Luckily, Nikki the nurse she’d been working with was able to access the prisoners’ notes and a small group possessing the right blood type were selected. She had assumed that there would be some resistance on their part. In her experience, there was always someone who would decide not to donate their blood but in this case they had all been more than happy to comply.

  Everything would have been a lot easier if they’d allowed her to bring Nikki back as an assistant but the Scarpi had been adamant. No one else was to be involved in Hermendal’s care and so Morton had been left to set up everything herself.

  Twenty-four hours later, Hermendal was sitting up talking.

  “I trust you did an adequate job with my stitches. They feel a little tight.”

  “They’ll be fine. I’d say that you were lucky to survive but I noticed when I was examining you that you’ve been shot before.”

  “That’s right,” Hermendal sounded surprised. “I’d almost forgotten. Fortunately, I have the constitution of an ox. A trait I inherited from my mother.”

  Morton tried to summon up a picture of a female version of Hermendal in her mind. She failed.

  “Well, it’s no doubt served you well in the past but I’d try and avoid getting shot in the future.”

  “Duly noted, doctor.”

  “Do you know why it happened this time,” she asked. “I mean, do you know who shot you?”

  Hermendal looked thoughtful for a moment.

  “You know, I don’t. But if I had to guess, I’d say that it was probably one of Mahbarat’s senior officers.”

  “Any particular reason.”

  “Well, I was trying to kill Mahbarat at the time, so they were well within their rights.”

  Morton sat back on the bunk and laughed.

  “Something amusing you, doctor?”

  “No, not at all – well, a little. I was trying to work out why none of the other medical staff wanted anything to do with you and now, well, that sort of explains everything.”

  Hermendal feigned offence. “I don’t see why.”

  “Well, whoever took you on as a patient just couldn’t win. If they’d tried to save you and you had died then you would have escaped justice.”

  “But if they tried to save me and succeeded …”

  “They’d be criticised for saving the man who tried to assassinate their captain.”

  “I wouldn’t say that I tried to assassinate him. That suggests an advanced level of planning of which I am totally incapable. No, I simply tried to smash his head in with the heaviest object that came to hand.”

  “I see. That’ll usually get the job done. Any particular reason why you attacked him?”

  Hermendal tried to sit a little more upright, grimacing as his stitches made their presence felt.

  “Actually, a very good reason. Captain Mahbarat is a quisling.”

  “A what?”

  “A quisling. Named after a Norwegian politician who collaborated with the Nazis during the Second World War. Vidkun Quisling. He donated his name to backstabbers everywhere.”

  “I’m sorry, Hermendal. Those pain killers must be stronger than I thought. You’re rambling.”

  “No, my mind has never been clearer. Why do you think Mahbarat wanted my services in the first place?”

  “He wanted you to translate something for him? I don’t know.”

  Hermendal gave her a pained look.

  “He wanted me to act as a translator, yes. But for whom?”

  “Not the Da’al?”

  “Precisely. You can see now why I wanted to kill him.”

  “Okay, now you’ve lost me again. Why don’t you go back and start again from the beginning?”

  So he did.

  *

  Hermendal had been standing at the back of the Serrayu’s bridge, a pair of Scarpi guards in attendance.

  His mere presence there providing him with the dubious distinction of being the first person ever to have stood on the bridge of a Da’al, a Confederation and a Yakutian battleship.

  But that hadn’t stopped him from feeling both confused and afraid. While he had no intention of cooperating with the Yakutians, the very fact that they had been able to flush him out whilst also determining his peculiar abilities made him very nervous indeed. He didn’t belong on the bridge of a ship – he wasn’t a warrior, no, he was a realist. A realist who, he knew, would quickly capitulate the moment his own life was threatened.

  The only person on the bridge he currently recognised was Commander Sunderam, but either Sunderam hadn’t recognised him or he was simply trying to ignore him. Hermendal had looked at him imploringly, hoping that he might be able to offer him some much-needed reassurance.

  “Gentlemen, the hour is upon us,” Mahbarat had said. “I trust that this will be a momentous moment both for us and for the Empire.”

  “Captain, I’ll ask you for the last time: are you sure you want to go through with this?”

  All eyes had turned in Sunderam’s direction.

  “I’m sorry, commander. Are you questioning my authority?”

  “Certainly not, sir,” but Sunderam’s voice had seemed to lack the assurance of his words. “I am merely fulfilling my role as your second-in-command. I would be remiss in my duties if I did not ask the question: by whose authority do you intend to contact the enemy.”

  “On whose authority!” Mahbarat’s anger surged beneath the surface.

  “This is a situation which would normally require the ultimate sanction of the Emperor himself,” Sunderam continued. This, at last, appeared to hit home. “For a negotiation of this sort, we would normally be working from a set of guidelines set down by the House of Adjustments. At present, I am aware of no such directive.”

  An awkward silence had descended upon the bridge. By evoking the name of the emperor, Sunderam appeared to be reminding the captain that the chain of command extended far beyond the deck of this starship.

  A ripple of disquiet had eddied around him. No matter how Sunderam might seek to justify his reservations, there was no denying what he was attempting to do. He was directly challenging not just the authority of his captain but also the allegiances of everyone around him.

  The question itself couldn’t have been any clearer: whose side are you on?

  And from their responses it had soon became clear that for the majority of them the answer was equally as clear. They were on Mahbarat’s side. Whatever he chose to do in the next few minutes, the captain could be assured of their support.

  It had been similarly obvious to Hermendal that Sunderam and his supporters were in grave danger of isolating themselves.

  To say that they were in the minority would be to overstate their case.

  The mood was slowly turning against them and this was evident in the way that Mahbarat’s House of Perseverance followers, conspicuous in their armoured shoulder pads, had begun to spread out in an attempt to contain them.

  Hermandal, though no expert in Yakutian uniforms, could only pick out four other members of the House of Attrition aside from Sunderam himself. The thin blue scarves tied at their waists had been distinctive enough to make them an easy target.

  “There are various precedents for such negotiations,” Mahbarat had continued, his anger seeming to have dissipated. “Anassis at Vospah. The Kergaan at Falin-Harcourt. They both had to make difficult decisions whilst cut off from contact with their superiors. In both cases they were attempting to reduce the number of casualties suffered by the emperor’s troops whilst at the same time disadvantaging our enemies.”

  “An admirable solution,” Sunderam conceded. “So long as we are clear who our true enemies really are.”

  Mahbarat rose slowly from his command chair.

  “Our true enemies are those member states who the emperor has directed us to destroy. An enemy which sent its main fleet to strike at the very heart of our empire.”

  “Then what of this new threat: the Da’al. The Da’al who have twice threatened our interests in this region. What of them? It is surely disingenuous of you to claim that we don’t know what their true intentions are when they have gone to great lengths to make their intentions known: the complete and total destruction of mankind. How are we supposed to negotiate with an opponent whose only concern is with the decimation of your people? How can such a situation ever be turned to our advantage?”

  As Mahbarat moved towards Sunderam, Hermandal felt the two Scarpi guards near him tense.

  “I can see that this has been a cause of great consternation for you, commander, and I thank you for your esteemed counsel,” he intimated the smallest of small bows in his XO’s direction. “But what you must understand is that these so called ‘difficult’ decisions are not so difficult for someone who has been prepared for these kind of judgements from birth. In that regard, the course we must now take has never been clearer.”

  Mahbarat’s gaze had taken in the whole bridge, judging the loyalty of those around him in an instant.

  “Death to the Unbelievers. Death to the House of Attrition.”

  Mahbarat’s ka’ich had come free of its scabbard in one smooth, flowing movement but, as he was already moving backwards, away from Sunderam, it was unclear as to who was to be Mahbarat’s intended victim.

  But Sunderam had read his captain’s actions more readily than most, dropping to one side before drawing his own weapon.

  His decision proved to be well justified because Mahbarat’s initial move proved to be a feint. As he moved onto the offensive, he allowed the weight of his ka’ich to swing him around, the blade ascribing a broad sweeping circle, parting the air where Sunderam’s head had been only seconds before.

  Tellingly, the members of the House of Attrition had all drawn their ka’ichs while the members of the House of Perseverance had all drawn their side arms, backed up by those members of the House of Fortitude.

  The two sides had eyed one another silently while the captain and commander had fought it out in the centre of the bridge. For some reason, neither one of their supporters saw fit to act so long as the outcome of the central conflict remained unresolved.

  The clash between the two superior officers was more finely balanced than Hermendal would have anticipated. With his superior height and reach, he would have naturally expected Sunderam to have had the advantage but, what he hadn’t anticipated, was Mahbarat’s speed and ruthlessness.

  The captain was a classic counter-attacker, always fighting off the back foot, ready to spring forward whenever he discerned a weakness in his opponent’s defences. And what his attacks lacked in sheer power, they more than made up for in terms of energy and aggression. While he appeared to be constantly on the receiving end of Sunderam’s punishing attacks, he somehow managed to weather the storm before withdrawing into a more defensive pose, daring his opponent to pursue him.

  Sunderam’s advances were slow and often poorly timed. His technique lacked the variety of his opponent and he was always moving forwards, looking for ways to close Mahbarat down with the sheer power of his thrusts. But that also made him very predictable so that when a particularly lumbering blow failed to find its target, he found himself vulnerable to a succession of well-judged feints and parries.

  Wildly mis-matched as the pair had seemed, it was, remarkably, Mahbarat who appeared to be gaining the upper hand.

  While Sunderam had held the ka’ich solidly by the handle, executing a series of interconnected downward strokes backed up by the full force of his body, Mahbarat spun the swords off his wrists using the leather straps attached to their handles. This meant that he was able to change his grip at a moment’s notice switching a defensive parry into a surprise counterattack, thereby peppering his opponent’s arms and firearms with a series of superficial cuts designed more to incapacitate than to eradicate.

  Mahbarat moved back against one of the larger consoles grouped around the edge of the room and for a second, Hermendal thought that he’d made a fatal error. With Sunderam pressing forward, Mahbarat had had nowhere to retreat to and as Sunderam aimed a clubbing blow towards the other man’s head, Mahbarat had suddenly dropped to the floor.

  But though it looked like an act of surrender, nothing could have been further from the truth as Mahbarat spun around, his trailing leg catching Sunderam low down, effectively knocking his legs out from under him.

  Sunderam had hit the floor in a heap and suddenly it was the bigger man who was on the defensive, forced to use both his sword and his feet to keep Mahbarat’s swirling blade at bay.

  One of the officers, identifiable as a member of House of Attrition, had moved forward then, as if planning to provide Sunderam with some kind of assistance. Immediately, a shot had rung out and the man had stumbled backwards. In an instant, the bridge had been transformed.

  What should have been an easy victory for Mahbarat’s supporters proved to be anything but, while they had not wavered initially to draw their side-arms, now they hesitated to use them. In the melee which immediately followed the first shot it had become impossible for them to get a clear shot at Sunderam’s men without at the same time jeopardising the lives of their own.

  At the same time, the House of Attrition’s followers, having drawn their ka-ichs had no such qualms about using them, laying into their opponents with a fury driven by desperation. Outnumbered as they were they knew that their chances of survival were slim at best, prompting each one of them to launch themselves at their rivals.

  In such a tumult of divided loyalties, the deck of the bridge quickly became a killing ground.

  Hermendal had slowly started to back away in the hope of avoiding getting caught up in the carnage. He had briefly considered making a break for the main door but had worried that if he tried it they’d simply cut him down, so he had just kept on backing away until he found his progress barred. The command chair. It was solid enough and capable of absorbing any indirect fire which might come his way. Without a second thought, he had gone and hidden behind it, his back pressed against one side.

  From there he could still peek around the sides in order to see that the battle between captain and commander as it moved into its final stage. Mahbarat had managed to trap Sunderam in one corner over by the communication desks and might well have finished him off if Sunderam hadn’t mounted such a spirited defence. But the big man had been fighting a losing battle – the whole floor was now slick with his blood and his strength was starting to ebb away.

  Each time Mahbarat had rejoined the assault, Sunderam’s defences had seemed a little less assured, his blocks less vigorous, his reactions noticeably slower.

  Sensing this, Mahbarat had come in high before dropping down low. The movement had seen him slip beneath Sunderam’s guard, scoring a solid contact against his hip, the edge of his blade biting into solid bone. The pain must have been immense and Hermendal had watched in horror as Sunderam’s weapon slipped from his grasp, to hang limply from his wrist.

  Mahbarat, unable to pull his kai’ich free, had started to panic – as well he might have – for he had strayed too far into his opponent’s range.

  With his weapon momentarily forgotten, Sunderam had launched himself forward, shattering Mahbarat’s nose with his forehead. Mahbarat had been sent reeling, his weapon forgotten as he attempted to stay on his feet. He had barged into the command chair, grabbing at it in an attempt to steady himself. Sunderam had reached down, gripping the handle of the other man’s weapon and wrenched it free. Blood had immediately started seeping down his side.

  Mahbarat meanwhile, his legs braced against the chair, had seemed unaware of his surroundings. As he shook his head to clear it, Sunderam had moved closer, adjusting the discarded ka’ich as he prepared to deliver the final blow.

  But he never got the chance.

  One of Mahbarat’s followers had stepped from the ranks and shot him in the back. The commander had stood his ground at first, locked in a frozen tableau, before very slowly, sinking to the ground.

  Then, everything had happened at once. Someone in the crowd had thrown Mahbarat a knife but before he could decide what to do with it, Hermendal had acted.

  A discarded kai’ich was lying at his feet and, without thinking, he had picked it up.

  He had seen what the Da’al were capable of. How they had moved to destroy every species which stood against and it was Mahbarat’s arrogance – the assumption that he, of all people, could somehow turn the situation to his advantage by trading off one part of humanity against the other -had filled Hermendal with an ugly and overwhelming sense of rage.

  Holding the kai’ich in two hands he had raised it over his head before launching himself across the bridge in Mahbarat’s general direction. As he swung the kai’ich down in a short arc, Mahbarat had had time to execute a cunning side-step before shouldering him off to one side.

  He might have missed his mark but the gunman hadn’t. He’d shot Hermendal from an oblique angle, hitting him in the upper chest and spinning him around.

  Hermendal had lain there as his whole world had narrowed, his vision turning first to stars and then to darkness.

  CHAPTER THIRTY

  “I’m afraid I can’t condone this,” Meyer said.

  Ardent did her best to control her own growing frustrations. They’d been at this since nineteen hundred hours, four of them sitting around the table, and it was now zero two thirty hours and they didn’t seem to be getting anywhere. Ardent couldn’t help blaming herself. Although neither one of them had spoken about her hitting him, it clearly was going to be a bone of contention between them for some time to come. If he’d been intransigent before, he was proving to be far more difficult now.

  Even if she had wanted to apologise, this was neither the time nor the place. He certainly wouldn’t thank her for bringing it up in front of others. She just hoped that Meyer could be persuaded to put aside his own feelings long enough for them to be able to assist the colonists on Laxx.