No one knew where the People's Republic was headed. Available reports suggested that the Navy had attempted a coup following its initial defeats, but if it had, it certainly hadn't done so very effectively. The attack that wiped out the entire Havenite government—and the heads of most of the prominent Legislaturalist families which had ran it—had been as brilliant as it was savage, but there'd been no effective follow-through, and it had provoked the formation of a Committee of Public Safety in the People's Quorum. That committee now controlled the central organs of the PRH, and it was moving with merciless dispatch to assure that no military coup could succeed.

The result was chaos within the Havenite military. No one yet knew how many officers had been arrested, but the arrest—and execution—of Admiral Amos Parnell, the PN's chief of naval operations, and his chief of staff had been confirmed. There were also confused reports of resistance and infighting as the new committee pressed ahead with its purge of "unreliable" senior officers, and one or two of the Republic's member systems seemed to have seized the chance to rebel against the hated central government.

Every strategic bone in Caparelli's body cried out to ram the Star Kingdoms current advantage home. The enemy was in disorder, savaging himself internally, some, at least, of his star systems in open rebellion and his senior officers more than half paralyzed lest any act of initiative be misconstrued as treason against the new regime. God only knew how many of them might actually come over to Manticore's side if the RMN pressed a heavy offensive now!

The thought of watching such a chance slip through his hands turned Caparelli's stomach, but he hadn't been allowed to do anything about it. In fact, he might never be allowed to, and the reason was politics.

Duke Cromarty's majority in Parliament had disappeared with the defection of both the Conservative Association and Sir Sheridan Wallace's "New Men" to the side of the Opposition. The Government's support in the Commons was solid; in the Lords, it was well short of a majority... and there'd been no formal declaration of war.

Caparelli's teeth ground together in acid frustration. Of course there hadn't! The People's Republic had never declared war during its half-century of conquest; such formal niceties would only have served to warn its victims. The Star Kingdom, unfortunately, didn't do things that way. Without a formal, legal declaration, carried in both houses, the Constitution empowered the Cromarty Government only to defend the integrity of the Star Kingdom. Anything more aggressive required the declaration of a state of war, and the Opposition leaders insisted the letter of the law be obeyed.

Their solidarity was unlikely to last, for their philosophies and motives were too fundamentally contradictory, but for the moment those motives were reinforcing one another, not clashing.

The Liberals hated the very thought of military operations. Once their initial panic had passed, they'd responded with a spinal reflex opposition to all things military that never consulted the forebrain at all. They knew better than to publicly restate their long-standing position that Manticore's military buildup was an unnecessary provocation of Haven—even they saw the suicide potential in that, given the public reaction to recent events—but they'd found another way to justify resistance to sanity. They'd decided what was happening inside the People's Republic represented the birth of a reform movement committed to the overthrow of "the old, militaristic regime" in recognition of "the uselessness of resorts to brute force," and they wanted "to help the reformers achieve their goals in a climate of peace and amity."

Their allies in Earl Gray Hill's Progressive Party no more believed in the pacifism of this Committee of Public Safety than Caparelli did. They wanted to let the PRH stew in its own juice—after all, if the Republic self-destructed, there'd be no need for further military operations—which made them even stupider than the Liberals. Whoever the brains behind the Committee of Public Safety was, he'd acted with dispatch and energy to secure control. Unless someone from outside toppled him, he was going to hang onto it, and sooner or later he'd finish crushing the last domestic resistance and turn his attention back to Manticore.

Then there was the Conservative Association—reactionary, xenophobic, isolationist to the core... and pigheaded enough to make the Progressives look smart. The Conservatives believed (or claimed to believe) that the Republics initial, shattering reverses would lead the new leadership to abandon any further thought of attacking the Manticoran Alliance lest still worse befall them, which overlooked both the tonnage imbalance and the fact that the People's Navy had to be lusting to avenge its humiliation. And last, and most contemptible, were the New Men, whose sole motive was a cynical bid to secure greater parliamentary clout by selling their votes to the highest bidder.

It was insane. Here they were, with a golden opportunity to strike deep and hard, and the politicians wanted to throw it away ... and leave his Navy to suck up the losses when the bill came due!

He dragged his mind back from its increasingly well-worn path of angry resentment and cleared his throat.

"Just how bad is the situation, Milady? I spoke with Duke Cromarty yesterday and assured him the Navy would support him, but—" Caparelli broke off as Morncreek looked at him sharply, then he shrugged. "I thought you knew he'd commed me, Milady."

"Well, I didn't. Nor did he happen to mention it when we spoke this afternoon. Exactly what sort of 'support' did you promise him?"

"Nothing at all on the domestic side, Milady." Caparelli was careful to avoid words like "coup," and Morncreek relaxed a bit. "I simply assured him we would continue to obey the lawful orders of Her Majesty and her ministers if he instructed me to continue operations. We can do that without a declaration, but not for very long, I'm afraid. If I completely suspend all current construction and divert every dollar I can from our essential infrastructure, I could probably sustain operations for another three months or so. After that, we'd need a special appropriation—assuming we don't have a formal declaration to free the Exchequer's hands—and I don't see how we can expect to get that if we can't get the declaration in the first place."

He paused with a shrug, and Morncreek nibbled gently on a fingernail, then sighed.

"The next time the Prime Minister coms you directly, Sir Thomas, I would appreciate your informing me of the fact," she said, but there was as much weariness as frost in her voice. "I suppose the Duke could order you to continue offensive operations, as long as the money holds out, without a declaration, but I assure you there'd be a furor in Parliament that would make the Gryphon Crisis look like a pillow fight! A point," she added grimly, "I intend to emphasize in my next discussion with His Grace."

"Yes, Ma'am." Caparelli fought an urge to rise and come to attention; Lady Morncreek might be petite and attractive, but the snap of her authority was unmistakable. "I understand, Ma'am. And I assure you we only touched very briefly on what I suppose I might call the tactical situation in Parliament. In light of what you've just said, could you give us a feel for just what it is we're looking at there?"

"We're looking at something that couldn't get a lot worse," the First Lord said bluntly. "The Duke is fighting for every vote in the Lords—God only knows what promises he's going to have to make, or to whom—and even if he puts a new majority together, it's going to be incredibly fragile."

"Stupid bastards," Cortez muttered, then flushed crimson as he realized he'd spoken aloud. "Forgive me, Milady," he began quickly, "I only—"