“Point.” Ky rubbed her face. “So if I hadn’t been so prominent at Sabine… if I hadn’t been so obviously in tight with ISC… maybe none of this would have happened.”

Stella touched her arm. “Ky, I don’t think it’s your fault. No one back home even hinted it was your fault.”

“They didn’t have time, did they?” Ky said.

“A few could have, but they didn’t. You can’t blame yourself…”

“Oh, yes, I can,” Ky said. “I certainly can—and I do, in part. I know it’s not all my fault, but I didn’t make things better. Hindsight’s no good if you don’t use it.”

“I just don’t want you taking all the responsibility—”

“Not all. Just some. A mistake I don’t intend to make again.” Though how she was to avoid it, she had no idea. Wars are won by those who make the fewest mistakes, one of her instructors had insisted.

Stella looked at her with an odd expression. “Ky… is that coming out of your military training, or have you really changed that much?”

“Changed?”

“Well… I don’t want to insult you or anything, but back when you were a kid—before you went off to the Academy—I thought of you as kind of a dreamy, impractical sort. You’d come out of it to do something hopelessly romantic, like champion some natural-born loser… we were always hearing about your lost pups.”

Ky felt her neck getting hot. “Hard to lose a family identity even when it doesn’t fit,” she said. “You should know about that.”

Stella’s face hardened. “True enough. But you were different.”

“Was I?” Ky turned away. “They even had me convinced that I was too softhearted and softheaded. If everyone tells you… what did they tell you, Stella, that led you to that first mess?”

Stella’s eyes widened in shock, then she looked thoughtful. “I suppose… everyone always made a big thing out of how pretty I was. Jo was the smart one, Benji and Tak were the strong athletic ones, and I was… Oh look at Stella, isn’t she adorable and Good grief, Stefan, you’ll have to use a cannon to keep the boys off her. I couldn’t outscore Jo—she’s—she was—brilliant, and I never wanted to outsweat Benji and Tak.” She paused. “So… are you telling me you aren’t softhearted and an easy mark for stray pups? When we have a literal stray pup on this very ship?”

Ky snorted. “Puddles isn’t my fault. Oh, I suppose I could’ve let the locals kill the beast, but they annoyed me.”

“You saved the dog to spite the Garda?” Stella said, brows arched.

“More or less, yes. And it might prove useful yet. The vet’s assistant said this breed makes good watchdogs.”

“I suppose, if you have foot-tall assassins, it might be of some use,” Stella said. “But otherwise?”

Was this the time to confess to a family member her self-discovery at the moment of killing Paison? No. Stella would be spooked, and she needed Stella’s support…” I’m not just an idealistic nice girl,” Ky said. Her voice sounded rough to her own ears. “Any more than you’re just a sexy pushover for handsome men.”

“Thank you for that,” Stella said, in a voice that could have been expressing either anger or amusement. “So we’re both renegades, are we? The surviving senior family members, barring Aunt Gracie, who is a renegade in her own way?”

“I suspect,” Ky said, her good humor restored, “that Vattas have always harbored a fair number of renegades. Do we even know how our great-great-great-grandfather obtained his first ship?”

“I do,” said Stella. “It’s in my secured files. And I’m afraid you’re right—he was not entirely respectable.” She shrugged.

“Was he a privateer?” Ky asked.

“Privateer? Maybe. Definitely a raider of some kind, at least for a while. Why?”

“Remember that letter of marque? I was thinking maybe it runs in the family.”

“But you didn’t ask for it; you aren’t using it.”

“Yet,” Ky said, as she got up to leave. Stella stared.

Down in Engineering, Ky found Quincy hunched over a screen, reading through the installation instructions again. Toby sat on the deck, with Puddles upside down in his lap; the pup looked ridiculous, kicking one stubby leg as the boy stroked his belly. Jim, across the compartment, leaned on an upright, scowling.

“How’s it going?” Ky asked.

“It would be going fine if that idiot dog hadn’t eaten a corner out of one of the cartons so we didn’t have all the connectors… we spent hours hunting and we’re still missing one. I think I can cobble something together. I hope.” Quincy gave the pup a poisonous look; Toby hunched over it protectively.

“You aren’t going to space it, are you, Captain?” Toby asked.

“No, of course not,” Ky said. “But we probably need to confine it somehow out of the way.”

“Not in a shipping carton,” Quincy said. “It eats them. And then throws up.”

“I told you—” Jim began, but Quincy silenced him with a gesture.

“Jim thinks if we give the pup the run of the ship, it will learn where everything is and be less trouble,” she said. “I think it would be disastrous. As with that carton. I can just imagine us arriving someplace—wherever we’re going—and finding that our salable cargo has been converted into dog messes.”

“Dogs can be… er… trained, can’t they?” Ky asked. Her family had never kept dogs. Cats, horses, birds, and some of the small arboreal creatures, mingas, but not dogs. She’d had friends with dogs, and those dogs didn’t seem to be much trouble. They made their messes outside. Of course, here outside was a hostile environment. “Didn’t we pick up some supplies from the vet?”

“And a book on training,” Jim said, nodding. “They can be trained to use a box or something. But it takes time.”

“You’ve trained a dog?” Ky asked.

“Not myself, but I’ve watched an uncle.”

Ky was about to say It’s your dog; you found it when she glanced again at Toby. The look he gave her said more than words. “Toby,” she said instead. “You’re caught up on your classwork, aren’t you?”

“Yes, Captain.”

“Quincy, how many hours a day do you need Toby’s help?”

Quincy pursed her lips. “Right now? Not at all, really… systems are all green, and the rest of this setup is software alignment. Why?”

“Because I need him to do something else. Toby, that pup’s your responsibility: I want you to keep it out of trouble, train it, take care of him. I know Jim found it—” She glanced at Jim. “—but, Toby, you’ve had a dog before, and Jim has other duties. If you need help, ask for it, but primarily I want this to be your job. Is that fair?”

His face lit from within for the first time since he’d come aboard. “Yes, Captain! I—I’ll make sure he’s not in the way.”

“I’m sure you’ll take care of him,” Ky said. She felt a pang of guilt. The boy had been through horrendous stresses, and she’d spent how much time making sure he was doing all right? Next to none. “I hope he turns out to be a good little watchdog for our dock area, on stations where dogs are allowed. Be sure to keep me informed how he’s coming along.”

“Captain, could I change his name?”

“His name?”

“Puddles just isn’t… a good name for him.”

“What would you name him?”

Toby glanced at Quincy. “How about Rascal?”

“Sounds good to me,” Ky said. “Now get Rascal out from under Quincy’s feet so she can get on with her work.”

“Yes, ma’am.” The boy scrambled up, all ungainly legs it seemed, and headed for his cabin with Rascal—now awake and wiggling wildly—in his grip.

When he was out of sight, Quincy cocked her head at Ky. “That was well done, Captain. Annoying as I find that animal, he’ll be good for Toby.”

“And you won’t be distracted while finishing the installation,” Ky said.

“I certainly hope not,” Quincy said.