The Prince by Jerry Pournelle and S.M. Stirling

“Brainless jocks,” the student with the glasses muttered; not, Ursula noticed, until they were gone. “That’s the only type the Brotherhoods are letting in these days; I thought Sparta was founded by people like us.” Glasses was in sociology.

“Ahmed’s folks were transportees,” someone said.

“Ass-kisser,” Glasses sneered. More politely: “What did you think of the Leader’s speech. Ursula?”

“Well, I’m certainly against slavery,” she said sincerely. Many of the others looked embarassed, especially Glasses—McAlastair, she thought—who had tried to kiss her in the stairwell at the faculty-student mixer last week. His wrist had healed nicely. Tanith certainly has a reputation here, she thought. If possible, worse than the actuality. Interesting that somehow everyone seemed to know all about what she did on Tanith.

“Then why are you in that Legion?” Mary Williams said sharply.

“Because I owe them for rescuing me from slavery.”

“I heard the mercenaries owe you,” the Williams girl said. This one was altogether more serious than the rest of the crowd of parlor pinks and NCLF-groupies she’d fallen in with. “For helping put down slave revolts on Tanith.”

“There weren’t any slave revolts on Tanith, just outlaws who robbed and killed convicts because it was easier than attacking the planters. Catching and hanging them did everyone a favor.”

McAllistair frowned and made to speak, but Williams laughed and laid a hand across his mouth.

“At least you’re honest,” she said. “I like that. And not so squeamish as the rest of these crybabies.”

“I am not squeamish!” McAllistair said. “Look, Croser himself—”

“Croser’s heart is in the right place, but he’s blind to some things too—that massacre at the Spartosky, people shot down in the streets!” Ah, yes, she was there with the demonstraters, Ursula thought. Dropped out of sight for a while, pretty broken up, her boyfriend was killed.

Williams was continuing passionately: “Can’t you see that the time Croser’s warning about, when refusal to reform brings on revolution is . . . oh, forget it, Andy. Anyway, Ursula, we’re going down to Ptomaine Heaven to grab some grunter sticks and fries. Want to join us?”

“Love to,” Ursula said. And keep talking, the meter is running.

* * *

Horace Plummer, Secretary to the Council, struck a pose. “His Majesty Jason the First, being unable to attend and having need of the assistance of Prince David, has designated King Alexander the First as his representative at this meeting, which is therefore an official meeting of the Council empowered to approve all measures. All rise.”

King Alexander came into the Council chamber and took his seat at the head of the big table. He nodded to the Council and the military staff. “Thank you. You may begin.”

Lysander stared at his father as they all took their seats. What he saw was shocking. He had been in the field with his battalion so that this was the first time he had seen the King in a month. I knew he was working too hard, but this—! Alexander Collins looked to have aged a decade in the last few months; the lines in his boney face were graven deeper, and there was a disturbing nervous glint in his eyes, a hint of desperation as he looked around the War Council. The meeting was in the Government House chamber where they had held the first briefing by the mercenaries three months ago. Today the chill seemed deeper than the mild seacoast winter beyond the windows could account for. Rain fell steadily from a soft gray sky.

“I gather you’ve got something for us?” The king was speaking more slowly than usually, as if he were fighting a speech impediment, but there was an edge of impatience in his voice.

“Colonel Owensford, please begin your presentation,” Plummer said.

“Your Majesty.” Peter stood. “We have a great deal to cover today. First, a summary: The First Royal Infantry is fully qualified to take the field, and I shall shortly recommend that we do so.”

“That sounds encouraging,” Alexander said.

“Yes, Sire,” Peter said. “Captain Alana, please give your report.”

Jesus Alana had been trying to hide a frown while looking at King Alexander. Now he stood and took his place at the display screen.

“We have found the satellite systems oddly ineffective,” Jesus said. “But yesterday we finally found something worthwhile.” Images formed on the screen. “The location is the Rhyndakos river, about twenty kilometers upstream from Dodona.” The screen briefly flashed a map, locating the area as a south-bank tributary of the Eurotas, in the western part of the Middle Valley; Dodona was a small town at its juncture with the main stream. “Lieutenant Swenson will explain.”

“Sir. Your majesty, we wouldn’t have gotten anything if the leaves weren’t off the trees, and there isn’t much even so, but look here.”

The screen changed. The image outlined in black was something that could be barely made out as the lines of a small river-steamer’s hull, a flat wooden rectangle with a rear-mounted paddle wheel. A little out of date now that diesels were becoming more common, but they were cheap and simple to make, able to put in anywhere and hundreds of identical models plied the Eurotas from the Delta to Olynthos.

“Here’s the computer enhancement.”

The image was still coarse and grainy; even the Legion’s computers could do only so much with the data input offered. What did show was glimpses of men in bulky clothing unloading coffin-sized boxes and carrying them down the bow-ramp to waiting animals, pack-horses or mules, where others lifted them on to the carrying saddles.

“Next sequence is interesting,” Swenson said; her voice had a technician’s satisfaction in getting better performance than could be reasonably expected from second-rate equipment.

This time it was a smaller, square box, and it had broken when it fell. The contents had spilled free, some of them out of the cylindrical wicker containers. Dull-gray metal cylinders about the length of a man’s arm, with conical tops and a rod coming out the bottom.

“Mortar bombs,” she said, with a prim smile. “Specifically, for your Rojor 125mm rifled medium mortar. There is,” she added pedantically, “no stencilling on the crates, but there isn’t much doubt where they came from, either.”

“Olynthos or Sparta City,” Owensford said. Those were the only two places on the planet with forging and machining shops capable of doing the work. “Probably Olynthos, given the location.”

Alexander’s voice was thin with fury he rose and turned to General Desjardins. “What is your explanation for this?”

The constabulary chief stuttered, paling. “Your Majesty, I, ah—”

“And how long has this been going on?” The king’s voice rose to a shriek: “Who is the traitor?”

“Your Majesty,” Owensford said. Then more sharply: “Your Majesty!”

Alexander Collins caught himself and wiped a handkerchief over his mouth. “Colonel,” he said, sitting again.

“Your Majesty, until quite recently Sparta had only the most cursory controls on weapons movement,” Owensford said. His face was blankly expressionless; Lysander had been with him long enough to know what that meant. “This could have been going on for quite some time, I’m afraid. With enough money, it wouldn’t have been hard to organize.”

“Export shipments,” Jesus Alana said. “Thurstone has been buying from here for half a decade now.” The five-sided civil war there had been going on for twice that length of time. “Mother of God, even the CoDominium Marines on Haven use Spartan-made light arms. Just shaving a few percentage points off each would get you a respectable amount, provided you weren’t expending them. You’d have to fiddle the weight allotments, but it could be done if no one was looking hard. Just for an example, you could overweight something else going up with the same load, and it’d look fine.”

“Yes, yes,” the king said. “What do you propose to do, Colonel Owensford?”

“Treat this as an opportunity, Your Majesty.” He called up a map. “We now have two battalions of the Legion. The Fifth is eager for duty, and has already been sent upriver. The First Royal is also on route to the Mandalay-Olynthos area. The seismic-testing teams have begun operations, and scouts can be sent into those hills immediately.

“I propose that we take to the field in full force. Three battalion-sized columns, with Brotherhood first-line militia in support, will move into the Dales on converging vectors.”

Worms of colored light writhed into the hills from the Valley.

“This will be a reconnaissance in force. That’s often a polite way to say ‘we have no objective,’ or in this instance ‘training war,’ but in fact we do have an objective. The enemy has probably been accumulating heavy equipment for years. We also know that they recently acquired off-planet support, which very likely includes computers, radars, possibly considerably more. All that requires a base. I propose to find that base and destroy it.”

“Bravo,” Alexander said.

“So in this case we really do have a reconnaissance in force,” Peter said. “Strong enough to fight anything they can put against us, and mobile enough to cover a lot of ground. We go in searching. Depending on the information we gain, we’ll modify the directions of attack, attempting to corral and destroy any Helot forces we contact.”