Rebellion of Stars (Starship Blackbeard Book 4) (6 page)

“You’ll be ready to fly?” he asked.

“I could leave right now, if I needed to,” Vargus said. “In fact, if I hadn’t been scraping around for your fleet, I’d probably be in orbit already. It’s kept me away from my work.”

“Any troubles finding people?”

“Nah, you’ve got a good reputation. Plenty of blokes happy to fly for you. So long as you hand over the gold up front. And
you’re
the one giving orders, not that stuffed shirt, Rutherford.”

In many ways, Drake was as much of a stuffed shirt as Rutherford, or had been, anyway. He’d never meant to consort with pirates and mercenaries, that was for sure. But he’d tried to carry over as much honor as he could. He paid his debts. He thrashed anyone who crossed him, and thrashed those who crossed his loyal compatriots. Fly next to
Blackbeard
and you might be killed in battle—those were the risks—but you’d never be cheated.

“I want my guns aligned before we launch,” Vargus said. “Easier to fix here than in orbit. But the other ships are coming out of the hangar. Take a look. Tell me if there’s anything you don’t like.”

Some of the craft were already out, sitting on the tarmac while forklifts and stevedores hauled in fresh supplies. Others came creeping out, pulled by lorries. Drake and Tolvern took a walk to inspect them.

Drake was already perspiring before they set out, but sweat soon streamed down his temples and from his armpits. San Pablo had been a Hroom world, but this western continent was now given over to Ladino settlements. It had been warm last time they’d visited these yards, but the hot season had arrived. It was not only baking beneath the direct sun, but humid, like a steam bath.

“I suppose I should get used to the weather,” Tolvern said. “It’s pretty much like this all the time in the lowlands of Hot Barsa.”

“It was brutal enough in the highlands.” He eyed her. “When did you figure it out?”

“That you were sending me on the away team? About three seconds after you said we’d be going back.” Tolvern unfastened her vest to let it hang open. Sweat dampened the linen shirt underneath. “Your first away team was killed. We need a new one. Brockett is a given—nobody else understands the antidote now that Henry is dead. I figured you were eying Nyb Pim to replace Sal Ypis. You need a loyal Hroom translator. Capp could be your firepower. That leaves only a commander.”

“And it turns out that I have an able military leader who is temporarily bereft of her ship. She is the logical choice for the mission.”

“Hah. Able? Not so sure about that part. I had one command, and I blew it.”

“Could have been worse,” Drake said. “You could have lost your ship.”

“Didn’t I? It’s out of commission for weeks.”

Tolvern tossed her head to the two largest hangars in the yard. Rodriguez was repairing the crippled HMS
Melbourne
in one, and in the other, Tolvern’s destroyer.

“Let me tell you about my first command,” Drake said. “I took the helm at Fort William. I was supposed to leave Albion orbit, take a swing around Thor to get the feel for my ship and new crew, and then rendezvous with a task force under Captain Peter Daw to jump to Fantalus. Do you know Daw?”

Tolvern shook her head.

“He’s retired now. An old fellow when I served under him, with mutton-chop whiskers so big they needed their own berth. A perpetually stiff upper lip and eyebrows drawn up in disdain as if the universe itself was an affront to his dignity. So much starch in his uniform, he could have been killed in battle and it would have kept him propped up at the helm. Not the sort of man you wanted to keep waiting.

“So when one of my new engines malfunctioned, I didn’t return to Fort William like I should have. Instead, I ran it hot to get to the rendezvous in time, figuring we were putting into port a few days after the jump, where I could see it repaired. Engineering warned me. I ignored the warning. Ten days into my first command, I had to dump plasma to keep my ship from blowing up.”

Tolvern laughed. “That’s pretty embarrassing, all right.”

“Oh, it gets worse. Imagine this. We were nearly at jump speed when I had to dump, so now I tell Daw to go through, and I’ll meet him on the other side. I can make it to port on one engine, no problem. He goes through, and engineering tells me I need to squeeze out a bit more speed or I won’t make it through the jump. So I run my
second
engine hot.”

“Don’t tell me you didn’t make it.”

“Oh, I made it. The engine didn’t, though. We arrived dead in the water. Nothing but auxiliary power. I had to be towed.”

Tolvern winced. “Ouch. Why have I never heard this story before?”

“If it had happened to you, would you be spreading it around?” Drake remembered the smirks on the faces of the navy engineers as they strolled onto his ship, cracking jokes about his broken-down engines. “And you don’t fix a burned-out plasma engine with duct tape and chewing gum—you need a new containment field. I would be sixteen days at the naval yards while Daw set off without me. A hunk of rock twelve million miles from anything—my crew was thrilled, let me tell you.”

“Wait, is this the same base where you fought the Hroom raiding party?”

Drake allowed a smile. “As a matter of fact, yes.”

“I’ve heard that part.”

“I was waiting to see if the Admiralty would court-martial me or merely toss my captain’s bars in the trash when three sloops of war attacked the naval outpost. I held them off for sixty-four hours while I waited for Daw to relieve me.”

“And that’s why you didn’t lose your commission, I suppose.”

“You feel like a goat now, Tolvern,” he told her, “but take care of business on Hot Barsa, and you’ll return feeling ten feet tall. They’ll build a statue to you back home some day.”

“Hah. Even on Auckland, they’ve got bigger celebrities than that.”

“Who? The annual winners of the local sheep dog trials?” Drake said. He and Tolvern were both from the same sleepy rock way out on the end of the Zealand Islands. “Or maybe that guy who built his entire home out of seashells. Remember him?”

“Thanks, Captain,” she said.

“For what?”

“For making me feel better.”

“It’s always a good idea to pump someone up before you send her to her near-certain death.” He said this with a smile in his voice, but perhaps it was a little too close to the truth, because her expression turned serious again.

They spent a little bit of time looking at the mercenary ships on hire. Mostly pirates, obviously, although in a time of war, that designation was fluid. Malthorne had hired a few privateers himself to harass shipping out of Saxony, but Drake had an easier time finding ships. Malthorne had ordered the atomic bombardment of San Pablo’s eastern continent, destroying the Hroom cities on that side of the planet in order to stir up war against the empire. Even on the human side, that gesture had been taken poorly.

There were several small schooners and two frigates, plus several ships that were harder to define. New Dutch and Ladino craft stripped down and cobbled together from so many pieces that Drake could only categorize them as “war ships,” “salvagers,” and “armed galleons.” Not to mention a few that he considered so underarmed and poorly armored that it was pointless to hire them at all. Tiny three- or four-men craft that had to be hauled through jump points, but then could scurry around asteroid belts, staying out of the way of powerful enemies. Unless Isabel Vargus had a darn good reason, he’d tell her to cut them loose.

The sum total was unimpressive. Drake thought
Blackbeard
and
Vigilant
could handle the lot. Certainly, they’d be no match for Malthorne’s heavy cruisers, corvettes, and destroyers, let alone
Dreadnought
. But, if you threw in Vargus’s
Outlaw
, plus the always-reliable
Pussycat
, he supposed they would serve their purpose.

“I wish we had
Orient Tiger
,” Tolvern said after they’d chatted briefly with one of the schooner captains. “Catarina’s ship is better than any of these, and I’ll wager she’s ten times the commander, too.”

“Catarina Vargus only looks out for herself,” he said. “So put that idea out of your head.”

“Yeah, I know. I’m just saying. If there’s a way to put out the word, if we can lure her back, she’s worth the money. I’d even take that scary mate of hers with the Gatling gun for an arm.”

By now, they’d taken a tour around the tarmac and visually inspected the mercenary armada. The shuttle was waiting to haul them back into orbit, where the fleet was finishing taking on supplies in preparation for a quick departure, but Tolvern wanted to take a final look at her destroyer. They entered the hangar to see her ship stretched out beneath cranes. Men and women crawled like insects over the hull, using torches to cut loose segments of damaged plating. Holes opened deep into the interior, where others worked on the electrical, plumbing, and other internal systems.

Tolvern muttered a low oath. Then, “Sorry for the bad language, sir. I just—to see her like this.”

“I understand. Get it out of your system and move on. You’ve got a new mission.”

“Yes, sir.” She paused. “So, me, Brockett, Capp, and Nyb Pim? Will you bring on
Philistine
’s pilot while we’re gone?”

“Not Capp. She stays on
Blackbeard
,” Drake said. “She’ll pilot while Nyb Pim is on Hot Barsa, translating for you.”

“I could use a marine. Someone handy with a gun. Who will go in her place?”

“Carvalho.”

He said it simply, but studied Tolvern’s face to see how she’d react. Tolvern and Capp had become friends of sorts since those initial days of the mutiny, in spite of their class and education differences. But Tolvern had never warmed to the rough Ladino gunner. He was Capp’s lover, and seemed to enjoy goading Tolvern. Drake didn’t think Carvalho held any malice for her, but Tolvern took it seriously.

“Carvalho is good with a gun,” she said, tone cautious. “Keeps his head in a scrape. I used to think he was a backstabbing crook. More interested in drinking, thieving, and screwing anything that walks than being a good crew member.”

“And now? What do you think?”

“I suppose he hasn’t stolen anything for a while.”

Drake smiled. “Capp will miss him for the other two things.”

“Oh, I don’t know. Drinking, she can do on her own. And I’m sure she’ll find a fellow to fill in for the rest.”

He’d lightened up on the fraternization rules, partly because he’d violated those rules himself with Catarina Vargus, but he still preferred having Capp and Carvalho separated during combat. In any event, Carvalho would manage well enough on Hot Barsa. No questioning his bravery or ability.

“Well, then,” Drake said. “Let’s get back to
Blackbeard
and figure out how to get you down to Hot Barsa alive.”

“I would appreciate that, sir. And to be frank, I’d appreciate making plans for a safe exit, while we’re at it.”

Chapter Seven

Drake emerged from the return jump into the Barsa system to find an urgent message from the Earl of Westmarch, who had been installed as governor of Saxony. No coward, he’d been justifiably alarmed to see the remaining rebel ships abandon Saxony and set off for parts unknown. Meanwhile, the governor had caught wind of Malthorne’s departure from Albion on
Dreadnought.
Word had it that the brutal General Fitzgibbons had troop transports filled with Royal Marines.

Malthorne could only mean to seize Saxony and flatten the rebellion in one blow, the earl insisted. Drake absolutely must return at once to mount a defense. The earl was an efficient administrator and a calm hand at the wheel in managing the jittery populace of Saxony, and so the strength of his demand indicated near panic, so far as Drake could tell.

Another problem was Mercia. The third planet in the core Albion kingdom had been flirting with joining the rebellion for the past several months, but now the Mercians had cold feet. Rutherford’s uncle, the Duke of West Mercia, declined to stake his claim to the throne of Albion. This, in spite of the fact that he was closer in line than Malthorne, was not a usurper, and seemed to have no tyrannical impulses. Overthrow Malthorne, and it was clear that the people of Albion and her two colony worlds would support the duke.

But the duke said he didn’t want the throne. Neither did the other powerful dukes, earls, and barons of Mercia want anything to do with the rebellion. The Mercians still claimed neutrality, but they would apparently return to Albion’s fold without complaint if the rebellion was put down.

Blasted cowards is what they were. They didn’t want Malthorne—the man had as good as killed King Bartholomew himself and meant to corrupt the throne for his own vainglory—but neither did they think the rebellion stood any chance. Not with Saxony abandoned by the rebel fleet.

Drake calmly sent responses to both Saxony and Mercia. In it, he broadcast his next move. Drake had tested the Barsa system’s defenses and found them wanting. Now, he was back in the system to mount a full-scale assault on Hot Barsa. He meant to wipe out Malthorne’s forces in the system, capture or destroy his sugar galleons, and widely distribute arms and the sugar antidote to rebellious Hroom. Once the primary source of Malthorne’s wealth was wiped out, he would return to Saxony to defend the planet.

All of this pronouncement was meant to find its way into Malthorne’s hands. To goad him, force him to defend his land and wealth on Hot Barsa.

Had Drake been the one in possession of Albion, with eighty percent of the Albionish population, two-thirds of the fleet, and the majority of its resources, he’d have abandoned Hot Barsa and focused on seizing Saxony. At the helm of
Dreadnought
and with Fitzgibbons’s marines, that could be done whether Drake and Rutherford returned to Saxony’s defense or not.

But he was not the lord admiral. The lord admiral was a proud, vengeful man. Acquisitive and greedy. Drake counted on these character flaws to force Malthorne to defend Barsa. And so he made sure that the enemy received word of his intentions.