‘Of course, nauarchus. Umm – why?’
‘Because she may have a better chance of survival aboard than if we leave her here. She deserves that much. But bind her hands and feet, in case her sense of duty gets in the way again.’
‘Yes, nauarchus.’
Glancing over at Freydis, Kerys saw that Höd was actually casting a shadow now, from the soft features of the woman’s young face, behind her visor. ‘Let’s hope, in the end, that all our heroics aren’t necessary after all … Come on, let’s get on with it.’
Eilidh, piloting the small kernel-driven landing yacht bearing her fractious and complicated companions, was ordered to descend to the third of the surface complex’s compounds, centred on Earthshine’s heavy bunker. But she wasn’t to land until the operations at the tree and at the Celyn were well under way, the guards drawn off. So after she had guided the yacht through its entry into the Martian air she hovered, waiting for a final confirming order from Quintus Fabius, who watched from the Malleus Jesu.
Mardina, surrounded by her family and companions, carefully followed the progress of the military operation on the ground. It wasn’t just that her life depended on its outcome. She was actually interested in it, the first genuine action she had ever been a part of.
She felt she was learning constantly, not least from Quintus Fabius and his officers as they had studied this strange surface target, and he had improvised his plan of attack. Nothing specific about that, she thought, could ever be taught in an academy, or on a training ground, or even on manoeuvres out in the field. All training could do would be to leave you with a certain suppleness of mind – suppleness, wrapped around a bony core of determination. Quintus Fabius had never lost sight of the ultimate goal of this operation, for all its confusion and complexity: to find a way to stop the ice ball, Höd, hitting the planet Mars, if he possibly could.
And now here she herself was, involved in this horribly ambiguous part of the operation herself. She was glad to be involved in the action. But she wished she was doing something simpler! Morally clearer! Even if more dangerous. She would have loved to bowl across the surface of Mars with Titus Valerius in his testudo, firing missiles at the sacred giant tree, or to storm that waiting spacecraft with Kerys and Freydis …
Not that there wasn’t danger enough in her own assignment. The yacht was broadcasting continual identifying messages, and images of the craft’s occupants: crucially, the faces of Beth and Mardina. All this was an attempt to get through to Earthshine, to persuade him to let them through. Fine. But it was all terribly flaky. They were so exposed in this yacht, hanging here in the air. It only needed a few of the ground troops to behave in an unexpected way – in fact, to follow their orders – and it could all go wrong. Mardina herself had watched as one lone officer had stood by her post at the spacecraft, the Celyn, and held up the nauarchus Kerys.
Worse than that, however, was the fact that in this fragile little ship Mardina was stuck with her family, among other lunatics. Her mother Beth, who could hardly bear to look at her father Ari. The strange slave boy Chu Yuen sitting as ever in his submissive posture, eyes averted, his pack containing the mysterious machine Collius cradled in his lap as if it were the most precious treasure in the world – well, Mardina supposed, for him it was, as it was probably all that kept him from being cast down into some even worse situation than this. And, to complete the party, here at her own insistence was Academician Penny Kalinski, a woman who Mardina, her former pupil, was very fond of – but she was so hopelessly old. What was Penny doing descending into a combat zone with an asteroid about to be dropped on her grey head?
This strange crew, all save Eilidh at the controls, were strapped into couches set in a rough circle in this small, cramped cabin, all facing each other, all trying to avoid the others’ eyes.
But at last the message came from the Malleus that they were clear to land.
It was Stef Kalinski who spoke to them from the ship. As the operation had sorted itself out, she had volunteered her services to Quintus Fabius as capcom for the yacht, as she put it, a strange pre-jonbar word that nobody understood, except possibly Penny. Now her voice called clear and strong from the speaker. ‘We finally got word from the bunker. Earthshine can see you. He says you’re free to land. You should see a docking port, suitable for ships of Roman, Brikanti or Xin design. Take her down when you’re ready, Eilidh.’
‘Thank you, Colonel Kalinski—’
And suddenly Earthshine was here. Standing in the cabin before them. He was tall, urbane, wearing a suit that was not unlike Brikanti garb, Mardina thought, but was too smart, sharp – too finely made – and his shoes were polished leather. He wore a brooch on one lapel, a bit of carved stone at which Ari stared greedily.
It had to be him. Mardina had never seen him before but she knew of no other being with such powers of projection. Yet there was an air of unreality about him, a translucence, a hint of an inner golden glow. When he smiled, even his teeth shone faintly golden.
Still, this was an intrusion into a military vessel. Eilidh reached for a weapon.
Ari Guthfrithson called out sharply, ‘Be calm! This is not real. He is an image – like a reflection in a mirror. And he can no more harm you than could such a reflection.’
Penny glared. ‘Well, don’t try your tricks on me, you chimera. How are you doing this? This craft doesn’t have the technological substrate to support virtual reality.’ She used the English phrase.
‘But I do,’ the ColU said mournfully from his satchel, which Chu held to his chest. ‘I received a signal from the ground, a request for interfacing, transmission capacity. I would have warned you all—’
‘But I overrode you, didn’t I?’ Earthshine said. ‘You are just a farm robot after all. Well, not even that any more. Whereas I, you see, am in control of the situation. As always.’
‘No,’ said Penny Kalinski. ‘You can’t grab hold of this ship, can you? Because it’s too primitive for your interfaces.’
‘I could shoot you down in an instant.’
‘But you won’t,’ Ari said. ‘Because she’s on board.’ He gestured at Beth; Mardina’s mother, as so often when challenged like this, was shut in on herself, angry, resentful. ‘And her – Mardina, your great-granddaughter.’
‘You seek to manipulate me, in your crude ways.’
‘It worked, didn’t it?’ Penny laughed, showing the remains of her teeth. ‘For all you’re so powerful, you have human weaknesses still.’
‘Weaknesses? Would you call a capacity for loyalty to one’s family a weakness? Oh, but I forgot; you’ve spent most of your life fighting against your own rejection by your impossible sister, haven’t you? What do you know, then, of family?’
She was still glaring at him. ‘Only that you helped me rediscover it once. In Paris, remember? Shame on you for speaking to me this way now, Earthshine.’
And to Mardina’s astonishment it was Earthshine who dropped his head first.
Ari watched this exchange, fascinated and amused. ‘Well, well. Perhaps it was worth bringing along this wizened matriarch after all.’
‘We do have history,’ Earthshine said. ‘So here we are. I believe I know what you want. But why don’t you tell me, in your own words?’
‘We want to know what you’re doing here, Earthshine,’ Penny said clearly. ‘Here on Mars. And we want to know why you’re bringing an asteroid crashing down on this planet – on your own head, apparently. Though I’m quite certain you don’t intend to die here – if to “die” means anything to you at all.’
‘Oh, I think it does—’