10 Aggravating Allies #3
Gerasimov scowled and jerked his horned head over his shoulder. “He has found himself a more distracting enemy to converse with.”
I looked around Gerasimov to see Selnikov laughing, tankard in hand, gazing down at a familiar waterfall of blue-black curls.
Lady d’Lyre chortled, her fingertips lightly resting on her collarbone before drifting over to lay against Prince Selnikov’s well-muscled abdomen.
I wondered if her approach would yield more Imperial information than mine.
Prince Aureli approached. I stepped back to give him space in our little circle. “Are you drinking tak without me?” he asked, and I heard the private rebuke in his voice. I tried not to wince. I was supposed to have joined him by now. “I’ve heard of this drink. Might I try some?”
Count Gerasimov squared his shoulders and loomed over Prince Aureli. “Tak is a warrior’s drink. You are not entitled.”
Prince Aureli took the insult so smoothly, Gerasimov might as well have spoken about the weather. “Because I’ve not killed anyone with my bare hands?”
“They need not be bare. Any weapon will do,” Gerasimov said with a snarl.
Aureli chuckled. “Then I’ve killed millions of Imperials. The Royal Commonwealth Army is my weapon.”
I tried minutely shaking my head to dissuade him from this line of argument, but the prince chose not to notice me. I knew that Imperials valued organizational and leadership skills separately from a warrior’s abilities.
Quickly, I tried to cover Aureli’s mistake.
“Prince Aureli was responsible for many of our most successful operations during the war.” He hadn’t been.
Other people had planned, prepared, and performed those operations, but Aureli’s name had been on the authorization forms to proceed, so I gave him what credit I could.
Count Zukov sniffed. “A mind is only so keen as the blade it directs.” Then the tak arrived, and Zukov passed me a tiny, smoking ceramic cup. “To victory.”
I raised my glass. “To mine, at least.” The demons chuckled at this, then laughed whole-heartedly when I downed the drink. Despite expecting the foul flavor and caustic burn, I could not avoid dissolving into a fit of wracking coughs.
“A cooling draft for the little demon slayer,” Gerasimov called, and a ready hordling offered me a tankard on a platter. I took it and gulped, relaxing as the cool honey-smooth beverage coated my throat and calmed my lurching stomach.
“Of course he’s not gentleman enough to take his drink like a man,” a voice said from behind me.
I glanced over my shoulder to see Senator Orsey standing behind me, cheeks flushed, swaying slightly with a cordial glass in hand. I sighed. I had hoped Orsey would not take his defeat as personally as Gretsky had taken his.
Not wanting to speak to him, I kept my back turned.
It was a calculated gesture, but one which honored the Imperials before me.
It was good manners in the Empire to face your most serious threat.
Turning my back fully to Orsey dismissed him as unimportant and harmless.
The demons noticed. I watched their eyes flick from me to Orsey behind me.
No doubt I’d just damaged his reputation in their eyes, but I honestly did not care.
I was here to help negotiate a peace with the Empire, not appease my obnoxious allies.
Orsey snorted behind me. “Did you ever see such rude manners?”
I continued to ignore him, and the demons followed my lead.
It was odd, directing this situation. It was like a new sense had awakened.
I was still blind in some ways – Prince Aureli was still a cipher to me – but in this moment I could tell just how my actions would impact Zukov and Gerasimov.
I wondered if this was how Boleslaw saw everyone all the time.
Count Zukov humored Prince Aureli. “What operations did you organize?”
Aureli puffed up his chest. “I helped plan the relief of Kakoda.”
My breath caught, my heartbeat accelerated. Gerasimov’s eyes focused on me, and I forced myself to resume breathing normally. I didn’t like thinking of Kakoda. I would not have Tilly had we not been cut off there, but those six months trapped on an Imperial-held world were the worst of my life.
Zukov nodded sagely. “A daring move, and victorious. We did not expect such recklessness from the Commonwealth. Still, we forced you to retreat in the end.”
Two years later, after a relief force rescued the lost soldiers from the first invasion and established a hard-fought salient deep in the Empire’s rear, the Empire brought overwhelming forces to bear against the Kakoda pocket, forcing us to abandon those worlds.
At least the second defeat was an orderly retreat and not a hellish rout like the first one.
“We almost had you the first time,” Count Gerasimov said, trying to ride the wake of Zukov’s power play.
But it backfired. Prince Aureli smiled, swirled the sherry in his coupe, and replied, “Almost.”
Gerasimov scowled and quaffed his stein, conceding the point.
Zukov stared at me, and I hid behind my drink.
He had read my record. He knew I was part of the first invasion, part of the reason for the Empire’s ‘almost.’ After careful consideration, Zukov nodded approvingly to me.
It seemed the Commonwealth had won this round of diplomatic maneuvers.
Then that idiot Orsey spoke up.
“Kakoda would have failed entirely had not the Federation rescued the Commonwealth. Had we not attacked the Valdotian sector, the Empire would have overwhelmed your first relief expedition.”
The fool. Even I knew not to undercut my allies when they were winning a conversation against our mutual enemies. Whose side was he on?