The conference room’s door slid open at Jedao’s approach. Irrationally, Khiruev was surprised that the far wall was still imaging the last thing she’d set it to, an ink painting of a gingko tree. The original was attributed to General Andan Zhe Navo, although it was anyone’s guess as to whether she had really painted it.
Jedao took his seat at the table, which was made of black stone with faint gold whorls in it, like spectral fingerprints. He had produced a deck of jeng-zai cards out of nowhere and was shuffling them with the ease of long practice. Then he caught the way Stsan was staring at the cards, grinned unsettlingly at her, and put the cards down.
Khiruev told herself that this was going to be an ordinary meeting, wishing she was better at lying to herself, and sat to Jedao’s right. The other staff heads took their seats in glum silence. Major Lyu looked as though he wished the Shuos analyst who had headed his section hadn’t been booted. Strategy’s Lieutenant Colonel Riozu, on the other hand, kept eyeing Jedao with that I’m going to pick your brains clean expression she got when she met someone new and exciting.
“All right,” Jedao said, “they didn’t exactly provide me with a library while I was busy being undead, but I did attempt to do my homework. If I’m understanding this correctly, the Fortress of Spinshot Coins had its defenses upgraded seventy-six years ago?”
My leg itches, Khiruev thought deliberately. This self-deception business wasn’t getting any easier. How did the Shuos manage it? Ironically, formation instinct prevented her from blurting out her plan. She was seized by the conviction that she mustn’t interrupt the senior general.
Trying not to wince too obviously, Khiruev reached down under the table. Her hand spasmed. She almost hissed, more in surprise than pain. Which was ridiculous, because she had known this would happen. Just an itch. Her fingers found the drone, switched it on after a mercifully brief moment of fumbling, and released it. If she hadn’t heard it scuttling into position, surely no one else had. Of course, there was the possibility the thing had failed to activate, but best not to dwell on that.
“—phantom terrain,” Riozu was saying. She tapped something into her slate. “Here’s a summary of the Fortress’s guns. I imagine you’ll find only a few details have changed. Phantom terrain is the bit you might not be familiar with.”
Jedao glanced over his own slate for the figures. “Yes, I see. How about you explain in your own words what you think I ought to know. The operational details, not the dry lists of numbers they put in the grid database. Pretend I’m a cadet.” He smiled at their palpable dismay. “I mean it. I assume it’s an exotic—weapon? A defense?”
“Exotic defense,” Riozu said. “Effectiveness falls off as inverse radius squared and it blows through the power cores like nobody’s business. But it does exactly what its name suggests. It generates temporary terrain in space.”
Where was the drone? Under other circumstances, Khiruev would have provided a better explanation. Riozu always thought she was more clear than she was. Sweat trickled down Khiruev’s back. She didn’t dare drop her pretense of attentiveness to look, and if she thought about it anymore, the debilitating physical effects would resume.
Jedao had taken up his cards again. He fanned them out and flipped over the first six. Ace of Gears, Ace of Roses, Ace of Eyes, Ace of Doors, the Burning Banner, and the Drowned General. A very unlucky hand, if you were superstitious.
“Terrain can refer to all sorts of things,” Jedao said, very mildly. “Especially when it comes to exotics. Are we talking impedance of motion like swimming through mud, actual physical barriers, force walls—”
Everyone became aware of a curious thready melody, high-pitched, coming from the side of the room. The drone had crept out from under a cabinet. Khiruev knew instantly what part of the wiring she had gotten wrong. She also had a moment to curse herself for using that wretched music box for parts. She clearly hadn’t thought through the resonance activations carefully enough.
The drone’s needler fired four times in lockstep with the horrible skewed melody. Everyone was already moving. Khiruev had reflexively lunged out of her chair to shield Jedao, as had Lyu, Riozu, and Operations’ Kel Meriki. Jedao had his gun out, but hadn’t fired into the tangle because he had no clear shot.
The needler jammed. The music hiccupped, caught on a two-note figure whining out of tune. The drone skittered back and forth for a moment. Meriki fired anyway. The bullet ricocheted. Khiruev’s knees buckled. More gunshots, she could feel them, but she couldn’t hear a thing even though people’s mouths were moving.
The drone came apart as two bullets finally hit it. Khiruev hadn’t built it to last. Fragments scattered across the room in several directions. One hit the table’s leg and bounced off, but Khiruev didn’t see where it went. A moment after that, Khiruev realized she hadn’t noticed all the blood, even though she could smell it, because she’d lost most of that side of the spectrum. Everything in her vision was blue-shifted, wintry. She tried to get to her feet, but her muscles wouldn’t cooperate.
Kel Lyu was sprawled on the floor. Meriki was slumped across the table.
“—Medical,” Jedao was saying from far away, his voice hard and crisp. “Two dead, don’t know about injuries. And I’m going to need a word with Doctrine about stepping up security if Hafn agents planted something on the fucking command moth. I heard about General Cherkad’s assassination.”
A team of servitors arrived first and confirmed that Lyu and Meriki were dead. Lyu had taken three needles. The fourth was buried in the wall next to the gingko image. One of the drone fragments had nailed Meriki in the eye.
“All right,” Jedao said, still in that clipped voice. “Notify Major Arvikoi that they’re the new acting head of Intelligence, the same for Major Berimay and Operations. We’re going to try this meeting again after Doctrine assures me there aren’t any other traps. Out, all of you.” He thought for a moment. “Except you, General Khiruev. Come with me.”
There was no way Jedao didn’t know, despite the flimsy cover story he had fed Medical. “Sir,” Khiruev said, or thought she said. She hauled herself to her feet. The surviving staff heads saluted them as they passed out of the room.
“All right,” Jedao said when no one else was in earshot, “your place or mine?”
His hand wasn’t anywhere near his gun, but then, it hadn’t been when he had fired on Brezan, either.
“I’m certain my quarters will be safe, sir,” Khiruev said, with no particular emphasis on ‘safe.’ When Jedao saw the boxes of dismembered gadgets, he’d have all the evidence he needed. Might as well get it over with.
Khiruev’s quarters were down the hall from Jedao’s. Jedao let her enter first. The door slid shut behind them.
“You weren’t kidding about watches, General,” Jedao said, inspecting the shelves where Khiruev kept her favorite trinkets. “That rose gold one would be nice if you fixed it up, but never mind. You were probably shocky when I called Engineering asking if anyone had recently requisitioned gewgaws. But then, you wouldn’t have needed their help. Engineering subspecialty as a cadet, isn’t that right?”
Khiruev wasn’t sure what she wanted more, a bullet in her head or a cane. Standing up without collapsing was taking all the concentration she could spare. “Come again?” she said.
Jedao eyed her, then brought over a chair. “Sit down, for love of fox and hound. I’d rather not be talking to the floor.”
She sat.
Jedao crossed his arms. “I’m not unaware of the effect that formation instinct is having on you right now, General, but I need you to pay attention to what I’m saying with your actual brain and not the part of your brain that’s going to ‘sir’ me to death. If you’ll pardon the expression.”
Khiruev stared at Jedao’s holstered gun. “I’ve betrayed you, sir,” she rasped. “My death is yours.”
“That’s not the salient point, General.”