A Matter of Oaths (14 page)

“I know,” Joshim acknowledged. Rafe’s skill in the web was a
delight. He did not have Rallya’s innate talent, which made her such a poor
teacher and a demanding key because she subconsciously expected others to find
webbing as easy as she did. Rafe’s skill was learned, and polished carefully
and continually; he knew how to pass it on, and how to use it to get the best
from others. It was rare to find that in somebody with only ten years
experience, and a crime to waste it, but…

“You won’t get an definite answer by keeping him out of the
key-position,” Vidar pointed out. “You’ll always be wondering.”

“So I should let him take the key-position and wait for him
to fold in the middle of combat?” Joshim argued. “Just to get a definite answer?”

Vidar tugged at his earring. “You’re not restricting Rallya,
and you know that now deterioration has started, there’s always a chance that
her web will fail without warning during combat. If you’re worried about Rafe,
shouldn’t you be equally worried about Rallya?” he countered.

“The chance of sudden web failure in Rallya’s current
condition is negligible.”

“You can’t be sure of that until you do a full
recalibration.”

“If there had been any major change, Rallya would have
mentioned it. She may be wilful, but she isn’t irresponsible.”

Vidar conceded the truth of that with a gesture that made
his collection of gold bracelets clink together. “I still think you’re wrong
about Rafe,” he insisted. “Even if there is a risk, wouldn’t it have been greatest
the first time he was in combat? He survived that, and he’s aware of the danger
now. It can only get safer.”

“Not if the conditioning is set to get stronger if it’s
ignored.”

“If they wanted him to keep out of combat, they would have
conditioned him against taking a berth on a patrolship, not faffed around
making him a liability in the web if he did.” Vidar shook his head in mock
despair. “You can’t even be sure it was the conditioning that made him sick.
When I was a junior, we had a Commander of ten years’ standing who still threw
up every time he came out of the web after combat. Nobody dreamed of barring
him from the key-position.”

When he was exasperated, Vidar had a lot in common with
Rallya, Joshim realized fondly. But not so much that he thought he could make
the Webmaster’s decisions for him, thank the gods.

“I’ll decide one way or the other before we start on the
in-bound run,” he promised.

“No, you won’t. You might change your mind and let him back
into the key-position, but you won’t make a decision.”

“Would you explain to me the difference between making a
decision and changing my mind?”

“If you change your mind, it will be for the wrong reasons
and you won’t be able to stop worrying about it. If you make a decision…”

‘…it will be for the right reasons and I’ll be happy with
it?” Joshim concluded. “Well, if that’s the difference, I’m not in a position
to make a decision. Only to change my mind.”

Vidar shook his head firmly. “You shouldn’t try so hard to
be the perfect Webmaster,” he said, not unsympathetically.

“Maybe not.” Joshim twisted his ring around his finger. “It
would be simpler if I were just his Webmaster. Loving him as well… I can’t keep
the two things separate.”

“Don’t try,” Vidar said crisply. “It doesn’t work. You can’t
be a Webmaster without being influenced by your personal feelings. Your
instincts about people are as accurate as any measurement of their performance
that you can make.”

“Even if I care about somebody so much that I dare not trust
my judgement about him?”

“Your judgement about Rafe is fine. What’s wrong is your
judgement about yourself. You think that you’re being objective about Rafe, but
you aren’t. You’re letting your fear of being biased in his favour push you too
far in the opposite direction, into a choice you know is wrong.” Vidar leaned
forward. “Admit it, Joshim. If you really believed that he was an unacceptable
risk in combat, he wouldn’t be in the web at all, would he?”

Joshim hesitated. “Probably not,” he conceded at last.

“So why didn’t you ban him from the web?” Vidar insisted.

Joshim glared across his desk. “Because it wasn’t necessary,”
he admitted. “And because I didn’t want to,” he added defiantly.

“If it was necessary, would you have done it?”

“Yes. I would.”

That answer, unexpectedly easy, freed a tangle of doubts.
Making it and knowing it to be true, Joshim could look clearly at the decision
he had made about Rafe and recognize that it had been a mistake. Not just for
all the reasons that Vidar had argued, but also for the simpler and more
important reason that he had not made it as Webmaster, as he had deceived
himself that he had. He had made it as Rafe’s lover, swayed by Rafe’s distress
and by his own guilt about the Oath-Breaking that he had proposed into doing
something — anything — to ease the tension between them. Something that made
him feel that he had not abandoned his duty as Webmaster, so long as he did not
examine it too closely.

No wonder the gods had not responded to his prayers: he had
been asking for a solution to the wrong problem, to a problem that only existed
in his head. Or had they responded, by whispering in Vidar’s ear? Joshim smiled
at the thought of the reaction he would get if he asked Vidar whether he had
received any divine guidance recently.

“At least I’m not the only fool involved,” he realized
ruefully. “Rafe would have argued the ears off any other Webmaster over this,
but he hasn’t said a word about it to me.”

Vidar sat back contentedly. “Too honourable to take
advantage of his position in your bed?” he teased.

“And in my affections,” Joshim corrected good-naturedly.

Too honourable to risk talking me into another form of
Oath-breaking, letting him in the key-position against my better judgement, he
added privately. That was not a subject he could discuss with Vidar, in spite
of the friendship they shared, but it was something he had to discuss with
Rafe, now that Vidar had bullied him into seeing sense.

“Thanks, Vidar,” he said quietly.

“Buy me a drink when we’re dirtside.” Vidar grinned. “Bring
Rafe along. He can buy me one too.”

* * *

 
“Ah, Rafe.” Noromi
welcomed him to
Meremir
’s web-room
with a curt nod. “Rallya not with you?”

“She’s outside, talking with Commander Erelna, sir.”

“Expects us all to wait for her, I suppose,” Noromi
complained. “Find her difficult to work with, do you?”

“Not particularly, sir.”

“Not likely to say if you did, in your position.” Noromi
chuckled knowingly. “Ought to congratulate you on your success against that
raider. Mostly the result of luck, of course, but still a creditable effort.”
He patted Rafe’s shoulder.

Rafe contrived a brief smile and moved out of easy range of
another pat. “I don’t underestimate the value of luck, sir.”

“Don’t overestimate it either,” Noromi warned. “It’s no
substitute for hard work and thorough planning.”

“No, sir, but it’s often the thing that makes the hard work
worthwhile.”

“Rallya told you that, I suppose?” Noromi shook his head
disapprovingly. “Take my advice, Rafe. Don’t believe everything she tells you.
Just because she relies on luck doesn’t mean you can do the same. Hard work and
proper training, that’s what it takes to get anywhere.”

“I couldn’t hope for better training than I’m receiving from
Commander Rallya,” Rafe said bluntly. The clumsiness of the approach was an
insult and the envy behind it irritated him. “At least she knows the difference
between luck and skill,” he added unkindly.

“One fluke success doesn’t make you a Commander,” Noromi
said, offended. “You’d do well to remember that instead of aping Rallya’s
arrogance.”

There were worse things to ape, Rafe decided as Noromi
stalked off. Like a pedestrian Commander who could not make an direct approach
to a First that he wanted to poach from another ship. Noromi should never have
been given overall responsibility for the convoy; Rafe had learned that from
the conference at Aramas. It was a formula for missed opportunities, for
slavish adherence to the tactics that Noromi had personally proven successful.
He was not incompetent, Rafe conceded honestly, but he lacked initiative.

Rallya was the obvious candidate for Convoy Commander, which
was one reason why Noromi was jealous of her, but she would have refused the
job if it had been offered, and her reputation was so formidable that Commander
Maisa would not dare order her to take it. Rallya would refuse Commander Maisa’s
job if it were offered, Rafe decided as she entered the web-room and paused to
greet Noromi. Too much routine work involved and too many people to deal with
who were not webbers, people who had to be coaxed instead of bullied.

“Noromi informs me that you’re impertinent,” Rallya
announced as she joined Rafe.

“I expect so, ma’am. I’m surprised that he’s so eager for me
to join
Meremir
.”

“Blinded by your more obvious attractions,” she said
scornfully. “Or hasn’t heard about your dubious past yet. How does it feel to
be in demand for once?”

“It’s your reflected glory that makes the difference,” Rafe
retaliated.

Rallya laughed. “Sit down and bask in it,” she advised,
relaxing into the nearest seat and closing her eyes. “Wake me up when the farce
is over.”

Noromi’s uninspired plans for the in-bound run, a reprise of
the out-bound run but in the opposite direction, aroused Rafe’s old intolerance
of a task performed barely adequately. It had been wise to keep all the
patrolships with the convoy when the cargoships were heavily loaded and unable
to move fast, but now that they were capable of some speed, it was wasteful to
repeat the tactic. Even
Bhattya
’s
limited roving commission was only confirmed by Noromi as a bow to the
inevitable.

Rallya sat throughout with closed eyes, as if intolerably
bored with the proceedings. Clearly, she had no more intention of arguing with
Noromi than had either of the other Commanders present, but at least they had
the excuse of lack of seniority. Wake me up, she had decreed; in a flood of
devilment, Rafe resolved to do exactly that.

“Any questions?” Noromi asked ritually at the end of his
presentation.

“Yes, sir,” Rafe said, violating the convention that the
Commanders’ shadows never spoke.

Noromi was disconcerted, but signalled for Rafe to continue.

“I’m not quite sure what the point of it all is, sir,” Rafe
said. Peripherally, he saw Rallya sit further down in her seat. No support from
her then, but no interference either.

“The point?” Noromi repeated. “The point is obvious.” He
moved to cancel the displays he had created.

“Not to me, sir,” Rafe said imperturbably.

“The point,” Noromi said acidly, “is to deliver the
cargoships safely to Aramas station. I would have thought that was obvious to a
half-wit.”

“I see, sir. Is that all, sir?”

“All? Isn’t that enough?”

“Aren’t our orders to ensure safe delivery of the convoy
and
to gather intelligence about the
Outsiders?”

Noromi choked. “You’re impertinent,” he accused
repetitively.

“Probably, sir,” Rafe agreed cheerfully. “You haven’t
answered my question.”

Noromi looked around for support, received none from Rallya
or from the other Commanders, and was forced to fall back on his own resources
to regain control of the meeting.

“Before you reach command rank, which is extremely unlikely
on the basis of today’s dismal showing, you will realize that orders are rarely
meant to be interpreted literally,” he told Rafe sententiously. “Until then,
your best course of action is to remain silent and learn from your betters.”

“Then you’ll explain your interpretation, sir?”

Noromi sought inspiration from the bulkhead above him, and
received it.

“Perhaps you’d like to explain yours,” he suggested
maliciously. “And the way it should be put it into practice.” He made a
grandiloquent gesture of invitation. “The meeting is yours.”

“Thank you, sir,” Rafe said happily.

“Some people never learn,” Rallya commented, opening her
eyes for the first time.

Rafe wiped Noromi’s displays, leaving only the plot of the
direct route back to Aramas. Turning to face his audience, he wondered for a
moment whether he was about to make a fool of himself. It was a familiar
uncertainty and he grinned, the grin which always persuaded his audience of his
confidence. An internal alarm flickered and he muted it hastily, helped by the
blatant expectation of his coming failure on Noromi’s face.

His ideas took shape as he transferred them to the displays,
his uncertainty and the nagging of his conditioning fading as he did so. He
laid down the simple elements first, the measures to ensure the safety of the
convoy. The aim of the Outsiders was to steal ships, not destroy them, so group
the cargoships in a fast, tight formation. Their combined mass shadow would be
protection against a ship being snatched without warning in the wake of a
raider’s jump; a tractor beam would have to be used to drag them free first.

The patrolships were at their slowest and most vulnerable in
a turn, so keep them at the rear of the convoy, poised to run down on a raider
approaching from any direction. The raider’s need to use a tractor beam would
grant the time the patrolships required.

The cargoships were lightly armed but not shielded, so order
them not to open fire unless fired upon, nor to attempt to block a raider’s
escape route. Under no circumstances were they to break formation or reduce
speed without permission.

The patrolships were not to fire upon a raider unless a
cargoship would otherwise be lost. A damaged patrolship was a greater danger to
the convoy’s safety than a fleeing raider. If a raider was about to jump alone,
let it go. If possible, ride on its wake, take a full spectrum sensor recording
of its arrival point and jump back at once through the same hole before it
faded. The manoeuvre was not compulsory, Rafe stressed drily; it was an option
open to a ship with the right team in the web. It would be useful to know where
the raiders jumped to, but not at the risk of losing a patrolship.