The Collapsing Empire (The Interdependency #1)(8)

Rennered was already the heir and Hannah Patrick, upon reflection, decided that she would rather step out of an airlock than become a permanent fixture of the imperial court. As a result, Cardenia’s childhood was pampered but far removed from the trappings of actual power. Cardenia was acknowledged as a child of the emperox and saw her famous father regularly but infrequently. She would occasionally be teased by classmates, who might call her “princess,” but not too often or too viciously, because as it turns out she was a princess and her imperial security detail was sensitive to slights.

Her childhood and early adult years were as normal as they could be when one is the daughter of the most powerful human in the known universe, which was to say not very but close enough that Cardenia could see normal, distantly, from there. She attended the University of Hubfall, received degrees in modern literature and education, and upon graduation gave serious thought to becoming a professional patron of some arts-related programs and initiatives for the underadvantaged.

Then Rennered had to go get himself killed while racing, slamming himself and his charmingly retro automobile into a wall during a charity exhibition race with actual race car drivers and basically decapitating himself in the process. Cardenia never watched the video of the crash—that was her brother, why would she—but she read the forensics report afterward, which while clearing the event of any suspicion of foul play, noted the safety features of the automobile and the unlikelihood of the accident being fatal, much less one that ended in decapitation.

Cardenia later learned that at the charity auction after the race Rennered was supposed to have publicly announced his engagement to Nadashe Nohamapetan. The confluence of those two events stayed firmly connected in her mind afterward.

Cardenia had never been very close to Rennered—Rennered was a teenager when she was born and their circles never meshed—but he had treated her kindly. As a child she idolized him and his playboy ways from afar, and as she grew older and saw how much of the crush of imperial fame had passed by her to land on his shoulders, was quietly relieved he was there to shoulder it. He seemed to enjoy it more than she ever would.

He was gone and then suddenly the empire needed another heir for emperox.

“I think I lost you there,” Batrin said.

“I’m sorry,” Cardenia said. “I was thinking of Rennered. I wish he were still here.”

“So do I. Although perhaps for different reasons.”

“I would be happier if he were succeeding you. A lot of people would be.”

“That’s certain, my child. But Cardenia, listen to me. I don’t regret that you are succeeding me.”

“Thank you.”

“I mean it. Rennered would have made a perfectly good emperox. He was literally born for the role, just as I was. You weren’t. But that’s not a bad thing.”

“I think it’s a bad thing. I don’t know what I’m doing,” Cardenia confessed.

“None of us knew what we were doing,” Batrin said. “The difference is that you know it. If Rennered were here, he’d be just as clueless but more confident. Which is why he’d faceplant right out of the gate, just like I did, and my mother, and my grandfather. Perhaps you’ll break the family tradition.”

Cardenia smiled at this.

Batrin cocked his head, almost imperceptibly. “You still don’t know what to make of me, do you?” he asked.

“No,” Cardenia admitted. “I’m glad we’ve come to know each other better, these last few months. But—” She opened her hands, palms up. “All the rest of this.”

Batrin smiled. “You want to get to know your father, but you have to focus on getting ready to rule the universe instead.”

“It sounds ridiculous. But yes.”

“That’s on me. You know you were an accident. At least on my part.” Cardenia nodded at this. “Everyone, including your mother, told me that it would be better to keep you at a distance. And I was happy to agree with them.”

“I know. I never blamed you for that.”

“No, you didn’t, and you have to admit that was odd,” Batrin said.

“I don’t know what you mean.”

“You are a literal princess, but you didn’t live like one. I think it’s fair to say most people in your situation would have resented that.”

Cardenia shrugged. “I liked it being optional. When I was eight, I resented it a little. When I was old enough to know what being a princess meant, I was glad I got to miss most of it.”

“It caught up to you anyway.”

“Yes, it did,” Cardenia agreed.

“You don’t still want to be emperox, do you?”

“No, I don’t. I would have rather you had given it to a cousin or nephew or someone else.”

“If Rennered had married earlier and had a child, that would have solved your problem. But he didn’t. And anyway if he had married that Nohamapetan woman, and she’d produced an heir, then she would have been regent. That seems like a bad idea, to have her running things unchecked.”

“You pushed him to marry her.”

“Politics. You’re being pushed to marry the brother already, I assume.”

“Yes.”

“It’s politically advantageous.”