Murray/Sable
March SY154
One of the downsides with having become known as one of the best doctors in Creation, is that I invariably get called in to deal with some of the trickier cases on the Outside. The stabbing of Czar Nickoli of Russia by Art von Mecklenburg had proved to be just that, and I'd received approaches from both Finndo and a former protégé of mine, Jessica, to help cure the boy. Under the usual circumstances, our paths would never have crossed. In fact, I would probably have avoided him, given he seemed to have a wider than usual streak of family belligerence. However, one of the problems with taking my oath as a doctor seriously, is that I find myself honour bound to render help if I can. This particular case, however, was challenging, to say the least, and it was all I could do to keep the patient from deteriorating any further.
I was contemplating what to do next, when my attention was disturbed by raised voices at the door to the patient's room, and I saw Reinhart von Mecklenburg stride in as if he owned the place. I was too startled to react immediately as he crossed to the body and started pouring water all over it, muttering about the Holy Grail and Russian Orthodox holy water. I looked around helplessly, but none of Nickoli's people seemed to be stopping him, which surprised me somewhat given the enmity between Nickoli and the Mecks.
Reinhart stepped back and I threw up a couple of investigation spells to make sure he hadn't done any actual damage, and was surprised to see that his method had actually made a difference.
More difference than I had in the time I'd been there.
Feeling worse than useless, I saved the magical data for later analysis and was contemplating what to do next, when I felt the stirrings of a Trump call. I scanned my mental deck, and was very surprised to see that it was Gray calling me. He almost never came to the Outside unless it was important.
"Yes?"
"Are you busy?"
"Apparently not any more...it would seem I've been rendered obsolete by a Mecklenburg and a glass of water."
"Ouch."
"What is it?"
"I need you back in Sable. We have a problem."
"We usually do."
I looked around at the faces of those in the room with me, and then back at the now rather less punctured body of my patient. They obviously had the matter in hand.
"Excuse me," I said to those there present, "I have an emergency at home to deal with. Let me know how Nickoli progresses."
And then I reached for Gray's hand, and he pulled me through to Huntly Palace.
"Sorry about that. I hope it wasn't something serious?"
"I'd been called in to see if I could heal the Czar of Russia," I answered, levelly.
"That troublemaker? Why in the name of the gods did you say yes?" he asked, incredulous.
"Because it's what I do," I snapped.
"No it's not," he replied, curtly, "what you 'do' is be King of Sable. Everything else is secondary."
"Not when I'm on the Outside."
"You severed Sable from the Outside for a reason...what draws you back?"
"Habit, I suppose," I replied.
He paused for a moment before continuing, but in the end changed his mind about what he was going to say, and I saw him relax.
"One day, my friend, you need to learn that you can't heal everyone."
"That was undeniably true in this case," I answered, and I could hear the bitterness in my own voice, "how did you get out here?"
"I caught a lift with one of my Pilots. There's a carriage waiting to take us back."
"I guess you'd better lead on."
He took me out to the private stone in the courtyard, where an unmarked carriage was waiting for us. The Pilot, Rebecca von Kleist, was known to me, and I greeted her politely before stepping inside. The doors were closed, and a few moments later the world disappeared, as is the way of Pilot travel. I counted up to twelve, but still felt relieved when the world came back into being around me. She unlocked the door, and I climbed out into the courtyard in the centre of the Maze.
We thanked her for the smooth journey, and then headed inside to Gray's office, where he poured us both a strong Scotch.
"So?"
"We have extremists."
"Is it painful?"
"Be serious, Your Majesty," he snapped, and I could see that he, at least, thought it was.
"Sorry, Gray. Go on."
"The day before yesterday I got word that one of the diplomatic cipher experts involved in making sure that the details of the treaty with the Reich were kept secure while the lawyers hashed out the details, Julian Hollister, had gone missing. I sent a group to investigate, and on the back of discovering that he had been kidnapped and murdered, they turned up some rather disturbing information."
"That we have extremists? Is this really that serious?"
"Let's see...one of their tenets is that you should be forced to abdicate for even considering a peace treaty, and that you're betraying Sable by condoning it. So yes. I'd say it's serious."
I looked at him in surprise. It had never even occurred to me that someone might believe sufficiently strongly that the treaty was wrong, that they might take action against me directly. Sure, I'd guessed it wouldn't be popular in certain quarters, but...
"It's never going to happen," I protested.
"Right now, I'm not sure that's true. At this moment, their champion seems to be Andrew – at least in their minds – and of all the people in Sable, he's the one who could replaced you."
"Andrew's working with them?"
"We're not sure. But certainly another of their aims is to get him restored to the succession, such that he could once again inherit were you to abdicate or meet some other kind of misfortune."
"What else?"
"They think the treaty with the Reich is a mistake and a betrayal and will oppose it, by military force if necessary. And the thing that worries me most: they seem well funded and far too well informed about discussions. For example, they knew exactly who to kidnap from Bexton House, and his body shows signs of magical interrogation by a Reich-trained mage."
"Reich-trained? A group of Sable fanatics with a Reich-trained mage?"
"The irony didn't escape me, either, so I checked with our contact within the ReichsMagieren. The information he's given us is that the mage in question, one Matthias Lourens, was a Gestapo interrogator who was declared missing when we took back Heimgard in SY130. Further background on him indicates that he was a Heimgard native who was taken into the Lebensborn system when his family were killed during the Black Friday offensive, in the hope that he could be moulded into a proper little Reich mage."
"The implication presumably being that he wasn't moulded, and escaped as soon as he could."
"Pretty much."
"But it's a stretch to get from a disaffected Gestapo mage to a Sable fanatical group."
"If he saw his family murdered, and that stuck with him? We've seen it before...an impressionable child sees something like that and it's graven in his mind, forever eating away at him, however good the Lebensborn indoctrination. Heinrich Strasse is a classic example."
I had to concede that one. Despite his Lebensborn upbringing and early service to the Reich, Strasse had taken his revenge, killed those who had murdered his mother, and later spent a long while working as one of Gray's deep cover agents. It was only after Rupert put him on the Black Pattern than he had finally defected to us, in the hope that we could save him from the Black Pattern's influence.
"Assessment, Gray. How big is the problem?"
"Given that even the possibility of the treaty hasn't exactly met with universal approval in Sable, and that a lot of what their agenda seems to be actually makes sense, even to me, I think it could potentially be very big indeed. Even laying aside Andrew's possible involvement with them...and you have to admit, he hasn't been exactly ecstatic about the whole thing, despite the fact that if anything, the Technocracy is the primary beneficiary of the whole process...at least one other member of the Royal Family is implicated. And if they have connections within your family, then further and extensive connections among the military and the Sable industrialists are not outside the realms of possibility."
"Who else is implicated?"
"Andrew's son Thomas. The papers my agents collected prove that he has been involved in helping them see if there are any legal grounds for revoking Andrew's abdication from the succession. I'm not sure if it goes any deeper than that...I hope it doesn't...but it isn't safe to assume."
"I have to ask. Are your agents clean in this?"
"Actually, my friend, there's a far more important question you should ask."
"Which is?"
"Am I clean in this?"
"You're kidding, right?"
"Consider it more trying to prove a point. You need to vet me. Once you're comfortable that I'm loyal, then I can start vetting the rest of the Maze."
"Gray, I know I don't need to prove your loyalty. You've proved it yourself on occasions to numerous to mention."
"It still needs to be done."
"This is crazy."
"No. It's necessary. Please, humour me. I would think a deep telepathic scan should do the job."
"You're really serious, aren't you."
"Yes, Your Majesty."
"Then maybe you shouldn't have given me the whisky."
I set the glass down, then sat opposite him in the comfortable chairs he kept off to one side of the office. He put himself into a trance, opening himself up to me, and I set to work.
I'm not sure he'd ever opened his mind to me so fully, and I tried not to intrude too far in the private areas of his memories, but he let me see everything related to his work for Sable over the last thirty years or so. Some of it, I didn't want to see – and I began to understand that he'd maintained his policy of giving me plausible deniability for a reason, before I'd forced him on the issue some months before - but nowhere did I pick up any trace of active disloyalty. Disagreement, certainly. We'd had our share of those over the years. But nothing more serious.
Eventually, I gently eased myself out of his mind and looked at him.
"Satisfied?" I asked.
"It had to be done," he replied.
"So what now?"
"I have to vet the Maze and the Sable High Command. You need to talk to Andrew and Thomas."
"What about Will?"
"I've seen no indication that he's involved, but that one's up to you. You also need to be aware that there is a possibility that the site we've chosen for the signing of the treaty has been compromised: Hollister may have seen reference to it, and if Lourens was successful...well, suffice to say that you need to think about an alternative."
"It isn't going to be easy. Not at this short notice."
"As I see it, you've got three options in that regard. One, press ahead with Il Rotonda anyway, and hope Hollister didn't know. Two, find an entirely alternative location between now and April 7th: I'm sure Emperor Sirius could make some suggestions. Or three, some combination of both: make it seem as if Il Rotonda is still the location, but also work on a backup where the treaty is actually going to be signed."
"I'll put some thought into it. I'll need to communicate with Wilhelm, though."
"And don't forget, if we have this problem, there's a good chance the Reich does as well."
"The Valhalla wackos...?"
"Yes, the Germanenorden, as they're more properly called."
"But there's no way the two groups would be working together?"
"However, if the Germanenorden agents are as well placed and as well informed as the Friends of the Lost, which seems plausible from what we know of them, then they could also form a second attack. And that doesn't even bring either the Machine or the Brotherhood into the frame. So as your Chief of Security, I would recommend option three."
"I'll consider it."
"Thank you. When are you going to speak with Andrew and Thomas?"
"I'll try to catch Andrew first. Thomas may end up waiting. After all, thus far all we have is that he was helping them look into the legalities of Andrew's Writ of Abdication."
"It may be that neither of them is involved, but I would certainly suggest you contact them sooner rather than later."
"So noted."
"Thank you."
"Anything else?"
"I think that covers it for now."
"Good luck, Gray. Keep me informed."
"Of course, sir."
With that, I got to my feet and headed out to the Maze central courtyard, and from there I took myself back to Sable Palace.
* * * * *
The following morning, I caught Andrew at breakfast and asked if he would join me for a ride. He seemed surprised at the invitation, but agreed after a short pause, and we headed out to the stables around ten. Stuart, the Head Groom, had Miller, a big bay gelding and one of my favourite mounts now I could no longer ride Eliane, saddled for me, and Copper for Andrew, and then we trotted out of the stable yard. I concentrated for a moment, and then teleported us and our mounts out to the north of the caldera.
We rode in silence for a while, enjoying the late March sunshine. It was fresh, but not cold, with the sky a brilliant blue, and as we made for the gallops beyond the caldera edge I could see daisies and crocuses in the grass. Moreover, Andrew seemed in a good mood, although he was obviously curious about what had occasioned the outing. However, I waited until we had got into the woodland beyond the gallops before reining in and suggesting we dismount. I indicated a fallen tree – one which had obviously come down during the winter storms - and we tethered our mounts lightly, so they could graze in peace, and sat down.
"This takes me back," Andrew commented, looking around at the sunbeams where the light came in through the bare branches of the trees.
"You and I used to ride together a lot."
"That was a long time ago. Both of us were more innocent then."
"Innocent and ignorant."
"And look at us now."
"Do you miss those times?" I asked.
"Before you Created Sable? Or even earlier? Before we truly knew what we were."
"Either. Both."
"Sometimes. Certainly things were simpler then. However, the world moves on and we can't change the past. Moreover, would you want to? Would you want to undo all of this?" he asked, gesturing widely with his hand.
"No. It's part of me now and I love it. To go back would be to destroy it all and I would neither want to do that, nor believe I could. Although I wish I could change what happened between you and my brother."
He tensed slightly at the reference to Rupert, but then relaxed.
"That, like this, is in the past."
I looked at him for a moment, and as far as I could tell, he actually meant it.
"Don't get me wrong," he commented, as he felt my gaze, "I wish you and he weren't as close as you've become, and I still hate his guts and would spit on the ground he walks on. And I'll carry on telling you you're a bloody fool to meet him on a regular basis. But I understand now that nothing I might choose to do to him would change what happened between us."
"You sound positively philosophical."
He shrugged.
"Call it realistic, and quit while you're ahead."
"And the treaty?"
"A necessary evil. I'm not sure I trust them to adhere to it, but given the strength we've seen from the Machine recently..."
"And yet you haven't been involved in any of the negotiations..."
"No. But note that neither have I impeded them. Sable needs to deal with that one itself, and as Head of State of a different nation, especially one who has a vested interest in the outcome, it wouldn't be appropriate for me to interfere."
"Are you planning to have the Technocracy sign a peace with the Reich?"
"In honesty, even though I realise that they're doing this so we can ally with them against the Machine, I still can't bring myself to do that. Maybe one day, when the scars have healed, but for now..."
He lapsed into silence, and I could see the shadows of old pain crossing his features. I stood up and walked round the tree for a moment, before picking up the bottle of The MacAllan and the glasses I knew would be there. Call it one of Sable's little oddities. I poured us both a glass and handed him one.
"To the healing of scars," I said quietly, and he looked at me, then gave a half smile and chinked his glass to mine. We drank in silence for a few minutes, enjoying the day and listening to the birds in the trees and the horses stamping contentedly as they grazed.
"What's troubling you?" he said, finally.
"I had a disturbing conversation with Gray yesterday."
"About?"
"Have you ever heard of an organisation called the Friends of the Lost?"
"One of my people asked me to have a word with one or two of their members the other day. I duly did and wrote up my impressions. Why?"
"Gray's worried about them."
"He's not specifically said anything to me."
"That's because he's worried that you might be involved with them."
"This is a joke, right?"
"Not really. They seem to think you're the one true hope for Sable."
"About which they're sorely mistaken," he snorted, disdainfully.
"Mistaken, maybe. But it sounds as if they're very well organised and have contacts in high places. And if they are that well spread, they could cause a lot of trouble."
"The treaty's going to be signed in just over a fortnight...yes, they seem organised, but they have a limited timeframe."
"That depends on what they know."
"You're serious, aren't you?" he said, his tone incredulous, "you're actually worried about them?"
"Gray is...and that makes me...concerned."
"And he thought I was involved. Did you believe him?"
"Not really...although I would have been a fool to discount it altogether."
"So you asked me anyway?"
"I told him that I would."
"And are you satisfied with the answer?"
"Of course...and relieved."
"Glad to hear it," he snorted, "presumably he's worried about this crazy idea they have of restoring me to the succession, and then easing you out?"
"Pretty much."
"He shouldn't be. It's legally impossible, as well you know. I walked away."
"Unless they can get your decision reversed."
"Robert, I'm not sure what fantasy world these wackos are inhabiting, but this whole ideas is crazy. You know it, and I know it. Hell, if they did anything to you, there wouldn't be a Sable for me or anyone else to rule."
"I guess that depends on how permanent the steps they take are. Crazy and well organised are a bad combination. We've seen that ourselves over the years, both within Sable and before, on Terra Magica."
He took a sip from his whisky glass and then sighed.
"You have my word that I have no intention of going along with this if they approach me on the subject."
I nodded, and we lapsed back into silence for a while. However, there was still something I needed to know, so eventually I spoke once more.
"Did you ever regret what you did? Abdicating as Crown Prince of Sable."
He considered for a moment, then shrugged.
"Sometimes. Although it's not as if I ever expected to inherit, what with you being immortal and all."
"Have you ever considered reversing your decision?"
"Can't be done," he answered.
"You sound very certain."
"I wrote the document. About the only way of reversing it is to get me declared retroactively unfit to have drafted it in the first place...and to then get the agreement of the counter signatories to that effect, making it null and void."
"Which isn't impossible. Both Alan Donaldson and Julian Castle are still alive, albeit that Donaldson is long retired."
"Neither Alan nor Julian argued when I asked them to act as the signatories, so to go back on that now would be dubious, at best. And honestly, Robert, if they do, they're effectively going to be breaking it by saying I was crazy. Which as well as being untrue – I knew exactly what I was doing - isn't going to help anything. How confident would you be if I was restored to the succession with the stigma of having been mentally unfit when I stepped down in the first place."
I looked at him, knowing he was right, but also well aware that I could see the steaming great hole in his argument. Because in my mind's eye I could see the bloodstained sand of his favourite cove on the King's Isle.
"Robert? Are you alright?" he asked, suddenly concerned, "you look as if you've seen a ghost."
"Sorry...obviously there's too much going on right now," I answered, finishing my glass of whisky, "you know, maybe we should be getting back."
"You're probably right. Will's called a general staff meeting for lunchtime, and it would be nice to ride back, rather than teleport. I've actually enjoyed this: introspective naval contemplation aside."
I magically cleaned the glasses, then tucked them and the bottle back into the tree roots, knowing that next time I looked for them, wherever I was, they would be there, and then we crossed to where the horses were standing. We both swung up into the saddle with the ease of long experience, and then started trotting towards the edge of the woods. About ten minutes later, once we were on clear ground, I saw a wild grin pass across Andrew's features, and for a moment, he looked years younger.
"Race you back to the caldera," he shouted, and before I could answer, he had urged his mount to a gallop. I watched for a few moments, and then decided what the Hell. The ground was firm and level and the conditions were perfect. I kicked Miller's sides and soon we were racing after him as fast as my horse's hooves could carry us.