Admiral's Gambit (A Spineward Sectors Novel:)

by Luke Sky Wachter

  “Not yet,” he said giving her a stare she failed to cipher. Its meaning eluded her, which was another irritating point about him. Always hiding how he felt, when she wanted to find a way to bring them closer.

  “Well then,” she said, unable to keep an edge from her voice at his continued evasiveness and generally uncooperative nature, “was she telling the truth when she said you had a secret name for me, too?” The hint of a look that flashed across his face before he regained control of his features spoke volumes.

  “She, who,” he asked, acting like a child trying to evade a sticky question and coming off just as unconvincing. He tried to sound innocent, but the truth was so obvious his attempt to delay and avoid was just insulting.

  “Now I really am curious,” she said, her eyes narrowed.

  “Still don’t know what you’re talking about,” he said gruffly, trying to brush past her and make for the hatch leading out of the shuttle.

  She placed a hand on his chest to stop him from escaping. For a moment she thought he was going to keep going and turn the situation into a test of strength. Instead, he stopped and sighed.

  “You did! Now I really must know,” she said. She cocked an eyebrow, foot tapping impatiently as she waited.

  He stood there looking rebellious. Well, she knew how to deal with rebels. For a brief second she wondered if there was precedent for a Sword-Bearer to execute such a sentence on her Sword-Bearer, then she shrugged it off.

  Giving him a stare she’d learned at the feet of her Grandmother, a fearsome woman if ever she’d seen one, she stood there willing to wait until he waved his flag.

  He sighed and she could sense weakness. She felt a surge of triumph when he placed a hand on his forehead and shook his head. “It wouldn’t be much of a secret if I went around telling everyone,” he said. He was as stubborn as a pack-beast.

  “Out with it,” she said, giving him back one of his own little hand motions.

  His brow wrinkled and then his eyes narrowed in turn and he smiled. She didn’t like that look very much, and watched him like a hawk. He was going to try to wiggle out of it somehow, she just knew it.

  “Here you are demanding all my secrets when you’ve offered nothing of equal value in return,” he said, sounding entirely too full of himself for comfort.

  “We agreed on the truth between us,” she pointedly reminded him.

  “Certainly,” he agreed with a nod. “However, that was for when we were alone,” he pointed back, like an Advocate standing in front of a Lawgiver. “Not only are we not alone, but if you are going to demand a secret from me, there should be reciprocity.”

  “What do you mean,” she asked, her interest piqued along with her temper.

  “I want something of equal worth. A secret, confidence, or so on,” he replied, sounding smug.

  For the first time she glanced around self-consciously. Then she got mad at herself for doing so, which spilled over into being mad at him, the author of her discomfort.

  “Not so eager to blurt everything out when it's you on the line and people are listening,” he said, his capacity for smugness seeming to have no bounds.

  That infuriating, smug little man was right. Or at least, he had a small point.

  She realized she was, if not bested, at least to the point that this game was threatening to grow beyond its original intentions. “Fine,” she said icily. He looked so triumphant she couldn’t resist the desire to stab his balloon. “When I think of something of equal weight, we’ll talk again.”

  Outside the shuttle, a large crowd had gathered waiting to see them. Personal issues and a whole host of lesser problems emptied from her mind like water poured from a barrel.

  A ghost of a smile on her face, she walked down to a receiving line of new Messene notables. This was the job she’d been trained for since birth. The fact that she’d been raised a Land-Bride of Argos didn’t mean her training as a Hold-Mistress was any less valid here in Messene.

  These travelers from the river between the stars had come here as refugees with no choice but to seek her favor and to settle these lands. They had some very different customs, it was true, however all she had to do was look at the families with children and the differences faded. Whatever her Protector might think, she wasn’t about to abandon children to the inhospitable regions of cold space.

  They were hers now and if there was one thing a Hold Mistress knew, whether she was young or a seasoned matron, it was how to hold what was hers.

  On Tracto there was wealth to be found in both land and minerals, but any Mistress worth her salt knew that the true wealth of a land lay in its people and she wasn’t about to let go of tens of thousands without a fight, at least not if they wanted to stay. These people were citizens, not slaves, after all.

  **********

  It was amazing to look at her. Akantha worked the receiving line like she’d been born to it. Which I suppose she had. Sometimes I tended to forget that just because she didn’t grow up in the Royal Family of Capria or on another ‘civilized’ world of the Confederated Empire didn’t mean that she hadn’t received her own lessons growing up.

  My erstwhile Sword-Bearer couldn’t hide her genuine pleasure as she moved through the crowd in that blithely reserved way of hers. Perhaps what I took for reserve was just a cultural difference in body distance ratios, I mused.

  It was an established fact that different cultures often have varying distances. For instance, Caprians preferred a two and half foot distance between individuals. People from Quin, a world used by my former tutor as an example, preferred a distance of only two feet when conversing. In class one day, he’d demonstrated how someone from Quin would continually ‘crowd’ a local Caprian's personal space. It was rather comedic to watch as the Quin would slowly chase the Caprian around the room, as each attempted to find and maintain a culturally comfortable conversational distance.

  Regardless of what the difference was, I needed to remember that while Akantha was still extremely deficit on her knowledge base and study of interstellar technological culture, she had been training her whole life to be the ruler of Argos. A position which, to my untutored eye, seemed to encompass everything except for the patriarchal dominated arena of challenges and warfare.

  She worked the crowd like a master and soon had them in the palm of her hand. This realization spurred me out of my little admiration fest. Firmly reminding myself there was reason to hold my distance, I strode out behind her.

  Large crowds (I estimated the gathering to be at least one or two thousand people) weren’t my specialty. I’d received the mandatory training but Sweet Murphy knew I was a Montagne after all. What gatherings, other than mobs, would I ever have the chance to practice on back home in Capria? Still, I wasn’t about to let that stop me.

  Suppressing a big gulp, I put on a plastic smile as soon as I reached the line and started shaking hands and pressing flesh with the best of them.

  “It's great to see both yourself and the Lady here at Messene Citadel, your Highness,” said a dignified man who looked like the epitome of a grey-bearded former Caprian. “We’ve worked hard to overcome the lack of startup materials and produce a place future generations can look back on and be proud.”

  “You’ve done a fine job,” I assured the man, even though I hadn’t had chance to take a look around and see what had actually been done and what was still in the planning phase.

  The next person was a middle-aged Promethean woman, “You take good care of our Hold Mistress, you hear,” she said sharply, causing me to look more closely at her. This seemed to satisfy the lady who gave the same look social dragons across the universe start to use as soon as they’re assured you understand they aren’t to be trifled with. I didn’t buy into the whole 'innocent older aunt or grandmother' routine and stayed on my guard until I could safely egress. I did make sure to commit her name to memory, as it's always important to know who would show up to a fund raiser or booster and politely gnaw on your ear until you t
hrew in the towel, agreeing to support whatever pet project they were championing. Mrs. Costel, that was her.

  As I went down the line, following in the wake of Lady Akantha who made everything look so effortless, I told myself to act natural and think of this as just another large artificial structure of some sort, like at the palace or inside the mess hall of the Lucky Clover and everything would work out fine.

  There was no way any native, even one as talented and beautiful as Akantha, was going to outshine someone like me. Someone whose entire life's purpose and training regimen, up until joining the crew of the Lucky Clover, was focused on acting like a peacock and shining like only the most practiced politicians and skilled of social butterflies could manage.

  “Great to see you,” I said, shaking the hand attached to another smiling face.

  “Good to see you, War-Prince,” replied another Promethean matron.

  “Glad we were able to save you,” I added, this time to a grizzled looking Promethean man. He looked like a tough character.

  When I went to release his hand and move down the line, he held mine in a strong grip.

  “We can handle the Stone Rhino’s well enough on our own, Sir. But what are we going to do about those Lyconese tools that have started raiding around the horn of the peninsula,” he said. From his tone of voice I understood that by ‘we’ what he really meant, was what are ‘you’ going to do about it. Since this was the first time I’d heard about any Lyconese raiders, I was momentarily stumped.

  “I’ll look into the situation,” I assured him, scrambling mentally for the right thing to do to make him let go of my hand without causing a scene. For all I knew, this guy could be a man with a legitimate grievance or a psycho unhinged by the destruction of his Settlement ship and subsequent colonization of a primitive undeveloped world.

  He held on, despite a second attempt to extract my hand.

  “We need more than that, your Greatness,” the man said, his steely gaze fixed on my own.

  “Look, Mister…” I began.

  “Call me Bones, your Greatness,” the man said.

  “I’m not a Greatness, just an Admiral,” I corrected, then continued with the main point I was trying to make, “Look Bones, I said I’ll look into it, and I will,” at least now that I’d had my nose forcibly pushed into the problem, for ‘Bones’ sake I certainly hoped it was a real problem, or he was about to find out just how difficult I could make his life. “If there is merit to your case,” I raised a hand to forestall an indignant outburst, “as I’ve no doubt there is, then it will be dealt with.”

  “What the Hades does that mean,” Bones blurted, his outwardly respectful façade crumbling to reveal the hardened individual who had been so poorly concealed earlier. “I’ve had enough platitudes and promises from politicians to last a life time.”

  For the first time I really looked at Bones. He'd caught my attention and for good or for ill, I wasn’t going to be forgetting this man anytime soon. He was on my radar screen now, and it was time to give it to him straight.

  “It means I’ll blasted well get around to it, when I blasted well get around to it. Which will be sometime before I leave this mud ball,” I said, my lips pursed and my forehead wrinkled. “It also means that if you’re not some lunatic or flat-out liar, and the problem with these 'Lyconese tools' you’ve been raving about is real, then I’ll see about taking care of the problem. Probably send over some Lancers to straighten them out before I leave, or if worst comes to worst I can always drop a rock on their heads from orbit. And that’s just off the top of my head.”

  By now, a small circle had formed around the two of us and several members of the native receiving line were starting to give me concerned looks.

  Bones frowned but slowly nodded. “Sounds like straight talk, but only time will tell,” he said.

  “Well, here’s some more straight talk. You can let go of my hand now, before I remove yours,” I said tightly gripping my hold out blaster weapon.

  Bones stared into my eyes for a moment and then released my hand. Stepping back he said, “I’ll be seeing you around,” before fading back into the crowd.

  After that, the ‘tour’ of the town, what the locals were now calling Messene Citadel, proceeded more or less to schedule. The worst holdup was when a group of primer children stopped listening to their teachers and wouldn’t leave, preferring to mob Akantha and ask for treats instead.

  Many more of the instant buildings had been assembled by the Settlers than had been in place in the most recent images and reports from before we returned to the system.

  “My new people are quick builders and very productive,” Akantha said to me, pride evident in her voice. “Soon this will become a thriving Agropolis.”

  I looked around and gauged the progress from our vantage in the temporary City Hall.

  “It seems well laid-out,” I agreed, gesturing to the uniform rows of temporary buildings in the residential section.

  Akantha nodded and beamed down at the people bustling back and forth across the town square.

  “Although,” I continued, trying to fairly compare the reality of what I was seeing against what I’d learned about colonial administration, “they seem a little behind where I’d have expected from a startup colony.”

  From Akantha’s thunderous expression it was clear that anything she construed as an attack on her subjects was the same as a personal attack on herself.

  “Although my knowledge of such things is all book learning,” I hastened to add, hoping to head off another fight, “and therefore strictly theoretical. I’m probably not accurately accounting for losing nearly half of their work force and most of their startup materials.”

  “Our people have suffered a great many losses,” Akantha grudged. “We need to be as positive and helpful as possible,” she said pointedly. I nodded to show I understood, more grateful for avoiding another conflict than swayed by her logic. But if all she wanted was for me to be positive and supporting, I was willing.

  “We should keep our eyes open in case we run across any equipment, automated factories and such that might help keep them on track,” I said carefully, unable to suppress the warm feeling I got when she said ‘our people’ as if we really were in this together.

  “A good idea,” she said with a smile. Then just couldn’t seem resist one last dig, “Although it still seems to me, they’ve made incredible progress,” she added. Too overcome with excitement to continue with the petty banter, she pointed to just beyond the pre-laid out city grid, “It's amazing how much of the city wall is already up,” she gushed.

  I did a double-take and looked at her again. Yep, she’d just gushed. Over a simple insta-create wall that wasn’t even finished, no less.

  “Insta-create is pretty easy to form into structures and pretty simple to make. Just take the base powder, add water and you’ve got yourself instant building materials with the same strength as solid stone,” I explained. If I’d known a little insta-create was the way into my girl’s heart, I would have demanded a cargo hold full of the stuff from one of the Planets where we’d driven away the pirates.

  It was nice to see her looking at me as if I actually knew something and had the answers. It might be about something as simple as a superior replacement for the lime and sand concoction used to make concrete, or whatever they called it around here, but for all of that it was still nice.

  I spent too many hours each day like a student cramming for a big test, always behind, always playing catch up, so it was nice to feel like I actually knew something about what I was saying. There was also the nice fringe benefit of having a beautiful woman doing the looking.

  Together we stood there, pointing out features of the new citadel. There was, of course, the wall being built on the edge of the proposed city grid. In addition, there were two main residential areas with a small manufacturing section slated to be wedged into the northern corner, and a straight road running between all three areas, which was intend
ed for vendors and other businesses.

  Akantha happily pointed out where a pair of large, heavily reinforced gates were scheduled to be built.

  I wanted to roll my eyes. A modern individual shouldn’t have to rely on walls and gates to protect him, not when there were laser cannons and automated turrets, but I forcefully reminded myself that this colony didn’t even have a full colonization package, let alone enough weapons and other goodies to secure the area. So having a wall and gate system to protect against the large and heavily armored Stone Rhinos, as well as potential native human enemies, wasn’t the worst idea anyone ever came up with.

  “There’s the desalination plant and the pipe which pulls water out of the ocean,” Akantha said pointing.

  I already knew where it was, but nodded, happy just to share the moment with her and also impressed at how quickly she was learning about our technology. For once, we weren’t fighting or feuding or full of angst.

  “It will be a,” I wanted to say lovely but this harsh unforgiving landscape wasn’t really the lovely type, “happy and productive place for the people here,” I said instead.

  “Messene is a hard land, but I know that with your magical technology, hard work and perseverance, people will come to live on the island once again,” she said, leaning into my side.

  “I’d say tens of thousands already do live on this island,” I said quirking my lips.

  She grinned and then punched me in the arm. I resisted the urge to rub where she connected. That punch hurt, though.

  “You know what I mean. No colony has managed to last more than a year, not since the reign of Hold Mistress Hecate at least, and that was over five hundred years ago,” she informed me.

  “I stand corrected,” I said, matching her grin and putting my arm around her waist.