Echoes Of Honor

Benjamin shook his head silently, and Allison looked at MacGuiness. The steward’s face was stiff, and pain flashed in his eyes, as if he’d realized why she wanted him here and wanted nothing to do with yet another formal proof of his captain’s death. But then he, too, shook his head, and Allison smiled at him.

"Thank you," she said softly. She took a moment to collect her thoughts, then cleared her throat.

"First of all, I was quite astounded to discover just how large an estate Honor left. Excluding her feudal holdings here on Grayson as Steadholder Harrington, but including the value of her private interest in Sky Domes and your new Blackbird Shipyard, her net financial worth at the time of her death was just under seventeen-point-four billion Manticoran dollars." Despite himself, Benjamin pursed his lips and whistled silently, and Allison nodded.

"Alfred and I had no idea the estate had grown to anything that size," she went on matter-of-factly, with only the pressure of her grip on her husband’s hand to show how dearly bought her outer calm was. "For that matter, I’m not at all certain she realized it, especially since over a quarter of the entire total was generated out of the Blackbird Yard in the last three years. But Willard had things superbly organized for her, as usual, and he seems to have managed to execute her wishes completely.

"The biggest part of what she wanted done was her instruction to merge all of her personal holdings and funds in the Star Kingdom—exclusive of a few special bequests—and fold them over into Grayson Sky Domes. Lord Clinkscales will continue as CEO, and Sky Domes will be held in trust for the next Steadholder Harrington with the proviso that all future financial operations will be based here, on Grayson, and that a majority of the members of the Sky Domes board of directors must be citizens of Harrington Steading. Our understanding is that Willard will be relocating to Grayson to serve full-time as Sky Domes’ chief financial officer and manager."

"That was very generous of her," Benjamin said quietly. "That much capital investment in Harrington and Grayson—and in our tax base—will have a major impact."

"Which was what she wanted," Alfred agreed. "There are, however, those special bequests Alley mentioned. Aside from a very generous one to us, she’s also establishing a trust fund of sixty-five million dollars for the treecats here on Grayson, adding another hundred million to the endowment for the clinic, and donating fifty million to the Sword Museum of Art in Austin City. In addition, she’s going to establish a trust fund for the families of her personal armsmen in the amount of another hundred million and—" he looked at MacGuiness "—she’s bequeathed forty million dollars to you, Mac."

MacGuiness stiffened, going white with shock, and Allison gripped his shoulder again.

"There are just two stipulations, Mac," she said quietly. "One is that you retire from the Navy. I think she felt she’d dragged you through enough battles with her, and she wanted to know you were safe. And the second is that you look after Samantha and the children for her and Nimitz."

"Of... Of course, Milady," the steward husked. "She didn’t have to—" His voice broke, and Allison smiled mistily at him.

"Of course she didn’t ‘have to,’ Mac. She wanted to. Just as she wanted to leave Miranda twenty million." Miranda inhaled sharply, but Allison went on calmly. "There are some other minor stipulations, but those are the important ones. Willard will bring all the official documentation with him, of course."

"She was a remarkable woman," Benjamin said softly.

"Yes, she was," Allison agreed. Silence lingered for several seconds, and then she drew a deep breath and rose.

"And now, since this was a ‘supper’ invitation, I imagine we should get on to the supper in question! Are we ready, Mac?"

"I believe so, Ma’am." MacGuiness shook himself and rose. "I’ll just go check to be certain."

He opened the library doors, then paused and stepped back with a wry grin as a quartet of treecats came through it. Jason and his sister Andromeda led the way, but Hipper and Artemis trailed along behind, keeping a watchful eye on them. The ’kittens scurried forward, with an apparently suicidal disregard for the possibility of being trodden on, but Allison wasn’t particularly worried. She had been initially, but treekittens had incredibly fast reaction speeds, and somehow they always managed to be somewhere the foot wasn’t at the moment it came down.

Now she watched them stop and sit bolt upright as they caught the emotions of the Protector’s daughters. The ’kittens’ ears pricked sharply, their green eyes intent, for it was the first time they’d tasted the emotions of human children, and their tails twitched. Artemis plunked down and watched them with a maternal air, and Allison’s earlier comments to Katherine flickered back through her brain. There were a great many similarities between treecat and Grayson notions of child rearing, she reflected. And a good thing, too. The Peeps hadn’t said a word about it, but every member of Honor’s extended family—human and ’cat alike—knew Nimitz had not survived her. More often than not, ’cats suicided when their adopted humans died, yet that was almost beside the point here. For the Peeps to hang Honor, they had to have killed Nimitz first; it was the only way they could have—

Allison’s thoughts broke off abruptly as something jabbed at the corner of her attention and pulled her up out of the bitter memories. She blinked, attention refocusing on the library as she tried to figure out what her subconscious had noticed, and then her eyes widened. Artemis was watching the ’kittens as the Mayhew children swarmed forward—suitably cautious after a sharp word from Elaine but still bubbling with delight—to greet the ’kittens. That was hardly surprising, for Honor had told Allison how the children had loved Nimitz, and these were ’kittens. Brand new, cuddly, wonderful ’kittens!

But if Artemis was watching with amused affection, Hipper wasn’t. He was crouched on all six limbs, leaning forward almost like a human sprinter poised in the blocks before a race, with his tail straight out behind him. Only the very tip of that tail twitched in quick, tiny arcs; aside from that, he was motionless, and he wasn’t even glancing at the ’kittens. His grass-green eyes were locked on the Mayhews.

No, Allison thought with sudden understanding. Not on the Mayhews; on a Mayhew.

The realization flicked through her in an instant and she began to open her mouth, but not quickly enough. Hipper suddenly shook himself and leapt forward in a cream-and-gray blur, streaking across the library towards the children.

Rachel Mayhew’s personal armsman saw him coming and reacted with the spinal-reflex quickness of his training. Intellectually, he knew no treecat would ever threaten a child, yet his reflexes were another matter, and his hand flashed out to sweep the girl aside and place himself between her and the potential threat.

But he didn’t quite manage it, for even as Hipper had started forward, Rachel’s head had snapped around as if someone had shouted her name. Her brown eyes settled on Hipper with unerring accuracy, and as her armsman reached for her, she dodged his arm with astonishing agility. She crouched, opening her arms with a blinding smile of welcome, and Hipper catapulted from the floor into her embrace.

She was only eleven years old, and at 10.3 standard kilos, Hipper was one of the largest treecats Allison had ever met. Which, coupled with Grayson’s 1.17 g gravity and the conservation of momentum, had predictable results.

Rachel went back on her bottom with a thump as the ’cat landed in her arms, and Allison’s hand flashed out. She caught Rachel’s armsman’s wrist out of sheer reflex, without even thinking about it, and only later realized that she’d stopped his hand on its way to the pulser at his hip. But it didn’t really matter. Even as she gripped it, she felt his muscles relax in sudden, explosive relief as everyone in the library heard Hipper’s high, buzzing purr of delight and watched the ’cat rubbing his cheek ecstatically against Rachel’s.