“We can’t get through,” one of them said, and she saw he was right. The bulk of the Outward fleet lay between her ships and the planet. Any ordnance fired would be intercepted and destroyed before it hit the atmosphere. All she could hope to do was try to fight her way through the blockade. But that would take time and lives. Her Scimitars were faster and more advanced than the Outward cruisers, but the enemy had their backs to the wall. By the time she got within striking distance of the planet—assuming she ever did—the Outward commanders would have fled their conference. If she wanted to end this war, she had to strike now.

She opened a channel to Fleet Headquarters, and was told a pack of four Carnivores were inbound from Cold Tor. As reinforcements, they wouldn’t be enough to decisively sway the outcome of the battle, but those in command had another use in mind for them.

And they wanted her to give the order.

“Get me the Adalwolf,” she said to her communications officer.

“Yes, sir!”

The main display dimmed, and a hologram of the Adalwolf’s commander appeared. Captain Valeriy Yasha Barcov had a smooth scalp and a thick, bushy beard. He was in his command couch, with a profusion of thin fibre-optic data cables plugged into the sockets at the back of his head.

“Dobryj dyen, Captain.” He smiled wolfishly, obviously relishing the anticipated conflict. “We will be with you momentarily.”

Captain Deal shook her head. “No, Captain, I have a different mission for you.”

The man raised an eyebrow. “Speak, and it shall be done.”

Resting her weight on her hands, Deal leant across the table. “You are ordered to jump past the Outward fleet. Do not engage them. Your target is the planet.”

Barcov’s quizzical expression fell into a frown. “But we do not know where the conference is located. By the time we survey the jungle, the Outward ships will be upon us.”

“That’s why I want you to skip the survey.”

His confusion deepened. “But what shall we bomb?”

Deal swallowed. She could feel her heart beating in her chest. “Everything.”

Barcov opened and shut his mouth a few times. Finally, he said, “You wish me to destroy the sentient jungle of Pelapatarn?”

Deal felt the sweat break out on her forehead. “We have been ordered to raze it to the fucking ground,” she said.

For a moment, the old warhorse looked taken aback. Then he drew a deep breath through his cavernous nostrils and drew himself straight.

“It shall be done.”

* * *

I came back to myself, spread-eagled on the floor of the darkened chamber. My heart churned in my chest and my breaths were the ragged heaves of a woman saved from drowning. I felt as if a hurricane had blown through my soul, scouring away the accumulated sediments of time to expose every thought or action I had ever had or taken.