He knew perfectly well he was more of a figurehead than an actual fleet commander. He’d done enough training over the years that he knew he could command a battle, but that wasn’t his job, and since he had professionals, he let them do it.
“Jump flares, my lord,” one of the scanner techs reported. “On the right vector to be on approach from Sol.”
“What have we got?” Damien asked. Those, hopefully, were the rest of the reinforcements that Alexander had promised him.
“I make it seven flares. Sensor network is still breaking down the contacts and we’re identifying IFF codes,” the tech responded.
Damien nodded, checking his channel to the bridge.
“Mage-Commodore?”
“We’re ready in case it’s someone playing games, yes,” Jakab replied, in answer to his unspoken question. “In the good news, most of the contacts look too small to be Republic warships. In the bad news, well.” The Commodore shook his head. “Most of the contacts look too small to be Republic warships,” he repeated.
Which meant few or no cruisers and mostly destroyers.
“We’ve got IFF on the lead ship,” someone reported. “Foremost Shield of Honor, one of the Guardian-class battleships. Mage-Captain…Cassian Nanni in command. I’m not reading any tags to note that there is a flag officer aboard.”
“So, Nanni is in command of the group, whatever it is,” Damien concluded. “What else have we got?”
“Looks like one old Minotaur-class armored cruiser and five destroyers,” Jakab told him. “That’s got to be Labyrinthine Heart of Gold.”
“Commodore?”
“She’s the only Minotaur left in service,” the Mage-Commodore replied. “She’s been fully modernized and kept up to date, but…”
“Kole?” Damien demanded.
“She’s primarily a training ship for the Sol Academy,” Jakab said quietly. “I doubt His Majesty has sent her out with cadets aboard, but she’ll have a scratch crew at best. His Majesty found us another battleship, but the rest of the task group out there…”
“Is the bottom of the barrel,” Damien concluded. “Well, I know the Royal Martian Navy, Kole. I have faith in even their worst.”
“So do I,” the Commodore agreed. “And I’m certainly not turning down a third battleship. Mage-Admiral Medici will make contact with Captain Nanni. Do you want to be involved in the meet-and-greet?”
“Yes,” Damien confirmed after a moment. “Regardless of who shows up to help us, those three battleships are going to carry the brunt of the fighting. Their Captains need to know I realize that.”
And if all the First Hand could do was tell people their efforts were valued, well, at least that made Damien feel useful!
41
Despite the fact that her grandfather had contacted her about Damien’s message, Grace McLaughlin was still surprised he’d let her take a full dozen of Sherwood’s frigates. The trip from Sherwood to Ardennes had passed relatively quietly as well, with startlingly few questions from her notoriously obstreperous captains.
“Jump to Ardennes in T minus five minutes,” her operations officer, Captain Gunther Meadows, reported. “All ships have confirmed readiness to jump in sequence.”
“Good.” Grace considered the situation. “Let’s get the task force to battle station, Commodore Meadows,” she told him, giving him the courtesy promotion due everyone with the rank of Captain aboard a ship who wasn’t the ship’s actual Captain.
“Feeling paranoid, sir?” he asked.
“We know the Republic wants Ardennes,” she reminded him. “While our last news is only forty-odd hours out of date, it’s entirely possible the RIN has moved in since.”
“What do we do if they have?” he asked carefully.
“We run. But since I’m not prepared to wait until we have two Mages ready to jump aboard each ship, we’ll need to stay alive for at least six hours first,” Grace pointed out. “So, let’s bring the task force to battle stations.”
Meadows grinned at her.
“Already sent the command, sir,” he noted. “I was questioning. I wasn’t arguing.”
“Good boy,” she told him. Boy was a misnomer. Meadows was the same age as she was. When she’d been going through university for her Jump Mage certification, he’d been studying to join Sherwood System Security.
She’d then poached the triple-S’s top precinct chief as a staff officer for her new fleet shortly after the Antonius Incident. If nothing else, she’d needed a top-tier investigator to dig out the rot the Legatans had managed to insert into the Patrol.
“Nervous, huh?” he asked a few moments later, and Grace realized she’d been unconsciously drumming her fingers on her seat’s arm.
“We’re about to jump into a war zone,” she replied, stilling her fingers. “The Patrol has only ever been in one real battle—and I was in Medical for it. But I know our people and I know the Navy and I know Montgomery.”
She shook her head.
“We’ll be fine.”
“I know that,” Meadows replied, his tone careful. “I was asking if you were nervous about seeing the First Hand again.”
Grace concealed a sigh. If there was one problem with the relative ages of most of her officers, it was that many of her Captains and up were either older than her…or the same age as her. And a lot of the latter didn’t quite understand that being in charge of the entire Sherwood Interstellar Patrol meant she wasn’t dating anyone in the Patrol. Meadows was one of the tiny subset who had actually gone far enough to try asking, though he’d taken being shut down gracefully.
Mostly.
“The last time I saw the First Hand, he prevented a war that would have shattered two star systems,” she told Meadows. “I’m hardly nervous to be seeing him again. He’s a hero and we’ve worked well together in the past.”
“I meant more on a personal level.”
“Damien and I understand the limits of the lives we’ve chosen,” she said calmly, but she let a frigid anger leak into her tone. “Anything else is none of your business, Commodore.”
“Of course, sir,” he admitted. “I just… Is your personal history with the Hand going to be a problem?”
Grace laughed.
“For the operation? No. Damien and I work well together. Regardless of the current status of our personal affairs.”
“Jumping.”
Mage Adrianna Luna was Robin Hood’s senior Ship’s Mage after the Captain himself. They’d been “reinforced” by Grace herself, who had made one of the first jumps.
Now Luna finished the trip, delivering them into Ardennes with the aplomb of an experienced Jump Mage. A pulse of Cherenkov radiation temporarily overloaded the frigates’ sensors as eleven other ships jumped out around her.
At the Antonius Incident, the failure to jump in formation had contributed to the loss of several of Sherwood’s frigates and thousands of lives. Grace had made very sure that failure wouldn’t recur, and this time, all twelve of her ships emerged within ten thousand kilometers of each other.
“Jump flare is fading; we are sweeping the system,” Meadows reported cheerfully. “Whoa.”
“Commodore?”
Grace was already pulling up his data on her own repeaters when he flicked it to the main holodisplay on Robin Hood’s flag deck.
“Three battleships,” she noted, picking out exactly what he’d seen. “Damn, what did Damien need us for?”
“Something that three battleships isn’t enough for?” her subordinate suggested. “Looks like he called Míngliàng, too. I’ve got two of their cruisers with a dozen destroyers for escorts making an approach. They didn’t beat us by much.”
Grace nodded as she found the codes. At Antonius, she’d very nearly ordered the Patrol to fire on the Míngliàng Security Flotilla. The icons and data codes attached to the other system’s fleet were burned into her mind.
Two cruisers was half of the MSF’s heavy warships. A dozen destroyers was more than half of their
lighter ships. It seemed Admiral Yen Phan had taken Damien’s request as seriously as she had. In fact…
“If I’m reading these codes correctly, Admiral Phan is in command?” she asked.
“I have the same,” Meadows confirmed. “Phan’s codes are flying from the lead cruiser, Light of Peace.” He paused. “Is that going to be a problem, sir?”
“Do you have an obsession with anticipating problems that don’t exist, Commodore?” Grace asked. “Yen and I have been in touch for years now. It’s amazing how strong a foundation for a friendship almost killing each other makes.
“Send our codes to the station and request an orbit from Mage-Admiral Medici. It seems we’re putting together a little surprise for the ‘Republic of Faith and Reason.’”
As Grace’s frigates slipped into the assigned orbit, a new set of jump flares lit up the sky.
A chill ran down her spine as she looked over at Meadows.
“Commodore? What have we got?” she demanded.
“Looks like…twelve destroyers, couple of bigger ships around the four-megaton range. Principality of Condor IFFs,” her subordinate confirmed. “I’m guessing the Prince decided he needed to build some goodwill with the Protectorate.”
Grace snorted. The Prince of Condor had been caught with his fingers in the cookie jar when the Protectorate had raided the Mafia’s new shipping center in his system. At the very least, he’d been turning a blind eye, and from some of the confidential reports that had crossed her desk through unofficial channels, well—that eye had been pretty knowingly blind.
Condor was a wealthy system, and its no-questions-asked transshipment was part of that wealth, but there were lines the Charter wasn’t willing to let be crossed. Last she’d heard, there was an entire division of the Royal Martian Marine Corps sitting on the Prince.
And the RMMC didn’t have very many divisions.
“The goodwill won’t hurt him, that’s for sure,” she agreed. Two mid-range warships and a dozen destroyers wasn’t going to change the tune of the next few weeks, but she had the sinking feeling that every little bit was going to help.
“Or us,” Meadows murmured.
“Agreed. We’re here to pay a debt forward, but believe me, the goodwill this will earn us with Mars was considered,” Grace replied. “Get in touch with Mage-Admiral Medici’s staff. I’m sure there’s some kind of planning session they’re going to want us to show up for.”
“There’s what, three Admirals here? Four?” Meadows shook his head. “Who’s in charge of this mess?”
“Medici,” Grace said instantly. “We don’t argue with the Navy. And if anyone else decides to argue with the Navy, they’ll get to talk to Damien.”
She remembered a meeting during the Antonius Incident with a shiver. Her grandfather had enough presence and charisma to constitute an unstoppable force in negotiations…and all of that had collided with Damien Montgomery’s will and just slid off.
“I don’t envy them that conversation,” she concluded after a second. “Damien is a kind man, a good man.
“I have no pity for anyone who assumes that means he’s a weak man.”
Meadows was silent, focusing on his communications, then looked up at her.
“I never met him,” he admitted. “But he has a reputation at this point. Anyone who thinks the Sword of Mars is weak…deserves what they get. Kind and good aren’t most people’s first description of Montgomery, sir.
“More like terrifying.”
She chuckled as that thought collided with her image of her ex-boyfriend.
“I also don’t envy the person who is expecting a great and almighty warrior and gets Damien Montgomery,” Grace told Meadows.
“Well, I guess that’ll probably include me,” he replied. “We’re invited aboard Duke of Magnificence for a meet-and-greet with all of the Militia and Navy flag officers, along with the flag captains and battleship captains. Sounds like a party.”
“It does. I assume aides and ops officers are expected as well?” she asked. Otherwise, he wasn’t coming and he knew it.
“Yes, sir. They want us flunkies along to serve coffee, I’m sure.”
Grace grinned.
“I’m mostly planning on making you take notes so I don’t have to,” she told him.
42
“I’m not sure I’ve ever dealt with this many Admirals in one place,” Mage-Admiral James Medici noted to Damien as they stood together with Mage-Commodore Jakab in the waiting section of Duke of Magnificence’s shuttle bay.
“It’s a logical title for the head of a system fleet to hang on themselves,” Damien replied. “I was always surprised that the Patrol went for Commodore to begin with, though I see they’ve updated that.”
“Three squadrons and change now?” Medici asked. “They needed levels of flag officers.”
“It’s not like we listen to that logic,” the Hand said. The Royal Martian Navy had two flag ranks: Commodore and Admiral. The Royal Martian Marine Corps only had one more: Colonel, Brigadier and General.
Now that they were finally facing a real war, Damien was considering the flaws in the Protectorate’s military structure. There were a lot of them, he realized. Most were rationalizations or cost-saving decisions or specialization choices inherent to being primarily a police and peacekeeping force.
For a warfighting navy, however, things as simple as the Royal Martian Navy’s ship names were going to be a problem. Not a big problem…but a problem.
The first shuttle tucked itself into the bay before their conversation could continue. Admiral Yen Phan was out of the spacecraft as soon as it was safe for her to exit, crossing the still-steaming floor to the safety barrier and saluting Damien and Medici.
“Welcome aboard Duke of Magnificence,” Jakab said brightly, offering Admiral Phan his hand.
The tall black woman in the black-and-blue uniform took his hand for a firm shake, then bowed slightly to Damien and saluted Medici.
“It’s good to see you again, Lord Montgomery, Commodore Jakab,” she told them. “And a pleasure to meet you in person, Admiral Medici.”
“And this time, Lord Montgomery isn’t even being threatening,” Jakab replied. “Except to the Republic, at least, and we have no sympathy for them.”
A flash of emotion crossed Phan’s face.
“I had friends in Nia Kriti and Santiago,” she admitted. “I have no idea when I’ll find out their fate. This ‘Republic of Faith and Reason’ can be damned.”
“We will beat them back,” Damien promised, shaking his head gently. “We were expecting a conflict with the Republic, yes, but this is so far beyond what we were prepared for. We will teach them the meaning of His Majesty’s Protectorate in the end. I promise you that.”
A second shuttle, with the sigil of the Principality of Condor, slid into the shuttle bay. Its engines cut off the conversation for several seconds, and then the hissing steam of the water spraying over the shuttle maintained a forced silence.
The first person out of the shuttle was an absolute giant of a man with disturbingly pale skin and blood-red eyes. The albino had shaved his head to add to the starkly disturbing effect and wore a dark burgundy uniform.
He had the same two stars on his collar as Admiral Phan and Admiral Medici, and bowed as he approached.
“Admiral Darzi,” Damien greeted him. He hadn’t realized just how large Shahrokh Darzi was, but there was only one albino Admiral in the Principality of Condor, let alone in the detachment they’d sent.
“My Lord First Hand,” Darzi greeted Damien, nodding to the other flag officers. “My Prince sends his regards and his hopes for healing of both your personal injuries and the grave wounds inflicted upon our Protectorate.”
Damien half-unconsciously checked that his gloved hands were tucked behind his back. Even now, he usually knew where his hands were, but there were moments.
“We can only hope for both of those,” he agreed. “It’s getting crowded in here, Admirals.”
Of course, the space was designed for major formal welcoming parties. It would take at least two more Admirals’ parties to fill it up, but there was only one left.
“Admiral Vasilev is already waiting for us in the main conference room, and Commodore Jakab’s people should have dinner ready to serve shortly. If I may suggest that we begin moving in that direction? I’ll wait for Admiral McLaughlin.”
And if that allowed him to avoid an audience the first time he saw Grace in two years, well, the First Hand was allowed some misdirections.
Damien was far from alone when Grace’s shuttle finally landed. He’d managed to bring the audience down to his bodyguards, led by Romanov, and Admiral Medici. He was, at least, not going to make a fool of himself in front of too many people.
He was more than a little amused at himself for it, too. He’d faced down fleets and armies alone and unarmed, but this one woman made him feel like he was going to embarrass himself just by the knowledge that she was arriving.
The steam from the cooling sprays dissipated, and Admiral Grace McLaughlin, her aide and a Patrol MP bodyguard crossed the shuttle bay and entered the waiting area. From the moment he could see Grace, everything else faded into insignificance.
Fortunately for his nerves, her gaze was locked on him at the same time. Her salute to Admiral Medici as she entered the room with them was almost an afterthought.
“Lord Montgomery,” she greeted him in a gentle voice as she bowed slightly.
“Admiral McLaughlin. Grace,” he allowed himself—a concession that earned him a familiar bright smile.
UnArcana Stars Page 25
