Raven Stratagem

by Yoon Ha Lee

  “All right,” Zehun said, “that’s good enough for our purposes.”

  “Jedao hasn’t tried to subvert you recently, has he?”

  “What, as if he’d tell me anything useful I could pass on to you? You should be so lucky.” Zehun removed a cookie from the top of the fort and nibbled at it, then winced. “Anyway, based on this, what should we be doing differently?”

  “Too bad we can’t find some creative ways to divert more funds from the damn Andan. We’re going broke as it is.” Mikodez drummed his fingers on his knee. “It can’t hurt to order additional checks on the regions Jedao’s passed through. Although I can’t imagine he’d have the time to be up to much, even if he can ditch tons of the paperwork that Kel Command would make a general do. Speaking of which, I’m tempted to play hooky from mine.”

  “Don’t be ridiculous,” Zehun said. Their gaze became hooded for a moment. It caught his attention because Zehun was normally more composed than that. “Mikodez. You do know you’re staring right at a long-term solution to the succession problem.”

  “We’re not discussing this now,” he said, very pleasantly.

  Zehun’s expression flickered, but they acceded.

  Mikodez wasn’t looking forward to the conversation when it resurfaced. This would do for now. Instead, he asked, “I know we’ve had similar fiascoes, but how many out-and-out secessions?”

  “Three big ones. The first was that Andan-Rahal revolt during Heptarch Liozh Henezda’s reign, which the Liozh put down in an impressively short period of time. Then there was that one Kel general whose name I can never pronounce. She allied with some foreign powers that we gnawed into pieces after. The last was another Kel general.” Zehun smiled cynically. “People forget formation instinct hasn’t always been around.”

  “Do you think secession is Jedao’s play?”

  “I doubt it,” Zehun said. “He’s one of us, Mikodez. Both assassins and soldiers like to operate from ambush. Whatever he’s doing, he’s working hard to make sure it’ll blindside us. We’re going to have to get ahead of him somehow.”

  “I’d say that we have numbers on our side,” Mikodez said, “except for Hellspin Fortress. Alas, leaning harder on the Kel is unlikely to accomplish anything but make them crankier. Still, we need someone to rout the Hafn so the shadowmoths can make their strike without leaving us open to unsavory foreigners. In the meantime, we’re going to train one eye on the political realm and see what that gets us.”

  Zehun rubbed their eyes, and then he realized how tired they must be. “I still feel like he’s toying with us,” Zehun said.

  “Yes, that’s the point,” Mikodez said ruefully. “Now I know how everyone else feels.”

  “Don’t flatter yourself,” Zehun said, but they were smiling.

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  KHIRUEV RECEIVED COMMANDER Janaia’s request after the third time the Hafn refused battle. They were eight days out from Minang System with its wolf tower. Khiruev was painfully aware that she had turned up her terminal’s displays brighter than anyone else in the command center. Everything around her looked as though someone had painted it over with shadows.

  Irritatingly, Jedao was playing jeng-zai against the mothgrid again. Khiruev, who could see the score, wished he would lose just once. Jedao appeared to be absorbed contemplating his hand.

  Janaia prodded her terminal for the twelfth time in as many minutes, then muttered under her breath. She wasn’t the only one frustrated with the Hafn’s continued flight. The Kel wanted battle.

  “They’d better make a stand somewhere, sir,” Janaia said, her annoyance at the situation overcoming her desire to speak to Jedao and Khiruev as little as possible. “Do you suppose the master clock in the tower will be a sufficiently inviting target?”

  “They’ve certainly arrowed straight toward it,” Jedao said. “Aside from the Rahal billing us for any damage to it, the calendrical destabilization if the Hafn wrecked it wouldn’t do us any favors. Even if their objective is elsewhere, they might bomb it in passing.”

  Khiruev was scrutinizing a map. It didn’t take much military acumen to determine that something was amiss, but she couldn’t undermine Jedao in front of the crew. After being driven away from the Fortress of Spinshot Coins, the Hafn swarm might have been forgiven for withdrawing toward the border. Instead, they had persistently zigzagged farther into the hexarchate.

  Khiruev could only think of two compelling reasons for this behavior. One, this swarm was a decoy for a second invasion force, in which case Jedao was leaving the Fortress open to a second attack. True, the Hafn ability to turn phantom terrain against hexarchate forces was no longer a secret, but that didn’t mean they hadn’t prepared other tricks. The other explanation, which she kept returning to although she wished she could scrub it out of her brain, was that Jedao wasn’t just herding the Hafn, he was colluding with them. Hafn movements were too convenient, considering the plans that Jedao had already confessed to.

  As the Hafn neared the Kel military outpost at Tercel 81-7178, Khiruev waited tensely for any indication that they were slowing or circling around. Nothing.

  Afterward, Khiruev went to contemplate her shelves of disassembled machines. She picked up the watch Jedao had admired, trying not to think about the gnawing sensation inside her, as though her bones were shuddering apart. When she was around other people she could set it aside, but here it nagged at her. She put on music, a plaintive zither piece. That didn’t help either.

  When Commander Janaia requested to see her, Khiruev was grateful for the distraction, even if it was likely bad news. The wording of her request was both correct and unrevealing. Khiruev put the broken watch back on the shelf, then indicated that Janaia should see her in twelve minutes.

  Janaia came by almost exactly on time, unusual for her. It filled Khiruev with foreboding. Khiruev had set the door to admit Janaia automatically. “At ease,” Khiruev said, emerging to greet her.

  There were faint lines around Janaia’s eyes. “Permission to speak freely, sir,” she said.

  “Granted,” Khiruev said. “You may sit, if you like.” She nodded toward a chair.

  After a significant look at the chairs, Janaia sat. “I’m surprised the fox let you keep your gadgets.”

  “Perhaps,” Khiruev said, “he thought I could use the reminder of my failure.”

  “So it was you after all.”

  The music box. Kel Lyu and Kel Meriki, sprawled dead. Khiruev had essentially pointed the needler at them herself. She’d written notifications to their families that she’d never be permitted to send. The one time she’d brought it up with Jedao, Jedao had quashed the idea on the grounds that it would get those families in trouble with hexarchate authorities. Which Khiruev had known, but she couldn’t stop wishing otherwise. “I didn’t think it was any secret,” she said.

  “It’s done,” Janaia said, unsentimental. “But that isn’t what I came to talk to you about. It’s the twenty-fifth day, sir.”

  The twenty-fifth day since Khiruev had invoked Vrae Tala. “That’s something you’ll have to take up with Jedao,” Khiruev said.

  “You’re good at jeng-zai,” Janaia said, “but I know a bluff when I see one. I could have gone straight to him. But I thought I’d find out what’s going through your head first.”

  “Why don’t you come right out and say it, Commander.” Inside the gloves her hands had gone clammy.

  “Jedao had no idea about the Vrae Tala clause, isn’t that right?” Janaia said. “I thought at first that he had coerced you into it. But this last high table, there was no quarter-candle by your seat. I may be no friend of the fox’s, but he respects Kel custom. He always passes the cup at high table, he wears the notorious gloves, I daresay he knows our regulations better than we do. Except, of course, the ones that came into existence after we made a hash of executing him.”

  “It was a command decision,” Khiruev said humorously, “and one a bit late to rescind. Do you wish to lodge an official
complaint?” Who was Janaia going to go over her head to?

  Janaia slammed her hand down on the chair’s arm. “Sir, I’ve served with you for fourteen years,” she said, her voice utterly level. “I’m Kel, you’re Kel, I’ll even follow you into a fox’s jaws. But I will serve you better if you help me understand what the hell we’re doing.” Funny how Khiruev had made the same argument to Jedao himself. “What is it that’s so important that you’re killing yourself for it?”

  Khiruev opened her mouth.

  “If you’re about to make a suicide joke, don’t. Sir.”

  “Jedao thinks he can take on the hexarchs and win,” Khiruev said.

  “Well, yes,” she said impatiently, “that kind of delusion is what landed him in the black cradle in the first place. But, I mean, he’s crazy. What’s your excuse?”

  Khiruev peeled back her right glove just far enough to expose the skin of her wrist, so Janaia would understand the seriousness of her intent. The Kel only ungloved for suicide missions and lovers, as the saying went. Khiruev hoped Jedao’s plan wasn’t suicide, but in a sense, it didn’t matter. She was committed.

  Janaia’s mouth compressed.

  Satisfied that she understood, Khiruev settled the glove back in place. “Commander,” she said, “I trust you remember Raggard’s Basket.”

  Kel Command had assigned Khiruev to deal with heresy at Raggard’s Basket. The orders had changed en route. The Rahal had been making a calendrical adjustment, and they had desired a fast resolution to the matter. In response to Rahal pressure, Kel Command authorized the use of fungal canisters.

  Khiruev looked for a better way, but she couldn’t get around the punishing timetable. Since she could offer no viable alternative, she ordered the launch of the canisters. The resulting fungal blooms destroyed anything of human value in the world’s ecosphere. It was estimated that decontamination would take upward of a century. Khiruev had a vivid memory of the first spores coming to fruit when they encountered one of the indigenous sea snakes, fungus sprouting in spongy tendrils from beneath scales until they cracked purple-red, fungus clouding the amber eyes, fungus spilling out of the agonized mouths in bloated masses. Her chief of staff caught her watching the video over and over and made her stop.

  “Yes,” Janaia said. “I remember Raggard’s Basket. I also remember that we had our orders.”

  “I would like to think that it’s possible to construct a society where our orders don’t involve slaughtering our own people,” Khiruev said. The heretics hadn’t been the only ones on that planet.

  “That’s always hard,” Janaia said. Her face did not change. “But I leave the philosophical considerations to you. My job is to fight where you point me. Tell me, do you think Jedao really has a chance, even if he isn’t going to backstab us all afterward? Even at Candle Arc he was only outnumbered eight to one. The odds are infinitely worse here.”

  “Let me put it this way,” Khiruev said. “For four hundred years he’s convinced Kel Command not to kill him, despite a million good reasons. Kel Command isn’t known for being slow on the draw. And then he escaped. He may not win, but I am not seeing a better opportunity.” Khiruev met her eyes. “My disloyalty to Kel Command must be a terrible disappointment to you.”

  Khiruev shouldn’t have put it to Janaia so directly, but Janaia only shrugged. “I must admit,” Janaia said, “this strikes me as a singularly bad time for an insurrection.”

  “This is the hexarchate, Commander. There’s never a good time.”

  “It’s going to be blood all the way down, one way or another. And you won’t be around to see the end of it.”

  “Someone has to decide to throw the dice,” Khiruev said.

  Janaia nodded curtly. “At least tell Jedao about the candles,” she said.

  She cared about the oddest things. “Why is this so important to you?”

  “Fourteen years. Tell him. Let him do the right thing by you.”

  Fourteen years and Khiruev was wondering if she’d ever understood Janaia. “I’ll take it under consideration,” she said. “Dismissed.”

  After Janaia had left, Khiruev returned to contemplating the watch. She opened up the back and stared at the unmoving parts. She was cold again, but she could get used to a little cold. It was only temporary, after all.

  THERE WAS NO such thing as a routine battle, something Khiruev had figured out as a lieutenant decades ago. Even so, certain rituals made the chaos manageable. More accurately, they gave you the comforting illusion that the plan would have any relationship to reality when reality decided to stab you in the eye.

  Khiruev had made sure to get to the command center as the swarm approached Minang System’s inhabited worlds. The swarm alternated between two defensive formations as they traveled, in case the Hafn proved capable of coming about more suddenly than they had in the past. The Hafn swarm was going just fast enough that the Kel had to go full-tilt to keep up, which couldn’t be an accident. But abandoning the chase wasn’t an option, either.

  For the most part, Khiruev occupied herself reading increasingly confusing scan summaries and rereading staff analyses of Hafn movements. As Chief of Staff Stsan said in private, they amounted to carefully phrased variations of ‘fucked if we know what they’re about.’ It was too early to tell if the Hafn would make a stand at Minang, attack the wolf tower in passing, keep spearing into the Concerto March, or pull something completely new. Among other things, they hadn’t left any more geese lying around. Maybe they were running low.

  What worried Khiruev more than the Hafn was the fact that Jedao hadn’t deigned to make an appearance. She couldn’t tell Jedao what to do, but Jedao’s apparent lack of interest was making the crew jittery. Janaia had glanced twice in the direction of Jedao’s empty seat before catching herself.

  Khiruev didn’t have a pretext for sending Jedao a message asking him what the hell he thought he was doing, although she sent a restrained note anyway. It wasn’t against any regulation for Jedao to be off playing cards or polishing guns or taking a nap when they weren’t in combat. Anyway, it was an open question as to whether Kel regulations had meaning to an ex-officer in a rogue swarm. Note aside, it would be best if Khiruev acted like nothing out of the ordinary was going on, not that ‘ordinary’ meant much either, these days.

  “Sir,” Janaia said when they were four hours out from the tower. Her executive officer glanced at her, then looked away, troubled. Even Muris was affected by the situation, it appeared.

  “Yes, Commander?” Khiruev said.

  “Where do you suppose all the geese are anyway?”

  It was patently not what she wanted to ask. “Your guess is as good as mine,” she said.

  “I would feel better if the Hafn stuck to a routine.”

  “The next time they consult me about their battle plans, I’ll pass that along.”

  Your general had better know what he’s about, Janaia’s look said.

  Khiruev smiled thinly at her, then returned to scrutinizing the scan readouts.

  Three hours and five minutes out, Communications said, “Request from Minang Tower to speak to General Jedao, sir.”

  “Forward it to the general,” Khiruev said. She checked the headers and was interested that a wolf tower was addressing Jedao by the rank he no longer held. Even if Jedao didn’t want to be in the command center, he might wish to deal with the call.

  Six minutes passed. Communications looked up, expression distinctly unhappy.

  “Let me guess,” Khiruev said, “the general hasn’t responded and the tower is repeating its request.”

  “That’s it exactly, sir.”

  While it was hardly outside the realm of possibility that Jedao had some way of hijacking a channel so he could talk to people without there being a record of it in the mothgrid, Khiruev doubted that the tower was playing any such games with them. “Forward the new request,” Khiruev said grimly, appending a second note asking for Jedao’s guidance. She began putting together alternate f
ormation orders for the swarm, just in case.

  Janaia had achieved the perfectly serene smile that meant she had weapons-grade reservations about their survival.

  You and me both, Khiruev thought. Strategy had come up with three separate plans, to say nothing of contingency variations, for the defense of Minang System during the pursuit. Jedao had not approved any of them. Khiruev thought the second one might do in a pinch.

  After another twenty-three minutes, the next transmission from Minang Tower wasn’t a request, dashing Khiruev’s hopes that Jedao was discreetly handling the matter. It came not long after Scan reported that the Hafn were changing course. If the Hafn kept on more or less in that direction, they would swing past Cobweb System, which had two settled worlds. And the Cobweb worlds weren’t the only ones out that way. The possibilities multiplied appallingly with each hour the Hafn weren’t stopped.

  “Do we have any indication of”—she didn’t say ‘legitimate’—“Kel reinforcements in the area?” Khiruev said. Kel Command had to be working on the problem, although she had some idea of the logistical difficulties. After all, this very swarm had had to be scrambled for defense after General Chrenka’s assassination, and the Kel were often stretched thin.

  “I can’t definitely identify any swarm formants,” Scan said.

  Communications added, “Local defenses have been scrambled, judging by system traffic, but I have seen no indication of a swarm presence.”

  “The message, then,” Khiruev said. “Forward it.”

  Jedao’s reply came back almost immediately, text-only: Deal with it. Then, a set of coordinates: Prepare a welcoming party for the enemy here.

  With what, the threshold winnowers that Jedao had so cleverly had them discard? Notably, Jedao had given a place but not a time. The fact of the Kel swarm’s presence wasn’t a secret, and hanging around to launch missiles would hurt. They carried some mines for situations where you could force an enemy through an approach, but the Hafn had been merrily ignoring calendrical gradients this whole time, so that didn’t work either.