Blackhawk: Far Stars Legends I Read online

  The field was silent, the stunned faces of all those gathered locked on Lucerne. Carteria was by far the strongest Warlord on Celtiboria…and he was regarded with dread everywhere on the planet. But Augustin Lucerne stood like a statue, speaking boldly and betraying not an iota of fear to anyone around him.

  “And from it I shall pay a bonus of six months’ wages to all men who take my service. And then we shall embark on a great campaign…to unite the Northern Continent. For too long Carteria has held himself above the rest of us, wielded power no other Warlord dared to challenge. It is time another power rises, one that can face the Marshal, meet him on equal terms.”

  Lucerne paused, looking out over the group of officers, and behind him, at his own people. There were stunned faces everywhere, all of the men assembled. Save one.

  Blackhawk’s face was cold, unreadable. His eyes were fixed on Lucerne, and inside his respect grew again. Blackhawk admired courage. It was one thing that spanned both his old and his new personas. And Augustin Lucerne, whatever else he was, was a courageous man.

  Dolokov stood quietly for a moment, exchanging glances with his fellow commanders. Finally, he looked back at Lucerne. “General, may we have a moment to discuss your offer?”

  Lucerne nodded. “Certainly, Colonel Dolokov.” He gestured behind him. “I will be at the base of the hill with my officers when you are finished.”

  Blackhawk watched the exchange, understanding it for what it was. Dolokov and his people would talk, then the mercenary would return with a list of conditions, minor guarantees, face-saving concessions. And then they would accept the offer.

  Augustin Lucerne’s victory was complete.

  * * *

  “Here it is, Jarvis. Two million silver ducats, as promised.”

  Blackhawk stood off to the side, watching as Lucerne presented the surviving Grays with their share of the booty. He had kept his word, followed through on what he had promised Cass.

  “And I will honor all the promises I made to Cassandra. Henceforth, the Galadan will be under my protection. None now will dare come and victimize your people, for such would put them at war with me.” That was a significant threat now. Lucerne commanded his and Ghana’s troops, both the forces that had fought over the Badlands, and all the garrisons and other armies stationed throughout the two Warlord’s domains…and to that he had added 95,000 former mercenaries, almost all the men in the companies that had contracted with Carteria. Altogether, 320,000 soldiers followed his banner, and he ruled over lands covering twenty-five percent of the continent.

  Trade flowed again across the Badlands, freed of both the threats of war and the raiding of the Grays, and even now, two weeks after the end of hostilities, revenue from caravans was flowing into Lucerne’s coffers, helping with the monumental task of supporting an army so large.

  “Thank you, General,” Jarvis replied. “For everything. I know Cass would have…” The ex-raider paused for a moment. “I know she would have been pleased…and grateful.”

  “It is I who am grateful, Jarvis. I only knew her for a very short time, but Cassandra Cross was an extraordinary woman…and she will not be forgotten.”

  “Again, thank you, General.” He turned and looked at a small cluster of uniformed figures, six of them. One third of the Grays who had survived…and the members of the company who had chosen to join Lucerne’s army. Elli Marne stood in front of them, their leader now despite her young age. Lucerne, too, had looked past her years, and he’d put a lieutenant’s bars on her shoulders. Her first mission would be to lead a company to the Galadan, to protect the silver convoy and establish a fortress to watch over the province, to protect it from any who might come again and ravage its rich farms and fields. Lucerne was sending more than money, more than soldiers. He had hundreds of thousands of soldiers to feed now, and he had agreed to buy all the grain the revived Galadan could produce.

  “Good luck to you, Jarvis.” Lucerne reached out, shook hands with the Gray. Then he turned and walked back toward the main camp.

  “Good luck from me as well, Jarvis.” Blackhawk’s voice was soft, clipped. He had trouble facing the man who had served so closely with Cass, who had seen his own behavior in those fateful moments on the battlefield.

  “Thank you, Blackhawk.” Jarvis’ voice was unemotional, and Blackhawk knew that was the best he could hope for. He knew Jarvis resented him, but he’d come to wish the new leader of the Grays his best anyway. It’s what Cass would have wanted.

  Blackhawk was sad as he thought of her. He felt he had let her down, hurt her in ways he wished he hadn’t. Leaving her the first time, refusing her when she asked him to stay, to settle with her in the Galadan. And later, on the battlefield…where she’d lost her life. Where he’d been unable to say the one thing he knew she’d longed to hear.

  He watched as Jarvis turned and walked away, led the rest of his people as they set out for home. He smiled as Elli Marne snapped her commands. Cass had been fond of both Jarvis and Elli, and he knew it would have pleased her to see them now, to know they had made it, that the Galadan was safe.

  Cass was gone, but she’d left one hell of a legacy, and he supposed there were worse ways to go. He felt a grim satisfaction that she hadn’t died in vain, but the emptiness was still there inside him, the sadness. Such feelings were new to him, and though the pain was almost unbearable, he knew his ability to feel it was a step forward for him. One more thing he owed Cassandra Cross.

  He watched the Grays for a few more minutes, as they made their way south, back toward home. Then he turned and headed back to the camp, following Lucerne.

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  Marshal Lucerne’s Camp

  Just West of the Badlands

  Northern Celtiboria

  Augustin Lucerne stared into the flames, sitting silently. He and Blackhawk sat in the great hall of the manor house he’d appropriated for his headquarters. The lands east of the river cities were considerably richer than the wastelands of the Badlands, and they provided more comfortable lodgings for the army.

  The fire’s warmth was welcome as the dusk had given way to a late night chill. Blackhawk had spoken long, and he had told Lucerne things he’d never confided to anyone, recollections he’d barely faced himself. He’d told the general of his past, all of it. From his beginnings, through all the deeds he’d done. He hadn’t intended to be so thorough, but by the time he’d finished, he had turned Lucerne into his confessor.

  He had waited to have this talk, until things had calmed, until the tumult from the Badlands Campaign had slipped from the present into the recent past. The wounded were healed, or at least on the mend, the army’s logistics had been patched together.

  Now that all that was done, Blackhawk knew the time had come for him to leave. He knew Lucerne couldn’t afford peace for long…he had built a massive army, and if he was going to pay for it in the long term, he had to use it. And Blackhawk had to be gone by then…for reasons that had become very clear to him on the battlefield. He was not ready to lead men in battle, to stand in the halls of power. It was too great a temptation. He had to learn to understand himself first.

  He had been uncertain how Lucerne would respond to the things he had just confessed. His past was dark, ugly. And Augustin Lucerne was now the only other person who knew the truth.

  “I knew you had a past, Ark…but I confess, I hadn’t imagined anything close to the truth.” Lucerne’s voice betrayed his surprise, but there was none of the disapproval Blackhawk had expected.

  “I broke my conditioning, Augustin. I am not that man anymore.” He paused uncomfortably. “But he is still inside me. That is why I must go, Augustin. Not because I wouldn’t serve you, wouldn’t stand at your side and help you reunite Celtiboria. There is no man I respect more than you.” He paused.

  “But you didn’t see me on the field. I lost myself, every time battle was joined. I slipped back into what I was. That man is not one you would want at your side, my friend, however gre
at his skills. He wouldn’t serve you. He would seek to replace you, to take control. He would think nothing of putting a bullet in your head to serve his purposes.” Blackhawk hesitated, took a breath. “I must be alone, Augustin. I must not command armies, for proximity to such power would surely destroy me. I would wander the Far Stars alone, a friendless drifter, before I would allow myself to become what I once was.”

  “To wander aimlessly? For a lifetime? Does any man deserve such a fate, no matter what he has done?” There was still no recrimination in Lucerne’s voice. Indeed, to Blackhawk’s astonishment, he thought he heard compassion.

  “Perhaps not for a lifetime. I must understand myself better, what I am, what I was. I must learn to face the monster that lives within me, to destroy him once and for all. And until I am able to do that, I cannot have a home…no matter how much I might want one.”

  Lucerne looked over at his friend. “And Celtiboria reminds you of Cassandra…”

  Blackhawk winced. He was unsettled at how insightful Lucerne was, how the general seemed to penetrate his very thoughts.

  “Yes. Her shade is heavy here.” He looked down at the floor. “She offered me a home, a life at her side. As a farmer. Perhaps that was my chance, Augustin, to live a quiet life, to grow crops, avoid the battlefield that feeds my dark side.” He paused and sighed softly. “But I spurned her. I told myself I had to find you, to redress the ill I thought you had done to me. Then I made other excuses. But the truth is, I don’t know how to be anything other than what I am. I couldn’t do that to her, tie to her to me. I don’t even know what I am, what I can be. She deserved better, Augustin.” His voice was soft, and he sat silent for a moment. “Instead she got nothing, no life at all. Just death on the battlefield.”

  “You suffer my friend,” Lucerne said, “You blame yourself for much. Perhaps some of that is just, and some you seek to feed your self-hatred. Perhaps there is justice in that, a penance of sorts. But promise me this, my friend…don’t stop looking for redemption. You will find it one day. I believe that with all my heart. You are not fated to live your life alone, without love, without friends. Do not make it so by your own actions when it need not be that way.” Lucerne paused. “And never forget, Arkarin Blackhawk, you have a home here on Celtiboria. Return to us one day, my friend. If ever you need aid or succor…or just rest, a place to hide, it is here.

  Blackhawk just nodded. He appreciated Lucerne’s thoughts, the general’s hopes for his future, but he wasn’t sure he believed it. He didn’t know what the future held for him, but he’d resolved to take things a step at a time. But he felt something, a bit of peace, of contentment.

  Perhaps this is what it is to have a friend. A home.

  * * *

  Blackhawk walked slowly across the dirt road, toward the small line of trucks ahead. It was a routine convoy, heading to Rhiombe to pick up supplies…but it was also Blackhawk’s ride. General Lucerne had offered to fly Blackhawk to Trattoria or Columbia, the cities that housed the Northern Continent’s two spaceports. But Blackhawk had refused, saying he would obtain his own transit in Rhiombe. Lucerne’s battered air force was already thinly stretched, and besides, he was going to have to get used to being on his own. In Lucerne’s camp he was an officer, a friend of the Warlord. But when he left he would be a wanderer again, a friendless drifter. He wasn’t the same as he’d been before, and he was grateful for that, to Lucerne, to Cass, to all those who had helped pull him back from the abyss…but his path was still a solitary one.

  He was confused, still struggling to deal with his new emotions, with the grief over Cass, but he felt something new, something good. He had been a part of Lucerne’s victory, he had fought for a cause, for more than personal gain. He liked the way it felt, the joy at aiding a friend, of winning something meaningful. He’d relished victory before, but this was something different, something less cold than what he recalled.

  His friend had become a very powerful man, and he wondered how the next few years would progress. Lucerne could handle any local enemies, he was sure of that, but eventually he would have to face off against Carteria. He’d avoided that war for now, through luck and deft maneuvering. He had returned the fifteen thousand survivors of Carteria’s guard, unharmed and without demanding any tribute. He knew an honorable gesture alone wouldn’t be enough to sway Carteria, but the Marshal had lost half his elite soldiers, as well as forty million ducats in silver…and Lucerne had grown vastly in strength. It was in Carteria’s interests to postpone any move against Lucerne and the Northern Continent, and the Marshal took the prisoner repatriation as an excuse to make peace…just as Lucerne had predicted.

  Lucerne had gained one other thing from Carteria, an asset beyond more soldiers, more lands. Ganz Jellack had come to the Northern Continent to organize Carteria’s mercenary army, and he’d been left with a small cadre of guards when the mercs deserted him en masse. Lucerne had taken his entourage prisoner, promising to return them to the Southern Continent as quickly as he could. But he quickly noticed Jellack’s gifts for organization and financial management, and he offered him a place in his own service.

  The Carterian had declined, though he’d been clear that he had no loyalty to Carteria, that the Marshal guaranteed his loyalty by holding his wife and children as hostages. Blackhawk had seen a certain sense in Carteria’s actions, a brutal logic, but Lucerne had been outraged…and he’d sent Rafe DeMark and a team of elite commandoes on a mission to rescue Jellack’s family. DeMark and his crew had dressed as pirates, approached from the sea. Surprise had been total, and Jellack’s wife and children were retrieved almost bloodlessly.

  Jellack had been stunned when Lucerne brought his family to him and repeated his offer, and this time he enthusiastically accepted. He would have to keep a low profile at first. Lucerne didn’t want to inflame the situation with Carteria by disclosing that he’d infiltrated and attacked one of the Marshal’s facilities. But Blackhawk knew it had been more than a minor coup. Jellack was a genius in his field, and with the massive expansion of Lucerne’s holdings, the general would desperately need a skilled finance minister.

  “Ark…” The voice was instantly recognizable. Blackhawk had already said his farewells to Lucerne, but the Marshal had come to see him off.

  “Augustin.” He turned. Lucerne was standing in the road behind him, a young girl following along behind him. Blackhawk had seen her in the headquarters before, running around with orders, working in the field hospital. She was perhaps ten years old, but there was something about her. He saw it in her eyes, a piercing stare, a gaze that broadcast intelligence.

  “I just wanted to see you off, my friend.” He paused, looking down at the girl. “This is my daughter, Ark.” Then: “Astra, this is Arkarin Blackhawk. He is a friend. Without his help the victory would not have been possible.”

  “Hello, Mr. Blackhawk. It is a pleasure to meet you.”

  Blackhawk returned the girl’s gaze. He hadn’t spent much time around children in his life, but he’d seen enough of them to realize how different this girl was. She spoke like an adult, and he was even more convinced now that she was extremely capable.

  “Hello, Astra. I assure you, the pleasure is all mine.” He smiled, glancing up at Lucerne and back down at the girl. “Can you do a favor for me, Astra?”

  She looked up at him, an expectant look on her face. “What do you want me to do?”

  “Take care of your father when I am gone. He is a good man, Astra, but he needs help. He carries much on his shoulders…and I am sure you are a great comfort to him.”

  She smiled. “I will, Mr. Blackhawk. I promise.”

  “Astra,” Lucerne said softly, “I need to speak with Mr. Blackhawk alone. I will meet you back at out quarters in a few minutes.”

  “Yes, father.” She turned toward Blackhawk and gave him a warm smile. “Goodbye, Mr. Blackhawk. Come see us again one day.” Then she turned and jogged back toward the manor house.

  “She is an extraordina
ry child, Augustin. I didn’t know you had children.”

  Lucerne nodded, a somber expression on his face. “Only Astra, I’m afraid.” A sadness fell on Lucerne’s face. Blackhawk could see there was more to the story. “Come back as Astra says, Ark. When you do, it will be my turn to share my shame and sadness, and yours to be confessor.”

  “That’s a bargain, Augustin.”

  There was a short pause then Lucerne spoke again, his voice normal, the sadness pushed aside. “I came to ask you once again to take more coin with you. This victory wouldn’t have occurred without you, Ark. Indeed, it is likely I would have faced defeat and disaster—even assassination—without your participation. You deserve more.”

  Blackhawk shook his head. “No, my friend…you need every ducat you can get. Even that will not be enough to sustain this army. I would not drain resources from you now. You have paid me what you offered when all this began, a thousand imperial crowns. That will be enough for me. That is my last word on it. Consider anything else you would have given to be my contribution to sustaining all of this…for you have declared it my home too, have you not?”

  Lucerne stood there, looking as if he might argue. But then he just nodded. The two stood silently for a moment then Lucerne said, “Whatever you might have done in the past, know this…the man standing before me is an honorable one, and one any man would be fortunate to call his friend.”

  “As are you, Augustin. You cannot know what you have pulled me from…and I shall never forget my debt to you.”

  Blackhawk stepped forward and put his arms out, grabbing Lucerne in a firm embrace. After a few seconds, he stepped back and looked at his friend for a few seconds. Then he turned and walked away.