by K. B. Wagers
“Yes, Majesty.”
“My Ekam will contact you soon about appropriate lodgings, and I assume we will be sending several teams to you early both to scope out a good location and to run point on security. Any suggestions you will have for them is appreciated.”
“I’ll get my staff on it right away, ma’am.”
“Good,” I said and smiled. “I’ll see you soon, Heyai.”
“Safe journey, Your Majesty.”
I disconnected the com and had time to take a breath before Alba poked her head in through the doorway.
“What is it?”
“I just received a message from Aiz Cevalla requesting a moment of your time.”
“Is he live?”
She nodded. “He’s holding, ma’am.”
“Put him through,” I said. “And come on in here, I want your take on his reaction.”
The screen shifted as Alba sent the com link through, and she sat in the chair on the opposite side of my desk.
Aiz dipped his head at me. There were hints of dark circles under his eyes, and his hair was barely presentable. The background in my vision was conspicuously blank, leaving me to wonder again just where he was. “Empress Hailimi,” he said formally. “Thank you for taking my com.”
“Took you long enough to get in touch.” I gave Aiz a steady look. “A little too long.”
“I am sorry, Your Majesty. We’ve been rather busy.”
“Yes, shooting up my people.”
Aiz blanched. “Empress, that wasn’t—” He stopped, closing his eyes as he drew in a deep breath. “It was us, but it was not supposed to happen. You have my deepest apologies for the deaths and injuries to your people. If we had realized there were civilians in the way we never would have engaged the Farian forces. And when I realized you were there as well?” He bowed his head and shook folded hands at me. “It was too late to do anything but watch. I am sorry.”
“I appreciate the apology,” I said. “And your honesty, which I have to say is refreshing.”
“You already knew we didn’t know your people were there.” His warm brown eyes narrowed slightly. “How?”
“I’m sorry, you’re going to have to drag me into at least one more basement before I start telling you my secrets.”
The Shen’s grin was sharp as a blade. “I’ll keep that in mind.”
Hail, you are dancing on the edge of a fire, and you don’t need to get burned. The abrupt warning—in Portis’s voice, no less—startled me enough I almost gasped.
“Keep in mind you’ll also have to kill me first,” I said. “The Farians have accepted responsibility because they fired the opening shot and will be the ones responsible for reparations.”
“The Shen are more than prepared to do what is necessary for our part in this.”
I bit the inside of my cheek, pleased with finally getting a handle on what made Aiz tick. His pride was something I could use. “Your reparations will be to show up at Earth in two standard months willing to listen and open to finding a solution that will bring peace.”
“I thought—” He paused. “I thought the Farians refused to agree to your terms.”
“It would seem they have little choice now. If left to your own devices you and the Farians will murder the rest of us just to satisfy this feud of yours. I will not allow that to continue.” I kept my voice even, the cold chill of my clipped words sliding across the link to slip between Aiz’s ribs.
He winced and, for just an instant, looked ashamed.
“I will be on Earth. You and your sister will meet me there. You will follow my requirements for the peace summit when they are presented to you. And you will do so without complaint. Is that clear?”
“Absolutely, Your Majesty.”
“Good. I will see you on Earth.” I moved to disconnect and noticed Aiz’s expression. “What?”
“I’ve misjudged you again, Empress,” he replied, his lips curving into a smile. He winked. “See you on Earth.”
The screen vanished. I pressed fingers to my lips and shared a look with Alba.
“He acts like this is a game,” she whispered. “But the intensity behind his words makes it all a lie.”
“Yes,” I replied. “That’s precisely it. He doesn’t seem to care that we can see through that façade. I wonder sometimes if I’m not missing something else because of it, though.”
“How so, ma’am?”
“He’s been more honest than the Farians. They looked me in the face and lied to me about the incident. He at least admitted he was at fault.” I gestured at the empty wall where the screen had been and got to my feet with a muttered “Bugger me.”
“Ma’am? May I say something that might offend you?” She smiled sheepishly at my raised eyebrow. “Aiz scares you, doesn’t he? He beat you before you even realized you’d been dragged into this mess.”
“Should I not be afraid of a man who can kill me with a touch of his hand? I like to think I’m not nearly as reckless as the stories say.”
Alba got to her feet, brow furrowed in thought as she searched for the right words to say. “You’ve been trying very hard to be an empress, and succeeding at it. It would be normal for an empress to be afraid of a man who refuses to play by the rules. In your pursuit of your duty, you’ve forgotten who you are.”
I hooked my hands behind my neck and stared at my chamberlain. “Go on.”
“Ma’am, you are not just an empress. You are not some empty-headed noble raised in pampered seclusion.” Alba squared her shoulders and faced me. “You are Cressen Stone. You are the Star of Indrana. Neither of those people would be afraid of someone like Aiz Cevalla.”
“You have an enormous amount of faith in me, Alba,” I said, dropping my hands with a sigh.
“I have seen you, Majesty.” She reached a hand out, linking her fingers through mine when I took it. “We all watched you face death with such composure. I know you are struggling with it now. I know it is not easy. Don’t forget who you are in your pursuit of your duty.”
“You’re telling me I should behave more like a gunrunner and less like an empress?”
A smile peeked through Alba’s anxiety. “Yes, ma’am. Though I’ll deny it if Emmory asks.”
My laughter filled the room and I wrapped my arms around Alba, hugging her tight. “A secret just between the two of us,” I said. “Emmory would probably agree with you.”
34
I finished off the last of my saag paneer, humming in contented delight as I ran the final piece of roti around my plate and shoved it into my mouth. The mess hall aboard the Hailimi was mostly quiet, the sounds of my BodyGuards eating and the staff cleaning up in the back of the kitchen the only noises wafting through the air.
Hao pushed his plate away with a sigh and rubbed at the back of his neck. Dailun and Alba sat opposite us in quiet conversation.
Nursing the cup of chai Stasia had somehow managed to shove into my hands before I could grab a cup of regular tea on the line, I leaned back in my chair and looked around the room. Emmory had finished before me. Johar was still eating. Zin, Indula, and Iza were by the door; they were technically on duty and had eaten earlier, but I wanted them in the room for the discussion that was about to happen.
“Majesty?”
I smiled at Emmory. “I think we’re close enough, Ekam. If we wait for Johar to stop eating, we’ll be here another hour.”
It was impressive the way she flipped me off without slowing at all, and several Guards chuckled.
“Ladies, gentlemen, and enbies,” I said. “We are headed for Earth, as you all have no doubt heard, to facilitate peace talks between the Farians and the Shen. Since I am going to be in the thick of it, we’re here to discuss some basic rules I can require the participants to follow that will make your lives easier.”
“Call ’em out, people,” Emmory said. “Don’t stand on any ceremony here, but try to keep it from getting too chaotic.”
“If we use the embassy for the nego
tiations,” Indula said from the doorway, “it’s going to make controlling the situation a lot easier. Just the delegates on the property, no one else except for us.”
“That’s not a bad idea.” I saluted him. “I don’t know why Iza keeps saying you’re an idiot.”
“She’s jealous.” Indula grinned when Iza kicked him. “Limit the participants,” Johar said around a mouthful of food. “Four each with the warning that they need to be unanimous in their decisions. It keeps the numbers low, but if you require a unanimous vote you don’t have to worry about an even split deadlocking things.”
Heads nodded around the room.
“I would be firm with anything we propose,” Dailun said. “Do not offer it as a suggestion, but make it mandatory if they want the negotiations to proceed.”
“No weapons would be an obvious one, but I’ll say it anyway.” Kisah had her knees tucked up under her chin, her blond hair obscuring part of her face. “Except for us. We’ll have our weapons, right?” She looked Emmory’s way and he smiled.
“It’s going to be an extremely short negotiation if they say no,” he replied.
“Majesty?”
Holding up a hand until the laughter from Emmory’s comment had receded, I gave Jagana an encouraging nod.
“The Farians have to have skin-on-skin contact, don’t they? What about the Shen?”
“They both do,” Fasé confirmed from her spot across the table.
“Why don’t we make them cover up? Long sleeves and gloves, or …?” She wiggled her hands. “I know it seems silly, and it wouldn’t stop them if they were determined, but it would be enough of a hindrance, wouldn’t it?”
There was a moment of stunned silence.
“That is fucking brilliant,” Hao said, and saluted Jagana with his mug. She ducked her head at the praise.
“It actually is,” Fasé said, smiling. “Plus it’s going to piss the other Farians off something fierce. Only prisoners are required to cover their hands.”
“How will the Shen react?” I watched the other BodyGuards voice their approval for Jagana’s suggestion, pleased she’d found her way back after her mistake on Kurma.
“They should be fine with it. The Shen don’t have the same bias in regard to covering their hands,” Fasé replied. “If they’re not, it’s not like they have much of a choice when you get right down to it.”
I chuckled. “We’re going to Earth for peace negotiations, Fasé, not to start another war.”
The Farian lifted a shoulder, a study in casual nonchalance that chilled my blood as much as her words. “Sometimes wars start no matter what actions we take to try to stop them.”
It was more than a week later, the Hailimi speeding her way through the endless black of the space between the galactic arms containing the Indranan Empire and the Solarian Conglomerate, when I sat down with Fasé in my rooms to talk. At full warp, with three stops to refuel, it would take us six more standard weeks to reach Earth and I was trying to make the most of the downtime, piecing together as much of the Farian/Shen history as I could.
“Aiz and his father were there when the gods were killed?”
“Yes,” Fasé replied, her knees tucked up under her chin as she sat in the corner of the couch in my quarters. She was wearing a white dress with long sleeves that hid her hands. “They were the ones who killed most of the gods, though some of the others fell beneath their companions’ weapons. None of those Shen survived the fight.”
“How old is Aiz?”
“Older than me, Majesty. Possibly older than Sybil.”
Sybil was on the Farian ship with Fasé’s siblings. The trio had chosen to ride in their own vessel rather than with us, while Fasé had stayed aboard the Hailimi.
“Do you have any concept of how staggering that is?”
“I don’t suppose I can, Majesty,” she replied with a tiny smile. “It is just life for us. If anything it’s staggering to me how fast your lives go by.” She sighed. “In so many ways I envy you, though.”
“How so?”
“This conflict is endless, and it will remain so because those who started it are still alive. They still have all those old hurts and hatreds burning them up inside. We cling to those grudges because we know we have the time to see the revenge through. You humans—” She sighed. “You hate and you kill, but you forget, and you forgive also, and I think you do it because your lives are so fleeting.” She lifted her cheek off her knees and smiled sadly. “It’s why you forgave Hao, isn’t it?”
“I—”
The question stunned me into silence and I stared down at my hands. I’d explained the reasons to Gita as to the significance of his sacrifice, but none of those really said anything about my forgiveness.
But I had forgiven Hao. I’d done it without even really thinking about it, between one breath and the next.
“He’s my brother, Fasé. How could I not?”
“I know,” she said. “But Aiz is Adora’s brother by blood and I fear she will not forgive him even after the universe snaps itself back into place. It is not something you can just teach; but oh, if you could? Imagine the wars you could stop before they even started. Imagine all the lives you could save.”
Fasé’s eyes were glowing with the possibilities, and I felt my own heart beat faster in response. “I wouldn’t even know where to start,” I said with a soft laugh.
“Everyone starts with a choice, Majesty.”
The door slid open before I could reply, and Emmory came through. “Are you ready for this briefing, Majesty, or should I hold off a while longer?”
“No, we’re ready,” I replied after a moment, and waved a hand. “Bring everyone in.” I got up from the couch and wandered across the room as the others filed in, shaking my hands at my sides to dispel the restless anxiety forming from having so many bodies in my space.
“Emmory, you want to give us the rundown on the plans?” I said, and my Ekam gave me an understanding nod as I settled by the open door.
“The peace talks are going to be held at the Indranan Embassy in the Interstellar Swiss Complex. We decided it was the safest space and the easiest to control given the short notice. There’s already a squad of Royal Marines on the ground, but they will be supplemented by the contingent aboard the Hailimi and Major Gill’s team.
“All participants in the peace talks will be unarmed except the empress and her Guards. All Farians and Shen, including Fasé and her companions, will be gloved at all times.”
Fasé nodded. “It’s not a perfect solution, Emmory, but preferable to the alternative and essential to your protection. While I doubt things will devolve to the level of the Farians and Shen trying to kill each other with their bare hands, it’s always a possibility.”
“Is that even possible?” It was Indula who asked the question from his spot on the couch. Iza nodded in concert as did several other BodyGuards.
“For us to kill each other?” Fasé asked. “Certainly. It is—think of it as a battle of wills rather than a physical contest. The Shen have an edge in this. They have committed to their fight and committed to the idea of killing with their power.” She shook her head. “There are many Farians who will never be able to make that decision, even in defense of their own lives.”
“We’re not taking the chance. Uniform will be long sleeves and gloves,” Emmory said, looking around the room. “I want everyone painfully aware of how fast these people can kill any of us and leave the empress undefended. You are to keep yourselves armed and in between any Farians or Shen and the empress at all times, is that clear?”
The echoes of agreement bounced along the walls.
“I’m included in that, everyone, just in case you were wondering. I don’t want to risk someone coming for me and Hail being injured or killed instead,” Fasé said with a nod.
“The talks will start with Her Majesty meeting each group separately to get an idea of the complaints and how to proceed. From there it will be her call on how the talks con
tinue and in what format.” Emmory pulled up schematics for the Indranan Embassy from the console on my desk. “Here’s what we’re dealing with as far as security goes. There will be eight teams of …”
I looked around the room as Emmory detailed the layout and security for the embassy, my mind flashing back to the number of times I’d done this with Hao or Portis for jobs that were far less aboveboard. My BodyGuards watched Emmory intently. I could tell that the Gupta twins were both taking notes on their smatis while Muna and Jagana busily picked out faults in the security net and pointed them out to Emmory.
Kisah was leaning against Zin’s knee. Iza whispered something to Indula that made the man smile and tap her shin with the back of his hand. Ikeki was frowning and spoke quietly in Gita’s ear when my Dve prodded her.
Everyone seemed relaxed, but the undercurrent of tension hummed in the room like a live wire. The awareness that we were going to sit down with three groups of deadly aliens—all of whom hated each other to some degree—was there just below the surface of what looked like a regular briefing. We could plan all we wanted, but I knew it would take less than a heartbeat for anyone—Farian or Shen—to slip off a glove and put their hands on my people.
My people. I had come to terms with the notion that all the citizens of Indrana were my people, but it was still a faceless mass of humanity, and nothing compared to the swell of love in my chest when I looked over my BodyGuards. These women and men had agreed to give their lives for me. There were holes, spaces left for the ones who already had, and I felt each loss so keenly at times.
However, Cas had been right. I couldn’t prevent them from choosing their path. All I could do—should do—was be grateful that they’d chosen to spend it with me.
