CHAPTER 13

Laniis had been having enough jitters waiting for the Slave Queen’s return call. Her mood was not improved by the arrival of the Eldritch and her insistence that she would also be speaking to the Chatcaavan.

“Can she do that?” Laniis whispered to Na’er.

“She can now,” Meryl said, wry. “Since she’s become an official Ambassador ad’Alliance.”

“From the Eldritch Queen?” Laniis asked, wide-eyed.

“Apparently our request lit a fire under them,” Meryl said, arms folded.

Sediryl was seated in the waiting area outside the secure comm room, reading from a data tablet with a nonchalance Laniis found enviable. The Eldritch was dressed in a tailored tan jacket, its sleek hems reaching halfway down matching trousers and high boots, and if the styling hadn’t been so obviously Pelted in execution one might have thought her about to go for a ride in some historical drama. But the cut was modern, and the sleek austerity of it suited her. The sash she wore from shoulder to hip made sense now, as did the pin on it: argent unicorn on cobalt ground. Sediryl had found some jewelry at last.

“There’s going to be trouble, isn’t there,” Laniis said.

“Maybe,” Meryl answered. “Maybe not. I’m guessing her Queen’s playing the politics. If she gets involved with offering amnesty, then it gives the Alliance another reason to protect the Eldritch.”

Laniis glanced up at her. “You think it’s that cold-blooded?”

The Hinichi snorted, ears flicking back. “Yes. And no. You can’t be in charge of a planet full of people and not start thinking that way. It’s your duty at that point.”

“That’s a sword that cuts two ways, anyway,” Na’er added. “If the Eldritch harbor the exiles, we can always point at them and say ‘we’re not involved, they’re the ones you want to string up.’”

Laniis’s ears sagged.

“Not that I think we’d do that!” Na’er exclaimed. “But… it’s complicated.”

“Everything’s complicated,” Laniis muttered.

He chuckled. “If it wasn’t, we’d be bored—”

The intercom woke. “Captain Osgood? We’re receiving something.”

“Get the lady,” Meryl said to Na’er, and pushed Laniis toward the booth. “Go, alet, you’re on.”

Laniis hurried into the room and sat in front of the projection, clasping her hands tightly in her lap to keep from fidgeting. She heard the Eldritch enter after her, standing too far back to be in view of the pick-up, and then the closing door sealed them into the soundproofed quiet. A few moments later, the Slave Queen’s image phased into view.

“Mistress,” Laniis said, knowing they couldn’t afford to waste time. Every minute they spoke was a minute they could be discovered. “We can do it. If you can get your people out of the palace, we can get them off the world and into safety in the Alliance.”

The Slave Queen’s eyes widened. “You have contacts? All the way onto our world?”

Laniis managed a smile. “We do now. It would have been useful to know before, wouldn’t it? The Ambassador wouldn’t have had to figure it out on his own. But apparently we can do this, Mistress. And once you make it here, you’ll be safe.”

From behind her shoulder, she heard movement, and then Sediryl spoke.

“We’ll protect you.”

The Queen’s eyes flicked upward, seized there as the connection brought the Eldritch into focus.

“I am Sediryl Nuera Galare,” Sediryl said. “Ambassador ad’Alliance from the Eldritch, and the niece of the Eldritch Queen. In her name, I greet you and offer you and yours asylum. The Alliance has agreed to give you to our care if you wish to come.”

Laniis had rarely seen the level of shock on the Slave Queen’s face she saw now, so intense the pupils in her brilliant eyes trembled, just a little. “Asylum. Among the Eldritch.”

“It’s not enough to flee,” Sediryl said. “You have to go somewhere you know you won’t be stolen again. And we owe you. You freed the heir to our throne.”

“The Ambassador was responsible….”

“The Ambassador succeeded with and because of your help,” Sediryl said, gratifying Laniis. “There is a debt there. We pay our debts.”

The Slave Queen stared at her a moment longer, then twitched her head back toward Laniis. “How soon?”

“You could ask it now,” Laniis said. “All you need to do is get a message. We’re going to position people to come to your aid when you call.”

She said nothing for several heartbeats. Then, quietly, “Laniis. Thank you.”

Laniis shook her head. “Mistress. It is my job. My work.” And with a deep breath, added, “I hope to see you soon.”

“I hope so as well,” the Slave Queen said. “But if we don’t, I will find a way to reach you again.”

“Hopefully you won’t have to,” Laniis said. “Now, please, go. You have my commtag. The Ambassador’s as well, if you need her.”

The Chatcaavan glanced again at Sediryl, nodded. “I’ll send word if I need you.”

The screen blanked, and it was over. Laniis twisted in her seat to look up at the Eldritch. “Is it true?”

“That we’re offering them asylum?” Sediryl asked. “Or that we’re doing it for a noble motive?”

Laniis sank into her chair, ears heating.

“Yes. And yes. And also no.” Sediryl grinned. “We’re Eldritch, I think we’re allowed to answer like that.” She pressed a hand to her breast and inclined her head. “Good afternoon, Lieutenant.”

By the time Laniis left the room, the Eldritch was gone and Na’er, predictably, was peering into the corridor after her.

“Go well?” Meryl asked, quietly.

“Yes,” Laniis said.

“But?”

Confused, the Seersa looked at her.

“There’s a ‘but’ in your voice,” Meryl said. “What did you see?”

What had she seen? Nothing she could have described or pinpointed. But she’d lived in close proximity to the Slave Queen for months, had slept in a basket in the Chatcaavan’s room, had groomed her, bathed her, seen to her injuries after the violent attentions of the males who’d visited her.

“I think we should be ready to move soon,” she said. “She’s afraid.”

“You’re sure.”

Was she?

“Yes.”

Meryl nodded. “I’ll tell them to set it up.” She tilted her head. “The Eldritch offer them refuge?”

“Yes.”

“Nice to know I’m not losing my touch either,” Meryl said, smiling.

“We’d be in trouble if you had,” Na’er said, finally giving up on his attempt to Eldritch-watch. “Since they don’t tell us peons anything.”

“Peons,” Laniis repeated, ears splaying.

“Absolutely! ‘PEONS ARE NEEDED!’” He jerked a thumb at his chest. “That’s us.”

“If I remember right, the peons in that game were needed so they could build monuments to emperors,” Meryl said dryly.

“If the uniform fits….”

Meryl laughed. “We fill it. All right, soldier. Out we go. We’ve got some calls to make.”

“This is Uuvek,” the Knife said to her.

The male sitting beside the Knife on the bench in the nursery was shorter than the Queen, thicker through the torso, and had the heftiest wing arms she’d ever seen. The knots of muscle at his shoulders and girdling his arm joints were nearly grotesque in their size. But he had an interesting face, lacking the hard cunning of the average Chatcaavan male. She perceived him to be analyzing her the same way she was him, and she found this refreshing.

“I have stolen him from the Navy,” the Knife continued. “He is deft with computers.”

“Oh?” She rested her folded hands on her knees. “Are you the one responsible for the security of my communications with the Alliance?”

“Yes,” he said. “I also doctor the security footage generated in the nursery.”

The Queen glanced up sharply at the walls, the ceiling.

“There is surveillance throughout the tower,” the Knife said. “Throughout all the towers. That has always been so, my Queen.”

The thought that Second—the previous Second—and Third, and the Emperor! might have been able to watch her during the Ambassador’s stay…she pressed her palms onto her knees, steadying herself. “I can’t imagine this hasn’t been used against us in the past.”

“Nothing like that,” the Knife said. “No one cared, my Queen. The only time anyone accessed that footage was during times of significant turmoil in the Court, and very few people have that access.” He canted his head. “Your rooms were never fitted with those cameras.”

She gaped. Around them, the squeals of female Chatcaavan children playing their new alphabet games with their brothers seemed distant, unreal.

“You are the most exalted female in the Empire,” Uuvek offered.

“More to the point,” the Knife said, “you belong to the Emperor, my Queen. For anyone else to spy on you would have been an insult to him. Only he should have access to you.”

Her breath shuddered out of her and she dipped her head. All the confidences she’d shared with the Ambassador, the plans to secret the Eldritch and the slaves out of the Empire, the sweeter and crueler things that had happened when the Emperor had joined them…all those things had remained private. Thinking back on it, she knew it had to be true: if there had been surveillance in her apartment, Second wouldn’t have had to abuse the truth out of her about whether she was helping the Ambassador. He would have known.

“So my rooms are safe,” she murmured.

“But the rest of the tower is not,” the Knife said. “So I brought Uuvek here to work his magic.” He grinned at the other male, and this evidence of camaraderie shocked her. “He has been making the footage here report the same sorts of activities the children used to undertake before you changed everything.”

“That is magic,” she said, considering him with interest.

“It is not,” the male said, shifting his wings against his back. “It is skill.”

“Underrated skill,” the Knife agreed. “Which is why I stole him from the Navy, where he was languishing.”

Uuvek sighed. “Yes, languishing. Being paid well, given computers to oversee—”

“Shoved into the backside of a station, where the only thing your computers were processing was the flow of materiel—”

“Logistics is interesting.”

The Knife snorted and said to the Queen, “You see why he needed rescue.”

“Surely the Empire needs such males,” the Queen said, fascinated. “Otherwise, the warships would soon be reduced to drifting without food or fuel. They do need fuel, I imagine.”

“Don’t start him on that tack,” the Knife warned, grinning. “He’s the one who taught me everything I know about the importance of logistics. Intelligence, I knew about already, but the rest of it…”

Uuvek wrinkled his nose, ignoring the Knife. “If you are interested, I will tell you about it. One day.”

“The important thing is that I’ve brought him here to help me oversee your security and to enable your secure communication with our allies outside the Empire,” the Knife said. “This is important now that it seems likely Second will be moving through the tower more often. Particularly since we don’t know why Second is moving through the tower, and whether he has permission or not.” He glanced at Uuvek. “That is another reason I have brought him here. He is the one I wish to entrust with contacting the Emperor.”

“Because?” the Queen asked, tilting her head.

“Because we would not want anyone hearing us ask the Emperor whether Second is his enemy or his ally,” the Knife said. “I almost made that call myself when I realized how utterly it would indict us. And Second would be notified of any such call to the Emperor.”

The Queen said, “Perhaps he would approve of your paranoia.”

“The male chosen to be Second would not approve of anyone questioning his authority,” Uuvek said.

Since that was manifestly true, the Queen said, “Perhaps we should not call, then.”

“We must,” the Knife said. “To do otherwise would be too risky. I would not take that gamble, not when the Emperor charged me with your safety.”

“And not when you do things that will endanger it so flagrantly,” Uuvek added, considering the children.

“You disapprove?” she asked.

“What? No.” Uuvek turned a puzzled look at her. “How could I disapprove of education?”

“Even of females?” she said, wondering why the Knife was grinning again.

“We will soon reach a point where our workforce will curtail our growth if we do not begin to employ females,” Uuvek said. “Over half our population is idle. What good is that? By all means, teach females to read. Put them to some useful work, even if it’s just counting boxes in a warehouse. Then we might take over the universe.”

“And is that what you want?”

“Isn’t that what all Chatcaava want?” he asked.

She narrowed her eyes. “You are not all Chatcaava, Uuvek.”

He jerked his head back. Then, slowly, he said, “No. I’m not. I like to observe the universe. I like to learn. But you cannot learn how the universe is if you are constantly trying to manipulate it into being what you want. When you do that, you ruin the data.” He paused, then added, “I have other reasons to dislike how things are, though, if this is a test of my loyalty.”

“If you are good enough for the Knife, you are good enough for me,” the Queen said.

He seemed skeptical, but when she didn’t push, he relaxed and said, “You are an uncommon female.”

“I am a very average female,” the Queen said. “It is you who are uncommon, for daring to observe things without imprinting them.”

He snorted. “I have been overseeing your comm security. The console in your room is the only one in this tower that is not directly monitored, but that’s meaningless—any computer can be watched if someone decides he wants to... and any encryption can be broken with sufficient will. In the future, I would like you to limit your calls. The Knife tells me you have spoken twice with your wingless slave friend?”

The Slave Queen turned this phrase over in astonishment. Wingless slave friend. What a monstrosity. “I have spoken twice with the Seersa, yes.”

“I’ve been told the purpose of those calls. You should not make another unless you are ready to run.”

A frisson of dread traveled her spine, rattling the edges of her wings. To her surprise, the Knife held up a hand, almost touching her arm. “It is a precaution, my Queen, but a necessary one. We must assume you have enemies because everyone has enemies.”

“I understand. And I am grateful. To you as well, Uuvek. Thank you for consenting to be… stolen… from the Navy.”

“He was not receiving the respect he deserved,” the Knife said.

Uuvek twitched his head. “I don’t need respect. Only to be left alone.”

The Queen canted her head. “He protects you as if you were a female. Does it bother you?”

“No,” Uuvek said. “If a crew is good, they watch one another’s backs. The Knife is just… very assiduous in his duties to his crewmates.” He smirked. “It’s because he didn’t have honest work. He kept having to make up things to do to fill his time.”

The Knife said, “Fortunately for you!”

“I will return to the work you’ve set me to,” Uuvek said. To the Queen he added, “You will see me from time to time. The Knife wanted to introduce me to you.”

“I have been introduced,” she said. “Thank you, my-better.”

He flicked his gaze over her. “Somehow I doubt that. Which interests me. Maybe another time you can talk to me about it, being female.”

“If you would want to know,” she said, startled.

“The Knife will tell you. I want to know everything.” He grinned at the Knife, then dipped his head and left the room. When he turned his back on her, she understood the over-development of his musculature, because the wings themselves were stunted. To fly with them must involve a great deal of flapping—there would be no gliding with such small pinions, and certainly no aerobatics. Small wonder he had become enamored of his computers: at a console, he could be free to move in every dimension without effort.

“You understand,” the Knife said.

“Yes,” the Queen replied. “At least, I understand why he has no love of how things are. What puzzles me is that there is amity between you. I was not given to understand that males could be…” She sought the old word, tasted it. “…friends.”

“The court would have you believe that all males are solitary predators,” the Knife said. “But that is because they are the apex of the Empire, my Queen. To be here, they had to fight their way over the bodies of everyone else. If all the Empire behaved the way they did, we would accomplish nothing. We would be too busy killing one another.” He looked after Uuvek. “There are places where males trust one another. The Navy is one such. There are others, but none so good as the Navy. If we do not trust one another there, we die. It is… a strong incentive.”

The Slave Queen watched one of the tongueless females scratching out another letter for the youth conducting the impromptu class in the corner.

“You are quiet, my Queen,” the Knife added, quieter. “What are you thinking?”

“Does it matter what I think?” she said, rousing herself from her unease.

“It does to me.”

She met his eyes. “You have not yet called the Emperor. Will you soon?”

“I was only awaiting Uuvek’s arrival in the flesh. He can work better from within the tower than without it, and as I said, this is not a call we can afford to mishandle.”

She smoothed her hand over her knee. “This new Second. He is a former Navy male.” When the Knife inclined his head, she said, “But he is here, at the court. He has reached this apex. So which will win? The Navy male? Or the court male?”

“I would like to believe his oath to the Emperor means more to him than his ambitions. That he would protect the Emperor’s back, as Uuvek and I and our compatriots protect each other’s. That...” The Knife closed his eyes, head dipping so that the neat tail of his naval hair-style slid in front of his chest. When he opened his eyes, the passion burning in them made them almost as incandescent as a normal Chatcaavan’s. “That is what the Navy is, my Queen. The best of what it stands for.”

The Queen thought of her empty vase. “He was in the harem. Without permission.”

“We don’t know yet that he did not have it. The Emperor may be about to tell us that he does.”

“And if he doesn’t?” She looked up at him. “Besides, if he did have permission, why wait so long before taking advantage of it? Why did he not indulge while the Emperor was here? Why come like a thief?”

The Knife said nothing.

“If I speak out of turn—”

He twitched a wing and a hand. “The thought that a male in the Navy might turn on the Emperor is unthinkable. Which means it would be the perfect position from which to execute a coup.” He exhaled. “I hate the thought, my Queen.”

“But?”

“But I will plan either way,” he said. “Just in case. And make our call as soon as Uuvek says he is ready.”

This conversation was on her mind as she ascended to her rooms, tangling with her too-brief communication with Laniis—and the astonishing Eldritch female, who had been nothing like the languishing creature the Ambassador had rescued. The Queen’s head was full of too much noise and worry, drawing strange associations: Uuvek’s stunted wings and her mutilated ones. The old Second and the new Second. The unrest in the Empire, and the Navy’s loyalty. So when she reached the top of the stairs and discovered Stripes awaiting her, she had no idea what to say.

“I apologize if this is presumption,” Stripes said. “But you used to have attendants, didn’t you?”

“Yes,” the Slave Queen said, padding into the room. “But they abandoned me when I began my association with the slaves, and the Ambassador.”

“The Ambassador,” Stripes said. “He was the strange, flat-faced alien who smelled like hekkret and brandy and the oil used on knives.”

Startled, the Slave Queen said, “I suppose he did. Smell of those things. I never thought of it.”

“Second was here again today. He tried two different females this time.”

The Slave Queen canted her head. “Was he violent?”

“No. He has pedestrian tastes for a male of his rank.” Stripes folded both sets of arms. “The other females whisper about it. A powerful male who uses them without hurting them.”

“But discards them,” the Queen said. She settled on her favorite windowsill. “He does not regard them except as vessels for his pleasure.”

“Of course. What else?” Stripes eyed her. “Don’t you fear to fall?”

“No.” The Queen looked out—down—at the sea. Up at the sky. “I don’t think I’m so important that my death would mean anything.”

“You’d be wrong.”

Shocked by the other female’s vehemence, the Slave Queen looked back and found Stripes standing, rigid and proud, her entire body a stroke that defied marring. No one seeing her would fail to count her properly. The words she spoke only underscored that impression, and the Queen’s incredulity mounted as she listened. “You are an example of what we could be if we were brave. If we were free. You helped the Mother survive. You went outside the tower to see the Emperor in the clinic. You meddled in politics—don’t deny this is true—and you survived. And the Emperor values you.” Stripes lifted her head. “You aren’t allowed to die. You have too much to do.”

“I had no idea anyone felt this way,” the Slave Queen said, eyes wide.

“You are being foolish,” Stripes said, acerbic. “You know the Emperor feels this way. You know the Ambassador felt this way. You know the Mother does, and the Knife. You know all these individuals would be appalled if you died, so do not tell me otherwise.”

The Slave Queen’s jaw dropped. And then, amazingly, she started to laugh. Stripes watched her, arms still tightly folded, until she finished. “You are forward,” the Queen said. “And you are ferocious. A throwback to ages past when we still worshipped the Living Air.”

“Like a priestess?” Stripes asked, tilting her head. “I like that.”

“I will call you that, then. You are now the Priestess.”

Stripes blinked several times, and the Queen felt a fierce satisfaction to have finally surprised her.

“Then my first act as a priestess of a dead religion is to demand that you do not become its first martyr. Come off the windowsill, Mistress.”

“And if I like to look out the window?”

“Then we will pull the bench over to it.” The Priestess stared down the tip of her nose at her. “That would be a practical way to enjoy the view. And you must now become a practical female.”

“As opposed to…?”

“A melancholic female,” the Priestess said.

The Slave Queen considered this, then slid off the sill. “I will not argue with my own priestess. On one condition.”

“That being?”

“That you bear me company more often. If I am to be a practical female, I will need an example.”

The Priestess looked pleased. “Good. I was hoping you would see that isolation serves no one.”

“Doesn’t it?” the Queen asked, startled.

“Not those who wish to start a revolution,” the Priestess said. “That’s what you’re doing, isn’t it?”

“I’m afraid the revolution has already begun,” the Queen said. “I am just trying to keep it from killing everyone I care about.”

“Excellent,” the Priestess said. “I will make sure you care about me, then, as I have no desire to die yet.”

“Any female who doesn’t desire to die in this Empire needs to survive,” the Queen said. “If only because their existence is novel. So, you will eat with me, Priestess, and then we will bathe before you return to the harem. And you will continue to tell me about Second’s activities in the harem.”

“I find this plan an excellent one,” the Priestess said.

“And you will tell me if there are other females of your mind.” The Queen hesitated. “Are there?”

The Priestess canted her head, eyes going distant. “Some,” she said. “Maybe. I will see.” Then with a quick dip of her head. “More allies are good.”

“Yes,” the Slave Queen murmured. “I think you are right.”

The only predictable thing about the next days were that the activities involved—sparring, riding the ridiculous but convincing faerie horses, dancing, eating—were blurred into one another by his cousin’s sensual touch. It was not always a sexual one, for which Jahir was grateful; he wouldn’t have been able to keep up with an injured and exhausted Lisinthir, and Lisinthir when healthy had the energy and appetites of a god out of mythology. Nor always a violent one, and for that he was never sure whether he was grateful or impatient. But sensual—that always. Like all Eldritch his cousin must have begun constrained from touching others, but having been acquainted with the practice in the Empire he had fallen into it with enthusiasm… with, Jahir judged, the same starvation he himself was struggling to slake now. He wondered if that was something all the Eldritch who found themselves driven off-world would have in common, if their agitation was the result of a need stifled by their culture. What a terrifying realization if so! For he did not want to have a need he would have to fulfill with someone other than his cousin… cousins, for he hoped Sediryl would have him. Watching how casually Lisinthir interacted with the Alliance’s populace, Jahir didn’t think himself capable of that level of nonchalance about touching. And if he could develop it through habit—if he could desensitize himself—would he want to, if it meant losing the exquisite consciousness of a fingertip tracing the delicate skin beneath his eye? Or down the blade of his scapula?

As if recognizing the storms Jahir was navigating, Lisinthir left him some time to himself each day. Not much, but enough to call Vasiht’h, or take a walk or a bath in peace. On the fourth day Jahir decided to use it for other purposes, and was awaiting his cousin when Lisinthir returned… returned, and halted.

“You have the look of someone lying in ambush.”

“That’s because I have arranged for our entertainment and our experimentation this afternoon.”

“Excellent,” Lisinthir said, offering his arm. “I am eager to be the one courted today.”

“Is that how you see it?” Jahir asked, startled. “As courting?”

“We have begun as acquaintances and are now lovers, and I believe I was the one who made the overtures.” Lisinthir glossed the words in alternating silver and gold so that they seemed to flash in sunlight, and the effect was dazzling, mirth and affection and deeper love and teasing somehow. “How else, then?”

“Is that why you are wanting to tuck my arm in yours?” Jahir asked, wry.

“I am being courteous!”

“You are being chivalrous, as you would to a woman. And I am not a woman, cousin.”

“You are very decidedly not.” Said with such relish, and all crimson. Sliding back into neutral grays and silvers, “Don’t be offended, Galare. A man who fights the way you do is not lacking in masculinity.”

“By our standards,” Jahir murmured.

“Those are the standards we use,” Lisinthir said. “So come, show me this entertainment. I am eager to see what you have planned.”

Jahir rose from the chair finally… and slid his arm through his cousin’s. He felt Lisinthir’s amusement through their touch despite the clothing and accepted this increased sensitivity the way his cousin must have accepted the utility of touching people more often. Perhaps they were both pragmatists in the end. “To show I hold no offense at the implication,” Jahir said.

“I would not have offered had it been intended as offense. Rather, I am delighted to have been accepted.”

Jahir sighed. “Not a woman, to accept your advances.”

“Not wholly Eldritch, to insist that you act as one.”

“Did you not just say the standards we use….”

“When they suit us, yes? We are both more than capable of casting them aside when they don’t.”

Disturbed, Jahir let his cousin guide him into the corridor. When they drifted to a halt, he looked up.

“I don’t know where we’re going,” Lisinthir pointed out gently.

“Are we really so fickle, to throw away what doesn’t suit us in the moment only to take it back up when it does? Like clothing we rip from ourselves to indulge in the wrongful tryst and then draw back on to disguise our sins?”

“Oh, for the sake of God and the Lady.” Lisinthir dropped his arm and rested a hand alongside Jahir’s face, palm warm against cheek. “If you must wax metaphorical, Galare, we are shedding the garrote that strangles us, or the chain that keeps us from freedom. You must accept that some of our culture is simply wrongheaded.”

“All cultures have wrongheaded moments, but if we want them to remain cohesive we can’t simply pick and choose the parts that please us and ignore the rest!”

“Can’t we? Don’t we?”

“No,” Jahir said, firmly.

“Jahir,” Lisinthir said. “You left the homeworld. What is the one thing Eldritch do not do?”

He flushed under Lisinthir’s fingers.

“You loved an alien. What is the one thing Eldritch would not do? Shall I list your other sins? You have loved a blood-cousin. You have refused to marry for duty. You have lain down with a man. Shall I continue?”

“No,” Jahir whispered. Marshaling himself, he said, “But if we do not uphold society, we destroy it.”

“If we do not resist society when it is stupid, we allow it to march to its destruction. Societies evolve, just as people do. They mature; they see the follies of their childhood years and amend their behavior.” Lisinthir brushed a thumb over Jahir’s lips, his voice gentling. “When a people’s traditions and customs do not serve its survival, they must change.”

Jahir searched the dark eyes resting on his, saw the melancholy in them and tasted it through their skins. “You think of the Empire.”

“And of our world. I think it meet that they are both at inflection points where they must make the choice to either adapt or die. Do you suppose the Divine mandated that symmetry?”

“Maybe They knew we would need each other to make that change.”

“Maybe.” Lisinthir kissed his brow. “We shall straighten out the Empire, and then our own people, and perhaps we will have a little more space to breathe on both sides of the border.” Tenderly, “So. Are we quit of the thought that you are lacking in moral fiber? You did promise you would commit fewer acts of self-flagellation.”

“Of the flesh, as I recall,” Jahir said.

“Had I know you were intending to set the whip to your spirit, I would have extracted that promise as well.”

Jahir shook his head. “Cousin.”

“What?”

“You are appalling. And too capable of charming your way out of everything. But not out of my entertainment, so… we should go to the lift.”

Lisinthir slipped his arm through Jahir’s. “Lead the way, my swain.”

“You did not just—” Jahir glanced at him and found his cousin batting his lashes at him extravagantly. He laughed. “God and Lady, don’t, you look ridiculous.”

“And here I thought I was charming…!”

“In a masculine way,” Jahir said firmly. “There is nothing like a woman in you, cousin.”

“By our standards.”

Jahir sighed, chuckled. “By the standards we are using now.”

“Excellent. I shall have you gentled to the saddle yet, Galare.”

But all of Lisinthir’s teasing fell away when Jahir led him into the concert hall, fell away and left him alert and silent. Walking alongside him, Jahir thought there was no shadow his cousin was not cataloging, no distance he was not calculating. Which served his purpose very well, and he knew Lisinthir could feel his satisfaction through their linked arms.

“You have brought me to an empty concert hall,” Lisinthir said with interest. “Will you tell me why or force me to guess?”

“Tomorrow morning we have tickets to a concert in this hall,” Jahir said. “So this afternoon I have rented it so that we might conduct the control to our experiment.”

“That being?”

“To discover at what distance our abilities begin to attenuate.” Jahir slipped his arm free. “Both when we are using them against one another, and when we are attempting to use them in tandem. We began this in the dance club, but we did not apply any rigor to it.”

“Then you mean us to try again when the hall is full of people.” Lisinthir looked up, eyes narrowing, nodded sharply. “This place is at least four times as large as the club. Yes, it is a worthy experiment. I commend you, cousin. How shall we proceed?”

“I will go to the stage, as one of the back walls is there. You will be the one moving. I thought it would be easiest to begin yoked and attempt to maintain contact until it breaks. Then we can try the antagonistic techniques.”

“Very good. I am at your disposal, with one condition.”

Jahir folded his arms behind his back and waited.

“That you grant me the impudence of a question, at the end.”

Jahir said, low, “If you mean to ask me if you can have me on the stage….”

“Nothing so crass, I pledge you.”

Warily, Jahir searched his cousin’s face, thought of trailing ephemeral fingertips over the surface of his feelings… but didn’t. Lisinthir was wearing his most urbane of masks, but such masks had hidden both vulnerabilities and outrageousness before, and there was no telling which was motivating him now. But he trusted Lisinthir, so—“Very well.”

“Excellent.” Lisinthir held out his hands. “Fall into me, and let us begin.”

He had been the one to plan this; he reminded himself of it and set his palms on his cousin’s, and did as bade. Accepted the caress of the other man’s mind, deepened the communion until it felt wide and raw and deep. It helped when he turned away that he was facing the stage and the distant piano. They were here to a purpose, and for once, the experiment was happening on his ground, within parameters he had set. Squaring his shoulders, he headed for the stage, and the interminability of the attempt.

Several hours later, he was glad of the advantages, for it had been a frustrating, fascinating, and terrifying exercise to witness the range at which they were capable of acting, and what confounded their abilities. Jahir was sitting on the piano bench when Lisinthir finally came into earshot, strolling down the aisle toward the stage. “You think it enough?”

“I do,” Jahir said as his cousin mounted the stage and joined him on the bench.

“We do better when we’re less cognizant of one another.”

“No,” Jahir said. “We do better when I’m less cognizant of you.”

Lisinthir negated that with a gesture. “Too simplistic, Galare. You do better when you can’t see me. When you look at me with your eyes, you lose your hold on the connection.”

“It doesn’t work that way in the salle.”

“Because you aren’t looking at me,” Lisinthir said. “You are focusing on our foes, or on my sword. But you are not distracted by me.”

Jahir looked away, frustrated, but allowed the touch that drew his face back.

“Don’t use yourself cruelly over it,” Lisinthir said, quiet. “You blame yourself for falling prey to the seductions of the flesh… what surprise there, when you were so lately virgin to them? I too went through the process you are suffering now.”

“Did you? That seems… unlikely.”

“It happened and it was horrendous,” Lisinthir said. “I did it in the Empire, where drowning in it could have slain me. Almost did slay me, as you noted.” He sighed. “Better you work through it here, in peace and at your leisure, than the way I did. Besides, overcoming these difficulties is a matter of practice, and with practice….” His eyes strayed toward the galleria’s furthest seat, shrouded in shadows and so distant Jahir couldn’t distinguish any details. “We can sustain this from a very great distance when we use it in tandem.”

“We are better at our talents together than we are at either of ours alone,” Jahir agreed, low. He rested his hand on the keys, cooling his fingers on the ivory. “Why do you suppose that is?”

“I think your beloved would say that it’s always easier to do anything with help.”

“Is it?” Lisinthir glanced at him but Jahir ignored the look, staring instead at his spread fingers. “That is the credo of the Alliance. Strength in numbers. Creativity through diversity. The power of community. But is there not something to solitude? To knowing you can manage alone?”

Lisinthir’s brows lifted. “I hear a man abandoning the philosophy that has shaped his life to embrace the one that has shaped mine, but I don’t hear why.”

Jahir said, low, “What if you’re the one who’s right?”

“Too easy, Galare. You should know better.”

Jahir looked over then at the man sitting easily alongside him, hands folded on one knee, legs crossed and head bent, just a little. Lisinthir was wearing a whimsical smile to go with gentle eyes, and the expression suited him. A man of mercurial moods, and all of them intense. “And what is it that I should know?”

“That it’s not a question of which of us is right, but which of us is right… for that particular moment and those particular people.”

“I would not think you a proponent of moral relativism, given that you have upended an entire civilization for failing to conform to the mores you uphold.”

“Oh, I am no moral relativist,” Lisinthir said with a laugh, and switched to Universal, “Not by a long shot.” His grin faded as he resumed in their tongue, silver and shadows and neutrals. “But that the world is rarely as simple as we wish it would be so we could apply those precepts? Yes, that I know from painful experience. Or would you say differently to a man who has done the things I’ve done?”

“No,” Jahir said with a quiver. “I know you have paid for your wisdom in sweat and blood, Imtherili.”

“Then what is it that’s driving this discontent?”

He wanted to say that he knew Lisinthir would try to stop him from participating in the war. He wanted to tell his cousin not to fight him on this. That the more they worked together, and the more they discovered how well they worked together, the more the idea took hold in him, grew. The first Eldritch mind-mage had won a war against the army of a planet—a small army, granted, but nevertheless. What could two Eldritch mind-mages do together in this war? Not win it on their own, certainly, but the potential was staggering. He found, to his discomfort, that he wanted it. That having discovered he’d been born with a sword he alone could wield, he yearned to use it to keep the dragons from endangering everything he held dear.

“I am finding,” he said at last, “that I am a great deal more like you than I thought.”

Lisinthir touched one finger to the side of his chin and turned his face by it until their eyes met. For a long, long time, for an aching breath that never seemed to end, he said nothing. Then, quiet: “Different clay. Same Maker.”

“Same wheel,” Jahir finished, rueful.

Lisinthir kissed him, and that kiss was reverent, and made his heart stumble. When they parted, his cousin said, “Will you play for me?”

“I… I beg your pardon?”

Lisinthir’s mouth turned up at the corner. “My impertinent question, to which you can say no. You are a musician, and this instrument I know you know well. Will you play it for me?”

This silence wanted patience, so Lisinthir waited. It had been a fascinating and profitable day thus far, letting his cousin lead, and he fully intended to maintain the theme until they sought their bed for slumber… precisely for opportunities like this one. Because it would be too tempting for Jahir to turn this interlude into an exception and to relegate the softer, more sensual aspects of his personality to one of those boxes he was so fond of using for compartmentalizing the moment they parted.

But Lisinthir had not asked his cousin to this tryst so Jahir might explore his nascent sexuality and then put it away again, but to help him integrate it into his normal life. And for that, he needed Jahir to perform activities typical to that normal life, and to demonstrate skills in which he was no hesitant innocent, but expert, and confident.

Music was one of those things.

To push him would be to lose that chance at integration, so Lisinthir didn’t. He asked, making it clear that no was an acceptable answer, and he waited. And if he waited with more suspense than typical, he suffered it gladly for hope of the answer he wanted—

“Of course,” Jahir said, quietly.

Lisinthir exhaled, drawing a curious glance from his cousin, and then a more tender expression. Jahir softened the question with holy white and silver, which made it perilously intimate. “Did you think I would refuse you?”

“If it had not been a real choice, I would not have asked,” Lisinthir said. “Shall I remove myself to the audience’s chairs?”

“No, it’s fine. Stay nigh, but stand. The bench is not quite wide enough for two if one is playing.” Jahir studied the piano with affection, one hand gliding over the keys. “I would not dare adjust it, given it is set up for tomorrow’s performer.”

Lisinthir rose to stand alongside the instrument, studying its gleaming flanks and the unlikely complexity of its exposed interior. “Is it?”

“Oh certes. This instrument will have been chosen by the pianist for this performance, and would have been shipped in at her request.” Jahir slid his fingers over the keys now. “Tuned for it as well. For performers of this caliber, they still handcraft pianos, did you know? And each is as individual as a person.”

How satisfying it was to hear the easy confidence in his cousin’s voice! This was what he had been hoping to inspire. “Is it? I had no idea.”

“I would not even touch it, did I not know they would do a final tuning tomorrow. But I will leave the bench at its height. What would you like to hear?”

“What would you like to play?”

Jahir shook his head, though he was smiling. “Always with the footwork, Imtherili.”

“This time I ask not out of any desire to seek knowledge I might use to advantage, but because I honestly want you to play what you will. I will enjoy it no matter what.”

“Mmm.” Just that, his cousin’s head bent toward the keys, eyes closed. His fingers flexed once, stretched. He began without fanfare, and Lisinthir could not have identified the composition: nothing written on their world, certainly. A lushly romantic piece, and it was flawlessly played—masterfully even—but as beautiful as it was, Lisinthir’s attention remained fused with the player. Despite knowing music as a sensual pleasure, he had not quite anticipated how erotic the mastery of an instrument was. The power of it, and the look on Jahir’s face, and the shift of light over the backs of his hands as the tendons played beneath the skin... how it brought the veins into sharp relief, gossamer blue against white. Had he thought his cousin’s arms the product of swimming alone? He would have to investigate later tonight and see the evidence that music had left on the muscle.

Jahir, he thought, was a stunning talent. It did not surprise him at all that no one knew. What Eldritch would have revealed such prodigy? Or such vulnerability? Because his cousin loved music first, and then everything else. He might have kept that love tightly confined but there was no hiding it while performing.

Lisinthir didn’t know what inspired his tears. But he remained alongside the piano, vibrating with too many emotions, until he knew he was standing guard there because his response to everything he cherished was its protection.

The last notes trailed away. Jahir let his fingers relax against the keys, closed his eyes, and let out a slow breath. Then looked up and started. “Cousin? You weep?”

“You play to shame angels… shall I not, then?”

Jahir blushed and gently set the fallboard down, covering the keys. “You do me too much honor.”

“I do you not enough, I think.” Lisinthir caught one of his cousin’s hands, then the other. Beneath his fingers they seemed the same hands he’d been caressing for days now, and yet! “That is not the only instrument you know, I take it.”

“No,” Jahir said, permitting the scrutiny with a pleased embarrassment that made the contact between their skins sting like mint. “It is the one I like best, however.”

“It is romantic and has power and range,” Lisinthir said. “It suits you. But what else do you know?”

The embarrassment had intensified at the comparison, but his cousin gamely replied. “Most stringed instruments, since we were taught those on the homeworld. Lute and guitar, violin, cello. Harp. Lyre.” The longer he spoke the more he relaxed. “I like the stringed instruments better than the woodwinds and brass, though I can play them as well. Percussion is probably my weakest point. I would hazard a guess now as to why.”

“Oh?”

Jahir nodded. “Rhythm asks more of the body.”

“Ah,” Lisinthir said. “Then perhaps you will find percussion no longer quite so alien to you.”

He’d said it before censoring himself, and halted—but to his relief, this reminder of what they were about did not seize his cousin into silence. It was the musician in Jahir that answered with a thoughtful, “That would be a great boon. I wonder… I would like to try.”

“But not this moment,” Lisinthir said. “Tell me why.”

Jahir hesitated, then chuckled. “No, that is too easy. Because we have been exerting our talents and this is work, and it is near supper. We must eat.”

“And then the bedplay, and then rest,” Lisinthir said. “So what shall we eat?”

Startled, Jahir said, “I… don’t know? Food, I imagine.”

Lisinthir snorted. “Lend me a handkerchief, cousin. And be more specific.”

Jahir frowned as he handed over the linen square. “Would you take it amiss if I said… I wouldn’t mind dining with you alone tonight, in the suite?”

“I wouldn’t take it amiss, but I would admit to curiosity.” Lisinthir wiped his eyes and cheeks, drawing his cousin’s gaze to the evidence of his tears. He had needed to wipe them, but he wanted the reminder to stay with Jahir, that he had power.

“The feeding, in the Harat-Shariin diner,” Jahir said, slowly. “I liked that. But it would be easier done in private.”

“If it was to be done more intimately?” Lisinthir said, impressed and approving. “Why, yes. And if that is what you want, then absolutely. But only…”

“Only…?” Jahir said.

“Only if you reciprocate,” Lisinthir said, amused. “I wouldn’t mind being fed myself.” He gave the handkerchief back. “We can listen to music, if you would like to distract me from overbearing you.”

“And how exactly is music going to accomplish this when so little does?”

“By being what you choose, which you will educate me on. I know the breadth of your tastes, but I am curious about the piece you chose to play and the others you enjoy playing.”

“Oh!” Jahir said. “You know then. That what you like to play is not always the same as what you like to listen to.”

“I am passing-fair at the instruments I was forced to learn,” Lisinthir said. “But those lessons were more than enough to teach me that.”

“Then yes!” Jahir said. “I would like it very much if we were to repair to the suite, to listen to music and feed one another.”

“Delightful. Lead the way.” Lisinthir grinned. “And before you feel the need to say it: yes, I know you know what I’m doing.”

Jahir shook his head. “We have known each other too short a time to know one another so well.”

“We have not known one another long enough for me to know you as well as I like,” Lisinthir said. “Or I plan to.”

“You could have shaded that red.”

Lisinthir laughed. “You just did.”

Jahir blushed, then laughed. “Point to Imtherili. I lead, before I lose any more.”

Satisfied, Lisinthir followed.

Supper was exactly what he wanted. Jahir allowed him to select the menu, which he did with an eye to what could be neatly handled and eaten in bites, and if it was lighter fare than he was used to, that accorded well with how he planned to spend the remainder of the night. With the array of tiny plates before them, they made use of the divan and chairs in the sitting room and there Jahir settled against him, back to Lisinthir’s chest, and consented to the feeding—both ways—while maintaining the discourse on the music he chose. All of it pleased: having this man warm against him, eating from his fingers while also showing the breadth of his mastery in a realm in which Lisinthir could only observe, not participate. He liked this evidence of strength and knowledge in his lover; liked it in all his lovers, really, the Slave Queen no less than the Emperor. She had not known the world well, but she’d known her people and her own mind, and she’d understood politics and psychology at a far higher level than she would have admitted to had someone suggested it.

When the music was intense, as the music often was, Jahir gave up eating entirely and sagged against him, lost in a world Lisinthir sensed through their skins where they touched. And that trust, that gave him the duty of guarding his cousin in his vulnerability as he sank into bliss… that roused every feeling in him, all good.

The wine loosened his cousin’s inhibitions, made him playful. From music Jahir knew well, they progressed to music they both found interesting, and from thence to music only they knew.

“Had you a favorite court song?” Jahir asked. He’d allowed Lisinthir to strip him from the waist up and was pooled into the hollows of Lisinthir’s side. “Or did you find them all insipid? You were at court for long enough to hear some of them, surely.”

“I was, though being more engaged on the dueling grounds than in the salons made it a trifle less likely for me to hear as many as you must have.” Lisinthir threaded his fingers into his cousin’s hair and brushed it back from his face before tracing the rim of Jahir’s ear. “But yes, I was among polite company long enough to have many such songs inflicted on me.”

“Inflicted! They were not all woeful.”

“I beg you to say that to me when you are not inebriated, Galare.”

“But the fingering was quite complex on… on… you are about to laugh, aren’t you.”

“And you are about to blush,” Lisinthir said, laughing. “But do go on. I love your blushes.”

“The music required a great deal of skill. The picking… it’s unusual. It demanded great artistry to create, to play. Was a delight to listen to.”

“The words were ridiculous.” Lisinthir lifted his free hand. “I’ll grant that there was nuance in it. When is there not nuance in our court? And I seem to recall there being some ridiculously arcane linkage between the placement of the fingers or the addition of notes from the chords to evoke the mood shadings in the lyrics. But the lyrics were pedestrian when they were not banal. How many songs do we really need about bringing flowers to fair maidens?”

“’Fresh as the morning air?’” Jahir murmured.

“Or sweet as the song of a lark, or pure as the dew at dawn… can you imagine being a woman and expected to conform to such tedious standards?”

“No,” Jahir admitted. And then, wistful, “But the music was beautiful.”

“And the fingering exceptional,” Lisinthir teased, gently.

“A skilled musician makes many promises with the fingers on the frets of a lute,” Jahir replied, somber, but with such an outrageous gradient of mood shading from neutral to brightest carnal red that Lisinthir coughed on the sip of wine he was taking and had to snatch a napkin. Once he was sure of himself he found his cousin smiling at him with such mischief that he laughed.

“Brilliantly played. Pun not intended.”

“Pun certainly not accepted, given its dreadful taste.” Jahir pushed himself upright with a regret Lisinthir felt vividly through the palm his cousin was using to steady himself. “This has been a very good day.”

“Hasn’t it? I have quite liked you taking charge, cousin mine.”

That won him a skeptical look. “Is that what I have been doing? Eating off your fingers? Losing my focus the moment you touch me?”

“Of course it is.” Lisinthir put his hands behind his head, stretching his legs. “You designed our exercise. You decided on our meal. You picked out our music.”

“And now?” Jahir asked, still wary.

“And now,” Lisinthir said with relish, “you shall end as you have begun the day, by taking me for a change.”

“I… beg your pardon—”

“For you’ll have to learn to do so, you will note, if you want to please your future wife—”

“Which is rather a different situation!”

“Only in detail,” Lisinthir said, enjoying the fluster. “I assure you, having done both. You should have some practice. And I not only miss having someone over me, now and then, but you have something to learn from this.”

“That I am incapable?” Jahir asked, voice strangled.

“You will be more than capable, I assure you.” Lisinthir sat up, caught his cousin’s hair in a fist. “No. What I want you to learn, in your skin, in your mouth, in your heart, is that how you feel about what you’re doing is often far more significant than the action itself. This, I perceive, is a lesson you will find familiar given your profession.”

“Cousin…”

“Strip off the pants.” Jahir grimaced, but before he could object, Lisinthir said, gentler, “You fear to disappoint me. You won’t.” Shading the words white: “Trust me.”

“I do, but…” Jahir stopped, then smiled, pained, thought better of the conditional. “I do.”

“Better,” Lisinthir murmured.

“Must we do this here?” Jahir asked, after their clothes decorated the floor. “The bedroom will surely be…”

Easier? More expected? Lisinthir pulled his cousin over him. “We can repair there later. This now, though.” Winding his fingers through his cousin’s hair and dragging his head down by it. “Stop fretting. It’s no different than what we’ve been doing before. You remain my obedient servant; I remain your demanding cousin. I intend to use your body for my own pleasure, is all.”

“Is it?” Jahir asked, breathless.

“Mercilessly,” Lisinthir promised. “And you will please me, I promise.” He thought of the Emperor’s clawtips trailing up his sides, the arch of black wings over him, shuddered.

“I can’t be that!” Jahir exclaimed.

“You don’t need to be, and I don’t want you to.” Lisinthir yanked him down. “Be you, Galare. That is what I want.” He grinned, fiercely. “The musician, the healer, the therapist, the heir to the estate. I want him as well as the cousin, the innocent, the lover of knives and masks.”

“I don’t love masks,” Jahir murmured against his mouth.

“Liar.”

Jahir sucked in a breath and said, “Fine. I sometimes love masks. But I always love walls.”

Lisinthir chuckled, low, and said, “Now, kiss me, and make me believe it.”

That his cousin borrowed some of his emotions to make his actions possible, Lisinthir was well-aware… and didn’t mind. He let Jahir use him to find the courage to make the attempt, and once he had begun it, Lisinthir took back the control he’d allowed his cousin to assume. To show him that, yes, one could be over someone and still under them. And to do as he’d promised, and use his cousin’s magnificent body to his own purpose. He’d expected it to remind him of the Emperor and it did—he’d expected that reminder to make it harder to enjoy… but it didn’t. He loved the Emperor. But he loved Jahir too. And there was a delirious pleasure in the unexpectedness of it, and it made him laugh: a joyous laugh, easy and quick, torn from him with his ecstasy. He felt his cousin’s shy delight at it before Jahir asked, tentative, “Again?”

“Again,” Lisinthir said, and rolled him onto his back to continue the demonstration.

Much later, so much later that they’d repaired to the bed, Jahir observed, “You never cease with the teaching through demonstration.”

“Alas! My pedagogy is lacking in novelty.” Jahir nipped him near the shoulder and Lisinthir laughed. “Your criticisms have teeth.”

“I will not dignify that bit of wit with a response,” Jahir said. Quieter, he added, “But I do feel different.”

Lisinthir petted his cousin’s temple with the backs of two fingers, an idle caress. “Because?”

“Less virginal.” Said with gentle amusement, before gravity returned. “But also… you let me in.”

Tempting to point out the salaciousness of the comment, but the fact that his cousin had not shaded it white or gold or silver to prevent him from doing so intrigued—and concerned—him. “Did I.”

“This was something that cost you a great deal to learn,” Jahir continued, resting a hand on Lisinthir’s chest, near the heart. “Something you wrestled with while you were there. The question of whether you could commit acts in the right spirit and not be corrupted by them.”

How easy it would be to fall into melancholy, contemplating that struggle. The anguish of it. He remembered the Slave Queen’s arms around him, sheltering him as he fell apart… and how painstakingly he’d put himself back together again. Lisinthir stared at the ceiling, saw instead the canopy over his Chatcaavan bed with its ominous depictions of males wrestling one another into abject submission. “I was changed by them,” he said at last.

“We’re all changed by the events of our life. But this tonight… this was your way of illustrating to me that the core remains true.”

“Does it?” Lisinthir asked, looking at him. “You are the therapist, not I. In your years of work, have you observed it to be true?”

Jahir was silent, mind working. Lisinthir let him have the time, waited, found he wanted the answer badly. Had wanted it since they’d shared the moment on the courier before the battle, when he’d asked for the nerve block’s removal. The subsequent events had convinced him that Jahir did not think him a monster. But this question… this one cut closer than he’d been willing to admit. He could accept that others did not think him a monster far more easily than he could face the idea that he’d been warped from true by his own standard.

“I think,” Jahir said, quiet, “that unless we are shattered, who we are at core remains stable. I will always be…” He breathed in, sighed, smiled whimsically. “Jahir Seni Galare, a little too apt to self-sacrifice, submissive to the right hand, and wanting very much to do the right thing. And you…”

“And I?” Lisinthir prompted, low.

“And you will always be Lisinthir Nase Galare, swift to the defense of the helpless, easy with power, quick and vital and strong.” Jahir paused, then finished, “Unless you become Lisinthir Keldi Imtherili.”

That surprised him into a laugh. “I suppose I might, one day. Though if I take Imtherili back I will make a new family name. I want none of my father’s.”

“That would suit you,” Jahir leaned up, kissed him. Said, affectionate, “You are still you, cousin, despite the Empire.”

“And you are still you,” Lisinthir agreed, touching his fingertips to his cousin’s lips. “Despite having proven you are quite as good at giving as you are at receiving.”

Jahir flushed, shook his head. And smiled. “I find I like receiving from you better.”

“Once more, then,” Lisinthir said. “And after, sleep.”

His cousin hesitated, then said, “Yes, please.” And that smile was such sweetness that Lisinthir gave up denying himself. He adored the Emperor for his passion, his ferocity, for the challenge in their contests. He loved the Slave Queen for her gentleness, her courage, her intelligence. But he also, it appeared, loved his cousin, for the contradictions that made his surrender so poignant, among his many other virtues….

He had his dragons. His cousin would have his wife. This might be the only interlude they ever had together. If the once more before sleep became thrice… they could sleep a little longer in the morning. He would drink his fill while he had it.

It was so early when the Knife arrived that she was still asleep on the divan where once she had entertained her lovers. His hand on her shoulder dragged her from dreams dense with sweetness and fear, and the stickiness of them seemed to pull at her as she lifted her head to squint at him.

What she saw in his eyes made her struggle to sit up, pulling her blanket tightly around her shoulders against a chill more durable than any caused by cold. “You called. Is it true? Did the Emperor not grant permission?”

“Worse, my Queen. We could not reach him to ask.”

“You... couldn’t reach him?” She waved him to the stool beside her, her racing heart clearing the shrouding sleep from her thoughts with nauseating alacrity. “That is not normal.”

“No. We should have received his messaging system, had he been engaged,” the Knife said. “Or the ship should have answered and taken the message for him. But the ship did not respond. Nor did the Emperor answer his personal tag. These things should not be possible. Not together.”

“Did the ship go down in battle?” she whispered, trembling.

“Possibly. Or our avenue to it is being blocked. By whom we do not know. Uuvek is at work on it.”

“The Emperor has enemies,” she said. “We already knew this.”

“Exactly,” the Knife replied, grim. “We know nothing more than what we already knew, my Queen. That the Exalted is besieged, and it may be that Second is behind it, or he may be innocent.”

But, she thought, the Knife doubted it. The set of his jaw, the way his lip was struggling not to curl back from his teeth, the hardness of his eyes... he presented every evidence of a male who felt betrayed.

The Queen thought of her flowers, and how much she missed them.

“We are not safe here,” the Knife said.

“No Chatcaavan is safe here,” the Queen replied, feeling resolve seeping into her, like the revelation of an alien body assumed for the first time after the Touch’s rapture. So quiet an epiphany to be so complete. “Let us finish with our plans, Knife.”

“We move, then. I need only to begin informing all those who will be abetting our flight. When shall I commence?”

When? How long could she tarry, and what could she learn in that time? The Knife was right: Second was in the perfect position to execute a coup. And she was in the perfect position to report on him. Did not the Emperor value knowledge like treasure? If Second was the Emperor’s enemy—if Second wanted the Emperor’s throne—then all that she could gather about him could be used against him. She would be responsible for crafting the weapon her master used to strike him down.

Such a thought. It dazzled with its audacity. More importantly, it was necessary. Why else had he left her here if not to exercise the fullness of her abilities on his behalf?

But how to balance that against the safety of those she’d been charged with?

She did not know the answer yet. So she gave the only answer she could. She met his eyes. “Do what you must so we can leave immediately. Wait for my word to commence.”

He bowed his head. “My Queen.”

For a long time after he left, she stared at the empty vase. Then she pushed the blankets aside and went into the day.