by K. B. Wagers
“We still need that,” I said, shaking my head. “The Shen aren’t going to stop just because Faria has a change in management.”
“True.” Alice nodded. “I don’t trust the Shen; I don’t care how easily they accepted these peace talks or your insistence on Fasé joining them.”
“Don’t worry.” I laughed. “I don’t either. They are arrogant, especially Aiz, strolling into my café like he owned it. Both of them expecting me to just up and leave because I couldn’t possibly be happy as the empress.”
“I think we’ve all misjudged you,” Alice replied with a smile. “Have you had a chance to read any of the reports I’ve sent you on the councils?”
“Not yet, but I will. We’ve got a decent stretch of time in the black once we leave Hothmein.” The contested stop on the tour was also the smallest stop on the tour, I’d be meeting with even fewer people than at the HCL research facility, but I was especially looking forward to seeing the new governor, Jia, and her husband, Nakula.
The pair had been inseparable since the former intelligence agent had rescued Jia from the Saxon attack on Canafey. Before that though, I’d known Nakula as a gunrunner, when his deep-cover missions had put us on the same deal for some brand-new plasma cannons from the Solarians.
“Do it,” Alice said. “The short version is integration is going really well. There’ve been some obvious difficulties, but people are starting to come around to the idea that this really is what’s best for Indrana.”
“Good,” I replied. “It’s nice something is going smoothly.”
“Are you okay?” Alice asked. “You seem sad.”
“I—” The answer got stuck in my throat and I closed my eyes for a moment. When I opened them again, Alice’s frown had deepened. “Hao and I—I’m all right.” Talking to Alice about Hao just felt like it would rip the rift between my brother and me even wider. I’d already decided to talk to him on Hothmein; maybe with Nakula there Hao would finally admit what was bothering him.
“You’re not,” she said. “But it’s okay if you don’t want to talk about it. I’m here if you need to.”
“I appreciate it.” I put a hand up on the screen. “Thank you, Alice, for caring.”
“Get used to it.” She smiled and brushed away a tear. “I’d better go. If I ruin my eye makeup and Yina has to fix it, I’ll be late and Taz will never let me hear the end of it.”
“Tell him hi for me, and congrats on the proposal. I’ll talk to you tomorrow.”
“Of course, Majesty. Have a good evening.”
I was curled up in my bed on the Hailimi that evening, absently scrolling through the reports Alba had filtered out for me, when the conversation with Alice floated back into my head.
Strolling into my café like he owned it.
Aiz hadn’t strolled into the café. There’d been no video of him coming through the door. Nothing we could find of him sneaking in through somewhere else, but a horrible thought lodged itself in my mind and I scrambled upright.
“Fuck me,” I muttered, and brought up the video of Aiz in the café. I scrolled through the footage until I found what I was looking for. It was a piece from Zin’s recording, just before the incident. “Stop.” I cued up Iza’s recording from her spot by the front door and watched as Hao came back into the café. Only it wasn’t Hao. The walk was wrong.
I went back to Emmory’s recording, watching as Hao said good-bye with a brush of his hand over my shoulder after I’d shooed him away from the table. He left the café, turned the corner and then someone who looked like Hao but wasn’t reappeared with a smiling apology, first to Iza and then to Zin, as he came back in the door.
“No. Please no. Tell me you didn’t, Hao.” I muttered the useless prayer as I kept watching. My gut clenched in misery as not-Hao vanished from Zin’s sight behind a display, and a second later Emmory finished his sweep of the café and realized that Aiz had a hold of my wrist.
I pulled surveillance of the building, easily finding the corner Hao had gone around, and I watched as he went into an alleyway only to come right back out several heartbeats later.
“He wouldn’t have. Oh, Dark Mother, he wouldn’t have.” I tried to tell myself the lie. Aiz could have been hiding in that alleyway. He could have slipped out after Hao had passed him by. He could have—
“How did he know I’d be there unless Hao—? Bugger me.”
The door slid open and Emmory came in. “Majesty, are you all right? Your readings are all over the place.”
Shaking my head, I swallowed down the grief and got up from my bed to put the recordings onto the screen. “I found it,” I said, my voice raw as though I’d been screaming. “I know how Aiz got past you in the deli.”
“Gita, Zin, get in here,” Emmory said over the com link as he watched the recordings and I showed him what I’d found. “How could he have pulled this off?”
“There are black market masking programs by the bushel. We used one when we took Canafey, remember?” I said. “We used to use them all the time for small jobs. They won’t stand up to most scanners, but they’re enough to fool smatis on the first glance—” I gestured at the screen as Gita and Zin came in the room. “It works perfectly on simple con jobs where people are expecting to see exactly what they see.”
Gita’s curse was ugly and I swiped at the tear that leaked down my face. My brain kept scrambling for an explanation that didn’t involve Hao betraying me even as all the times I’d insisted on his loyalty slapped me in the face.
“Maybe Hao didn’t know?” I said, grasping for anything to prove my eyes wrong. “Maybe Aiz just saw the chance and took it?”
“No,” Zin said, shaking his head. “I’m sorry, Majesty, but this was planned out, every detail. Aiz Cevalla isn’t the kind to leave things to chance.”
“We’re going to have to scan anyone who comes within a meter of her,” Emmory said, his mind already whirling with plans on how to protect me from this new threat.
Zin nodded. “I’ll get to work on something right away.”
“I am going to cut him into pieces,” Gita swore.
I pressed a hand to my mouth and sank back against my desk. “I asked him if Po-Sin had been approached by the Shen, and he didn’t give me an answer. I am a fucking gullible idiot. I thought—” I couldn’t stop the tears, could barely keep myself from screaming.
“Majesty, I’m sorry.” She apologized, reaching for my hand.
“Why? Why would he do this? It doesn’t make any sense.”
“I don’t know.” Gita squeezed my hand and then released it, wrapping an arm around my shoulders instead. “The latest report from Caspel said there are more indicators every day that Po-Sin is going to declare the Cheng as allies of the Shen. Hao is his second-in-command. It’s not a position you just walk away from.”
“I thought we were family.” The whisper was loud in the silence. “Bugger me. Where’s the War Bastard?” I pushed away from the desk, dislodging Gita with my sudden movement.
“A day ahead of us, ma’am. They’ll be at Hothmein in about seventeen standard hours,” Zin replied.
“I don’t want a word of this to leave this room, is that understood?”
“What are you planning?” Emmory asked.
“I don’t know yet, but I’m going to have a talk with my brother.” I bared my teeth at my Ekam as my anger fed upon my grief. “And possibly put my foot up his ass in the process.”
“Majesty, you’re sure you want to wear one?” My maid shook the pair of delicate crowns with a hesitant smile on her face.
“I’m sure,” I said, and reached for the silver one. Had I been in a better mood, I would have teased her about the way she held it out of my reach, but my discovery of Hao’s betrayal lingered in my mouth like poison even twenty-four hours later.
Without a doubt, at least part of her concern was that for what was probably the first time I was wearing a crown with my traditional black uniform. It was a deliberate choice, a reminder of
who I was, both to myself and to anyone who saw me.
Stasia slid the crown into place, fussing for far less time than she would have spent had my mood been better, and then stepped back with a second smile and a nod.
I returned the nod, too weary to even try for a reassuring smile, and headed out of the bedroom into the main room of my suite aboard the Hailimi. Emmory and the others came to attention, a precise line of black in the center of the room.
“Ready, Ekam?”
“Yes, Majesty.”
I’d debated wearing a sari and discarded the idea in much the same way I’d had to give up on the desire to march down the ramp and kick Hao’s ass the second we landed.
The crown was enough. There was still a risk that something could go sideways here, and if I had to get into a fight I’d rather not be wearing something ridiculously formal.
“You look imperial,” Johar said, one black eyebrow arched as we exited my rooms and headed for the cargo bay. “What’s the occasion?”
“Part of the point of this tour is to remind people who I am,” I said with a smile that got lost before it hit my eyes. Johar noticed, but didn’t comment. “This seemed as good a time as any.”
“Fair enough.”
Johar was relaxed, all loose limbs and easy smile. I hated that I distrusted her now, because if I couldn’t trust Hao, how could I trust her? I wondered if she was reporting back to Rai while lying to me about moving to my empire. I hated that it bothered me at all, that’d I’d grown so attached to her presence.
And I hated Hao for planting the seed in the first place.
The door opened, revealing the spotless interior of the main hangar for the 101st Division. To the left I spotted Hao and Dailun, deep in conversation. Directly ahead of us stood a small group of military personnel and civilians. General Prajapati came to attention, the others following suit while the civilians looked on.
I put a little more warmth in my smile, straightened my shoulders, and headed off the ship.
“Your Imperial Majesty.” Maya Prajapati dropped her salute at my nod. “Welcome to Hothmein.”
“General. Everything under control here?” I glanced past her to where Colonel Lou Nyr stood, and the smaller woman gave me a nod. General Maya Prajapati had disgraced herself by throwing her support to my cousin upon my return home, but her redemption seemed to be going well.
There had been protests over my decision to move her from Basalt IV to Hothmein for obvious reasons. Putting someone whose loyalty was in question on a planet that had been in full support of Wilson’s coup was questionable at best. However, I’d understood Maya’s reasons for going up against me upon my return—she hadn’t been the only person happy about a former gunrunner sitting on the throne. The fact that Wilson had been careful to keep her out of the loop on the real reasons for their power grab told me a lot about Maya’s loyalty to Indrana.
Colonel Nyr was the general’s keeper, with orders to shoot her if Prajapati so much as hinted at taking a stand against me again. Because of that, and the general’s ferocious stand on Basalt IV, I’d felt she was the perfect choice to send here.
“Yes, ma’am,” General Prajapati replied. “As requested, your arrival wasn’t announced until just after you touched down. Governor Ashwari was unhappy about it, but that’s life.” She gestured over her shoulder at the tiny civilian waiting just behind her.
“Jia,” I said, extending both my hands and crossing over to the former governor of Canafey Minor. She was the other reason I wasn’t the least bit concerned about Prajapati.
“Your Majesty.” Jia took my hands and I bent down to press my cheek to hers, throwing a wink to the lean man standing next to her. “You gave us no advance notice.”
“I know. You can have Nakula shout at me later; I’m sure he wants to.” I squeezed her hands once and then let her go. “This is a shitty reward for all your assistance, but I am deeply grateful you agreed to it.”
“It’s not so bad,” Jia replied, her smile twisting her cupid’s-bow mouth upward. Jia Li Ashwari had been instrumental in our success at Canafey. The governor, with help from Nakula, had escaped Saxon custody and fled with the lock codes for the brand-new Vajrayana ships that were being built in the shipyards around Canafey Major. Ships that had been useless thanks to the Saxon attack. Because of her, we’d been able to retrieve the ships, take back the Canafey system, and eventually use those Vajrayanas in the fight for Pashati.
“Majesty.” Nakula Ashwari bowed, gray eyes narrowing slightly as he came up.
I stepped forward and embraced him, pressing my cheek to his with a smile.
“You’re upset.” His voice was pitched low against my ear, and I kept my expression neutral as I pulled away, a tiny hum in the back of my throat.
When I’d met Nakula, I’d known him as Vasha, a fellow gunrunner and smuggler. We’d worked several jobs together over the years. But only after he appeared in Santa Pirata with Jia had I discovered he was a GIS agent whom Caspel had tasked with rescuing my governor from the hands of the Saxons.
“How’s married life?” I asked, and watched his mouth tighten in amused annoyance.
“It’s good,” he replied. “Even if I think it was an abuse of your powers to suggest you were going to order me to get married.”
“You were being extremely obstinate about the two of you coming from different worlds,” I said with a smile and a wink. “The only reason I didn’t order you is because I knew Jia would wear you down eventually.”
Jia slipped her arm through Nakula’s with a wink of her own. “I didn’t even have to do that much, Majesty. He finally realized that just because my family is established doesn’t mean they were going to hate him for growing up poor. My offices are this way and my staff is waiting. I know Emmory will feel better once you’re not out in the open, though I promise things have calmed down a lot here in the last few months.”
I followed the pair, Alba slipping into the open spot at my side as we headed through the hangar and into a long, brightly lit corridor.
“Major Gill.” I held a hand out to the broad ITS officer and she took it, a smile creasing her weathered face. “Good to see you again.”
“Majesty.” Ilyia nodded to me and then to Emmory. The ITS officer had been in charge of the original squad who’d brought me home. Several of her people had been killed during an explosion set by a more violent sect of the Upjas and Lieutenant Aashi Saito had been promoted to captain a month ago and assigned her own squad. Ilyia’s squad was composed of all new faces, but I trusted her and that was enough.
“The way is clear,” she said. “Things are quiet. We’ll keep an eye out though for trouble once the news spreads that you’re here.”
“Do we honestly think there will be trouble?”
Ilyia shook her head. “It’s hard to say, ma’am. The majority of the population doesn’t seem to care about the empire one way or the other. It was the former governor and the military command who were in Wilson’s pocket. But we get paid to think there will be trouble, so it doesn’t catch us flat-footed when it happens.”
“Fair enough.” I patted her on the shoulder and continued down the hall. Emmory stayed behind and Gita slipped easily into the empty space.
I fell back half a step, letting Alba chat with Jia as we headed down the hallway so that Dailun and Hao could catch up.
“How was your trip?” Dailun asked.
“It was good enough.”
“Are you going to let me apologize? Or are you still mad at me?” Hao said without preamble, putting a hand on my arm. He kept his voice low, but I was still surprised when Gita snarled at him.
“Get your hand off the empress. Now.”
Hao took in my Dve’s hand on her gun and carefully removed his own off my arm. His eyes slid up to the crown on my head and then back to the floor. “My apologies for the familiarity, Your Majesty. I was out of line the other day and my words were hurtful.”
I reached out and put a hand on hi
s shoulder, the material of his long-sleeved shirt smooth under my fingers. “They were, and I forgive you. I trust you,” I lied, and felt him tense, almost imperceptibly, under my hand only because I was waiting for it. “Whatever the problem you have with me, when you’re ready to talk to me about it, I’m here.”
Hao looked up at me, an unidentifiable tangled pain washing over his face. I stepped hard on the sympathy that blossomed in my chest, all too aware that Nakula’s intense gray gaze was settled on us. Even now, here I was being a sentimental fool when Hao was still a gunrunner to the bone.
“Jia, tell me more about Hothmein. I did some reading on the way over.” I gave Hao a little push in Nakula’s direction and slipped my arm through Jia’s as we reached her offices. The twins were already in place, and I exchanged a smile with my BodyGuards before turning my attention to the civilians standing behind them.
“Your first meeting is with some of the salt miners, Majesty. I’d hate to steal their moment,” Jia replied. “Let me introduce you to my staff.”
Thanks to the incident in Kurma, and Emmory’s general distrust of the citizens of Hothmein, the pre-meeting screenings were far more thorough.
I disliked it immensely because it cast a pall of nervous energy over the entire proceedings, but at the same time I wasn’t about to protest. Emmory would pack my ass back up on the Hailimi and we’d be on our way.
I stood outside the main offices for Indranan Salt Limited, one of the top three companies mining salt in our corner of the galaxy, surrounded by Guards, Marines, and ITS troops; plus Hao was on my left, Nakula and Jia were behind me, and the young man who’d been chosen to take us on the tour looked as though he was going to pass out from sheer fright.
My smati identified him as Pablo Zatrevie, though he’d been introduced to me as Zat. “Relax,” I whispered. “I promise I won’t do anything awful if you won’t.”
“Yes, ma’am, uh, Your Majesty.”
“Ma’am is fine. How’d you end up here, Zat?”
“The pay is good?” Zat looked at the floor and sighed. “I probably should have said something a little more inspirational, huh?”