March To The Stars

And if that was the alternative, he preferred to throw himself over the side now.

'We'll hold our course, Mupp. And let the Lady of the Waters decide.'

* * *

Roger pulled on a strand of hair and sighed.

'Captain, much as I hate making suggestions—' he began, only to stop dead as Pahner let loose an uncharacteristic bark of laughter that momentarily made him jump. Then the captain snorted.

'Yes, Your Highness?'

'Well, I don't,' Roger retorted.

'I know you don't, Your Highness,' Pahner said with a smile. 'You tend to do something by yourself, and then ask me if it was okay later. That's different from making suggestions, I'll admit. So let's have it—what's the suggestion?

'I was thinking about wind position,' Roger continued, after deciding that it wasn't a good time for a discussion of whether one Prince Roger MacClintock had been making too many stupid mistakes lately. Most of the watchers had returned to the deck once the general outline of the approaching ships and their formation had been established. A Marine private was now perched at the fore topmast crosstrees beside the Mardukan lookout, using her helmet systems to refine the data. But at this point it was a matter of waiting nearly two hours as the ships slowly closed the intervening gap.

'They're coming in on our starboard bow, straight out of the wind, but the formation of six ships is spread to our west, and it takes a few minutes for us to wear around. If we stay on this course, when the pursuers come up to us, the most westerly ship will be in a position that would make it hard for us to completely avoid her.'

'I'm ... not quite getting this,' Pahner admitted.

Roger thought for a moment, then did a quick sketch on his toot, detailing the human/K'Vaernian flotilla, the lead unknown, and the trailers.

'I'm sliding over a graphic,' he said, flipping the sketch from his toot to the Marine's. 'From the point of view of avoiding contact, we can break off from the lead ship easily. But if we decided to avoid the trailers, we'd have three choices. One would be to tack to starboard when we come up to them. That would put us in a position to take full advantage of the schooners' weatherliness to run past them into the wind and avoid contact handily. But it takes a bit of time to tack, and there's a small risk of getting caught in irons.'

Pahner nodded at that. A couple of times, especially early in the voyage, when the native Mardukan captains were still getting accustomed to the new rig, one or more of the ships had been caught 'in irons' while tacking, and ended up facing directly into the wind, effectively unable to move or maneuver until they could fall off enough to regather way. It was not a situation he wanted to be in with potential hostiles around.

'We don't want that to happen,' he observed. 'Go on.'

'Our second choice would be to fall off to the west,' Roger said, 'opening out our sails and either sailing across the wind, or coming around to let it fill our sails from behind while we run almost away from it. That's a 'reach' or a 'broad reach.' The problem is, on either tack, the westernmost ship would have at least some opportunity to intercept us. We could probably show them our heels—I'd back any of ours, even Snarleyow, to outrun anything they've got. But there's a risk of interception.'

'In which case, we blow away whatever unfortunate soul intercepts us,' Pahner noted as he brought up the sketch on his implant and studied it.

'Yes, Captain, we can do that,' Roger agreed, licking a salty drop of sweat off his upper lip. 'But I submit that it would be better to be in a position where we can avoid contact altogether, if that's what we decide to do. Or control the maneuver menu if we decide to engage.'

'Can we?' the captain asked. 'And should we be discussing this with Poertena or the Skipper?'

'Maybe,' Roger said. 'Probably. But I was thinking. If we tack to starboard and put them on our port side, we've got all that maneuver room to starboard. It's a better wind position. Also, if we decide to jump in, we can get to windward for maneuvering better from that position. But we need to wait a bit, until we're a little closer.'

'I'll talk it over with T'Sool,' Pahner agreed. 'But unless I'm much mistaken, that's a very good idea.'

* * *

'They're wearing around,' Pelu said.

'I can see that,' Kerr answered. He rubbed his horns as he considered the small fleet's maneuvers. Its units were changing to an easterly heading on the port tack, and the maneuver was a thing of beauty for any seaman to watch. The sails seemed to float into position naturally, and in a remarkably short period of time, all five ships were hove over and flying before the wind.

'They're in a better position to drop on us from windward,' Pelu worried. 'Could they be some new ship type out of Lemmar?'

'If Lemmar could build ships like that,' the captain snorted, 'we'd already be in chains in Kirsti! And if they're in a better position to drop on us, they're also in a better position to avoid all of us. They can leave us in their wake any time they want to now, but before, they could have been cut off by the western Reavers. Actually, I think what they're doing now is a better sign.'

'I wish we knew who they were,' Pelu fretted.

'I wonder if they're wishing the same thing?'

* * *

'Ready for some more unsolicited input?' Roger asked with a grin.

'Certainly, Your Highness,' Pahner replied with a slight smile. 'Every fiber of my being lives to serve the Empire.'

'Somehow, I think I detected just a tad of sarcasm attached to that answer,' Roger said with an answering grin. 'But I digress. What I was going to say is that we need to make contact with these folks.'

'Agreed. And you have a suggestion?'

'Well, for first contact, we'll need someone who's well versed with the translator program and whose toot has enough capacity to run it. And that means either Ms. O'Casey or myself. And since it's a potentially dangerous situation ...'

'You think it makes more sense to send the person I'm supposed to be guarding,' Pahner finished. Then he shook his head. Firmly. 'No.'

'So you're going to send Eleanora?' Roger asked sweetly.

'Quit smiling at me!' Pahner snapped. 'Damn it. I'm the commander of your bodyguard, Your Highness. I'm not supposed to be sending you into situations because they're too dangerous to send somebody else!'

'Uh-huh,' Roger said. 'So, you're sending Eleanora?'

'There is no way you're going over to that ship,' Pahner said. 'No. Way.'

'I see. So ... ?'

* * *

'Ah, freedom!'

Roger leaned back in the sailing harness, suspended from a very thin bit of rope less than an arm length above the emerald sea as the catamaran cut through the water at nearly sixteen knots. D'Nal Cord shifted and tried to get into something that felt like a stable position—difficult for someone his size on the deck of the flimsy craft— and rubbed a horn in exasperation.

'You have an unusual concept of freedom, Roger.'

Most of the small boats of the flotilla were traditional 'v' hulls, but both Roger and Poertena had insisted on at least one small 'cat' for fast movement. Building it had required nearly as much human-provided engineering knowledge as the much larger schooners—light, fast catamarans require precise flexion in their crossbraces—but the result was a small craft that in any sort of decent weather was even faster than the schooners.

And it was fun to sail.

'I have to admit that this is sort of fun,' Despreaux said, fanning her uniform top. 'And the breeze is refreshing.'

'Back on Earth, catting and skiing were as close as I ever got to being free,' Roger pointed out, bounding forward in the harness to see if it improved the point of sail. 'You guys would actually let me get away for a little bit.'

'Don't complain,' Kosutic replied. 'Your lady mother's spent most of her life wrapped in cotton. As your