"You are right. I did smile rarely. But now I indulge occasionally."

"What an annoying trait. I hope I do not have to see your smile often for it makes your face look like the back end of a surat."

Aidan sipped from his own metal wine cup, then gave Joanna another smile as he returned to the subject on his mind. "I heard about what happened on Twycross, Star Commander. It is unfortunate that, in the Clans, we demote previously successful officers for blunders that are not really their fault. None of Malthus' unit could have anticipated the demolition charges."

"What you say comes close to treason, Aidan Pryde. The reasons for the loss are not relevant. The shame is in the loss itself. At any rate, you know I was not demoted merely because of that failure. What happened on Twycross demanded only that I be retested. When I did so, the outcome required a demotion in rank."

"Required?"

"Do not try to provoke me. Of course I do not enjoy being a mere Star Commander again, but I serve my Clan in any way that is ordained. It must give you great pleasure to outrank me now."

Aidan shook his head. "No, not at all, Joanna. I take no satisfaction from revenge."

"The Aidan Pryde I knew would have."

"You forget. I was not Aidan Pryde then. After my final Bloodname battle, I saw you again only long enough to hear you say that it was fate, and not my own skill, that won me the Bloodname. I have changed in some ways since that day when I became Aidan Pryde. My only aim now is to serve the Clan as both a valorous and loyal warrior."

"Strange."

"What? That I should have turned out to be a good Clan officer?"

"No. It is the curiosity of the name itself. When you were not Aidan Pryde, you were the most arrogant being I had ever observed. Except for me, that is. Now that you are Aidan Pryde, you seem to have lost that pridefulness. It is as if you are Aidan without Pryde instead of Aidan Pryde. Ah, but this wine is affecting my coherence, quiaff?"

"Aff. It has that property. But I have long wondered what you meant when you told me I owed my Bloodname victory more to fate than my abilities."

"The truth is I can no longer remember what I meant. I do not even recall saying that to you."

Aidan nodded. "A pity really. I have not stopped recalling that moment, and you have forgotten it." He could not tell Joanna, but he had once read a set of stories in which each character remembers the same events in slightly different ways. He had not understood the stories at the time. Now the meaning seemed a bit clearer.

"Think again," he said. "What mightyou have meant by attributing my victory to fate?"

Joanna shrugged. The movement shifted her tunic, giving Aidan a brief glimpse of a deep scar just below the collar line. "I do not know what I meant. We of the Clans put no store in fate. I do not even understand it. Are we not taught that we control our own destinies, that fate cannot affect our lives unless we let it?"

"And, if we let it, then we are still the masters of our fate, quiaff?"

"Aff. Or I suppose so. I have never cared much for any discussion beyond what I need to learn from the manuals and textbooks. Fate is fate. Keep it at the back door, and you do not have to worry about it."

"Maybe so. Maybe life is negotiation. Bidding against fate is what we do."

Joanna squinted at Aidan, then gulped down the rest of her wine. "You seem also to have picked up some strange ideas since I last saw you."

He had an urge to tell her about the secret library, but watching her stare somewhat longingly at the bottom of her cup, he knew that such a revelation would be unwise.

"Then enough of the past. The main reason I called you here was to discuss the campaign," Aidan said. "Would you care for more wine?"

"It is swill. But yes, I will have some more."

"For the most part, our unit has not seen as much action as others," he said, refilling her cup. "They usually hold us back in reserve, then send us in for mop-up."

"Is that complaint I hear?"

Aidan looked away from her hard stare. "Not complaint, but perhaps dissatisfaction. Do I have, well, permission to speak frankly?"

"You mean will I keep our conversation secret, quiaff?"

"Aff. I know how deeply your animosities run, but I also know you would never violate a vow."

"Oh, come off the high-sounding drivel. Any Clan warrior can be trusted once he gives his rede.I give you my redeto guard whatever secrets you are harboring. It seems odd for a subordinate to say this to a commanding officer, but, yes, you have permission to speak freely, Aidan Pryde."

Aidan put his cup down on the table and brought his hands together in front of his face in a gesture that looked to Joanna almost like praying. How many more oddities was this man going to spring on her? she wondered.

"It is about the campaign itself, its motives, its chances. When ilKhan Leo Showers was killed, I was called back to Strana Mechty with all the other Blood-named warriors. I have always done my duty toward attending councils and casting my vote when required. I have rarely participated much in the debates, however, for others often object to my viewpoint purely and simply because of the taint that still seems to hover over me. So I tend to hold my tongue.

"At this council, however, the stink of politics seemed to pervade every session. I came there excited, anticipating—"

"You? Excited?"

"As much as I get excited. You see, Joanna, this was the first election of an IlKhan in perhaps a hundred years. Not only were we participating in an historic event, but we had been forced to temporarily halt our invasion of the Inner Sphere in order to be there.

"But from the first I began to observe that the major leaders were attempting to manipulate matters. There were the two sides, the Crusaders and the Wardens, competing for support. Charges were hurled back and forth. The eventual selection of Ulric Kerensky as the new ilKhan seemed dominated by ulterior motives. What better advantage for the Crusaders than to place a Warden in power? It was a masterstroke for them to put the man prompting peace into the warlord's chair.

"Then the new ilKhan countered the Crusaders' plot by naming Natasha Kerensky to replace him as Khan of Clan Wolf. Finally he announced that the goal of the invasion was not to restore the Star League for the oppressed people of the Inner Sphere but to resurrect the League, with Clan leaders in the key seats of power."

"The difference seems insignificant to me. What is your objection?"

"I am not certain. But hearing that made me believe that the . . . idealism had gone out of the invasion. The invasion was suddenly about power, about us gaining more—"

"And I say, more power to us!" interrupted Joanna, raising her cup aloft.

"You do not see the difference?"

"Frankly, no."

"Looked at one way, the Clans are removing decadent and evil governments for the good of the people being crushed under these dictators. That is good. That is the reason for the existence of the Clans, I think. But if we are invading the Inner Sphere to take power for ourselves, to enlarge Clan domains, are we any better than the despots we conquer?"

Joanna growled and slammed her cup down on the table, which threatened to leap up even though secured to the flooring. She stood. The drink made her momentarily dizzy, but she took care not to show it.