“The Andros is ready to fly, skipper.”
“She always is.” Mira half smiled. “Has Lydia gone over?”
“She has.”
“All right. Let’s get this underway, shall we?”
“You got it, skipper,” Gaston said, nodding as he reached for the ship-wide broadcaster. “All hands, all hands, stand by for lift.”
The corsair’s launchers boomed in unison, sending her sail projectors soaring ten thousand feet up. The silver-white blossom bloomed above them, and Mira planted a foot on a bulkhead as the ship lurched. Gaston hit the winches and the Andros began to move, slowly at first but accelerating as they drew a deep furrow behind them that grew shallower over time.
Then, in a final surge, the big ship abandoned the dirt and took to the sky. As the Andros chased her sails, Mira looked back to the thousands of men and women, and all their ships and gear, and wished the young people she’d just barely gotten to know all the luck they deserved.
She figured fate owed them a good roll or two.
That was all she had time for, as the mission ahead of her swallowed Mira’s focus whole. When it was all over, perhaps, she could see them again.
For the moment, however …
“Bring us up into the winds and turn our sails to the capital.”
“Aye, aye, skipper!”
Lydia stood beside William as the Andros vanished into the sky, swallowed by the eternal haze that surrounded them. She was moving fast and still accelerating into the wind, and Lydia was almost certain that she had seen the Andros fire off projectors to climb to the next wind layer.
“They’re in a hurry,” William confirmed. “Wind’s fortune to them … to us all, because we are going to need it.”
“Is the situation that bad, William?” Lydia asked softly, uncertain if she wanted to know.
“Maybe. Maybe it’s worse,” William said. “It depends on how much support Corian truly has. Some will fight for him because they think he represents your father still, others because they’re actually loyal to Corian himself … and some because they work for people who think they can steal more power from Corian than they could from your father.”
“Are they right?”
William snorted. “Possibly. Corian is a battle master of the highest level. He was assigned to command legions in the south of the empire, just to teach the independent kingdoms a lesson they’d not forget. They didn’t either. He beat them so badly they’ve never peeped back in our direction since. A statesman, however, he is not. So maybe they could steal power from him, but I wouldn’t care to be in their shoes if he caught them at it.”
“I see.”
“Do you?” William looked at her sharply. “Your father was far from a perfect man or emperor, but he did understand that diplomacy and battle only differed in the nature of the weapons one used.”
Lydia sighed, shaking her head. “Right there is what got my father killed, William. He only knew how to wage war, and he died by the weapons he chose to wield. Imperial diplomacy is, in fact, conducted exactly as you suggest … and that is a mistake. A victory in diplomacy comes only when all sides involved believe that they’ve won, but a true victory is when they’re all right.”
Lydia walked away from him, heading toward the command cruiser that she had an assigned suite on, leaving William Everett with thoughts whirling in his head.
She’ll be a great leader one day, if those ideas of hers don’t get her killed first.
Someone had to keep her alive until she fulfilled that fate, he decided, and right then William swore that he’d do just that.
I don’t know if we deserve her, but maybe someday we will.
CHAPTER 23
Brennan looked at the alley askance, a nervous twitch running down his spine as he considered the directions he’d been given.
She’s got to be kidding.
Kennick had stayed behind to watch over the Naga and perform the necessary maintenance to keep the old bird in the air. It was Imperial construction, which meant that unlike many of the more sophisticated ships in modern use, the Naga could be repaired almost literally with a spool of wire and some windburn tape. But even so it needed almost an hour of maintenance for every hour it spent in the air.
Better that than one of the new ones, Brennan thought with a shudder as he started down the alley.
One of the new Savage Warriors required almost ten hours of maintenance per hour of flight time, and really could only be run by government forces because of the costs involved. They were superior machines by many metrics, but Brennan liked to handle his own work as much as possible. It was one of the few things he could get away from his guards to do while in the palace. They figured that if he was in the hangar, he was about as safe as could be.
That life was no more.
He came to a stop, his mind refocusing on the present as he spotted the sign that was almost hidden in the grime and dirt of the old alley.
The Blood and Hunt Tavern. Lovely.
He shoved his way into the place, the ancient door creaking like something out of a damned ghost story. Any decent handyman would have used a silicate lubricant on it and solved the problem permanently, but either that was beyond the abilities of the owner or someone liked the noise.
The general hum of chatter inside dulled to near silence as people looked up and spotted him, but Brennan ignored them. He had a message to deliver, even if he was damned if he understood any of it.
He walked up to the bar, earning himself a glower from the older, balding man standing behind it.
“Kid, I think I hear your mama calling,” the paunchy fellow grunted, rolling his eyes. “Best go find her.”
“My mother died when I was three, and my father followed her just recently,” Brennan told him flatly, “just so you know and don’t get any cute thoughts about my dad sounding like a woman.”
The bartender stared blankly at him for a moment, then chuckled. “Never thought of that one, kid, but I’m keeping it to use later. All right, what are you here for?”
“Have a message,” Brennan said, looking around.
“Oh yeah? For who?”
“Don’t know.”
The barkeep laughed. “Not much of a messenger, then, are you? Who sent it?”
“Delsol.”
The near silence of the bar suddenly descended into total silence, and Brennan slowly turned around to see every face looking at him.
“Where does a brat like you hear a name like that?” the barkeep asked, drawing his attention back.
“I told you, she sent the message.”
The man grunted, but held out his hand. “Let’s see it.”
“Who says it’s for you?” Brennan asked, feeling contrary all of a sudden.
The barkeep just laughed at him. “You don’t know who it’s for. Let’s see it.”
Brennan sighed, but figured that if the man could read the cipher, then it was for him. If not, well, no loss. He handed him the card.
The keep flipped it open and glanced down at it, eyes widening for a moment before he dropped it on the counter.
“Go on out of here, kid.”
Brennan looked up sharply. “I was sent to deliver a—”
“Message. Mission accomplished. Good on you, now get out of my bar.”
“Hey!” Brennan tried to protest, only to be cut off by a hand the size of a shovel slamming down on the counter.