Cursed Command (Angel in the Whirlwind Book 3) Read online

  “Stand at ease,” William curtly ordered. He took a moment to match the face to the files he’d studied during the flight from Tyre. Janet Richmond, Captain Abraham’s personal steward. Blonde enough to remind him of Kat Falcone, but lacking Kat’s poise and grim determination to prove herself. “Where is the XO?”

  Janet quailed. William suddenly realized that he might have been too harsh. “I . . .”

  William took a breath. Janet was a steward. She wasn’t in the chain of command. Hell, he doubted she had any authority outside her CO’s suite. What the hell was she doing here?

  “Calm down,” he ordered, forcing his own voice to calm. “Where is the XO?”

  “He’s not on the ship, sir,” Janet said carefully. She cringed back, as if she expected to be slapped. “Commander Greenhill hasn’t been on the ship for the last ten days.”

  William felt his mouth drop open. “What?”

  “He left the ship ten days ago,” Janet said. She sounded as if she were pleading with him for . . . what? Understanding? “He ordered the communications staff to keep up the pretense that he was onboard.”

  “I see,” William said.

  He had to fight, hard, to keep his anger under control. He hadn’t thought much of Commander Greenhill after he’d read the man’s file, but he’d promised himself that he would keep an open mind. Now . . . Commander Greenhill would be lucky if he was merely kicked out of the Navy. Going on unauthorized leave when he was meant to be in command of his ship? Dereliction of duty was a shooting offense in wartime.

  “Please don’t tell him I told you,” Janet pleaded. “He’ll get angry.”

  “He’ll get dead,” William snapped. Shooting was too good for Commander Greenhill. Far too good for him. William had been raised to do his duty or die trying, no matter what curves life threw him. Commander Greenhill didn’t even have the decency to resign his commission and totter off to spend the rest of his life in the nearest bar. “Who is on this fucking ship?”

  Janet cringed, again.

  “The chief engineer is in command,” she said finally. “But he’s in his cabin . . . the bridge crew are scattered . . . the crew . . .”

  “Let me guess,” William said. He hated himself for taking his anger out on her, but it was so hard to remain focused. “They’re currently too drunk to notice that they’re steadily poisoning their own fucking atmosphere?”

  He saw a dozen answers cross Janet’s face before she nodded, once.

  William shook his head, feeling an odd flicker of sympathy for Commander Greenhill. He might have had a good reason to throw in the towel, after all. Offhand, William couldn’t remember a ship and crew falling so far, certainly not in Commonwealth history. A handful of UN ships had turned pirate, he recalled, after the Breakaway Wars, and quickly fell into very bad habits.

  And most of them were small ships, he thought numbly. This is a heavy cruiser.

  “Take me to the bridge,” he ordered, meeting her eyes. “And don’t call ahead to say I’m coming.”

  “Yes, sir,” Janet said.

  She turned and hurried down the corridor, moving so quickly that she was practically running . . . as if, William reflected grimly, she wanted to get away from him. He hadn’t paid much attention to her file, he recalled; in hindsight, that might have been a mistake. A captain had considerable authority over who served as his steward, after all. Had Captain Abraham been motivated by something other than efficiency?

  He followed Janet, feeling his anger simmering as he took in the condition of his starship. A dozen maintenance lockers had been left open, their contents scattered over the deck; a handful of overhead lockers had been torn open; the strange smell only grew more unpleasant the farther they moved into the ship. He winced inwardly as he smelled the telltale presence of rats and cockroaches. He’d been wrong, he reflected, as they passed through a pair of solid hatches and entered Officer Country. There were pirate ships from the edge of explored space that were in better condition than Uncanny.

  Janet stopped and turned to face him. “It wasn’t their fault,” she said. “Sir . . .”

  William scowled at her. “What wasn’t their fault?”

  “Everything,” Janet said. She turned back and opened the hatch to the bridge. “You’ll see in a minute . . .”

  William followed her onto the bridge . . . and stopped, dead. A single officer sat in front of the tactical console, smoking something that smelled of burning grass. William stared at him, and then realized, to his shock, that there was no one else on the bridge. Regulations insisted on at least three officers on duty at all times, even when the starship was in orbit around the safest world in the Commonwealth. Where were the other two? It struck him, a moment later, that Janet might be one of the other officers. Was she even qualified to stand watch?

  He pushed the thought aside as he surveyed the compartment. The holographic display that should have showed the system was gone; five consoles were deactivated, four more dismantled for parts. He’d never seen anything like it, at least not outside a shipyard putting the finishing touches on a brand new starship. Creeping horror threatened to overcome him as he keyed the nearest console, demanding a status update. The internal sensor net was down . . . completely. He’d never seen that outside starships that had been battered into hulks by enemy fire.

  “It’s nonfunctional,” Janet said.

  “I can see that,” William snarled. He strode over to the smoking officer and tore the cigarette out of his mouth, dropping it on the deck and grinding it under his heel. “What happened to the bridge?”

  The officer stared at him. “Who are you?”

  “I’m your new commanding officer,” William snapped. Up close, the man’s breath made him want to reel. He had no idea what the man had been smoking, but it couldn’t be good for him. Or anyone. “Who are you?”

  The officer’s mouth opened and shut for a long moment. “Lieutenant Rodney Graham, sir,” he managed, finally. “I’m officer of the watch.”

  “Glad to hear it,” William said. “What happened to my bridge?”

  “The engineers cannibalized it to keep other starships running,” Janet said quietly. “They were practically stripping out the entire hull . . .”

  William understood, just for a moment, why one of his uncles had drunk himself to death after his farm had failed. It hadn’t been the old man’s fault, not really. He’d just seen his investments fail, one after the other, even before the pirates had arrived to threaten his homeworld. Maybe the remainder of the ship’s crew—his crew—felt the same way.

  The First Space Lord couldn’t have known, William thought grimly. Even if they hadn’t stripped out essential components, they’d been vandalizing their own ship and rendering it unserviceable.

  He cursed under his breath savagely. It was difficult, sometimes, to get spare parts from the bureaucracy. Even during wartime, the bureaucrats insisted on having the forms filled out before they released the components, despite the best efforts of supply officers. Having a source of supplies they could tap without having to fill out the paperwork would be wonderful, as far as the supply officers were concerned. God knew, he’d rewarded a couple of officers for being excellent scroungers . . .

  It may not be as bad as it seems, he told himself. Or that could be just wishful thinking.

  “Right,” he said, pushing the thought aside. “I want you”—he glared at Graham—“to recall each and every officer and crewman who is currently not on the ship. If they are back before the end of the shift”—he made a show of glancing at his wristcom—“nothing further will be said about their absence. This time.”

  Graham looked as if he wanted to object but didn’t quite dare. “Yes, sir.”

  “Good,” William said. “I suggest”—he hardened his tone to make it very clear that it wasn’t a suggestion—“that you get rid of any drugs and anything else that could get you in hot water before I hold a search. This is your one chance to clean up your act.”


  He turned and met Janet’s eyes. “And you are to take me to the chief engineer.”

  Janet paled. “Yes, sir.”

  “Good,” William said. He wondered, suddenly, what Kat Falcone would make of a ruined starship and a wrecked crew. “Let’s go.”

  CHAPTER TWO

  “You gave him Unlucky?”

  “Uncanny,” the First Space Lord corrected. “Her name is Uncanny.”

  Kat closed her eyes in pain. She owed Commander William McElney—Captain William McElney—her life and career. He’d been her XO on HMS Lightning and she knew, all too well, that she would have lost everything without him. She’d called in every favor she was owed and made promises of future favors to ensure that the delay between his promotion and his assignment to a command was as short as possible. Still, she’d never expected that he might be offered Unlucky. That ship had killed two of her commanding officers and ruined three more.

  “Might I ask,” she said in a tone she knew would get anyone else in trouble, “why you gave him that ship?”

  “Politics,” the First Space Lord said dryly.

  “Heavy politics,” King Hadrian added.

  Kat swallowed, hard. King Hadrian had sought her out more than once since her return from Theocratic Space, but she’d never been sure why. Perhaps he just wanted the benefit of her experience. The monarch had vast power in wartime, but King Hadrian had no military experience. He’d never been allowed to leave his homeworld, even after being crowned.

  “Politics,” she repeated finally.

  “It’s a delicate balancing act,” the First Space Lord said. “On one hand, we have noncitizens of Tyre who want postings to the very highest levels; on the other hand, we have the existing power structure complaining about outsiders being allowed to compete with insiders. And you know it. We have to navigate this political storm before it tears the Commonwealth apart.”

  “We don’t have enough ships to go around,” King Hadrian said.

  “Yet,” Kat countered.

  She shook her head, irritated. The Commonwealth had a formidable industrial base, but the demands of wartime were pushing it to the limit. Her father, the Minister of War Production, had told her that production was still being ramped up even though countless new starships, gunboats, and missiles were rattling off the assembly line. According to the latest projections, the Commonwealth wouldn’t achieve a decisive tonnage advantage over the Theocracy for another two to three years.

  But we now know that we overestimated their industrial base, Kat reminded herself. They’re already running hot, while we’re still increasing our production rate.

  “Yet,” King Hadrian agreed. “But we do not have enough stability, not right now anyway, to risk upsetting the political balance of power.”

  “And not allowing outsiders to be promoted will also upset the balance of power,” Kat pointed out tartly.

  “Quite,” the First Space Lord said. “So we promote your XO and offer him a chance to put an . . . unlucky . . . starship back into active service. If he does well, we can use him as a test case to prove that outsiders should get their chance; if he doesn’t . . . well, at least we have good reason to justify turning down other promotions.”

  Kat managed to keep her face impassive, but not without effort. The Kingdom of Tyre had never intended to become a multistar political entity, not when everyone had assumed that the UN’s hegemony over humanity’s growing domain would last indefinitely. However, the UN had fallen into war, leaving chaos in its wake. Tyre had created the Commonwealth, a union of stars and planets, with the intention of integrating the newcomers slowly and carefully. And yet the war had blown all of their careful plans out the airlock. The Commonwealth had to square the urgent need for manpower with the political requirement not to sacrifice the ethos that had made the Commonwealth great.

  But William deserved his promotion, Kat thought. How many others also deserve promotion?

  “I am not an all-powerful ruler,” King Hadrian said. “We cannot ram through such changes without paying a stiff price.”

  He cleared his throat. “In any case,” he added, “we did not call you here to discuss your former XO.”

  Kat leaned forward, stiffly. She didn’t share her father’s obsession with political games—no one had really expected the tenth child of Duke Lucas Falcone to wield political power—but she knew enough to expect trouble. King Hadrian wouldn’t have called her to the palace’s war room, knowing that it would have displeased some of his ministers, if he hadn’t wanted her here. And if he wanted her here, he had a reason. He wouldn’t have summoned her on a whim.

  The First Space Lord tapped a switch. A holographic star chart materialized in front of them, hanging over the table. Kat devoured it, noting with interest the handful of stars that had seen raiding parties from the Theocracy sweeping through in hopes of delaying the Commonwealth’s mobilization. None of those raiding parties had taken or held territory, not since the first thrusts into Commonwealth territory. The war seemed to have stalemated.

  “As you are aware,” the First Space Lord said, “Admiral Junayd defected six months ago, after you embarrassed him in front of his superiors. Since then, he’s been singing like a bird. We’ve learned a great deal about the Theocracy’s industrial base, its long-term plans for conquest, and most importantly, how its government actually works. Our analysts have been able to confirm enough of the data to discern that Junayd’s been telling the truth.”

  Kat nodded. Admiral Junayd would have to be insane to lie. She honestly couldn’t imagine the Theocracy choosing to sacrifice an entire superdreadnought, perhaps more than one, in a vain attempt to prove Junayd’s bona fides. There was the vague possibility, her father had warned, that the whole thing was a con, but Admiral Junayd had been checked and tested extensively.

  “Admiral Junayd did not know just what his former allies had in mind to break the stalemate,” the First Space Lord added, “but he does know some of their long-term plans. Despite waging war against us, the Theocracy has continued its aim to subvert nearby star systems and eventually bring them under its control. Admiral Junayd believes that the Theocracy intends to continue those plans.”

  Kat blinked. “Even now?”

  “They’re committed to spreading their religion,” King Hadrian reminded her. “Even if they lose the war, even if their homeworld gets blasted from orbit, their religion will survive.”

  “Maybe,” Kat said. “But they could be wrong.”

  The thought made her shudder. She’d seen thousands of refugees fleeing the Theocracy and knew there were hundreds of millions trapped on a dozen occupied worlds. She rather doubted that the Theocracy would survive if it lost control of the high orbitals. The level of hatred the Theocracy had unleashed promised bloody purges once the war was over. The Theocracy had meted out savage treatment to their helpless prey and, once the boot was on the other foot, savage treatment would be meted out to them in turn.

  “They could be,” the First Space Lord agreed.

  He pointed to a cluster of stars near the Commonwealth’s border. “The Jorlem Sector,” he said by way of introduction. “I believe you’ve been there?”

  “I visited briefly, when I was assigned to HMS Thomas,” Kat recalled. “But I only had a couple of days leave on Vangelis. I never saw Jorlem itself.”

  King Hadrian looked surprised. “You are not familiar with the sector?”

  Kat shook her head. Groundhogs never really comprehended the sheer immensity of interstellar space. The Jorlem Sector held over fifty stars and over a hundred settled worlds, ranging from tiny farming settlements to Jorlem itself. She hadn’t really seen much of Vangelis, save for a few tourist traps near the spaceport. The idea that her limited experience made her an expert on the sector was absurd.

  Although quite a few analysts claim to be experts without ever having left their homeworld, she reminded herself. At least the king is trying to talk to people who might know better than himself.

&
nbsp; “I couldn’t call myself an expert,” she said.

  “Very wise,” the First Space Lord said.

  He gave her a half smile as he pointed to the star chart. “The important part, right now, is that the Theocracy is planning to . . . seduce . . . a number of independent planets within the sector,” he told her. “Our defector believes that the Theocracy intends to offer all sorts of incentives to its potential allies, ranging from protection from Theocratic incursions to honored positions within the Theocracy.”

  “They wouldn’t fall for that,” Kat insisted.

  “They might,” the First Space Lord said. “There’s a great deal of resentment and suspicion of the Commonwealth in that sector, Captain. They may see the Theocracy as the lesser of two evils.”

  “They’ll regret it,” Kat said. She shook her head in disbelief. “How can people be so stupid?”

  “Poor trade policies,” the king said. “A number of worlds have expressed interest in joining the Commonwealth, Kat, but their local rivals have been much less enthusiastic. They’ve actually been trying to arm themselves to the teeth for the last couple of decades. Not enough to be a threat to us on their own, of course, but allied with the Theocracy . . .”

  Kat nodded as his voice trailed off. The Theocracy had poured its resources into building the largest fleet of warships it could but neglected the sinews of war. She’d known, long before Operation Knife, that the Theocracy was trying to buy up freighters and hire merchant spacers in a desperate attempt to solve their problems, yet that hadn’t been enough. The Theocratic advance into Commonwealth space might well have gotten farther if its logistics system hadn’t collapsed mere weeks after the war began.

  “They could tip the balance back in their favor,” she said.

  “That’s not the only implication,” the king confirmed. “If the Theocrats open trade links with the Jorlem Sector, they’ll have access to markets and traders from right across the human sphere. It wouldn’t be hard for them to purchase military-grade gear from a dozen potential sources, mil-spec gear that might be enough to neutralize our advantages. There would be nothing we could do about it. Diplomatic protests won’t be enough when vast sums of money are at stake.”