Rules of Engagement

Chapter Seventeen

Escovar was not aboard; he was at another meeting.

“Is there something I could answer?” asked Lieutenant Commander Dockery. Barin hesitated only a moment.

“Yes, sir, quite possibly, but it would be better somewhere else.”

“Trouble?”

“Perhaps.”

“Sten, you have the bridge,” Dockery said. And to Barin, “Come on, then—we’ll use the captain’s office.”

Barin had just time to realize that he might be scuttling several careers, not just his own, when Dockery turned to him.

“Out with it, then. Found another problem with master chiefs?”

Barin’s jaw almost dropped. “As a matter of fact, sir, possibly yes. But that’s not my main concern.”

“Which is?”

Best get it out quickly, before he was tempted to soften it. “Sir, an officer from this ship has accessed records which she has no legitimate interest in, and may have given false information about someone else.”

“Hmm . . . that’s a serious charge about an indefinite—I presume you have a name for each of these?”

“Yes, sir.” Barin took a deep breath. “Lieutenant Ferradi talked a master chief named Pell—who incidentally is known to his juniors to be forgetting things this past year—into accessing Lieutenant Suiza’s legal records from the court-martial.”

“It didn’t occur to you that she might have had orders to do so? She is on Admiral Hornan’s staff for the present . . .”

“No, sir. If she’d had orders, she’d have gone through channels, not Chief Pell.”

“And you also accuse her of giving false information about Lieutenant Suiza? What kind of false information?”

“She’s said a lot of things about what Es—what Lieutenant Suiza was like in the Academy. Now I was too far behind to have witnessed any of this directly, but other people who were there don’t have the same account at all.”

Dockery pursed his lips. “I know that Lieutenant Ferradi’s been interested in you, Ensign—it’s been fairly obvious. Scuttlebutt had it that you were . . . ‘falling under her spell,’ I believe, is the term I heard used most. Are you sure this isn’t just a lovers’ quarrel you’re trying to make official business? Because if so, you’re about to be in more trouble than you were in over Zuckerman.”

“No, sir, it is not a lover’s quarrel. I have no interest in Lieutenant Ferradi and never did.”

“Mm. The other rumor was that you had been in love with Esmay Suiza—” Barin felt his face getting hot; the exec nodded. “And so the other possibility I see is that you’re accusing Lieutenant Ferradi of unprofessional behavior toward another officer because you’re still besotted with Suiza and can’t stand to hear her criticized.”

“Sir, I became . . . very fond of Lieutenant Suiza when we were both on Koskiusko. I think she’s a fine officer. We quarrelled at Copper Mountain, over what she’d said to Brun Meager”—and to him, though he wasn’t going to mention that at the moment—“and I haven’t seen her since. Whether I have a bad case of hero worship, which is what Lieutenant Ferradi’s told me, or a friendship, or—or something else, doesn’t really matter. What does, is whether the stories Ferradi’s spreading about her are true.”

“If they were true, what would you think?”

Barin felt a pain in his chest squeezing out hope. “Then, sir—I would have to change my opinion.”

“Barin, I’m going to tell you something, in confidence, because right now you need to know it. Casea Ferradi has been trouble for every commander she’s had—it’s why she’s at the back of her class’s promotion list—but she’s never quite managed to get herself thrown out. If Lieutenant Suiza hadn’t had that quarrel with Sera Meager, if Lord Thornbuckle hadn’t fastened on her as the scapegoat in this mess, no one would be paying the slightest attention to Ferradi’s accusations. Now they are—and if she’s so far overreached herself as to break regulations concerning legal paperwork, we’ve got her at last. Tell me, do you know if Koutsoudas is still running scan on your cousin’s ship?”

“I think so, sir.” Where was this leading?

“Good. We’re going to need really good scan to catch her in the act, because she’s no dummy. And by the way, good job on finding Pell. We’ve found two others here . . . though we haven’t figured out what the problem is yet.”

A half hour later, Barin was on his way to the berth of the Navarino, his cousin Heris’s ship. Heris was at home to family members—he had the distinct feeling that if he’d been an ensign named, perhaps, Livadhi or Hornan, he might have cooled his heels for an hour before getting in to see her.

“You want my scan techs sucking for you? What’s wrong with yours? Escovar’s always been able to pick good people.”

Dockery had left it to him how much to tell, but this was family. Barin made it as short as he could, emphasizing that he had thought at first it was Heris’s record Ferradi was after, in order to help Hornan wrest command of the task force from Admiral Serrano.

“Are you involved?” The emphasis clearly meant culpable as well.

“No, and yes,” Barin said. “Lieutenant Ferradi also happens to see me as her ticket to the Serrano dynasty.”

“Does she now?” Heris looked suddenly very dangerous indeed, as if a sleeping falcon had waked, and aimed its deadly gaze at a target. “And what do you think she’s done, that you need Koutsoudas to discover?”

“Gone hunting in supposedly secure legal files, and possibly altered data, sir.” That last was his own guess; Dockery hadn’t been impressed by it, but he was sure that if Ferradi would lie verbally, she would not be above fudging the records. Why else risk tinkering with those files at all?

“Ah. Well . . . tell you what. You can have a couple of hours of Koutsoudas’ time—but I get the whole story afterwards.”

“Yes, sir.”

“And your captain owes me dinner.”

Now how was he going to explain that one? He returned thoughtfully to Gyrfalcon’s berth, and reported his success to Dockery. “Koutsoudas will be along after lunch, sir,” he said at last.

“Good. In the meantime, I want you to go destroy property and get yourself chewed out.”

“Sir?”

“Go find Lieutenant Ferradi—which shouldn’t be hard, as you say she’s been adherent—and figure out some way to damage her datawand. I want her to have to initialize another. I don’t care how you do it, as long as you don’t damage the lieutenant—but I will mention that just dropping one in an alcoholic beverage is not sufficient. On the other hand, the application of sufficient point pressure is.”

Barin set out on this mission with the uneasy feeling that Dockery’s past might be more interesting than he had thought. When—and why—had Dockery discovered that dropping a datawand in alcohol wouldn’t damage it?

Ferradi found him just as he was turning into the junior officers’ mess and recreation area. “Lunch, Ensign?” she asked brightly.

“Oh—yes. Excuse me, Lieutenant—” He made a show of patting his pockets. “Drat!”

“What?”

“I was supposed to check on something for Commander Dockery, and then Major Carmody asked me something else, and—I forgot my datawand. It’s back aboard. I’ll have to go back—unless I could borrow yours, sir?”

“You should carry it with you all the time,” Ferradi said, pulling out hers. “What did Dockery want?”

“Spares delivery schedule,” Barin said promptly. “He says they’ve shorted on pre-dets the last four times. You probably know all about it.”

“Oh—yeah. Everyone’s complaining.” She handed over the wand, and Barin looked around. The nearest high-speed dataport was out in the corridor.

“I’ll just be moment,” he said. “I heard they have Lassaferan snailfish chowder today—” Sure enough, she went on to the serving tables. Snailfish chowder was a rare treat.

Barin found the high-speed port and jammed the datawand in. Nothing happened; it lit up normally. He pulled it back out, looked around, and shoved it in as hard as he could. Its telltales came up normal again. He pulled it out and looked at the tip. Someone had designed it to withstand normal carelessness . . . and he realized that a high-speed dataport probably had internal cushions to protect the port side of the contact as well. Fine. Now what? She’d be looking for him any moment.

A thought occurred. He went back into the lounge, waved to Lieutenant Ferradi, who had found a seat at a small table facing the entrance, and pointed at the head, then strode quickly in that direction, as if in urgent need.

Heads were full of hard surfaces; Barin tried one after another, between flushes, until he’d produced a crumple at the datawand’s tip by catching it between the door and its jamb, and then squashing it with the door as a lever. He’d had no idea datawands were that tough.

“Sorry, sir,” he said to Lieutenant Ferradi, as he seated himself and handed her the wand. “Some kind of bug, I expect.”

She had tucked it away without looking at it. “So—you’re not having chowder?”

“No, sir. In fact, I think I’ll just sit here, if that’s all right.”

“Of course.” She gave him one of her looks from under long eyelashes. Despite his opinion of her, he felt a stir . . . and she knew it. He could have strangled her for that alone. He hoped very much he’d done enough damage to that datawand.

Esmay changed into her uniform aboard the ship that had brought her, and took the tram over to the Fleet side.

“Lieutenant Suiza,” she said to the security posted at the entrance to the Fleet side of the station.

“Welcome home, Lieutenant.” The greeting was merely ritual, but she felt welcomed nonetheless. Beyond the checkpoint, the corridors were busy. No one seemed to notice her—and no reason why they should.

She paused to check the status boards. The task force was still here; her ship was still docked at the station. She entered her name and codes, and found that she was still on the crewlist, though coded for “leave status: away.” All other leaves had been cancelled.

“Well, if it isn’t Lieutenant Suiza,” came a voice from behind her. She turned, to find herself face to face with Admiral Hornan. He was looking at her with considerably less than pleasure. “I thought you had indefinite leave.”

“I did, sir,” she said. “But we got everything taken care of back home, and I came back at once.”

“Couldn’t leave it alone, could you? Think you’ll have a chance to gloat over the Speaker’s daughter, if we get her out?”

“No, sir.” Esmay managed to keep her voice level. “Gloating was never my intention.”

“You did not think she richly deserved what she got? That’s not what I heard.”

“Sir, I neither said, nor thought, that Brun deserved being kidnapped and raped.”

“I see. You did, however, say that she wasn’t worth going to war over.”

“Sir, I said that no one makes war over one person, not that she wasn’t worth it. That is what others have said, as well.”

The admiral made a noise somewhere between a grunt and a growl. “That may be, Lieutenant, but the fact remains that what is on the record is your statement that she wasn’t worth a war.”

Before she could answer—if she could have thought of an answer—the admiral turned away. So much for making allies. She couldn’t think of anything she might have said to change his mind.

Esmay had never really thought about the people who might be annoyed, or envious, because of her success. That first triumph had felt so fragile: she had not planned to be the senior survivor of a mutiny, and her struggle to bring her ship back to Xavier, and help Commander Serrano, had been a desperate struggle, one she did not expect—even at the last moment—to win. How could anyone resent it when it was clearly more luck than skill? As for the Koskiusko affair . . . again, it was pure luck that she had been there, that she had not been snatched, like Barin, by the Bloodhorde intruders.

But now, thinking about it, she realized that her peers were used to thinking of her as a nonentity, no threat to their own career plans. They had kept a closer eye on more credible rivals. The very suddenness of her success must have made her seem even more dangerous—to those inclined to think that way—than she really was. They would doubt her real ability, or fear it.

So she had . . . enemies, perhaps . . . in Fleet. Competitors, anyway. Some would want to frustrate her goals; others would want to ride her coattails to their own.

Once she’d thought of it, she felt stupid for not thinking of it before. Just as people had interacted with her without knowing what her internal thoughts and feelings were—seeing only the Lieutenant Suiza who was quiet, formal, unambitious—so she had interacted with the others without knowing, or caring much, what their internal motivations and goals were. She had been concerned what those senior to her thought of her performance, of course . . . she paused to consider that “of course,” then set that aside for later. The problem was, until recently she had been just existing alongside others, unaware of them except where interaction was required. So she had no idea which of them thought of her as a rival, and which as a potential friend. Except for Barin.

She arrived at her assigned quarters still thinking this over. She had unpacked her duffel and was looking up references on the cube reader when the doorchime sounded. When she opened the door, she was facing an elderly woman she had never seen before in her life, a civilian woman who carried herself with the confidence of an admiral—or a very rich and powerful person.

“You don’t look like a desperate schemer,” the old woman said. Her night-black hair was streaked with silver, bushing out into a stormy mass, and with her brilliantly colored flowing clothes, she looked like a figure out of legend. Granna Owl, or the Moonborn Mage or something like that. “I’m Marta Katerina Saenz, by the way. My niece Raffaele went to school with Brun Meager. May I come in?”

“Of course.” Esmay backed up a step, and the woman came in.

“You are, I presume, Lieutenant Esmay Suiza, just returned from leave on Altiplano?”

“Yes . . . Sera.”

Marta Saenz looked her up and down, very much as her own great-grandmother had done. “You also don’t look like a fool.”

Esmay said nothing as the old woman stalked about the room, her full sleeves fluttering slightly. She came to rest with her back to the door, and cocked her head at Esmay.

“No answer? Indirect questions don’t work? Then I’ll ask outright—are you a heartless schemer, glad to make profit out of another woman’s shame and misery?”

“No,” Esmay said, with as little heat as she could manage. Then, belatedly, “No, Sera.”

“You aren’t glad the Speaker’s daughter was captured?”

“Of course not,” Esmay said. “I know that’s what people think, but it’s not true—”

The old woman had dark eyes, wise eyes. “When you have called someone—what was it? oh, yes—a ‘stupid, selfish, sex-crazed hedonist with no more morals than a mare in heat,’ people are going to get the idea you don’t like her.”

“I didn’t like her,” Esmay said. “But I didn’t want this to happen to her.” She wanted to say What kind of person do you think I am? but people had been thinking she was bad for so long she didn’t dare.

“Ah. And did you think she was morally lacking?”

“Yes . . . though that still doesn’t mean—”

“I honor your clear vision, young woman, which can so easily find where others are lacking. I wonder, have you ever turned that clear vision on yourself?”

Esmay took a deep breath. “I am stubborn, priggish, rigid, and about as tactful as a rock to the head.”

“Um. So you’re not casting yourself as the faultless saint in this drama?”

“Saint? No! Of course not!”

“Ah. So when you decided she was lacking in moral fiber, you were comparing her to an objective standard—?”

“Yes,” Esmay said, more slowly. She wasn’t even sure why she was answering this person. She had been over this so often, without convincing anyone.

The old woman nodded, as if to some unheard comment. “If I were simply going by Brun’s past behavior, I’d say there’s a man at the bottom of this.”

Esmay felt her face heating. Was she really that transparent? The old woman nodded again.

“I thought as much. And who, pray tell, is the young man on whom Brun set her sights, and whom you think you love?”

“I do love—” got out before Esmay could stop it. She felt her face getting hotter. “Barin Serrano,” she said, aware of being outmaneuvered, outgunned, and in all ways outclassed.

“Oh, my.” That was all the old lady said, though she blinked and pursed her lips. Then she smiled. “I have known Brun since she was a cute spoiled toddler they called Bubbles—”

“Bubbles?” Esmay could not put that name with what she knew of Brun. “Her?”

“Stupid nickname—gave the girl a lot of trouble, because she thought she had to live up to it. But anyway, I’ve known her that long, and you are right that she was as badly spoiled as it’s possible for a person of her abilities to be. My niece Raffaele was one of her close friends—and Raffa, like you, was one for getting other people out of scrapes. She got Brun out of a lot of them.”

Where was this leading? Esmay wasn’t sure she was following whatever chain of logic the old woman was forging; she was still too shaken at having admitted—to a stranger—that she loved Barin Serrano. She was hardly aware that the emotional atmosphere had changed, that the old woman wasn’t as hostile as she had been.

“Tell me that Brun Meager has no morals, and I find myself defending her. But tell me that she cast covetous eyes on your young man, and I am not only willing to believe it, but not even mildly surprised. She’s been that way since she first discovered boys.”

Was that supposed to excuse her? Esmay felt the familiar stubborn resentment. The old woman paused; Esmay said nothing.

“If you’re thinking that making a habit of stealing other women’s men is even worse than happening to fall in love with one of them, which is what your face looks like, that’s true. She collects them like charms on a bracelet, with reprehensible lack of concern for anyone’s feelings. Or she did. Raffa said she’d been more . . . er . . . discreet in the past few years. Apparently someone she took a fancy to refused to have a fling with her.”

“Barin . . . didn’t,” Esmay said. Then, realizing how many ways that could be taken wrong, she tried to explain. “I mean, he wasn’t the one, but he also didn’t. He said . . .” Her voice failed her. After a miserable pause, during which she wished she could evaporate, the old lady continued.

“But what you should know is that while Brun’s moral qualities are certainly immature, the girl had the right instincts about many things. She’s been wild, heedless, rebellious—but she’s not wittingly cruel.”

“She said things to me, too.” That sounded almost childish, and again Esmay wished she could just not be there.

“In the heat of an argument, yes. She would. Both of you sound rather like fishwives in the tape.” The old lady picked up and put down a datawand and a memo pad. “Suppose you tell me how you met her, and what happened then?”

Esmay could see no reason for doing so, but she felt too exhausted to protest. Dully, she recounted the story of her first sight of Brun arguing with her father, and what followed, up to the point where Barin arrived.

“Let me see if I have this right. Brun admired you, wanted to be your friend, but you found her pushy and uncomfortable.”

“Sort of. I’d seen her throw that tantrum with her father—”

“That sounds like her—and like her father, for that matter. Stubborn as granite, all that family. Back when her father was a boy, he had almost that same argument with his father. But since he was only ten years old, it was easier to deal with. So, from the first, Brun impressed you as spoiled and difficult, and you wanted no part of her.”

“Not exactly,” Esmay said. “If I hadn’t been so busy, taking double courses, I might’ve had time to talk to her. She kept wanting to go off somewhere and have a party, when I had to study. But that doesn’t mean I wanted her to get hurt.”

“And knowing Brun, she would’ve counted on her charm—she probably couldn’t figure out why you weren’t being friendlier. A natural ally, she would have thought—ran away from a repressive home and made a career for herself, and her family isn’t interfering.”

“I suppose . . .” Esmay said. Had that been what Brun was thinking? It had not occurred to her that Brun could ever think of them as having much in common.

“And then, on top of that, she made a play for your man. I wonder if she was serious about that, or if she just thought he could help her get to you?”

“She asked him to sleep with her,” Esmay said, angry again.

“Ah. Unwise of her, at best. And you suddenly thought of her as a rival, a sneak, and a slut, did you?”

“Mmm . . . yes.” Put like that, it made her seem even more naive than she was. If that were possible.

“And you got mad and reamed her out for it. But, my dear, had you ever bothered to tell her you were in love with the man?”

“Of course not! We hadn’t made any promises . . . I mean . . .”

“Have you told anyone?”

“Well . . . only when I went home for Great-grandmother’s funeral, I told my cousin Luci.”

“Who is how old? And what did she say?”

“She’s eighteen . . . and she said I was an idiot.” Esmay blinked back sudden tears. “But she—she’s had those years at home, and her mother—and no one ever told me—”

The old lady snorted. “No, I don’t suppose how to conduct a love affair is one of the courses taught at the Academy or the prep school.”

“What they said was not to become involved with people above or below in the same chain of command, and avoid all situations of undue influence.”

“That sounds like a recipe for confusion,” Marta commented.

“In the professional ethics segment at Copper Mountain,” Esmay said, “there was more about that—and I started worrying about what I might do to Barin—”

“Professionally, you mean?”

“Yes—I’m two ranks senior, he’s just an ensign. It seemed natural at first—and we weren’t in the same chain of command—but maybe I shouldn’t, anyway. I told myself that,” Esmay said, aware of the misery in her voice. “I tried to think how to talk to him about it, but—but she was always there, and I didn’t have time—”

“Oh . . . my. Yes, I see. She had the experience, and you didn’t. She had the time, and you didn’t. And you would not see her being concerned about her effect on his career, either, I daresay.”

“No. It was always ‘Barin, since Esmay’s being no fun, let’s go into Q-town for a drink or something.’”

“I’ve met the young Serrano,” Marta said. Her finger traced a line on the built-in desk. “Handsome boy—seems very bright. His grandmother thinks rather well of him, and tries not to show it.”

“How is he?” asked Esmay, her whole heart waiting for the answer.

“Thriving, I would say, except for the woman he’s got on his trail. One Lieutenant Ferradi, as slickly designed a piece of seduction as I’ve ever seen. I wonder who did her biosculpt. He’s at that age, Lieutenant Suiza, where young men of quality are full of animal magnetism and some women behave like iron filings. Tell me, if you will, who noticed whom first between the two of you?”

“He—came to me,” Esmay said, feeling the heat in her face.

“Ah. No iron filing tendencies in you, then. Typical—the magnets prefer to join other magnets: like to like.”

“But I’m not—”

“A magnet? I think you misjudge yourself; people often do. The most distressing bores are most sure they fascinate; the least perceptive will tell you at great length how they understand your feelings; every hero I ever knew was at least half-convinced of his or her own cowardice. If you were not a magnet, so many people could not be so angry with you.”

Esmay had never looked at character that way, and wasn’t sure she agreed. But Marta went on.

“You’re a born leader; that’s clear from your record. That, too, is a magnet quality. You repel or you attract . . . you are not, as it were, inert. Brun’s the same—and when magnets aren’t attracted, they’re often repellent to one another. You got, as it were, your like poles too close together.”

“I suppose . . .”

“Tell me, if you hadn’t been working so hard, and if Barin hadn’t been there, do you think you’d have found anything to like in Brun?”

“Yes,” Esmay said after a moment. “She could be fun—the few times we had a few minutes together, I enjoyed it . . . I could see why people liked her so much. She lights up a room, she’s bright—we were on the same team for the E&E class exercises, you know. She learned fast; she had good ideas.”

“Good enough to get herself out of her present predicament?”

“I . . . don’t know. They wouldn’t let her take the field exercise—that’s one thing she blamed me for, and I had nothing to do with it. But against a whole planet—I don’t think that would’ve helped. What worries me is that they aren’t paying attention to her character in the planning—”

“I thought you said she had none—”

Esmay waved that away. If this woman, even this one woman, would listen to what she’d worked out, maybe it would help Brun. “I don’t mean sexual morality. I mean her personality, her way of doing things. They’re talking—they were talking—as if she were just a game piece. Unless she’s dead, she’s planning and doing something—and if we don’t know what, we’re going to find our plans crossing hers.”

“But the Guernesi said there’s no way to communicate with her—that pregnant and nursing women are sequestered, and besides, she can’t talk.” Still, Marta’s eyes challenged Esmay to keep going.

“She needs to know she’s not forgotten,” Esmay said. “She needs to know someone thinks she’s competent—”

“You sound as if you thought you understood her,” Marta said.

“They silenced her,” Esmay said, ignoring that invitation. “That doesn’t mean she can’t think and act. And—did they tell you about the children on that merchant ship?”

Marta frowned. “I . . . don’t know. I don’t think so. What does that have to do with Brun?”

Quickly Esmay outlined her new theory. “If they didn’t kill those children, if they were taking them, they’d have put Brun in with them. That might be enough to keep her alive—if she thought she had a responsibility to the children. And she’d be planning some rescue for them, I would bet on it.”

“I suppose it’s possible . . .”

“And besides, for her to come out of this in the end, even if she is rescued, she needs to feel that she had some effect. It’s one of the things they taught us, and Barin knows from experience . . . a captive who is just rescued like a . . . a piece of jewelry or something . . . has a much harder time regaining a normal life. She was not just captured; she was muted, and then raped—made pregnant. All her options closed. They should be thinking beyond getting her out, to getting her out with some self-respect left.”

Marta looked at her with a completely changed expression. “You’re serious . . . you couldn’t have come up with that if you didn’t really care. That’s good thinking, Lieutenant—excellent thinking. And I can tell you that you’re right—the planning group is not considering any of those things.”

“Can you get it across to them?”

“Me? It’s your idea.”

“But I don’t know how to get anyone to listen to me. They’re so convinced I wanted something bad to happen to her, none of them will let me near the planning sessions, let alone speak. If you tell them, maybe they’ll consider it.”

“You’re not asking for credit—”

Esmay shook her head. “No. Brun’s the one in critical danger. Of course, I’d like to be the one to come up with the best solution . . . but it’s better that someone comes up with it, than have it ignored.”

“I’ll . . . see what I can do,” Marta said. “In that and other situations.”

Admiral Serrano frowned as the door opened, but her expression eased as Marta Saenz swept through. “Marta! I heard you were back from downside. We missed you the past few sessions. Lord Thornbuckle was actually making sense when you left, but he’s foaming at the mouth again.”

“I was prowling amongst the troops, as you’d put it. And I just had a little conversation with your Lieutenant Suiza,” Marta said.

“Her.” The admiral frowned again. “A very disappointing decision, encouraging her switch to command track. She’s not working out at all.”

“You’ve got the bull by the wrong leg,” Marta said. “Did you know the girl was besotted with your grandson?”

“I know they formed an attachment on Koskiusko, which I’m glad to see is no longer important.”

“Oh, but it is,” Marta said. “The silly child fell madly in love for the first time in her life, and nothing in her background told her what to do when a rich, beautiful, charismatic blonde moved in on her love life.”

“But she’s—what?—almost thirty.”

“She’s also Altiplanan, lost her mother when she was five, and apparently no one told her about anything to do with love. So when she finally fell, she fell like the side of a mountain. Something she heard in a class on professional ethics started her worrying about whether she should have—as if rules ever affected gravity or love—and while she was fumbling around trying to put her emotional affairs in order, Brun started playing come-hither with your grandson. Who resisted, by the way, but Esmay didn’t know that when she blew up.”

“I can hardly believe—”

“Oh, it’s true. And your grandson is equally besotted with her, though he’s tried to fight it. He was angry and hurt that Esmay didn’t trust him, and—since he wasn’t the one feeling unsure and jealous—he was appalled at her attack on Brun.”

“Where did you get all this . . . inside knowledge of my grandson’s head?”

“His heart, not his head. By poking around being a nosy old woman and then a more . . . er . . . traditional grandmother than you are. He could hardly confide his guilty passion to you, now could he? Not when his lady love was in your black book and he knew your position was shaky, with dear Admiral Hornan doing his best to grab your command.”

Admiral Serrano looked thoughtful. “They both still think they’re in love, do they?”

Marta chuckled. “All the symptoms. They blush, they tremble, they look shy—it’s rather sweet, actually, as well as unmistakeable. I admit my fondness for young love, messy though it often is. It’s why I helped Raffa and Ronnie get free of their appallingly stiff-necked parents. So you can quit looking for hidden political motives in Lieutenant Suiza’s behavior—this is the oldest story in the book.”

“That may be, but it doesn’t excuse—”

“What she said? No. But if her commander had known from day one that this was a squabble over a man, would he have handled it the way he did?”

Admiral Serrano pursed her lips. “Well . . . probably not. We do get late bloomers from time to time, and they do usually make a mess of things at least once.” The admiral sounded thoughtful, less harsh.

“Making a mess of love is part of growing up,” Marta said, nodding. “Making a mess of someone’s career, however, requires the connivance of others.”

“I don’t follow you.” But the dark eyes were alert, watchful.

“Well . . . as the resident sweet old lady in this facility—” The admiral snorted, and Marta flashed a quick grin but went on. “The youngsters tell me things. They always have. It’s why I was Raffa’s favorite aunt. I’d already begun to wonder how so shining a young hero could become everyone’s favorite wicked woman quite so fast. I suspected that someone else’s interest lay in making Lieutenant Suiza look as bad as possible, and I found that the tainted effluent, as it were, led to a few sources quite remote from Copper Mountain. That’s why I went planetside, so I could do a little discreet database poking from a civilian facility.”

“And you found—?”

Marta held up her hand and ticked off points on her fingers. “I found Academy classmates of Esmay’s who were jealous of her success—who resented her honors—who would be quite happy to see her back in tech track, or out of Fleet, because she can fight rings around them. Much that’s been attributed to her has come from these sources, and they’ve put the worst possible interpretation on what she did say. The people who’ve actually served with her are confused and upset right now, but find it hard to believe she could be the way she’s now being painted. I found others who want to get influence with your grandson because he’s a Serrano . . . who are very glad to put a barrier between him and Lieutenant Suiza.”

“All very interesting—but are you sure you’re hearing the truth?”

“Vida—remember Patchcock? My nose for this kind of nastiness—”

“Yes . . . all right . . . but that doesn’t get Lieutenant Suiza off the hook for what she actually said and did. And there’s a witness to her saying that Brun wasn’t worth starting a war over.”

“So did I, m’dear. So did you. So did the Guernesi ambassador, more than once. We wrapped it in platitudes, but you know and I know that no one—not even the Speaker, and certainly not his daughter—is worth starting a war for. Taken in context, what she actually said cannot be construed to mean that she thought all those things attributed to her.”

The admiral spread her hands. “So—what do you propose to do about this? Since you came here, I presume you have a plan in mind.”

“Well . . . having played fairy godmother to at least three other romances recently—you know about Raffa and Ronnie, but you don’t know about the others—I feel I’m on a roll where love is concerned. If Esmay and Barin can work out their problems—”

“You mean you aren’t planning to do it for them?” That with a challenging grin.

“Of course not.” Marta made a prim face. “Children learn by doing. But if they can work it out—and since they’re both still smitten, I expect they can—that will take the teeth out of some of the other criticisms. After all, if a Serrano is her lover—”

“Ah—so that’s why you tackled me first. So I wouldn’t tell young Barin to avoid her?”

“Got it in one. Incidentally, if you thought Suiza was bad, you ought to see what’s working on him now. One of Esmay’s classmates, and a very sleek piece of work she is, too. Knows everything Esmay doesn’t know about men, and since she’s also a colonial, from one of the Crescent Worlds, you have to wonder where she got that kind of skill. Rumor has it, from seducing her senior officers.”

“Pull in your claws, Marta—I won’t do anything to warn Barin off. And I already know about Lieutenant Ferradi—she may have done even worse than you know, according to Heris. If so, her doom is about to be upon her: Heris lent Koutsoudas to the cause.”

“You’re going to tell me, I trust? No? Wicked woman—but then you are an admiral.” Marta’s chuckle ended. “There’s another thing, though. Lieutenant Suiza, when I talked to her, had what I think are some very good insights into Brun’s situation and some concerns about the planning. She is convinced that no one will listen to her, and asked me to pass these ideas on, as my own. I’d much rather get her involved in the planning herself—”

“Can’t be done,” Admiral Serrano said crisply. “Lord Thornbuckle’s adamant. Apparently he had liked her when he met her at Copper Mountain, and feels that this proves she is . . . treacherous, was his word. He will not have her involved at all. And I doubt you can change his mind. Not in the time we have left.”

She glanced at the wall calendar and Marta followed that glance. A red rectangle covered the most probable dates for the end of Brun’s pregnancy; a green one covered the time the Militia were known to allow before rebreeding a captive. That was their target; somewhere in that period they had to extract her—or face even more difficult problems.

“All right. One war at a time. I’ll present Esmay’s ideas; they certainly make sense in terms of my knowledge of Brun’s character.”