Eric Flint - The Course of Empire
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Key Selling Points- Eric Flint is a popular new star of fantasy and alternate history SF. The hardcover edition of his alternate history novel 1632 sold out in just a few months and went back to press, and the mass market edition, now in its third large printing, has an 88% sellthrough.- Flints collaborations with New York Times best-selling author David Weber (1633) and best-selling fantasy superstar Mercedes Lackey (The Shadow of the Lion) will have greatly expanded his already impressively large and enthusiastic audience.- K. D. Wentworths novel Moonspeaker (Hawk) was praised for creating a complex but fascinating society by Anne McCaffrey, who also called her a good storyteller.- Wentworth is author of seven novels, including Black on Black and Stars Over Stars for Baen, and over fifty short stories for Fantasy & Science Fiction, Hitchcocks Mystery Magazine, Realms of Fantasy, etc. She is a winner in the Writers of the Future contest, and has been a Nebula Award finalist twice. Her latest solo novel is the alternate history fantasy This Fair Land (Hawk).
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The Course of Empire
by Eric Flint and K.D. Wentworth
Prologue
"The Pluthrak scion has left Marit An, Preceptor. He should be arriving on Terra soon."
The Bond of Ebezon's strategist did not look away from the holo tank which, at the moment, was depicting the latest known activities of the Ekhat in Markau sector. "Send a courier to Terra then, Tura. Inform our agents that it is beginning."
"Finally," she said.
He turned and studied her. The young pleniary-superior's posture was excellent, the gestures and stance subtle and subdued in the manner that the Bond preferred in its private discourse. In public, of course, Harriers were expected to maintain a completely neutral posture at all times. Tura had risen quickly in the ranks of the Bond. The Preceptor had great hopes for her; indeed, had selected her for this assignment with the specific aim of furthering her training. Not the least of the responsibilities of the Strategy Circle was training its own replacements for the time when its existing members grew too old to serve.
"Do I detect a trace of amusement in the lay of your ears?" He waggled his own whiskers with understated humor.
"Not amusement, exactly. Call it exasperated rueful-patience."
The Preceptor tried to summon up an image of that combination. It could be done, by a master movement stylist, but it would be an exceedingly difficult tripartite posture. The Preceptor's old bones almost ached at the thought.
"Finally, indeed," he murmured. "Twenty years, it has taken us."
The pleniary-superior seemed a bit confused, and the Preceptor realized he had lapsed into a humanism again. He did that often, of late. Not surprising, of course, as long as he had studied the species.
"A 'year,' Tura, refers to a Terran orbital cycle."
"Ah." She did the calculation in her mind. It was not easy. Translating the particulate human notions of time into Jao concepts was always difficult. "A very long time."
The pleniary-superior's eyes moved to the holo tank. It was still showing the reported Ekhat movements, but, not long since, she had seen the image of a young Pluthrak there. The same scion who was even now on his way to Terra. The Preceptor had spent much time, studying that face.
"Do you think he can do it?" she asked.
The Preceptor shifted into a very subtle version of the tripartite posture best-attempt coupled with uncertainty. It was very elegantly done, as always.
"There is no way to know. We can only create the situation, which we have done. There is always the chance he will shrink from the task-and, if he doesn't, the impossibility of knowing in advance what, exactly, he will create as well as destroy. Such is the nature of strategy, Tura. The element of unpredictability is inherent to its working."
"Yes, Preceptor," she said respectfully, and left.
***
Just before entering the doorfield, Tura paused for a moment and looked back at the Preceptor. He was turned away from her now, back to studying the holo tank.
There was fondness in her eyes, as well as deep respect. The old Preceptor was a splendid commander, and in all respects. The greatest of the Bond's strategists, even if, officially, only one of five members of the Strategy Circle. But, also, someone who invariably treated his subordinates with courtesy and dignity.
Tura had no doubt at all he would order her death in a moment, if he thought it necessary. The Preceptor was perhaps the most ruthless Jao in existence. But that knowledge only brought further admiration. If he found it necessary to do so, she was quite sure he would be right.
***
As she passed through the doorfield, she sternly corrected herself, remembering one of the Preceptor's maxims.
He would probably be right. Strategy did not deal in absolutes.
PART I: Firsts
Chapter 1
Aille krinnu ava Pluthrak found Terra a world of unharmonious contrasts. His ears, set low and back on his skull, swiveled to take in the nearby murmur of the sea, along with the unnerving screeches of an avian lifeform native to his new posting.
Windward, water of a startling blue lapped at a pale expanse of sand, while, heartward, unbridled green plant growth vied with the graceless piles of stone and glass that guarded the periphery of the great Jao military base. In front of one building, several rectangles of red and gold fabric had been secured to the top of a pole. Even from here, he could hear the cloth snapping in the breeze. Bizarre, but he supposed they must serve some purpose.
The compact, elegant ship behind him radiated heat from its descent through the atmosphere, its engines ticking as they cooled. His favorite kochan-mother, Trit, had thought the vessel too showy for one as newly emerged as Aille. But Meku, the current kochanau, had said Pluthrak must maintain its status for all to see. The more so since the Governor of Terra was Oppuk krinnu ava Narvo-a scion of Narvo kochan, with whom Pluthrak kochan's relations were very strained.
Exhilarated at finally having the opportunity to be of use, Aille attenuated his perception of the moment's flow in order to better take in his new surroundings. The wind-tossed waves slowed to languid, enticing swells and reminded him that he'd had no opportunity to swim since leaving Marit An. His ship was equipped with adequate sanitary facilities, but not the luxury of an actual pool. After the long trip, his skin felt desiccated, his nap stiff, and his whiskers reduced to lifeless strings. He longed to immerse himself in this new sea, despite its alien scent, and sluice the accumulated dregs of travel away.
First, however, he must officially accept his new command. Later, when the flow of arrival was complete, he would indulge himself.
The yellow sun of this solar system beat down, brighter than Nir, his homeworld's star, which was farther along in the main sequence. He gazed out past the base's buildings, whiskers quivering. The land before him was so unrelentingly-flat.
He thought wistfully of the cliffs back at his kochan-house. There, the tide pounded against massive black rocks both early and late, and the breeze was always filled with the refreshing cool tang of spray. Here, the sultry air was thick with indigenous salts and more than a hint of decay. Well, his time on Marit An had completed itself. It was the duty of all Jao scions to cast themselves into time's river in the ongoing struggle against the Ekhat, and that he would do.
The voyage from his birthworld, Marit An, to Terra had been long but fruitful, filled with discourse with his fraghta and study for the responsibilities which awaited him. It was his last opportunity to take advantage of the older Jao's accumulated wisdom before assuming his new post as Subcommandant and he did his best to absorb as much as possible. By the end, he believed he knew the indigenous species as well as anyone could without ever having come nose to nose with one.
Farther away, in the distance, Aille could see several ruined buildings. Those were apparently a legacy of the Jao conquest over twenty orbital cycles ago. He had detected more signs of unamended damage as he'd swept in for landing: fractured, overgrown roads, cast-off machinery, abandoned dwellings now inundated by wilderness. By all reports, this political moiety had resisted long after the rest of this stubborn world and therefore had suffered proportionally greater damage.
They were an odd breed, these "humans," frustrating in their reluctance to be civilized and unique in many respects from any other species ever conquered by the Jao. Recorded reports detailed their long resistance to Jao rule and it seemed they were not completely subdued even now, so many orbital cycles later. Pockets of discontent and unrest apparently still persisted across the globe.
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