Honor Harrington Quotes

It was rumored she held grudges till they died of old age, then had them stuffed and mounted.

Your Grace," she said, "I have only one question. Do you wish this man crippled, or dead?

WAGs... That's a technical term we engineers use. It means 'Wild-Assed Guess'.

Nothing in the universe had a shorter half-life than a politician's memory for inconvenient facts,

There are two sides to every dialogue, but if you accept the other side's terms without demanding equal time for your own, then they control the debate and its outcome.

We will maintain heading until he's committed, then I want a hard skew-turn to starboard. As hard as you can make it, Chief. I want our starboard broadside on him as he passes below us, and then I want to cut down across his stern and stick it right up his kilt. Clear? (Honor Harrington)

Let's be about it, people.

The bigger the lie, apparently, the more likely the uninformed were to accept it, simply because they couldn't believe any government would tell such an absurd story unless it were true.

Never keep a lawyer waiting. They have friends in low and infernal places.

Extremists tend to grow more extreme, not less, as problems get closer to solutions,

Nuts didn't need religion to make them nuts, Allison had long since decided, but it did seem to give them a certain added sense of commitment to whatever goals their nutdom decided to embrace.

...the one certain thing in life is that no one can make the truth untrue simply because it hurts.

Yet i say to you, do not rush to marriage for it is a deep and perfect thing. Test first, that you may be certain you are called to it by love, and not simply by pleasures of the flesh which will consume themselves and leave only ashes and misery

Fail not in this charge at your peril.

I am an officer of the Royal Manticoran Navy, Sir—" Venizelos felt an undeniable rush of adrenaline and pleasure as he faced the burly captain squarely "—and the Royal Manticoran Navy does not 'bluff.

This just gets worse and worse," Rob Pierre sighed as he skimmed Leonard Boardman's synopsis of his latest gleanings from the Solarian League reporters covering the PRH. "How can one person—one person, Oscar!—do this much damage? She's like some damned elemental force of nature!" "Harrington?" Oscar Saint-Just quirked an eyebrow and snorted harshly at Pierre's nodded confirmation. "She's just happened to be in the right places—or the wrong ones, I suppose, from our perspective—for the last, oh, ten years or so. That's the official consensus from my analysts, at least. The other theory, which seems to have been gaining a broader following of late, is that she's in league with the Devil.

They could hate her guts all they liked as long as they did their duty.

McKeon: “You know Hauptman is going to deny they had anything to do with it [smuggling].” “Forty-three million in illegal peltries? Of course they will, just as Mondragon's captain insists the space fairies must have brought them,” Honor said ironically.

If you ever mention my uncle to me again, I will personally push your face through the top of this table," Elizabeth told him in a flat, deadly tone, and the baron recoiled physically from her.

All things considered, Her Grace's plan may not have been the single rashest, most foolhardy, do-or-die, all-or-nothing throw of the dice in the history of the Royal Manticoran — or Grayson — Navy. If it wasn't, however, I have so far failed to find the plan that was.

She really should be careful about imputing sordid motives to the First Lord. Not because she doubted that he had them, but because not even Sir Edward Janacek could have only sordid motivations. That would have completely devalued his ability to do such things out of simple stupidity, instead of calculation.

Victor smiled politely in return, the way someone smiles when they're thanked for having done a minor favor in times past. Held open a door in the rain, lent someone a small amount of money, butchered an ex-lover, that sort of thing.

She was never certain how long she wept, and it didn't really matter. It wasn't something to be measured by clocks, cut up into minutes and seconds.

This, she realized suddenly, was probably the best squadron command she would ever have—unless,

one of the first signs of a self-destructing aboriginal culture always seems to be an increase in the use of drugs and intoxicants,

that was about as good as it was going to get this side of a hot tub, a good-looking man, and a chocolate milkshake.

How could a society hang a man for stealing honey?” we ask from our perspective; “Why does a man repeatedly risk hanging to steal some honey?” wonders Frantz.

Popular prejudice always dies slowly, especially among those individuals most anxious about their own deteriorating economic situation and unstable social status.

Shut not your minds to the new because the chains of the past bind you tight, for it is those who cling most desperately to the old who will turn you from the new way and lead you once more in to the paths of the unclean

Dying gloriously sounds good in bad historical novels. Speaking for myself, I think doing it in real life when you don't have to is fucking stupid, and it irritates the hell out of me that we don't appear to have any choice.

She was thirteen T-years older than he, but there was something uncannily familiar about his emotions where she was concerned. Somehow, without realizing it was happening, she'd acquired a MacGuiness with a gun, and she suspected her life would never be quite the same again. She

There's a reason I've always relied on you for the necessary political miracles, Emily," Hamish told her with a smile. "Give me a fleet problem, or a naval battle to fight, and I “know exactly what to do. But dealing with scum like High Ridge and Descroix—?" He shook his head. "I just can't wrap my mind around how to handle them." "Be honest, dear," Emily corrected him gently. "It's not that you really can't do it, and you know it. It's that you get so furious with them that you wind up climbing onto your high moral horse so you can ride them under the hooves of your righteous fury. But when you close your knight errant's helmet, the visibility through that visor is just a little limited, isn't it?

It’s not what you don’t know that hurts you; it’s what you think you know that isn’t so.

Admiralty House was a modest structure, only a little over a hundred stories in height,

liberty was a tree which had to be watered occasionally with the blood of patriots?

They’re human beings, and the two things humans make are tools…and mistakes. But sometimes we get stuff right, too, and there are some really good models out there

She'd heard so many tales about the way love could save one's sanity; no one had ever told her hate could do the same.

only counts in horseshoes, hand grenades, and tactical nuclear weapons,

Manticore System's G0 primary and its G2 companion were dim behind her, reduced to two more stars amid millions, for the Junction lay almost seven light-hours from them.

Without love, there can be no true marriage; with love, there can be nothing else.

You're entitled to not be strong about everything every instant. And you have the right to admit that it hurts, and that things frighten you.

Roaring Deeps,

Hamish Alexander stood on Benjamin the Great's flag deck with his hands clasped behind him and tried very hard not to feel a sense of godlike power.

The bigger the lie, apparently, the more likely the uninformed were to accept it,

Close' only counts in horseshoes, hand grenades, and tactical nuclear weapons,

I'll bring the rest through as quickly as I can," Honor promised after the inevitable delay. "And I'll try to make sure there's still a Star Kingdom when you do," Kuzak replied.

There’s not much point in making logical arguments to someone who’s already decided to ignore inconvenient truths, so

You might as well have called them Amygdalum and Amygdalee. He could only hope they didn't do anything really foolish. Too much too hope, of course, that they wouldn't drool.

Fat flakes of snow fell like silent, feathery ghosts in the windless sub-arctic night beyond the window.

kinesthetic

The other side’s version,” Kolokoltsov thought. Even here, he’s not willing to call it “the truth.” Whoever said truth is the first casualty of war damned well knew what he was talking about!

It was only in stupid stories written by idiots that good triumphed unscathed and only the evil died. She'd known that, but where did it say her people must always be the ones to pay for victory? Her

The message she'd just ordered Webster to send and Venizelos to relay to Manticore was never sent in drills, not even in the most intense or realistic Fleet maneuvers. Case Zulu had one meaning, and one only: "Invasion Imminent.

Hamish Alexander-Harrington knew his wife as only two humans who had both been adopted by a pair of mated treecats ever could. He'd seen her deal with joy and with sorrow, with happiness and with fury, with fear, and even with despair. Yet in all the years since their very first meeting at Yeltsin's Star, he suddenly realized, he had never actually met the woman the newsies called "the Salamander." It wasn't his fault, a corner of his brain told him, because he'd never been in the right place to meet her. Never at the right time. He'd never had the chance to stand by her side as she took a wounded heavy cruiser on an unflinching deathride into the broadside of the battlecruiser waiting to kill it, sailing to her own death, and her crew's, to protect a planet full of strangers while the rich beauty of Hammerwell's "Salute to Spring" spilled from her ship's com system. He hadn't stood beside her on the dew-soaked grass of the Landing City duelling grounds, with a pistol in her hand and vengeance in her heart as she faced the man who'd bought the murder of her first great love. Just as he hadn't stood on the floor of Steadholders' Hall when she faced a man with thirty times her fencing experience across the razor-edged steel of their swords, with the ghosts of Reverend Julius Hanks, the butchered children of Mueller Steading, and her own murdered steaders at her back. But now, as he looked into the unyielding flint of his wife's beloved, almond eyes, he knew he'd met the Salamander at last. And he recognized her as only another warrior could. Yet he also knew in that moment that for all his own imposing record of victory in battle, he was not and never had been her equal. As a tactician and a strategist, yes. Even as a fleet commander. But not as the very embodiment of devastation. Not as the Salamander. Because for all the compassion and gentleness which were so much a part of her, there was something else inside Honor Alexander-Harrington, as well. Something he himself had never had. She'd told him, once, that her own temper frightened her. That she sometimes thought she could have been a monster under the wrong set of circumstances. And now, as he realized he'd finally met the monster, his heart twisted with sympathy and love, for at last he understood what she'd been trying to tell him. Understood why she'd bound it with the chains of duty, and love, of compassion and honor, of pity, because, in a way, she'd been right. Under the wrong circumstances, she could have been the most terrifying person he had ever met. In fact, at this moment, she was . It was a merciless something, her "monster"—something that went far beyond military talent, or skills, or even courage. Those things, he knew without conceit, he, too, possessed in plenty. But not that deeply personal something at the core of her, as unstoppable as Juggernaut, merciless and colder than space itself, that no sane human being would ever willingly rouse. In that instant her husband knew, with an icy shiver which somehow, perversely, only made him love her even more deeply, that as he gazed into those agate-hard eyes, he looked into the gates of Hell itself. And whatever anyone else might think, he knew now that there was no fire in Hell. There was only the handmaiden of death, and ice, and purpose, and a determination which would not— couldnot—relent or rest. "I'll miss them," she told him again, still with that dreadful softness, "but I won't forget. I'll never forget, and one day— oneday, Hamish—we're going to find the people who did this, you and I. And when we do, the only thing I'll ask of God is that He let them live long enough to know who's killing them.

It must come from your father's side of the family," Allison informed her with severe disapproval. "You never got that sort of dreary, plebeian logic from my genes, dear! Beowulfans' cognitive processes rely far more on the creative and intuitive manipulation of concepts without the drudgery of applying reason to them. Don't you realize how badly you can damage a perfectly good preconception or assumption if you insist on thinking about it that way? That's why I never indulge in such a vice.

He seemed quite a cheerful fellow, too. Even puckish, you might say—at least if, like Brice, you had just recently encountered the term and been taken by it, but hadn't yet read enough literature to realize that "puckish" was by no means the same thing as "harmless.

Lester Tourville stared at his plot in horror as the impeller signatures of sixty-eight Republican ships of the wall abruptly vanished. Seventeen continued to burn on the display for another handful of seconds. Then they, too, vanished in what he devoutly hoped was a frantic hyper translation.

Battles aren’t always—or even usually—won by killing everybody on the other side. They’re won inside the other side’s brains and wills. Given the right weapons, the right tactical situation, anyone can kill an enemy. Convincing her to yield, to do what you set out to compel her to do without killing her—that’s harder.

It was also horribly embarrassing, and the fact that none of them knew she could sense their emotions only made it worse. It was as if she stood outside their windows, listening to whispered conversations they'd never meant to share with her, and the fact that she had no choice—that she could no longer not sense the feelings of those about her—only made her feel perversely guilty when she did.

People at the apex felt unbridled contempt for the people who spent their lives laboring to support their “betters” in the style to which they had become accustomed. After all, if those lesser being had mattered, they’d have been the ones making the decisions, right? The fact that they weren’t was directly attributable to their inherent inferiority and general stupidity, not the inequality of opportunity.

There's got to be at least some contact if they aren't going to lose their assets simply because someone dies before she gets around to telling her son or daughter "Oh, by the way. We're actually secret agents for the Mesan Alignment. Here's your secret decoder kit. Be ready to be contacted by the Galactic Evil Overlord on Frequency X with orders to betray the society you've been raised all your life to think of as your own.

So bring on your inquiry. Present your case, and we’ll present ours. Not because we give one single solitary damn for your prepackaged, predetermined ‘impartial conclusions,’ but because we care about history. Because unlike you, we do care about truth. And because someday your successors, whoever they may be, will have a record of what you actually do here and will revile your memory with all the contempt and all the disdain your actions will so richly merit.

And now the same people who'd already infuriated Grayson public opinion had falsely and publicly attacked their greatest planetary hero, who was also the second ranking officer of their navy, the Protector's Champion, only the second person in history to have received the Star of Grayson not merely once, but twice, and one of the eighty-two steadholders. And a woman. Even now, the surviving strictures of Grayson's pre-Alliance social code absolutely precluded public insult to a woman. Any woman. And especially this woman.

There's panic, and then there's panic, Commander. Fear of the odds, of the enemy, even of death is one thing. All of us feel that. We'd be fools if we didn't. But we learn not to let it dictate our responses. We can't, if we're going to do our jobs. But there's another sort of terror: the terror of failure, of being blamed for some disaster, or of assuming responsibility. It's not just the fear of dying; it's the fear of living through something like Seaford while everyone laughs behind your back at what an idiot you were to allow yourself to be placed in such a disastrous situation.

But when they arrived, Honor reached out and pressed the override button, holding the lift doors closed, and turned to him. "Mr. Hauptman," she said in a vioce of frozen helium, "you've seen fit to insult me and my officers and to threaten my parents. In fact, you have descended to the tactics of gutter scum, and that, in my opinion, Sir, is precisely what you have proven yourself to be." Hauptman's nostrils flared in a congested face, but she continued in that same ice-cold voice. "I am fully aware that you have no intention of forgetting this incident. Neither, I assure you, have I. I am a Queen's officer. As such, I will react to any personal attack upon me only if and as it arises, and for myself, both personally and as a Queen's officer, I dislike the custom of dueling. But, Mr. Hauptman, should you ever attempt to carry through your threat against my parents-" her eyes were leveled missile batteries and the tic at the corner of her mouth jerked like a living thing "-I will denounce you publicly for your contemptible actions and demand satisfaction. And when you accept my challenge, Mr. Hauptman, I will kill you like the scum you are." Hauptman stepped back against the wall of the lift, staring at her in shocked disbelief. "Believe it, Mr. Hauptman," she said very, very softly, and let the lift door open at last.

Let's see, we've got the Empress of Manticore, the President of the Republic of Haven, the Protector of Grayson, the chairman of the Beowulf Board of Directors, Queen Berry, and the Andermani emperor's first cousin. Not to mention your own humble self as Steadholder Harrington and the commander of the Grand Fleet, followed by a scattering of mere planetary grand dukes, dukes, earls, members of the Havenite cabinet, three other members of the Beowulf Board of Directors, the chairman of the Alliance joint chiefs of staff, the First Space Lord, the Havenite chief of naval operations, the Beowulfan chief of naval operations, High Admiral Yanakov, Admiral Yu, two or three dozen ambassadors, and God alone only knows who else.

Jesus Christ!" Foraker's shocked exclamation burned across the bridge like a buzzsaw, and Caslet's mouth fell open as his plot suddenly changed. One instant, his ship was charging into the teeth of two opponents' fire; the next instant, there were no opponents. The warships' acceleration had carried them within less than three hundred thousand clicks of the Manty merchantman, which had suddenly rolled back down to present her own broadside to them. Eight incredibly powerful grasers smashed out from the "unarmed freighter" like the wrath of God, and the second raider destroyer simply vanished. A single pair of hits on the light cruiser burned through her sidewall as if it hadn't even existed, and her after third blew apart in a hurricane of splintered and vaporized plating. Three of Shannon's shipboard lasers added their own fury to her damage, chewing huge holes in what was left of her hull, but they were strictly an afterthought, for that ship was already a helpless hulk. "We're being hailed, Skipper," Lieutenant Dutton said shakenly from Communications. Caslet just looked at him, unable to speak, then looked back down at his plot and swallowed as the unmistakable impeller signatures of a full dozen LACs drifted up from the "freighter's" gravitic shadow and locked their weapons on his ship. "Speaker," he rasped. "Unknown cruiser, this is Captain Honor Harrington of Her Majesty's Armed Merchant Cruiser Wayfarer," a soprano voice said quietly. "I appreciate your assistance, and I wish I could offer you the reward your gallantry deserves, but I'm afraid I'm going to have to ask you to surrender.

He really did have far too many things to do, and as soon as this foolishness - whatever it was - was out of the way, perhaps he could get back to them and- He froze, hazel eyes flaring wide as they locked on the tall, slim figure in a blue-on-blue uniform identical to his own, and his mental grousing slithered to an incoherent halt. He could not possibly be seeing what he thought he was, a small, still voice told him logically. Only one woman had ever been authorized to wear the uniform of a Grayson admiral. Just as only one woman in the Grayson navy had ever carried a six-legged, cream-and-gray treecat everywhere she went. Which meant his eyes must be lying to him, because that woman was dead. Had been dead for over two T-years. And yet- "I told you I wouldn't apologize," Benjamin IX told his senior military officer, and this time there was no amusement at all in his soft voice. Matthews looked at him, his eyes stunned, and Benjamin smiled gently. "It may be a little late," he said, "but better late than never. Merry Christmas, Wesley.

Na zlomeček věčnosti oběma lodím nic nebránilo ve volné střelbě na protivníka a v tom okamžiku dva různé počítače odstartovaly své palebné plány. Žádný lidský smysl nedokázal postřehnout, co se odehrálo potom; žádný lidský mozek by si to neuměl přebrat. Vzájemná vzdálenost činila dvacet tisíc kilometrů a řízené střely, lasery a grasery dštily zkázu přes tu miniaturní propast vakua jako rozzuření démoni. Ahmed zavrávoral, když jeho bočním štítem bez námahy prošel první graserový svazek. Jeho boky byly opatřeny metrovým pancířem z nejtvrdší slitiny keramiky a kompozitu, jakou se člověk doposud naučil odlévat, a přesto se jí graser prodral pohrdavě snadno. Od strašlivé rány se rozlétly obrovské úlomky a vzájemný pohyb lodi změnil to, co by bývalo kruhovým otvorem, v dlouhou zející trhlinu. Paprsek rozpáral bok lodi, jako když vyvrhovací nůž rozpáře žraloka, a z rány vytryskl vířící cyklon vzduchu, trosek a lidských těl. Ale to byl pouze jeden z osmi takových graserů. Všechny do jednoho zaznamenaly přímé zásahy a na bitevním křižníku nikoho ani ve snu nenapadlo, že by přestavěná obchodní loď mohla nést takové zbraně. Zatímco si zuřivý úder Poutníka s křižníkem pohrával, komunikační obvody zahlcovala kakofonie výkřiků bolesti, šoku i hrůzy a potom se přihnaly řízené střely Q lodě a znovu a znovu křižník probodávaly jednorannými lasery, aby dokončily strašlivé dílo graserů. Zbraňová stanoviště se rozlétala na kusy, výboje bláznivě sršely a kabely syčely, pukaly a explodovaly. Příďová místnost gravitoru vybuchla, když jeden graser zasáhl naplno generátory, a tlaková vlna změnila sto metrů pancéřovaného trupu v pokroucené trosky. Všechny tři fúzní jednotky se automaticky nouzově zastavily a po celé lodi se zavírala vzduchotěsná vrata. Ale v příliš mnoha případech neměla ta vrata v čem zadržovat vzduch, neboť grasery Poutníka se propálily naskrz celým trupem a křižník se převaloval v prostoru jako umírající bezmocný vrak. Ale nezahynul sám. Poutník vypálil o zlomek sekundy dříve než Ahmed - ale jen o zlomeček a na rozdíl od Ahmeda neměl žádný pancíř a žádná hermeticky uzavíratelná oddělení. Byla to obchodní loď, jenom tenká slupka kolem obrovského prázdného prostoru pro náklad, a to nemohla žádná přestavba změnit. Zbraně, které přežily, aby se mohly zakousnout do jeho trupu, byly mnohem lehčí než ty, jež rozpáraly Ahmeda, ale proti tak zranitelnému cíli byly děsivě účinné. Celý pravobok od přepážky třicet jedna dozadu po přepážku šedesát pět byl na padrť. Prázdné doky LAC se rozlétly jako rozšlápnuté sklenice. Zásobníky dva a čtyři byly roztrhány na kusy, stejně jako všechny výmetnice kromě čísla dva. Šest z osmi graserových stanovišť vybuchlo a prakticky celá jejich obsluha zahynula. Jeden laser se prořízl až k jádru lodě, zničil fúzní reaktor jedna a prorazil palubní vězení, z něhož už Randy Steilman a jeho druhové nikdy neměli vyjít před soud, a další se prořízl až na samotnou velitelskou palubu. Můstek zametla tlaková vlna, přepážky a podélníky se trhaly jako papír a zuřící hurikán vytrhl Jennifer Hughesovou navzdory tlumícímu postroji z křesla a odnesl ji do prostoru mimo loď. Její tělo už nikdo nikdy nenajde, ale na tom sotva záleželo, protože svištící příval atmosféry s ní udeřil o okraj trhliny v trupu a na místě jí roztříštil přilbu. John Kanehama zaječel do interkomu, když ho jako oštěp probodla dlouhá letící tříska slitiny. Staršího seržanta O’Haleyho přesekl vejpůl plochý úlomek, dlouhý jako on sám, a Aubrey Wanderman se pozvracel do přilby, když tentýž úlomek prolétl mezi osazenstvem jeho stanoviště a roztrhal Carolyn Wolcotovou a poručíka Jansena. Tento výjev z pekla se po obrovském trupu Poutníka opakoval znovu a znovu. Další výbuchy a odletující trosky zasahovaly lidi, které minula palba Ahmeda, jako by se umírající loď mstila posádce za to, do čeho ji přivedla, a HMS Poutník se potácivě převaloval pryč s nefunkčním pohonem, zničeným hypergenerátorem a s osmi sty mrtvými a umírajícími lidmi v rozbitých odděleních.

were significantly more

No one could place two-thirds of a world's population on the Dole and keep them there forever without the entire system crashing 

But his only alternatives were to play for the possibility, however remote, that he could pull one of them off or else to simply surrender everything he'd spent the last forty-six T-months trying to achieve. He couldn't do that. Even running the very real risk of slipping back over into a brief, bloody clash with the Republic was better than that.

overtures from a cold-blooded consideration of advantages to an emotional rejection based on their own bigotry. And if I've learned one thing over the years, it's that when it comes down to raw emotion against reason, emotion wins." *

sweeping, simplistic solutions to complicated problems are much more appealing than tackling the real thought that might actually solve them. "At

if I've learned one thing over the years, it's that when it comes down to raw emotion against reason, emotion wins.

one certain thing in life is that no one can make the truth untrue simply because it hurts.

as it did. The crest said "PNS Farnese" and that always irritated him. After all, the battlecruiser wasn't a Navy ship; she belonged to State Security, and her designation should reflect that. Except that the Navy's position was that she was only a Navy ship which was assigned to StateSec, as if the true guardians of the People's safety had no right to put on the airs of "real" warriors. Of course, Thornegrave conceded, hanging SSS on the front of a ship's name would probably look a little funny, but it's the principle of the thing! The Navy and the Marines represent vestigial holdovers from the decadent elitism of the Old Regime. It's past time that State Security absorbed them both into a single organization whose loyalty to the People and State can be absolutely relied upon. The people's commissioners are a move in the right direction, but there's still too much room for recidivists to secretly sabotage the war and the Revolution alike. Surely Citizen Secretary Saint-Just and Citizen Chairman Pierre realize that, don't they? No doubt they did, he told himself once more

The world's best swordsman doesn't fear the second best; he fears the worst swordsman, because he can't predict what the idiot will do.

Treason, my dear, is often simply a matter of perspective." Emily

A fool who knew a little was far more dangerous than someone who at least had the wit to admit he knew nothing.

But the universe wasn't really unfair, she thought, and her mouth quirked. It just didn't give much of a damn one way or the other.

She'd known Pavel was too stupid to choose matching socks without help,

but it’s been my observation that justice is conspicuous by its absence when it comes to politics and entrenched, self-serving regimes.

perhaps the cardinal element, was the belief that the book was never closed, never ended. God was infinite; Man's understanding was not. And so, there would always be more for Man to learn, more for God to teach him, and as the doctrine of the Test taught, it was best to pay attention to one's lessons, whatever the form in which they might come.

The purpose of shooting someone as an object lesson is to convince other people to pay attention to it, and that takes time.

small craft had yet returned, so

On the other hand," the exec continued, "I've seen pirates do some pretty stupid things over the years.

Ferrero and her crew hadn't really planned on doing any pirate-hunting this afternoon, but sometimes God rewarded the virtuous when they expected it least.

Unfortunately, I think we're into information overkill. In some ways, I think I know less about what's going on now than I did before I came over here!

But the Republic is much larger, and the new régime there clearly has a 'crusading spirit,' whereas the High Ridge régime in Manticore was about as venal—and shortsighted—as we could have asked for. Unfortunately, neither side, each for its own reasons, wanted to resume hostilities.

Makris obviously had a detailed checklist of Things to Do to Piss Off Survey Ship Captains, and she was determined not to leave any of them undone.

She drew a deep, unobtrusive breath and thought longingly of public dueling grounds and ten-millimeter pistols as the representative sat back in his chair, jaw clenched with manly fortitude and brown eyes hard with steely determination.

To understand Solly foreign policy, we’d have to be Sollies . . . and nothing would be worth that!” —Queen Elizabeth III of Manticore

Comfortable or not, when those ‘sometimes’ come along, the only coinage history seems willing to accept is our lives, our fortunes, and our sacred honor.

The Solarian League can’t accept something like this—not out of some frigging little pissant navy out beyond the Verge—not matter what kind of provocation they may think they have! If we let them get away with this, God only knows who’s going to try something stupid next!” —Fleet Admiral Sandra Crandall, SLN

He let the thought trail off, because he didn't really know what would be waiting "at the end of it." Except for the biggest naval battle in human history, of course.

I don't think he likes us very much," the Earl of White Haven observed. "What a pity.

Commissioner Floyd was inclined to think they hadn’t. Rear Admiral Pyun was inclined to think Commissioner Floyd was an idiot.

It’s the next best damned thing to an Eridani violation, but someone will.

Kolokoltsov wondered if the others would be as appalled by it as he was? And whether or not they’d find themselves endorsing it anyway.