Democracy's Light

Chapter Seventeen

“How does it feel to be back here?”

Jason Cordova scowled at him. Even wearing a more subdued outfit, rather than his traditionally outrageous mixture of bright colours and flamboyant design, he looked intimidating. He might have hoped, Tiberius suspected, that the absence of his normal outfit would put any watchers off the scent, but there was no mistaking him for a harmless man. Something, long ago, had burned most of the human weaknesses out of Jason Cordova and it showed.

“I feel strange,” he said, flatly. There was little tone in his voice. Someone who had survived and prospered among the inhabitants of the Rim would be skilled at controlling themselves, refusing to act violently unless there was no other choice. Tiberius had never been to the Rim, not even on his Grand Tour of the Empire, but he’d heard stories. Life was cheap along the Rim for those who chose to play the great game of intrigue. “I never expected to be back here again.”

“We always kept a candle in the window for you,” Tiberius said, carefully. Cordova wasn’t armed, at least on the surface, but he was a very dangerous man. In theory, the guards outside the room should be able to break in and stop him before he killed Tiberius, if he decided to go out in a blaze of violence and glory, but Tiberius wouldn’t have cared to bet his life on it. The fact he was betting his life on it wasn’t one he wanted to face. “You were always honoured as a member of the Family.”

Cordova’s gaze wandered to the Family Wall, a giant family tree that traced the Cicero Family backwards to the foundation of the Empire and beyond, even to the pre-spaceflight days when Earth had been a heavily populated world on the brink of disaster. It was complete and comprehensive, although Tiberius’s father had once told him that it was also unreliable for pre-spaceflight members, but it lacked one name. Jason Cordova wasn’t just scored out, disowned by his family, but removed completely. He had been written out of the Family’s history.

“I appear to be missing,” he said, dryly. “There are my two sisters, married off now to bring two other Families into the Clan. There is my brother, dead in a duelling accident the year after I… departed. There is my mother, God rest her soul, and my father, who expired pleasantly, if not peacefully, in someone else’s bed. Where is Jason Cicero, I ask you?”

“We did not wish to formally disown you,” Tiberius said. It sounded weak and he knew it, but perhaps Cordova would accept it as the truth, or at least the accepted version of events. “Given what was at stake…”

“I do the right thing for once in my parasitical existence and I get forced out of the Family, forced to flee for the Rim with a pack of battlecruisers snapping at my heels,” Cordova snapped. “Where was the Family’s concern then?”

“The Family’s very existence was at stake,” Tiberius reminded him. He forced as much conviction into his voice as he could. “We had little choice, but to wipe you from official history, just to prevent the other Families from learning the truth.”

“I would be very surprised if some of them didn’t know the truth,” Cordova sneered, sarcastically. “It might have been kept from the poor common folk, who would have been the first to condemn me if the truth came out, but I doubt it was a secret from the other Families. The more senior ones, at least, could have found out the truth before you managed to cover it up.”

Tiberius lifted an eyebrow. “And how do you account for the fact that none of them ever sought to use it against us?” He asked. “It’s political antimatter. If they used it as a weapon, they would have the entire Family…”

He paused, looking for words. Cordova suggested them. “Bent over a table, chained down and with our legs spread?”

“Effectively,” Tiberius agreed. Cordova was trying to rattle him slightly. He was determined that it wouldn’t work, even if the conversation became even cruder. “They never attempted to use it as a weapon against us…”

“Because it was always a two-sided sword,” Cordova said. “You stand here in the High City, secure — or you were secure — in your power and position, and you don’t grasp what it might mean to the commoners. They don’t draw any distinction between Cicero and Roosevelt, or Rothschild and Windsor; they just care about the Thousand Families, the aristocrats who have been systematically sucking the life out of the Empire. They wouldn’t care about fine details like the fact it was a Cicero who made the decision; they would blame the entire system!”

He leaned forward, close enough for Tiberius to smell his breath. “That’s why they never tried it on your father, or anyone else from your Family,” he snapped. “It would rebound on them as well.”

“You may be right,” Tiberius conceded. He’d never known the truth until after his father died and he’d read the secret files. He had assumed that the cover-up had worked and that no one else knew the truth. Cordova was right, however; the other Families might well know the truth already, but regard it as a weapon of mass destruction, politically speaking. “Still, I doubt that it will benefit you if the truth came out now.”

“Colin would understand,” Cordova said. “You managed to save Cicero from the doom that came to Roosevelt and a dozen other Families. Are you sure you want to risk throwing that all away just to get me sucking your dick?”

Tiberius considered it. “You have seen the news recently?” He asked. “Sure, Colin might understand, but how many others will share his… compassion? Is it not far more likely that they will seek to lynch you in the streets?”

He turned to peer out of the windows, down towards the garden below. The news of Colin’s latest proposals had hit the Empire hard, with acrimonious exchanges in Parliament and a great deal of covert manoeuvring behind the scenes. Daria had been right, he realised; Colin had, however accidentally, destabilised part of the Empire. The repercussions might be a long time coming, but they would come. The real question was how far Colin was prepared to go to get his way.

His gaze slipped upwards towards the blue sky. Floating up there, lost in the glare of the sun, were thirty-five orbital battle stations, each one controlled by Colin’s loyalists… and perfectly capable of bombarding the surface of Earth. Beyond them, if more were needed, were three squadrons of superdreadnaughts and their escorts, protecting Earth from external and internal threats. Colin could have his way, if he decided to threaten them with the wrath of the Shadow Fleet, but that would destroy the system he was trying to build. He would become Emperor in all, but name… and Daria had already discovered the limits of that position.

And that’s why she wants the war with Admiral Wilhelm, he thought coldly. It won’t just expend Colin’s loyalists, but it will serve as an excuse for all kinds of war-related changes, including some that will strengthen the Empire. A single-minded ruler would be far more effective than a committee…

“They might,” Cordova said. He wandered over to the bookshelves and took a book from them at random. “My life would be forfeit in that case… and the Cicero Clan would be badly damaged by the information. I could return to the Random Numbers and vanish off to the Rim, but how could you do that, unless you abandoned the factories and industries that make you powerful? Are you sure that you want to play this card?”

Tiberius took a breath. “And where would you hide?”

“I beg your pardon?” Cordova asked. “I spent years on the Rim. I know hundreds of places where I could hide a light cruiser and her crew…”

“And how long would that last if the truth got out?” Tiberius asked. “I would see to it that the truth got everywhere. Your former friends and allies would desert you, even if they didn’t shoot you on sight, just from general principles. Your admirers would become your strongest detractors. Those who praised you for standing up for the right would damn you louder than anyone else.”

“Never underestimate the power of sheer embarrassment,” Cordova agreed, coldly. “They defended me, only to discover that they were defending… I don’t think I did the wrong thing.”

“Politics,” Tiberius said. “You might have done the perfectly correct thing under any dispassionate moral laws, but popular opinion will hold that what you did was wrong, wrong, so wrong that you should be put in front of a wall and shot, or handed over to Imperial Intelligence as a test subject. Worse, your crew clearly knew the truth — they must have done — and they will be regarded as your accomplices. Where will they go after the truth is revealed and you become public enemy number one?”

Cordova’s eyes flashed. “You do not threaten my crew,” he snapped. “They’re the ones who came with me when every man’s hand was against me. I may be related to you and that blonde bimbo you sent as an Ambassador, but they’re my real family!”

“But you miss this Family,” Tiberius said. He leaned forward, despite himself. “You chose to enter a relationship with someone who shared the same background as yourselves, as well as a desire to alter the Empire. Since you came back here, after the Battle of Earth, you have stayed here, at the High City. You didn’t take Colin’s offer of a squadron and the Volunteer Fleet has been largely disbanded. Why would you stay here, were it not for the fact that you missed it?”

He watched Cordova carefully. No one from the outside would understand it, but the Thousand Families were family. A person who was born into that complex network of intertangling families and relationships would never need to fear. They might intrigue against each other, they might positively loathe each other from time to time, but they were always there. Their mere presence was comforting for those exposed to the harsh realities of the universe, even though the universe had changed sharply. So many of the Thousand Families might like to try to pretend that nothing had changed, holding parties as if they still didn’t have a care in the galaxy, and it was succeeding. The Families were warmth and safety to the younger aristocrats…

And he was sure that he had hit on the truth. No one doubted Cordova’s competence as a starship commander. He might not have been suitable to command a squadron — Joshua had hinted at that much, and Tiberius didn’t know anyone else with more right to an opinion on the subject — but he could have taken the Random Numbers to join the fleet gathering near Cottbus, or anywhere else. Instead, he had chosen to stay and be effectively useless… why? The only reason that made sense to Tiberius was that he wanted to be back with the Families.

“They also need someone to keep an eye on you and watch your activities,” Cordova said, finally. It wasn’t particularly convincing. “Colin is a clever person and a diabolical strategist, but he doesn’t have the mindset to cope with you and battles fought on… less open ground. I decided to remain here so that I could watch you and deal with any problems you might cause.”

He leaned forward himself. “And I still fail to see why I should consider transferring my loyalties to you,” he said. “Yes, you have blackmail information, but are you willing to use it if I refuse?”

Tiberius met his eyes. “Yes,” he said, flatly. Cordova lifted a single eyebrow, never breaking eye contact. It was hard for Tiberius to hold contact, but somehow he managed. “You would leave me with no other choice.”

“I could kill you right now,” Cordova said, dispassionately. He still hadn’t broken eye contact. Tiberius believed him implicitly. “You may have some highly illegal enhancements in your body, but nothing that would stop me from breaking your neck before your guards could rush in and overpower me.”

The words almost made Tiberius shiver. He held onto himself firmly. “And the truth would still get out,” he said, calmly. “I didn’t agree to hold this meeting without creating a fallback position for myself. No one with any sense would expose themselves so much when they could be… removed at any moment.”

“Indeed?” Cordova asked. “And you’re willing to hazard your life on it?”

“There is a second point,” Tiberius said. He forced his voice to harden. He had thought that it would be easy, but there was something about Cordova’s presence and attitude that made him want to grovel. “If something happens to me, and if by some miracle you avoid the guards and escape, Kathy Tyler will be killed.”

Cordova stared at him. “And you think that that would bother me?” He demanded, but his eyes told the truth. He might not have loved her — Tiberius found the idea of Cordova having anything to do with love a little amusing — but he certainly cared for her. She was also very important to the Provisional Government. Colin wouldn’t be able to find someone else with her credentials quickly. Indeed, the best person at his disposal would have been Tiberius himself…

“Yes,” Tiberius said, flatly.

There was a long pause. “Fine,” Cordova said, finally. “You appear to have me over a barrel. Should I drop my pants now?”

“No, thank you,” Tiberius said, angrily. Even if he swung that way, and he didn’t, he doubted that Alicia would have approved. It was considered bad form to cheat on your fiancée, even in the Thousand Families, until the final papers were signed and agreements had been made. “I want you to do something for us.”

“Us?” Cordova asked. “Could it be that there are others involved in this scheme?”

Tiberius said nothing. Cordova didn’t know, and couldn’t be allowed to know, that Daria was the Empress. He wasn’t someone who could be completely trusted and even if he were, he didn’t need to know. The information would probably kill him, when he finally found out. They might not have been friends, but they’d worked together to develop the Freebooter’s League into a genuine political force.

And then Colin comes along and knocks all their plans into scrap, Tiberius thought, amused. Daria’s original plan would have eventually dropped the entire Empire into her lap like ripe fruit, but instead Colin had appeared out of nowhere and launched the rebellion against the Thousand Families, at least twenty years too soon. Tiberius wasn’t going to complain about that, however; the original plan might not have included either him or the Cicero Family. Who would have predicted that a lowly Commander would have had the nerve to take an entire observation squadron and then an entire superdreadnaught squadron?

Joshua did, he thought, and scowled. Joshua had warned him, way back once the news of the rebellion had reached Earth, that the Thousand Families had made thousands of competent and determined enemies, who knew that there would be no chance of promotion or even security under their rule. The discussion had been an eye-opener — and he knew that Joshua intended to change things in the Imperial Navy, bureaucrats be damned — and it said more about Colin than Daria. Colin wanted to change things because he believed in right and wrong; Daria wanted to change things to preserve the Empire.

“Yes,” he said finally, and refused to give any more details. “I shall place my cards on the table. We want you to prepare to… remove Colin from power.”

Cordova smiled. “You do realise that that is high treason?”

“Why doth treason never prosper?” Tiberius asked, rhetorically. Joshua had taught him the quote years ago. “Because if it prospers, Jason, none dare call it treason.”

“And if I refuse?”

“You can probably guess at the consequences,” Tiberius said. He smiled and sat back into his armchair. “I am willing, however, to sweeten the pot. If you do as we order — and strike when we tell you to strike — I will bring you back into the Family fold. You can become Jason Cicero once again, with all the rights and duties that that implies, and Kathy can marry you, entering the Family. Your children would be brought up within the Family and they will want for nothing.”

He leaned forward. “I will even designate them as being within the second tier, if you wish,” he added. “They will be in line for the Clan Headship.”

Cordova’s face twisted. Tiberius could almost read his thoughts. A person in the second tier wouldn’t be that close to the headship, but Tiberius himself had no children, not yet. If he never produced a child, he would leave the second tier — which included Gwendolyn and Pompey — to fight it out over the succession. Any child of Cordova and Kathy Tyler would have an excellent chance to become Clan Head. It should have been irresistible.

“I’ll think about it,” Cordova said, finally.

“This isn’t the time to play games,” Tiberius warned, sharply. “. On this, you are either with us, or against us. There is no middle ground. If you are not ready to move when we give the signal, the truth will come out and you will become the most hated man in the galaxy.”

Cordova smiled. He seemed genuinely amused. “When there’s so much competition for the title?” He asked. There was a mocking note in his voice. “You must have a high opinion of my capabilities.”

He bowed once and left the room. Tiberius knew what he would do. He’d been careful to give Cordova no choice. One way or the other, he would do as Tiberius bid… or his new life would come crashing down around him.