Free House of Steel: The Honorverse Companion by David Weber Page B

Juggernaut, and he had a brain that worked . He hadn’t been in the First Space Lord’s chair long enough to have thoroughly cleaned house, but he was working on it, and his appreciation of the Star Kingdom’s strategic realities was far better than Admiral Truman’s had been.
    Or it’s closer to mine , at least. Of course, that’s the dictionary definition of “better,” isn’t it?
    That thought brought him a much-needed chuckle, and he grinned at his mother.
    “We’re getting them trimmed down and shaped up, Mom. All we need is a bigger, sharper machete.”
    “And two or three years to work on them,” his mother agreed. “I just hope the Havenites give us the time for it, Roger.”
    “It’s going to be a while yet,” Roger told her, and she looked at him. She let him see the worry in her eyes, and he smiled gently. She’d been worrying about it too long, he thought. And she was afraid she was going to run out of time—that she was going to run out of time—before she accomplished everything her responsibilities to her kingdom and her people required of her.
    “We’ve got at least another twenty or thirty T-years, I think,” he continued. “That’s part of the problem, actually. The people who want to pretend the sky isn’t falling can do exactly what Janacek and Truman have been doing for the last ten or twelve T-years and point out that there’s no immediate threat. The problem is they keep acting as if we’ve got some kind of unlimited savings account of time. That if the threat isn’t ‘immediate’ right this moment we’ll always have time to prepare before it becomes ‘immediate.’” He shook his head, then shrugged. “The good news is that we’re starting to get the people we need in place to do something about it. Like Admiral White Haven and Admiral Lomax.”
    “That’s what Abner said last week,” Samantha admitted. “And he also complimented me on my choice of White Haven for First Space Lord. He thinks the earl is going to work out very well. Of course, I smiled and accepted his praise with becoming humility without ever pointing out that you were the one who’d recommended him.”
    “Thank God!” Roger grimaced. “Even hinting to anyone that a lowly commander is ‘recommending’ flag officers for appointment as space lords would be the kiss of death for any Navy career I might still hope to cling to! I’m sure quite a lot of people have figured out you’re going to ask me for advice on questions like that, but the longer we can keep even a whisper of it from becoming official knowledge, the better I’ll like it!”
    “I suppose I can understand that,” she said with a crooked smile, opening her arms to invite Magnus into her lap. The treecat hopped down and curled into a silken oval, purring loudly as she stroked him while she gazed at her son.
    “I’m afraid your career—your Navy career, at least—is on borrowed time, though, Roger,” she said softly, and he froze in his chair, looking at her. Her smile reappeared, but this time it was gentle, almost compassionate. “I don’t seem to be wearing quite as well as I could wish. I’m afraid you may find yourself sitting in my chair sooner than you’d like, love. I wish it weren’t so, but—”
    She shrugged, and Roger drew a deep, deep breath.
    “You’re not going anywhere for a while,” he told her. “I don’t care what anyone else says; I say you’re not going anywhere for a while. I’ll step up the time earmarked for Cabinet meetings and even—God help us—sessions of Parliament to take more of the weight off your shoulders, but you’ve still got too much to teach me to go traipsing off and leave me stuck with the job!”
    “I’ll try to bear that in mind. And while I’m bearing it in mind, Earl Thompson made a rather pointed suggestion to me last week. The same sort Earl Mortenson used to make.”
    “You know, I really don’t think of myself primarily in terms of breeding stock,”