Star Trek: The Empty Chair (42 page)

She raised her eyebrows, then nodded acquiescence. “So after all our planning for direct injection into the city, now we must after all advance across terrain. And that leaves us only one option. We will have to go in through the Pass, past the Firefalls.”

“But not until we’ve first suckered as many of their troops away from ch’Rihan as possible,” Kirk said. “My intention is to turn this exercise into a logistical nightmare for them. We are going to strand as many of them as we can on ch’Havran,
by doing everything possible to give them the impression that that’s where we’re going. That will be your opportunity,” he said, looking over at Gurrhim, “to stop being dead. When you turn up on a broadcast, alive and breathing, and announce that you’re heading for ch’Havran to take your planet back, everyone’s going to find that completely believable, especially if we plant other information on ch’Rihan to confirm it at the highest levels. It’ll then seem far too plausible to waste time on groundless suspicions that it’s all a ploy. After all, it makes perfect sense for the insurgency to try to consolidate ch’Havran first. It’s always been the more reluctant of the Hearthworlds to be subjected to the Imperial yoke, going right back to that old suspicion that the territorial settlement lotteries were rigged.”

Ael smiled. “You are truly beginning to understand us.”

“Only beginning?” Kirk said. “We’ll discuss that later. At any rate, we’ll be acting in every way we can as if ch’Havran was where all our landings-in-force will be. They’ll think we intend to go there and consolidate our power before moving on ch’Rihan. But they’ll have it exactly backward. Once they’ve swallowed the bait and committed large troop movements to ch’Havran, we do the switch and head for ch’Rihan instead. That’s the point at which we interdict transport, and start large-scale jamming. They’ll be doing the same, of course. It’s going to be interesting to see whose jamming wins. It’s possible theirs may. But we have other communications options to exploit that they won’t expect. And after that, things will start to get interesting.”

Kirk sat back in his seat, studying the table. “What if they do not swallow the bait, Captain?” Veilt said.

“Then we go ahead with the assault on Ra’tleihfi regardless, on a slightly different timetable, and using the transporter interdiction tool in different ways. But I firmly believe that they’ll swallow it, because Ael has been kind enough to show me the most recent war-gaming scenarios that have
been leaked to her from the Grand Fleet’s War College. We’re going to seem to be doing exactly what the very, very few tacticians to model this situation have said an insurgency would do. Not for the same reasons, of course, but every strategist is always happiest to see the enemy doing what he
believes
he should. It usually makes him so happy that when reality starts doing something else entirely, as we will, he disbelieves it for just long enough to render him vulnerable, and for us to do all the damage we need to.” He let out a breath. “This will also be the time to take the Neutral Zone’s surveillance satellites down—again, on both sides. Starfleet won’t be able to see what’s happening, which has its advantages at the moment. But neither will Grand Fleet. If we can also plant with them the idea that the Federation
itself
has taken those satellites down…”

“Before, they might not have credited that,” Ael said. “But now the presence of Starfleet vessels at Augo will render them all the more likely to believe there will be a Federation strike force associated with our attack. Their worst fears will seem to be coming true all at once.”

“The constructive bluff,” Jim said, glancing at Ael. “Very useful in poker, as you’ll find out someday when we get around to playing a real game.”

“That was not real?” Ael said, ever so demurely.

Jim gave her a look.

Thala looked down at the battle plan and nodded slowly. “There is a great deal here to digest. Many more layers of detail. But the main structure of the plan seems sound. Now all we must do is attack, and find out how sound it really is.”

They looked at one another.

“If our schedule continues to go to plan,” Veilt said, “we will arrive at ch’Rihan in two days. We will need to be alert for the next day to make sure that we are not caught by surprise by some last-minute attempt to forestall our arrival in Eisn’s system.”

“But I think we need not fear that now,” Ael said. She had been turning this issue over in her mind for some time. “I think the Three will be saying, ‘If the traitress is so willing to come here, let her come. After all the trouble she’s caused us, easier now to deal with her on our own doorstep than to chase her all over space. If she dies spectacularly within easy view of the Hearthworlds, that will suit us. If she falls into our hands, the whole reason for the insurrection falls apart, and that too suits.’” She gave Veilt and Thala an angry smile. “And in that concept lies a hidden strength for our side that cannot be counted in numbers of troops. If my last day’s experience is anything to go by, neither the government nor Fleet understand at all that what is happening now, would have happened sooner or later whether I or the Sword were involved or not. And that fact, perhaps, will be worth more to us than twice or three times our numbers when we assemble outside the city.”

“Always assuming,” Kirk said, “that the people rise.”

Ael shook her head. “No. If they merely fail to rise
against
us, that will be more than sufficient. The government, you understand, expects them to rise in
its
defense. I think the Three will find that they have grossly miscalculated.”

“That the event must prove,” Thala said, and rose. So did all the others. “Meantime, we remain here twelve more hours to allow the last of our shipborne assets to join us. Then—onward to ch’Rihan.”

Arrhae woke up the next morning with the strangely disconnected feeling that had hung over every morning since her meeting with tr’Anierh. She lay there, staring at her ceiling, and thought:
I am still alive. It is a wonder.

She sat up and looked out the window. It was very early. Arrhae was almost getting used to these dawn awakenings now—a harking-back to her days as
hru’hfe,
when her duties
would have meant she needed to be up so early to supervise the household staff. Now, though, she knew the source of such early wakefulness.
Stress,
she thought,
nothing but the sheer stress of it all—the fear of the ringing commlink, of the sound of weapons blasting in the front door. I am not built for this kind of thing.

But then she laughed out loud at herself, and stretched, looking out the window once more.
If I’m not, letting the Federation send me here was a poor career choice.
She threw the silks aside and got up, looking out at the weather. It was cloudy at the moment, but it was the kind of light cloud that suggested it would burn off when the sun had been up awhile.

Arrhae went into the ’fresher and took care of her morning routine, then headed out of her chamber into her little media room again. Since she started getting up so early again, Mahan had changed the household routine a little, and now always left a hot pitcher of morningdraft on the sideboard near the viewer, along with some plates of wafers and burnt bread and other light morning foods.

Arrhae brought the viewer up and flicked through various of the news channels, initially not much noticing what they were showing. It had been three days ago, that meeting with tr’Anierh, and once she had gotten inside her own door and shut it behind her, she had become most uncertain of what effect she might have had on him. All the rest of that day, and all that night, Arrhae had either paced the house like a trapped beast, or sat or lain awake in the dark or near-dark, certain that at any moment the people would arrive who would take her away to death or worse. But it did not happen. The next day Arrhae had spent in front of the viewer, waiting to see what result might come from the battle she knew was even then taking place at Augo. But no news came at all.

That, more than anything, started to calm her somewhat.
Had there been a great victory, even a moderate one, it would have been all over every channel. But the news channels remained, for all that day, as relatively uncommunicative as they had been for weeks, talking about “disturbances” or “isolated incidents” here and there in the Hearthworlds as if such things had happened forever and were of no particular import. That night Arrhae actually slept for a few hours, and woke up in the dark of dawn feeling merely anxious, not utterly terrified as she had been the day before.

That second evening, though, was when the news had begun to change. It seemed like a relatively minor business, at first. The government was announcing “security alerts” in all the major cities, a “civilian readiness exercise.” “Readiness” seemed to mean that people were expected to be ready to lock their doors and stay inside when they were told to. They were also to make sure they had several weeks’ worth of food and water laid by, and additionally had to see to it that whatever legal weapons they might possess were ready for use in what was being referred to as “a mass call-up of civilian defense assets.”
And what about the illegal weapons?
Arrhae had thought with some amusement when House Khellian’s version of this notification arrived.
Should we get those ready too?

But these announcements told Arrhae what she needed to know, and grim though they might have seemed on the surface, they nonetheless lifted a great weight from her heart. The battle at Augo had happened, and it had gone well for the Free Rihannsu.
And now they’re coming here. But the government doesn’t know how to say, doesn’t
dare
say, “invasion”—because then there would be too many questions. How is this happening; why is this the first we’ve heard of it; why haven’t you protected us better?
And when people first heard that word used openly, something dangerous might happen: the unexpected.

So it was that Arrhae was one of very few people in the
city who knew that they were all about to be caught in the middle of a major military engagement, and somehow, on her own account, anyway, Arrhae found it hard to be afraid.
Is it because I’ve been seeing this coming for so long? Or because I’ve become Rihannha enough to
want
it to be happening, at whatever price?
For even before things had started happening in the Hearthworlds and the Empire this last year, Arrhae had sensed a long slow undercurrent building, a murmuring among ordinary people who kept hearing and sharing stories about things that had happened to friends of friends, to distant relatives—stories of heartless or cruel or stupid actions by the government or its agents. There had always been stories like that, sure enough, but over the past year they had seemed to gain momentum and weight, becoming an everyday matter, rather than something sporadic. Then slowly the small cruelties and little oppressions from above seemed to grow in number, to get closer. They became commonplace. But people were not taking them for granted. The murmuring grew quieter, but there was a lot more of it. Not that she heard it herself. Now that she was a Senator, Arrhae had noticed with some discomfort that even her own staff watched what they said in her hearing, or occasionally looked afraid at the thought of what they might have said in front of her once. Mahan, however, had privately confirmed her suspicions. The Rihannsu of ch’Rihan, at least those he knew, were becoming restive, frightened, and angry.

And it is not a good idea to frighten my people,
Arrhae thought.

She sat in her chair for a while and drank her hot draft, flicking from channel to channel. She was almost amused to see that, despite all the alerts, the information about increased food supplies being made available and link-words for householders to call for advice, there was still not the slightest sense of what all the readiness was supposed to be
about.
The newsreaders speculated about the announcements
in a manner that managed to be both tense and casual, as if this were something that happened every day—or as if they had been told to make it seem so. It could not have been easy work, and Arrhae felt sorry for them.
But my part is harder. I must sit here knowing at least some of the truth, and wondering what to do about it that will not put myself and the household in danger.
And then there was the Old Lord to think about, too, up there in the mountains, chivvying the construction workers who were working on the old shieling-house. At least the Old Lord was far enough away from civilization that he was unlikely to come to grief due to any civil unrest. But nonetheless, when the planet came under attack, his safety had to be thought of. And who was seeing about
his
food? And were his weapons in proper condition, and did he have enough clothing?

Arrhae smiled at herself, then.
I am a
hru’hfe
to the bone,
she thought. She changed channels one more time and found herself listening to an intent discussion of yet another food-availability announcement, one that spent entirely too much time concentrating on groundroot. Something about the tone of it, or perhaps just any Rihannha’s usual reaction to the wretched root, especially when it might be all you had to eat for a while, made Arrhae start to frown.
I want to
do
something. I am not going to just sit here anymore.

The thought decided her. Arrhae went back to her chambers and got dressed in the most casual clothes she could find—an old soft tunic and long skirt, and some comfortable softboots well worn in by what now must be years of wear. Then she went out into the front hall and fished her oldest morning-cloak out of the closet nearest the door.

Sure enough, Mahan was in the hall within a matter of seconds. “Mistress,” he said, “where are you going? Was there a call from the Senate?” And then he blinked, and saw how she was dressed.

“Elements be thanked, no,” Arrhae said. “They’re not in
session today. But, Mahan, I can’t bear it. I’m going to market.”

“Mistress, no! You are a Senator, you are a—”