MacRuder pointed with his other hand. "Minister, if you
will take a chair at the table over there, we'll do our best to make you comfortable."
"You're pressing your luck, MacRuder." Her voice went flat. "You expect me to sit at a portable table-in the middle of this… this crowd? Enough of this, take me to Sinklar Fist. Now!"
The ring of blasters clattered metallically.
"Easy, people," MacRuder ordered, giving Ily an anxious glance. "Sink would be very upset if you blew the shit out of the Regan's diplomatic envoy. The First gave his orders. We don't question them."
Ily walked to the table, brushed dust off the seat, and sat, knowing her black dress would look like five shades of hell. Her ring of-escorts? — backed off, never letting her out of their sight while they crouched, ever vigilant.
Why didn't I listen to Rysta? So help me, Blessed Gods, get me out of this and I swear, I'll roast this planet into magma!
Ily lasted an hour, her anger building to a fuming rage. Finally she handed her escutcheon to MacRuder. "This is my authority. Either I see Sinklar Fist… or this is over. "
MacRuder studied the jessant-de-lis and handed it back. "It's the Regan crest. So? It doesn't pass water down here." Ily stood, pacing her anger out. "You know, don't you,
that with one order I could melt this damn planet to slag. You people don't seem to realize it, but your fate hangs by one thin little thread. I'm warning you, if you don't take me to Sinklar Fist now, I'm walking out of here and you can take the wrath of the Emperor."
"Bring 'em on," MacRuder cried with a gesture. "We slapped the hell out of five of your best, lady. Let's see how the gawddam Emperor and the rest of his troops stand up to Sink! Let's see!"
"You're dead," Ily replied coldly, starting for the door. Can I go? Will they let me?
"There will be no more dying." The commanding voice rang out over the deepening silence in the room.
Ily turned, anger still welling as she sought to turn her wrath on this new irritant. A man stepped through a small access door and closed it behind him.
He didn't amount to much-a runt of a youth. He wore loose hanging combat
armor that bore no adornment or
insignia of rank. Unruly black hair stuck out from his head in a mussed thatch. His hollow cheeks gave his full jaw a bony look. The nose jutted straight and thin over wide lips. His forehead rose high and smooth, as if to advertise his intelligence.
Then those eyes pinned her. One steel gray, the other tawny-yellow, they studied her and she could read a curious vulnerability mixed with a strange dominance. Though she could define no reason, he appeared remarkable, magneticas if an aura of competence and strength suffused him.
What quality did he project which made him appear so familiar? Where had she seen him before?
"Mac," his voice sounded kind and reproving. "Must you always allow your passions to get the best of you?" He smiled warmly at MacRuder, and Ily watched the man crumble. "And the same for the rest of you. Your hatred ill suits you. Now go on and leave us to find an end to Regan fighting Regan. Mhitshul, see if you can find two cups of stassa for the Minister and myself. We'll take them in the LC."
The guards, so hostile to her, so deadly in their rage, slipped away, cowed by his simple words.
Sinklar turned and cocked is head, odd eyes taking Ily's measure. He smiled timidly, almost shyly. "I'm sorry, Minister Takka. Please, don't blame them. Things have been difficult here. They need time to forget the dead. We have all been wounded… one way or another." And she noted the pain, the bitter anger and grief straining under an iron control.
Ily walked beside him as he turned his steps toward the LC. "And forgive me for being late. I went for a walk earlier, trying to put things in perspective. I needed time to think… to remember…. Well, that doesn't matter. I guess I lost track of time."
She couldn't help but note how the entire room had gone silent, men and women, soldiers and Targans, all had eyes only for Sinklar Fist. She could have been invisible for all they cared.
She walked up the ramp of the LC, idly noting that it bore Second Targan Division markings. The inside looked just as battered and tacky as the outside. She followed him past rows of acceleration benches and ducked through a
hatch in the forward bulkhead. A thin pallet supported a threadbare bedroll on an acceleration bench to one side while a fold-out mess table and plastic benches filled the opposite alcove.
A sad light animated his incredible eyes. "Welcome to my quarters. This also serves as my office and command post. We had a nice headquarters — but I'm afraid your fleet redesigned it."
IIy slipped down on the recessed plastic bench while Sinklar seated himself opposite her. Mhitshul came trotting up the aisle, two cups of stassa steaming in his hands. He ducked through the hatch and handed one to Ily — venom in his eyes — and settled Sinklar's carefully before him.
// Mhitshul had a tail, he'd be wagging it! Ily reached into her pouch and pulled a monitor, sticking it into the stassa. She relaxed at a clean reading.
Amusement tempered the pain in Fist's eyes. "Mhitshul might not like you Minister Takka, but he would never poison you. It would be detrimental to our cause."
At the word poison, Mhitshul had stiffened, face white. He looked his loathing at Ily as if — by suggesting such a thing — she were as monstrous as a Cytean cobra. Whatever else these rebels of Fist's might be, they weren't deep, or steeped in high-stakes intrigue.
"You will be quite safe," Sinklar continued. "I give you my word. You may go where you will on Targa. Any who molest you or harass you will deal with me — directly." He looked up. "Mhitshul, see to it that such information and clearance are disseminated."
"Yes, sir. I'll attend to it as soon as the Minister leaves." Mhitshul replied woodenly.
"Attend to it now, please."
Mhitshul might have been ordered to jump from a tall building for all the enthusiasm he showed, but he turned on his heel and walked back toward the ramp.
"I will accept your offer with reservations," Ily told him. "I can't say the greeting by your people was at all conducive to good will." She picked up the stassa and sipped.
His stare went vacant. "We've been through a great deal. We have been betrayed. watched friends and loved ones die for no reason beyond politics in a faraway capital. Can
you blame them for feeling alienated? They have survived, Minister Takka — despite all the odds."
"I see."
"I sincerely hope you do. The Minister of Internal Security would hardly be drinking stassa with a… shall we say, rebel… in a situation like this were it not for extraordinary circumstances."
"What do I call you? Though you are officially a Sergeant, do I call you First Fist? Commander? What?"
His face reddened with embarrassment. "Sinklar will be fine. I don't make pretensions about rank. That was for another era."
"Another era?"
He nodded, expression changing, knowledge and power in his bicolor stare. "ree Space changed when the First Targan Division didn't roll over and die. The last gasp of the old guard echoed in Hauws' blaster shots as he blew away Weebouw — and sealed the fate of the Third Ashtan Assault Division."
He sighed, eyes weary as he looked at the stassa cup in his hands. "Two decisions could have been made when we took Rysta's five Divisions. First, orbital bombardment might have been employed to destroy the threat we pose. I don't underrate what we haye become. Indeed, not even Targa's production would have been worth the risk of letting us loose. The other option, the second choice, brings you to me." He raised his eyes. "Very well Minister. I agree to most of your terms."
"You haven't heard them yet," Ily blurted.