Blood of a Thousand Stars (Empress of a Thousand Skies #2)(30)
Nero had doubled down. Not only did the UniForce remain in Nau Fruma, but now there had been three fresh attacks on neutral territories across the galaxy. Everything was spinning headlong into chaos and violence, and she could not sit back and let it happen.
She had to stop it, but she didn’t know how. Not with the people of Kalu demanding retribution for what they saw as an attack on neutral ground. Not with Fontis arming for retaliation.
It was a massive undertaking, and she simply couldn’t do it alone. She needed Nero’s endorsement. She needed those who followed him to follow her too. And Nero had already agreed to meet with the United Planets and lay out the terms for a cease-fire, which seemed remarkable to her—a huge sign of progress.
But now Dahlen was avoiding her, and she needed his help to include the Fontisians. Showing the galaxy that Fontisians wanted peace too was important.
Dahlen had turned the east wing of the palace into makeshift barracks, where he slept with dozens of other Fontisian fighters. But the palace was enormous—the summer palace on Nau Fruma was hardly a tenth the size of this one—and around every corner, a piece of her past opened up. She’d slowly been rediscovering pieces of her childhood, new and old blending together in her consciousness as she managed the organic memories that floated up to the surface, immersive, almost suffocating.
“Empress.”
Rhee jumped. She spun around on the cool marble floor to face Lahna. Today, she wore her hair in the style of an ancient Fontisian warrior: half up in a dozen braids, intricately coiled and tucked.
“I’d rather you not sneak up on me,” Rhee said testily. She didn’t like how she felt in Lahna’s presence—nervous, as if Lahna was evaluating her.
“I’d rather not come to fetch you. But we don’t all get what we want.” She put her hands on her narrow hips.
“I’m not a thing to be fetched,” Rhee said—an immediate, knee-jerk reaction when in truth she was relieved. This was Dahlen’s way of summoning her, which meant he was talking to her again. “He just expects me to come at his command?”
“He expects nothing,” Lahna said. “We’re leaving as soon as he gathers his things. I thought you’d want to say goodbye.”
“Wait, what?” Rhee’s heart started pattering hard in her chest. She thought for a second she’d misheard. “What do you mean, leaving?”
“He can’t answer if you haven’t asked.”
Rhee’s confusion and anger were kinetic; the faster she moved the more intensely she felt them. Lahna led her to the barracks, where she saw Dahlen’s things packed neatly beside him as he sharpened his blade on a whetstone. His blond hair, shoulder-length, fell in an arc, obscuring his face from her. Rhee’s stomach sank. Dahlen had no flair for drama. He’d packed. He really was planning to leave.
“You can’t do this,” she blurted out. She wished she could think up some eloquent insult, or a dressing-down that would humiliate him into reconsidering, but all she could think was: This can’t be goodbye.
She felt her heart cracking open. “Look,” she said, striving to control her voice, “I know you don’t approve of working with Nero.”
“I don’t approve?” He crouched over the whetstone but would not look up. “As if I could approve a union so insidious. As if you’d be willing to listen.”
“You’re the one who’s not willing to listen!”
He looked up. His eyes felt like fire on her skin. She stared back, holding his gaze, but it was hard to breathe, hard to swallow. “This is not a mere disagreement,” he said. “This is a fundamental rift.”
He held the blade up to the light, examined it, and, seemingly satisfied, sheathed it. “That man is an abomination.”
How could he not see? She had to entertain Nero’s proposition—otherwise she might as well declare an all-out war against him and risk alienating his supporters further, alienating those whom he had pressed under his thumb—alienating everyone.
“You think I don’t know that? I’m not so stupid or so young that I can’t see through his plan. But this is politics. I’m empress of the Kalusian territories, public enemy number one in the eyes of every other government. Kalu’s loyalty is slowly being stolen by that very abomination you speak of—a holovision star with a pretty face, of all people. And Joss is somewhere out there, hidden away, when her real life is here waiting for her . . .” Rhee’s throat seized at the thought of her older sister. “Besides, it’s a temporary alliance.”
“You can’t ‘temporarily’ corrupt your soul.”
“I don’t have any other choice, and you know it!” Her anger flared. “You’re being stubborn for the sake of it! You self-righteous, fanatical—”
“Watch yourself, Empress,” Lahna said. “Don’t say something you’ll regret.”
Rhee took a deep breath, restarted. Lahna was right. “Dahlen, we want the same thing: peace. Too many lives are being risked . . .”
He let out a hollow laugh that surprised her, chilled her even. It might have been the first time she’d heard him laugh. “Lives must be risked in the name of what’s right. We must determine to take the more difficult path, if it is the righteous one.”