The Prince by Jerry Pournelle and S.M. Stirling

—Martin van Creveld

The Transformation of War, 1991

* * *

The Council Chamber was colorful, and for the moment buzzing with informal chatter. Most seats at the big conference table were taken. The conspicuous exceptions were the cabinet secretary’s console at one end, and a single large arm chair at the center. The War Cabinet was already at the table. Rear Admiral Samuel Forrest, as senior Naval officer, sat between Generals Owensford and Slater, the deep midnight blue of his Navy tunic contrasting with the more colorful army garrison uniforms. Madame Elayne Rusher, the Attorney General, was next to General Lawrence Desjardins, Chief of the Royal Spartan Mounted Police. Roland Dawson, Principal Secretary of State, chatted with Lord Henry Yamaga, Secretary of State for the Interior and Industrial Development. Eric Respari of Finance listened to them with a sour expression. Everyone knew that Respari had been an avid student of the late King Jason’s economics theories; now he resembled the Freedman King in expression as well. Sir Alfred Nathanson, called Minister of War even though his office was administrative rather than part of the chain of command, was hard at work on his notebook computer. At the far end of the table Dr. Caldwell Whitlock sat alone. He had been invited by Prince Lysander, and if some of the regular members of the War Cabinet resented his presence, none of them were going to say so, especially not today.

In addition to the principal officers at the conference table, another dozen chairs along the walls were filled with experts: Legion Captains Jesus and Catherine Alana, Alan Hruska, the Milice chief for Sparta City; Spartan and Brotherhood military; Legion officers; civilian officials, most carrying notebook computers.

The room fell silent as Horace Plummer, Secretary to the Cabinet, came into the conference chamber and stood just inside the door. “My lords, ladies, gentlemen, His Highness Crown Prince Lysander, Master of the Forces by order of the Kings acting under the Ultimate Decree of the Senate of Sparta.” Everyone stood. The military acted from habit, as perhaps did some of the others, but some were reacting to the solemn formality of Plummer’s announcement.

Lysander wore the military uniform of an officer of the Royals but with no insignia of rank. He looked older than his years as he took his place at the center of the big conference table. There was only one chair there. Previously there had always been two, and Lysander had sat across from them, where General Owensford was now. Lysander nodded pleasantly to everyone, but took his seat in silence. After a moment the others sat down as well.

“The agenda is on your screens,” Plummer said.

“With his Highness’s permission,” Roland Dawson said, “the agenda will endure a brief wait. We understand there is good news from St. Thomas’s.”

Lysander frowned for a moment, then suddenly his smile returned, as if he had remembered to wear it again. “Thank you. Yes, very good news indeed. Graffin Melissa is recovering well.”

“Well enough to have enjoyed a brief visit to the Palace last evening. Her father mentioned it this morning. And, Highness, I have heard that we may have better news shortly,” Dawson continued relentlessly. The Principal Secretary of State was the leader of the majority party in the Senate, and by definition a politician, and not even the Ultimate Decree would change that. “I understand the Queen is consulting the Archbishop to reschedule the wedding. I understand and appreciate that Your Highness would prefer this to remain a private matter, but the Citizens will be overjoyed at the news, and I ask permission to make the announcement.”

Lysander looked around the room at the eager faces. Even the dour finance minister was smiling agreement with Dawson.

“Time we had some good news to announce,” Elayne Rusher said.

“The Citizens will certainly want to celebrate,” Sir Alfred Nathanson said.

Lysander nodded. “I expect you’re right. I’ll leave the details to you, then. Now—and thank you, Roland—Mr. Plummer, if we can get back to the agenda?”

“Item One. A report from the military field commands,” Horace Plummer said. “General Owensford.”

“Highness. My lords and ladies. You’ve seen the overall figures, and the rest are in the conference room computer. I can summarize in two words. We’re winning.”

“Thank God,” Roland Dawson said. The Principal Secretary of State mopped his brow with an already damp handkerchief. “How soon do you think this will be over?”

“Not as soon as you’d like, I’m afraid,” Peter Owensford said. “We’re stretched pretty thin, no reserves to speak of. Nearly everything we’ve got has been thrown into the two campaigns, the Stora pursuit, and the reduction of their main base. We’re winning, but it isn’t all that easy, there are complications. Full details are in the reports on your consoles there. Unfortunately, I must ask you not to remove electronic copies of those reports from this room. We know the computers here are clean, and they have no physical connection whatever to any other system.”

“General?”

“General Desjardins?”

“Does this mean we still can’t rely on our computer systems?”

“Correct,” Owensford said. “We captured a fair number of Helot technicians in training at Base One, and we’ve learned a lot from them. Murasaki’s people were deeper into our computer systems than I would have imagined. We learned that much mostly by inference and skilled questioning of Helot officers and trainees.” Peter Owensford nodded acknowledgment to the Captains Alana. They smiled briefly. Both looked both overworked and triumphant.

“Unfortunately, we didn’t get a single live technoninja,” Owensford said. “The four we did apprehend were dead when captured, or died before they could be drugged. Interestingly there was one already dead, killed by torture, apparently by Helot experts. No one seems to know anything about that, unless Captain Alana has learned something since I last spoke with him. Yes, Jesus?”

“We have one Helot officer who said the execution was personally ordered by Field Prime, as punishment for failures during the Stora Mines operation,” Jesus Mana said. “Apparently this was demanded by the senior survivors of the Stora Commando. They felt they had been betrayed, and someone should be punished.”

“So,” Lysander said. “The vipers are fanging each other.”

“So it would appear, Highness,” Owensford said. “We’re beginning to see fair numbers of defecting officers. Especially in the Stora Commando group, where we got a colonel, one Hamish Beshara, code name Ben Bella. Incidentally, his spetsnaz brigade commander was our friend Niles.” Owensford stopped. Prince Lysander’s face had frozen into a mask of hate. “Ben Bella had nothing to do with the missile attack, Highness. Jesus?”

“No, my prince. To the best of my skills, no one we have captured had any notion that the missile would be used against a non-military target. Colonel Ben Bella thought its purpose was to destroy the geo-thermal generating system if, as happened, the sabotage effort failed.” Jesus shrugged. “I am certain I could find evidence to convict him of wanton destruction of civilian property, but I would not care to argue the case in a CoDominium court martial. Especially since the man surrendered on promise of amnesty for all except deliberate atrocities. He has a different conception of atrocity than we, but he is convinced he committed none—and that the missile attack was an atrocity. He insists that he would not have allowed that had he known, and while I may doubt he would have risked his life to prevent it, it is certain he believes he would have.”

“Which brings us to a decision item,” Owensford said when Lysander didn’t answer. “We have captured a number of Helot soldiers, and in the base camp we took prisoner other rebels. The Helots have no conception of non-combatant status. All their membership are rebels, and would be expected to fight. They are nearly all armed, and some of their women and children were killed bearing arms against our forces. Others threw away their weapons. In any case it is difficult to think of a ten year old child as an armed enemy.”

“Nits make lice,” someone said.

Owensford frowned. “That has been said in every revolutionary war in history,” he said. “And it’s no more appropriate here than it was in Palestine or Kurdistan. Your Highness, we will need policies and procedures. What shall we do with captured Helot soldiers and their non-military adherents?”

“We can’t just let them go,” Yamaga said. “They won’t work. They wouldn’t work before they became Helots, and they won’t work now, and now they’ve got a taste for rebellion. And training with weapons. Let them loose and they’ll turn criminals even if they don’t rejoin the rebellion.”

“They have to be taught to work,” Madame Rusher said. “Work habits.”

“Arbeit macht frei,” General Desjardins said. “A much abused slogan, but I believe Madame Elayne has the essence of it. They must become convinced that work is a better alternative than banditry.”

“We can use some of the soldiers in expeditionary forces,” Hal Slater said. “And the Legion. But that requires transportation. I can’t think we want them armed and at large on Sparta until they’ve been obedient for a few years.” He chuckled. “Pity we can’t make them involuntary colonists to somewhere else. Send them to Byer’s and let them buy the criminal life in Hell’s-a-comin’.”