But the idea of one of the most powerful Alseans on the planet allowing her attacker to act as her Guard—he could practically feel his brain short-circuiting as he tried to grasp it.

  “I didn’t mean to hurt her,” Rahel said in a quieter voice. “It wasn’t part of my plan. But things got out of control. She forgave me, and then she got me the help I needed. She made a deal to keep me out of prison. So when she called to invoke my oath to her . . .” She let the stave rest against her shoulder, both hands still wrapped around it. “If my captain hadn’t given me permission, I would have stolen a shuttle and coerced someone to fly me down. Nothing would have stopped me from fulfilling my oath.”

  The Bondlancer turned to stare at her. “Are you insane?”

  “Possibly.” Rahel grinned. “But at least it’s in a good way now.”

  “Fahla, I’m glad Ekatya gave you permission. You grainbird.”

  For some reason, the insult made the two of them smile at each other in a way that left no doubt as to their mutual affection.

  Vagron cleared his throat. “I’m satisfied. She’s no White Citizen.”

  Once Salomen passed the test she hadn’t known would be necessary, the Voloth had a spirited discussion in which she fielded as many questions as she could, deferred several to Rahel, and had to admit an inability to answer a few. She knew she was asking a great deal. Not only could she not guarantee their safety, she couldn’t even guarantee her own. Nor could she be certain that their actions in the march would make a difference in how Alseans saw them.

  But it seemed that honesty was all they wanted—that, and the right to make their own choices.

  Rahel was very honest when she told them that if it came to a caste war, New Haven would be one of the first casualties. An Alsea fighting itself would not be devoting resources to maintaining and protecting a settlement of former invaders. Alseans filled with fury and looking for an outlet would find the settlers easy targets.

  In the end, the majority of the settlers agreed. Thirty-two refused, which still left Salomen with over one hundred and twenty protectors willing to put their bodies between the marchers and harm.

  The afternoon flew by as she, Rahel, Lhyn, and the three Alsean residents conducted a quick fitting of each settler. With her access to Protectorate data, Lhyn had procured the matter printer pattern for Fleet combat uniforms, which were made of a flexible but armored material that would turn away projectiles. They would prevent real damage, though not bruising. Prime Builder Eroles was waiting for the data, which she would use to print up standard sizes of the uniforms—with an Alsean twist on the colors—and then deliver them to New Haven.

  It was surpassingly strange to be touching one Voloth body after another as Salomen took names and measurements. These people had invaded her world. Andira, Rahel, Corozen, Ronlin, Fianna—people she knew and cared about had fought them with everything they had. Warriors and scholars had lost limbs and lives. It seemed as if she should hate these soldiers out of respect for the sacrifices made to defeat them.

  Yet they were so very ordinary. Some were brash, some bashful, some even flirted. All of them had hope. Many thanked her for seeing them as a resource rather than a burden.

  “Even if it doesn’t work, you’re giving us a chance to try,” one young man told her. The scar that ran from his eyebrow to his jaw was fearsome, and when she cautiously lowered her blocks, his emotions felt older than his physical age. This was a young man who had known terror, who knew fear right now but allowed it little importance because he had something much worse to compare it to.

  No one, she thought, could touch and feel these Voloth and still maintain their hatred.

  They left New Haven after extracting a promise that none of the settlers would breathe a word about their presence or the march.

  “Do you think they’ll keep their promise?” Salomen asked from the back seat.

  “I do,” Rahel answered. “They’re soldiers. They understand secrecy and missions.”

  “Rax knows it’s in their best interests,” Lhyn added. “If any of them tell, it could disrupt the march and that would disrupt their chance.”

  “I’m concerned about the ones staying home,” Salomen said. “If they’re not part of the mission, will they still keep the secret?”

  “They’re still part of the village. It’s literally all they have in the universe. If they commit an act that gets them ostracized, they have nowhere else to go. That’s a powerful incentive for cooperation.”

  “What about the Alseans?” They had assured her of their cooperation, but they were also warrior and scholar caste.

  “Same incentive. Or at least very similar.”

  “They chose New Haven as their home,” Rahel said. “When you don’t fit anywhere else, you’ll do almost anything to protect what you have.”

  They drove cross-country for fifteen ticks, then stopped in the middle of a field while Rahel applied colorizer drops to her eyes and spritzed it through her hair. The transformation was instantaneous as her auburn hair darkened to brown and her eyes turned hazel. She pulled her hair out of its braid and let it hang loose, then resumed their journey without a word.

  Salomen leaned forward and rested a hand on her shoulder. “I know what you’re thinking.”

  Lhyn looked over, her brow furrowed. “Now you’re telepathic?”

  “She knows the last time I used colorizers was when I worked for Shantu.” Rahel did not take her eyes off the path she was picking across the fields.

  “Oh. When you kidnapped her brother.”

  Salomen didn’t need her empathic senses to see the guilt. “I’ve wondered how much of Shantu’s original reputation was him, and how much was really you. Did you ever find it unfair that he took the credit for your work?”

  The distraction was effective; Rahel’s guilt diminished as she shook her head. “He was welcome to it. If people ever found out who I was and what I did, I’d never have walked the shadows again. I couldn’t do that work with a reputation for upholding the law. I needed to sell myself as someone who was happy to break it.”

  “That shouldn’t have been too hard a sell, considering you were ready to steal a shuttle off Ekatya’s ship,” Lhyn observed.

  “Some laws are more important than others.”

  “I’m glad you’re on my side,” Salomen said.

  “I am, too. Fahla’s vessel is a powerful friend to have.”

  “Oh, for the love of—I keep telling you not to call me that.”

  Rahel chuckled as she neatly slid their skimmer between two trees and onto a road.

  They arrived in a town south of Blacksun, chosen for its location a mere twenty ticks from the starting point of the march. Rahel drove to a pleasant-looking inn and parked behind a tintinatalus tree with a massive trunk.

  “Stay here,” she said.

  Salomen watched her walk toward the entrance and thought she wouldn’t have recognized her from the back. Besides the hair color, her whole posture was different. Rahel normally moved with fluid grace and a long, powerful stride; now her steps were smaller and her back and arms were stiff. She did not look like a Guard.

  “I have a feeling I’m going to tire of the words ‘stay here’ very soon,” Salomen said.

  Lhyn hummed in agreement. “You and me both. I’m just as recognizable as you.”

  “At least she parked us in the shade.”

  “Fifty cinteks says that’s not why she chose this spot. She chose it because it puts the tree trunk between you and the lobby window.”

  Salomen hadn’t noticed that. “No bet. You’d make a better spy than I.” She rested her head against the seat and closed her eyes, enjoying the quiet and the lack of emotions other than those pouring from Lhyn. After spending an afternoon at New Haven, even Lhyn’s uncontrolled output felt like a mere trickle.

  She floated in the peace for a few ticks, then said, “Lhyn?”

  “Hm?”

  “Thank you. For staying with me, even though I won’t let you march.”

  “There’s still time to change your mind. I’m sure Chief Kameha would join up, too.”

  “No. I’m grateful for the offer, but having the first Gaian caste members in our march would cloud the waters. This has to be kept internal. Besides, I thought you had rules against interfering in the cultures you study?”

  “I do. Great, huge ones. Enormous ones.” Lhyn turned around in her seat. “But I live here. I’m a citizen and a member of the scholar caste. I think I broke that rule some time ago. Besides, you heard Rahel. Some rules are more important than others.”

  “I believe she said laws, not rules.”

  Lhyn waved a hand airily. “Eh. Same thing.”

  Rahel reappeared, still walking in that constrained manner, and passed a key chip to Salomen as she slid into her seat. “Only two keys, since as far as the innkeeper knows, there are two of us in the cabin. Not that you’ll be using yours, but . . . just in case.”

  She started up the engine and drove around behind the inn, where a small cabin sat fifty strides from the main building. A flower-lined path led from its front door to the inn’s back door, and a clear patch of grass marked the parking area for a skimmer.

  As the skimmer settled to the ground, she was already opening her door. “Stay h—”

  “Oh, stop! There’s no one around! What are you going to do, teleport me inside?”

  “I’m going to check the cabin. The innkeeper said it was ready, but that’s not a guarantee that the cleaning staff aren’t behind schedule.” Rahel was unimpressed with Salomen’s outburst. “Never assume. When I know it’s safe, I’ll come and get you.”

  “Wait.” Salomen gazed at the cabin and let her senses loose. This range was no challenge at all, and she quickly verified the absence of life. “There’s no one inside.”

  She took some satisfaction in watching Rahel’s take-charge attitude deflate slightly, and couldn’t help adding, “You forgot I’m Fahla’s vessel so quickly?”

  Lhyn snickered. “This should be a fun two days.”

  47

  Cellmates

  Being trapped in a cabin for three nights and two days was an extraordinary test of Salomen’s patience.

  “The next time I visit Herot, I’m telling him how proud I am of him,” she said on the second evening. “He says he’s found a kind of peace in prison. I’m ready to climb the walls.”

  “He’s freer than you are right now,” Rahel observed. “He has the run of a whole campus. Library, education center, training rooms, miniature caste houses.”

  “And hiking trails,” Lhyn said. “Your prisons are palatial compared to some I’ve seen. If I had to be incarcerated somewhere, I’d choose Alsea. Except for the Pit.”

  “I suppose it’s all relative. Oh, Rahel, the Prime Builder called while you were out getting evenmeal. The uniforms are already at New Haven.”

  The checklist was getting shorter, and she couldn’t do a thing to help at this point. Her last contribution had been getting the Voloth signed on. It was frustrating to know that the four Primes were out there furiously organizing while she sat here doing nothing.

  Avoiding being seen was now the entirety of her job. Once out of Hol-Opah and free of her security, she had called Prime Builder Eroles on her new earcuff. From that moment, the countdown had begun and the final preparations were put into play, the things they couldn’t do earlier for fear of word getting out. All involved more people with more knowledge than they had allowed before, including—scheduled for late tomorrow afternoon—the directives to caste members notifying them of the marches. At that point, they assumed word would begin trickling out to the warriors and scholars. Their hope was that ten hanticks would not be enough time for angry groups of warriors to organize.

  One other event was timed to her call to Eroles: the leaked announcement of her disappearance. The global media was going wild with speculation. She cringed to see Andira being forced to make a statement that no, she did not know where the Bondlancer was, but she did know for certain that she was safe and well. Andira only knew that through their divine tyree bond, and Salomen had never been more grateful for it. Difficult as it was to sense what she was putting her bondmate through, she also knew Andira would have torn the world apart without the constant assurance of her safety.

  Her lengthy disappearance was Prime Producer Arabisar’s idea, and there were times when Salomen wondered if this was a sly, particularly evil punishment for the way she had forced Arabisar’s hand with her speech: both putting her into virtual imprisonment and making her the head of the uprising. As Prime Crafter Bylwytin enthusiastically declared, this would have the same effect as the theater lights going out before a production began. When Salomen burst back onto the public stage, Alsea would be electrified.

  On the third night, her nerves set in with a vengeance. The directives had gone out a hantick earlier; there was no turning back. She hadn’t been this terrified since she was eighteen and preparing to make her first speech at the caste house.

  “Distract me,” she pleaded. “I’m losing my mind thinking about tomorrow morning.”

  Her cellmates, as she had jokingly called them, looked at each other with identical expressions of you first.

  Lhyn cleared her throat, her gaze still on Rahel. “I do have something I’ve been wanting to ask you.”

  “You can ask me anything, you know that.”

  “Right, but this is personal.”

  “You’ve quizzed me on joining techniques. Is it more personal than that?”

  “Probably?”

  “After this, I want to hear about the joining techniques,” Salomen put in.

  Amused, Rahel gave a nod. “I’m listening.”

  Lhyn chewed on her bottom lip. “Salomen’s brother asked how I could study the Voloth after being tortured. I said they weren’t the ones who hurt me. But they did hurt you. How did you walk into New Haven so easily? And take all those measurements? You didn’t show any signs of stress. Why don’t you hate them?”

  Salomen had noticed that as well but would never have mustered the courage to ask. She forgot her nerves as she waited for the answer.

  “I did,” Rahel said. “A lot. But Lanaril helped me pull apart the reasons for my trauma shock. Most of it wasn’t from what they did to us. It was from what we did to them.”

  She crossed to the window and stared out at the flower-lined path. “You haven’t seen horror until you’ve seen someone die of pure terror. Ten pipticks was all my high empaths needed to shatter their minds. I couldn’t live with that knowledge, so I hated the Voloth instead. And, um, Lancer Tal. They were safer to think about. I could tell myself that Lancer Tal caused most of my problems, and the Voloth deserved what they got.”

  “Denial,” Lhyn said knowingly. “Your mind was protecting itself from something it couldn’t accept.”

  Rahel turned with a small smile. “Lanaril?”

  “Mm-hm. Now that I think about it, she’s the reason all three of us are sane.”

  “Speak for yourself,” Salomen said. “What I’m doing tomorrow is the definition of insanity.”

  “But it’s insanity with a clear purpose and full self-awareness,” Lhyn pronounced. “Which means it can’t be insanity.”

  “That hurt my head,” Rahel said.

  “Mine, too.”

  Lhyn gave them an exasperated look, then softened as she focused on Rahel. “Lanaril pulled aside the curtain and helped you see what you were hiding from yourself. And that’s when you stopped hating the Voloth?”

  “It wasn’t instant. But I started thinking differently. I saw the same things in different ways. And I had already learned that Lancer Tal wasn’t who I thought she was.” She shifted her gaze to Salomen. “Being forgiven for my own acts made me more forgiving of others. Then I met Rax on the Phoenix. He felt like any other Gaian on the ship. But the odd part? He was too calm about being beaten to a paste. The only people who can shrug off a beating are people who have been beaten before. People who think it’s part of life.”

  “I hate that you know this,” Salomen said. Lhyn nodded in emphatic agreement.

  “I know less than most of those Voloth do. After I met Rax, I asked Dr. Wells about it. She wouldn’t give me any details, but she did say that Voloth training seemed to involve a lot of broken bones and scarring.”

  “Scarring,” Salomen repeated. “I measured a young man who had one from here to here.” She drew a finger down the side of her face. “I assumed he got it in battle, but . . .”

  “They fought in impervious shielded boxes,” Rahel pointed out. “I don’t think many of them were injured in those. They were injured by their own officers.”

  “You’re right.” Lhyn unfolded her long legs and stood up to refill her glass of spirits. “Salomen?”

  “Please.” Salomen held out her glass.

  Lhyn didn’t offer the bottle to Rahel, who never drank. “They’ve told me about their training. They had the questions beaten out of them. It’s how the Voloth Empire creates a military that follows any order and believes any lie.”

  Rahel lifted her shannel cup. “Hard to hate people you pity.”

  “That’s the truth and a half,” Lhyn said.

  They sipped their drinks in thoughtful silence.

  “Now then.” Salomen set her glass down. “About those joining techniques?”

  Salomen’s greatest aid through her three nights of imprisonment was Lhyn.

  Knowing that the AIF was looking for three women together, Rahel had reserved rooms for two. She had planned to sleep in the living area, an idea both Salomen and Lhyn immediately rejected.

  “The beds are big enough,” Salomen said. “We’ll share. We’ve done it before.”

  She missed Andira most acutely at night. But something about Lhyn’s presence soothed her, and she thought it must be due to their foursome Sharings. Lhyn carried a piece of Andira inside her, and Salomen’s senses were responding to it.