“We have a duty to keep fighting the war,” Moses said.
“And what happens,” Admiral Zaskar asked, “when our mystery backers decide they no longer need us?”
He leaned back in his chair. “We don’t know who they are,” he said. “We don’t know what they really want. We know nothing about them, save that they’re rich and powerful enough to take the risk of doing something that could easily be construed as an act of war. Askew and his superiors have their own agenda, Your Holiness, and it may not coincide completely with ours. What happens to us when they decide we’re a liability?
“We captured enough supplies to settle a whole new world. We can do that now and, many years from now, our descendants will resume the war. And then . . .”
“But it would mean abandoning the believers,” Moses said.
He sat down with a thump. “Let us hit the convoy,” he said. “Let that be enough to drive the unbelievers out of our sector. And, if it isn’t enough, we can find a colony world and regroup there. Will that be acceptable?”
“As you wish,” Admiral Zaskar said. He knew he wouldn’t get a better offer. The cleric couldn’t be pushed too far. “But we have to be careful. The enemy could be using the convoy as bait in a trap.”
“They started planning the convoy months ago,” Moses pointed out. “Back then, they didn’t even know that we’d survived.”
“So we were told, Your Holiness,” Admiral Zaskar countered. “Even if that happens to be true, and we have no independent verification, there’s no reason they couldn’t have attached a superdreadnought squadron to the convoy as an afterthought. And it would be easy to have that squadron link up with the convoy in deep space, well away from prying eyes. I . . . I have to be careful. We cannot afford to lose any more ships.”
“They may feel the same way too,” Moses said. The confidence in his voice was striking. “The unbelievers fear to die.”
Admiral Zaskar rather doubted it mattered. The Royal Navy had fought well, even when it had been caught by surprise. And they had won the war. But it wasn’t something he could say to the cleric. The man’s hatred for the enemy was without peer.
“They can afford to replace their losses,” he said, instead. He didn’t pretend to understand how the enemy’s economy worked, but he couldn’t deny its efficiency. “We can kill ten of their superdreadnoughts for every one of ours, and they will still come out ahead. Losing a single superdreadnought, Your Holiness, will cut our fighting power in half.”
“Then we will put our faith in God,” Moses said. “Start planning the attack.”
Admiral Zaskar bowed his head. “Yes, Your Holiness.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
ASHER DALES
The message was relatively clear but brought no relief.
William scanned it three times, looking for hidden meanings. Scott McElney had always been careful, even before he’d left Hebrides to become a smuggler. His brother had taken an unseemly delight in defying the social norms and conventions of their homeworld, constantly on the verge of being ostracized for challenging the authorities, and he’d learned plenty of ways to get messages across without flagrantly breaking the rules. But none of his tricks were visible here. The message appeared to be nothing more than what it seemed.
And that isn’t good news, William thought. If Scott is to be believed, the smugglers aren’t supplying the Theocrats.
He sat in his cabin and contemplated the message. Scott wouldn’t have lied to him, not directly, and there were none of the tells that suggested he was being deliberately misleading even though nothing he’d said was a lie. Besides, he couldn’t imagine Scott helping the Theocrats. Their mere existence was bad for business, even before they’d turned Hebrides into a radioactive hellhole. And yet . . . Scott wasn’t the sole smuggler chief in the sector. He wasn’t even the largest. Could one of the others be supplying the Theocrats? It would be an insane risk for any of them.
His wristcom chimed. “Captain, we’re picking up two ships approaching the planet,” Patti said. “They just dropped any pretense at sneaking in.”
William stood. Pirates? Or Theocrats, intent on finding out what had happened to their missing destroyer. The hulk was currently orbiting the moon, waiting to be turned into a training ship. In hindsight, perhaps he could have rigged a false IFF and lured the enemy into a trap. No, too risky. They simply hadn’t been able to recover enough intelligence from the captured datacores to make the masquerade work.
He walked through the hatch and onto the bridge. “Report,” he said. “What do you have?”
“Two ships, both apparently light cruisers,” the sensor officer said. “One of them appears to be an ex-UN design, the other is of unknown origin. The warbook doesn’t have a record of her design.”
Which means she’s either a completely new model or someone refitted her to the point she’s unrecognizable, William thought. And that means she could be carrying all sorts of surprises.
“Sound battlestations, then alert the planet,” he ordered. “We are about to be attacked.”
He sat down and checked the displays. The enemy ships were heading right towards Dandelion and Petunia without making any attempt to hide their approach. They clearly hadn’t realized that Lily and Primrose were under cloak, unless they’d decided they could take all four destroyers without risking serious damage, let alone defeat. It all depended, he reminded himself, on just how long the new enemy had been watching the system. They might not even know that Lily and Primrose existed.
“All weapons and drives are at full readiness,” Patti reported.
“Very good,” William said. “Use the StarCom to send an alert to Ahura Mazda. Ask them for immediate reinforcement if they have ships on station.”
“Aye, sir.”
William leaned back in his chair and silently assessed the situation. The enemy ships had to be pirates, unless their ships had been
