"Liaden Universe - 04 - Plan B" - читать интересную книгу автора (Miller Steve)

Plan B

Sharon Lee and Steve Miller

For the Friends of Liad: lisamia keshoc.
We are in your debt.

Here we stand: An old woman, a halfling boy, two
babes; a contract, a ship, and a Tree.

Clan Korval.

How Jela would laugh.

ЧExcerpted from Cantra yos'Phelium's Log Book

LIAD

DEPARTMENT OF INTERIOR COMMAND HEROQUARTERS

There was time, but neither night nor day.

Time. Current time on twenty planets was counted along the digital displays in the long left wall. The light was impartial, unchanging. Shadowless.

In addition to the silent, steady chronometers, the room contained a desk upon which sat two screensЧone large, one smallЧa keypad, some few files of hard copy, a stylus. Behind the desk was a chair; in the chair was a man.

Those who owed allegiance to the Department, to the Plan, addressed him as "Commander" or, formally, "Commander of Agents." That was enough.

Commander of Agents touched his keypad, advancing the file displayed upon the larger screen.

Blindfolded and questionedЧif any would dare itЧhe could easily have recited the entire contents of the file. He perused it without reading it, as another might shuffle and deal hand after hand of Patience, mind wrestling a problem light-years beyond his busy fingers.

The immediate problem was threefold, the sections named thus: Clan Korval, Val Con yos'Phelium, Tyl Von sig'Alda.

Clan Korval. The Department of Interior had long been aware of the danger presented by Clan Korval, that maverick and most oddly successful of clans. The Department of Interior had taken measuresЧbold measuresЧin the past, with an eye toward nullifying Korval's menace. The culmination of these measures was the recruitment of Korval's young nadelm into the Department and the subsequent redesign of that same Val Con yos'Phelium into an Agent of Change.

That stroke, brilliant and necessary, had produced uncalculated results. Korval became aware of the Department. And, being Korval, measuresЧbold measuresЧhad been taken. The Department found its name spoken in public places; long-stable funding sources came under scrutiny, several dummy accounts were unmasked and summarily closed by the Masters of the Accountants Guild, the funds returned to the Council of Clans.

Not satisfied with such unseemly commotion, Korval moved againЧand more boldly yet. The clan vanishedЧ ships, children, servants, and petsЧall, all gone from Liad.

Not quite all.

Commander of Agents touched his keypad. One of the line direct remained upon Liad: Anthora, youngest of the adult yos'Galans, who had prudently moved to the ancient and formidable Jelaza Kazone, KorvalТs first base of planetary operation, and was living there retired. For now.

Commander of Agents advanced the file, eyes looking beyond screen and data. Korval was outthere somewhere. Who knew what they might do? Or when?

The Commander considered the probability that they had gone entirely, leaving behind one too odd to understand her peril. Were Korval to abandon Liad and accept sanctuary from Terra, the balance long in favor of Liaden trade missions and Liaden expansion would be at risk. The children of yos'Galan were half-Terran. Mongrels. They might well go to kin.

The Commander was not one to feel qualms. The various actions against Korval, including fomenting revolution on the world of Korval's oldest trade partner, were necessary to reduce Korval's influence and bring about the true ascendancy of Liad.