I lucked into an Imperial Terra collection, starting with this story, and I'm suitably impressed. Flandry is a pilot in the Terran Navy, serving a tired and decadent empire which has been drawn into a slowly escalating proxy war between two alien species on a distant plant with a medieval level of technology. After being shot down, Flandry is rescued, becomes a trusted advisor to the human aliens, and gets roped into an interstellar escapade to the capital of a rising interstellar power, where he is implicated in a scheme by the local chief of intelligence, Max Abrams, against the diplomat Hauksberg, that has him on the run and then the hero, heading off a plot that could have crippled the Terran fleet.

As always, Anderson has deft touch with pacing, handling in 180 pages what might take a lesser author (cough David Weber cough) 600 or more. I'm excited for the rest.