A Matter of Oaths

by Helen S. Wright

  “Elanis won’t have time to prevent that,” Vidar objected. “The approval will be ready by the time we get back to Aramas. All it will need is our signatures.”

  “True.”

  Vidar looked quizzically at Joshim. “What’s the problem?”

  Joshim sighed. “The problem is, I don’t know if there is a problem.”

  “But you think there may be. Any connection with swapping Rafe’s web-shift and keeping him out of the key-position?” Vidar asked shrewdly.

  “Yes.” Joshim hesitated, knowing he had to ask but not wanting to hear the wrong answer, which was why he had not asked before. “Tell me, when you were in the web with him while we were in combat with that raider, did you notice anything odd?”

  “About Rafe’s performance? Apart from the fact that he handled himself like a veteran, no.”

  “No sign that his concentration was disturbed?”

  Vidar shook his head. “Not a thing, and I was watching him damned closely. It’s not too comforting, going into combat with somebody in the key-position who’s never been in combat before.” He frowned. “Had he been in combat before?”

  “It’s possible,” Joshim said cautiously. “After he came out of the shub, he was as sick as a first-timer through jump. It might have been caused by the conditioning that goes with identity-wipe.”

  “Whatever it was didn’t hit him until he came out of the web,” Vidar said positively. “I was monitoring him so closely I was almost inside him. Emperors, I was monitoring him so closely I probably was inside him,” he said sheepishly.

  Joshim tutted automatic disapproval. Shadowing somebody in the web so closely that you experienced everything they felt and did was dangerous. At best, it could damage their control. At worst, with the potential that it introduced for circular feedback, it could cause permanent burn-out of both webbers involved.

  “I don’t think he registered that I was doing it,” Vidar volunteered. “And I’m not good enough to shadow perfectly. If I didn’t disturb him, nothing else would.”

  “I hope not.” Joshim chewed his lip. Vidar’s comments were encouraging, but they were not conclusive.

  “If he were any other First who’d never been in a patrolship before, you’d be watching him carefully but you’d let him take the key-position,” Vidar said reasonably. “Especially when he’s sharing a web-shift with you. There’s nobody better qualified to take control if anything does go wrong. And he’s one of the best webbers in Bhattya’s web-room. Almost as good as you or Rallya. He’s wasted as a permanent number two.”

  “I know,” Joshim acknowledged. Rafe’s skill in the web was a delight. He did not have Rallya’s innate talent, which made her such a poor teacher and a demanding key because she subconsciously expected others to find webbing as easy as she did. Rafe’s skill was learned, and polished carefully and continually; he knew how to pass it on, and how to use it to get the best from others. It was rare to find that in somebody with only ten years experience, and a crime to waste it, but…

  “You won’t get a definite answer by keeping him out of the key-position,” Vidar pointed out. “You’ll always be wondering.”

  “So I should let him take the key-position and wait for him to fold in the middle of combat?” Joshim argued. “Just to get a definite answer?”

  Vidar tugged at his earring. “You’re not restricting Rallya, and you know that now deterioration has started, there’s always a chance that her web will fail without warning during combat. If you’re worried about Rafe, shouldn’t you be equally worried about Rallya?” he countered.

  “The chance of sudden web failure in Rallya’s current condition is negligible.”

  “You can’t be sure of that until you do a full recalibration.”

  “If there had been any major change, Rallya would have mentioned it. She may be wilful, but she isn’t irresponsible.”

  Vidar conceded the truth of that with a gesture that made his collection of gold bracelets clink together. “I still think you’re wrong about Rafe,” he insisted. “Even if there is a risk, wouldn’t it have been greatest the first time he was in combat? He survived that, and he’s aware of the danger now. It can only get safer.”

  “Not if the conditioning is set to get stronger if it’s ignored.”

  “If they wanted him to keep out of combat, they would have conditioned him against taking a berth on a patrolship, not faffed around making him a liability in the web if he did.” Vidar shook his head in mock despair. “You can’t even be sure it was the conditioning that made him sick. When I was a junior, we had a Commander of ten years’ standing who still threw up every time he came out of the web after combat. Nobody dreamed of barring him from the key-position.”

  When he was exasperated, Vidar had a lot in common with Rallya, Joshim realized fondly. But not so much that he thought he could make the Webmaster’s decisions for him, thank the gods.

  “I’ll decide one way or the other before we start on the in-bound run,” he promised.

  “No, you won’t. You might change your mind and let him back into the key-position, but you won’t make a decision.”

  “Would you explain to me the difference between making a decision and changing my mind?”

  “If you change your mind, it will be for the wrong reasons and you won’t be able to stop worrying about it. If you make a decision…”

  “…it will be for the right reasons and I’ll be happy with it?” Joshim concluded. “Well, if that’s the difference, I’m not in a position to make a decision. Only to change my mind.”

  Vidar shook his head firmly. “You shouldn’t try so hard to be the perfect Webmaster,” he said, not unsympathetically.

  “Maybe not.” Joshim twisted his ring around his finger. “It would be simpler if I were just his Webmaster. Loving him as well … I can’t keep the two things separate.”

  “Don’t try,” Vidar said crisply. “It doesn’t work. You can’t be a Webmaster without being influenced by your personal feelings. Your instincts about people are as accurate as any measurement of their performance that you can make.”

  “Even if I care about somebody so much that I dare not trust my judgement about him?”

  “Your judgement about Rafe is fine. What’s wrong is your judgement about yourself. You think that you’re being objective about Rafe, but you aren’t. You’re letting your fear of being biased in his favour push you too far in the opposite direction, into a choice you know is wrong.” Vidar leaned forward. “Admit it, Joshim. If you really believed that he was an unacceptable risk in combat, he wouldn’t be in the web at all, would he?”

  Joshim hesitated. “Probably not,” he conceded at last.

  “So why didn’t you ban him from the web?” Vidar insisted.

  Joshim glared across his desk. “Because it wasn’t necessary,” he admitted. “And because I didn’t want to,” he added defiantly.

  “If it was necessary, would you have done it?”

  “Yes. I would.”

  That answer, unexpectedly easy, freed a tangle of doubts. Making it and knowing it to be true, Joshim could look clearly at the decision he had made about Rafe and recognize that it had been a mistake. Not just for all the reasons that Vidar had argued, but also for the simpler and more important reason that he had not made it as Webmaster, as he had deceived himself that he had. He had made it as Rafe’s lover, swayed by Rafe’s distress and by his own guilt about the Oath-Breaking that he had proposed into doing something—anything—to ease the tension between them. Something that made him feel that he had not abandoned his duty as Webmaster, so long as he did not examine it too closely.

  No wonder the gods had not responded to his prayers: he had been asking for a solution to the wrong problem, to a problem that only existed in his head. Or had they responded, by whispering in Vidar’s ear? Joshim smiled at the thought of the reaction he would get if he asked Vidar whether he had received any divine guidance recently.

  “At least I’
m not the only fool involved,” he realized ruefully. “Rafe would have argued the ears off any other Webmaster over this, but he hasn’t said a word about it to me.”

  Vidar sat back contentedly. “Too honourable to take advantage of his position in your bed?” he teased.

  “And in my affections,” Joshim corrected good-naturedly.

  Too honourable to risk talking me into another form of Oath-breaking, letting him in the key-position against my better judgement, he added privately. That was not a subject he could discuss with Vidar, in spite of the friendship they shared, but it was something he had to discuss with Rafe, now that Vidar had bullied him into seeing sense.

  “Thanks, Vidar,” he said quietly.

  “Buy me a drink when we’re dirtside.” Vidar grinned. “Bring Rafe along. He can buy me one too.”

  * * *

  “Ah, Rafe.” Noromi welcomed him to Meremir’s web-room with a curt nod. “Rallya not with you?”

  “She’s outside, talking with Commander Erelna, sir.”

  “Expects us all to wait for her, I suppose,” Noromi complained. “Find her difficult to work with, do you?”

  “Not particularly, sir.”

  “Not likely to say if you did, in your position.” Noromi chuckled knowingly. “Ought to congratulate you on your success against that raider. Mostly the result of luck, of course, but still a creditable effort.” He patted Rafe’s shoulder.

  Rafe contrived a brief smile and moved out of easy range of another pat. “I don’t underestimate the value of luck, sir.”

  “Don’t overestimate it either,” Noromi warned. “It’s no substitute for hard work and thorough planning.”

  “No, sir, but it’s often the thing that makes the hard work worthwhile.”

  “Rallya told you that, I suppose?” Noromi shook his head disapprovingly. “Take my advice, Rafe. Don’t believe everything she tells you. Just because she relies on luck doesn’t mean you can do the same. Hard work and proper training, that’s what it takes to get anywhere.”

  “I couldn’t hope for better training than I’m receiving from Commander Rallya,” Rafe said bluntly. The clumsiness of the approach was an insult and the envy behind it irritated him. “At least she knows the difference between luck and skill,” he added unkindly.

  “One fluke success doesn’t make you a Commander,” Noromi said, offended. “You’d do well to remember that instead of aping Rallya’s arrogance.”

  There were worse things to ape, Rafe decided as Noromi stalked off. Like a pedestrian Commander who could not make a direct approach to a First that he wanted to poach from another ship. Noromi should never have been given overall responsibility for the convoy; Rafe had learned that from the conference at Aramas. It was a formula for missed opportunities, for slavish adherence to the tactics that Noromi had personally proven successful. He was not incompetent, Rafe conceded honestly, but he lacked initiative.

  Rallya was the obvious candidate for Convoy Commander, which was one reason why Noromi was jealous of her, but she would have refused the job if it had been offered, and her reputation was so formidable that Commander Maisa would not dare order her to take it. Rallya would refuse Commander Maisa’s job if it were offered, Rafe decided as she entered the web-room and paused to greet Noromi. Too much routine work involved and too many people to deal with who were not webbers, people who had to be coaxed instead of bullied.

  “Noromi informs me that you’re impertinent,” Rallya announced as she joined Rafe.

  “I expect so, ma’am. I’m surprised that he’s so eager for me to join Meremir.”

  “Blinded by your more obvious attractions,” she said scornfully. “Or hasn’t heard about your dubious past yet. How does it feel to be in demand for once?”

  “It’s your reflected glory that makes the difference,” Rafe retaliated.

  Rallya laughed. “Sit down and bask in it,” she advised, relaxing into the nearest seat and closing her eyes. “Wake me up when the farce is over.”

  Noromi’s uninspired plans for the in-bound run, a reprise of the out-bound run but in the opposite direction, aroused Rafe’s old intolerance of a task performed barely adequately. It had been wise to keep all the patrolships with the convoy when the cargoships were heavily loaded and unable to move fast, but now that they were capable of some speed, it was wasteful to repeat the tactic. Even Bhattya’s limited roving commission was only confirmed by Noromi as a bow to the inevitable.

  Rallya sat throughout with closed eyes, as if intolerably bored with the proceedings. Clearly, she had no more intention of arguing with Noromi than had either of the other Commanders present, but at least they had the excuse of lack of seniority. Wake me up, she had decreed; in a flood of devilment, Rafe resolved to do exactly that.

  “Any questions?” Noromi asked ritually at the end of his presentation.

  “Yes, sir,” Rafe said, violating the convention that the Commanders’ shadows never spoke.

  Noromi was disconcerted, but signalled for Rafe to continue.

  “I’m not quite sure what the point of it all is, sir,” Rafe said. Peripherally, he saw Rallya sit further down in her seat. No support from her then, but no interference either.

  “The point?” Noromi repeated. “The point is obvious.” He moved to cancel the displays he had created.

  “Not to me, sir,” Rafe said imperturbably.

  “The point,” Noromi said acidly, “is to deliver the cargoships safely to Aramas station. I would have thought that was obvious to a half-wit.”

  “I see, sir. Is that all, sir?”

  “All? Isn’t that enough?”

  “Aren’t our orders to ensure safe delivery of the convoy and to gather intelligence about the Outsiders?”

  Noromi choked. “You’re impertinent,” he accused repetitively.

  “Probably, sir,” Rafe agreed cheerfully. “You haven’t answered my question.”

  Noromi looked around for support, received none from Rallya or from the other Commanders, and was forced to fall back on his own resources to regain control of the meeting.

  “Before you reach command rank, which is extremely unlikely on the basis of today’s dismal showing, you will realize that orders are rarely meant to be interpreted literally,” he told Rafe sententiously. “Until then, your best course of action is to remain silent and learn from your betters.”

  “Then you’ll explain your interpretation, sir?”

  Noromi sought inspiration from the bulkhead above him, and received it.

  “Perhaps you’d like to explain yours,” he suggested maliciously. “And the way it should be put it into practice.” He made a grandiloquent gesture of invitation. “The meeting is yours.”

  “Thank you, sir,” Rafe said happily.

  “Some people never learn,” Rallya commented, opening her eyes for the first time.

  Rafe wiped Noromi’s displays, leaving only the plot of the direct route back to Aramas. Turning to face his audience, he wondered for a moment whether he was about to make a fool of himself. It was a familiar uncertainty and he grinned, the grin which always persuaded his audience of his confidence. An internal alarm flickered and he muted it hastily, helped by the blatant expectation of his coming failure on Noromi’s face.

  His ideas took shape as he transferred them to the displays, his uncertainty and the nagging of his conditioning fading as he did so. He laid down the simple elements first, the measures to ensure the safety of the convoy. The aim of the Outsiders was to steal ships, not destroy them, so group the cargoships in a fast, tight formation. Their combined mass shadow would be protection against a ship being snatched without warning in the wake of a raider’s jump; a tractor beam would have to be used to drag them free first.

  The patrolships were at their slowest and most vulnerable in a turn, so keep them at the rear of the convoy, poised to run down on a raider approaching from any direction. The raider’s need to use a tractor beam would grant the time the patrolships required.
<
br />   The cargoships were lightly armed but not shielded, so order them not to open fire unless fired upon, nor to attempt to block a raider’s escape route. Under no circumstances were they to break formation or reduce speed without permission.

  The patrolships were not to fire upon a raider unless a cargoship would otherwise be lost. A damaged patrolship was a greater danger to the convoy’s safety than a fleeing raider. If a raider was about to jump alone, let it go. If possible, ride on its wake, take a full spectrum sensor recording of its arrival point and jump back at once through the same hole before it faded. The manoeuvre was not compulsory, Rafe stressed drily; it was an option open to a ship with the right team in the web. It would be useful to know where the raiders jumped to, but not at the risk of losing a patrolship.

  The point of greatest danger would be the jump from the Jalset system into the Aramas system; two patrolships would go ahead to secure the arrival point. But they would not travel with the convoy. Once the cargoships were taking their share of the responsibility for their own safety, two patrolships would form an adequate escort from Jalset’s world to the departure point. The other two would be free to carry out the second part of their orders: to gather intelligence about the Outsiders.

  The Jalset system’s nearest neighbour was an uninhabited binary system. Uninhabited, and with the multiplicity of major jump points that any binary system had; an ideal system for the raiders to route through. Two patrolships would leave within a planetary day to seed that system with recording drones, set to monitor jump flares, before jumping on to Aramas. The drones would be collected during the next convoy’s turnaround. If the raiders were passing that way, the recordings would reveal it, the first pointer for the diplomats and the historians to the origin of the Outsiders. If the records were blank, then the drones could be reused in another system.

  It would have been too insulting to Noromi to ask for questions at the end of the presentation, too likely to undo any good that had been done. Instead, Rafe gave the audience a hesitant, expecting-to-be-corrected look and waited for their reaction. Equally tactfully—or, on Rallya’s part, maliciously—the other Commanders waited for Noromi to speak first.