by Yoon Ha Lee
“You said the Kel got him. What happened to you then?”
“The same thing that happened to all of us. The Kel brought soup, and blankets, and bottled water. All sorts of riceballs and dumplings. And doctors. As if they hadn’t been the ones to bomb us.”
His fingers suddenly dug into Jedao’s back. Jedao stilled. “They looted the warlord’s possessions,” Kujen said. “I didn’t mind that. I used to steal things to survive, when I wasn’t selling myself. Before Halash took me in. But the things they... Halash collected ancient documents. Some of them older than the heptarchate. Some of them much older. Mathematics, astronomy, books of poetry. I used to sit in the solarium and read them. Halash let me because he knew I would be careful.”
“Couldn’t the Kel have sold the books?” Jedao said. “If they were old and valuable?” Now that he had calmed down, he wondered how much he could get Kujen to let slip. Nothing useful... yet. But the more Kujen talked, the more he might reveal.
“The Kel commander didn’t care,” Kujen said “They burned the books because they wanted fuel for their damnable celebration pyre. I went to the biggest Kel I could find. I didn’t know rank insignia then, so I thought the hierarchy might go by size. I begged him to spare the books. I offered to be his whore. He patted me on the head and sent me to the tents with the children. Said I was too young. Young, as if fucking was so damn difficult.”
Jedao was glad he couldn’t see Kujen’s face.
“Useful as they are,” Kujen went on, “I have never forgiven the Kel for that.”
Jedao thought of Dhanneth, of formation instinct. “And afterward?” he said when Kujen fell silent.
He felt Kujen’s shrug. “The Kel were good about getting us into orphanages and arranging for our educations. I tested into Nirai Academy very young.”
“I’m sorry,” Jedao said. It was the only safe thing he could think to say.
“It was a long time ago,” Kujen said, unsentimental. “And you weren’t involved. We’ll fix the world and return it to the way things ought to be, and you’ll never have to endure the things I endured.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
INESSER HAD HEALED enough that the doctors had been allowing her to totter around unsupervised for the last couple of weeks. She’d submitted herself to physical therapy with grim determination. “I don’t get it,” one of the doctors had said to her in honest bafflement. “Generals are terrible about physical therapy.” To which she’d retorted that she had no intention of going around with a limp if she had a choice in the matter. The ankle had taken longer to heal than it would have in the past, even with treatment. One of the consequences of her age.
Brezan had ceded the best quarters on the bannermoth to her. In a surprising move, he had left its decor to her. Inesser hadn’t done much in that regard, not least because she had other matters to deal with. Still, she’d had the grid image one of her favorite paintings against the wall. It depicted an archer drawing her bow: usually attributed to Andan Zhe Navo (what wasn’t?), although she had it on good authority that it was a fake painted by a gifted entrepreneur. It gave her something to look at that didn’t have to do with (modern) warfare while she did damnfool things like writing letters of the alphabet with her foot and meditating on stroke order.
She was in the middle of another round of exercises when the grid indicated that someone wanted to talk to her: Brezan. He had flagged it as a matter of some urgency. “Come in,” she said. It was about time she take a break anyway.
Brezan didn’t salute her after he entered, which was refreshing. “Protector-General,” he said. “I need to ask you for a favor.”
Ah. That explained both the formality and the lack of salute. He wanted her to take him seriously. “Have a seat,” Inesser said, nodding toward one of the extra chairs. “I assume this won’t be fast.”
“Well, that depends,” Brezan said. He sat. “Kel Cheris contacted me just now.”
“And you didn’t tell me.”
“She didn’t think you’d be a receptive interlocutor.”
Inesser snorted. “Well, at least she’s a realist. Go on.”
A smile flickered at his mouth, was gone. He explained about Kujen’s body-hopping ability, its limitations, and Cheris’s proposed plan.
Inesser couldn’t help reflecting that either he had started out with good communication skills—not necessarily something you could take for granted with staffers—or his role in the Compact’s government these past years had forced him to develop them.
“You’re not surprised, are you,” Brezan said.
“It makes a lot of things make sense,” she said. “If it’s a fabulation, it’s an inspired one. Do you consider Cheris’s information reliable?”
“She claimed her source was one of Kujen’s assistants. How she managed to subvert one of Kujen’s assistants—well.”
“The obvious person to consult would be Hexarch Mikodez,” Inesser said. “I wouldn’t expect him to be able to verify this definitively in time to be useful. But it won’t hurt to check.”
Brezan raised his eyebrows.
“Just because I can’t stand him doesn’t mean I don’t acknowledge his occasional usefulness,” Inesser said. “If you ask me, Mikodez decided that Kujen was too much of a rival for power and is taking advantage of the opportunity to have us do away with Kujen for him.”
“Oh, I don’t disagree,” Brezan said.
“Hrm,” Inesser said. She took a seat herself and rubbed her eyes. “I can tell you’re not done because you haven’t asked for the favor yet.”
“Cheris doesn’t just propose that we bait a trap for Kujen,” Brezan said. “She wants to be the backup plan.” He outlined Cheris’s idea of assassinating Jedao in order to create a local spike so she could then assassinate Kujen.
Inesser laughed harshly. “Well, at least she knows that it’s good to have a backup plan. With Jedao in her head, I sometimes wonder. Details, please.”
“She wants to be reinstated. As General Jedao.”
Inesser saw the scheme immediately. Nine years ago, as General Jedao, Cheris had abused formation instinct to hijack General Khiruev’s swarm. That was the problem with formation instinct, of course. It had once guaranteed the state loyal soldiers, but the whole thing went up like dropped porcelain if you subverted someone at the top.
Hilariously, Cheris infiltrating Kujen’s command moth wasn’t the hard part. Cheris was Kel infantry, presumably still in good condition, and she had been infused with Jedao’s assassin training. Even so, there was only one of her (thank fire and ash). Being able to pull rank would facilitate her mission—and, presumably, her ability to get out alive.
“That’s one hell of a promotion she’s asking for,” Inesser said. “Especially considering the things she can do with it.”
“Well, think of it this way,” Brezan said. “She’ll only be able to abuse it in high calendar space, so that limits the damage she can do.”
Inesser harrumphed. “I’m willing,” she said. “I can’t deny the usefulness of multiple avenues of attack.”
Brezan could have gone behind her back and facilitated this. That he hadn’t spoke well for him. Ordinarily, Kel uniforms responded to encrypted codes transmitted by individuals’ augments and changed insignia, medals, and so on in accordance with the profile on record. In theory, this prevented people from impersonating officers. Inesser was guessing that Cheris couldn’t figure out how to hack a modern uniform. (She rather doubted that getting executed for impersonation was going to bother Cheris of all people.) She needed the command codes—codes that Brezan had once had access to, codes that he had ceded to Inesser’s control.
Brezan had tipped his head up and met Inesser’s gaze. “There’ll be a price, of course.”
“You look as though you’re facing a firing squad.”
His smile had a hard edge. “Feels like it sometimes.”
“I need you to publicly declare for me.”
“More than I alre
ady have?”
Inesser steepled her hands and regarded him meditatively. “Do you know how I secured the Protectorate in the early days?”
“Threatening to shoot anyone who got in the way?”
“Do you really believe that?”
“I did back then,” Brezan said. “Not anymore.”
“Oh, the swarms didn’t hurt,” Inesser said. “But one of my key pillars of support came from a deceased wife of mine. Namely, the fact that her brother is the commandant who holds the Fortress of Pearled Hopes.”
A flicker in Brezan’s eyes told her what he thought of her abuse of family connections. It was almost funny to find straitlaced Kel squeamishness about using marriage connections in a crashhawk. In her experience, even squeamish Kel came around when they saw a promotion within their reach, or a particularly desirable posting. Ignoring the tendency only caused it to fester, instead of bringing it into the open where it could be lanced.
“Yes,” Inesser said. “I was able to secure the fortress because I leaned on my brother-in-law.”
“I don’t see where you’re going with this,” Brezan said, “unless you’re telling me that you’re about to marry into my family. Which would frankly be difficult, considering that Miuzan’s as Kel as you are. Her twin Ganazan, besides also being Kel, has never shown the slightest interest in sex or romance. Although if you’re into duelist trading cards, she’s happy to talk your ears off about that. Keryezan married her childhood sweetheart and they’ve shown no sign of wanting to expand the marriage to include anyone else.”
“Tell me,” Inesser said mildly, “why haven’t you gotten married?
Brezan only laughed at her. “Never wanted to settle down, I guess.”
“I don’t think that’s true,” Inesser said. “You found someone, except you had a choice. Between duty to the hexarchate and a continuation of your affair with her, or revolution and a break with her.”
Give him credit: he didn’t stand up and walk out, even though his nostrils flared. “I’m not in love with Tseya,” Brezan said.
“Brezan,” Inesser said, “who said anything about love? Love makes it easier. But that’s not what I’m talking about.”
“I don’t see,” Brezan said, “how a marriage alliance between Tseya and me does you any good. Among other things, if my fathers haven’t disinherited me—”
“You think your inheritance is what matters here?” Inesser demanded, entertained. “As opposed to the position you’ve carved out for yourself?”
“Well,” Brezan said, droll, “I’m sure access to a vast personal fortune never hurts. Not that I would know from experience. You’re that sure of Tseya as an ally that you think binding me to her will bind me to you?”
“It’s a small opportunity for some personal happiness,” Inesser said. “Tseya had broached the topic to me herself, because of the political repercussions. And she felt I would make a better intermediary, to avoid any awkwardness.”
“Oh, for love of fire and ash,” Brezan said. “Now I feel like the pimply kid whose well-meaning relatives try to set him up with a hot date out of pity. What’s in it for her? If she has your ear, she’s already near the center of power.”
“She thinks you could be useful.” For a moment Inesser wondered if she’d gone too far, but Brezan only pulled a face. It made him look incredibly young. “Also, she said that she would teach you that Andan cake recipe you were lusting after.”
Brezan laughed in spite of himself.
“It hasn’t escaped my attention that ‘personal happiness’ leads directly to political entanglements,” Brezan said after a while.
Inesser shrugged. “If you can offer me something more attractive—”
“No. I’ll talk to Tseya. I want to be sure this is something she wants.”
Inesser had the sudden and inexplicable urge to ruffle his hair the way she would have with one of her grandchildren. So earnest. “Fair enough,” she said. “She’s been waiting for this talk.”
“It figures that an Andan would go through an intermediary rather than talk to me herself,” Brezan said, but he didn’t sound as though he minded. “Considering what I did to her, I suppose I can’t blame her.”
“Let me give you the codes,” Inesser said, “and you can convey them to Cheris. Give her a nice reinstatement of her rank. She won’t outrank me, of course”—she grinned ferociously—“because I remembered what she’d pulled on poor Khiruev, so I asked my experts to rewrite the protocol so ‘protector-general’ outranks all the ordinary generals.”
“Good to know,” Brezan said.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
JEDAO’S CONVERSATION WITH Kujen had convinced him that he needed allies. But who? Dhanneth didn’t know anything. If he didn’t, Talaw was unlikely to either. The same for the rest of the Kel.
He did, however, know somebody who might be willing to work with him. First, he needed something to cover what might possibly be long periods of his staring off into space. He sent a note to Dhanneth to leave him alone for anything short of a emergency. Then he sat at his desk and asked the grid to present him with a curated selection of pornography.
“Fox and hound,” Jedao said involuntarily, “people do that to each other?” Was he flexible enough to do those things? Then he wondered what it would be like if he and Dhanneth... He felt the rush of heat to his face. Good thing no one was watching him.
All right. Now that he had some extremely athletic people gyrating on video for his edification, it was time. He closed his eyes and listened to the subliminal whir of circulating air. Beyond that, he could hear the moths singing to each other. They had sweeter voices than the Revenant’s. If he unfocused his mind, he could almost understand them.
Hello, he thought in their direction, just in case.
Immediate silence.
My name is Jedao, he said. I just... I just wanted to talk.
It was a stupid thing to admit to.
The silence continued.
More silence.
Then the Revenant spoke, more softly than it ever had before. They will not talk to you, it said. They speak to me, of course, as I’m the command moth. They’ve absorbed Kel notions of hierarchy. But you—you are not a moth.
I’m not human either, Jedao said.
Nevertheless. Don’t contact them further. It will do you no good.
Jedao opened his eyes. The pornography sampler had moved on to something less athletic and... what on earth were they doing with all those candles? He hadn’t realized anyone still used candles. Hell, he hadn’t realized he knew what candles were. Wasn’t the whole room the actors were in one giant fire hazard?
I can’t blame them, Jedao said, for not trusting me. Why do you talk to me, then?
I am responsible for you, the Revenant said.
His othersight revealed that two servitors had whisked into the hallway just outside his quarters. All doubts that he lived under surveillance had evaporated. The question was, whose side were the servitors on? Their own? The Revenant’s? Kujen’s? Someone else’s entirely?
The door opened. The servitors entered. Jedao put on a show of paying them no attention. Too much depended on his ability to fool Kujen to risk revealing his plans to players with unknown motives. He didn’t know that the servitors were sentient, but he didn’t know that they weren’t sentient, either. Even if they weren’t, they could still serve as spies.
The Revenant spoke. The servitors are my allies. They are here to ensure that you aren’t being monitored.
Interesting, but he had no way to verify that independently.
Order something to eat.
Jedao was distracted from the very interesting thing that the gentleman in the video was doing with his—You’re lecturing me about my eating habits? he demanded.
It said, You may have a moth’s abilities of regeneration, but it comes at a physical cost. If you fail to nourish yourself, you’ll simply shut down and go into hibernation.
Tempting as it sou
nded, Jedao had to concede the point. He ordered the first thing on the menu, which turned out to be fried pork fritters. He had no idea whether or not he liked fried pork fritters, or whether they were good for half-moth humanforms. Presumably the servitors in the kitchens would figure it out.
Two more servitors joined them some time later, both mothforms. By then Jedao had been treated to people in all sorts of combinations, plus a staggering variety of costumes. He wasn’t sure what the costumes represented, if anything. One of them made its wearer look like a giant ant, but surely he was misinterpreting it?
The servitors had color-coded themselves, whether for his benefit or theirs, he wasn’t sure: Green, Violet, Orange, Pink. Pink bore the tray of fritters and a dipping sauce that smelled like a mixture of soy sauce and rice vinegar. It placed the tray on Jedao’s desk, then made an encouraging hum.
Technically the half gloves would let him pick up a fritter with his fingers rather than using the provided chopsticks, but it would be crass. Even if his crew wasn’t watching him. He used the chopsticks.
Green spoke. Its voice was not dissimilar to the grid’s, which made a certain kind of sense. “The hexarch has his blind spots,” it said, “but your maneuvers have not escaped our notice.”
Well, that tears it. “Can you hear me when I speak to the Revenant?” Jedao asked.
“Not directly, no. We can communicate with it by other means, but we must be circumspect so that we don’t get caught.”
“I presume the details get technical,” Jedao said.
“Something like that.”
“I had no idea you could talk in human voices,” Jedao said wonderingly. “Bad assumption on my part.”
“That’s fairly common,” Pink said.
Jedao thought back to all the times he had followed Kujen’s lead, and Dhanneth’s, and paid no attention to the servitors except as exactly that—servitors. Workers who only existed for his convenience, and the crew’s. “I owe you one hell of an apology,” Jedao said. “For that matter, you must have a language of your own, to get things done—I don’t know how good I am at learning languages, but...”