The Praxis

by Walter Jon Williams

  “The squadcom was here yesterday with a different bunch,” Dietrich volunteered.

  “Was he?” Martinez looked at him. “Do you know what he’s up to?”

  “No idea, Lord Lieutenant. They just flashed at each other, like today.”

  Martinez wondered if there was some kind of big surprise inspection scheduled. But only a total swine of a fleetcom would schedule an inspection two days before the Festival of Sport.

  Right, he thought. And Fanaghee wasn’t exactly known for dripping sweet compassion over her subordinates, was she?

  Martinez decided he’d better have a quiet word with the warrant officers who ran each of the ship’s departments. And, while he was at it, make sure his own communications rigs, both the primary and auxiliary, were immaculate, and his subordinates at their most presentable.

  “May I speak with you privately?”

  Lord Richard Li was the only person at the reception besides Sula who was wearing dress whites, and Sula only wore her uniform because she didn’t have anything elegant or expensive enough for this company. Lord Richard, she presumed, had some other reason.

  “Privately?” Sula looked at him in surprise. “Yes, of course.”

  It was Terza Chen, Lord Richard’s fiancée, who had invited her to this function at the ornate Chen Palace, but Terza had glided off in her elegant way, and left Sula with Lord Richard.

  He took Sula’s arm and led her to a library off the front hall, dark wood carved with a pattern of holly, and ancient leather-bound books sealed behind glass, their delicate contents preserved by a mixture of rare gases. The sight made Sula want to lunge for the cabinets, pop the seals, and indulge in an orgy of reading.

  On the desk was a small fountain, water trickling over small stones, that gave the air a slight scent of brine. Lord Richard gazed at the fountain for a moment, then turned to face Sula.

  “Lord Richard?”

  “I heard about the Midnight Runner verdict,” he said. A Fleet Court of Inquiry had just proclaimed Blitsharts’s death an accident, the result of a faulty water intake coupling.

  “Unfortunately it’s only the first Midnight Runner verdict,” Sula said. “There’s going to be a lawsuit before the insurance company will part with any money. They’re going to say that Blitsharts damaged the coupling intentionally. So I’ll be stuck here giving depositions for years, unless I can get ship duty.”

  A smile crossed Lord Richard’s chiseled features. “Well, as to that,” he said, “I’ve just returned from the Commandery. That’s why I’m in uniform. The announcement won’t be made for a few days, but I’ve been informed that I’ll have command of the Dauntless when it comes out of refit. We’ll be joining the Second Cruiser Division, Home Fleet.”

  “Congratulations, my lord.” Dauntless was a new heavy cruiser finishing its first refit, with everything that hadn’t worked properly on its first tour repaired, replaced, or redesigned. It was a perfect command for this stage of Lord Richard’s career, and spoke well of Fleet Commander Jarlath’s confidence in him.

  “I know you’ll do well,” Sula said.

  “Thank you.” Lord Richard inclined his head as he looked at Sula. Behind him the little fountain chimed.

  “You know,” he said, “that I get to promote two lieutenants into Dauntless when I get command of her. In view of your family’s kindness to mine over many years, I wish to offer you one of those places.”

  Sula’s heart gave a surprised little skip. A captain’s promotions were usually quid pro quo arrangements within or between families—“I’ll promote your youngster, and you’ll see my cousin gets the supply contract for the satellite relays on Sandama.” But Sula didn’t have anything to offer in exchange. This was pure kindness on Lord Richard’s part.

  Sula found herself flushing with the effort to compose her thanks. Composing thanks wasn’t one of the things she did well. “Thank you, Lord Richard,” she managed. “I—I appreciate your—your confidence.”

  He smiled with his perfect white teeth. Sula observed little crinkles around his eyes when he smiled. “We’ll consider it done, then,” Lord Richard said.

  “Ah…my lord.” She felt herself flush. “You know that I’ve been cramming for my exams.”

  “Yes. Well, now that won’t be necessary. You can enjoy yourself.” Lord Richard began to step toward the exit across the deep pile of the Tupa carpeting.

  “I was going for a first, my lord,” Sula said. Lord Richard hesitated in mid-stride.

  “Really?” he said.

  “Ah…yes.” Her cheeks must be pouring out nova heat, she thought.

  “Do you think you have a chance?”

  There, Sula reflected, was the key question. The cadet who achieved a first—the highest score of all lieutenants’ exams given throughout the empire during a year—was almost certain to acquire a name in the service, and very possibly some patrons to go with it. She wouldn’t be dependent entirely on Lord Richard for promotion: with a first, many more doors would open to her.

  “I’ve been working the practice exams and doing very well,” Sula said. “Though of course a first is, ah…well, it’s unpredictable.”

  “Yes.” He knit his brows. “Well, the exams are in a mere ten days or so, correct?”

  “Yes, my lord.”

  He gave a modest shrug. “My offer will remain open, then. I won’t need a lieutenant in the next ten days, and if I get someone who was first in the Year 12,481, then Dauntless will only gain by the prestige.”

  “I—thank you, my lord.” Gratitude still had her tripping over her tongue.

  Lord Richard took her arm again and steered her for the door. “Good luck with all that, Caro—Caroline. I was never very good at exams—that’s why I was happy to take my uncle Otis’s offer of a lieutenancy.”

  Sula paused in surprised contemplation at the thought of a Lord Richard who wasn’t good at something, then dismissed the thought as modesty on the captain’s part.

  She and Lord Richard rejoined the reception, Lord and Lady Chen and their twenty-two guests. Terza floated toward them, looked at Sula and said, “Is it decided?”

  “Lord Richard has been very kind,” Sula said.

  “I’m so pleased,” Terza said, and clasped her hand.

  Suddenly Sula knew that the offer of promotion had been Lady Terza’s idea.

  “He’ll be able to set you on your career,” Lady Terza said.

  “Well, turns out it’s a little more complicated than that,” Lord Richard said, “but Lady Sula will be set on her career one way or another, and very soon.”

  Terza hesitated, then decided to smile. “Well,” she said, “that’s very good.”

  Sula’s nerves gave a warning tingle as Lady Vipsania Martinez walked into sight on the arm of a exquisitely dressed man with a receding hairline. Lady’sVipsania’s eyes widened slightly as her eyes met Sula’s, then she strode toward Sula with impressive dignity, the man following in her wake.

  “Lady Sula,” she said, “I’m sure you remember Sempronia’s fiancé, Lord PJ Ngeni.”

  Sula didn’t remember Lord PJ at all, but she said, “Of course. Is Sempronia here?”

  Melancholy touched PJ’s long face. “She’s over there.” He nodded toward a corner of the room. “With those officers.”

  Sula turned to see Sempronia speaking to a pair of men in civilian suits. “They’re officers?” she asked. She didn’t recognize them.

  “They’re always officers,” PJ said, his melancholy growing.

  “Go and fetch her, my dear,” Vipsania advised. “I’m sure she’d like to speak to Lady Sula.”

  “That’s a lovely gown,” Sula said. It was too. Some elderly seamstress had probably grown blind sewing on the thousands of beads.

  “Thank you.” A look of modest concern knit Vipsania’s brows. “We’ve been sorry you haven’t been able to attend our little get-togethers.”

  “I left town,” Sula said. “I was cramming for my exams.”

&
nbsp; “Ah.” She nodded in apparent satisfaction. “It hadn’t anything to do with my brother, then.”

  Sula’s heart gave a jolt. “Lord Gareth?”

  “He thought he might have offended you in some way. He can be a dreadful idiot sometimes.”

  “Dreadful idiot?” queried Sempronia as she arrived with PJ. “We’re talking about Gareth, I presume?”

  Sula decided to set the record straight. Or straighter, anyway. “He hasn’t offended,” Sula said flatly. “And he’s quite the opposite of an idiot.”

  Sempronia narrowed her hazel eyes. “I hate him,” she said. “I refuse to hear a word said on his behalf.” She smiled as she said it, but those narrowed eyes weren’t smiling.

  Lord Richard seemed both amused and a little discomfitted to find himself in the midst of this family drama. “What do you have against my brother officer?” he said finally.

  Sempronia gave PJ a flicker of a glance. “That’s between me and Gareth,” she said.

  “Sometimes I feel as if I’m marrying into a pack of tigers,” PJ said. “I’m going to have to watch myself night and day.”

  Sempronia patted his arm. “Retain that thought, my dear,” she said, “and we’ll get along fine.”

  PJ adjusted the line of a lapel, then gave his collar a tweak, as if suddenly finding himself a little warm.

  “Lady Sula,” Terza said in her soft voice, “Richard tells me that you’re interested in porcelain. Would you like to see some of our collection?”

  “I’d love it,” Sula said, happy for Terza’s tactful shift of subject. “And I wonder,” she ventured, “if I might glance at some of the books as well.”

  Terza was mildly surprised. “Oh. Those. Certainly. Why not?”

  “Do you have any books,” Sula asked, “that come from old Terra?”

  “Yes. But they’re in languages that no one reads anymore.”

  Sula gave a contented smile. “I’ll be very happy just to look at the pictures,” she said.

  The case of the missing wardroom supplies was solved when Martinez went into the wardroom that evening for a cup of coffee and found Lieutenant Captain Tarafah rummaging through the steel-lined food locker. Tarafah had just returned with the team after a day’s practice, and he was placing a couple of smoked cheeses in the hamper carried by his orderly. Martinez observed that the hamper already contained three bottles of wine and two bottles of excellent brandy.

  “My lord?” Martinez asked. “May I help you?”

  Tarafah looked over his shoulder at Martinez, then nodded. “You may, Lord Lieutenant Martinez.” He reached into the locker and withdrew two bottles of aged cashment. “Do you prefer the pickled or the kind soaked in vermouth?”

  “The pickled, my lord.” Martinez hated the stuff and would be glad to see the last of it.

  The pickled cashment went into the hamper, followed by some canned butter biscuits, purple-black caviar from Cendis, and a wedge of blue cheese. “That should do it,” Tarafah said with satisfaction, then closed the heavy doors and locked them with his captain’s key.

  The captain’s key opened the wardroom store and spirit locker, Martinez noted. Interesting.

  The smoky odor of the cheeses floated up from the hamper, which sat on the narrow cherrywood table built to serve Corona’s three lieutenants and one or two of their guests. Martinez called up the inventory, and jotted the captain’s acquisitions onto the wardroom screen.

  “My lord?” he said. “Would you sign for the stores?”

  “I can’t sign. I’m not a member of the wardroom mess.”

  Which was perfectly true. Martinez reflected that the captain certainly had the facts at his fingertips.

  Time, he thought, for the query discreet.

  “Are the captain’s stores running low, my lord?”

  “No.” Offhand, as he tucked his key away into his tunic. “I’m contributing as well.”

  “Contributing, Lord Elcap?”

  Tarafah looked at him with impatience. “To our series of feasts for the Steadfast’s officers. They’re providing the officials and referees for the game, and it’s necessary to keep on their good side.”

  “Ah. I see.”

  “The chief referee is being very sensible about the offside rule. We need to keep him sweet.” Tarafah shouldered his way past Martinez and into the corridor that led to his own cabin. “Koslowski, Garcia, and I won’t be back till late. You’re on watch tonight, right?”

  “Ah, no, my lord.” But Tarafah was out of earshot, followed by his orderly, before Martinez could explain that he’d just got off his double watch, and that the watch tonight would be kept by Corona’s master weaponer, who would be drinking himself into unconsciousness in Command while Cadet Vonderheydte performed all necessary watch-keeping tasks from an auxiliary station he’d set up forward, near the umbilical.

  But Tarafah wasn’t interested in these arrangements, anyway.

  Martinez watched the broad-shouldered back of the captain recede, then returned to the wardroom and signed out all missing stores as a “contribution to captain’s personal charity.” Then he signed out a can of caviar—the last—a tin of macaroons, another of crackers, a bottle of smoked red peppers, a duck preserved in its own fat, a brace of cheeses, a couple bottles of wine, and a bottle of brandy, from which he made a splendid cold meal, the remainder of which he stowed in his own cabin.

  If he was going to be paying for someone else’s feast, the least he could do was have one of his own.

  The exam proctor was a Daimong, and scented the room with the faint putrescence of her perpetually dying, perpetually renewed flesh. Strips of dry, light gray skin, weightless as the empty husks of insects, hung from the Daimong’s cuffs and long, long chin, and her round, deepset black eyes gazed at the assembled cadets with the fixed Daimong combination of melancholy and alarm.

  “Electronic devices must now be turned off,” she said in her chiming voice. “Any electronic devices will be detected and the user marked down as a cheat.”

  It would have been hard to smuggle electronic devices into the examination room in any case. The cadets—all in this room were Terran—wore their black examination robes, silk with viridian stripes for Peers, synthetics without markings for commoners. They had been made to change into these just moments ago, and their clothing was being held for them till the end of the day. The rest of the costume consisted of felt slippers and a soft, floppy round hat, the Peers’ version of which had a green pompon.

  Sula supposed she might have smuggled some electronics in her underwear, but how she would read them past the densely woven black silk was beyond her imagination.

  The Daimong checked the telltales on her electronic scanners. Apparently the result was satisfactory, because the next command was, “Activate your desks.”

  Sula did so. The exams existed only in electronic form, and had been loaded into the desks only moments before by the proctor herself. Though the computers in the desks could be used to help solve problems, there was no information in their memories that could give the cadets any help beyond doing the numbers.

  The first exam was mathematics—a snap, Sula reckoned. Then astrophysics, with an emphasis on wormhole dynamics, followed by theoretical and practical navigation, which was math and astrophysics combined. All things she prided herself as being good at.

  The next day’s exams included history, military law, and engineering, all subjects in which she felt confidence. The third, final day featured tactical problems and the only exam for which Sula felt trepidation, “The Praxis: Theory, History, and Practice.” As the old joke went, it was the only exam where too many wrong answers could earn you the death penalty. Even though the Praxis was supposed to be eternal and unvarying, in practice the ground of interpretation tended to shift uneasily over time, and Sula had saved studying Praxis theory till last in hopes that her answers would reflect the current official line.

  “You may toggle on the first question,” the Daimong said. “Y
ou have two hours and twenty-six minutes to complete the series.”

  Sula toggled, and the first question appeared:

  Under what circumstances does the identity

  give the following:

  The answer was obvious to her: when x = x1, x2, x3, etc. and R4(x) vanishes.

  Then she read the question again to make sure there wasn’t something hidden in it.

  Are they all going to be this easy? she wondered.

  During the next afternoon watch in Command, Martinez made certain one of the displays showed the view from the security camera set outside the airlock. If the high command had a surprise inspection scheduled for his watch, he wanted to see it coming.

  He had done his best to prepare. He’d told the first lieutenant, Koslowski, of his suspicions, and Alikhan had alerted the senior warrant and petty officers. As a result, Corona’s crew—at least those who weren’t involved in football—had joined Zhou, Ahmet, and Knadjian in furiously applying scrub brushes, polish, or lemon wax to every surface in sight.

  Even the missiles in the tubes had been hand-buffed, and any scrapes from the automatic loaders to their special lawn-green paint had been repaired.

  And now, Martinez saw, a party of Naxids was on its way, their scurrying, pounding feet driving them at their usual rocketing pace on the broad rubberized passage along the outside of the ring station. The party came to a lurching stop at the airlock of the Steadfast, the cruiser docked off Corona’s spinward flank. Through the display, Martinez could see their chameleon-weave jackets flashing as they looked at Steadfast’s airlock and at their sleeve displays.

  He couldn’t imagine what they were doing. They certainly weren’t inspecting anything.

  Martinez reached for the joystick that controlled the security camera and zoomed toward the Naxid party.

  Kulukraf wasn’t in charge of this group, he saw: instead there was a senior captain, a half-dozen lieutenants, and—strangely—twice that number of warrant officers. They were going through the same routine Martinez had seen yesterday—pointing, conferring, flashing. Whatever they were up to, it required senior specialists. He was about to zoom in closer in order to distinguish the specialty patches on the warrant officers’ uniforms when the group moved, their scrabbling feet throwing their long bodies out of the camera frame.