“Because the Fleet leader at the time ordered them stopped. The AIs did not wish to be stopped. It’s likely they wouldn’t have attacked anyone if nobody had gotten in their way.”

  “They were stealing Kingdom property, namely those ships they took over.” Bjarke gave Kim an exasperated huff. “Leave it to him to side with the robots.”

  “I’m not siding with anyone,” Casmir said. “Just pointing out that they proclaimed their independence and left without doing significant damage, and haven’t bothered anyone for more than a century.”

  “Until now?” Kim asked.

  Casmir hitched a shoulder. “Maybe they’ve run out of metals from the nearby asteroids and are going farther afield.”

  “My message said they were heading for the gate. If all they wanted was ore, there are other asteroids to mine in that system.”

  “Is it possible they’ve allied themselves with the astroshamans?” Kim asked. “Maybe they all want to get that ancient gate working and go through it together to get out of the human-infested Twelve Systems.”

  “Human-infested? Really, Kim.” Casmir folded his hands. “There’s no proof that AIs in another system feel that way about humanity.”

  “But we’re fairly certain the astroshamans do, aren’t we?”

  Casmir hesitated. “Moonrazor did mention that her people didn’t feel they’d been welcomed or have a place in the Twelve Systems. I tried to offer her refuge on Odin if they wanted a quiet place to take the time to build a new gate from scratch, but she didn’t seem that interested.”

  “You were going to offer an entire race of people refuge? Where? In your bedroom? Casmir, I’m not sharing that bathroom with anyone else.” A fresh wave of disappointment washed over Kim as she realized how unlikely it was that either of them would ever see their shared cottage on campus again. After all this time, the landlord had probably thrown out their belongings and rented it to someone else.

  “I was thinking of the base in the Kingdom Forest that the terrorists claimed.”

  “Which belongs to the king.”

  “I thought they could use it in secret. Or that Princess Nalini might be able to make a real-estate deal with the king to get that land for them.”

  “Not only has he been siding with robots, but he’s trying to find refuge for our enemies.” Bjarke wrapped his hands behind his neck and thunked his forehead down on the table. “How did I end up in league with such a crazy man?”

  “Casmir isn’t crazy,” Kim said.

  “Thank you,” Casmir said.

  “He’s naive and idealistic.”

  “I retract my thank-you.”

  “Why?” Kim looked frankly at him. “You know I’m right. You want happy endings for everyone. Even robots.”

  “Robots are sublime and deserving of happy endings,” Zee said from the wall.

  Kim had forgotten they were there.

  “Especially crushers,” Zee said. “Casmir Dabrowski, I have decided that the inferior android Tork will be my mate.”

  “Oh?” Casmir smiled as if he’d expected this announcement and it wasn’t at all strange.

  Maybe Bjarke was right and Casmir was crazy. Still, Kim would rather hang out with someone idealistic than someone else as cynical as she. Surely, the universe needed more idealistic people and fewer cynical ones.

  “Have you run that by him?” Casmir added.

  “Not yet. I have only recently had this realization. He has returned to System Lion on Princess Nalini’s ship, and we are again playing network games.”

  “I’m glad for you.”

  “We are also discussing the foreign relations and political problems plaguing this system,” Zee said.

  “Have you had any enlightening realizations?” Casmir asked.

  “Perhaps. I will let you know after further discussion.”

  “No doubt while they’re planning their wedding,” Kim murmured.

  Bjarke lifted his head and heaved a sigh. A melodramatic sigh, Kim decided, but she didn’t say so.

  “Here’s the question.” Bjarke looked straight at Casmir, as if he were their commander now. “Can we do anything about all this?”

  “We?” Kim asked, even if the question hadn’t been for her. “Aren’t we all exiles? Save for Casmir, whom the king simply wants dead.”

  “Yes, but we’re—at least I’m still a knight. Even if Baron Farley has put me in exile and says I have to return my armor and pertundo, I will always be a knight.” Bjarke flattened his hand to the table. “And this is my home and my home world and my home system. I can’t flee to another system, wave goodbye from the gate, and hope for the best for the Kingdom.”

  Kim was about to say that she could, providing she could take her family with her and they could figure out a way off the planet, but Tristan ran in first carrying a tablet.

  “There you all are. Have you seen this?” He stopped at the head of the table, kicked out the stand on the back of the tablet, and set it so they could see the display. “It’s playing on all of the channels on Odin. Maybe across the entire system.”

  An older woman with bronze skin, spiky white hair, and milky eyes stood before a metallic background while looking into the camera. Her face was familiar, but Kim had never seen her in person, so it wasn’t until Casmir groaned that she realized who it was. Kyla Moonrazor.

  Two older men walked in from either side to join her. Their heads and necks appeared more machine than human, reminding Kim of the time she’d seen a half-assembled android before its faux skin had been put on. They gave Moonrazor long pointed looks but did not say anything, merely turning to face the camera.

  Moonrazor was the one to speak. “Your people have taken something that we rightfully claimed. We’re coming to get it back and will arrive at your home world within days. If you order your king to send that which belongs to us away from your planet on a ship, we will not bother your people. If he does not comply, we will take the items forcibly, and the casualties may be many. If you place ships in our way, we will destroy them. It is your choice, people of the Star Kingdom. Return to us that which is rightfully ours, or we will take it.”

  “Nice girlfriend you’ve got there, Casmir,” Kim muttered.

  “Girlfriend?” came Oku’s voice from a hallway as she stepped out.

  Kim blushed, though Casmir didn’t appear that discombobulated. He brightened and beamed warmth toward Oku, even though the entire planet had just been delivered an ultimatum.

  “She’s more of a frenemy,” Casmir told Oku.

  “Funny, Rache implied that same thing when he spoke about you.” Oku came to rest a hand on his shoulder and frowned as the tablet replayed the recording. Was it looping over and over out to the entire system?

  “He called me a frenemy? I didn’t know he had friendly feelings toward me. I keep vexing him.” Casmir looked toward Kim. For confirmation?

  Kim nodded agreement of his assessment.

  “He called you an enemy,” Oku said, “but I read that there was something more between the lines.”

  “Yes, vexation.”

  “That might have been it.”

  Bjarke made a chopping motion with his hand. “We need to figure out how to help our people deal with this.”

  “That will be hard given that our people want nothing to do with us,” Tristan said glumly.

  “They need to get over that. If we’ve got Moonrazor’s frenemy, maybe we’ve got an advantage.” Bjarke’s mouth twisted, as if he felt foolish using such a word, but he did give Casmir a pointed look before stabbing his finger at the tablet. “This must be what Jager was talking about when he warned the people of an astroshaman invasion fleet and a virus.”

  “Is it?” Casmir arched his eyebrows. “She didn’t mention a virus.”

  “It’s a broadcast,” Bjarke said. “That particular threat might have been delivered in a direct message to the king.”

  “Or she’s hiding that she has it, and Royal or Military Intelligence unearthed the information.”

  “Why would she hide it when fear of a planet-killer virus would more likely cause the Senate and populace to pressure the king into complying with her?” Casmir gripped his chin and watched the tablet replaying the recording.

  “Send her a message, Casmir,” Bjarke said. “See what you can unearth. Then, if we find out Jager won’t comply with her, we’ll know enough to act.”

  Kim thought Casmir might object to Bjarke taking charge and giving orders, but he stood up, put his bowl away, and said, “I’ll see what I can figure out,” as he wandered out of the kitchen, that abstract expression back on his face.

  “Will he be in danger from her?” Oku looked from the tablet to the direction Casmir had gone and back to the tablet where the message continued to loop. “I know Moonrazor isn’t close to Odin yet, but the astroshamans can attack people through the network and their chips, can’t they?”

  “He’s fought her off before when she’s attacked him through his chip.” Kim didn’t mention what Casmir had shared, that he no longer had all the programs he’d modified to allow him to do that. “At the worst, she’ll probably ignore him or tell him to get out of the way.”

  Kim hoped that was true.

  “I better go home. I was hoping Casmir could help me figure out who’s behind a plot against me from a few weeks back, but this is all more important.” Oku waved at the tablet. “I don’t want my mother worrying about me in addition to everything else we have to worry about.”

  Kim nodded, relieved Oku would go of her own accord. It would be easier for the rest of them to stay hidden or move secretly about if half the Kingdom Guard wasn’t out looking for her.

  “A good idea, Your Highness,” Bjarke said. “If anyone asks, will you feel compelled to share who’s here and where we are?”

  “Not in the least. I didn’t help Casmir escape just so he could be captured again.” Oku tilted her head. “Besides, I think he can help if he has the freedom to think and act.”

  “We can all help, Your Highness,” Bjarke said.

  “Yes. Good. Please keep him alive, Sir Knight.”

  Judging by Bjarke’s flustered expression, keeping Casmir alive wasn’t the way he’d intended to help, but his training made him bow politely. “Yes, Your Highness.”

  16

  Greetings, High Shaman Moonrazor, Casmir messaged as the birds chirping in the trees around the estate and the autumn sun beaming down on his shoulders belied the danger approaching Odin from space. Imagine my surprise to have seen your broadcast this morning and to have learned that you have once again followed me to another system.

  Casmir sat cross-legged in the grass near the hole Chasca had dug the night before, plucking up strands absently as he composed his thoughts. He’d believed it would be easier to do this without anyone else talking around him. Speaking with Moonrazor was always like fencing with the ocean; he needed his wits about him to keep from being knocked over by the waves.

  He tried to be patient as he waited for an answer. Since he’d heard Oku say that she would leave soon, he wanted to get all the information he could for her and bundle it up in a neat digital packet to take home, possibly to give to Royal Intelligence, if she trusted them to help.

  His gaze snagged on the groundskeeper’s cottage, and he winced, remembering Asger had asked him to look up the man. He ran a quick search on Moritz Thacker, found nothing on the public network, and delved into the Kingdom Guard network with the access codes he’d created for himself the night before. There was nothing there. The lack of news was probably good news, but he wished he could find something more solid for his friend.

  I believe we agreed last time, came Moonrazor’s reply, that it is you who keep following me. You keep denying that you were moved to ardor by my kiss, but what other explanation could there be for your attentive stalking?

  Casmir didn’t know whether to be pleased that she’d answered him or horrified that she kept bringing up that kiss she’d planted on him. I live here, he replied, going along with her attempt at banter, though he would prefer to get to business. How could I be the one doing the stalking?

  You are the one contacting me. And I see that you’ve been doing some research related to me and my people. News searches for my name, image searches in an attempt to identify the two high shamans who appeared in the video with me. What a snoop you are.

  It didn’t surprise him that she’d been monitoring the public network searches for news on astroshamans, but it was impressive that she’d picked his out of the millions that had to be taking place right now. Or was it that she’d expected to find him here and was monitoring him specifically? Given that she shouldn’t have known about his new chip ident, that was also impressive.

  It’s true. I am. How are high shamans Robilard Chatelain and Chongrak Cometrunner doing? Are you getting along well with them?

  The pause was longer than the previous ones. Casmir hoped he’d surprised her by scrounging up their names in a twenty-year-old academic database from a joint-systems university research project on the astroshamans. Unfortunately, he hadn’t gotten much more than that. They were both older men, who’d joined the order more than forty years earlier, and history had forgotten who they’d been before they became astroshamans.

  Their names aren’t anywhere in your system’s databases, she replied.

  Aren’t they? Huh. Are they your colleagues in this endeavor?

  They are colleagues.

  A terser answer than usual from her. He’d played the broadcast recording several times, watching their body language as Moonrazor spoke, and there had been a tense set to her shoulders. The men never spoke, but it had been interesting that they’d stood to either side of her, almost fencing her in. When she’d finished speaking, she had glanced at Chatelain, as if to ask if that was good enough.

  Maybe he was misinterpreting their relationship—it hadn’t been a long message from which to study them—but if there was any hint of division or tension between them, he hoped to pry it out and take advantage of it, if possible.

  Are you all equals?

  We are all high shamans. What is it that you want, Professor? My time is not limitless.

  I’ve seen your message to our people. Why destroy Kingdom ships and threaten an entire planet for five gate pieces? Are you open to negotiations?

  We contacted your king and attempted to reason with him, but he insists on calling us thieves, and he said that he would not only keep those five gate pieces hidden but would attack us and forcefully take the ones we’ve already acquired.

  Casmir pushed a hand through his hair. He didn’t trust everything Moonrazor told him, but he could see Jager refusing to back down.

  His idea of negotiating, she continued, was saying that if we gave him all the other gate pieces and agreed to assemble the gate on your planet, he would allow us to leave the Twelve Systems alive, assuming we agreed never to return. The man is as audacious as he is stupid. You make much better attempts at offers than your king. Why don’t you leave that world before we’re forced to attack it? We can pick you up, and you can join us. You belong with astroshamans, not ignorant, xenophobic humans. Also, you promised me a crusher.

  I know. Why don’t you come down for a picnic, and I’ll give one to you?

  A picnic? On the planet where you’re currently being hunted? I do hope you’re staying in some secret tunnel or cave.

  Casmir plucked up a strand of grass and eyed the open blue sky. Someone had moved the Kingdom Guard shuttle into the stable the night before, so if a search craft flew past, the pilot wouldn’t spot it, but he admitted that this couldn’t be a long-term place for him to stay. Eventually, someone would think to check on the Asgers.

  Did you know they had a public execution planned for you? Moonrazor added. How barbaric. Perhaps after enjoying the execution, they intended to feast on charred meat while throwing the bones over their shoulders to the hounds.

  Do you truly have Dubashi’s virus? Casmir asked.

  Now, now, Professor. You don’t expect me to give you free intelligence, do you? My fellow high shamans would be most put out with me. We’ve put aside our differences to work together toward this end goal, but our trust depends on us all doing what’s best for our cause. Perhaps, if you want to save your people from harm, you could fetch the gate pieces and bring them up to orbit for us. It is all that we’re asking for, all that it would take for us to leave your system in peace.

  In peace? As soon as you entered our system, you destroyed four Kingdom Fleet ships. How can I believe that your intentions could ever be peaceful?

  My colleagues wished to make a statement, to let your king know we are serious. We’ve attacked no other ships since. Though we will defend ourselves if he sends his Fleet against us.

  A statement! That was murder.

  Might I remind you that your people barged into my fortress and killed many of my followers and friends in order to steal the gate from me?

  I admit that they were wrong to kill people, but you also were not in the right when you stole the gate from our system.

  From a moon where it had been abandoned for centuries. The old saying is, I believe, finders keepers.

  You didn’t find it. Our archaeologists did.

  Do as I say, Professor. Fetch the gate pieces and bring them to us. You know as well as I that your king will only spread his vileness into the rest of the galaxy if he’s permitted to have the blueprint to build a new gate network. We only wish to find a new home where we will not be bothered by humanity and its prejudices. Bring us the pieces. That is how you can ensure that we will not kill more of your people.

  Casmir flopped back on the grass. That was the last thing he should do. Jager might destroy everything Casmir cared about if he worked against the crown again.

  He kept himself from saying so. He might get further with Moonrazor if he played along, or at least wasn’t adamant that he would work against her.

  I don’t know where the gate pieces were stored, he sent. Are you able to tell where on our planet they are? You’ve clearly developed a way to track them down.