“Too much?” the Emperor asked, very quiet.
“Not enough...!”
There was tenderness in the answer. “Help me?”
“Yes,” Lisinthir answered, and pulled the shirt over his head. He was far more dressed than the Emperor, who needed only drop his fur and shrug out of the clinic’s disposable gown, and in his eagerness he found his hands were trembling. They were trembling still when they skimmed up his lover’s sides and settled palm-down on his dark chest. The right color now. The right texture. Beneath it, a heart beating, steady and quick.
The Emperor moved into him and sighed against his hair, ruffling it. He arched wings round to trail their tips against Lisinthir’s flanks. In that embrace, close and calm, Lisinthir felt the knife-edge memories and sodden anguishes of his beloved’s captivity beginning to set into patterns, like stained glass in lead. He drew in another breath through his mouth, unable to hold still. “Beloved—”
“Perfection,” the Emperor murmured against his neck.
“The bed, please.”
A faint nod—through their skin, a stronger reply, welling up through the cracks. Lisinthir drew him back to the bed, brought the other male over him, let him be the one who decided who would be touched and when. Gave him the chance to reclaim the agency stolen from him in the Worldlord’s slave annex... and tried not to weep when the Emperor responded by giving it back to him. Tentatively, but with such trust. Lisinthir wrapped his arms around the crowned head and drew it down to him, drew the smell and softness of the mane, the unyielding cruelty of the horns, the aching emptiness of the mouth that could not kiss the way he desperately wanted to kiss. But licking they did, and shuddering, and it was close and good and silent—so silent that Lisinthir did not realize the shivering wracking his lover’s body was not solely desire, but the Change. Over him, dragon became Eldritch, became skin porous to emotion, became open lips and gentler body.
Against his mouth, the Emperor whispered, “I wanted to be in you.”
“You are,” Lisinthir said, and gathered him in. “Oh, you are...!”
They kissed one another through their tears, sharing their source. Same cup, Lisinthir whispered.
You gave it to me, Beloved. Perfection.
Later, entwined on the bed, the Emperor said, “My name is Kauvauc.”
Evidently, Lisinthir’s shock was sufficiently extreme to inspire a chuckle. If it was not the merriest of sounds, he was glad of having heard the Emperor finally laugh. “Surely your name was Kauvauc.”
“It is what they are calling me now, those who have decided I am no longer Emperor.” The Chatcaavan, once again in his proper shape, was tracing a design on Lisinthir’s chest with the side of a finger, holding the talon arched out of the way. “And it has never stopped being me. The part of me that was born named... to pretend he did not partake in my creation would be wrong. I am still Kauvauc. Just as I will always be Dainty.”
No shame accompanied that admission. Grief and exhaustion, yes. A cold acceptance of fact that stippled Lisinthir’s arms with gooseflesh. But there was a serenity to the male’s aura that Lisinthir found aweing, and the fact that the Emperor could tell and did not chide him for it made him wonder if the Emperor was as confounded to have reached this point as Lisinthir was to have witnessed it.
“Is that why you called me by my name?” he asked, quiet.
“Partly. But mostly because... when I was there I realized that a title could also be nothing. ‘The slave’. ‘The fragile one.’ ‘The human.’” The Emperor paused his caress, resting his palm flat. “The Emperor—that describes the Usurper to some. And me to others. The title does not care which of us uses it. It is above individual desires. To be Kauvauc is to be a particular Chatcaavan, one who is not described by his relationship to others. That is not a negative thing, when the relationship described can be a leash as easily as it can be a throne.”
“Not a very Chatcaavan thought,” Lisinthir observed.
“No,” the Emperor said. “And I would not have had it, had I not known you... and moreover, had I not known the others in the annex.” He closed his eyes. “Among the Chatcaava, I must be the Emperor, or I am no one. But I understand your names a little better now, Ambassador. And did not want you to think that I called you yours out of disrespect.”
Lisinthir shuddered and turned into him. “I knew the moment you used it that you meant the very opposite. It was... very affecting.”
“Very affecting,” the Emperor murmured. “You should try mine on me, then.”
“Shall I then?” Lisinthir asked. At the Chatcaavan’s steady attention, he finished, quiet, “Then, Kauvauc... when shall you take back what is yours?”
The shock that swept beneath the Emperor’s skin burned, though the male didn’t flinch. Only his pupils reacted, contracting in the enormous yellow-green eyes. The emotion faded slowly, leaving behind a raw sensation, like sunburned flesh.
Very softly, the Emperor said, “Is it mine to take back?”
“If you do not make it yours, the Usurper will make it his,” Lisinthir answered. “So I ask again. Kauvauc. When will you take up your title?”
The Emperor exhaled and managed a pained laugh. “How can I take it up, Lisinthir Nase Galare, when I have not yet set it down?”
Lisinthir laughed then, delight close to pain, pride sharp as knives. He cupped the Chatcaavan’s face and said, “Oh, my Beloved, who is Greatness. Yes!”
“It will not go as we had hoped,” the Emperor warned.
“It never does,” Lisinthir said. “And just as well, for we are never so good a judge of what must be as the Living Air, and the God and Lady.” He dropped a kiss on the dark nose. “We should shower and dress. The Admiral-Offense has been waiting to speak with you. And the Knife would dearly like to know that you are well.”
“The Knife?” The Emperor sat up, frowning. “How does he know where I am? And what befell me?”
“He was the second Seersa,” Lisinthir said. “And yes, there is a story to tell there. You will not like it.”
“No,” the Emperor said. “I don’t think I will. But let us see the Admiral-Offense first. If there is to be news, let me have it all at once.”
The Chatcaava knew, Lisinthir thought when he brought the Emperor to the conference room to meet them. They knew the magnitude of the transformation their Emperor had undergone. Only the Knife had been present to witness the Emperor’s durance, and Lisinthir knew better than to believe he’d shared those details with anyone, even Uuvek. But it hardly mattered. Washed, dressed, and once again wearing his true shape, the Emperor nonetheless drew behind him a mantle indescribable in its potency: an aura that forced the eye to seek him. Once upon a time, the Eldritch had read that beauty always had in it some strangeness. The male who had been Emperor before had been all a Chatcaavan would have expected in a male of that title. This Emperor… now had that strangeness. He was no longer predictable, and there was power in it. And beauty, Lisinthir thought. That also.
“Exalted,” the Admiral-Offense said with a quiver that ran the length of his wings. “You live…!”
“Huntbrother,” the Emperor said gravely. “So do you, and your fate seemed far more inevitable than mine.”
“Pure luck,” the Admiral-Offense said. “That we were able to escape pursuit and then that we were found.” He indicated Uuvek with the tip of his nose. “You have excellent resources to hand. Nor is he the only one. Exalted, many resent your overthrow and its implications for the Navy. The trouble is not a lack of wings to rise to your call… it is separating them from their traitorous comrades. We have begun this process but it will not go quickly.”
“No,” the Emperor murmured.
“And in the meantime, the Usurper is fostering the rupture that will destroy the Empire!”
The Emperor looked at him, then the Knife, Uuvek. His gaze rested last on Lisinthir before returning to the older male. “Huntfriend, the Empire is already doomed.”
“W-
what?” The Admiral-Offense stared, mouth agape. Then, outraged, “Will you not even fight for it?”
“I will, yes,” the Emperor said, and his dignity was impenetrable, like a deep, still pond. “But we must resign ourselves to the loss of large pieces of it.”
“But… but you don’t even know what’s going on! The pirates, the war with the freaks, the way the Usurper has connived to set the system lords at the Navy’s throat when the Navy has already been compromised by his perfidy—”
“And you must relate all these details to me,” the Emperor said. “But it will not change the truth, Admiral-Offense. Unless we face that truth… we will lose what little there is to gain.”
Lisinthir said, hesitant, “I’m not sure I understand. You will not aim to keep the Empire in one piece?”
“Perfection,” the Emperor said, regret in his eyes, “Even aiming, I will fail.”
That silence, broken only by the hush of the recirculated air filling the conference room… it was crushing. In his mind, Lisinthir saw the map of the Alliance and the Empire’s vast bulk and wondered how they would keep the galaxy from collapsing into chaos without someone to unify the Empire and rein it back. Was there then no hope?
“Finally!” Uuvek said.
“Hush!” the Knife hissed.
“Why should I be quiet?” Uuvek said. “Will the Emperor execute me for agreeing with him?” The male considered the Emperor, eyeing him from foot to crown. “I don’t think he’ll execute me for the insolence of speaking to him directly either. He doesn’t look the sort.”
“I’m not now,” the Emperor said. “Neither of you need fear insulting me. Though you, Knife… I would like to know what you are doing here. After your companion explains himself.”
“It’s his pet theory.” The Knife scowled, resettling agitated wings. “He’s held it for years.”
“That the Empire is unstable?” the Emperor asked.
“That the Empire is falling,” Uuvek said. “All the data is there. We have cycles of expansion and contraction, but every time we undergo one the results are more extreme and the culture more frayed. I gave us maybe forty years before we imploded. This time for good.”
Lisinthir could not contain himself any longer. “Then how will we survive?”
The Emperor’s chuckle was soft. “How else, Ambassador?” He lifted his brows. “What remains of this Emperor’s Empire must ally with the Alliance—true alliance, this time, not the mockery we perpetrated before—against everyone else.”
“We will all die!” the Admiral-Offense said, horrified.
“No.” The Knife sounded surprised, but looking up, his expression hardened. “No, we won’t. They only look soft, sir. Beneath the fur and the gentle words… there’s steel there. Steel and claws.”
“But to think that it might be done… it is madness!” the Admiral-Offense insisted. “How will we ever compel them to accept us? To trust us?”
Lisinthir met the Emperor’s eyes. “So strange,” he said with a quirk of a smile. “The things we begin in a bedchamber.”
“We began them long before the bedchamber. But we made them real there.” The Emperor considered Uuvek and the Knife. “And we make them real everywhere else, do we not. In every place we are willing to learn.”
“To Change,” the Knife said, fiercely.
“Yes,” the Emperor agreed. “Admiral-Offense, it is who we are. And we have held it apart from us for too long. It is not enough to rule. We must also Change.”
The Admiral-Offense was standing stiffly, wings tense. “It will not give us back the Empire we knew and swore to defend.”
“That Empire is already dead. It falls to us now to bring forth something from the corpse… and use that opportunity to create what we always desired. To bring the camaraderie and trust that represented the Navy at its best to the entirety of our society. Yes?”
“Glorious,” the Knife whispered.
“Finally,” Uuvek said again, satisfied.
The Emperor smiled a little before prompting the Admiral-Offense with a look. That worthy said, “It is… a goal worth striving for. Though I do not know it is possible, or that we will see it before we die.” Glancing at Lisinthir, the older male said, “And what says the Alliance to all this?”
Lisinthir’s smile was joy, was anticipation of the chase. Was triumph, that the Emperor had survived the crucible… and that there might not be an end to the work before them. What good a sword, without an honorable battle to use it in? “I think you will find the Alliance has been waiting for her huntbrother all this time.”
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
It was unfair that tailing a live vessel in Well was both nerve-wracking and boring. Maia was willing to explain the principles of what they were doing and how it was possible, but those explanations made little sense without the foundations that Sediryl didn’t know—yet. Studying the basics of flying a modern vessel occupied some of her time. She also read politics, another subject she had neglected in a fit of pique over the loss of her position in the Eldritch hierarchy. But there was only so much reading she could do before anxiety started giving her fingers nervous tremors, and her attempt to garden on the ship was strangely unsatisfying. Growing plants was more than putting them in pots. For her, at least. She needed the sun, the vagaries of the weather, the feel of the soil on her fingers and the light on her face. Hydroponics would never be her specialty, she concluded ruefully, no matter her degree in agronomy.
As a last resort, she unpacked her dog. Petting dogs was purported to lower blood pressure. She could only hope it was having this effect on her, because between her enforced idleness and the sleep broken by nightmares, she was beginning to feel haggard, enough to no longer want to look at herself in the mirror while washing up of a morning.
The days passed. She tried not to count them. She wrote numerous letters—to her father, her aunt Fassiana, to Liolesa, to Jahir and Lisinthir and Amber, even to Hyera and Mildred and her friends on the starbase—and sent none of them because they were traveling under comm silence. One notable afternoon she even wrote one to the Chatcaavan Slave Queen, and on a whim attempted to translate it into Chatcaavan with the aid of the computer’s lexicon. This only solidified her belief that she had no talent for languages, leaving her to hope this would not be problematic in a future queen.
She tried not to think about her future as a queen. Maybe Liolesa would look at this entire escapade and conclude her wayward niece was far too impulsive to put on a throne. Maybe Sediryl was too impulsive for a throne. Was the Galare talent for long term planning something that could be cultivated? Or did you have to be born with it? Goddess help her if so, because she was far too impatient to play a game as long as she sensed Liolesa was playing.
Wasn’t she?
Bells crawled into her lap and sprawled there, all rainbow-colored fluff, perfumed feet, and long-suffering sighs. Sediryl stroked the dog’s spine, shooing away the fish halo, and tried not to dwell on imponderables. The only reason she succeeded was because she drifted to sleep.
Naturally, Maia chose this moment to wake her. Precipitously.
“Alet. You should come to the fore. Now.”
Sediryl leaped from the chair, spilling her indignant pet, and ran for the bridge. She had just enough time to realize they were no longer in Well before her unease became full-fledged shock. “Maia? I don’t understand. Did we go back home?” She looked at the magnified view of the Fleet ships hanging in orbit around a dark planet, her disorientation extreme. “Is this the armada they’re assembling to meet the Chatcaava?”
Maia coalesced beside her and there were lightnings playing in her purple fur. “Alet. We are nowhere near the Alliance. This is where the pirate vessel has brought us.”
“What?” Sediryl stared at the ships. “Then why…”
“Those are captured vessels,” Maia said, voice hard. “And I assure you… the last thing on their minds is helping us.”
Sediryl fell into the copilot’
s chair. Her hands were too cold and too still. Moving them seemed beyond her. “But this… it’s enormous! This is a fleet, Maia!” she whispered.
“With modern weapons? With our modern weapons?” Maia said. “Yes. And there are several hundred of them. If the Chatcaava have convinced them to come in on their side….”
Sediryl glanced at her sharply. “But why does your tone suggest you think otherwise?”
“Because if I was a criminal and a cutthroat and a traitor, and someone invited me to join up with them to kill someone else, I wouldn’t be thinking of making an honest deal,” Maia answered. “I’d be thinking about how I could stab them in the back, too. Which makes this the worst of every situation, alet, because we don’t know what they’re planning, or what they’re going to do. This… this is a wild card. Are they going to fight us with the Chatcaava and then turn on the Chatcaava and kill them? Are they going to turn on the Chatcaava and fight them while they’re fighting us? Are they going to ignore everything and creep around the back of the Alliance and fight us while we’re fighting them?”
“They could hurt us.” Was her heart pounding too quickly?
“They could change the course of the entire war,” Maia said. “Unless we figure out what they’re going to do next… they could more than hurt us. Much more.”
Sediryl swallowed. “Well, then. We know why we have come. I take it they haven’t found us yet?”
“Not for lack of effort,” Maia said, pointing at the edges of the system. “They’ve seeded all the approaches with mines, and what they haven’t dropped mines on, they’ve thrown sensor platforms at. I haven’t moved us any closer. We need time to map the platform routes, see if we can find anything we can exploit. The Duster will keep us safe from most scrutiny, but it’s not the latest technology anymore, and seeing this…” The D-per shook her head. “I can’t assume anymore that they haven’t got sensor tech capable of finding us if we show up at just the wrong moment. We’re going to have to take this very, very carefully.”
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