Winter's Orbit

by Everina Maxwell

  “That woman they’ve put forward is a no,” Taam said, his elbow propped on the table and his forehead in his hand, as if it had been a long meeting already. “Tell them to find someone else.”

  “Taam,” Jainan said quietly. “We’ve done this twice now.”

  There was a general rustle around the table. “Count Jainan?” the official said, as if this was an unexpected turn of events.

  Taam ignored her and spoke directly to Jainan. “And?”

  Jainan looked unwell, but said, “The clans are getting impatient, Taam. Please, can we just confirm someone?”

  Taam leaned in. “You want this woman,” he said, “because she’s a friend of your family. I’m losing patience for how everyone on Thea gets appointed because they’re someone’s brother’s aunt.”

  “That isn’t true,” Jainan said. “Her clan is neutral toward Feria, but if you want an enemy of Feria’s, they can find one. We desperately need someone in the ambassador role. I promise I am not playing clan games—I am not Thean anymore, Taam.”

  “Oh, for fuck’s sake,” Taam said, with the general air that they’d had this conversation before. “Moving on. Next item.”

  Kiem had been keeping his mouth shut since his opinion didn’t seem wanted, but he wasn’t going to let that pass. “Hey,” he said. “Taam. Jainan’s right, you need someone to be”—he hesitated. The new Thean Ambassador? Didn’t Thea already have an ambassador?—“whatever job you’re talking about. Don’t ignore him.”

  Taam frowned at him. “Why are you here?”

  Kiem had no idea, but wasn’t going to let that slow him down. “To stop you from making really boneheaded decisions, apparently.”

  “Kiem,” Jainan said.

  “I’m not sitting here to be insulted,” Taam said. “Who invited you?”

  “I’m the Thean treaty representative.” That felt wrong, but Kiem knew it was true. “Aren’t I supposed to be here?”

  “You’re bloody not the representative,” Taam said, pushing back his chair to stand. “Is this a joke? I’ll take this behavior to General Tegnar if you don’t get out.”

  Kiem glanced at Jainan, who was rigid, his hands resting folded on the table in front of him. “I’m fine right here.”

  Taam propped his hands on the table and leaned forward, scowling. “Meeting over, then. We’re done here. Get out, Kiem.”

  “I’m sorry,” Jainan said.

  The officials were already packing up, clearly used to rapid changes of direction from Taam. Even the elderly man was prodded awake. “Wait,” Kiem said, but the officials only paid him cursory attention. “Wait—you can’t just cancel the meeting because you want to, Jainan had a point, this is ridiculous—” He tried to stride forward and catch up with Taam as he left, but as he stepped over the threshold, everything around him wavered. Taam turned back, an incredulous eyebrow raised, but he was fading, and the walls around him started to dissolve. Jainan was sitting in the room behind him, alone.

  Kiem thought, That was the wrong person to chase, at the same time as everything disappeared again.

  * * *

  When Kiem next opened his eyes, he heard voices even before the dark surroundings resolved enough for him to see.

  “I don’t know what it is you want.” That was Jainan’s voice. It was low and close to him.

  “Will you just shut up?” That was Taam.

  Someone took a heavy breath, but Kiem couldn’t tell who. The hair on the back of his neck prickled. It felt close and warm in here, but not pleasant. He started to realize that wherever the field was generating, the surroundings weren’t going to get much lighter. The murk was resolving into the faint silhouettes of a bedroom. Kiem felt a sick guilt rise. Invading Jainan’s memories was bad, but this felt like a part he shouldn’t see at all.

  “Hell,” Taam muttered savagely. “Do you have to just lie there? I could pay for better.” There was silence, then rustling in the dark. Taam made a noise of disgust and moved, and now Kiem could see him faintly outlined, rising to kneel over Jainan. “Is that why Thea sent you? Send someone to marry the Iskaner, but let’s make sure they’re like a damp flannel in bed?” Jainan said something nearly inaudible. Taam cut him off. “You don’t have to talk.”

  It only took Kiem three steps to get over to the bed. In the next moment he had Taam’s bare shoulder in his grip and yanked him roughly away.

  Taam grunted in shock. He flailed backward with his arms for purchase on the bed, and Kiem shoved him away. The lights came up enough to see by, showing Jainan half sitting up with one hand near the light sensor, frozen in surprise. He was naked, and Kiem didn’t want to see; it felt like a profound violation just to be in the same room.

  “Kiem?” Jainan said.

  “The—the hell!” Taam pushed himself upright, choking with rage. “Who are you? The hell do you think you’re doing?” He shoved himself up and grabbed Kiem by the collar of his shirt.

  Kiem was done being reasonable. He caught Taam’s arm and went to shove him back, but suddenly realized that would put Taam closer to Jainan. In that moment of indecision, he’d forgotten Taam had military training. Taam drove a punch into his gut. Kiem doubled over.

  He tried to pull back before the next punch. He might not have combat training like Taam, but he knew he was in a horribly vulnerable position, and a blow to his face now might knock him out. But it didn’t come.

  When he looked up, he saw Jainan had caught Taam’s wrist.

  Taam looked as blankly shocked as if the bedspread had come to life and held him back. He tried to break out of Jainan’s grip. His muscles flexed, but it didn’t have any noticeable effect. “Let go.”

  “No,” Jainan said. “Kiem, you had better leave.”

  “Let go,” Taam said again, low and dangerous.

  It felt like the haze around Kiem was starting to clear. “Wait—Jainan,” Kiem said. “This is the Tau field.”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Jainan said. His eyes were on Taam. “Please leave.”

  “Jainan!” Kiem said. “The interrogation machine Aren put you in to alter your memories, remember? Bel and I came to get you!”

  Jainan looked up in shock. With a roar, Taam broke free of his grip and swung for his face, but even as he did, he was starting to become transparent. So were the bed, the walls, the floor beneath his feet. It all faded into black. Kiem braced himself for the next room.

  It didn’t come. Instead, as he stared into the darkness around him, he realized it was actually a kind of gray. His feet were on what felt like solid ground, but it was completely featureless. He couldn’t see more than a few meters—or maybe he could see for kilometers, and it was just all unbroken gray.

  “No,” a voice said behind him. Kiem whirled to face it—dizzyingly, because it was hard to keep your balance when it wasn’t obvious where the floor was. Jainan was standing there with his hands over his face, now dressed in light-shaded casuals. “Something’s wrong.”

  “Jainan!” Kiem’s initial wash of relief drained away when Jainan took his hands away from his face. His eyes were tightly shut and his skin had a sheen of sweat.

  “My name is Jainan nav Adessari of Feria,” Jainan said in a barely audible voice. His eyes were still shut. “I am a diplomatic representative to the Empire. I am an engineer. I. I. I am proud to represent my planet. I have always tried to do the right thing for Thea and the treaty. I have nothing to be ashamed of.” The litany turned his voice into a bleak, steely thread, like the safety tether that spooled a spacewalker into the void. “I might be easy to manipulate. But I am very difficult to break.”

  Kiem felt like he had been punched in the stomach. “Yes.”

  Jainan opened his eyes and fixed them on Kiem. It was like watching shutters open behind a porthole: they were black and glassy and had shut off all ways in. “You are not real.”

  Kiem didn’t realize he’d taken a step toward him until Jainan deliberately backed away. Kiem froze. Right. �
��Uh. No. I’m real. I thought we’d sorted that just now.”

  “You are not,” Jainan said. “You’re the technician. The interrogator.”

  “I’m not,” Kiem said. “Jainan, listen, we found you and followed you in here. We took the interrogator out. Bel’s keeping guard over her.”

  “How long have I been in here now?” Jainan said. “Am I to expect you to go off-shift at some point?”

  Kiem stared at him, then scrubbed a hand through his hair in frustration. “No, it’s really me. Look.” He held out his hand for Jainan to take.

  Jainan declined it with a slight gesture. “I am well aware this place can simulate sensation.”

  Kiem recoiled, horror running down his spine at that on top of the last scenario. He dropped his hand, frantically trying to think of better arguments. “Really. I got Bel back from the shuttleport. She basically broke us in here—she says she used to be a raider? She doesn’t do that anymore. I mean, obviously. You were already in the Tau field when we found you. We’re probably going to get arrested when we get back out, but arrested is fine as long as we get you out of here. This is classified as an instrument of torture, did you know?”

  “I know,” Jainan said. His expression was preternaturally calm. “You don’t need to make things up about Bel to add color. I am aware Kiem is not coming to get me. Nobody is. Please don’t insult us both with this tactic.”

  Kiem took a deep breath. “I can prove this. Ask me a question only we’d know the answer to.”

  “Everything I’ve seen so far has been from my own memories,” Jainan said. “The field clearly has access to them. You could let it play back the correct answer to anything I asked.”

  “Then why do you think I’m here?” Kiem said. “Why do you think I was in your last three memories?”

  “I don’t know,” Jainan said. “It could be to get me to trust you so I slip up later. Or you may not be the interrogator; maybe she’s on a break. You may be entirely a production of my own mind.” His mouth quirked into another non-smile. “That would be depressing. I would rather not be such a sad fantasist that I hallucinate you coming to find me.”

  Kiem felt a hollow open up in his belly. “That isn’t a fantasy,” he said. “Listen to yourself! Why wouldn’t I be here?”

  “Mm,” Jainan said. “Now I’m back to thinking you’re my interrogator. You should really have let the field handle that response.”

  “What? Why?”

  Jainan sighed. “You may have been briefed, but you’re missing a vital piece of information about how I last left Prince Kiem.”

  “We … argued,” Kiem said.

  Jainan’s smile was quick and mirthless. “Yes, my question gave that away, didn’t it?”

  “What does that have to do with anything? I didn’t think about how to bring up that vid with you and I screwed up,” Kiem said slowly. He could feel the edges of what Jainan was putting together, and he wished he couldn’t see how it looked. “You thought I … would just abandon you because we argued? You don’t think very much of me.”

  “It’s not you,” Jainan said, his controlled voice beginning to fray around the edges. “It’s me. I know it’s me. I am not worth you risking yourself to get out of trouble, and I wish my mind had not produced this delusion of you turning up anyway!”

  “Jainan—” Kiem started, but Jainan deliberately turned away. He walked a little distance, fading into the gray, but seemed to realize at the same time as Kiem did that there was nowhere for him to go. He sat down with his legs crossed, neat and self-contained.

  Kiem rubbed a hand across his face, then went and sat a few feet in front of him. Jainan ignored him.

  “It wasn’t your fault,” Kiem said tentatively. “I think it was mine. I mean. I don’t know if it was even an argument, really.”

  “You are not getting anything out of me with that,” Jainan said flatly.

  “All right, have it your way,” Kiem said, exasperated. “Truce. I’m not real.”

  “I know.” There was an expectant pause, as if Jainan was waiting for Kiem to disappear.

  “No,” Kiem said. “It’s not going to work for you to dive back into your memories. I may not be the sharpest knife in the set, but—”

  “Stop it,” Jainan said.

  “What?”

  Jainan looked up at the empty gray air above them. “That’s the one thing the real you does that very much annoys me,” he said to the space above. “You aren’t stupid. Stop saying you are.”

  Kiem stopped, thrown. “You should know. You’ve tried to explain your work to me.”

  “That’s not a difference in ability, that’s a specific skill set,” Jainan said. “You’re manifestly better at—at life than Taam was. Than I am.”

  “Not true. You—”

  “Don’t,” Jainan said. He gave something that was half a laugh, half a cough. “It just makes me think of where I am right now.”

  There was a long silence, while Kiem drummed his fingers on the spongy, featureless ground, and Jainan stared straight ahead. After a while, Kiem said, “Was that … something that happened to you? The Taam thing?”

  “Which one?” Jainan said colorlessly.

  Four hours, Kiem remembered. “The ones I saw.”

  “They’re my memories.” Jainan didn’t look at him.

  All of the words Kiem had were wrong. “I’m sorry,” he said. It seemed pathetically inadequate.

  “Why?”

  “What?” Kiem said. “Because—because I didn’t help you? Nobody helped you! Someone should have figured out what was going on and dissolved the marriage! Taam should have been—prosecuted, disgraced, stripped of his rank, all of that. And not just him. Anyone who covered it up!” He realized he was starting to go off and cut himself short. “Sorry. I know you don’t want it raked over. But it just makes me so angry that Taam died before it came back to hurt him. You didn’t get any justice.”

  Jainan was finally looking at him, his forehead creased and his lips slightly parted.

  “I don’t know how you survived it,” Kiem said. “Being—alone like that, with all that shit happening. I wouldn’t have got through—”

  “No,” Jainan interrupted. “No, you don’t understand. It was me.” He got to his feet in agitation, turning away from Kiem. “That wouldn’t have happened to anyone else. Taam had good intentions. He had a sense of honor. It was just unfortunate that he ended up with someone he didn’t like.”

  “Screw Taam’s good intentions!” Kiem said. He got to his feet as well, moving around to face Jainan. “Nothing was good about what he did to you! Are you trying to tell me this was your fault?”

  Jainan didn’t move away. “It would have worked,” he said. “It would have worked, if I’d been someone else.”

  Kiem made a chopping motion with his hand. “No,” he said. “Rubbish. Bullshit. I may never be right about anything again, but I’m right about this.” Jainan hadn’t moved away. Kiem reached out and touched his shoulder. “If he couldn’t cope with you, then he couldn’t have coped with anything except curling up with one of his own rank medals. Nobody could want more than who you are.”

  For a moment, the gray world seemed to hang in the balance. And then Jainan raised his hand to Kiem’s wrist, and Kiem stepped forward, and Jainan let him put his arms around him. Jainan took a ragged breath and dropped his head, resting his forehead on Kiem’s shoulder. “You’re a hallucination,” he said, though he no longer sounded certain of it. “You’re telling me what I want to hear.”

  “I’m not,” Kiem said. “Listen, if I’d met you before you got married, I’d have fallen over my own feet trying to get you to look at me. You’re out of my league. You’re out of most people’s league, especially Taam’s. I’ve been trying to tell you this for weeks. I don’t know how to say it so you’ll believe it.”

  Jainan was silent for a long time. He was a solid warmth in Kiem’s arms, his head a weight on Kiem’s shoulder. Kiem shouldn’t be happy, but
he was.

  “I don’t know where that comes from,” Jainan said. “You can’t be one of my own hallucinations. I haven’t thought that.”

  “That’s because I’m real?” Kiem said. “I thought we’d sorted that.”

  Jainan let out half a breath of laughter. “It’s not sorted just because you say it’s sorted.”

  “That’s all it should take—” Kiem started.

  * * *

  Kiem’s eyes slammed open into blackness. He drew a huge, painful gulp of air that felt like his first breath in minutes. There was something on his head; he clawed at it desperately for a moment before realizing it was the Tau field helmet and managed to still the panic for long enough to lift it away. His sight flooded back.

  They were in the warehouse again. The technician lay slumped on the floor. There was no sign of Bel. Jainan sat up on his narrow bed a couple of meters away and pulled the medical helmet off. As he moved, the wire attached to his head came with him; he reached up and brushed it off. The end came away in bundles of filaments, like dead plants.

  Jainan’s eyes went to the technician. “Asleep?”

  “I don’t know,” Kiem said. “And where’s Bel? She was supposed to be watching us.” It felt like there was a lump lodged between his lungs and his throat. He knelt down to check the body.

  “Kiem, I have to tell you what’s going on,” Jainan said, with a sudden thread of urgency. “Taam and General Fenrik were organizing an unsanctioned invasion of Thea. They used Kingfisher as cover to buy weapons and steal the remnants. They want to break with the Resolution and use the remnants for war. Aren saw the dark money flowing around and diverted some for himself, then killed Taam when he found out.”

  Kiem had gotten halfway there already. He wished the rest of it came as a surprise. “And then Aren decided to frame you, right?” he said grimly. Aren had known what was going on in Jainan and Taam’s marriage. Was that what had made him think Jainan was an easy target? “Fuck Aren. Fuck Taam.”