“Good. Which ships? When can we expect them?” She pulled the pad from her sleeve, preparing to take notes.

  “They’re already there.”

  The pad clattered to the table. “What?”

  “Alsea has a battle group permanently assigned to it,” he said patiently. “Now, I realize you believe that planet is our only ally of importance, but there are others with vital resources and governments asking why they don’t get the same treatment. There’s no support in Gov Dome for sending additional assets after the substantial investment we’ve already made.”

  “Since when do you allow politics to override Protectorate security?”

  “Don’t play the ingenue, Captain. It’s unworthy of you.”

  “Then perhaps you could explain to me how something other than politics is preventing a sensible response to an active Voloth threat!”

  He spread his hands. “What you call sensible, others call excessive. I have knowledge of a threat. I have no knowledge of its breadth, intent, or date of play. Politics has nothing to do with lack of actionable intelligence.”

  “You can’t tell me you don’t know the date of play. We all know when they’re most likely to come.”

  “‘Likely’ is not a word that unlocks a massive allocation of resources.” His expression darkened. “I’m giving you a warning, Captain. I strongly advise you to use it.”

  “For what? You’re telling me I’ll have no reinforcements. Not to mention that I’m not in command of this battle group.” She sat back, hearing her own words. “Why are you talking to me and not Greve?”

  “I’m talking to the person in charge of the battle plan.”

  On paper, Greve was that person. In reality, Ekatya had been driving every bit of it. How Sholokhov had determined that, she did not want to know.

  He leaned forward, crossing his hands on his desk. “You destroyed half of the Voloth Empire’s Fifth Fleet by yourself. The Alseans destroyed the entire hardware inventory and most of the personnel of the Third Fleet before they had a single functional fighter. Now they have over two hundred. We know for a fact that the Voloth haven’t built any new orbital invaders. We also know they’ve had trouble restocking the Third. We’re not seeing movement of invasion groups. What that leaves for an attack doesn’t look like a threat you and the Alseans can’t handle, especially given the presence of a defensive minefield and two destroyers you didn’t have before.”

  It began to sink in. “That’s your warning. That we won’t have reinforcements even if you do get actionable intelligence.”

  “Yes.”

  She propped an elbow on the table and rubbed her forehead. “Lovely.”

  “You’re a victim of your own success, Captain. You and the Alseans. Which brings me to my second topic. I want to leverage your connection with Lancer Tal.”

  “For what?” she asked absently, still processing the unwelcome news.

  “An offer of trade. What price do you think she’d ask for twenty high empaths?”

  She was frozen by shock before bursting into laughter. “No price you could pay. She doesn’t sell her people.”

  “I don’t want to buy people,” he said calmly. “I want to trade resources.”

  “I don’t care what phrasing you use, she won’t give it a second of thought.”

  “Then perhaps you could convince her to think more carefully.”

  “Even if I were willing to interfere in her governance, nothing I could say would convince her.”

  His slight huff of air could hardly be called a laugh, but it was more than he had ever done in her presence. “Really, Captain. ‘Interfere in her governance’? You sat on her side of the table during treaty negotiations. She procured the Phoenix for you. Then she made it a governmental demand that you stay in command of it after infecting you with an Alsean mental bond. You can’t possibly be so blind as to think you have no connection with her policy decisions.”

  “What she does, she chooses to do.” If he was hoping to get a rise out of her with the “infected” comment, she would be happy to disappoint him. “What do you want with twenty high empaths?”

  “I want them to work for me,” he said in a tone that indicated her idiocy for asking. “High empaths are to my work what the first surf engines were to space travel. They will make things possible that couldn’t be done before.”

  “That’s exactly why she won’t give them to you.”

  He examined her as if she were a particularly interesting insect. “Tell me, Captain, why would you not want the Protectorate to have a security advantage?”

  She didn’t want him to have the advantage, but it would not be wise to say so. “I’m a Fleet captain. Keeping the Protectorate and its allies safe is my job. Lancer Tal’s primary concern is the safety and future growth of Alsea. Public perception of Alsean empathic power is an inextricable part of that, and she won’t risk fueling the fear of her people acting as weapons against us. Or being used as weapons.”

  “A reasonable concern, given the torture of your bondmate by people fearing exactly that.”

  His understanding caught her flat-footed, as did his use of bondmate. It was a respectful gesture, the same one Greve withheld every day.

  “In this, our purposes align,” he continued. “There are two types of weapons in my line of work: the kind that are effective as a threat, and the kind that are effective because no one knows they’re a threat. Having Alsean high empaths on my side would be effective no matter what. But I could get a great deal more out of them if their existence was unknown.”

  “A secret trade? You’d have to conduct the entire negotiation outside diplomatic channels.”

  “Correct. Hence this call to you and not Ambassador Solvassen.”

  It all fell into place. “That’s why you saved my command. You wanted me as your conduit.”

  He frowned. “Who told you I saved your command?”

  “Who do you think? Your pet admiral.”

  “Greve is a gasbag,” he said dismissively. “Useful for a limited purpose, useless beyond that.”

  It was a sign of how ludicrous her Fleet life had become when she felt solidarity with Sholokhov. “Then why did you put him here?”

  “I only deal with the big decisions. Meddling in the minutiae of Fleet personnel choices is not in my bailiwick.”

  Unless that personnel choice put a spy or an assassin on her ship, she thought.

  “Convey my proposal, Captain. We’ll see where it goes from there.”

  “And when she says no? Is that the part where you take the gloves off Greve?”

  “Is he using gloves?” he asked mildly. “My impression was that he hated you enough to piss in your command chair before you sat in it. Lancer Tal won’t say no right away. She’s too savvy a negotiator, as we all know from the outrageous terms of our treaty. Tell her the Protectorate has more to offer than what she has right now. I’m willing to listen to any reasonable proposal. Call me when you have an update.”

  His visage blinked out and was replaced by the priority blue emblem. Ekatya stared at it, her thoughts whirling before settling on one revealing point.

  Sholokhov knew Admiral Greve was riding on her shoulder. If there were no gloves to take off, then it couldn’t get worse.

  Which meant Greve had no power over her career unless she gave it to him.

  18

  Symbolism

  Rahel didn’t know what to do with herself. She was buzzing with the thrill of the war game, when she and Candini had worked as a perfect team and the lead cog in the intricate machinery of Alsea’s fighter fleet. They had danced through space like nightwings, power and grace in a deadly ballet against the backdrop of the space elevator.

  Though the shield breakers and missiles were dummies, designed to burn down to their constituent molecules and leave no debris, that hadn’t lessened the impact of seeing so many of them hurled through space. The unending streaks of laser cannon fire were even more impressive due to their greater visibility. But most impressive of all was Candini’s ability to dodge every danger, flitting through a shifting, lethal maze while chasing down targets. Her call sign, Nightwing, was perfectly chosen. Rahel had never doubted that they would make it through unscathed.

  The best part of the battle came at the end, when Candini swung them around the elevator in time to see the Phoenix perform the double Serrado Spin. Their war game was based on an optimal scenario, in which a Voloth heavy cruiser and two escort destroyers entered the system only to be immediately whittled down by the defender mines guarding the base space exit point. With its destroyers disabled, the heavy cruiser and the fighters it carried would be at a disadvantage.

  Captain Serrado was not supposed to win. When Rahel watched her ship hurl barrage after barrage of weapons, spinning gracefully with each one, she had nearly burst with pride.

  Now she was back aboard, floating on that pride and wanting to twirl down the ship’s corridors. She wanted to spar against a worthy opponent until she dropped. Most of all, she wanted to speak with someone who understood.

  Her feet had brought her here seemingly of their own accord. The clipped response to the entry chime did not dampen her enthusiasm, and when she stepped through the door, she knew she was in the right place.

  Dr. Wells looked up from her computer with an impatience that instantly melted to welcome. “There you are! What did you think of your first war game? I heard you killed half of our fighters.”

  Rahel crossed her office, skirted around the desk, and bent down for a warmron. “It was fantastic.”

  Though startled, Dr. Wells returned the embrace as well as she could from her chair. “I can see that,” she said with a laugh. “Sit down and tell me.”

  “I can’t sit. I’m still flying.” Rahel leaned against the desk, one hand tapping a beat on its surface. “I’ve heard of this, but it’s never happened to me before. The bloodfire. When a warrior finds so much joy in the dance of combat that she doesn’t know how to stop dancing.”

  “That’s not limited to warriors. I’ve come out of emergency surgery still high on the adrenaline rush.” Her understanding smile curled into a smirk. “Ordinarily, I’d recommend a vigorous round of sex.”

  “Helpful, thanks. I know what you’ll be doing two ticks after landing on Alsea.”

  “Give me some credit; it’ll be at least five ticks. Getting undressed takes time.”

  While many Gaians were oddly shy about discussing it, Dr. Wells brought the same matter-of-fact attitude to joining that she did to her work. She also brought the same drive for knowledge, leading to interesting conversations during Rahel’s treatments. Based on those, Colonel Micah had to be the happiest man on Alsea.

  “Physical activity of any kind can help,” she added in a more serious tone. “Even something as simple as walking.”

  Rahel pounced on the idea. “Come for a walk with me?”

  “I’m still collating the results from our simulations. I really should—” Dr. Wells stopped with a shake of the head. “Stars above, that look. It’s like I’d be breaking your heart to say no.”

  “I’m not that fragile. But there could be bruising.”

  She glanced at her computer terminal, lips pursed, then reached out to blank the display. “I’m sick of numbers. Let’s go.”

  Instead of walking downstairs to the lobby and its busy entrance, she led them up two flights and through a little-used exit from the medbay’s storage areas.

  “How did your simulations go?” Rahel asked as they emerged into a main corridor. “Now that I think about it, you never told me exactly what you’d be doing.”

  “Practicing for battle casualties. We ran simulations of blunt force traumas, sprains and fractures, the kinds of injuries you see when people are thrown around.”

  “I thought the Pulsar design prevented that?” She had learned about this while studying blueprints of the ship in her early days of training. The battle hull and the sacrificial decks outside of it absorbed the greatest impacts, leaving the majority of the ship relatively unaffected.

  “Prevents? Not possible. It reduces. Besides, there will always be some crew caught out on the sacrificial decks, or forced to go there to repair something. Or retrieve someone. We also ran a simulation for fighter crew injuries, which I’ll thank you never to incur.” Dr. Wells pointed at a tile mosaic they were passing. “That’s one of my favorites.”

  She stopped to examine the bucolic scene. “Why?”

  “It reminds me of my home planet. These crops are nebulous enough that I can see my own in them. The ones we used in our crop genetics work.”

  Rahel absorbed her emotional warmth, increasingly common on the occasions when she spoke of her life before Fleet. “You talk about it more than you used to.”

  “Do I?” Dr. Wells traced a row of plants in the mosaic before resuming their walk. “Makes sense, I suppose. I’m thinking about it more than I used to. Seeing things in new ways. I’m realizing that I threw out the good with the bad.”

  Perfect translation capability didn’t always mean perfect understanding. Rahel was still puzzling out the meaning when Dr. Wells offered an assist.

  “What I mean is, when I left that life behind, I left it all behind. I couldn’t think about what I’d lost, so I didn’t think about any of it. Do that long enough and it becomes a habit.”

  “Huh. I couldn’t stop thinking. That was part of the reason for the drinking.”

  “We all cope in different ways.”

  “Now you sound like Lanaril.”

  “I’ll take that as a high compliment. She’s a planetary treasure, as far as I’m concerned. I wish we could talk more often.”

  They turned into the crew services hall, lined on both sides with shops and bars. With most of the crew still engaged in postgame tasks, there was little traffic at the moment.

  “Ah, that reminds me.” Dr. Wells veered toward a shop with a sign showing scissors and a comb laid across each other. “I need to make an appointment.”

  A slender man in a white coat descended on them the moment they walked through the door. “Dr. Wells! About time you came in. I thought you’d gone to the competition.”

  “And let other hands touch my hair? Not a chance. I’m due for a trim, though. Do you have any openings tomorrow night?”

  “I have one now.”

  “Oh, I can’t, I’m—”

  “Yes, you can,” Rahel said. “We can still talk, can’t we?”

  “Not about anything to do with patients or her personal life,” the man said. “But we can gossip about anything else in Fleet. Our lovely chief surgeon has the most acid tongue this side of . . . well, me.”

  Rahel was intrigued by his lack of nervousness. Most crew members did not react that way to Dr. Wells, who intimidated everyone from her staff right up to Commander Lokomorra.

  “I thought you needed to move,” Dr. Wells said.

  “I did, but I’ve never seen this.” Rahel made a gesture encompassing the room.

  “It can’t be that different from what Alseans do, can it?”

  “Sure it can. For one thing, you do it with your clothes on.”

  They stared at her, one shocked and intrigued, the other skeptical but unsure. She managed to keep her expression bland until Dr. Wells put her hands on her hips.

  “Rahel Sayana. You are kicking the dokshin.”

  Her use of an Alsean phrase sent Rahel into helpless laughter. Bent over, hands on her thighs, she gasped, “Yes, but your faces!”

  “I don’t know what you just said, but I like her,” the man said. “Why haven’t you brought her here before now?”

  “Because I always get mine cut on Alsea.” Rahel straightened and held out a hand. “First Guard Rahel Sayana.”

  “As if I’d need an introduction. You’re the third most famous person on the ship after the captain and this lady.” He shook her hand with a firm grip. “I’m Reynard. Stop wasting your precious leave time getting your trims dirtside. For the love of flight, it’s all the same length. I could do that in three minutes. Give me thirty and I’d make you a new woman.”

  “Good luck with that. She doesn’t—”

  “What would you do?” Rahel interrupted.

  Dr. Wells’s eyebrows nearly vanished off her forehead. “Really?”

  “I’ve been thinking about it for a while. Every time we fly, I have to put my hair up like yours to keep it from interfering with the pressure seat.” She shrugged. “I’m ready for something different. Easier.”

  “Something like Candini’s?”

  “Oh, no!” Reynard held up his hands. “Nope. I’ve seen First Pilot Candini. Our lovely Alsean here will not do spiky hair. That face is not for spikes.” He studied her, his chin resting between forefinger and thumb. “Hm. Yes, possibly. Come here.” With an authority that brooked no dissent, he steered her by the shoulders and sat her in a chair before a long mirror. In a few deft movements, he had her braid undone and was running strands of hair through his fingers, staring at her reflection and humming thoughtfully.

  Dr. Wells sat in the neighboring chair. “If you’re not sure, say so now. He’s working up to light speed, I can see it.”

  “Your hair is practically edible,” Reynard said. “It’s a shame to keep it tied in a braid. Look how thick this is! It wants to be free.”

  “See what I mean?”

  “I’m sure,” Rahel said. “It’s a traditional warrior braid, but I’m not a traditional warrior anymore.” And the bloodfire still humming through her veins approved of a drastic change.

  “I like her even more. You want easier? You’re lucky. With hair this thick and the right cut, you can step out of the shower, finger comb it, and go. I would cut it to here”—he laid a hand across the back of her neck—“and leave it a little thicker on top. You’ve got a natural wave that will take care of that. Then a bit in front of the ears to keep it soft.” He drew a line to illustrate. “And you’ll break hearts.”

  “I’m not interested in breaking hearts, but go ahead.”

  Dr. Wells leaned back in her chair, an intrigued smile lighting her face. “This will be fun.”