by K. B. Wagers
“Gita, you need to see it,” Emmory said, holding up a hand before she could protest again. “I’m not saying believe it. I’m saying watch it. We need to know what’s driving the Shen the same way we’ve needed to see what’s driving the Farians.”
I held my hand out to Hao, watched his eyes narrow. “Are you going to argue with me twice in under an hour?”
“I’m considering it.”
“It will help you understand why I am so willing to trust them.” I wiggled my fingers. “I need that understanding from you. I don’t have the energy to fight you every step of the way.”
“You want to die, sha zhu; I feel like fighting you on that is sort of my place.”
“Oh.” I smiled and shook my head. “I’m—no, not anymore.” I didn’t know how to explain the tangled emotions that had knotted in my chest when I thought they were all dead. “I told Aiz I would fight with him if the Farian gods wouldn’t listen, but I want the chance to talk to them. To try to convince them. I promise to you I won’t throw my life away.”
Gita’s sharply indrawn breath dragged Hao’s eyes away from me, and he muttered several curses before crossing to me in three steps and grabbing my hand.
He closed his eyes against the onslaught, fingers tight on mine, and I held his hand as he rode through the shock wave even though I didn’t need to.
What he did next surprised me.
Hao leaned in and kissed my forehead. “I need to speak with Dailun,” he said, and left the ready room without another word.
“Emmory, I’d like to speak with Gita alone,” I subvocalized over our private com.
“Yes, ma’am. I’ll wait outside.” He tapped Zin on the arm and gestured for the door. The pair left and I walked around the table to where Gita was braced, palms flat on the top and head hanging down.
“I owe you an apology, Gita.”
To my shock, she dropped to her knees, her eyes locked on the floor. “You don’t. I’m sorry. This is all my fault. I failed you. I didn’t keep you from harm’s way, Majesty. Worse, I left you blank with grief and then alone to rage at the universe because it felt like my world had ended, too, and I didn’t have the strength to grieve with you.”
“Gita.” I stared at her bent head, her words echoing back at me from a quiet moment in my palace rooms. They weren’t verbatim, but they didn’t need to be when the emotion behind them was so fucking clear.
Tears dropped to the floor, the moisture gleaming against the gray surface. “No,” I said, crouching down next to her and reaching out to cup her face in my hands. “Shiva, you didn’t fail me. Look at me, Gita.”
“You carried that vision in your head for how long? All alone,” she whispered.
“I won’t feed you some cowshit line about how this was all meant to happen,” I replied. “I’m not that messed up, and Dark Mother knows that I’d much rather it had gone down in a manner that was less painful than what we had to endure. I needed you when it was happening, and you tried. I am sorry I pushed you away.”
She wrapped her arms around me, holding me tight, and everything in me uncoiled, the tension sliding away as I hugged her back.
“Any failures were mine and mine alone,” I whispered. “I’m so sorry that I went down a path you couldn’t follow.” I couldn’t find the words to say I would do it again if presented the choice, but I think she knew as I sat back and met her gaze. “I’m sorry that I was so cruel to you. It was uncalled for, no matter what I was going through. I need you now, at my side with your critical eye and your ability to see the problems before they happen. It’s going to take all of us to keep the empire—to keep all of humanity safe.”
Gita reached out with shaking fingers to touch my face. “I’m afraid, Hail. Not just because of what Emmory showed me. We lost you back on Sparkos. I don’t think you’re fully back, are you?”
I wasn’t, but I smiled. I could fake it well enough, and maybe that would get me where I needed to be. “I am finding my way.” That was honest at least. “I don’t think it’s possible for me to go back to who I was, but that’s life, isn’t it?” I took her hands, pulling her to her feet and into a hug. “Everything is going to be okay, Gita.”
“I don’t trust Mia,” she whispered against my hair. “Please be careful, she’s dangerous.”
“So Hao just said,” I replied. “But so am I.”
Gita left me alone, the door closing behind her, and I broke two fingers on my left hand before the pain registered, sinking down onto a chair with a shaking exhalation.
The sharp tendrils of pain wove their way up my wrist and into my forearm as I murmured the words of the Aparadha Stotram. “O Lord Shiva who is all compassionate, please forgive me. You are the Lord of all deities and one whose nature is to bless all.”
The words and the pain filled me as I curled into myself for a long moment. I didn’t try to escape them but let them crawl under my skin and into my bones until I had the strength to stand once more.
It was early the next day when the knock sounded on my door. I looked away from the weapon schematics Aiz had translated for me to where Emmory stood.
He had, surprisingly, deferred to my desire to stay in the original room they’d put me in. It was smaller, safer as far as my still paranoid brain was concerned. There wasn’t a lot of space in this ship to begin with, and moving me just for the sake of my position seemed ridiculous.
“Majesty? Mia would like to speak with you.”
I hadn’t pushed about keeping Mia under guard, even though I had a feeling that anyone other than Sybil wouldn’t be able to actually stop her if she decided she wanted out. It seemed a better course of action to wait to speak with her, especially if I wanted to avoid any more accusations of obsession from my people.
What surprised me was Emmory taking the cuffs off Mia and waving her into the room at my nod. He planted himself by the doorway, dark eyes unreadable.
“It appears your Ekam took my promise of not hurting you seriously,” she murmured as she sat in the chair on the other side of the desk.
I suspected it was more he believed the bit about her not being able to kill either of us with just a touch. What I wasn’t sure was if Emmory thought Mia not a threat because of it, which seemed strange for him. Of course, I hadn’t told him about how she’d put me on my knees with just a touch of her hand either.
“I think he’s just in a good mood,” I murmured back, and was pleased by the smile it earned me. “What did you need?”
“I would like to speak with my brother if you will allow it.”
The realization of the complete shift in the power balance between us hit me like a railgun in the chest, and I stared at her for so long Mia frowned.
“Hail?”
“Sorry, of course you can. I—”
“Majesty.”
I looked away from Mia to Emmory. He hadn’t moved except to raise an eyebrow in silent question. “We can do it here. You understand, yes?”
“Of course.” If Mia was thrown by the situation, she was doing a much better job at hiding it than I was.
She didn’t lose everything and have a breakdown because of it, that voice in the back of my head reminded me. I rubbed at the bridge of my nose, muffling a sigh and sending the com request through on my desk.
“Hail.” Aiz appeared on the screen on the wall, smiled at his sister, and then his eyes flicked to Emmory, visible in the background. “Good morning, to what do I owe the pleasure of this com?” he asked in Shen.
“Don’t be rude,” Mia replied in Indranan. “I wanted to speak with you, and Hail was gracious enough to allow it.”
“Given that you are her prisoner.”
Mia held up her hands and shook her head. “You’re being petty. We knew this would happen. It’s fine.”
“We knew this could happen,” Aiz replied. “There is a difference, though you seem to be unharmed and I don’t need to win this argument so badly as to pursue it.”
“He’s just saying tha
t because he lost,” Mia murmured to me, and I grinned.
“I’m hanging up now.”
“Aiz.” She held up her hand. “It’s time. Tell the fleet to meet us at Encubier.”
“You are sure?”
I held my breath. I couldn’t understand the significance of what was happening, only that my gut knew something had been set in motion and now there was no turning back from it.
“I am sure,” Mia said. “It is time to go home, to Faria.”
Aiz was at a loss for words, and he blew out a breath before giving us both a brilliant smile. “Well, I will spread the news and see you both on Encubier, then. Hail, I hope you’re prepared to decide which of us will be in charge.” His wink said all too clearly that the decision would likely not come as a result of a polite conversation.
“I am.” How, exactly, I was going to accomplish that when we both knew I hadn’t yet beaten him in a fight was something I was going to have to figure out and quickly.
“We’ll see.” He nodded and cut the connection.
“I take it you’ve seen all this.” I waved a hand in the air.
“Not all, Hail, you know that.” Mia got to her feet with a smile. “But I’ve seen enough. I will go back to my quarters, Ekam, unless you feel the need to have someone escort me?”
“No, Thína, I think I trust you enough to go where you should. I will tell Sybil to expect you.”
I saw in the slight hesitation between one step and the next how Emmory’s use of her title had surprised her, and I pressed fingers to my lips in a poor attempt to hide my smile. Mia disappeared around the corner and there was silence for a moment before Emmory spoke again.
“Are you up for another visitor?”
“I’m not made of glass,” I replied. “You don’t have to keep filtering people in.”
He gave me the Look, and the burst of relief in my chest was painful. “Stasia brought you chai, Majesty. Would you like to see her?”
“Yes.” I fumbled, pushing out of my chair with more force than was necessary in my haste. The familiar smell of blue chai wafted on the air, and tears filled my eyes as my maid came into the room.
“Your Majesty.” Stasia set the tray on the table and dropped into a curtsy. “I am so glad to see you again.”
“Up.” I tried to make my command as gentle as possible, then tried and failed to keep my hands from trembling as I reached for her.
Stasia stepped willingly into my embrace and repeated the words I’d once said to her in that quiet, calm voice of hers, “‘You are not just anything, Stasia Vintik, and certainly not just my maid. You are my friend. Don’t ever let anyone tell you differently.’”
I pulled her close and buried my face in her gold curls.
“I am so sorry, ma’am,” she whispered as her arms tightened around me. “Sorry we didn’t keep you safe. Sorry we couldn’t get to you faster and keep you from this pain.”
“It’s not your fault. You have always been there for me.” I pulled back, cupping her face in my hands and pressing a kiss to her forehead. “Thank you.”
“Of course. We would all wade through blood and fire for you.”
Coming from anyone else, that could have been dismissed as bravado. But from my maid the declaration simply rang pure, echoing Mia’s earlier words. I didn’t know why it didn’t scare me, but the voices in my head were silent for now and I would take what stillness I could get.
“You brought me tea.” Tears filled my eyes a second time; Stasia’s answering smile was kind.
“I talked Hao into getting some for when we found you because I knew you’d be missing it.”
“Thank you.” I took the steaming cup from her and something broke, or healed, inside me. The pain had blurred together so long ago I couldn’t tell the difference. I clapped my free hand to my mouth, not quite stopping the sob that broke the air and nearly spilled the tea all over both of us.
I fumbled to set the cup down on the nearby table, and it rattled against the surface before Emmory reached down to still it, taking me by the arm with his other hand.
“I’m okay.”
Stasia sniffed away her tears. “Do you need anything else, ma’am?”
“One more hug,” I said, tucking her against my side for a moment before I let her go. I picked up the mug, closed my eyes and inhaled, letting the pepper and star anise sink into my lungs before I took a sip.
Little did Stasia know that the chai would have been a perfect proof all on its own. There was no one else who could make it this way, just the right side of sharp spice and hot enough to burn an unwary tongue.
When I opened my eyes, Emmory was watching me. “Better, Majesty?”
“Momentarily.” I mustered up a smile he didn’t answer. “What is it?”
“How?”
“You’re going to have to be a little more specific.”
“You treat them like friends.” He hesitated, closing his eyes for just a moment. “Johar showed me what Aiz did, Hail—”
“Oh, I wish she hadn’t done that.” I didn’t consider that Jo would have logged some of the fights she watched, but I should have. “What I chose, Emmory, not what Aiz did.” I rose to my feet, cup in hand, and turned my back on him so I couldn’t see the expected flinch. “I chose this. Stop trying to make Aiz the villain.”
“He beat you to death.”
Well. There was that.
There was a wealth of violence in Emmory’s voice, and for a shameful moment that thing squatting in my chest came to life, snapping and snarling with a dreadful desire to answer his violence with my own.
“I chose this!” I kept my hands wrapped around the cup and tried to steady my voice. “I understand your need to protect me. But this was my choice.” I put my cup down, fisted a hand, and hit myself in the chest hard enough to bruise as I turned to him. “Please don’t take this away from me.”
“All right.” Emmory held up a hand in surrender. “I don’t—Hail, I get it. I don’t like it, but I hear what you’re saying. Now I need you to listen to what I’m saying; all of us who love you know what happened, and every single one of us from Hao to me and down the chain to Stasia wants revenge on Aiz.” He pointed at the open doorway. “And on Mia. Choices aside. They hurt you. It would take a thousand years to see vengeance served. A truce with them is even more ambitious than peace between the Farians and the Shen.”
The fight drained out of me, chased away by the love that clung to every word Emmory had just uttered.
“I’m sorry,” I whispered, my words choked with tears, and sank back into my seat.
I’d been so lost in my own misery I hadn’t stopped to think for a moment that those who loved me were also fighting their way back to what we’d had before.
It was a long road ahead for all of us.
“Don’t apologize.” Emmory went to a knee at my side, his gloved hand resting lightly on the back of my head. “I understand. I really do. I just needed you to see the other side, too. We will follow you through blood and fire but not without question or hesitation, Hail, because looking after you is what we are supposed to do. We need you to trust in us.”
I grabbed for his other hand. “I hate that I am terrified of losing you all over again, and that is the only part of this I would change. Nothing else—not the fights with Aiz, not my time with Mia—none of it broke me. You all being dead broke me, and I don’t know if I’ll ever recover from it.”
He pulled me into a hug, cradling my head like a child’s as I clung to him.
“I missed you, Emmy. Every Shiva-damned day.”
“I know.” He released me and sat down, bracing his forearms on his knees. “Tell me what happened.”
I took a deep breath and told him everything.
25
The rest of my people filtered by in the following days, offering unprompted assurances of their validity in a way that I neither asked for nor deserved. Alba was easier than expected, but we’d had so many quiet moments together befo
re Earth and I desperately wanted her to be real.
Dailun handed me back kindness I had shown to him with a tenderness that I didn’t deserve. Kisah reminded me of the space I’d given her to grieve for Willimet’s death while on Hao’s ship. It was a moment shared between the two of us during that desperate flight from Red Cliff.
Iza and Indula came to me with their fingers linked. “Family, ma’am,” Indula said with tears in his pale blue eyes. “Found is just as blessed by the gods as those who share blood. You gave me a little sister.”
“You gave me an older brother.” Iza reached a hand out to me and I took it. “Please, for Shiva’s sake take him back.”
My laughter dissolved into a second round of tears and I pulled them both into a hug as the memory of a rainy afternoon at the beach overflowed and wrapped around my heart.
Johar, of course, picked the most obnoxious way to verify herself short of punching me in the face. “Am I interrupting?” she asked, poking her head into the ready room later that afternoon when I was talking with Emmory, Zin, and Hao about Shen fleet locations.
“No,” I said, pleased that I not only didn’t flinch, but I didn’t have to look across the room at Hao for reassurance. Plus Emmory and Zin were by the door and Jo wasn’t visibly armed as she strolled into the room.
“You need to know I’m me, right?” She smiled and spread her hands wide. “That’s an easy thing to prove. Though I’m certain you’d rather I not say this out loud for everyone to hear—” Johar leaned in when I raised an eyebrow at her, still grinning, and whispered in my ear, “You make the cutest noise when you—”
“Uff!” I slapped a hand over her mouth before she could finish the sentence, even though I was reasonably sure no one else had heard her.
Hao laughed out loud. Emmory raised an eyebrow and I closed my eyes as embarrassment and amusement went to war in my head. “You are awful,” I declared, finally opening my eyes again and letting her go.
Jo grinned. “I think I won that contest.”
“It wasn’t a contest.”
“You know it’s me, though, right?” Her amusement fled, and she slipped her hand around the back of my neck, pulling me in until our foreheads touched.