"Water," Ursula croaked.
There was a fountain in the center of the Spartosky's lobby. They pushed through the thinning crowd that still milled, some shocked-silent, some hysterical, some getting first aid for minor injuries while the professionals saved those on the edge of death. The kings were in one corner with a communications tech and a knot of uniforms, mercenary and RSMP, grimly busy. Water bubbled clear and cold from the fretted terracotta basin; Melissa and the woman in uniform rinsed their hands until they were clean enough to scoop up a handful. For a long minute they waited, letting stress-exhaustion slump their shoulders.
"Thank you again, for saving my life," Melissa said. She shivered slightly, remembering it again; the roar of fire, the screams, the sudden flat
crack
of bullets.
"It's my job," Ursula said. Her eyes met the other woman's; Melissa wondered how her own looked now.
Glazed, probably. Not as steady as hers.
"I'm . . . sorry, I've been . . . impolite," she continued. Her skin flushed, embarrassment and anger at having to say what honor demanded; the feeling was welcome, pushing away the sick knot of fear and disgust in her stomach.
"Miss von Alderheim," Ursula said calmly. Her eyes moved to one side, ever so slightly. "It's perfectly understandable. Lys—The Prince—goes to Tanith, nearly gets killed, and nearly gets snatched by a designing whore. Perfectly understandable that you should be angry, especially when she shows up here to remind everyone of it."
"I never said you—"
"Well, I was. A whore, that is, if not designing. Not my career of choice, but there it is. My lady, I never had any slightest belief the Prince would stay with me. I wanted it, yes, but I never believed it. The Prince dreamed about it; he's a romantic to his bones, but he knew better too."
"But that's it, isn't it?" Melissa said with quiet bitterness. "He loves you, you love him, but he'll
marry
me, out of
duty.
"
Her mouth twisted in something that might have been a smile. "A designing woman and an infatuated Prince would have been much easier on my pride, I think. I may get what I want, but not the way I want it."
Unexpectedly, Ursula smiled, an almost tender expression, and reached out to touch the Spartan on the shoulder. "He will, if you let him." she said. "Love you, that is; he's that sort of man. Besides, that's not the important thing."
"Easy for you to say."
"Well no, actually, it's rather difficult. But it's true. We were in love, or thought we were, and that's about all we had in common, apart from a few books. My mother was a drug addict and a prostitute and a petty thief, until they sent her to Tanith; who my father is or was, God only knows. I grew up on a prison-planet that lives from drugs grown by slaves, and it's just the sort of place you'd expect it to be. All I was taught was enough to make me pleasant company. You grew up with him, you've got a shared
world
in common, the beliefs and the feelings and the little things like knowing the jokes and songs . . . and something important to work on together. Opposites may attract, but it's the similarities keep people together."
Melissa blinked at her and slowly sat on the coping of the fountain. "Now I really
am
sorry," she said. "I forgot how difficult it must be for you."
"I'll heal," Ursula said. "Mostly I already have. I'd have preferred to go somewhere else, but—" She touched the Legion crest on her shoulder. "There's more choices in this business than in my old trade, but not a whole lot more. The Prince will heal too, if you help him, Miss von Alderheim."
"Melissa," the other said impulsively, holding out her hand. They clasped palms, smiling tentatively. "How old are you, Cornet Gordon?"
"Ursula. Eighteen standard years and six months. Going on fifty."
"You certainly make me feel like a babe in the woods, Ursula!"
"Never had a chance for a childhood," Ursula said. "But look at it this way: you're still more grown-up than most men of fifty." They shared a chuckle. "Not all, of course. Colonel Falkenberg's quite adult—but then, he
is
fifty-odd."
The chuckle grew into a laugh; a quiet one that died away as they grew conscious of a man standing near.
"Why, Lysander," Melissa said, rising and taking his unwounded arm. "Ursula and I were just talking about you."
The Spartan prince looked a little paler as they walked away; Harv followed, giving Ursula a glare as he passed.
The mercenary sighed, rising and looking down at the ruin of her dress uniform.
Amazing,
she thought, suddenly a little nauseated with herself.
Twenty-odd people just killed, and we find time for emotional fiddlefaddle. That's humanity, I guess.
There was a line of caked, crusted blood under her fingernails, where she had had to clamp hard.
"Cornet Gordon?"
A Legion trooper, face anonymous under the bulging combat helmet, body blocky and mechanical in armor and mottled synthileather. He carried a smell with him, of gun oil and metal and burnt powder, impersonal and somehow clean. "Captain Alana wants you in the manager's office, they're setting up debriefing, ma'am."
"Thank you. Carry on." Manager's office would be up the sweeping double stairs, all marble and gilt bronze. She took a deep breath and forced herself to stride briskly, but paused at the top to look back. There was a good view out the big doors; he was holding open the door of a car as Melissa climbed in.
Just like him,
she thought.
Shot in the shoulder, and
he
holds the car door for
her.
There was something in her throat; she coughed and swallowed.
Client number 176, not counting
family groups,
she told herself coldly.
After all that, a few years of celibacy and hard work are just what you need, Cornet Gordon.
You could believe anything, if you repeated it to yourself often enough.
Peter Owensford shuffled the pile of paper from one side of his desk to the other. Most of it was routine, but it could be important to set up the right routines. Or avoid the wrong ones, anyway.
Personnel decisions. Munitions design. Military industrialization with extremely limited resources. Schools for the Legion's children. Commissary, laundry, home construction, perimeter defense, training schedules. Reports for Falkenberg, who wouldn't get them for months. Use of aircraft. Communications. Medical supplies. Much of it had nothing at all to do with strategy or leadership, but it all had to be taken care of, and some of it
did
have an impact on strategic decisions. More important, though, was that strategy had to drive the details, rather than the other way around.
And just now I don't have a strategy. Just objectives.
Captain Lahr knocked at Peter's office door. "Colonel Slater's here, sir," he announced.
"Thanks, Andy. Send him in. Give me a few minutes, then we'll need to see you."
Peter stood to greet his visitor. Hal Slater walked with a cane; there was only so much that regeneration stimulators could do when the same tissues were damaged time after time. Slater's handshake was firm, and his eyes steady.
"Good to see you again, sir," Peter said. "Damned good. Glad to see you recovered so well."
"Yes. Thank you. Surprising how little all that titanium in there bothers me. Of course given my druthers I'd take a low-gravity planet—"
"Sit down, please."
"Thank you, I will."
Peter eyed Slater's conservative suit. "Still in civvies?"
"Well, I wanted to check with you," Slater said. "They say they've made me a major general, though that's more title than rank. And of course I've still got a Legion suit with oak leaves—"
"You'd be welcome here either way," Owensford said. "Of course you knew that."
"Thank you," Slater said. "I figured as much, but it never hurts to touch the bases properly. How is John Christian?"
"A little heavier, hair a little grayer, otherwise much the same," Owensford said. "He said to give you his regards. Care for a drink?"
"Not just now, thank you," Hal said. He looked around the office.
"Pretty bare," Peter said. "But the electronics are here."
"Yes, and so is the paperwork."
"You know it."
"It looks like you've enough to do," Hal Slater said. "I know I'm up to my arse in Weems Beasts. They seem to have given you plenty to work with from what I saw on the way in."
"Quite decent," Peter said. "I think they actually like us."
"Seems that way," Slater agreed. "Certainly they gave me decent facilities, I'll say that for them. Right near the University. Good library. Fair computer, but I brought better. Anyway, we're setting up, and I'll be having some kind of opening ceremony one of these days. I'd appreciate it if you'd come help."
Peter grinned. "Sure. I'll bring Centurion Hanselman. He wears enough fruit salad to impress the yokels." Peter waved at the stack of paper on his desk. "You can't start turning out staff officers soon enough for me!"
"Well, it will still take a bit of time—"
"Yeah." Peter paused for a moment. "Did you get a chance to look over the reports on the riot?"
Dr. Slater nodded. "Yes. Very interesting."
"Interesting."
"Perhaps I should say revealing," Hal said.
"Yeah, well they showed us some unsuspected capabilities all right," Peter said.
"Perhaps a bit more than that," Hal Slater said. "They told us a bit about themselves, too. For instance, what did they expect to accomplish?"
"Eh? I'd have said they did very well," Peter said. "They showed they can disrupt a Royal gathering. Scared the militia, killed some of them. Stood up to us, and got headlines and TV pictures showing them doing it. I'd say they racked up some points."
"Yes, of course," Slater said. "But think about it. They showed us they have far more capability than we suspected. More important, they revealed they have considerable off-planet support—"
"I doubt they intended that we learn that."
"So they underestimated us," Slater said. "All the more interesting. So they gave us all that information, and to what end? They haven't harmed the Legion. They've made the kings furious, and they convinced most of the waverers in the Brotherhoods that the threat is serious. They let us know they have professional competence in crowd manipulation, and that they can assemble a larger and uglier crowd than the RSMP suspected. They told us they have fairly sophisticated military equipment and the ability to use it. And with all that capability they destroyed one crowd-control car and killed no one irreplaceable."
"Hmm. I didn't think of it that way. All right, Hal, what do you make of it?"
"First, since they aren't complete fools, look for them to have a great deal more capability that they didn't show," Hal said.
"Hmm. Yeah. Right. You said they told us about themselves. What?"
"I think they're amateurs," Slater said. "Academics."
"If you'd seen that fighting retreat you wouldn't say that."
"Oh, I grant you they're competent enough," Slater said. "But even so there's a decided flavor of book learning. Peter, I think they're operating right out of the classical guerrilla war theory manuals. People's War, People's Army. Mao's Basic Tactics. Enemy advance, we retreat. Enemy halt, we harass. Enemy retire, we attack."
"All that from one riot?"
"Well, of course I'm guessing."
"
Pay attention to your hunches,
"
Falkenberg said. Only I don't have a hunch. Hal Slater has a hunch, and Hal Slater isn't Christian Johnny.
"Ok, I'll think about it," Owensford said. "Now, let's get Andy Lahr in here and go over just what I can do to help you get set up properly. . . ."