Sykora sits up. Her lips slip open—underneath her teeth are gritted. “Third touch, second blood, or first to fall?”

“Second blood,” Inadama says.

“Terms,” Sykora says. She has the automatic air of ceremony about her now.

“If you win, I’ll sign your papers. And you’ll be a Princess Margrave.”

“And I suppose if you win, I am a Princess Palatine.”

“You lost that chance.” Inadama’s still not broadcasting video. “I see now your upbringing has made you too coarse for a Palatine title. You are a suffixless Princess, sweet and simple. Conditions.”

“If I am to return to the Imperial Core, it is with all the independence I desire,” Sykora says. “You have no inherent right to my time, or my husband’s, or our family.”

“Overruled,” Inadama says. “I will remain in my descendants’ lives.”

“They get two overrules apiece,” Vora whispers.

“What then?” Grant whispers back.

“Then it’s accept or refuse.” Vora is squinting nervously at the blank screen. “And refusal is heavy.”

Sykora sighs. “Then you’ll furnish me with land on a world other than Taiikar. And we will agree to the time and manner of your visitations well in advance.”

“I accept,” Inadama says. “My condition is this. You will owe me, as your mother, one cycle in every deca of my grandchildren’s time. They will stay with me.”

“Overruled,” Sykora says.

“Sykora. They must keep their ties to the Core. I will not see them grow up as frontier outlanders.”

“Correct, Marquess,” Sykora says. “You will not see them grow up.”

“This, then.” The edge is growing in Inadama’s voice. “You will permit me to install a tutor aboard the Pike, who can—“

“Overruled.” Sykora interrupts.

A sharp exhale from the other end of the line. “Are you truly so hateful of me, Sykora?”

“I do not hate you, Marquess,” Sykora says. “But I cannot stand to be your daughter.”

Silence over the line.

“This, then.” Inadama’s voice is deadened. “You’ll tender to me, as repayment for your release, one hundred thousand imperial marks’ worth of your sector’s exports, of my choosing.”

Sykora’s eyes narrow. “What exports?”

“I have none in mind. I shall examine your ledgers at my leisure and decide. I want recompense. That is the least of what I am owed; and should you best me, I’ll remit the hold my blood gives me upon you, in exchange for it.”

“Your blood is nothing to me,” Sykora hisses. “I am my own creation.”

“Draw it from me, then.” The dare couches in Inadama’s tone. “And we’ll read its proof, and so conclude. Accept my terms or refuse my challenge.”

A pause. Sykora’s mouth opens and shuts. Grant sees her chest slowly rise as she draws a careful breath. Vora’s state-still.

“I accept your terms.” Her tail twitches in beckoning. “Vorakaia.”

The midnight-blue woman is at Sykora’s side, swift and silent as a wraith. “Majesty. Marquess.”

“My majordomo will be my second,” Sykora says. “Name yours, and they’ll draw up the particulars.”

“My second is Livinai, my bannerwoman. She will contact you presently, Majordomo Vorakaia.”

Vora’s bow is fluid and practiced. “I will look forward, Marquess Palatine.”

“I shall meet you, Sykora of the Black Pike,” Inadama says. “At the Embassy of Blades.”

***

“The Embassy of Blades. Holy shit.” Grant stares at the distant image, magnified on the cabin window’s readout, of the cylindrical fortress their landing carrier is flying toward. Its exterior is rung with spear-shaped colonnades that extend into a gleaming skybridge off its southern side. “That name is metal as hell.”

“Metal.” Sykora opens one eye and favors him with half a grin. “Is that a Maekyonism?”

He nods. “It’s from a kind of music.”

“We’re quite overdue for a followup acquisition visit to Maekyon, I think,” Sykora says. “Now that I have a limited amount of English under my belt, it’s time for some cultural education. We ought to make a list.”

“Metal might not be…” He tilts his head. “I don’t know, actually. Maybe the Taiikari would get a kick out of it.”

“You’ve opened me to a great many things I never thought I’d appreciate.” Sykora’s cross-legged and motionless but for her tail. “I’ll follow you wherever you point. If we make it out of whatever Inadama’s got planned.”

“You doubt it?”

Sykora sighs. “I wouldn’t have accepted this challenge if I had the choice.”

“Is a hundred thousand Imperial Marks a lot of money?”

“Oh, yes. It’s a, uh—what was that Maekyonite phrase?”

“Fuckton.”

“A fuckton of money. Yes. But that’s not what concerns me. I’m more than able to pay it back through whatever export she requires. Exo, at a guess. It’ll put a ding in my treasury, but those coffers will be flush again soon enough.” Sykora’s neck extends as she enters into a back bend. “But her refusal to broadcast video—I’d wager she had witnesses. Carefully selected ones.”

“Like who?”

“Admiralty, fellow Princesses, the press. Who knows? And to refuse a duel, as a Void Princess whose ambition is Margrave? That’s not damage I can afford. She could use that to cut me down so badly I’d have no choice but to crawl back.”

“You’re a badass, though. You really think she can beat you?”

“Not in the slightest,” Sykora says. “But surely she knows that. That’s what concerns me. Perhaps it really is as simple as myopic, wounded pride. That’s not so uncommon, in the Imperial Core.”

“That sounds… optimistic.”

“Mmm.” Sykora opens an eye. “I fear you’re right. You know what else is common, in the Imperial Core?”

“What?”

“Cheating,” Sykora says. “Especially in duels.”

A timer beeps. “Shrike pose, Majesty,” Vora calls from the opposite end of the cabin. She shifts into an arms-out stretch on her stomach, one leg bent back and arched high.

Sykora flips prone and follows suit. Her foot slips upward. “Tug on that for me?”

He obeys. Sykora hisses between her teeth as he deepens her stretch. “No armor this time?” he asks.

Sykora shakes her head. “Second blood,” she says. “It’s just how it sounds. Draw blood twice and the bout is yours.”

“Are there deaths?”

“Now and then.”

“Are you, uh…” Grant cuts himself off.

Sykora’s mouth cracks into a thin smile. “I won’t kill her. Even if this is some screwjob. It’s a political crisis to kill anyone in a second-blood duel. Especially a Marquess-Palatine who’s convinced she’s my mother. I’d love to take an eye from her.”

“Hellfire. For real?”

“She can vat-grow a new one,” Vora says. “I think it’s a capital idea.”

Grant looks to the mousey little majordomo. “You too, Vora?”

“I am a proud officer of the Void Navy,” Vora says. “If some Core world cockholster thinks she can mess with the ruling family of a ZKZ to this degree, it requires an unmerciful reply.”

Sykora sputters a laugh that threatens the integrity of her shrike pose. “Core world cockholster. My God, Vora.”

“Pardon me, Majesty.” Vora twists out of her stretch. “The situation flashed its eyes at me.”

“Two minutes to landing pattern. Two minutes.” Hyax’s voice clicks from the intercom. “Marines make ready. Boots and banner, Majesty.”

“When we land,” Grant says, “let’s do the Groom’s Code trick. I’ll get lost on the way to the bathroom and see what I can learn.”

Sykora stands up and steps over to where he sits, leaning in between his legs. “Are you sure?”

“We need to know what game we’re playing. If she’s getting ready to screw us and imprison us in the Core, maybe I can find out how.”

Sykora glances to Vora. “You’ve fought here before at tournaments, yes? Is there a clear way?”

The Majordomo nods. “The Embassy is one large torus with the arena in the center.” She draws it in the air with a pointer finger. “Once we’re in our respective pits, there’s a route Grantyde can take to listen at their door.”

“All right, dove. So long as you’re careful.” Sykora pulls her boots on. The thrum of the gravity generator changes pitch as the carrier’s landing pattern begins.

The Embassy of Blades’ roof is a giant walkway that overlooks the misty violet jungle on its outside and the sandstone arena within its span. The entire circumference is full of nobles, here to watch the Marquess Palatine and the Void Princess clash. Word must have gotten around to the Taiikar coterie. They watch with one communally held breath as the boxy, military-pattern carrier that bears the Black Pike’s colors taxis onto the skybridge spoke that juts out to receive it. It’s a T-junction, with a pair of landing pads on either side. One space is already taken by the golden egg-shaped cruiser that Grant saw in the Marquess’s bay.

The carrier lands. Its parking garage-sized bay tilts open, descends, and, with a thunder of metal and a hiss of hydraulic steam, locks into a ramp. A platoon of marines descends from its dark steel guts in rows of gleaming onyx and bright scarlet. At their head strides Hyax, accompanied by Sergeant Ajax, a streaming banner clasped in his gauntlet. The flag of the Pike slashes across the sky like an open wound, the twin polearms bold in its center.

Grant and Sykora wait in the train of soldiers—him in a high-collared gold-and-crimson uniform, her in body-hugging martial black, her blazon-hung spear in hand.

“Can I hold your hand?” he asks.

“Not traditionally.” She stares outward, eyes fixed on the ship opposite them. “Traditionally, you walk behind me.”

He moves into shadow. Her tail thwaps firmly against the small of his back. She shakes her head. He steps forward again with the pressure she’s exerting, back to her side.

“Fuck tradition,” she whispers.

Together, they move out into the stark light of the Taiikar dawn. Sykora’s hand finds his and locks tight around it.

On the opposite end of the bridge, Inadama’s retinue is smaller but finer and flashier, her footsoldiers in ceremonial uniforms rather than the ceramic plate of the Pike’s marines. White and Gold. The colors of Clan Taiikar. Their banner waits, in form and flair a match for the Pike’s. Inadama’s crest is upon it—a raptor’s talon, enclosed in a golden circle.

Inadama stands behind her retinue, defiantly alone, in a stark-white bodysuit. Grant has only seen Inadama in heavy gowns and robes of office. Now she’s wearing the same tightly fitted duelist gear Sykora is, and Grant comes to a regrettable but perhaps unsurprising conclusion that he would never dream of vocalizing aloud:

Marquess Palatine Inadama of Taiikar is gorgeous.

Her cheekbones are high and graceful, and dotted with a mole that’s so well-placed Grant isn’t sure whether it’s makeup. The lines that gild her lidded eyes don’t so much age her as lend her a regal, imperious sheen, like a Classical Hollywood screen maven. Her body has the same shapely, bottom-heavy figure as Sykora’s, the same honed shoulders and thick thighs.

Grant holds secure to his wife’s thin-boned hand. The strangeness of the situation comes home to roost as he gazes out over the curved horns of his Imperial escort. An absurd thought flutters through his mind and he shoos it away before it threatens his solemnity:

We’re here to fight this total MILF for Sykora’s right to become a total MILF, too.

The front ranks of both women’s garrisons meet and part in the center. “Once the marines move, you follow,” Sykora whispers, then raises his wrist to her lips and kisses it. A murmuring ripple spreads through the royal observers. Sykora releases her hold on Grant and strides forward, heedless of the attention.

The two noblewomen pass through the opened corridor of soldiers and meet at the center of the bridge. The gold-spun feathers hanging from Inadama’s spear jangle as she raises the tip out and up to cross with Sykora’s. Mother and daughter stand for a frozen moment, spears locked, as applause crescendoes from the crowd.

Then Sykora slams the butt of her spear to the ground at her side, and Inadama follows suit. The Marquess bows. The Void Princess salutes. They turn out to the crowd and march, side by side and steadfastly avoiding one another’s gaze, toward the Embassy of Blades. The wide promenade is large enough to accommodate both soldier detachments. The crowd opens to let the women through.

In their wake, Grant follows. Sykora’s out of sight but for her spearhead, held above the curved horns of her retinue. Its crimson blazon drapes down its length like running blood.

***

Grant sits before his wife, cross-legged on the floor of their hushed marble ready room. Her hands are laced in her lap. Her spine curves forward as she breathes deep.

He looks between her and Vora, who’s changed into the same tight duelist uniform. It always disarms him when he sees skittish little Vora out of her majordomo attire and remembers she’s a capable warrior in her own right.

“You’re fretting,” Sykora says.

He wonders how she knows. But these days they’re so attuned to one another he can’t be surprised. “A little.”

“Don’t worry about me, dove,” Sykora says. “I’m not the sort of woman who loses her life at one of these.”

“I won’t,” he says. “Once I’m sure.”

He reaches down to his boot and tugs one of the laces; the knot starts to unravel. He gets up and cracks the door. Just wide enough so the guard outside can hear.

“I have to go, real quick,” he says. “Bathroom. Would you code me?”

“Of course, dove. Groom’s code.” She flashes him. “Straight there, straight back. If you would give him the mark, Majordomo.”

“Of course.” Vora ties a scarlet ribbon to Grant’s wrist, then gives his palm a quick squeeze. “Be careful, Majesty,” she whispers.

He nods, then pulls the door the rest of the way open. He flashes his wrist to the guard, who bows and steps aside.

He strides the curving hall of the Embassy, beneath the stone eyes of its many reliefs, scenes of bloody conquest and martial victory. There are a few stragglers here and there in quiet conversation, but most of them have passed through the archways into the amphitheater seating of the arena.

Another Embassy guard, another ready room door. As he passes, he steps on his trailing lace and lets it unwind.

“Hellfire,” he mutters. He bends down and fiddles with his boot. The guard glances briefly at him, sees the ribbon and the undone boot, and glances away again.

Grant gently tugs the directional microphone from the lining of the boot and places it on the floor, boot-heel over it to cover the compact electronic. He shifts its receiver toward the crack of the door. The fuzzy crackle of the carpet fibers nearly makes him wince as it fills his flesh-toned earpiece. Then the feed resolves into voices.

A man’s: “What was she learning in training? What did you practice?”

A gruff-sounding woman: “Simple things. Just drills and getting her back into step. Been hectocycles since she’s dueled. She picked it up all right.”

“All right enough for a Void Princess?”

“Oh, no. No, not at all.” A humorless laugh from the woman. “Sykora’s going to take her apart.”

“There’s no trick up her sleeve?”

“Nope. None. Inadama was never going to win, and she knows it. She’s only trying to survive. A Marquess Palatine versus a Void Princess. It’s impossible.”

“So why? She’s only just recouped her position after having Princess Sykora. Now she allows this humiliation ritual? Demands it? What’s her angle?”

“That’s Inadama’s ace. She pretends at an ego, but she lacks one. What other noblewomen would never dream of doing for the social reprimands and pressures, she does. You and I are afraid of pain and humiliation. She isn’t. She intends to lose.”

The guard glances Grant’s way again. He’s un-laced his tall boot all the way, and is fumbling the aglets back through the forest of fasteners. He gives silent thanks to the Gods of the Firmament for complicated dress uniform boots.

“The cowering and sniveling and climbing back up she had to do after she had Sykora and Narika,” the woman continues. “And now she has two incredibly powerful daughters with two incredibly powerful ZKZs.”

“They’re not her daughters. They’re Void Princesses.”

“By Imperial decree, sure. And yet here we are. About to witness… whatever it is we’re witnessing. The Princess is playing into her hands; at a guess, she always has been.”

“For what?”

“I don’t know. But she’s always got an angle. Always.” Grant recognizes the tone in the woman’s voice. This is how the Black Pike command group sounds when they talk about Sykora. “What’s about to happen—this is the price she’s willingly paying. We are, all of us, exactly where she desires.”