Resistance: Hathe Book One (32 page)

She
laughed back, an expectant look crossing her face.

“
Got
to go now, Commander. We have seditious plans to make. Tell you
what, though, you’ll be the first to know when we decide to
overthrow you. How about it, Jocy? Feel like overthrowing the
Commander?” He let a wicked gleam enter his eyes. “On second
thoughts, I’ll throw you first,” and with another, fuddled laugh,
he stumbled off in the arms of his new companion, followed by the
appreciative rumbles of the Terran chief.

“
Now
there’s a boy who has his priorities right.”

Fortunately for Griffith an Castre’s peace of mind, Jacquel’s
brash attempts at obstruction were just then eclipsed. An awed
silence suddenly blanketed the hall. Looking from beneath his hood
towards the source of the abrupt change, Griffith saw a strange
squad of soldiers entering through the far door and Jacquel des
Trurain’s antics immediately fell to the bottom of his list of
worries. The superiority of these troops over the usual Terran
soldier was striking, their heads held high and their uniforms of
an immaculate cut. Obviously an elite corps. Why hadn’t they been
seen on Hathe before now?

Then
he noticed the woman in their midst, elderly in appearance,
slow¬moving and weary, but the fear slashed upon the Terran faces
left him in no doubt of her power. The riddle was solved when
Radcliff came eagerly towards the lady, bringing his new bride.
Griffith smiled coldly. So this was Administrator MacDiarmid, the
mother of our troublesome major. How very interesting.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

Even
as Griffith watched, Marthe came face to face with the frail woman,
dragged along by Hamon right into the middle of the nerve-searing
squad of giants. He’d been stunned by the soldiers’ arrival and had
stood for a full minute, she swore, staring in disbelief. Never
before had she seen the signs of emotion marked so clearly on his
well controlled face. Without a word of explanation, she’d been
propelled towards the terrifying men about the carefully guarded
lady. She needed only one look at the stranger’s face and the
loving look on her husband’s to tell her the visitor’s identity.
The woman’s smile of welcome for Hamon was unmistakable.

Marthe
warmly hugged her new mother-in-law and discovered her first
impressions to be false. Frail and aged the lady may appear, but it
came of a burden carried too long. The Administrator, she quickly
realized, was younger than her own mother would have been, and
Marthe’s heart was filled with pity.

“
Madame, how wonderful that you could be with us. I can see
that it means a great deal to Hamon,” she said.

“
Thank you, my dear.”

She’d
been right. The voice was golden, clear, mature but not yet
elderly.

Madame
MacDiarmid now turned her warm smile on Marthe. “Ferdo sent me a
message I’d almost given up hope of ever receiving, and I just had
to meet the young woman who had finally tamed this rogue of a son
of mine.”

“
Thank you for the kind words, Mother,” her ungrateful son
laughed back, “but how did you find the time to come? I was under
the impression that Earth would be reduced to starvation level if
you ever dared leave that desk of yours.”

“
It
will if I stay. A few weeks’ break can’t possibly make matters
worse. Who knows, I may even find that some of my staff are halfway
to being competent.” Her son’s gruff snort at what was obviously an
old complaint brought a quiet smile to his mother’s
face.

“
So
the food rationing is still as critical as ever?” Hamon
said.

“
Worse. We’re down to seventy-five percent of maintenance
requirements. You have to really earn your keep on Earth these
days.”

Bewildered, Marthe looked to Hamon in query. The words had
been so harsh and his mother’s callous chuckle jangled Marthe with
its wrongness. It didn’t match the lady in front of her. Stern she
may be, but Marthe sensed fairness and compassion there.

Hamon
proceeded to explain and, for the first time, Marthe learnt of the
harsh reality that ruled the lives of Earth’s residents. That all
registered Terrans must carry a license stating the percentage of
survival rations to which they were entitled, depending on work
type, health and general usefulness to society, and that his mother
was responsible for setting the rules governing that entitlement.
She stared in horror. This woman standing before her literally
decided who lived or died on Earth.

His
mother’s calm voice only confirmed it, as she wryly commented on
her son’s words. “Which is why, my dear, I am the prime target for
any would-be briber. You have no idea how wealthy I could be. It’s
a pity they don’t realize that all the wealth in the world will not
buy me what I really need—a food supply greater than one hundred
percent of requirements. It’s the old story: for that we need more
energy. Thank the stars for your planet, my dear.”

Despite the horrors of the situation on Earth revealed by the
woman’s words, Marthe couldn’t hide a flush of anger at the
reminder of Hathe’s oppression and she straightened
grimly.

Fortunately, Hamon knew her well enough now to catch the
danger signs before she did anything stupid. Even as she began to
open her mouth, he was moving his mother away from Marthe and
towards the converging horde of officials. She supposed she should
be grateful.

“
Watch them grovel,” was his quiet aside to Marthe, and she
had to smile at the devilish gleam in his clear hazel eyes, not in
the slightest quelled by his mother’s glare of reproof.

Leading the group coming towards them was the Commander, his
face so fearful that Marthe was dumbstruck. Nor was he alone. All
the officials were equally terrified, including the head of the
Guards, a man well known among the Hathians for his cruel
excesses.

Then
Hamon’s mother spoke to him, and Marthe was no longer surprised.
She was the Administrator and the level of contempt in her voice
froze out any attempt at familiarity. She and her bodyguard held
themselves aloof from the reception party, as if to infer that the
very air was contaminated. Hamon had told her that the conquering
troops were gleaned from the veriest riffraff of Earth, picked
solely for their lack of scruples. Now she saw it confirmed. Yet
were those who sent them here any better? Or were they simply, as
was her husband, men and women of principle forced by the harsh
reality of Terran society to brutally discard aspirations to
justice.

Marthe
shook herself. Earth’s problems were not her concern. Only those of
her own oppressed people. Her new mother-in-law chose that moment
to voice her opinion of the Hathian servants. “Take him away. He
reeks,” said the Administrator, frowning with disgust at the too
close approach of a cup bearer.

The
wine Marthe had drunk so carelessly took sudden and disastrous
hold. How dare the woman! To speak so of Marthe’s valiant comrades,
bravely risking discovery to attend her wedding.

“
Their bodies maybe, but not their souls,” she shot back.
“Unlike others here present.”

A
deathly wave of silence filled the room and crashed with all the
savagery of reality on her head. The insult was unmistakable to
everyone.

Administrator MacDiarmid stared. Hamon looked stunned, then
shocked, then retreated behind that hateful bland mask of his. The
husband became again the Terran officer as he moved away from her
and towards his mother as his expression dared her to continue. The
elite bodyguard looked questioningly at their mistress for
instructions concerning this impudent baggage; and inside her head,
she heard the growing chorus of Hathian outcries.

Alone
among the horde of visible and invisible participants, it was the
disapproving and cool Griffith who kept his head. He sent her an
urgent warning to stay still, then slipped quietly from the room, a
simple peasant bound on his duties. Once outside and safe, she
heard his signal to the absent Jacquel.
“Only the drunken
brashness of that young idiot can help us now,”
was what
Griffin messaged to her, and the sharpness of his tapping told only
too clearly that she was included in the young idiot
category.

Jacquel had long learnt to ignore such jibes from Griffith an
Castre. The man was a pompous prig, but he’d trusted him with his
life more times than he cared to remember. Jacquel listened to
Griffith’s precise description of what had happened, hastily
disentangled himself from a warm embrace and raced to the servant’s
entrance. Donning the peasant robe Griffith threw at him, he
entered the hall unseen, hoping to have been thought present all
along. Quickly he summed up the scene. The initial, shocked silence
had been short-lived. A loud babble of voices rose higher and
higher, with the Colonel’s uppermost, demanding that Marthe explain
herself, though the stars knew her remark had been plain
enough.

Only
Radcliff remained uninvolved. The bastard was just standing there,
cynically watching the chaos unfold. The only point in his favour
was he still stood between Marthe and the threatening crowd. But
that was all.

Luckily, Marthe had done as ordered and remained silent. Or
was she merely stunned by her stupidity? Worst of all, on the
underground channels Jacquel could hear two hotheads applauding her
words and urging action if the guards should make a move towards
her. By the Pillars! Only this morning, they were all too ready to
kill her in the street, now they wanted to throw everything away by
charging in to defend her. Dramatics are not what is needed now,
you morons, just good, old-fashioned tomfoolery.

He
smiled mischievously, then had a quiet word to a nearby peasant
girl and proceeded to grab her lecherously about the waist, one
fumbling hand groping for her breast. About him hung the rumpled
vestiges of the peasant’s outer robe, partially looped over his
head and falling in a drunken knot round his shoulders.

Amidst
a growing chorus of guffaws, he lurched with her towards the centre
of the storm, the girl’s face a barely glimpsed slash of terror
under her hood.

Marthe, desperately striving to know what to do next, had
never seen a more welcome sight. As he neared, she could hear
Jacquel’s carelessly muffled stage whispers, urging the girl to
come and meet his cousin.

“
ltsh her wedding, you know. Anyone can talk to a lady on her
wedding. Hey, Rickard, like my latest? Don’t smell too sweet, but
who cares,” he called to a nearby Terran, then sprawled headlong as
his foot caught in the robe, landing just in front of
Marthe.

She
rushed forward, uncertain whether he was drunk or sober. Then
recognized the grin of pure impishness on his face from old and her
heart sank. Relinquishing the peasant girl, he grabbed her instead
as she helped him to sit up.

“
Ho,
ho,” he exclaimed. “This is more the thing. Next best thing to a
Hathian lady is a Hathian peasant. But the real thing! John,
Rickard, ever been with a real Hathian lady?” With a strength that
convinced Marthe he was all too sober, he suddenly grasped her
about the waist, one hand clutching embarrassingly at her breast as
he slobbered about her throat. She did not even have time to shriek
before she felt familiar hands dragging her away. Hamon was finally
galvanized to action, the green flames of jealousy sparking in his
eyes. It was too much. She suddenly burst into tears, and couldn’t
stop. Both men were so shocked they momentarily refrained from
their threatening brawl to stare in consternation.

For a
few seconds only, she clung to her husband. Then the memory of his
desertion returned and she drew back, turning aside and moaning
softly.

Hamon
couldn’t hear what she said, only that it was the same word, over
and over. Across from him, des Trurains listened hard, then Hamon
saw comprehension on the man’s face. The drunken stance and girl
were abruptly discarded.

“
For
God’s sake, Radcliff, get her out of here before she breaks down
completely. Whatever you suspect, she deserves better than that.
And here’s me thinking she’d finally learned to live without
him.”

“
Who?” demanded Hamon, jealousy tearing at him.

“
Bendin, of course. Haven’t you realized yet that you’ve only
one true rival—her five-years-dead twin brother? Right now, I’m
guessing she wishes like hell he was standing beside her. After
all, it’s not as if there was anyone else offering to protect her.
If Marthe means anything to you at all, Radcliff, get your mother
to apologize. Those peasants, reek though they might, are the
nearest thing she has to family tonight.”

Hamon
stood, torn between giving this rogue the hiding he deserved,
finding out what really lay behind this drama, or seeing to the
woman he loved, still standing so terribly rigid beside him. Her
face was frozen, but whether from sheer self-control or an
overburdened loss of all feeling, he couldn’t say.

With
an oath, he drew her in, hoping the frozenness would hold a few
seconds longer, as he led his wife and mother away from the curious
mob. For the first time in his life, he was grateful for his
mother’s deathly efficient guard as they kept at bay the staring
crowd.

Jacquel let them go first, as he signaled in code to the young
Hathians standing tensely on the verge of the crowd to stay out of
a purely family affair. A command he hoped they obeyed. Then he
followed Hamon and Marthe.