“The Kreelans don’t take prisoners,” Sato said flatly. “Take my word for it.”
* * *
Riyal-Tiyan tensed as the tactical display showed another human ship jump into the system. As the senior shipmistress of the small squadron of destroyers, her mission had been simple: wreak havoc among the human shipping lanes in this area of space. She was specifically not to attack planets or any orbital complexes, only ships. Her purpose was to test how well the humans had developed their defenses and to rekindle their respect for and fear of the Empire.
This was the second system her squadron had visited. In the first one, they had destroyed six merchant ships and three lightly armed defense vessels before the other merchantmen had jumped away. Some smaller craft, armed only with small kinetic weapons, had risen to challenge her destroyers. She had saluted their courage by allowing them to live as she took her warships on to the next target.
In this system, which the humans had named Kronstadt, her ships had jumped into the midst of a small fleet of merchant vessels, which tried to run away from them like terrified steppe beasts before the claws of a genoth. With guns hammering and lasers singing, her ships tore at the fat merchantmen, then turned with equal ferocity on the small human warships that bravely sped into the attack. Like those Riyal-Tiyan had encountered at the first system — Andover, the humans called it — these were only lightly armed and hardly worth calling warships. They put up a spirited fight, however, and succeeded in diverting her attention long enough for the merchant ships to try and race for their jump points.
Now a new ship had appeared, and it immediately began to race directly toward her squadron. Not a merchant vessel, then.
“Ah,” she sighed with anticipation as the tactical display showed the targeting systems emanating from the human vessel. “A true warship. Ayan-Kulil,” she said to her tactical officer. “Let our ships form in pairs and flank the human warship. Ignore the merchant ships for now.”
A moment later the other three destroyers turned from hammering the defenseless merchant ships and sped to their places in the designated formation to greet their new opponent.
* * *
“They’ve formed up in pairs, sir, trying to flank us,” the tactical officer reported tensely.
Sato eyed the display, silently calculating his options as the range rings showing the maximum effective range of his weapons quickly converged on the charging Kreelan warships. He was under very strict orders not to let Yura suffer heavy damage while she was operating solo: the Confederation Navy was still tiny compared to the number of systems they were tasked with defending, and every ship, particularly the new heavy cruisers like Yura, were precious. Each captain on solo patrol had discretion on whether to engage the enemy, but they were not to risk destruction of their ships for any reason, even if the Kreelans were mounting an invasion. In that scenario, a single ship would not be able to make a substantial difference, anyway.
His main problem was preventing the Kreelans from raking him from two sides at once, which could be lethal to Yura. “Tactical,” he ordered, “prepare torpedo tubes one through five for salvo fire at the left pair of targets on my mark.” Sato didn’t expect the torpedoes to hit their targets, but he hoped it would distract that pair of destroyers. “Then engage the right pair with kinetics and heavy lasers. Helm,” he turned to Bogdanova, “when I give the order, I want you to come forty degrees to starboard. Let’s try to keep them from flanking us on both sides as we pass by.”
On the tactical display, Yura raced toward the two pairs of Kreelan destroyers, the range rings overlapping. Sato let them close, then close further.
“Enemy kinetics, inbound!” called the tactical officer.
“A little closer,” Sato whispered to himself. The destroyers were now close enough to be picked up on visual display, their rakish hulls unmistakable. “On my mark, people...stand by...mark!”
Yura shuddered as five torpedoes leaped from their launch tubes and streaked toward the farther pair of Kreelan destroyers. In the same instant, two of the main triple-gun turrets volleyed fifteen centimeter projectiles at the nearer pair of enemy ships, while three heavy laser turrets fired, flaying tons of metal from the sides of the nearer destroyers.
At the same time, Yura made a sharp turn to starboard, missing all but a few of the projectiles the Kreelan ships had fired. As the ready rounds in the first two gun turrets ran out, Bogdanova skillfully rolled Yura to bring the other batteries to bear.
“Cease fire,” Sato ordered as the nearer pair of destroyers disappeared in twin balls of flame and debris, struck by a full salvo of heavy shells. One of the other pair of enemy ships disintegrated under the impact of three torpedoes.
The fourth destroyer escaped unscathed.
“Turn and pursue,” Sato ordered, setting aside his pleasure at his ship’s performance for later.
Bogdanova brought the ship around, even as the crew belowdecks were reloading the guns and torpedo tubes.
* * *
Riyal-Tiyan was both shocked and pleased. Shocked that the human ship’s weapons had been so effective, and pleased that the humans had apparently not been idle in the time since Keran had been taken by the Empire.
She mourned the loss of her ships and their crews, that they could no longer bring glory to the Empress. She and her own crew would have preferred to turn and charge the pursuing human ship, but Tesh-Dar’s orders and the will of the Empress had been clear: the squadrons such as Riyan-Tiyal’s were not to sacrifice themselves. In such a situation as this, any surviving ships were to return with information on what they had encountered, and how well the humans were fighting back.
“Prepare to jump,” she ordered her navigator, failing to mask her disappointment. They would rendezvous with the fleet heading toward the human world of Saint Petersburg.
* * *
“They jumped, sir!” the tactical officer said incredulously.
For a moment, Sato didn’t believe it. He simply couldn’t accept that the Kreelans would run away from a fight. But there was no denying that the surviving Kreelan destroyer had escaped. Could it be a trick?
That didn’t fit any better, he decided. While he couldn’t deny what the tactical display showed him, he knew deep in his soul that the Kreelan hadn’t run because the captain was afraid of challenging his ship. It was something else, some other reason he didn’t understand, and it gave him a bad feeling in his gut.
“Very well,” he said finally. “Helm, bring us around toward Kronstadt. XO,” he told Villiers through the vidcom, “prepare the cutters for launch: let’s see if we can’t help the coast guard with search and rescue.”
“Aye, aye, sir,” Villiers said before he disappeared to carry out his orders.
Sato continued to stare at the place on the tactical display where the Kreelan destroyer had disappeared, wondering where she had gone. And why she had run.
* * *
After helping to rescue the surviving crew members of the merchant ships and turning them over to the Kronstadt coast guard ships, Sato had placed Yura in a high defensive orbit over the planet. Before this battle, he would have been sure that the Kreelans would return in force, but the Kreelan destroyer’s sudden departure had shaken his confidence in his assessments of their actions. He knew there must have been a reason other than just “running away to fight another day.” That would have been a very reasonable action were it a human destroyer facing off against a heavy cruiser, but was totally out of line with all he knew, or thought he knew, about the enemy.
His decision now was whether to proceed on schedule to the next leg of his patrol, or delay here in Kronstadt in case the Kreelans returned. He knew that, unless the enemy returned only with a token force, his single ship would hardly be able to hold off an invasion fleet. Yet showing the Confederation flag to new signatories like Kronstadt was vitally important. Yura had already made a lasting impression, but he was worried about leaving the colony if there was a chance the Kreelan
s might return soon.
He set that matter aside for the moment. They still had seven hours left before they would have to jump out on their next leg to stay on their patrol schedule. Commodore Hanson had built some time into the navigation exercise for her ships to actually patrol, rather than just jumping from system to system. With the other responsibilities, particularly repairs to the light damage the ship had suffered, taken over by the XO for now, Sato had some time to relax.
Sitting on the side of his bunk, he pulled out a shiny black lacquer box that Steph had given him just before they’d parted at Africa Station. She hadn’t told him what was in it, and made him promise not to look until after his first jump. He smiled as he opened it.
Letters. She had written him three dozen letters, each lightly scented with perfume. He had only read three so far, and it had almost been enough to make him want to turn the ship around and head for Earth. Neither of them were terribly good at expressing their emotions face to face. They could talk about things, certainly, but there seemed to be a limit to those conversations, something that held them back. Steph’s letters broke through that barrier, cast it aside. The words on those slips of stationery were really her. He had read the first one at least a dozen times, then sat down and wrote his own. He had grinned to himself at writing his words of love on ship’s letterhead, but that was the only real paper (even if it wasn’t actually made out of wood pulp) he had aboard ship. In a way, though, it was fitting: his ship, the Navy, was part of him. And even though it kept them apart much of the time, she had made it clear that it was a part of him that she loved.
He had just begun to read the fourth letter when his alert chime sounded. “Yes?” He tried to conceal his irritation.
“My apologies, captain,” the communications officer said, “but a courier just jumped in, broadcasting a coded message for us.”
“What does it say?” he asked, knowing she would have already decoded it.
“It’s a recall from headquarters, sir,” she said. “The entire squadron is ordered to rendezvous at an assembly point for a possible assault on Saint Petersburg.”
“Damn,” Sato spat as he carefully folded Steph’s letter and put it back in the box. “Have the navigator plot us a least-time course, then ask the department heads, Marine commander, and the senior NCOs to meet in my ready room in five minutes.”
If nothing else, he thought grimly, he no longer had to worry about making a decision about extending their stay in Kronstadt.
CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE
“You do well, child,” Tesh-Dar told Li’ara-Zhurah after they completed their latest sparring match in the ship’s arena. Even the smallest ships of the Imperial Fleet had one aboard, for the arena was not just an affectation of their civilization, it was a fundamental institution of their civilization since before the founding of the Empire. As the fleet made its way toward the human world of Saint Petersburg, Tesh-Dar worked each day with Li’ara-Zhurah, trying to ease the pain from her soul and guide her along the path that the priestess so hoped she would choose to take.
Tesh-Dar not only remembered Pan’ne-Sharakh’s words of caution about the young warrior, but had used them as a guide to further build her relationship with Li’ara-Zhurah. She had come to believe that there was indeed something the young warrior was shielding in her heart, and had sought to gently sway her into revealing it of her own accord. Tesh-Dar could have simply ordered her to do it, and while that would have revealed the truth of the matter, it would also likely have destroyed the bond between them. That was the one thing Tesh-Dar was loathe to do, for if Li’ara-Zhurah was to follow in her footsteps and become a priestess of the Desh-Ka, her faith and trust had to be complete, without reservation.
“I am honored by your words, my priestess,” Li’ara-Zhurah said as she quickly stilled her breathing after their latest round of fierce swordplay. She knew that she would never be a tenth as good as was Tesh-Dar with any weapon, but she found herself proud of her own abilities: she was no warrior priestess, but knew she could defeat any of her peers. Tesh-Dar pushed her beyond the limits she had set for herself, and Li’ara-Zhurah was openly surprised at how much her combat skills had improved, even in the short time since returning from the nursery world. And much as part of her wished to deny it, the gentle spiritual ministrations of the great priestess had allayed the worst of the melancholy that had so distracted her since the battle of Keran. It had not changed her loathing about bearing a male child, or her fears for any fertile female children, but she had set aside the thoughts of sacrificing herself in battle simply to avoid future matings. Early in the voyage, she had gathered her courage enough to speak to one of the other young warriors who had recently suffered through her first mating. Li’ara-Zhurah was surprised to learn that the warrior had felt much the same as she herself had: the warrior had been greatly distraught by the experience and had suffered similar thoughts of casting her life away before another mating could be consummated. Yet, after a time, the warrior told her, these feelings had passed; mating would never be a pleasant experience, but like with all things in the Empire, it was a duty to the Empress that could not be set aside. Honor would not allow it.
“Come, then, child,” Tesh-Dar said as she sheathed her sword. “Walk with me.”
Li’ara-Zhurah bowed and saluted before following the great priestess from the arena. Walking behind Tesh-Dar as they passed the next group of challengers set on honing their skills before fighting the humans, Li’ara-Zhurah was again amazed, as she had been every time she had witnessed it, that Tesh-Dar left no footprints in the sand behind her. While the priestess possessed a soul in a vessel of flesh and blood as did all of Her Children, there was so much more to her. The powers she possessed, glimpsed here in the grains of sand that were left untouched by her passing, were both frightening and reassuring. Frightening, because Li’ara-Zhurah could not imagine any enemy, no matter how terrible, standing against her, and reassuring for the same reason: as long as Tesh-Dar lived, the Empire and the Empress would endure, would be safe. The other warrior priestesses were great in their own right, yet they could not compare to the high priestess of the Desh-Ka. If the Empress was the body and soul of Her Children, Tesh-Dar was the physical manifestation of their sword and shield. Li’ara-Zhurah had once heard Pan’ne-Sharakh refer to Tesh-Dar as Legend of the Sword, and she had come to understand the truth of that name in the time she had spent with the priestess.
Walking in Tesh-Dar’s path was truly a humbling experience.
“You could be more than simply a witness to the powers of the Desh-Ka,” Tesh-Dar said quietly as Li’ara-Zhurah moved up to walk beside her, once they were clear of the arena. “I would show you the temple where our order has passed on our knowledge from generation to generation, from priestess to priestess.”
Li’ara-Zhurah stopped and stared at Tesh-Dar, her eyes wide with surprise. “My priestess...” she began, unsure if she had heard correctly what Tesh-Dar had said. “Did you just say...”
“Yes, I did, child,” Tesh-Dar said, turning to face her young disciple. “Your Bloodsong sings to me in a way that very few have over the many cycles of my life,” she explained. “You have suffered in a way that few of our warriors have, and you have shown the strength of will to control, and I hope to conquer, your inner fears. At Keran you brought great glory to the Empress in battle, and showed your courage in the face of a worthy enemy.” She looked deeply into the young warrior’s eyes, into her soul. “One of my greatest honors, one of my greatest responsibilities as high priestess, is to choose a successor, a warrior who shall inherit the powers passed down to me, whom I shall teach all that I know. I have chosen you. You may choose to accept, or not, as it pleases you.”
Li’ara-Zhurah closed her eyes and bowed her head. In a shaking voice she said, “Great priestess, I am unworthy of such an honor.” She was suddenly stricken with a deep sense of guilt for the thoughts that had clouded her mind earlier, thoughts of casting away her honor even as Tesh-Da
r was considering granting her the greatest gift that she could give, a gift nearly as great to one of her kind as life itself.
She suddenly felt Tesh-Dar’s hand against her cheek. “Be not ashamed of your earlier thoughts,” she said, as if reading Li’ara-Zhurah’s mind. “You have endured much in Her name, child. Our Way is never easy, from the moment we emerge from the womb until the instant our spirits pass into the Afterlife to join the Ancient Ones. To honor Her, we each seek perfection in our craft, as warriors or clawless ones. Yet what we aspire to is something we can never achieve; perfection is a state of grace that only the Empress knows.”
“I cannot imagine imperfection in you, my priestess,” Li’ara-Zhurah noted humbly.
Tesh-Dar gave an ironic humph. “Child, I was punished upon the Kal'ai-Il when I was young, before my Seventh Challenge, and wear the scars of my disgrace upon my back, even now.”
Li’ara-Zhurah looked up at her, shocked. “You...were punished upon the Kal'ai-Il?” She shook her head. “Then how...” She looked at the great cyan rune on Tesh-Dar’s breastplate that was the twin of the one engraved in the oval disk on her collar. The rune of the Desh-Ka, that only priestesses were allowed to display.
“How did I become a priestess after suffering such dishonor?” Tesh-Dar asked as she turned and began walking down the passageway of the ship toward her quarters, Li’ara-Zhurah falling into step beside her. “Because, like you, daughter, I learned what it truly means to bear the burden of Her honor.”
* * *
While her punishment on the Kal'ai-Il was complete absolution of her sin in the eyes of the Empress and the peers, Tesh-Dar was unable to rid herself of a deep sense of guilt. With Sura-Ni’khan’s very reluctant blessing, Tesh-Dar left for what was to be a long and lonely sojourn on the frontier. For nineteen cycles she sought out every challenge that her people faced in the deep unknowns of space and the many worlds they sought to conquer. While there were many perils to be found, there were few that truly tested her.
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