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CHAPTER 28: Mandelfarne Island on Dunbar's World

"Gentlemen and ladies," said Daniel, pulling out his own chair. "Please be seated."

The plural 'ladies' was stretching the point. Adele was at his side, while Elemere sat with Krychek across the square table. Between them were Corius and Colonel Quinn to Daniel's left, and to the right a pair of Federal Republic officials—Field Marshal, formerly General, Mahler and a civilian named Bartolomeo, the Finance Minister, who'd just arrived from Sinclos.

There wasn't a suitable conference room on Mandelfarne Island, but the weather was sunny with a brisk wind that kept the summer heat from being incapacitating, so Daniel'd ordered a sailcloth marquee spread over the Duilio's dorsal turret. The covered area was fifteen feet by twenty-five, quite sufficient for eight people around a table.

They could've cleared the cruiser's Great Cabin for the meeting, but Daniel preferred the outdoor location for a number of reasons. It was the highest flat surface on the island, so the gathered leaders could both see and be seen by everyone else. It gave them a close view of the damage done to the cruiser by the Sibyl's guns, which demonstrated to the local officials just how effective plasma cannon could be.

Perhaps the most important reason was the fact that Daniel found the setting congenial but he suspected that the others did not. If they were uncomfortable, they were less likely to bluster and force him to demonstrate that the real power was in the hands of the RCN representative. Bartolomeo had initially spoken as though he were in charge.

Daniel'd learned from his father's example that in the long term you were better off leaving your opponents with their dignity. If you robbed them of that, you had to destroy them utterly so that they couldn't come back and stab you at a later moment. Speaker Leary had understood the latter rule also, as the sole surviving Mundy could've testified.

Spacers were using a diamond saw to replace the cruiser's High Drive motors. The keening was audible, but it wasn't the overwhelming shriek it'd have been if the conference hadn't been seventy feet above with the depth of the hull between. The replacement units had been unbolted from the wreckage of the Greybudd in normal fashion, but flaring antimatter had welded the remains of the Duilio's motors into the remains of their mountings.

"I'm not clear on the purpose of this meeting, Leary," Bartolomeo said, mopping his forehead with a checked kerchief. He was a florid man whose quick, darting eyes had never quite made contact with Daniel's. "And I don't mind saying that I don't like heights!"

And I don't mind hearing it, Daniel thought. With a bland smile he said, "You can think of this as a logistical conference, Minister. As the ranking representative of the Republic of Cinnabar, it falls to me to suggest some dispositions."

"I don't see that you have any right whatever!" Bartolomeo said. "Dunbar's World is an independent—"

Corius rapped the table sharply with the tips of his right index and middle fingers. Marshal Mahler touched the minister's shoulder and, when the latter glanced up angrily, gave a quick shake of his head. Fallert was on the Dorsal 2 mainyard, watching the meeting from thirty feet away; Hogg and Tovera were on Dorsal 3, a similar distance aft of the turret. Bartolomeo hadn't noticed them or hadn't understood the implications, but Mahler certainly had.

"Commander Leary's skill and intelligence gave me my victory," Corius said calmly. "I'm more than ready to endorse any suggestions which such a benefactor chooses to make. Given that Dunbar's World owes her very liberty to him, I should think that in simple courtesy you'd grant him the same precedence, Minister Bartolomeo."

"Well, of course I'll listen to what he has to say," Bartolomeo said, licking his lips. "I. . . ."

His voice trailed off; he'd finally noticed Fallert's grin. He jerked his eyes down to the table in front of him.

"To begin with, there's the problem of the Pellegrinian prisoners," Daniel said. "I suppose under the laws of war they're the responsibility of the Federal Republic, but—"

"We don't have the facilities to feed and house eight thousand men," said Marshal Mahler. "Thus far they've been eating their own supplies and the weather's been temperate enough to keep them in the open here on Mandelfarne Island, but neither of those things will last long."

"We're not responsible!" Bartolomeo said quickly, though he kept his face lowered. "And they certainly can't be allowed back onto the mainland. Why, they're just pirates, you know. We should shoot them all!"

"Do you have any idea how long it would take to shoot eight thousand people?" asked Adele. She'd been sitting primly with her personal data unit on the table in front of her. Now she eyed Bartolomeo like a hawk over a vole. When the minister didn't look up, she tapped his ear lobe with the wand in her right hand.

"Do you, Minister Bartolomeo?" she repeated in a tone as thin as a razor. "Or are you proposing that we of the RCN handle the task with plasma cannon? Is that your plan?"

"I don't—" the civilian said. He leaned away from her, his eyes wide. "I didn't—"

Mahler put his hand firmly on Bartolomeo's shoulder and said, "Commander Leary, what solution do you propose?"

The fellow's showing himself to better advantage than he did as a rabbit being dug out of his hole, Daniel thought. Aloud he said, "I've discussed the matter informally with Councilor Corius. As I understand it, he's prepared to supply the prisoners and transport them off-planet."

Corius nodded. He was a handsome man and had a very pleasant smile, if you didn't look up at his eyes.

"I've already started making the arrangements," he said. "I've held discussions with the surviving Pellegrinian officers, and I'm pleased to say they're in enthusiastic agreement."

"They agree, you say?" said Landholder Krychek in a tone of surprise.

"I believe they were expecting alternatives of the sort Minister Bartolomeo proposed," Corius said. He chuckled. "Gathering sufficient shipping may take as long as ten days. I trust I can expect the help and forbearance of the Federal Republic during the delay?"

He raised an eyebrow toward the minister. "Well, I. . .," Bartolomeo said, then looked down at his hands again.

"Given that ten thousand trained troops are in favor of your plan, Councilor," Daniel said with a cheery smile to lay a swatch of velvet over the iron reality of his words, "it'd seem extremely dangerous, not to mention inhumane, for the Republic not to support it fully. Wouldn't you agree, Marshal Mahler?"

"My troops'll do all they can to make sure supplies get to the camps and to generally keep a lid on it while you're hiring transports, you bet," Mahler said. "But the sooner the better, Councilor."

"And to that end," Daniel said, "I've arranged the sale of the Rainha, an RCN prize, to Councilor Corius."

Referring to the Rainha as a prize was shading reality a trifle. Strictly speaking, Adele was the only active-service RCN officer involved in the taking, which otherwise bore many similarities to piracy carried out by Cinnabar citizens. Daniel was quite willing to pay the normal quarter share to Navy House when he returned to Xenos in order to beg that question.

He cleared his throat, then continued, "The prisoners are taken care of, then. The next—"

"One moment!" Bartolomeo said. "One thing I must know: where is Nataniel Arruns himself? We cannot compromise on this!"

"My servant Tovera," said Adele, looking at the minister but speaking with less emotion than a voice synthesizer would inject, "informs me that Arruns and his personal staff refused to surrender. They were killed in the fighting."

"Rather a fortunate result, frankly," said Corius with his usual smile. "His presence would've complicated my negotiations with the other Pellegrinian officers."

"Is that true?" said Marshal Mahler, looking past Bartolomeo to Adele. "I would've have expected. . . ."

"I'm quite sure that Arruns is dead if Tovera says he is," Adele said in the same flat tone. "If you believe it's necessary to look into the circumstances of his death, you have my permission to question my servant."

Mahler looked over his shoulder. Hogg grinned and waved with his left hand. The marshal faced around quickly and said, "I misspoke. My apologies."

"Next," Daniel continued in the pause, "is the matter of captured equipment. I propose that the small arms be delivered to Councilor Corius in consideration of Bennarian help in resisting the invaders. Marshal?"

Mahler grimaced. "I'd been hoping—" he said, then angrily shook his head. "No, I'm not going to get in your way, Leary."

He snorted. In a more cheerful tone he added, "I've seen what happens to people who do."

"Your society is already unsettled by the invasion," Adele said. Though dry, her voice was as harsh as a saw blade. "The availability of that number of automatic rifles would have even more serious consequences for the social order. I can give you examples after the meeting, if you'd like."

She smiled without humor. "I've seen examples."

"There remains the captured gear other than weapons," Daniel said, "including vehicles and heavy equipment. I believe these will be of value to your army, Marshal."

Bartolomeo looked from Daniel to Marshal Mahler. "The disposition of spoils is a matter for the finance ministry, not the army," he said sharply.

Daniel shrugged and smiled. "That's an internal matter for you gentlemen to discuss at leisure," he said. "I'm sure you'll be able to find a satisfactory solution."

Really he was sure that a number of local officials, including Mahler and Bartolomeo, were going to make a very good thing out of the loot, while little or none would go to either the army or the treasury. That didn't even begin to be a concern of Daniel Leary or the Republic of Cinnabar.

Krychek had been sitting with his hand over Elemere's. Now he removed it and thumped both palms on the tabletop. Leaning forward slightly, he said in a tone of challenge, "You haven't mentioned this Duilio, Leary, this cruiser. You are repairing it as we all hear. You plan to give it to Cinnabar, that is so?"

"It most certainly is not so, Landholder Krychek," said Daniel. He straightened in his seat and tried to give the words a properly upper-class nasal twang. Adele could've done it much better. . . . "I would regard any such action as a violation of my agreement with you—a despicable violation! In fact, I intend to transfer the Duilio to the Bennarian naval forces in exchange for the destroyer Sibyl. Which in turn—"

Krychek's face had flushed, then gone pale. Elemere laid her palm on the Landholder's bearded cheek. She smiled at Daniel as she spoke reassuringly in an undertone.

"—I propose to make over to you, milord," Daniel continued. "I hope you'll consider the Sibyl fair recompense for the Mazeppa and your valuable services to Leary of Bantry in my personal activities on Bennaria and here."

"By God, Leary," Krychek said.

He stood and reached over the table. Bartolomeo jumped back to avoid a brawl, but the Landholder merely gripped Daniel's hand and pumped it enthusiastically. "By God, you're a man!" he said.

Daniel rose and clasped the Landholder with both hands, then disengaged by stepping back. He looked to either side, largely to break eye contact as a hint to Krychek that it was time to sit down again.

"I realize that it may seem I'm being cavalier with other people's property," he said, "but I'm able to be the honest broker in this case since I have no share of the proceeds."

"The starship Rainha, you said," Bartolomeo noted with a fierce glance. "That's surely something, is it not?"

"The Rainha was captured on Pellegrino by persons under my command," Adele said, her voice rising. "In no respect does that affair become the business of yourself or Dunbar's World, sirrah!"

Daniel couldn't see his friend's face from his present angle, but Mahler flinched back as she focused her gaze on him. "Marshal," Adele said, enunciating with unusual precision even for her, "I suggest you muzzle your dog or I'll have him whipped into the sea. On my oath as a Mundy!"

Adele wouldn't ordinarily do that, Daniel thought. The shoulder wound, or perhaps what she'd been doing when she was wounded, was affecting her.

Loudly he said, "Remember your place, Mundy! I'm the ranking officer here."

He paused, then went on, "I will have him whipped into the sea."

Bartolomeo's mouth opened and closed twice. His expression wobbled between fear and anger as he tried to determine whether he was being threatened or mocked. Both, I suppose, Daniel decided.

"Commander, mistress," Mahler said. "We beg your pardon." He sounded sincere.

Adele visibly relaxed. She turned, looking up to Daniel, and nodded. "Sorry, sir," she said quietly.

"Quite all right, Mundy," Daniel said as he settled back onto his chair. "You were provoked. Now, getting back to business—"

He smiled brightly at the assembled group. Colonel Quinn looked extremely uncomfortable. Daniel wondered if it'd been a misstep at a meeting with Headman Ferguson and his magnates which'd cost Quinn his nose, ears, and position. That wasn't going to happen here, but Quinn was correct in feeling out of place.

"—there's the matter of crew for the Duilio. Many of her spacers aren't Pellegrinians, of course. They should be as willing to work for Bennaria as they were for Chancellor Arruns. Nonetheless, a prudent commander—"

He nodded to Corius and grinned; Corius grinned in reply. Quinn edged his chair a little further back from the table.

"—would want his officers to be men—"

Daniel would've said "persons" if he'd been speaking to a Cinnabar audience, but "men" was precisely the correct usage here.

"—of unquestioned courage, skill, and loyalty. With that in mind, Councilor Corius, I suggest you discuss the matter with Landholder Krychek. And Krychek?"

He cocked an eyebrow at the Landholder. Elemere was gripping his right hand in both of hers, looking happily excited.

"Aye, by God!" Krychek said. From the words and expression alone he might've been furious, but Daniel thought he knew the fellow well enough to be sure that wasn't the case.

"You were considering entering service with Headman Ferguson," Daniel continued. "I suggest—"

"Bloody hell, you don't want to do that!" blurted Quinn, shocked out of his worried silence. He tapped his nose. Though the shape was natural, the pale pink of the tip ended in a sharp line where the rest of the face was reddened and wind-burned from the weather here on Mandelfarne Island. "He's a right psycho, that one, and I'm the man to tell you!"

"Yes, I'm sure you can, Colonel," Daniel said. "On a more positive note, Councilor Corius has proved to be a colleague whom I could trust and respect. Given that he led the assault on Mandelfarne himself instead of waiting in safety on the mainland, he may even—"

Daniel let his grin spread into a broad, completely honest smile.

"—be crazy enough to command a man of your demonstrated courage, Landholder."

Krychek guffawed and turned to Corius. "So?" he said. "We talk, yes? But after the Commander has finished."

He gave Daniel a look that was certainly well-meaning but would've seemed normal at feeding time in a carnivore's cage.

"The Commander, he is bloody worth listening to, by God!" he said.

Daniel gave the Landholder a nod of appreciation, but when he shifted back to Corius he let the smile fade to neutrality. "Though my last subject isn't really a matter for group as a whole," he said, "I'd like to say it, so to speak, in public. Councilor, your planet has seen a good deal of disruption recently. I'd expect that to continue for a time after you've returned to take up your responsibilities."

"Go on, Commander," Corius said politely. A less intelligent politician would've bragged about his intentions. Corius was no more the man to make that mistake than Speaker Leary had been when he planned the Proscriptions.

"The Government of Bennaria is no business of mine nor of the Republic I represent," Daniel said quietly. "But the safety of Cinnabar citizens is a proper concern both of the Senate and of the RCN. The Cinnabar consular agent on Bennaria, Master Luff—"

"The Manco factor," Corius said; not loudly nor in a hostile tone, but with great clarity.

"I'm not talking about Manco House or its employees," Daniel said, just a touch more harshly. "I'm talking about the Cinnabar representative, Master Luff. A man whose courage in a difficult situation made this victory possible. I might describe him as a friend."

Daniel gestured generally toward the scene around them. Ap Glynn had been skilled as well as lucky to land on the east end of the island, near the Rainha and the wreckage of the Greybudd. The landing beacon still worked, if only because the Bennarian Volunteers hadn't thought to disable it.

The prison enclosure was in the muddy high ground of the island's center. The cruiser's dorsal cannon and those of the Sibyl and Princess Cecile on the shore to the west supplemented the razor ribbon and quickly-built guard towers.

Corius laughed. Someone who knew what to look for—and Daniel did—could notice Fallert, Hogg and Tovera all relax minusculy.

"I'll need officials whom I can trust in difficult situations," Corius said. "Since the slave trade on Dunbar's World will be ending shortly, Master Luff's present employers will have no further use for his services. I'll contact him on my return."

He smiled. Unlike the laughter a moment before, the smile was cold as a glass knife.

"I don't need to be taught that Daniel Leary is a bad enemy," Corius said, indicating their surroundings with a sweep of his chin. "Rather, I'll make it a policy to convince him that I'm a good friend."

Krychek banged the table with the flat of his hand. "Done, then?" he demanded.

"Done, I believe," Daniel agreed.

"Then time for a drink," said Krychek. "Many drinks, by God!"

Daniel, wrung out but completely relaxed, could only nod. His tongue was too dry from adrenalin to speak another word.

* * *

The sound of knuckles ringing on metal outside the missile command trailer brought Adele to her feet. She reached into her pocket by reflex, but there was no need for that now.

She smiled wryly as she stepped to the doorway: it was the wrong reflex besides. She'd reached into her left tunic pocket, but the little pistol was still in her right.

Daniel stood ten feet away. When she appeared in the ragged opening from which Tovera had blown the door, he threw away the steel cartridge box he'd knocked on to signal and gave her a cautious smile.

"I won't intrude if you're busy," he said. "I just thought I'd come see, ah, how you were getting along."

Adele transferred the pistol to its usual location. Her left arm still twinged, but not enough to pose a problem. Not a problem as great as having the wrong reflex in a crisis, anyway.

"Well enough," she said, amused to notice that she'd weighed the question before answering it. That in its way proved she was all right. "Come in, if you like. Or—"

When she turned back into the command trailer, she realized what a shambles it was. A stinking shambles. The corpses of the Alliance missile controllers had been buried with the Pellegrinian dead in a trench dug by a captured backhoe, but nobody'd tried to mop up blood and fluids flung about by the bullets. The splatters had quickly ripened in the heat.

One of the operators had fallen into his arcing console. The odor of his burned flesh remained as the only monument the man would ever have.

"Here, let me get my data unit," Adele said, slipping the wands into their slots as she spoke. "We'll find a place outside to sit. I suppose we could go back to the ship. The Sissie."

"No need," said Daniel, gesturing to a short line of sandbags interlaid with boards from packing cases. The bunker it'd been part of had collapsed, but this knee-high section of wall remained. "I've been in one ship or another for the past two days, and I don't mind being out in the open."

He grinned. The expression was real, but Adele knew her friend well enough to see the caution still in his eyes.

"I'm a country boy at heart, remember," he said as they sat down together. He cleared his throat and added, "I've been overseeing the installation of the new motors on the Duilio. It's the Duilio for now; I suppose Corius will change the name."

He chuckled. "Hogg's, ah, befriended the widow of one of Arruns' officers. They've gone off on a picnic, Hogg said."

"I'd heard," said Adele. She let her mind follow the direction the statement led her, then shied away with a grimace. Of course it was just information, rather like the process of decomposition. . . .

"Heard?" said Daniel. "That is, ah. . . ."

"I'm not spying on Hogg's private life, Daniel," Adele said in mild reproof. "Fallert and Tovera have gone with them. Fallert borrowed the Councilor's aircar for the purpose, as a matter of fact."

"Good God," said Daniel, blinking. "Good God. Fallert and Tovera and. . . ."

He stopped and licked his lips. "Well, that's a good thing," he said, though the cheeriness of his tone didn't ring quite true. "I was afraid that Hogg was driving the car. Whatever he thinks, I know very well that he'd not safe at the controls."

"Yes," said Adele, agreeing with both what Daniel'd said and what he determinedly wasn't saying. It's not our business, after all. "And we also don't have to worry about them being set upon by bandits while they're—"

She grimaced. "Concentrating on other matters," she said, sounding even to herself as though she had something unpleasant in her mouth.

A pair of earthmovers, part of the Pellegrinian siege equipment, were crawling from the cruiser to the Princess Cecile with a missile slung between them. Spacers whom Adele didn't recognize were withdrawing another missile from Duilio's loading hatch while a bulldozer and a backhoe maneuvered into position to take it.

Daniel followed the line of Adele's eyes. "Some of the Pellegrinians decided they'd rather be Sissies than see how Chancellor Arruns felt about the way things worked out here," he said. "We've got proper missile handlers now."

He smiled and gestured toward the equipment squealing past loudly. "Strictly speaking, we haven't handed the Duilio over to the Bennarian navy yet," he added. "It seemed to me simple prudence to equip the Sissie to fight if we have to on the way home."

Adele smiled faintly. Fight if we have a chance to, she thought. As we well might, with Commander Leary in command.

"The Duilio'll have forty-three missiles left after we've filled our magazines," Daniel said. "Bennarian ships haven't launched that many in the past generation. Of course that might change. A great deal's likely to change when Councilor Corius takes power, I'm afraid."

Adele noted the concern underlying the words. She shrugged and said, "The people of Bennaria deserve a better government than they have now. Perhaps Corius will give it to them. Not that it's a proper concern of mine, so long as he remains a friend to Cinnabar."

Mistress Sand would care about that; therefore Adele cared also. From the beginning of Adele's activities as a Cinnabar spy, Mistress Sand had been as much of a friend as a superior officer.

"One thing that puzzles me about the Councilor's plans. . .," Daniel said. His voice trailed off as he watched spacers walk hooks dangling from the Sissie's crane into eyebolts on the missile they were about to take aboard.

Catching himself, he grinned apologetically at Adele and continued, "Saying he was going to end slavery on Bennaria, I mean. Now, I'm in favor of that, of course, but frankly, Corius hadn't struck me as moral reformer himself."

"I don't think he is," Adele said. "That was my suggestion—and before you ask, no, I'm not a reformer either, merely an observer. I pointed out to him that the abolition of slavery would destroy the basis of his fellow Councilors' wealth. That'd make it much more difficult for them to attempt a counter-revolution."

"Ah!" said Daniel. "I see. Yes indeed, I see."

Adele saw his eyes flick toward the trailer. It was a tiny motion, there and back, but nonetheless it showed her that he really did understand. That shouldn't have been a surprise; it was Daniel, after all. It surprised her nonetheless.

Aloud and more harshly than she'd intended, she said, "I'm quite sure Corius will have quite a number of people executed out of hand also, Daniel. But that's none of my business either, because I won't be the one shooting them."

Adele paused, playing back in her mind the words, the tone, of what she'd just said. She pressed her fingertips to her brow and her thumbs to her jawbone, covering her down-turned face for a moment but not closing her eyes. The last thing she wanted just now was to close her eyes to the present, leaving only memories to fill her mind.

"I'm sorry, Daniel," she said, looking at him as she crossed her hands primly in her lap. She nodded toward the trailer. "I wasn't inside to remind me, you know. I was just punishing myself. I didn't need reminders."

"You don't need punishment either, Adele," Daniel said quietly. "But I don't suppose I can convince you of that."

"Not emotionally, no," Adele said, smiling wryly. "Intellectually I prefer a universe in which I killed another. . . a number, I'm honestly not sure. In which I killed another dozen or so soldiers to a universe in which I failed, so that you and two thousand Bennarian Volunteers were killed instead. But emotionally, what I see in the gunsight stays with me."

The sounds of heavy equipment quieted to a grumble of idling diesels. For the time being the chain hoists were still and the diamond saws silent.

"Then oh then, the loved ones gone. . .," came a clear, rich voice.

Adele turned; Elemere stood on the cruiser's turret, singing without a microphone. Krychek, Vesey and a number of others sat on chairs behind him, but on the ground below hundreds of off-duty spacers listened.

"Wake the pure celestial song. . .," Elemere sang. He was in full costume, the blond wig and a dress that seemed a shimmer of sunlight.

"Woetjans asked if it'd be all right," Daniel murmured. "She'd heard about the show at the Diamond Palace but she'd missed it in Charlestown.'

"Angel voices greet us there. . . ."

"I said of course, if Elemere was willing."

"In the music, in the air," Elemere sang, concluding the piece.

As the crowd of spacers cheered, Adele felt her lips spread in an unintended smile. "I have difficulty imagining my mother and father as part of a chorus of angels," she said, looking at Daniel again. "My sister Agatha, perhaps. But that's an intellectual difficulty. The song—"

The song by a decent, caring human being who is alive because I was willing to kill people who were neither decent nor caring. . . but those words didn't reach her lips.

"—helps emotionally despite that. I don't understand emotion, Daniel."

He rose. "I don't think anyone does, Adele," he said. "Let's move closer, shall we? I'd like to hear—"

"Little white snowdrop. . .," Elemere sang, beginning her next number.

The innocent delight of Daniel's smile shone brighter than sunstruck gold. And for the time being, it washed away the last of the memories that'd returned Adele to the bullet-scarred trailer.

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Framed

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CHAPTER 28: Mandelfarne Island on Dunbar's World

"Gentlemen and ladies," said Daniel, pulling out his own chair. "Please be seated."

The plural 'ladies' was stretching the point. Adele was at his side, while Elemere sat with Krychek across the square table. Between them were Corius and Colonel Quinn to Daniel's left, and to the right a pair of Federal Republic officials—Field Marshal, formerly General, Mahler and a civilian named Bartolomeo, the Finance Minister, who'd just arrived from Sinclos.

There wasn't a suitable conference room on Mandelfarne Island, but the weather was sunny with a brisk wind that kept the summer heat from being incapacitating, so Daniel'd ordered a sailcloth marquee spread over the Duilio's dorsal turret. The covered area was fifteen feet by twenty-five, quite sufficient for eight people around a table.

They could've cleared the cruiser's Great Cabin for the meeting, but Daniel preferred the outdoor location for a number of reasons. It was the highest flat surface on the island, so the gathered leaders could both see and be seen by everyone else. It gave them a close view of the damage done to the cruiser by the Sibyl's guns, which demonstrated to the local officials just how effective plasma cannon could be.

Perhaps the most important reason was the fact that Daniel found the setting congenial but he suspected that the others did not. If they were uncomfortable, they were less likely to bluster and force him to demonstrate that the real power was in the hands of the RCN representative. Bartolomeo had initially spoken as though he were in charge.

Daniel'd learned from his father's example that in the long term you were better off leaving your opponents with their dignity. If you robbed them of that, you had to destroy them utterly so that they couldn't come back and stab you at a later moment. Speaker Leary had understood the latter rule also, as the sole surviving Mundy could've testified.

Spacers were using a diamond saw to replace the cruiser's High Drive motors. The keening was audible, but it wasn't the overwhelming shriek it'd have been if the conference hadn't been seventy feet above with the depth of the hull between. The replacement units had been unbolted from the wreckage of the Greybudd in normal fashion, but flaring antimatter had welded the remains of the Duilio's motors into the remains of their mountings.

"I'm not clear on the purpose of this meeting, Leary," Bartolomeo said, mopping his forehead with a checked kerchief. He was a florid man whose quick, darting eyes had never quite made contact with Daniel's. "And I don't mind saying that I don't like heights!"

And I don't mind hearing it, Daniel thought. With a bland smile he said, "You can think of this as a logistical conference, Minister. As the ranking representative of the Republic of Cinnabar, it falls to me to suggest some dispositions."

"I don't see that you have any right whatever!" Bartolomeo said. "Dunbar's World is an independent—"

Corius rapped the table sharply with the tips of his right index and middle fingers. Marshal Mahler touched the minister's shoulder and, when the latter glanced up angrily, gave a quick shake of his head. Fallert was on the Dorsal 2 mainyard, watching the meeting from thirty feet away; Hogg and Tovera were on Dorsal 3, a similar distance aft of the turret. Bartolomeo hadn't noticed them or hadn't understood the implications, but Mahler certainly had.

"Commander Leary's skill and intelligence gave me my victory," Corius said calmly. "I'm more than ready to endorse any suggestions which such a benefactor chooses to make. Given that Dunbar's World owes her very liberty to him, I should think that in simple courtesy you'd grant him the same precedence, Minister Bartolomeo."

"Well, of course I'll listen to what he has to say," Bartolomeo said, licking his lips. "I. . . ."

His voice trailed off; he'd finally noticed Fallert's grin. He jerked his eyes down to the table in front of him.

"To begin with, there's the problem of the Pellegrinian prisoners," Daniel said. "I suppose under the laws of war they're the responsibility of the Federal Republic, but—"

"We don't have the facilities to feed and house eight thousand men," said Marshal Mahler. "Thus far they've been eating their own supplies and the weather's been temperate enough to keep them in the open here on Mandelfarne Island, but neither of those things will last long."

"We're not responsible!" Bartolomeo said quickly, though he kept his face lowered. "And they certainly can't be allowed back onto the mainland. Why, they're just pirates, you know. We should shoot them all!"

"Do you have any idea how long it would take to shoot eight thousand people?" asked Adele. She'd been sitting primly with her personal data unit on the table in front of her. Now she eyed Bartolomeo like a hawk over a vole. When the minister didn't look up, she tapped his ear lobe with the wand in her right hand.

"Do you, Minister Bartolomeo?" she repeated in a tone as thin as a razor. "Or are you proposing that we of the RCN handle the task with plasma cannon? Is that your plan?"

"I don't—" the civilian said. He leaned away from her, his eyes wide. "I didn't—"

Mahler put his hand firmly on Bartolomeo's shoulder and said, "Commander Leary, what solution do you propose?"

The fellow's showing himself to better advantage than he did as a rabbit being dug out of his hole, Daniel thought. Aloud he said, "I've discussed the matter informally with Councilor Corius. As I understand it, he's prepared to supply the prisoners and transport them off-planet."

Corius nodded. He was a handsome man and had a very pleasant smile, if you didn't look up at his eyes.

"I've already started making the arrangements," he said. "I've held discussions with the surviving Pellegrinian officers, and I'm pleased to say they're in enthusiastic agreement."

"They agree, you say?" said Landholder Krychek in a tone of surprise.

"I believe they were expecting alternatives of the sort Minister Bartolomeo proposed," Corius said. He chuckled. "Gathering sufficient shipping may take as long as ten days. I trust I can expect the help and forbearance of the Federal Republic during the delay?"

He raised an eyebrow toward the minister. "Well, I. . .," Bartolomeo said, then looked down at his hands again.

"Given that ten thousand trained troops are in favor of your plan, Councilor," Daniel said with a cheery smile to lay a swatch of velvet over the iron reality of his words, "it'd seem extremely dangerous, not to mention inhumane, for the Republic not to support it fully. Wouldn't you agree, Marshal Mahler?"

"My troops'll do all they can to make sure supplies get to the camps and to generally keep a lid on it while you're hiring transports, you bet," Mahler said. "But the sooner the better, Councilor."

"And to that end," Daniel said, "I've arranged the sale of the Rainha, an RCN prize, to Councilor Corius."

Referring to the Rainha as a prize was shading reality a trifle. Strictly speaking, Adele was the only active-service RCN officer involved in the taking, which otherwise bore many similarities to piracy carried out by Cinnabar citizens. Daniel was quite willing to pay the normal quarter share to Navy House when he returned to Xenos in order to beg that question.

He cleared his throat, then continued, "The prisoners are taken care of, then. The next—"

"One moment!" Bartolomeo said. "One thing I must know: where is Nataniel Arruns himself? We cannot compromise on this!"

"My servant Tovera," said Adele, looking at the minister but speaking with less emotion than a voice synthesizer would inject, "informs me that Arruns and his personal staff refused to surrender. They were killed in the fighting."

"Rather a fortunate result, frankly," said Corius with his usual smile. "His presence would've complicated my negotiations with the other Pellegrinian officers."

"Is that true?" said Marshal Mahler, looking past Bartolomeo to Adele. "I would've have expected. . . ."

"I'm quite sure that Arruns is dead if Tovera says he is," Adele said in the same flat tone. "If you believe it's necessary to look into the circumstances of his death, you have my permission to question my servant."

Mahler looked over his shoulder. Hogg grinned and waved with his left hand. The marshal faced around quickly and said, "I misspoke. My apologies."

"Next," Daniel continued in the pause, "is the matter of captured equipment. I propose that the small arms be delivered to Councilor Corius in consideration of Bennarian help in resisting the invaders. Marshal?"

Mahler grimaced. "I'd been hoping—" he said, then angrily shook his head. "No, I'm not going to get in your way, Leary."

He snorted. In a more cheerful tone he added, "I've seen what happens to people who do."

"Your society is already unsettled by the invasion," Adele said. Though dry, her voice was as harsh as a saw blade. "The availability of that number of automatic rifles would have even more serious consequences for the social order. I can give you examples after the meeting, if you'd like."

She smiled without humor. "I've seen examples."

"There remains the captured gear other than weapons," Daniel said, "including vehicles and heavy equipment. I believe these will be of value to your army, Marshal."

Bartolomeo looked from Daniel to Marshal Mahler. "The disposition of spoils is a matter for the finance ministry, not the army," he said sharply.

Daniel shrugged and smiled. "That's an internal matter for you gentlemen to discuss at leisure," he said. "I'm sure you'll be able to find a satisfactory solution."

Really he was sure that a number of local officials, including Mahler and Bartolomeo, were going to make a very good thing out of the loot, while little or none would go to either the army or the treasury. That didn't even begin to be a concern of Daniel Leary or the Republic of Cinnabar.

Krychek had been sitting with his hand over Elemere's. Now he removed it and thumped both palms on the tabletop. Leaning forward slightly, he said in a tone of challenge, "You haven't mentioned this Duilio, Leary, this cruiser. You are repairing it as we all hear. You plan to give it to Cinnabar, that is so?"

"It most certainly is not so, Landholder Krychek," said Daniel. He straightened in his seat and tried to give the words a properly upper-class nasal twang. Adele could've done it much better. . . . "I would regard any such action as a violation of my agreement with you—a despicable violation! In fact, I intend to transfer the Duilio to the Bennarian naval forces in exchange for the destroyer Sibyl. Which in turn—"

Krychek's face had flushed, then gone pale. Elemere laid her palm on the Landholder's bearded cheek. She smiled at Daniel as she spoke reassuringly in an undertone.

"—I propose to make over to you, milord," Daniel continued. "I hope you'll consider the Sibyl fair recompense for the Mazeppa and your valuable services to Leary of Bantry in my personal activities on Bennaria and here."

"By God, Leary," Krychek said.

He stood and reached over the table. Bartolomeo jumped back to avoid a brawl, but the Landholder merely gripped Daniel's hand and pumped it enthusiastically. "By God, you're a man!" he said.

Daniel rose and clasped the Landholder with both hands, then disengaged by stepping back. He looked to either side, largely to break eye contact as a hint to Krychek that it was time to sit down again.

"I realize that it may seem I'm being cavalier with other people's property," he said, "but I'm able to be the honest broker in this case since I have no share of the proceeds."

"The starship Rainha, you said," Bartolomeo noted with a fierce glance. "That's surely something, is it not?"

"The Rainha was captured on Pellegrino by persons under my command," Adele said, her voice rising. "In no respect does that affair become the business of yourself or Dunbar's World, sirrah!"

Daniel couldn't see his friend's face from his present angle, but Mahler flinched back as she focused her gaze on him. "Marshal," Adele said, enunciating with unusual precision even for her, "I suggest you muzzle your dog or I'll have him whipped into the sea. On my oath as a Mundy!"

Adele wouldn't ordinarily do that, Daniel thought. The shoulder wound, or perhaps what she'd been doing when she was wounded, was affecting her.

Loudly he said, "Remember your place, Mundy! I'm the ranking officer here."

He paused, then went on, "I will have him whipped into the sea."

Bartolomeo's mouth opened and closed twice. His expression wobbled between fear and anger as he tried to determine whether he was being threatened or mocked. Both, I suppose, Daniel decided.

"Commander, mistress," Mahler said. "We beg your pardon." He sounded sincere.

Adele visibly relaxed. She turned, looking up to Daniel, and nodded. "Sorry, sir," she said quietly.

"Quite all right, Mundy," Daniel said as he settled back onto his chair. "You were provoked. Now, getting back to business—"

He smiled brightly at the assembled group. Colonel Quinn looked extremely uncomfortable. Daniel wondered if it'd been a misstep at a meeting with Headman Ferguson and his magnates which'd cost Quinn his nose, ears, and position. That wasn't going to happen here, but Quinn was correct in feeling out of place.

"—there's the matter of crew for the Duilio. Many of her spacers aren't Pellegrinians, of course. They should be as willing to work for Bennaria as they were for Chancellor Arruns. Nonetheless, a prudent commander—"

He nodded to Corius and grinned; Corius grinned in reply. Quinn edged his chair a little further back from the table.

"—would want his officers to be men—"

Daniel would've said "persons" if he'd been speaking to a Cinnabar audience, but "men" was precisely the correct usage here.

"—of unquestioned courage, skill, and loyalty. With that in mind, Councilor Corius, I suggest you discuss the matter with Landholder Krychek. And Krychek?"

He cocked an eyebrow at the Landholder. Elemere was gripping his right hand in both of hers, looking happily excited.

"Aye, by God!" Krychek said. From the words and expression alone he might've been furious, but Daniel thought he knew the fellow well enough to be sure that wasn't the case.

"You were considering entering service with Headman Ferguson," Daniel continued. "I suggest—"

"Bloody hell, you don't want to do that!" blurted Quinn, shocked out of his worried silence. He tapped his nose. Though the shape was natural, the pale pink of the tip ended in a sharp line where the rest of the face was reddened and wind-burned from the weather here on Mandelfarne Island. "He's a right psycho, that one, and I'm the man to tell you!"

"Yes, I'm sure you can, Colonel," Daniel said. "On a more positive note, Councilor Corius has proved to be a colleague whom I could trust and respect. Given that he led the assault on Mandelfarne himself instead of waiting in safety on the mainland, he may even—"

Daniel let his grin spread into a broad, completely honest smile.

"—be crazy enough to command a man of your demonstrated courage, Landholder."

Krychek guffawed and turned to Corius. "So?" he said. "We talk, yes? But after the Commander has finished."

He gave Daniel a look that was certainly well-meaning but would've seemed normal at feeding time in a carnivore's cage.

"The Commander, he is bloody worth listening to, by God!" he said.

Daniel gave the Landholder a nod of appreciation, but when he shifted back to Corius he let the smile fade to neutrality. "Though my last subject isn't really a matter for group as a whole," he said, "I'd like to say it, so to speak, in public. Councilor, your planet has seen a good deal of disruption recently. I'd expect that to continue for a time after you've returned to take up your responsibilities."

"Go on, Commander," Corius said politely. A less intelligent politician would've bragged about his intentions. Corius was no more the man to make that mistake than Speaker Leary had been when he planned the Proscriptions.

"The Government of Bennaria is no business of mine nor of the Republic I represent," Daniel said quietly. "But the safety of Cinnabar citizens is a proper concern both of the Senate and of the RCN. The Cinnabar consular agent on Bennaria, Master Luff—"

"The Manco factor," Corius said; not loudly nor in a hostile tone, but with great clarity.

"I'm not talking about Manco House or its employees," Daniel said, just a touch more harshly. "I'm talking about the Cinnabar representative, Master Luff. A man whose courage in a difficult situation made this victory possible. I might describe him as a friend."

Daniel gestured generally toward the scene around them. Ap Glynn had been skilled as well as lucky to land on the east end of the island, near the Rainha and the wreckage of the Greybudd. The landing beacon still worked, if only because the Bennarian Volunteers hadn't thought to disable it.

The prison enclosure was in the muddy high ground of the island's center. The cruiser's dorsal cannon and those of the Sibyl and Princess Cecile on the shore to the west supplemented the razor ribbon and quickly-built guard towers.

Corius laughed. Someone who knew what to look for—and Daniel did—could notice Fallert, Hogg and Tovera all relax minusculy.

"I'll need officials whom I can trust in difficult situations," Corius said. "Since the slave trade on Dunbar's World will be ending shortly, Master Luff's present employers will have no further use for his services. I'll contact him on my return."

He smiled. Unlike the laughter a moment before, the smile was cold as a glass knife.

"I don't need to be taught that Daniel Leary is a bad enemy," Corius said, indicating their surroundings with a sweep of his chin. "Rather, I'll make it a policy to convince him that I'm a good friend."

Krychek banged the table with the flat of his hand. "Done, then?" he demanded.

"Done, I believe," Daniel agreed.

"Then time for a drink," said Krychek. "Many drinks, by God!"

Daniel, wrung out but completely relaxed, could only nod. His tongue was too dry from adrenalin to speak another word.

* * *

The sound of knuckles ringing on metal outside the missile command trailer brought Adele to her feet. She reached into her pocket by reflex, but there was no need for that now.

She smiled wryly as she stepped to the doorway: it was the wrong reflex besides. She'd reached into her left tunic pocket, but the little pistol was still in her right.

Daniel stood ten feet away. When she appeared in the ragged opening from which Tovera had blown the door, he threw away the steel cartridge box he'd knocked on to signal and gave her a cautious smile.

"I won't intrude if you're busy," he said. "I just thought I'd come see, ah, how you were getting along."

Adele transferred the pistol to its usual location. Her left arm still twinged, but not enough to pose a problem. Not a problem as great as having the wrong reflex in a crisis, anyway.

"Well enough," she said, amused to notice that she'd weighed the question before answering it. That in its way proved she was all right. "Come in, if you like. Or—"

When she turned back into the command trailer, she realized what a shambles it was. A stinking shambles. The corpses of the Alliance missile controllers had been buried with the Pellegrinian dead in a trench dug by a captured backhoe, but nobody'd tried to mop up blood and fluids flung about by the bullets. The splatters had quickly ripened in the heat.

One of the operators had fallen into his arcing console. The odor of his burned flesh remained as the only monument the man would ever have.

"Here, let me get my data unit," Adele said, slipping the wands into their slots as she spoke. "We'll find a place outside to sit. I suppose we could go back to the ship. The Sissie."

"No need," said Daniel, gesturing to a short line of sandbags interlaid with boards from packing cases. The bunker it'd been part of had collapsed, but this knee-high section of wall remained. "I've been in one ship or another for the past two days, and I don't mind being out in the open."

He grinned. The expression was real, but Adele knew her friend well enough to see the caution still in his eyes.

"I'm a country boy at heart, remember," he said as they sat down together. He cleared his throat and added, "I've been overseeing the installation of the new motors on the Duilio. It's the Duilio for now; I suppose Corius will change the name."

He chuckled. "Hogg's, ah, befriended the widow of one of Arruns' officers. They've gone off on a picnic, Hogg said."

"I'd heard," said Adele. She let her mind follow the direction the statement led her, then shied away with a grimace. Of course it was just information, rather like the process of decomposition. . . .

"Heard?" said Daniel. "That is, ah. . . ."

"I'm not spying on Hogg's private life, Daniel," Adele said in mild reproof. "Fallert and Tovera have gone with them. Fallert borrowed the Councilor's aircar for the purpose, as a matter of fact."

"Good God," said Daniel, blinking. "Good God. Fallert and Tovera and. . . ."

He stopped and licked his lips. "Well, that's a good thing," he said, though the cheeriness of his tone didn't ring quite true. "I was afraid that Hogg was driving the car. Whatever he thinks, I know very well that he'd not safe at the controls."

"Yes," said Adele, agreeing with both what Daniel'd said and what he determinedly wasn't saying. It's not our business, after all. "And we also don't have to worry about them being set upon by bandits while they're—"

She grimaced. "Concentrating on other matters," she said, sounding even to herself as though she had something unpleasant in her mouth.

A pair of earthmovers, part of the Pellegrinian siege equipment, were crawling from the cruiser to the Princess Cecile with a missile slung between them. Spacers whom Adele didn't recognize were withdrawing another missile from Duilio's loading hatch while a bulldozer and a backhoe maneuvered into position to take it.

Daniel followed the line of Adele's eyes. "Some of the Pellegrinians decided they'd rather be Sissies than see how Chancellor Arruns felt about the way things worked out here," he said. "We've got proper missile handlers now."

He smiled and gestured toward the equipment squealing past loudly. "Strictly speaking, we haven't handed the Duilio over to the Bennarian navy yet," he added. "It seemed to me simple prudence to equip the Sissie to fight if we have to on the way home."

Adele smiled faintly. Fight if we have a chance to, she thought. As we well might, with Commander Leary in command.

"The Duilio'll have forty-three missiles left after we've filled our magazines," Daniel said. "Bennarian ships haven't launched that many in the past generation. Of course that might change. A great deal's likely to change when Councilor Corius takes power, I'm afraid."

Adele noted the concern underlying the words. She shrugged and said, "The people of Bennaria deserve a better government than they have now. Perhaps Corius will give it to them. Not that it's a proper concern of mine, so long as he remains a friend to Cinnabar."

Mistress Sand would care about that; therefore Adele cared also. From the beginning of Adele's activities as a Cinnabar spy, Mistress Sand had been as much of a friend as a superior officer.

"One thing that puzzles me about the Councilor's plans. . .," Daniel said. His voice trailed off as he watched spacers walk hooks dangling from the Sissie's crane into eyebolts on the missile they were about to take aboard.

Catching himself, he grinned apologetically at Adele and continued, "Saying he was going to end slavery on Bennaria, I mean. Now, I'm in favor of that, of course, but frankly, Corius hadn't struck me as moral reformer himself."

"I don't think he is," Adele said. "That was my suggestion—and before you ask, no, I'm not a reformer either, merely an observer. I pointed out to him that the abolition of slavery would destroy the basis of his fellow Councilors' wealth. That'd make it much more difficult for them to attempt a counter-revolution."

"Ah!" said Daniel. "I see. Yes indeed, I see."

Adele saw his eyes flick toward the trailer. It was a tiny motion, there and back, but nonetheless it showed her that he really did understand. That shouldn't have been a surprise; it was Daniel, after all. It surprised her nonetheless.

Aloud and more harshly than she'd intended, she said, "I'm quite sure Corius will have quite a number of people executed out of hand also, Daniel. But that's none of my business either, because I won't be the one shooting them."

Adele paused, playing back in her mind the words, the tone, of what she'd just said. She pressed her fingertips to her brow and her thumbs to her jawbone, covering her down-turned face for a moment but not closing her eyes. The last thing she wanted just now was to close her eyes to the present, leaving only memories to fill her mind.

"I'm sorry, Daniel," she said, looking at him as she crossed her hands primly in her lap. She nodded toward the trailer. "I wasn't inside to remind me, you know. I was just punishing myself. I didn't need reminders."

"You don't need punishment either, Adele," Daniel said quietly. "But I don't suppose I can convince you of that."

"Not emotionally, no," Adele said, smiling wryly. "Intellectually I prefer a universe in which I killed another. . . a number, I'm honestly not sure. In which I killed another dozen or so soldiers to a universe in which I failed, so that you and two thousand Bennarian Volunteers were killed instead. But emotionally, what I see in the gunsight stays with me."

The sounds of heavy equipment quieted to a grumble of idling diesels. For the time being the chain hoists were still and the diamond saws silent.

"Then oh then, the loved ones gone. . .," came a clear, rich voice.

Adele turned; Elemere stood on the cruiser's turret, singing without a microphone. Krychek, Vesey and a number of others sat on chairs behind him, but on the ground below hundreds of off-duty spacers listened.

"Wake the pure celestial song. . .," Elemere sang. He was in full costume, the blond wig and a dress that seemed a shimmer of sunlight.

"Woetjans asked if it'd be all right," Daniel murmured. "She'd heard about the show at the Diamond Palace but she'd missed it in Charlestown.'

"Angel voices greet us there. . . ."

"I said of course, if Elemere was willing."

"In the music, in the air," Elemere sang, concluding the piece.

As the crowd of spacers cheered, Adele felt her lips spread in an unintended smile. "I have difficulty imagining my mother and father as part of a chorus of angels," she said, looking at Daniel again. "My sister Agatha, perhaps. But that's an intellectual difficulty. The song—"

The song by a decent, caring human being who is alive because I was willing to kill people who were neither decent nor caring. . . but those words didn't reach her lips.

"—helps emotionally despite that. I don't understand emotion, Daniel."

He rose. "I don't think anyone does, Adele," he said. "Let's move closer, shall we? I'd like to hear—"

"Little white snowdrop. . .," Elemere sang, beginning her next number.

The innocent delight of Daniel's smile shone brighter than sunstruck gold. And for the time being, it washed away the last of the memories that'd returned Adele to the bullet-scarred trailer.

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