The Short Victorious War Read online

  He'd watched her after that. She'd been the pet of the Academy, of course, her and her damned treecat. Oh, she'd pretended she didn't know how the instructors made her their favorite or how everyone fawned over her filthy little beast, but he'd seen it. Even Chief MacDougal, that lout of a phys ed instructor, had doted on her, and Mr. Midshipman Lord Young's interest had grown until he finally made it known.

  And the baseborn bitch had turned him down. She'd snubbed him—snubbed him!—in front of his friends. She'd tried to make it seem she didn't know what she was doing, but she had, and when he'd started to put her in her place with a few well-chosen words, that bastard MacDougal had appeared out of nowhere and put him on report for "harassing" her!

  No one had turned him down, not since his father's yacht pilot when he was sixteen T-years old, and he'd fixed her ass the next time he caught her alone. Yes, and his father had seen to it she kept her mouth shut about it, too. It should have been the same with Harrington, but it hadn't. Oh, no, not with Harrington.

  A low, harsh, hating sound quivered deep in his throat as he remembered his humiliation. He'd planned it so carefully. He'd spent days timing her schedule, until he learned about those private late-night exercise sessions of hers. She liked to turn the grav plates up, and she could have the gym to herself that late, and he'd smiled as he realized he could catch her alone in the showers. He'd even taken the precaution of slipping cotanine into the celery one of her friends kept feeding to her damned treecat. He hadn't got enough into it to kill the little monster, damn it, but it had made him so sleepy she'd left him in her dorm room.

  It had been perfect. He'd caught her actually in the shower, naked, and seen the shock and shame in her eyes. He'd savored her panic as he stalked her through the spray, watching her back away while her hands tried ridiculously to cover herself, already tasting his revenge . . . but then something changed. The panic in her eyes had turned into something else when he reached for her to throw her up against the shower wall, and her slippery-wet skin had twisted out of his grasp.

  He'd been surprised by her strength as she broke his grip. That was his first thought. And then he'd whooped in anguish as the heel of her right hand slammed into his belly. He'd doubled up, retching with hurt, and her knee had driven up into his crotch like a battering ram.

  He'd screamed. Sweat beaded his forehead as he remembered the shame of that moment, the searing agony in his groin and, behind it, the sick, terrible humiliation of defeat. But just stopping him hadn't been enough for the bitch. Her savage, unfair blow had surprised and paralyzed him, and she'd followed through with brutal efficiency.

  An elbow had smashed his lips to paste. The edge of a chopping hand had broken his nose. Another crushing blow snapped his collarbone, and her knee ripped up again—this time into his face—as he went down. She'd snapped off two incisors at the gum-line, broken six of his ribs, and left him sobbing in bloody-mouthed agony and terror under the pounding shower as she snatched up her clothing and fled.

  God only knew how he'd gotten to the infirmary. He couldn't even remember staggering out of the gym or how he'd run into Reardon and Cavendish, but they'd put some sort of story together. Not enough for anyone to believe, but enough, coupled with his name, to deflect official retribution. Or most of it, anyway. That sanctimonious prig Hartley had still dragged him into his office and made him apologize—apologize!—to the bitch in front of him and the Adjutant.

  They'd had to settle for reprimanding him for the "harassment" episode. Young didn't doubt the slut had spilled her guts, but no one had dared do anything about it. Not with no more than her word against that of the Earl of North Hollow's son. But he'd still had to "apologize" to her. And infinitely worse, he'd been afraid of her. He'd tasted his own terror that she might hurt him again, and he'd hated her for that even more than for the beating itself.

  He bared his teeth viciously at his reflection. He'd done his best to get her after that, used all his family's influence to destroy her career the way she deserved. But the bitch always had too many friends, like that asshole Courvosier. Of course, Young had always understood that relationship. He'd never been able to prove it, despite the time and money he'd invested in the effort, but he'd known she was spreading for Courvosier. It was the only explanation for the way the old bastard had watched over her career, and—his smile turned ugly with triumph—at least Courvosier had finally gotten his. Too bad the Masadans hadn't gotten their hands on Harrington, too!

  He shook himself free of that sweet daydream and back to the drear reality of his repeated failures to deal with her once and for all. He and his father had managed to throw out enough roadblocks to slow her promotions, but the slut had a way of being there whenever the shit hit the fan, and somehow she always got the credit. Like the power room disaster when she'd been tac office on Manticore. She'd gotten the CGM and Monarch's Thanks for pulling three worthless ratings out of that one, then gotten herself mentioned in dispatches for rescuing assholes too stupid to get out of the way when the Attica Avalanche hit Gryphon in 275. Every goddamned time he turned around, there was Harrington, with everyone telling him how wonderful she was.

  He'd thought he finally had her in Basilisk, but then she stumbled over the Peep attempt to seize the system. Blind fucking luck again, but did it matter? Hell, no! She got all the kudos, and he got officially censured for "failing to properly assess the threat to his assigned station"! And while she went off to fresh glory in Yeltsin, those motherless bastards at the Admiralty had shuffled him off into oblivion escorting convoys to the Silesian Confederacy, running routine grav wave surveys to update BuAstro's charts—every scut job they could think of. In fact, he'd been due to take still another convoy to Silesia when the growing crisis forced the Admiralty to pull Warlock at the last minute to reinforce Hancock.

  And now this. She was flag captain. He was going to have to take the conniving bitch's orders, and he couldn't even use his superior birth to put her in her place. She actually took social precedence, as well! He might be heir to one of the Kingdom's oldest earldoms, but she was a "countess" in her own right. The newest parvenu in the peerage, perhaps, but a countess.

  The flicker of the location display slowed as the tube capsule neared its destination, and he managed—somehow—to get the snarl off his face. Four years. Four long, endless T-years he'd endured his shame, the humiliating smirks of his inferiors as he toiled under the Admiralty's displeasure over Basilisk. He owed the bitch for that, too, and someday, somehow, he'd see to it that she paid in full. But for now, he had to endure one more humiliation and pretend nothing had ever happened between them.

  The doors slid open, and he drew a deep breath as he stepped out into the spacedock gallery. Fresh, bitter hatred glittered briefly in his eyes as he saw the magnificent ship floating in the dock. HMS Nike, pride of the Fleet. She should have been his, not Harrington's, but the bitch had taken that away from him, as well.

  He settled his sword on his hip and walked stiffly towards the Marine sentries at Nike's boarding tube.

  * * *

  Honor stood with the side party in the entry port, waiting while Young swam the tube, and her palms were damp. Sick loathing boiled in her belly, and she wanted to dry her hands. But she didn't. She simply stood there, face calm, shoulder feeling unnaturally light and oddly vulnerable without Nimitz's warm weight. She hadn't even considered bringing the 'cat to this meeting.

  Young appeared around the final bend, sliding through the tube's zero-gee, and her mouth tightened almost imperceptibly as she saw his mess uniform. Just like him to overdress, she thought scornfully. He always had to impress lesser beings with his family's power and wealth.

  He reached the scarlet warning line and grasped the grab bar to swing across the interface into Nike's internal gravity, and the scabbard of his sword caught between his legs. He stumbled awkwardly, almost falling, even as the bosun's pipe's shrilled and the wooden-faced side party snapped to attention, and Honor's eyes glowed with br
ief, vicious pleasure as his face went scarlet in humiliation. But he got himself back on balance, and she'd banished satisfaction from her expression, if not her emotions, by the time he'd settled the sword properly back into place.

  He saluted her, his face still red, and she didn't need Nimitz to feel his hatred. He might be senior to her, but he was visiting her ship, and she knew exactly how bitter that had to taste to him as she returned the salute.

  "Permission to come aboard, Captain?" The tenor voice, so like and yet so unlike Admiral Sarnow's, was utterly without inflection.

  "Permission granted, Captain," she replied with equal formality, and he stepped through the entry port hatch. "If you'll come with me, Captain, the Admiral is waiting for you in his briefing room."

  Young nodded a curt acknowledgment and followed her into the lift. He stood on the opposite side of the car, back to the wall, while she punched their destination into the panel, and silence hung between them like poison.

  He watched her, savoring his hate like some rare vintage, its bitter bouquet touched with a sweet, hot promise that his day would come. She seemed unaware of his gaze, standing completely at ease with her hands clasped behind her while she watched the location display and ignored him, and his hand tightened on the hilt of his sword like a claw.

  The plain-faced slut he remembered from Saganami Island had vanished, and he realized he hated the tall, beautiful woman who'd replaced her even more than he'd hated that self-conscious girl. The understated elegance of artfully applied cosmetics emphasized her beauty, and even through his hatred and the residual fear of finding himself within her physical reach, he felt the tug of desire. The hunger to have her and reduce her to one more notch on his bedpost to put her in her place forever.

  The lift stopped, the door opened, and her graceful wave gestured him out. He accompanied her down the passage to the flag briefing room, and Admiral Sarnow looked up as they stepped into the compartment.

  "Captain Young, Sir," Harrington said quietly, and he came to attention.

  Sarnow looked at him for a long, silent moment, then rose from his chair. Young met his gaze expressionlessly, but something about the admiral's green eyes warned him that this was yet another of the flag officers who sided with the bitch. Was she putting out for him on the side, too?

  "Captain." Sarnow nodded, and Young's jaw clenched behind the cover of his beard at the omission of his peerage title.

  "Admiral," he replied in an equally toneless voice.

  "I imagine you've got a lot to tell me about the situation as seen from Manticore," Sarnow went on, "and I'm eager to hear it. Be seated, please."

  Young slid into the chair, adjusting his sword carefully. It was awkward, but it also gave him a flicker of superiority as he compared his own sartorial splendor to the plain undress uniform the admiral wore. Sarnow glanced at him, then looked back at Harrington.

  "I understand you have a previous engagement aboard the base, Dame Honor." Young's jaw clenched tighter as he used her title. "Captain Young and I will undoubtedly be tied up here for some time, so I won't keep you. Don't forget the com conference." Something like a small smile touched his lips. "It won't be necessary for you to return aboard if that will be inconvenient. Feel free to use a com aboard the base, if you like."

  "Thank you, Sir." Harrington braced to attention, then glanced at Young. "Good evening, Captain," she said emotionlessly, and vanished.

  "And now, Captain Young—" Sarnow sat back down and leaned back in his chair "—to business. You brought me a dispatch from Admiral Caparelli, and he says you and he discussed the situation at some length before he sent you out. So suppose you start by letting me hear exactly what His Lordship had to say."

  "Of course, Admiral." Young leaned back and crossed his legs. "First of all . . ."

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  Robert Stanton Pierre eased the small, nondescript air car out of the main traffic pattern and turned his flight computer over to Hoskins Tower's approach control. He sat back in his seat, looking out and down at the twinkling oceans and mountains of light which were Nouveau Paris, capital city of the People's Republic, and his face wore the grim, harsh expression he did not allow himself in daylight.

  There wasn't much traffic this late at night. In a way, Pierre wished there were; he could have used the rush and flow of other vehicles to hide his own. But his official schedule was too busy for him to slip away during the day, especially with Palmer-Levy's Security goons watching him like hawks.

  Of course, they weren't very bright hawks. His tight mouth twitched wryly, despite the pain locked deep within him. If you showed them what they expected to see, you could count on them to see it—and to stop looking for anything else. That was why he'd made sure they knew about his meetings with the CRP. The Citizens Rights Party had been part of the system for so long its leadership, with a very few exceptions, couldn't find its ass with both hands, an incapacity which reduced it to little more than a convenient blind for his real activities. Not that the CRP wouldn't prove useful if—when—the time came. It just wouldn't be the CRP Palmer-Levy (or, for that matter, most of the present CRP's leaders) knew anything about.

  Approach control nudged his air car closer to the pinnacle of the tower, and he turned his attention fully to it.

  Hoskins Tower was just over four hundred stories tall and a kilometer in diameter—a huge, hollow hexagon of steel and ceramacrete, dotted with air traffic access points and thrusting up from the greenery so far below. There'd been a time when Nouveau Paris' towers, each a small city in its own right, were its pride, but Hoskins Tower's supposedly near-indestructible ceramacrete was already beginning to crack and scale after barely thirty years. Seen close at hand, the tower's skin was leprous with slap-dash patches and repairs, and though it wasn't evident from the outside, Pierre knew its upper twenty-three floors had been closed off and abandoned over five T-years ago because of massive plumbing failures. Hoskins was still on the waiting list for repair crews who, probably, would get around to its pipes someday. Assuming, of course, that the bureaucrats didn't end up diverting them to some more urgent "emergency" (like repairs to President Harris' swimming pool) . . . or that the repair crews didn't decide life would be easier on the Dole and simply quit.

  Pierre didn't like Hoskins Tower. It reminded him of too many things from his own past, and the fact that even a Dolist Manager with his clout hadn't been able to get its plumbing fixed infuriated him. But this was "his" district of the capital. He controlled the votes of the people who lived in Hoskins, and it was to him they looked for their share of the welfare system's spoils. That made him a very important man to them—and gave him a security screen here that even Palmer-Levy couldn't match . . . or breach.

  Pierre's lips curled back from his teeth as approach control inserted him into the tower's hollow top and his air car began drifting down the patchily lit bore. Despite the physical youth prolong conferred, he was ninety-one T-years old, and he remembered other days. Days when he'd fought his way off the Dole, before the rot had set so deep. There'd been a time when Hoskins Tower's plumbing would have been fixed within days—when the discovery that the bureaucrats in charge of its construction had used substandard materials and evaded building codes throughout the massive structure in order to pocket enormous profits would have led to indictments and prison time. Now, no one even cared.

  He punched an inconspicuous button, and the air car withdrew itself from approach control's grip. It was illegal—and supposedly impossible—to do that, but like everything else in the People's Republic, there were ways around that for anyone with the money to buy them and the will to use them.

  He slid the air car sideways, sidling up to an abandoned apartment on the three hundred and ninety-third floor, and settled it onto a terrace. The terrace hadn't been designed for such landings, but that was why the air car was so small and light.

  It was time, Pierre thought as he powered down the systems, for someone to fix Hoskins Tower. Amon
g other things.

  * * *

  Wallace Canning raised his head, the movement quick and nervous. Heels clacked sharply on the bare floor, echoing and resounding down the hollow, empty corridors until it seemed an entire, unseen legion was converging upon him, but he'd been to plenty of meetings like this over the last three years, if not any under quite such outré conditions. He was no longer prone to panic, and his pulse trickled back to normal as his ears sorted out the single pair of feet at the heart of the murmuring echoes and a patch of light appeared.

  He leaned back against the wall, watching the patch become a beam that swung from side to side as the walker picked his way down the steps from the mezzanine. Halfway down, the beam flicked up, pinning Canning to the wall while he screwed up his eyes against its intensity. It held on him for an instant, then swiveled back down to the bits and pieces of fallen ceiling littering the stairs. It reached their bottom at last and crossed to Canning, and then Rob Pierre shifted the light to his left hand and extended his right.

  "Good to see you, Wallace," Pierre said, and Canning nodded with a smile that was no longer forced.

  "Good to see you, too, Sir," he said. There'd been a time when saying "Sir" to a Prole, even one who was also a Dolist Manager, would have choked him. But those days were gone, for Wallace Canning had fallen from grace. His diplomatic career had ended in humiliation and failure, and not even his Legislaturalist family had been able to save him from the consequences. Worse, they hadn't even tried.

  Canning had become an object lesson, a warning for those who failed. They'd stripped him of place and position, banished him into Prole housing like Hoskins Tower and into the monthly lines that gathered for their Basic Living Stipend checks. They'd turned him into a Dolist, but not like other Dolists. His accent and speech patterns, even the way he walked or looked at others, all singled him out as "different" in the eyes of his new fellows. Rejected by everyone he'd ever known, he'd found himself shunned by those whose equal he'd become, and it had seemed hate and self-pity were all that was left to him.