“Sorry about that, Commander,” she said contritely. “Are you all right?”

Denby removed his own mouth protector and then rotated his right shoulder cautiously and gave her a lopsided grin.

“I think so, Your Grace,” he replied. “I’ll tell you for sure when that damned bird stops singing in my ear!”

Honor chuckled. She and the commander both wore traditional gis. Although Denby’s belt showed only five rank knots, he was really very good… and like quite a few officers who followed the coup—perhaps somewhat disproportionately represented among the LAC portion of Werewolf’s complement—he was always available for a sparring match with the station commander.

Unfortunately, he’d forgotten about Honor’s artificial arm. The move he’d just attempted had depended upon its victim’s reaction to leverage against her elbow joint. Which hadn’t worked out quite the way his reflexes had assumed it would in this particular case. Honor’s counter had caught him out of position and completely by surprise, and he’d hit the mat hard. In fact, he’d hit it rather harder than she’d intended, because her reflexes hadn’t assumed that he’d be left quite as open as he had by her left arm’s failure to flex properly.

“Well,” she said now, “we’ve got enough time for you to finish listening. Take your time.”

“Thank you, Your Grace, but I think he’s coming to the end of his selection.”

Denby gave her another grin and reinserted his mouth protector, and she smiled back before she did the same thing. The two of them stepped back towards the center of the mat and dropped back into the ready position. Honor watched him warily. They’d sparred enough over the course of this deployment for her to have a very good feel for his personality. Even without her ability to sense his emotions, she would have known that his recent misadventure had inspired him to dump her on her very senior posterior. On the other hand, inspiration and success weren’t necessarily the same thing, and—“Excuse me, My Lady.”

Andrew LaFollet’s voice interrupted, and she stepped back from Denby and turned towards her senior armsman.

“I’m sorry to interrupt, My Lady,” LaFollet said from where he’d stood watching her back, even here in Werewolf’s gym, and she removed the mouth protector once again.

“What is it, Andrew?” she asked.

“I don’t know,” he replied. “Lieutenant Meares just commed. He says you’re needed on Flag Bridge.”

“On Flag Bridge?” Honor repeated. “He didn’t say why?”

“No, My Lady.” LaFollet half-raised his wrist-mounted com. “I can com him back and ask, if you’d like?”

“Please do. And ask him how urgent it is.” She waved one gloved hand at her gi. “Unless it’s earth shattering, I’d like to at least shower and change before I report for duty!”

“Yes, My Lady,” LaFollet acknowledged with a small smile, and spoke into the wrist com. Then he looked up with the slightly absent expression of a man listening to a reply from her flag lieutenant over his unobtrusive earbug.