Honorverse favorite passages

"Been wantin' t' meet you for years," the captain stated, speaking in a drawl which Du Havel immediately recognized. Not specifically, of course—the galaxy had easily ten times as many dialects and verbal mannerisms as it did languages and inhabited worlds. But he knew the phenomenon for what it was, since it, too, was as ancient as privilege. Members of an elite group—"elite," at least, in their own minds—almost invariably developed a distinctive style of speech to separate themselves from the common herd.

Oversteegen, smiling thinly, gave the crowd his own quick overview. "Only reason I agreed t' come t' this Walpurgis Night of prattlin' political heathens."

He bestowed the smile on Cathy, widening it a bit. "Present company excepted, of course. I've long had a grudgin' admiration for the Countess here—former Countess, I suppose I should say. Ever since the speech she gave at the House of Lords which got her pitched out on her ear. I was there in person, as it happens, observin' as a member of the family since my mother was indisposed. And I'll tell you right now that I would have voted for her expulsion from the Lords myself, had I been old enough at the time, on the simple grounds that she had, in point of fact, violated long established protocol. Even though, mind you, I agreed with perhaps ninety percent of what she'd said. Still, rules are rules."

Cathy smiled back. "Rules were meant to be broken."

"Don't disagree," Oversteegen replied immediately. "Indeed they are. Providin', however, that the one breakin' the rules is willin' t' pay the price for it, and the price gets charged in full."

He gave Cathy a deep nod, almost a bow. "Which you were, Lady Catherine. I saluted you for it then—at the family dinner table that night, in fact. My mother was infinitely more indisposed thereafter; tottered back t' her sick bed cursin' me for an ingrate. My father was none too pleased, either. I salute you for it, again."

Turning back to Du Havel: "Otherwise, breakin' rules becomes the province of brats instead of heroes. Fastest way I can think of t' turn serious political affairs int' a playpen. A civilized society needs a conscience, and conscience can't be developed without martyrs—real ones—against which a nation can measure its crimes and sins."
Du Havel's interest perked up sharply. He understood the logic of Oversteegen's argument, naturally. It would have been surprising if he hadn't, since it was a paraphrase—not a bad one either, given the compression involved—of the basic argument Du Havel had advanced in one of his books.

Oversteegen immediately confirmed his guess. "I should tell you that I consider The Political Value of Sacrifice one of the finest statements of conservative principle in the modern universe. Havin' said that, I also feel obliged t' inform you that I consider the arguments you advanced in Scales of Justice: Feathers Against Stones t' be—at best!—a sad lapse int' liberal maudlinism. Principles are principles, Doctor Du Havel. You, of all people, should know that. So it was sad t' see you maunderin' from one compromise t' another, tradin' away clarity for the sake of immediate benefit. Sad, sad. Practically gave social engineerin' your blessin', you did."

Hallelujah! Du Havel began plucking at his sleeves, in a vain attempt to find the buttons so he could roll them up.
"Social engineering, is it? Ha! Explain to me, Captain Oversteegen, why it is that so-called 'conversatives'—nothing of the sort, mind you; just dinosaurs with pretensions—only object to social engineering when it threatens to hang over into their own—invariably lush and well-kept—front gardens? Yet never have the slightest objection to social engineering when it created those palatial grounds in the first place?"

Oversteegen drew himself up a bit, looming even taller than ever. Cheerfully—except for the problem with the sleeves; dammit, where were the buttons?—Du Havel plunged on.

"Consider your own aristocratic system here on Manticore, if you would. Blatant social engineering, Captain. As crude as it gets. A pack of rich people, creating a constitution deliberately designed—with greed aforethought, if not malice—to keep themselves and their descendants in a blessed state of privilege. Or are you going to try to argue that the principles of aristocracy arose from the native soil of what was then an alien planet? Like weeds, as it were—which, by the way, is a pretty apt analogy for any variety of caste system. Weeds, preening like roses."

Oversteegen grinned, acknowledging the hit. A splendid intellectual warrior, Du Havel noted gleefully, not fazed in the least by a mere dash of blood. He was practically clawing at the sleeves, now.

"You'll get no argument from me on that issue, Doctor. Indeed true. Can't even argue that my ancestors were better murderers and robbers and rapists than anyone else, I'm afraid, the way a proper Norman baron could. Just bigger moneybags and an earlier arrival date, that's all. Lamentable, isn't it, the lengths to which modern nobility is driven by the advance of social conscience? Still, I'll argue in favor of an aristocracy."

A high-pitched, derisive snort issued from his long and bony nose. "Not because I believe for an instant that Conservative Association babble about good breedin', much less their downright superstitions on the subject of so-called good birth. No, the issue isn't the worth of the individuals in any given aristocracy. It's simply the social advantage which havin' any aristocracy gives a nation. Pick 'em by lottery, for all I care. But just the fact it exists gives the nation manifold benefits."

Cathy interrupted. "Web, those sleeves can't be rolled up. The style doesn't allow for it."

He glared at her. "Is that so? Hmph. Watch this."

Du Havel had been bred a J-line by Manpower. That was—supposedly; as usual, their claims fell wide of reality—a breed designed for technical work. Thus, an emphasis on mental capability, at least of a low and mechanical variety. But also, since J-lines were designed basically for engineering work, a breed which was physically quite sturdy. Web wasn't particularly tall, and his long years of sedentary intellectual activity had put thirty kilos of fat on his frame. But the frame beneath was still square and solid.

So were the muscles which went with it.

Riiip. Riiip.

"Ah. That's better.

"So what do you suggest instead?" Elizabeth asked. Honor's eyes widened slightly at the queen's reasonable tone, and Elizabeth chuckled harshly. "Step up to the plate, as I believe they say on Grayson, Duchess Harrington. You've just done the equivalent of spanking me in public—well, in semi-public, at least—and I may have deserved it. But if you're prepared to tell me I've been wrong, then I'm prepared to tell you to suggest something better!"

"We've got some confirmation of technology transfers from other sources, as well," Honor told her guest quietly. "The seeking systems in Peep missiles have gotten much better in a very short period of time. We had a thirty to forty percent edge when the war began; BuWeaps estimates that our superiority's dropped to no more than ten percent at present. Fortunately, our countermeasures and general electronic warfare capability have continued to improve at a faster rate than theirs, so the effective relative increase in their missile accuracy is 'only' on the order of twenty percent, but that's still not good. Also," her eyes darkened, "we've had unconfirmed reports that the Peeps have begun deploying missile pods of their own."

"We have?" White Haven's voice was sharp. "I didn't see that mentioned in ONI's briefing documents!"

"As I say, it's unconfirmed . . . mainly because the ships we think may have encountered them haven't come home to tell us about them." Honor shrugged. "The Weapons Development Board was convinced of the accuracy of the reports in large part because they dovetailed so neatly with other, incremental improvements we're seeing across the board in the PN's technology. But ONI's taken the position that until we have something more definite, the existence of Peep pods has to be considered conjectural."

" 'Conjectural'!" White Haven snorted harshly. "That's going to be a lot of help when they stick their damned 'conjectural' pods up some poor damned commander's—" He broke off suddenly and cleared his throat. "I mean, the first time one of our fleet commanders encounters them. I can't believe Pat Givens is being this coy about a threat like that!"

"I know exactly what you mean, My Lord," Honor said with a lurking smile for the word he hadn't let himself use in her presence. Was it possible Grayson mores were contaminating the Manticorans assigned here? And if they were, was that such a bad thing? Then she turned more serious and leaned slightly towards him.

"As for Admiral Givens, I don't know why she's failed to make the warning official. One possibility—and I offer it only as pure conjecture on my part, from some of the things I observed while at the WDB—is that she's less of a technician than a strategist. It seems to me that she's a bit more hesitant to commit herself on hardware issues than on operational or diplomatic ones." She shrugged apologetically. "I may be out of line on that, but it seemed that way to me." She saw no reason to add that what she and Nimitz had read of Givens' emotions was a major factor in her "conjecture."

cthia wrote:In Enemy Hands

"
"As for Admiral Givens, I don't know why she's failed to make the warning official. One possibility—and I offer it only as pure conjecture on my part, from some of the things I observed while at the WDB—is that she's less of a technician than a strategist. It seems to me that she's a bit more hesitant to commit herself on hardware issues than on operational or diplomatic ones." She shrugged apologetically. "I may be out of line on that, but it seemed that way to me." She saw no reason to add that what she and Nimitz had read of Givens' emotions was a major factor in her "conjecture."

A very humorous but poignant passage that gets me every time. However, the bold that is mine is quite surprising. How can Honor be wrong about Sonja's technical acumen, being that her empathic sense bears witness to it? Yet, how can she be right, as Sonja's technical genius speaks for itself?

And if she really is less of a technician than a strategist - knowing how much of a technical genie she really is, then she is one hell of a strategist then isn't she?!

This passage seems to bear a bit of contradiction and confusion.

cthia wrote:In Enemy Hands

"
"As for Admiral Givens, I don't know why she's failed to make the warning official. One possibility—and I offer it only as pure conjecture on my part, from some of the things I observed while at the WDB—is that she's less of a technician than a strategist. It seems to me that she's a bit more hesitant to commit herself on hardware issues than on operational or diplomatic ones." She shrugged apologetically. "I may be out of line on that, but it seemed that way to me." She saw no reason to add that what she and Nimitz had read of Givens' emotions was a major factor in her "conjecture."

A very humorous but poignant passage that gets me every time. However, the bold that is mine is quite surprising. How can Honor be wrong about Sonja's technical acumen, being that her empathic sense bears witness to it? Yet, how can she be right, as Sonja's technical genius speaks for itself?

And if she really is less of a technician than a strategist - knowing how much of a technical genie she really is, then she is one hell of a strategist then isn't she?!

This passage seems to bear a bit of contradiction and confusion.

Armed Neo-Bob wrote:Cthia, this is Pat Givens, not Sonja Hemphill.

Rob

Amber light strings began to blink above the waiting docking buffers, a sure sign the pinnace was on final with the pilot looking for that visual cue, but White Haven didn't even notice. Or perhaps he did, for the blinking lights took him back to that hideous day fifty years before when the supersonic med flight with its strident, eye-shattering emergency lights had delivered his wife's broken and mangled body to the Landing General trauma center. He'd been there to greet the flight, summoned from his office at Admiralty House, but he hadn't been there to prevent the air car accident, now had he? Of course not. He'd had his "duty" and his "responsibilities," and they were both prolong recipients, so they'd had centuries yet to make up for all the time those inescapable concepts had stolen from them.

But he'd been there to see her carried in—to recognize the damage and cringe in horror, for unlike himself, Emily was one of the minority of humanity for whom the regeneration therapies simply did not work. Like Honor, a corner of his brain thought now. Just like Honor—another point in common. And because they didn't work for her, he'd been terrified.

She'd lived. None of the doctors had really expected her to, even with all of modern medicine's miracles, but they hadn't known her like White Haven knew her. Didn't have the least concept of the dauntless willpower and courage deep within her. But they did know their profession, and they'd been right about one thing. She might have fooled them by living, and again by doing it with her mind unimpaired, yet they'd told him she would never leave her life-support chair again, and for fifty years, she hadn't.

It had almost destroyed him when he realized at last that the doctors were right. He'd fought the idea, rejected it and beaten himself bloody on its jagged, unforgiving harshness. He'd denied it, telling himself that if he only kept looking, if he threw all of his family's wealth into the search, scoured all the universities and teaching hospitals on Old Earth, or Beowulf, or Hamilton, then surely somewhere he would find the answer. And he'd tried. Dear God how he had tried. But he'd failed, for there was no answer; only the life-support chair which had become the lifetime prison for the beautiful, vibrant woman he loved with all his heart and soul. The actress and writer and holo-vid producer, the political analyst and historian whose mind had survived the ruin of her body unscathed. Who understood everything which had happened to her and continued the fight with all the unyielding courage he loved and admired so much, refusing to surrender to the freak cataclysm which had exploded into her life.

The horsewoman and tennis player and grav skier from whose brain stem an artificial shunt ran to her life-support chair's control systems and who, below the neck, aside from that, now had seventy-five percent use of one hand. Period. Total. All there was and all there ever would be again, for as long as she lived.

He'd come apart. He didn't know how Emily had survived his collapse, his guilt, his sense of failure. No one could change what had happened to her or make things "right," but it was his job to make things right! It was always anyone's job to make things "right" for the people he or she loved, and he'd failed, and he'd hated himself for it with a bitter virulence whose memory shocked him even now.

But he'd put himself back together again. It hadn't been easy, and he'd needed help, but he'd done it. Of course, it was an accomplishment which had come with a layer of guilt all its own, for he'd turned to Theodosia Kuzak for the help he'd needed. Theodosia had been "safe," for she'd known him literally since boyhood. She was his friend and trusted confidante, and so—briefly—she had become his lover, as well.

He wasn't proud of that, but he'd run out of strength. An Alexander of White Haven understood about duty and responsibility. An Alexander was supposed to be strong, and so was a Queen's officer, and a husband, and he'd tried to be strong for so long, but he just couldn't anymore. And Theodosia had known that. She'd known he had turned to her because he'd had to, and because he could trust her . . . but not because he loved her. Never because of that. And because she was his friend, she'd helped him find the broken bits and pieces of the man he'd always thought he was and glue them back together into something which almost matched his concept of himself. And when she'd reassembled him, she'd shooed him gently away in a gift he knew he could never hope to repay and gone back to being just his friend.

He'd survived, thanks to Theodosia, and he'd discovered something along the way—or perhaps rediscovered it. The reason for his anguish, the intolerable burden which had broken him at last, was the simplest thing in the world: he loved his wife. He always had, and he always would. Nothing could change that, but that was what had made his agony bite so deep, the reason he couldn't forgive himself for not somehow making things "all right" again . . . and the reason he'd had to turn to someone else to rebuild himself when the collapse came. It had been cowardly of him, in many ways, but he simply could not have made himself dump his weakness, his collapse on her shoulders while she coped with everything God had already done to her. And so he'd run away to Theodosia until Theodosia could heal him and send him back to Emily once more.

She'd known. He hadn't told her, but he'd never had to, and she'd welcomed him with that smile which could still light up a room . . . still melt his heart within his chest. They'd never discussed it directly, for there'd never been a need to. The information, the knowledge, had been exchanged on some profound inner level, for just as she'd known he had run away, she'd known why . . . and the reason he had come back.

And he'd never run away from her again.

Alexander's head turned, along with everyone else's, and all other conversation faded as the diners realized Benjamin Mayhew had risen to his feet. He smiled at them, waiting until he was certain he had their full attention, and then cleared his throat.

"My Lords and Ladies, Ladies and Gentlemen," he said then, in the easy tones of a trained speaker, "you were all promised that this would be a 'nonworking state dinner'—meaning that you'd all be spared the tedium of speeches—" that earned him a rumble of laughter, and his smile grew broader "—and I promise not to inflict anything of the sort upon you. I do, however, have two announcements which I believe should be made at this time."

He paused, and his smile faded into a sober, serious expression.

"First," he said, "High Admiral Matthews has informed me that the Office of Shipbuilding has elected to name the newest superdreadnought of the Grayson Navy the GNS Honor Harrington, and that Lady Harrington's mother," he bowed slightly in Allison Harrington's direction, "has agreed to christen her in our service."

He paused, as a spatter of applause interrupted. It grew louder, and Alexander turned his head to see several men in GSN uniform come to their feet. Other male Graysons joined them, and then women began to stand, as well, and the spatter of applause became a torrent that echoed and resounded from the Great Hall's cavernous spaces. The thunder beat in on William Alexander, and he felt himself coming to his own feet, joining the ovation. Yet even as he clapped, he felt something else under the approval. A hungry something, with bare fangs, that sent a chill through him as he realized how accurately Hamish had read these people's reaction to Honor Harrington's murder.

Benjamin waited until the applause slowly faded and the audience had resumed their seats, and then he smiled again. Despite the harsh wave of emotion which had just swept the hall, there was something almost impish about that smile, and he shook his head.

"You should have waited," he told his audience. "Now you're going to have to do it all over again, because my second announcement is that yesterday morning, Lady Allison Harrington informed my senior wife that she and her husband are expecting." That simple sentence spawned a sudden silence in which a falling pin would have sounded like an anvil, and he nodded much more seriously. "Tomorrow, I will formally inform the Conclave of Steadholders that an heir of Lady Harrington's blood will inherit her Key and the care of the people of her steading," he said quietly.

The previous applause, Alexander discovered, had only seemed thunderous. The ovation which arose this time truly was. It battered him like fists, surging like an exultant sea, and he saw Allison Harrington flush, whether with excitement or embarrassment he couldn't tell, as she stood at the Protector's urging.
It took a seeming eternity for the applause to fade, and as it did, Alexander saw someone else stand at the Protector's table. The wiry, auburn-haired man looked remarkably young to be wearing the uniform of a GSN admiral, and his gray eyes flashed as he faced his ruler.

"Your Grace!" he cried, and Benjamin turned to look at him.

"Yes, Admiral Yanakov?" the Protector seemed surprised at hearing the admiral address him.

"With your permission, Your Grace, I would like to propose a toast," Admiral Yanakov said. Benjamin considered him for just a moment, and then nodded.
"Of course, Admiral."

"Thank you, Your Grace." Yanakov reached down and picked up his wineglass, holding it before him while the light pooled and glowed in its tawny heart.

"Your Grace, My Lords and Ladies, Ladies and Gentlemen all," he announced in a ringing voice, "I give you Steadholder Harrington . . . and damnation to the Peeps!"

The roar which answered should, by rights, have brought the Great Hall crashing down in ruins.

Cachat’s poise faltered for an instant. “Well…thank you,” he said awkwardly, seeming to shed a decade and two inches of psychic armor in the process. Cathy now understood the truth of something Anton had once said to her about his Havenite partner: that somewhere deep underneath Cachat’s ferocious skills and adamantine willpower there remained a shy and lonely boy from the slums. Only a handful of people in the universe were ever made privy to that inner core, he’d told her—and Anton himself wasn’t really one of them. Or only partly so, at any rate.

“I’m not sure if he lets anyone into that sanctum, except Thandi Palane and Ginny Usher,” he’d told her. “Probably Kevin Usher, too.”

Cathy decided then and there that she’d add herself to that small list. First, because she owed the man that much. Second, because she enjoyed a challenge. And finally—

She couldn’t keep herself from giggling. At her age!

“What’s so funny?” asked Anton.

“Never mind.” She didn’t think even Anton would understand, not really. He thought—she was sure almost everyone did, except Jeremy X and Web DuHavel and maybe Empress Elizabeth, who’d been a close childhood friend—that Cathy’s rebellious history stemmed from her deep political principles. And…

That was indeed true enough. But she couldn’t deny that at least a part of the reason for her notorious past was simply a juvenile glee in thumbing her nose at the establishment. Any establishment.

As Countess of the Tor, Cathy’s coat of arms carried the family motto I cannot, which according to family legend referred to the heroic stance taken by an early politician who refused to sign on to a popular but unwise law. Cathy had her doubts about the legend, but the motto suited her well enough. In the interests of full disclosure, though, she’d sometimes thought she should add to the motto Épater la bourgeoisie—or use it altogether as a substitute.

She’d already scandalized Manticoran polite society with her longstanding association with the terrorist madman Jeremy X—now, sadly for polite society’s amour-propre, reborn as a respectable cabinet member of Torch’s government. Now she could add the scandal of a friendship with the man who was rapidly becoming the Republic of Haven’s most notorious secret agent.

How delightful.

A slight stir went through the throne room as someone noticed the Queen and her lean, muscular bodyguard entering through the side door. The two of them moved across the enormous room, which had once been the ballroom of the planetary governor when Torch had been named Verdant Vista and owned by the planet Mesa. The men and women who'd come to meet the Queen of Torch were a little surprised by how very young she looked in person, and heads turned to watch her, although nobody was crass enough to start sidling in her direction until she'd seated herself in the undecorated powered chair which served her for a throne.

Harper S. Ferry and Judson Van Hale were still ten meters from the New Age Pharmaceutical representative when Tyler looked up and saw Berry. Unlike any of the other commercial representatives in the room, he took a step towards her the moment he saw her, and Genghis' head snapped up in the same instant.

The 'cat reared high, ears flattened and fangs bared in the sudden, tearing-canvas ripple of a treecat's war cry, and vaulted abruptly from his person's shoulder towards Tyler.

Tyler's head whipped around, and Harper felt a sudden stab of outright terror as he saw the terrible, fixed glare of the other man's eyes. There was something . . . insane about them, and Harper was suddenly reaching for the panic button on his gun belt.

The pharmaceutical representative saw the oncoming 'cat, and his free hand flashed across to the briefcase he was carrying. The briefcase with the "perfume" of which no one at New Age Pharmaceuticals had ever heard . . . and which Tyler didn't even remember taking from the man who'd squirted that odd mist in his face on Smoking Frog.
Genghis almost reached him in time. He launched himself from the floor in a snarling, hissing charge that hit Tyler's moving forearm perhaps a tenth of a second too late.

Tyler pressed the concealed button. The two canisters of "perfume" in the briefcase exploded expelling the binary neurotoxin which they had contained under several thousand atmospheres of pressure. Separated, its components had been innocuous, easily mistaken for perfume; combined, they were incredibly lethal, and they mingled and spread, whipping outward from Tyler under immense pressure even as the briefcase blew apart with a sharp, percussive crack.

Genghis stiffened, jerked once, and hit the floor a fraction of a second before Tyler, left hand mangled by the explosion of the briefcase, collapsed beside him. Harper's finger completed its movement to the panic button, and then the deadly cloud swept over him and Judson, as well. Their spines arched, their mouths opened in silent agony, and then they went down as a cyclone of death spread outward.
* * *
Lara and Berry did their best to maintain suitably grave expressions, despite their mutual amusement, as they walked towards Berry's chair. They were about halfway there when the sudden, high-pitched snarl of an enraged treecat ripped through the throne room.

They spun towards the sound, and saw a cream-and-gray blur streaking through the crowd. For an instant, Berry had no idea at all what was happening. But if Lara wasn't especially well socialized, she still had the acute senses, heightened musculature, and lightning reflexes of the Scrag she had been born.

She didn't know what had set Genghis off, but every instinct she had screamed "Threat!" And if she wouldn't have had a clue which fork to use at a formal dinner, she knew exactly what to do about that.

She continued her turn, right arm reaching out, snaking around Berry's waist like a python, and snatched the girl up. By the time Genghis was two leaps from Tyler, Lara was already sprinting towards the door through which they'd entered the throne room.

She heard the sharp crack of the exploding briefcase behind her just as the door opened again, and she saw Saburo and Ruth Winton through it. From the corner of her eye, she also saw the outrider of death scything towards her as the bodies collapsed in spasming agony, like ripples spreading from a stone hurled into a placid pool. The neurotoxin was racing outward faster than she could run; she didn't know what it was, but she knew it was invisible death . . . and that she could not outdistance it.

"Saburo!" she screamed, and snatched Berry bodily off the floor. She spun on her heel once, like a discus thrower, and suddenly Berry went arcing headfirst through the air. She flew straight at Saburo X, like a javelin, and his arms opened reflexively.

"The door!" Lara screamed, skittering to her knees as she overbalanced from throwing Berry. "Close the door! Run!"

Berry hit Saburo in the chest. His left arm closed about her, holding her tight, and his eyes met Lara's as her knees hit the floor. Brown eyes stared deep into blue, meeting with the sudden, stark knowledge neither of them could evade.

"I love you!" he cried . . . and his right hand hit the button to close the door.