The Feds sent a strike team from the bombard to board us, Marines towering over me in non-reflective, armored combat suits, black as the void and crudmucking intimidating. Staring up at a fully suited marine sure made you feel small. Even Hao, two heads taller than me, barely reached their helmet visors.

  If they were going to stop us, this was the moment. Intern the envoy, send him back with the next dispatch, straight for Santa Kylie. Where my envoy codes would do cold crud.

  I swallowed the saliva pooling in my mouth and clasped my hands behind my back. Be polite, be persistent, and look like you know what you were doing. Basic insurgency tactics. Easy.

  As long as my non-existent game face didn't betray me.

  "How may we help you, maam?" I said to the Marine commander, a middle-aged lieutenant with frown lines etched into her cheeks. Looked a bit too old for being a lieutenant, but maybe she hadn't bribed the right credentials out of her superiors. Or maybe she was one of the good ones, however unlikely that was. They tended to stay junior grade until retirement.

  Or maybe she had the wrong affiliation. The patch on her arm showed a Spade Paladin logo, a big, hulking, shadowy brute standing behind a slim, elfin-looking girl, rather than the Free Fleet's. Spade's World Self-Defense Forces usually were good people, or as good as you could get in the Federal Navy.

  "Jakob Viis?" she said. It took me a second to remember that this was my current name.

  "Yes?" I replied, with barely a squeak to my voice.

  The marines had spread into the Bucket’s central corridor, ten men heading deeper into my ship while a five-man squad held Hao and me at not-quite-gunpoint, their guns angled down at the floor before us.

  Not that it made much of a difference. A Caravel Assault Shotgun pointing between your feet can very easily point at your gut. Those 25 mm bores are mighty big when you're on the wrong end of them. The corridor smelled of gun oil, and the faint metallic odor of spent explosives. Live fire exercises. Marines practiced a lot.

  "May we search your ship, sir?" the lieutenant said.

  "You are already doing so," I replied, masking my fear by pushing a tiny amount of irritation into my voice. Maybe it worked. The lieutenant had the honesty to look abashed.

  Her security detail moved off, leaving her with us. Apparently, they'd decided that we weren't a threat.

  If they were going to lock us up, this was the time. This, or the second after they discovered my gun locker. It was warded, but they'd brought six dowsers. Six was a lot.

  I waited while they searched, my heart beating, trying to breathe calmly, trying to look like I belonged and definitely not like a rogue warder on the run. The marines moved through the Bucket, waving their dowser rods over the walls, the threads of force I summoned parrying them, giving me a headache. At least the lieutenant waited in silence, not distracting me with talk.

  After what seemed like a voidmucking eternity, the marines gathered back around their commander. I prepared my arguments for going down, for having a hidden stash of weapons, including two anti-ship-capable plasma cannons, for really being one of Riina's Kylians.

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  Turned out, I didn't need them. The two squad leaders clomped up to the lieutenant and gave her a head shake and a flick of their dowsers.

  "Cleared," the lieutenant said, tapping her com readout. "Two crew, seven hand weapons, all licensed."

  "Confirmed," a thin voice said in her ear. If I hadn't up-tuned the wards in my stockman hat at the right moment, I wouldn't have heard it. I conjured up a thread of cold force from the void and down-tuned them before they blew my eardrums. At least spying gave me something to do.

  "You're authorized to descend, sir," the lieutenant said, giving me a spiffy salute. She let her arm fall, started turning away, and stopped. "Sir..."

  She hesitated, looking unsure.

  "Yes?" I said, suddenly apprehensive again. Had the Feds changed their mind?

  "Good luck."

  I hadn't expected that. Feds wishing me luck. It must have shown on my face, because she glanced at her combat detail, who were taking great care to study the Bucket's beautiful steel walls. The lieutenant was ignoring them just as studiously. She stepped closer to me.

  "This war, it's bad," she said softly, one hand over her com pickup. "If you can find your people, and negotiate their safety, we might be able to help once the quarantine is lifted. If not... Cant City isn't a good place to be."

  Meaning that I should get into orbit as fast as I could.

  "No rescue option then?" I asked, all innocent like.

  The lieutenant gave a minute shake of her head.

  "No landings," she said. "Maybe some fire support, but definitely nothing ground-based. I'm surprised the vaunted admirals are letting you go down. This whole setup stinks."

  My gut clenched. When a Federal Navy officer on a mission tells a non-affiliated civilian that things are bad, there's a mighty unrest in the ranks.

  I'd heard about something like that once, right before a mutiny that ended with nukes and a dead planet. Stinks was the word. I'd better get down and find the Knife's kid fast, before I got caught up in whatever was happening.

  "Politics?" I asked. It wasn't unheard of for planetary interests to intervene in the Regional Federal Assembly to get the fleet to further their own agenda. Whatever that might be.

  "Politics," the lieutenant confirmed. "And money." For a second, she looked about to say more. Instead she quirked her lips, as if she'd tasted something bitter.

  "Well, good luck," she repeated. Maybe she really was one of the good ones.

  "Thank you, lieutenant," I said, meaning it. Kindness is precious. Always repay it in kind. I wished I had something to offer her, something that wouldn't be construed as a bribe. You didn't want to insult good people, especially when they were Spade's World.

  No time to cook, though. I settled on giving her a Navy salute, thumping my fist to my chest. That got me a smile in return.

  The lieutenant stepped back, waving her combat detail into their shuttle ahead of her. She cast one last glance at Hao and me, and keyed the airlock shut behind them. The steel doors closed with a soft hiss.

  "That was strange," Hao said.

  "Getting searched at gunpoint?" I said, walking toward my gun locker. "Or our talkative officer?"

  The locker was hidden behind a pair of regular, very ordinary, steel wall plates, but the wards I'd put on it were anything but ordinary. I'd felt the dowsers reach for it, and up-tuned the dispersal wards, matching their flow to the dowsing rods'. Likely, that was why the marines hadn't spotted it. If they’d had a mage with them, we’d have been crudmucking voided.

  "Three squads on a light hauler," Hao replied. "Usually, you send a platoon, either half or full."

  I kept forgetting that she'd been in the navy, a long time ago. She didn't like to talk about it. I wouldn't have, either. Bad memories like to remain buried.

  But thinking about it, there had been a half-platoon that did the work. The lieutenant's combat detail had stood around, guarding her.

  Not quite guarding her. They'd moved with the half-platoon at first. Then they'd congregated on the airlock and the lieutenant. Waiting. As if they'd done their duty. There had been no love lost between the officer and her security detail. Nothing at all like the easy camaraderie and common signs that had woven her and the rest of the half-platoon together. They had worked well together. The security detail had not.

  A cold sliver of void stabbed my gut. The Feds had sent a bug squad.