“Warren was—is—a good man.” Holsten wasn’t ready to give up on his agent until he was sure.

“Yes. He…is. And his mission was a success. He was able to confirm that the Union has been in contact with the Alliance. The report doesn’t include extensive details, except that Gaston Villieneuve was in command. And that he has since returned to the Union.”

Holsten had been about to take another sip from his coffee, but he paused with the cup halfway to his mouth. “Villieneuve? He’s their top man. Whatever they were doing in the Alliance, it must have been serio…” He put the cup down on the table. The alert from Archellia…

“My thought exactly. If we were going to have any trouble with the Alliance, that’s where it would be.”

“If the Union was able to persuade the Alliance to attack us while we’re heavily engaged with them…”

“It would be a disaster.”

“Have you forwarded this to the Admiralty?”

“Not yet…I wanted to discuss it with you first, see what you wanted to do.”

Holsten nodded. “You’re right. Perhaps we should keep this under wraps for now.” He knew the navy types would have gone ballistic if they’d heard him. They were constantly complaining that the intelligence service withheld data from them.

And there’s no easy way to explain we do it for their own good…

“Didn’t the Admiralty react to the alerts already?”

“Yes…coincidentally, they had a battleship at Archellia. Apparently it got routed there for routine refit because all the bases close to the Union were at capacity.”

“Lucky break. What ship?”

“Dauntless.”

“Tyler Barron’s ship?”

“Yes.”

Holsten hesitated. He was all for sending a vessel to investigate, but Barron was the closest thing the Confederation had to royalty.

If he gets scragged out on the frontier, it’s going to be bad for morale…

“Even if the Union convinced the Alliance to ally with them—and that is still a big if—I doubt the Alliance would move first. They aren’t the most trusting people…and with their culture, they would despise the Union and its ways. That might not stop them from opportune cooperation, but they would never commit their fleets before the Union does. They would be too worried about treachery.”

“I went through the same thought process. But something’s going on out there, Gary. I saw the communiques myself. The Archellians think it’s criminal traffic of some kind, smugglers or pirates. But with the information we have from Tom Warren, I’d say that looks like too much of a coincidence to me.”

“I have to agree.” Holsten sighed. He didn’t believe in coincidence. “So, what can we do? War with the Alliance and the Union at the same time would be a disaster.”