Princess Valerie's War

by Terry Mancour

  But it was the guns that made the most dramatic impact. The natives had been fighting with single-shot muskets or captured pistols – some even held spears. From the way they held the new weapons, however, and the slipshod way they had their base defenses laid out, Valkanhayn realized that the Nuitian rebels were likely to get destroyed long before they inflicted any serious damage on their overlords. But they had plenty of fighting spirit, and Valkanhayn knew that in an insurgency, that could count as much as an extra aircav division.

  After discussing the matter with his senior officers, and asking for volunteers, he ordered twenty Royal Navy marines to stay behind as advisors, to teach the Nuitians how to fight and plan a successful strategy. Most of the marines were Tanith natives, themselves, so they had a better appreciation of the more primitive Nuitian society than the Sword Worlders – but every one of them was a graduate of Camp Valiant, which made them a crack shot and well-experienced in the art of dispensing mayhem. The brave lieutenant who commanded them promised that inside of two thousand hours he’d have a robust resistance force ready to attack the local puppet’s strongholds.

  Less than twenty hours after she’d been taken by the Space Scourge, the Belvoir vanished back into hyperspace, on her way to Tanith, where she’d be re-commissioned as part of the new Tanith Space Merchant Fleet. Valkanhayn himself would pocket a healthy percentage of the sale of the ship to the fleet, and since he was a stockholder as well, the ship would continue to earn money for him. And he hadn’t fired a shot.

  Valkanhayn’s thoughts turned to Lucas as the Space Scourge climbed back out of Nuit’s gravity well. If it hadn’t been for Lucas Trask, Valkanhayn would never have been tempted to raid Nuit at all, ever – they were too civilized, too well armed to be considered a “chicken” planet that the old Space Scourge was capable of raiding -- at least the parts of the world with enough portable wealth worth stealing. But Lucas had changed all that. Thanks to his patronage, Valkanhayn’s ship had been thoroughly refurbished and refitted back at Wardshaven on Gram, and she was now as well-armed and as hardened as any civilized warship.

  Valkanhayn himself was refurbished and refitted, too. Where once he’d all but accepted the prospect of dying violently, likely in poverty, unknown and unremembered, now he had a ship, a title, a position, rank, even lands – there was a County somewhere in central Gamma continent that was labeled “Valkanhayn”, a twisty strip of fertile river valley surrounded by forests. He’d seen pictures of it – it was pretty. And now thanks to Lucas Trask, he might have an opportunity to retire there someday.

  But not now. He had a debt to pay to his missing Prince, and a blood debt he owed to the Atonians. Captain Horvelle of the Queen Flavia had been a good friend of his, and Lucas was a prince worthy of being followed. He would attack the Atonians until he was out of ammo and out of men, and keep attacking them until Lucas was returned and asked him to stop. It might be a long, bloody, dangerously violent quest, but he was committed to Lucas’ return. Besides, he rather enjoyed waging war, as opposed to raiding. The money might not be as good, but the entertainment was ideal.

  Valkanhayn quite fancied the idea of himself as a pirate.

  He sighed contentedly as he ordered the course to the next target, Jotun, to be laid in. According to his intelligence, there should be another Atonian merchantman arriving there in just three hundred hours from some distant mining colony in the galactic hinterlands to trade with that world’s puppet government.

  Intelligence said that there wasn’t a regular Atonian Navy patrol ship based there, but Valkanhayn wasn’t taking any chances. He needed to capture as many of these ships as possible, as quickly as possible. Once the Atonians realized that the Tanith ships were aware of their scheduled flights they’d change the schedule or add naval protection or both, of course – but until then, Tanith would snipe at her boarders, raid her shipping, and steal the workhorse merchant ships for their own use.

  And when Lucas was rescued, Valkanhayn told himself as the hyperspatial field built around the ship, he’d have to thank him all over again for the chance to serve. He hadn’t had this much fun in years.

  * * *

  The Golden Hand came into the solar system quietly, emerging from hyperspace far out in the Oort cloud where the chances of detection were remote. The G2 sun gleamed feebly in the distance, and only four planets – three terrestrial rocks and a pint-sized Jovian world – glinted in its dim light. The second planet of the system was the target, or, more accurately, the busy lunar base installed on the largest of its three moons was.

  The planet, Nimue, had been raided last year by the Space Scourge and the Queen Flavia. The two ships had plundered the industrial zones on the planet itself, hauling away a huge amount of robotics and electronics from its factories. They’d dueled briefly with an Atonian cruiser before pulling out, but the battle had been inconclusive. The raid had severely irritated the Atonians, from what Mardukan Naval Intelligence revealed, and irritated them to the point where additional ground defenses for the planet were already en route.

  But the planet wasn’t the Golden Hand’s target. Tanith’s council of war had spent weeks trying to plan out a mission that would hamper the Atonians, and after dissecting every piece of information available on the Old Federation empire – and then consulting with Mr. Dawes, who provided additional information only the Wizard could have known – a list of targets was generated from across Atonian space.

  The targets were selected not to inflict maximum casualties, or even destroy Aton’s means of production. Instead they were designed to put as many kinks in their commercial and military network as possible. To that end, the busy commercial spaceport on Dryad, the largest moon, was selected as a high-value target.

  Nimue had never lost the arts of civilization completely – during the hundred and fifty years it had suffered without contact with other planets after the Interstellar Wars it had muddled along, largely unscathed by the factional fighting that had torn apart the Old Federation. Baldur had re-contacted the world and reopened trade as it sought markets for its precious Honey-Rum.

  A century later Marduk, in its ascendancy, had claimed suzerainty over the world, and had helped it develop its technical industries. The skill of the Nimuans with electronic design and production made the world a highly strategic prize, one prosperous enough to keep Nimue from becoming a battleground. Odin won the trading rights to the world as a treaty concession a century after that, and most recently Aton had taken charge of the planet. According to Mardukan Naval Intelligence, they were already constructing a large military base on the second moon, Naiad.

  Analysis indicated that this base would grow to be a strategic threat to Tanith within three years, if it was allowed to be constructed. And the commercial lunar base was a major port between Enlil, Aton, and Ishtar. Which made it an ideal target for the Golden Hand.

  The attack was sudden, as the Golden Hand’s weapons ports were open and ready to fire the moment she re-emerged from hyperspace. Dispatching two of her four pinnaces in the Oort cloud, Captain Molina made four rapid microjumps before deploying the other two. They were detailed to destroy the crater-like construction site on the second moon, and within ten minutes of entering the planetary gravity well, five 20 kiloton nuclear missiles lanced silently across the void to turn the three thousand construction workers and their equipment into radioactive slag on Naiad, before turning to support their mother ship.

  The Golden Hand, meanwhile, made a high-speed pass over the busy port where five merchant ships in the process of loading or unloading were berthed. As her missile ports spewed a variety of nuclear and conventional ordinance, the equatorial cannons blazed away, strafing the sensitive infrastructure of tubes, cables, and life-support equipment exposed around the base with 90 mm collapsium-plated explosive shells.

  The base was taken utterly by surprise. The central hub, a dome of collapsium completely covering a small but prominent crater, was struck six times by nuclear strikes. While th
e dome itself survived the silent hell, the walls of the crater proved to be less sturdy. The dome de-pressurized, and as the Golden Hand passed by, a lucky 10-kiloton tactical nuke penetrated the breach and evaporated 250,000 human beings in an instant.

  Four of the five ships docked at the port were damaged to one extent or another. The only ship that was unscathed displayed the large blue-triangle-in-a-white-circle that the Gilgameshers used as both a religious symbol and a blazon on their ships. Tanith had always respected the Gilgameshers, and Captain Molina had taken great pains to make certain that the ship escaped unharmed.

  While the Golden Hand was wreaking havoc on the lunar bases, two planetary defense ships rose from the surface of Nimue to intercept – they would be too late, of course. But as they did so, the other two pinnaces microjumped to the other side of the planet. Eclipsed from the defenders by the bulk of the world, and appearing above one of the planet’s two oceans, the pinnaces were able to successfully descend low enough into the atmosphere to release several aircars safely below, before they climbed back into high orbit and hyperspaced out.

  The aircars were the key to the whole operation. As much as Tanith wanted the lunar bases gone, the real goal was to insert teams of agents into the Atonian trading empire for later positioning. Golden Hand agents and Ministry of Everything Else operatives had studied for weeks to pass as their cover identities. The insertion into Nimue during the time of crisis gave them plausible enough stories to let them work their way into various parts of Atonian society. They could embed themselves amongst the refugees and make their way to their ultimate destinations in the confusion.

  Captain Molina released a pre-recorded message into the airwaves as the Golden Hand began preparations for departure, beaming it directly towards the planet.

  The audiovisual clip showed Her Highness sitting on her throne, next to Prince Lucas’ empty throne, looking absolutely gorgeous and incredibly deadly in her custom-made white combat armor, the imposing Sword of State she had so recently hefted defiantly in the air laid across her lap. She delivered a blistering ten-minute diatribe on the Atonian Planetary Nationalist Party, explained the reason for the attack, and assured all who saw that this was the price paid by those who would assail the Princely Realm of Tanith. Such attacks would continue, she promised, until Prince Lucas was restored to her.

  The amount of electromagnetic disturbance in the ether made immediate receipt of the message difficult for the Nimuans – and they were responding to a severe crisis, anyway. But to ensure the message got through, the Golden Hand released a small satellite into high Nimuan orbit before it left, re-broadcasting the message on all frequencies in an endless loop. There it would sit until someone went and got it. And with a power cell the size of a coffee can powering the transmitter, the message could be expected to play, continuously, for three thousand, five hundred, and twenty five years. Designed as a permanent annoyance, the satellite also had a suite of electronics designed to “listen in” on local communication traffic, too – but the Nimuans wouldn’t know that until they actually took the time to send a ship to retrieve it.

  Rendezvousing with her pinnaces in the orbit of the Jovian world a mere ten hours after entering the system, the Golden Hand continued on to its next target, where it would repeat the process. They had done billions of sols in damage, crippled commercial shipping at a critical hub, and delivered a massive blow to the morale of the Nimuans, who had been attacked twice in a year because of their alliance with Aton.

  And damaging that may have been the most important success of them all.

  * * *

  The Moon Goddess did not go straight for an attack on Atonian worlds. Instead it jumped from Nuit to Osiris, five hundred hours away.

  The need for Tanith to have additional allies in the Old Federation was clear. Marduk had been an outstanding sponsor and surrogate, but due to its long history with Aton the amount that Marduk could do on Tanith’s behalf was limited. Odin was too proud to ally with tiny Tanith, and Isis considered Space Vikings to be the worst sort of neobarbarians. Baldur was too concerned about being on the winning side to actually take sides. Ishtar was aloof, concerned with its eight billion inhabitants first and foremost.

  That didn’t leave a lot of room for potential partners for Tanith, but there were several smaller power blocs who might be persuaded. Osiris was one of these.

  Dating from the second great phase of expansion in the Old Federation, Osiris was a warm, wet planet, the fourth of its G7 star, which despite its relatively small population had managed to maintain civilization relatively uninterrupted during the period of the Interstellar Wars. Internal political pressures had gotten the better of them, finally, just as the other Great Powers were beginning to forge their own empires, and Osiris was able to stave off the final plunge into decivilization thanks to the efforts of Ishtar and Baldur. The Osirian government had stabilized, finally, and when Ishtar withdrew her support to deal with her own troubles, Osiris was able to maintain and protect its affairs on its own.

  More, its association with the merchants of Baldur had helped Osiris become ambitious. At first buying cast-off and near-junked ships from its patrons, it began a local triangular trade route between Baldur, Osiris, and the local decivilized world of Jarilo. Jarilo produced a number of vegetable-based raw materials that had a lot of marketable value.

  From there, they expanded their trade alliance to other local worlds, and now they were building their own ships. They were considered upstarts by the other Great Powers, of course – their military fleet was smaller than Tanith’s. But they had made themselves rich through trade and they had a lot of influence in certain parts of the Old Federation. Most importantly, they seemed strongly distrustful of Aton, due to some Atonian interference in Osiran elections a generation before.

  The Osirians might not make ideal allies for Tanith, but they had potential. That’s why the Moon Goddess was there. Sir Alexi Karvall had been appointed Special Envoy to Osiris, in order to feel them out on the matter. After being challenged by two sleek thousand-foot patrol ships in translunar orbit, the Moon Goddess presented her diplomatic credentials and then waited patiently to be directed to a berth at the Memphis Spaceport.

  The city was quite impressive, Sir Alexi noted to himself as they descended. Built on the edge of an escarpment, the pyramid-shaped Government Building dominated the city, and was flanked by two gloriously cascading waterfalls. The rest of the city of four million people spread out in a rough circle below the building, and the spaceport was located just to the South. To the North were little circular towns and hanging suburbs that dotted the face of the escarpment. Everything hummed with an activity and a liveliness that Alexi hoped to see one day on Tanith.

  Since the arrival of the Moon Goddess was unanticipated, there was a scramble to find the proper and appropriate diplomat to officially meet and greet the Space Vikings. In the end, the Foreign Secretary and two aides greeted him at the airlock with a small welcoming ceremony. The three were dressed in the dark brown coats and neck cloths that seemed to be the uniform of officialdom on Osiris, and after presenting his credentials and extending an invitation for them to tour his ship, Sir Alexi was escorted to a well-appointed conference room for consultation.

  Secretary Muniz seemed cordial enough, as he listened to Alexi’s well-practiced introduction to the current crisis between Tanith and Aton, and his aides took copious notes. But Muniz did not seem to think that Osiris could either be much help or what doing so would do to advance the planet’s own interstellar ambitions.

  “Trade, Excellency,” Alexi explained. “I’ve brought just a small selection of recent good brought to Tanith by our ships. Coffee from Malebolge, spirits from Lyra, tobacco from ten different worlds, and more. Tanith is becoming a clearing house for luxury goods as well as more industrial concerns. When a Space Viking ship raids a world, there’s no telling just what it’s going to pick up. There are bazaars on Tanith who sell liquor from over fifty worlds,�
� he boasted.

  “Luxury goods are nice,” conceded Muniz. “But there are plenty of them out there, and a limited market. If we start selling your spirits, then sales of Honey-Rum go down, and we still trade extensively with Baldur. And the market is limited. We’re a prosperous world, Excellency, but we are not wealthy.” That wasn’t quite true – Osiris’ economy was ten times larger than Tanith’s.

  “What about military supplies?” Sir Alexi asked. “Tanith has a growing arms industry.”

  “We do get most of our military materiel from Baldur, still,” he agreed, “and to be honest, the Baldurans may be outstanding at trading and manufacturing comforts, but their military hardware leaves much to be desired.”

  “The Tanith foundries have just begun producing a newly-designed 180mm anti-ship gun,” Alexi said, pulling up a basic schematic on his clerical robot. “It’s called the Dragon. It’s based on an old System States design that was never produced.” The complete plans for it had never found their way out to the Sword Worlds during the evacuation from Abigor, but the uncanny Mr. Dawes had provided a complete set to the Realm, and then oversaw its construction and testing. “It’s twice as large as a standard ship’s gun, but the special shells it fires have more than three times the penetrative power. The chemical charge is augmented by an electric propulsion system, giving the gun a demonic muzzle velocity. Further, the shells themselves are not merely collapsium-plated; they’re actually cones of collapsium-plated steel wound into a tight spiral. The additional layers harden the shell and between that and the high velocity, a barrage from the Dragon can rip through a standard-grade hull like a knife through butter. These will be standard on all Royal Navy of Tanith ships, soon. We believe it will give them a distinct tactical advantage.”