CHAPTER SIX

Whitechapel

Apollo

Clan Ice Hellion Occupation Zone

13 September 3071

It was an illusion.

All of it.

Connor Rood swallowed for what felt like the hundredth time. The rolling gait of the new OmniMech he’d chosen was different from his old Kit Fox. The speed was the same, but the ’Mech massed more than twice his last ’Mech. The feeling of being large and slow was an illusion, but it was convincing.

Like so many of the illusions that kept the Ice Hellions in the Inner Sphere.

“I will never hear the end of this.”

“Sir?”

Connor grimaced. He punched a button on his com panel—the wrong button—and then found the right one. “Nothing, Lira.” A glance at his HUD showed her repaired Shadow Cat still where it should be, thirty meters to the left and back of his ’Mech. His ’Mech. All sixty-five tons of it.

A Linebacker.

Idris is laughing at me.

He had put his bondsman in charge of locating a suitable replacement OmniMech after Bone Norman. There hadn’t been a need for a ’Mech during the debacle on Wotan, and he hadn’t fought directly on any of the worlds since. He’d been stuck in offices and command centers and the armored battle direction centers of DropShips, overseeing battles and Trials and bidding. And arguing, via HPG, with the Khan.

Idris had come back when they’d been inbound to Apollo. Star Colonel Brendon Wick had handled the bidding for the world, but Idris had said he’d found a suitable ’Mech and had it transferred to Rapacious’ ’Mech bays. Rood had found time to review it just after the DropShip had landed, when Wick had led his forces out for the formal Trial.

“You are joking,” Rood had said.

“I am not,” Idris had replied. 

“That is a heavy ’Mech.”

“Yes.”

“I am an Ice Hellion.”

“Yes.”

“I cannot drive that.”

“We Hellions,” Idris had said, and there hadn’t been a catch in his voice for all that he’d been a Hellion for only a matter of weeks, “value speed, quiaff?”

“Aff.” Rood had stood looking up at the Linebacker, arms crossed.

“The Linebacker is as fast as the Kit Fox you used to pilot.”

“That is—” Rood stopped.

“Does not Khan Montose pilot a Stormcrow?” When Rood had nodded, Idris had continued. “This ’Mech is only ten tons heavier. Does ten tons matter so much?”

Rood had stood there, pondering for a minute or two. Then he had turned and, taking the bondsman’s hand, cut one of the three bondcords with his knife. He’d replaced the knife in the hilt-down sheath at the small of his back and clapped Idris on the shoulder.

“We shall see,” was all he had said.

As he racked the Linebacker in Rapacious’ bay, Connor Rood tried not to imagine the other things that seemed illusory to him just then. There were too many. He knew when he rode the lift down to the bay floor he’d find Idris and Ephraim Cage waiting for him, fresh with another batch of HPG dispatches. More bad news, almost certainly, from Alpha Galaxy and Khan Montose. There was little to complain about his own task force. Wotan was behind him, thank the Founder.

He tapped the Linebacker’s reactor to standby and tried not to grind his teeth. Wotan. I will not think about Wotan. He hadn’t been able to crack the nut that was Wotan before he had to move on to oversee the assaults on Bensinger and Toland. He’d been distracted by those duties while the Khan destroyed the flower of the Ice Hellion Clan on Evciler. Rood undid the clasps for this neurohelmet and racked it in its bin above his command console. Perhaps he should have led the Trial of Possession for Apollo himself.

I could have worked some of this frustration off. But no. Brendon Wick had helped him rebuild Beta Galaxy from the near-shattered formation it had been when Sellen Cage left office to the force that had claimed a sizable portion of the Jade Falcons’ occupation zone by itself. He deserved a chance to earn his won glory. The fighting in the OZ would lead—had led—to casualties. A Galaxy command slot might open—Wick deserved to be ready for it. That was part of leadership, loyalty. Wick had served him well. Giving him the chance to impress the warriors he might someday lead was a demonstration of Rood’s loyalty to him.

The Linebacker’s hatch opened smoothly. The OmniMech’s codex was fairly clear—a Falcon Star Colonel had taken the machine as isorla during a Trial against the Wolves, and the Hellions had done the same before the ’Mech had been used in combat. Rood smiled as he climbed out onto the gantry. Perhaps there’d be a Trial of Grievance in his future and he’d be able to try it out for real.

He’d been correct in the cockpit. Both his bondsman and Ephraim were waiting when the ’Mech gantry lift deposited him near the Linebacker’s right foot. Both men held noteputers—which meant the HPG reports he’d been fearing were in.

“How fares the Khan?” he asked. Then he held up his hand, looking past the two warriors. Several men in gray technician caste jumpsuits stood behind them, eyes down, waiting. “Technician?”

The lead man, a small, older freeborn technician with a shock of eerily-white hair, stepped forward. “My Khan?”

Rood frowned. “Your name?”

“Kiley, sir.”

“You are assigned to this ’Mech?”

“My team is, yes sir.” He gestured to the three other freebirths behind him. “We wanted to inquire after its performance. If there are any calibrations the Khan would like…?”

Rood sniffed. “The ’Mech is perfect, Kiley,” he said. He met the eyes of each of the technicians. “My compliments to your team.” He nodded to the lead technician and waited while the men shuffled past toward the gantry. Then he turned back to Idris and Cage. “My apologies.”

Idris grinned, looking from the backs of the techs to Rood and back. Cage said nothing, but his expression was grim. Rood loosened the seam of his combat suit and waited. Cage held out the noteputer he held. Rood took it.

“Brendon Wick is dead,” Ephraim Cage said.

“What?”

“Killed in the Trial,” Idris said. “Which we won, by the way.”

“How?”

“A Gauss slug to the cockpit,” Idris said. Rood looked from him to Cage.

“It was quick,” the DropShip captain said.

Rood drew in a deep breath. Brendon Wick had been his friend for many years. A warrior lived on the knife’s edge, of course. He didn’t mourn his death in the mopey sense that a Spheroid would. That does not mean it is not still a shock. He looked at Cage again. “The giftake?”

“Secure.”

Rood nodded. A warrior’s giftake was the genetic sample that would be returned to the Hellions’ genetic repository on Hector for use in the eugenic breeding program. Brendon Wick’s prominence in Beta Galaxy—and his possession of the Wick Bloodname—had already secured his place in the breeding program. There would be future sibkos spawned from his material. It was the goal of every trueborn Clan warrior. A place in the breeding program, a few words in the Remembrance, the epic poem of each Clan…these were as close to immortality as a Clansman could come.

Rood shook himself. Many places in the breeding program are being earned here, he told himself. “The Trial?”

“Won,” Cage said, inclining his head toward Idris. “As your bondsman said.”

“Losses?”

Cage shrugged. “As expected, save Star Colonel Wick.”

 As expected. Rood lifted the noteputer, but only stared at its blank, unpowered face. We speak of the death of Ice Hellion warriors as expectations. The dichotomy had bothered him for some time during his sibko years. The life of a trueborn Ice Hellion warrior—of any Clan warrior, he’d later realized, trueborn or freeborn—was precious. They were highly-trained, genetically-enhanced specimens. But they were expendable—more, they were trained, grown and equipped to spend themselves for the Clan.

Precious gems. To be thrown against the diamond-hard wall of war until they broke.

“For the world of Amaris,” Rood muttered.

Idris cleared his throat. “The formal reports are there,” he said, gesturing toward the noteputer Rood held, “but we have also claimed Botany Bay and Von Strang’s World.” He paused to lick his lips. “Three more worlds for the Hellions, with Apollo.”

“Three worlds,” Rood said. He felt his lip curl into a sneer, despite his best efforts to control it. “And what three worlds. A Periphery station named for an ancient penal colony. Apollo, homeworld of the bloodline of the greatest horror ever to blight the human race.” He waved broadly with his free hand. “And, of course, the world claimed and named for Vampire von Strang, who might have been Amaris’ greatest monster.” He barked a bitter laugh. “Imagine our honor, brothers,” he said. “We have claimed the dirt from the boot heel of history.”

Ephraim Cage frowned, glancing at Idris. The small man was standing slightly bent forward, his hands clasped behind his back. His lips moved and pursed, but he didn’t speak. His eyes focused on the scuffed bay floor between them. Rood waited, but the DropShip commander still didn’t speak. Rood considered, and then let it go. He looked at his bondsman.

“What word from Evciler?”

“There is a holo from the Khan,” Idris said. He met Rood’s eyes evenly, with no fear. As if he were challenging him. That means he has seen the message and, knowing its contents will not please me, wants to see if I will kill the messenger. 

“And?”

“Last Chance and Lackhove.”

Rood blinked. Both were Jade Falcon-held worlds. “She retreats toward them?”

“Neg.” Idris waited until Rood raised an eyebrow. “They are to be Beta Galaxy’s next targets.”

Rood closed his eyes. “And the Khan?”

“Remains on Evciler with Alpha Galaxy.”

His right arm snapped out, flinging the noteputer away from him. The flat device spun in a shallow arc before shattering against the armored bay wall. His lips were compressed, holding his voice inside by conscious effort. It would not do to curse the Khan for the freeborn whelp of a mentally-handicapped laborer’s incompetent sister in front of anyone. Not even these two men.

It was also too tame a profanity.

She is killing us. Rood opened his eyes.

Idris looked toward where the noteputer had shattered, then grinned at Ephraim Cage. Cage shook his head slightly and shrugged.

Idris held out the noteputer he’d carried. “We brought a spare.”

Nadir Jump Point

Steelton

Clan Hell’s Horses Occupation Zone

19 September 3071

“That is not supposed to be here.”

Star Colonel Tanda Ho Jang didn’t have to ask what Galaxy Commander Damon Hawkins had meant by “that.” The offending object hung in Impaler’s combat information center holotank. Tanda was too far away to read the alphanumerics scrolling alongside the floating image, but she recognized the Clan insignia easily. It was a standard Clan communications satellite. They were often left at a system’s jump point to announce possession of the system to whomever arrived. She’d seen many on Delta Galaxy’s path through the Jade Falcon observation zone. All of them had flown the green, square-bottomed insignia of the Jade Falcons.

Except this one. It showed a horsehead. 

Clan Hell’s Horses.

Freebirth.

The technicians running the CIC were carefully—and, Tanda knew, consciously—silent. Damon Hawkins’ temper was legendary. She regarded him now, surreptitiously from the side. He was a small, squat man, with black hair just beginning to show streaks of silver. His shoulders were wide and thickly-muscled, but his posture was that of a lumberer, like a bear. Tanda imagined that was a legacy of his past. In his youth he’d been captured from the Ghost Bears and made a warrior of the Ice Hellions. It was rare—not unheard of, but rare—for an abtakha warrior, as they were called, to rise so high in their new Clan. Hawkins had earned every position. 

“It is confirmed, Galaxy Commander,” a technician said. “The satellite is broadcasting a Hell’s Horses IFF.”

Hawkins snorted. “I can see, can I not?” He waved a hand angrily at the holotank. “What else?”

“It is a looped transmission,” the tech said. His voice was a half-octave higher, his tone more hesitant. Tanda glanced at him but didn’t let her gaze linger. “It announces the Horses’ possession of Steelton, and orders anyone not cleared to depart immediately or face attack.” The technician stood at the edge of the holotank’s entryway. “Nothing else.”

“The Watch had this world in Jade Falcon hands, quiaff?” Hawkins asked.

“Aff, Galaxy Commander,” Tanda said. She gestured the technician away while Hawkins was engrossed in staring at the satellite image. “Apparently our information is out of date.”

“Damn.” Hawkins abruptly stood up straighter, slapping his palms against his trousers. His toes were hooked beneath a staple in the floor to hold himself in place; Impaler had not yet begun to accelerate in-system, which meant they stood in microgravity. “I had hoped to continue our streak.”

Tanda understood what he had meant. Aside from Wotan—damned Wotan, the Sargasso of this bloody part of space—Delta Galaxy had proven itself exceptionally well in the invasion. Losses were heavier than they had predicted, to be sure, but losses were always heavier than predicted. One often wondered if whomever made the predictions had ever been in combat. Morale in the Galaxy was high, as the warriors were expecting to crush another Jade Falcon garrison and move on. Steelton was an important world, heavily industrialized. Taking it for the Ice Hellions would have been quite a coup for the Galaxy Commander. And his subordinates, Tanda let herself note, especially those who have just won command of their Clusters. 

It would have also secured valuable production facilities for the Hellions. Resupply was getting thin. Greater than expected losses, combined with longer campaigns and the general reluctance of several of the Falcon garrisons to engage in quick, stand-up fights, meant that they were getting critically low on expendables. Isorla captured from the Falcons made up for some of that use, but not all.

But the Hell’s Horses being in possession made taking Steelton a different thing entirely. There was no way that Hawkins would order an attack on the Horses—the alliance between the Hellions and the Horses was quiet, to be sure, but it was strong. They shared a common enemy in the Jade Falcons. Tanda opened her mouth—

“We will do it,” Hawkins said.

Tanda closed her mouth. “Sir?” Do what? Withdraw? Of course we will—

“Attack.” Hawkins raised a clenched fist at the Hell’s Horses satellite. “We proceed as planned, Star Colonel.”

“But—”

Hawkins turned and looked at her. His eyes—blue, almost gray eyes—met hers. “Yes, Star Colonel?”

“We cannot attack a Hell’s Horses world, Galaxy Commander,” she blurted. What was he thinking? He’d been there—Founder’s bones, it had been Hawkins himself who’d face the Hell’s Horses Khan James Cobb in the Trial of Possession!—on Nouveaux Paris when Khan Montose and Khan Cobb had agreed to the alliance. “The Khans—”

“Are not here.”

Tanda blinked. “Sir, you were there. You know the Khan’s mind on this matter. We are allied to the Hell’s Horses. They are striking the Wolves, we the Jade Falcons.” She stopped and kicked loose of the staple holding her to the deck. A small motion sent her toward the holotank entryway, where she triggered and then sealed the hatch so no one in the CIC would hear. “Sir, please. This is madness. Khan Rood will challenge you to a Trial of Grievance.”

Hawkins shrugged. “Perhaps he will. But I think rather, when I have secured Steelton for the Hellions, the Khans will say nothing. We will challenge the Horses to a proper Trial of Possession. Alliance or not, trial by combat is part of the Way of the Clans. What the Hellion desires, the Hellion takes. The Horses would do the same.” He barked a short laugh. “Consider the situation, Star Colonel. Steelton was a Jade Falcon world. Now it is a Hell’s Horses world. The Horses have already abrogated the agreement. They were to take Wolf worlds, quiaff?”

“Aff,” Tanda said, pulling herself down to rest her feet lightly against the floor. 

“Inform the Star Colonels that bidding will commence once the Horses have replied to my batchall.” He glanced at the Horses satellite, floating peacefully in the midst of the gathered power of the Ice Hellion’s Delta Galaxy. The predatory shape of the Fredasa-class corvette Swift Bait floated behind the satellite from where Tanda stood, watching. She reached down, unaware she was doing it, and wiped suddenly-sweating palms against her snow-camo jumpsuit. 

“As you order, Galaxy Commander,” she said, triggering the hatch. She didn’t look to see if any of the technicians looked up. She pulled herself out of the holotank as Hawkins shouted orders to Impaler’s crew past her. She’d almost made the armored lift doors when the tones announcing imminent acceleration echoed down the corridor. She made sure her feet were firmly planted as Impaler’s massive drives lit off, pushing the Lola III-class destroyer toward Steelton.

This is madness. But even as she thought it, another part of her mind was arguing. Hawkins is right. This is the Way of the Clans. If the Hell’s Horses have claimed a Jade Falcon world, perhaps we are right to claim it from them.

Would the Khans see it that way?

No part of Tanda Ho Jang’s mind would answer that.

Whitechapel

Apollo

Clan Ice Hellion Occupation Zone

19 September 3071

While he waited for the file to download, Connor Rood examined his hand. He flipped it back and forth, looking at the lighter skin on his palm and the darker skin on his knuckles. He flipped it back and forth, as if it were a freebirth child’s toy. There is a commentary to be made there, he told himself. Something about the duality of nature. What the ancients called yin and yang. Then he chuckled.

Or perhaps you simply cannot decide between an open-palmed slap or a backhanded one, the next time you are alone in a room with that damnable woman.

The door to his office slid open and Idris stepped through. Rood waved him to a chair and pointed to the small holo emitter on the desk. “Any moment,” he said. Idris nodded and sat down. A chime rang from the desktop. Rood touched a control and the holo sprang to life, painting the head and shoulders of a woman over the desktop. 

“I said no the last time, and I meant it, Connor,” the image of Raina Montose said.

Rood tapped the pause key and drew in a deep breath. The frozen image of his Khan stared at him, her eyes accusatory. He leaned forward, looking closely. The resolution on the holo was high enough to be lifelike, and he could see every centimeter of her face. Her skin was pale and drawn, with a sheen of light sweat across her forehead and down her throat. Her eyes had a hint of madness—not the usual, near-fanatical drive toward whatever goal she had at the time that Connor Rood knew well, but something more—and her pupils were dilated. She is on painkillers, he realized. As he’d been informed. Enough that it must be—must it not?—be affecting her judgment.

Her hair was unkempt, with strands of the night-black mop falling from her temples and around her ears. There was a crinkle between her eyes, atop her nose. Rood unconsciously rubbed the same area on his own face. That crinkle meant stress—more stress than could be hid beneath stoicism. Raina Montose was worried. He released the pause key.

“We will not withdraw,” she continued. “Your orders stand. You will take Beta Galaxy to Lackhove and Last Chance, and claim them both for the Hellion. By the time you have finished that, I will have reconsolidated Alpha and Zeta Prime, and Hawkins will have taken Steelton from the Falcons. We will then move to the next phase.”

“The next phase?” Rood whispered. He knew this wasn’t a conversation—he knew he was talking to a recording and that his bondsman was sitting across the desk, watching him speak to uncaring, unhearing adjusted photons. He didn’t care. “The next phase is death, woman.”

“There will be no more talk of retreat,” Montose’s image said. She stopped for a moment, looking down at something outside the holo’s field. Notes? Her hands? Some ethereal demon her drug-addled mind has concocted like a Goliath Scorpion’s visions? Rood chewed his lower lip. “You are saKhan of Clan Ice Hellion. I expect you to follow orders and support mine. The Clan cannot afford to have us divided, not when we are so close to victory.” Her eyes came back up. “Persist in this disloyalty, and I will have you challenged to a Trial of Position.” Her face was set. “We can discuss our differences after we have secured our objectives.” The holo ended and went dark.

Idris sucked air through his teeth. “So that is what the intimate conversations of Khans are like,” he said. “I have often wondered.”

“She is mad.” Rood said it without inflection. He might have been saying “the wall is red.” He felt numb—too numb to think, too numb to plan. 

“We knew this already, quiaff?”

“Aff. But one hopes…” Connor Rood reached up with both hands and rubbed his face. He needed a shave. Both his chin and his head were stubbly. The calluses on his hands caught on the stubble on top of his head. He slid his hands down, feeling the thick pads rub against his nose and chin, and then sighed.

“That is it, then,” he said.

“That is what, exactly?”

“I cannot allow her to crush the Ice Hellions beneath her madness,” Rood said. “When we have completed the invasion, and the Clan will survive it, I will challenge her to a Trial of Position for the Khanship.” He set his hands on the desktop, palms down and fingers splayed. He looked at them. “I thought it would feel different.”

“Different?”

“Saying that out loud.”

“How did it feel?”

“Empty.”

Idris snorted. “Empty, says the next Khan of Clan Ice Hellion.” The bondsman stood. “What is next?”

Rood pursed his lips. “We prepare for movement. The Khan has ordered us to Lackhove. I will take the Lithe Kill and what is left of the Nintieth Striker Irregulars.” He tapped the tabletop. “The 121^st can move to Last Chance.”

Idris grunted. “We do not move deeper, to challenge the Khan?” When Rood glared at him, he held up his hands in mock surrender. “If we are to challenge her, surely now is better, is it not? To save more of the Clan that will be slaughtered on the altar of her madness?”

“We cannot.”

“Because that would be treason, quiaff?”

“Neg. Because it would be stupid.”

Idris frowned. “This unworthy bondsman does not understand,” he said. “Please instruct me, o great Khan.”

Rood grinned. “You were a Jade Falcon. Ignorance is to be expected.” He beckoned Idris back down into his chair. “What is the greatest calling of a Clan warrior?”

“Combat,” Idris said.

“And what has Khan Montose given the Ice Hellions?”

“More combat than they’ve see since the Hellions’ Tantrum?”

Rood nodded, not bothering to correct Idris on the name. The Hellions’ fury at being shut out of the initial Clan invasion was considered a righteous campaign on Hector; to the rest of the Clans, it had been little more than a tantrum. “More combat,” he agreed, “but more than that, she has given them victory.” He gestured to the austere, tan-painted room he’d appropriated as his office. “And even more than that, victory in the Inner Sphere.”

“Ah.” Idris nodded. “Even if that victory is bleeding the Clan white, it is still victory. No one will listen.”

“Is it worse than that. If I challenge her now, at best I am a power-hungry greed-monger who wishes to claim credit for the final victory before it is won,” Rood held up his hands. “At worst, I am a defeatist coward, afraid to bring the Jade Falcons to heel.”

Idris nodded. “Few Clansmen would have reasoned that out,” he said. “Elias Crichell, perhaps.”

Rood smiled. “Crichell was ilKhan.”

“For a few seconds.”

“It is not how long you hold it, but what you do with it that matters.”

It was Idris’ turn to snort. “The whole of his reign was spent bleeding on the Grand Council floor, I believe,” the former Jade Falcon said. Then he sobered. “So. Lackhove?”

Rood nodded. “Lackhove.” He stood and waved to the door. “Let us go. The sooner we get there, the sooner I can kill something and we can bring this damn fighting closer to an end.” He stepped around the desk.

“Soon,” he muttered as Idris led the way into the corridor. “Founder knows we cannot take any more mistakes.”