by David Drake
"And then the Pellegrinians invaded," Adele prompted, since her host appeared to be concentrating on the fresh drink. She couldn't imagine how Claverhouse had gotten to his present age if he drank like this as a regular thing; perhaps the shock of being driven from his home again had overwhelmed him.
"Not exactly," said Claverhouse, looking at her shrewdly. "You really are interested in Dunbar's World, aren't you?"
"Yes, of course," Adele said, holding her temper with some difficulty. If he isn't drunk, is he senile? "I'm accompanying Commander Leary to help our ally Bennaria oppose the invasion of their ally, Dunbar's World."
"In the middle of war with the Alliance, the Navy is sending one of its most successful young officers off to the back side of nowhere?" Claverhouse said. "You see, I've done some checking myself. And I'm afraid I don't find your story convincing, Mistress Mundy."
Adele felt her face stiffen. She carried a pistol in her left tunic pocket, its weight as familiar and comforting to her as that of the personal data unit. She'd killed with it in the past, killed more times than she could count. An old man who'd called her a liar would be a slight additional burden to her soul.
Then instead she smiled. "Maurice," she said, "I wouldn't have thought I had to tell you that Cinnabar politics can be harsh. Commander Leary was thought, perhaps with justification, to be a favorite of Admiral Anston, the former Chief of the Navy Board. Anston retired after a heart attack shortly before Commander Leary returned to Cinnabar in a captured prize. The new Chief, Admiral Vocaine, is most definitely not a partisan of Commander Leary. One might surmise that this mission to 'the back side of nowhere' was a Godsend to both men."
Adele paused and licked her lips; they'd gone dry with the rush of adrenalin that had urged her hand toward her pistol. "I tell you that," she continued, "on my honor as a Mundy. I hope you won't question my word, Maurice."
Claverhouse set his drink back on the table and met her eyes. "No, of course not," he said. "My apologies, dear girl. My sincere apologies. As for Dunbar's World—"
Skre-e-ell! "Would you care to hear the specials on today's luncheon menu?"
Claverhouse gave the waitress a look of cold fury and said, "No, we would not. Bill me for two soups and salads and eat them yourself while leaving us alone."
He glanced at Adele. "Unless you, my dear. . .?"
"No, quite right," said Adele.
"Then be gone, " Claverhouse snapped to the waitress. "And take you vermin with you!"
He cleared his throat and went on, "Yes, Dunbar's World. Chancellor Arruns, the leader of Pellegrino, has a son named Nataniel. Nataniel Arruns is an active, ambitious young man. He's not ideally suited to living quietly at home and waiting to rule Pellegrino when his father dies in the normal course of events. Nataniel has gone to Dunbar's World with ten thousand mercenaries to conquer a base for himself."
"So it's not a Pellegrinian invasion after all?" Adele said, frowning. Mistress Sand hadn't been able to provide much information, but that much at least had seemed certain.
"Technically, no," said Claverhouse. He smiled coldly. "But those mercenaries were until a month or so ago members of the Defense Forces of Pellegrino, and I have suspicions as to where their pay is coming from even now. The fact that it's not legally war between states is useful for all concerned, however. It'd wreck Pellegrino's economy if vessels trading to Ganpat's Reach couldn't stop there as they ordinarily do."
"Ah," said Adele, nodding. This was a legal fiction which, like so many other things that looked like lies, made normal human interactions possible. That was much of the reason that Adele was uncomfortable with human interactions.
She brought out her data unit now—properly, because they'd gotten onto the business of the meeting and she didn't have to worry that she'd offend Claverhouse. What the staff of Pleasaunce Style thought of her was another matter, but she really didn't worry about that.
"Ten thousand troops is a large force to transport even a relatively short interstellar distance. . .," she said as the unit's holographic display bloomed in pearly readiness. Daniel had told her Pellegrino was from three to five days from Dunbar's World as a civilian vessel would make the voyage. "But Dunbar's World has a population of half a million according to my information. Is that correct?"
"Close enough," Claverhouse said. "There's no army, there wasn't, I mean, but if everybody'd been behind the govern. . . ."
His voice trailed off as he stared at Adele. "What in God's name are you doing?" he demanded. "Are those chopsticks?"
Adele grimaced in embarrassment; another person might have forced a smile instead. "These are the wands I use to control my personal data unit," she said. "With practice they're much faster and more accurate than a virtual keyboard. I, ah, prefer them."
Claverhouse shook his head in wonder. "I always thought you were a clever little girl," he said. In a different tone he added, "So much has changed. So very much."
Adele shrugged. "I suppose times always change," she said. She smiled faintly. "Sometimes they even change for the better."
Her amusement was not at the thought itself but because the thought'd come into the mind of Adele Mundy. A few years ago—before she met Daniel and became part of the RCN—it would've been beyond her conception; and that was the best evidence of change for the better that there could be.
"Do they?" said Claverhouse. "Well, perhaps you're right. But you want to hear about Dunbar's World."
Adele nodded crisply, then smiled again—this time at the serious way she'd responded to what Claverhouse had meant as a mild joke. Fashion-conscious people weren't the only ones who had difficulty finding humor in their specialties.
"The planet has one temperate continent," Claverhouse said. "Most people live there, three quarters of them at least and probably more. But there's islands, more than anybody's counted so far as I know, with villages and individual farms. The islanders're pretty much ignored by the national government, but they have to trade with merchants on the mainland, especially in Port Dunbar on the west coast."
"The capital," Adele said. She wasn't looking at her display, but it helped her concentrate to have the unit live and the wands in her hands.
"Until the invasion, yes," Claverhouse said. "The islanders have no reason to love the folk in Port Dunbar. Some are helping Arruns, and even those who aren't probably don't think they'd be any worse off under him than under the mainland government. Arruns landed on Mandelfarne Island, a dozen miles off the coast from Port Dunbar, then attacked across the strait. He gets food from the islanders, and I've heard that military supplies still come from Pellegrino."
"The Pellegrinians haven't captured Port Dunbar, though?" Adele said. "Some of the reports said they had."
The only information on what was happening in Ganpat's Reach had arrived with an ambassador from Bennaria, whose sun circled a common point with the sun of Dunbar's World. The two planets had close relations, and Bennaria was technically allied to Cinnabar—the Senate had declared it a Friend of the Republic.
The Bennarian ambassador had asked Cinnabar for aid against the threat to the region. Ordinarily—particularly in the middle of all-out war with the Alliance—the Senate would've responded with polite regrets. Because the Manco family drew much of its wealth from Bennaria and Senator Manco was a member of the Republic's current administration, the Senate had instead directed the Navy Board to provide all help possible during the present emergency.
The Navy Board was responding by sending an advisory mission. Rather than a retired admiral to head the mission or perhaps a senior captain with a drinking problem, Admiral Vocaine had picked Commander Leary, an officer with a brilliant record despite his youth.
"Arruns very nearly did capture Port Dunbar," Claverhouse said. "He took the northern suburbs and made the harbor too dangerous to use, but then he bogged down. It's all street fighting now, that and Arruns shelling the city. The government's moved to Sinclos in the middle of the continent."
Cl
averhouse drank, but this time he was simply wetting his lips after talking rather than trying to gulp himself into oblivion. His voice had strengthened; Adele saw signs of the man she'd met in her former life, one of her father's closest associates.
"Ollarville on the east coast is a starport too," Claverhouse continued. "There's always been rivalry between the regions, and the war's made it worse. I don't know that Dunbar's World can survive as a single state no matter how the fighting comes out."
He shrugged and smiled with bitter humor. "Not that it matters to me, of course," he said. "I'll stay on Cinnabar till I die. I didn't particularly want to come back, but thanks to the Edict of Reconciliation I could. Poor Miroslav can't go home so long as Porra lives; he's on Bennaria now. My share of what we salted away will keep me for the rest of my life, but he's got a household of two hundred to care for."
"Perhaps Colonel Krychek can resume business on Dunbar's World after the war," Adele said. "Even if Pellegrinians win, there's no reason they should object to third-planet traders, is there?"
Claverhouse laughed until he started to cough; he bent over the table to catch himself. Straightening, he sipped from his drink and met Adele's gaze.
"There's a problem for Miroslav and me, yes," he said, speaking with a hint of challenge. "We met our suppliers on uninhabited worlds, moons often enough, and traded them food and liquor for their merchandize. Then we sold the merchandize to landowners on Dunbar's World."
"You dealt with pirates," said Adele, her eyes on Claverhouse but her fingers cascading images across the data unit display. Piracy was common outside the center of the human-settled galaxy, and Ganpat's Reach was well on the fringes.
"Very likely we did, yes," Claverhouse agreed coolly. "We didn't touch Bennarian goods, not when we could tell, but most of our stock probably came from Pellegrino."
He drank again and continued, "Our freighter, the Mazeppa, was well armed, and Miroslav's retainers were well able to convince our suppliers that it wouldn't be worth the effort to try robbing us instead of trading. Mind, we were honest businessmen. We dealt fairly on both ends of our transactions. But when Arruns arrived, well—the firm of Claverhouse and Krychek closed, and the principals got off-planet very quickly."
"I see," said Adele. "Will Bennarian support be enough to drive Arruns back to Pellegrino? I'd think that the Bennarian fleet operating so close to home would be able to intervene."
"I've never known the Bennarian fleet to put more than one ship in orbit at a time," Claverhouse said, curling his lip. "And I don't imagine there's much enthusiasm for open war among members of the Council. They're the heads of the wealthy families, and all their trade passes through Pellegrino, remember."
"I see," Adele repeated, and of course she did. The leaders of Bennaria didn't like what was happening on Dunbar's World, but neither were they willing to pay the cost of stopping it. If an RCN squadron set things right, everything would be fine; and were it not that the present war stretched RCN resources rather beyond their limits, that might well have happened.
Except—because Adele saw things from a wider perspective than parochial bumpkins in Ganpat's Reach did—RCN intervention would probably have been followed by a Commissioner from the Bureau of External Affairs in Xenos; who'd in turn be followed by a Senatorial Advisor to oversee the activities of the Bennarian government. Cinnabar would have to make assessments, of course, to pay for administrative costs and for a proportion of the expenses of the RCN which defended Bennarian interests so ably.
And the Bennarians would pay and obey. If they didn't, the RCN would be back.
Adele looked up from her display. She'd been running estimates of Bennarian trade and the potential income to the Republic from tribute based on that trade. It was an empty exercise now since the RCN wasn't sending a squadron, but Adele couldn't help following a chain of causation when it suggested itself.
Claverhouse was glaring at her. "Maurice?" she said in puzzlement.
"Aren't you going to lecture me about trading with pirates?" he said. "Tell me that it was unworthy of a Cinnabar noble?"
Adele smiled faintly. "I'm not your conscience, Maurice," she said. "And the Proscriptions would've taught me what Cinnabar nobles were capable of, even if I knew nothing else about our Republic's history."
Often in the dark hours after midnight, Adele was visited by people she'd killed. In dreams she saw their faces clearly. When it'd happened—when she'd shot them—they'd been blurs without sex or personality, aiming points in the shattered swirl of a firefight.
Adele felt her smile broaden, though her lips were as hard as glass. She should object to the way someone else made his living?
Adele stood, sliding her personal data unit back into its pocket. "Thank you," she said. "This has been very helpful."
The glass of wine stood to the side where she'd set it out of the way of her data unit. She raised it and drank; she hadn't been doing much of the talking, but her thoughts had dried her mouth.
"I thought you intended to kill me," Claverhouse said into his own empty glass. "I thought that was why you wanted to meet me."
Adele stared at him. His face was suddenly that of a corpse.
"What?" she said. Then, "Why?"
"They caught me while I was on my way off-planet," Claverhouse said, raising his stricken eyes to her. "Not the Militia—a squad of Speaker Leary's private goons."
He means the Three Circles Conspiracy, not whatever just happened on Dunbar's World. . . .
Claverhouse licked his lips. "I made a deal," he whispered. "I gave them names, dates; everything I knew. And afterwards they let me go."
Adele set her glass down. She hadn't finished the wine. She said nothing.
"I checked on you, little Adele," Claverhouse said. "I know you're a spy. You knew what I'd done; and I knew that a Mundy of Chatsworth wouldn't let the Edict of Reconciliation or any other law stand in her way."
"No, I don't suppose I would," Adele said carefully. She'd thought about the implied question before answering it, because she did think things through before she acted. And then she acted, regardless of potential consequences.
She quirked a smile. At least she now knew why Maurice had chosen the most public venue in Xenos for their meeting. It wouldn't have stopped her, of course.
"Do you recall my little sister Agatha?" Adele said. "Yes? Did you personally cut her head off, Maurice?"
"What?" said Claverhouse. His hand twitched, knocking over his empty glass. "What do you mean? Are you joking?"
"Yes, I suppose I am," Adele said. "That would take a different sort of man, wouldn't it, Maurice? Well, since you didn't, I think I'll leave you to your own ghosts. Thank you again for the information."
She turned, reminding herself that the stairs down from the Sky Room would have moved. . . and so they had, but the room had made a full rotation and the stairs were in almost the same place they'd been when she'd come up them.
That seemed to be generally true of life, Adele had found. If you took the long view.
* * *
"Please come in, Commander," said Madame Dorst, holding the door for Daniel. She wasn't fat, but she'd become a good deal plumper than she'd been the day she'd bought the dress she was in. Her hair was drawn back with a black fillet, mourning for her son.
"Oh, Commander Leary, Timothy would be so proud!" said the younger woman, Midshipman Dorst's twin sister Miranda. "We're honored that you've taken time to visit us."
Her dress was simpler than her mother's and probably hand made; she'd sewn a black ribbon around the right cuff. Like her brother, Miranda was tall and fair; not a stunning beauty, but a girl who drew a man's eyes at least once.
Daniel wore his 1st Class uniform, his Whites, with his medal ribbons. Full medals would've made a much more striking display, particularly because Daniel had a number of gaudy foreign awards, but he wasn't here to show off. Midshipman Dorst had been brave, as was to be expected in an RCN officer. He'd been competent at shiphandli
ng and astrogation, though without the exceptional skills that Midshipman Vesey, his colleague and fiancée, had demonstrated.
But beyond that, Dorst had shown a unerring instinct in battle. He'd brought his cutter so close to enemy vessels that his salvos were instantly disabling. Despite his lack of brilliance, Dorst would've gone far in the RCN if he'd survived; but it wasn't likely that an officer who put defeating the enemy ahead of every other consideration would survive, and Dorst had not.
Dorst's attitude had brought his widowed mother and his sister a personal visit from his commanding officer, though, since Daniel had survived against the odds.
"Thank you, Madam Dorst," Daniel said, bowing with his saucer hat in his hand. "Mistress Dorst. Your Timothy was a valued officer, both to me and to the RCN. I felt I needed to express my condolences in person."