War Of Honor

There were places on Grayson, like Protector's Palace, which were even older and possessed that same sense of ancientness. But Protector's Palace, like every other Grayson building, was a fortress against its world. Part of that world, and yet forever separate from it. Like Honor's own parents' house on Sphinx, though on a far larger scale, White Haven wore its age like a comfortable garment. That made it something she understood, and if White Haven was a fortress in its own way, its defenses were raised against the maddening pressure of human affairs, and not against its planet.

Despite all that had happened to finally drive her to this place, Honor sensed the living, welcoming presence of Hamish Alexander's home, and a part of her reached out to it. Yet even as she yearned towards its shelter, she knew it could never be hers, and a fresher, bleaker wave of resignation washed through her as Simon Mattingly landed the limo gently on the pad.

Hamish climbed out of his seat, cradling Samantha in his arms, and his slightly strained smile invited her to follow him from the limo. She was grateful to him for sparing her pleasantries which neither of them needed, and she managed to return his smile with one of her own.

Like him, she carried Nimitz in her arms, not in his usual place on her shoulder. She needed that extra contact, that sense of additional co

The door opened at their approach, and a man who radiated a subtle kinship to James MacGuiness looked out with a small bow of greeting.

"Welcome home, My Lord," he said to White Haven.

"Thank you, Nico." White Haven acknowledged his greeting with a smile. "This is Duchess Harrington. Is Lady Emily in the atrium?"

"She is, My Lord," Nico replied, and bestowed another, more formal bow on Honor. His emotions were complex, compounded of his deep loyalty to the Alexander family, and to Hamish and Emily Alexander in particular, and an awareness that there was no truth to the vicious stories about Hamish and Honor. She tasted his sympathy for her, but there was also a sharp edge of resentment. Not for anything she'd done, but for the pain others had brought to people for whom he cared, using her as the weapon.

"Welcome to White Haven, Your Grace," he said, and to his credit, not a trace of his ambivalence at seeing her there colored his voice or his ma

"Thank you," she said, smiling at him as warmly as her emotionally battered state allowed.

"Should I a

"No, thank you. She's . . . expecting us. We'll find our own way, but ask Cook to put together a light supper for three, please. No, make that for five," he corrected, nodding at the two treecats. "And make sure there's plenty of celery."

"Of course, My Lord."

"And see to it that Her Grace's armsmen get fed, as well."

"Of course," Nico repeated as he stood aside, then closed the door behind them, and Honor turned to LaFollet.

"I think Earl White Haven, Lady White Haven, and I need to discuss things in private, Andrew," she said quietly. "You and Simon and Spencer stay here."

"I—" LaFollet began an immediate protest, then clamped his jaws tight.

He should be used to this by now, he told himself. The Steadholder had made great strides in accepting that it was his job to keep her alive whether she liked it or not, but the old stubbor

"Of course, My Lady," he said.

"Thank you," Honor said softly, and looked at Nico.

"Take care of them for me, please," she asked, and the retainer bowed more deeply still.

"I'd be honored to, Your Grace," he assured her, and she smiled one last time at her armsmen and then turned to follow White Haven down a wide, stone-floored hallway.

She had a vague impression of deeply bayed windows set in the immensely thick walls—of tasteful paintings, bright area rugs and throws, and furniture which managed to merge expense and age with comfort and utility—but none of it really registered. And then White Haven opened another door, and ushered her through it into a crystoplast-roofed atrium which must have been twenty or thirty meters on a side. That wasn't very large for Grayson, where the need to seal "outdoor gardens" against the local environment created enormous greenhouse domes, but it was the largest atrium she'd ever seen in a private home in the Star Kingdom.

It also seemed younger than much of the rest of the estate, and she looked sharply at White Haven as a spike in his emotions told her why that was so.

He'd built it for Emily. This was her place, and Honor felt a sudden, wrenching sense of wrongness. She was an intruder, an invader. She had no business in this peaceful, plant-smelling space. But she was here, now, and it was too late to run, and so she followed White Haven across the atrium to the splashing fountain and koi pond at its heart.

A woman sat waiting there. Her life support chair hovered a half-meter off the atrium floor, and it turned smoothly and silently on its counter grav to face them.

Honor felt her spine stiffen and her shoulders straighten. Not in hostility or defensiveness, but in acknowledgment and . . . respect. Her chin rose, and she returned Lady Emily Alexander's regard levelly.

Lady Emily was taller than Honor had expected, or would have been, if she'd ever stood on her two feet again. She was also frail, the antithesis of Honor's slimly solid, broad shouldered, well muscled physique. Where Honor was dark haired and dark eyed, Lady Emily's hair was as golden blond as Alice Truman's, and her eyes were a deep and brilliant green. She looked as if a kiss of breeze would lift her out of her chair and carry her away, for she could not have weighed over forty kilos, and her long-fingered hands were thin and fragile looking.

And she was still one of the most beautiful women in the entire Star Kingdom.

It wasn't just her face, or her eyes, or her hair or bone structure. Anyone with her wealth could have had those things, in these days of biosculpt and cosmetic gene therapy. It was something else. Some i

"Emily," White Haven's deep voice was deeper even than usual, "allow me to introduce Duchess Harrington."

"Welcome to White Haven, Your Grace." The voice was a husky shadow of the warm, almost purring contralto which had reached out to so many HD viewers, but it retained more than a ghost of its old power. The countess held out one delicate hand—the only one she could move, Honor realized, and stepped forward to take it.

"Thank you, Lady White Haven," she said softly, and her thanks were deep-felt and genuine, for there was no anger, no hatred in Lady Emily's greeting. Sadness, yes—a vast, bottomless sorrow, and a weariness which almost matched Honor's own. But not anger. Not at Honor. There was anger, a deep, seething rage, but it was directed at another target. At the men and women who had callously used her, just as surely as they'd used Honor or Hamish, for political advantage.

"You're not as tall as I expected from the talk show circuit and news reports," Lady Emily observed, with a faint smile. "I expected you to be at least three meters tall, and here you are, scarcely two and a half."