Hour of Judgement Read online

  “Specialist Vogel, then,” Lowden suggested. “We’ve been expecting you?” He had no clue as to which was which, Vogel and Ivers. The woman — black eyes, black hair, a little shorter than her partner — betrayed no sign of Iversness or Vogelicity, any more than the man looked Iversish or Vogellic. Two’s descriptive statements frequently lacked precision, in translation. Lowden had decided years ago that she planned it that way.

  “Transfer of preliminary defense locks to your shuttle.” Of the two of them at the end of the table it was the man who spoke. Middling tall, middling bald, with a voice that gave neither cause for offense nor any other information younger than his hairline, Lowden guessed. So he was Vogel. “For transport ahead of the Danzilar fleet, to be ready when prince Paval I’shenko arrives. You’re sending?”

  Bench intelligence specialists didn’t observe rank, didn’t conform to the norms of military titles or respectful address. They didn’t have to. They were Bench-level operatives chartered on an individual basis by the Bench itself and accountable not to any given Judge, but only to the Jurisdiction’s Bench in formal convocation,

  “My First Lieutenant. G’herm Wyrlann.” Who fortunately had the good sense to rise to his feet and salute when his name was called. Whatever unspecified rank a Bench intelligence specialist might hold it was good odds Vogel outranked a mere Command Branch First Lieutenant. “The shuttle’s loaded and waiting for immediate dispatch, Specialist, ready bay five down three over? Serge? Yes.”

  They needed to get Wyrlann to Burkhayden as soon as possible. It was to be Wyrlann’s formal responsibility to complete the final inventory that would be incorporated into the formal contract between Danzilar and the Bench. “If you’d care to accompany Lieutenant Wyrlann, Specialist.”

  Bench Indentured World, Burkhayden, Meghilder space. Danzilar to be planetary governor, and responsible to the Bench for tax revenues; to be left to himself to exploit Burkhayden as he saw fit as long as the cash continued to flow. Lowden wished Danzilar luck with his enterprise. There was nothing left worth taking off Burkhayden that the Bench hadn’t taken — and nobody there but Nurail, resettled from the dregs and scrapings of the Nurail worlds in the bloody aftermath of the promulgation of the Political Stabilization Acts.

  Vogel bowed and cocked an eyebrow at Wyrlann, who took his cue and started for the door. Just as they reached the doorway Lowden remembered the advice he had meant to give; important advice, in light of Wyrlann’s history on ground detach.

  “Lieutenant. Let’s be prudent this time around. There are still Bench resources at Burkhayden.” And you don't want to go breaking anything while Fleet still has to pay for it. Lowden hoped and trusted that the point would be taken, even implicit as it was. Wyrlann had a heavy hand at times. He had to learn prudence in the timing of his little exercises of authority.

  Wyrlann didn’t like being reminded.

  But there was nothing he could do but accept the rebuke and go.

  Once the door closed again Lowden turned his attention to the remaining Bench specialist, who by process of elimination could only be Jils Ivers. “And your role in this convoy would be . . . ?”

  Convoy was perhaps not the right word. There were eights of ships in the Danzilar fleet, and its flagship — prince Paval I’shenko’s Lady Gechutrian — displaced space at twice the volume of a mere cruiser-killer in the Ragnarok’s class. One Fleet ship in escort was a mere token, its ceremonial nature emphasized by the fact that the Ragnarok was not a chartered warship but an experimental test bed sized and shaped like one.

  “In this instance to pay my respects to your Chief Medical Officer.” Ivers’ voice was level and uninflected. Unrevealing. Unimpressed. “And to present the First Secretary’s compliments. You may recall having cleared the interview, Captain?”

  Well. Perhaps. If he thought about it. He’d wondered at the time why Chilleau Judiciary bothered to send an envoy to Koscuisko. They could hardly hope to succeed where Lowden himself had failed, and persuade Koscuisko to renew his term.

  Koscuisko himself had half-turned in his place to frown at Ivers skeptically, ignoring for once the unwisdom of turning one’s back on Serge of Wheatfields if one was Ship’s Inquisitor. Wheatfields only glared down at the back of Koscuisko’s bared neck in turn. Maybe Wheatfields was mellowing. Maybe not.

  “I, er, may have neglected to forward the appointment through to Andrej’s scheduler, now that you mention it.” His turn to come under that mirror-silver glare of Koscuisko’s, but Koscuisko was too well trained to let any real displeasure show. Koscuisko was autocrat, surgeon and Inquisitor. But Captain Lowden was his master, and Koscuisko knew it. “Sorry, Andrej. Recent excitement and all, I suppose. Do you have time for Specialist Ivers this shift? Now, for instance.”

  Koscuisko hadn’t had a prisoner in Secured Medical for upwards of two weeks. All Koscuisko had on his scheduler was running his Infirmary. Koscuisko could make time. Koscuisko would.

  “Of course, Captain.” Koscuisko’s clear tenor matched Ivers’s own tone for inscrutability. Being irritated about it would get Koscuisko precisely nowhere. It only amused Captain Lowden to see how easily Koscuisko could be annoyed. “If you like, Specialist. My office?”

  Koscuisko almost didn’t even pretend to wait for an answer, rising as he spoke. “If the Captain will excuse us, of course.”

  Lowden nodded in reply to Koscuisko’s perfunctory bow, secretly delighted. He had not thought to have this much amusement at staff. He was going to genuinely miss Koscuisko when Koscuisko was gone. “Quite so. Good-greeting, Specialist Ivers. Andrej, ward report, my office, second and six.”

  Could he get rid of the rest of his staff in time to have Two open a channel into Koscuisko’s office?

  Or should he rather let this staff play out, and pump Koscuisko for the details afterward?

  He hadn’t heard anything from his Lieutenants. And he was supposed to be paying attention.

  “Lieutenant Brem. There’s an inventory shortage on the Wolnadi line, I understand, and you were to have a report for me this morning.”

  Resigning himself to an indulgence postponed, Lowden set his concentration on analyzing cargo loads, and put Andrej Koscuisko to the back of his mind for later.

  ###

  If he thought about it, Andrej believed he might remember this woman. She was shorter than he was, and many women weren’t, since he himself was to the short side of the Jurisdiction Standard. Chilleau Judiciary had sent two Bench specialists to the Domitt Prison at port Rudistal, these five years past; they’d arrived in time to assist the inquiry into the Administration’s crimes, but Andrej had never managed to convince himself that they hadn’t been originally dispatched to cover things up.

  “So, then, Specialist. You travel with my cousin Danzilar’s fleet to Burkhayden.”

  Strolling through the corridors of great Ragnarok, on the way to Infirmary and his office. There was no sense in being gratuitously unpleasant. He was going home, after all. He was to be free from all this within a very few weeks’ time. He could afford to let bygones be bygones, just this once. Justice had been done at the Domitt Prison at last, whether with the help of or despite these Bench specialists. He should be at least polite.

  “Audit authority, your Excellency. One last check on inventory before everything goes to Danzilar. Your cousin? Don’t tell me, sir, Dolgorukij aristocratic genealogies make my head hurt.”

  As a matter of fact they did his, as well. “It is either third cousin four times removed or fourth cousin three times removed. I do not know which. It is safest to call them all cousin and forget about it.”

  He was to go home because eight years had passed since he had sworn his oath to Fleet, and eight years was all Fleet and his father could demand of him. Well, Fleet would have kept him on, because there were not enough Ship’s Inquisitors to go around; but eight years had been agreed upon and eight years had been suffered and eight years were passed.

  He was never going to be able t
o forget them.

  “The Danzilar prince sends his regards, sir. And said something about cortac brandy. An armful, I think he said.”

  Had Shiki brought liquor? Well, of course Shiki had. “A crook of liquor, Specialist, four bottles, three under one’s arm and one in one’s fist. Very promising of Shiki. It is through here; sit down, do you take rhyti?”

  Hearing himself engaged for an interview with a Bench specialist had not been a very welcome piece of news, just now. But his office was his own territory. He felt more comfortable just stepping across the threshold, and more inclined to be hospitable accordingly.

  “Thank you, your Excellency, no. With respect, sir, I’ll come straight out with what I have to say.”

  He did remember her from the Domitt Prison. Surely he was being paranoid to blame either Ivers or Vogel for crimes that Chilleau Judiciary should have noted and prevented long before his own arrival. Bench specialists were not partisan players. They would have done the same as he, had they found themselves in the same position. Surely.

  “Excuse me that I draw a flask, then, I am thirsty. Out with what, yes, I listen.”

  Once he’d had a moment or two to think about it he didn’t even feel she’d changed. That hint of a frown was something that Andrej could remember having found rather fetching, before, for no particular reason.

  “Very well.” She waited for him to join her in the conference zone of his office, watching him set his flask of rhyti down on the low table between them with an air of concentrating on her thought. “Your Excellency. The term of your initial tour of duty is due to expire very shortly. It is understood that you have not been very satisfied with your placement here on Ragnarok, in recent years.”

  No, he had been critically dissatisfied with his tour of duty on the Ragnarok from the moment he’d first set foot to decking. Andrej settled back in the slatwood chair, templing his fingers in front of him, suspicious. What did she mean, his “initial” tour of duty?

  “Captain Lowden is not fit to direct my Writ, or any other. So I have pled. I am sure the documentation has been made available for your review.”

  Captain Lowden was not a support to the rule of Law. It was precisely abuses of power of the sort that Captain Lowden indulged so shamelessly that gave subversion its ever-increasing numbers of champions under Jurisdiction. The Bench had heard his cry against the Domitt Prison; why did the Bench not hear his complaint against his Captain?

  But Andrej knew the answer to that question already. It was Fleet and the Bench, this time. “You have not come all this way to give me a going-away present related to this issue, Specialist Ivers?”

  Not likely. He was a Bench officer, to the extent that he held the Writ. He was also a Fleet officer under Captain Lowden’s authority. Fleet resisted the Bench on principle, regardless of the merits of the case.

  Ivers smiled politely, but her smile ended well short of her eyes. “To the extent of assuring his Excellency that no Inquisitor has been identified for immediate assignment, yes.” She sat carefully at the edge of her seat, and her back was as straight as an abbess’s. “His Excellency has declined to renew his term with Fleet and the Bench.”

  Indeed he had. And it was in the poorest possible taste to have even expected otherwise. There was a shortage of Ship’s Inquisitors? Very well. There should properly be a shortage of Ship’s Inquisitors. There should properly be no Ship’s Inquisitors at all, especially under Lowden’s direction; but Andrej wasn’t going to say as much out loud. There were limits.

  “Fleet does nothing to protect the bond-involuntaries, Specialist. Tell me that they are all to be reassigned and I will be well satisfied. What is your point?” Because after all they both already knew that he’d refused the offer of a second term. And if she had no news but for the denial of yet another appeal against Griers Verigson Lowden she need not have wasted time and effort telling him how carefully the Bench had considered the merits of his plea.

  “The Bench cannot afford the loss of critical skills, your Excellency. The Free Government grows more persuasive daily. Sabotage takes the lives of increasing numbers of loyal citizens, and the Bench must have the weapons it needs to fight the battle against this — one could hardly dignify the Free Government by the name of ‘enemy.’”

  Ivers’s hatred and contempt was clear in her words, regardless of how calm and level her voice was. Andrej could empathize to an extent: terrorism was terrorism, and never to be condoned. It was just that the Bench itself also practiced terrorism, and against its own, against the self-same loyal citizens it claimed to be protecting. Torture was terrorism. Andrej set his hands to the armrests and straightened his spine, decisively.

  “Then the Bench must criticize its moral self, Specialist Ivers. Fearlessly.” When would the Bench realize that the practice of institutionalized torture as an instrument of statecraft and the maintenance of civil order had just the opposite effect from that intended? “It is by the health and contentment of the body politic that one is to evaluate the rectitude of the State.”

  Skating perhaps a little close to politically questionable discourse, but nothing actionable. Ivers seemed annoyed.

  “Resources must be carefully husbanded in unsettled times, your Excellency. As you may be aware the Bench can exercise the power of annexation of critical resources. According to the provisions of the Political Stabilization Acts the Writ to Inquire is a Bench-critical resource.”

  Now of a sudden the flooring fell away from underneath his chair, and Andrej knew he dared not so much as glance into the bottomless chasm that gaped open at his feet or else he would fall in. He gripped the armrests of his chair desperately. He could feel the suction of the moiling vortex of black Hell: He had to hang on.

  “Annex critical. Resources. Name of all Saints, Specialist, what are you saying?” It had been eight years, eight years, eight years, he was done with this, he had fulfilled his term, he was free to go —

  “His Excellency declines to continue service in Fleet. That is understandable in light of his Excellency’s stated convictions and dissatisfaction with his post. The Bench cannot afford to lose your skills, sir.” She could not see the abyss that yawned hugely between them. She could not have spoken so calmly had she done. “First Secretary Verlaine offers you pride of place at Chilleau Judiciary, command of the sector’s medical resources and all the rights and emoluments accruing thereunto. The need is too great, your Excellency. The Bench must make difficult decisions for the greater good of all under the rule of Law.”

  Chilleau Judiciary.

  No.

  Andrej swallowed hard, focusing on the talk-alert on the far wall to anchor himself in the world. He had to control himself. He could not panic. There was no reason to panic. She could not mean what she seemed to be saying. It was intolerable.

  “Specialist, no one could wish me to this work a single day the longer, Judicial Order or no. Not even for my sins should it be wished on me, and you must know that they are many, and grievous.”

  Her expression was pained, almost irritated. Andrej didn’t care. The rule of Law was no excuse for torture. He had to press what advantage he had, while he could still feel that he had the advantage —

  “Say therefore to First Secretary Verlaine that I would rather sell myself to a Chigan brothel and suckle at fish than have anything to do with Chilleau Judiciary. Or the Protocols. Not one day the longer, Specialist Ivers. It has been eight years.”

  Irritation had shaded over into stubbornness in her face, somehow. Andrej wasn’t quite sure how that had happened.

  “You’ve earned a rest, sir. No one dreams of disputing that. You have three eighths of a years’ worth of accumulated leave, and I have the privilege of bringing word from the prince your father” — reaching into her over-tunic, as Andrej stared in horror — “with a personal message. Your Excellency.”

  Holding out a heavy square of folded paper she waited. Andrej was afraid of that message, suddenly. He didn’t want to disgra
ce himself by showing his fear in front of the Bench specialist. It was an effort, but he forced himself to reach out his hand in turn to receive the note, his hand almost absolutely steady. There was his name on the note, in script so black against the clotted fabric of the writing-cloth that it was almost red. And bled as Andrej stared at it, the blood draining from the letter to stain his hand and overflow his fist down to the floor.

  Son Andrej.

  It will be good to see you again, child. We are glad of the First Secretary's charitable gesture, in letting the past forget itself. Come home and kneel for your mother's blessing before you go to Chilleau Judiciary.

  His father’s hand, his father’s voice, more loving than it had been these past eight years, and as much as Andrej ached for his father’s blessing he could not force himself to accept that he would have to pay so high a price to purchase it.

  “I cannot go.” He whispered it half to himself, half to the room, transfixed with horror. “Oh, it is too much. I cannot be made to go, Specialist Ivers, surely. And my family. I owe duty there that I have much neglected.”

  Ivers sat unmoving in her chair, straight-backed, formal. Unyielding. “And the First Secretary understands, sir. There need be no impediment to a long and well-earned duty leave to see to personal business. The facilities at Chilleau Judiciary will be awaiting your arrival upon the conclusion of your leave. I’m sorry, sir — ”

  She hesitated, but she said it anyway. What, did she see the roiling pit at last, and hear the tortured screams of damned souls in horrific torment? “I’m sorry, your Excellency. Secretary Verlaine has communicated with your family, and has taken great pains to explain the value of your technical qualifications to your father. How much Chilleau Judiciary needs your skills. And it is a Bench prerogative to annex, sir.”