BooksBarbecue
Back Rising Thunder Save as PDF
Chapters (35)
  1. Chapter One
  2. Chapter Two
  3. Chapter Three
  4. Chapter Four
  5. Chapter Five
  6. Chapter Six
  7. Chapter Seven
  8. Chapter Eight
  9. Chapter Nine
  10. Chapter Ten
  11. Chapter Eleven
  12. Chapter Twelve
  13. Chapter Thirteen
  14. Chapter Fourteen
  15. Chapter Fifteen
  16. Chapter Sixteen
  17. Chapter Seventeen
  18. Chapter Eighteen
  19. Chapter Nineteen
  20. Chapter Twenty
  21. Chapter Twenty-One
  22. Chapter Twenty-Two
  23. Chapter Twenty-Three
  24. Chapter Twenty-Four
  25. Chapter Twenty-Five
  26. Chapter Twenty-Six
  27. Chapter Twenty-Seven
  28. Chapter Twenty-Eight
  29. Chapter Twenty-Nine
  30. Chapter Thirty
  31. Chapter Thirty-One
  32. Chapter Thirty-Two
  33. Chapter Thirty-Three
  34. Chapter Thirty-Four
  35. Chapter Thirty-Five

“Oh, I think you could take it as a given that that’s one possibility which has crossed their minds,” Honor agreed with a faint twinkle of genuine amusement. “Mind you, Elizabeth isn’t the sort to let anyone else ‘go after’ Mesa if she can possibly do it herself, especially after the Yawata Strike. But if it should happen that we find our hands full with the League, I suppose it could be convenient if there just happened to be another modern navy, with its own pod-layers and a bone of its own to pick with Mesa, who could stand in for her.”

She leaned forward and selected a cheese wedge from the platter MacGuiness had put between them, then looked back up innocently.

“You wouldn’t happen to know where she might be able to find one, would you, Chien-lu?”

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Nineteen

It was undoubtedly, Honor thought, surveying the outsized conference room, the most unlikely meeting she’d ever attended. In fact, it was the sort of meeting no Manticoran could have imagined outside a drug dream as recently as last month.

Empress Elizabeth, President Pritchart, Benjamin Mayhew, Michael Mayhew, Prime Minister Grantville, Foreign Minister Langtry, and Secretary of Commerce Nesbitt sat ranged around the head of the enormous conference table. (Nesbitt was substituting—not without some obvious reservations—for Leslie Montreau, who’d been sent home with the daunting task of presenting Elizabeth’s and Pritchart’s draft treaties to the Havenite Senate.) Stretched along one of the table’s long sides were Honor herself, Hamish, High Admiral Judah Yanakov, Sir Thomas Caparelli, Admiral Pat Givens, and Admiral Sonja Hemphill. Stretched along the other were Thomas Theisman, Admiral Lester Tourville, Kevin Usher, Vice Admiral Linda Trenis, and Rear Admiral Victor Lewis. And at the end of the table, facing Elizabeth, Benjamin, and Pritchart, were First Director at Large Fedosei Demianovich Mikulin and Third Director at Large Jacques Benton-Ramirez y Chou.

The one star nation conspicuous by its absence was the Andermani Empire, but that was by design. Chien-lu Anderman had decided to recommend that Gustav take Elizabeth’s and Pritchart’s advice and stand aside from the Star Empire’s confrontation with the League. Accordingly, the Andermani battle squadrons attached to Eighth Fleet had been withdrawn to Trevor’s Star, and no Andermani officers were present.

If they were missing, however, there were more than enough treecats present to make up for their absence.

Nimitz, Samantha, and Ariel would have been there anyway, but now treecats sat on the backs of Benjamin’s, Pritchart’s, Theisman’s, Tourville’s, her Uncle Jacques’, Caparelli’s and Grantville’s chairs, as well, and it was virtually certain that everyone else sitting at that table would be receiving his or her own personal furry bodyguard very shortly.