Princess of the Void

Sykora steeples her fingers against the soft curve of her lower lip. “You’re asking me to do something against doctrine, aren’t you?”

“I’m not asking you to do anything. This is all me. I’m only asking you for permission. You’re the only one here who outranks me. Remember?” His knuckles brush her midsection. She leans into the touch. “I think there’s a way to reach them. I think there’s a different way to go about this, a way to get them to capitulate without having to blow one of their worlds into ashes.”

Sykora’s fang glows in the pale light of the scarring moon as she chews her lip. “You know I don’t relish this thing I have to do, dove, but—”

“This thing we have to do, Batty.” Grant takes his wife’s hand into his. “I’m doing it with you. I’m a Prince of the Taiikari Empire now, and I’m here to conquer Eqtora. I’ll work to make these people imperial subjects. I will. I’m not asking for us to leave them alone, I’m not arguing in favor of their self-governance. All I am asking is that you give me a chance. And if it works, we won’t have to destroy Taiqan. We’ll conquer them without a shot. We’ll let them feel all right.” He puts Sykora’s palm on his chest. “Like you let me. Meeting in the middle.”

“Grantyde, let’s—come on.” Sykora tugs his sleeve. “I don’t want to be on the deck for this conversation.”

Hyax is watching them as they depart the bridge. She catches Grant’s eye. She salutes. He salutes back.

Sykora pads across the carpeted hall beyond the command deck and beckons Grant into a side office they’ve furtively banged in a few times. He ducks his head habitually as he enters, but there’s no need; under the Princess’s strident orders, the archway has been resized to accommodate him.

“Grant.” Sykora parks her butt on the table and sits cross-legged; he takes the chair before her, which—sized as it is for a Taiikari male—barely fits him. “If we fail to follow through on the Imperial procedure, and it leads to disaster, we’re sunk.” She leans forward. Her red silk sash rides up her stomach. “That is the sort of quagmire that ends a Void Princess’s career. And I can’t even imagine what they’d do to you. They might revoke your citizenship. I can’t countenance that.”

“You can’t countenance mass murder, either, Sykora. I know you.”

“We don’t know what will happen as the clock winds down.” She twists to one side, her arm sweeping to encompass the attacking fleet. “As their attacks continue to fail and they realize how badly they’re outmatched, as the hours draw near, they’ll see sense.”

“The Malkesti didn’t.”

“The Malkesti are alien. Really alien. God love them, and their tapestries are quite gorgeous, but they’re Maekyonite-sized hivebrained arachnids, dove. You look into their eyes and there’s nothing recognizable. We met Ipqen. We saw that anger and fear in the councilor.”

“We did,” he says. “But we’re missing something. Maybe the faith they live with. They’ve never shed it, and I kinda see why. A religion that holds choice sacred. I might have stuck to that if I’d grown up with it.”

She smirks. “Knowing you, I don’t doubt it.”

“Maekyonites and religion have a long and complicated history,” he says. “Some of our most beautiful creations, some of our worst atrocities. And those religions weren’t globally unified, and they didn’t maintain the same chokehold that this one has even after globalization and democracy. From what I understand of the omnidivine, it’s sorta universal, right? Like it’s the blanket name for a whole quilt of religions you borrow and bind.”

She nods with new hesitation. As he’s been talking, her certainty has ebbed.

“This isn’t that,” he says. “It’s specific. In ways I don’t think we fully understand, yet. And it’s strong enough to keep an interplanetary civilization in its bounds. That’s not something either of us have ever experienced. I think it’ll sink us if we let it. But it could also save us.”

He scoots his seat in. She unfolds her feet past the lip of the table and rests them on his thighs.

“All I request is you let me work on this myself,” he says. “I swear to you I won’t take up space. I wouldn’t be trying this if I didn’t have confidence. You can keep preparing for the official method. And if the clock winds down, and it still hasn’t worked, let me present it to you and the command group. And you make your decision then.”

“And you’d accept it?” Sykora’s red gaze bores into him. “If I pulled the trigger as my Empress demands, you’d accept it? You’d stand by me?”

He takes a deep inhale. “I would,” he says. “If you’re right, and they evacuate, I would.”

A tremor clatters the golden hoops in her long ears. “What if they don’t evacuate? What if I kill millions? What if this is Malkest again?”

“You won’t. I can’t believe you would. You told me when you threatened Azkaii Trimond—”

“This isn’t Azkaii, Grant. This isn’t something I can say no to.”

“Sykora—”

“Just tell me.” She leans further forward. Her forehead is inches from his. “Please.”

“I would try,” he says. “I would try really, really hard, but I don’t know. I will always love you, but I don’t know if I could stay.”

Her eyes close. Her chest rises and falls. “Do it,” she says. “Make your plan. Any resources you need, tell me and you’ll have them.”

“Thank you, Batty.” He kisses the bridge of her nose. “I won’t let you down. I swear. And I won’t let the Empress down, either.”

That summons an uncertain smile from her. “What are you planning to do?”

“If I tell you,” Grant says, “you are going to either laugh in my face or throw me in the brig to keep me from doing it.”

“Oh.” Sykora sits back onto her elbows. “Lovely.”

“I need time and space and help to prove I’m not being totally nuts about this. What I really need is a connection to the listening post, somehow, but if it’s too much of a risk I’ll make do. We have that translator, Havnai. I can work with her. And maybe some of the chapel clerics. There’s a lot I need to understand about the omnidivine and the way Eqtoran religion works.”

“I don’t—” She blows a curtain of air toward the ceiling. “I don’t know about the clerics, Grantyde.”

He cocks an eyebrow. “Why not?”

She turns herself around on the table so her head’s dangling from the lip and she’s laying looking at him upside down. “The clerics, of course, are essential servants of the Empire. Of course they are. But they’re some of the only people on this ship that aren’t my direct subjects. If you’re going to attempt this, I want to ensure word about it doesn’t get back to the Imperial Core. It would reflect poorly on you if this was a failed attempt.”

“What if it works?”

“Well, if it works, it’d reflect poorly on you, anyway. But you’ll also have conquered a solar system, so there’s only so many spears they can throw at us. Either way, I’ll defend you like a rabid cave wolverine.” Her tail swishes in emphasis, hissing along the silk of her tunic. “And you will have your cleric. There’s only one I trust to keep mum about this thing you’re attempting. It’ll take a couple of days to bring him here, but I’ll retrieve him for you.”

“Who is he?”

“Brother Tymar of Indrik. Brother to all the firmament.” She reaches a finger up and pokes his chin. “Brother-in-law to you.”

“Am I about to meet the last member of the family?”

“You are,” she says. “And the only one I’d happily claim. Tymar is a lovely man. He’s always told me he’ll be there if I need him, and it’s always been a quiet guilt in me I’ve never called on him.”

“I don’t think we should fly him to the Pike,” Grant says. “There’s so many eyes on it. What about putting him at the listening post?”

“We have stealth transports, dove. It’s a bit of a risk, but even in the worst case, I have every confidence in our pilots to run that blockade. Their spacing is quite wide; slipping through should be elementary. It might honestly be less of a risk flying to the listening post than beaming a message to it. We have the measure of their ships already.”

“I’m going to get on one, then, and I’m going to fly to the listening post. I’ll rendezvous with your brother and with the experts there, and with Ipqen-mek-Taqa, and we’ll put together a proposal.”

“Grantyde.” She clicks her tongue. “I can’t just up and ditch the Pike in the middle of preparations, dove. There’s so much to get ready for the Eqtoran surrender.”

“Batty—”

She gesticulates as she speaks. “And even more if they refuse, God knows.”

“Batty.” He catches her hands. “I mean just me.”

“What? But—” Sykora’s eyes widen and dilate. Her spine compresses. Grant’s tiny wife shrinks even tinier. “You’d leave me alone?”

Grant’s heart does a U-turn. “Maybe we could, uh. Maybe we could fly the team from there to the Pike. I know there’s a no-aliens rule, but—”

“No.” Sykora blinks rapidly. “No, no, I’m being ridiculous.” She shakes the coiled tension from her shoulders. “No, Grant. It’s a good plan. It’s what you should do. It’s good.”

“Are you sure?”

She nods. “You’ll figure it out in no time, and I’ll see you soon and you’ll have something brilliant for me. And I’ll just—we’ll just have a little while, in the meantime.” Her smile doesn’t reach her eyes. “To see how much of that resilience I’ve managed to build. That’s all. It’ll be okay.” She sounds like she’s trying to convince herself most of all.

“I’ll—” I’ll call you every day, he was about to say, but he can’t, can he? Not with the threat of discovery looming over them. “I’ll work as quick as I can.”

She slides off the table and into his lap. “You’re not gone yet, darling. And it’ll take a couple of days to get word to my brother and retrieve him.” Her butt nudges into his crotch. Her thighs are warm atop his. “And we are going to spend those two days stuck to one another like lampreys.” She settles back against his chest.

He rests his chin between her budding horns and gazes with her out the conference room window at the progress Hyax’s gunners are making.

“We should return to the command deck,” he says.

“Mmhmm.” She shuts her eyes and doesn’t move. He buckles his hands across her stomach.

The plasma of the Pike’s cannons flare as they drag north along her sigil’s left axehead. He watches his wife’s warship inflict the largest-scale destruction he has ever witnessed.

(So far.)

***

Nightfall never comes to Laudr.

The sun cycles down and the dark doesn’t come. High above the planet, a thin strand of light lances from the invisible alien vessel to Winvr’s distant chalky surface. So bright is the destruction that the half-formed landscape glows in eerie, flickering violet.

Hroq gazes out the vast vaulted window above the obsidian altar. The huddling contingent of ecclesiasts and cerebrants are vastly outnumbered by the chattering throng around the ivory altar that faces it.

He’s seated in the middle of the kirk. Moran’s hand is tight in his. Her thumb draws little circles on his wrist. They were going to stay home with Aqva today, pigging out on roe cakes and watching horror serials. Then the TV became an alien’s face and the message came down, and Aqva had to buckle her armor on and run to work, and Moran couldn’t stop crying, and now they’re at temple watching the sacred exchange.

The argument tonight is the only argument anyone’s having.

“My mother and my mother’s mother spent their lives making this world habitable.” A woman he doesn’t recognize has jostled her way to the ivory mic. “They want to glass it, they’re gonna glass me with it. What kind of world do we have waiting around for us on the other side of this? Huh? An Empire? No, ma’am. There’s one last choice before choice is gone. And I’m gonna take the one that matters. I’m gonna take the one that shows those sky slavers up there who the children of Eqt are. To send a message to the ones above and the ones who are left. If I have to burn to shed that light, I’ll burn.”

A rumble of voices follows. Consternation, sure, and disunity. But strains of approval, too. In the long oval pews, singly or in pairs or threes, Hroq’s temple family are scooting toward the kirk’s ivory side. The humming music changes, rebalances. Its minor key sharpens.

Hroq chews his xhurr leaf nervously. Moran's the big xhurr fan of the household, but he's found himself in need of it more often. Otherwise, the music feels like it's leaving him behind.

“Siblings. Please.” A slate-colored keeper, her fringe mottled with worry, has captured the obsidian altar. “If we don’t let people flee the planet, is that not as egregious a sin as the one they’re threatening? Keeping the ports locked down is complicity.”

“Complicity?” An unamplified man bellows to be heard from the ivory altar. “We’ve got laws, sister. Ain’t none of those attempted flights are authorized.”

“Nobody’s got to tolerate piracy or unlicensed takeoffs. But they’re trying to stay alive. They’re trying to escape. How can we blame them?”

“There is no escape.” That’s sister Maqi. She taught Hroq algebra. “Not from this.The skies will show to burn and melt the edifices of Eqt and they are. All the blades of the children of Eqt will turn from its hide and so it’s been. You all know me. I’m proud to know many of you. I’ve never been a brimstone sort of woman. Snorted at the armageddon folks. But we were given eyes to see. And goddamn if it ain’t the Tamuraq. Tamuraq is here. Anybody who doesn’t think so is dunking their heads in the murk.”

“Siblings.”

All Ecclesiast Noma needs is the one word and the churning voices are silenced. The wizened keeper stands in the center of the room, at the gray altar, framed by the darkwood shelves of the Library Sacrosanct. She lifts the golden mantle from the altar’s surface, and lays it across her shoulders. The gazes of the kirk solidify and bond like freezing ice. Noma has slipped from qer day-to-day identity and identifiers. Qe now speaks with the breath of the gods. The verse of the sacred word.

A sharp inhale from Hroq’s keeper. Moran idolizes Noma. Who doesn’t?

“The chant tells us the holiness of the gods below is reflected in the self-determination of their children,” Noma says. “That’s what separates us from the beasts of burden and the stones and the evergreens. The Song of Aeons—you folks know your Song of Aeons, don’t you? Song of Aeons says: Such was the world made—”

Ecclesiast Noma only needs to sing the first few words for the whole kirk to join in tri-part harmony.

“That the fate of our children might rest within their own minds. That by their hands a paradise is built, atop the ice and below the ice.”

The belonging flares in Hroq’s chest with the syllables joined with his neighbors. The unity.

“Beautiful, siblings. Beautiful, and true.” Noma slaps qer palm on the lectern in time to the song. “But I want to read to y’all from another songbook. I want to tell y’all about what to do when the sky sets on fire. When paradise melts onto your feet. I want to talk about one of the most sacred choices you can make.”

A rustle of anticipation and bated breath. Hroq finds his lungs as arrested as his neighbors’. Noma stands on tiptoe and reaches to the high shelf of the Library, to a book limned with dust that shines in the bonfire light like the luster of prophecy unveiled.

The spindly little ecclesiast drops the book onto the lectern with a leaden cemetery-gate clunk. “I want to sing to you from the Book of Thorns.”