you don’t mind, we can continue this later.”
They all replied with an “Of course, Your Lordship.” They gathered up the designs and disappeared quickly. Arthur closed the door behind them. “Computer,” he called over his shoulder as he strode back to his desk. “Full privacy and surveillance scan, no recording, no monitoring.”
“All entrances are sealed,” the computer replied. “Surveillance scan verifies a monitor free environment within the confines of your study. Vocal monitoring will be disabled upon your verification. You’ll have to reactivate manually when you’re finished, Your Lordship. Please verify.”
“Verified,” Arthur said.
“Confirmed,” the computer replied.
He turned to Charlie. “Okay, Charlie. We can talk. There’ll be no record kept.”
“That bad?”
Arthur shrugged. “We’re going to discuss the Realm’s dirty laundry. And some of what we say might be construed as treason.”
That bad, Charlie thought.
Arthur began with a question. “What do you know of the situation with Aagerbanne?”
This time it was Charlie who shrugged. He had heard bits and pieces on the trip back from the prisoner exchange, but not much. “Lucius is negotiating for unlimited access to the Aagerbanni port facilities on Aagerbanne Prime, which would give us access to all the trade routes into the independent states. But there’s been some sort of snag.”
Arthur sat down behind his desk. “On the surface, you’ve got the gist of it. But the Aagerbanni Cabinet Minister for Trade thinks the crown might take the position that, since Aagerbanne was originally colonized with funds from the royal treasury, it’s a candidate for annexation as a Crown State Holding.”
“That’s ridiculous,” Charlie said. “Aagerbanne has been an independent state for more than five centuries.”
“Yes,” Arthur said. “But once it’s done, and crown troops are occupying Aagerbanni nearspace . . .” Arthur finished with a shrug.
“Lucius is insane,” Charlie said.
“No,” Arthur said. “Foolish, yes. Idiotic, maybe. But this is calculated. The Syndonese war badly depleted the royal treasury. If he pulls it off, it would be a financial windfall. So Lucius’s real game is to push the negotiations into stalemate, feed appropriate amounts of misinformation to the media, and when the time is right, forcibly annex Aagerbanne.”
Charlie shook his head, couldn’t believe what he was hearing. “He might get away with it. Even with advance warning Aagerbanne can field only a few hundred thousand troops and maybe a dozen warships. What about the independent states?”
“They’re moving carefully,” Arthur said. “Finalsa and Allison’s Cluster have signed a mutual defense alliance with Aagerbanne. Toellan and Istanna are arming themselves now, and the other states are simply watching the situation nervously. If Lucius—”
The computer interrupted him. “Your Lordship. Forgive me for interrupting, but Lord Theode is demanding admittance.”
Arthur sighed. Charlie grinned and asked, “How is Twerp?”
“Unchanged. And please don’t call him that to his face. It’ll only start a fight, and he’ll go whining to his mother.”
“And the Lady Gaida?”
“The witch-bitch is also unchanged. Oh, Charlie!” Arthur laughed. “I haven’t called her that since you got killed.”
“Again, Your Lordship, I apologize for interrupting, but since my monitoring systems are deactivated at the moment, if you have replied to my earlier request, I am unaware of it and cannot respond to vocal instructions.”
Charlie sighed. “You might as well let Twerp in and get this over with.”
Arthur reached over and touched a switch on the console buried in the surface of his desk. “Computer, reactivate standard monitoring and security procedures. Then admit Lord Theode.”
“Well, if it isn’t the whoreson,” Theode announced as he strode into Arthur’s study with two friends following him. “And newly risen from the dead. Quite a miracle, especially considering the lineage.” He glanced at his two friends and raised an eyebrow, which appeared to be a signal that he was being witty, and they were now supposed to laugh. They did.
As Arthur had said, Theode hadn’t changed. Small, slight of build, dark hair combed and oiled, an impeccably trimmed goatee. He sported an expensive green tunic, with the coat-of-arms of House de Maris tastefully embroidered on the lapels, and cream colored pants stuffed into soft, leather, knee-high boots. Theode had always been conscious of fashion, and spared no expense to ensure that he was properly attired.
“I’m told the conditions you survived were rather atrocious.” In the Syndonese prison camp Charlie had remembered Theode’s voice as a nasally, high-pitched whine. But he’d convinced himself that his dislike for Theode had colored his memories, that no one’s voice could be that irritating. He realized now that his memories had been all too accurate. “Now, that, I think, is genetic. One