by Unknown
Alone among the guests, Colonel Griffin had seemed less than completely overawed by Ezekiel Crow. He’d been perfectly respectful, of course, just . . . standoffish, in a way that he had never been while working with Tara alone. Perhaps he too had felt insulted on her behalf by the Exarch’s gift. If so, she could hardly fault his loyalty.
Everybody else, on the other hand, had professed themselves delighted to meet the Paladin. Tara watched with appreciation as Crow greeted the president of the Northwind branch of Bannson Universal Unlimited, talked economics with him earnestly for three minutes, and sent the man on his way smiling.
At the next lull in the conversation, she murmured, “Damn, my lord, but you’re good. I couldn’t have handled him that neatly if I’d tried.”
His answering smile warmed the dark blue of his eyes, and softened his austere features into something close to attractiveness. “I’ve had considerably more practice.”
“It’s the part of political life I like the least,” she admitted. “Pretending to be interested in everybody. I suppose I’m just a soldier at heart, like my father.”
“You could do worse. Everything I’ve heard about Jon Campbell says that he was a good man.”
“He was,” she said. “It’s been years, now, and I still miss him.” She forced a smile. “But enough of past hurts. Can I offer you some whisky punch, my lord?”
He shook his head. “Your local recipes are too strong for me, I’m afraid. I don’t drink.”
“Try some of the pink fizzy stuff, then. It’s guaranteed free of intoxicating or hallucinogenic substances.” She caught the eye of a member of the catering staff. “Bring the Paladin a glass of the offworlders’ punch and a plate of the mixed pastries, please.”
She turned back to Crow. “We don’t want you expiring from hunger before we have a chance to pick your brains and use your expertise.”
“I’ll do my best to stay alive, then, and ready for the picking.”
It was hard to tell in the atmospheric lighting of the reception hall—myriad small faux candles in the crystal chandeliers overhead, and dozens of larger ones in the mirror-backed sconces along the wall—but she thought that she saw him color slightly as soon as the words came out. She was surprised. She’d thought that a Paladin would be above noticing such accidental double meanings, let alone committing them.
Apparently not, she thought, blushing a little herself, and hastened to change the subject. “I foresee a deal of boredom in your future, my lord. Everybody from the Planetary Legate down to the cooks is going to be lined up to ask you what’s what and how are they doing it this year back on Terra.”
“Not the cooks, surely.” His plate of delicacies had arrived, and he was making considerable inroads into the smoked finny serpent in pastry, the candied fruits, and the little cakes with the nut toppings. “I haven’t had some of these dishes since my student days here. I’m guessing that all of the ingredients are local?”
“Yes.” His words gave her an idea. She turned it over in her head a couple of times, then said, “We’ll have to schedule at least a few of your many, many meetings for an afternoon in Castle Northwind. The cooks will be put on their mettle by the chance to show off.”
“Castle Northwind is your family’s principal residence?”
“Yes,” she said. “I live here in the city these days, but Castle Northwind is where I did most of my growing up. The staff will be delighted if I bring them home something as exotic as a Paladin.”
“By all means, then, let us give your staff a treat.”
Tara found herself blushing again. She was not completely inexperienced—she could hardly be that, after getting her schooling in the intense and often sexually charged atmosphere of the Northwind Military Academy—but in all of her half-formed fantasies and daydreams, she’d never visualized herself in such casual, almost flirtatious, conversation with a Paladin of the Sphere.
Don’t even think of it, she told herself. He outranks you politically and militarily both, he’s a guest on your world and—very soon now—in your family home, and he’s quite probably been sent out from Terra for the express purpose of either keeping you from making disastrous mistakes or reporting back to the Exarch when you do. No good could possibly come from a romantic entanglement with this man.
She would have to be careful around Paladin Ezekiel Crow.
11
Camp Jaffray
Northwind
January, 3133; local summer
The summer sun was setting over the plains of western Halidon as the bus groaned and settled to a halt. Will Elliot looked out at the sprawling assortment of dusty redbrick buildings and saw a man approaching the bus on foot. He was dressed in a sharply pressed uniform of Northwind drab, and so far as Will could determine, he was alone.
The doors at the front and rear of the bus sighed open, and the man spoke. “All right, sweethearts, off the bus. Move it!” He had to have lungs of iron, Will thought, to make the words penetrate.
“Move, move, move,” the man chanted. His voice carried through the sides of the bus as if the vehicle had been made of paper rather than of steel and glass.
Will stood and joined the other recruits moving toward the exits. The rear exit was closer; he headed that way, going with the crowd and taking the steps at a fast shuffling pace.
The parking lot outside the bus was flat black macadam, without so much as a sprig of grass growing through a crack—if there had been cracks, which was not the case. The pavement was so meticulously maintained that nothing marred its smooth perfection. Even the red dust which seemed so much a part of the surrounding landscape had apparently been swept away. Somebody, thought Will, must work hard to keep the surface in such good order.
On the pavement ahead of him was a set of footprints, painted in yellow. The footprints met at the heels, a forty-five-degree angle leading away toward the toes. They faced away from the bus.
“On your marks, people,” the sharply pressed man said. “You’re wasting my time. You don’t want to waste my time.”
He wasn’t raising his voice, Will realized. He was speaking with no audible strain, but nevertheless punching the sounds out so that they could be clearly heard by everyone. Will moved forward with the rest of the new recruits until he found an unoccupied set of painted footprints. Then he stood, centering his feet in the outlines, and waited. He was in the second row from the front, near the right-hand side.
Behind him, Will heard the wheeze and rumble of the bus starting up and pulling away. He was aware of his fellow travelers, fifty young men and women counting himself, shifting uneasily on their marks. He didn’t turn to look, or gaze around.
The sharply pressed man paced back and forth in front of the group. At last he looked at his watch, and turned toward them. His gaze ran up and down the ranks of waiting recruits, meeting each one’s eyes. Then he spoke again, in the same carrying voice.
“Good evening, gentlemen and ladies. I am Master Sergeant O’Neill. This is Camp Jaffray. You are recruits.
Right now none of you has a birthday. If you work hard and do as you are told, it is possible that someday the Regiment of Northwind may issue you a birthday. Now. ’Ten–SHUN!”
The last word cracked out hard enough that Will nearly jumped. Instead, he tried to stand straighter.
“People, that is pathetic. The position of attention is as follows. Your feet are together, toes pointing slightly out. Your hands fall to your sides, palms toward your legs. Your thumb lies in the groove between your first two fingers, and along the outer seams of your trousers. Your stomach is in, your chest is out, you are gazing straight forward. This is a very comfortable position. When called to attention, you remain in that position until some other order is given. Take this as a general rule: When given an order, you will carry out that order until given another order.”
Master Sergeant O’Neill fell silent, and resumed his pacing. He passed out of Will’s line of sight. Will remained in place. The sky
grew darker. Lights on towers switched on, bathing the tarmac in white light that made the shadows seem deeper. After what seemed like hours, he heard another voice, as loud as O’Neill’s had been.
“Good evening, Master Sergeant O’Neill.”
“Good evening, Master Sergeant Murray,” O’Neill replied.
“What do you have for me?”
“A gaggle of civilians,” O’Neill said. “No help for it, I suppose.”
“One or two of them might make soldiers,” Murray said. “May I have them?”
“With pleasure,” O’Neill said. Then: “People, this is Master Sergeant Murray. He will discover which of you is meant to have the honor of fighting for Northwind. If he says jump, you don’t ask how high. You jump and hope it’s high enough.”
Another long pause followed. Then Murray’s voice: “Recruits! Left face!”
Will turned to his left. He was looking up a long row of men and women, though he couldn’t see much through the head of the man in front of him.
“No hope,” O’Neill said, still projecting his voice.
“Perhaps not,” Murray said. “People. In a moment I will say, ‘Forward, march.’ ‘Forward’ is a preparatory command. A preparatory command tells you what is to come. ‘March’ is a command of execution. When a command of execution is given, you will perform the action for which you have been prepared. In this case, to march forward. Very simple. Even recruits can do it.”
Murray’s voice was moving down the line to Will’s left; the man himself was out of Will’s line of sight. “On the command ‘march,’ you will step forward with your left foot. Then with your right foot. Then with your left. Every foot should strike the ground at the same instant. You will continue in this manner until another command is given.”
The voice was moving behind Will now. Ahead, but quite a distance away, stood another of the brick buildings, its windows brightly lighted.
“The next command, tonight, will be ‘Ready, halt.’ ‘Ready’ will be the preparatory command. ‘Halt’ will be the command of execution. On the word ‘halt’ your left foot will strike the ground; then your right foot will come up beside it, and you will once again be in the position of attention.”
The voice was moving up to the right, and Will caught sight of the Master Sergeant out of the corner of his eye. A short man, Will thought, though with wide shoulders. The Master Sergeant came up to the corner of the column and turned to face the men. “Forward,” he said. “March.”
Will stepped out with his left foot, and attempted to keep lined up with the men to his right and left, while following the man in front of him.
“Left, left, left, right, left,” Murray shouted. “Keep it together, recruits. This is not an amble along the riverbank with your sweetheart.” Will felt the foot of the man behind him come down on his heel. He stumbled a bit; that hurt.
“Left, right, left. One, two, three, four, left.”
Will counted to himself, along with the Sergeant. This was no great thing; he’d walked farther than this every day of his life. It was only the keeping in step that was different. The building ahead grew nearer, and Will could see now that they were heading toward it. Its wide double doors stood open, and yellow light poured out from the interior.
“Company!” Murray shouted. “Ready, halt! One, two.”
They were facing directly into the open doors.
“I will call you off by files,” Master Sergeant Murray said. “When I do so, you will follow the red lines painted on the floor. You will come to a number of stations. You will be given instructions. Follow them. You have no cause to talk to anyone. Now. Company. At ease!”
He paused for a moment. “ ‘At ease’ is yet another order. It means ‘you may move your right foot, though your left will remain in one place as if glued there. You will clasp your hands in the small of your back. You may look around, but you may not talk.’ Try it again. Company! At ease!”
Will clasped his hands in the small of his back, as instructed, and waited for the command that would send him into the open building and the next phase of his strange new life.
PART TWO
Tigress, Summer 3133
Power Play
12
DropShip Landing Field
The Four Cities, Tigress
Prefecture IV, Republic of the Sphere
April, 3133; local summer
On Tigress, the day was clear and dazzlingly bright. The air above the landing field rippled with midsummer heat. Then ground and air alike trembled with a heavy, growling vibration as an object came into view in the sky above the field: first a dot, then a disk, then a huge and steadily descending shape, as the first of the DropShips landed with a roar and rumble. The Steel Wolves were coming home to the Four Cities.
The fighting had been good on Achernar, at least for those of the Wolves who had won honor and promotion. Not everybody was happy among those returning. Some of the Warriors looked beyond the fighting to the longer strategy, and saw Achernar still master of its own fate, loyal to The Republic of the Sphere and controlled neither by the Steel Wolves nor by Lord Aaron Sandoval and his puppet Erik Sandoval-Groell. The defenders of Achernar could boast that they had taken on Kal Radick’s Steel Wolves and sent them home bleeding, and that was no little thing in times like these.
Star Colonel Anastasia Kerensky saw the longer strategy as well as anybody else. Nevertheless, she had a bit of a swagger in her step as she left the DropShip Lupus, with her leather jacket slung over her shoulder and the sun picking up the red highlights in her thick black hair.
The patches and blazons on the jacket told an interesting story. Its wearer, they said, had indeed fought in the campaign just past, but her fellow Warriors had not been Clan. Anastasia grinned, remembering. She’d had fun on Achernar, fighting next to the locals and testing herself against Kal Radick’s Steel Wolves. Finding a comrade-in-arms—and a pleasing if temporary lover—in her fellow MechWarrior Raul Ortega. Being Tassa Kay.
The grin faded a little. Raul Ortega had gone back to his local woman in the end, and Tassa Kay was—not dead, exactly, but put away until the next time Anastasia wanted to shed for a little while the ambitions and expectations that went with being the bearer of a famous Bloodname. And there was no Bloodname more famed among the Clans than Kerensky.
Aleksandr and Nicholas Kerensky had pulled the ancestors of the Clans away from the wreckage of the original Star League and made them into what they now were. Natasha Kerensky, the Black Widow, had won fame and notoriety throughout the Inner Sphere as one of the group of mercenaries—and covert intelligence gatherers—called the Wolf’s Dragoons. Anastasia, for her part, intended to take the Kerensky Bloodname still further before she was done.
For now, she needed to get herself established here on Tigress. The port workers could handle the offloading and berthing of her Ryoken II BattleMech without her direct supervision, and could begin the job of cleaning it up and repairing the damage it had taken during the campaign on Achernar. She would check up on their progress frequently, of course, because the Ryoken II was hers—her weapon and protection in battle, a metal-and-myomer extension of her physical self—and its continuing good condition was as important to her as her own. But Tigress was a Clan world now, and its port laborers and repair techs would know the difference between a real fighting machine and a retrofitted piece of industrial gear. Meanwhile, Anastasia had other work to do.
Her first stop was the Portmaster’s office. The Portmaster, like the laborers who worked under him, was a Steel Wolf from one of the labor castes—in his case, from among those charged with administration and record keeping. His placid expression changed when she entered his office; she could see that he already knew who she was. Absolutely nothing travels faster than gossip, and Anastasia was well aware that the news had spread from the DropShip faster than its passengers could disperse: A Kerensky is among us.
“Star Colonel?” he asked.
His voice was defere
ntial. His manner was not cringing or subservient—he was a Wolf, even if he was not a Warrior, and no Wolf was ever subservient—but he nevertheless accorded her the deference befitting her rank and name. She had missed that automatic deference while she was fighting among the natives on Achernar, even while Tassa Kay was enjoying the easy camaraderie that had filled its place.
She gave the man a brief nod of acknowledgment. “Portmaster,” she said. “Is there anything happening at the moment here on Tigress that a new arrival ought to know?”
“Your arrival with the DropShips from Achernar is the only matter of current interest,” the Portmaster said.
“We have already arranged a local berthing facility for your Ryoken II, and a repair crew has been assigned.”
A reputation, Anastasia reflected, was a handy thing to have, even if so far hers was mostly genetic and not of her own making.
“Excellent,” she said.
“And for yourself, Star Colonel—do you wish your personal effects taken to Headquarters?”
Anastasia had done her research before embarking on this adventure. The newly constructed Headquarters building housed the senior Steel Wolf officers present on Tigress—at least, it would do so once the Wolves finished settling in—and her rank of Star Colonel entitled her to a substantial set of rooms.
“No,” she said. “I plan to look for accommodation on the local economy.”
A person could obtain a great deal more privacy by securing private housing, and could also escape the strain of having to endure the company of potential rivals on a round-the-clock basis. Living alone would also make it easier, if she ever wanted, to bring Tassa Kay out of hiding for a few hours of irresponsible fun.
“As the Star Colonel wishes,” said the Portmaster. “The Four Cities area has a wide range of possibilities available for officers who want to look for separate quarters, and Headquarters keeps a list of recommended housing providers on file.”