Rules of Engagement

  “It may have,” Esmay said, ever more uncom­fortable with where this was heading, onto turf that Luci clearly knew well. “I didn’t think of it at the time-I just wanted off-planet. Away from it all.”

  “But surely you’ve met someone, sometime, who made your knees weak?”

  Before she could say anything, she felt the telltale heat rushing to her face. Luci nodded.

  “You did . . . and you don’t want anyone to know . . . Is it something . . . outworldly?”

  “Outworldly?” Barin was an outworlder, but she wasn’t sure that’s what Luci had meant.

  Now it was Luci blushing. “You know-those things people do that-we don’t do here. Or at least, not officially.”

  Esmay laughed, surprising both of them. “No, it’s nothing like that. I’ve met people like that, of course-they don’t think anything of it, and they’re quite ordinary.”

  Luci had turned brick red by now. “I always wondered,” she muttered. “How . . .”

  “We had that in the Academy prep school,” Esmay said, grinning as she remembered her own paralyzing embarrassment. “It was part of the classes on health maintenance and I nearly crawled under the desk.”

  “Don’t tell me; you can show me the data cube,” Luci said, looking away. Then she looked back. “But I do want to know about him-whoever it was-is?”

  “Was,” Esmay said firmly, though pain stabbed her. “Another Fleet officer. Good family.”

  “Did he not love you?” Luci asked. She went on without waiting for an answer. “That happened to me-the second time I fell in love, he didn’t care a fig about me. Told me so quite frankly. I thought I’d die . . . I used to ride out in the woods and cry.”

  “No, he-he liked me.” Esmay swallowed and went on. “I think-I think he liked me a lot, actually, and I-”

  “Well, what happened, then,” Luci said.

  “We . . . quarrelled.”

  Luci rolled her eyes. “Quarrel! What’s a quarrel? Surely you didn’t let one quarrel end it!”

  “He’s . . . angry,” Esmay said.

  Luci looked puzzled. “Is he violent when he’s ­angry? You still love him-that’s obvious. So why-?”

  “It’s-mixed up with Fleet business,” Esmay said. “That’s why I can’t explain-”

  “You can’t stop now,” Luci said. “And I’ll bet most of it’s about you and him anyway, and nothing to do with any universe-shattering secrets. You trust me with your horses and your money; you ought to trust me to keep a few stupid secrets about Fleet.”

  The logic made no sense, but Esmay was past caring; she’d held it in as long as she could; she had to talk to somebody. As simply as she could-which turned out to be not very simply at all-she explained about Barin, about her transfer to ­com­mand track, and her arrival at Copper Mountain. And Brun. When she first mentioned Brun, Luci stopped her.

  “So-that’s the rat in the grain bin.”

  “She’s not a rat . . . she’s a talented, bright, attractive-”

  “Rat. She went after your man, didn’t she? I can see it from here. Used to getting what she wants, probably started falling in love at twelve-”

  Esmay had to smile at Luci’s tone. “It’s not that simple, though. I mean, that’s what I thought-that’s what other people said, with all the time she spent with Barin-”

  “And why weren’t you spending time with him?”

  “I was taking double courses, that’s why. They both had more time off-everyone had more time off than I had. And then she talked to me . . . she said she wanted to be friends, but she was always telling me how to dress, how to do my hair-”

  Luci pursed her lips. “You could use some advice there-”

  “It’s my hair!” Esmay heard her own voice rise, and brought it down with an effort. “Sorry. She wanted to talk about Altiplano, and about our customs, and it sounded so . . . so condescending, and one day she was talking about Barin, and I just . . . blew up.”

  “Told her to keep her sticky fingers off your man, did you?”

  “Well . . . not exactly. I told her-” She didn’t want to repeat those angry phrases, which echoed in her head sounding far worse than they had at the time. “I called her names, Luci, and told her she had no morals worth mentioning, and should go away and quit corrupting people.”

  “Oof. I can see I don’t ever want you mad at me.”

  “And then I had to leave for the field exercise in Escape and Evasion-no, I’ll tell you about that later-and when I came back she’d left Copper Mountain, and my commander was furious with me for what I’d said to her. She was under surveillance, being the Speaker’s daughter, so they had it all recorded, and somehow the news vids had got hold of it. Barin-I thought he’d slept with her, and then he was mad at me for thinking he would. And as if that weren’t bad enough, she was later captured by pirates, and they tortured her and took her away-and everyone’s blaming me.”

  Luci gave her a long, cool look and shook her head slowly. “Landbride you may be, and Fleet officer, and decorated hero, but you’ve been acting like a school­girl with her first crush. Your brains have all gone to mush.”

  “What!?” After the previous conversation, she had expected some form of sympathy, not this.

  “Yes,” Luci said, nodding. “I guess I can see why-no back­ground at all. But still-what a wet ninny you’ve been! Let me tell you something, cousin, if you don’t get yourself back to wherever Barin is and tell him all about it-why you blew up at Brun, and that you love him-you will be confirmed as a total complete idiot.”

  Esmay could say nothing for the shock; she was aware that Luci was thoroughly enjoying what must be her first chance to lecture an elder.

  “All right, this was your first love affair. But you’ve made every mistake there is.”

  “Like what?” Esmay said.

  “Like not telling him. Not telling this Brun person. She may be the sort who snatches other peoples’ lovers for the fun of it, but if you didn’t even tell her-”

  “How could I? We hadn’t-and anyway there are the regu­lations-” Quickly she outlined the relevant portions of the code of conduct.

  “Poppycock,” Luci said confidently. On a roll, ready to lecture, apparently for hours-Esmay wondered if she had been like this with Brun. No wonder Brun had flounced away; if she’d known how to flounce, she’d have done it herself. “You weren’t exploiting Barin; emotionally you’re younger than I am. You could be reasonably careful and professional without turning into an icicle.”

  “I don’t know . . .”

  “I do. You are a fool if you sit here playing about at being Landbride, when you don’t really care about this land at all-”

  “I do so care about the land!”

  “In the abstract, yes. And you’d like it to be here, unchanged, when you visit. But you can’t convince me that you feel really passionate about whether coastal pastures are crossfenced to allow HILF grazing or left open and grazed in alternate years.”

  “Er . . . no.” Esmay scrabbled at her memory, trying to think what “HILF grazing” was.

  “Or whether we quit buying cattelope breeding stock from Garranos and develop our own breed, and if so, on what criteria.”

  “Not really . . .” She hadn’t known they had been buying cattelope from the Garranos.

  “Or whether to bring in new rootstock for the nut trees, or top-graft with the latest varieties onto the old.”

  “I suppose not.” Rootstock? Top-graft? She had not suspected her great-grandmother of knowing anything about any of this.

  “Well, then. You have always wanted a wider world, and you made your way into it. You found love there-that proves it was the right choice for you.” That was a line of reasoning Esmay had never heard, let alone thought of, before. “Don’t let anyone take it away from you,” Luci finished, triumphantly.

  “They can,” Esmay said bleakly. “They can ask me to resign my commission-”

  “Have they?”

  ??
?No, not yet. But Admiral Hornan hinted at it.”

  “There’s more than one admiral, surely. Esmaya-you are older than I am, and you are the head of my family now, but you cannot be a good Landbride if your heart is somewhere else. You want a career in Fleet, you want this man Barin-go get them. No one in our family has ever been shy about going after what he or she wanted. Don’t break with tradition.” Luci sat back, arms crossed, and gave Esmay a challenging stare.

  The tumult inside subsided gradually. It seemed so simple to Luci, and it wasn’t simple . . . and yet it was. If she had a goal-and she did-then why wasn’t she pursuing it? Why had she been side­tracked? And, more importantly, what could she do about it?

  “They’re organizing an attempt to free Brun,” Esmay said. She could talk calmly now. “The ship I was on is part of it. I should be part of it, but Lord Thornbuckle is blaming me for the whole thing-he insists that he doesn’t want me to have anything to do with it. And someone I knew in the Academy is sticking to Barin like dried egg to a plate-”

  “He’s the sort of man other women want,” Luci said, with no heat. “You said that-”

  “Yes . . . but she’s a bad one, really.”

  “So what would it take to get you back in Barin’s good graces, so you can find out if he still loves you, and back in your admiral’s good graces?”

  “I don’t know . . .” She paused. “I don’t know if Barin will ever forgive me . . .”

  “He might not,” Luci said frankly, “But you won’t know that until you see him again. And the admiral?”

  “I suppose-if I could convince them somehow that I don’t hate Brun, and I didn’t ever say that she deserved what she got-”

  “They think you said that?”

  “Casea-the woman who’s after Barin-says I did. Says she knew me at the Academy and I was always saying things about the senior Families. Of course I didn’t . . .”

  “Muerto de Dios,” Luci said. “I would have a knife for that one if I saw her. But if she’s having to lie about you to keep Barin away from you, then he’s not that eager for her. Go back, Esmay. Go back and make them know how good you are.”

  “And you, cousin?”

  “And I will breed horses, and-with your consent and sup­port-marry the man I love and have babies.”

  “And be Landbride someday?” Esmay asked, after a decent interval.

  “That is entirely up to you,” Luci said. “I don’t want that job too soon, I can tell you. At least let me prove my abilities with your herd before I take on another.”

  Esmay sat alone as the light dimmed, thinking over what Luci had said. She knew what she wanted-she was supposed to be a tactical genius-so it should be possible to figure out what she could do to get herself out of the mess she was in. If she could retrieve her intelligence from the mush her emotions had made . . .

  And yet, what she wanted had more to do with emotions than brains: what she wanted was love, and respect, and honor, and the sense that she was serving something worth serving.

  She could do nothing about it here. With every passing minute, she realized that no matter how hard she worked, or how pleasant a life she could contrive here, as one of the wealthiest women on the planet, she would never satisfy her own desires, her own needs, by being a Landbride, even the best Landbride she could be. She would always know she had run away from trouble. She would always know she had failed. In her mind’s eye, she could see herself-her civilian self-meeting an older Barin far in the ­future. They would be ­polite. He would admire, politely, her empire. And then he would go away, and she . . . she blinked back tears, and pushed herself up from the chair.

  The judge and the advocates and auditors were annoyed when she walked in on them, and insisted that she must soon return to Fleet.

  “We understood you had indefinite leave.”

  “My pardons, sirs, but there are events afoot which I cannot discuss, but which make it very desirable that I return as soon as I can. I must know how long this will take.”

  “We could, if we hurried, have the transfers ready within five days . . .”

  Esmay had already looked up the commercial passenger schedules. “Sirs, the next ship leaves in five days, but the one after is another twenty days. I’m sure you can have all ready in four days, with all the cooperation and resources of this house.”

  “It will hardly be possible,” said one of the advo­cates, but the judge waved him to silence.

  “You have honored Altiplano already by your deeds, Sera; for you, this is possible. Not easy, but possible.”

  “My thanks are eternal, and I will place the household at your service.”

  On the last of the four days, having signed the last paper, Esmay asked her father to come to the library, scene of that earlier confrontation. This time, however, she put that aside, and asked his advice. With the same precision and organization that she might have briefed someone on a military problem, she told him what she faced. “So you see, far from being a credit to our house, I am in disgrace,” she said. “But I cannot change that here-and if I stay here-”

  “I see,” he said. He nodded, sharply. “You are a credit to this house, Esmaya, and to Altiplano; you will never be a disgrace in my sight. But I agree: for your own sake, you must clear your name. If you cannot, you are always welcome to return, and you must not give up your Landbride Gift until this is over. Stand or fall, it will be as the Land­bride Suiza.”

  She had been more than half afraid he would demand that she give it up; her eyes filled.

  “As for the matter of the Speaker’s daughter-you were wrong, there, and you know it. Her rudeness does not excuse yours. But your reasons for not claiming the man’s affection makes sense to me, though perhaps not to those with different ways. Still-they will not hold it against you, if you can prove that you wish her no harm, and can convince her, when and if she is rescued. As for the man-even I have heard of Serranos. A remarkable family, and well suited to this house. You must have made friends, Esmaya, and this is the time to call on them.”

  “Approach them?”

  “Yes. When under attack, seek allies-you cannot fight all Fleet alone, and when people are lying about you, you need those who will not. If you say nothing, if you avoid them, they can more easily believe the lies are true.” His voice grew husky. “Thank you, daughter, for your great courtesy in confiding this to me . . . I always did care for you.”

  “I know.” She did know, and she also knew it had not been enough-but it was all he had to give. Bitterness rolled over her one last time, and then washed away.

  With her family’s advice in her ears, and more resources than she had ever had at her disposal, Esmay chose to take the fastest transport she could find. Civilian fast-transit passenger ships were almost as fast as Fleet, and more reliable in schedule-she would not risk being told there was no more room when she held first-class tickets. She had never traveled this way before. In her stateroom, with access to the first-class exercise and entertainment facilities, she thought of Brun, who had grown up thinking this was normal.

  If captivity and brutality were bad for an ordinary person, how must they be for a girl who had experi­enced luxury, with every whim indulged? How could she withstand the shock? She had taken the E&E course, yes, but Esmay doubted she had taken the lectures about nonresistance, passive resistance, seriously. Brun had no habit of passive survival. She had no experience of being silenced, of having no one listen to her. She would fret, rebel, bring on herself more punishment and abuse. Only if she had a possibility on which to focus her mind and effort-only if she could imagine herself into a different future-would Brun be able to concentrate her resistance into that hope, and not waste herself on futility.

  So far as Esmay knew, from the little she’d been allowed to know after being banished in disgrace, the planning had concen­trated on a covert operation to extract Brun, with no consi­deration of her own need for activity. They were clinging to the hope that she had survived, but they di
dn’t consider finding a way to include her help in her own rescue. They were thinking of her as a passive object, something to be snatched from a thief-just as her captors had thought of her as a passive object, some valuable to be stolen and appropriated for their own use.

  Just as she herself had been only an object to the man who raped her in childhood-and had himself been only a disgusting object to the sergeant who killed him-and she again had been only an object when her family ignored her memory of the rape and made her into the outcast with nightmares who lived at the far end of the house. She wondered suddenly if Brun’s family had ever seen her as a person, not a decorative object . . . if all her wild behavior had been as much a cry for recognition as Esmay’s dreams.

  And she, too, had treated Brun as a silly piece of decorative statuary-she had not seen the person behind the pretty face, the lovely hair, the exuberance. Familiar guilt rolled over her, and she pushed it away. Guilt would not help. Remorse would not help. Brun the person was in trouble, and Esmay the person would have to figure out how to help her-and not by ignoring the person she was.

  She put her mind back on the problem, as she spent an hour in the ship’s countercurrent swim salon.

  Brun was, or had been, pregnant. Would preg­nancy give her a reason to stay alive, or not? Would babies? She had told Esmay, the day of the disas­terous argument, that she didn’t want children . . . but that didn’t mean she hated them.

  That stuffed toy. Esmay stopped swimming, and the pool’s current pushed her back to the edge. That stuffed toy from the Elias Madero . . . there had been children aboard, and no children’s bodies had been found. If-perhaps-the Militia had kept the children, if Brun had been with them, would that give her a focus? Something to live for? Some reason to be ­patient, in a way that nothing in her past had made her be patient?

  It might. Esmay climbed out of the pool, dried off, and went back to her stateroom hardly noticing those who spoke to her. She spent the last days of the transit putting together everything she remem­bered about the debris from the trader, and Brun, and trying out one scenario after another. If she had fixed on the children as a means of staying sane, she would want to bring them out too. How could that be done? Esmay didn’t let herself think it might be impossible.