by David Weber
“Sure it has,” Chomps said. “Right, Travis?”
“It’s…interesting,” Travis said. “But are you just going to…? I mean, isn’t there some test or something I have to take?”
“You just took it,” Calvingdell said, gesturing to the display. “Your record shows you have an eye and a mind for picking out details and coming up with ideas. Furthermore, Chomps informs me that you’re quick on your feet and, if properly motivated, can tell a convincing lie. Something about chocolate chip cookies, I believe.”
“Yes, My Lady,” Travis admitted, feeling his face warming. It had been a long time since he’d thought about that incident.
“So,” Calvingdell said briskly. “Here’s the deal. Once you sign on, there’ll be six weeks’ of training—not really long enough, but that’s all the time we have before Casey’s upgrade is finished and she’s ready to head out to Silesia. Chomps will be aboard as a Chief, and he’ll continue your training—”
“Excuse me, My Lady?” Travis interrupted, frowning. “We’ll be taking Casey?”
“Indeed,” Calvingdell said. “In case you’d forgotten—or more likely never knew—part of the original plan for Casey was to send her around the region as an example of Manticoran shipbuilding skill. A chance to drum up future business, and possibly give certain parties a reason to excavate a money pit to develop our own impeller ring industry.”
“Sounds expensive,” Travis said, frowning.
“As I said: a money pit.”
“But is there really that much call for that kind of work out here?”
“That’s what this goodwill cruise was supposed to ascertain,” Calvingdell said. “That’s also why you’ll have a passenger: Countess Acton’s assistant manager Heinreich Hauptman. He’ll be handling the sales pitches along the way.”
“Purely coincidentally, of course, he also has contacts with some of the shipyards and supply people there,” Chomps added. “That’s the real reason he’s coming along. You and I will be looking into inventory lists; he’ll be our intro vector for getting our hands on them.”
“Does he know what we’re really doing?”
“Yes, he’s been fully briefed,” Calvingdell said. “But that’s him. We’re talking about you. Bottom line, Lieutenant: are you in? Yes, or no?”
Travis took a deep breath. A lot of good men and women had died in the Battle of Manticore. If there was a chance he could help track down the perpetrators and bring them to justice…
“Yes, My Lady,” he said. “I’m in.”
“Excellent,” Calvingdell said, standing up and offering Travis her hand. “Welcome aboard. Flora, if you’d let them in?”
“Yes, My Lady.” Flora glided back to the desk—Travis hadn’t noticed until that moment how graceful the young woman’s movements were—and tapped a few computer keys.
Chomps gestured to Travis and circled the desk to the door beside the potted plant. He turned the knob and pushed open the door.
To reveal a much larger room than Travis had expected. One section was packed with computer desks, a handful of which were occupied by men and women gazing intently at the displays. On the other side of the room were a trio of lab tables with various high-tech devices gathered around them, with more men and women working there. At the very back was an open space, currently unoccupied, filled with mats like the ones in the hand-to-hand combat training areas at Casey-Rosewood.
“Sorry about the mess,” Chomps apologized as he led the way toward the rows of desks. “This is supposed to be just our analysis area, but the three other rooms we’re supposed to get aren’t ready yet, so everything’s been crammed into here.”
“How big a department is it going to be?” Travis asked
“At least a couple more big rooms,” Chomps said. “Personnel-wise, so far we’ve got a couple of dozen. Ultimately, Calvingdell wants Delphi to get this whole floor and enough people to fill it. But we’ll see.”
“Delphi?” Travis echoed.
“That’s what we call the place,” Chomps explained. “Shaves a whole syllable off Ess-Eye-Ess, plus it has a nice classical ring to it.”
He stopped at one of the computer desks and pulled out the chair. “There’s a lot of reading to get out of the way, so we’ll start you on that. So. How does our Lisa like teaching at MPARS?”
Travis’s first reaction was to blink at the abrupt segue. His second was to bristle at Chomps’s casual familiarity. Our Lisa? Where did he get off talking about our Lisa?
His third was to belatedly realize he was being tweaked.
“Not really, no,” he said. “All things being equal, Lieutenant Commander Donnelly would rather be aboard a ship.”
“Oh, she’s Lieutenant Commander Donnelly now?” Chomps asked, giving Travis a sidelong look. “My mistake. I thought she was your special friend.”
“She’s a friend, yes,” Travis said firmly. “But just a friend. And she’s definitely not your special friend.”
“Of course,” Chomps grinned. “Regardless, whoever she is or isn’t, I think we’ve convinced Her Ladyship to send her to Haven.” He shrugged. “Personally, I’d rather teach than go on a multi-month voyage with nothing but talking at the end of it. But to each their own.”
“Let’s hope there’s more than just talking,” Travis said. “If this lead fizzles, do we even have anything else?”
“Oh, yes,” Chomps said, his voice gone suddenly dark. “You remember that little incursion we had awhile back? Count Ernst Bloch and his Merry Men of Barca?”
“Of course.”
“Well, our dear Count made a mistake,” Chomps said. “Amid all the double-talk he was pitching, he smiled.”
Travis frowned. What was he talking about?
And then, abruptly, he got it. Smiled…
“You’re joking.”
“Not at all,” Chomps assured him. “It was the same smile. The exact same ice-fish-cold smile.
“Count Bloch was our Cascan mass-murderer. And the one who offed your Secour pirate in his cell on Haven.”
“The man gets around,” Travis murmured. “So that NavSat thing was you?”
“It was Lady Calvingdell, actually,” Chomps said. “But yes, it was my suggestion. We set up the satellite to spout complete gibberish, hoping Bloch would interpret it as an encrypted transmission and see if he got spooked. He did, which helped cement the conclusion that he was up to something.”
“Your smile thing wasn’t sufficient?”
“Strangely enough, no,” Chomps said. “But I think Admiralty is fully on board now. Of course, that doesn’t mean we’ll have a plan if and when he comes back.”
“So how is he connected to Tamerlane?”
“No idea,” Chomps said. “But finding out is very high on our things-to-do list.” He gestured again to the desk. “Anyway, here’s where you start. Sorry we can’t just send it to your tablet, but this is stuff we don’t want floating around the ether. Punch in your ID, set up your encryption, and start reading.”
With a nod, he headed across the room toward the work tables.
Hunching his shoulders, Travis sat down. There was still a lot about this whole thing that made no sense at all. But at least Delphi and the Navy were starting to make a collection of puzzle pieces. With enough pieces, and enough people working on them, hopefully they could come up with an answer.
And as to Lisa…
He glowered at Chomps’s back. She’s not a special friend, he insisted silently. Not the way you think. She’s not.
Glowering at the display, he keyed in his ID and got to work.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Duchess New Bern, First Lord of Law, set her tablet on the table in front of her. “That’s the situation, Your Majesty,” she concluded. “The original wording simply doesn’t make a compelling case one way or the other. My apologies that the situation isn’t more definitive.”
“I see,” Elizabeth said, keeping her voice even. Out of the corner of her eye she saw Bu
rgundy shift uncomfortably in his seat on the opposite side of the table. Clearly, he’d hoped the situation would be more definitive, too.
Or maybe he was regretting that he and the other Framers hadn’t taken the current possibility into account. “And your personal opinion, Your Grace?” she added.
“I have no opinion, Your Majesty,” New Bern said primly. “My job is to strictly follow the law.”
“I understand,” Elizabeth said. “Let me put it another way. If you were the Justice hearing the case, how would you decide?”
“I would decide based on whatever was best for the Star Kingdom,” New Bern said. “I believe that’s the burden on all who serve our star nation.”
“Excuse me?” Burgundy spoke up, his voice harsh. “Your job is to determine what the law is, not interpret it according to your own personal feelings.”
“And I will continue to do that job,” New Bern said frostily. “But Her Majesty asked me a hypothetical question with regard to an unclear law, and I answered.”
“Of course,” Burgundy said, mollifying his tone a bit. But Elizabeth could see the flash in his eyes that showed he understood exactly where New Bern was coming from.
Only in this case, unfortunately, he was wrong. New Bern was usually an ally of Breakwater’s, and thus could be expected to follow the Chancellor’s lead on most matters of policy. Here, though, her friends and quiet allegiances didn’t really come into the calculation.
Because Elizabeth had waded through the Constitution, plus a raft of concurrent documents and discussions, plus the later writings of each of the Framers, and had quietly interviewed the handful of men and women who, like Burgundy, had been involved in the process.
And she’d come to the same conclusion New Bern had. Both sides of the marriage question could be reasonably supported, and both sides could be reasonably attacked.
Still, the idea of the First Lord of Law talking about what was best for the Star Kingdom…
“It seems to me that me that the marriage question is relatively minor,” Burgundy continued. “The far more urgent problem is that we currently have no legitimate heir to the throne. And if you’ll forgive my bringing up a painful subject, we’ve already seen with your brother and niece how that can end in disaster.”
“And not just for the Winton line,” Elizabeth said, a fresh trickle of old pain whispering through her. “I’m not sure what would happen to the Crown and the Star Kingdom.”
“Your father still has two sisters and a brother,” Burgundy pointed out.
“But all of them are in their seventies or eighties and in questionable health,” New Bern said.
“And none of them have children who would be Constitutionally suitable heirs to the Throne,” Burgundy conceded.
“No, I suppose not,” Elizabeth murmured, eyeing her Prime Minister closely.
And not liking what she saw.
As far back as she could remember, Burgundy had always seemed old. Granted, when she was a child everyone over fifteen T-years had looked that way. But as she grew up, and her parents and brother changed, Burgundy didn’t. His hair had slowly gotten thinner, and a few splotches had appeared on the backs of his hands, but otherwise he seemed to be treading water, age-wise, as if he was going to forever stay the same.
Until now. Now, like a collapsing star, he seemed to be falling in on himself.
His body and face had grown thinner. He moved more carefully, as if concerned about his bones and uncertain of his balance. He leaned forward in conversations, as if worried that he could no longer see or hear everything that was going on.
Elizabeth didn’t know for sure when the rapid decline in Burgundy’s health had begun. But her gut suspicion was that it had been triggered by the deaths of her brother and niece in the waters of Jason Bay.
Burgundy had had high hopes for the Star Kingdom under Edward’s leadership. Edward had talked to Elizabeth about it, and she’d seen some of it in action for herself. The Prime Minister had acted as traveling blocker, cutting through the political noise and doing what he could to smooth the path for his King.
And then, in an instant, it had all been taken away.
A part of Elizabeth wondered if she should feel insulted that Burgundy apparently thought she was such a lost cause compared to Edward that he might as well give up. But she knew that wasn’t the case. Burgundy was simply old, and it had only been his affection for the King that had kept the weight of all those years at bay.
Now, the King was gone, and the years were finally winning.
“I know you don’t want to hear this, Your Majesty,” Burgundy said. “But it has to be said. You need an heir, and the Constitution strongly implies that the father must be a commoner. The simplest solution—”
“I’m not going to remarry,” Elizabeth interrupted. “Not under this kind of duress.”
“Your Majesty—”
“I said no.”
Burgundy pursed his lips, a muscle in his cheek tightening. “All right, then. Let me suggest the following. I’ll make up a list for you of suitable…consorts, shall we say…should you decide to go that direction at some point in the future,” he finished hurriedly, as if expecting her to cut him off at the knees.
For a moment, Elizabeth was tempted to do exactly that. But this was Burgundy. Even if she violently disagreed with him, he’d earned the right to be respected. “I can’t prevent you from doing what you want in your spare time,” she said instead. “Thank you both for you time. You may go.”
“Your Majesty.” New Bern stood up, bowed low, and strode past Elizabeth’s chair to the door.
Elizabeth remained seated at the table. So, to her complete lack of surprise, did Burgundy. They sat together in silence, listening to New Bern’s footsteps as she passed between the guards flanking the door and out into the Palace corridor. The guards closed the door behind her—
“She has got to go,” Burgundy bit out when the door had closed behind her. “Whatever’s best for the Star Kingdom? Seriously? She’s supposed to be a jurist, for God’s sake.”
“There are five years yet in her term,” Elizabeth reminded him tiredly. “Leave her be. We have more important matters hanging over us.”
“I know.” Burgundy took a deep breath, visibly pushing his frustration at New Bern aside. “First of all, I want apologize for that suggestion of possible consorts. I hope you weren’t offended.”
“It did come across as a bit cold-blooded.”
“I didn’t mean for you to take it seriously,” he hastened to add. “I knew New Bern would report all of this back to Breakwater, and I wanted him to think that we were…you know…doing something. Of course I would never actually do you such an insult.”
Elizabeth sighed.
“Perhaps you should.”
His eyes narrowed. “Your Majesty?” he asked cautiously.
“Perhaps you should make me a list,” she said. “It’s a reasonable enough step for me to take.”
“But if you—” He broke off, and a tight smile creased his lips. “So that Breakwater will think you’re giving in to his demand?”
“Or at least that I’m considering it,” Elizabeth said. “Unfortunately, the demand isn’t his alone. But yes, it should quiet his bloc for a while. Especially since I can drag out the whole process until we can come up with a better solution.”
“Yes, Your Majesty.” Burgundy hesitated. “Assuming there is such a solution.”
“There is,” she said firmly. “And we will find it.”
“I hope you’re right.” Getting his hands on the edge of the table, Burgundy carefully pulled himself to his feet. “With your permission, Your Majesty, I’ll get started on that right away.”
“Thank you, Davis,” she said. “It’s comforting to know that you, at least, will always be standing firmly at my side.”
“Always, Your Majesty,” he promised. With one hand still gripping the table, he bowed low. “I’ll let you known when the list is ready. It may ta
ke a few days.”
“Take whatever time you need,” Elizabeth said. “I’ll look forward to meeting with you again when you’re ready.”
“Thank you,” he said. “I’ll let you know.”
Walking with a curiously stiff-legged gait, he passed behind her along the same path New Bern had just taken, between the guards and out the door.
Elizabeth never saw him again.
* * *
It happened three days later, just before dawn.
The head of the Queen’s Own, Major Jackson, with Elizabeth’s rest in mind, waited another two hours before informing her. By the time she arrived at Burgundy’s office, the doctors had already come and gone, taking the body with them.
“What was it?” she asked as she stood beside the Prime Minister’s desk, her mind numb, her eyes trying to see her friend and advisor sitting in the empty chair.
“The doctors said it was a heart attack, Your Majesty,” Burgundy’s personal secretary, Louisa Geary, murmured. Three hours after finding him, the tears were no longer flowing, but her eyes were still red. “It was…we knew it would happen one day. We just…you’re never ready for something like this.”
“I understand,” Elizabeth said, a dark sense of guilt digging into her heart. Burgundy’s office staff had clearly known he had heart problems. Why hadn’t she?
Or had that fact been reported to her and she’d simply forgotten it amid the press of other business?
The Star Kingdom as a whole was the Queen’s primary business. But what was the point of protecting her star nation if the individual people didn’t matter to her?
She raised her eyes from the desk and the chair and slowly looked around the room, pausing on each of the mementos arranged on the rows of display shelves. Burgundy had lived a long and productive life, serving four monarchs. It was a legacy he and his family could be proud of.
Distantly, she wondered if anyone would ever match that record.
“Your Majesty?”
Elizabeth started, only then realizing she’d gone into introspective mode. She usually tried to avoid doing that in public. “Yes, Ms. Geary?”
The secretary was holding out a data chip. “I took a moment earlier to check His Grace’s most recent work before you arrived,” she said. “I thought there might be something vital that needed to be given to Parliament or—” She broke off, blinking back a fresh welling of tears. “The most recent file was labeled For The Queen. It was…I think he must have been working on it when…” She trailed off.