In the Stormy Red Sky-ARC

by David Drake

  He coughed. "Leaks everywhere from the whipping," he added. "Of course."

  "Of course," Daniel said. He closed his eyes, but that didn't help so he reopened them.

  "Even so the Millie's tighter than a lot of ships that never saw action, sir!" Cory said earnestly. "Ah, there's thirty-three casualties beyond bruises and such. Mostly they were in the aft section'—"

  And therefore vaporized.

  "—but there were half a dozen broken bones and—"

  He actually smiled as he nodded.

  "—head injuries. Woetjans says she'll have the outriggers watertight in six hours so we can land. We'll ride low, but there's enough buoyancy. I estimate seventy percent of the rig is serviceable. We've got over half our High Drive motors now, and Pasternak figures he can raise that to eighty percent in a day or two when he's replaced feed lines. And the plasma thrusters, all but the aft eight, they're fine."

  "You haven't asked about the battle, Leary," said Senator Forbes in a rusty voice. "Don't you care?"

  Daniel looked up at her. It wasn't a silly question to a civilian, he supposed.

  "Your Excellency," he said aloud. "At the point I left duty—"

  Hogg guffawed. Adele and Cory smiled; hers cold, his startled. The Senator didn't react.

  "—I already knew that we'd won. The fact that I'm alive and the Milton is functional if not healthy means that we've won at lower cost than I'd feared. I'll get to other matters in good time, but first I had to learn our status."

  He tensed to rise. That went well enough, so he began to lever himself up. Hogg put his broad hand beneath Daniel's shoulders to steady and carefully assist, though his frown showed that he didn't approve of the young master's decision.

  "We're still above Cacique," Adele said. "You've only been unconscious for three hours. Captain Battenberg of the Jervis is in operational command. She, ah, was commodore of the ships that escaped from New Harmony, and she appeared to be fully competent."

  "She is indeed," Daniel said. "She commanded one of the destroyer flotillas under Admiral Ozawa, I believe."

  He was puzzled to detect—he thought—a defensive note in Adele's voice, as though the command was something to do with her. Since Battenberg was the senior captain, she naturally took command after the—he grinned—admiral had been incapacitated.

  "Can this ship get to Cinnabar, Leary?" Forbes said. "Or do we have to transfer to another one? I want to get back with this news immediately."

  "Ah, your Excellency . . ." Daniel said. He wondered if he were hallucinating. "We've effectively captured the Montserrat Stars. Organizing the cluster will be an enormous job."

  "Yes, it bloody well will," snapped Forbes. "A job for a Senatorial Commission, whole shiploads of bureaucrats, and I shouldn't wonder if it required any number of people from Navy House and the Xenos Barracks as well. For now there's nothing here that Governor Flanagan on Cacique and Captain Battenberg can't handle as well as we could."

  "As you say, your Excellency," Daniel said. "But I would have expected that you'd want to take charge of the reorganization yourself?"

  "What?" said he Senator. "Bury myself here in the boondocks? I don't think so, Leary!"

  She tented her hands and grinned over them. "No, no," she said. "We'll go back to Xenos, where you will make a personal report to the Senate in open session."

  Forbes chuckled. Her expression was almost a parody of delight. "Let's see them keep me out of the cabinet now, when I've recovered the Montserrat Stars," she said. "At the side of the Navy's greatest hero!"

  I will be buggered, Daniel thought. He didn't speak.

  Adele turned to Forbes. There actually was humor in her smile, which made it all the more horrifying.

  "If we're to be the supporting players in your little drama, Senator," she said, "you should learn that the correct terminology is 'the RCN', not 'the Navy.' But regardless, you can expect us to honorably accomplish the tasks assigned by our political masters."

  EPILOGUE

  Xenos on Cinnabar

  "The Senate has met here occasionally, you know," said Deirdre Leary, looking around the Main Lecture Hall of the Library of Celsus. "I've never been inside myself, though."

  Daniel shrugged and smiled. "History wasn't one of my strong suits, Deirdre," he said. "It's a suitable room for this affair; that's all that matters."

  Though thinking about it, he wasn't sure that Adele would have been in this hall before. She said she'd spent her youth largely in the Library, but to her that meant carrels in the stacks and the offices of individual librarians whom she respected.

  The dais was three steps up from the mosaic floor and behind a knee-high screen of carven stone. Adele stood in the center, wearing Dress Whites with a non-regulation thigh pocket. Today that did not—somewhat to Daniel's surprise—hold her personal data unit.

  Adele looked not so much uncomfortable as absent. She seemed to have shut down emotionally.

  Behind her were the chief dignitaries. On the left end of the line was Admiral Anston; as a concession to his health, he sat on the only chair in the hall. The remaining officials were members of the Senate in full regalia, with Speaker Bailey opposite Anston and Senator Forbes immediately to his right. Her robes had the dark blue stripe of the Defense Ministry.

  Daniel frowned in puzzlement. Unless he was badly mistaken, the remaining senators were leading members of four different—and mutually antagonistic—factions.

  "I, ah, appreciate the way you've handled this for me, Deirdre," he said in his sister's ear. Onlookers who shuffled and chatted before the start of the proceedings raised a curtain of white noise, but he didn't want to be overheard in a chance silence. "When I'd put the request through RCN channels on our return from Diamondia, I didn't expect a problem."

  He looked away, then back to Deirdre. "I wasn't willing to let it pass. Not . . . this."

  "No," said Deirdre. "A Leary can't ignore an obligation to a retainer."

  "I'm not sure," Daniel said, "that Adele would approve of being considered a member of the Leary household."

  The smile remained on his lips, but his mind was on the night when he, Hogg, and the Bantry retainers waited around the manor, armed with anything from hay forks to stocked impellers. His mother and her maids were inside. She'd thought that Daniel should be with her, but Hogg had been firm: "The young master's a good shot. We might need him."

  Daniel Leary had indeed been a good shot, for a seven-year-old. That was the night the Corder Leary crushed the Three Circles conspiracy. Adele's parents had died then, and during the next few weeks hundreds of their friends and associates had died also during the Proscriptions.

  Adele was on Blythe at the time, so she wouldn't have personal memories of that night. She preferred to get information at second hand, however, from books and records. The Proscriptions were well documented in all their bloody horror.

  Deirdre sniffed. "When has a Leary ever cared about what somebody else thought was right?" she said.

  Daniel chuckled, but that was the truth. He was a Leary and he would do what was right, regardless of what others thought about it.

  The body of the lecture hall was almost entirely filled with RCN uniforms, though they alternated between officers in Whites and common spacers in liberty suits. Daniel and his sister were in front, and Woetjans was a little farther down the row.

  Deirdre was the only person near the dais who wasn't one of the original Sissies . . . though that was stretching the point slightly for Tovera, standing primly at Deirdre's left with her hands folded on the handle of her attaché case. Rank today was determined by how close a person was to Adele Mundy, and no one was closer than the shipmates from Kostroma whose lives she'd saved and who had in turn saved hers.

  "Father says it was a useful exercise," Deirdre said. "A show of unity now will help the conduct of the war, and this was a cause all factions could support without losing face. He described it to his colleagues as a necessary assertion of Senatorial authori
ty over bureaucrats who were getting above themselves."

  She gave the senatorial finery on the dais a professional appraisal. She wasn't a member of the Senate yet, but that would change whenever she and Corder Leary decided that it should. Daniel's elder sister was in all ways their father's proper heir.

  The only important Senator who didn't stand on the dais was Corder Leary: still Speaker Leary to his colleagues. His absence was more than mere courtesy. If Adele didn't have her data unit, then she probably hadn't brought her pistol either. She could have borrowed something from Tovera, though, and she would have.

  The Mundys were just as careful of their honor as the Learys were. If Adele were forced to meet the man who had ordered the massacre of her family, she would act.

  "This was worth doing for itself," Daniel said, his mind still back on that former time. "I'm glad it benefits the Republic, but that had no bearing on why I'm doing it."

  He cleared his throat. "I, ah, wasn't sure how much difficulty I'd put you to, Deirdre," he said. "The lady in question is formidable, I believe?"

  "She wouldn't be of much use to the Republic were she not formidable," Deirdre said with another sniff. "I talked with her myself, though, and found her quite willing to accept the judgment of a united Senate. To tell the truth—"

  She looked around, though her modest height—neither child had gotten Corder Leary's craggy stature—prevented her from seeing beyond the second row. Mistress Sand wouldn't have been present anyway.

  "—I don't believe she was too deeply disturbed. It seems that the problem you asked me to look into was caused by someone in her organization exceeding his authority and not reporting his action. I know how I react when something like that happens at the bank."

  "Ah," said Daniel, for he did understand. He thought for a moment, then said, "I haven't been a notably obedient subordinate myself, but if I'd acted to embarrass my superiors, my career would have been shorter."

  "Yes," said Deirdre. "I don't think the fellow will repeat his mistake. So that was no problem, but oddly enough Navy House made some difficulty."

  "Ah, Vocaine," Daniel said. It wasn't a surprise that the Chief of the Navy Board disliked Daniel Leary enough to carry the enmity to Leary's friends, but it was a disappointment nonetheless.

  "Not really," said Deirdre. "According to Senator Forbes, who handled the negotiations—"

  Daniel raised an eyebrow.

  Deirdre nodded. "Father thought she provided a suitable mixture of goodwill toward the RCN and a disinclination to be bullied by bureaucrats. And it was the bureaucracy generally which objected, on principle—a concept which Navy House seems to take more seriously than the Senate does."

  She shrugged and smiled. "In the end, they decided that because Lady Mundy had been an acting admiral—"

  "What?"

  "Yes, that's right," Deirdre said in a tone of amused superiority. "I gather it happened during your absence."

  Her expression changed. "You have a hard head, brother," she said. "I've never before been so pleased at the fact."

  He looked away and nodded. "Yes, well," he muttered.

  "In any case," said Deirdre, "the fact that Mundy had acted as a commissioned officer was significant. Mistress Forbes told them that she didn't care what excuse they found, but that she was glad they had found one or there would shortly be empty offices in Navy House."

  "I'm glad it didn't come to that," said Daniel quietly.

  A slim man in Dress Whites came from a side aisle and took the steps up to the dais. His face was set, and he held a small casket covered in red leather.

  Daniel straightened to attention. He was smiling broadly.

  The hall grew silent. Adele looked at the pale misery on Lieutenant Commander Huxford's face as he approached. I wonder if he thinks I did this to him?

  She smiled at the thought. Her record should have told Huxford that she would either have ignored the matter as she ignored most such matters, or she would have dealt with it in a more direct fashion. But then, if Huxford had bothered to study her record to begin with, he wouldn't have chosen to be so superciliously insulting.

  Adele's smile appeared to make the smooth young man even more wretched. Direct action—shooting him—might have been kinder at that.

  Huxford transferred the casket to his left hand and saluted Admiral Anston. The admiral returned it, smartly but with a smile that Adele read as one of mocking triumph. Chiefs of the Navy Board had to accept the fact that sometimes intelligence personnel would wear RCN uniforms, but Adele couldn't imagine that they liked the fact.

  She was, she hoped, a different animal: an RCN officer involved with intelligence. Not that she cared what Navy House thought, so long as her family accepted her.

  She had first seen Anston in person at the funeral of Daniel's uncle, three years before. Then he'd been ruddy, plump, and vibrant; a lively man though one who gave little outward evidence that he was capable of managing the RCN with genius.

  Anston was white, now, and the skin sagged from his cheekbones. There was still a spark, but its casing of flesh was tottering toward dissolution.

  "Admiral Anston," said Huxford, his voice clear. Though unamplified, it easily filled the hall. The architects of the Celsus had created a temple to human knowledge. To them, knowledge was the greatest of Gods, and to Adele also. You don't skimp your duties to God.

  "Senators and fellow citizens of the Republic," Huxford said.

  Daniel, resplendent in his medals, flashed Adele a broad grin. She found herself grinning back, because it was funny.

  At least Huxford has the decency not to address his audience as "fellow spacers." There were some present who might have tossed him out into the street without his trousers if he'd tried that. And Anston might have been leading them if he managed to get out of his chair. . . .

  "I have been chosen to grant the Republic's highest award for bravery to Signals Officer Adele Mundy," Huxford said. "The commendation refers to her activities in bringing Dunbar's World into the Friendship of the Republic. Those of you who are familiar with Lady Mundy's career know that there have been many other exploits, any of which would have amply justified the award."

  "Bloody well told!" muttered Hogg in the brief pause. He looked startled, obviously surprised at how good the acoustics were.

  Huxford opened the casket and took from it the small red-enameled star on a ribbon whose vertical red stripes framed the blue stripe in the center. An RCN Star would reverse the colors. . . .

  Adele's eyes blurred. She hoped she wasn't going to cry.

  "Signals Officer Mundy . . ." said Huxford. "As agent for the Republic, I hereby award you the Cinnabar Star."

  She felt the pressure of his fingers above her left breast. His face was out of focus, a blob of white.

  Huxford stepped back. The cheers were immediate and stunning. The hall couldn't hold more than two hundred people, but they sounded as if there were thousands. And it went on. . . .

  Adele made a decision. She raised both hands, a gesture she didn't recall having made in the past. The noise didn't stop but its level reduced, and finally it stopped.

  Adele swallowed. "Fellow spacers," she said. She'd been afraid that the words would choke her, but she got them out.

  Turning enough to look back at the robes figures behind her, she said, "Senators of the Republic of Cinnabar."

  If anybody had a problem with her priorities, that was regrettable. She felt a smile of sorts lift the corners of her lips. But not very regrettable.

  "I cannot accept this honor for Signals Officer Mundy," she said. "And certainly not as Mundy of Chatsworth."

  There were puzzled expressions in the audience. Good.

  "I will accept it, however," Adele said, feeling her voice grow firmer with each word, "as the representative of the many thousands of common spacers, and of—"

  Huxford had stepped to the side. She turned to him, nodded, and faced the audience again.

  "—of all the other
unseen personnel who sacrifice and often die to maintain the Republic's freedom."

  And me among them. Not me alone, but me also.

  Adele couldn't see anything for the tears filling her eyes. "RCN forever!" she shouted.

  The hall echoed her a thousand fold.

  THE END

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