Chapter 12 - Negotiations
The drums never stopped.
They were not war drums, nor part of any official ceremony. They were three old drums that vibrated in the central square of the camp out of habit, not by command. Two elders and a clanless boy played them. Sometimes no one listened. Sometimes not even they knew why they kept playing. But they did it anyway, as if they were afraid of what might happen if the rhythm ever faltered.
Nuka walked past them without looking.
He carried a bucket full of bones. It was not a task he had been assigned, but he did it anyway, every day. He took the remains of discarded offerings and carried them to the dumping area behind the butchers’ tents. The bones still had meat on them in some cases. The camp dogs followed him in silence, without coming too close. They knew they were not allowed to touch anything until he threw it away.
The bucket dripped a thick, dark liquid that drew a brief trail on the reddish ground.
"You don’t have to do that," a voice said as he passed.
It was a woman from the Arvak clan, sitting on a stone bench, sharpening a spear. It was not a kind remark; Balmorans disliked anyone doing work that was not theirs to do, especially if that someone was… short.
Shorter than everyone.
Shorter than any Balmoran ought to be.
That made him, in their eyes, a flaw in his own bloodline.
Nuka did not answer. He glanced at her, barely, without slowing down, and kept going.
The woman went back to silence, although her expression said what she had not: secondhand shame. It was the usual reaction. Always the same. He no longer registered any difference.
When he reached the ritual dump, he emptied the bucket without effort. The sound of the bones falling was almost sweet. Nuka nudged them into place with his foot, as if they still had a shape worth honoring. Then he stood a moment, looking at the pile. The flies formed a slow veil, a thick tide that rose as the sun heated the air.
He crouched and pulled out a small rib from among the viscera. He brought it to his face. Sniffed.
"You’re not one of mine," he murmured in a neutral tone.
He set it aside, separated from the rest. There was something almost ceremonial in that gesture, even if he did not consider it a ceremony. It was more like… order. An order only he seemed to see.
He walked back toward his tent.
It was made of urka hide and petrified branches. The floor was bare earth, no matting. A low bed, far too low for a Balmoran, but he did not have the height to demand anything else, a long knife on a stone, and three jars filled with yellowish liquid were the only things that decorated the interior.
Sitting in a squat, his back against the canvas, Nuka drank a sour brew. He did not grimace. He never did. The bitterness went down without resistance. It was a familiar taste, old, the only one that had never betrayed him.
The communicator vibrated.
"Nuka Vak’Zarr," a deep voice sounded.
The device was crude, nailed to a column of bone. The symbol of the Circle was engraved on the metal, five clans, five points, an empty center.
Nuka stood up slowly and pressed the button. The screen flickered and Kren Vak’Zarr, his father, appeared.
Kren wore the ceremonial headdress. Not out of respect for his son. He was simply in the middle of other, more important matters.
"Did I interrupt your meditation, son?"
Nuka did not answer.
Kren tilted his head, annoyed.
Talking to Nuka was always like that, blows against a rock.
A low rock, on top of everything.
"Someone told me you are hauling bones. As if you were a servant of Bagdur."
"They were in the wrong place," Nuka said, simply.
Kren snorted.
"And you are going to fix the order of the world?"
Silence.
The older Balmoran adjusted his claw necklace. His hands were stained with red pigment up to the knuckles.
"There was an attack on the Capitol," he commented in the tone of someone talking about the weather. "Several of Bagdur’s soldiers fell."
Nuka’s eyes sharpened a little.
"And the do-gooders did not say anything?" he asked, without emotion. "I do not recall receiving that information."
"It has not been released yet. It was a quick operation. A diversion, they say. But they went where they should not have gone." He paused briefly. "We are not going to let it slide. Bagdur feels it. He wants it paid. And we are going to demand it."
"Sacrifices."
"Sacrifices," his father repeated. "Not of ours. Of theirs. Let them feel it. Let us feed the lord of shadows."
Nuka nodded, barely.
"Why tell me?"
Kren rested his elbows on a table, outside the frame.
"Because you are the only one who still plays with bones as if you understood what they mean. I thought you might like to know we are going to give him a new one. A big one." And he added, "And because I need you ready. They might send you to fetch it."
The screen flickered. Kren’s face seemed less imposing with the grainy image, but his voice still carried its edge.
"I spoke with the front. They do not want you near them. They say you make them uncomfortable."
"I do not talk much."
"That is not the problem. The problem is the way you look at people. As if you could skin anyone who breathes harder than you do," Kren said. "Although, well… breathing harder than you is easy."
It was an insult disguised as a joke. A reminder of his height.
On Balmora, measuring less meant being worth less.
Nuka knew it. He had never argued. He had only survived by not needing height.
Kren sighed, as if tired of his own son.
"We know who you are. And what you are. I made you. Your mother too. Between the two of us… we got this. But you killed Varus, Nuka. And even if we already talked about it, the shadow does not go away."
"He offered himself," Nuka said.
"Yes. And you were there to pick up the knife. It was easy for you, wasn’t it?"
Nuka thought.
"Easier than the second time."
Kren closed his eyes, irritated.
"I do not want to know."
A long, thick silence followed.
"Listen to me. Something big is moving. Whole planets do not want to keep marching with the do-gooders. You know that. But we need order. You are not order. You are a blade. You are chaos."
Another pause. This one heavier.
"Do not make me justify your existence again. I already have enough with claiming you are still useful."
Nuka lowered his gaze. Not as submission. As calculation.
He was always calculating.
Where to stand.
What weight to carry.
Which bone to separate.
"When?" he asked.
"Soon. I will let you know. For now, stay away from the children. And from the dogs."
He cut the connection without saying goodbye.
Nuka left the tent.
Day in Pyra’gul smelled like boiled bone. There was no wind. Only the buzz of round insects hitting the dry-skin standards. He crossed the open ground without haste. The Balmorans watched him pass the way one looks at something that should have been taller, stronger, more… Balmoran. Every glance was a silent judgment.
A child ran by in the distance. Saw him. Stopped. Lowered his head. Walked away.
Children always knew. Earlier than adults did.
They knew who needed to be kept far away.
Nuka sat on a stone bench. He looked at the central fire. It burned without shape.
He did not think of Varus.
He did not think of his father.
He did not think of the attack.
He thought of the rib he had set aside that morning. Whether it would be of use. To something. To someone. To some order other than this one.
Because if not…
What was the point of carrying the bones at all?
The third dawn found them still walking.
The sky over Tau Ceti IV had turned into a uniform crust of low, colorless clouds, as if someone had erased the violet and left only a dirty haze. The crystal formations repeated themselves with an almost mathematical cruelty: spires jutting from the ground, cracked plates that vibrated with every step, tiny flashes along the edges that tricked the eye and made it seem as if something moved at their sides.
They had been marching for more than a day and a half, with brief, calculated stops. Constantina knew it because she had learned to tell time by the weight in her feet: when the boots started to feel like another person hanging from her legs, she knew they were near thirty hours. When the silence among the soldiers grew denser than the wind, she knew they had gone beyond that.
According to the map and the tracker, in two days, if they did not veer off, if nothing exploded where it should not, if no one died on the way, they would be at the end of the Kyros valley, just before the ocean. "If we do not fall behind," she thought. That kind of conditional had become almost a private joke with herself.
"Shorten your stride, Div," she murmured without turning. "Do not break the formation."
She felt the boy stumble once, hurry two steps, then return to his place at her left. Chuet’s breathing sounded ragged just behind her, as if he were chewing the air with his teeth. Diemano, at her right, kept the pace with his usual precision, not a single centimeter more, not one less.
A few yards back, at a deliberate distance, came the Blue Stars. They did not make the same effort to march in silence. Every now and then a broken burst of laughter reached them, an insult, the clatter of metal hitting rock. Constantina could already recognize some of the voices: a deep grunt that almost always ended in a cough, Cruger; a shrill laugh that cut the air like glass; a sharp whistle that sometimes turned into a song.
The wind hit them from the side, lifting a fine layer of mineral dust that clung to armor and eyelids. The constant vibration of the crystals ran up her legs like an internal hum.
When the system’s invisible sun began to sink behind the wall of clouds, Constantina raised her fist.
"Stop."
The footsteps faded little by little. She chose a shallow depression between two slanted crystal plates, wide enough to spread the squad out and let the campfires be seen from not too far away. Or at least, not more than those of the Blue Stars, who would probably manage to set half the valley on fire if they tried.
"Same procedure," she ordered. "Chuet, Div, supplies. Diemano, first perimeter. Hishio, Yolanda, second sweep. Garran, weapons. I want the safeties checked three times. I do not want stupid accidents at this point."
The "Yes, Hand" came almost in unison, although with different tones. Chuet shot off toward a strip of old crates and structures; Div followed with that clumsy mix of enthusiasm and lack of coordination that always made him look like a lost guest at the war.
Constantina dropped her pack with a measured motion and knelt to check the tracker. The oval device gave off the same faint blue glow, marking the line of march they had followed. She made a mental note: they had advanced as planned. Nothing remarkable. Nothing heroic. Some part of her was grateful for that mediocrity.
On the other side of the depression, the Blue Stars spread out with less order. They drove stakes into the ground at random, threw blankets over the rock, kicked small crystals just for the noise. Constantina saw Cruger sit on a raised rock, like a deformed king on an improvised throne. From there, he overlooked both groups.
Chuet and Div came back laden with dried wood pieces, a rusted section of some old structure, remains of a broken ammunition crate. Div also carried a bent metal sign fragment that showed only the shadow of an inscription worn away by time.
"This one was not going to explode, right?" he asked, lifting it.
"No, but if you keep waving it around I am going to shove it in your mouth," Garran growled, snatching it away. "Come on, leave something still."
Chuet crouched right away to start building the fire. Div, true to himself, circled him twice before deciding to sit exactly where he got in the way most.
"Div," Constantina said, without raising her voice. "Let him work. Go and…" she searched for something irrelevant, "check your ammo is complete."
"I already counted it twice," he replied. "I can count it again. Third time makes it safer."
He walked away, counting under his breath, touching each cartridge as if they were beads on a rosary. Constantina watched him for a second, that uneven walk, that habit of talking only to himself. Seeing him like that weighed on her more than the hours of marching.
"He is not going to amount to anything, Hand," Garran muttered, without sarcasm this time, only with tiredness. "The first day the bullets come at us from the front, he is going to stand there counting something else."
"As long as he counts them on our side, better," Chuet cut in, trying for a lighter tone as he flicked the lighter against a piece of old cloth.
Constantina was about to answer when a clipped, too-loud laugh came from the right. She did not need to look to know it was one of the Blue Stars. She followed it, involuntarily, with her ear. A murmur, words she did not quite catch, then a short whistle as someone called another over.
"Hey, kid."
Cruger’s voice carried clearly. There was something in that raspy, wet timbre that made even the wind seem to quiet down to listen.
Constantina lifted her head. Div was halfway between their fire and the strip where the Blue Stars were pushing crates and drawing knives. He hesitated. Looked first at her, then toward the voice.
Cruger snapped his fingers.
"The one with the lost face. Come here a second."
Div took one uncertain step. Before he could take the second, Chuet jumped to his feet, almost dropping the lighter into the fire.
"Div," he called, quickly. "Come here. I need you to help me with this."
The boy turned toward him, confused.
"But he called me…"
"I am calling you too," Chuet said, coming closer and grabbing his elbow with a firmness he rarely used. "And you march with me. You are going to get lost if you wander off."
Div looked at him, doubt wrestling with an obedience learned under blows. In the end he nodded, almost grateful that someone decided for him. He let the half-step toward the Blue Stars die and went back to the circle of the fire, glued to Chuet like a short shadow.
From his rock, Cruger tilted his head. Constantina caught a glimpse of his crooked smile, saw his lips move as he murmured something to the men around him. Harsh laughter followed, contaminating the air.
The fire finally caught. The small flame grew, feeding on the scraps of wood and cloth. Heat rose slowly, a rough caress on their faces.
Diemano came closer, never taking his eyes off the horizon.
"They saw us, Hand," he said quietly. "They saw us not going toward them. That is an answer too."
"I know."
Constantina turned the phrase over in her head, weighing it. "To go or not to go" had stopped being a choice a long time ago. That day, the simple act of staying on their side of the fire was already a statement.
Night fell without visible stars. There was only a bluish gloom, filtered through the crystals, that made edges look harder. The improvised camp filled with sitting shadows, resting weapons, short whispers.
Constantina set the same watch rotation, the same list of responsibilities. She was getting used to hearing her own voice give orders, and that, in a way, was what unsettled her most.
Once she finished assigning shifts and checked the perimeter Hishio and Yolanda had marked, she looked for Chuet. She found him a few meters from the fire, half crouched, rifle across his knees, staring at the ground.
Div Kut was already asleep, curled around his pack, clutching his rifle against his chest. His breathing was uneven, little snorts like those of a boy having mild nightmares.
Constantina approached slowly. Chuet looked up, as if he had been waiting to be caught.
"What happened today?" she asked, directly. "And do not tell me nothing, because I saw you jump as if someone had aimed at your heart."
Chuet pressed his lips together. He looked at Div, then at the far glow of the Blue Stars’ fire. Finally he took a deep breath, like someone about to dive into icy water.
"Cruger called him," he said. "Called him. The kid with the lost face, those were his words." He spat the phrase out with disgust. "He made… comments."
"Be specific."
"Specific," Chuet echoed, with tired sarcasm. "Fine. He called him over, said he was growing up nicely. That when we got through the valley he would teach him things real soldiers learn." His fingers tensed around the rifle strap. "He made a gesture with his tongue, Hand. One of those you learn to recognize even before you know what they mean."
Constantina felt something rise in her throat, something sour. It was not surprise. It was confirmation of a disgust she carried pre-installed.
"Did Div understand?"
Chuet hesitated.
"Not completely. I do not think so. He looked more confused than anything. He looked at me like he was trying to decide whether it was a joke. If he knew exactly what Cruger said, he would be more scared. Maybe that is the only good thing about this."
Silence settled between them, filled by the crackling of the fire and the distant mumble of a ragged song on the other side. Constantina realized she was clenching her jaw so hard she could feel a pulse at her temple.
"He is not going to touch him," she said, slowly. "He is not touching any of you. If he tries, I will kill him myself. I do not care what Roq, or Devouir, or the damned separatist union have to say."
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Chuet gave a brief, humorless smile.
"I am not sure they will let you," he said.
"They will be busy counting corpses," she replied. "And if they are not, they can come to me."
Her voice came out harsher than she expected, but she did not soften it. She needed it that way.
Chuet studied her for a moment, with a different kind of respect, less military and more… human, almost.
"Div should not be here," he added in a lower voice. "Not because of Cruger or the war alone. Not like this. He does not have the head for it. He gets lost when you count in threes. Sometimes he forgets to check the safety unless you remind him twice. It is not that he does not want to. He just cannot. You know that."
Constantina glanced sideways at the sleeping boy. The young features, the faint frown even in rest, hands clamped around the rifle like it was a metal stuffed toy.
"I know," she admitted.
Chuet waited. There was more behind that I know, and he sensed it.
Constantina sighed, letting the air leak out slowly between her teeth.
"Do you know who General Diara Kut is?"
"The one from the Lurien offensive, yes. The one they say took three platforms with half the planned troops. That Kut."
"That Kut," Constantina repeated. "Diara is… a living legend. They put her on recruitment posters, in speeches. Some call her the mother of the front. Half the cadets cut their hair like hers." She let out a small laugh with no humor. "Div is her son."
Chuet blinked, genuinely surprised.
"Div… Kut?" he repeated, as if the pieces only now clicked. "Of course. I am an idiot. I had never thought of it."
"You are not the only one," Constantina said. "He does not go around telling people, and neither does Diara. She cannot afford it being known that one of her most… fragile… soldiers carries her blood."
She looked at the boy again.
"She tried to keep him away from the front. At first. I had him as a cadet in logistics simulations, rear positions. He was bad. Not lazy-bad. Bad as in he messed up adding crates. Too much information blocked him. But he tried. That destroyed Diara. He is her only son. Her only biological legacy. The others…" she made a vague gesture, as if brushing ash from her fingers, "war did not let them grow up."
Chuet swallowed.
"So she sent him to the front."
"She forced it," Constantina corrected. "No one was going to say no to her. She is Diara Kut. If she asks for her son to have a post in a real squad, the only question they ask is where to place him. She says that way she honors the family name. That if she asks hundreds of mothers to give up their sons, she cannot hide her own."
Her voice hardened repeating those words.
"We honor him so much we put him within reach of people like Cruger," Chuet muttered. "Nice way to protect the legacy."
Constantina did not answer right away. The wind slid between the crystal plates and brought a low hum, as if the planet were laughing at them.
"Div does not have the capacity to command anything," she said at last. "But he can follow orders. Hold the line. Fire when told. That is enough for the union. And it is enough for Diara to say her son is at war. Even if he does not fully understand why."
"And for you?" Chuet asked. "Is it enough for you?"
Constantina took a second she probably did not have.
"No," she admitted. "But I am not the one signing the assignments. I am the one marching them. And now I am also the one who has to try to bring him back. If I can."
Chuet nodded, as if that confession placed them on some shared, unnamed ground.
"It is good you told me," Constantina added. "If Cruger goes near him again, you let me know before he has time to open his mouth. Him or anyone else. I am not going to assume these bastards only burn houses."
"Done."
They stayed in silence for a while, watching the fire. Div shifted in his sleep, muttered something unintelligible, hugged the rifle tighter.
That was when the shadow appeared at the edge of the hollow.
"May I come closer?"
The voice was different. It did not have the rasp of the Blue Stars, nor the dry bureaucratic tone of the command officers. It was clear, well-modulated, as if someone had taken the trouble to train it.
Constantina raised her head. A man stood a few steps away. He wore the same blue star emblem on his chest, but everything else seemed to belong to another army: his armor was impeccably clean, without the improvised patches the others had; his boots were polished to the point of throwing back blurry reflections of the fire; his hair was short and slicked back, not a strand out of place. No obvious scar marred his face, only a thin line near the corner of his mouth, so discreet it looked more like a worry crease than a war mark.
"Heriak Volosko," he introduced himself, placing a hand over his chest with an almost ceremonious gesture. "Second in command of the Blue Stars."
He did not offer his hand. He was not that out of place.
Constantina straightened where she sat. She did not invite him in explicitly, but she did not send him away either. That was enough for Volosko to take a couple of steps and stand within the circle of firelight.
"Hand of the squad," he said, inclining his head slightly in her direction. "Constantina Dull, if my briefing was correct."
"It was," she replied. "What do you need?"
Volosko lowered his eyes for a moment, as if sorting his words.
"First of all," he said, "I would like to apologize for my commander."
Constantina raised an eyebrow.
"For which of all his actions?" she asked, dry.
A shadow of a smile crossed Volosko’s face, quick, almost guilty.
"For the ones you heard," he answered. "And for the ones your men heard more clearly. Cruger…" he searched for a word that was not an outright insult, "has not been stable, let us say, for some time. The union hires him for results, not for his ability to coexist with others. I, however, do have to coexist with him. And with you."
He took the time to look at Chuet, who stared back at him with a mixture of mistrust and curiosity.
"I am not going to ask you to trust us," Volosko went on. "That would be absurd. I only wanted you to know that, at least on my part, I will do what I can so that certain lines are not crossed. Especially where your younger soldiers are concerned."
His gaze slid, just barely, toward Div, still asleep.
Constantina noticed the way he measured the distance, how he seemed to register everything around him without looking straight at it. He did not have the chaotic energy of the other Blue Stars. He was, in a sense, a different kind of danger.
"I appreciate the intention," she said. "But your control over Cruger does not sound impressive."
"It is not," Volosko admitted without taking offense. "But sometimes it is enough if someone is there to remind people there are eyes on them. He does not care much about authority, but he does care about not looking like a clown in front of the troops. If he goes too far in front of me, he loses that fear. And Cruger likes people to fear him."
He gave a small shrug.
"It is a miserable balance, I know. But it is the only one I have."
Chuet let out a brief chuckle.
"Sounds like you are the responsible adult in a band of arsonists," he said.
Volosko looked at him, and his smile became a little less automatic.
"Something like that."
The fire cracked, sending a spark upward that went out quickly in the cold air. Constantina decided that if they were going to have this conversation, she might as well not dance around it.
"Why are you here?" she asked. "Beyond the official line you have surely memorized. Why did the Blue Stars join this war?"
Volosko took a second before replying. He did not seem surprised by the question. He seemed, rather, to be evaluating how much honesty was worth it.
"It depends on who you ask," he said at last. "Some, for money. The union pays well for tasks no one else wants, and we have lived off that for years. Every explosive we plant, every building we leave in ruins, has a price. The price goes up when the enemy is afraid just hearing your name. In that regard, Devouir has been generous."
He counted on his fingers, almost as if making an inventory.
"Others, for glory. They like to be called Firemen, to have stories invented about us. They are addicted to the look of terror in people’s faces before something burns. I suppose it is the cheapest version of purpose they could find."
He stopped a moment, looking toward his own camp. At that distance, the Blue Stars were just shadows moving sloppily around oversized bonfires.
"And then there are the dreamers," he continued. "The ones who believe that when all this is over, when the union wins or loses or whatever happens, someone will remember that we were on the right side. That we will get a good position on some council, or a parcel of land, or a title. They see themselves as future governors of ruins."
The way he said dreamers made very clear what he thought of those expectations.
Constantina looked straight at him.
"And you?" she asked. "Which group are you in?"
Volosko held her gaze. His eyes were light, a washed-out gray that was neither quite cold nor quite warm. There was a different sort of exhaustion in them than in Kael or Rudolph, less weight of decisions, more of constant adaptation.
"I…" he began, and the corner of his mouth curved faintly, as if he were about to admit something shameful. "I do not believe in glory. Or in titles. And if it were about money, I would have chosen something more stable than playing in other people’s wars."
He adjusted his armor slightly, as if saying it out loud had shifted its weight on his shoulders.
"For me, this is the best way I found to survive."
There was no drama in the sentence. Just a simple statement.
"Survive what?" Constantina insisted.
Volosko gave another small shrug.
"Time," he said. "Shifting allegiances. Commanders falling out of favor. Planets that stop being important overnight. If you are a useful Blue Star, there is always someone who has an unpleasant task to hand off. You can always sell your skill to whoever pays. If you stay put in one place, if you try to be a respectable citizen, you become collateral damage in someone else’s first bad decision."
Chuet snorted.
"How optimistic."
Volosko looked at him with something that might have been compassion or pure calculation.
"I did not say it was pretty," he said. "I said it works. I have been through more campaigns than I like to count. I am still here. For someone like me, that is already a kind of victory."
Constantina let the words settle. In another context, she might have seen something admirable in the blunt honesty of his reasoning. On Tau Ceti IV, listening to him with his face half-lit by a makeshift fire, she could only see a tidier version of the same problem: war as a trade, war as shelter for people who did not fit anywhere else.
"Survive at whose expense," she said, almost without realizing it.
Volosko inclined his head slightly.
"That is the question asked by people who can still choose," he answered. "I stopped asking it a long time ago. Sometimes that helps with sleep."
He let the line hang between them. He glanced once more at Div, at the ring of soldiers around the fire, at the rim of the hollow where Diemano still stood on watch, firm, a dark point against the horizon.
"I do not want to disturb your rest any longer," he added. "I wanted you to know that as long as I am breathing, I will try to ensure what Cruger did today does not happen again. I am not asking you to trust me. Only to keep it in mind when you decide where to point first."
He turned away with the same neatness with which he had arrived. As he climbed the slope, the firelight drew the clean line of his boots and the impeccable edge of his uniform. He looked almost from another world, until the shadow of the blue star on his back reminded them exactly who he belonged to.
Chuet watched him until he disappeared behind a crystal column.
"I did not dislike him that much," he admitted in a low voice. "That is the worst part."
"That is the most dangerous part," Constantina corrected.
She said it without rancor, without explicit hatred. Simply as one more truth in the growing list of unpleasant truths she had been collecting since she set foot on Tau Ceti IV.
She stood up slowly. She walked over to Div and, without waking him, adjusted the rifle so it would not dig into his neck if he moved in his sleep. The boy murmured something about houses of fire and rolled over, curling up a little more.
Two more days. Two days to the end of the valley. Two days of marching between men who saw war as salary, as shield, as a way to keep existing while everything else collapsed.
Constantina pressed her armor against her chest.
She was also, in some way, surviving. But she was not willing to pay for other people’s survival with the bodies of her lambs.
As she settled in for her brief rest before second watch, she let the vibration of the crystals fill the silence. The valley of Kyros waited ahead, patient. Behind them, the Blue Stars laughed around fires that were too large.
In between, she walked with her own, balancing on a line that grew thinner by the day between obeying orders and not handing them over to rot.
She did not yet know how long that balance would last. But she knew one thing with absolute clarity: if someone had to fall so others could keep breathing, it was not going to start with her people.
Lin could not hear the murmur of the city.
In that part of Klynos, noise was forbidden.
The mag-vehicle slid along the elevated track without a tremor, cutting through layers of filtered, clean air that did not smell like anything at all. Beneath him, the city stretched out like a scale model: dense towers, industrial levels under a light smoke, the middle districts where the people who actually kept the planet running lived. Higher up, where he was, everything was glass, suspended gardens, and facades that showed no antennas or cables. Luxury, he thought, consisted in making technology invisible.
The vehicle slowed as it entered the residential belt of the delegates. A translucent dome surrounded the district, softening the light of Klynos into a gentle glow. The climate shield for that zone had a different tone than the rest of the city, a warm white, almost golden. There was no crystal vibration here. No echoes of war. Only well-paid silence.
The automated driver announced the destination in a neutral voice.
"Von Hessol Residence."
The doors opened with a soft hiss. Lin stepped out, smoothing the sleeve of his jacket out of habit, even though it had no crease. The air felt too light to him, insufficient, as if they had just installed a new atmosphere and it had not yet settled into the right lungs.
The residence was not ostentatious in height. It did not need to be. It occupied an entire block, with terraced gardens stacked like the stands of a private amphitheater. Fragments of pale stone imported from other systems framed the entrance, carefully arranged to look casual. Small lights embedded in the floor marked a silent path.
A synthetic butler waited at the door: pale, flawless skin, eyes too still, movements perfectly measured. He wore the house symbol at his neck, a circle divided into three bands.
"Mr. Jung," he greeted, inclining his head slightly. "Delegate Von Hessol will receive you in the north salon. This way, please."
Lin followed him through a lobby that smelled of resin from trees that had never grown on Klynos. The walls bore no battle paintings, no symbols of the Union. Only landscapes: lakes, forests, mountains. Worlds where war was a distant rumor or an academic concept.
The north salon opened onto a raised garden. Wide glass panels framed a carefully edited view of Klynos: only the elegant domes, the more stylized government towers, the temple beacons. No industrial smokestacks, no lower districts.
Bernard Von Hessol stood with his back to the door, hands clasped behind him. He wore a dark tunic of impeccable cut, without the gaudy adornments of those delegates who needed gold and bright trims to prove their rank. His wealth was in the cloth, in the tailoring, in the way the garment fell with a natural ease that betrayed how many bodies had tried it on before it was deemed acceptable.
"Lin Jung," he said without turning. "Always punctual."
Lin gave a discreet smile.
"Delegate Von Hessol. If one is late in this part of the city, it gives the impression he does not understand how things work."
Bernard turned. His face looked younger than in the official transmissions, though Lin knew that was partly the work of image treatment. His eyes were light, almost transparent, and his expression seemed permanently calibrated between cordiality and distance.
"If one is late," Bernard replied, "it gives the impression he understands nothing. And you understand too much. Please, sit down."
They took low seats facing each other, a black stone table between them. On the table, two glasses and a slender bottle. Bernard poured without asking. The liquid was a pale amber, more scented than strong.
Lin tasted it. He made no comment. It was good, but different from the rough wine of the middle zones. Less honest, he thought.
"I suppose you are not here to talk about harvests," Bernard said, raising his glass to his lips.
Lin set his down without letting it go.
"No, delegate. I am here to talk about numbers. In particular, the number six."
Bernard smiled, barely.
"To pass a law, six out of ten votes. I am aware. Robert Santiago has four. Lilian Solvyn has another four. My party has two." He listed them with the calm of someone reciting a tax table. "You need one. Either mine, or my colleague’s. And Lilian needs the same."
He leaned back a little.
"And when two sides need the same piece, that piece tends to be worth more than it truly is."
Lin let the remark hang in the perfumed air.
"This piece," he said calmly, "is not just any piece. It is the difference between Operation Bastion moving forward or Operation Bastion buried. Between the Union’s expansion toward Tau Cet and winning the war, and the message that fear of war weighs more than the government itself. You know that."
"I do," Bernard admitted. "Which is why I am not in a rush."
They remained silent for a few seconds. The glass of the window let in an even light, without shadows. Nothing changed position there. There was no feeling of time passing.
"Aligning with Santiago," Bernard went on, toying with the rim of his glass, "is effective. No one can deny that. But it is also…" he searched for the word, "impoverishing."
Lin raised an eyebrow slightly.
"Impoverishing?"
"For one’s own strength," Bernard clarified. "For identity. If I give my vote to Santiago, I am not supporting a project. I am signing a certificate: Bernard Von Hessol has decided to become one of Robert Santiago’s soldiers. An appendage. A footnote. And the elections repeat this very year."
He set the glass down carefully.
"I want to be First Delegate," he said, with no detours. "Not someone else’s general. Not a bright prop in his second reelection. The title of planetary delegate is… charming. But it does not settle the risk of putting my name beneath his right before the whole galaxy votes again."
Lin studied him closely. There was pride in those words, yes, but also cold calculation. He was no fanatic. He was weighing his own relevance on the map.
"You know as well as I do," Lin replied, "that Santiago’s reelection is already a fact."
He did not say it with enthusiasm or threat. He said it like one states a physical law.
"The polls favor him in the core systems, the cult reveres him as the arm that sustains the Universal Government, the war has given him a protagonism no other delegate can buy. Lilian can block, delay, wear down… but she cannot take this election from him. At best, she can stop Bastion and force him into an even dirtier campaign. That is not convenient."
Bernard rested his chin on his knuckles, thoughtful.
"If I support him now," he said, "everyone will assume any future run of mine for First Delegate is decorative. A gesture so it looks like there was competition. You know the game. I stop being a possible successor and become a docile heir waiting for the patriarch to hand me the chair, if he ever gets tired."
"No one believes Santiago will get tired," Lin replied. "Neither you nor I."
A shadow crossed Bernard’s face at the mention of the cult. Just a trace.
Lin took it as a small foothold.
"I did not come to ask you to abandon your ambition," he said, leaning forward. "I came to propose you channel it somewhere it can actually become real. You want to be First Delegate. Good. Let us talk about that. But it is not going to happen this electoral cycle. It might happen in the next. And to get there you need two things: to remain relevant… and to stay rich."
"Ah," Bernard smiled without joy. "We arrive at the matter that truly interests the rest of the world when it says public interest."
Lin did not pretend to be offended.
"I am honest enough not to dress it up," he answered. "Fortunes like yours do not survive abrupt political weather changes without a temple to bless them or a clear link to the executive power. You already have the temple."
Bernard tilted his head, paying attention.
"You mean Priest Piaros."
"I mean Piaros," Lin confirmed. "Guide of the Governing Church. That is the influence we are missing."
Outside the window, a cluster of maintenance drones crossed the falsely serene sky like orderly insects. Lin followed them with his eyes for a second before looking back at Bernard.
"What I am proposing is this," he continued. "You support Operation Bastion. Not rashly. Not on your knees. You do it as an act of responsibility toward the Union’s security and the stability your voters appreciate so much. In return, we make sure that, once reelected, Santiago looks the other way when it comes time to discuss planetary delegates."
"Which planet?" Bernard asked, without pretense.
"Klynos," Lin replied. "You do not want to remain the delegate of a two-vote party. You want to be the direct voice of the planet that houses the Universal Government. The public face before the other systems. Planetary Delegate of Klynos. It is a modest position compared to First Delegate, but it builds the right image. The man who holds the center, the guardian of the capital. It is a narrative that sells easily to the cult and the media."
Bernard thought in silence. He stood, walked to the window, and placed his hand on the glass. From there, the city was a clean model. No sirens, no factories, no protests could be heard.
"It sounds… tempting," he admitted. "Perhaps even realistic. A step below the summit. If I support Bastion and secure Klynos, I can present myself next cycle as the man who guaranteed continuity, not only of the government, but of the empire’s very heart."
He turned slightly, looking at Lin over his shoulder.
"But there is a problem, Jung. My wealth does not depend only on Santiago not hating me. It depends, as you said, on Piaros not cursing me."
He returned to his seat with a slow movement.
"Priest Piaros has been very careful not to speak openly about Bastion," he went on. "He has not condemned it, but he has not blessed it either. My agreements with him, with the Governing Church, are the foundation of this house, this district, of the way we breathe air different from the rest of Klynos. If I cast my vote without his approval, I send a clear message: I am willing to move without his light. And Piaros does not like men who believe they can walk where he does not see them."
His fingers drummed softly on the table.
"Until Piaros gives his approval, I am not going to do it."
Lin had anticipated that. Not in those exact words, but in that logic. The Church as another block of votes, one without a chair yet with more power than many of those who occupied one.
"Piaros breathes the same political atmosphere you do," Lin said. "If he sees Bastion is going to pass, he will say it was inevitable. If he sees it fall, he will say it was providential. His faith is adaptable. The only thing he does not want is to be on the losing side of history. And that, delegate, is something I can help adjust."
"You are saying you can convince him?" Bernard asked, with a mix of skepticism and curiosity. "Piaros is not a delegate. He is not bought with posts or contracts."
"I know," Lin admitted. "But he can be spoken to. He can be reminded that by securing victory, we guarantee his temples stay full, that his cult keeps collecting tithes every time people use its services. We can show him Bastion is not just a military offensive, but a way to lock down the economic grid that feeds his altars."
He leaned in.
"I can do that. I can go to his sanctum, sit with him, lay out the same arithmetic I laid out for you. I will not promise you he will walk out hugging a copy of the Bastion bill, but I can promise you that if you decide to raise your hand, Piaros will not later use it as an example of heresy."
Bernard looked at him for a long moment without speaking. Lin held his gaze. He knew that in this district words were not enough, one had to show conviction even in the pauses.
"It is a good deal," Bernard said at last. "Not perfect. Not clean. But nothing we do is."
He lifted his glass and swirled it, watching the amber cling to the crystal walls.
"If you manage to get Piaros to say in public that Bastion does not contradict the designs of the Universal Government…" he paused, choosing each verb with care, "then we can keep talking about Klynos and about votes."
He set the glass down carefully.
"Until then, my answer is no. I will not give Santiago the sixth vote he needs to turn this war into one more doctrine. Not until I know that the man who blesses my contracts will not twist his face every time he sees my name."
Lin nodded. It was not defeat. Not yet. It was a line traced with precision.
"I understand," he said. "I am not going to ask you to jump into the void with your eyes closed. Only that you do not close the door before I show you what is on the other side."
He rose. Bernard did the same. The synthetic butler appeared at a prudent distance, as if he had smelled the end of the meeting.
"Delegate Von Hessol," Lin added, before protocol pulled him toward the exit. "When this is over, whatever shape it takes, you are going to need a story to tell about yourself. I was prudent is not always enough. I was decisive carries more weight."
Bernard allowed himself a small smile.
"You are efficient, Lin. Please send my regards to your grandfather Haruki."
It did not sound like a joke or a jab. But it irritated Lin. Any mention of his grandfather felt like a disguised attack.
The butler escorted him back to the lobby. The air still did not smell like anything. The walls still showed landscapes where no one died because of assembly decisions.
When the mag-vehicle took him in again, Lin let his eyes close for a few seconds. He saw Piaros’s face, solemn, carved into the altars of hundreds of temples. He saw poll numbers, military hatchways, Kael Durnan’s tired eyes in front of a lake on Tau Ceti. For an instant he saw the whole board.
Four votes for Santiago.
Four for Lilian.
Two for Bernard.
And himself, in the middle, running between a delegate and a priest to convince them that the same war that frightened them was also what kept them rich, influential, alive.
The vehicle moved off, leaving behind the aseptic air of the wealthy district. As they descended toward the lower levels, he began to feel the city’s weight again: the discreet smog, the smell of metal, the hum of Omnis in the structures.
He rubbed the bridge of his nose.
He had to speak with Piaros.
He had to sell him the war as if it were a sacrament.
