The Service of the Sword

Now, it appeared, there was going to be a third bird in the path of this particular stone: Captain Honor Harrington herself.

'Bring up the wedge,' he ordered, admiring the way his voice rang around the bridge. The convoy, following its escort as best it could, was in perfect striking position now, situated more or less between Vanguard and Fearless. Dominick could head toward Fearless, picking off the merchantmen with the Crippler as he passed. Then, when Fearless turned back to defend them—as she undoubtedly would—he would have her pinned between himself and Captain Vaccares's appropriated Andy cruiser.

'We have the Jansci now, Sir,' Koln announced. 'Bearing two-four—'

'I see her,' Dominick interrupted, a stirring of anticipation in his stomach. First the Jansci, then the rest of the merchantmen, then Harrington. Life was indeed good. 'That's your target, Mr. Koln. Order the Crippler prepared for action.'

For the first fraction of a second, Cardones thought his eyes were playing tricks on him, or else that something had gone wrong the Dorado's sensors.

And then, the horrible truth rolled in on him. 'Captain!' he snapped at Sandler. 'That's not a merchie. It's the Peep battlecruiser!'

Sandler was at his side at an instant. 'Damn,' she bit out. 'You sure?'

'She just brought her wedge up to military strength,' Cardones told her tightly. 'Better trick even than lying doggo—we knew something was there, and so we didn't look at it more closely.'

'We would have looked if we'd had the sensors to do it with,' Sandler ground out. 'And you saw how that first ship drew Fearless off before she could get within range to see through the masquerade herself. Clever. Looks like someone's still pulling the Peeps' strings.'

'So what do we do?' Damana asked from the helm console beside Cardones.

'What else?' Sandler said. 'We let him come for us.'

Her hand, resting on the edge of Cardones's sensor board, tightened against the smooth metal. 'And find out if this defense really works.'

The Vanguard was on the move now, and the first Manty merchantman was within range. 'Fire Crippler,' Dominick ordered.

The bridge lights dimmed as the weapon did its magic with the Vanguard's impellers; and with a suddenness that still never failed to amaze him, the Jansci's wedge collapsed.

'Target disabled,' Koln confirmed.

'Very good, Mr. Koln,' Dominick said. First the Jansci, then the rest of the merchantmen. 'Lock onto second target. Fire when ready.'

'Skipper!' Venizelos snapped. 'We've got—what the hell?'

'What?' Honor asked, her eyes darting to the display holding the image of their fleeing raider. There was no indication it was firing or changing course or anything else that should have startled her exec that way.

'The Cornucopia,' Venizelos bit out savagely. 'She just fired up a military-class wedge.'

'New identification from CIC,' Wallace put in. 'They now make it a Peep battlecruiser.'

Honor felt her throat muscles tighten. Exactly the same trick they'd used themselves on Iliescu back in Zoraster system. Only this time it was Fearless who'd been caught like an amateur.

'She's moving on the convoy,' Venizelos continued. 'The merchies are starting to scatter. A lot of good that's going to do them. Looks like the Peep's going to– Skipper!'

'I saw,' Honor said, staring at the displays in disbelief. Suddenly, without warning, the Jansci's impellers had gone down. 'Was she hit?'

'I didn't see any missiles,' Venizelos said. 'She is within energy range; but I didn't see any—'

He broke off, inhaling sharply. The Poor Richard's wedge had collapsed, too.

'Commander?' Honor demanded, swiveling toward Wallace.

But Wallace looked as bewildered as everyone else on the bridge. 'No idea, Ma'am,' he said grimly. 'I've never heard of anything like this happening before.'

'Well, it's happening now,' Honor said, watching her displays. Behind them, the Sable Chestnut's wedge was the third to go.

And this time she spotted something else: an odd fluctuation in the battlecruiser's own wedge just before the merchie's had collapsed. Some new Peep version of a grav lance, maybe? Something powerful enough to take down an entire wedge, not just sidewalls?

Or had the fluctuation been for the same purpose as the flicker she'd ordered on Fearless's own impellers an hour earlier? There were two known players on the Peep side now; could there be a third lurking in the shadows?

Abruptly, she came to a decision. 'Turn ship and decelerate,' she ordered. 'We're going back.'

Wallace's head twisted around. 'Captain?'

'We're going back, Mr. Wallace,' she repeated. 'The convoy needs us.'

'But the raider—'

'The raider will keep,' she cut him off, warning him with her eyes.

His mouth worked, but he turned back to his board without comment, shoulders hunched in silent protest. Thinking of their orders from Admiral Trent, no doubt.

Or else thinking about the fact that the enemy was a battlecruiser that outgunned Fearless by probably three to one.

'Peep's altered course toward the Dorado,' Venizelos announced. 'From the data, CIC speculates that whatever they're doing to the merchie's impellers operates at a range of about a million klicks.'

Or in other words, ten times the range of a grav lance. Or at least, of a Manticoran grav lance.

Which meant that Honor's gut reaction a minute ago had been correct. If this was indeed a new Peep weapon, they needed to find out as much as they could about it. Admiral Trent might not be happy that she'd let the Andermani raider escape, but under the circumstances—

'Aspect change in the raider, Skipper,' Venizelos announced. 'She's also flipped and decelerating.'

'Run the numbers, Stephen,' Honor ordered. 'Assume the battlecruiser waits for us. What's our intercept time?'

'For a zero-zero intercept, two hours thirteen minutes,' DuMorne said. 'We'll be in missile range twelve minutes before that.'

'And the raider?'

'She'll be in missile range of us four minutes after that,' DuMorne said.

'Good,' Honor said, forcing her voice to remain calm. So the enemy wasn't going to be content with just looting the convoy, or even with suckering Fearless into going up against a ship three times her size. Instead, they were going to guarantee victory by making Fearless fight both ships at the same time.

'Good?' Wallace echoed. 'What's good about it?'

'They'll have us surrounded,' Honor said evenly, remembering an old, old quote. 'This time they won't get away.'

She turned back to her displays, ignoring Wallace's look of disbelief. In the distance, the battlecruiser's wedge fluctuated again—

–and with a distant thundercrack and a jolt that could be felt straight through the deck plates, Dorado's wedge collapsed.