The Consuming Fire (The Interdependency #2)(70)

“That is correct, Captain Ponsood.”

“We are wondering what your intentions are now, Lord Marce.”

“Well, Captain, the answer to that rests entirely on you.”

“Please explain.”

“Why did you destroy the Oliveer Bransid?”

“We were hired to.”

“Who hired you?”

“I don’t know. We were hired by intermediaries who wouldn’t tell me the identity of the primary contractor. I, uh, work in a very specialized contracted business field. I don’t always know who is hiring me.”

“Thank you, Captain Ponsood. Enjoy oblivion.” Marce looked over to Chenevert, who nodded.

“The circuit is muted on this end,” he said.

“You think he’s lying about who contracted him,” Sherrill said.

Marce nodded. “We’ll find out soon enough.”

Five minutes later Ponsood was back on the circuit, asking for Marce. Marce nodded to Chenevert, who opened up the circuit. “Yes?”

“Lord Marce, we were hired by an intermediary. A representative of the Wu family.”

Marce frowned at this. “You were hired by the imperial family?”

“No, not by the royal family. By the Wus that run the merchant house. Cousins of the emperox.”

“Who were the Wus acting as an intermediary for?”

“I asked that of the representative. I’ve done business with the Wus before—it’s why they contacted me in the first place—but never with them as the intermediary. They were always the primary client. Their representative didn’t want to say, but I told him there was no way I would take the job without knowing. The job was time-sensitive and the Wus didn’t really have any other option, so the rep swore me to secrecy and told me: the Countess Nohamapetan.”

“How did the Nohamapetans know about the Bransid in the first place?”

“She heard about it from the Wus. The Wus heard it from an admiral, is what I was told. The navy is obviously close with the Wus. They get all their weapons and ships from them.”

“That doesn’t make sense. The Wus aren’t close with the Nohamapetans.”

“I don’t know the relationships of the great families, Lord Marce. I don’t have time to keep up with gossip. You asked who contracted me, and I’m telling you.”

“Okay, but why would the Countess Nohamapetan want to attack the Bransid?”

“She didn’t,” Ponsood said, and an exasperated Marce was about to mute the line again, but Ponsood continued from there. “She didn’t care about the ship one way or the other. It was a means to an end for her actual target.”

“Who or what was that?”

There was a pause on the line. Then, “It was you, Lord Marce. The Countess Nohamapetan wanted you dead bad enough to send us to attack the Bransid to get to you.”

Marce stared in disbelief. He looked around the bridge of the Auvergne to see every other set of eyes on him.

“Hello?” Ponsood said. Marce had been silent for nearly a full minute.

“Why?” Marce asked.

“I wasn’t told that. Just that we were to make sure you were dead. I asked if that meant I could leave the Bransid crew alive if they surrendered you, and I was told that the Bransid could not be allowed to return to Hub, and I had a choice of destroying it, or destroying its field generator. That would have meant marooning the crew here to a slow death by starvation or suffocation. I opted for the faster way. It seemed more humane to me. You should know, Lord Marce, that the Bransid put up a hell of a fight. You wouldn’t have captured us without the damage they did to us first.”

“And the Dalasyslans?”

“The who, Lord Marce?”

“The people who inhabit this system, Captain.”

“I don’t know who you’re talking about, sir. I was focused on the Bransid, which was keeping me busy enough. Are you saying that there are still people alive here? After eight hundred years?”

“Yes.”

“It’s just as well I didn’t know about them. It wouldn’t have done to leave anyone who could attest to what we did here.”

“Except for the one person you came specifically to kill.”

“The irony of this does not escape me, Lord Marce. I’m telling you because I have no other choice. Neither I nor my crew wants to die here, or like this.”

“You’re asking me to give you an option that you wouldn’t give to the crew of the Bransid.”

“Lord Marce, if I didn’t believe you would entertain the option, I wouldn’t have opened my mouth.”

“Hold on,” Marce said, and looked at Chenevert, who nodded and muted the connection. Marce sat down heavily in a chair, put his face in his hands, and sobbed.

“It’s—” Hanton began, but Marce held up a hand at him. Hanton stopped and looked uncomfortable. It was a common look around the room.

After a minute Marce nodded to Chenevert, who opened the connection again. “You’re going to testify about all of this, Captain Ponsood.”

“If that is what it takes to keep my crew alive, Lord Marce, I’ll repeat everything I told you to any judge you pick.”

“You’re not going to tell it to a judge, Captain. You’re going to tell it to the emperox. To her face. And I will be there as you do it.”