14

"All right, Pryde, what is this offer you wish to make?" Jared Mahoney said, speaking loudly, making a play for audience attention.

"You and I, Mahoney, on a field of battle. I will grant you warrior status and the right to choose both weapons and the site. The winner will decide all issues. I win, you and your mob give up. You win, I find a way to stop the claiming of your people as bondsmen.

Jared Mahoney stared at Aidan for a long moment, then laughed harshly. "I have heard about your Clan battles. What is it you call them? Trials? And what you said to me, was that your bid?"

"Not exactly. But close enough, I suppose. For these circumstances, at least."

"And I have also heard that such bidding does not consist of idle challenges. It is based on strategy, the attempt to achieve the best possible results with a low bid of personnel and weaponry. If I understand the process correctly, it is strategic for the bidder to make his bid from a presumed stance of victory. And I submit to you, Pryde, that that is what you are doing. You make the challenge sound even, knowing that you, as a trained warrior, have advantages that I, as a barely trained militiaman, could not match. Don't speak to me of an even match between us. It cannot be."

Aidan nodded. The man was right. The bid was not legitimate. It was against warrior custom to make the kind of bid that Jared Mahoney suggested, one that would allow for differences between true warriors and hastily trained rabble.

"Sit down, Pryde."

"I wish to stand."

Jared Mahoney pushed Aidan roughly, with unexpected strength, back into the chair. Then, surprisingly, the man sat down in the other one, the chair so recently occupied by the ComStar Demi-Precentor.

"I have lived all my life on Quarell," he said suddenly. He looked away from Aidan, obviously not expecting a response. "The Free Rasalhague Republic never considered this world to be of much value, even though the reason for its underdevelopment is the years, centuries, of war. But we who live here like it that way. We like living in what is considered a frontier existence. We know of the luxuries available on so-called civilized worlds, but they do not interest us. Hell, we would not even use Agro-Mechs if it were not necessary. We like getting out into the fields and working with our hands.

"But we are loyal subjects, too. When General Craigh called us to defend Quarell against your Clan, we mustered the militia and fought, despite the futility of the effort. We did not want to see our home world violated. You swept over us as if we were not there. Your forces occupied the planet, ComStar representatives replaced our elected leaders, and then we returned to our homes. Yet for many of us it was only to find that we would not be resuming our lives, rejoining our families, enjoying our children, returning to the joy of working with our hands."

Aidan, a man with no home and who had never known parents, could not easily understand what Jared Mahoney was trying to tell him. Could it be, Aidan wondered, that the concept of family superseded the ideals of service and achievement for these people? Aidan would give up anything, sacrifice any part of himself, to serve the Clan, to achieve such glory that his genes would be passed on in the sacred gene pool. Then it occurred to him that the transmission of one's genetic legacy did have at least one correspondence with these people's values. In the Clan genetics program, the parent was transmitted through generations via his children and their children. The Clan way was similar but, because there were no social entanglements, better. Still, for the first time he almost understood something that had filled many of the pages of the books in his secret library.

Just then, he glanced up and saw a familiar face staring at him from the first rank of the crowd. For a moment he thought of Marthe, who had been so close to him during their days in the sibko, then he realized that this face was younger than hers would be now. Now he recognized the woman, and wondered how he could have confused her with Marthe. It was one of the new warriors from Joanna's Star. He could not recall her name, nor did that matter. The main puzzlement was, what in the blessed name of the Kerenskys was she doing here now?

Their eyes met for the briefest moment, then she edged backward into the crowd and vanished, leaving him wondering if it were only some hallucination created by the strain of being held captive.

"I want you to understand this, Pryde," Jared Mahoney was saying. "I have nothing against any of you. You are the conquerors and we can accept that."

"Then you must accept our rule."

"But when a rule is immoral or unethical or unnecessarily cruel, must we allow you to rape us with it? I think not. It is wrong to make slaves of us, and that is all there is to it. Slavery is your way of life, how could you understand? But we must make our stand and fight for it."

"Why do you say that slavery is our way of life?" Aidan asked, though a bit distractedly. He was still busy scanning the crowd for another sign of the young Clan warrior he had just glimpsed.

"You are a bondsman, too, Pryde. You are a slave of your system, bound to the ideas of war and caste. If you succeed in making me a bondsman, I will still be freer than you."

"This is mere rhetoric," Aidan said, turning his gaze back to the rebel.

Jared Mahoney's eyes widened. "I didn't know you Clanfolk had a sense of rhetoric."

Aidan shrugged. How could he reason with this man? At any rate, he was too preoccupied with the presence of the warrior from Joanna's Star. Where was she now? What was she up to? What kind of crackpot strategy motivated her?

Jared Mahoney was still going on with his fanatical talk, when one of his subordinates rushed over.

"The BattleMechs have moved out of the forest again," the man shouted. "They are advancing on the city."

"Man your posts," Jared Mahoney roared, springing out of the chair. He gestured toward one of the other rebels, then pointed toward Aidan. "Hold a gun on his head," he said. "Anything happens, kill him."

Aidan was aware again of that face in the crowd. The young woman's head turned in his direction, concern in her expression.

If there was going to be some kind of attack by his people, Aidan would have liked to get out of this chair and lead it. A rescue attempt by Joanna's Star might not be the best strategy under the circumstances, but Aidan was beginning to believe there might be no other way to subdue this rebel group. Jared Mahoney was too fixed in his ideas, too obsessed. Better to wipe them out, rebels, innocents, and hostages, than let such ideas fester and spread.

The young warrior looked away from him and began to walk toward the AgroMech, away from the flow of the rest of the crowd, which was readying for battle. In the AgroMech, the pilot gave Jared Mahoney another thumbs-up gesture, then fired off a series of pulses from her pair of lasers. It was immediately obvious that the woman had no idea how to pilot a 'Mech, much less an agribot with weapons on makeshift mounts.

The children and their parents still huddled together, not having budged from under or near the AgroMech's legs. They all seemed full of fear, but the adults clutched the children protectively, as though to shield them from harm.

Then Aidan saw the young warrior again. She was standing now next to one of the AgroMech's giant rear legs.

15

As Diana stared down at the confused and restless children, she wondered whether to just abandon her plan and only mutilate Jared Mahoney instead. What kind of person would use non-combatants as a buffer between himself and the enemy? It was true that the Clans often used old warriors in that way, but for useful strategic purposes, for the good of the battle or the campaign, ultimately for the good of the Clan itself. Besides, they were oldwarriors, all of whom had served well and lived a useful life; they were not childrenwhose chances were yet to come. Jared Mahoney's words were meaningless if he must use children to die for them. If he had substituted all the old people of Vreeport for the children, Diana would have understood.