14

Norfolk
Skye
12 October 3134

An icy breeze blowing in off the distant North Inlet carried a hint of brine and the sharp, acrid smell of gunpowder into Norfolk. In the shadow of a partially completed Overlord, Tara Campbell pulled her wool overcoat tightly closed at her neck. She walked the edge of the DropShip’s “cradle” with Paladin McKinnon and Legate Eckard, ten stories up, surveying the nearby battlefield and the hive of activity that buzzed through the streets surrounding the Shipil Company dockyard.

It had taken less than an hour on-site for Tara to understand that the dockyards were the reason Norfolk existed. Its industrial center was twice as large as it would be for any similar-sized city. The commercial sector half again as small. There were no office building skyscrapers or high-rise apartments. Since nothing could compete with the thirty-story vessel under construction, the massive cradle that surrounded its lower third, or the multifactory complex nearby that required six months to turn out just one interplanetary drive for the mammoth vessels, no architect or construction company even tried.

“A people who know who they are,” McKinnon said when she voiced her observations. From the cradle’s north corner, they could look west toward the recent battlefield and, several kilometers beyond, the azure blue waters of the North Inlet, or east toward the low-lying sprawl of Norfolk. His hard eyes narrowed. “And now they know what they are.”

“A prime target.” Tara nodded.

Yesterday’s Jade Falcon raid had pushed no closer to the city than the borders of Shipil Company property, but that was close enough for most of the locals. So many had called in to take the day off from work—laying in provisions or moving their kids to relatives far outside of the city or just plain worried for themselves—that the corporation had dismissed everyone with pay for forty-eight hours.

Very few civilian vehicles moved on the streets. Tara easily counted two dozen Maxim hover transports, patrolling with a hastily scraped-together militia. A Praetorian rolled into the Shipil parking lot, establishing a local command post. A pair of Drillson hover tanks and SM1 Destroyers flanked the mobile HQ.

Tara pointed out a gap in the snow-dusted hills to the west. As she had hoped, the cradle gave them an incredible overview of the surrounding terrain.

“So they came through there in column formation. One Griffin leading a short company of hovercraft. The local defenders took a piece out of them just this side of the gap.”

Legate Eckard raised a set of field glasses to his eyes, nodded. “Shipil Company keeps a small mercenary force under contract. Last month I supplemented them with a lance of Condors and a Kinnol main battle tank.” Eckard was a small man, but had a bodybuilder’s shape. There was no mistaking the knuckle-whitening strength with which he gripped the field glasses. “If they had been on the ball, they would have plugged that gap with the Kinnol and shoved the Falcons right back toward the coast.”

“While we’re wishing,” McKinnon said with a nasty edge, “if they had been veteran troops, we’d be counting up Jade Falcon salvage right now.”

“So the defenders retrograde back toward the industrial area,” Tara continued, keeping the peace by drawing both men back to their purpose at Norfolk: to assess damage and make preparations for any follow-up raids. “They lose a pair of Condors crossing the river.” She couldn’t see the silver-blue stream they had visited earlier, but a winding cut in the woods to the west gave her an idea of where it was. “And they set loose some Gnome infantry in the forest to slow down the Falcon advance while they reset the lines right out there.”

Right out there was the wide-open ground where local tree farms had been harvested only a year ago. Several square kilometers of bare-branched saplings tied up to stakes, blackened craters, and burned-out vehicles.

“More room to maneuver,” Eckard said.

Sire McKinnon snorted. “More room for the Falcons too. You can’t stay on the defensive against a small, maneuverable force.”

Tara watched as a VTOL snaked its way down the river’s twisting cut. It dipped down low, beneath the treetops. “And a small force had no hope of taking the Shipil Company dockyards. So was this simply an intelligence-gathering raid? Or did the Jade Falcons hope to accomplish something more here?”

“They had a J100 salvage vehicle. They might be trying to replace some losses of their own.” But the legate did not sound too certain himself.

The Paladin turned his weathered face toward the city’s main stretch, then turned to look up at the DropShip that towered over them. Not all of its armored hull was in place yet. There were still weapon bays to finish and a docking collar to install, but engines and navigation were intact according to all reports.

“Could be they were thinking of grabbing the Overlord and fell back when they saw it wasn’t quite spaceworthy. Afraid we’ll get it finished and deployed before they make it back in force.”

“We will,” Tara promised. She wasn’t about to let such valuable hardware sit there for the Falcons to claim as battle spoils. Isorla, they called it. “We need to advance the manufacturing lines at Cyclops, Incorporated, as well.”

It was more a mental note than an opening for a new discussion. Neither man commented. Sire McKinnon continued to study the DropShip, the towering cranes that rose up from three corners of the massive cradle complex, and the work that would remain unfinished by the crews for the next day and a half. Legate Eckard focused his glasses on the VTOL, which jumped up over the tree line and skimmed above the nearby battlefield. A Cavalry, the craft had sharp lines that pulled back severely from the missile systems that blunted its nose. It thundered straight for the trio, as if intent on finding them, then banked into a long, slow turn that circled it back over the killing grounds.

“Company?” she asked. She shivered as the wind ran icy fingers through her spiked hair.

“Jasek.” Eckard waved a dismissal. “Never was one to be content with reports. Della’s been complaining about his people in the New London Tower, pulling every battlerom we’ve collected from the Jade Falcons’ first assault on Skye.”

Tara could understand that. Prefect Della Brown had a larger grudge against Jasek than anyone had, save perhaps his father. Legate Eckard had lost a handful of troops to Jasek’s Stormhammers. Brown had lost nearly the entirety of the prefecture’s standing army, and then had watched as the Jade Falcons rolled over worlds unopposed.

“We could do worse than listen to a fresh perspective,” Tara said, shading her own reservations with a touch of optimism. A large part of her position here as Exarch Redburn’s direct representative seemed to be bridge building. If Skye had any hope of standing free from the Jade Falcons, Tara could not allow demons from the past to set fire to her carefully constructed work.

Eckard lowered his field glasses. “I hear he’s been tearing into your plans for a counterassault as well.” The legate looked at her with curious brown eyes.

Why should that surprise her? She had copied the Stormhammers on plans she’d put together with Paladin McKinnon, hoping to draft them into her upcoming operation. So Jasek Kelswa-Steiner had some criticism to offer. So what?

So what if she wanted to bridle right there in front of the legate and Sire McKinnon, who now gave her the same careful attention he’d spent on the DropShip a moment before? Studying her. No doubt seeing the parts that lay open, unfinished, with work delayed by circumstances beyond her direct control. McKinnon knew a few of the areas that lay exposed, but he had avoided poking at them again since that evening in the O-club, and he didn’t say anything now.

He simply watched.

“All right,” she said, not altogether against a debate with the Stormhammer leader, but not eager for it either. But how much of that was personal, and how much professional? He’d make some good points, she was sure. She nodded toward the Praetorian crawler. “Why don’t we adjourn to the local command post, then, and invite the Landgrave down?”

Sire McKinnon shrugged. “Why not indeed?” he asked.

Tara couldn’t help but feel that she had missed something important in the Paladin’s simple question. Was Sire McKinnon warning her, or offering tentative support for her building an alliance with the Stormhammers?

Whichever it was, she knew, he would make his feelings known soon enough.

 

Jasek jumped down from the VTOL’s open bay, feet splashing through icy slush that coated the parking lot’s paved surface. Colonel Joss Vandel followed him. The Cavalry’s blades hammered overhead, still pounding at the air, but Jasek didn’t bother to duck. No VTOL had been built yet that would take a man’s head off for not crouching down, and he had always thought it stupid when a soldier worried more about the perfectly safe rotors than he did the battle that waited just ahead.

Which was what he was looking forward to, he felt certain.

Battle.

“Landgrave.” Tara met him with a warm handshake and cold, blue eyes. She had a warrior’s grip, made more obvious by the hard callus at the base of her thumb that told of her years of experience at the control stick of a BattleMech. “It is good to see you again.”

For all her initial warmth when they first met at the New London DropPort, their last few meetings certainly hadn’t made him feel particularly welcome. Not that he needed Tara Campbell’s favor. He simply hoped to win it. And that was not likely to happen today.

He quickly reintroduced Colonel Vandel. Tara had certainly not forgotten the Stormhammers officer, but it gave Jasek the chance to break the ice between them with a social chisel.

“I hoped to catch up with you,” he said as the three of them walked into the shadow of the two-story Praetorian. Legate Eckard and Paladin McKinnon waited near the command vehicle’s armored door. “We’d like to speak with you about your plans to strike back at the Jade Falcons.”

“Not one for small talk either,” Tara said to Eckard with a tight smile.

Her offhand comment and the legate’s frown left Jasek with the feeling he and Vandel had interrupted a conversation. Had she been asking about him? It threw him off his stride for a few seconds. But the dark glower ever present on the Paladin’s face helped him snap back quickly. Some things in the universe were constants.

“Since you were hoping to launch at multiple Falcon positions in three days,” he said by way of explanation, “there doesn’t seem to be much time for dalliance.”

The inside of the mobile HQ was warm and well lit, with armored shutters open over ferroglass windows to reduce any feeling of claustrophobia. The command-level officers filed back toward the rear of the massive vehicle, taking over the Praetorian’s small but well-equipped strategic office. The room smelled of electronics. Legate Eckard and Tara Campbell slid over bench seats and around to the rear of the holographic display that doubled as the room’s only table. Paladin McKinnon stayed at the door, leaning back against it with an air of finality.

Jasek did not doubt that he was stuck in this room until McKinnon decided to let him leave. He also took a seat at the table/display, leaving Vandel to stand at his shoulder. The Lyran officer set himself in an easy, patient stance.

“As you say,” Tara finally broke the uncomfortable silence that had followed them into the office. “There isn’t a great deal of time. Yes, I intended to strike back at the Jade Falcons. But with this latest raid . . . ,” she trailed off.

“It wasn’t a raid,” Jasek said evenly. “It’s a bluff.”

“What?”

“It’s a bluff. They had no hope of taking salvage or even creating much havoc against Shipil Company. A short company to attack a DropShip? Even an unfinished one? No. What this has done is draw your attention here. To Norfolk. Which means they will ready their play somewhere else.”

“New London?” Eckard asked. “We would prepare against them at the capital regardless.” Answering his own question, the truth lit up his eyes. “Cyclops, Incorporated.”

Jasek shrugged. “That would be my guess. Cyclops manufactures the Drillson and the Maxim, as well as weaponry for the Wolfhound and Banshee BattleMech designs. That’s the kind of prize they need to further their goals against other worlds.”

Tara tapped a thoughtful finger on the glass tabletop. “Which means they are readying their next assault.” She considered, nodded. “Our plans, as you’ve seen them, involve a series of simultaneous strikes. None would force them from a world they currently control, but they would throw them off-balance and hopefully push back any timetable for a new assault against Skye.”

“This has been in the works for some time, I take it?”

Tara nodded hesitantly. “Sire McKinnon and I consulted with Legate Eckard weeks ago. We agreed on the need to buy Skye more time.” She paused, obviously considering, then, “But it wasn’t until your arrival with the intelligence gathered by your Stormhammers that we had all the data needed for such a plan. We didn’t”—she shook her head—“I didn’t inform you at first, as we were adapting earlier plans made in your absence.”

The politics of alliances. Jasek knew that game.

“I noticed that you did not make use of my Stormhammers in your plans,” he said, conceding the point easily, as he did not particularly care about the late notification. Only the results. “Your Highlanders will be spread very thin. You plan to hit three worlds in simultaneous strikes?”

“Ryde,” Paladin McKinnon said from the door. His voice was as abrupt as his manner. “Zebebelgenubi. Glengarry.”

“Glengarry is the most important world, naturally,” Eckard elaborated. His tone held a touch of conciliation. “We know that is the world the Jade Falcons are using now as their staging grounds.”

“But they were using Chaffee,” Vandel reminded them. His voice was deep and broken, like a rusted gate. “It is a redundancy.”

“We don’t intend to throw the Falcons off Glengarry regardless,” Tara said. “We only want to shake them up a bit, and make them burn time. Weeks. Hopefully months. Skye can use whatever we can purchase.”

“Then allow me to chip into the account,” Jasek said, warming to the idea.

He caught himself leaning in toward Tara Campbell, and pulled back reluctantly. He had to keep things professional, with a wary eye on how they would use his people. Tara’s divine reputation aside, he never doubted she was for The Republic first and foremost.

“I think you should modify the target worlds, and pull back some of your Highlanders in exchange for most of my Stormhammers.”

“Which worlds would you change?” Tara asked.

“Trade Summer for Zebebelgenubi.” Jasek’s first recommendation was his easiest sell. “We just hit Zebebelgenubi, so they are on high alert and spoiling for another fight.”

“Summer isn’t part of Prefecture IX,” Eckard said.

No. It wasn’t. Summer sat just over the border into VIII. “Why should that matter to you?” Jasek asked Tara directly. He glanced at the Paladin. “It’s still part of The Republic.”

McKinnon thought about that for all of three seconds. “Maybe the better question then is why should Summer matter to you?”

But Tara knew the answer, Jasek saw. She leaned forward, intent on his face, which he held impassive. “Because Summer is a world of the old Isle of Skye. Isn’t it?” No need to answer. “If your Stormhammers land there, and the people rally to them, you could throw the prefecture borders into dispute.”

Jasek shrugged as if the thought had never entered his mind. Niccolò had bet him a gentlemen’s wager that Tara Campbell would see through that play. He was ready to pull it from the table in exchange for a stronger position on his next move.

“Also,” he offered, “thanks to a quick and nearly bloodless conquest, Summer’s docile population is settling in under Jade Falcon reign. The garrison there is complacent and can be severely hurt, which might inspire some of the local population to rise against the occupation.”

Tara hesitated. “He makes a strong case,” she said. She weighed in Eckard’s and McKinnon’s vote by glance. “What if we use the Highlanders for Summer?”

Jasek had not counted on Tara’s so easily volunteering to shift her own forces away from Glengarry. But that played as well. “Then you don’t have to worry about any pro-Lyran uprising,” he said. “And I’ll support the Highlander drive on Glengarry as well.”

“Why not simply give Glengarry to your people?” Eckard asked. “Why spread the Highlanders so thin if you are truly on board?”

Jasek smiled. “Well, you should give Glengarry to me, since my people know it better than any outside force. But regardless, it will take us both, since I have one more target I’m putting on the table.” He had their attention. “It is my intention to hit Chaffee as well. By stirring up the Falcons on both their staging worlds, inside and outside of The Republic, we can hope to accomplish more toward setting back their timetable.”

A flicker of interest sparked behind McKinnon’s dark eyes. “Doing favors for the Steiner court?” he asked, measuring his gaze between Jasek and Colonel Vandel.

“Opening a bridge to the Commonwealth is not the same as handing over Skye to House Steiner,” Jasek pointed out. “Let’s at least keep the option on a future alliance. That’s just good business.” He saw a wary look in every eye, and decided to raise the pot. “Plus, I’m going to hit it with or without any formal blessing from Skye. If you’re so worried about me, have my father put his stamp on it.”

Tara’s dark glance told Jasek that he had forced her into a corner, and she didn’t like it. But he knew there was only one way out, and that was his way. Or their way as everyone did, in effect, get what they were after.

Compromise. Again, the politics of alliances.

“It might work,” she finally admitted. “But we counted on at least some of the Stormhammers remaining on Skye to guard against a new Jade Falcon raid. We’ll be spread very thin with just the Seventh Skye Militia, a few Highlanders, and mercs.”

“I’ll leave at least a third of my people here,” he guaranteed her.

She frowned. “That’s an awfully light force left to you for hitting two stronghold worlds. Even with my Highlanders assisting on Glengarry, you are going to need more troops.”

“I’ll get more,” he assured her.

There was that wary look again. “Where?” Tara asked. Almost an accusation.

Time to play his trump card. His ace in the hole, which he had saved in the last week for just such an occasion. “I have my resources,” Jasek said breezily.

But seeing that the others would never be content with that, he leaned in toward Tara as if spilling a confidence. Maybe she had drawn him in, despite his best preparations to ensure the Stormhammers held themselves as an independent party. But she couldn’t see everything. And that gave him an advantage.

“I know where the Steel Wolves are hiding,” he told them all.