The Honor of the Qween

'Dear, sweet cousin Jared.' Mayhew sounded as disgusted as he looked, then waved his hands in the air. 'Oh, you're right—you're right! And old Clinkscales is even worse, though at least he's not second in line for the protectorship.' The Protector sank into an overstuffed armchair. 'But we can't afford to see this thing go down the tubes over something as stupid as cultural prejudice, Bernie. Manticore can do a lot more for us than Haven can: they're closer, their technology's better, and they're a hell of a lot less likely to absentmindedly gobble us up one fine day.'

'Then I suggest you tell your negotiators that,' Yanakov sighed.

'I have, but you're the historian. You know how the Council's cut back the Protector's constitutional authority over the last century. Prestwick is a decent sort as Chancellor, but he doesn't really want to open the door to resumption of direct rule by Yours Truly. I happen to think we need a stronger executive to deal with all that's about to come down on us, but I may be a bit biased by who I am, and whatever I'd like to have, the fact is that I'm pretty much reduced to the power of prestige. Admittedly, the Mayhew Clan still boasts a fair amount of that, but a disproportionate share of it's with the conservatives—and the conservatives, as you yourself just pointed out, think accepting any outside help `will threaten the Grayson way of life'! I've got the Council in line so far, and I think I've got a majority in the Chamber, but it's slim—very slim—and if the military doesn't sign on, I'll lose it. You've got to get your people to see reason about this.'

'Ben,' Yanakov said slowly, 'I'll try, but I don't know that you fully grasp just what you're asking for.' Mayhew straightened in his chair, but the Admiral went on speaking. 'I've known you since you were a kid, but I've always known you were smarter than I am. If you say we need the Manticoran alliance, I believe you. But sometimes I think your grandfather made a mistake having you and your father educated off-world. Oh, I know all about the advantages, but somewhere along the way you sort of lost touch with how most of our people feel about some issues, and that's dangerous. You talk about the conservatives in the Chamber, but, Ben, most of them are less conservative than the population as a whole!'

'I realize that,' Mayhew said quietly. 'Contrary to what you may think, having a different perspective actually makes it easier to see some things—like how difficult it really is to change entrenched attitudes—and the Mayhews have no more desire to be Grayson's Pahlavis than its Romanovs. I'm not proposing to overturn society overnight, but what we're talking about is the survival of our planet, Bernie. We're talking about an alliance that can bring us modern industry and a permanent Manticoran fleet presence Simonds and his fanatics won't dare screw around with. And whether we sign up with Manticore or not, we're not going to be able to sit this one out. I give the Havenites another T-year at the outside before they move openly against Manticore, and when they do, they'll come straight through us unless there's something here to stop them. We're in the way, Bernie, and you know that even better than I do.'

'Yes,' Yanakov sighed. 'Yes, I do. And I'll try, Ben. I really will. But I wish to hell Manticore had been smart enough not to stick us with a situation like this, because I will be damned if I think I can pull it off.'

CHAPTER SEVEN

Sergeant Major Babcock smiled as Honor stepped onto the mat.

Babcock was from Gryphon, Manticore-B V. Gryphon's gravity was only five percent above Terran Standard, less than eighty percent that of Honor's native Sphinx, and Babcock was a good twenty centimeters shorter, with a much shorter reach, to boot. She was also just over twice Honor's age, and like Admiral Courvosier, she was first- generation prolong. The original treatment had stopped the aging process at a much later point than current techniques, and there were strands of gray in her red hair and crows-feet around her eyes.

None of which had kept her from throwing Honor around the salle with embarrassing ease.

Honor was taller and stronger, with better reaction speed and hand-eye coordination, but that, as Ms. Midshipman Harrington had learned long ago on Saganami Island, didn't necessarily mean a thing. Babcock was in at least as good a shape as she was, and she'd been doing this forty T-years longer. She knew moves her CO hadn't even thought of yet, and Honor suspected the sergeant major was delighted by the opportunity (one couldn't exactly call it an excuse ) to kick the stuffing out of a senior Navy officer.

On the other hand, Honor was getting back into the groove herself, and she wasn't in the mood to be humiliated today.

They met at the center of the mat and fell into guard positions, and there was no smile on Honor's lips. Her face was still and calm, her background anger and frustration—not at Babcock, but nonetheless real—leashed and channeled, and only those who knew her very well would have noted the hardness in her eyes.

They circled slowly, hands weaving in deceptively gentle, graceful patterns. Both were black belt in coup de vitesse, the martial art developed to combine Oriental and Western forms on Nouveau Dijon eight centuries before, and a hush enveloped the gym as other exercisers turned to watch them.

Honor felt her audience, but only distantly as her senses focused on Babcock with crystal, cat-like concentration. Coup de vitesse was a primarily offensive 'hard' style, a combination of cool self-control and go-for-broke ferocity designed to take advantage of 'Westerners'' larger size and longer reach. It wasn't too proud to borrow from any technique—from savate to t'ai chi —but it was less concerned with form and more with concentrated violence. It made far less effort to use an opponent's strength against her than most Oriental forms did and laid proportionately more emphasis on the attack, even at the occasional expense of centering and defense.

A classmate from the Academy unarmed combat team who preferred the elegance of judo to the coup had once likened it to fencing with two- handed swords, but it worked for Honor. And, like any of the martial arts, it wasn't something one thought through in the midst of a bout. You simply did it, responding with attacks and counters which were so deeply trained into you that you didn't know what you were doing—not consciously—until you'd already done it. So she didn't try to think, didn't try to anticipate. Babcock was too fast for that, and this was a full contact bout. She who let herself become distracted would pay a bruising price.

The sergeant major moved suddenly, feinting with her left hand, and Honor swayed backward, right hand slapping Babcock's right ankle aside to block the flashing side-kick. Her left palm intercepted the elbow strike follow up, and Babcock whirled on her left foot, using the momentum of Honor's block to turn still faster. She slammed the ball of her right foot onto the mat and her left foot came up in a lightning-fast back-kick, but Honor wasn't there. She slipped inside the striking foot, and Babcock grunted as a rock-hard fist drove home just above her kidneys. Honor's other hand darted forward, snaking around the noncom for the throw, but Babcock dropped like a string-cut puppet, pivoted out of Honor's grip, and kicked up through an instant backward somersault. Her feet caught Honor's shoulders, driving her back, and Babcock bounced up like a rubber ball—only to find herself flying away as hands like steel clamps flung her through the air.

She hit the mat, rolled, vaulted to her feet, and recovered her stance before Honor could reach her, and it was the captain's turn to grunt as stiff fingers rammed into her midriff. She buckled over the blow, but her left arm rose instinctively, blocking the second half of the combination and carrying through in an elbow strike to Babcock's ribs that rocked the sergeant major on her heels, and a fierce exultation filled her. She pressed her attack, using her longer reach and greater strength ruthlessly, but the sergeant major had a few tricks of her own.

Honor was never certain precisely how she found herself airborne, but then the mat slammed into her chin, and she tasted blood. She hit rolling, bouncing away from Babcock's follow-through, and rocked up on her knees to catch an incoming kick on her crossed wrists and upend her opponent. Both of them surged upright, and this time they were both smiling as they moved into one another with a vengeance.

* * *

'I trust you feel better now?'

Honor's smile was a bit puffy as her tongue explored a cut on the inside of her lower lip, and she wrapped the towel around her neck as she met Admiral Courvosier's quizzical eyes. She should have worn a mouth protector, but despite what promised to be an amazing array of bruises, she felt good. She felt very