the case. You have to assume your honor will be questioned sooner or later because of me.”
“I seem to recall you once telling me that you could look out for your own honor. I can do the same.”
“Can you?” Rione took a long, deep breath. “If I’m supposed to be your example, you’re not very convincing. Why are you trying to defend me?”
“Because any man worth anything wouldn’t fault you for an honest mistake-”
“Any man? Will you speak for my husband now, John Geary?” Rione glared at him. “What would I tell him? What should I tell my ancestors? I haven’t spoken with them since I learned of this. How can I?”
Geary looked silently back at her for a moment. “Do you want me to speak honestly?”
“Oh, why not? One of us should be honest,” Rione answered bitterly.
“Then I’ll tell you a few things.” Geary kept his voice firm, speaking as if giving commands on the bridge. “First, my honor isn’t stained. Neither is your honor. A stain requires knowingly doing a dishonorable thing.”
“That is not-”
“I don’t care how people see things now! A hundred years ago people understood that! Aren’t your lives hard enough after a century of war? Do you need to make them even harder by holding yourselves to impossible standards?” Rione stared at him. “I don’t have the right to tell you how to feel, but I’m telling you that’s how I feel. Secondly,” Geary continued, “you’re not helping anyone by flaying yourself this way. Yes, in a perfect, ideal universe you could be held to some impossible standard of loyalty. Not here.”
She shook her head. “That’s unlikely to bring comfort to my husband or to my ancestors.”
“What would you have wanted to happen if the situation were reversed?” Geary demanded. “If you’d been badly hurt, taken for dead, and perhaps forever separated from your husband? What would you have wanted?”
Rione spent a long time with her eyes lowered, saying nothing. Finally, she raised her gaze again and spoke calmly. “I would want him to be happy.”
“Even if that meant finding someone else if he thought you were dead?”
“Yes.”
“And if he then learned you could still be alive but still possibly forever lost to him? Would you want him to blame himself?”
“Do not use my husband against me, John Geary,” Rione spat. “You don’t have the right.”
He sat back and nodded, trying to stay calm. “That’s so. Why not talk to your ancestors? Maybe they’ll give you some sign of how they feel.”
“Such as the word adulteress appearing on my forehead?” Rione asked, still angry.
“Since you already think it’s there, why not?” Geary shot back. “But maybe they won’t condemn you. They’re your ancestors, Victoria. They were human, too. They lived imperfect lives. That’s why we talk to them, because they can remember and understand and maybe, just maybe, they can show us some wisdom that we’ve not yet learned.”
She shook her head, looking away again. “I can’t.”
“Even the most dishonorable can talk to their ancestors! No one can take that from you!”
“That’s not what I mean.” Rione stared stubbornly toward the opposite bulkhead.
He studied her profile, the set of her jaw, and slowly began to understand. “You’re afraid to talk to them? Afraid of how they might react?”
“Does that surprise you, John Geary? Of course I’m afraid. I’ve done many things I’m not particularly proud of, but I’ve never done anything that I thought would shame my ancestors.”
He considered that for a while. “You don’t have to face them alone. There are-”
“I will not share my shame with another!”
“You’ve already shared it with Desjani and now me!” Geary yelled back.
“And that is where it will end,” Rione muttered, her face grim and stubborn.
“I could-”
“No!” Rione visibly tried to calm herself again. “That would have been my husband’s role. I won’t have you beside me when I face my ancestors.”
That left only one option. “How about Desjani? Could you ask her to accompany you?”
Rione stared at him, plainly shocked.
“She already knows.”
“And she detests me.”
“Because you wouldn’t tell me. Now you have.” Rione’s eyes wavered. “You said it yourself. Desjani has honor. Your ancestors can’t object to her.”
Rione shook her head, avoiding Geary’s gaze again. “Why would she do that for me?”
“I could ask her.” Wrong answer, as Rione’s eyes blazed. “Or you could. Do you think Desjani would deny you that?”
She finally sighed. “Oh, no. Not the noble Captain Desjani. She’d even stand beside a politician if that person needed her, wouldn’t she? Especially if she thought the great Captain Geary wanted her to do it.”
“I think so, but you can leave the ‘great Captain Geary’ crap out of it. I’m trying to help you here, and Captain Desjani will help you if you ask, so you don’t need to keep throwing verbal missiles at either of us.”
Rione stood up, gazing down at Geary with a searching expression. “You won’t be in command of this fleet forever. Someday you’ll get it home. The living stars alone know how, but somehow you’ll do it. You can retire the day after that if you want. No one in the Alliance would deny you that. On that day, when you no longer have the responsibilities of command, when regulations and honor no longer keep you from personal relationships with any other officers, would you want to be tied to someone like me, or would you like the freedom to learn the heart of someone like Tanya Desjani?”
“I’ve never-”
“No. And you won’t. Damn you.” Rione spun around and left.
GEARY started awake as his stateroom door opened, then closed. He slapped the light control, bringing the dim night lighting to life, and saw Victoria Rione standing there, watching him silently.
“Hello, John Geary.” She walked a bit unsteadily toward him, then sat down on the end of the bed, staring at him. “Aren’t you going to ask?”
He could easily smell the wine on her breath even across the distance still separating them. “About what?”
“How it went.” Rione waved one hand grandly. “Me, my ancestors, and Captain Desjani. Surely you want to know.”
“Victoria-”
“Nothing.” She shook her head, slightly wobbly, her voice thick. “I explained what had happened. I expressed my remorse. I asked for guidance. Nothing. I felt nothing. They sent me nothing. My ancestors don’t even want to acknowledge me anymore, John Geary.”
He sat up finally. “That can’t be true.”
“Ask the noble Captain Desjani! Damn her and damn you.” Rione shoved herself to her feet and started pulling off her clothes.
Geary got up, too. “What are you doing?”
“Being what I am.” She dropped the last garment and half fell onto the bed, gazing up at him. “Go ahead.”
“You must be crazy if you think I’d take advantage of you right now.”
“Too honorable? Don’t fool yourself. Just be Black Jack for a while. Do whatever you want.”
He stared down at her, trying to find words.
Rione spoke again, her eyes looking past Geary now as if seeing other things. “I’ll kill him if I have to, you know. If Black Jack tries to harm the Alliance and there’s no other way to stop him, I’ll kill him. Too many others have died to let their sacrifices be lost. Maybe that’s when my honor disappeared, when I vowed to do anything it took to stop Black Jack.” Her eyes focused back on him with some difficulty. “Anything.”
It wasn’t easy to say, but he had to speak the thought that came to him. “Is that why you started sleeping with me in the first place?”
Her mouth worked; then she shook her head slightly. “No,” she whispered. “I don’t think even I would do
