Accepting the Lance Read online

  Table of Contents

  Prologue

  SIX AGAINSTTHE UNIVERSE One

  Two

  Three

  SUREBLEAK Jelaza Kazone

  Surebleak Port, Portmaster’s Office

  Jelaza Kazone

  Jelaza Kazone

  Bechimo

  The Bedel

  Surebleak Port, Scout Headquarters

  The Consolidated School

  Jelaza Kazone

  Surebleak Port, Scout Headquarters

  Blair Road, Boss Nova’s House

  Jelaza Kazone

  Surebleak Port, Portmaster’s Office

  Surebleak Orbital Influence Zone

  Jelaza Kazone

  Surebleak Orbital Influence Zone

  Surebleak Port, Office of the Road Boss

  Jelaza Kazone

  Surebleak Port, Office of the Road Boss

  Jelaza Kazone

  Surebleak Port, Office of the Road Boss

  Jelaza Kazone

  Surebleak Orbital Influence Zone, Northern L5 Limits

  The Bedel

  Blair Road, Boss Conrad’s House

  Jelaza Kazone

  Five Light-Hours out from Surebleak Libration Point Five

  Blair Road

  Surebleak Port, Portmaster’s Office

  Jelaza Kazone

  Blair Road, Boss Conrad’s House

  Blair Road, Boss Conrad’s House

  Jelaza Kazone

  Bechimo

  Jelaza Kazone

  The Port Road, Yulie Shaper’s Place

  Bechimo

  Jelaza Kazone

  Surebleak Port, Portmaster’s Office

  Six of Us, Jenarian Station

  Port Road, Surebleak

  Six of Us, Jenarian Station

  Dudley Avenue and Farley Lane, Lady Kareen’s House

  Six of Us, Jenarian Station

  Council Meeting Room, Mercantile Building

  Bechimo

  Six of Us, Daiellen System

  Bechimo

  Six of Us, Daiellen System

  Bechimo

  Port Road, Yulie Shaper’s Place

  Surebleak Port, Office of the Road Boss

  Jelaza Kazone, The Tree Court

  Bechimo

  Bechimo

  Six of Us, Daiellen System

  Six of Us, Jenarian Station

  Runcible System, Daglyte Seam

  Six of Us, Daglyte Seam

  Six of Us, Daglyte Seam

  Six of Us, Daglyte Seam

  Six of Us, Daglyte Seam

  Six of Us, Daglyte Seam

  To Perfection

  Six of Us, Daglyte Seam

  Bechimo

  Surebleak, The Bedel

  Bechimo

  Jelaza Kazone

  FlourPower Bakery

  Surebleak Port, Portmaster’s Office

  Jelaza Kazone

  The Bedel

  Jelaza Kazone

  Jelaza Kazone

  Jelaza Kazone

  The Bedel

  Basalial

  Jelaza Kazone

  The Bedel

  Jelaza Kazone

  Jelaza Kazone

  Surebleak Port, Portmaster’s Office

  Surebleak Port, Emerald Casino

  On the Road

  Surebleak Port, Office of the Road Boss

  Surebleak Port

  Surebleak Port, Office of the Road Boss

  The Way Between

  Mercantile Building

  Jelaza Kazone, Tree Court

  Epilogue

  ACCEPTING THE LANCE

  A New

  Liaden Universe®

  Novel

  SHARON LEE &

  STEVE MILLER

  Accepting the Lance

  Sharon Lee & Steve Miller

  NEW NOVEL IN THE NATIONALLY BEST-SELLING LIADEN UNIVERSE® SERIES. Sequel to national bestseller Neogenesis.

  Exiled from Liad after bombing a city to save it from The Department of the Interior’s infernal weapons and plans, Clan Korval has gone to ground on the back-water planet Surebleak, whose people are as untamed as its weather. The old Boss-controlled fiefdoms largely fell to Pat Rin yos’Phelium’s influence, but the world is restive, the influx of outworld lawyers, guns, and money a brewpot for armed dissatisfaction.

  Far beyond the surface of frigid Surebleak Korval’s farflung trade network needs a serious reset to recover from exile. From flagship Dutiful Passage to the experimental—if centuries old—self-aware Bechimo co-captained by the Delm’s blood-sister Theo Waitley, the clan’s ships are prowling space lanes seeking trade. Meanwhile, Old Tech from a failed universe—the ancient but revived Tinsori Light—and the machinations of the mysterious Uncle are coalescing into dangerous opportunity or nefarious trap.

  And the Department of the Interior is not done with Clan Korval yet. They seek a final fully reckoned revenge, with Surebleak and Korval’s ships and people everywhere in the crosshairs.

  BAEN BOOKS by SHARON LEE & STEVE MILLER

  THE LIADEN UNIVERSE®

  Fledgling

  Saltation

  Mouse and Dragon

  Ghost Ship

  Dragon Ship

  Necessity’s Child

  Trade Secret

  Dragon in Exile

  Alliance of Equals

  The Gathering Edge

  Neogenesis

  Accepting the Lance

  Trader’s Leap (forthcoming)

  THIRTIETH-ANNIVERSARY EDITIONS

  Agent of Change

  Conflict of Honors

  Carpe Diem (forthcoming)

  OMNIBUS VOLUMES

  The Dragon Variation

  The Agent Gambit

  Korval’s Game

  The Crystal Variation

  STORY COLLECTIONS

  A Liaden Universe Constellation: Volume 1

  A Liaden Universe Constellation: Volume 2

  A Liaden Universe Constellation: Volume 3

  A Liaden Universe Constellation: Volume 4

  THE FEY DUOLOGY

  Duainfey

  Longeye

  BY SHARON LEE

  Carousel Tides

  Carousel Sun

  Carousel Seas

  ACCEPTING THE LANCE

  A New

  Liaden Universe®

  Novel

  SHARON LEE &

  STEVE MILLER

  Accepting the Lance

  This is a work of fiction. All the characters and events portrayed in this book are fictional, and any resemblance to real people or incidents is purely coincidental.

  Copyright © 2019 by Sharon Lee & Steve Miller

  Liaden Universe® is a registered trademark.

  All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form.

  A Baen Books Original

  Baen Publishing Enterprises

  P.O. Box 1403

  Riverdale, NY 10471

  www.baen.com

  ISBN: 978-1-9821-2421-2

  eISBN: 978-1-62579-745-2

  Cover art by David Mattingly

  First Baen printing, December 2019

  Distributed by Simon & Schuster

  1230 Avenue of the Americas

  New York, NY 10020

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Names: Lee, Sharon, 1952– author. | Miller, Steve, 1950 July 31– author.

  Title: Accepting the lance / Sharon Lee & Steve Miller.

  Description: First edition. | Riverdale, NY : Baen Publishing Enterprises,

  [2019] | Series: Liaden universe

  Identifiers: LCCN 2019034873 | ISBN 9781982124212 (hardcover)

  Subjects: GSAFD: Science fiction.

  Classification: LCC PS3562.E3629 A65 2019 | DDC 813/.54—dc23

  LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2019034873

  Pages by Joy Freeman (www.pagesbyjoy.com)

  Printed in the United States of America

  10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

  Electronic Version by Baen Books

  www.baen.com

  To Sam, who drew all the bad cards.

  See you in the World Beyond.

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  Many thanks to the Mighty Tyop Hunters; your efforts are appreciated!

  Deb Boyken, Millie Calistri-Yeh, Andrew Donaldson, Irene Harrison, James Kirby, Tee Lewison, Robert McKnight, Evelyn Mellone, Abigail Miller, Rebecca Ouwehand, Marni Rachmiel, Anne Reisser, Kate Reynolds, Ken Shoemake, Linda Shoun, Anne Young

  ACCEPTING THE LANCE

  Prologue

  • • • • • • • • • • •

  Runcible System

  Daglyte Seam

  Commander of Agents presided over a desk awash in failure and dismay.

  The Scouts, the damned meddling Scouts, ever more temerarious, brazenly pursuing their agenda of eradication. Not satisfied with the destruction of Sinfreed Hub, the Department’s last intact communications and data center, the Scouts had pressed on, capturing Engthrelt and Oonabrij. While neither facility had ever been as vital to the Plan as Sinfreed, and each had taken significant damage in the confusion immediately following Clan Korval’s terminal strike on Prime Headquarters, they had been functional to a degree none of those remaining began to approach.

  There was more.

  She had ordered a force assembled from their stores of Old Tech
, the last and most potent of their strike forces. Specific engines, known by name, which had served the Department well in the past. Several had come forward to receive their orders.

  Others had not.

  Others, in fact, were—gone. Absent. Disappeared.

  At first, it had seemed that the inventory systems, as all else, were made unstable by the destruction of so much of the network.

  A team had been sent to investigate; she had their report in hand.

  In fact, equipment was missing; a measurable—a significant—number of specialized engines had vanished from the ranks, as if they had been sent out on assignment. There had been no protest from the devices; there had been no sign of sabotage or of forcible removal. It was as if their proper operators had simply relocated them according to orders.

  Save that no such orders had been issued.

  The fact that among the missing were the eldest and most destructive of the Department’s accumulated machines, could only add to the general state of failure and alarm.

  Teams—she could spare so few!—teams had been dispatched, to locate the missing and bring them back. If they proved recalcitrant, the order was to decommission. They could afford no rogues wandering the space lanes, acting on their own necessities.

  There was more…

  A few days ago had come a scattering of reports that Healers and others of the Department’s dramliz had fallen into sudden faints, or woken from sound sleeps or trance, screaming and clutching their heads. There had been no new instances reported, and one might be tempted to assume a mere affliction of the nerves; those of the dramliz being oversupplied with nerves. However, Commander of Agents left nothing to chance. She passed the reports on to the Unit Head for follow-up, with a request to share her findings.

  So, those, the smaller failures.

  There remained one larger failure, overshadowing all other errors. Large enough, indeed, that it might well bring the Department to its knees, its purpose unfulfilled.

  The team sent to acquire, or terminate, Shan yos’Galan Clan Korval had failed in its mission. Four senior field agents had been killed. The two surviving had been taken into custody by the local police, from whom they could have been expected to rapidly extricate themselves—save for the timely arrival of Scouts, bearing warrants of extradition and a long list of crimes for which the captured pair were wanted, on Liad…

  Given repeated failures to bring Val Con yos’Phelium, rogue Agent of Change, back to Headquarters, in order to refresh his training and reaffirm his loyalty to the Department, the repurposing of yos’Galan into a weapon crafted to destroy Korval from within had become the centerpiece of the New Plan to destroy Korval. That failure was dire.

  Alternatively, the actions to discredit Korval tradeships at key ports, and the blacklisting of Korval traders was going well. Indeed, Pale Wing, a major Korval trader, second only to Dutiful Passage herself, had been compromised most effectively at Liltander.

  Had they sufficient time, the Department would see Korval broken in the markets, the last choice remaining to the delm the dissolution of the clan. Lacking powerful allies, Korval would be absorbed by the barbaric Terran hordes, nameless, with neither melant’i nor wealth to shield them. Their blood would be polluted, the so-called Korval Luck diffused…

  Eventually, oh, yes—eventually, the Department could see these things done.

  Time, however, was in short supply; the Department in a disarray that hourly grew more profound. They were so disordered that the loss of even small systems became a significant difficulty.

  They should, perhaps, Commander of Agents thought, have pulled back, regrouped, repaired systems…Korval would have believed the threat gone, themselves safe. The danger there had been that, while the Department healed and increased its strength, so, too, did Korval. A decisive strike while the enemy was weak…that had seemed the certain path to success.

  Commander of Agents closed her eyes.

  She was weary. Even that admission was a failure; Commander of Agents did not tire, did not become befuddled with lack of sleep; did not surrender to despair.

  For a moment only, inside the privacy of her skull, Commander of Agents considered the unthinkable.

  She considered disbanding the Department. It was within her power to do this thing; she knew it. The precise procedure eluded her at this present, but she was certain that she could retrieve it, if she merely concentrated…

  Commander of Agents took a profoundly deep breath. She felt renewed, alert, and in control. There had been setbacks, yes, of course there had. Korval was a cunning and resourceful enemy; its delm had been one of the Department’s best, before he had broken training and turned his hand and his considerable talents against them.

  None of it mattered.

  Were they vulnerable and in disarray? They were; and yet—not even the masters of the Accountants Guild had been able to find all of the Department’s cash reserves.

  Did they lack operatives?

  No matter: Operatives could be bought, after all.

  The Department would destroy Clan Korval. Utterly.

  It would happen; and not only would it happen on her watch…it would happen within the Standard.

  One needed only to embrace the bold course—and stay on target.

  • • • • • • ✴ • • • • • •

  SIX AGAINST

  THE UNIVERSE

  • • • • • • ✴ • • • • • •

  They were six, at the start of it.

  Immediately they put the plan into motion, they were five, having left one of their number in plain sight and vulnerable, fixed in the enemy’s eye…

  …And to avenge the five, should they fall.

  This thing that they attempted—it was impossible. Anyone in possession of the barest facts of the matter—they were six against thousands—would have said so.

  It was well, then, that the facts did not describe the whole.

  One

  • • • • •

  Red-haired Miri Robertson sat in the middle of the so-called “reading rug” in the ruckus room, watching her daughter stalk her lifemate.

  Lizzie wasn’t doing too bad, she thought, given that she’d only gotten the hang of standing relatively recently, and remained deeply suspicious of two-legged locomotion. On all fours, though, she was nothing more nor less’n greased lightning. Not that speed was the name of this game.

  Val Con, Lizzie’s stalking horse, was keeping the action on her level, crawling with a certain amount of low cunning, until taking up a hiding place behind a large red-and-blue-striped ball. He was currently on his belly behind this object, which meant only the top of his head, one shoulder, and the entire length of one arm was in plain sight.

  He could, as Miri knew from experience, have completely vanished behind that ball and possibly behind the stuffed monkey to the right of it, had this been the sort of game he was most accustomed to playing, which was—thank the gods—above Lizzie’s pay grade.

  For a couple more years, anyhow.

  Lizzie’d been pointed the wrong way when Val Con took cover, and now she was methodically moving back-and-forth, advancing on the position of the ball, the monkey, and her father, a little closer with every turn.

  She made one more turn—and Miri saw her focus on the ball. Deliberately, she straightened to her knees, the new height giving her the perspective she needed.

  With a squeal, she threw herself into a fast crawl, hurtling past the ball and onto Val Con, who rolled under the assault.

  “Indeed, you did find me—and speedily, too!” he said, pulling her onto his chest. Lizzie shouted with laughter.