Starfist: Kingdom's Swords Read online

  KINGDOM’S SWORDS

  Starfist

  Book Seven

  David Sherman

  and

  Dan Cragg

  BALLANTINE BOOKS • NEW YORK

  Dedicated to:

  O. A. Lock

  Former Airman, Cold Warrior,

  and Most Loyal Friend

  PROLOGUE

  * * *

  Clouds made the night so dark a Soldier of the Lord would have had to step on a raider to know one was in the area, and the rain and thunder masked what little noise the raiders made as they crawled through the muck and ground cover toward the Army of the Lord outpost. Lack of visibility didn’t bother the raiders; their plan was detailed, they knew their routes. Nor did the rain bother them. The receptors that lined their sides detected and located life-forms, could tell the difference between their own kind and others and were more effective in the rain than on a clear, dry night.

  The Soldiers of the Lord were all gathered in their barracks or in the duty office. None of them manned the observation posts; on a night like this, they knew, there would be no one about to guard against. Most of the eighteen soldiers in the duty office ignored the displays from the remote sensors; the effectiveness of the sensors was seriously reduced in severe weather, and they were unlikely to detect the approach of any mass smaller than a mob or an army, though no mob or army would be on the move on such a night. The Soldiers of the Lord had grown to like dark and stormy nights, for it gave them a break from the toils of guard duty at that remote outpost.

  Which was why the raiders selected a dark, stormy night.

  A Master led the night’s raid, though with only fifty Fighters slithering and crawling toward the barracks and duty office, it needed no more than a Leader in command. This raid was the first direct strike in several months against the Army of the Lord, and the Over Master in command of operations in that sector of Kingdom greatly desired certainty of success.

  Sword Worshipful, the duty noncommissioned officer, briefly glowered at the displays. He took security duty in the farming lands more seriously than most; he thought most of the soldiers in the outpost risked their immortal souls with their laxness. But glowering at the displays did nothing to improve their efficiency.

  “I am going to make the rounds,” Sword Worshipful announced.

  The other soldiers looked at him curiously as he donned his slicker. What posts would he check? Everyone who should be manning a post was huddled in the duty office, reading sacred tracts, talking, or sinfully playing cards. There were no manned posts for him to make the rounds of.

  “Soldier Truth, Soldier Hellsbane, come with me.”

  Soldiers Truth and Hellsbane grumbled at having to leave the dryness and warmth of the duty office, but they didn’t grumble loudly or long; Sword Worshipful was an easy taskmaster, but a harsh disciplinarian. They shrugged into slickers and picked up their weapons, then stood next to the exit while Sword Worshipful gave instructions to the assistant duty noncom.

  Outside, rain battered the three men as they headed toward Post One. It drummed on their heads and shoulders, cascaded down their slickers, and gusts of wind blew it up under their raingear. Except when bolts of lightning allowed brief glances of the surrounding farmland, they could see no farther than a rod through the driving rain. Yet, with the ease born of constant repetition, they found their way unerringly to the post.

  Sword Worshipful stepped down into the unmanned watch post. Under the woven-reed overhead the rain dripped rather than pelted, but water flowed steadily into the pit, and muddy water sloshed over the tops of his boots. Soldiers Truth and Hellsbane huddled together on the post’s leeward side.

  Careful not to allow water to drip onto the infrared scanner Sword Worshipful raised its waterproof shell and leaned his eyes into the viewing port. He scanned the area assigned to Post One, saw nothing but wind- and rainswept grain as far as the treeline windbreak. Carefully, he secured the scanner, then called in an “all-secure” report.

  They repeated the process at Post Two and Post Three. Soldiers Truth and Hellsbane looked forward to returning to the warmth and dryness of the duty office.

  The five Fighters were close to each other, and had a Leader seen them, they would have been ordered to maintain the proper interval. But neither Leader was close enough to detect their bunching up. Suddenly, a Fighter hissed at the others—something—three somethings—was approaching from the left. They needed a Leader to tell them what to do.

  One of the five had a genetic defect—his intelligence was far higher than Fighters were bred for, and he quietly harbored the ambition to become a Leader. He growled an order to his four companions to get on line facing the oncoming trio. The four hesitated; obeying orders from another Fighter was as unheard of as a Fighter giving orders. But the one growled his orders more harshly, and the four recognized the command voice of a Leader even though they knew it came from another Fighter. They formed the line as ordered.

  Three humans loomed out of the darkness, two slightly to the rear and flanks, one centered and leading. The Fighter with the genetic defect aimed the spout of his weapon at the centered Earthman, the obvious Leader, and shouted the command to fire.

  Each Fighter fired at the closest Earthman. Fluid, vaguely greenish in the dark, shot from the muzzles of the Fighters’ weapons and splashed on the Earthmen, eating through the waterproof fabric, through the soldiers’ uniforms, and into their flesh. The screams of Soldiers Truth and Hellsbane were drowned out by a crack of thunder. Sword Worshipful didn’t scream; the fluid had struck him square in the face, was sucked into his lungs, and he began burning from the inside.

  The defective Fighter barked another order, and the other Fighters fired again at the Earthmen. He ordered them to cease fire and crawled to the downed Earthmen to make sure they were dead. One wasn’t, but would be soon. The Fighter turned away, leaving the Earthman to die agonizingly in his own time, and ordered his companions to resume the crawl toward the duty office.

  Some minutes later the assistant duty noncom noticed that Sword Worshipful was late reporting in from Post Four. As he wondered why, the door of the duty office burst open and ten shrieking, growling, barking, manlike hellspawn were in the office, spraying greenish fluid. The soldiers screamed as the viscous fluid began eating into their flesh. Five who weren’t hit in the initial volley scrambled for their weapons, but two of them were doubled up in agony before they reached the rack. A third was hit before he could bring his weapon to bear. The fourth was hit by three streams, and his finger spasmed on the trigger of his fléchette rifle, spraying miniature darts into the ceiling of the duty office. One man got off a directed shot, and one of the demon creatures screamed as fléchettes shredded its chest. Half a dozen streams of fluid struck that soldier, and he died much faster, though with no less agony, than the others.

  Simultaneously, twenty raiders burst into the barracks. The weapons of the off-duty soldiers were locked in racks. The slaughter was one-sided.

  A Leader and three Fighters raced into the small side building that housed the First Acolyte and Lead Sword who commanded the outpost. They caught the First Acolyte in the bath and the Lead Sword at his prayers. Both died before they could begin to fight.

  The Fighters who had been left outside as a blocking force saw no action. In less than a minute the fifty-six Soldiers of the Lord who manned the outpost were dead.

  The Master commanding the raid ground his teeth when told of the Fighter killed in the duty office. He ordered the body to be bagged and all interior surfaces of the office to be sprayed with acid from the weapons, then had the building burned down. The few helix traces left should prove impossible to find.


  CHAPTER

  * * *

  ONE

  Big Barb’s, the combination bar, bordello, and ship’s chandlers that served as third platoon’s headquarters when the men were on liberty in Bronnysund, was jumping.

  To start the evening out, Gunnery Sergeant Charlie Bass, along with Joe Dean, Rock Claypoole, and some others, had shoved three tables together in what they called the banquet room and ordered beer. Hours had passed, during which the other members of third platoon had trooped in by ones and twos, each new arrival greeted by loud cheers and hardy backslapping. Eventually almost the entire platoon was crowded around the tables, drinking, eating, and singing, as Bass held court at one end. Sitting nearby was Lance Corporal Chan, the unofficial honoree of the evening. Chan would soon be the newest corporal in third platoon, and Bass and the other NCOs were flexing their arms and clenching their fists in anticipation of the pinning-on ceremony. Chan sipped his beer happily, eagerly anticipating the sore shoulders that would plague him for a week after Captain Conorado pinned on the new chevrons.

  Owen the woo perched comfortably on Dean’s shoulder, glowing the bright pink of wooish contentment, rocking gently back and forth, seemingly taking in everything with his enormous eyes. Top Myer had taken good care of the woo while Dean was away on Havanagas, but he confided to the lance corporal upon his return, “Dean, the little bastard never got beyond light gray the whole time you were away. He missed you, lad!” Owen extended an appendage and snatched up a ceramic fragment from a stein someone had broken earlier. The fragment disappeared down Owen’s gullet and stayed down. It seemed to like ceramics. Several Marines applauded, and Claypoole, who was watching the woo carefully, was sure the little creature appreciated the attention. Claypoole had not forgotten the corpsman’s story about the woo shouting a warning when the Skinks attacked his aid station on Waygone. Though Claypoole had never heard the woo make any sound that could be interpreted as words, he believed the story.

  Barmaids flitted in and out of the room, trays loaded with one-liter steins of Reindeer Ale. The women slapped away eager, groping hands and enthusiastically traded verbal barbs with the Marines, to everyone’s great enjoyment. To be a barmaid at Big Barb’s, a girl had to know English well and be able to think and move quickly, because after a few beers many of the patrons forgot who was a barmaid and who was a whore. But Big Barb’s other girls were there too, matching the Marines beer for beer, joining in with the singing and holding their own in the repartee. To be a whore at Big Barb’s a girl had to know some English, work fast, and move men quickly to the upstairs rooms and give them what they bargained for—and if they were really good, more than they bargained for. That’s what kept ’em coming back.

  But that night was special, not particularly because Lance Corporal Chan was anticipating his forthcoming promotion, but because it was one of those nights fueled by the magical chemistry of alcohol, companionship, and shared experiences. It was just one of those magnificent nights for drinking with friends. They’d worry about their heads in the morning.

  Occasionally a Marine would get up, his arm around one of the girls, and drift out into the bar, headed for the stairs. Everyone cheered and clapped and shouted ribald advice to the pair, and those behind loudly ordered more rounds of beer to celebrate a comrade’s good fortune.

  Out at the bar, sailors from the ships in port crowded three deep. Someone had brought an accordion and another man a fiddle, and they wheezed and scratched lively sea chanteys. Men and women stomped onto the dance floor, shaking the boards with the pounding of their feet. The bonhomie was infectious: sailors wandered into the banquet hall and were made welcome at the tables with the Marines. And as Marines stumbled through the crowded bar to the rest rooms, they were swept into the arms of the dancers and whisked around the room, to the delighted cheers of the patrons.

  But sometimes at Big Barb’s it wasn’t all just beer and skittles and a headlong rush to the private rooms upstairs . . .

  A new girl was holding court, seated on the bar in the main room. Hilma was above average height, full-breasted and broad-hipped, with her hair a blond that would have given even Mother Nature pause to wonder whether that shade of yellow actually existed anywhere in the spectrum. Her laugh was full and nearly as brassy as her hair. A dense knot of Marines and fishermen surrounded her, eager to get acquainted. She laughed and sang and joked—and urged her throng of admirers to drink up and eat more. The men roared approval with each sound she emitted, every move she made. And her movements were many; exotic, graceful, and sexy all at the same time.

  So nobody noticed particularly when the door opened and John Francis walked in. One of the many off-worlders who’d come to Thorsfinni’s World to pursue the wild and freewheeling life of the fisheries, Francis had the build of a tugboat and short-cropped black hair above a moon face. He walked with a limp occasioned by an encounter with a trawler that wanted to occupy the same space he and a dinghy happened to hold. Looking around just inside the entrance, Francis saw an open space at a table occupied by some acquaintances. He worked his way through the crowd and slowly, like a davit lowering a fragile cargo into a ship’s hold, levered himself into the empty chair. The fishermen exchanged greetings. A harried serving girl popped up at his shoulder almost immediately to take his order for beer and brownies.

  John Francis slowly shrugged off the satchel slung on his left shoulder. Moving just as deliberately, he opened it and withdrew a portable trid viewer.

  “Were any of you at Einaar’s Fjord on First Day?” he asked. Without waiting for an answer, he continued, “Rumbart Tomison ran his sprint-hover.” He turned on the viewer and popped a trid crystal into it. “I had my cam with me, got some beautiful pictures.” While he talked he fiddled with the viewer’s controls, then turned it toward the other fishermen. “Look at this. He hit 225 kph in the half-K run. He let me into his pits and I got to work on the engine.”

  The others exchanged glances before they turned toward the viewer. They weren’t ready to talk about the races just yet, but they knew they had a choice: listen to John Francis talk about the hovercraft sprints and watch his trids, or get up and leave the table. There wasn’t another open table, so moving wasn’t much of an option.

  John Francis talked and talked and showed his trids of the previous First Day’s sprints. His tablemates felt twinges of jealousy that they hadn’t been there. He drank his beer and ate his brownies. Every time the laugh of the new girl, Hilma, cut through the din, he cocked his eyes toward her, and each time he did, his eyes glowed more brightly. Francis wasn’t known as a ladies’ man, so the fishermen who watched his sprints trids paid his glances no attention.

  At length one of the fishermen in her circle broke through Hilma’s mesmerizing spell long enough to announce that he was taking her upstairs. The announcement was greeted by an uproar of protest from the others.

  “Excuse me,” John Francis said to his tablemates, “I have to take care of something. You know how to use this; you can look at more pictures.” Then he ponderously levered himself to his feet and heavily limped toward the bar, where a good-natured argument was in progress about the selfishness of the one fisherman who wanted to take Hilma away from the rest. Hilma, for her part, laughed about it with raucous delight.

  Limp or not, no crowd could divert John Francis’s progress. He waded through like an icebreaker in pack ice until he stood with his belly against Hilma’s knees. He looked seriously into her face. She looked back and a laugh dribbled away before reaching full throat. Her broad grin melted into a sweetly timorous smile.

  “Hi, sailor,” she said softly, but not coquettishly.

  “I’m John Francis,” he said. “You’re Hilma.”

  She nodded shyly. He backed just far enough to turn around without pushing her knees, looked out at the surrounding men, and said in a voice that sounded like the foghorn on the tugboat he was built like, “This one’s mine!” He turned back to Hilma and offered his hands. She slid off
the bar into his grasp, and he gently lowered her to the floor.

  A hush fell over the bar and a way parted for them to the stairs. They went up. They didn’t come back down.

  The next time anyone at Big Barb’s saw Hilma, she was on John Francis’s arm, flaunting a wedding band on her finger.

  Sometimes at Big Barb’s everything wasn’t just beer and skittles and a headlong rush to the private rooms upstairs.

  “I have a song!” Corporal Raoul Pasquin shouted, standing up and waving his arms. The Marines listened attentively. That he could stand and wave his arms so soon after what he’d been through on Havanagas was a bit of a miracle in itself, but he was not the kind of Marine who’d let a few missing body parts keep him down very long.

  When Pasquin had joined 34th FIST from his old outfit, 25th FIST, he’d given every indication he was a problem child, and gotten off to a bad start at Camp Ellis. He and Dean had serious words just before they deployed to Society 437, but once there, and during the Avionian mission, Pasquin proved he could handle himself in combat and was accepted in third platoon as a trusted NCO. More important, on Havanagas, where the corporal had withstood vicious torture at the hands of the mobsters who’d been running the place, he’d proved to Dean and Claypoole that he was far more than a Marine corporal, more even than their fire team leader. He was a proven comrade, a man Marines could trust their lives to.

  But the best proof that Corporal Raoul Pasquin was not the ass he’d started out as was that Owen the woo had taken a liking to him. Everyone was sure Owen could tell good from bad, and the Marines trusted his judgment.

  So when Raoul Pasquin stood up, he was given a measure of respect. Dean and Claypoole shouted for silence. Bass gestured him to continue.