“No.” And then, for the first time, she faltered. “I… I was on my way… to my base at Ancha and I… I guess I just wanted to see you…”

“One last time?” He reached out, touched her cheek. Her eyes were very bright, and her skin was wet—though not with salt spray. An image swam before his mind’s eye; of his little Rachel when she’d scraped her knee and how he’d cupped her cheek, told her that everything would be all right. But now, nothing would ever be right again.

It was almost too much for his old heart to bear. “Katana, if my daughter had lived, I would’ve been overjoyed for her to call you sister. But, my dear, I fear for you. I fear for us both. Please, Katana, please… don’t force me to become the agent of your death.”

He let his hand fall away and turned again toward the sea and setting sun. They stood awhile, side by side, as the sea stole land from beneath their feet by imperceptible degrees. Then he felt the brush of fingers on his right cheek and he heard the rasp of sand as she walked away.

He turned at the last possible second. She was atop the sloping dune once more, unmoving, her back to him. The setting sun painted the sand orange and bronzed her skin. His old heart hoped that she’d turn and come back to him—even as his reason knew she wouldn’t.

And, in this at least, she didn’t disappoint him.

8

Katana’s Journal

26 December 3134

Well, that hurt like hell. I don’t why I’m so surprised, though. What did I expect? That Sir Reginald would pat me on the head and tell me what a good, brave little girl I’ve turned out to be? Dumb.

And, of course, Sully noticed, damn it all. Let me have it as soon as I was aboard the DropShip. “Well, ain’t this a fine and pretty picture?”

I tried a smile that didn’t work. “That noticeable, huh?”

Sully blew out like a horse. He’s a bear of a man: thick-necked, barrel-chested, a little grizzled because he’s always got a five o’clock shadow, even at ten in the morning, and a rich Scottish burr that makes me think of crackling wood fires, smoky whiskey, green heaths. He still wore his cook’s apron, and he smelled like good steamed rice: rich and nutty. “Your face gets any longer you gonna need a wheelbarrow to cart around your chin. What’s on your mind, girl?”

So I told him. He listened. Sully’s good that way, always has been, and it probably explains why his bar on Northwind was always packed. The best bartenders are just a step away from being psychiatrists, I guess. Anyway, when I started up Dragon’s Fury and recruited my Brotherhood, there he was at the head of the line, asking where to sign. So now I take my best cook everywhere. My one failing—but he’s that good.

Sully gave his chin a thoughtful rasp with his nails and said, “All right. Now we could talk about why you even bothered going to see Sir Reginald…”

“I’d rather not.” I’d been playing with my breakfast, pushing natto beans around with my bowl of rice, and now I balanced the tips of black lacquered chopsticks on their holder. “There’s really no point.”

“Oh, there’s a point, Kat, there’s always a point.” Sully gave me a shrewd going-over with those baby blues of his. “But that ain’t all that’s bothering you, is it?”

I shook my head, sighed, picked up my teacup and took a sip. “Dragon’s Fury’s in trouble,” I said flatly. “We’ve reached the limit of our available resources, and we simply don’t have any way to stretch ourselves further. It’s not just men; it’s materiel, supplies, everything. If one of those occupied worlds got it in its head to mount a rebellion, I’m not sure we’d quash it, or get there in time. Crawford said that unless we secure stockpiles, and I’m talking lots and lots of weapons, hardware, fighters, ’Mechs, we’re going nowhere in a hurry.”

Sully grunted. “Thought it might be something like that. People talk, you hear things if you’ve got your ear to the ground. And that Andre Crawford, I know he’s one of those agent-types, O5P, and I don’t usually take to that cloak-and-dagger stuff. But he’s got a head, and he’s loyal. If he says it’s so…”

“Then it’s so.”

“Couldn’t a said it better. But what about that McCain fella, and Miss Viki? You heard from them yet?” When I shook my head, he said, “Well, now, Kat, I’m not one to lord it over ya, tell you that I didn’t like it one bit what you did, ordering them Junction-way, dealing with them lowlifes, and you never no minding what I said, ’cause if there’s one thing a man knows what keeps a pub is that them criminal-types, they’s dicey. I told you from the very beginning, Kat, only you’re a stubborn one.”

“Gee, don’t hold back, Sully. Tell me what you really think.”

“Now, don’t you go mouthing your betters.” Sully wagged a thick finger. “You got to face up to the unpleasant facts, Kat, or else what you got’ll be gone. You’ve done things a sight faster’n better than even Theodore Kurita, Bob’s your uncle.”

Bob? Sully says the strangest things. “It’s not a contest, Sully.”

“Just you listen to what old Sully’s saying, because I’ll tell you something else. I don’t see the coordinator, all hot and fevered-like, roaring down in a DropShip and clapping you by the hand and saying what a good job you done. You keep saying you want the Dragon to wake up, am I right?”

I opened my mouth, but Sully breezed on. “’Course I’m right. Only maybe you ain’t figured that he is awake, and just don’t care. That’s part of why you ain’t letting well enough alone, is ’cause you want the coordinator to care.”

“Look, I won’t argue that it’d be nice for the coordinator to sanction what I’m doing. Maybe then I’d get some support. God knows, I need it. But, Sully, The Republic’s a grand experiment that’s failed, and that’s all there is to it.”

“With a little help from you.”

“And you think I’d have gotten so many people to follow me if they hadn’t wanted to? Look at me. I don’t have millions of troops. I’m not pulverizing worlds into subatomic particles. But people want to belong to something greater than themselves…”

“Like you?”

Heat crawled up my neck. Sully’s better than a sensor that way; he always knows how to push my buttons. “And you, I might add. Why else join up with the Brotherhood? Because you worry I won’t get a square meal?”

“Well, you wouldn’t’ve.” Sully held up a meaty paw. “Kat, you don’t have to convince me, girl. I’m only saying that you’ve snatched plenty. Now… rest easy for awhile. Count yerself lucky you’ve still got your head screwed on proper.”

We left it at that, but, damn it all, if Sully hasn’t hit the nail on the head—again. I’ve never felt at home anywhere except the Combine, ever. Oh, sure, my father was governor on Ancha. But he’d been Combine before; the Dragon ran in his veins, I know it did. It wasn’t just bad luck or routine timing that his first marriage went down faster than a DropShip with no engines, because what did he do? He married my mother, Rachel Jefferson: musicologist, specialist in all things Japanese and Combine.

But I got my first taste of what home, a real home in the Combine, could be when I was eleven. That’s when I met Uncle Kan’s brother, Oniji Otome. I had gone to return Uncle’s swords. I remember that Otome-san seemed very old, even then, with deeply lined features and his brother’s gray-blue eyes. He listened without comment as Mom told him how Uncle Kan had died. Then I presented the swords, which we’d placed upon a special, pure white silk pillow, because white is the color of death. I remember being very nervous, worried that I’d mess up the bow because I had to kneel, put the pillow down, then hunker down into a sitting rei and get both hands on the ground and do the bow just right.