I crashed into the ground and then was crushed by what felt like falling rock. Something—probably a rib or two—cracked with a spike of pain. The lack of sound was eerie, until the ringing filled my head—loud and painful. The rock rolled off me and I realized it was Emmory. I gasped, flopping around like a fish out of water on the pavement as I tried to get my body to cooperate and failed.
“Hail!” His panicked shout was muffled, coming through the haze of pain and chaos surrounding me. He slid his hands over me, concern plastered across his face as he searched for injuries. “Dark Mother of all, talk to me. How much of this blood is yours?”
I could taste the copper on my tongue and swiped a hand under my nose. It came away red.
I opened and closed my mouth, my lungs refusing to drag air inward, and the panic must have shown in my eyes because Emmory swore—something he’d yet to do in front of me.
I’d have to remember that. Though getting myself nearly blown up every time I wanted to make him swear and call me by name didn’t seem like that great of an idea.
“Up, Majesty, I need you to get up.” Emmory glanced over his shoulder, then returned his dark gaze to me. “We have to move.” He hauled me to my feet, and practically plastered himself to my back, one hand on my neck to keep my head low. Cas was on my other side, his gun out and his young face stone hard.
“This is Ekam Tresk. Confirmed Charlie Level emergency at Garuda Square. Suicide bomber. At least four BodyGuards dead. I need a check-in from all BodyGuards now.”
“I’m okay,” I finally managed to gasp as I got some air into my lungs. “I’m not hurt.”
Which was essentially true. I hurt and I probably had a cracked rib. But beyond that and a few cuts and some bruises that were going to make me not want to move tomorrow, I was fine. Jet was—
“Jet.” I struggled to turn in Emmory’s grip. “Oh Gods, Emmory. He—”
“I saw,” he said grimly. “Don’t look, Majesty. You don’t need to see.”
“That poor little girl. Where’s Alba? Where’s Zin?” I was babbling as we stumbled along, the panic rising in my throat and threatening to choke me. The screams of the wounded started to filter past my clogged ears.
“Right here, Majesty.” Like a ghost, Zin melted out of the smoke, supporting my chamberlain.
“Let me see,” I said, reaching out for the hand pressed to her temple.
“I’m all right, Your Majesty. Just a cut. We can deal with it once you’re safe.” She mustered up a smile. “How bad are you hurt?”
“My nose already stopped bleeding. Everything else is incidental.”
Zin clamped a hand down on Emmory’s shoulder, and Emmory reached up, their fingers brushing.
I thought I’d lost you.
You didn’t.
It was all said without any words at all. I turned my head, feeling like I’d intruded on a sacred moment.
“We need to get moving. I want to get to the aircar.” Emmory spotted Rama crumpled against a lamppost. He grabbed the dark-haired young man and hauled him up. “Focus for me, Rama.”
“I’m all right, sir. I just clipped my head. Where is everyone else?”
“Jet and all of Team Four are dead.” Emmory’s response was clinically cold, and I found myself struggling to remember the names of the men who’d just given their lives for me. I’d just spoken to them a few hours ago.
“I’m getting responses—Pezan was injured in the blast, Adail is with him. Willimet hasn’t checked in yet. Tanish and Jul were on the perimeter and are circling around to meet us at the aircar.” Emmory was already on the move, hustling me down the street as he filled the others in. “I’ve notified the other teams of the situation.”
“There’s Adail—” Rama’s announcement broke off and my concussion-stomped brain was so foggy it took me a full second to comprehend why. He crumpled in a heap, the blood spreading out in a crimson pool on the gray sidewalk.
Adail opened fire again.
“Get down!” Zin pushed me toward the building. We slammed into the doorway, falling through the door when the lock gave. My already bruised body protested the additional abuse, and the air left my lungs for the second time in less than an hour.
He slid off me with a muttered curse. “You okay?”
“No,” I wheezed, lying there a minute struggling for breath. “Never mind bombs and shooters, you two are going to crush me to death.”
“Sorry.”
The breathy pain in that single word slapped at me. I rolled over and scrambled onto my knees, pressing my hands to the wound in Zin’s side. “No. I’ve lost too many today, I’m not losing you, too. Do you hear me, Starzin? I’m not losing you!”
“Watch the door,” Emmory snapped the order to the others, dropping to a knee at Zin’s side.
“Where’s Adail?” I snarled. The older green-eyed Guard had always been kind to me; his sudden betrayal sent my brain spinning.
“Dead.” Grabbing a sari off a toppled mannequin, Emmory tore a strip off. “Sit up, Zin. I’ve got ITS incoming to the landing site, but we’ve got bigger problems.”
“Other than me being shot?” Zin’s laugh was cut short by coughing and he spat blood onto the floor. “Shit, that must have nicked my lung. I’m getting some warnings here, Emmory.”
“I know, just hold on. ITS says we’ve got troop movements. There’re reports of firefights in the palace. I think our traitors are making their move.” He swore again, sheer anger racing over his face. “I didn’t think they’d move this fast. I didn’t think they’d dare to do this on Pratimas.”
“None of us did,” I said. “Let it go and focus, Emmy.” I tore strips from the sari as fast as Emmory could pack them against Zin’s wound and bandage him up. Once that was done, I wiggled out of my coat and unwound my own sari with Alba’s help, piling the jewelry Stasia had draped on me that morning on top of the green fabric.
“I’ll keep it for you, Majesty. I’m going to stay here and try to help with the wounded. No one will bother going after me.”
“It’s better this way. I don’t want your BodyGuards to have to worry about me. Their focus should be on you.”
I embraced her. “Stay safe, please.”
“You, too, Your Majesty. We need you.” She smiled. “I know you don’t think it sometimes, but we need you. You will carry us through this dark.”
Pulling my SColt from the holster at the small of my back, I shrugged into a long jacket taken from another downed mannequin and crouched at Zin’s side. Emmory was funneling updates to my smati as fast as he got them and the news drove frozen claws into my chest.
I wasn’t badly hurt because Team Four had put themselves between me and the blast and brought up their kinetic shields to cover us. They’d paid for it with their lives and the blast had still been bad enough to knock us around like dolls.
Things were too scattered and confused for a clear picture, but what I was piecing together was that at the same time as the explosion there’d been an assault on the palace from a force of unknown strength and origin.
“I’ve got troops assaulting the palace gates, Saxon uniforms.”
“Security for all the matriarchs reports their residences on lockdown.”
“I need some backup over here!”
The ground shook beneath us.
“Holy Mother, ITS headquarters just disintegrated!”
I turned off the audio when the incoming ping rang in my ear. “Admiral.”
“Thank Vishnu, you’re all right. You dropped off the grid and I thought—” Admiral Hassan didn’t even try to hide her relief. “Majesty, where are you?”
“Can’t tell you. A shop in Garuda Square.” I looked around, catching Emmory’s eye and mouthing the admiral’s name. He nodded once and held up four fingers then jerked his head toward the door before he went back to binding Zin’s wound. “Someone tried to blow me up. And it sounds like ITS HQ just went up in flames.”
Hassan’s little gasp was as clear as the gunfire that suddenly echoed outside. “Majesty, we don’t have much intel, but I’ll send you what we’ve gathered so far. All Navy ships are holding at present.”
“Are there any Saxon ships incoming?”
“No, ma’am.”
“Well, that’s something at least. Pass the word, Admiral, we’ve got a coup in progress. Unsure if foreign or domestic. If anyone approaches the planet and won’t stand down in my name, you blow them into dust, is that understood?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
A second broadcast tone sounded in my ear and it took me a moment to realize this one was coming over the planet-wide system, not just the palace smati link.
“Citizens of Indrana.” Ganda somehow looked both regal and girlish, facing the camera with only a hint of tears still staining her cheeks. “It is with great sadness that I must announce to you not only the death of our beloved empress, but of her heir.
“One of them was stolen from us by fate, the other—my dear cousin—was murdered this very afternoon in an explosion set by Saxon spies. This act of war will not go unanswered!”
“Oh, bugger me,” I swore, getting to my feet. “Emmory, why does everyone think I’m dead?”
“I cut your smati off from the network, Majesty,” he replied. “It seemed safer.”
The shoes I was wearing were crap for running and I cursed myself for letting Stasia talk me out of my boots. “Admiral, are you still there?” I didn’t even bother listening to the rest of Ganda’s speech.
“Yes, Majesty.”
“Coordinate with Caspel and General Saito, tell them that I’m still kicking but to keep it quiet for right now. I don’t think this is actually the Saxons but I could be wrong. If I’m not, then Ganda is trying to take my throne and start a war all at the same time. Funnel the information back to me. Find Toropov, too, make sure he’s safe. We’re going to be on the run for the aircar. I won’t be able to talk until we’re back in the palace, but I’ll see what you send me.
“And Admiral, if General Vandi is still alive, find out if she’s loyal to me. I don’t care if it’s a breach of protocol—you ask her directly. I need to know if I can count on more than just one gods-damned ITS squad.”
“Yes, ma’am. Gods be with you.”
“With you also,” I replied and cut the connection. “Alba, I want you to stay here until we’re long gone. No one will make the connection if they don’t see you with us.”
“Yes, ma’am.” Her smile was forced and I hugged her again.
“I’ll see you soon.”
“Tanish reported Willimet met up with him and Jul,” Emmory said to me as he helped Zin to his feet. “Her com got taken out by Adail. He apparently finished off Pezan and tried to kill her, too. I’m having them backtrack and meet us here.” He tossed me the location over our link.
I slid under Zin’s arm. “This one didn’t try to do something stupidly noble like staying and bleeding to death, did he?”
Humor fought free of the concern on Emmory’s face. “Only momentarily, Majesty. I’m down to protecting you in the middle of a coup with only two healthy BodyGuards until we can get to the others. Sergeant Terass is going to meet up with us at the aircar.
“I know it won’t do any good to ask you to keep your head down,” he said. “So please just try to stay alive for me?”
I winked at him and wiggled my gun at the door. “Let’s get moving, Ekam, before Ganda plants her ass on my throne.” There were a thousand things jockeying for prominence in my head, but I let my training take over as we hit the open air and my focus sharpened on the world around us.
We came around the corner and Emmory jerked his gun up when a uniformed police officer sprinted toward us. “Ekam Tresk, Officer. I will drop you if you don’t back off.”
The woman skidded to a halt. “Sir, yes sir.” She blinked at me. “Is that the princess? But they just said she was—”
“Not dead,” I said with a grim smile. “And not a princess anymore. What’s your name?”
“Officer Hajuman, Your Majesty. Iza Hajuman.” The young woman kept her hands away from her weapons as she dropped to a knee and bowed her head. “I am your loyal subject. My life for you, Shining Star of Indrana.”
I arched an eyebrow at her earnest devotion. “Let’s hope it doesn’t come to that.” I looked past Zin to Emmory. “What do you say, Emmy? Right now we can use all the guns we find.”
My BodyGuard nodded. “Iza, get up and take point. You kill anyone who won’t drop their weapons at first challenge. Understood?”
“Perfectly, sir.”
We kept moving. I didn’t have a clue where Emmory was headed, but I trusted him. Cas was on my other side, blue eyes scanning the deserted landscape around us. “Sir, I’ve got ITS on the landing pad. They say everything is secure. Captain Gill wants to know if she should send troops out to meet us?” Blood coated his neck and my throat constricted when he turned away from me to scan the scene. His back was cut up from flying debris. Emmory’s order about the shield had come too late to keep him from being injured.
Emmory shook his head. “We’re almost there. Tell her to hold. Do we have a sitrep on the palace?”
“Nothing yet, sir. It’s chaos over there.”
Tanish melted out of a side street so fast it even startled Emmory.
“Shiva, man. I almost shot you,” he muttered, lowering his gun.
“Sorry, sir. Jul and Willi scouted out an approach to the landing pad. Everything looks good. We didn’t contact ITS, though. I wasn’t sure what the situation was.”
“Good job.” Emmory patted the younger Guard. “The ITS is Captain Gill’s squad; we’re safe.” He turned around and looked at Zin, who gave a sharp nod.
We sprinted down the sidewalk, across the landing pad to meet the ITS shuttle. Troops had fanned out, weapons at the ready, and they hustled me into the relative safety of the shuttle’s interior.
The shuttle lurched, taking off before I made it to a seat. Zin stumbled, throwing me into Emmory. I felt my Ekam wince as he tried to steady us. “You’re hurt, too,” I whispered, swallowing past the lump in my throat when the realization hit me.
“I’ll be fine.”
His black coat was charred on one side and he was as spattered with gore as I was. He was bleeding from several cuts and holding his left arm tight to his side—the side he’d used to shield me.
“No, you won’t. Where’s Sergeant Terass?” I demanded.
“I’m right behind you, Majesty.” Fasé’s lilting voice drifted into the air over my left shoulder. “If you’ll sit down, I’ll take a look at you.”
“I’m fine.” I lowered Zin into a seat. “Look at Zin, then Emmory, and then Cas.” All my BodyGuards were injured, but those three were the worst of the lot.
“Look at her first,” Emmory replied.
I snarled a curse at him and grabbed him by his uninjured arm. “Sit. Down.”
Emmory stared at me for a long heartbeat, but finally sat. Fasé, however, wasn’t quite so cooperative.
“Majesty, I really should insist, your ribs—”
“It’s just cuts and bruises. I’m fine,” I lied, knowing full well that Emmory knew the truth. “I swear to the Dark Mother the next person that argues with me is going to get my fist in their face, is that understood? Heal them. That’s an order, Sergeant.”
Fasé swallowed, glancing at Emmory. Thankfully, he gave her a little nod and she put her hands over Zin’s. Silence descended and I realized I was holding my breath. I exhaled when Zin did, some of the tight lines of telling pain easing out of his face.
“May you feel better,” Fasé whispered, touching her forehead to Zin’s. The motion left a smudge of soot and blood on her pale skin. “Your Majesty?”
“Do the others first.”
“Majesty.” This time it was Zin, not Emmory. “Please sit down. At least let her check you. We need to be sure you aren’t seriously injured.”
I already knew I wasn’t and Emmory did, too, but he wasn’t speaking up. Muttering a vicious curse under my breath, I sat and held a hand out to Fasé. “All right. Get on with it.”
Her fingers were cool as she wrapped them around my wrist. “I meant what I said about not healing me. You need to save your strength for them.”
I closed my eyes, resting my head against the back of the seat. I felt vulnerable just lying here. I wanted to be up doing something. It was a bad idea to close my eyes. The minute my lashes fell, I saw Ramani’s face, Jet’s back, and then the explosion. “Oh, bugger me.” I shoved away from Fasé, stumbling for the facilities and barely making it before emptying the contents of my stomach into the toilet.
“Majesty?”
“Fasé, if you don’t go take care of the others, I’m going to be very upset with you.” I didn’t even look up from the toilet when I said it.
“Easy, Majesty.”
“Don’t you tell me to be easy, Starzin,” I snapped, struggling to keep my voice low. “Someone just tried to blow me up. Someone just killed my mother.” I stood up, steadying myself against the wall. “Emmory got toasted, you got shot—the others—and Jet—all these people dying for me. What’s the fucking point? I’m nothing more than a gunrunner.”
Zin caught me when I sagged forward. The door closed behind him, shutting us in the tiny bathroom. “You’ve got a minute, Your Majesty. Then you have to pull yourself together.” His words were shocking—flat and cold. All I could do was stare at him in astonishment. “Those are friends out there, but you don’t want them to see you like this. They need to see their empress. They need to see—”
“Stone.” I shoved away from him as far as the space would allow. “You want me to be a gods-damned statue.”
“I want you to be the empress! Those people need you to be that leader.”
“No.” I shook my head so hard stars flashed in my eyes. “I saw what that did to my mother, Zin. I won’t do it. I won’t pretend like I’m not grieving for my people or the fact that Jet’s wife will have to raise their daughter alone. That I’m not dreading having to talk to Rama and Salham’s parents and tell them how their sons died. That I don’t feel like total shit because I can’t remember the names of the other three BodyGuards who put themselves between that bomb and me and paid for it with their lives! I won’t pretend that a little girl”—I jabbed a finger into his chest with such force I was surprised it didn’t sink knuckle deep—“didn’t die right in front of me today.”
“I’m not asking you to pretend. I’m asking you to do something with it rather than wallow in it. You don’t understand how much your people love you. Look.” He held his hand up, using his smati to project the images onto the bathroom wall with the tech in his fingers. News articles about my return, comments on the Hansi network, more beaming selfies that I only half remembered taking.
“Being loved doesn’t make me a good empress, Zin. I don’t know what I’m doing.”
“Cowshit,” he replied. The curse so at odds with his normally polite demeanor that I blinked at him in shock. “You’re smarter than you give yourself credit for. We’re on the brink of war. The gunrunner I retrieved knows what she’s doing and right now we need her.”
“Make up your gods-damned mind,” I hissed at him. “Gunrunner or empress, Zin.”
He shook his head slowly and smiled. “This isn’t an either-or proposition, Majesty. You are a gunrunner. You are the empress.”
Which meant I got to decide, I realized. I was the Empress of Indrana. I got to decide how I behaved and no one could tell me otherwise. “Let me out of here.”
“Of course, Majesty.” Zin reached behind him and opened the door, stepping out of my way with his head lowered.
“Emmory, find us a safe place to get into the palace. Don’t argue with me about it, just do it. I know you’d rather take me to some damn safe house but that’s not the way this is going to work.” I whirled in a tight circle, meeting the eyes of everyone on the shuttle.
“Listen up, all of you. I’ve lost some very good people today and I will probably lose more before the day is done. Innocent lives were sacrificed by people who value power more than decency. Those are not the people who control the fate of Indrana. I do. You do.
“I don’t know what’s going on out there, but it doesn’t matter if the enemy is my cousin or the Saxons. I’m not going to cower in a hole while they try to destroy everything we have built here. You won’t get stone-faced cowshit from me, you won’t get some prim and proper royal line. Get used to this now. Everyone wanted me back, well, now they’re going to have to deal with having a former gunrunner as an empress. Is that understood?”
Their murmured “Yes, ma’am” was somewhat stunned.
Emmory, however, didn’t seem at all shocked. “I got in touch with security at the landing pad, Majesty,” he said. “We’ll land and get you in as fast as we can. You’re right, I don’t like it, but I do think that we’re better off dealing with this now as swiftly as we can.”
There was just the barest flicker of emotion in his eyes. A tangled dance of relief, pride, and amusement that winked out of existence before it was even fully formed and tipped me off to just what Zin had been after.
“We’re coming up on the landing pad now, Your Majesty,” Zin said, putting a hand on my arm. “If you’ll find a seat.”
I snapped my mouth shut, crossed back to Emmory, and dropped into a seat next to him. There was a flurry of activity around me as the members of Captain Gill’s team and my remaining BodyGuards prepared for the landing.
“You two are going to keep me on my toes,” I said over our smati link.
“Zin said what he thought would help, ma’am. You were teetering on the edge. The shock is understandable.” He gave a little shrug, not looking at me as he checked and double-checked his guns. “Anger clears the mind, puts things in focus.”
“And going into the palace?” I pulled out my own gun, letting my restless hands do their work.
“I don’t like it, any of it. But we need to be in there. I couldn’t suggest it outright. As your Ekam, my duty is to keep you as far away from danger as possible, not drag you right into a trap.”
“So what’s the plan? Hopefully it doesn’t involve one of us getting shot, because we’ve done that already today.” I grabbed Emmory by the forearm and squeezed until he looked at me. “I’m serious. Don’t die, Emmy. I’m not saying ever, I know what your job is. I know what you’re prepared to do for me and this empire. But just today, please, don’t die. Promise me.”
“Emmory, we’re—”
I snapped my free hand up, cutting Zin off. “Promise me,” I repeated out loud.
Emmory blinked and, after what seemed like an eternity, nodded at me. “I promise, Majesty. And no, the plan is not to get shot.”
Zin shook something dark at me. Clothes, I realized, or more accurately an ITS uniform. “From the pilot,” he said with a grin. “Sergeant Hoff is living every soldier’s nightmare of going to war in his underwear so we can hide you in plain sight.”
My laughter startled everyone in the shuttle, while Emmory groaned and covered his face with a hand. “Could you take this seriously?” he asked Zin, who shrugged.
“Just another day as BodyGuard to the Gunrunner Empress. You’re going to want to get dressed, Majesty. We’re on the clock.”
I grabbed the uniform from him and hustled into the bathroom again, stripping out of what remained of my outfit and wriggling into the flat black pants and jacket. When I came out, Fasé handed me a helmet. There were dark bruised circles under her eyes and her hands were shaking a bit.
“You’re exhausted,” I said. “You should stay with the shuttle.”
“No, ma’am. I need to stick close to you. Just in case.”
I forced myself not to argue and not to run back into the bathroom to be sick again. Get used to it. The voice in my head sounded like Portis and it was sympathetic. You’re the most important person in their world right now. They’ll give up everything, even their lives, for you.
I twisted my hair up into a knot, put on the helmet, and keyed into the com system. The display lit up, making the shield in front of my eyes as transparent as glass from my side.
From the outside it was just one of a dozen blank helmets. No one would know who I was.
Emmory tapped me on the helmet. “No heroics, ma’am.” His voice was clear on the com.
“Back at you,” I replied. “Let’s go get my throne.” It felt right to say it after days of fighting the idea. I was the Empress of Indrana. “May the gods save us all.”
Everyone echoed me and we sprinted from the shuttle.
My breathing and heart rate shot up through the atmosphere. Adrenaline is a funny thing. After all these years, all this separation from our birthplace, from Earth, our biology hasn’t changed all that much. The moment we were all clear of the ramp, Sergeant Hoff pulled back off the landing pad and bugged out for a rendezvous point known only to Emmory and myself.
We were now stranded at the palace, but at least we’d still be able to get off-planet if it became necessary.
I really hoped it didn’t become necessary.
I stayed low, Zin at my front and Fasé at my back, a pretty impressive M2220 in my hands. I was surprised Emmory let me have such a cannon without any kind of hesitation.
Getting into the palace proved easier than I’d suspected, but it made perfect sense if Bial was trying to trap us. We slipped in through a service door used for deliveries without seeing a soul and followed Emmory down the hallway.
We approached an intersection, Emmory slowing cautiously. He whispered something to Iza I couldn’t make out. Emmory gestured for us to stay put, and they proceeded around the corner.
The silence that followed carried a tension with it that felt like someone had turned up the gravity on us.
“Majesty, will you join us?” Emmory called for me just before I thought my head was going to implode.
I shoved my visor up and shared a curious glance with Zin. “Well?”
“I don’t know, Majesty. I’ll go first.”
No one had said anything about leaving weapons behind, so I kept a hold of the M2220 and followed Zin around the corner. What we saw brought us both to a standstill.
Bial and half a dozen BodyGuards were on their knees with their hands behind their heads. Emmory stood off to the side, talking with a pale-skinned man with icy eyes.
“Well, this is a surprise,” I said, drawing everyone’s eyes to me. I locked eyes with Bial. “And yet not, disappointingly. Emmory, can you tell me what’s going on?”
“He was conspiring against the throne, Majesty. Some of the other Guards disagreed and disarmed him before we got here.”
“I wish I could say I was shocked. Damn it, Bial, for a moment there I was starting to trust you.”
“I did what was best for Indrana,” Bial said. His jaw was set and there wasn’t a trace of remorse on his face. “Ganda should be empress.”
“Is that so?” It took everything I had not to take the gun off my shoulder and blow him to pieces.
“You’re a criminal! What authority would we have if we just looked the other way for you? How could you enforce any laws when you’ve broken most of them yourself? How could we trust you to keep us safe when you’ve probably sold weapons to the very people who are looking to tear this empire apart?”
“I never sold guns to the Saxons,” I snarled, advancing on him until Zin brought me up short.
“A convenient sense of honor, Your Majesty.” Bial spit my title at me. “A gunrunner on the throne of Indrana would reduce the empire to laughingstocks of the universe.”
“Don’t you dare talk to me about honor!” It was a good thing Zin had stopped me. I was too far away to kick the man in the face. “If you hadn’t wanted me to come home, you sorry bastard, you shouldn’t have helped Ganda and Laabh kill my sisters! You shouldn’t have let someone poison my mother! I would have happily stayed away and let Cire have the throne.
“She would have been twice the empress I could ever be. You killed them and I had to come home. This is your fucking fault in the first place, you bastard. You were supposed to keep them safe!”
All the color drained out of Bial’s face. “What? I didn’t kill them. I didn’t have anything to do with that. It was the Upjas. I swear, Majesty, I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Liar.” The rejection was automatic, but the misery in his blue eyes drove a wedge of doubt into my fury. “How else did you think they were going to clear the path for Ganda?”
“Clear the path?” There was real confusion in Bial’s voice now. “Majesty, I don’t know what you’re talking about. I wasn’t involved in anything until you arrived. All I have been trying to do is talk your mother into naming Ganda as the heir. I don’t—”
“Shut up.” I popped the M2220 off my shoulder at Zin. He was surprised enough that, instead of letting it fall and stopping me, he bobbled the gun. I pulled the Hessian45 we’d retrieved from Rama’s corpse from my belt and advanced on Bial.
Emmory caught my wrist and jerked my hand to the side. The blast I’d been meaning to put between Bial’s eyes instead drove into the cement between him and the man next to him. Bial didn’t even twitch. The other guy dove to the side with a panicked shout.
“He’s got information we need, Majesty,” Emmory said. “Plus, we need him mobile at the moment.”
“What for?”
“To get into the throne room. Indula here says they weren’t going to kill us. They were just supposed to stop us and give you the choice of abdicating or being taken to your cousin.”
“So why aren’t we in custody, Ekam?”
“Apparently, the idea of taking you off the throne didn’t sit right with some of the Guards.”
“I’ve seen the video of you taking out that assassin, Majesty. I’ve heard the stories about your exploits.” The man Emmory had been speaking of gave me a quick nod, lowering his pale eyes to the floor for a moment. “It looks like we’re headed into another war with the Saxons, and I’d rather have someone on the throne who knows what they’re doing.” Indula shrugged a shoulder. “Plus you’re the heir, there’s no denying that. If we were that chaotic mess they call a democracy in the Solarian Conglomerate, our opinions would matter on the subject, but they don’t.”
“She’s a gunrunner!” Bial protested.
I kicked him in the stomach, not hard enough to damage anything but just enough to knock the air out of his lungs. “You wouldn’t let me shoot him,” I said when Emmory gave me the Look. “So you decided to side with the gunrunner rather than my royal cousin?” That was aimed at Indula.
Indula shrugged. “My mother worked in a bar, Majesty. My father was a mechanic. Bial’s mistake, and your cousin’s, I guess, was thinking those of us in the Guard care about someone’s breeding. We’re all common folk, though. Most of the nobility go into the Navy. We don’t care where you come from, we care what you do now.”
“I like you,” I said, pointing a finger at him and he gave me a surprisingly boyish grin.
“I’m glad to hear it, Majesty.”
A similar conversation with Jet echoed up in my memory, carrying with it a wash of pain that brought tears to my eyes and I struggled to get back under control. “All right.” I took a step away from Bial and stuck my gun back in my belt. “What’s the plan, Emmory?”