Elizabeth Moon - Sporting Chance

They were only halfway home, as Cecelia put it, when the escorts pulled up on either side. R.S.S., both of them; Heris got an exterior visual and grinned. She had once captained one of these stubby, peculiar-looking ships; ridiculously overpowered, designed for fast maneuvers within a single system, their small crews prided themselves on “flair.” On distant campaigns, they traveled inside podships, even though they mounted FTL drives.

The voicecom board lit. Heris flicked the lit buttons, and then a sequence which informed the caller that she had no secured channel.

“Ahoy, Sweet Delight . R.S.S. Escort Adrian Channel calling—”

“Captain Serrano, Sweet Delight ,” Heris said.

“You don’t have any kind of secure com?” At least that showed some discretion; she’d been afraid they’d ask in clear if she had the prince aboard.

“Negative.”

“Well . . .” A pause, during which Heris amused herself by imagining the comments passing between the two escorts and their base. Then the voice returned. “We understand you have urgent need for priority docking at Rockhouse Major. Is that correct?”

“Yes, it is,” Heris said. “The relevant enabling codes were in my initial transmission—”

“Yes, ma’am. Well, ma’am, we’re here just to see you make a safe transit, and chase any boneheaded civvie that doesn’t listen to his Traffic Control updates out of your way. Our instruments show you on course—” Oblo scowled at that; with him on the board there was no question of being off course.

The counterburn maneuver, when it came, strained the resources of the Sweet Delight ’s artificial gravity; dust shimmered in the air and made everyone on the bridge cough. For one moment Heris felt nausea, then her stomach ignored the odd sensations. Others were not so lucky. She saw a medic light go on in the prince’s stateroom, and in the galley.

Then the internal gravity stabilized again; the tug’s grapple snagged the yacht’s bustle, and Petris shut down their drive. Far faster than a commercial tug, the R.S.S. ship shoved them toward Rockhouse Major, and put them in a zero-relative motion less than 100 meters away from the docking bay. Visuals, boosted several magnifications, showed the Royal Seal above their assigned bay, and the gleaming sides of a Royal shuttle and a larger, deepspace yacht twice the size of Sweet Delight . Grapples shot out, homing on magnetic patches on the yacht’s hull. These would stabilize, but not change, their inward drift under docking thrusters. Heris had always enjoyed docking maneuvers, and the chance to show off at a Royal berth delighted her. She eased the yacht in, with neither haste nor delay, until the grapples were fully retracted and the hull snugged against the access ports.

Until this moment, she had spoken with the Rockhouse Major Sector Landing Control—a professional exactly like any other landing control officer—and their exchanges were limited to the necessary details of bringing the yacht in. Now another channel lit on the board. Heris took a steadying breath. This would be a very different official, she was sure—and even after hours reading everything Cecelia’s library had on Royal protocol, she wasn’t sure she would get it right. Once, she could have relied on the military equivalent, but as a civilian captain—

“Royal Security to the captain of Sweet Delight —”

“Captain Serrano here,” she said.

“We need to establish a secure communications link before your passengers debark; we’ll need hardwire access. Open the CJ-145 exterior panel next to the cargo access, please.”

At least he’d said “please.” For a moment she was surprised that they knew which panel to use, but of course they would: the yacht was a standard design, built at a well-known yard. They’d had weeks to get all the specs.

“Just a moment, please,” she said. She nodded at Oblo, who put the relevant circuits up on a screen, and cut out all but the communications input. No reason to give them easy access to Cecelia’s entire system, just in case they were of a mind to strip that, too. When he grinned at her, she popped the latch and waited while Security set the link up.

And after all that, the formalities were no different than docking at any fairly large Fleet base. Mr. Smith—the prince—had spoken to Security from his suite, she presumed in some code. She herself admitted the Royal Security team (one technician in gray, the others in dress blues, a major commanding) who would escort the prince down to the planet. No one seemed to expect any protocol from her that she didn’t already understand.

But when the prince came into the lounge, Lady Cecelia was with him. Her maid followed, with a small travel case in her hand. The prince’s servants, behind the maid, filled the passage with luggage.

“I’m going with him,” Cecelia said. Heris, who hadn’t expected this, stared at her. Cecelia pulled herself to her full height, and looked every millimeter the rich, titled lady she was. “The Crown Minister gave me the responsibility—”

“But madam . . . we’re Royal Security.” The major looked unhappy, as well he might.

“Very well. Then you can make sure that I also reach groundside safely.”

“But our orders were to take . . . er . . . Mr. Smith . . .”

The red patches of incipient temper darkened on Cecelia’s cheekbones. “Your sacred charge, young man, is the personal safety, the life itself, of your prince. If you think I endanger it, you are sadly mistaken about the source of danger. I suggest you need to have a long talk with the Crown Council. I went out of my way, at my own expense, to bring this young man safely home from a life-threatening situation. It might be asked where you, the Royal Security, were when he was being shot at!”

“Shot at!” Clearly this man had not heard the whole story. Heris wished Cecelia had not said so much; she’d assumed they would know already. “But he was on a training mission, with military guard—”

Cecelia glared. “Perhaps your superior will, if you prove discreet, tell you the full truth later. Suffice it to say that my honor, and my family’s honor, are involved in this, and I will witness Mr. Smith’s return to his father myself. You will find that his father agrees, should you care to take it that far.”

“Yes, madam.” The Security man still looked unhappy, but resigned. Exactly what she wanted.

“I will not require my maid’s attendance, since I expect to travel directly to my brother’s residence once I’ve spoken to the king. I am ready.” She glanced back, to find Gerel and his luggage in the passage behind her, took her small case from her maid, and stepped forward.

The Royal shuttle eased into atmosphere with hardly a shiver in its silken ride. Four Royal Aerospace Service single-seaters flanked it, and another pair led it in. The prince sprawled in a wide seat, looking glum. Cecelia divided her glances between the viewports—she had always liked watching planetfall—and the Security men, who avoided meeting her gaze. She enjoyed the excellent snack a liveried waiter served her. The prince, she noticed, waved it away, and the Security men drank only water.

Two flitters waited on the landing field. Both dark blue, both with the Crown Seal in gold and scarlet. Honor guards stood by both. Cecelia snorted to herself. It wasn’t going to work; she would see to that.

Sure enough, Security steered the prince toward one flitter, and attempted to lead her to the other. She strode on after the prince.

“Gerel—wait a moment.” He paused, and looked back almost blankly.

“Yes, Lady Cecelia?”

“You’re too fast for an old woman,” she said, grinning at him. “Ronnie knows to slow down for me.”