Jonah felt his composure slip at the end. A brief moment, when the mask slipped away, and he nearly let them see the desperation lurking so close to the surface. People on the outside. Yes, he’d need them. If it came to that.

Faith defend, it would not.

He stood, and Julian followed suit. There was not much left for the exarch but to exchange solid grips with Tara Campbell, and wish her the best. “I will not hesitate to call,” he warned her. “And I know you will not hesitate to answer. The Republic’s thanks, Countess Campbell.”

He turned them all toward the door of his office, walking across the seal, sparing it only a quick glance downward.

“And you, Lord Davion. If I thought I could steal you away from Prince Harrison, I might try.” He waved back Julian’s beginning of polite refusal. “No need, no need. I saw it the first day we met. Your devotion is admirable. Harrison is fortunate to have such a strong… champion. And I know he is waiting for you, and it grows late. Go, Julian. Both of you go with my blessing and appreciation.”

“There is nothing more we can do?” Julian asked. Tara waited on the answer as well.

“Nothing that cannot wait until tomorrow. We aren’t finished yet. I have high hopes of turning today’s misfortunes into a boon. A formalized alliance with the Federated Suns is only the beginning of what we might accomplish. We, all of us, work toward peace. Out of everything Damien said at the service today, that sits strongest with me. And we will continue to do so. All it will take is for the right people to step forward. And I think we are close to that.” So very close, Jonah could almost reach out for it.

Tomorrow.

And when he was left alone in his office, with a few minutes until his next appointment in a long string of meetings and planning sessions that would burn away most of the night, Jonah Levin crossed back to his desk and took a moment in the alcove. Pulling back the curtains. Watching twilight gather over Magnum Park, Geneva, and The Republic. His Republic now.

He only needed to hold things together a short while longer. To stop the nation from bleeding out through a thousand, tiny cuts.

“No. We aren’t finished yet.”

But it was looking more and more like a race to the end.

Terra

Republic of the Sphere

2 June 3135

Midnight had come and gone.

Still, Caleb Hasek-Sandoval-Davion stormed the wide, third-floor balcony at the chateau at Thonon-les-Baines, pacing back and forth, restless and wrestling with his suspicions. His anger. Still awake, waiting for the hero’s return. Killing time. He cradled a glass in one hand, filled half-full and sloshing with smoke-colored bourbon. In his other, he pinched a cigarette.

“Julian left Geneva hours ago. Where the hell is he?”

The doors to his personal suite stood open, with golden light bleeding out onto the open-air patio. The only illumination he’d wanted. The two other rooms opening onto the balcony, given over to his personal staff (all two of them!) and his security agents, remained dark and closed off.

Only one agent on duty this time of night anyway, and he stood post in the hall outside of Caleb’s living area.

“Where is he?” he asked again.

He finished his cigarette in a long, greedy drag, searching for something—anything—to help calm him. Nicotine wasn’t it, and he flicked the butt over the balcony’s stone railing. The cherry-red ember arced out into the night, falling in a slow tumble past the second-floor balcony and into the trees below.

Summer had dried out the grounds and raised the snow line farther up the mountainside. There was a danger of fire, he supposed, but that was for others to worry about.

“Denied!” His father had actually denied him the opportunity to join his cousin in the field. “He forbid it.”

Caleb had realized his mistake the day Julian fought Yori Kurita to a standstill in the simulator battle. Until then, he had played his own part perfectly. His father’s son. The heir to the throne, and the future of House Davion. He had seen and been seen. Rubbed elbows with all of the major political figures except the damnable Kuritas.

He had even managed since to avoid another run-in with Danai Liao. No matter his personal fascination. For the good of the Federated Suns. His image.

But none of that mattered because it was Julian everyone looked to. Courted. Questioned.

“They forgot,” he said. He took a stiff drink, letting the bourbon taste roll around in the back of his mouth a moment before swallowing. “Forgot that I engineered that conflict. Alaric Wolf and Magnusson, they jumped in after it was already set off.”

And then he had made the mistake of pushing all the glory onto Julian, as prince’s champion, when he could have—should have!—suited up to command the armored corps. Not Calamity Kell, who nearly ran the entire battle into the ground with her showboating. Almost as bad as Jasek Kelswa-Steiner, who had fed Alaric Wolf an impressive victory of his own.

With him in the fight, certainly the Federated Suns would have prevailed with a strong showing. Then everyone would have remembered his part.

Another lost opportunity. Like being too late to arrive on Terra at his father’s side.

Who had taken his place there? Julian!

Who found every opportunity to take personal meetings with the Sandovals and the exarch? Julian!

“Who was tapped to champion this budding alliance with The Republic of the Sphere? To show himself off as a hero of the Federated Suns? To usurp my proper place?”

Caleb spun and hurled his glass with all the strength in him, sending it smashing into the chateau wall next to his door. The glass shattered into tiny shards and splinters, littering the threshold. Dark liquid stained the wall, the flagstone patio, and the edge of the carpet just inside the room.

The scent of bourbon rose up in the night air.

“Caleb? Is everything all right?”

Harrison’s voice. His father. From Caleb’s room!

A shadow filled the doorframe, large and solid, as The Bear stopped on the threshold. With the light behind him, the prince’s face was dark and unreadable. He was all beard and hollow pits for eyes. His words sounded guarded.

“Everything all right?”

“Why shouldn’t it be?” Caleb stopped his pacing as his father stepped out onto the balcony. He folded his arms over his chest and stared out over the mountainside drop. The slender tops of tall pine trees reached almost level with the stone railing. “Everything’s fine so long as Julian is around.”

The large man shrugged away Caleb’s concern. Shrugged!

“It was not appropriate to send you with him. This kind of fight is the job of the prince’s champion.” But he did not sound convincing. Not this time.

“And the prince’s heir? What of him, Father? What of me?” Caleb kept his fury in check, but felt it quivering in every muscle. Like a hive of angry hornets. “Is this my punishment? To keep me buried from sight over a small”—he reached for a word, trying to sum up his error in judgment in the least-damaging way—“indiscretion?”

“This has nothing to do with whatever passed between you and Danai Liao.”

Caleb wasn’t listening. “Someone had to know who she was. Someone should have told me.” He remembered the Grand Ball. “Julian knew. He recognized her right off. And he’s always poking his nose in where it doesn’t belong. He should have found out and warned me.”