Change of Command

  CHANGE OF COMMAND

  Elizabeth Moon

  This is a work of fiction. All the characters and events portrayed in this book are fictional, and any resemblance to real people or incidents is purely coincidental.

  Copyright (c) 1999 by Elizabeth Moon

  All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form.

  A Baen Books Original

  Baen Publishing Enterprises

  P.O. Box 1403

  Riverdale, NY 10471

  ISBN: 0-671-57840-5

  Cover art by Gary Ruddell

  First printing, December 1999

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Moon, Elizabeth.

  Change of command / by Elizabeth Moon.

  p. cm.

  ISBN 0-671-57840-5

  I. Title

  PS3563.0557C48 1999

  813'.54—dc21 99-26627

  CIP

  Distributed by Simon & Schuster

  1230 Avenue of the Americas

  New York, NY 10020

  Typeset by Windhaven Press, Auburn, NH

  Printed in the United States of America

  DEDICATION

  For Susie and John Neary,

  for all the years of friendship.

  Baen Books by Elizabeth Moon

  Sheepfarmer's Daughter

  Divided Allegiance

  Oath of Gold

  The Deed of Paksenarrion

  Liar's Oath

  The Legacy of Gird

  Hunting Party

  Sporting Chance

  Winning Colors

  Once a Hero

  Rules of Engagement

  Change of Command

  Remnant Population

  Sassinak

  (with Anne McCaffrey)

  Generation Warriors

  (with Anne McCaffrey)

  Phases

  Acknowledgements

  As always, quite a few people helped with technical bits. Certain parts of this book could not have been written without the help of the fencing group . . . I leave it to them to figure out who contributed which bit of necessary information or advice. David Watson helped choreograph some of the fights and advised on metallurgy, and Kathleen Jones did yeoman work in the structural engineering of a very complicated plot. Susan and Andrew both provided useful information on points of high finance I would never have thought of (stock parking?); Allen helped with naval procedure. Other assistance came from a panel at the Baltimore WorldCon, but unfortunately a computer crash six weeks later robbed me of all the names, email addresses, and even snail-mail addresses (I had put them in the computer, of course . . . and since it was the mail function that crashed . . .) But they have my gratitude, though I can't thank them properly unless we run into each other at another convention. Their input changed one section greatly; remaining mistakes are all mine, including having put their addresses in a computer about to lose its memory so that I couldn't thank them properly.

  CHAPTER ONE

  CASTLE ROCK

  Newscast: "Today the Speaker of the Table of Ministers and the Grand Council of the Familias Regnant was assassinated while en route from the shuttleport to the Palace. His close friend and legal advisor, Kevil Mahoney, was seriously injured and is now undergoing emergency treatment in a secure medical facility. Three security personnel also died. Speaker Thornbuckle's youngest daughter, travelling in a separate conveyance, was not injured, but is now in protective custody. . . ."

  BREITIS MEDICAL PAVILION

  Kevil was aware of disturbing dreams, and tried to fight his way to consciousness. He felt stiff, as if he'd been in the same position too long, and somewhere in the distance someone hurt quite badly. Red and pink swirls slid past his vision; when he blinked, nothing happened but the addition of ugly green smears to the swirls. He thought he heard something, but—like the vague shapes that teased his eyes—the sounds were curiously unhelpful, blunt and unformed.

  He struggled harder, and finally made out a voice, speaking some arcane language he didn't know. What was a sub-cue something-or-other? What was an ivy line? His fogged mind tried to show him a picture of ivy leaves lined up in a row.

  "—need complete rejuv, if he lives that long—" came suddenly, with silvery clarity.

  Ice, then fire, washed through him; he never knew if it was something they did, or his body's response to what he heard. His eyes opened to see a pale blur; he struggled to get his mouth open, then realized it was open, wedged with some instrument.

  "Lie still," someone said. "Close your eyes."

  He was in no mood to take orders. He gagged on the thing in his mouth, and someone slid it out.

  "What happened?" he croaked, in a voice he didn't recognize but felt in his painful throat.

  Memory returned in that moment, even as he asked. Even as the people he could not yet see hesitated, he knew what had happened.

  He and Bunny in the ground car. Bunny's face, taut and lined for so many months, finally relaxing. They had been chatting about the continuing problems resulting from the Morelline's pharmaceutical plant on Patchcock, the rising price of rejuvenations and the political implications—

  And then the white flare of some weapon, and Bunny's face disappearing into a mess of red and pink and gray—

  He must be dead. No one could survive that. And he, Kevil Mahoney, was alive—at least for now—because his friend's head had taken the brunt of whatever attack.

  The New Texas Godfearing Militia had sworn vengeance on them. Evidently it had been no idle threat.

  He needed to know what had happened. Who was in charge now? What was Fleet doing? But he felt a dark chilly fog rising over him, and slipped into that darkness unsure if it was death or a drug.

  Hobart Conselline permitted none of the emotions churning inside him to show in his face or demeanor. His secretary's expression of cautious solemnity proved he'd been successful; the silly man couldn't tell how his employer was taking the news. Good.

  "It's been confirmed by three separate agencies, milord," his secretary said.

  "Terrible!" Hobart said, and shook his head. "I suppose it was those terrorists, in retaliation for the executions—"

  "That's the speculation at this time, milord."

  "How many were killed or injured?"

  "Lord Thornbuckle and three security personnel killed; Ser Mahoney is alive but in critical condition. He is not expected to live."

  "A terrible, terrible situation." Hobart shook his head again. Terrible for some, certainly. Bunny Thornbuckle's relatives and friends were no doubt reeling in shock and confusion. So would the whole Council be, if someone didn't take hold and give the guidance that had been so sorely needed for the past several years. If Kevil Mahoney had been uninjured, they might have turned to him, but without either Bunny or Kevil, the Families would mill about like panicky sheep, baaing uselessly at the wolfpack around them. He knew exactly what far-sighted, strong, decisive leader should take charge.

  "Send our condolences to Miranda," he told his secretary. "Inform my wife's secretary that I'm sure my wife will want to call on her." Poor, beautiful, clever Miranda, so unlucky in her choice of men and her children.

  Poor Brun, for that matter. Like everyone who had met the child, he had enjoyed her scatterbrained, madcap beauty. She had needed a good husband to settle her down, but Bunny had insisted on letting her run wild, with disastrous results. Another instance of Bunny's lamentable lack of decisive, firm leadership. Nothing like that had happened to the Conselline daughters, nor ever would. Bunny's older children had turned out well enough, though young Buttons was no second Bunny. He had all his father's stuffiness and none of his father's brilliance. All the better; the
last thing the Consellines needed was another Bunny Thornbuckle in that Chair.

  "You have messages from several of the Families," the secretary said.

  "No doubt," Hobart said. Those he had been talking to, in preparation for the Grand Council meeting this year, would want to know his plans now. For an instant, the internal vision of those plans blinded him to the room around him. With Bunny and Kevil Mahoney out of the picture—with Bunny's supporters in disarray, shocked and grieving—a man who knew what he wanted and moved quickly and decisively might go farther than he had believed possible.

  He glanced over the messages as his secretary left the room. As he'd expected: shock, concern, fear, shock . . . with every passing moment, he felt more certain that he, and he alone, would have to act in this crisis. How fortunate that he had not left Castle Rock with the others. "Make a list of all the Chairholders who are still onplanet," he said. His secretary nodded. "And set up a conference call for the Conselline Sept, all chairholding members."

  "Sir, I have the list—I keep a current file on all the Chairholders—"

  "Excellent." He looked over it carefully while his secretary was arranging the complicated linkage of ansible and ordinary communications lines for the conference call, and realized that the opportunity would never be greater.

  The Barraclough Sept, which included the lesser Aranlake and Padualenare septs, had not rallied to Bunny's side when Brun returned. The Aranlakes, with the exception of Lady Cecelia de Marktos, had supported an Aranlake candidate, Hubert Roscoe Millander, for Family head, and they'd lost. They were home sulking. The Padualenares favored Bunny's brother Harlis, who supported their claim to seniority over the Aranlakes, and their ambitions in the colonial worlds. This left only a few of the Barracloughs themselves onplanet, those closest to Bunny and therefore more likely devastated by his death.

  Hobart glanced around the room, his gaze roaming from one proof of his eminence to another. Would his family be devastated if he were assassinated? Delphine would be; she could cry and cry until her pretty face was all swollen and splotched with ugly color. The girls would cry, but only for awhile, he was sure. They would look for another patron, another source of favor and another dispenser of luxuries. Fickle, that's what women were, unless you trained them well, as he had trained Delphine. The boys, though—if he had brought them up well, they would be planning already how to avenge him, and how to gain more power.

  But he would not be assassinated. He would be more careful than Bunny, more alert to covert threats, less—not less brave, but less foolhardy. Brun had no doubt got her foolhardy genes from him, not from prudent Miranda.

  His excitement mounted as he went on through the list. If he had had Bunny killed—and the thought had crossed his mind more than once, in the year when it seemed that nothing else would get that great fool out of an office he was unfit to fill—he could not have chosen a better time. Best of all, he hadn't done it himself; he'd had nothing to do with it. Fate had finally come over to his side. He had proven himself capable of succeeding against the worst Fate could do, and now Fate—womanlike—had chosen him for that very energy and persistence and will to triumph.

  He closed his eyes a moment, allowing himself the luxury of imagining the moment when he took over as Speaker—when the faces which had ignored or turned away turned to him—had to turn to him—and he could finally show his true abilities. I will make the Familias great, and everyone will know who saved it from destruction.

  * * *

  R.S.S GYRFALCON

  "I didn't know they would take it out of my pay," Ensign Barin Serrano said. His voice almost squeaked, but he couldn't help it. His entire paycheck, gone . . . nothing in his credit cube, and he'd already ordered the traditional engagement and wedding gifts.

  "Well, who did you think would pay for it? Those people have already used up the Sector discretionary fund, and most of the recreational reserve. And they're not even charging you for all of them, just the ones your pay will cover."

  "Ten dependents . . ." Barin murmured. That would eat up all his pay after he was promoted, too. He supposed he should count himself lucky that Fleet regulations prohibited official indebtedness. "And I'm not even married. How could they do this to me?"

  "Look at it this way, sir—it'll keep you out of trouble."

  "No . . . not really. I've just sent in my order for the wedding . . ."

  "Well, sir—"

  "Attention all hands . . . attention all hands . . ." A pause, during which Barin tried to think how to get himself out of his present financial fix. Then the captain's voice: "It is my sad duty to announce that the Speaker of the Table of Ministers has been assassinated. Stand by . . ."

  Barin stared at the chief, who stared back. The Speaker assassinated? Where? How?

  And what would happen to Brun, and all those women?

  R.S.S. SHRIKE

  "Lieutenant Suiza, there's a flash priority message, Cobalt encryption."

  "Ummm . . ." Esmay Suiza's mind had drifted, as it did often these days, to Barin. "Right—well—keep a link to the ansible and I'll get the captain." The last priority message had been medical, directing them to relieve senior NCOs with rejuv of duty, but they had none aboard. Maybe this one would be useful. What she wanted was a message from Barin, preferably with a friendly reaction from his family. Being on two different ships really hampered communication; she hoped they could meet in person for a few days. Captain Solis knew she was due leave; he had already said she could take the time off. But she'd heard nothing. . . .

  Captain Solis, never talkative this early in first shift, became even more silent after the encrypted message had gone to his console. Esmay glanced over. "Sir?"

  "I . . . said nothing, Lieutenant." He met her eyes. "Lord Thornbuckle is dead. Assassinated. Presumably—" his gaze dropped to the readout of the decryption device. "Presumably it's the New Texas Militia, in retaliation for our execution of their Rangers." A pause, during which Esmay did her best not to ask the question that hammered at her mind. He answered it anyway. "Lieutenant, you can count on all leaves being cancelled. I'm sorry. There are some things more urgent than a wedding."

  "It won't hurt to do the paperwork," Esmay said, without thinking. Solis gave her a long look, but finally nodded.

  "Good idea. Then if you get the chance . . . but in the meantime, I want a threat assessment . . . get started on that while I make the announcement to the crew."

  ALTIPLANO

  Newscast: "General Casimir Suiza announced today that the Landbride Suiza is planning to marry an outlander, Barin Serrano, also an officer in the Regular Space Service. Opposition to any such outlander marriage is expected from the Landsman's Guild; questions have already been asked about the succession, in view of the fact that Landbride Suiza continues to reside offworld and serve in the Regular Space Service. In other news, the Speaker of the Table of Ministers has been assassinated on Castle Rock . . ."

  GUERNESE REPUBLIC GENERAL NEWS SERVICE

  Newscast: " . . . of more concern is the threat of renewed violence from the New Texas Militia branches which were not destroyed by the Familias Regnant in their extravagant attempt to rescue the Speaker's daughter. Questions have been raised in Parliament about the involvement of Guernesi intelligence personnel in that attempt, and whether such cooperation with the Familias Regnant compromised Guernesi interests . . ."

  Memorandum to the Chair of the Benignity:

  Whatever the Familias Regnant hoped to gain by attacking the Texan Militia, and despite the successful extrication of the Speaker's daughter, they will find they have poked a hornet's nest. Although it is tempting to take advantage of this, I believe that any contact with the Militia would endanger our longstanding policy, and would risk alienating the Holy Father.

  Our intelligence reports indicate continuing and widening splits between the ruling elements, however, which might well be exploited without entangling us with the New Texans. Project Dance has provided the most accurate a
ssessments so far of the behaviors of major Familias septs. Project Retainer is showing a profit, and the latest data indicate that some 15-23% of the R.S.S. senior NCO corps will be severely affected within another 180 days, with peak incidence at 250-300 days. Three independent sources confirm early failure beginning over 300 days ago. It is somewhat surprising that the Familias have not cut back manufacture and distribution of the drugs . . .

  Memorandum to the Admiral of the Fleet:

  At the request of the Table of Ministers and the Grand Council, all ships not on high-alert status will maintain one minute of silence at 1200 hours on the day of Lord Thornbuckle's funeral, and no other recognition shall be given; specifically there shall be no salute of arms.

  "One minute of silence in respect for the Speaker of the Grand Council."

  Silence dragged on. Longer than a minute, it felt like. Esmay wondered how Brun was holding up. She had not had time to recover from her captivity, and already she had lost her father. Esmay murmured prayers she had not thought of in years.

  Memorandum to the Chief of Personnel, from the Chief, Medical Services:

  Urgent you refer all enlisted personnel who received rejuvenation treatment within the past ten years to medical immediately. Make no exceptions. If necessary, refer in order of rejuvenation.

  Admiral Vida Serrano, now securely in command of Sector Seven, read the memorandum in silence, very aware of the tension in Master Chief Valdos' shoulders. She herself had forwarded the concerns of Barin and Captain Escovar about mental deterioration in senior enlisted personnel, under the tightest security. She had followed the subsequent medical investigation, but the details eluded her. Rejuvenation neurobiology was not her field. She needed to be briefed on it, and so far—despite several increasingly firm requests to Fleet Headquarters—no such briefing had taken place.