New York Times, USA Today, Wall Street Journal, and international bestselling phenomenon David Weber delivers the next book in the multiple New York Times bestselling Honor Harrington series.
There are two sides to any quarrelunless there are more. Queen Elizabeth of Manticore's first cousin and Honor Harrington's best friend Michelle Henke has just handed the invincible Solarian League Navy the most humiliating, one-sided defeat in its entire almost thousand-year history in defense of the people of the Star Empire's Talbott Quadrant. But the League is the most powerful star nation in the history of humanity. Its navy is going to be backand this time with thousands of superdreadnoughts.
Yet she also knows scores of other star systemssome independent, some controlled by puppet regimes, and some simply conquered outright by the Solarian Office of Frontier Securitylie in the League's grip along its frontier with the Talbott Quadrant. As combat spreads from the initial confrontation, the entire frontier has begun to seethe with unrest, and Michelle sympathizes with the oppressed populations wanting only to be free of their hated masters.
That puts her in something of a quandary when a messenger from Mobius arrives, because someone's obviously gotten a wrong number. According to him, the Mobians uprising has been carefully planned to coordinate with a powerful outside ally: the Star Empire of Manticore. Only Manticoreand Mike Henkehave never even heard of the Mobius Liberation Front.
It's a set-upand Michelle knows who's behind it. The shadowy Mesan Alignment has launched a bold move to destroy Manticore's reputation as the champion of freedom. And when the RMN doesn't arrive, when the MLF is brutally and bloodily crushed, no independent star system will ever trust Manticore again.
Mike Henke knows she has no orders from her government to assist any rebellions or liberation movements, that she has only so many ships, which can be in only so many places at a timeand that she can't possibly justify diverting any of her limited, outnumbered strength to missions of liberation the Star Empire never signed on for. She knows thatand she doesn't care.
No one is going to send thousands of patriots to their deaths, trusting in Manticoran help that will never come.
Not on Mike Henke's watch.
