Somewhat more than a year earlier, and a very great distance from the Garthid homeworld, Shuuf'r Thaak, two humans sat in an arbor. In a palace garden, on a world called Varatos. Neither of them knew the Surrogate of God existed, barely knew the Garthids existed. One of the two was the Emperor Kalif of the Karghanik Empire, Chodrisei "Coso" Biilathkamoro. The other was his deputy, the exarch and Kalif-to-be, Jilsomo Savbatso.
The Kalif would leave the planet before lunch. Most of the things he would take with him had already been sent up to the flagship.
It was a lovely sunny morning, and from time to time the two prelates sipped iced tea. When the Kalif had said he wanted to speak privately with him, Jilsomo had supposed he had last minute observations and suggestions to communicate. So far, however, he'd seemed preoccupied, saying nothing beyond comments on the weather and garden.
For just a moment his obsidian eyes touched those of his deputy, then shifted elsewhere again. "What do you think of the language and literacy training the invasion troops have been given?" he asked.
The question surprised the deputy. The Kalif knew well what he thought of it. "I like it," Jilsomo said. "I like it very much. I intend to expand it, as feasible, to peasants outside the military."
By and large, army command had thought it a waste of time—time that might better have been spent in additional military training. Many from the Great Families considered it subversive, a continuation of reform.
After a moment the Kalif spoke again. "There is something I've kept from you, about the invasion expedition. It is not what it seems."
Not what it seems? Jilsomo's eyebrows rose. What else could it be, that vast armada of warships and transports waiting some 60,000 miles out?
"Since the coup attempt," the Kalif went on, "I've looked differently at war. Consider the destruction we suffered here, then imagine it extended over a planet." He shook his head. "I intend there be no conquest. No destruction, no killing."
Jilsomo had always felt uncomfortable about invading the Confederation, but wasn't it preemptive? There was, after all, the prospect of the Confederation invading the Empire, a prospect the Kalif himself had emphasized. Had made it seem quite real. The Klestronu, in their arguably illegal military exploration, had attacked a minor Confederation fringe world, had occupied its major town. Only to be driven off by a Confederation garrison, a garrison that had fought with sobering ferocity and skill. Surely a people like that would plan retribution, and they would hardly distinguish between a wayward sultanate and the Empire of which it was part.
"What do you have in mind, Your Reverence?"
"The armada will wait in the outer reach of the Iryalan System, while I go in with a single ship, a scout, and confer with them."
Jilsomo sat with plump lips parted. I'm the one who's seen as peacemaker, he thought. You have been the fighter.
Fighter, seasoned politician, and skeptic. Had Coso Biilathkamoro been as observant as usual, he'd have seen dismay in his deputy's eyes. No wonder he'd kept this secret. His plan seemed naive beyond belief.
He continued. "Consider. The Confederation consists of some seventy worlds—member worlds, trade worlds, resource worlds. Seventy! Over a sector of space as large as it can administer, a sector rich in habitable systems. Unlike our own. What lies beyond it? Surely they've explored. They must know of habitable worlds unpeopled beyond their fringes. I'll find out what they know of them, then go to one and colonize it.
"And if there are none, we'll dicker for one of their fringe worlds, one largely unsettled, like the world the Klestronu found."
His lips twisted. "If they refuse to talk, or if they prove hostile or treacherous, perhaps we'll fight them after all. But in Kargh's name, I'll make every effort to deal peacefully."
He spread his hands as if examining the hairs that curled thick and dark on his fingers. "Earlier, under the pressures of politics and in my own shortsighted hubris, I promoted recklessly, and endangered my options. Now I must make it come out in a way the Prophet would approve.
"On our new world, the peasant soldiers will become our citizens, the pastors their teachers. I will prevent a stratification into masters and serfs there, and the Pastorate will be my allies."
Coso Biilathkamoro chuckled wryly, but his face was bleak.
He knows, Jilsomo thought, how impossible it is. The officer corps will not settle for less than conquest. He argued too well for it, made too many—call them promises. Inspired too many ambitions, stoked the furnaces of greed.
"I'll have nearly four years to work on it," Coso went on, "four years in hyperspace, without the burden of governing. The kalifa and little Rami and I, and my guard company, will not travel in stasis." He smiled slightly, without humor. "I have allies, though they don't know yet what I intend.
"I've told this to no one except you and the kalifa. Tomorrow, when the flagship passes Sentinel, and we enter hyperspace, you will be Kalif, and you can do with the information as you please."
They'd neglected their drinks. Now they turned to them, saying almost nothing. The Kalif's eyes absorbed the garden around him. A corporal of the palace guard arrived, saluted. "Your Reverence," he said, "the shuttle is ready."
The Kalif looked at him and sighed. "Thank you, corporal." He got to his feet with unaccustomed heaviness, and turning to the exarch, shook his hand. "You've been my good friend and confidant, Jilsomo. I'll miss you. Miss your help, your good advice—your necessary scoldings."
Friend? Yes, Jilsomo thought. But confidant? Certainly you said nothing of this before. If you have a confidant, besides the kalifa, it is SUMBAA. And I'm not sure an artificial intelligence qualifies.
"Thank you, Your Reverence. I am honored."
The Kalif looked around as if remembering a hundred things undone, a thousand unsaid. "You'll remember to give the envelopes to Thoga and Tariil? And Dosu?"
"Depend on it, Your Reverence."
"Well then." He seemed reluctant to leave, to face what awaited him in space. Again he extended his drill-callused hand to Jilsomo, and again they shook. When their hands disengaged, the Kalif's strong shoulders straightened. "All right, corporal," he said, "let's go."
Jilsomo accompanied them. The Kalif's heaviness had dropped from him. His bearing, his stride, his whole demeanor bespoke strength and certainty, but Jilsomo was not fooled. The shuttle sat on the drill ground, the kalifa waiting by the ramp, still lovely. Always lovely except that one terrible day, that day of destruction and blood. Stood holding little Rami, who could be so remarkably patient and quiet for a child so young and normally so active. Rami reached out to his father, who took him laughing, and the kalifal family walked up the ramp together into the shuttle.
The colonel of the kalifal guard battalion had also been waiting, and moved to stand beside Jilsomo. Together they watched the ramp telescope and disappear, the hullmetal door slide shut. The craft lifted easily, then accelerated slowly and quietly out of sight.
"I'm going to miss him, Your Reverence," the colonel said.
Your Reverence. It was premature, of course. He was only acting kalif, wouldn't be crowned till the next evening. Then he would be "Your Reverence." Jilsomo felt of the title. It felt—as if it would fit. He'd get immersed in the duties, the problems, the intrigues of governing this unwieldy Empire, and it would fit.
"I'll miss him too, Colonel," he said. "I'll miss him too." Four hopeless years. He was glad he wasn't Coso Biilathkamoro.
Afterward, in his office, Jilsomo reexamined what the Kalif had told him. The explanation, of course, was the kalifa. She'd been the one uniformed prisoner the Klestroni had brought back with them. Being female, she had not been killed. And being military, she might, beneath her deep amnesia, have useful information. That had been the rationale. Eventually she'd been brought to the palace, and once the Kalif had seen her. . .
Tests supported her amnesia. But even remembering nothing of her background, what had she felt and said when she learned her new husband planned to conquer the world she'd come from?
The Kalif's moods, these last few years, were clear now. He'd thought he'd understood them before. Because of the reforms he'd forced through, the military distrusted him. Even with the gentry and most of the lesser nobility behind him, since Iron Jaw's coup attempt, he'd ruled under the threat of another. This was widely recognized.
Now he planned to single-handedly frustrate the officer corps' passion for conquest, wealth, power, and a new empire far larger than the old.
It seemed to Jilsomo he'd never again see Coso Biilathkamoro alive.
In his small but comfortable suite on the flagship, the Armada's command admiral sat talking with a long-time friend, Major General Sopal Butarindala. Sopal "Snake" Butarindala, named in his student days for his skill on the wrestling mat. He commanded the 2nd Marine Division.
"He boarded half an hour ago," the admiral said. "He and his foreign wife. He was under some pressure to stay behind—some of it inspired by myself—and I hoped he'd change his mind. I didn't expect him to, but until he boarded. . . " The admiral shrugged. "Kargh does not arrange things for our convenience."
"Too bad we couldn't simply have left before he arrived."
"Believe me I was tempted. But it wouldn't be worth the trouble it would cause." The admiral chuckled. "More trouble than his presence creates. Actually, he's less a problem than Chesty may turn out to be. But with your help, and my, um—" he grinned "—my fist, we'll handle it nicely."
Snake Butarindala was uncomfortable with the admiral's "fist." It was a heavy secret to know. But if his own contingency role proved necessary, it was knowledge he'd need.
The admiral's wide mouth pursed. "You know, I rather like Chesty. Good man. Able. But soft in critical areas. Well, we'll see. We'll see."
The general grunted. "I'd better get down to Stasis," he said, rising to his feet. "It's either that or eat, and if I eat, I'll have to starve another twelve hours before they're willing to chill me."
The admiral gestured from his chair, a casual sort of farewell salute. "The next time I see you," he said, "I'll be some three, close to four years older. Four boring years. And you'll be what? A few days older."
As the general reached the door, the admiral spoke two final words. "Pleasant dreams," he said.
Snake left with a slight frown. He'd never heard whether people dreamed in stasis or not. Going on four years of dreaming? He hoped not. But surely they didn't; he'd have heard. People would talk about it if they did.
The admiral got to his feet too, to go to the bridge. Snake Butarindala had never been a mental giant, he thought. But the man was tough, resourceful, and dependable. While Chesty—Chesty thinks too damn much, the admiral told himself, about the wrong things. That's what his trouble is. That's what makes him soft.