Kiem brushed a stray twig off his elbow as they emerged from the gardens and into the front yard of Central One HQ. “It was just being … you know. Enthusiastic. Which entrance do we take for the Kingfisher offices?”
Kingfisher was in a different part of the building to his mother’s old stomping grounds, and Kiem didn’t know the labyrinth of alabaster corridors very well. Jainan silently indicated the way to the right office, though even he had to guess at the last few turnings. “I’ve forgotten,” Jainan said apologetically. “I wasn’t here all that much.”
The junior of the two officers met them at the door. Major Aren Saffer turned out to be a sandy-haired, energetic officer with pale freckled skin and one hand stuck permanently in the pocket of his uniform. A casual wooden pendant on a chain around his neck marked his gender. Kiem liked him immediately. He’d expected Aren to be some medaled stick-in-the-mud like most of his mother’s military friends, but he was much younger than that crowd, and he seemed genuinely pleased when he saw Jainan.
“Oh, don’t stand on ceremony,” Aren said when Kiem shook his hand. The office was a high-ceilinged room with a polished wooden floor and a silver bird emblem mounted on the far wall. Apart from that, it barely looked like the headquarters of a major operation: only a handful of soldiers occupied the rows of empty desks. “We’re still recovering. Losing Taam was a body blow, if I’m honest. Really knocked us off course. But he would have wanted us to keep going—right, Jainan?”
Jainan didn’t respond. He hadn’t come fully into the room, but had stopped to stare at a picture on the wall adjacent to the door: a memorial image, surrounded by gray flowers, showing Taam in full military dress. Taam had the right kind of jawline for that photo. He looked like something out of a war documentary.
Aren tilted his head to one side, smiling quizzically. The small movement made Jainan start, and his attention came swiftly back to the other two. “Of course,” Jainan said. “I’m glad to see your memorial.”
“Hell with the memorial. I’m glad to see you,” Aren said. He’d been smiling—he had an easy, constant smile—but now he sobered up, and his gaze on Jainan was intent. “You must be finding it hard; I thought you’d dropped off the face of the planet. You should have been in touch sooner.”
Even with his very limited experience of Jainan, Kiem suspected that wasn’t the best approach. Jainan closed up visibly and said, “Your concern is appreciated.”
“Is your boss around?” Kiem said cheerfully. “Understand this is top secret stuff, this crash data. My aide said you had to hand it over in person.”
This worked to smooth over the awkward moment. Aren showed them into an office where an officer with a colonel’s insignia was waiting, her hands clasped behind her back. Kiem had never met her before either: she was maybe in her late thirties, with an air of deliberateness and unusually straight hair scraped back into a severe plait.
The object of her attention was the screens covering one wall of the office. A string of text said OPERATION KINGFISHER—HVAREN BASE. They showed a bustling remote office with the same silver bird emblems mounted around the walls. From the view out the window, it looked to be somewhere out in the mountains; it seemed like a big on-planet office for a spaceside operation, but Kiem supposed the military had to find something to keep itself occupied.
She turned as they came in. “Your Highness,” she said. She waved a hand and the screens on the wall went dark. “Thank you for coming. Please take a seat. Saffer, you too.”
Kiem warily sat on one of the uncomfortable chairs. The office was austere and chilly; he should have brought a jacket. Next to him Jainan turned his head to keep both of the officers in view. “You wanted to see us, Colonel?” Kiem said cheerfully.
Colonel Lunver put her hands formally on her knees and said, “I understand the Resolution has absolutely refused to instate you.”
Kiem felt a bit like he’d opened a door and found an unexpected pit of spikes. “Er,” he said. “I wouldn’t say absolutely refused, as such. It’s more like a delay.”
“A delay,” Colonel Lunver said, her skepticism obvious. Kiem wasn’t sure why she was allowed to interrogate him—he would have expected that question to come from the Thean embassy—then he remembered that Kingfisher operated in Thean space. Jainan clearly thought she had the right to an opinion.
“They must do it eventually,” Jainan said, quiet and intense. “We both have the correct chain of authority. There is no legal reason to deny us.”
Beside him, Aren tipped his head and made a noise through his teeth. “That’s assuming the Resolution thinks like humans,” he said, with an apologetic look at his senior officer. “Not sure that’s the case. Who knows what they’re actually looking for?”
Jainan gave a single nod and folded his hands in his lap. Kiem felt a moment of dismay. He’d been working under the assumption that this was a temporary hiccup. But Jainan was the one with diplomatic experience; if even he agreed they might not get instated, they could really be in trouble.
“We’ve been working on the Auditor from our side,” Lunver said. “I hardly need to explain military affairs to the son of General Tegnar—”
“You really do,” Kiem said apologetically. “I haven’t spoken to her in months.”
“—but we care about keeping the Thean treaty stable just as much as Jainan’s embassy,” Lunver said. “Just as much as the late Colonel Taam, in fact. We’re not the only ones who’ve been nagging the Auditor: Internal Security and the Emperor’s Private Office have also been in on the act. But we haven’t gotten far. Given that, I have a suggestion for you.”
“Go on,” Kiem said. At this point he’d take any advice.
Lunver said briskly, “Step down.”
“I’m sorry?”
“Step down,” Lunver repeated. There was a thin window in the corner of the office; the light coming through it glinted off the flint brooch at her collar. “The Auditor doesn’t seem to like how rushed your appointment was. We can convince him to accept Jainan: he’s Thean, and he was appointed according to due process. The problem seems to be you.”
“Oh,” Kiem said. He felt like a hole had opened up in his stomach, which was ridiculous, because this hadn’t been his idea in the first place. He said the first thing that came to mind: “I honestly don’t know how they appointed me. The Auditor said the problem was Taam.”
“The problem is Taam’s replacement. The paperwork must have been rushed,” Lunver said. She sounded mildly aggrieved, as if intergalactic politics was just another obstacle in the way of her operation. “The investigation into Prince Taam’s death is unlikely to find anything new—even Internal Security can’t make up evidence where there isn’t any. However. If you resigned your position, the wedding was annulled, and Jainan remarried, we could make certain the Auditor is happier with the next representative.”
Kiem tried to get his thoughts straight. “I’ll step down if it will help,” he said. “If that’s what the Emperor wants—”