The Star Kingdom of Manticore is once again at war with the Republic of Haven after a stunning sneak attack The graduating class from Saganami Island the Royal Manticoran Navy&s academy are going straight from the classroom to the blazing reality of all-out war Except for the midshipmen assigned to the heavy cruiser HMS Hexapuma that is They&re being assigned to the Talbott Cluster an out of the way backwater far from the battle front The most they can look forward to is the capture of the occasional pirate cruiser & the boring duty of supporting the Cluster&s peaceful integration with the Star Kingdom at the freely expressed will of eighty percent of the Cluster&s citizens With a captain who may have seen too much of war & a station commander who isn&t precisely noted for his brilliant & insightful command style it isn&t exactly what the students of Honor Harrington the " Salamander" expected But things aren&t as simple
- or tranquil
- as they appear The "pirates" they encounter aren&t what they seem & the "peaceful integration" they expected turns into something very different A powerful alliance of corrupt Solarian League bureaucrats & ruthless interstellar corporations is determined to prevent the Cluster&s annexation by the Star Kingdomby any means necessary Pirates terrorists genetic slavers smuggled weapons long-standing personal hatreds & a vicious alliance of corporate greed bureaucratic arrogance & a corrupt local star nation with a powerful fleet are all coming together & only Hexapuma her war-weary captain & Honor Harrington&s students stand in the path They have only one thing to support & guide them the tradition of Saganami The tradition that sometimes a Queen&s officer&s duty is to face impossible oddsand die fighting