John Ringo: Emerald Sea

As he approached the entrance to the town hall the two guards at the door braced to attention. Gone were the days of half-awake guardsmen with rusting weapons leaning up against the wall. The guards were permanent members drawn from the militia and trained with the Blood Lords. Just enough to know they didn’t want to be Blood Lords was the joke. Blood Lord training and “winnowing” was merciless and even after a recruit passed the tests to join the fraternity, training continued unabated. Running up and down Raven Hill in full rucksacks was just the start of a daily regimen that was brutal to the point of sadism.

But that, and a belief in teamwork that went all the way to the bone, meant that Blood Lords could outfight and, often more important, outmaneuver enemies that were their numerical superior. “Fight until you die and drop” was just one of their unofficial mottoes. And nobody fought like Blood Lords.

He walked inside and took the left turn to Edmund’s office but was stopped almost at the door by a secretary. That was another new iteration.

“Can I help you?” the woman asked. She was faintly familiar but Herzer couldn’t quite place her. Dark hair, just below median female height… nope, wasn’t coming.

“Herzer Herrick,” Herzer replied. “I’m under orders to see Duke Edmund ‘at the earliest possible moment.’ ”

“He’s very busy,” the woman said with a sniff. Whoever she was, she didn’t appear to recognize him either. “Why don’t you just take a seat?”

Herzer didn’t bother to smile; he just took a parade rest position, hands behind his back, legs spread shoulder width apart, and simply looked at her.

“Why don’t you go tell Duke Edmund that I’m out here,” he said in a totally neutral voice. He let his eyes do the rest. “Now.”

It was a technique he’d picked up from Gunny and as usual it worked. The woman was more than willing to pass the buck to someone who, she clearly hoped, might put him in his place. It wasn’t the most politic way to deal with a petty-power-hungry functionary, but it tended to work.

In this case the woman looked at him poisonously for a moment, then got up and knocked on the door.

“Duke Edmund,” she said, opening the door without a word from the interior, “a Herzer Herrick insists on seeing you immediately.”

“That’s because I told him to, Crystal,” Edmund replied, mildly. “Send him in.”

As Herzer walked through the door he remembered where he had met her before.

“Nice to see you again, Crystal,” he oozed insincerely as he stepped through the door. “How’s Morgen?”

He carefully shut the door behind him and then saluted with right fist to left breast.

“Lieutenant Herrick reporting,” he said neatly.

“Can it, Herzer,” Edmund growled, standing up and stepping to a cupboard. “Care to cut the trail dust?”

“If you please, sir,” Herzer replied. “What’s with the Cerberus at the gates?”

“She’s anything but a dog,” Edmund replied. “But whether she knows it or not, she’s temporary. I had a protégée of June’s holding down the desk but she’s on maternity leave.” He handed the lieutenant a glass dark with liquor. “Salut!”

“Blood and steel,” Herzer replied, taking a sip. “Very mellow.”

“Laid it down nearly thirty years ago,” Edmund replied. “It should be.”

Herzer observed Sir the Honorable General Edmund Talbot, duke of Overjay, carefully but could see little sign of change in the last year. The duke was heavy-set with a full beard and a shaved head. He was wearing gray linen trousers and a blue tunic of a fine woolen material, the edging of which was embroidered in yellow. The clothing was worn smooth from use but had the look of being comfortable clothing rather than old. He could have been anything from a hundred to two hundred years old, judging by the fine lines on his face and the flaccid skin on his forearms, but Herzer knew he was closer to three hundred. He had a solid, calm look that he somehow projected to those around him. Wherever the duke went, even if it was in the middle of a battle, chaos lessened and order followed. It was another trick, like his ability to pitch his voice to be heard above a battle and the knack of always knowing where to be, that Herzer was desperately trying to figure out.

“You’re wondering why I called you in so abruptly but we really should wait until…” the duke said, then paused as the door opened.

“It’s fine, we know him,” Daneh Ghorbani said as she stepped through the door. “I sleep with him every night, he won’t mind me barging in.”

Doctor Ghorbani was middle tall for a female, perhaps a meter and three quarters, with long red hair that was currently braided down her back. She was heavily bosomed and inclining to a plumpness that was decidedly odd in the post-Fall society. Prior to the Fall human genetics had been tinkered with to such an extent that all but minimum fashionable body fat tended not to form. She wasn’t fat; the term “padded” came to mind, and on her it looked good. She, like her paramour Edmund, seemed to project a field of calmness around her, even when putting down annoying underlings. And she looked well, which Herzer found, to his surprise, was of sudden immense importance.

She was followed by what could have been her younger sister but was in fact her daughter. Unlike her mother, Rachel Ghorbani was anything but calm.

“Father, you have to get rid of that insufferable woman,” she said hotly as soon as the door was closed.

“So I’ve been told,” Edmund replied with a smile. “Daneh? A glass of wine?”

“Isn’t it a little early?” Dr. Ghorbani asked, glancing at the drinks in their hands.

“I’m sure the sun is over the yardarm somewhere in the world,” Duke Edmund replied, pouring a glass of wine that caught the light through the window like a ruby.

“Yes, thank you, Father, I will have some,” Rachel said, acerbically.

“Of course.” Edmund chuckled, pouring another glass and handing them to the women. “A toast: to a smooth sea and a fair journey.”

“What journey?” Rachel blurted out.

“The one that Herzer and I, at a minimum, are going to be taking.”

Chansa snarled and shook his head as the modeling projection completed its run. No matter how many times he ran the model, the current projections made invasion of Norau impossible.

The room that he worked in was low and cramped for his huge bulk, a subbasement under the council chambers that had only recently been found and reopened. It wasn’t that he’d been relegated to a subbasement, it was simply that lately it fit his mood. Let Celine scamper about her laboratories and Paul create his insane workrooms to “do the work of the people.” This tiny room controlled more raw power than any other room on earth. But with all that power, he still couldn’t make the impossible possible.

It wasn’t a matter of forces. The implementation of the Change program, while hampered by the various program lock-outs that bitch Sheida had started, was continuing apace. And the Changed males made more than adequate soldiers, while their females were sturdy enough to do most of the drudgery of food supplying. And arms were not an issue, either. Not only did Ropasa have supplies of them for historical reasons, inserting the same sort of training as the combat and farming training of the Changed was not difficult. A special class of Changed had been created that made excellent artisans.

No, the problem was logistics.

Lifting his entire force would leave Ropasa stripped of garrisons. Not only did that mean that Coalition forces could make strikes against them, it also meant being unable to prevent internal revolt, which was a very real problem among the Unchanged. Second of all, supplying that entire force over nearly two thousand kilometers of ocean was chancy at best. Impossible if there was any coherent resistance. And the likelihood of such resistance was high.