Yoon Lee - Ninefox Gambit

“Point to the general, I believe,” Nerevor rasped. “Really, sir, was it necessary to feign such incompetence?”

Cheris blinked at her, trying to connect what had just happened to what Nerevor was saying. She couldn’t pretend she had been feigning – that would just be insulting – but she didn’t think it would be any better to explain that she had surrendered to a dead man’s expertise. “Fight harder,” she said instead.

“I will indeed,” Nerevor said, smiling.

Cheris won the last two rounds faster than she meant to. Apparently Jedao had believed in ruthless, decisive action. She was uncomfortably aware of Jedao’s dueling record. He had only lost to one Kel.

Nerevor saluted her without any trace of irony. “I will remember not to underestimate you,” she said. “This has been most informative.”

“I’m honored to have faced you,” Cheris said, because it was true.

People were staring at her shadow with its inscrutable eyes, but there was nothing to be done about that. Liis looked worryingly pleased.

Nerevor nodded, then walked off, looking cheerful.

“That was the thing,” Jedao said the instant they were back in her quarters. “You kept thinking about what you were doing. Calculating. The body isn’t about thought. It’s about reflex. Especially in combat. You would have figured this out sooner if somebody had come at you with a real weapon, but I couldn’t very well advise the commander to set her sword to lethal mode in a friendly duel.”

“You could have told me,” Cheris said, looking at her hands as she turned them over, palms down. They were the same hands she had grown into, but she kept expecting them to be larger, longer. She was momentarily convinced that if she took her gloves off, her hands wouldn’t belong to her anymore. “Does this go away after you’re not anchored to me anymore?”

“I don’t have that information,” Jedao said. Then: “You’re not in a good mood.”

“That obvious?” Cheris said.

“Seriously, what’s bothering you?”

“It wasn’t a fair fight.”

Jedao’s brief silence spoke volumes. “The point of war is to rig the deck, drug the opponent, and threaten to kneecap their family if they don’t fold,” he said. “Besides, you didn’t use any resources Nerevor didn’t know of in advance. She knew I was anchored to you. If she couldn’t compensate for it, that’s not your fault.”

“That’s a good way to save lives,” she said, a chill in her voice.

They weren’t discussing the duel anymore. “The faster it’s over with, the fewer people die,” Jedao said. “I realize you have delicate Kel sensibilities, but please accept my advice. You can’t leave advantages lying around, either, or people will use them against you.”

“I’ll keep that in mind,” Cheris said stiffly.

Jedao sighed, but didn’t press the point.

ON THE NINETEENTH day, Cheris was reviewing the New Anchor Orientation Packet, hoping for clues on how to handle Jedao, when the chime came. “Commander Nerevor requests your presence,” Communications’ voice said. “Scan indicates possible guardswarm contact.”

“I’m on my way,” Cheris said.

“We’re going to try to coax some information out of the enemy,” Jedao said. “You’re going to have to talk your swarm commanders through it. Be ready.”

The cindermoth realigned itself briefly so she could reach the command center more quickly, although the savings in time was a matter of seconds. Cheris entered and looked around. Nerevor was pacing.

“General,” Nerevor said with a rapid salute. “I don’t like it. There’s something peculiar going on with the formation effects, probably the jinxed calendricals, but that looks like a full defense swarm and it’s moving to intercept.”

“Let me see the formation data,” Cheris said. Scan routed the information to her terminal. She looked through the decay coefficients, then set up some preliminary computations, frowning to herself. “Doctrine, what do you have on the rot?”

“Summary or equations, sir?” Rahal Gara asked.

“Equations,” Cheris said. Subvocally, she said, “Jedao, you need to tell me what the plan is or we’re going straight to the fight.”

“We can’t surprise them,” Jedao said, “but we can confuse them. Listen, they have to have some plan beyond sitting under siege for, what was it, thirty years? They won’t have supplies for that long. They must expect a relief force to make their heresy viable. It could be a conspiracy, but whatever Captain Ko’s suspicions are, I don’t think the hexarchate is quite that lax. Which leaves foreign intrigue. Pretending to be their allies might do the trick.”

Cheris started to say, But that’s treason, then reconsidered. “We can’t act like a foreign swarm! They know what Kel moths look like. And we don’t even know who they’re expecting.”

“True, but we can be the next best thing: opportunistic domestic allies. Just be prepared to be firm with your officers.”

“There it is,” Scan said. “See that odd formant in the readings, sir? That’s got to be a rot effect, and I’m convinced it’s keeping me from getting a closer look at the lead warmoth.”

Cheris looked up from the fever-tangle of equations and numbers long enough to ask, “They’ve transmitted no banner?”

“We should be so lucky,” Nerevor said. “Should we transmit ours?” She had reason to be enthusiastic even about the null banner: once banners had been exchanged, battle could be properly joined.

“Not yet,” Jedao said. “They know we’re here, but the banner is additional information. We want to give it when we can provoke a response we can read for clues, and they’re too far away. Now would be a good time to explain to Nerevor that we’re going to try a ruse.”

“Commander,” Cheris said, “when they’re close enough for scan to give us better detail, we’re going to try to trick some information out of them. Communications: warn the swarm commanders of the same.”

“How very Shuos,” Nerevor said, “but orders are orders, sir.”

“I heard that,” Jedao said, a little testily.

Scan and Doctrine consulted with each other, and agreed that the guardswarm was 1.7 days out from the effective range of the Fortress’s shields.

“That swarm isn’t out here for defense,” Nerevor said. “It’s here to scout us.”

“Have you hailed it?” Cheris asked sharply.

“We were awaiting your instructions.”

“Good,” Cheris said.

“I hate tripwires,” Nerevor said, “but why so close to the Fortress proper?”

“We need to get closer,” Cheris said. “Look –” She mapped the calendrical gradients. “The fractal boundaries are a mess, but we can’t define them better without active probing and that’ll take too long.” She pointed out the key equations. “There, there, and there. If you solve for the roots and iterate –” She demonstrated. The map updated itself accordingly.

“My guess is they’re hoping to meet us in that yellow zone,” Jedao said. “They’ve got something planned for the phase transition.”

Cheris concurred and relayed the assessment.

“I didn’t know you were Nirai-trained, sir,” Nerevor said, scrutinizing Cheris.

“Mathematics was my specialty in Kel Academy,” Cheris said patiently. She had known this would come up.

“Trip the wire?” Nerevor said. “Or lure them out here?”

“We need information,” Jedao said. “We need to take the hit more than they need to make it.”

Cheris didn’t like the idea, but there was no getting around the fact that they had to crack the Fortress, and that meant getting past the guardswarm.

“I’d ordinarily scout them right back,” Jedao added, “but go in with the whole swarm. I saw the grid data on how fast you tested calendrical effects against the Eels on Dredge. You can take them by surprise.”