The Price of Glory

"You know where it is?"

"If I do, don't think I plan to tell you."

"Somehow, I didn't expect you to. But I do think I can help you."

"How?"

"Come with me."

"Where?"

"To Helmdown."

"How?"

"I have the necessary papers. We can dress as businessmen, run into Helmdown, see who we have to see, and then leave."

"To see this Deirdre person?"

King looked Grayson up and down, as though measuring him. "I want you to talk with Duke Ricol."

* * *

"You don't trust me."

Lori stared across the headquarters tent at Grayson, shook her head, and said again. "You don't trust me."

"It's not that, Lori." The pain in his soul was like a knife's twisting. "It's better if you don't know, that's all."

"But you calmly walk in here and tell me that if anything happens to you, I'm in charge . . . and to go through with the plan as we've discussed? God, Grayson ... I loveyou! Doesn't that count for anything?"

"Yes, Lori. It does. And it's why I . . . why I can't go into it, right now."

He had wrestled with his conscience all the way to the tent after he left King to ready the "demilitarized" skimmer. His moral dilemna had suddenly become more complex. It was unacceptable, from Grayson's point of view, to negotiate with either Garth or Rachan. It had occurred to him that finding the cache and offering it to either of those men, with certain safeguards, might be a means of guaranteeing the safety of the Legion: the Star League weapons in exchange for the safety and freedom of the regiment.

How could he even bring himself to do such a thing, though? Rachan—with or without ComStar's knowledge, but certainly with Garth's co

He had tried to convince himself that the Marik forces might leave the Legion alone if the cache were destroyed and there was nothing left to fight for, but Grayson realized finally what a delusion that was. If he destroyed the cache, Rachan would guess that Grayson knew of the whole plot. Grayson's death, and the death of every man and woman with him, would be absolutely necessary to keep quiet the fact that Rachan—and possibly ComStar itself—was involved in the massacre on Sirius V.

It was a dead end, then. He might preserve the unit's honor, but he could not preserve their lives.

Now the equation had become even more complex. King thought that Duke Ricol might have a way out for the Legion, and Grayson knew what price Ricol would demand for his help.

Should he bargain with Ricol?Grayson was still wrestling with the moral aspects of that question. For nearly four years, he had thought of the Red Duke as his father's murderer. Yet Ricol's stratagem on Trellwan had been a legitimate ruse of war. If Grayson looked at it that way, Ricol had simply been trying to minimize casualties among his own forces and the civilian populace of Trellwan by arranging it so that Trellwan's inhabitants would not wantto rise against their conquerors.

Where was the right all this? What was right? What would Grayson's father have wanted him to do?

There was no clear answer yet, but if Grayson told Lori where he was going and who he was going to see, her protests would make the decision that much more difficult. At that moment, Grayson realized how much he didlove Lori, no matter how poorly he expressed it to her. Because he did love Lori, he could not tell her where he was going and what he was pla

"I love you, too, Lori. More than I can say. And I would tell you ... if I could." He shrugged. "But I can't. All I can say is . . . please . . . trust me." Grayson knew there was a chance he would not come back, but it was remote. From what King had said, he was sure that Ricol did actually want to talk to him, that it was not a trap. But to see Ricol, he would have to enter Helm-down once again, and Garth's fleet was nearly upon them.

"Don't forget that I need you as the Legion's Exec to get things rolling here." He shook his head sharply, cutting off her protest. "No! You've got to see to rounding up any last survivors that might be hiding out there in the woods. You'll have to saddle up the regiment, have it ready to move. Strike the camp, and be ready to go an hour after sundown. I should be able to do what I have to do and return by then. But if I'm not back, you must get the regiment on its way. If I know I'm going to be late, I'll adjust my course accordingly, and catch up with the column along the way. You can have one of the trainees pilot my Marauder,so it'll be with you when I get in."

Lori smiled softly. "Are you sure you shouldn't take your Marauderwith you . . . wherever you're going?"

Grayson took Lori in his arms. She resisted at first, then molded herself to his body, clinging to him with all her strength. He raised her chin, then sought her mouth with his. They kissed, long and lingeringly. "I must go. But I will see you . . . tonight, I promise."

23

"Your Grace." Grayson gave the bow proper for a MechWarrior in the presence of a man of Ricol's station.

Duke Hassid Ricol was an impressive figure, as tall as Grayson was, but broader across the shoulders, with larger, heavier hands whose grip took Grayson's in a powerful clasp. He still wore the same, thick full black beard, and his teeth were very white against the beard when he smiled.

When Grayson had met Ricol before, the man had worn the full-dress reds for which he was famous, but such garb would be too conspicuous here on Helm. He was dressed instead in the ruffled blouse and richly patterned trousers of a merchant. His high-topped boots were also ornate and expensive, the mark of a wealthy man showing his worth through tasteful ostentation.

Grayson was fully aware that Ricol used clothing, as he used all else, for his own purposes. He had heard once that the dress reds were the Duke's way of instilling awe in those he ruled, a kind of psychological advantage because men's minds so easily associated the color red with blood, danger, and death.

So, too, the ornate civilian dress had let this Duke of the Draconis Combine ground his DropShip, stroll through an occupied city, and visit this house on Gresshaven's hill without attracting the least bit of unfavorable notice—and without giving anyone a clue as to his real identity.

"I am glad to see you again," Ricol said, "though you probably don't believe that."

"I have endured a number of surprises of late, Your Grace," Grayson replied. "One of the biggest was learning that you were here.'.'

"Events . . . required it," the Red Duke said. "Things were happening too quickly for me to oversee their progress from elsewhere."

Ricol's ship the Huntresswas in the Helm system, had been insystem for nearly five days, but no one had questioned it. The Marik forces gathering now at Helm numbered dozens of ships, ranging from the Rapaciousand her consorts at the jump point, to DropShips like the Assagaiand transports such as those on Helmdown's landing field. Like most modern military organizations, the Marik government relied on private merchants and traders to carry the vast amounts of food necessary to provision a fleet as large as the one that had descended on Helm during the past week. The Huntress,and the DropShips with her, were carefully disguised as lightly armed merchanter vessels. Ricol's DropShip Alpha,grounded now at Helmdown's landing field, would excite no more comment than any other civilian merchanter now in port. And Ricol himself looked the part of the Alpha'smerchant-owner.