before.'
'Why not?'
'Mostly because the Starwolves would rip this sector apart to find him.'
'But what can they do about it, if they have no idea where we have him?' the Sector Commander demanded. 'That is the trick, isn't it? We just need to keep him in hiding until we're finished with him. We did it before, with the Vardon's memory cell. We kept it hidden for thousands of years.'
'That is a completely different case,' Lake replied, brushing that impatiently aside. 'For one thing, they weren't even aware it existed until we finally put it on public display here in Vannkarn. And the memory cell is also an imperishable good; you can bet that they plan to come for it in their own good time. But a prisoner is altogether something else. They know that we have him, where we got him, and they are going to do whatever they must to get him back.'
'You think they can trace him?' Richart asked.
'I am willing to bet on it,' the Councilor said firmly. 'They have technology we can only dream about. For all we know, their scanners can track a ship across stellar distances. And just as likely, they can follow its trail of energy-emission residue. How should I know?'
'Here comes trouble,' Richart said suddenly, having spied one of their distinguished guests approaching. 'Let me distract him for a moment.'
With that he shot off like a missile to intercept his intended target. Trace stared after him for a moment, surprised at such a magnanimous gesture on his part. Trace had always held the younger Lake in mild contempt. He was small for one of old Terran stock, hardly any taller than most modern humans, stocky and plump. His boyish looks had now followed him into his thirties; he was cherub-cheeked, with curly brown hair and the eternally amused look in his eyes that he had inherited from his grandfather. But Donalt did not let personal dislike interfere with his judgment. Richart was an administrative genius exceeding even his formidable grandfather.
'You want this prisoner, don't you?' Lake asked.
'Of course I do.'
'Why?' the Councilor asked, eyeing him shrewdly. 'Prestige?'
'Hardly!' Trace declared, somewhat indignant. 'It has occurred to me that, with a live subject to study, we might finally discover how Starwolves were made. So that we can make our own.'
'Ah, I see,' Lake said thoughtfully. 'The ultimate weapon to use against a Starwolf is another Starwolf.'
'Of course,' Trace agreed. 'That is the premise behind our Tracer missiles. But we already know that anything mechanical we build would never equal the real thing. Therefore we need the real thing.'
The Councilor nodded thoughtfully. 'All right, then. If you can keep him, and I emphasize the 'if,' then you will have all the help we can muster in probing their secrets. But that is sort of out of your hands right now, I'm afraid. They would have to get their prisoner situated somewhere long enough for you to issue some orders on his handling. Right now we don't even know where he is.'
* * * *
Boulder was essentially just that, a big rock in the middle of open space, not large enough to be a real planet, barely large enough to have served some planet for a moon, and with no sun to warm it. How such a piece of basalt had ever happened to end up in the middle of nowhere was uncertain, so it must have been drifting about for quite some time. To the Starwolves, however, it was a valuable piece of property indeed. It was just big enough to have the gravity to hold a carrier in stationary orbit twenty kilometers out. It had a hole in it just large enough for a damaged carrier to back into, the guns of its forward battery facing out, and, best of all, the Union had no idea it existed.
A ship was already waiting, not the carrier Delvon but one of the immense Starwolf freighters. Although the size and general shape was the same, the freighters had less than half the mass. They were not fighting ships, being only lightly armored, and more than half their main hull was devoted to several cavernous holds. The Union knew nothing of these ships, for they never showed themselves.
'Hello, who is there?' Valthyrra called out as she approached. There were, of course, official rules and procedures for recognition, but the Starwolf ships tended to be more informal, since they were all old friends.
'This is Fyrdenna Lesdryn,' the freighter responded. 'Hello, Valthyrra. Long time, no see.'
'Hello, Feery. You look well. But what are you doing here, if I may ask the obvious?'
'Thenderra transferred your call to me, and I was closer to Boulder at the time than any of you. I'm on my way home, in fact, but I have plenty of room for all the junk you have to give.'
'You may have it with my gratitude, and especially Thenderra's,' Valthyrra said. 'She did not sound at all happy to have to take it off my hands.'
'I should say not! My bridge crew is still laughing at the sight of you popping out of starflight with your transports and capture ships following you like a brood!' Fyrdenna exclaimed, then became serious. 'Still, you do have more than Lyerrana Vyesden gave me.'
'Lyerrana?' Valthyrra prompted, unsure whether she should have heard this. The entire bridge crew paused to listen, since she was putting this over audio.
'You were too far to one side to have caught the news on achronic,' the freighter continued. 'Lyerrana was making her usual rounds of the outer fringe when she came upon a Union invasion of a nonaffiliated world. Balgan by name. It seems that they were just starting to make a profit, and the Union decided that it wanted that profit for its own trade companies.'
'The old story.'
'Yes, and Lyerrana said that she has been expecting it for the past twenty years. But this was strange. It was only a small invasion force, a battleship, three carriers and four troop transports. A force like that usually just runs when they see Starwolves coming, but instead they turned and fought like they had never heard of us. She caught the battleship and two of the carriers — I have them in my hold right now — and sent the survivors heading for home in the transports. Then she sent for me to haul home the spoils so that she could stay and watch the system. I almost believe that she would indeed have another load by the time I get this home.'
'I heard that there is a new Sector Commander in my haunts,' Valthyrra mused. 'But that is not even an adjoining sector.'
'I can understand an invasion,' Fyrdenna continued. 'But what happened to you defies explanation.'
'Oh, it did turn out to be a trap,' Valthyrra said, and quickly explained the details. Then she had to pause, since the channel was echoing with the laughter of the Lesdryn's entire bridge crew.
Fyrdenna was laughing with the rest. 'Wonderful! It was your good fortune to spring the trap in halves.'
'Oh, there was no mistaking that ship,' Valthyrra insisted. 'They had it phasing so hard that it would have burned itself out in twenty minutes of hard running. I got control of it and sent it on with my compliments. I popped it right over their heads, just to give them a good scare.'
'The Union is getting mean, and I fear that we have some hard battles yet ahead of us,' Fyrdenna said. 'I am beginning to wish that I had been built a fighting ship. I would envy you, if I were not so thoroughly pleased with myself. Now park yourself and start off-loading. Thenderra cannot be four hours behind me.'
The two ships met far enough out from Boulder to avoid the bother of its feeble gravity. They drifted together bellies facing, upside down in respect to each other, with just enough room between them for the Lesdryn's handlers to shift the load. The Methryn opened every hold and bay she had, and her own capture ships came in to haul away the intact ships as they were freed from her holding bays. These were set in a row between the two larger vessels, for the Lesdryn's handlers to look at and decide how best to pack them in her own vast bays. Her largest bay had folding racks for transporting a large number of ships, but this constituted a respectable fleet by Union standards. Some of the destroyers might have to be secured in other bays.
'Bless my buttons, what a haul!' Fyrdenna exclaimed. 'You must have come away with just about everything they threw at you. My compliments to your pilots. They must be the best.'
'Thank you,' Valthyrra replied graciously. 'But the truth is, I had only two packs out during most of the battle. They had things well under control before I could get anything else out.'
'You ironclad hulk of a bragging bitch!' Mayelna muttered under her breath without looking up from her screen, privately glad that Velmeran had not been present to hear all this. Valthyrra heard that, however, and quickly cut the audio, keeping the conversation private at least on her end.
'Do you want this credited to your account?' Fyrdenna asked.
'Just make sure that they knew where it all came from,' Valthyrra replied. 'I am going to be coming in for a
