Mercenary (34 page)

“I'd have chosen battle,” Roulette said. “But it was a nice ploy. My father wouldn't have fallen for it, but Bloodstone's a sucker. Look, before I get locked up, may I meet your strategist?”

“This way,” Spirit said, leading her toward Emerald's site. I could see that Rue had developed quick respect and even some awe of my sister.

It followed as Spirit had said: We chased down the semiderelict Fiji ships and made them captive without resistance. Bloodstone was dead, one of the unlucky percentage, though perhaps it made no difference, since we would have executed him, anyway.

We put the survivors on trial. We lacked time or facilities for a full-blown legal process, but we were as fair as was feasible in military doctrine. Each pirate was interviewed separately by a legal specialist from Spirit's S-1 Adjutant staff, since that was concerned with personnel, and allowed to present his case before the panel of judges with the help of the specialist. This process can take months or years in the civilian society; it was jammed into days or even hours here, very much the assembly line. But we did try to be fair as we performed our triage. The established criminals were summarily executed; Spirit supervised that aspect, as it was a function of her office and I lacked the stomach for it despite my hatred of piracy. My sister had always been tougher than I was; now it showed. The doubtful cases were put aboard a patched pirate ship and sent home under suspended sentence; if we ever encountered them active in space again, they would be executed without trial. We branded them, literally, for future identification. I suffered a qualm about this, too; in fact, my antipathy toward pirates was suffering some attrition, as it came to the cruel mechanics of implementing it. I realized I had been unrealistic; I had wanted to abolish piracy without actually hurting any pirates. But we were far from Jupiter now, and reality was stern.

The third group of processed pirates concerned me directly. Spirit sent me a number of men who were prospects for induction into the Navy. I discovered I did not like this, either. But Commander Repro braced me on this subject, and he was again correct. We did need to salvage what we could, and that included men as well as equipment. Otherwise we would find ourselves with a number of ships we could not properly man. So I girded myself to these necessary chores of attitude and interviewed the prospects, using my talent to separate the sheep from the goats. The goats were shipped out, unbranded; these were noncriminal pirates. I proffered employment to the sheep, provided they would swear allegiance to the Jupiter Navy. Some would and some would not; we kept the first and shipped the second.

With one exception: Shrapnel. He was a tough, smart man of about my own age, an experienced commander of men. His dossier informed me he had served in the military force of one of the Uranian nations and deserted when lured by the wife of a superior. He had turned her down, and the vengeful female had accused him of what she had tempted him with, forcing him to flee the wrath of the prospective cuckold. Shrapnel was an honest man, forced to piracy by circumstance; there was a price on his head on Uranus, and any legitimate government would have extradited him to Uranus. He had acted with honor, even in the Fiji band, holding his place there because of his competence and the fact that Bloodstone trusted him as a lieutenant. Bloodstone had not liked him but had known Shrapnel would not betray him, which was more than could be said for most Fiji pirates. The men of Shrapnel's command had not raped or pillaged wantonly, in sharp contrast to the Fiji norm. I knew that if Shrapnel swore allegiance to me, he would be an excellent officer. We needed him, for now we had several new ships to fill.

But he would not so swear. The Fijis had been defeated, and Shrapnel had been injured and unconscious when captured, but he had not yielded. He came before me in chains, for he was a powerful man, and versed in martial arts; he had tried to make a break for it as soon as he recovered consciousness.

“I can offer you security for the duration of this campaign,” I told him. “I can release you to a region of your choice when we return to Jupiter. All I ask is that you serve me for this campaign.”

“I serve Bloodstone,” he said firmly.

“Bloodstone is dead.”

“Then I serve the current leader of the Fiji.”

“The Fiji band has been destroyed.”

“Then I serve whatever band takes over the Fiji territory.”

I smiled. “That will probably be the Solomons. They have surrendered to us, and we are freeing them provided they no longer oppose us and stay within interplanetary law in all matters except the technicality of gambling. No murders, no raids on innocent ships, just business with voluntary clients.”

“Straight has always been that way,” Shrapnel said. “If he moves in, I will serve him. But you are the representative of a planetary navy, the kind that honors extradition. I will not serve you.”

I sighed. I wanted this man, pirate though he was, but that same quality of honor that made him worthwhile also barred him from the Navy. “Swear, then, that if I free you, you will practice no piracy and will not oppose the Jupiter Navy.”

He stood silent, refusing.

“Then I cannot free you,” I said regretfully. “You are too competent to set loose. It seems a waste.”

“That's war.”

I thought of another angle. “Will you accept hostage status and obey the officer's code as a prisoner?”

He considered. This code granted a high-ranking prisoner freedom of person, on his bond not to abuse the privilege. It allowed the prevailing power to treat honorable prisoners as hostages rather than felons.

Roulette had that status and was honoring it; she had not been “locked up.” It was a considerable convenience for both victor and vanquished.

“Does that permit extradition?”

“No extradition for hostages,” I said.

“Then I will accept it.”

I turned to Spirit. “Free this man on his own recognizance. Assign him a hammock and an officer's pass for facilities.”

She nodded. This was an expedient compromise, and it offered a lot: lodging, meals, courtesy, and use of the Tail.

Even in active war, there are periods of inertia. The processing of pirates, rushed as it was, still took time. Unfortunately, this also gave the other pirate bands a chance to analyze what had happened and to make their plans and build up their forces for defense. The next band we planned to tackle was the Marianas, the strongest in the Belt, the pirates who had taken over the Jupiter base. They dealt in human slavery, and they were absolutely ruthless. They had no intention of being wiped out by my task force.

They had three battleships and a good support fleet, and they knew how to use them. The plain fact was that the Marianas were stronger than we were, despite our acquisition of a number of new ships.

About the time this came clear, we suffered another blow. Somehow, someone had pulled a string and gotten our mission reduced in importance. Spirit was first to learn of this. She came to me in such a fury as I had not seen in her since our childhood years. “Those black-hole admirals!” she swore. “They cut off our supplies!”

“They what?” I tend to react somewhat inadequately when surprised, which is one reason I don't enjoy being surprised.

“They couldn't recall our task force, because that would suggest the Jupe Navy was giving up,” she explained. “But we haven't performed the way they anticipated—”

“We've been winning, not losing,” I filled in.

"Precisely. So they have deleted the authorization for supply convoys on the pretext of cost-cutting.

We're supposed to make do with what we have."

“What we have will disappear in the first battle!”

“Which will force us to close shop and come home before we starve, even if we win.”

We held a council-of-war staff meeting. All our officers were angry, but it was Emerald who had most positive suggestion. “We can forage from the land. The real Carolines and Solomons and Fijis are not pirates; they are decent, hardworking colonists. We can get what we need from them.”

“That sort of thing alienates the populace,” Mondy warned. “We can't afford to act like pirates ourselves.”

“We don't have to act like pirates,” Phist pointed out. “We can pay for our purchases.”

“Up to a point,” Spirit said. “We don't have surplus funds for an extended stay.”

“Unless we borrow from the payroll,” he said.

There was a pause. Tampering with the payroll was extremely irregular business.

“If the men authorized it—” Spirit said.

We put it to the men, i.e., the enlisted personnel, male and female, and allowed three days to debate the issue. Abort the Belt mission or borrow from their pay in order to extend the mission. Victory over the Belt pirates would lead to some legitimate plunder that would be used to reimburse the payroll in kind. It was awkward and risky but feasible in theory. It was also un-Navy.

They hashed it out and voted, and decided by a clear if not overwhelming majority to extend the mission.

But this did tighten our time. We had to meet and defeat the Marianas soon, and we still lacked the fleet strength to defeat them, unless Emerald could come up with some phenomenal ploy.

“Mohi Heath,” she said. “The Mongol commander Subedei was outmanned and far from home in 1241, but he used a daring tactic to overwhelm the Europeans. I think it would work for us. But it's risky. We really need more ships.”

“Jupiter won't send more,” Spirit said. She remained angry.

“We could get more,” Mondy said.

“How?”

“The Solomons.”

“The Solomons won't fight for us,” Spirit said. “They won't fight against us, because Straight surrendered and we retain their hostages, but they certainly aren't with us.”

“But that would change,” Mondy said, “if we took the proper step.”

Emerald's eyes seemed to develop an internal glow. “You conniving bastard! Are you planning what I think you're planning?”

“Just moving up the schedule a little, on the inevitable.”

Now Spirit caught on. “Would it work, so soon?”

“What are you talking about?” I demanded.

Juana, the ever-present secretary, was standing beside Spirit. “Don't ask, sir.”

“Fetch Brinker; she'll know,” Emerald said smugly.

“When you girls start acting mysterious,” Phist said, his voice carrying the same baffled annoyance I felt,

“it's time for us men to beware.”

Juana hurried out to fetch Brinker. “I think Straight had this in mind from the outset,” Emerald said. “It was tacit in the surrender. He knew all along it would come to this.”

“Knew what?” I asked.

Emerald exchanged a dark glance with Spirit. Both smiled. Neither answered me.

Brinker arrived with Juana. Ordinarily Brinker would have been aboard her own ship, the destroyer we had captured from the Carolines, but she was on the Sawfish now to help interview pirates and ascertain their competencies. As a former pirate herself, she had excellent insight in this regard. Now she was smiling grimly; evidently Juana had told her what was up.

“Will it work, Little Foot?” Emerald asked.

“It should, Rising Moon,” Brinker agreed. “That's the pirate psychology.”

“Of course it is,” Repro said. “But there's one problem you vixens may not have considered.”

“Peat Bog's no vixen!” Emerald retorted, reaching across to take Mondy's hand affectionately. “He's as cunning, underhanded, sinister, devious, and scheming as any of us.”

“Haven't you been playing keep-away long enough?” Phist asked.

“Must have,” Emerald agreed. “Who's going to tell him?”

Now the women were serious. None of them wanted to tell.

“I'll do it,” Mondy said. He faced me formally. “Sir, if the men must sacrifice their pay, you must sacrifice also. You will have to marry the pirate wench.”

“What?” I believe I have mentioned my stupidity when surprised.

“Roulette,” he clarified, as if I didn't know. “Straight's hourglass daughter. The creature you've had your eye on. Now you can have her.”

I remained baffled. “Why?”

“Because, sir, the pirates will only follow one of their own. Marry her, and the Solomons will form an alliance with us and help us fight the Marianas. With the Solomons actively on our side, our force will be equivalent to that of the enemy. And if the enemy doesn't know about that alliance, the element of surprise could be our crucial advantage.”

“I'll say!” Emerald agreed. “We need them, sir.”

“But Roulette hates me!” I protested weakly.

“That depends on how you look at it, Worry,” Emerald said. "She knows her father intends her for you.

She hates the idea of submitting, especially the way it has to happen."

“The way—”

“The one small problem,” Repro said with heavy irony.

“You will have to rape her, sir,” Mondy explained.

“I what?”

“That is the pirate way,” Repro said. “These forms are important; they must be honored.”

Appalled, I looked at the women, as different from each other as they could be: Emerald, Spirit, Juana, and Brinker. Surely they could not approve. Slowly, in unison, all four nodded affirmatively.

“But I wouldn't—” I protested faintly. “I couldn't —”

“We shall just have to teach you how, sir,” Emerald said with a metallically brilliant smile.

Now, at last, the reason for Rue's rage toward me was clear. She had known. She had cause.

Yet the cold equations of this situation were also clear. This was, indeed, a thing I had to do. I could not escape it.

They taught me with a certain vicious pleasure. Commander Phist, a genuinely decent man, absented himself from the proceedings, and Isobel Brinker pleaded the press of other business, but the others pitched in with what I felt was a bit more enthusiasm than was strictly warranted. They required Brinker to write out a summary of the pirate marriage convention before she departed, and this helped clarify what Straight had said about his marriage to Flush, and why he had told me that.

It seemed it was not mere abduction and rape; it was an intricately structured program, almost a play, with the words and actions virtually choreographed. The groom raided the bride's ship—in theory, pirates always lived aboard their ships, even when comfortable planetoid facilities were available—carried her away bound and gagged so that her screams would not alert her male relations, and brought her to his own ship. Obviously, today, this had to occur with the tacit cooperation of the bride's family, as it was just about impossible for an enemy to infiltrate a ship undiscovered unless he used a gas bomb. He would have to wear a space suit and put her in one, making the business immensely awkward. So in practice the bride was generally turned over to the groom's ship peaceably, and the abduction occurred from her private chamber. Terrified, she was not supposed to resist effectively. But later, when she realized what her fate was to be—