Requiem for a Ruler of Worlds by Brian Daley Read Free Book Online Page A

be the case, Alacrity, but I can't prove it. At least not now. The sentence commutation covering Project Shepherd applies to lesser crimes as well as to homicide. Inciting to riot, for example; disturbing the peace; aggravated assault."
    "They needed a babysitter, so they gave me a visa and arranged for trouble." He looked around the room suddenly. "Hold on; is anybody, uh … "
    Ash motioned a dismissal. "No one monitors my conversations if I don't allow it."
    "Nobody scroodles with Citizen Ash, huh?"
    "Let's stay with the subject; I haven't much more time. A Terran named Hobart Floyt must go to Epiphany to claim an inheritance at the Willreading of Caspahr Weir, and return to Earth with it for disposition by the Earthservice Resources Bureau."
    "Epiphany … " Alacrity frowned. Few outsiders ever made planetfall on Weir's personal world. The breakabout had heard rumors about the fabulous Frostpile and about Weir himself, even though a little nineteen-system realm was barely a spit in the ocean. Alacrity had already made up his mind but continued to probe, from reflex and for sheer love of it.
    "What's the inheritance? What am I going to be guarding?"
    "Floyt, at the very least. Beyond that, no one knows yet. A pittance, perhaps, or the deed to a planet."
    Alacrity squinted at him. "I can't think of many reasons Earthservice would trust me, saving only one, citizen."
    Ash nodded. "There's a proviso. That's why you're in an Alpha Bureaucrats' clinic."
    "Conditioning!" Alacrity clenched his fists and prepared again to jump the executioner.
    "Stop!" Ash had his palm up again. "There'll be no enslavement, Alacrity; no altering. My word on that."
    Alacrity found himself listening.
    "You escort Floyt to Epiphany, stay with him for the Willreading, which, with its attendant ceremonies, shouldn't take you more than a few days. Keep him safe, then return him with his inheritance.
    And that will be an end to it, insofar as you're concerned."
    "And all I have to put up with is a little brain-changing, hmm?"
    "There'll be no tampering, Alacrity. The modifications will only ensure that you keep your end of the bargain. I've let it be known that I will tolerate nothing beyond that."
    "Out to Epiphany and back … " Alacrity said to himself, as though he hadn't decided. "You win. But just don't forget: we've both been scroodled, good and proper. Me because I was bugtrapped; you because you're sentencing an innocent man."
    "I have no intention of forgetting it."
    "Why aren't you trying to find out who did it to us?"
    Ash looked at him for five seconds or so. "When I leave here, I will fly directly to the cell of a young woman who's been sentenced to death. She admits her guilt but refuses any alternative. She isn't as fortunate as you in having another way out. I will try to dissuade her from choosing execution, but I don't hold much hope. There are other cases, more than my office can properly deal with. And the backlog's growing worse. You're not the highest priority on my list, not anymore."
    Alacrity said nothing. Ash was about to leave again when he remembered something. "By the way: your surname, 'Fitzhugh.' It's of ancient derivation, like mine. But I doubt it's your real one. What made you pick it?"
    Alacrity grinned. "It was given to me a long time ago. My name's a pun, Citizen Ash. In your precious Terranglish ."
    CHAPTER 4—FIRM OFFER
    Floyt drew a deep breath when he reached his apt doorpanel. "Open," he said to the pickup mesh; the lock snapped back, and the doorpanel slid aside.
    He trudged between the neat stacks of boxes and cases that held a good part of the family's possessions. They were piled in the hallway because Floyt had appropriated the hall closet as a tiny workspace. Into it he had crammed a chair and minuscule table, desk-model accessor, and the accumulated reference materials and data of years of research. Balensa was fairly tolerant of the arrangement, in that he'd ceded her most of the rest of the apt.
    And