“Correct by point-two degrees. Lower elevation.” An artillery spotter, safe and secure inside Vandel’s mobile HQ. “Bring it home!”

Jasek traded his PPCs with a quartet of ruby-bright spears that slashed at him from the Warhammer. Autocannon pounded around him, hammering armor as well as the dirt around his feet as the Overlord added a portion of its own firepower to the Clan BattleMech’s. The Falcons had obviously identified him as the Stormhammers’ point leader.

Fair enough. “Primary units, slash at their front,” he ordered. “Secondaries, transfer fire to the Warhammer. Now!”

In a well-coordinated strike, half of Jasek’s line leaped forward, suffering the VTOLs’ line of death, and turned all weapons against the ’ Hammer. Less than half hit, at the ranges they traded fire at, but it was still enough to set the Clan MechWarrior back on his heels. The BattleMech teetered and swayed, but held to its feet. The Long Tom dropped an artillery strike only sixty meters behind it, crushing a Nacon scout like a tin can, and no doubt worrying the Clanners a little more.

“Transfer all fire to the DropShip. If you can get an angle on it, work over the main ramps. Let’s clip their wings.”

The last of the noncombat vehicles had lined up for entry. Two of them fell under heavy attack and erupted in flames. A Gauss slug from the Kelswa clipped Jasek’s knee and nearly sent him sprawling. He corrected with a foot planted ahead of him, turned, and sliced at the tank in a cross-body shot.

By luck more than design, one PPC found a flaw in the assault tank’s armor, cutting deep over one tread well, severing the chevron-shaped belt and anchoring it in place.

As the concentrated firepower began to work over the ramp area in earnest, it was enough for the Falcons. In good order, the main units began to fall back for emergency boarding. Jasek’s artillery piece kept working over their lines, but the Falcons got some of their own back as VTOLs continued to pounce on any vehicle that strayed too far forward.

The Overlord shook with unleashed fury as its main drives lit off, blasting the ground beneath it with a bright plasma flame. Smoke and steam curled up around its sides and hid the main ramp from view as the Shadow Hawk and the Warhammer were last to board.

The VTOLs spun about and shot off to the southeast, running for the safety of their closest stronghold.

Knowing the kind of damage a drive flare could do if the DropShip decided to hover and drift over his line, Jasek scattered his units back. Most of them took cover at the forest’s edge. A few found safety inside the near fringes of Norfolk.

Jasek waited on the field, confident in his ability to outmaneuver such an ungainly—if powerful—craft.

The DropShip tried nothing spectacular. It lifted straight off, setting fire to a new ring of saplings as it drifted slightly off center, but doing little more damage than it had already caused on its landing. Within moments it was a bright star in the sky.

“Good riddance,” Joss Vandel said.

Jasek nodded. “But not good-bye. They’ll be back.” He had almost hoped for a longer stand-up fight, giving him the chance to inflict heavier damage on the Clanners. But the Falcons had learned from their earlier mistakes, it seemed. They were far more ready to retreat and re-form.

They were in this for the long haul as well.

“They’ll be back,” he said again, though this time in a whisper quiet enough not to activate his mic. Louder, he ordered, “Get some men into the facilities, Joss. Battlesuits sweep through first, then combat engineers. Make certain that it’s safe—then we’ll see what kind of mess the Falcons have left for us. And send out the call.”

“Everyone?” Vandel asked.

“All of them. If they’re not needed or supporting a current firefight, I want the Tharkan Strikers and the Rangers to begin gathering here at Norfolk.” He bared his teeth, knowing what it was about to cost them. “It’s time for the Stormhammers to draw a line in the sand.”

And then they’d see just how badly the Jade Falcons wanted Skye. If it was enough to stand, and to die, for.

32

Miliano

Skye

15 December 3134

Alate frost still dusted the pale grass and rimed Miliano’s streets where trees and buildings cast their protective shadows. Skye’s sun, drifting higher every morning as local winter gave over firmly to spring, beat down out of a perfect, cobalt sky to melt what it could reach. Here, ice crystals glittered. There, wisps of steam rolled over paved, damp-black surfaces.

Cold one moment. Sweating the next.

Tara Campbell understood that sensation very well.

Riding with Duke Gregory Kelswa-Steiner in his stretched hover-sedan, Tara stared out of the mirror-tinted window and attempted to catalog reasons for her unease. The streets and side lots surrounding Avanti Assemblies looked nearly deserted compared with her previous visits. She had expected to see military vehicles swarming around the facilities, with damaged ’Mechs and tanks waiting in a long queue for their time in the maintenance bays. Battlesuit infantry patrolling the streets. Support vehicles bringing in salvage and the wounded. An armed camp bursting at the seams, preparing for siege—that was how she had characterized Miliano last time.

All erased in less than five days, since Jasek’s return to Skye. Under his direction the Stormhammers responded much more smoothly, rotating refit units into the field at a much quicker pace.

It also appeared that he had pulled half of his troops out of the city. Tara had yet to count one vehicle bearing the crest of the Tharkan Strikers. Lyran Rangers were all that appeared to be left.

Another corner and Duke Gregory’s motorcade—with full military escort, of course—flashed through the gated entrance without so much as a nod to local security. A squad of hoverbikes leading, a pair of VV1 Rangers marking perfect time behind them, and then the black hover-sedan with Tara and Jasek’s father seated in back. A Fox armored car followed, where Legate Eckard had taken the one passenger jump seat.

Tara saw Jasek standing outside the main factory, attended at the moment by his civilian adviser and a Lyran general. Jasek looked ready to jump into combat at a moment’s notice, wearing the gray utility jumpsuit most MechWarriors pulled on over their battle togs. She shifted uncomfortably on the leather seat of the armored limousine, feeling more than a bit pretentious with her formal arrival. It didn’t help when she saw Jasek shake his head and lean over to whisper something to GioAvanti. She could only imagine.

“Sometimes I wonder if we would do better without Jasek.” These were the duke’s first words in the last quarter hour. He sat next to her, staring through the tinted glass at his son, stroking his beard thoughtfully.

“We need his Stormhammers,” Tara reminded him. The blood price they had laid down for Miliano, for Roosevelt Island, argued for itself. Even the lord governor had to admit that by now.

Apparently he did. “But do we need Jasek?”

Something in his tone caught her attention. “Why?” She glanced at him sharply. “Is there a reason we would lose him?”

“Apparently not, if he is able to leave the Commonwealth for our company.” If there had been a suggestion hidden in his words, it had clearly been pulled back. It was simply a tired politician and a disappointed father who sat next to her.

The motorcade pulled up in perfect parade formation. She was out of the sedan the moment it drifted to a stop, never waiting for the driver to get out and open the door for her. The sun warmed the back of her neck, but her ankles felt the dampness of a frost-touched breeze that blew out from the shaded alley between two buildings. Gooseflesh tingled on her arms, and she wrote that off to the chill in the air.