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“He blessed or something? Touched by the Vale?”

“No. Not blessed,” she says distantly. “He used to work for the Sons, you know. Joined after my brother died.” Her voice is slow and robotic. “Served as a recruiter before becoming a scar hunter. Back before House Lune fell, before the Battle of Ilium even. When the Society’s agents owned this moon, he brought in people like you. Like me. He taught them how to fight. How to survive so they could take back just some of what’d been taken from ’em. After Luna fell to the Rising, he was given a mission in Endymion to find a Gold who was organizing raids. It was a trap. They interrogated his men in front of him. Skinned them alive and made him watch. By the time we got there, he was the only one left. The Gold was captured with the peeling knife in hand.” She pauses, disliking the memory. “But…the Gold had information the Sovereign needed, information he exchanged for a full pardon. Ephraim watched the man who skinned his friends walk free.” She looks at me. “Point is, Ephraim wants to die, but he can’t. That’s his curse.”

“That’s why you took the Obsidian,” I say. “Because he couldn’t watch another friend die?”

She shrugs. “I know where to hurt.”

There’s no regret in her eyes. She seems a person made all of flint and iron, one who came into the world full-born, without mother or father or past or future. Less a woman than shovel or an axe. If there is more than that to her, she would never show it to me. “What sort of person does that make you?” I ask.

She doesn’t answer immediately.

She points east to the New Forum on the far side of the Citadel grounds. The domed building is pale in the night and rises out of the trees around it like a hill of snow, stark in contrast with the brutal lines of the pyramid forum the Society used. “Beautiful, isn’t it?” I nod. She stares on at it. “You think clean hands built it?”

—

The Sovereign is in conference with Theodora and Daxo when we join them. I keep my distance from both Pink and Gold, my arm still itching from the torture. Above the table, a map shows the progress of the squadron toward the stolen shuttle. The Sovereign watches it coolly as she converses with Theodora, but I can sense the underlying tension in her. Her eyes are bloodshot and heavy bags have formed under them. Coffee cups and the remnants of a meal litter the table. How long can a Gold go without sleep?

“…could not have done this alone,” Daxo is saying to Theodora. He cuts short when he sees me enter the room with Holiday.

“Continue,” the Sovereign says.

Daxo hesitates for a moment with me in the room. “The Syndicate is working with someone. I recommend we conceal this from the Senate until we know more. My spies will have names by the morning. Heads by the end of the week.”

“Theodora?” the Sovereign asks.

“You know my thoughts,” she says. “The longer we hold this from the Senate, the more it discredits the transparency you promised them. Senator Caraval is already inquiring about the unusual traffic over Hyperion.”

“It’s stupid to go before them until my son is safe here, by my side,” the Sovereign says. “I won’t have those men saying a mother can’t govern when her child is in danger. They’ll smear me and call a referendum to make me step down before the vote. With Caraval and the Coppers lost, we’re going to lose six to seven. My veto is all that can stop this absurd peace process.”

“Who would replace you?” Theodora asks.

“The Senate would vote. Majority rules until next election,” Daxo answers.

“Until we know who did it, there will be suspicion that this is a ploy to delay the vote…” Theodora says.

“I already know who did it,” the Sovereign replies. Theodora and Daxo exchange confused glances. “The Syndicate was hired. But by whom? Who has the most to gain?” She waits for an answer. None comes. “It was the Ash Lord. He can’t beat our legions, so he’s after our Senate. Darrow was right. This happened because I was weak, because I was tired. I never should have let the Vox chase him away.”

She focuses back on the holo of her son’s ship making its way back to Hyperion, her long fingers tapping her side.

“Lyria,” she says, eyes boring into me. I don’t bow my head this time, but stare back at her, knowing this is when the axe falls. Yet her tone surprises me. “You made a dire mistake, girl. One that should end your service to me, to anyone. But without you, we would not have found this Volga and…” She spares a glance to Holiday. “…Ephraim. Soon my boy will be back with me, because you were brave enough to own your mistakes. I must now own mine.” How could she ever understand what her mistakes cost me? She’s lost her son for a few days and she thinks she knows. She’ll never know the mud. The flies.

“You lost your family,” she says. “You trusted the Republic and we broke that trust.” Then I’m struck dumb. She goes to a knee. Her eyes on the ground. “I do not deserve it, nor must you give it, but I ask, all the same: Will you forgive us? Will you forgive me for not doing better?”

Forgive her?

I don’t understand the idea. Nor do her councilors. They gawp down at her, as off-footed as I am. Her golden braids are even with my eyes. There’s loose strands. The faint, earthy smell of oil and the coffee from her breath. I hear the air enter her mouth and fill her lungs and whistle out her nose, see her shoulders rise and fall. The power is shed, her naked soul there in front of me. She’s just a woman. Just a mother with more children than any other. Maybe she does know my pain. Before this, she was a freedom fighter. A soldier. It’s easy to forget that. She’s seen mud, and now I think she remembers it.

I can’t hold on to the anger or the pettiness or the pain. I want only to help her, to protect families like mine. Letting go of that anger doesn’t spit on the memories of Ava or Tiran or the children. It honors them. And for the first time I can remember, I feel hope.

With a trembling hand, I reach and touch her head.

She stands afterwards. “Thank you.” I nod, unable to put what’s inside me into words that don’t sound stupid. “A storm is coming to the Republic,” she says softly. “This was just the first breath. You still have a part to play in all of this.”

“What could I ever hope to do?” I ask.

“You have a voice, don’t you? When I go before the Senate, I will need you as a witness. Your testimony will save lives. It will bring the men behind this to justice. Will you help me, Lyria of Lagalos?”

“If you promise me that Liam will be looked after, and his eyesight given to him. I know there’s a way. But I don’t have the money.”