Heirs of Empire

“You have?”

“Of course we have. Lordy, Colin, don’t you think I’ve been around long enough to realize how you think? It takes you a while, sometimes, but you usually get to the right decision sooner or later.”

“You,” Colin observed dryly, “don’t have the most respectful demeanor of any naval officer in the galaxy.”

“I do on duty. Want to see my ‘official commandant’s’ face?” Her smile vanished instantly into a stern expression and cold, measuring eyes that impaled him for a ten-count before she relaxed with a grin. “I keep it in a box on my dresser till I need it.”

“God, no wonder the middies are all scared spitless of you!”

“Better me than the bad guys.”

“True. Actually, though, I want a bit more from you than adjustments to your curriculum. I want you to endorse the suggestion.”

“Well, of course,” she said with some surprise. “Why shouldn’t I?”

“I mean I want you to go public and talk to the media,” he explained, and she grimaced. One of the things she liked best about the Imperial Charter was that while it guaranteed freedom of speech it didn’t regard reporters as tin gods. Imperial privacy laws and—even better—libel laws had come as a shock to Terran journalists, and if there was one life form Adrie

“Oh, shit, Colin. Do I have to?”

” ’Fraid so,” he said with a twinge of guilt, for a large chunk of the Palace staff was devoted to keeping the press as far away from him as possible, helped by the fact that Jiltanith was not only far more photogenic but surprisingly comfortable with the public. Colin knew his subjects respected him, but they loved ’Ta

Which, he mused, indicated the public had a higher IQ than he’d once believed possible.

“Look,” he went on persuasively, “you know my policy on Narhani civil rights. They’re citizens, just like anyone else. Giving them their own planet may have defused the potential for direct unpleasantness, but we’ve got to integrate them into the government and military or that very isolation’s only going to make things worse. I’ve got quite a few in civil service positions here on Birhat already, but I need to get them into the Fleet, too.

“I don’t expect trouble from the military, but the civilians may be something else. I need all the help I can get selling the idea, and after ’Ta

Adrie

All of which meant Colin was right. If he was trotting out the big guns, she was going to have to come to battery.

“All right,” she sighed finally, “I’ll do it.”

Francine Hilgema

She ambled across the parking lot to the pedestrian belt serving the enormous, brightly-lit Memorial complex. She was uneasy at the thought of meeting in the very heart of Shepard Center, but she supposed it made sense. Who in his right mind would expect a pair of traitors to make contact here?

She stepped off the belt into the people flowing past the fifty-meter obsidian needle of the Cenotaph and the endless rows of names etched into its unadorned battle steel plinth. Those names listed every individual known to have fallen in the mille

Another, even quieter crowd surrounded the broken eighty-thousand-ton hull that shared the Memorial with the Cenotaph. The sublight battleship Nergal remained where Fleet Captain Robbins had landed her, resting on her belly and ruined landing legs, preserved exactly as her final battle had left her. She’d been decontaminated; that was all, and crippled missile launchers and energy weapons hung like broken teeth from her twisted flanks. How she’d survived was more than Hilgema

She turned away after a moment, walking to the service exit she’d been told to use. It was unlocked as promised, and she slipped through it into the equipment storage room and closed the door behind her.

“Well,” she said a bit tartly, looking around at the deserted machinery, “I must say this has all the proper conspiratorial ambience!”

“Perhaps.” The man who’d summoned her stepped out of the shadows with a thin smile. “On the other hand, we can’t risk meeting very often … and we certainly can’t do it in public, now can we?”

“I feel like an idiot.” She touched the brunette wig which hid her golden hair, then looked down at her plain, cheap clothing and shuddered.

“Better a live idiot than a dead traitor,” he replied, and she snorted.

“All right. I’m here. What’s so important?”

“Several things. First, I’ve confirmed that they know they didn’t get all of Anu’s people.” Francine looked up sharply and received another thin smile. “Obviously they don’t know who they didn’t get, or we wouldn’t be having this melodramatic conversation.”

“No, I suppose we wouldn’t. What else?”

“This.” A data chip was handed over. “That little item is too important to trust to our usual pipeline.”

“Oh?” She looked down at it curiously.

“Indeed. It’s a copy of the plans for Marshal Tsien’s newest toy: a gravitonic warhead powerful enough to take out an entire planet.”

Francine’s hand clenched on the chip, and her eyes widened.

“His Majesty,” the man said with a soft chuckle, “has decided against building it, but I’m more progressive.”

“Why? To threaten to blow ourselves up if they ID us?”

“I doubt that bluff would fly, but there are other ways it might be useful. For now, I just want the hardware handy if we need it.”

“All right.” She shrugged. “I assume you can get us any military components we need?”

“Perhaps. If so, we’ll handle that through the regular cha

“Quite nicely, actually.” Hilgema

“No, I can pick a few targets. You’re certain they don’t know about you?”

“They’re too well compartmented for that,” she said confidently.

“Good. I’ll select a few operations that’ll cost them some casualties, then. Nothing like providing a few martyrs for the cause.”

“Don’t get too fancy,” she cautioned. “If they lose too many they’re likely to get a bit hard to control.”

“Understood. Then I suppose that’s about it … except that you’ll want to get your next pastoral letter ready.”

“Oh?”

“Yes. His Majesty’s decided to bite the bullet and begin enlisting Narhani in the military.” Hilgema