.
TESSELL: No, because by law none of you can leave this room.
ACHARA: She’s right. We are in conclave.
KRAINE: You expect us to stay in here, arguing, while the houses spoil for war outside?
TESSELL: Yes, I do. Because it is your duty and a part of who we are. On the death of a High Monarch the court and heads of the houses gather in conclave, and vote for a new monarch. The security forces can handle the streets. Indeed, I have enacted the Conclave Protocol as is my right, and if any of you leave this room the sacristan monks guarding it will use force to prevent you.
[Pause: 1 second]
TESSELL: Non-lethal force, at first. But if you’re persistent there are other remedies. My sacristans have put all Knight suits under guard, the ban on mounting the noble machines during conclave is now in force. No one will be going to war, at least not in our ancestral war-gods, until after the coronation.
YUMA: She allowed my monarch to be killed, Arch-Maintenancer. An eternal stain on the honour of both me and my noble machine, a–
TESSELL: A stain that can be wiped away only by good service to a new monarch, Yuma. Let the past be past. All of us have failed. We have here a Kingsward who cannot ward the king, a Gatekeeper who cannot keep the gate, a herald who keeps her monarch silent, and two heads of houses that can’t keep their heads straight or houses in line. I myself am a maintenancer who could not keep my monarch well and healthy despite living inside our greatest vessel. Soon, we’ll be joined by a Master of Justice who takes months to decapitate a few rebels.
ACHARA: Fontaine is on his way?
TESSELL: Yes, I signalled him. He approaches at the head of the army.
ACHARA: He can’t march an army into the streets of Gathering Palace, not with things as they are. The populace will turn on them as traitors and conspirators, they’ll tear the palace-city apart.
KRAINE: And I’m not letting any Stryder, even a member of the court, bring an army into Gathering Palace while we’re in conclave.
HAWTHORN: We need him.
KRAINE: You need his vote, you mean.
TESSELL: I have sent negotiation broadcasts to Baron Fontaine. He has agreed to abide by law and leave the fyrd at Pikeridge Pass, beyond the mountains, and come alone at all haste. The army’s proximity, three days’ march from Gathering Palace, can act as a threat against disorder in the streets. Though I’m sure we can expect a few house murders during conclave, as there always are. I’m sure this is satisfactory?
[Pause: 3 seconds]
TESSELL: Good. Now that you have all remembered yourselves and your solemn duties, I think we should call for food and vin. If memory serves, it will take time to choose a monarch.
‘After all that. All that castigating about following the plan, following orders, not improvising, being careful about exposure. Insisting on killing Rakkan as too much of a risk. He just… walks up and shoots the monarch.’
Sycorax decapitated the training dummy and sank her phase sword in its belly, spilling the simulated viscera.
She was in her natural form, or at least, the form she’d chosen as a default. Sheathed in her synskin bodysuit with the hood down.
Getting comfortable, Koln supposed. Using her rage to re-familiarise herself with the body she’d no doubt need shortly. In a way, Koln was doing the same – channelling frustration into the chart of hard-copy picts and notes she’d affixed to the inside wall of a command centre disguised as a shipping container. One wall opened like a drawbridge at the touch of a button, and the outside contained enough hazardous materials markings to dissuade even the most enthusiastic search party.
‘I’m not thrilled either,’ she answered, without looking up from her chart.
Sycorax rebuilt the training dummy and dismembered it again. ‘He said he wanted our expertise. That we would use all our skills. He lied. Just wanted to get close enough to take the shot himself. Claim the kill.’
‘He’s the commander. He can do what he likes…’ Koln trailed off. ‘Lycan-Bast is a first cousin, or second cousin?’
‘Second,’ said Sycorax, uppercutting a second dummy’s groin so the blade would impale the target’s genitals, intestines, stomach, and sever the connection with both lungs. ‘So you’ll just accept it?’
‘Can’t change it, I suppose,’ said Koln. ‘Better to keep an even head, see how we can turn this to our advantage.’
‘So he gets to be Sicarius Primus, and we get to figure out how to play speed-regicide with killers encased in Knight armour. Yuma got inside my head, you know. Ordered me. Made his will my own. Felt more than him, too. All those compulsions echoing from the Armigers. It gave me flashbacks to having that heretek Quivarian in my brain.’ She stopped, her blade pausing as she quartered a dummy like a game fowl. ‘How are you so Throne-damned calm?’
‘Active meditation protocols and focus-chants,’ Koln breathed through pursed lips, as if she were exhaling lho-stick smoke. ‘Aided by a few chemicals.’
‘Think I’ll join you,’ said Absolom Raithe.
He came out of the forward crew compartment, each footstep so quiet no one asked how he’d gotten inside without alerting them. His hair was wet, and combed back. Right arm shoved into a pocket of an exercise bodyglove. In his left hand, he’d managed to weave his fingers around the neck of an amasec bottle and thread three fingers into glasses.
‘You,’ said Sycorax. ‘Nice of you to show up. I see you took the time to shower.’
‘Took me a while getting back,’ he said, setting the bottle and glasses on an oil barrel and sitting back in a foldable camp chair. Koln thought she detected one eye twitch in a wince when he leaned back, but it was hard to tell with the Vindicare. ‘After I clapped the mask on a civilian and you smoked him – thanks for that, by the way – I got lost in the stampede. Found a hatch into the under-pens where they keep the ferocious animals, found a small effluent channel. Started as a ditch, became a pipe. Good thing I brought a throwaway rebreather in addition to the mask. Dumped me out in one of the poorer out-districts of Gathering Palace.’
‘We’re blown,’ said Sycorax, stepping close. Her blade, Koln noticed, was still out. ‘You spoke, face to face, with their counter-intelligence chief and then killed Yavarius-Khau in front of every high worthy on Dominion. Started a damned counter-revolution in the streets.’
‘I had to fight my way out with Rakkan,’ said Koln. ‘Started a fire to cover you. Killed a few peasants, I think. It was a bit overwhelming for our guest, he’s sleeping. But at least the court, for now, is ascribing it all to hinterland rebels. They think you’re an outside mercenary recruited by them, and that the attacks were coordinated. Rakkan is still suspected. He’s been summoned back to the palace where he can be watched.’
‘We owe a lot to those hinterlanders,’ said Raithe. He picked up the bottle in his left hand and poured three drinks, tall ones. ‘The operation was almost blown. Dask sniffed me out. Knew I wasn’t one of Sabban’s crew. Either way I’d have had to go loud to exfiltrate, but under the cover of an attack they’ll stop asking who I was with. Better for them to think the High Monarch was killed by rebels than by outside forces. And the mobs provided useful cover. I ran into a few fanatic barricades, but given that I was caked with filth, they let me go as a mute beggar.’
‘You just might be, when I get through with you,’ snarled Sycorax.
‘Have a drink, I always like one after hitting a target.’ He raised the glass in a toast. ‘To Yavarius-Khau, who still manages to surprise us.’
Sycorax backhanded the glass out of his hand. The crystal shattered on the deck.
‘You listen here, you sanctimonious arsehole.’ She brought the phase blade around beneath his chin. ‘What you did put all our lives in danger. Put the operation in danger. I had to fight that machine to keep it from killing you, and now it’s rejected me. The Rakkan identity is blown. Jester won’t even let me hook into it.’
‘I saw an opportunity and I took it. With your improvisational style, I thought you’d appreciate that.’
‘Groxshit. You saw an opportunity to get kill number fifty. Become Sicarius Primus. To hell with the rest of the operation, who cares if you died on exfiltration? We’d clean up your mess. As long as you got yours. That’s what you Vindicare do. One pull of the trigger, another mark on your rifle stock, and you’re gone. You never have to see the aftermath. That’s for others, you just get your kill.’
‘It wasn’t a kill,’ Raithe said, picking up another of the glasses. ‘You mind if I drink this?’
Sycorax blinked. ‘What?’
Koln turned away from her chart, no longer watching peripherally. ‘What do you mean, not a kill?’
‘I breached the hatch porthole. Took six penetrator rounds to do it. Was out of rounds so I reached in to do him with my hands. He was already dead. No kill.’
‘From shock?’ Koln asked. ‘Cardiac arrest during your attack? My bug recordings say he was in bad health.’
‘At first I thought so,’ Raithe said. Koln could see him looking Sycorax directly in the eyes. ‘Thought it was just a bad shoot. That he’d gone cardiac, or a piece of shattered window crystal embedded in his brain. But he was stone cold. Way past rigor mortis. Bloated, decaying. He’d been dead days, maybe weeks. Terminal before we even arrived here.’
Sycorax withdrew the blade, took a step back, and laughed. It was a cold, rueful sound.
‘I’ve been listening to broadcasts out of the conclave,’ said Koln. ‘Via the bug Sycorax planted on Yuma. They admitted to the house heads that Yavarius-Khau was mad, that they’d been isolating him and speaking for him to prevent a house war. They didn’t say he was dead, though. Maybe they were holding that back until the right time.’
‘Then who was speaking for him at the tournament?’ asked Sycorax. ‘That outburst. If he was dead…’
‘Someone in the court?’ Koln guessed. ‘Achara seemed surprised, but she’s clearly capable of deception.’
‘The Arch-Maintenancer cut it off,’ Sycorax said. ‘Maybe she triggered it in the first place. Or Dask, who’s clearly capable of something that ruthless.’
‘Does it matter?’ asked Raithe. ‘Given that they’re in conclave, any stratagem that involves Yavarius-Khau being alive is moot. And if a faction tries to wield the power of the mob during the conclave, we’ll know who is responsible. Right now, we have to move fast and hard to put our man or woman on the throne.’
‘We have no plan,’ said Sycorax.
‘Koln has a plan,’ said Raithe. He took a sip of his amasec. ‘At least she’s making one.’
‘Things are in flux, but I have ideas. Lord Bazile Daggar-Kraine is by far our best candidate. The most pro-Imperial and with the right bloodline. But being the son of Baron Kraine will mean Stryder will have several other preferred candidates. They won’t like putting a direct child of a Rau House head in the pilot throne. We can’t just kill one or two to clear the way for him. He likely won’t be elected in the first few rounds of voting. This is going to be fluid, and it’ll take more than one sanction.’
‘Sycorax,’ said Raithe. ‘You wanted me to trust you two. And we’re going to have to work on the fly. Hitting multiple targets, hours apart, and adapting to a fluid situation. Avaaris monitors the conclave and designates the targets, you and I serve as hitters.’ Raithe pulled his right hand out of his pocket and rotated the arm in an overhead swim-stroke. Koln saw his jaw tense, teeth pressing together. ‘Think we’re up to it? I do.’
Sycorax smiled, tapped her teeth with a fingernail, mulling.
‘Are you all right?’ Koln asked, jutting a chin at Raithe’s shoulder.
‘Perfectly,’ he said. ‘Just stretching it. What do you say, Callidus? Ready for a little improvisation?’
‘The king is dead,’ said Sycorax, smiling her mocking, lopsided smile and raising her glass in a toast. ‘Long live the king.’
THIRTY-TWO
HAWTHORN: We have been arguing for nine hours. We should bring it to a vote.
KRAINE: No.
HAWTHORN: Why not? Because you know he’ll lose?
KRAINE: Tarn-Kegga is a brilliant candidate.
YUMA: He is impressive on the field. Current Summer Champion.
HAWTHORN: It is midwinter. Past midwinter. His term as champion has lapsed.
ACHARA: Well… that may not be accurate. The Summer Champion passes the Banner of Victory to the Midwinter Champion at the end of the tournament. That is when he ceases to be the champion.
KRAINE: And gives up his extra electoral vote. Therefore he still has it.
HAWTHORN: That is absurd. No one would stand for the fate of this planet being decided on such ceremonial trivialities.
ACHARA: It’s not trivial, it’s tradition. A sacred institution.
HAWTHORN: You wouldn’t consider it so sacred if Kegga favoured Stryder. And even so you don’t have the votes. Do you, Baron Kraine?
FONTAINE: He does not.
DASK: No. Kegga is a good warrior, but doesn’t have the constitution for rule. Even calling him Tarn-Kegga sends him into a fury.
TESSELL: Agreed. He is a brute.
KRAINE: And if I offered the Duchy of Waveshatter?
HAWTHORN: Waveshatter? That barren rock? Waveshatter has no reason to exist but to keep shellfish on my plate. If I’m selling the crown, I want more.
KRAINE: What about Raderfall Cairn?
[Pause: 2 seconds]
HAWTHORN: More.
‘Renauldus Tarn-Kegga,’ said Koln, pegging a pict-capture up with a dagger. He was a lantern-jawed man with thinning hair and a mocking augmetic eye. ‘Not unexpected, given he’s the Summer Champion.’
‘Is he well liked?’ asked Sycorax.
‘No, strangely enough,’ Koln responded. ‘He’s fairly open in his preference for Rau. At least that’s what Rakkan told me in our briefings.’
All had agreed that, with Yavarius-Khau’s death, Rakkan’s role was largely over, and any further impersonation only risked exposure. They’d packed him and Gwynne off to their quarters in Gathering Palace to fulfil the summons, ensuring that when the escort came, both Koln and Raithe were seen alive and well. All were happy to distance Rakkan from this part of the operation. After all, killing the High Monarch was a sin Rakkan could probably live with given their history, but Koln argued he might not be so sanguine about eliminating, say, Lady Lycan-Bast or Mauvec Kawe.
‘Kraine is holding a snap vote,’ said Raithe. ‘Hoping that civic instability and time pressure might buy him a vote from Arch-Maintenancer Tessell and he can bribe Hawthorn with territory. Will it work?’
‘It might,’ said Koln. ‘The vox-snatchers I planted in the palace are paying dividends. Kegga has separatist feelings, which Hawthorn shares, and she may put that above Stryder interests if Kraine signs over enough domains so she can walk away smiling. Kegga isn’t young, after all, and in the meantime, Stryder increases in power. Do you want my estimation?’
‘I’d like to hear it,’ Raithe nodded.
‘Kraine knows this is his best shot, and that to put it through it needs to happen quickly. Hawthorn knows that too. Conclave has broken for the night, but I’ve detected messengers running back and forth between Kraine and Hawthorn’s cells, and one messenger from Hawthorn to Dask.’
‘Hawthorn’s thinking about it,’ said Sycorax. ‘She’s planning to squeeze Kraine for all he’s worth, then throw her and Dask’s votes to Kegga.’
‘Precisely,’ said Koln.
‘So tell us about Kegga,’ said Raithe.
‘He’s a beast-fighter, a hunter. Famous for it. His win in the summer tournament was due to tearing apart a carnosaur with his gauntlet.’
‘Where is he?’ said Sycorax.
‘He keeps an exotic game preserve,’ said Koln. ‘Fifty miles south of here, out past the fens. Predation Manor. Gets most of his stock through the Sabban line, I understand.’
‘I’ve got this one,’ said Sycorax, then turned to Raithe. ‘You take the next.’
predation manor
22:06 dominion standard
Like the fiercest animals, Renauldus Tarn-Kegga was most active at night.
That’s when he preferred to stalk, to mount the noble Knight Horned Hunter and sprint out on the moorland, gunning down the flocks of razorkin he specifically bred so that he always had dangerous things to kill.
But special animals – the particularly dangerous or illegal specimens – were kept down here in the dungeon menagerie. A place of reinforced cages, chains rigged on pulleys, and the sweet stench of butchered meat.
Kegga knelt in front of the cell, ensuring that he kept six feet away from the bars. He held his chin in his right hand, as he often did while thinking, his index finger massaging his bottom lip.
He was watching how the beast moved.
