“Can I claim a favour?” Athos asked after a long moment.
“Try us,” said Aramis.
“Wait until we’re in orbit before you attack me with that Sobriety patch D’Artagnan has in her pocket. I don’t want to be sober on this fucking planet.”
Aramis and Porthos exchanged a glance.
“Fine,” said Porthos. “But if you throw up in my beautiful ship, I will toss you out an airlock.”
Athos winced as they turned a corner and that setting sun pierced his vision again. “Didn’t know being thrown out an airlock was on the table. That’s actually my preferred option.”
Aramis squeezed his arm. “Do you want us to get what’s left of the Parry-Riposte out of hock before we go?”
Athos shifted slightly, preventing Dana from sliding off his shoulder. She moaned as his arm bumped against her stomach. “No. Sometimes you have to leave rubble behind and start over.”
Porthos bumped against his other side – the side holding Dana – with her hip. “Sounds like good advice, Athos. Maybe you should take it some day.”
“Bite me, Porthos.”
The Musketeers and Dana allowed the engies to pilot the Hoyden and the Morningstar back to Paris. Planchet was sent on the Morningstar to practice astronavigation with Bazin, and Bonnie took the helm and harness of the Hoyden with Grimaud snoozing in the jumpseat beside her.
Dana woke up four hours out of Meung Station, pressed against the wall in Porthos’ bunk. A Sobriety patch burned a perfect triangle into her right shoulder. Aramis sat beside Dana, her long legs tangling with those of Athos, who was propped up comfortably against the other end of the bunk reading from a tablet, with Porthos tucked under his arm.
There were three Sobriety patches visible along the length of Athos’ neck.
“I can’t believe we all fit in one bed,” Dana said as she yawned herself awake. Her own feet were pressed against Porthos’ knees.
Aramis elbowed her. “Economy of space is the most important skill we have as a species,” she said, quoting a long-ago prophet who had taken their people to the stars.
“This bunk is larger than regulation,” added Athos.
“I like to be comfortable,” said Porthos defensively.
“No complaints here,” he said with a quirk of his mouth, and head-butted her gently. She poked him in the ribs with a finger.
Dana pulled herself up upright, sitting with the wall behind her. “This is nice,” she said. She wanted to grin stupidly at all three of them, but she settled for letting her head fall on to Aramis’ shoulder so she could doze again.
When Dana awoke the next time, Athos and Aramis were no longer there. Porthos sprawled out at the end of the bunk, watching a cinquefoil game on the same tablet Athos had been reading from earlier.
“They’re checking on Grimaud’s injuries,” Porthos yawned, before Dana gave any indication she was awake. “Or rather, Aramis is checking on her injuries, and Athos is being extra sarcastic so that he can pretend he’s not fussing over his engie like a mother hen.”
Dana grinned at that. “He’s protective.”
“Oh, honey, you have no idea.” Porthos muted her game, laying the tablet aside. “It was bad down there, huh?”
She meant the cellar, of course.
Dana frowned. “I’ve never seen him like that,” she confessed.
“Not many do.”
“He was so lost. Is he that unhappy all the time?”
“Pretty much,” Porthos sighed. “He hides it well. Too well, most days.” She flicked a curious expression at Dana. “You’re burning to ask questions. I wouldn’t, if I were you.”
“No questions,” Dana muttered, looking away. She had enough of Athos’ secrets now; she didn’t need more of them.
“Oh,” Porthos breathed. “Well, that’s new.”
Dana scowled. “What are you talking about?”
“He told you, didn’t he? About his husband.”
That earned a startled glance from Dana. “What?” She double-checked that the door to the flight deck was firmly closed. “He said you didn’t know,” she hissed.
Porthos looked guilty, and sad. “I found out on a very bad day,” she admitted. “He was out of it, he doesn’t remember telling me. Aramis knows too, the shape of it at least.”
Dana was relieved. She was not cut out to be anyone’s support person, least of all the complex bag of angry spiky space weapons that was Athos’s inner turmoil.
“How much do you know?” she asked finally. She wasn’t going to assume all Athos’ secrets were fair game because Porthos had an excellent poker face.
Porthos tilted her head at Dana, regarding her. “I know his husband is dead,” she said softly. “He blames himself. Sometimes he’s so eaten up about it that he sabotages everything good in his life.”
Dana nodded at that, thinking of the business with the nexus. Athos was a brilliant pilot, but he didn’t trust himself. “Except you,” she said after a moment. “You and Aramis. Having you as friends, it’s the best thing that he has.”
Porthos laughed at that, not an overly cheerful laugh, but deep and honest. “Believe me, he’s sabotaged that plenty of times. We won’t let him go, though.” She leaned in and scritched Dana’s short buzz of hair on her scalp, as if she was a puppy dog. “If you know as much as I do, about the husband and the deep dark misery and all that, I’m impressed.”
“It’s not -” Dana said awkwardly, because she knew more, a lot more than Porthos was saying. She was the one Athos had chosen to trust with the complete truth about his husband. “I was there when he needed to talk,” she muttered.
“Ha,” said Porthos. “Athos has been needing to talk as long as I’ve known him, but he doesn’t let himself, not about things that matter. Telling you his secret, that’s important, Dana. Hold on to that.”
Athos’ voice called harshly through the doorway. “D’Artagnan, Porthos, get in here now!” For a moment, Dana was embarrassed. Did he realise they had been gossiping about him?
As she entered the flight deck, all thoughts of Athos and his angsty past bled away fast. Aramis, closest to the doorway, reached out and caught Dana’s hand, squeezing it gently between her own.
Everyone, even Bonnie who had slipped the Hoyden into autopilot, stood watching the enlarged media screen on the inside of the hatchway. It was the beginning of a press conference – the Regence stood behind a podium, speaking in her clear, confident voice. In the background, Dana could see Prince Alek and the Cardinal, standing much closer together than usual, grave and united.
“These recent attacks on citizens of the solar system make it clear that the alien race known to us as the Sun-kissed have no intention of meeting our overtures of peaceful negotiation with anything other than contempt,” said the Regence, well aware that her words would be recorded and rebroadcast over and over in the years to come. She was speaking history, a kind of history they had hoped never to repeat.
“When all other options have failed, there is only one clear path remaining. As of today, our Solar System is once again at war with the Sun-kissed. Let the God of All have mercy on their souls, for we have no mercy left for them. Not this time.”
31
Musketeers at War
Dana stared at the viewscreen where the Regence’s declaration of war still hung in the air. Her first thought was of Athos, of the terrible look in his eyes when he confessed to her that his husband had been a spy for the Sun-kissed. He had loved one of them, an alien, without even knowing it. His jaw was tense, and he muttered to Aramis, “Hell of a time to be without a ship.”
“You’ll have time to acquire a new helm and harness,” Aramis said. “And a hull to wrap around it.”
“Not a lot of time,” Athos grated back. His eyes flicked to Dana, and the look in his face had nothing to do with that deep misery he had spilled out to her on the floor of the cellar of The Gilded Lily.
It was pity, she realised with a sinking feeling. It was –
he was looking at her as if he expected her to be the one to fall apart. Why would he think that? Her three friends might be going off to war without her, but she was part of the Mecha Squad, it was hardly as if she would be left out altogether…
The screen shifted from the press conference to show the recent attacks that had inspired the Regence’s declaration of war, and Dana’s mouth went dry so fast that it stung the inside of her cheeks.
Gascon Station. That was Gascon Station.
She watched the broadcast in silence, taking in the details. Six incendiary bombs, planted in secret across the station, detonating at ten-minute intervals. Emergency response thrown into disarray. Life support disconnected across whole sectors of the station.
Ten thousand casualties. Even taking into account passing trade and miners on rec leave, that was a third of the population of Gascon. She couldn’t even start thinking about specifics, about which areas had hit and which people she knew were most likely to have been where at that time of day. All she could hear was a faint buzzing sound in her ears.
Aramis squeezed Dana’s hand again.
Dana heard Athos and Porthos arguing about which of them were going to take over the helm from Bonnie. Athos insisted he was faster, but Porthos overruled him on the grounds that the Hoyden was her damned ship.
Dana wondered if Athos was even capable of flying right now. Had Grimaud given his last ampoule of nexus to Dana when they were busy crashing the Parry-Riposte, or did she have further supplies with her?
The broadcast flicked from the damage done to Gascon Station to a repeat of the Regence’s declaration of war, then the edited highlights of the questions she had answered afterwards.
“I need to contact my family,” Dana said aloud. No one heard her in all the arguing, so she repeated it again, louder.
Porthos turned to her. “I have subspace credit. Give Bonnie your residential codes and she’ll try to get the call through. Athos, if your butt even touches my chair I am going to kick you in it.”
Bonnie relinquished the helm to Porthos, and drew Dana back into the cabin to connect the call. It didn’t work the first time they tried, or the second. None of Dana’s family comms were workin: not her Mama or Papa’s personal studs, nor the home mainframe, nor any of their work codes. Neither of her sisters replied. The emergency contact line was running hot, and Dana was unlikely to make it to the front of the queue before they got back to Paris.
“I’ll keep trying,” Bonnie said finally, taking the tablet out of Dana’s shaking hands. “I’ll get Planchet on to it, the kid is a genius with communications. Give us a little while, we’ll get you through.”
And she did, but it took an hour, and an hour is far too long to be thinking that your family might not exist any more.
By the time the call came through, tensions were running high in the Hoyden. Whoever’s idea it had been to cram all three Musketeers and Dana in one musket-class dart had been a dumbass. Aramis and Athos sniped at each other about religious doctrine, of all things, equally frustrated at their inability to make the ship go faster by mind control.
The newsreels only stopped showing the endless clips of the destruction on Gascon Station and the Regence’s speech in order to report that fifty alien ships had unfolded in Truth space, rendering the planet and its orbital cities (Artemisia, Valentine, Lucretia, Rochelle) under siege. No shots had yet been fired, but it was clearly a message, as much as the attack on Gascon Station and the planet Freedom had been: one planet at a time, we are coming for you.
Porthos, flying the Hoyden as fast as she could thanks to the wonders of spaceship design and long-lasting power globes, refused to speak to Athos or Aramis except to say ‘shut up both of you, stop acting like children,’ and ‘I will make you walk the fucking plank, I swear to God.’
“Chief,” Planchet said suddenly, her voice coming through Dana’s comm from the Morningstar as if she was right next to her on the bunk. “I’ve got your call, standby.”
Dana caught her breath and then she heard her mother’s voice, business-like and firm over the subspace comm line. “Dana, is that you?”
“Mama,” Dana burst out. “Are you – is everyone –” But no, asking about everyone was too much. She had watched lists of known fatalities grow with every repetition on the smaller vid screen in the cabin. So many names that she knew, friends and extended family and acquaintances. People she had grown up with. “Are you all right? Is Papa?”
“It’s bad, darling, but we’re holding on,” said Mama. That assurance was enough to make Dana sob out loud. She wanted desperately to beg forgiveness for leaving home, and to swear to kill all the Sun-kissed.
Instead she stayed calm, asked sensible questions, and tried not to break too hard inside as her mother reported what had been destroyed, and who was dead, and what was happening in the wake of the disaster.
At one point, Mama stopped talking altogether, and after a scrabbling frequency sound, Dana’s elder sister Debo came on instead, sounding stiff and robotic. “Di and Pippa were missing for six hours,” she said, referring to the middle D’Artagnan sister and her wife. “The kids are okay, they weren’t in the school that was hit. Papa didn’t want you to know, but he’s been evacuated to a medibay ship – we can’t do more than field treatment on station. He was caught in one of the explosions. His burns are extensive.”
As Dana listened, burying herself in the sound of her older sister’s familiar, no-nonsense voice, Athos and Aramis came to sit near her on the bunk.
Athos patted her briefly on the shoulder, in an ‘if only we had swords I might be willing to talk about your feelings but let’s face it, probably not’ kind of way. He sat close enough to Dana that she could feel the warmth of him. Aramis had no restraint – every time Dana’s voice stumbled over the very basic task of exchanging words with her sister and then her mother again, Aramis reached out and rubbed small circles against her lower back.
They were here, and her family were alive, and there was more to think about.
War, and what it meant for all of them.
24 hours later, her feet solidly planted on the ground of Lunar Palais, Dana stared at the mecha-suit. She had been immersed in ships – and darts in particular – for so long that she could barely remember knowing what to do with one of these.
She was going to have to catch up fast.
“Cadet D’Artagnan,” said a voice behind her. “Good to have you back from leave.”
Dana turned, to find her commanding officer behind her. Commandant Essart was a short, solid woman with greying hair. She had a motherly air about her but she could yell loud as Amiral Treville.
“Ready for service, boss,” Dana said, saluting.
“Good to hear. The rosters for the next two months will be posted in the mess later today. Two mecha units will remain here on Lunar Palais for city security, and other two will be shipping out with the Royal Fleet to Truth Space.”
The thought of staying here when the Fleet were going to war was awful beyond words. Of course they couldn’t leave Paris and Lunar Palais defenceless, but Dana could not bear the idea of being left behind. She nodded, without saying anything.
Truth was as close to Freedom and the remains of Gascon Station as she was going to get while still contracted to the military. Would it be worse to be so damned close and still not home?
“You, however, will not be with any of them, if you accept this,” said Essart. She handed over an envelope with a familiar blue fleur-de-lis seal upon it. “Amiral Treville is short on pilots for supply transport. She wants to buy out your contract, if you allow it. Your crew would be printing and ferrying supplies for the troops, providing parts for repair and replacement weapons, and running a medibay for the wounded. No military action expected.”
Dana opened her mouth and closed it again. Treville wanted her. She’d be with the Musketeers, even if she still wouldn’t be one of them. She would have her own ship: a supplies venturer rather than the musket-class dart
she longed for.
If anything happened to Aramis, Athos or Porthos, Dana would be right there in the midst of the action, she wouldn’t be left out of the loop. She might even get a glimpse of home.
If she stayed with the Mecha Squad, she had a 50% chance of combat, might have an opportunity to take bloody revenge against the bastard Sun-kissed.
“Can I think about it?” she asked, not realising she was going to say those words until they were spilling out of her mouth.
Essart looked almost sympathetic. “Take three hours, kid,” she said. “Get your head on straight. Then report to me with your decision.”
“Yes, boss.”
Dana climbed inside the mecha suit and opened her thoughts to it, flexing her limbs and trying to get used to the odd sensation of controlling the heavy metal armour. She had been a long time away, but she was more attuned to the machine than when she first started. The reflexes would come back.
She thought about taking a mecha into combat, of blasting the Sun-kissed ships out of the sky of Truth. She thought about her Papa, lying in a medibay ship and complaining about being made to stay immobile while they worked on replacing his skin. She thought about how being here, protecting the Regence herself, was a vital job, and someone had to do it.
Dana had done enough for the Crown lately. It was time to think what she wanted – what she had to offer the Solar System. She made her choice.
I’m going to war.
Milord Vaniel de Winter was not a loving man. Love was for fools. He had no particular attachment to his daughter Morgan, the de Winter heir, who had been neatly packed off to a nursery from birth, and had a series of boarding schools lined up for her future. Milord’s late wife, Delia de Winter, had not inspired much in the way of love during their short marriage. He had a higher tolerance for her sister Bee who was at least amusing, and loyal, and played a mean game of cards.
Romance and sex were political tools like any other. Milord allowed himself the occasional attraction, like his current hunger for the fascinating Marquise de Wardes, but only after he had formed a strategy for how that romance would be useful to his schemes.
Musketeer Space Page 29