"That's true, Mr. Prime Minister," Zachary agreed. "The longest wormhole leg anyone's ever charted is right on nine hundred light-years long in normal-space terms. The average is a lot shorter than that, and transits of more than three or four hundred light-years are rare. Harvest Joy, on the other hand,has a four-month unrefueled endurance. That gives us a cruising radius of eight hundred light-years before we'd have to re-bunker, and that figure is based on our having to make the entire trip under impeller drive. As soon as we could get into a grav wave, our endurance would go up hugely, so we'd have to go a hell of a lot farther directly away from any settled area of the galaxy before we wouldn't be able to get home eventually."

"Well, that's a relief," Du Havel said.

"So are we prepared to authorize the transit?" Kare asked.

"I think . . . yes," the prime minister replied after a thoughtful moment, and glanced at the queen. "Finding out where that terminus connects to is going to have too many economic and strategic implications for us to even think about delaying over something as . . . esoteric as this 'kick,' I think."

"I agree." Queen Berry nodded, but she also frowned. "Before we do, though, is there any reason you have to go along, Dr. Kare?"

"I beg your pardon, Your Majesty?"

"I asked if there was any reason you, personally, would have to go along," the queen repeated.

"Well, no . . . not really, I suppose," Kare said slowly. "It's my project, though, Your Majesty. If we're going to send anyone through, then I ought to be going along, as well. Sort of like the captain going along with the rest of his ship."

"With all due respect, Jordin," Zachary said with a chuckle, "that's not really the best example you could have come up with. It wouldn't be like a captain going along with the rest of her ship; it would be like an admiral going along with one of the ships under her command. You might want to consider which one of us would actually be in command."

"Well, you would, of course, Josepha!" Kare said quickly.

"And that's my point," Berry said. "From what you're saying, it sounds to me like the return charting ought to be pretty straightforward. They aren't going to need you or Dr. Wix to do it, at any rate, right?"

"Right," Kare acknowledged with manifest unwillingness. "But—"

"But I'm afraid that means you're staying home, Doctor." There was understanding, and more than a little compassion, in the teenaged monarch's voice, yet that voice was also firm. "I know we're almost certainly worrying about nothing. And I know how much I always hated it when Daddy told me I couldn't do something I really wanted to do. Especially when I knew that he knew I wasn't really going to get into trouble if I did it. And I know you're going to be really pissed off if I don't let you go along with Captain Zachary. Despite which, I'm not going to."

"Your Majesty—" Kare began, but Berry shook her head.

"Doctor," she said with a very slight yet undeniably impish smile, "you're grounded."

Chapter Twenty-Seven

"Ready to proceed, Ma'am," Commander Samuel Lim, HMS Harvest Joy's executive officer reported crisply.

"Thank you, Sam," Captain Josepha Zachary acknowledged, and glanced one last time around her bridge.

Although she'd managed to hang on to Harvest Joy, she had an entirely different complement of officers from the one she'd had for the exploration of the Lynx Terminus. They were just as good a bunch, she thought, but there was a subtle difference this time around. Last time, everyone had been a newbie as far as wormhole exploration was concerned; this time, she was the experienced "Old Lady" whose calm, confident demeanor everyone else was trying to duplicate.

The thought amused her more than a little, and she turned her attention to one of the half-dozen other veterans of the Lynx Terminus expedition who were back aboard Harvest Joy today. Dr. Michael William Hall was the third-ranking member of Dr. Kare's team, in terms of seniority, which made him the most senior scientist present, given Queen Berry's edict. Hall's shaved scalp gleamed as if it had been waxed, and with his swarthy complexion, broad shoulders, and generally muscular physique he looked far more like the stereotype of a rugby player (which he was) than of an extraordinarily well-qualified hyper-physicist (which he also was). At the moment, she suspected, Hall was finding it a bit difficult to restrain his own half-triumphant and half-sympathetic smile as he reflected upon what must be going through Jordin Kare and Richard Wix's minds about now. It was truly amazing how stubborn Berry Zilwicki could be when she set her mind to it, Zachary reflected.

Or maybe not so amazing at all, given the stories about what she survived in Old Chicago before the Zilwickis came along, she thought much more grimly, then shook that thought aside.

"If you're ready, Doctor?" she asked out loud, arching one eyebrow.

"We're ready, Captain," Hall confirmed for the remainder of his team. He was the only one actually on the bridge; the others were assembled under Dr. Linda Hronek, the survey expedition's fourth ranking scientist, in the wardroom which had been transformed temporarily into the science team's command post.

Lieutenant Gordon Keller, Harvest Joy's tactical officer, had made himself even more than normally useful helping them set up their equipment. Which was saying quite a bit, since Lieutenant Keller was always useful to have around. He was definitely on the young side for a cruiser's tactical officer, but Harvest Joy's combat days were well behind her now. Zachary and Keller kept her people well trained and well rehearsed—she was a Queen's ship, however long in the tooth she might be growing, and the possibility that she might yet be called to action always existed, however slight it might have become—but she'd sacrificed a quarter of her armament when she was converted for service with the Astrophysics Investigation Agency.

At the moment, Keller was on the command deck, with his weapons crews closed up, but his attention—like everyone else's—was on the astrogation plot, and Zachary had no doubt that his extra efforts on the survey team's behalf had been his own way of getting his hands at least a little dirty. Missiles and energy weapons might not have anything to contribute to exploring a wormhole, but at least he could tell himself truthfully that he'd contributed.

"Well, if everyone's all set, I suppose we should get started," Zachary said calmly now, and glanced at Lieutenant Karen Evans, her astrogator.

"The transit vectors are locked in?" Zachary knew the answer to the question already, of course, but there were rules to follow, and those rules existed for very good reasons.

"Yes, Ma'am." If Evans felt any irritation at being asked a question she'd already answered for the XO, her response showed no trace of it.

"Very well." Zachary turned to her helmsman. "Ten gravities, Senior Chief."

"Ten gravities on Astro's programmed heading, aye, aye, Ma'am," Senior Chief Coxswain Hartneady acknowledged, and Zachary looked down at the com display by her left knee as Harvest Joy began to creep slowly towards the terminus.

"Prepare to rig foresail for transit, Mr. Hammarberg," she told the face looking back at her from the com.

"Aye, aye, Ma'am," Lieutenant Commander Jonas Hammarberg replied formally. "Standing by to rig foresail on your mark."

"Threshold in two-zero seconds," Evans reported.

"On your toes, Senior Chief," Zachary murmured.

"Aye, Ma'am," Hartneady replied, never taking his eyes from his own displays as Harvest Joy edged into the terminus. The survey ship was tracking directly down the path Evans had programmed. If everything went the way it was supposed to go, she'd go right on doing that. If things decided not to go the way they were supposed to go, however, James Hartneady might find himself extraordinarily busy sometime in the next few seconds.