Now, unfortunately, that respite had come to an end, and Ferrero felt a slow, intense boil of anger bubbling away deep down inside.

She drew a deep breath and forced herself to remember Duchess Harrington’s orders. Like most of the ship commanders assigned to Sidemore Station, Ferrero had been delighted when she learned Harrington was being sent out to take command. It wasn’t that she had a thing against Rear Admiral Hewitt. He was a good man and a competent flag officer, but Ferrero had hoped Harrington’s assignment indicated that someone back home was finally taking the situation in Silesia seriously. Certainly they wouldn’t have sent “the Salamander” all the way out here if they hadn’t meant for her appointment to send a message to the Andermani!

Unfortunately, it was beginning to look like the people who’d hoped that were going to be disappointed.

It wasn’t Harrington’s fault. That much was obvious. But the nature and number of the reinforcements the Janacek Admiralty had decided to send out with the duchess made it painfully evident that—to use Bob Llewellyn’s colorful phrase—Sidemore was still “sucking hind teat.” The astonishing arrival of so many Grayson warships had only underscored the weakness of the reinforcements the Admiralty had seen fit to spare Harrington, and the duchess’ instructions to the ships assigned to her new command had been another sign that no one back home gave much of a damn about what was happening out here.

Ferrero knew that no flag officer with Harrington’s reputation could have been happy issuing those orders. And the fact that she’d done it had said volumes about just how out of touch with reality the Star Kingdom’s government really was. Her Majesty’s starships in Silesia were to maintain and protect the traditional interpretation of freedom of space, as well as the territorial integrity of the Silesian Confederacy, against anyone who threatened to violate either, while simultaneously avoiding “provocations” of the Imperial Andermani Navy… or responding in kind to Andermani provocations.

That mouthful of platitudes and qualifications must have stuck in Harrington’s craw sideways, Ferrero thought. That much had been evident even through the officialese of her orders. And if it hadn’t been, the revision of the controlling rules of engagement which had accompanied those orders would have made it clear enough. Although the modified ROE strongly reiterated that officers were to avoid counter provocations—which, Ferrero suspected, was at least partly aimed at her own destruction of Hellbarde’s remote sensor platforms, despite the fact that Harrington had officially approved her report of that patrol—they also emphasized that “These orders shall not be construed to in any way supersede or compromise a captain’s responsibility to safeguard the vessel entrusted to her command. No officer can do very wrong by taking all such defensive actions as shall seem necessary and prudent in her judgment.” Taken together, those seemingly contradictory provisions told Harrington’s officers a lot. The most important message was that she really meant it when she ordered them to avoid responding in kind to Andermani provocations… and that she would back them to the hilt in any reasonable action they took in self-defense.