Chief Baylor, who’d been the Aglaia’s missileer, had retired after the ship—including the missiles that had been the children of his heart and mind—had died in the harbor serving Kostroma City. Daniel regretted losing Baylor: the missiles launched in the Aglaia’s final moments had functioned perfectly, putting paid to most of an Alliance invasion fleet. Still, Betts was an experienced man and far more senior than a corvette would normally rate.
The Princess Cecile had been on Kostroma during a major war and revolution. Many items of value had been saved from destruction by members of the corvette’s crew, with Daniel’s personal servant Hogg chief among the list of rescuers.
Daniel couldn’t have stopped the practice—it would be wrong to call it looting; mostly wrong, at any rate—if he’d tried, and he was too well aware of the risks his crew had run to feel they didn’t deserve anything they could make off with. He wasn’t comfortable with accepting the half share Hogg insisted was his, however—as a moral question, not from fear of being caught. Theoretically Hogg could fall foul of the Republic’s customs authorities, but the chance was too vanishingly small to affect Daniel’s decision on the matter.
Then it occurred to Daniel that any doubtful money could be spent on raising the Princess Cecile’s fighting readiness. No one wearing an RCN uniform would find anything morally reprehensible in that, even if the money came from brothel receipts. Daniel accepted his half, then spent it on missiles and extra rations for the crew.
Surely the money didn’t come from brothel receipts, did it? Though knowing Hogg, it was probably better not to enquire too closely.
Adele stood up at the communications console. “My systems are in order, Captain,” she said, remembering this time to be formal while in uniform. She was as likely as not to say “Daniel,” which from her couldn’t be considered a breach of discipline.
“Then I think we’re ready to lift as soon as we have orders and port clearance,” Daniel said, beaming with pleasure. “It might be as little as four hours.”
His grin became rueful. “Or not, of course,” he added. “We act at the pleasure of the Navy Office, which is rarely to be hastened.”
“I, ah, wonder, Daniel,” Adele said. “If we have some hours, might I . . . absent myself on some personal business?”
Daniel blinked. “Why of course,” he said; just as he would have said to any of his officers, knowing that even the ones who had a tendency to drink were too excited about the planned voyage for them to risk missing liftoff. Daniel didn’t imagine that the truth of the corvette’s orders would be half as wonderful as the rumors circulating about them, but the stories had been enough to keep an already crack crew in a state of wire tautness.
Mind, the rumor that the Princess Cecile was being sent to capture a disabled Alliance treasure ship was one that had Daniel himself counting shares of dream wealth.
Adele looked down at her clothing as if in puzzlement, pinching a fold of the blouse between her thumb and forefinger. Like everybody else aboard she was wearing a utility uniform of mottled gray fabric. “I’ll change and be off, then,” she said. “I don’t suppose I’ll be very . . .”
She stepped toward the cabin off the bridge which she shared with Tovera. It was officially the captain’s lounge, half of his tiny suite. Daniel preferred to have Adele bunking there in a crisis rather than in the Warrant Officers’ Quarters. Those were at the other end of C Level, adjacent to the Battle Direction Center where Lt. Mon commanded the midshipmen and mates of the missile and gunnery officers on a set of duplicate controls.
“Ah . . .” Daniel said, but he couldn’t think of a way to continue.
Adele’s few personal belongings were already aboard. She had no friends or family in Xenos—no friends or family anywhere beyond the hull of the Princess Cecile, if it came to that—and she wasn’t the sort to go out for one last hell-raising party before lifting ship.
Even in the midst of his concern, Daniel felt a smile start to crinkle the corners of his mouth. He’d tried to imagine Adele raising hell—and had collided with a brick wall.