“Is that legal?” asked Lord Thornbuckle.
“Perfectly,” Heris said. “An admiral’s fitness for command is judged afterwards, by results. He is not obliged to take advice from anyone but his own commander, and our group was operating far from anyone more senior. It was something Lepescu had worked toward for years.”
“Did his order to you risk the whole operation?”
“No. Most of the group would attack the main objective, and while his orders for that were not what I’d have given, they weren’t as reckless. Our diversionary action was important, but it need not have been suicidal.”
“Did this admiral have a grudge against you before? It seems he must have. . . .”
“I’m not sure.” In her own mind she was sure, but she would not condemn even Lepescu on the basis of her personal belief. “I had not anticipated anything like this. But the point is, that in the event I did not obey his very plain orders. My ship and forces attacked the lunar complex, and gained control of it, but I didn’t do it his way.” At the change in his expression, Heris nodded grimly. “That’s right: I deliberately disobeyed the order of a lawful superior, in combat status. Grounds for court-martial; in fact, that’s what I expected. I knew exactly how serious it was; my family’s been Service for generations, after all. I had evidence, I thought, that would protect my crew at least, and that seemed better to me than losing several thousand of them because Admiral Lepescu enjoyed ‘a good fight.’ There was even a chance that a court might see it my way—small, but there it was.”
“And then what?”
“Then I was offered the chance to resign my commission, in exchange for immunity for my officers and crew, or a court-martial for all. The scan data had disappeared; accidents happen in combat. I had some junior officers whose careers would be cut short forever by a court-martial now, even if they won . . . the stigma never really goes away. And some hotheads in the crew would, I knew, convict themselves if they got before a court; there are always people who can’t keep quiet even to save themselves. So I resigned.”
“You didn’t tell me all that,” Cecelia said. “Not about what he wanted you to do.”
“It didn’t seem relevant,” Heris said. The rest of it boiled up in her mind—what Lepescu had said to her and about her: Coward. Stupid bitch. Typical woman, only good to lay and lie. And more, that she would never tell anyone. Who could understand?
“So I judge from your report,” Lord Thornbuckle said, “that Admiral Lepescu is more likely to put someone else in danger than to risk his own hide?”
Heris struggled to be fair. “He’s not a coward, sir; he had a name for boldness when he commanded his own ship. But he’s also ambitious in politics and society. He would enjoy hunting here under your nose, but he would not chance making such a powerful enemy by attempting open invasion.”
“What about taking hostages?”
“Possibly. Especially if he found himself in a trap.”
“Do you think he’s the head of whatever is going on?”
“I don’t know. He has other hunting friends—” Quickly, she told him about the club she’d heard of, and the rumors about it.
“And you would recommend?”
“Taking in enough force to make resistance futile—and there’s the problem of surprise and collusion. If they find out you’re coming in, they might get the shuttle off, and the yacht—”
“Not if their crew’s in the Bay,” Lord Thornbuckle said. “That’ll be easy enough to find out; it’s on a routine report.” All this time, he had been tapping out orders on his personal comunit. “There’s a Crown Minister here—Pathin Divisti—but I hate to involve the Crown if we can avoid it. And he’s here for hunting; he brought no staff.”
Heris hoped her face didn’t reveal her reaction. She thought of Crown Ministers as a particularly bloated form of bureaucratic incompetence, whose internal struggles for power resulted in unexpected budget changes for the Services.
The door chimed; a servant Heris had hardly noticed opened it to a militia squad, uniformed and armed. Lord Thornbuckle smiled at Heris.
“Captain Serrano, if you’d brief my Captain Sigind while I get some more information—”
Heris stepped outside; the hunt had ridden off some time before, and she could just hear the hounds giving tongue somewhere in the distance. Captain Sigind was a lean, tough man a decade younger than she, whose expression hardly wavered when he saw he was to be briefed by an older woman in hunting attire. Heris laid out the situation as far as she knew it, and he nodded.
“I know Bandon, of course, and something of the other islands. Haven’t been there in a couple of years, but here’s the layout.” He pulled out a map display and flicked through the file. Bandon came up in a standard military format, with topo lines and color-codings for vegetation types. “The landing field’s here—with shuttle extension into these woods. When they expanded the field, they cleared a little place at the lodge itself for small flitters—right here. It’s grass, not paving. It’d be real handy if we knew how many were at the lodge, and how many on this other island—”
“All I know about is one shuttle load, and I don’t even know if it was troop-fitted or civilian,” Heris said.
“Ah. You’re military?” His pale eyes were shrewd, wary.
“I was. Regular Space Service.”
“Any ground combat experience?”
“No, not myself. That’s—”
“Why you didn’t rush into this like a damn fool. Smart.” His brisk nod approved. “But you see our problem. . . .”
“Of course. You need to know how many they are, what their resources are, and which of Lord Thornbuckle’s employees are on their side.”
“The outrange supervisor, for one,” he said. “I’m sure of that, because it’s his responsibility to know who’s on which settlement, and when. They’d have needed his codes to get the Bandon beacon functioning for the shuttle.”
“And someone at that Station,” Heris said. “Where the charter yacht that launched the shuttle came from, because I understand that the use of private shuttles isn’t permitted.”
“Right. But back to you—you say this man Lepescu is part of some sporting club? Most sportsmen have self-imposed limits on the weaponry they’ll use—or is he a trophy hunter type?”
“I don’t know,” Heris said. The door opened, and Lord Thornbuckle came out. The bony face she had once considered amiable but weak now looked anything but amiable.
“Complete shuttle records for the past thirty days,” he said. “The same station where that charter’s berthed has launched twice its normal quota of shuttles. Cargo and supplies, most of them were said to be, for Bandon lodge. We don’t land supplies for Bandon there very often, not offworld supplies. Certainly not at this season. One of my comsats recorded the same conversation your officer picked up, Captain Serrano—as well as these—” He handed over strips of hard copy, which Heris glanced at. She could not read that fast, and he was still talking.
“I’ve relieved the Stationmaster there, and put old Haugan in charge—I know he’s loyal, at least. Suspended all shuttle flights, and all communications, with the explanation of power problems on the Station. If I understand correctly, there are fewer than twenty people who’ve taken shuttles like the one Lepescu was on. All but one have returned to the Station. You were right, Captain Serrano, that they were fitted for civilian luxury use, with a total capacity of ten passengers—and carried less. Here are the latest satellite images of Bandon and the adjacent islands—there’s some cloud interference, apparently a storm overnight—”