Not that he cared before, she thought. I was just his annoying kid sister.
She shook her head as she stood, brushing the crumbs off her uniform. She wasn’t a little girl any longer, or a teenager who was slowly starting to realize that there was no place for her within the family; she was a grown woman, with a career and a life of her own. And Peter wasn’t the stuffy big brother either.
I suppose we never really grow out of our childhood until our parents are gone, she told herself ruefully. The people who’d killed her father had never been caught. That worried her, more than she cared to admit. And now . . . we have to be adults.
Kitty stepped into the room. “Admiral?”
“I’ll be in my quarters,” Kat said. “Were there any urgent developments on the planet while I was gone?”
“No, Admiral,” Kitty said. “A handful of minor problems, but nothing that demands your attention.”
“Good,” Kat said.
She walked back to her quarters, feeling tired. If she took a nap . . .
A message was blinking on her display when she walked into the room. She frowned, then sat down in front of the terminal and placed her hand against the sensor. The message decrypted itself a moment later.
“Lady Falcone,” the family manager said. “Commodore Sir William McElney returned to Tyre two months ago, where he was hired as a naval officer by Asher Dales. I’m afraid that we have been unable to obtain direct contact details . . .”
Kat froze the message and checked the starchart. Asher Dales? She’d heard that name before . . . Margaret Falcone had mentioned it as a suitable long-term investment, if she recalled correctly. Kat knew very little about Asher Dales, but she trusted her sister’s judgment. If Margaret said it was a good investment, it was a good investment.
“Ah,” she said. She keyed her wristcom. “Fran? I want my task force to escort the StarCom ship to Asher Dales.”
“Aye, Admiral,” Fran said. “May I ask why?”
Kat hesitated. “I have an idea,” she said. It wasn’t a social call. Not a completely social call, at any rate. “But I’ll discuss it with you later.”
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
* * *
TYRE
At least we don’t have to wear the absurd robes this time, Peter Falcone thought as he found his place on the ducal bench. The other dukes nodded to him. There would be no open discussions in the Houses of Parliament. We’d be hot and sweaty by the time the session was over.
He leaned back in his seat and surveyed the giant hall. The aristocracy occupied the upper seats, while their commoner counterparts and the colonial representatives were at the bottom. A neat bit of symbolism, he felt, that was lost on absolutely no one. The king and his supporters might want to make the colonial representatives feel welcome, but hardly anyone else shared their view. The Commonwealth was a money sink, as far as they were concerned. Any hopes they’d had for upgrading the member worlds to full equality had been destroyed in the fires of war.
Shaking his head, he keyed his datapad and scanned the latest set of updates from his staffers while waiting for the session to begin. There had been a small surge in the planetary stock market, although it didn’t seem focused enough for him or his staff to suspect insider trading. He studied the boosted stocks, then dismissed the thought. It didn’t look as though anyone was positioning themselves to take advantage of ill-gained knowledge. The stockbrokers probably assumed that everyone else would be distracted with the parliamentary session.
Peter’s lips twitched. As if we didn’t have staff to keep an eye on the markets for us.
A low rustle ran through the hall as the prime minister and the Leader of the Opposition entered together, another bit of symbolism that irritated Peter more than he cared to admit. No one expected Prime Minister Arthur Hampshire and Israel Harrison to be friends, although they were supposed to understand that their real job was keeping the government running. Disagreement was one thing, and there were plenty of legal ways to challenge or reverse government policy, but outright opposition could never be tolerated. Such a stance was practically treason.
Not practically, Peter told himself. Identical.
He studied the prime minister for a long moment, frowning. Arthur Hampshire was the king’s man, through and through. He was simply too much of a nonentity to hold any position without a powerful patron. And he’d do whatever it took to make sure he kept his position. Politics was a drug, and Arthur Hampshire, like so many others, was addicted. Peter had read his father’s files very carefully. Hampshire had proved a loyal client to his master.
A trumpet blared as the king himself strode into the hall, wearing a black naval uniform covered in gold braid. Peter had to admit that it made the younger man look devilishly handsome, although he rather doubted the king had any moral right to wear it. Technically, the king was commander-in-chief of the navy; practically . . . Peter scowled. The king had swapped enough personnel around in the last couple of years to ensure that his clients were in control of most of the navy. It was fairly normal for a patron to do everything in his power to promote his clients—their success was his success—but the latest moves worried Peter. Israel Harrison had been right. The king was starting to challenge the structures set up to limit his power.
He stood, along with everyone else, as the king walked to his chair. It wasn’t precisely a throne, but the chair was large enough to signify he was in charge symbolically at least. Peter eyed the king thoughtfully, wondering if that really was frustrated ambition in his eyes. He’d had to see off a handful of challenges from family members who thought they should be in charge. The king was already so powerful that any restraints had to seem intolerable. It wasn’t a pleasant thought.
The king stood in front of his throne, clasping his hands behind his back in parade rest. He had never been in the armed forces, yet his posture was perfect. Peter kept his face impassive as the room waited, wondering what the pose meant. The king had never been in the military, but neither had Peter himself. And while the files insisted that his lack of military service grated on the king, Peter wasn’t so sure. He’d never had any ambitions to command starships or wage war on distant worlds. The thought of wading through a muddy swamp or crawling across a bloody battlefield was enough to make him feel queasy. And yet, he’d never really had a choice in life. He’d been the firstborn. He’d been trained to succeed his father from birth. He dreaded to think what his father would have said if Peter had asked for a naval commission.
Kat managed to join the navy, he reminded himself. But Kat was never required to serve the family.
He felt an odd flicker of envy, which he ruthlessly suppressed. The king was beginning his speech.
“We won the war,” he said. “Four years ago, we feared we would lose; now, with the enemy crushed and our forces occupying their worlds, we know that we have won. But victory on the battlefield does not always translate to victory on the political field. The cost of war has been high, in both blood and treasure. Millions of lives have been lost; millions more, alas, have become refugees, fleeing in hopes of finding a safety that does not exist. The liberated worlds face many problems in adapting to an existence without the Theocracy . . .
“And now, we discover that a sizable number of enemy starships survived long enough to resume the offensive. We have all seen the reports from Judd.”
Peter kept his face impassive. He’d seen the official reports, of course, but his clients in the MOD had also slipped him copies of the reports that hadn’t been made part of the public record. They’d confirmed that the enemy starships were receiving help from someone, although they didn’t know who. There was a list of potential suspects attached to one of the reports, but Peter suspected that it would be difficult to find actual proof. Whoever was helping the Theocrats wouldn’t want to be identified.
“We must secure our victory,” the king told them. “We made commitments, both to the Commonwealth and to the liberated worlds; we promised the former
that we’d help them rebuild and the latter that we’d provide protection long enough for them to stand on their own two feet. And now, with a resurgent enemy threat, it is more imperative than ever that we meet our commitments. Failure now will be disastrous. On one hand, our standing as an interstellar power is at risk; on the other, perhaps more importantly, millions of lives are at risk. Judd was the first world to be attacked. It will not be the last.
“There are those who say that we should back off, that we should withdraw our ships and troops and leave the Theocratic Sector to its own devices. But I say that to do so would be a betrayal of everyone who died in the war. We bought our victory with their lives. We owe it to them to press on until our victory is secured.”
But we already won the war, Peter thought. Didn’t we?
“And even if that wasn’t true, let us consider the misery heaped on Judd. The Theocrats killed hundreds of thousands and condemned hundreds of thousands more to starvation and death. Do you think it will stop there? If we withdraw our forces, if we allow the enemy to run rampant, millions—billions—of people will die. They will die because we abandoned them! And if the Theocrats manage to reestablish the Theocracy, what then? Will we be forced to refight the war in fifty years? Or a hundred? Let us settle the matter now!
“This is not a time for petty party politics. This is not a time for bickering over tiny issues or for putting personal disputes ahead of serious issues. This is a time to reach forth and claim the fruits of victory! Lives—countless innocent lives—depend upon us! Will we refuse the challenge? Or will we continue the good fight until it is truly won?”
He sat, firmly. The rest of the chamber sat too. Peter frowned inwardly, silently replaying the speech in his head. The king had made a good case, he had to admit, but it was long on emotional calls to action and short on hard detail. There were a great many issues that would have to be addressed, starting with the balance of power within the Commonwealth, that he hadn’t even mentioned. Peter suspected that boded ill for the future. If the king had chosen not to mention these details . . .
Or if he didn’t know he had to mention them, Peter thought. Tyre had been able to build a mighty navy, but only because it had a substantial economic and financial base. That might be more worrying.
Arthur Hampshire rose, his eyes scanning the chamber. The prime minister looked distinctly nervous, although he was trying to hide it. Peter felt a flicker of unwilling sympathy. Client or not, Hampshire probably had a better appreciation of the political realities than his royal master. And, perhaps, an understanding that he would be the scapegoat if the king’s political gambit went disastrously wrong. Peter couldn’t help wondering just how much input Hampshire had been allowed into the budget. The king might not have taken his opinions seriously.
It wasn’t a pleasant thought. Peter’s father had warned him, time and time again, that he had to let his people talk freely, even when they disagreed with him. Indeed, Lucas Falcone had made it clear that disagreement—constructive disagreement—was often more valuable than fawning praise. But staffers, people who could be fired at any moment, were often reluctant to speak frankly to their bosses. It was safer to be a yes-man than risk openly contradicting your supervisor. A man who was dismissed for speaking his mind too bluntly would have trouble finding employment elsewhere.
And Dad went out of his way to teach me the dangers of getting too full of myself, Peter thought ruefully. He hadn’t enjoyed learning that the only reason vast numbers of girls and boys had thrown themselves at him had been because of his family wealth, but he had to admit that he’d needed the lesson. He’d definitely been getting too full of himself. I wonder if the king learned the same lesson?
Hampshire cleared his throat. “It is vitally important that we pass the budget as quickly as possible,” he said flatly. “His Majesty is not looking for a debate. There is simply too much to be done.”
An angry rustle echoed around the chamber. Peter resisted the urge to smirk or roll his eyes. That had been a misstep, all right. Parliament might or might not be inclined to pass the budget without significant changes, but the MPs wouldn’t be pleased with the suggestion that they shouldn’t debate the issues. No one wanted to write the king—or anyone—a blank check. Too much money had been wasted or expended on classified projects during the war. Peter had been assured that new technology would be entering the civilian sphere soon, but he wasn’t sure he believed it. The military presumably wanted to maintain its edge as much as possible. Besides, with the financial downturn, the likelihood that anything new would save Tyre from a recession was minimal.
Hampshire droned on, outlining a budget that Peter knew wouldn’t pass without substantial modification. Subsidies to the outer worlds and the liberated worlds were to be increased, the naval budget was to be expanded . . . item after item, each one a serious issue in its own right. The whole budget was an indigestible bulk. Peter studied Hampshire thoughtfully, wondering just how the prime minister had managed to drop the ball. He should have warned the king that there was no way the budget would pass.
And there are to be no reductions in tax either, Peter thought as Hampshire finally came to an end. The details of the bill popped up on his datapad. That alone will doom it.
He skimmed through it quickly, wondering if there was any way to modify the bill. The government would need to keep the wartime taxes in order to fund its projects, which wouldn’t please the House of Lords; the government would be spending money in the Commonwealth or the Theocratic Sector rather than Tyre, which wouldn’t please the House of Commons. They’d be united by shared dislike of the bill. Peter shook his head in disbelief. The king had to know the budget would never go through. Only a complete idiot would think otherwise.
The king might be trying to manipulate events so we have to bargain him down, Peter considered. It was the only explanation that made any kind of sense. But it’s politically risky.
Israel Harrison rose. “If it pleases my honorable friend,” he said, “there are a number of points that need to be made before we get to the meat of the matter.”
He paused, just long enough to allow his words to echo around the chamber. “We in Opposition were reluctant to grant any excess taxes at all, and, as I must remind you, we only conceded high taxes over the last four years because of the war. It was better to spend money than have our heads removed by a victorious Theocracy. But the war is now over, and it is our belief that taxes should return to their peacetime level.
“Second, I fail to see why we should make an open-ended, perhaps even permanent, commitment to the Theocratic Sector. The commitments to which His Majesty refers were made by him, unilaterally, without the approval of either the Houses of Parliament or His Majesty’s own Privy Council. I believe a number of his older councilors resigned in protest. I do not consider the Kingdom of Tyre, or the Commonwealth as a whole, to be bound by such commitments. The king had no legal right to make them on his own authority.
“But those points pale next to the final two issues. We are facing a financial crisis of unparalleled magnitude. Whether we care to admit it or not, the strain of founding and funding the Commonwealth, and then the war, put immense pressure on our economy. We need time to breathe, not massive financial commitments that will not provide any relief for our people. And while His Majesty has chosen to present the issue in terms of dealing with a later threat, it is the considered opinion of a number of analysts that there is no danger of a Theocratic revival. Their remaining ships simply cannot remain operational for long. They may cause havoc, they may ravage the sector, but they pose no threat to us. Indeed, honorable members, the expense of waging war against the hold-outs may do more damage than the hold-outs themselves.”
He paused again. “Let us be brutally honest. This bill is not a rational response to the problems facing our world. We simply cannot afford to keep spending at our current levels. I doubt, if I may make so bold, that the trustees of the Royal Corporation will disagree with me.�
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Peter had to smile as a faint ripple of amusement ran through the chamber. The king looked, just for a second, extremely displeased. Peter understood his irritation more than he cared to admit. Technically, the king ruled the Royal Corporation; practically, the trustees would put a brake on uncontrolled spending. And the Royal Corporation faced the same dangers as the others. The king might face opposition from within his own family.
“The war is over,” Harrison concluded. “It is time for us to recognize that we have won and move back to a peacetime footing. We no longer need to maintain huge fleets or sizable garrisons. Let us, instead, concentrate on repairing the damage and building for the future instead of wasting our resources on pipe dreams.”
He sat down. Peter watched him for a moment, feeling reluctantly impressed. Israel Harrison could not have known what was coming, or he would have made sure to galvanize resistance to the bill before it was ever entered on the parliamentary record. A united front would have successfully blocked the king and his servants from putting the budget in front of Parliament, let alone putting it to a vote. Instead, Harrison had to make his speech up as he went along. Thankfully, judging by the number of MPs who were even now demanding the right to speak, it didn’t look as if matters would proceed to a vote by the end of the day.
Unless the king uses his authority to demand an immediate vote, Peter thought. But would he win?
He studied the king thoughtfully, grimly certain that King Hadrian was asking himself the same question. Could he win if he pushed for an immediate vote? Peter rather doubted it, but the king had already gambled. Why not raise the stakes? But, as MP after MP rose to praise or denounce the bill, he slowly discerned that passions were running high. Too many people would vote against the bill, merely to make clear that they wouldn’t be manipulated. The king might not have lost the first round, but he certainly hadn’t won either.
Debt of Honor (The Embers of War) Page 15