King's Sacrifice Read Online Free PDF

of you," Dixter said gravely.
    "Yeah,
well, gotta keep up appearances," Tusk muttered. A shining steel
bulkhead reflected his image back to him. He gave himself a quick
once over, couldn't help but wonder—at first glance—just
who the hell this character was.
    The stern,
chilling lines of the black uniform, its stiff, high collar and
smooth, adhesive-flapped front closing trimmed with red piping and
glittering major's insignia, were light-years away from the
many-times-washed, army-surplus fatigues Tusk had been accustomed to
wearing. Looking at himself, he had a momentary wish that wherever
those fatigues were, he was with them.
    The jet-black
color of the uniform was too near the ebony-black color of his skin;
it was difficult to tell—other than by the bloodred lines of
the piping—where the uniform left off and Tusk began. Sometimes
he had the feeling he was all uniform, nothing remained of
himself. Even the fit reminded him constantly that he was in the
Warlord's service: uncomfortable, rigid, with a tendency to grip him
too tightly about the neck. Tusk felt himself continually short of
breath, had fallen into the habit of tugging at his collar in an
ineffectual attempt to loosen it.
    He regarded
himself with a small measure of contempt and a large amount of
self-pity. Turning away, he saw that Dixter's amusement had broadened
into a wide smile.
    "You're
beautiful," he assured Tusk.
    "Oh, stow
it . . . sir,"Tusk mumbled in return, casting the general a
bitter, envious glance.
    He didn't know
how Dixter managed it He wore the same type of severely tailored
uniform that Tusk wore, yet Dixter always appeared comfortable—his
uniform wrinkled and rumpled, the collar undone (the top button
missing in action), general's stars half falling off.
    Dixter sat at
his ease, rump propped on one of the control panels, where he'd been
chatting casually with the operator waiting to receive the vid signal
from the Warlord's ship, Phoenix II. The general might have
been back in his old HQ in the desert of Vangelis, except for a few
minor changes that no one who hadn't know him a long time would have
noticed, someone like Tusk.
    Looking at
Dixter closely, as the general turned to answer a question from the
operator, Tusk saw the older man's hair had gone a little grayer, the
lines in the face were a little deeper, die brown eyes in their maze
of wrinkles were a little tireder, a lot older. The deep suntanned
brown of the skin, obtained after a life of living and fighting on
land, would never completely fade, but the tan had gone sallow after
months of being confined aboard a spaceship. And there was a faint
pallor beneath the tan and the puffiness about the eyes of a man who
never feels himself at ease traveling the frigid, black void of
space.
    Tusk's envy
evaporated, replaced by concern and a growing, smoldering anger. For
two plastipennies, he'd grab the general and get the hell off this
ship and away from the whole fuckin' mess. Tusk was fired up, he
could have blasted off himself without benefit of a rocket. He loped
across the deck, the words were on his hps, he was—in his
mind—already flying out of the hangar when Dixter turned back
to face him. One look at the mild brown eyes, and Tusk's energy
drained from him.
    Dixter wouldn't
leave, any more than Tusk—when it came down to it—would
leave. Only what held them wasn't precisely the same.
    Tusk drew
closer, lowered his voice. "Any word from the Lady Maigrey,
sir?"
    Dixter shook his
head. "No." One word, but it held all the pain a man could
conceivably hold and go on living.
    "Begging
the general's pardon, but damn it all to hell!" Tusk's anger
found a vent. "One minute she's there and the next she's not,
without so much as a 'so long, wasn't it fun, let's do it again
sometime.' No, sir! I gotta say this, get this off my chest. If I
don't, I—I might hit somebody!"
    Noting the
fierce expression on the mercenary's face,