Resistance: Hathe Book One (26 page)

In the
morning, she was still left wanting. Hamon sent word that she
should call a guard if she wished to go anywhere. He would be
unable to leave his work until evening. Her face closed and blank,
she asked only to be taken to Jacquel’s quarters at
midday.

It was
a long morning, picking up and then discarding one task after
another, her mind unable to concentrate on any but the one problem.
Or person, rather. Where was he? Did the cold anger and disgust of
his farewell still hold him in thrall? Had he relented? Or had it
hardened into something else altogether, something that would kill
all they had?

Even
now, a shred of something held her back: honor, loyalty, she
couldn’t say. Whatever it was, it kept her from rushing to do as
her instincts commanded: to lay all before him and once again be
enfolded in his arms, all barriers down.

Then
again, perhaps it was only that she knew, deep within, that to give
way to treason would finally kill all they had. Without that strong
and abiding love of the culture that gave him birth, his fierce
drive to somehow save his world from the threatening holocaust,
would she love him as deeply? She sensed not. Just as surely, she
knew that it was the Marthe who loved and cared for her people
enough to sacrifice her own happiness that he loved, not the
beautiful but shallow Lieger she strove so hard to
appear.

It was
with a heavy heart that she followed the guard later that day to
see Jaca. The years of deception had taught her well, though,
enough to ensure that not a sign of her inner turmoil broke through
the elegant mask of her face as she greeted his two
guests.

“
Jocelyn, Helen, how delightful to see you both. I see my
step-cousin has not taken long to avail himself of both
surroundings and companions more suited to his graces.” She gazed
around at the familiar Hathian touches: subtle splashes of color,
an exquisite statuette, softly glowing panels of a changing
luminescence lightening the standard issue tint of the
walls.

“
Quite an improvement on my old quarters,” grinned Jacquel,
watching her take it in. “Dearest Jocelyn prevailed upon the
Commander and my sweet Helen managed to procure these few odds and
ends.” Somehow, he managed to keep both women purring contentedly
at him, she noticed as she took the seat opposite the trio. “But my
dear,” he added, turning back to her, “you look a trifle miffed.
Radcliff still out of sorts with you?”

“
You
rather forced him into a corner.”

“
Did
the man really think he could get away with depriving us of a
party? What cruelty. Don’t you agree, my pets?”

“
Oh,
completely,” said Jocelyn, curling closer into his shoulder. “It
sounds such fun, and it’s far too long since we had any of that
around here.”

“
Is
the man ashamed to be marrying you?” demanded Jacquel.

“
I
think he was hoping it would be more intimate celebration,” she
replied, half apologetically. “I must admit I’d prefer a lovely,
big party. A real wedding, like we used to have. Nevertheless, his
reasons are honorable; and he was worried about the peasants if
they’re left unguarded. Terrans have so little experience in such
matters.”

Helen
suddenly sat up. “I hadn’t thought of that.”

“
It’s no problem,” said Jacquel, pulling her firmly back. “You
throw a party for the whole town and they all get blind drunk.
Works a treat every time.”

“
And
if you’re at all worried about trouble, you drug the food,” added
Marthe. “You forget, we’ve had to deal with them longer than you.
The only consistent emotion they feel is hatred of the Haut Liege.
So we always put in place safeguards. You Terrans are too easy on
them.”

“
Enough of the peasants,” cried Jacquel with a dismissive
wave. “Surely Radcliff isn’t still insisting on a small
affair?”

“
No,
but he does claim that you and I engineered last night between us.
To think all I wanted was a proper Hathian wedding, just like Maman
and Father’s. Do you remember when Laren got married, Jaca? My
sister,” she explained to the two women. “You should have seen her.
She was so beautiful. Everyone came, almost five hundred at the
ceremony and a thousand afterwards. There was dancing and music,
poetry and games for three days after. It took us weeks to recover.
And Hamon gets in a huff over a mere few hundred and one night of
revelry!”

She
sat down next to the Terran ladies, a picture of complete misery.
Jaca’s dancing eyes applauded her performance. Fortunately, both
Terran women were too busy comforting her to notice her fellow
conspirator’s barely stifled laughter.

“
You
leave Radcliff to me,” said Helen firmly. “I’ll have a word with
him.”

“
Oh,
would you?” She let her most brilliant smile bloom on her
face.

“
Don’t you worry any longer. I know just how you feel; men can
be so heartless sometimes.”

In a
remarkably short time Hamon was made to feel the result of Marthe’s
interventions, accosted by both of her new Terran allies with stern
speeches of reproach. They made worse an already pounding head, the
price of a sleepless night of soul searching. He was cruel and
uncompromising, the women told him. If he continued in this vein,
he would soon be the laughing stock of the Terran forces. He
listened carefully to all they had to say, the hammering in his
head mercifully preventing him taking in more than a quarter of
their tirade. Promising faithfully to make all well with his
grievously wronged fiancée, he at last escaped to the sanctuary of
a dark, dark room.

But
that was no good. All he could do there was think. Think of the
duplicity, and the sheer talent for manipulation he was pitted
against. And comprehending at last the threat, could feel only
admiration, more than any other emotion—more, even, than he feared
it.

Cursing himself, he stalked out of the room, bent on losing
himself in work—work so absorbing that it excluded all else. He
took the side door to his office, unable at present to cope with
the idle greetings of his staff. The pristine black slab of his
desk welcomed him to its safe harbor, and it was with an eager hand
that he activated his screen. The very ordinariness of the
shimmering surface materializing, then settling into cream and
black report mode, settled some of his inner turmoil and he sat
back to study the incoming data.

He had
neglected his desk these last weeks, and the number of reports
waiting him had clocked up steadily.
What have I been
thinking
? he berated himself grimly. Then, as he read, a
growing sense of disquiet overtook him.

There
were too many paradoxes, too many unexplained happenings. Most
disturbing of all to his cynically analytical mind, too much was
going well. The output of the mines had imperceptibly increased
over the months, to a level that almost matched requirements. Food
shortages were infrequent, resulting in fewer riots and military
rampages through the streets by frustrated soldiers, and the number
of peasants reporting sick had declined in the work camps but not,
he noticed, in the village clusters next to military posts such as
this.

Some
kind of climax was pending, he would lay money on it. But what, and
when?

He had
always suspected that the peasantry were involved. Now in the data
scrolling down his screen he saw it confirmed. What were they
planning, and why? Did they plan to take over the planet for
themselves? Or maybe they were still helping their old masters, the
mysteriously vanished off-world Liegers? Or was it as he first
thought? Was the whole set-up here a complete fake?

His
fingers tapped a drumbeat on the desktop. The first possibility
wasn’t a serious worry. The peasants were too poorly equipped to be
anything but a minor nuisance. The second, that they were helping
hidden Liegers, was more serious but still not a major worry. The
Hathians had fought bravely enough trying to keep the Terrans off
planet during the invasion, but ultimately their lack of experience
had beaten them. Nor would he expect the peasants to be eager to
come to the aid of a class they claimed to hate so much.

As for
the third option … now that was a different matter
altogether.

“
The
problem is,” he said, talking it over with Ferdo later, “if the
social system here wasn’t the strict, class driven one we’ve been
led to believe existed, then what was it? Are all those peasants a
complete fabrication and this whole place carrying out one colossal
masquerade?”

“
Impossible,” declared his friend. “A whole planet of the best
actors in the Alliance? That’s what they’d have to be. We’d have
discovered such a cover up years ago. After all, we’ve been here
nearly five years. No resistance group waits that long to fight
back.”

“
All
true.” Hamon was forced to agree. It was so reasonable. He sat
forward on the edge of his chair and drummed his fingers on Ferdo’s
desk, on edge and unable to banish his suspicions. “Something’s
boiling. I just know it. And the peasants are involved.”

“
So
it could be your first theory. In which case, why worry? It’s
obvious that our two Lieger friends aren’t involved
anyway.”

“
Is
it?”

“
Of
course. That Jacquel fellow wouldn’t have a serious thought in his
head beyond wine, women and song. By the stars, does he know how to
enjoy himself. He’s got half the women in his pocket
already.”

“
Exactly.”

Ferdo
stared at him. “Where’s the harm in that. Even if he tried to pump
anyone, no one would tell him anything.”

“
Maybe, but des Trurain’s no playboy. I’ve checked the old
files on prominent Hathians. His academic record is particularly
interesting. He’s a highly qualified historian, well able to assess
the sociological set up here, along with the general state of
morale and who really pulls the strings among the Terran hierarchy.
Very useful knowledge to any opponent.”

Ferdo
was silent a moment, digesting this. He shifted uneasily, as if
searching for a counter argument. “What can he do with anything he
learns? A resistance large enough to be a threat would need a
massive organization. You can’t hide anything that big from us, not
for this long.”

“
It
depends. We’ve no idea what scale of technology we’re dealing
with.”

“
Nothing could be that advanced. There’s never been a
resistance movement yet that wasn’t known to the opposition, and
you haven’t got one concrete fact to back up your
theories.”

“
Maybe, but Marthe was telling me of the deficiencies of
Terran technology last night. She said that in communications we’re
fifty years behind. A well endowed scientific community can learn a
lot in fifty years. And even if ignorance of the field leads her to
exaggerate, it still suggests they are well ahead of us.

Ferdo
suddenly sat up, a tight frown creasing his face.

“
Ignorant? Not the daughter of Sylvan an Castre. Even on
Earth, we heard rumors of the work he was doing. Unfortunately, no
one in authority thought it worthwhile finding out more. But if
only half the stories of his work are true and he talked to his
daughter about it, then she’d know exactly how far ahead of us they
are.” Ferdo paced once, then turned back to stare at
him.

“
Fifty years, you say?” He looked at the ceiling and Hamon
could almost see him turning over ideas. Then he turned back in
disgust. “If that’s true, why haven’t they made any attempt to
interfere with our transmissions? If they’re that far ahead, they
should be able to bring us to a standstill, but we’ve never
detected the slightest hiccup in the network.”

“
Not
even a twitch?”

“
Not
a thing.”

Radcliff slumped back. He was grabbing at phantoms, but
something was happening. He knew it.

“
One
more flaw in your argument,” said Ferdo then. “The beautiful
Marthe, your First Union partner. You obviously don’t suspect her,
not with this marriage thing you’re planning. I understand it’s
fairly binding?”

“
For
life.”

“
So
you trust her.”

“
Quite the contrary,” said Hamon bitterly. “I’m more and more
convinced that she was planted deliberately in the Citadel. Her
intuitive understanding of our real lines of influence is amazing;
and she knows how to use them. On two occasions already, she’s been
able to manipulate our affairs enough to threaten the security of
the Citadel, while at the same time increasing sympathy among her
supporters.” He gripped the arms of the chair as the pounding in
his head suddenly exploded.

“
You
exaggerate, surely.” Ferdo was too innocent still, too unaware that
even the most trustworthy of people would stab you in the back when
it suited. He was glaring at Hamon as if he’d said something
absolutely unforgivable. “If you mean her introduction of des
Trurain, it’s only natural she’d wish to help a friend. As for the
wedding, I’ve never seen a woman yet who didn’t want an affair of
which she was to be the centre of attention to be as large and
grand as possible.”