Matushka

Fleet Admiral Catherine Romanova has come home to Narsai to retire. She and her second husband, her long-time comrade Lincoln Casey, have left Earth in disgust following one more sign of the growing distrust between the Outworlds of which Narsai is part and the Inner Worlds that have Terra at their political center. The last straw for them was the expulsion from the Star Service of all "scramblers" - officers promoted from the ranks of ordinary crew members, with whom Casey feels kinship because of his despised Morthan heritage. The couple's idyll (and unexpected boredom) is interrupted when their foster son, Dan Archer, arrives with a fugitive companion?and with a ruthless Corporate Marshal not far behind.