Wizard in a Feud

1 Magnus, we have an emergency." Magnus d'Armand looked up at the source of the calm voice. There was nothing there, of courseonly a woodland scene in a gilded frame; the loudspeakers were hidden. "What sort of emergency, Herkimer?" Across the expanse of thick, dark red carpet, Alea looked up from the scrolling print in front of her padded velvet armchair. She wore lounging pajamas of silk that only emphasized her height; there was no need to minimize it when her companion was nearly seven feet tall himself. She had a long, bony face framed in long, lustrous dark hair. Magnus glanced at her, then glanced away to hide the admiration in his eyeshe was still unsure as to the nature of the heartbreak that had made her so wary of men and he was determined not to alarm her. She did seem to be past the worst of it, though there were still moments of hostility in her manner, and she still seemed too quick to argue minor points. But he was determined to prove himself a good friend and reliable companionand safe. He mustn't let her see how much he was aware of the generous curves in that long figure or how exquisite he thought the bone structure of her face. Besides, he had memories of his own, reasons to avoid intimacy. Fortunately, the ship's computer distracted him with its answer. "There is a malfunction in my central processing unit, Magnus." Magnus stiffened and saw the look of alarm on Alea's face. Amazing that a woman of a medieval society had learned so much of modern technology in two short years! "How serious is the malfunction, Herkimer?" "There is no way to tell, Magnus. It had resisted my standard diagnostic programs. It will require extended analysis." "We'd better plan for the worst," Alea said. "Any breakdown in the computer could threaten the life-support systems." "Yes, and at any moment." Magnus frowned. "What functions are impaired, Herkimer?" "Only memory so far, Magnus. I attempted to retrieve records of our last expedition but could not even bring up the name of the planet." "It was Oldeira, and we limited the power of magician-despots by introducing Taoism," Alea told him. "Datum entered," Herkimer acknowledged, then immediately said, "I could not even bring up the name of the planet." Magnus's and Alea's gazes met with alarm. "The memory-sector is so corrupted that it can't even hold new data!" she exclaimed. "And if Herkimer can't diagnose it, there's no way to tell whether or not it will spread to other functions," Magnus said. "If he forgets the rate at which he's supposed to be feeding us air or gets the nitrogen-oxygen proportions wrong, we could wind up having a very sound sleep indeed." "We have to land!" "Let's hope we can." Magnus raised his voice again. "Can you initiate a scan for livable planets, Herkimer?" "Scanning," the computer responded. A few seconds later, it said, "There is a G-4 star less than a light-year distant." "That's the same stellar type as Terra's sun," Alea said. "Does it have any planets, Herkimer?" "Three," the computer answered, "with an asteroid belt between the second and the third, which is a gas giant." "Tidal forces tore a fourth planet apart." Magnus nodded. "Or prevented it from ever forminStasheff, Christopher is the author of 'Wizard in a Feud', published 2002 under ISBN 9780812541526 and ISBN 0812541529.