“Captain Bishop!” she said over the private command circuit. “Do you have a fix on the Blade?”

“Yes, Countess. I’m tracking him.”

“Then I want you to get with a battery of JES II SMCs. Two batteries would be better.”

“Wouldn’t that be dishonorable, ma’am? This was supposed to be a match just between the two of you, agreed and sworn.”

“I’m not asking you to shoot at him,” she said. “I want you to shoot at the ground around him. Make sure you miss his ’Mech by at least fifty meters every time, just so long as you put a box of shell holes around him a klick in every direction. North, south, east, and west of him—I don’t want to see anything but craters full of mud.”

“If you’re ordering it, ma’am—”

“I am.”

“Then I’ll see that it gets done.”

34

Belgorod

Terra

Prefecture X

April 3134; local spring

Ian Murchison hadn’t been expecting to watch the battle for Terra from the Steel Wolves’ rear command post. He made no claim to know much about war and soldiering, but it seemed only good sense that a person of ambiguous status and divided loyalties—such as himself—should be confined to quarters for the duration, or at the very least told kindly to go back to sick bay and stay out from underfoot. He’d neglected to take into account the fact that he was Anastasia Kerensky’s Bondsman, and good sense and Anastasia Kerensky were only the most distant of nodding acquaintances.

He would observe the battle from the field, she told him, and would not be denied.

When he went out to the command post—an array of communications and data consoles set up in a tent near the open hatch of Anastasia’s DropShip Fenrir–he took his medical bag with him. He wasn’t able to fully explain his insistence upon doing so even to himself, much less to Anastasia, who maintained that a post so far from the front lines was unlikely to provide casualties requiring his immediate attention. He suspected, however, that something to do with identity was involved. A medic could watch a battle and tend to the injured of either side without qualms of conscience. A man of Northwind without a proper job to do—that was another matter.

Anastasia Kerensky, for her part, appeared untroubled by either scruples or qualms. She stood in the shelter of the command post in shorts and a thin knit shirt, her hands busy working her long hair out of the way into a braid. If Murchison had seen her that way in any other place but here, he would have thought—after observing her cheerful demeanor—that she was thinking of nothing more than a country hike on a sunny day.

Her custom-modified, seventy-five-ton Ryoken II, however, stood only a few meters away from the command post, and gave the lie to all such innocent appearances. This was the first time that Murchison had gotten a close-up view of Anastasia’s heavily armed personal BattleMech, with its missile six-packs and particle projector cannons. This was a ’Mech that could both run and fight, perfectly suited to the leader of the Steel Wolves.

Anastasia had set up a sensor repeater on the map table in the command post, the better to monitor the fight between the Countess of Northwind and Ezekiel Crow while she braided her hair and waited on the outcome. She had piped the radio traffic between the two combatants over the external speakers of her Ryoken II so that everyone in range could hear.

Murchison frowned as Anastasia tied off the braid and began stretching to limber up her muscles for the day’s work to come. She had to still be experiencing considerable discomfort from the knife wound she’d taken at Saffel Station. He’d patched her up as best he could, but was by no means certain that his handiwork would hold in the face of vigorous physical activity.

Anastasia finished stretching. Catching his eye, she nodded toward the screen of the sensor repeater.

“What do you say, Bondsman Murchison?” she asked him. “Those are your people over there. Do you wish you were standing with them now?”

“What I wish isn’t of much importance at the moment,” Murchison said. “If I were you, I’d be more worried about where the Countess of Northwind wishes to stand.”

Anastasia laughed. It was a sound of pure delight. “I like you, Murchison,” she said. “Give me your wrist. Now is the time to cut your last cord.”

Murchison shook his head. “Thank you for the honor, Galaxy Commander—but I’d prefer it if you waited until this evening. There’s many ways that a battle can go.”

“I see,” Anastasia said. She gave him a considering look. “What you wish is of little importance, eh? But if that is what you truly want, then I have no objection.”

“Thank you, Galaxy Commander.”

“Wait until this evening,” Anastasia said. “Then thank me.”

Their conversation was brought to an abrupt halt by the arrival of a messenger, a young Warrior on a fast scout vehicle.

“Galaxy Commander,” he said, saluting. “Star Captain Illis reports DropShips landing to the south. Whose or what they are, we do not yet know.”

“Tell Illis to send a detachment southward to find out,” Kerensky said. “This is not a day for surprises.”

“No surprises,” the Warrior repeated, saluted, and left.

“Those would be the DropShips that followed us in,” Anastasia said thoughtfully. “Whoever they are, they have pulled up a seat at our table. Tell me, Bondsman Murchison, what do you suppose it means?”

“Trouble,” the medic replied. “This is Terra, after all. Every hand in The Republic will have been raised against us.”

“It could be trouble,” Anastasia agreed. “Or it could be a friend. Regardless of what you Northwinders seem to think, not every person in the Inner Sphere loves The Republic with a whole heart.”

“As you say, Galaxy Commander,” Murchison said absently. His thoughts were occupied with wondering why he had referred to the Steel Wolves as “us.” Maybe the cord that encircled his wrist was already cut.

One of the readouts on the sensor repeater began to flicker on and off repeatedly, and he saw Anastasia Kerensky stiffen. Something new had apparently happened in the single combat between Tara Campbell and Ezekiel Crow. Murchison wondered which one of them had won.

Anastasia seemed either not to know the answer, or not to care. She picked up a microphone, and spoke to the Steel Wolves over the main Clan frequency.

“All stations,” she said. “This is Galaxy Commander Anastasia Kerensky. Commence the attack.”

She put down the mike, climbed the Ryoken II’s access ladder, and entered the cockpit through the hatch. A few minutes later the ’Mech stretched its articulated metal arms skyward—a maneuver that Ian Murchison, watching, found eerily reminiscent of Anastasia’s own movements—then lowered them again and strode away to the east.