Free Linesman by S. K. Dunstall

when talking about a Lancastrian princess. “Did she want a ten?” Gate Union would do anything to get a spy onto Lady Lyan’s ship, even to asking someone to pretend to be a lesser linesman. He hoped they wanted a six or a seven. Rebekah would hate that.
    â€œLyan is studying the confluence.”
    Rossi perused the menu set into the table so he didn’t have to answer immediately. He keyed in his selection—Naidan had already chosen, he noted—pressed to order, and took another careful mouthful of wine, before he said, “Has anyone told Lady Lyan she’s not welcome here?” She’d be stupid to come anyway. Lancia was affiliated with the Alliance. Gate Union and the Alliance weren’t officially at war, but it was only a matter of time.
    It felt as if half of Gate Union’s military fleet was here at the confluence right now. Putting Lady Lyan in among them would have the same result as a horned rickenback jumping into a lynx sett. The lynx would have dismembered the rickenback before the foolish creature had even realized it had jumped into danger.
    Although one never knew with Lady Lyan. She could dosome gutsy stuff. Maybe this was her way of kick-starting a war. Maybe Gate Union should be worrying.
    He thought about the news vids he’d watched over the past two weeks. At least he still watched the vids. Some of the linesmen were so focused on the confluence, they even forgot to do that. “Isn’t she getting married?”
    To businessman Sattur Dow, if the media were correct. Even on the news, Dow had looked sour. If Rossi had been marrying Lady Lyan, he’d be looking much happier than that. Lady Lyan now, she could look gloomy. The man was twice her age, and he’d already buried three wives.
    Funny that he always buried them, never separated.
    If he’d been Lyan, Rossi would have been running very fast the other way.
    Naidan dismissed those rumors with a flick of her hand. “Lady Lyan will get married when Lady Lyan wants to get married. Not when her father tells her to. But it is a problem because there are representatives from every Alliance world coming to her wedding. And if she comes here, they’ll come, too.”
    So was she getting married or not? Emperor Yu arranged marriages for his children—both legitimate and illegitimate—for political expediency. It was hard to imagine what political benefit he could gain by marrying his oldest daughter off to a fellow Lancastrian, no matter how rich that Lancastrian was.
    But it could get Alliance representatives together for some other reason. Like to agree on a preemptive strike against Gate Union.
    Rossi savored another mouthful of wine and tried not to think of Lyan’s curves. “We are talking Crown Princess Michelle Lady Lyan here?” There were three Lady Lyans, not to mention two Lord Lyans, and all of them had Michel in their name. Only the Lancastrians were stupid enough to name their children so similarly.
    â€œThe dangerous one, yes.”
    They were all dangerous, and Emperor Yu’s children had fingers in every pie in the galaxy. Lancia was what had kept the Alliance together so long when it should have imploded from corruption and old age decades ago. But yes, Crown Princess Michelle was the most dangerous. And the mostcharismatic. And the most beautiful. Rossi let the confluence take him for a moment, thinking of that beauty.
    He shivered and forced his mind back to the meeting.
    â€œExactly,” Naidan said. “And she’s coming here, probably with representatives from every Alliance world.”
    Rossi didn’t envy Rebekah her job.
    â€œSo she comes, she looks, she goes.”
    Naidan snorted inelegantly. Rossi leaned back to avoid the delicate spray of wine that came out through her nose. This was one of the reasons she did backroom work, and people like Rebekah and he liaised with outsiders.
    The first course arrived then, giving him