“Yes.”
“Give … Give you control over all the generals across all the nations? Give you control to all our intelligence, all of our operations!”
“Yes,” says Shara mildly. “I will have it, or neither of us will. Because if you do not step down, Auntie, I will leak our awful family secret.”
Vinya looks like she is about to be sick.
“I understand my stock has risen in Ghaladesh these days,” Shara says, with a quaint pout of modesty. “I am, after all, the only person since the Kaj to have killed a Divinity—two Divinities, technically, to the Kaj’s three. This, after Urav. They haven’t ever crowned another Kaj since Avshakta, but I don’t doubt that a few people in Saypur are discussing it. I believe that when I speak, I will be listened to. And as such, I believe your time in the Ministry is over, Auntie.”
Vinya is rubbing her face and rocking back and forth in her chair. “Why … ?”
“Why what?”
“Why are you doing this? Why are you doing this to me?”
“I do not do it to you, Auntie Vinya. You flatter yourself by imagining so. Things are changing. History itself was resurrected in Bulikov four days ago, and it rejected the present just as the present rejected it in turn. And we now have a new path we could take. We can keep the world as it is—unbalanced, with one nation holding all power …”
“Or?”
“Or we can begin to work with the Continent,” says Shara, “and create an equal to keep us in check.”
Vinya is aghast. “You wish to … to elevate the Continent?”
“Yes.” Shara adjusts her glasses. “In fact, I plan to spend billions on rebuilding their nation.”
“But … but they are Continentals!”
“They are people,” says Shara. “They have asked me for help. And I will give it.”
Vinya massages her temples. “You … you …”
“I also intend,” Shara continues, “to dissolve the WR, and declassify all the Continent’s history.”
Auntie Vinya slumps forward and goes white as custard.
“I don’t think we can build much of a future,” says Shara, “without knowing the truth of the past. It’s time to be honest about what the world really was, and what it is now.”
“I am going to be sick,” says Vinya. “You would give them back the knowledge of their gods?”
“Their gods are dead,” says Shara. “Those days are gone. That I know. It is time for all of us to move forward. In time, I hope to even reveal the nature of the Kaj’s parentage—though that might be decades away.”
“Shara … Dear …”
“Here is how the narrative will go, Auntie,” says Shara. “It will be said that things are different now—true enough—and that the old ways and the old warriors who keep to them must adapt, or go. You can go graciously and quietly: ceding authority to the new generation, after I’m just coming off of an incomparable victory. You might even be lauded for your foresight, as you chose to keep me in Bulikov—that would be a nice touch. And I can make sure that you land on your feet, winding up the head of a research institute or prominent school that can take good care of you. Or, I can dislodge you. You’ve said before you have enemies in Ghaladesh, Auntie. I now have a very big dagger I can give them, which they will then promptly plant in your back.”
Vinya gapes at her. “You … You really …”
“I will arrive in two days, Auntie,” says Shara. “Think about it.”
She wipes the porthole glass with two fingers, and her aunt vanishes.
*
Sunlight bounds out of the clouds, across the waves, ripples over the deck. Far above the ship, gulls float and dip gracefully from current to current, dodging through the air. Shara grips the ceramic canister a little tighter as the ship bobs to the port side: she has never been an accomplished sailor—something the crew members quickly deduced, and are wary of—and she is thankful the sea is calm today.
“Anytime soon, Captain?” she asks.
The captain breaks away from a conversation with his midshipman. “I could give you an exact time,” he says, “if you were to give me an exact point.”
“I have given you that, Captain.”
“The, quote, ‘point equidistant between Saypur and the Continent’ ain’t exactly as exact as you think, if you pardon my saying so, Chief Diplomat.”
“I don’t need for it to be too exact,” Shara says. “Just how long until we’re close?”
The captain tips his head from side to side. “An hour or so. On such calm waters, and with such a benevolent wind, maybe less. Why do you want to know, anyway?”