Kerensky doesn’t want Northwind, he thought. Kerensky wants Terra, just as the Clans have always wanted it. Seizing control of humanity’s home planet would allow her to fulfill what the Clans believed to be their manifest destiny, and it would make her—what was the word they used?– ilKhan. Northwind was just the springboard.

The idea made sense, and chilled him even in the heat of the Blade’s cockpit. After Anastasia Kerensky had finished with Northwind, when the Highlanders’ homeworld was no longer a threat at her back, then she would strike at Terra.

He’d reached the gates of the mercenary encampment while pursuing these thoughts, and was stopped by soldiers on gate guard with Gauss rifles, backed up by an SM1 Tank Destroyer.

“Halt and identify yourself, MechWarrior!”

A ceremonial threat, given muscle by the SM1. Crow replied over the Blade’s external speaker: “Paladin Ezekiel Crow. I need to speak with your commanding officer. At once.”

From the Blade’s cockpit, he saw the gate guards put their heads together for a quick consultation. He didn’t wait, but began unstrapping from the control seat and getting ready to climb down. The gate guards would have recognized Crow’s name by now as that of the person who held the mercenaries’ current contract. If Farrell were not already waiting by the time Crow reached the ground, he would be arriving in haste soon after.

In fact, Farrell showed up at the gate as Crow was stepping off the bottom rung of the access ladder. “Paladin Crow,” he said. “To what do I owe this unexpected visit?”

“The Steel Wolves have landed at Tara DropPort.”

“Huh.” Farrell didn’t look particularly surprised. “You’re the one that’s giving the orders, Paladin. What’s the word?”

Crow, looking at Farrell, realized that the man didn’t care what answer he got. At Crow’s order, he would fight for the Northwinders, or against them, with equal skill and determination. His loyalty—if such was the word—was not to the cause, but to the contract, and to the man holding it.

The moment between Farrell’s question and Crow’s reply stretched out into infinity, with time within it for a host of considerations.

If I stay here and fight, he thought, it’ll mean the end of my career. I might as well be dead for any use I’ll be to The Republic after what’s in that envelope gets published.

As for the Countess of Northwind—Crow realized with a pang of regret that whatever future they might have shared was lost to him, no matter what happened. Tara Campbell would never forgive the Betrayer of Liao.

On the other hand, the cold voice of reason pointed out, even without the aid of Jack Farrell’s mercenaries, she would be able to hold out against the Steel Wolves for some time before having to admit defeat. Not forever—but long enough for Crow to reach Terra.

From Terra, he would have access to the resources that would let him deal with the threat of exposure as Daniel Peterson, Betrayer of Liao. The name was the connection, the only loose thread that could be pulled. If he could discredit or eliminate the source of the name, the rest would be nothing but rumor.

More than that, however—on Terra, he could protect The Republic of the Sphere and Devlin Stone’s peace against the threat of invasion by the Steel Wolves. Such protection was the Exarch’s responsibility, some people might say, but a crisis was no time for false modesty. If Damien Redburn was good at his job, Ezekiel Crow knew that he would be better.

“Take your forces,” he said to Farrell. “Deploy them to block the roads out of the city. Don’t give the Highlanders a chance to break off from combat and retreat.”

“Do you want us to fight them,” Farrell asked “or just to get in their way?”

“If you have to—fight.”

PART THREE

Burning

February 3134

35

DropShipQuicksilver

Tara DropPort

Northwind

February 3134; local winter

By the time Ezekiel Crow had brought his Blade from the mercenaries’ encampment back to the city, the hour was well past midnight. The city lay in eerie quiet around him. The Wolves would have disembarked from their DropShips by now, and the port complex itself had undoubtedly fallen; now they would be moving cautiously forward, testing the defenses that Prefect Tara Campbell would have begun setting up as soon as the DropPort sounded the alarm. The Highlanders, for their part, were waiting for Farrell’s mercenaries to move into position before starting their counterattack. They had a long wait ahead of them, Crow thought, and disappointment at the end of it.

He took his Blade through the streets leading to the DropPort. He had nothing else with him of his own except his MechWarrior’s gear and the uniform—now stowed in the cockpit locker—which he had been wearing when he left the New Barracks for the Armory. The wallet containing his keys and ID and financial-access cards had still been in the pocket of his uniform trousers when the initial alarm sounded, which in retrospect was a good thing. He would not have liked to attempt a journey from Northwind to Terra backed by nothing but his personal charisma.

He would rather not have been making the journey at all. Running away, leaving a city to its fate… I’m making a career of this, he thought.

He shook his head. He was a Paladin of the Sphere. His loyalty was not to one world any longer, but to all of them, and to Terra above the rest. He had to go where he could to deal with the forces that threatened to stain his reputation, and where he could most effectively counter the threat of Anastasia Kerensky and her Steel Wolves.

Near morning, he reached the last checkpoint before the port: a barrier of wood and barbed wire, manned by combat troops in powered armor with a revetted gun emplacement and a comm set. Crow switched on the Blade’s external speakers.

“Paladin Crow, on Republic business,” he said to the troopers.

He’d been able, by means of judicious detours, to avoid alerting any of the secondary checkpoints further in. This one, marking as it did a point in the Highlanders’ outer defensive perimeter, could not as easily be circumvented, and he had already made up his mind not to try. The troopers here might send word back that Paladin Ezekiel Crow had passed through the lines in the direction of the port—but, with luck, not until it was too late for anyone to stop him.

The guards saluted him with their Gauss rifles and stepped back, raising the barrier. His Blade could have stepped over it without any difficulty, but to do so would have raised the alarm. Better to follow protocol, and buy himself time with polite behavior.

He continued on toward the DropPort. When the sound of gunfire marked the direction in which the Steel Wolves were making their first attempt at the Highlanders’ defenses, he swung wide to avoid that sector, coming at the landing field from another angle. Behind him, on the skyline of the city, a column of black smoke rose straight up in the still air, making an ugly streak against the dawn-fresh sky.

The Steel Wolves held the port, but had not, apparently, expected a lone ’Mech to enter it unsupported. He suspected that they had spotted him early on, and were waiting to see what he would do.

“Any unit, any unit,” came a call over the intra– ’Mech circuit. The speaker was using one of the Highlander frequencies. “Any unit, request support at grid one-five-three.”

Crow reached up and switched off the internal speaker. One-five-three, he thought. The smoke on the skyline would be coming from somewhere near there. One-five-three was in the north-west quadrant, near the suburb of Fairfield, where the Highlanders and the Wolves faced one another across the Tyson and Varney ’Mech factory. He had chosen his route out of the city well.