The Honor of the Qween

'We're just starting to put it all together,' Mayhew went on in that same wretched tone, 'but Security got several assassins alive, mainly thanks to your treecat. Aside from the first one he attacked, he seems to have settled for blinding his opponents. I'm afraid only one of the ones you hit survived.'

Honor said nothing. She merely sat watching his expression and feeling his pain. She was an only child, but the Harrington clan was an extensive one. She didn't need anyone to tell her how terribly it must hurt to know his own cousin had plotted his family's murder.

'At any rate,' the Protector continued after a moment, 'Howard and his people took them into custody, patched them up, and interrogated them. Howard won't tell me exactly how. I think he's afraid I wouldn't approve of his methods, but whatever he did to them, some of them talked fairly quickly, and he's been able to put together at least a rough chronology.

'Apparently Masada's been building a fifth column out of our own reactionaries ever since the last war. We never even guessed—something else Howard blames himself for—but that was because, religious fanatics or not, these `Maccabeans' apparently realized their ideals were too divorced from the mainstream for them to achieve anything by open resistance or guerrilla warfare. So instead of coming into the open and alienating the population as a whole—not to mention warning Security of their existence—they've been waiting until they thought they had a chance to decapitate the state in one blow.'

'And replace you with your cousin,' Honor said flatly.

'Precisely.' Mayhew's voice was equally flat. 'None of the assassins had ever actually met him, but the support they'd been given—genuine uniforms and IDs, the exact guard schedule, detailed maps, Palace Security's challenges and countersigns—all pointed to someone inside the palace itself. And they could tell Howard's people how to locate the `Maccabean' communications net, which led him to a couple of plotters who did know who `Maccabeus' was.'

Mayhew looked away for a moment.

'Howard was devastated. He and Jared have been close Council allies for years, and he felt personally betrayed. But instead of arresting him immediately, Howard confronted him in person, and Jared was stupid enough—or desperate enough—to admit he was Maccabeus. Apparently he hoped Howard shared enough of his beliefs to join him. I imagine he thought the two of them together could still kill me and put Jared in my place. Instead, Howard recorded the entire conversation, then called in his people to arrest him.'

'Protector Benjamin,' Honor said softly, 'you have my sincere sympathy. To know your cousin—'

'If Jared could betray my planet to Masada, if he could plot to kill my family and succeed in killing men who protected me from birth,' Mayhew said harshly, 'he is no cousin of mine! The law of Grayson sets only one penalty for what he's done, Captain Harrington. When the time comes, he'll pay it.'

Honor bent her head silently, and the Protector's nostrils flared. Then he shook himself.

'At any rate, he's clammed up since his arrest. Whatever else he may be, he seems to hold his beliefs honestly. But he made the mistake of keeping records. They've told Howard a lot, and he believes he can break the entire organization with them.

'It seems Jared's position as Minister of Industry was the key to the entire plot. His father, my uncle, held the same position before him, and they'd placed entire crews of Maccabeans on some of the mining and construction ships. The Masadans have been slipping in and out of Yeltsin for some time—Mike tells me it probably wasn't difficult if they translated into n-space beyond detection range, then came in under minimal power—and Jared's Maccabean crews have been rendezvousing with them as his couriers to Masada.

'Howard isn't positive, but he now believes this war was launched not as a genuine bid to conquer us militarily but to create panic. According to one of Jared's people, the plan was for him to have Michael and myself killed at what he judged was the proper psychological moment. That would have made him Protector, and if there'd been enough fear and confusion, he could have made himself dictator, as well, on the pretext of dealing with the crisis—at which point he would have `negotiated an end to the hostilities.' Ending the war without Masada's actually attacking the planet itself was supposed to cement his hold on power, after which he'd have appointed like-minded cronies to positions of power in order to `reform' us into voluntarily accepting the Masadan line and, eventually, amalgamating with Endicott.'

'I can't believe he'd have succeeded,' Honor murmured.

'I don't think so either, but he did, and he'd managed to convince Masada. And if it could have been pulled off, it would have been perfect from the Faithful's viewpoint. They'd have gotten their hands on us and our industry without all the damage a fight to the finish would inflict, and Jared would have terminated our negotiations with you as his very first step. With your Kingdom out of the way, Masada—which, Howard tells me, is definitely working with Haven—would've had the only outside ally. If his `reform' approach failed, they still could have used that edge to pick us off any time.'

'But do the Peeps know what's going on, Sir?' Commander Truman leaned diffidently into the com pickup's field, and the Protector raised his eyebrows at her. 'Commander Alice Truman, Sir,' she identified herself, and he gestured for her to continue.

'It just seems unlikely to me that Haven would willingly attack a Queen's ship and risk war with Manticore as part of any such long-term, iffy operation, Sir. Even assuming we didn't wind up at war with them —and I'm not at all sure they would assume that—there'd be too many opportunities for something to go wrong on Grayson that might get us invited back in.'

'I'm afraid we don't know the answer to that yet, Commander,' Mayhew said after a moment's thought. 'I'll ask Howard to look into it. On the face of it, however, I can't see that it matters much. The Faithful are committed now, and they've lost their `Maccabeus.' I don't see that they've got any choice but to follow through on the military option.'

'Agreed.' Honor realized she was rubbing the left side of her face again and lowered her hand. 'Of course, if they did know the truth, and if they expected Maccabeus to make his try, that may explain why they've held off this long. They're waiting to see if he succeeded.'

'If they knew his timetable, then they also know he's failed,' Mayhew said, and Honor's eyebrows rose. At least both of them still worked, she thought, but her mordant humor vanished as Mayhew went on. 'If his plan had succeeded, Captain, your next in command—Commander Truman, is it?' Honor nodded, and he shrugged. 'Well, then, Commander Truman would already have pulled your vessels out of here.'

Alice Truman bristled at his assumption that anything could have induced her to abandon Grayson to Masada.

'And why might that have been, Sir?' she asked stiffly.

'Because the entire idea was to place responsibility for my death on Captain Harrington,' he said quietly, and all three Manticorans stared at him in disbelief.

'That was why they were armed with disrupters, Captain. Those aren't Grayson—or, for that matter, Masadan—weapons. The plan was to claim your demand for a meeting was only a pretext to get close to me, at which point you were supposed to have produced your off-world weapon, murdered my guards and family as part of a Manticoran plot to seize Grayson, and then been shot down by other Security people when you tried to escape.'

'He 'as ou' 'f his mind!' The right side of Honor's face tightened as the clarity of her speech vanished, but Mayhew seemed not to notice, and she went on doggedly. 'No one would have believed that!' she said more distinctly.

'I don't know about that, Captain,' Mayhew admitted with manifest reluctance. 'I admit it would have sounded insane, but remember what a pressure cooker Grayson is right now. With me dead and your body as `evidence,' he probably could have produced enough panic and confusion to at least get himself into office and summarily break off the negotiations. If he managed that and informed Commander Truman your ships were no longer welcome in Yeltsin space, what could she do but leave? Especially when he could construe any decision to remain as further `proof' of a Manticoran plot to seize Yeltsin's Star?'

'He's got a point, Honor,' Truman muttered, tugging at a lock of golden hair. 'Damn. I hate to admit it, but he does have a point.'

'So if they knew his timetable, and if they're monitoring the inner system for outbound impeller signatures, they know he failed,' Honor said.