• • •
I hope I never have to have a conversation with the woman again, Asala had told President Ekrem. And now here she was, ringing through to the general’s personal quarters at an hour well too late for polite calling of any variety. She hadn’t slept in a full day, and the nanosplints tingled painfully where her ribs were knitting back together, but she was on the scent of something. Everything was fitting together so well . . . and yet somehow just slightly not well enough.
She cradled one hand over her injured side while she waited at General Cynwrig’s inner door. The med team had told her not to exert herself, that she’d damaged internal organs and “healed” didn’t mean it all couldn’t be jarred out of place, but Asala had never been good at listening to instructions when it didn’t suit her.
It was a long, long time before Cynwrig answered. In the meantime, Asala ignored the spider chittering behind her. At least the woman will know who’s calling, she thought sourly.
When General Cynwrig finally did open the door, she was dressed in full uniform.
“Am I mistaken,” she asked, with a curled lip, “or is it not a very late hour here in Khayyam’s capital?”
Asala quickly said a canto of Our Mortal Stars in her head, one of the verses she used to relax herself while she waited with a rifle. She took a breath. “I need to examine your ship.”
“Out of the question.”
I could just go to sleep and let you die. But that—that would have stung her professional pride. “The intelligence about Khwarizmi is wrong.”
“Explain.”
“I think both assassination attempts were distractions,” Asala said. “The attack in your chambers came immediately on the heels of this morning’s show in the plaza, almost as if they expected the first attempt to fail—and I think they did. This morning’s incident was timed to be stopped, and this afternoon, the guard should have known she wouldn’t be able to get past the inner doors before real security caught up to her. Even if I hadn’t been here to stop her—the intelligence needed to get this far should have told her she couldn’t succeed in the time frame she had. I think someone paid these people and then didn’t tell them they were being set up.”
“Their true purpose being?”
“To throw you off your routine.” As she said it, it felt right, deep in her gut, where she’d learned to trust her instincts. If the general would just cooperate, dammit, Asala would solve this and save her sorry Gandesian hide for a third time, and the mighty General Cynwrig would always and forever owe her life to someone with a clan tattoo. Wouldn’t that be sweet justice.
“Ekrem already told me you’ve moved up your departure timeline, and that dominoes in a host of changes all on its own,” she continued. “I’ve been combing through the interrogation reports, and one bit might have some truth to it—one of them said something about an indirect attack before going silent. But both the attacks we’ve seen were more than direct. ‘Indirect’ suggests something like coming at you in transit, or poisoning your food. Or your water supply.”
“I bring my own sustenance for that reason,” Cynwrig said. “It is secure at all times.”
“I know you do. But I checked your ship’s logs. There were some mass variations recorded.”
The ship was the weak link. On the ground, Cynwrig had security twenty-five hours per day, but a ship was a tin can in space that cradled people’s lives in a fragile hull—plenty to go wrong. Asala’s instincts were screaming. Those mass variations meant something.
“All ships have mass variation.” The general’s voice dripped scorn. “That’s how artificial gravity works.”
Forget the sun dying, this woman could give the whole system frostbite. “I’m telling you, I’ve been doing this a long time,” Asala argued. “This isn’t over. If you want to go back to bed, fine. I’ll send Ekrem a message that I’m quitting your detail, and walk away. But if you want to live, you will let me examine your ship.”
General Cynwrig’s eyes flicked up and down, taking in Asala’s full height. “You’re quite the renegade . . . Agent.” She leaned on the title as if testing it in her mouth. “You come and make demands of a visiting head of state? Far more appropriate channels exist for such requests.”
“You want me to put in the paperwork to Ekrem to access your ship? Sure,” Asala said. “It’ll still have to be approved by you, but by that time you’ll probably be dead. Don’t expect me to mourn.”
“Most of your kind wouldn’t.”
Asala tried not to let any reaction show on her face.
Damn, she was going to hear it from Ekrem. But that conversation would go a lot easier if she had a living protectee to flaunt.
Cynwrig held Asala’s eyes for a long minute, but if she was trying to out-wait a sniper, she failed. She finally broke the gaze and folded back her sleeve to tap some commands into an armband.
“The codes to access my ship,” she said, holding out her arm.
Asala touched her handheld to it.
“We have a saying on Gan-De,” said General Cynwrig. “The worm that raises its head from the hole is right, or it is dead.”
“Good thing I’m not a worm,” Asala said.
• • •
Armed with the general’s codes, Asala exited the outer suite—and ran right into Niko.
“What the—what in cosmic hell are you doing here?”
Niko straightened and brushed themself off. “I wasn’t sure whether it was too late to come call, but I have something to show you. And I wanted to see if you were all right . . .”
“I don’t have time for this.” Asala accidentally muttered it aloud. She pushed past Niko and down the hall.
Niko dogged her like a dust bat who’d smelled food in her pockets. “Can I come back tomorrow? I found something and I know you’ll want to see—”
“Maybe I’ll go on vacation tomorrow,” Asala said. “Wouldn’t that be nice? I’ll take a cruiser to Khwarizmi and relax in some real hot sun. Maybe try some glow. I hear it’s an experience.”
“Then let me show you after you come back tonight,” Niko pressed. Asala’s well-crafted sarcasm was apparently lost on them. “Where are you going this late, anyway?”
Asala didn’t slow and didn’t answer.
“Maybe I can help,” Niko kept on. “I really am good at data analysis, maybe—”
“I’m going to General Cynwrig’s ship,” Asala overrode them. “And I’m not interested in help.”
Niko stopped for a moment and then ran again to catch up. “Wait, you can’t!”
“Can’t
