“This Dalgo fellow sounds like someone former Crown Councilman — now Citizen-In-Exile — Drazok would employ,” Tolith said as the Royal Guardsman hurried out. “But Drazok’s safely immured on Prexath, so at least he couldn’t have been involved.”
Though I couldn’t tell from where I was, I think Mr. Skoko’s eyes narrowed. “Are you sure? There has been no report of him escaping from Prexath?”
“No one escapes from Prexath,” said Verim. “The only way on or off the planet is by spaceship, and those are kept off-world at the space station inhabited by the Superintendent and his staff. They are primarily for emergency evacuation and can only be enabled from Cholar.”
“What about supply ships? Or do they all just fend for themselves?”
“By and large, yes. Some of the land around the colony is arable enough to grow food, and each inmate has a rudimentary but adequate shelter. All of them received instruction in the making and mending of fundamental items such as clothing and are, of course, provided with any medications they require.”
“Anyone seriously ill or injured is temporarily taken up to the space station to be treated by the military doctor serving a tour of duty there,” Ezrias put in. “Ships docked at the station are released for that purpose too. As well as to convey visitors and new prisoners down to the colony, pick up ones who have served out their sentences, and deliver shipments of comfort packages provided by friends and relatives. Or, if a prisoner has none, various charitable organizations. During any ship’s visit, electronic barriers keep prisoners back from the landing area until the task at hand has been accomplished and heavily-armed guards oversee the operation to ensure there are no breaches. The ship then departs, and the prisoners are released to go about their usual activities.”
“Comfort packages? The arrival of those must lead to some vicious fights,” Mr. Skoko commented.
“If violent offenders were kept there, that might be so,” Verim replied. “The criminals serving sentences on Prexath are not considered violent, though some, like Citizen-In-Exile Drazok, were perfectly willing to have others commit violence at their behest. Violent offenders are housed at facilities here on Cholar. Some have mental issues better dealt with through treatment of their disorders. Others are merely reacting to unfortunate life circumstances and can be taught better ways of handling their troubles.”
“The prisoners of Prexath do not fall into either category,” Ezrias added. “The majority are self-centred individuals whose desire for personal gain or glory caused them to engage in activities detrimental to the common good. Fraudulent stock traders, purported miracle workers and other mountebanks, cult leaders, political conspirators, drug traffickers, and the like. All of them people who demonstrated a complete lack of remorse for their actions and were unlikely to respond to conventional rehabilitation techniques. Instead, they have been removed from society and forced to form a society of their own. In an environment so harsh that sharing resources and working co-operatively are the only means by which they can expect to survive. And they are sufficiently skilled in attending to their own best interests to realize this. Those not committed to Prexath for life endure what they must while they must and rarely risk incurring another stay by taking up their old ways upon their return to Cholar.”
“I would imagine not,” said Mr. Skoko, impressed.
I didn’t think it too likely either. Prexath sounded like a thoroughly disagreeable place. Even so, I couldn’t conjure up any sympathy for Drazok. However uncomfortable his life had become, he’d been prepared to sacrifice the well-being of everyone on Cholar to fulfill his own ambitions. It seemed only fitting for him to be the one suffering deprivations instead.
A good hour passed before the Royal Guardsman brought Brizerom in and forced him into a chair at the end of the table, where he could be scrutinized by all. Going by a couple of bruises on his face, he had not chosen to come quietly. Jorthoans aren’t, by Earth standards very tall, but neither are Cholarians, though both stand taller than Mr. Skoko and other Ralgonian males. Pitted against an ordinary Cholarian he might even have got away, but Royal Guardsmen are the crème de la crème of Cholar’s military and highly skilled in methods of apprehension and restraint.
“He was at the starport, Your Majesty, attempting to take ship for his home world.”
“Why should I not?” Brizerom quavered. “I applied for and was granted some holiday time. I was going home to visit my parents.”
Verim regarded him with disdain. “They will be told you have been delayed. Possibly, depending on how deeply you are involved in the disappearance of the royal children, for years. Many years.”
Brizerom paled. “I had nothing to do with that. I was as appalled as anyone to hear they had been taken.”
Palming something he’d slipped out of a chamber in his belt, Chief Rupin stood up and went over to Brizerom.
“And just where were you when you learned about that?” he inquired.
“At the starport. I saw it on a news viewer.”
“Really? I was not aware it had become public knowledge. The palace has issued no statements. Only those within the palace’s walls are aware of what transpired here last night. They were ordered not to reveal it to anyone. As you must have been yourself.”
“No,” said the Royal Guardsman. “He left the palace long before dawn and was at the starport when the children’s disappearance was discovered. I checked.”
Brizerom licked his lips. “I…well, someone must have leaked the information.”
“I think not,” said Chief Rupin. “If they had, reporters of every ilk would be at the palace gates clamouring for news. They are not.”
He held up the thing he’d been hiding. “This is a lie detector. A very efficient one. The kind accepted as evidence in court. It can be attuned to the physiology of any sentient race and flashes when people lie. Thus far, it has produced four flashes, so it would be foolish of you to try to deceive us further. Being an accessory to kidnapping is a very, very, serious offence on this world. And believe me, it will not serve you well at your trial if it becomes known you gave untruthful answers to questions involving the welfare of small children. If, however, you were to be co-operative from here on in, the court might be moved towards leniency.”
Brizerom buried his face in his hands.
“I dare not. The person I was working for said the people he was working for would kill me if I said anything.”
The detector must not have flashed at this statement, because Chief Rupin promised him protection.
“For how long? Forever? He said there would be no escape for me if I betrayed them.”
Chief Rupin slammed a fist down onto the table. “What of those you have already betrayed? Tell us what you know, Brizerom. Your conscience can surely not allow you to imperil little children in this way.”
“He said they would not be harmed.”
“Vedetian youngsters tend to be high-strung, and the prince and princess are mere babies, torn from all that is familiar to them. The trauma alone will harm them. And how certain can you be these people will not harm them physically as well? If they are Cholarians, no, I do not think they would. But if they are not? How certain can you be if they are not?”
Brizerom gave a low moan. “No names. I will give you no names. Or disclose my contact’s origins.”
“From which we can assume he was not Cholarian,” said Mr. Skoko.
“No. But…but that is all I will tell you.”
At that point, Tolith touched Taz’s arm.
“It is time to make the ransom payment, Your Majesty.”
Taz nodded and stood. “Please go on with the interrogation, Rupin. Tolith and I will return as soon as possible.”
“There is something I must attend to as well,” said Mr. Skoko, following them out.
Brizerom’s steady refusal to name names was exasperating, but he did eventually break down and reveal how the kidnappers got into the palace. As supposed, he had been the one who drugged Lyetta and Keza and tampered with the security monitors during the power outage, setting them up to show certain areas as being devoid of activity whenever they were scanned. Having spent some time familiarizing himself with the palace and studying the patrol patterns of both the inner and outer guards he’d then let the kidnappers into — and later, out of — the building through an ancient side door most people had forgotten about. Its existence innocently revealed to him by an old palace servant.
Once inside the palace, the intruders kept to a storeroom, not venturing out until the storm subsided and restive people went to bed. When all was quiet, they made their way to the nursery floor and waited until Brizerom projected Challa’s voice and image (surreptitiously recorded earlier) into the corridor to attract the attention of the Royal Guardsman.
“I tried to stop them taking all of the children — they weren’t supposed to — but they wouldn’t listen.”
“Irrelevant,” said Verim. “You would be in just as much trouble if it were only the two royal children who were missing.”
A few minutes later, Chief Rupin’s communicator beeped and we learned it was only the two royal children who were missing. Keza’s had been found in a factory on the edge of the city, locked in a back room. Workers arriving for their shift had heard their cries for help and contacted a law officer. The kids had been too worked up to tell her much, but she did eventually get their names out of them. After making some inquiries, she learned their mother worked at the palace, and they were now back in the nursery being examined by the royal pediatrician.
Everyone headed there immediately — followed, discreetly, by us — and were joined en route by Taz and Tolith, who had just finished paying out the ransom money.
In the nursery, all three kids were clustered around Keza, sobbing. Keza was crying too. With relief.
“Aside from exhibiting considerable, though of course, understandable, emotional distress, they are quite all right, Your Majesty,” the physician told Taz. “They do show signs of having been drugged, but I believe this occurred after they had been taken.”
“After? Not before, as Lyetta and Keza were?”
“They have been somewhat incoherent, but the boy did say they woke up when the intruders entered the nursery. They were kept from calling out, and it was not until they were outside the palace they, as he put it, ‘went back to sleep’. When they next awoke, they were locked in the factory and the little prince and princess were no longer with them.”
At the rekindling of this memory, the kids left off sobbing and started to downright howl.
I’m sure everyone sympathized with them, and Cholarians, being Cholarians, would have been loath to badger distressed children, but this couldn’t be allowed to go on for long. Not with Challa and Kadi still missing.
Moving across to them, Verim bent down to their level.
“Stop that infernal noise,” he said sharply, his old disciplinarian mien having evidently not declined as much as Vostia had thought.
Startled, they did so pretty much immediately.
“That’s better,” said Verim, his tone somewhat gentler. “I realize you have had a very disagreeable experience, but Challa and Kadi are still missing and you cannot help us find them if you give way to hysteria. And you do want to help, don’t you?”
All three gulped, but nodded.
“Jagri. You told the doctor you woke up when the people who took you came into the room. You must, therefore, have got quite a good look at them before you went to sleep again. What did they look like?”
“T-They were…they were big,” Jagri managed to say. “With bald heads…and scrunched up faces, lots of arms, and…and lots of hands.”
‘B-Big, hairy hands,” said Sabra. “They put them over our mouths.”
“And they smelled,” Tiffa put in.
“Quorlians,” said Chief Rupin.
I’d never personally come across a denizen of Quorl, but I’d seen pictures and could understand why the kids were so shaken up. The lots of arms Jagri described would only have been four — two short and two long — but even so, Quorlians are scary looking, and if any had turned up in my room in the middle of the night when I was small, I’d have screamed the place down.