Текст книги " Blood Legacy"

At first, he thought the great, silent room empty but for him, then saw the shadows begin to stir as a form slowly emerged. The silhouette limped toward him, and Focht gradually made out a face he had not seen for twenty years. "This is madness," he said, as though the words could awaken him from this dream fast becoming a nightmare.

The shadowman stopped a dozen meters from the throne and smiled with the smugness of a well-schooled courtier. "Of course, it is, my friend. But when did that ever matter?"

Focht's right fist smashed down on the arm of the throne. "This will end, and end now!" He thrust a finger at the man standing before him. "I know you, Aldo Lestrade, but you have been dead for the past twenty years."

The phantom shrugged as though to say it mattered little. "Physically, yes. I died years ago, poisoned by a whelp I never knew I had sired." He cackled horribly. "But I have lived on within your mind and thrived there. Yes, yes, I know all about the training those Buddhist monks and ComStar Adepts put you through to free your spirit of worldly attachments and concerns. But now you see, Precentor Martial, that I have been there all along, the receptacle for all the ambition you tried to leave behind."

The shade raised its hands to take in the entire room. "And now you have done it. Finally. There you sit on the throne of the Lyran Commonwealth, fulfilling the desire you have long held most dear."

Focht lifted his snow-maned head proudly and stared hard at the shade with his single good eye. "You are wrong, Lestrade. The man I once was desired the throne, but that man is no more." He plucked at the left breast of his long white robe, indicating the golden star insignia embroidered there.

"I now serve ComStar and the Word of Blake. This throne is the rightful place of Archon Melissa Steiner Davion of the Federated Commonwealth, and I recognize her joint ruler-ship with her husband, Prince Hanse Davion of the Federated Commonwealth."

Lestrade laughed softly, but the sound was sinister. "Deny it if you will, old friend, but I am here to prove you wrong. I know the truth of your heart, and it is your desire for power. By giving you this vision of yourself on the throne, I permit you to glimpse the possible future. Use the means in your power and take the throne!"

Banishing his unease, Focht gave a laugh of his own. "It is pure foolishness to believe I either desire the throne or that I would move to take it. It is true that as Precentor Martial of ComStar's forces, I command fifty crack regiments. And yes, that is a force sufficient to depose Melissa if I so desired, but I cannot and I will not."

"Bah!" snarled Lestrade as the healthy glow of his complexion began to fade to a grayish pallor. "You always had to be pushed to see what must be done ..."

"Stop!" Focht shot to his feet, towering over the ghost. "You've never been a MechWarrior! You've never understood the code of duty and honor that rules those who pilot these engines of destruction. Placing such an awesome weapon in the hands of an individual implies a similar gesture of trust." Focht's single gray eye flashed with anger. "You betrayed my trust when you were alive. Why would I trust you now?"

Focht turned and waved a hand at the twin Griffinsstanding behind the throne. "For more than six hundred years, the BattleMech has occupied a central place in the mythology we spin around ourselves like a cocoon then call reality. Since the fall of the Star League, it is BattleMechs that have decided the outcome of our endless wars. It is those very wars that have destroyed most of the means to produce these magnificent war machines. Worse, we have lost so much technology in this long Dark Age that our 'Mechs haven't half the capabilities of those their great-great grandfathers took into battle. In these centuries of Succession Wars, the leaders of the Great Houses lost the vision of a unified humanity. They only saw their greed for another's land or power, and that was how they put the BattleMech to use."

Lestrade opened his mouth to speak, but Focht cut him off. "For centuries, we have told ourselves that the BattleMech is invincible. New models like the Hatchetmanor Wolfhoundhave shown that improvements are possible, but these designs were still based on technology we understand. They present no newthreat."

"The same cannot be said of the Clans. Though they, too, fight with 'Mechs, theirs surpass even those our ancestors knew at the pinnacle of man's technological development. Clan 'Mechs move faster, shoot more accurately, and can hit targets at ranges much greater than our machines. What's more, the Clans, as a people, devote their whole existence to firing the engine of war. The defeats they suffered last year were little more than accidents. The Federated Commonwealth attacked them on the poorly garrisoned backwater world of Twycross. And, yes, the Lians forces were crack troops, but Kai Allard-Liao's single-handed destruction of a whole Cluster of front-line Clan 'Mechs can only be attributed to luck."

Lestrade's mechanical left hand worked his jaw around to make it work. "And what of the battle on Wolcott? Theodore Kurita defeated a planetary assault."

"True," Focht conceded with a nod. "He managed to use the Clans' own military conventions against them, but the greater significance of how the Clans function has escaped notice. Some military thinkers of the Inner Sphere believe it only some quirk that makes the Clans bid away troops in order to attack a planet with the minimum number of troops. In fact, it is a sinister omen of things to come. When the Clans stop bidding so boldly, their technological edge will overwhelm our forces. All will be lost."

Lestrade smiled broadly, tearing the desiccated flesh off his lips. "And all the more reason for you to seize control of Tharkad and the throne."

"Have you heard nothing I've just said?" In his anger, Focht grasped the fabric of his nightmare, making the towering Griffinswaver, then shift to become the hulking forms of the Clan 'Mech known as the Madcat.Mounted on birdlike legs bent backward at the knee, the blocky body thrust the cockpit forward. Above the hip joints rode two boxy long-range missile launchers, and each arm ended in slender, rectangular weapons pods. The slate gray 'Mechs looked like deadly, predators ready to devour any opposition.

"These are the kinds of 'Mech we face now. They have more than double the effectiveness of our machines." This time, Focht took the shadows and formed them into a man-sized suit of armor. The right arm ended in a laser muzzle while the left hand had only three thick fingers. A rocket-launcher rode on the back of the armor suit, and the individual wearing the suit had only a V-shaped black glass slit for a viewport.

"The Clans call these powered suits and the people who pilot them Elementals. This armored infantry can withstand direct hits by 'Mech weaponry. Working in concert, Elementals can take down and destroy a 'Mech." Focht ran the slender fingers of his left hand through his white hair. "The only way mankind can hope to hold back the Clans is by uniting their full resources to defeating the invaders."

Lestrade stared at the armor suit, but seemed unimpressed. "It took no such union to drive the Clans off this time, did it?"

Focht snarled inarticulately, then warped the stuff of dreams again. Against the darkness of the throne room, pinpoints of light began to burn. Above, a system's sun rotated and shot out a massive solar flare. Below, just beyond the whiplash of solar plasma, dozens of waspy JumpShips materialized in the system in two distinct groups. The thick hulls of the smaller group, composed of one massive and four small ships, bristled with weaponry. The larger group, looking skeletal compared to its foes, detached DropShip after DropShip and launched furious flights of fighters in a space-borne assault.

The Precentor Martial gritted his teeth and focused the dream on one fighter. Shaped like a boomerang, the craft made one strafing run from the bow to the stern of the enemy flagship, then turned and came back again. Both the fighter and its wingman were hit in the second run. The wingman's ship drifted away from the battle, but the primary ship boosted forward. Dropping into a long, sweeping dive, it ran its engines higher than they were meant to go. Glowing like a nova, the Shilonefighter smashed into the bridge of the Clan JumpShip.

Focht pointed to the gaping hole torn in the JumpShip's hull. "There. That's the reason the Clans have stopped their assaults. That suicide ship killed their ilKhan, the man in charge of the whole invasion of the Inner Sphere. The Clan leaders have withdrawn to elect a new overlord, but the garrison they have left is more than ample to ward the worlds they have taken. Having chosen a new warlord, they will return. This I have from Ulric, Khan of the Wolf Clan, who has never given me reason to doubt him or his words. Once again, it was sheer luck that aided us in our war against the Clans, but to depend on such luck would be suicidal."

The corpse applauded heartily. As his metal hand impacted the other of flesh, the decaying hand lost bits and pieces of skin and fingers. "Spoken like a warrior, Precentor. As such, your analysis of the situation is flawless. You are correct that only the unification of the warring states of the Inner Sphere could defeat the Clans. You speak as a soldier, but I, as a politician, see the impossibility of it all."

"Is that so?" Focht smiled calmly. "Jaime Wolf has gathered the leaders of all the Great Houses to his world of Outreach to discuss the situation. He could forge the ties that will bind everything together."

The sound of Lestrade's teeth rattling loosely in his jaw made an irritating counterpoint to his words. "For that, Wolf would have to be a magician, not a mercenary leader. Hanse Davion and Theodore Kurita can no more get along than light and darkness can abide each other. Twice in the last twenty-five years the Federated Suns had launched an invasion of the Draconis Combine, and twice Theodore Kurita has turned them back. Davion and Kurita are like a snake and a mongoose, each one knowing a single false step could be his death."

Lestrade tried to gesture broadly with his metal arm, but a grinding click in the joint left it hanging useless at his side. "And let us not forget the sisters Liao. The St. Ives Compact ruled by Candace is little more than a protectorate of the Federated Commonwealth. If not for Davion troops stationed there, Romano would have long since have attempted to retake the Compact worlds for the Capellan Confederation. As it is, Romano has made at least a dozen assassination attempts on her sister's life, and she has a bounty out on the heads of Candace's friends and the kin of her husband, Justin Allard. The idea of anyone cooperating with Romano, no matter what the threat to the Successor States, is ludicrous."

The dead Duke's head came up and his lifeless eyes locked on Focht. "As for the Free Worlds League, I'd not expect much from them. Wolf clearly does not trust ComStar, hence the barring of any ComStar personnel from his world and this conference, in particular. As Thomas Marik was a ComStar Acolyte before he took his father's place on the throne, I cannot believe Wolf will be inclined to put much faith in anything Thomas does or says.

"There is also the problem of Thomas' four-year-old son, who has leukemia. It is a cruel blow, but you already know that he had signed the decree legitimizing Isis, his sixteen-year-old daughter by a mistress. Aside from his domestic troubles, Thomas is in a good position to bargain hard for his support because the Clans will have to come through the Lyran Commonwealth before they can hit him. Hanse and Theodore will have to make concessions to Marik for his help. But with the Primus backing him, Thomas still might not give in."

Focht stiffened at the mention of ComStar's leader, and the revenant pounced at this show of anxiety. "Don't try to hide from me, Precentor Martial. Am I not inside your brain and knowing your very thoughts? You style yourself a warrior, and you are good at it, but politics is a minefield. Your Primus, Myndo Waterly, is an excellent player, isn't she? She's convinced that ComStar can work with the Clans until the invaders have bled themselves white in battle, and thenComStar can step in, destroy them, and reform all society into Blake's dream of a Utopia. Has there ever been a greater foolishness?"

As they spoke, the shade of what had once been Aldo Lestrade slowly disintegrated. His flesh was all but gone and the white of his bones showed through the worm-gnawed rents in his clothing. His death's-head watched Focht with shadow-filled eye sockets, but the bony jaw worked up and down uselessly, no words coming from its throat.

Focht leaned back in the throne. "If you are the container for whatever trace of ambition still claims me, I am pleased to see the state it is in. I am a warrior who commands other warriors. I know better than to dabble in politics." He raised his hand to adjust the patch over his right eye. "I paid a dear price for that realization, but I survived the lesson. You, Aldo Lestrade, did not."

The ghoul laughed one last time. "But what you did not learn, Anastasius Focht, is that you can never escape politics. It is everywhere and, someday, it will lay you in the ground, just as it has me ..."

Lestrade's skeleton collapsed into a pile of dust, but his laughter continued to echo in Focht's brain until the sound gradually transformed into the incessant beeping of the Drop-Ship's visiphone intercom system. Pulling himself up into a sitting position, Focht reached out to punch the glowing button on the console beside his bed.

"Yes?"

The ComStar acolyte on the screen bowed his head. "Forgive me for waking you, Precentor, but you asked to be alerted two hours prior to atmospheric entry. We have just passed that mark and should be on the ground in just under three hours."

Focht nodded. "Call Sandhurst and have them arrange a full staff meeting for ETA plus 30 minutes. No excuses accepted for absence."

The Acolyte paled visibly. "I cannot do that, Precentor."

Focht's voice deepened with a rumble of anger. "Explain."

'The Primus sent us a priority directive while you slept. We are to land at Hilton Head, and you are to brief her immediately on the Clan situation. You will then address the First Circuit."

"Send my message nonetheless. I will leave for Sandhurst as soon as possible."

The Acolyte regained some of his color. "It shall be done as though it were the Will of Blake, Precentor Martial."

Focht broke the connection with the flick of a finger. "Perhaps you were right, Aldo. Perhaps none of us can escape politics, but that does not mean I must succumb to them. One man losing an eye to politics is enough. I cannot allow Mankind to be sacrificed on that same altar. The most elegant speeches may sway the hearts and minds of men, but not one ever stopped a bullet."

1

Wolf's Dragoons General Headquarters, Outreach

Sarna March, Federated Commonwealth

15 January 3051

 "You're who?"

Victor Ian Steiner Davion sat stunned in his chair as Romano Liao's shout filled the Dragoons' Grand Council Chamber. In front of him, his father stiffened while his mother reached instinctively for her husband's hand. Romano's voice rang out again. "By all the gods of heaven and earth, I can't believe it."

"I thought, Madam Chancellor, that my statement was clear enough." Jaime Wolf leaned heavily on the raised podium at the front of the chamber. Though the mercenary was not a big man, Victor could see the inner strength that had made Wolf a legendary leader and warrior. His black uniform and short cape only added to the grim expression his face now wore, particularly with the cloak thrown back from the left shoulder to reveal the ruby-eyed wolf's-head epaulet.

"Let me try again." Wolf looked around at the assembled leaders of the Inner Sphere, who gazed back at him with rapt attention. "More than forty-five years ago, Wolf's Dragoons were sent by the Clans to determine the level of military preparedness of your states, those fragments of what had once been the Star League. Since that time, we have worked both for and against every one of the Great Houses of the Inner Sphere."

Prince Haakon Magnusson of the Free Rasalhague Republic angrily raised a clenched fist. "Then I have you to blame for the Clans half-devouring my nation!" Magnusson, a silver-haired man who was neither tall nor particularly strong, put all his strength into the emotion that accented his words. "Was the Rasalhague Republic the choice target for the assault because we are a young nation or was it our reputation for disliking mercenaries?"

Wolf held up his hands to forestall other shouted questions. "Stop! You misinterpret my words." The diminutive mercenary turned to face Magnusson. "The Dragoons had nothing to do with the Clans' choice of targets. They are merely following the same route back into the Inner Sphere by which they left it. The Free Rasalhague Republic just happens to inhabit that slice of known space."

Magnusson returned to his seat at the table set between that assigned to the Draconis Combine representatives and the aisle that split the room in half. Varldherre Tor Miraborg, a sour-looking man with a long, deep scar down the left side of his face, leaned forward in his wheelchair to whisper something to Ragnar, Magnusson's son and the Crown Prince of Rasalhague. It looked to Victor as though Magnusson's heir was listening intently to Miraborg, but it was equally obvious that something in the words had taken him aback.

Hanse Davion rose from his seat with the ease of a much younger man. Though the years had slowed the elder Davion slightly and leeched the auburn from his hair, Victor knew his father took pains to remain physically fit. The Prince of the Federated Suns flashed his son a warm smile as he pushed his chair slightly back and out of the way. As always, the vitality flashing through Hanse's electric blue eyes made Victor confident his father would successfully gauge the problem and find a solution.

"Colonel Wolf, I gather by your answer to Prince Magnusson that you are no longer associated with the Clans?"

Wolf nodded, apparently relieved at an opening to explain. "Our last communication with the Clans occurred just after the Marik civil war in 3014. At that time, our leader believed that a Clan invasion of the Inner Sphere was a distinct, if distant, possibility. Even so, we were ordered to cease communicating information back to the Clans. Since then, we have had no contact with them until their recent broadcast informing us of the death of the ilKhan."

Romano Liao, recovered from her earlier shock, laughed derisively. "And we are to believe this, Colonel Wolf? What proof do you offer?"

Candace Liao, Duchess of the St. Ives Compact, rose from her place at the table to the right of the Federated Commonwealth contingent. Unlike her flame-haired sister, Candace kept a tight rein on her emotions and easily maintained an air of regal dignity. "I would point out, sister mine, that were Colonel Wolf still working for the Clans, we would all have probably died either en route to this meeting, if not before."

"Ha!" Romano waved away her sister's words with contempt. "You have so long clasped a viper to your breast that you cannot see Wolf for what he is."

The Chancellor of the Capellan Confederation would likely have continued to rant, but the savage expression on her face died the moment a slender young man seated behind her rested his hands on her shoulders. The youth threw her a wink when she turned to give his cheek an affectionate pat. As Romano turned back, now composed and in control, Candace slowly seated herself, still glaring at her sister.

Victor's blue-gray eyes narrowed as he studied Romano's son, Sun-Tzu. Clean-limbed and handsome, he did not have the wild look around the eyes that marked both his mother and his sister as seriously disturbed. The tales of paranoid purges and other lunacy from the court in Sian were so rife that Victor took Sun-Tzu's very survival to mean that he was both intelligent and politically astute. From Sun-Tzu's dossier, Victor knew he had undergone only rudimentary MechWarrior training, but the Capellan gave the distinct impression he could fight his own battles.

Victor glanced over to where the St. Ives Compact delegation was seated. Despite Romano's protests, Wolf had accorded the Compact full rights of a sovereign nation. The Dragoon leader had stated that Candace Liao was the ruler of an independent state of the Inner Sphere, even though the Capellans still claimed the realm as "occupied territory."

Behind Candace sat Kai, her eldest son, and her twin daughters, Cassandra and Kuan Yin. In comparison with his cousin Sun-Tzu, Kai fared well. Equally as good-looking and somewhat more athletic, Kai held himself ramrod-straight, as though the whole honor of St. Ives and his family rested on his shoulders. To Victor, the biggest difference between Kai and Sun-Tzu was that Kai's eyes lacked the hungry gleam that flashed from Sun-Tzu's. Perhaps it was because Kai, older than Sun-Tzu as his mother was older than Romano, could press a more convincing claim to the throne Sun-Tzu so coveted.

When Victor looked over his shoulder at his aide, he found the big blond man also staring at the pair, apparently making similar comparisons. "There will be trouble between them," said the Prince.

Hauptmann Galen Cox nodded, a predatory grin stealing across his face. "My money's on Kai. After what he did on Twycross, who'd want to bet against him?"

Hanse Davion, still on his feet, cleared his throat. "I must agree with Duchess Liao's assessment of the situation." Hanse gestured to the man seated beside Candace. "As my Intelligence Secretary can confirm, there has been no overt or covert contact between the Clans and Wolf's Dragoons since they took up residence here on Outreach twenty years ago."

Justin Allard, a slender Eurasian whose left forearm and hand were a black metal prosthesis, nodded in silent agreement with Hanse Davion. Given Romano's legendary hatred for her sister and her sister's husband, she might have risen up again in agitation, but a voice from the Draconis Combine steered the debate into less dangerous waters.

"I would agree that the Dragoons had ample opportunity for treachery in this situation, but I would more have expected some of usto try to kill one another than for Colonel Wolf to do the job." Theodore Kurita, Warlord of the Draconis Combine, steepled his fingers as he spoke. "If someone was trying to entrap us, he has succeeded, for here we are, all together, in a most, extraordinary gathering. As nothing untoward has yet occurred, perhaps it would be more productive to assume we have not been betrayed."

As Theodore spoke, Victor studied the delegation from the Draconis Combine. Theodore Kurita, the tall, lean Gunji-no-Kanrei of the Combine, sat between his wife and his eldest son, Hohiro. Hohiro had the fierce, noble features of his father, and Victor felt a jolt when their stares met.

The younger Davion could not suppress a grin. He's just like me. Our fathers have hated each other for as long as they've been alive. Now that legacy falls to us.

Behind Hohiro, Victor saw a man he recognized as Narimasa Asano, the head of the Genyosha, one of the most feared military units in the Draconis Combine Mustered Soldiery. Then he noticed a beautiful young woman, made up and dressed in ceremonial Japanese fashion, standing between Hohiro and Theodore. A council of war seemed no place for such exquisite and serene loveliness, and it set Victor's mind to all manner of questions about her.

Jaime Wolf looked up from his podium at another contingent of royals from the Inner Sphere. "You are the last to speak, Captain-General. What are your thoughts? Are you in a trap, or can the Dragoons be trusted?"

"I do not think, Colonel, that your questions are necessarily two sides of the same coin." Though Thomas Marik did not rise to speak, he was an imposing figure. Tall and slender, he was severely scarred on the right side of the face and on his right hand, reminders of the burns suffered in the same explosion that assassinated his father. Despite the disfigurement, Marik's strong features and bearing hinted at an inner strength that may have been forged during his internship with ComStar. He wore a purple uniform, but without any rank insignia. Over his graying hair, he wore a short-billed service cap.

Wondering at the addition of the cap, Victor noticed that Sophina, Thomas's wife, also wore one. As did Joshua Simon, all of five years old, who sat holding his mother's hand. The boy's uniform imitated his father's, while the cap hid his baldness. Against the dark-colored uniform, Joshua's skin seemed even more pallid, His eyes sunk deeply in the shadows around them. The boy moved with a languor suggesting utter fatigue, yet was obviously trying to hold himself as tall as possible.

Galen sucked in a sharp breath. "It is true, then. The child is very ill."

"Justin's sources report leukemia." Victor shook his head in pity. "Marik hopes the boy will survive, but the prognosis is not good. Joshua is sensitive to the chemicals they're using to treat him, and they really knock his system out. Look how blue his lips are. It's anemia from the last bout of chemotherapy."

Seated next to the boy, Isis Marik preened herself like a debutante. She, too, wore a paramilitary uniform and had even donned a cap in solidarity with her half-brother. The cap, though, was set at a jaunty angle, flaunting the long, thick braid of abundant chestnut hair that Isis had drawn forward around one shoulder and down onto her breast.

Victor frowned. "It's almost as though she mocks how sick the boy is."

"If he dies, she'll become Captain-General, my Prince." A hint of distaste flashed through Galen's eyes. "You're first in line to the throne, so you may not think much about succession. But being a newly legitimized royal bastard could definitely give someone ideas about power and how to achieve it permanently."