CHAPTER FOUR
Oh, my God, Gavin Vellacott, Baron Winterfall, mouthed silently to himself as the recording played itself out. This wasn’t happening. This couldn’t be happening.
But it was.
The recording ended. Seated at the head of the table, Prime Minister Julian Mulholland, Baron Harwich, cleared his throat. “Comments?” he invited.
Winterfall sent a furtive look around the table. Most of the men and women of the Cabinet had occupied their same posts for years and were old hands at this. In the eight months since Winterfall had been named Foreign Secretary, in fact, only two other new faces had been added.
But those turnovers had been accompanied by high levels of quiet drama. Would that drama, he wondered, find a resurgence with today’s news?
“I hope everyone realizes,” Olga Strait, Baroness Crystal Pine, jumped into the silence, “what a tremendous opportunity this is.”
Winterfall winced. And thus it began.
Everyone else at the table was worried about military and political implications of the unexpected arrival. Crystal Pine could see only the potential profits.
Though there was no reason anyone should have expected anything different from her. The new Secretary of Industry had only joined the House of Lords five months ago, following the terrible air-car accident that had killed Jonathan Martinez, Duke Serisburg, and his entire remaining family. And while Crystal Pine’s enthusiasm for her new post was evident, she still didn’t quite have the niceties of proper closed-room protocol down pat.
Not all of that was her fault, of course. The death of an entire Peerage was a situation that none of the Founders had ever wanted to happen, but in the middle of the wholesale death that was the Plague Years they’d had the foresight to make sure it was addressed in the Constitution. In the aftermath of the accident, with the rest of Serisburg’s family already gone, the duchy’s lands had been turned over to the Crown while the vacant seat had been handed to the next investor of the original Manticore Corporation.
The deaths had been a traumatic time for everyone in the Lords, most of whom had known and worked alongside Serisburg for years. Crystal Pine had had an uphill climb against all that emotion, plus a whole lot of it’s-always-been-this-way-and-I-see-no-reason-to-change-it mindset. That institutional inertia, along with Crystal Pine’s lack of upper-level political experience, had naturally led to a certain animosity toward her, along with the general assumption that she would sit quietly for the first year or two as she sorted out the differences between her old local parliament and the far more tangled labyrinth that was the Lords.
But to everyone’s surprise—and some people’s resentment—she’d instead hit the ground running, soaking in everything like a sponge and leveraging the social and business contacts she’d made through her industrial manufacturing business into political ones. Two months after her arrival, when Baron Stallman resigned his short-lived position at Industry and the various political factions began scrambling to add the vacant Cabinet seat to their personal powerbases, Crystal Pine’s immensely competent business and industry background—plus her still-neutral position vis-à-vis any of the established factions—made her a logical if somewhat half-hearted choice to replace him.
That had led to a small resurgence in animosity from some quarters. The fact that she, like the Prime Minister himself, was a loyal and frequently outspoken supporter of Queen Elizabeth was probably also a factor.
“With My Lady’s permission,” Katra Nessler, Countess Greatgap, put in acidly before anyone else could speak, “do you think we can hold off on matters of money and profit until we’ve dealt with the more immediate situation?”
“I never said anything about money,” Crystal Pine countered calmly.
“No, but we all know you were thinking it,” Greatgap said.
Mentally, Winterfall shook his head. The whole thing with Serisburg and Crystal Pine had only just begun to settle down when the government was hit by a second gut-punch: the resignation of Chancellor of the Exchequer Anderson L’Estrange, Earl Breakwater, and his replacement by Greatgap.
Most of the speculations about Breakwater’s departure centered around his age and health, or perhaps fallout from the same faction rivalry that had put Crystal Pine in Industry. Winterfall knew better. Breakwater had once been one of the most powerful men in government, with the kind of political muscle that had allowed him to believe he could challenge even the Queen herself.
That challenge might conceivably have succeeded. Nearly had, Winterfall suspected.
Few people knew of Winterfall’s small contribution to the Queen’s quiet victory in that behind-the-scenes battle. Winterfall himself knew better than to flatter himself that he’d been the factor that turned the tide. But he was also smart enough to recognize that his sudden appointment to the post of Foreign Secretary in the wake of that victory was hardly coincidence. The Queen and her supporters were grateful, and they’d made their gratitude known in a tangible way.
Not that the appointment was exactly a matter of anyone going overboard with appreciation. Up to now, the Foreign Office had been little more than a side show, barely more than an afterthought to the Prime Minister’s sphere of responsibility. With Manticore’s nearest neighbors weeks or months of hyperspace travel away, the Foreign Secretary was lucky if he or she got to greet a minor foreign functionary once a year, or to advise the Cabinet on some tidbit of news brought by a merchant ship. Up to now, it had been largely a ceremonial position, handed out to political cronies or to whoever was willing to put up with the boredom.
Up to now.
Now, in the space of a two-minute message, all of that had changed. The Queen and Lords knew something about the Republic of Haven and how to deal with it. None of them knew the first thing about the Andermani Empire or how to deal with that. They needed to figure it out, and fast.
And Winterfall was the man squarely in the middle of it all.
“In my mind, the first question we need to ask is whether these people are, in fact, Andermani,” Greatgap continued. “We’ve been snoggered before by false IDs and lying bastards. And by empty promises of profit.”
Winterfall sensed another small ripple of discomfort run around the table. Greatgap was settling into the Exchequer’s position well enough, but there was an undercurrent between her and Crystal Pine that he hadn’t quite figured out.
“The Admiralty’s analysts are convinced,” Harwich said. “And if I may suggest, this isn’t the time for future speculations of any sort. This is the here and now, and we need to address more immediate concerns.”
“Of course, My Lord,” Greatgap said.
“Thank you.” Harwich shifted his gaze to Winterfall. “I’d like you, Lord Winterfall, to screen your brother, send him a copy of this message if he hasn’t already heard it, and see if he concurs with the Admiralty’s assessment.”
“Yes, My Lord,” Winterfall said, making a note on his tablet.
Harwich’s eyebrows went up, just slightly. “As in now, My Lord.”
“Of course, My Lord,” Winterfall said hastily, wincing at his momentary brain glitch. He might be new to the Cabinet, but he knew better than to try to hold a secondary conversation in the same room where others were trying to talk. “Excuse me.”
Which was also just as well on another level, he mused as he hurried from the room. Winterfall and Travis hadn’t been the closest of half-brothers, and the political fallout from their relationship had added a level of difficulty to Travis’s slow rise through the navy’s ranks. An out-of-the-blue screen might well end up being awkward or even antagonistic, and Winterfall had no desire to have anyone listening in, least of all the entire Cabinet.
Travis answered on the second ring. “Gavin,” he said, his voice tight. “I assume you’ve heard the news?”
“Yes,” Winterfall said, feeling the tightness in his chest easing a bit. Maybe with a situation that was completely outside their family looming like a hexapuma in front of them they could have a calm discussion without guilt or recrimination or baggage. “The news and the message both. Lord Harwich wanted me to play the message for you and ask if you could tell if it was really Basaltberg.”
And winced again. Dropping Harwich’s name, with the reminder that Winterfall was now in the upper echelons of the Star Kingdom’s power, was the worst kind of self-aggrandizement.
To his relief, Travis didn’t seem to notice. “No need—I’ve already heard it,” he said. “Near as I can tell it is Basaltberg. Any idea what he’s doing here?”
“All he said in his follow-up messages is that they’re here for discussions with us, with an eye toward maybe opening full diplomatic relations.”
“I guess that’s doable,” Travis said doubtfully. “We’ve got a sort-of relationship with Haven, and New Berlin’s almost a month closer. Still a pretty hefty distance for any real back-and-forth communication.”
“And of course Haven wants to make regular contact with its neighbors,” Winterfall pointed out. “I’ve looked through all the archives, and as far as I can tell the Andermani have never reached out to the Star Kingdom before. I’m not sure what relationship they have with Haven, either, for that matter.”
“You’ve looked through the archives? Don’t you have a staff for that?”
“Oh, I’ve got a staff, all right,” Winterfall said sourly. “Her name’s Verona Blankenship, she was hired as a secretary and receptionist, and she’s extremely not happy at having this kind of research load suddenly dropped in her lap.”
“Maybe you should promise her a raise.”
“I’ve promised her two,” Winterfall said. “Assuming we all survive the upcoming all-night slave sessions, I may even be able to pry the extra money out of the Exchequer. Anyway, we were talking about Haven.”
“Right,” Travis said. “My point was that whether or not they’ve got official relationships with us or Haven, they’ve definitely been watching us. Did you read my report?”
“Yes,” Winterfall said. “You’re right, they do seem pretty familiar with the Star Kingdom. And with Haven, and Silesia, and probably everyone else in the region. Either they’re paranoid or just very cautious.”
“I’d guess the latter,” Travis said. “Gustav Anderman was a mercenary commander in the League for a long time. You collect enough enemies, and you probably learn to watch your back.”
“And all the rest of your anatomy,” Winterfall said. “Speaking of enemies—or not—how were things between Casey’s officers and Basaltberg after Walther? Clegg’s report said it was an amicable parting, but she wouldn’t be the first person to tell people what they wanted to hear.”
“Captain Clegg wouldn’t be first, the last, or any of the others,” Travis said, a little stiffly. “She’s as honest and straightforward as they come.”
“Sorry,” Winterfall said hastily. “Didn’t mean to impugn her honor.”
“I’m sorry, too,” Travis said. “Knee-jerk reaction. Our relationship with the government hasn’t always been the most friendly. The Navy’s, I mean.”
“Understood,” Winterfall said. “Verona and I have been through all the official correspondence—what there is of it—but you’ve met these people face-to-face. What’s your assessment of their attitude toward us?”
“No idea what their government’s attitude is,” Travis said. “I’d say their navy’s is probably less friendship between equals and more uncle to slightly dimwitted nephew.”
Winterfall made a face. Captain Trina Clegg, commander of the advanced cruiser Casey, had also made the point that Andermani equipment and training was vastly superior to the RMN’s. Had made it repeatedly and in great depth.
In which case… “Is there any chance they’re here to pick up where the Volsungs left off?” he asked carefully. The last thing he wanted was to spark another bad reaction from his brother, but it had to be asked. “If they’re that much more advanced than we are, maybe Emperor Gustav figures we’d be an easy addition to his real estate.”
“Not a chance,” Travis said firmly.
“Are you sure?” Winterfall persisted. “Like you said, Anderman was a merc for a long time. Maybe whoever hired the Volsungs decided to upgrade for their next attempt.”
Travis’s sigh was clearly audible. “One: you can’t take Manticore with a single battlecruiser and a frigate,” he said. “Even the Volsungs knew better than that. Two: there’s no point in sending Basaltberg and an advance team to scope us out. They’ve already seen Casey and the RMN’s combat readiness, which makes a pre-invasion survey a waste of time. And three: if the amount of data they have on the Silesian Confederacy is any indication, that’s where Gustav is looking to extend his reach. Assuming he’s looking anywhere.”
“That all seems reasonable,” Winterfall said.
Which didn’t mean it was all necessarily true. But that would be for the Queen and Cabinet to determine.
Speaking of which, he needed to get back. Having a mostly friendly conversation with Travis was something of a new experience, but Harwich hadn’t sent him out here to mend family fences. “Anyway, I have to go. We’ll catch up soon, okay?”
“Sure,” Travis said, in a tone that suggested he would believe it when he saw it. “Good-bye, Gavin.”
Harwich and Greatgap were discussing some kind of formal reception as Winterfall reentered the chamber. The Prime Minister held up a hand as he spotted his foreign secretary, cutting Greatgap off in mid-sentence. “Well?” he asked.
“He believes it to be Basaltberg’s voice, My Lord,” Winterfall confirmed as he resumed his chair. “He furthermore reiterated that Casey and the Andermani parted on very good terms, and feels it unlikely there’s any threat or danger implied by Basaltberg’s arrival.”
“I don’t recall anyone saying there was a threat,” Crystal Pine murmured.
Winterfall winced. “I didn’t mean—”
“Whether or not anyone said it,” Harwich came smoothly to Winterfall’s rescue, “it’s clear that people are thinking it. Otherwise Lord Dapplelake would be here with us instead of in the War Room with Admiral Locatelli and First Lord of the Admiralty Cazenestro.”
“My apologies, My Lord,” Crystal Pine said, ducking her head in a brief nod. “My Lords,” she amended, giving Winterfall the same nod. “I didn’t mean to cast aspersions. I understand that every possibility has to be taken into account.”
“That’s good,” Harwich said. “And while the Navy deals with the military possibilities, our job is to deal with the political and diplomatic ones. You all have your assignments; Lord Winterfall, your job will be to go through the archives and see what, if anything, we know about Andermani social protocols.”
“Yes, My Lord,” Winterfall said. Yet another job to hand off to Verona. She might need a third raise. “I presume someone will also be talking to Captain Clegg? Our archives are probably somewhat out of date.”
“Lord Grange will be doing that,” Harwich said, nodding toward the Interior Minister. “You can pull in your brother as advisor if you want, assuming the Navy doesn’t grab him first. Any questions?” The Prime Minister sent his gaze around the table. “No? Then let’s get to it, My Lords and Ladies. Our distinguished guests will be here in just a few hours. If we can’t impress them with our military prowess, let’s try to at least impress them with our social graces.”
With a flurry of quiet activity and murmured conversation the Cabinet ministers gathered their tablets and data chips in preparation for their exit. Winterfall, mindful of the task looming in front of him—and painfully aware that he’d damn well better pull this particular rabbit out of the hat—was the first one out of the room. He hurried down the corridor, mentally working out a list of which key words would be best to start his search with—
“My Lord?” Crystal Pine’s voice came from behind him.
Reluctantly, he slowed, turning to look over his shoulder. The Secretary of Industry was hurrying toward him, the tails of her long jacket flapping with each step.
“Yes, My Lady?” he asked as she reached him.
“My apologies,” she said, huffing a bit with the exertion. Clearly, her single-minded focus on carving out a place for herself in the Lords hadn’t left her much time for outside activities or exercise. “I know you’re busy, but I wanted to ask a favor.”
“Certainly, My Lady.”
“Two favors, actually,” Crystal Pine corrected. “First: I’m naturally very interested in Andermani technology. I’m hoping you can keep an eye out for relevant information during your search and make me copies of anything you find.”
“I doubt we have anything that’s recent enough to be of any use to you,” Winterfall warned.
“Oh, I know that,” Crystal Pine assured him. “I was more looking for attitudes or protocols. How they see their tech, how willing they are to share or sell, whether they see it as an honored servant or a necessary evil. That sort of thing.”
“Ah,” Winterfall said, frowning. “You know, I don’t think I’ve ever thought about technology as either servant or evil.”
“It’s just there,” Crystal Pine said, nodding. “Yes, that’s how most people think of it, if they think about it at all. Anyway, I’m hoping to get an hour or two to talk with them about tech purchases or trades, and having an idea of how to make my approach could save a lot of time and blind alleys.”
“Understood,” Winterfall said. “If I find anything that looks useful, I’ll be sure to pass it on to you.”
Crystal Pine inclined her head. “Thank you, My Lord.”
“You said there were two favors?” Winterfall prompted, resisting the urge to glance at his chrono. He didn’t have time for this.
“Yes,” she said, giving him an oddly shy smile. “I’d be honored if you’d call me Olga. Lady Crystal Pine always sounds way more formal than I ever feel.”
“I understand completely,” Winterfall said, automatically smiling back. The Secretary of Industry, bending the unspoken rules of protocol for a mere Foreign Secretary? “I’d be honored in turn, Olga,” he said. “And please: call me Gavin.”
“Gavin,” she repeated, her smile widening a bit. “Thank you for your time and your efforts. Let me know if I can help you with any of this.”
“I will.”
With a final exchange of nods they headed off toward their respective offices.
Olga. Gavin. Down deep, of course, Winterfall suspected the barrier-breaking was just one more aspect of Crystal Pine’s campaign to solicit friends and build acquaintanceships, with the longer-term goal of making herself an indispensable part of the Cabinet and Lords.
But even with that knowledge, and with all his years of accumulated cynicism, he had to admit that it still felt good.
* * *
Queen Elizabeth the Second, supreme ruler of the Star Kingdom of Manticore, was feeling extremely tired. She was also sore, in places she’d never been sore before.
But she was content as she drifted along, rising gradually out of her afternoon nap. Affairs of state, the tangled spaghetti that was politics in the House of Lords these days, even such mundane tasks as deciding what she wanted for dinner—all of that floated past like wispy clouds, distant and inconsequential and someone else’s problem.
And through it all flowed a quiet happiness unlike anything she’d ever known.
Mother hormones, the analytical part of her brain reminded her. Not real.
She smiled. Of course it was real. It was as real as anything else in life.
Certainly as real as the two-day-old child lying on the bassinet quilt beside her.
She smiled, her eyes still closed, her thoughts and emotions stretching out toward the sleeping infant. Her son. More importantly, Carmichael’s son, created inside her body from his frozen sperm.
For a moment her smile faded, the light wispy clouds overhead darkening with memory and loss. It had been six T-years since the hunting accident that took her beloved husband from her, but the pain was no less deep and unrelenting. Once, she’d thought that sense of loss would fade. Once, she’d hoped it would. Now, she realized it would be with her for the rest of her life.
But now she had his son. It was as close to having Carmichael back as she would ever get in this life.
From across the hospital suite came the sound of footsteps. Not the quiet, subtle steps of her nurses or doctors, but a more measured tread. Measured, yet at the same time oddly hesitant. Even through the happiness and the hormones she felt herself wince.
A politician.
Her eyes were still closed, and for a moment she toyed with the idea of pretending she was still asleep and making the intruder decide whether this intrusion was important enough to awaken the sovereign. But that would be childish. No, Elizabeth would wait until the footsteps stopped, give her visitor a moment to admire the sleeping baby beside her, then open her eyes. The footsteps were almost to her—
“Your Majesty?”
Elizabeth sighed inwardly. Prime Minister Harwich. And not only hadn’t he waited until he was right beside her, but hadn’t even taken the time to admire her son.
Unless her son was no longer there.
She snapped her eyes open, a sudden surge of hormone-fueled fear shattering the hormone-fueled contentment. If something had happened to her son—if the doctors had hurried him away for some emergency treatment while she slept—if Harwich was here to tell her the bad news and wait with her through the crisis—
David was still there, lying peacefully on the quilt. His own eyes were shut, his little lips twitching and puckering with some arcane baby dream.
Elizabeth sighed, the fear draining away and being replaced with relief and more tiredness. Mother hormones.
She looked up at the man gazing down at her. The Prime Minister’s expression was tight, his throat working with the familiar mix of urgency and uncertainty. “Your Majesty?” he repeated.
“This had better be really good, Julian,” she warned him.
He blinked. “This had—? Your Majesty, didn’t you get my message?”
“What message?” Elizabeth asked, a horrible premonition flooding across her. Her standing do-not-disturb order while she took her nap… “No, I’ve heard nothing.”
He took a deep breath. “Your Majesty: four hours ago two ships carrying a diplomatic mission from the Andermani Empire entered Manticoran space. Their commander—”
“Andermani?” Elizabeth gasped.
“Yes, Your Majesty,” Harwich said. “Their commander, Admiral Gotthold Riefenstahl, Graf von Basaltberg, brings greetings from Emperor Gustav. I sent word that the Cabinet was on it and that I’d come here as soon as I could to brief you personally unless you contacted me sooner—”
“Yes, yes, I’ve got it,” Elizabeth interrupted, fighting back a surge of anger and frustration. Even with a DND order in place, someone at the hospital should have passed it up the chain, at least far enough to reach someone who would have brought some common sense to the equation. “Never mind that. Why are they here, and what do they want?”
And then, her sleep-fogged brain abruptly caught up with her. The Andermani…the joint attack on the Volsung base and the retrieval of the mercenaries’ data…Tolochko’s possible wormhole junction… “Do you think they’re here because…?” She let the half-question hang in the air.
“Because of Dr. Tolochko?” Harwich shook his head. “No, I don’t think they know or even suspect. As I said, Your Majesty, it’s a diplomatic mission.”
Elizabeth winced. He had said that, hadn’t he? Mother hormones.
“We don’t know if they’re hoping to establish full relations with the Star Kingdom, or whether they just want a preliminary conversation,” Harwich continued. “I already have the Cabinet investigating protocol and preparing to greet our guests.” He hesitated. “We haven’t told them about your, ah, condition.”
Elizabeth looked over at her sleeping baby. “My condition, Lord Harwich, is that I’m the queen of the Star Kingdom,” she said tartly. “Thank you for the news. I presume you passed Sergeant Adler on your way in?”
Harwich nodded. “She’s standing guard by the outer suite door.”
“Send her in,” Elizabeth ordered. “On your way out, please stop at the nurses’ station and have someone start the paperwork for my release.”
Harwich’s eyes narrowed. “I was under the impression you were to stay another two days for observation.”
“That was then,” Elizabeth said firmly. “This is now. Tell the Cabinet I’ll be there as soon as I can, and I’ll expect a full briefing.”
Harwich sighed. “Yes, Your Majesty.”
“And tell them to pull out all the stops,” she said. “Cabinet, Parliament, Navy—everyone.”
“Yes, Your Majesty.” Bowing low, Harwich turned and hurried away.
Elizabeth looked back at her baby. Mother hormones…only now, she realized, they didn’t apply just to her newborn child. In a very real sense she was the mother of her whole nation.
Were Basaltberg and the Andermani here to be impressed by her child? Fine. God willing, she and the Star Kingdom would impress the hell out of them.
* * *
Travis had spent a fair amount of time with Basaltberg during the Walther mission, watching the admiral interact with both his own officers and the Manticorans. And while Basaltberg had always been polite and correct he’d never been what Travis would consider jovial.
But wherever he’d been hiding his supply of good will, he was making up for it now. He seemed calm, even cheerful, as he stood with a handful of uniformed officers and another handful of civilians and endured the hastily-thrown-together welcoming ceremony.
Or maybe he wasn’t really cheerful. Maybe he was just trying to be a balance for the formal rigidity of the Manticorans.
Travis himself tended toward the solemn. But even with that predisposition, the honor guard, cabinet members, and assorted Lords struck him as painfully over the edge.
Maybe that was to be expected. After all, there had been little need for full-blown diplomatic pomp throughout the Star Kingdom’s existence. Official visitors had been rare, most of them from their various neighbors’ navies, and had been handled by the RMN and its top brass. The civilian authorities had mostly stood watching from the sidelines on those occasions.
They were certainly making up for that lost time now. Small processionals, stiffly worded speeches of greeting, Lords and other dignitaries seemingly loaded with every bit of regalia that had collected since King Roger’s time—every one of the attendees seemed intent on outdoing everyone else in ill-fitting gravity.
The one exception was the queen herself. Of everyone on the Manticore side of the welcoming ceremony she seemed the most relaxed and comfortable, as if greeting unexpected emissaries from a distant star nation was something she did every day.
What was even more astonishing was the fact that she was just two days past childbirth. Travis didn’t know much about such things, but he was pretty sure that the typical woman didn’t just bounce back into a normal routine this quickly.
Earlier, he’d heard someone speculate jokingly that she was so calm because she was still on drugs. He hadn’t seen the comedian since then.
He’d have bet heavily that Basaltberg wouldn’t spot Captain Clegg and the Casey’s senior officers, four tiers back from the assembled Cabinet ministers. He would also have bet that, if Basaltberg did see them, he wouldn’t bother to come over personally when the formalities were over.
He’d have lost his money twice.
“Captain Clegg,” Basaltberg greeted the captain, a pleased smile on his lips as he bowed and then offered his hand. “I’m gratified to see you returned home safely.”
“A homecoming due entirely to your generous assistance against the Volsungs, Admiral,” Clegg said, bowing in return and then taking his hand for a quick but firm handshake.
“You flatter me,” Basaltberg said. “As well as modestly understating your own contributions to the mission. Were it not for you, I might still be searching for the traitor.” His eyes shifted to Travis, and it seemed to him that the admiral’s smile grew a bit wider. “Or, alternatively, the bodies of far too many of my officers and crew might well be floating through the vastness of Silesian space.”
Travis felt his throat tighten. He’d offered a single suggestion, far less important and momentous than Basaltberg was giving him credit for. Was he supposed to accept the compliment at face value, knowing it was overly lavish? Surely he wasn’t supposed to argue with the man out in public?
“But there will be time to reminisce about such matters later,” Basaltberg continued, relieving Travis of the need to say anything at all. “Right now, I believe your military leaders would like to sit down with my military staff and me for a preliminary conversation, while our respective diplomatic staffs do likewise.”
Travis suppressed a smile. Manticoran diplomats: Prime Minister Harwich, Defense Minister Dapplelake, and whoever else the Cabinet had been able to throw together into a believable diplomatic corps in the past few hours.
Plus Travis’s brother Winterfall, of course. Briefly, Travis wondered how he was handling this sudden change in his job description, then put it out of his mind.
“I would like to host a reception for you, Captain, and the rest of Casey’s officers at the end of the week,” Basaltberg said, turning back to Clegg. “If you’d be good enough to make the arrangements from your end, I’ll see to your transport to Zhong Kui.”
“Ah—you mean Friday or Saturday?” Clegg asked, throwing a quick glance at Travis.
“Either would be acceptable,” Basaltberg said, frowning slightly. “Is the offer perhaps inappropriate?”
“No, Sir, not at all,” Clegg said. “It’s just that…Saturday is Commander Long’s wedding.”
For a long moment Basaltberg just stared. Then, abruptly, the widest smile of all broke out across his face. “Well, well,” he said. “My heartiest congratulations, Commander, and best wishes. The Andermani Empire is mighty indeed, but even we would never risk the wrath of a bride whose day has been usurped. By all means, let us postpone any formalities until all schedules are clear.” He raised his eyebrows. “Provided…?” He let the word hang in the air.
And for once, Travis didn’t need help figuring it out. “Absolutely, Admiral,” he said. “We would be honored if you would attend.”