Shadow of Freedom

“Precisely,” she agreed. “At the moment, I have no definitive instructions on political administration of territory captured—or liberated—from the Solarian League.” Which, she refrained from mentioning, was because she had no instructions about capturing or liberating that territory in the first place. “Because of that,” she continued, “I’m afraid I’m rather in the position of making things up as I go along. That gives me a certain degree of freedom, although it also obviously means any arrangements I might put in place would be subject to review by higher authority. On the other hand,” she looked directly into Montview’s eyes, “there aren’t a great many ‘higher authorities’ in the Star Empire.”

Montview sat back in his armchair, sipping coffee and regarding her thoughtfully. It was clear to Michelle that he’d done his homework on her just as thoroughly as she’d done hers on him. What she wasn’t certain of was whether or not he realized she was effectively putting the honor of the House of Winton on the line. She couldn’t be certain even Beth would honor every detail of any arrangement to which she committed the Star Empire, but she was positive her cousin would never betray or abandon anyone Michelle had agreed to support.

“I believe I appreciate your position, Milady,” Montview said, and Michelle raised mental eyebrows as he addressed her as a member of the Manticoran peerage rather than by her naval rank. “Should I conclude from what you’ve just said that you’re considering an arrangement which would involve my King?”

“I am,” Michelle confirmed, leaning back in her own chair and resting her elbows on its arms to steeple her fingers in front of her. “Of course, the exact nature of that arrangement would depend on a great many factors.”

“Factors such as…?” Montview raised his eyebrows as he allowed his voice to trail off.

“At the moment, Mr. Prime Minister, no one outside the Meyers System knows what’s happened here. No hyper-capable unit made it out, which means it will be some time—probably T-months, in fact—before anyone else realizes anything’s happened at all. That gives us some time to work with. Unfortunately, we’re in what you might call a…dynamic situation, and my military capabilities are a bit lopsided.” Michelle showed her teeth briefly. “I’ve got oodles—that’s a technical term, Mr. Prime Minister; it means lots and lots—of naval combat power, but I’m severely strapped for ground combat power.”

Montview nodded gravely, although Michelle doubted that he truly realized just how short of ground troops she actually was. Colonel Liam Trondheim, the senior Gendarmerie officer present, had surrendered the system to her as soon as her ships entered Meyers planetary orbit. He hadn’t had a great deal of choice about that, under the recognized interstellar laws of war. For that matter, Michelle had been perfectly willing to take out every Gendarmerie base on the planet from orbit (also as the interstellar laws of war permitted for planets which didn’t surrender), and he seemed to realize that fact.

She rather regretted that Brigadier Yucel hadn’t been here to do the surrendering herself. Everything she and Cynthia Lecter had been able to dig up on the brigadier suggested she was an ugly piece of work, even by the standards of the Solarian League Gendarmerie. On the other hand, according to Trondheim, one reason he’d been so quick to surrender was that Yucel had taken two full battalions of her best troops (although Michelle doubted Yucel’s definition of “best troops” would have matched her own) off to the Mobius System. She didn’t like to think about what someone like Yucel might have been doing with those troops, but she felt confident, somehow, that Sir Aivars Terekhov would experience no insurmountable difficulty in dealing with the brigadier.

Here in Meyers, however, Michelle was left with the problem that she simply didn’t have the troop strength to garrison what she’d captured. The planet Meyers itself was home to 3.6 billion people. Another thirty-two thousand lived on the next planet out, Socrates, which was very like the Sol System’s Mars but with a slightly thicker atmosphere. The Truman Belt was home to another 843,000 people, most committed to routine mining and other resource extraction. And then there were the two hundred thousand living on the moons of the gas giant Damien, mining the planetary atmosphere for hydrogen and rare gases.

That wasn’t very many people by the standards of one of the League’s Core Worlds, but it very nearly equaled the total population of the Manticore Binary System, and there was no way in the universe her own limited Marine strength could possibly hope to control them.