At last, we reached Dargonus. Our arrival in the Mundus Valancius system was marked by many hails of welcome that Vigdis took pleasure in relaying to me: from the palace, from the governor's office, from the von Valancius fleet moored there (while I did know I owned a fleet before, it was still jarring to see all those ships on the auspex), from the Cardinal's office, but also from half a dozen noble houses and twice that number of guilds, cults, and private organisations. It was a bit overwhelming. Janus had been, after all, a rural place with relatively few inhabitants, and Kiava Gamma, well. But here was the seat of my power, on a planet populated by hives so tall their summits grazed the upper atmosphere and so deep their roots dove in places too hot for unaugmented human habitation. I come from a small, wild world. Dargonus awed me.
Mundus Valancius is a vast system and, despite our speed, the distances involved made our journey from the Mandeville point to orbit a crawl of twelve days, which we used by progressively synchronising our clocks with the time in my — my — palace. We were met halfway through by the flagship of the fleet, the Caerula Umbra, a giant Oberon-class battleship beside which our frigate was a mote of dust. But we were the flagship of the dynasty, and they were here to provide us with a honour guard. Reaching us, they voxed the helm with what Helmsman Ravor explained to be some sort of ancestral greeting from newer big, bad ships to old and small but deadly ones:
Caerula Umbra to Emperor's Mercy: Who are you?
Emperor's Mercy to Caerula Umbra: Von Valancius dynastic flagship Emperor's Mercy.
Caerula Umbra to Emperor's Mercy: You are still, after ten thousand years, the most beautiful ship in the galaxy.
Voidships flirting. I did feel like I had seen it all.
Day after day, our destination got bigger, from pinprick of light to bright disk and then a true planet with its atmospheric haze and the geometrical patters of spires, with their continent-spanning avenues and, on the night side, lights flowering everywhere.
Soon enough, I found myself disembarking a shuttle (the pretty one) on a marble landing pad surrounded by enough sculpted decor to be some sort of open-air museum. Abelard was with me and looked rather pleased at the prospect of introducing me to my capital planet. The palace was, surprisingly, only about mid-height of the hive; while this allowed for open skies over it and true hanging gardens submitted to the real weather, which I liked, I wondered. Gubernatorial houses, in general, were at the very top if only for the symbolism; I remembered visiting one where stars shone in the indigo sky even during the day and a vast dome held in the air. And then, truth hit me. Ten thousand years ago, this must have been the summit of the hive. The city had grown, to accommodate the protectorate prosperity, and the dynasty was that old. This palace must have been built when the Emperor was busy conquering the galaxy — before the Horus Heresy took root, before the Siege of Terra, and before He, dead and yet alive, ascended to the Golden Throne to become Humankind's one true god. He, after all, had signed my Warrant of Trade himself, with His hand of flesh. It's easy to know one thing and yet fail to grasp its scale; the architecture around me told a story that Abelard's scholarly teachings had lacked. Being the von Valancius Rogue Trader wasn't just about owning planets and making shady deals to further imperial cause in the wild territories beyond the borders of the Imperium. I, who had grown up an orphan behind the high Schola Progenium walls, owned a civilisation.
I nearly ran back to the shuttle and ordered it to take off.
A squad of guards clad in dress uniforms laden with enough gold to make a pawnbroker swoon saluted me. Three servo-skulls hovered to my position, chanting glory to the great Rogue Trader over a repetitive tune — the hymn of the protectorate, that had lyrics bordering on the ridiculous. They escorted me to the palace proper, along a tall bridge where I stopped to take in the towering view, through a triumphal arch so tall and wide you could have driven a Baneblade through it while drunk and still fail to hit the pillars, then through hanging gardens where trees and flowers of great beauty grew between gilded chapels and singing fountains. There were birds, too; Cassia would like this place. And then, beyond a plaza where the pavement was a work of art with its patterns of Aquila, skulls, and heraldry worked in stone of many colours, a flight of stairs rose to the palace, its massive double doors of adamantine a testament to the occasional martial nature of Rogue Trader business. On the bottom of the stairs, before yet another squad in parade attire, stood a lone woman in a long full dress uniform, complete with heavy robes and devotional seals. She carried herself with the quiet ease of one used to have her orders obeyed. Her short, greying hair framed stern features that immediately reminded me of Abelard. I would have known her anywhere, without having met her: Clementia Werserian, the court chancellor. A younger man stood at her side.
Clementia greeted me with a graceful curtsy, saying as I signalled for her to rise: 'The Emperor protects! Welcome home, Your Ladyship.'
Home. I hadn't had one of those in a while. The hovel I had slept in when discharged from the Officio Prefectus had never felt like home, and before that there had been decades of following regiments here and there, never stopping long enough anywhere. My Schola dormitory had been a home, though. Now that I thought of it, I had grown accustomed to my rooms on the Emperor's Mercy too, but a few months were still not enough to feel anything else than transitory. While I was distracted by these thoughts, Clementia went on, offering me her deepest condolences on the untimely passing of Theodora, the grief that comes with one star's setting, the hope that comes when another rises. She spoke well, better than her grand-father who, if I was any judge, was torn between pride at such a tastefully subdued, yet fitting, reception, and exasperation at so many words. When she was done, the assembled squads raised their lasguns and shot three salvos that cracked when ionising the air, shouting in between long live the Rogue Trader! The servo-skulls hadn't shut up the whole time, one of them so slightly out of tune, and I dimly hoped I wouldn't be subjected to this ceremonial every single time I returned home. A bird fell with a splat five meters to my right, a lasbolt wound smoking where its head had been. It was a good thing I hadn't brought Cassia right away.
After that, the solemnity appeared to ease a little. Abelard greeted Clementia with a reserved nod that was returned and both appeared satisfied by such display of unbridled effusion. I got a better look at Clementia's companion: he appeared young mostly because he was so slim, but his real age was hard to discern for the amount of burn scars covering his face. He bowed to me, and then needed to bring a respirator to his face with thin metal fingers before he could speak and introduce himself as Achilleas Scalander, secretary of the Administratum. Not the man I expected. I asked why Governor Drivestem was absent.
'Apologies, Your Ladyship,' coolly replied Clementia. 'Governor Drivestem's residence is on the other side of the world. We sent word as soon as you entered the system, but it takes time to travel the great distances of your domain.'
While Abelard tried not to choke in repressed outrage at the governor's slight, I smiled sweetly and said:
'Please, Chancellor, remind me to increase his stipend. It is a shame such a mighty person cannot afford a shuttle and is therefore compelled to make the journey on foot.'
Clementia's short bow wasn't deep enough to hide the sudden twinkle in her eye.
After this, I was shown my apartments: a study that doubled as private audience room, a bedroom and its assorted bathroom (no waterfall, which I almost deplored)… and that was all. My quarters aboard the Emperor's Mercy were bigger, and also cosier. No sitting room, no library.
Everything had remained untouched since Theodora had last left Dargonus, just before she embarked on her last journey. Only the bedroom had been freshened, and some of my stuff prepared there earlier. The desk was tidy: inkwell, a stack of paper and another of parchment, a deported screen, keyboard and data-ports from the big cogitator on the wall that now was idle. I sat on Theodora's chair and tried the drawers. The first one opened easily; it contained only office supplies. The one below remained locked until, pulling and pushing, I uncovered a gene-scanner hidden behind an ornamental plate. When I pressed my thumb on it, a small needle pricked me, and the drawer opened. All the other drawers were similarly protected. There had been no such security on the Emperor's Mercy, but Theodora must have spent enough time in her study there to deter robbers and secret thieves herself. Here on Dargonus, the desk would stand abandoned for years at a time.
I found files, too sensitive to be kept in the cogitator's data-crypts, about the local nobility. There were three major families: Drivestem, like the absent Dargonus governor, Gaprak, like the dead Kiava Gamma governor, and Sauerback, like my ship's Master-at-Arms. Theodora had dirt on them all. I already knew the Werserian were considered something like upstarts, as Abelard had been the first to serve House von Valancius, and indeed their file was the thinnest. All the others had several hundred, if not thousand, years' worth of strife and squabble to compile. Parsing all this and, more importantly, committing it to memory, would take days. Theodora may have been a closet heretic, but I wasn't about to pass on that kind of intelligence. A good Commissar always reads the disciplinary files when being posted at a new regiment.
I was more interested, however, by another file. It was a cardboard binder, where the previous ones had been leather, that carried the hastily written word, as if by an impatient hand: HEIRS. Right enough, when I opened it Edelthrad's smug face looked right at me. Each one of us had been awarded a single sheet of paper upon which our pictures had been stapled. I dove into Edelthrad's biography right away. Psyker, sanctioned, had been a Scholar Arcanum in the Adeptus Astra Telepathica. Initially brilliant career stalled by, oh, that was interesting, a conflict with his superiors. He had told them to get bent over the Golden Throne when they had politely asked he studied less controversial fields. He had had a son, a psyker too. Burnt at the stake by the Inquisition for committing heresy so foul he wasn't worth putting on a Black Ship.
Next was, well, me. The picture was an old one, where I was so young I didn't even look like myself. I whistled between my teeth: I don't know how Theodora did it, but she obviously got the minutes of my trial as I read details no one but the Inquisition or the Commissariat could know. Perhaps Kunrad Voigtvir hadn't been such a lousy Master of Whispers, after all.
Third one was a Lord General of the Guard. I recognised the name; she had been a proper Emperor-touting bitch with a flair for tactical genius who, it turns out, hid special tastes for all things xenos. She had nearly lost her career (not to mention her life) when the Ordo Xenos expressed concerns about her holding a Drukhari prisoner in her own quarters without supervision. False accusations, in the end. I wondered if a Commissar had ratted her out. Fourth was a crime lord who ruled a planet. Fifth, a Ministorum priest. There was also a high-ranking Navy officer, a scheming noble, yet another Militarum brass, another priest… All of them people with decades of experience in high responsibility fields — leaders used to getting their way. None from the Koronus Expanse, which should be bursting with potential scions after millennia of the dynasty spawning children around. All of them with very good and very personal reasons to distrust the Holy Orders of the Emperor's Inquisition. Yes, after ten thousand years of breeding, the von Valancius bloodline really must have spread to contain eleven people who encountered such a notoriously secretive and understaffed organisation. Theodora must have seeped through thousands of files to find us, and she had known exactly what sort of heir she wanted — one that would be an outsider, too.
I mused about this for a while: the Chaos-adjacent Rogue Trader, who got herself under orders to pick up Calcazar's acolyte on her way back from finding herself an heir who would be presumed hostile to the Inquisition. I already thought she must have been desperate to brave the Warp storms of the Maw to get Edelthrad and I. This only confirmed it. There must have been no one in the Expanse she felt she could trust. Kunrad, after all, had been her official heir once, before he fell from grace for reasons yet unknown. Theodora had been an animal at bay.
Suddenly, familiar voices reached me. Jae's dominated them, as she loudly admired the centuries-old paintings in the antechamber to my apartments. I threw the files back in the drawer and closed it; I wasn't ready to share their content yet with anyone, including Heinrix. Despite our growing closeness (or perhaps because of it), I didn't want to tell him of my guesses regarding Theodora's peculiar relationship with the Inquisition: if he already knew, it would bring nothing and, if he didn't… While I hoped he would, perhaps, be an inside ally against Calcazar's machinations, I wasn't ready to put that theory to the test. Yet. I wanted to have my little dream for a while.
Well, Heinrix wasn't there. Cassia immediately drifted to the colossal oil painting that covered half the cogitator wall and piped something about it being a Jormunari original, the talent in composition, the choice of colours and etc. Now that she came a little out of her shell, I had discovered that her art wasn't merely the way she steered the ship through the Warp. She had a real passion for it, even painting my portrait in abstract shapes that were both baffling and eye-catching. I wondered if her appreciation for art painted by others lay in the fact it was about the only time she could see someone's face without a superimposed haze of colours. But my little Navigator princess had, in any case, a taste for classical education, be it music, art, literature, or poetry.
Meanwhile, Jae had already appraised everything not nailed down and sat on my desk to remind me of my promise to get her a Mercatum Tabula Officiale. That piece of paper (sorry, that thrice-blessed and twice-stamped Administratum benediction) would take her from the shadows of smuggling to the spotlight of being an Imperium-sanctioned trader, opening many doors on the way. Not that she would ever stop smuggling as her new job description would still forbid xeno-artefacts, but having a legitimate source of income and network could only do her good. I agreed to go with her to the Administratum palace whenever my business here would allow it.
Meanwhile, Argenta was being suitably impressed by some relic on a bookshelf. In the background, Idira sulked, for a change, and Yrliet loomed. They professed, when questioned, to be satisfied with their quarters. Heinrix was nowhere to be seen which, yes, made me sulk a bit, too.
What is one meant to do in one's own palace? All of my things having been moved dirtside, like Abelard says, and everyone appearing on their way to be settled, I went in search of Clementia Werserian. As court chancellor, she of course had her own grand office that the first guard I found was glad to show me the way to. The servo-skulls, that had stopped following me when I had entered my apartments, once against latched onto me like lamprids. Pasqal had stayed aboard the Emperor's Mercy to get some serious work done on the ship's systems without interference from laypersons, but I made a note to call him and get him to cut the vox-box from these things. Or untether them from my person, whichever would be quickest, because I was tempted to shoot the one that was off-key.
Clementia was surprised to see me step in her office; apologising for the mess, she explained that she expected to be summoned to the throne room instead. Ah. Palaces indeed usually have those. I was probably expected to sit my Rogue Trader ass on the overpriced chair that had graced nineteen Emperor-anointed buttocks before mine. With a courteous nod, I said aloud that I wouldn't have dreamed to step in the throne room without introduction from my chancellor. No, I do not have a particular fondness for being announced by members of the Werserian family. The good thing about my past life as Commissar is that it left me with excellent reflexes when it comes to placating people.
And so we went to the throne room, following opulent corridors and crossing galleries adorned with more art than one could be expected to appreciate in a single lifetime. At my request, Clementia briefed me on the Dargonus sociological climate .
Only by realising then how far out of my depth I was, did I understand how familiar the Emperor's Mercy had become. The ship's military organisation was something I had know since childhood; down here, I would try to swim in a pool of scheming, manipulating, nobles with poorly-defined roles and tentacular influence. I would need lessons on etiquette, on civilian manners, on civilian everything before I could be at ease. The three years I had spent drinking too much and being a wedding security guard after I was chucked from the Officio Prefectus would be of very little help.
The throne room took my breath away. It was designed to emphasise majesty and grandeur in a fashion I had never seen. Pillars, tall and wide, made a honour guard of marble along a nave leading to the throne itself — a splendour of gold that stood beneath stained glass windows so it always shone in natural light while the rest of the room would have been in gloom if not for many candelabras. A purple carpet muffled my steps when I climbed on the dais. I didn't sit right away: I was suddenly overwhelmed by the very concrete fact of my despotism. So instead, I looked at the symbols carved on the throne: the Imperial Aquila, of course, over where my head would be, and the arms of my House, but also many others. The skull, symbol of the Emperor's perpetual sacrifice and therefore of life beyond death. Eternity. The sword, self-explaining. Stars, four-pointed as they appear to voidship augurs. Planetary globes, upon which my hands would lay on the armrests. Perhaps someone else would have found something profound and witty to say before sitting on that throne for the first time, and the annals of the protectorate would have consigned it with reverence. Me, I didn't find words, for once. When at last I shook wonder away, I just turned to face the room and carefully lowered myself over what proved to be a decadent cushion.
The view from up there was solitary. I was a lone figure of authority over a mostly empty room, and I had to force myself to listen to Clementia Werserian's plans for the next few days. So many decisions I needed to approve, or refute. And for each I would need a speedy course on the local history, resources and politics. When she was done — but she really wasn't — she also told me of the Navigator House Orsellio; words had finally reached them that I had taken Cassia under my wing, and they had wisely decided that Dargonus was the most probable place for us both to turn up. They were here, and they wanted A Chat. I would grant them one, and decided I was rich enough to throw them the kind of reception that would shut up anyone's accusations of not treating their future Novator with the respect her rank entailed. And it emphatically wasn't my fault said future Novator had developed a fondness for birds, romance novels and shotguns while in my care. Well, perhaps the shotguns were my fault, but she had asked for them first. Girls will be girls and all that.
By the time Clementia was truly done, I had noticed two platforms on each side of the dais. I supposed that, during parties, they could host a small orchestra — but they also appeared to function like a waiting spot for people trying to secure a public audience with me. I caught a glimpse of a familiar head, of a familiar cape, of pauldrons covered in devotional seals. So that was where Heinrix had been. And with him was the runty Administratum secretary, Achilleas Scalander. It also explained the empty room: very few people had Heinrix's talent for chasing away people by walking by menacingly, rosette at the ready. He walked to Clementia and spoke to her ear; she turned to me again and said aloud: 'The honourable Master van Calox, Interrogator of the Holy Inquisition, humbly begs an audience with Your Ladyship.'
I have to say, the thing where I'm not supposed to notice what's going on around me until a high-ranking enough minion officially tells me is perhaps one of the most embarrassingly dumb features of being a Rogue Trader. But still, it has its uses, by giving me time to think before I need to react. Heinrix could have walked to me any time, and I didn't like one bit the conclusion I reached before I waved him forward. Achilleas Scalander followed him like his shadow. Clementia Werserian took her leave.
'Rogue Trader,' he saluted with a formal bow. So formal, so cold, so reserved, hiding behind a dutiful mask, just like he had been when he first set foot on the Emperor's Mercy. 'Allow me to introduce Achilleas Scalander properly. In addition to his duties as secretary of the Administratum, he acts as an agent of the Golden Throne under my aegis. I am sure you will find Achilleas's service useful — especially when dealing with the schemes of Humanity's foes within the borders of your trade empire.'
The coughing Achilleas stepped forward and, once again, offered me his condolences on Theodora's passing. More importantly, he assured me he would do anything to track down and destroy all of Kunrad Voigtvir's accomplices on the capital world. A good thing, for which I thanked him, as I have no use for traitors — and the ties between Kunrad and the Final Dawn, in the person of Uralon the Chaos Marine, were too worrying to neglect. At least, Dargonus appeared mostly free from heresy, be it home-brewed or imported, which came as a relief after Janus and Kiava Gamma. But there is always a catch with the Inquisition, and it came with an apologetic bow from Achilleas.
'The main reason for my presence on this planet, however, is xenos — and the threat they pose both to you and to Humanity as a whole.'
Well, I had one in my retinue, but she had been so far easy enough to live with, and I gestured for Scalander to continue.
'These last few months have been difficult for the people who report to me — my eyes and ears scattered throughout the Koronus Expanse. Warp disturbances. Astropaths overcome with madness, ships disappearing in the Immaterium… many of my observers and contacts have gone dark or have been killed by some calamity or other. Still, I managed to establish communication with some key… individuals who were able to warn me about incoming threats, including xenos raids.' His eyes gleamed with something akin to passion, now that he spoke of his real work. 'The truth of the matter is, Drukhari raids are getting bolder by the day. I beseech you, Rogue Trader — if I ever report a threat looming over a ship or a planet, do not dismiss it.'
Drukhari. The sun-stealers of Rykad Minoris, the pirates who had ambushed us once already. From what little Heinrix had told me, and from the hours of blood-curling tales Jae had regaled me with, I knew enough not to treat them lightly. I asked Scalander to send me the relevant reports; turns out he had already dispatched them to Abelard. Suitably edited, I had no doubt, and I missed having a Master of Whispers to counterbalance whatever the Inquisition spoon-fed me.
'I shall review them with the greatest interest,' I said, and looked at Heinrix. 'Master Interrogator, would you be free some time tomorrow to discuss those reports with me?'
He frowned and appeared to think. 'I shall be hard pressed to find the time during the day. You shall understand the hunt for Kunrad Voigtvir's associates requires of me to leave for the hives and acquaint myself personally with a few promising individuals Achilleas has already flagged.' Scalander watched him like a hawk. It is easier to keep a secret on a voidship than in a palace teeming with spies of all shapes and colours that presumably can't all be bullied into keeping their mouths shut. Heinrix's cool, collected gaze crossed mine. He gave no inkling of having once passionately begged me, while I rode him, to kiss him, which I had done, holding his face cradled in my hands. His mouth had an almost disdainful crease when he added, like an afterthought: 'I should, however, be back about an hour before Compline. Would this be convenient to you, Rogue Trader?'
A late dinner it was then. One hour of proper work, top. And then evening. Perhaps not the night. It was good.
'Acceptable,' I said. 'You are dismissed. Interrogator, Master Secretary, may the Emperor walk with you.'
They bowed again, deeper. 'For as long as the stars shine in the sky, my vigil continues,' replied Heinrix. 'May He watch over you too, Rogue Trader.'
By the time evening came, the Dargonus sun lighting colourful fires through the windows of my office, I was more than ready for a nap. Too many new faces, too many new informations, and a Master of Ceremonies who was ecstatic about being the one who got to plan the first Magnae Accessio in three centuries. Olever af Putnam was his name. At least there was a man who didn't even bother to pretend to mourn Theodora; his only regret was not having directed her funeral. He was a small man, with a shock of greying hair and an enthusiastic way about him that about convinced me to let go of my uniforms in favour of what he called 'elegant garb suited to my figure.' When on Holy Terra, do as Terrans do — and I would always keep the Emperor's Mercy as a refuge from fashion.
'I love a good challenge,' he said, wide eyes twinkling. 'Military uniforms are all fine and dandy on the battlefield, but Your Ladyship shall find the palace a battlefield of its own kind that requires its own equipment. Nobles here fight like spiders in a jar. Am I right in thinking, and may Your Grace pardon me if I am wrong, that Your Ladyship never willingly wore anything that wasn't at least reminiscent of a regimental tunic? No, don't answer. It is quite obvious you have the natural fashion sense of a mudroach.' He turned around me, evaluating, appraising. 'You soldierly type always have such excellent posture. And fit, too. That back of yours is a work of art. The Emperor's Mercy head tailor is a former student of mine; she has done excellent work on Your Ladyship already. The dynastic blue does suit your complexion. Something simple, sober, and that sings, this is what Your Ladyship needs! You also need a hairdresser like a hiver needs a shower, how you let them get away with that chin-length bob cut really is proof of your clemency, but worry not. I shall send word. Tomorrow at dawn, the Coiffeur and her henchwomen will attend to you and redress the wrongs inflicted to your noble scalp.'
And, just like that, Olever af Putnam was gone, muttering about getting a composer and new hymns and dusting off the liturgy of oath-taking. I crossed to my bedroom and fell on the bed. I stretched and rolled. It was getting dark. What the hell had I gotten myself into.
It was just as well that Heinrix had declined to meet early, on the following day, because I got caught in a whirlwind of meetings and decisions — not all of them that should have required my input — as well as getting the surprise, while searching for a lumens switch in my bedroom, to discover a secret room gene-coded to me. It was filled to the brim with xeno-artefacts, presumably too hot for even a Rogue Trader to openly own, and I just let Jae loose inside it.
'Pick whatever you feel you can safely sell,' I said while gobbling a sandwich. 'Consider it an investment of the von Valancius dynasty in your soon to be flourishing business.'
My princess-turned-smuggler was already elbows deep in a cabinet. Only her shining mane of black hair was visible.
'Shereen, those are worth a fortune. You might be able to buy Footfall twice over with the contents of that room. I can give you five per cent. No, ten, for your generosity, and I'll hold an auction instead of selling flat-rate. What do you say?'
'I say that I'd trust you with my life, but not my purse. Make this a gift and save yourself the pain of swindling the books. I just want to be able to turn this place in a cosy nook.' The friendly dig got Jae laughing and she emerged holding a necklace of some shining blue material. I have seen abalone and mother-of-pearl taken from waves of wild planets, but none can ever compare to that gleam. Against Jae's brown hand, the necklace was a piece of twilight sky. I knew — still know — next to nothing about gems and stones, but it was… incredible. Beauty coalesced in flakes of heaven, cool and soft to the touch. Diamonds were studded, star-like, in between flowing geometric patterns.
'Rose of all roses, keep this then. A necklace of wraithbone, crafted by Yrliet's kin when humanity wasn't yet out of its cradle. It might even protect you from the Warp, and when you wear it no one will doubt that you are the Rogue Trader.' She chuckled. 'Anyone else the Inquisition would execute on the spot.'
Compline came and went. By the time Heinrix got there I had ran out of reports to read; I still underestimated the new memory skills my data-implant. I was standing by the window, looking at the changing lights of the hive in the indigo night, when he was announced and shown in.
'My apologies, Katov, for being so tardy,' he began. And then he looked at me and stopped. The surprise, the delight, the admiration on his face erased the frustration of having waited for him. He quickly crossed the distance between us and, taking my offered hands, drew me from the corner, slowly turning around me. I smiled under his scrutiny. Olever af Putnam himself had delivered those clothes: loose slacks, thin and flowing, and a bustier that was silk draped and knotted around forms I didn't know I had. His single concession to my past tastes had been epaulettes. My own concession to his vision was a revealing neckline. All this was in deep von Valancius blue — a colour I was the only one allowed to wear on Dargonus.
I kissed his lips. His cheek, against my cupped hand, was so soft. 'Duty,' I whispered. 'For this once, I will allow it.'
He claimed my mouth, hungrily, holding me close. It took us a while to be sated and to part.
'Thank you for your understanding, Rogue Trader.' There was a vibration in his voice that went straight to my core. Asking if he had made satisfying progress, I took his hand a drew him to a small table where a cold dinner waited.
'Yes, in a fashion. Contacts have been made and foundations laid; it will be weeks, maybe months, until results trickle back to me.'
We sat; I lit a candelabra between us. 'I want Kunrad's cronies, if you find any, alive,' I said. 'I want to put them on public trial, that everyone may see what happens when you conspire: punishment, mitigated by justice. Separating the wheat from the chaff is excellent for building morale, and Emperor knows I need something to unite the Dargonus masses under my rule.'
Heinrix had been lifting his cup to his lips; he paused for an instant and stared at me over the edge. I felt something recede from him; when he spoke, he put great care in the choice of his words.
'I am afraid, Katov, that this… will not be possible. They will be taken into inquisitorial custody.'
I frowned. 'They are my subjects, on my capital planet.'
'They are heretics. Outside of your personal retinue, I am afraid you do not have the power to oppose the Holy Ordos.' He took my hand, avoiding my eyes. 'However, I can relay a request to Xavier… to the Lord Inquisitor Calcazar, for public execution. This will be the most I can do.'
That was a disappointment, and in the way Heinrix had spoken it was clear he held very little hope for such a request to succeed. It was more than a disappointment. It was vexing. But I didn't want to be vexed. I wanted Heinrix's wit over dinner, and then a regicide party where he would be devious, ruthless, and where I could best him. Last, but not least, I wanted him in my bed; I wanted him warm and thoughtful, naked by my side, running his hands on my skin after undressing me. I wanted to laugh with him, to lose myself in his eyes, to cry out in pleasure, in a blessing of fulfilment. Not waste what promised to be a rare moment by wallowing about the Inquisition stepping on my toes.
'Let it be, then,' I said.