Page 49 of Ashes & Aether

Maggie tilts her head, her blue eyes pinning me with a silent, sharp command. She gives a microscopic shake of her head.

Wrong tactic.

She steps away from the wall, walking slowly around the perimeter of the room. She doesn’t look at the female. She looks at me.

“She isn’t afraid of Korvann,” Maggie says in English. The Avaren female frowns, unable to understand the human tongue. “She is furious with him. He left her behind without a word, and she learned of it the way everyone else did. Don’t threaten her, Orien. Offer her the chance to ruin him.”

I stare at the brilliant, terrifying woman standing in my interrogation room.

Then I pivot. I pull out the chair opposite the lover and sit down, lounging back, projecting an aura of conspiratorial sympathy.

“He abandoned you,” I murmur, my voice dropping into an understanding purr. “He utilized your influence, drank your wine, and fled the planet.”

The female’s haughty mask cracks. Her eyes flash with genuine venom.

“His goal is to force Queen Raelith to abdicate using the prince’s match as the blade that removes the crown,” she spits out, her voice dripping with disdain. She leans forward, eager to malign him, eager to burn his legacy to ash. “He is a fool chasing a throne he cannot hold.”

“A delusional fool,” I agree smoothly. “Where is he hiding?”

“I don’t know the coordinates.” She sneers, adjusting her silks. “But he spent an entire night complaining about a young engineer at the port who went gray the moment he walked past. A boy. Sophan.”

I capture Sophan before the rotation ends.

He is barely more than a youth, terrified of the plasma blade hanging at my hip, terrified of the treason charges hovering over his head. I don’t even need to press him. He takes one look at the cold, calculating glare Maggie aims at him from the corner, and he crumbles.

What he gives me is thin and sharp: a cousin who is a scientist aboard the Pride, a research program the general keeps confidential, and a planet I know too well. He never says her name. He doesn’t have to. Vessa Korvann.

With half a thought, I engage the direct mind-link to Kairen.

I have something. I’m on my way.

Tell me now, Kairen’s voice violently crashes into my skull, vibrating with desperate impatience.

I’m bringing someone who might know a location of interest...

I grab Sophan by the collar of his tunic, hauling him out of the chair. We march out of the holding cells, Maggie flanking my right side, her presence a silent, grounding anchor in the chaos.

I continue briefing Kairen.

I also spoke with a female whom the General is occasionally close to... Apparently his goal is to force Queen Raelith to abdicate using your match as the blade.

Maggie, Sophan, and I reach the main flight control room. The tension inside is suffocating. Kairen stands near the holographic starmap, his muscles coiled, looking like he is moments away from tearing the metal bulkheads apart with his bare hands.

“He’s now the most loathed male in our history!” Kairen roars the moment I step through the doors, aiming his wrath at the phantom of Korvann.

“He’s delusional,” I agree, pushing Sophan forward.

The boy stumbles, catching himself on the edge of a console. He looks up at the Crown Prince and practically stops breathing.

“Sophan, correct?” Kairen says, and the engineer’s ears turn red under his attention. “Tell me what you know of my match, please.”

“C—commander.” Sophan’s voice cracks. “I overheard General Korvann asking one of the chiefs how to disable the tracking systems on the Pride. He said it was for a military exercise. New tactics against the Ghorvek.”

I watch hope drain out of Kairen’s face. “Is that all you know?”

“N—no. My cousin is a scientist aboard the Pride. She mentioned at the last family gathering that the general has been looking into reversing the effects of the Ghorvek genetic virus.”

“We’ve been looking into that for long cycles,” Kairen says. “What does he think he’ll achieve on his own?”