“There’s so much to do,” Julian said, keeping to the subject. “This morning I had to shut down a site that was half-completed.”

He pointed out an abandoned work area where three high slab walls stood over a finished excavation and new-poured foundation. Half a kilometer behind it rose the massive, twenty-story satellite dish of Yare’s geothermal station.

“What was wrong with the site?” Amanda asked, studying the layout for herself and not seeing the problem.

“Too close to the microwave tower. Too far from the next supporting bunker. If it were me, I’d throw a combined-arms company right at it, with flankers to hold off any chance for reinforcement from the east or west.”

He made a steeple with his hands, showing the maneuver. Then clap!

“Bring them together, smash the defensive line, and storm the facility.”

The ground-based power stations were a known weakness of the orbiting shipyards. House Liao had pointed that out over a century ago, during the Fourth Succession War, and might have seriously undermined the Davion offensive if the Kathil Uhlans hadn’t successfully defended the world.

During the Steiner-Davion civil war the shipyard itself came under fire, and this local ground facility had been all but destroyed in the fighting as Prince Victor’s supporters rose up against the usurper’s garrison. Katherine Steiner-Davion had not relinquished her hold on the Federated Suns easily, and Kathil had been a hotly contested world over most of five years.

And right on its heels had come the Word of Blake’s Jihad, dragging the entire Inner Sphere to the brink of ruin.

Julian had studied the history of all three wars very closely, and recently had refreshed himself on Kathil’s failed defense during the Jihad. Victor Steiner-Davion, in fact, had authored several political and military papers about Kathil. Julian found his study of the man as fascinating as what Victor had had to say about the importance and vulnerabilities of such high-profile worlds—namely, that they were nearly impossible to hold, or to take, without ruining the infrastructure that made them valuable in the first place. Not without years of preparations and a unified vision for their defense.

Harrison Davion wanted no part in such destruction, which was why the first prince had dispatched his champion to oversee these final stages of planning—a decision that did not sit well with Amanda Hasek, or with other Capellan March nobles who wanted less interference from their prince, not more.

“And we are truly certain that House Liao will suddenly come for Kathil one day?” the duchess asked.

“They will,” Julian promised. “Suddenly come for Kathil. One day.”

Unless the Confederation was already defeated, he did not say.

He sounded so certain because it was his profession. Julian could read the signs—and the intelligence reports. The shadows of war loomed, and not just within the Federated Suns. Peace was at an end unless calmer heads prevailed very, very soon.

“Fighting in the Draconis Reach has intensified,” he said. This was the private, silent conflict financed against House Kurita by the Sandoval dynasty, noble heirs and ministers of the Federated Suns’ Draconis March. “The Republic of the Sphere is being torn apart from several directions, as well as from within. And if Daoshen Liao was not so preoccupied with reclaiming lost worlds from The Sphere, he might already be coming for us. When the Confederation does turn in this direction—not if!—Kathil, with its shipyards, will be a key world.”

Amanda Hasek might be born and raised among the Federated Suns’ nobility, but she knew enough of the leveraging of focused violence to at least appreciate the danger, and nodded.

“Especially when the Capellan Confederation has barely recovered from losing their own primary shipyards at Necromo during the Blakist Jihad,” she said. Noting Julian’s raised eyebrows, she added, “I do read my generals’ reports. It’s hard to forget the account of an entire world sterilized.”

She looked into the distance. “Kathil must shine like a forbidden gem to the Liao chancellor.”

The prospect of war, and her Capellan March turned into a battleground, turned the duchess’ mood very quickly. She walked along in silence for a moment, and Julian wished desperately to know what she might be thinking. Of ways to prepare? Or of taking the war to the Confederation’s chancellor?

And, sadly, knew that either was preferable to his prince’s true worry. That after half a century of near-autonomous rule, the Haseks were beginning to look very seriously at New Avalon, the very throne of the Federated Suns.

“The prince only has your best interests in mind,” Julian prompted the duchess.

Another long pause.

“When Isabella was alive, I don’t remember Harrison being such an alarmist,” she finally said.

Julian steeled himself against any outward reaction, wondering who was now goading whom. “Your sister had a way of making everyone see better days ahead,” he offered cautiously. The wounds still ran deep between both families. “But I think even she would have sensed this gathering storm.”

“Or perhaps that woman has sunk her claws in deeper than I imagined. Stroking Harrison with her dreams of martial glory.”

“That is unkind, Amanda. And unwarranted.”

But having brought it out into the open, Amanda Hasek was not about to be cautioned so easily. “Some might say what is unkind is the way Harrison treats the memory of my sister.”

“Some might. Those who don’t see four years of mourning to be enough. Or how Isabella’s death stole the joy out of our prince’s life.”

Julian walked a thin line, upbraiding the Minister of the Capellan March. But she was also Julian’s cousin by marriage, and certain courtesies extended between family. Also, as prince’s champion, Julian often spoke for Harrison Davion. It was one of the greatest honors of his young life, and an awesome responsibility.

“Amanda, please.” Julian stopped them beneath the pink-flowering dogwoods. A sweet, roselike scent drifted around them. They stood within sight of Amanda Hasek’s executive craft but beyond the point at which her loose screen of security would converge. The duchess stared fixedly ahead. “Do you realize how rare it is that a leader born to Harrison’s duties finds a companion and a peer? I can only hope to be so lucky.”

As he had planned, the mention of his own single status brought the ghost of a smile back to Amanda’s compressed mouth. But she still refused to look at him. The patrolling Pegasus hovercraft glided by them on cushions of warm air. She followed their path with her gaze instead.

“Well, we shall have to see what we can do about that. Dear boy.” She said this last as an afterthought, but reached out for his hand anyway and tucked it under her arm, escorting him forward.

The Chariot-class VTOL waited, hunched low to the ground with its rotor drooping overhead as if wilted under Kathil’s strong sun. Two infantrymen in Infiltrator Mark II suits stood at the fore and two more at the aft. A shiny metallic gold trimmed in regal purple, the Chariot could not have shouted dignitary aboard any louder without setting its identification transponder to broadcast the message.

But one of the best things about having such a craft available was its cutting-edge electronics suite, which allowed the duchess to stay in constant contact with Kathil’s planetary administration. A colonel in the Federated Suns Armed Forces, wearing the unit insignia of the Syrtis Fusiliers and likely Amanda Hasek’s pilot, waited for them outside the craft with a verifax reader in hand. The device took secure downloads from the communications board and was specifically coded to Amanda’s DNA. No one but her could access its controls.

The colonel handed over the reader with a military precision that bordered on ceremony. Enough that Julian wondered if the grapevine already had the news, and it had raced here alongside or even ahead of the official transmission.