Winter's Orbit

by Everina Maxwell

  “What?” Kiem said in astonishment. “He doesn’t have to do that. How is it Jainan’s fault that there’s something wrong with your evidence?”

  “If permission is necessary,” Jainan said, then stopped.

  “You copied them to my account as well, and I don’t give permission,” Kiem said. “What gives you the right to poke around in our personal lives?”

  Rakal’s look gave Kiem pause, even as his indignation picked up steam, because he had come across several of Iskat’s more murderous fauna while on hikes and Rakal reminded him strongly of something with too many teeth. “Because, Your Highness,” Rakal said, as if this was something painfully obvious Kiem had failed to get, “your partner is a subject of interest in the investigation.”

  Kiem stopped.

  He saw the slightest of movements in the corner of his eye; Jainan had gripped the edge of the table, as if he was having difficulty standing up. Even as Kiem started to turn, though, Jainan straightened, looking unsteady and ill. Rakal was watching Kiem closely. “That’s nonsense,” Kiem said blankly. It was more than nonsense. “That’s the most ridiculous thing I’ve heard this year, and considering my last audience with the Emperor, that’s a high bar. What do you think he did to Taam, murdered him?” Jainan shook his head urgently beside him.

  There was another, even more horrible silence.

  “Are you asking to be involved in the case, Prince Kiem?” Rakal said.

  “I am involved in it,” Kiem said. “He’s my partner! Tell me what you’re investigating!”

  Rakal seemed to weigh their words before they spoke. Their voice came out cool, as if Kiem were a hostile media outlet. “Prince Taam’s death was suspicious,” they said. “We are investigating a number of options. There have been attempts to break into Operation Kingfisher’s systems even after Prince Taam passed away. Operation Kingfisher, which, I shouldn’t need to remind you, is not popular on Thea.”

  “That’s your evidence?” Kiem said incredulously.

  “Of course not,” Rakal said impatiently. “That is context. I am not going to litigate the case evidence with anyone but the Emperor.”

  “I didn’t,” Jainan said, swallowing audibly. “I know there is very little use in me saying that, but I did nothing. Your people told me I wasn’t needed for questioning.”

  “He’s a diplomat,” Kiem said. “He has no motive, you have no proof, and he’s a goodwill ambassador. You’re treating him like he came in on a raider ship! He’s just lost his partner, and now you’re going to drag him through an investigation? What do you think that’s going to do to our relationship with Thea?”

  “This is why I think we would all prefer to do this informally,” Rakal said. “Either you and Count Jainan can give us access to your accounts voluntarily, or I will apply for a sealed Imperial Justice Order. Either way, this can be done without causing further tensions with the Resolution.”

  “I’ll take it to the Emperor,” Kiem said, but he felt the negotiation slipping away.

  “Do,” Rakal said, and Kiem heard in the word the truth they both knew: Kiem didn’t have an ounce of influence with the Emperor. Internal Security was in the Emperor’s pocket.

  Could he pull rank any further? He felt something like despair at the thought of it. It would be obvious he had no idea what he was doing. Rakal would just laugh, and they’d be right to.

  And then, all of a sudden, Kiem realized he was going about it the wrong way. He met Rakal’s eyes. “You’ve got to admit,” he said, “our whole track record with Jainan looks bad. Jainan gives up his family and his life on Thea to come over here, and then we revoke his security clearance and isolate him. We treat him as an enemy. Cut him off from his family. People will sympathize, don’t you think?”

  “I couldn’t say,” Rakal said expressionlessly. “But I would say that most people in the palace understand security threats.”

  Kiem leaned in. “I have a couple of friends who might see it a different way,” he said. “Journalists. You know journalists—always obsessed with the human angle. Like I said, it could get out. Could look very bad.”

  Beside him, he heard Jainan’s soft intake of air. Kiem didn’t look around; he couldn’t afford to look away from Rakal.

  “You would not,” Rakal said.

  “Oh, I’m not suggesting anyone blows the whole thing open,” Kiem said. “Your half-baked investigation would really screw things up if it got out. But mistreatment of the Thean representative? Forbidding him to talk to his relatives? That’s something we could give the press.”

  “You would not invite a scandal across half the royal family,” Rakal said. They looked like they had bitten something sour. “The Emperor would—”

  “Exile me to a monastery again?” Kiem said. “Already went, three years ago. I’m a world-class meditator. I don’t mind being in the newslogs.”

  They stared at each other.

  “Denying us access to evidence will not stop Internal Security’s investigation,” Rakal said eventually.

  “I don’t want to stop it,” Kiem said. “I want you to find out what happened; all I’m asking is that you don’t take our lives apart. And you can reinstate Jainan’s security clearance while you’re at it,” he added. Jainan was looking at him with something like disbelief. “I want you to tell me he can call anyone he likes, please.”

  Rakal stared at him further, now not bothering to hide the flat dislike. “I will remove the flag.”

  “If you harass him, expect a bunch of newslog articles to show up on Hren Halesar’s desk with your name all over them,” Kiem said. “Let me put this diplomatically: you have done an absolutely shit job of being balanced and proportionate in how you treat Thea’s formal representative in the palace, and I don’t trust you.”

  “So you have made clear,” Rakal said. “Were there any other points you wished to raise?”

  “No,” Kiem said. “Thanks for reinstating his clearance, though. I really am grateful. Jainan, anything you want to add?”

  He looked at Jainan properly. He didn’t know what reaction he’d hoped for, but Jainan barely ever reacted in public, and his poker face was intact. “No, thank you.”

  Kiem offered his arm—which Jainan took—gave Rakal a courtly nod, and said, “Thank you for your time.” He steered them out.

  The righteous anger was fading, all the more so as Jainan’s grip stiffened on his arm. Kiem managed to confine himself to “You okay to head back?”

  “Yes,” Jainan said.

  Kiem recognized that tone: it was the one where yes only covered ten percent of what Jainan might have said. Kiem didn’t know what to do about that. When they were in a completely empty corridor, Jainan looked over his shoulder and to either side, and said, “May I ask you something?”

  Kiem wasn’t sure he had any answers. “Go ahead.”

  “I will, of course, back you up in anything,” Jainan said. There was a meticulous air to his words, as if he were laying them out very carefully on a tray. “I am at your disposal. But—I do not mean to cast any aspersions on your judgment—if there is any way to avoid a public scandal in the newslogs before the treaty renewal, I would…” He stopped, and for the first time Kiem realized the strain it was taking him to keep his voice even. “I would rather do anything else,” he finished, losing the edges of his calm. “Anything. Please.”

  Kiem’s foot caught on a low stone step and he stumbled. “Jainan, that was a bluff,” he said in dismay. “I thought you knew. What did you think I’d do, just throw you to the press? You’re my partner!”

  Jainan looked relieved, which made Kiem frantically try and think of what else he’d done wrong to provoke that reaction. But of course, he thought of Jainan: grave and dignified, his every public action totally correct, holding duty around him like a shield—of course public scandal would be his worst nightmare. “We’ll keep everything private,” Kiem said. “I can promise that.”

  Jainan nodded. His expression hadn’t changed at
all, and Kiem wondered if he even believed what Kiem was saying. If he were Jainan he wouldn’t have trusted anyone from the palace as far as he could throw them. Now Kiem thought about it, he realized Internal Security hadn’t even given them an excuse for the fake crash data. They’d just tried to threaten Jainan into deleting it, and there wasn’t a damn thing either of them could do about it.

  Kiem tried to take stock. “We can ask Aren’s people about the crash data,” he said. “Someone must have swapped it out before it reached us. I’ll get in touch with him.”

  “Yes,” Jainan said. They were nearly outside their rooms now. “So,” he said tentatively, “I only need to clear my contacts with you?”

  “What?” Kiem said. What had he missed now? “Why would you need my opinion on who you call?”

  “Because … I thought that was the agreement we came to?” Jainan’s inflection turned it into a question.

  “No! What? No! I’m not going to track who you talk to!”

  “Sounds wise,” said Bel’s voice, as she came in from the study. “Everything okay? After that call I was half expecting to have to go and bail you out of a Security cell.”

  “Everything’s fine,” Kiem said. “I mean, it’s not—Internal Security is being cagey with us, and Taam’s crash might not have been an accident—but neither of us have been arrested yet. Am I late for something?”

  “You’d better fill me in,” Bel said. “You’re not late if you go and change now. Terraforming Assistance donor gala, remember?”

  “Right, right,” Kiem said. “I’ll change. Jainan, do you need the bedroom?”

  “I’m going to call Ressid,” Jainan said. It sounded like a tentative challenge.

  “Please,” Kiem said. “Study’s all yours if you want the vidchair. Or the bedroom’s yours, of course. Or here—I don’t need to change, I can just go out. I’ll go out.”

  “No,” Jainan said, stopping him in midflow. “Thank you.” Before Kiem realized what was happening, Jainan stepped in and pressed a kiss to his cheek, light and swift.

  Jainan turned away to the study, which was a good thing, as he didn’t see Kiem raise his hand to his cheek like an idiot before he caught himself.

  Kiem turned away too. “Bel, he’s not to be disturbed unless the palace is on fire.”

  “Noted,” Bel said. Her eyes followed Jainan curiously.

  Jainan hadn’t remembered to close the door. As Kiem moved to fix that, he could see the screen inside already lighting up with a connection. A face flickered into view: the Thean noblewoman who had upbraided Kiem the morning of his wedding. Now her expression was softer, more shocked than anything else. “I didn’t believe the ID,” she said. “Jainan, why are you calling now? Is everything all right?”

  “It’s. Yes,” Jainan said. What Kiem heard in his voice made him reach more hastily for the switch: it felt like more of a violation of Jainan’s privacy for Kiem to overhear that raw, unguarded note than anything Internal Security had done. “Yes,” Jainan said again, and swallowed audibly as the door started to slide shut and hide him from view. “I’ve missed you.”

  CHAPTER 12

  It took Kiem all ten days of the next week to nail down Vaile. In the meantime, he sent a series of increasingly exasperated messages to Internal Security and to the military’s Signals HQ, which was supposed to be in charge of log transmission for flybugs like the one Taam had flown. It was like sending messages into a black hole.

  Jainan worked on his Imperial College project and accompanied Kiem to events with the same detachment as before. He didn’t volunteer any information about his first conversation with his sister, and Kiem would rather have set his own hair on fire than ask. Jainan didn’t seem to blame him for failing to get an answer about the crash data. Occasionally Kiem caught Jainan watching him with a slight frown, as if Kiem was an unpredictable cog in an otherwise orderly machine.

  Some things coaxed Jainan out of his shell. Professor Audel or one of her students seemed to call him every day for animated discussions about their deep-space mining project. And on the day that Vaile returned from orbit again, Kiem found Jainan in the gardens outside with that Thean student, Gairad, who was also part of the Feria clan. Kiem had been trying to figure out clan etiquette from talking to Jainan and the few Theans at the embassy who seemed approachable, as well as reading the occasional memo from Bel, but the whole system of clan relationships took some effort to get your head around.

  It looked like some kind of lesson: Gairad held a quarterstaff above her head while Jainan stood in front of her and corrected her grip. His own quarterstaff leaned against a tree a little way away.

  “—can’t get it,” Kiem heard her say.

  “You will. Try again.” Jainan took up his own staff and turned it crosswise in front of him. “Ten!”

  It seemed to be a code word. Gairad spun in the melting snow, brought her hands together on the staff, and swung it at Jainan’s stomach. She obviously had grounding in the techniques, but the strike was slow, and Jainan blocked it easily. “That was better. The farther down you can get your grip, the more momentum you’ll have.” He finally caught sight of Kiem standing in the doorway and broke off.

  Kiem waved and came forward, seeing as he’d interrupted them anyway. “Looks like fun. Can I join?” he asked, half-jokingly.

  “Oh.” Jainan seemed surprised, but instantly recovered. “Of course. Please.” He handed Kiem his own bronze quarterstaff. Kiem took it gingerly. It was much heavier than he’d expected but couldn’t be traditional metal, since it wasn’t cold. “Ah, not quite.” Jainan put his hands over Kiem’s—for once without diffidence—and shifted his grip. “You want to hold it here.”

  His touch was warm. Kiem tried not to think about that as he settled his hands around the staff. “Didn’t mean to hijack your lesson,” he said. “Just show me one move.”

  “Jainan, the pair forms,” Gairad said. She seemed refreshingly unbothered by the fact Kiem was a prince. “Can we try form five?”

  “Yes. Kiem, would you mind?” Jainan picked up a white handle from the ground, which folded out into something like the quarterstaff Gairad was using, cheaper and flimsier-looking than his own. “Traditional quarterstaff has twenty basic moves, and one to six are for fighting with an ally. Since we have three people, Gairad’s form five could do with work.”

  “I haven’t had anyone to practice with,” Gairad said defensively. Kiem spun his staff experimentally beside her, fumbled it, and lost his grip. It clattered to the ground around Gairad’s ankles. Gairad picked it up and handed it back to him with a martyred air. “At least I can be better than you. That’s motivating.”

  Kiem grinned at her. “My form five’s perfect. Legendary, even. Angels weep.”

  The corner of Jainan’s mouth twitched. “Of course,” he said. “But Gairad needs to practice.” Had that been a smile? Kiem wasn’t sure.

  Once Kiem had his grip sorted out, the basics of quarterstaff turned out to be fairly easy to grasp. Form five meant Gairad doing a sort of crouching spin and taking her imaginary opponent out at the knees, while Kiem’s part was simpler—he stepped forward next to her with what Jainan called a disarming strike, which meant hitting out with his staff at wrist height. They tried it a few times against thin air. Eventually, Jainan seemed satisfied with that, and readied his own staff. “All right. Kiem to hit, please.” He stepped in front of them and held up a block.

  “Uh.” Kiem said. Gairad nodded and crouched, but Kiem didn’t move. “You want me to … attack you?”

  There was a pause. Jainan gave Kiem a quizzical look. “I’m blocking.”

  “What if I miss?” Kiem said. Swinging something heavy around had been kind of fun, but now he remembered why he’d never taken well to martial arts.

  Jainan lowered the block. “I see. Gairad, why don’t you hit, then. Kiem, you can pull your strike.”

  “Right,” Kiem said. Jainan politely hadn’t mentioned that there was no way Kiem could get pas
t his guard, but Kiem still felt obscurely relieved. On Jainan’s snapped, “Five!” Kiem swung halfway. Gairad lashed out, and her staff hit Jainan’s with a violent crack.

  “Again,” Jainan said.

  They did it a few more times, until Kiem accidentally stepped in front of Gairad as she started her spin. She tripped over his ankle, said, “Shitfuck,” and crashed forward into the ground. Kiem tripped as well, catching himself with his hands as the impact jarred all the way up to his shoulders.

  Jainan was there immediately, offering Kiem a hand up. Kiem took it and was about to make a joke before he noticed how strained Jainan’s expression was. “I’m sorry,” Jainan said. “Are you hurt?”

  “I’ve got bruises,” Gairad said. She rolled over and knocked snow off her knees. “Legendary, Prince Kiem.”

  “Gairad, apologize,” Jainan said as Kiem pulled himself up.

  Gairad frowned and opened her mouth, but Kiem forestalled her. “My fault,” he said. “Totally my fault. I think I need to divert my legendary skills into something else. Maybe bull wrestling.” He picked up his dropped quarterstaff and handed it back to Jainan with a rueful grin. “I’ve got an appointment. Let’s try it again another time.”

  That seemed to fractionally relax the strain on Jainan’s face. “As you like. Of course.”

  Kiem left them to it. He could see them through the windows as he closed the door behind him. The lesson was obviously going a great deal more smoothly without him there. Gairad wasn’t bad, but Jainan had been training longer, and Kiem could tell every time they clashed; however much force she put into her attacks, they glanced off his defenses. Jainan’s face was intent, the same way he looked when he talked about engineering, as if there was nothing you could put in front of him that he couldn’t take apart. Kiem looked away and firmly reminded himself that he had an appointment.

  The sunlight today was bright and thin. It was melting sad green patches in the snow, which would last maybe a day before a new fall covered them up. Kiem glanced up through the glass roof of the connecting walkway as he left the Courtyard Residence. The trees were dripping slush.