The Consuming Fire (The Interdependency #2)(25)

The emperox, however, was not at Brighton. She was at Xi’an, the massive imperial habitat hovering over the planet of Hub and the city of Hubfall. She was in communion, some suggested, with her ancestor Rachela, the only other prophet-emperox, planning her next move, her next announcement, to save her people and her empire.

Which was not entirely wrong, as far as it went.

*

Archbishop Korbijn couldn’t say she was entirely thrilled to receive her next visitor, but at this point there didn’t seem much that she could do to refuse him. And so into her offices at the Xi’an Cathedral Complex walked Lord Teran Assan.

“Welcome, Lord Assan,” Korbijn said, with what she hoped was enough politeness.

Assan did a small bow with his head and swiveled his head around, taking in Korbijn’s private office, which was immense and exquisitely appointed. “This is impressive,” he said.

“Thank you,” Korbijn said. “I am the head of my church.”

Assan nodded. “Not a church that’s big on humility.”

“We were founded by a scion of a merchant family who then became the emperox of an interstellar civilization, so, no. Not really.”

“Speaking of merchant scions who became emperoxs, I assume that you heard the news that Grayland II is going to address parliament.”

“I’d heard,” Korbijn said.

“There’s speculation that she will use the occasion to announce martial law. Seeing as how her pet scientist’s prediction about the collapse of the Terhathum’s Flow stream panned out and now people are in a panic.”

“It’s not a panic yet.”

Assan tilted his head and smirked. “Really.”

“Really,” Korbijn asserted. “People are shaken and afraid, yes. But they’re not burning things.”

“Yet.”

“Hopefully not ever. Fires in closed habitats are never good things.”

Assan motioned with his head out the window, where a crowd had gathered on the lawn of Xi’an Cathedral. “Your business is doing well in this moment of crisis.”

“You had a reason to want to see me, Lord Teran?”

“What will the church do if the emperox declares martial law?”

“Is that why you came to see me?”

“It’s part of it,” Assan said. “As a representative of the guilds on the executive committee, I’ve been fielding a number of con cerned calls and correspondence from noble houses and guild representatives. I know my counterparts in parliament have been doing the same with their own constituents. But your constituency isn’t people, Archbishop. It’s the church itself.”

“You say that like we don’t have parishioners, Lord Teran.”

Assan motioned back toward the crowd. “More now.”

“I’m saying I disagree with your assessment.”

“As you will, but you still haven’t answered my question.”

“I haven’t given it any thought,” Korbijn said. “I haven’t given it any thought because this is literally the first I’ve heard of such a thing. I’m not inclined to give snap judgments on hypotheticals. I might as well ask you what you would do if Grayland announced she was abolishing breakfast.”

“I’m pro-breakfast.”

Korbijn threw up her hands. “You’re missing my point.”

“I got your point,” Assan assured her. “But I dare say you’re missing mine. I’m not offering you a random hypothetical, like outlawing a meal. The emperox addressed the church in her capacity as its leader and announced she was having visions—a thing unheard-of in a millennium—and obliged you as a church to follow her lead.” He waved toward the crowd at the cathedral. “She played that one very well, I’d say. You have an influx of freaked-out people flooding your churches and cathedrals, and suddenly your institution, the thing you represent, Archbishop, has more power. But it’s power you have on loan from the emperox, who set it up with her canard about visions.”

“What are you suggesting?”

“I’m not suggesting it, I’m saying it out loud: She pulled a coup on you—on you specifically, Archbishop—and used the collapse of two Flow streams to shift the power of the church onto her. And she did it so well that apparently you haven’t even noticed it yet. Unless you have and are perfectly fine with it.”

Korbijn opened her mouth to address this, but Assan continued. “And now the emperox wants to address parliament, right after the Terhathum Flow collapse, when people are scared, and vulnerable, and looking to be reassured, and politically persuadable. Given all of that, does my question about the possibility of the emperox declaring martial law sound like a random hypothetical to you now?”

“No,” Korbijn said, after a moment.

“So back to my question.”

“But neither does it sound probable to me,” Korbijn continued, ignoring Assan’s interjection. “I’ve worked with this emperox for her entire reign so far. I knew her before she was emperox. Grayland is many things, Lord Teran, not all of them desirable in an emperox. But power-hungry is not one of them.”

“And if you’re wrong?”

“What if you’re wrong?” Now it was Korbijn’s turn to motion to the crowd outside. “Your assessment of Grayland’s coup of the Interdependent Church glosses over the fact that at no point either before or after her address to the bishops has she tried to exercise any control of the church. She’s not the one in this office, setting policies and practices and doctrine. I am. She’s not the one assigning priests to churches. Bishop Carnick is. She’s not administering our social services. Bishop Ornill is. For now.”