David Drake - When the Tide Rises

He grinned. She wouldn't have been able to set up a missile attack, though. Which, unfortunately, wasn't a skill he needed at the moment.

The creature rotated 90 degrees to face the flat-plate display; its tentacles twitched again. Am I supposed to turn with it or against it…?

The display itself worked. On the screen was a series of images and calculations involving the Castle System, the governmental hub of the Alliance. Pleasaunce was Castle Three, but Daniel's interest was centered on the unnamed fourth planet.

Well, now his interests was on the creature which shared his captivity; he had operations against Castle Four planned as well as he could at his present stage of knowledge. Daniel turned his hand so that his fingers pointed the same direction as its tentacles.

The diameter of Castle Four was over 6900 miles, but the gravity was only about half standard because it didn't have a metallic core. Despite the thin atmosphere being low in oxygen, vast quantities of water ice were locked beneath the surface crust.

The creature hopped almost an inch straight up, changing direction 180 degrees while in the air. It settled and its tentacles tapped, twice and twice as before. Daniel pondered, then tapped in answer but without moving his palm.

Hundreds of ships were on or above Castle Four at any one time. It was easier to get landing rights on Four than on Pleasaunce, making it an ideal emporium for high-bulk goods which could be stored cheaply in a near vacuum until they were purchased and transshipped. Most ores and grains were carried to Pleasaunce by intra-system lighters. Tariffs on such items were rigged to favor the practice. Not coincidentally, the monopoly on such transit was in the hands of a favorite of Guarantor Porra.

The creature hopped around, then hopped back and repeated its tapping. All right, I was supposed to turn with it, Daniel thought. He rotated his hand accordingly.

He assumed this was a courtship ritual, but it was possible he was in the midst of a dominance battle. If so, the creature who'd challenged him was insanely brave. It would make a good mascot for theSissie…

"All personnel on the IBSLadouceur," roared the ceiling speaker. Even through the sealed hatch, Daniel could hear the command rumbling in the corridor and from other compartments. "This is the Minister of the Navy, his Excellency Douglas Lampert. Captains Hoppler, Seward, and Leary are to report to theLadouceur's bridge immediately to confer with me. There can be no excuses!"

The voice said it was Lampert, but there was no question that Adele was speaking the words. Daniel grinned and straightened his uniform, then checked the set of his cap. The RCN insignia gleamed neatly.

"I repeat!" said the speakers. "Hoppler, Seward and Leary will meet me as soon as I arrive or face immediate justice as traitors to the Republic!"

How in the world was Adele able to do that from outside the ship? It wasn't a surprise-she'd taken over the PA systems of hostile vessels and forts a number of times in the past-but to Daniel it was like Spring or a sunrise: it didn't become less magical by repetition.

"You heard your orders!" Hogg said from the corridor, his voice harsh and forceful. He wasn't shouting, but he clearly meant business. "What do they do to traitors on this anthill of a planet? On Cinnabar it's the high jump, then your head nailed up on the Pentacrest, but here I'd guess they just shoot you. That what you want them to do to you?"

"Ican't let him out!" whined the guard's unfamiliar voice. "Look, if the minister wants him out, that's fine, the minister can let him out. Right? I-look, here's Lieutenant Blyth, talk to him. Lieutenant, this guy wants to let the Cinnabar admiral out!"

"Well, let him out!" snarled the aide who'd drawn his gun on Daniel when Vesey called from thePrincess Cecile. "And he's not an admiral, you bloody fool!"

The hatch swung back. David Blyth was toying with the flap of his holster again, but he hadn't drawn the pistol. He was a trim little man with a pencil moustache and a nervous tic in his left cheek.

"Good evening, Lieutenant Blyth," Daniel said pleasantly. He was glad that the guard-standing aside and holding his carbine by the muzzle end-had used the officer's name or he'd have had to peer at the corroded nametag to recall it. "What's going on?"

Daniel thought of the creature he'd left on the desk behind him. He felt a pang of regret, but he could tell the little fellow from personal experience that romance was a tricky business. Less so now that he was the famous Commander Leary with a chestful of medals-which hewasn't above using in his dealings with the fair sex; but even so, he too had disappointments.

"Look, just get…," Blyth said. He made a sour face; he must've realized that the situation had just changed and he didn't know what was happening. He resumed, "C-Captain Leary, will you come with me to the bridge, please?"

"I'd be pleased to, Lieutenant," Daniel said, stepping toward the bridge; it was adjacent to the space cabin, after all.

An aircar flew low over the cruiser. The whine of fans and downdrafts from shifting directions bounced through the many open hatches.

"Master," said Hogg, matching Daniel step for step, "you need to change into your Whites. It's not proper to meet the minister-"

An armed spacer stood at the bridge hatch, goggling at the procession. Daniel entered. Hogg followed.

"-dressed like that."

"There's no time!" Lieutenant Blyth said, his voice becoming shriller with each syllable.

The poacher's pockets sewn into Hogg's baggy clothing could conceal a whole covey of game birds-or an arsenal. He'd just entered the bridge unchallenged.

"Leary, you're behind this!" said Hoppler, standing arms-akimbo beside the command console. He'd obviously noticed that Minister Lampert had called him "Captain Hoppler" instead of "Admiral" and he wasn't sure what that implied.

Seward and two aides were between the signals and gunnery consoles to starboard of the perhaps-admiral Hoppler. They glanced keenly from him to Daniel and back. They appeared concerned, but they weren't showing the degree of anger that Hoppler was. They hadn't been verbally demoted, after all.

"With respect, Admiral," Daniel said cheerfully, "I don't know what you're talking about. I've been locked in my cabin, you'll recall. Whatis going on?"

"Which, is a, bloody good, question!" Minister Lampert said between wheezes as he clomped out of the companionway. He must've run all the way from the entrance ramp, five decks below. A guard with a sub-machine gun preceded him; Adele, Tovera, and three more armed guards followed him out of the armored tube.

"And you're going to, answer it," Lampert continued as he entered the bridge. His medals jangled with his gasping breaths. "Right now!"

"Of course, your Excellency," Daniel said, walking between Hoppler and Seward before turning to face the minister. "Whatever you'd like to know."

Hogg was wearing a glove of metal mesh on his left hand; Tovera took a writing stylus from her breast pocket. Behind them, Adele gestured Lieutenant Blyth aside and closed the bridge hatch.

"For myself…," Daniel said, putting his arms around the shoulders of the two Bagarian captains. "I'd like to discuss my plans for an attack on Castle Four."

While everybody-all the Bagarians, that is-stared at Daniel, Adele stepped to her right so that Lieutenant Blyth could move past her to see better. Seward grimaced and reached toward Daniel's hand to remove it like a piece of lint from his shoulder.

"Leary, have you gone insane?" Minister Lampert said, his tone that of a real question rather than an insult.

Adele nodded. Daniel banged Hoppler's and Seward's heads together with a hollowthwock! Adele had seen him demonstrate his strength before, but this was a remarkable reminder. She drew Blyth's electromotive pistol left-handed and pushed the safety at the front of the trigger guard forward, off-safe.