A Choice of Treasons (58 page)

She wanted to know who killed him. But she hadn’t seen their faces, just a glimpse of a uniform, and that had been unmistakable. The killer had been wearing the uniform of DCO Security.

“It’s a whole fleet. It’s got to be, a whole, god damned fleet. I’ve already picked up close to thirty transition wakes, all within one light-year.”

Jewel looked at her screen.

Soe continued. “And I’m sure some of those wakes are multiple ships, clustered so close together I can’t resolve individual wakes.”

“Steady as she goes,” Jewel said, trying to affect some semblance of calm. “Anything you can identify?”

Soe shook his head. “A wake is a wake, some bigger, some smaller.”

“Andro. Any activity from Sarasan Station?”

Innay shook his head. “Nothing. Business as usual. Shields are probably up, but that’s normal. No activity in the outer defenses, no movement from her orbital weapons platforms.”

That told her what she needed to know. Sarasan had undoubtedly detected the approaching wakes, and if they were unidentified, or clearly Federals, the Station Commander would be bringing all her defenses up to battle readiness. So the approaching ships had to be an imperial fleet, and from their transition vectors they were coming from their sector headquarters at Aagerbanne.

“Steady as she goes,” Jewel said calmly. “That’s an
imper
fleet coming in. We’re going to be right in the middle of them. But with all the transition noise they’re making there’s not much chance they can detect us. So let’s just sit tight.”

“Fifty lights and holding, sir. Range: point-one-three light-years.”

York scanned his screens, could feel a bead of sweat running down his back inside his tunic. As they approached Sarasan
farspace
the entire ship filled with anticipation. Their journey was almost over; safe harbor was within easy reach, but York was spoiling it for them.

Assume nothing
, he’d told them.
We’re going in with extreme caution. Hunter-killer approach; battle stations; the works.

“Forty lights,” he ordered.

“Forty lights,” Maggie responded. “Serious gravitational instability all over the ship . . . but she’s holding.”

The last time they’d tried this
Cinesstar
had dropped into down-transition at forty lights. Maggie was getting better at this. “All right, Maggie. Start easing her back slowly until she drops into transition, and when she does, hold onto all the velocity you can. Keep our flare to a minimum.”

York waited, tried to watch all his screens at once, couldn’t ignore the tumbling in his stomach as a cluster of gravity waves rolled through the ship. Maggie got
Cinesstar
down to thirty-one lights before she dropped into transition. Cappik cut the deck gravity instantly and they floated free.

They all waited for Gant. York wanted to bark at her to hurry up, but he knew better. Finally, she cried out, “Clear to a hundred thousand kilometers.”

York let out his breath. “Drones out—passive.”

The hull echoed with the clang of the drone launch. Jondee acknowledged, “Drones out.”

Gant started filling in the details. “We’re point-one-two light-years from Sarasan
farspace
, coasting at point-nine-three lights, dilation factor two-point-seven. Preliminary scan shows no activity between here—” Her voice shot up an octave. “Wait! Contact. Dead ahead. Ranging at point-oh-five lights.”

“Us or them?” York demanded. “And are they closing.”

“They’re headed this general direction, but I can’t tell more than that. With the drones passive I don’t have enough of a baseline for the resolution I need. Whoever they are they’re driving hard in sublight, or I wouldn’t be able to pick them up. But I can’t get a good vector on them, no possibility of a targeting solution, and I certainly can’t resolve a recognition profile.”

Whoever was out there was driving hard, and that had to mean they’d been spotted. “Tell Mister Cappik to stand by with full power for the shields. Let’s power up and have a look.”

York felt the weight of gravity in his bones again, and Gant started to smile as her drones spread out under power.

“Incoming,” she suddenly shouted. “Extreme long range transition shot.”

“Hold your fire, Mister Jakobee,” York growled, “unless it’s actually targeted on us.”

The shot flared about one million kilometers in front of them—a shot across the bow—the standard calling card of a deep space picket. Gant confirmed York’s suspicion. “It looks like one of ours, sir.”

“Mister Jondee. Send them an imperial recognition code, but don’t identify us.”

York waited for several seconds, then, “I’m getting a reply, sir, but I can’t decode it. Our codes must be out of date.”

“Resend the recognition code until they reply in kind.”

Jondee had to broadcast the code eight times before the captain of the distant ship decided to communicate with them in a code they could decipher.

“Captain,” Jondee said. “You’d better take this.”

The image of a middle-aged woman in an imperial uniform with commander’s pips on her collars appeared on one of York’s screens. York knew her, had met her somewhere, though he couldn’t recall her name, or the circumstances under which they’d met.

She spoke immediately, “Your codes are out of date. Identify yourself and . . .” Her eyes narrowed.

Good
, York thought.
She recognizes me too
.

“York Ballin,” York said. “Late of
H.M.S. Invaradin
. Presently commanding
H.M.S. Cinesstar
.”

She flinched, frowned, an odd reaction. York continued, “And you are?”

She considered his image for a long moment, then nodded. “Commander Vilnay. Commanding
H.M.S. Australis
, attached to the Third Fleet. Please excuse me for a moment.”

York gave her a nod and she blanked her screen. He looked at the empty screen, began to feel uneasy. She should have asked for more information, should have paid deference to certain courtesies, should have expected him to return those same courtesies in kind.

York’s screen suddenly flashed back to life, but now it was split, with Vilnay occupying one half, and an older man with admiral’s stripes and scrambled eggs all over the bill of his cap on the other. There was something about the look in the man’s eyes, as if he expected absolute, unquestioned obedience. Vilnay said, “Captain Ballin. May I introduce His Grace, Sergai Leonavich, Duke de Neptair.”

Shit!
York thought, almost said it aloud. He managed an appropriate bow of his head and said, “Your Grace. I’m honored.”

Leonavich didn’t have to pay deference to any courtesies. “We’re sending you a transition plan for a short jump into Sarasan
nearspace
. Execute it immediately. That’s an order.”

No mention of the empress. No request for assurances that she was all right. No request to speak with her. York bowed again. “Very good, Your Grace. Can you clear us for
contact exchange
. With updated codes we’ll be able to set it up a lot easier and faster.” Only a small half-truth.

“Sure,” Leonavich said almost angrily. “Do it, Vilnay. It won’t do any harm.”

It won’t do any harm
. An odd thing to say. That phrase made York think back to the look on Vilnay’s face when she’d first heard him identify
Cinesstar
.

Australis’
computer set up a link with
Cinesstar’s
computer. The two ships exchanged contact packets in an automated process each had gone through hundreds of times, and in minutes
Cinesstar’s
codes were up-to-date and she could tie into Third Fleet’s command grid.

It won’t do any harm.

York looked at the plan Vilnay had fed them: a short transition hop into the Sarasan system, but nowhere near Sarasan herself. They were receiving data from Third’s command grid now and York could see the deployment of all the elements of the fleet. The plan would have them down-transit in the midst of a cluster of cruisers and destroyers. It was safety, of a sort, having your friends all about you, but not as safe as having
Cinesstar
transit deep into the system well behind the protective armaments of the fleet. York made a slight adjustment to the plan that put them close to, but not in the midst of, the cluster of fighting ships.

“But sir,” Gant said. “Duke Sergai’s orders—”

York growled at her, “You just worry about my orders.”

It was an easy jump. They barely had time to accelerate before down-transiting. York had his crew set up the down-transit without any deceleration. They were close to two thousand lights, and the resultant flare was excessive, would be momentarily blinding to any targeting computer trying to compute a solution on them.

“That’s it,” Tac’tac’ah shouted. “Big flare. That’s our
imper
.”

“He’s close enough for a solution,” Soe added. “We’ve got him now.”

Jewel looked at the system summary on her screen. “I want solutions on all of them,” she said.

She should be elated. Their
imper
had come right to them, was almost asking to be burned. And yet she couldn’t erase the image of Illcall Terman’s dead eyes staring at her from the recording he’d sent. In a way it was his last will and testament, something he’d felt was important enough to die for. That image, and his last words, had haunted her dreams, had kept her awake at night.

“Funny thing,” Innay said. “His friends are closing about him like he was one of us, like they didn’t trust him.”

“I want targeting solutions on all of them,” Jewel repeated. “All of them.”

Leonavich was on one of York’s screens immediately. “What kind of sloppy vectoring is that, Ballin?”

“I’m sorry, Your Grace,” York lied. “We have a damaged drive chamber; it threw us off a bit.”

Leonavich’s ships were moving quickly to close about
Cinesstar
. It wasn’t the action of a friend welcoming an ally home after a long and dangerous journey.

It won’t do any harm
. And the look on Vilnay’s face, the look that now settled on Leonavich’s face: distaste, as if confronted with the need to perform an unpleasant task.

“Your Grace,” York said. He tried to get Leonavich to meet his eyes, but the Duke looked away under some pretext. One of the nine most powerful people in the empire, Sergai, Duke de Neptair, couldn’t meet the eyes of a former
juvenile delinquent, lower deck pod gunner, spacer second class
. York pleaded with him, “What’s going on here, Your Grace? Please.”

Leonavich finally met his eyes. The Duke’s eyes were angry, and tired, but mostly they were sad, and they were hardened, as if reluctantly accepting the need to do something unpleasant.

“Captain!” Jondee’s voice intruded. “Captain, I just got us tied into their command grid, and there’s been some sort of mistake here.”

York’s eyes remained locked on Leonavich’s. He flipped a switch on his console so Leonavich couldn’t hear Jondee, then he asked, “What kind of mistake, Mister Jondee.”

“Well, I don’t see how it happened, or maybe I’m just reading this wrong, or maybe we’ve got com problems, or—”

York grew impatient. “Spit it out.”

“Yes, sir.” It was rare for Jondee to be so respectful. “Sir, we’ve been allocated as a target on Third’s command grid. I know it’s not possible, but—”

Now it made sense, or at least the actions of Leonavich’s ships made sense, if they were trying to close on an enemy and cut off all possibility of escape.
But why
? The
why
of it didn’t make sense.

To Leonavich, their eyes still locked, York said, “Your Grace. I don’t know why you’re doing this, but there’s no need. I’ll surrender, without terms. I’ll surrender myself and my ship and all aboard her, and trust to your honor to judge us fairly for whatever it is you think we’ve done. I’ll lower my shields, cut my drive, go fully static, whatever you require.”

Leonavich nodded sadly. “Then do so now. Drop your shields.”

York saw no lessening of the hard intent in Leonavich’s eyes. He asked, “Will you accept my surrender, take proper care of my people?”

Leonavich hesitated, almost lied to him, but at the last instant he seemed unable to stomach whatever motivated his actions, and all he said was, “I’m sorry, Captain . . .”

York’s hand shot out almost involuntarily and hit a switch on his console, killing Leonavich’s picture.

“Shields up. Full combat status. Mister Jondee, cut all external transmissions. Pull us out of their command grid, but we’ve got the codes to decipher their command transmissions so feed their command grid into our targeting computer. And I want a copy on my screens.