“Heartening. Are they from this century?”

  “I didn’t look that closely, but judging from the dust covering them, perhaps not.”

  “Casmir… I don’t fault you for wanting to do this—I think you’re right and that the best thing is to get those gate pieces off Odin—but would Admiral Mikita have flung himself into the middle of the danger?”

  “I don’t know. Maybe?”

  “Assuming he had your stature and a few medical issues, I doubt he ran in at the head of the troops and punched down his enemies. Look at any battle in history. The fleet admirals sent in their ships and their troops to accomplish the mission. They didn’t lead the way themselves.”

  “Those historical admirals didn’t have to be there to crack the door codes to let their troops in.”

  “You can’t tell me you can’t do that remotely.”

  “It’s possible that I won’t be able to, especially if something is hard-wired and not on the network. I appreciate you wanting to keep me safe, but… I have to lead.” Casmir shrugged and smiled. “This is my idea. I can’t ask others to risk themselves while I hide somewhere safe.”

  “I feel like you’re a cat with nine lives and that you may have used up eight of them by now. You and Rache both.” Kim hung her head at the idea of losing both of them, Casmir to his idealism, Rache to his obsession.

  “That is possible. But I’ll try to live. I would like to kiss Oku for more than two seconds before I die.”

  “You should have done that before she left.”

  “I tried. We were interrupted. The universe is not being considerate.”

  “That’s the understatement of the millennium.”

  Casmir glanced at the helicopter. Bjarke was waving for him to get in.

  “You’ll keep an eye on my parents?” Casmir asked.

  “Of course. And… I am working on something and will continue to do so while you’re off risking your life. In my arrogance, I believe it could be important and that I should finish.” Kim opened her mouth to explain further, but Bjarke yelled for him to hurry up.

  Casmir nodded at her. “Good. I’m glad, and I believe you. I’m leaving however many crushers won’t fit in the craft, and they’ll protect you. Just in case trouble finds you here, Bjarke said there’s a basement bunker and also tunnels underneath the castle that lead off into the woods. You access them through the ancient suit of armor on the pedestal in the great hall. There’s also a trapdoor under his bed.”

  Kim doubted tunnels would be of much use if the astroshamans bombed the area, but she nodded.

  Casmir hugged her, then ran to jump into the craft. It took off immediately, leaving three crushers behind. The helicopter wobbled, and she didn’t know if it was from its advanced age or the great weight it carried.

  There wasn’t time to ask, Casmir messaged. What are you working on? A vaccine for the virus?

  No. I sent all the information I had on that to my colleagues at the lab as soon as we entered the system. Kim hesitated to explain what she was working on, but of all people, Casmir should support her. He hadn’t even told her how nuts she was lately to date Rache. I’m taking my experiences and all the reports Oku sent me and writing a novel about everything that’s happened. Rache said he would publish a novel for me, and I… This is going to sound arrogant, Casmir, but I think it may be the best way to get the truth out there in a way that people would pay attention to. Well, a movie would be better, since… Well, how many people actually read? But maybe it could make a difference. If the people of the Kingdom saw what their king and his sons had been doing—and what we’ve been doing—maybe they would care enough to fight the system. What do you think?

  She held her breath, realizing how idealistic that all sounded, and maybe she was foolish to believe this was worth doing right now. It was the kind of thing that one did after all the fighting was over, wasn’t it? But if she waited for that, she might be dead. They all might be.

  I’m skeptical of Rache as your publisher, Casmir replied after a minute, but I like your idea. My father and I were talking last night about the need to educate the people, and a story is a lot easier to swallow than a lecture. Make sure to write the book so it’s fun and exciting, so the common man will like it. Like your thriller! Don’t use big science words. Or anything over four syllables.

  Kim folded her arms over her chest. She hadn’t been planning to write something inaccessible, but she didn’t think it needed to be overly simplistic. Do you want me to let you draw pictures to go with it?

  Can I?

  No.

  You’re a tease. My art is fabulous.

  Your stick figures are dreadful. I don’t know how someone who can draft sophisticated schematics can’t draw a cartoon dog.

  You can use rulers, protractors, and compasses on schematics. Straight lines look funny on dogs.

  How obnoxious.

  I know! Nature should have made itself more geometric.

  After gaining enough altitude, the helicopter took off toward the south, and Casmir waved out the window to Kim and his parents. Knowing Casmir, he was having rapid-fire conversations with all of them while simultaneously hacking networks and calculating the probability of success for his mission.

  His parents joined Kim, Aleksy carrying a tablet, perhaps the same one Tristan had been watching the news on earlier.

  “I tried to talk him into staying here with us,” Kim told them, “and leaving the combat to the combat specialists, but he thinks he needs to be there to open doors for them.” She should have countered Casmir’s argument with the fact that his crushers could force open any doors that stood in the team’s way.

  “I’ll admit that it’s strange seeing my son with a team of combat specialists,” Irena said.

  “And knights,” Aleksy murmured, though he was watching the tablet display.

  “Knights are combat specialists, dear.”

  “I know, but I mean that it’s even more surprising that he seems to be leading them.”

  “It appeared to be more of a democracy than a military chain of command,” Irena said.

  “Mm.”

  “I do wish he were working with our government instead of against it. I’m so worried about him. But I admit our government has been failing us of late.”

  “Our government has been failing us for a long time,” Aleksy said. “It’s only recently become trendy to point it out.”

  “Is it trendy now?” Had Kim been off the planet for long enough to miss changes to the zeitgeist? She supposed so.

  “Since the bombings. The last bombings.” Irena looked warily toward the sky, gray clouds now drifting in from the sea and threatening to blot out the sun. “And since King Jager finagled the Senate into giving him King’s Authority. Our people were scared enough to do it, but it’s improved nothing.”

  “We need a diplomat in charge of the Kingdom now,” Aleksy said, “not an autocrat.”

  “At least someone willing to bend and yield with the wind, not be like a rock monolith destined to crack and crumble with each earthquake.”

  “That’s a bit of a mixed metaphor, dear.”

  “I’m a physical therapist, not a teacher.”

  “A physical therapist with an advanced degree.”

  “In therapy, not wordsmithing.” Irena poked him in the ribs.

  Aleksy smiled, but only fleetingly as his gaze remained on the tablet.

  “I do hope Casmir isn’t condemning himself,” Irena murmured, looking to Kim, concern furrowing her brow. “Is he doing the right thing? I am concerned and somewhat disgruntled that we had to leave our apartment of many years in the middle of the night, and he doesn’t know if we’ll be able to go back—or stay in the Kingdom at all—but if I knew he was right, it would all be much easier to accept.”

  “He’s trying to do a right thing. It may be up to the historians to decide if it’s the right thing.” Kim wondered if she could make a difference with her novel, an attempt to set the record straight in a way that people would appreciate. Maybe it was hubris to believe that she could do so or that anyone would read it. “I am certain that Jager is doing the wrong thing.”

  “I believe that too. I wonder if we’re truly safe here.” Irena glanced at the sky again—looking for more ships on bombing runs? “We didn’t fly that far from the capital.”

  “Casmir said that Asger told him there’s a bunker under the castle and escape tunnels that lead out into the forest.”

  “Will that keep us safe if some deadly virus is unleashed? Jager said they were threatening us with that too.”

  “Look at this.” Aleksy turned the tablet toward his wife and waved Kim over close enough to see it. “Another message from the astroshaman leader.”

  “How does she keep forcing her way onto the broadcast network?” Irena huffed. “Can’t Jager stop that?”

  “Maybe it’s best that he can’t,” Aleksy said. “If she weren’t on the channels, we wouldn’t know what the true threat is. Just like last time.”

  “We can’t assume she’s being honest with us.”

  “Sh.” Aleksy turned up the volume.

  “You may have noticed by now that our allies have entered the system,” Moonrazor said, the two silent male astroshamans standing beside her and again letting her do the speaking. “A ship from Verloren Moon. They have developed an interest in the gate and have come to lend their assistance, should we need it. It’s clear that we don’t, that your ships, though many, cannot see us to target us, but if you were not properly concerned before, you should be now.”

  The view shifted from her to a big cylinder of a ship floating out in space with the wormhole gate visible in the distance behind it. Moving lights or indicators of some kind flashed all along its black sides.

  It was very ominous, very alien, and looking at it filled Kim with foreboding. She caught herself eyeing the three silent crushers that Casmir had left behind. When he controlled them, she didn’t mind them, but they had that same kind of ominous alienness about them. Even though they were shaped into bipedal human forms, nothing about them seemed human. Only when Zee spoke did some hint that he wasn’t a big indifferent computer come out, but that was Casmir’s influence, she knew, not the true nature of computers and robots. The AI ship wouldn’t have any of Casmir’s influence, and it might have no regard for humanity as a whole.

  What had the astroshamans offered them to bestir their interest? To make them leave their moon?

  “As if things weren’t grim enough,” Irena said.

  When the recording looped to repeat, Aleksy lowered the tablet. “Perhaps we should find that bunker and those tunnels. Just in case we need them.”

  Kim nodded and followed them into the castle, but she worried neither tunnels nor bunkers would be enough to protect them from what was coming.

  “Sighing dramatically and looking at me with those sad puppy-dog eyes won’t change anything,” Oku informed Chasca, who was gazing at her while lying pitifully on towels Oku had folded into a semblance of a dog bed.

  The cement floor of the subterranean apartment was gritty and hard like a swimming pool deck, and Chasca’s short fur and lean build didn’t give her a lot of padding. The human bed had only one pillow and was too small for sharing, so Oku was reserving that for herself.

  “I suppose I could ask one of the guards to try to find you something more comfortable, but that seems an abuse of my royal authority, especially when the world is under attack. Again.” Oku sat at the studio apartment’s small dining table, designing a possible new hybrid of the nutrition-packed green algae that grew well in tanks on space stations. Algae wasn’t as romantic—or flavorful—as the other crops she’d worked on, but it was relatively easy to grow in space and meant the difference between a population having to supplement extensively with minerals and vitamins or not. It was a worthy project, but it was hard to concentrate when her mind kept wandering.

  Chasca sighed and flopped onto her side—dramatically.

  Oku picked up a tug-of-war rope toy that had slid under the table and squeaked a ball on the end. Chasca debated it for a while before coming over to chomp on the other end and pull.

  “I know you’d rather be in the castle where you can run all over the grounds. Or back out at the As—out in the wilderness.” She’d almost said the Asger estate, but nobody seemed to know about that yet. In case the apartment was monitored, she kept herself from mentioning it. “I wish I was there too,” she whispered, though she didn’t know if Casmir was still there. He was the main reason she would want to return.

  She’d kept communications with him to a minimum, knowing that if her father returned, Chief Van Dijk might grow much more interested in capturing Casmir. She also might not have been honest with Oku about her indifference, hoping that she would let her guard down and lead Intelligence to him.

  The last thing Casmir had sent her was a suggestion that someone with sway over the king might want to beg him to negotiate with the astroshamans rather than trying to fight them. Oku didn’t know who had that kind of sway over her father. Neither she nor her mother did.

  A knock sounded at the door and Chasca bounded to it, tail wagging.

  “That could be a deadly assassin or nefarious kidnapper, you know.” Oku raised her voice to call, “Come in.”

  Her mother only managed to take two steps in before Chasca swarmed her, jamming her head into her hip and wagging fiercely.

  “Chasca misses her freedom,” Oku said.

  Mother looked a touch beleaguered as she patted the dog on the back. “I’m certain that most princesses with pets throughout history have had cats or lapdogs.”

  “That sounds boring.”

  “She almost knocked me over.”

  “She likes you.”

  “What does she do with enemies?”

  “Unfortunately, she refuses to accept people as enemies.” Oku clapped her hands and squeaked the toy. “Over here, girl.”

  After Chasca bounded away, Mother sat on the bed. “Your brother has been found.”

  “Oh, good. Where was he?”

  “In orbit floating in an escape pod that was issuing an automatic SOS. A Fleet ship picked him up, and he’ll be downside in a few hours. I’m having him brought here for his safety. He says he escaped from Rache’s ship.”

  “He escaped? Or was let go?”

  “He told the officers who collected him that he escaped from Rache’s brig.”

  Oku thought of the short and strange conversation she’d had with the man who’d sneaked into her suite—and had been capable enough to sneak past all castle security and capture Finn. The idea of him allowing a prisoner to get away seemed ludicrous.

  “Given Rache’s reputation, it’s a lot more likely that he let Finn go for… some reason.”

  “Van Dijk and I think so, too, and we’ll have a doctor standing by to do scans and a thorough exam. I wouldn’t put it past that criminal to have ordered a surgeon to implant Finn with a bomb programmed to go off when he’s next to your father.” Mother shuddered.

  “That’s horrible. Is that possible?”

  “I don’t know. I’m glad he’s on his way back, but I am worried that it was too easy for him to get away.”

  Oku wondered if Casmir had heard anything—or could find out things if he hadn’t. She still didn’t know what to make of his relationship with Rache—David—but if he could be a conduit to Rache, it was worth using that.

  “We’ll keep you both down here.” Mother waved to the wall—the apartment next door.

  Oku managed to keep from grimacing. She didn’t want Finn to die, but she also would have preferred that his apartment were on the other side of the city.

  “Until all of this is over,” Mother added. “One way or another.”

  “A friend thinks Father should negotiate with the astroshamans instead of stubbornly ignoring their demands,” Oku said.

  “A friend?” Her mother made a show of peering around the room, then looked at Chasca.

  “Nobody has removed my chip access yet,” Oku said dryly. “Though the signal down here is awful.”

  “Is he planning anything except lying low?”

  “He?”

  “Your friend,” she said, equally dryly. “The friend Van Dijk is pretending she’s too busy to hunt down.”

  “Is she too busy?”

  “She probably won’t be now that Finn is back, but…” Her mother spread her hand, palm up. “If there’s a chance that he can help with this problem, she would appreciate that. She—we—may be the only ones besides you who believe he can. And that he would.”

  Oku thought about mentioning that Casmir had asked for the location of the gate pieces, but maybe it was best to keep his plans a secret. She didn’t even know his plans, not for sure. So far, she was guessing.

  “I don’t know how to convince your father that he can be an ally and not have him executed, but I would like that. I never wanted him to be cast aside and certainly not to be killed. Not when he was born and not now. We brought him into this world, and I always felt responsible for him.”

  “Did Father want him killed all along? When he didn’t turn out to be the genetically perfect baby he expected?”

  Her mother hesitated. “He… didn’t see the point in letting him live, no. We argued, and I thought I would have to smuggle him away to a foster mother. In the end, your father said he didn’t care if he lived but that he was determined to start over and do it right the second time, with clean genes. A perfect baby.”

  Oku snorted. The perfect baby that had turned into Rache. She almost said as much, but did her mother know about that? Until he’d showed up in her suite, Oku hadn’t known David had survived that crash. Survived that crash he must have orchestrated, she realized. Staging his death so he could run off and become Rache without repercussions.

  “I don’t mind that you’ve found him,” her mother went on, “but do realize that your father has marriage plans for you.”

  Oku couldn’t keep from making a face.

  “True love is not a fairy tale that applies to the nobility. We must do what’s best for the Kingdom.” Her mother patted her shoulder and stood up.