All characters normally associated with Sailor Moon belong to Takeuchi Naoko. All characters normally associated with Sailor Moon Expanded (i.e., Pumice, Garnet, Rudra, and whomever else I happen to mention) belong to their respective creators. Sard probably belongs to Tim Stamper. Don't sue me, please; it just wouldn't be very good karma for anyone concerned.

"I, Ayakashi Petz, Avatar of the Tower Megaera of the United Sisters of Nemesis,
do hereby bear witness that all debts within the demesne of the Tower are
canceled and forgiven, up to the sum of six
million credits. Let the will of the Tower be known throughout Caina."

Two down, two to go.

Rubius was feeling perfectly calm and steady and totally in control.

Sure he was.

Absolutely.

... He was going to go stark raving mad in a few hours, he just knew it.

He really hated women. All of 'em.

Especially the Uncanny Sisters.

Absolutely.


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~


Serpentine quietly let himself into the Seven Stars Citadel, exchanged a few
words with the doorwarden on duty while he was being scanned, and left a request
that Prince Carnelian was to be informed that Serpentine was back.

He wondered if he could get anything to eat -- most of the Citadel was asleep at
this hour, but twentysomething men the universe over are all alike: slaves to
their stomachs. The kitchens were probably still running, and if he went down to
see about something to eat -- at this point he would've settled for mold, so
long as there was enough sauce on it -- he could make sure that there was
nothing nasty in it. Sard hadn't poisoned anyone for years -- not since
Carnelian had had a bite from his wife's plate, gone blue in the face, and lost
his temper -- but there was no point in getting careless.

He navigated his way surely through the mazing corridors and winding hallways
without really thinking about it. Anyone except a Seven Stars lord would've
gotten lost before five minutes had passed, and not many Seven Stars would have
been able to find their ways for more than ten minutes. For Serpentine, who had
been wandering around the place for twenty years, it was easy enough as long as
he stuck to the parts he knew. No one knew all the passages in the Citadel; as
per standing procedure, the blueprints were locked somewhere in the Ministry of
Architecture and City Planning, and somehow, after depositing them, the original
architect of the Citadel had been assassinated.

That was the whole point of a Nemesian Citadel; no one save the people who lived
or worked there was supposed to know his way around. The walls were thick and
heavily warded to keep out those unwanted; the guards were many, to hamper the
clever intruders; and the passages were labyrinthine to weed out those that the
guards missed. It was a nice touch to keep a few traps around, too; Carnelian,
for instance, was very fond of the sort that woke you up when the intruder
started to scream. The maids hated them, of course; a pile of ash that big is
hell to clean up after.

The kitchens, and by extension Serpentine's snack, were duly located; munching
contentedly on something that vaguely resembled a croissant only with more
flakes and bits of meat stuck here and there, Serpentine began the lengthy walk
to his own rooms. He was, now that the hunger pangs had been partially satiated,
extremely depressed.

Serpentine supposed that there must be something intrinsically wrong with him,
but there was just no getting around it.

He absolutely could not drum up any enthusiasm about having herded his future
father-in-law to the poor man's death.

This disturbed him. You'd think that he would be jumping for joy at the chance
to bootstrap himself higher up in the clan hierarchy, but for some reason
pleasure continued to elude him.

Maybe it would come with practice. Certainly Sard never seemed to have any
trouble steering people into their downfalls. But then, Sard had ice water
flowing through his veins and actually liked talking to bureaucrats, and what
_can_ you do about a man like that?

Oh, certainly it had been fun carrying the plan out. Feldspar had been quiet and
docile, allowing Serpentine to run things his own way; things had gone just
swimmingly, right up until Feldspar had died.  Even that had gone rather well;
he'd died with his face and his thighs covered, as Carnelian would say, and
certainly he'd had the extremely good fortune to die almost right next to the
Peacekeeper's building in downtown Breccia, with plenty of impeccable witnesses,
some of whom had even been induced by the Peacekeepers to sign affidavits as to
what they'd seen.

Serpentine was well aware that he'd pulled off his father's plan without a
single hitch, and he ought to be proud of himself for having been so
well-disciplined and cool under fire (and 'fire' was probably the right word for
a Peacekeeper's inquisition).

He could not get the look in Feldspar's glazing eyes out of his mind. What was
that expression? Oh, yes -- a lamb to the slaughter. Serpentine hadn't the least
idea what a lamb was -- lambs were mythical creatures, like nymphs and elephants
-- but whatever it was, in his imagination it had Feldspar's dying look in its
eyes.

Depressed? That was not even in the same league as what Serpentine was feeling
at the moment.

By now he'd finished his snack and still wasn't to his rooms. He looked around
and felt annoyed; he'd taken a wrong turn somewhere. Somehow, he'd passed from
the living quarters into the business section of the Citadel, an area he was
rather less familiar with. How irritating. At least he knew the current
passwords; as annoying as being lost in his own home was, it would be ten times
more humiliating if he got detained by a guard and had to be rescued by his
father or by one of the other lords with high-level clearances.

He chose a corridor that seemed likely to lead him back to the living quarters,
followed it for a little while, turned a corner, and found himself literally
face to face with Sard.

The latter stared at him, then said coldly, "And just what sort of idiocy have
you been getting yourself into?"

Serpentine blinked. Even for Sard, this was a bit unfriendly. "None."

Sard merely looked at him. "Ha."

You really couldn't assign a color to Sard; the man was dark of hair and eye --
not black, or brown, or dark blue: just... _dark_ -- with skin so milky pale it
was almost blue under certain lighting. He was sharp-featured, with a milky dark
stare that could have driven a feather six inches into a marble wall at fifty
paces; he wore dark green and maroon, with no flesh showing save that of his
face. Colorless, hard and possessed of a certain vulpine air: that was Sard. No
one had seen him smile in more than twelve years; Carnelian claimed that once he
had heard Sard laugh, but since Sard had been only seven years old at the time,
it probably didn't count. Had Serpentine had any knowledge of ferrets, he would
have immediately seen a resemblance between those weaselly creatures and his
uncle; as it was, Sard merely sent prickles of discomfort down Serpentine's
spine.

"If you haven't been indulging in something stupid, where have you been?" Sard
snapped. "You've just gotten in after having been away for nearly six hours.
What have you been doing?"

Serpentine wondered for how long the doorwarden had had orders from Sard to
report who came in. "I'd been discussing a transference of an intendant from
Tanzanite's section of the clan to my jurisdiction," he said, quite truthfully.
At least, it was true as far as it went; Feldspar had been part of Tanzanite's
clientele, and with his daughter marrying Serpentine he would naturally be
transferred into the ranks of Serpentine's client-lords.

Sard wasn't ready to let this go. "Which intendant? And why? Why would you --"
something in Sard's tone suggested that a number of less polite words might have
easily been substituted -- "need another intendant?"

Before Serpentine could reply to this, Sard's eyes flicked to a point on his
nephew's face, widened then narrowed. He reached up and traced a gloved hand
along the faint cut across Serpentine's cheek.  "And what's this? Serpentine.
What sort of idiocy have you gotten yourself into?"

Serpentine barely managed to hold his temper in check. "I regrettably suffered a
loss of the intendant before the transference could be made," he said thinly.
Damn. He knew he should've Healed that cut; it just hadn't seemed important at
the time... Trust Sard to see it. "I must've gotten that cut around the same
time."

Sard made a noise halfway between a snort and a harrumph. "Oh, I knew it," he
muttered grimly. His eyes narrowed even more. "You weren't in a Nemetian Well,
were you?"

Genuinely taken aback, Serpentine said, "No! Only an idiot would go into the
Wells of the Nemetia right now, what with all the Lower Stars crammed in there."
For some reason, this remark seemed to irritate Sard even further.

"No smart remarks, young man, just come with me," Sard said. He aboutfaced and
strode off down the corridor, obviously not much caring if Serpentine followed
him or not.

His posture said that Serpentine had better care.

Grinding his teeth, Serpentine took a few long strides and caught up, easily
keeping pace with his shorter uncle. "Where are we going?"

"My office. Be quiet."

Serpentine boiled. Who did Sard think he was, anyway? Serpentine outranked Sard!
Serpentine was the next clan Prince! Serpentine was...

Being herded along like a seven-year-old, was what he was. He could,
theoretically, yank on Sard's arm and point out calmly that he was the Second
Lord of Seven Stars Sept whereas Sard was merely Third Lord. Technically he
could do that, and technically be owed an apology.

Practically, however, Serpentine would never get away with such a thing. He had
no real power base; Sard and Tanzanite and the other lords at the top of Seven
Stars hierarchy controlled all the key intendants and necessary lesser lords.
Sard had almost absolute control over the investments of the clan Treasury,
subject only to veto from Carnelian; Tanzanite and Tourmaleen had managed to
finagle their way into heading the personnel-oriented aspects of the clan; and
Lychnite... Besides heading the logistics section of the clan, he was also Seven
Stars' Lord Savant, which meant that he had practically every aspect of the clan
businesses locked away in his memory banks somewhere.

There seemed to be very little left for Serpentine to manage; and an even
smaller area through which he might hope to drive a wedge and gain some power
for himself.

Of course he could always try dislodging and replacing one of the lords
technically below him.... But Serpentine rather doubted that any of his four
candidates -- Sard, Tanzanite, Tourmaleen, or Lychnite -- would fall to a mere
twenty-two-year-old, not after they'd been going through the political
gymnastics of Nemesian public life for years.

At which point a niggling little thought popped into Serpentine's mind. Demand
Black Moon was only twenty years old... and his clan jumped around if he so much
as raised an eyebrow.

He examined this interesting little tidbit from all mental angles, and then
decided that its implications couldn't possibly apply to him. So Demand was
unargued lord of his sept at an unheard-of age. Fine.  Good for him.

Yes, well.... Demand didn't have Sard to contend with, now did he.

Firmly shoving the heretical idea back down where it belonged (i.e., somewhere
where it couldn't make trouble with the more sensible and survival-oriented
portions of Serpentine's brain), he followed Sard into the latter's office. Sard
took his seat behind the desk, obviously indicating that Serpentine face him
from across it, in the suppliant's place; Serpentine neatly foiled him by
dragging a chair to the desk's corner.

Sard's office was small, and rather bare, and very brightly lit. The decor was
mostly gray ... things... that had probably once been furniture, in the style of
Late Bureaucratic Hideous. Serpentine found  nothing wrong with this, as that
particular style was a favorite in Judecca. There were no windows. Of course
not. Windows? Windows facing outside? Outside-facing windows in the study of a
high-ranking, paranoid Nemesian lord?

Ha.

Serpentine put on a Brightly Inquiring expression, and said, "Yes? Did you want
to know something, Sard-ojisan?"

Sard-ojisan looked decidedly nonplused at this. "I don't have time for this," he
said, rather pleasantly (for Sard, at any rate). "Just tell me what sort of
idiocy you've been into, and then I'll decide what damage it can possibly do to
the clan."

"Your confidence in me is truly uplifting," Serpentine said, serene in the
knowledge that sarcasm would sail right over Sard's head.

As indeed it did; the dark man simply looked as patient as a glacier and twice
as cold, waiting for Serpentine to begin.

"What I've been doing," Serpentine said. He sighed. Shouldn't his father have
sent for him by now? Oh, well. Might as well lay his groundwork here. "All
right. I was discussing a transference of one of Tanzanite's minor client-lords
to my jurisdiction..."


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~


Demand was currently also having problems with his uncle.

Actually, to be more accurate, he was really having problems with the ...
_creatures_ that his uncle had spawned.

He cast a jaundiced gaze at the two young women in front of him. Esmeraude:
beautiful, sly, and vainer than Narcissus. She was loud and she was stupid and
she had a distinct tendency towards antagonizing some of the more staid (read:
Judeccan) clanlords and, unfortunately, she was one of the most powerful
magicians in the Family. Pumice: slightly shorter, bubbly, and slightly less
vain than her sister, although this was scarcely an improvement. She was stupid
in a slightly quieter way; the only redeeming feature Demand (admittedly neither
a sensitive person nor a patient one) had ever been able to find in her was that
she at least would never so much as make a peep in Demand's presence.

There seemed to be no sense at all, let alone subtlety or political acumen, in
either of them. According to the files resting under Demand's left hand,
Esmeraude showed some sort of dim grasp of tactics and strategy, and Pumice had
received several favorable reports from instructors in hand-to-hand and military
history, but neither of them would ever be a great captain on the field.

Except for Esmeraude's rich green hair and Pumice's wide green eyes, one would
not have known them for Garnet's daughters at all.

Very well. Demand's problem was with his uncle, and with his uncle's idiot
offspring, and, most pertinently, with the damned nepotism that was time-honored
tradition among the ruling elite of Nemesis.

There was no help for it.

He was going to have to find somewhere to stick these two where they couldn't
screw up too much and wouldn't reflect badly on him... or on the clan, he added
vaguely. But really, what was the clan but an extension of himself? ...

He didn't have time for this. He had a clan to oversee and a world unity to
achieve and a jihad to plan. There was absolutely no leeway in his schedule for
finding positions in the clan for his genius uncle's worthless daughters. Didn't
he have counselors for this very reason?

Prospects were rather limited. Since Esmeraude was a sorceress, she might have
been placed on the list of those authorized to watch over the jakokuzuishou's
reactor; however, Demand had thought twice, and then twice more, about this, and
after envisioning the kind of havoc that the flighty Esmeraude could wreak with
the dark crystal, had shuddered and firmly buried the thought forever. Saffir
had flatly refused to work with either of his cousins, and while Demand could
usually twist his younger brother around his finger, this was one point on which
Saffir was not prepared to budge. All Demand could get out of him was a muttered
imprecation against stupid cousins and "see if he would stand being called
useless in his own laboratory."

Sometimes there was simply no talking to Saffir.

He firmly disciplined himself against fiddling with any of the things on his
desk, and said pleasantly, "And what exactly are you capable of doing for the
clan, Esmeraude? What can you do that will be a credit to us, Pumice?"

The half-sisters looked blankly at each other for a few seconds, then chirped in
unison, "Management!"

Demand decided that it was going to be a very long day.

                                                                                                                                           
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~



There are very few communists or anarchists on Nemesis. This is probably due to
the fact that there are also very few idealists on Nemesis. Something about the
harsh, forbidding environment seems to nip idealism in the bud, not unlike the
effect engendered by certain parts of Arizona.

There is, however, an absolutely thriving batch of capitalists on Nemesis.
Capitalism is not idealism, no matter what Horatio Alger or Adam Smith says
about it: you get in there with your dough and you damn well destroy anyone who
tries to get in your way, although it's a nice touch to leave him just enough to
make it worthwhile to buy his business away from him so you can have people say
admiringly that you're a real champion of the human spirit.

The bureaucrats of Nemesis quite approve of their non-idealistic capitalists.
However, this is not as great a recommendation as you might think, because the
bureaucrats most likely would have approved a cult of Kibo had the cultists
filled out their paperwork and didn't get snarky about the miles of red tape
and, above all, paid their fees on time.

The whole point of capitalism is to make a lot of money. That's the sum total of
it.

It's generally hard to make money when one cannot collect the money due one
because some little girl wearing feathers and improbable footwear says that one
can't.

There are a _lot_ of capitalists on Nemesis.

Most of them do not take kindly to having their fiduciary affairs interfered
with, especially not by a pubescent -- _pre_pubescent, in Cooan's case -- snip
of a thing, acting under orders of some wet-behind-the-ears clanlord.

Most of them will probably resort to doing what all Nemesians do, when faced
with something threatening their treasuries.

They shall file a formal complaint with the appropriate Ministry.

And, because the civil servants like their capitalists, and moreover because
most normal adolescent girls, much less the Uncanny Sisters, rarely bother to
fill out their paperwork, the civil servants will devote some very serious
thought to the matter.

And, because it's the way of bureaucrats, they will kick the matter Upstairs.

And, because things kicked Upstairs have a nasty habit of languishing on
someone's desk until the crisis is long past, it will, therefore, be a bit of a
while before the mess comes to the attention of the civil servant whose opinion
counts the most:

Rudra, the eternal prime minister of Nemesis.


                                                                                                                                           
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~



Reachen re'Basalt Graycloak, to his occasional annoyance, had children numbering
in the double digits and mature grandchildren in triple digits. The sum total of
his _useful_ descendants was precisely fifteen by his last count.

Those fifteen had been summoned to him so he could issue his orders anent Demand
re'Adamant's preposterous ideas, although Reachen was rather less than confident
that his orders would be carried out to his complete satisfaction. Young people
never concentrated, that was their trouble...

Turquoise, his current heir apparent (twenty-seventh son, by the sixth wife),
began mildly enough. "We're losing Lucivar and Chabriri, but chances are good
that we can recover both of them if we're patient and can get around the Omega
Clan. We own nine of the seventeen city fathers, and can probably buy away two
more from the Silver Fire Clan if we can find the funds somewhere --"

"Take it out of our treasury in Eblis," Morion said (eleventh daughter, by the
fourth wife). She and her half-brother Turquoise exchanged cool stares. They had
an uneasy sort of truce between them, or, at least, the faction that Turquoise
headed seldom advocated actual _harm_ to Morion, and Morion had never said a
disparaging word about her brother in their father's hearing. Morion was by far
Reachen's favorite child, but she was also a Savant, and thus could not inherit
the clan leadership, and thus had no real place in the clan pecking order beyond
her status as her father's pet. Certainly, Morion had the upper hand in the
constant cabals between herself and Turquoise's faction; Reachen had not yet
confirmed Turquoise as his heir, so all and sundry were paying their court to
the Savant Morion, who could conceivably sway Reachen's choice.

"We're not doing very well in Eblis; it would probably be more feasible to
borrow funds from the Nirriti treasury," Vermarine said sweetly. Both Turquoise
and Morion turned to stare at this interloper, the firstborn daughter of
Aquamarine, Reachen's thirteenth daughter by the fifth wife.

As a general rule, the battle lines of Reachen's sprawling brood were divided in
three descending tiers: firstly by dam (with even those split between Wives One
through Three and Wives Four through Seven; the current wife, Number Eight, was
childless and seemed likely to remain so, given that Reachen seemed to agree
with most of his children that she was utterly empty-headed); secondly by
generation; and finally by political orientation. Even though all Graycloaks
over the age of twelve were, by very definition, reactionary conservatives,
there was a surprising amount of wriggle-room within this narrow stripe, and
Reachen's family managed to embody every thread, from the ultra-far-right to the
ultra-super-duper-extreme-far-right -- Reachen himself, as one of the most
inherently talented political tergiversators in the history of all mankind, had
managed to turn his cloak inside out so many times that not even he knew where
he currently stood in the political spectrum.

The liberal (for a Graycloak) Vermarine was, therefore, Turquoise and Morion's
common enemy by all three tiers: her mother had belonged to Wife Number Five's
brood; she was a member of the second generation; and her political slant went
across the grain of everything that Turquoise and Morion (professed to) believe
in. The two elder Graycloaks caught the other's eye and instantly formed an
alliance against the upstart, resolving to destroy her standing at the first
opportunity.

That done, Morion merely said in her sweetest, coldest voice, "I believe that
the Nirriti treasury is reserved only for deep emergencies, Vermarine-chan. I
hardly think we need classify the purchase of aldermen as a crux."

The younger woman looked slightly put out for an instant; Morion compounded the
freeze by utterly ignoring her thereafter. Reachen, who might've been older than
God but was definitely _not_ senile, observed this bit of interplay and nearly
smiled.

"How much of this money do we have out on loans?" the patriarch asked,
apparently idly.

Reachen never asked rhetorical questions. Morion scrambled to answer. "Er...
perhaps twenty-five hundred credits, sire," she said.

"Get them back," Reachen said. "You have four hours in which to do so. --
Andradite." The seventeenth son, by the third wife, sat up straighter. "What
d'you think Demand Black Moon is doing?"

Andradite blinked. His siblings scented weakness and leaned forward eagerly.

Their hopes were dashed. Andradite was one of the cannier members of the first
generation. His mother, Citrina re'Citrine, had been a political theorist of no
mean ability, and he himself had managed to hold on to his position as a member
of Reachen's inner council for more than forty years, which was no mean feat in
a clan that believed very highly in a little "brotherly" jockeying for status in
the family pecking order.

"Well," he said thoughtfully, fitting together long, nervous hands, "he's
obviously gearing up for something major. After all, he does have all four of
the Uncanny Ones; he can't have all four and only use two. He must mean to bring
forward Calaveras of Antenora and Cooan of our Judecca, and very soon, at that."

Reachen was probably pleased, although of course it wasn't immediately apparent.
"Yes? And what do you think he's getting ready for?"

"He's going to make himself a dictator," Morion interrupted calmly. Andradite
knew better than to look annoyed at this usurpation; Reachen brooked very little
criticism of his favorite. "Or, at least, he will try. After all, he could
theoretically declare anything through his pet Tower Avatars."

"... Really? And this is legal?" asked Ametrine. She was Turquoise's full
sister, and not as capable as her brother, although she took great pains to
cover this up.

"By one way of looking at things, it's more legal than anything that's happened
for the past four or five hundred years," Morion replied. "Even the bureaucrats
only work by guidelines; there are very few actual laws, as such. An Uncanny One
is the ... ah... will of the Tower made flesh, you know that. When she speaks
_ex cathedra_ as an Avatar of her Tower, then the will of the Tower has been
handed down from on high and is made law." Morion looked faintly disapproving
for a moment. "A dreadfully slipshod way of managing things. I would have
planned it better."

"More than likely," said Reachen, who had no sense of humor, "but the important
thing is that the only way young Demand can enforce the decrees of his pet
Avatars is to have the support of leading clans."  The cold gray eyes glittered
for a moment. "It strikes me that we haven't yet sent Lord Black Moon a
coronation gift and a renewal of the friendship between our clans."

Vermarine's brow furrowed. "We ever were friends?"

Reachen stared at her for a moment in silent contemplation, then snorted in
disgust. "And to think that I married her grandmother _specifically_ for her
unlikelihood to seed idiots," he mused to the room at large.

Morion and Turquoise exchanged satisfied looks. Vermarine bowed her head in deep
mortification.

"Andradite, you will extend an offer of friendship to Lord Black Moon and
present him with a gift," Reachen ordered, "and Chalcedony, you will keep an eye
on our affairs in Ptolomea and Caina."

This raised some eyebrows. Chalcedony (second-youngest son, forty-seventh child,
by the seventh wife) was technically not a member of the political arm of the
Graycloak empire; he was an master smith and alchemist -- the unkindly would
always add, with a sniff, "Of _sorts_," but only if they were fairly certain
that no one on the Graycloak payroll was listening -- and was the head of the
metalworking division.

There was precious little metal on Nemesis, but what there was did occasionally
have to be shaped. Most of it went into weapons, and at these, the Graycloak
smiths excelled; but there was also some fairly useless metal, like gold and
silver, which could not be shaped into blades. Well, it could, but it was
generally felt that swords made of gold were only useful as clubs, and even then
there was always the chance that your opponent would shear it in half with his
own weapon. With these throwaway metals, the Graycloaks indulged themselves with
useless but lovely little trinkets that served no conceivable purpose save to
remind the other clans that they had a stranglehold on both metal in general and
metalworking in particular. They maintained this near-monopoly mostly by sheer
skill in smithcraft, but also by dint of quietly earmarking those non-Graycloak
metalworkers and dispatching an executioner with one or two sharp implements and
very quick reflexes. There was nothing to b!
e done about other clans hoarding metal out of the Graycloak reach and purse --
Reachen felt grimly certain that those damned Third Eyes had a hoard of iron
somewhere, and he knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that the Omega Family was
stocking up on copper and tin -- but the Graycloak _smiths_ worked in a closed
shop.

Being head of the metalworking division was a full-time job; Chalcedony
evidently felt the unfairness of having a complicated assignment dumped on his
head as well, because he dared voice a protest. " --"

Or, anyway, try to voice a protest; at the first sign of Chalcedony opening his
mouth, Reachen flicked a lazy, disinterested glance his way, one that had the
stopping power of a well-aimed brick. Most of Reachen's glances did, even the
ones that didn't have the life-draining force of his peculiar Gift behind them.

Chalcedony closed his mouth with an audible "snap". Reachen turned his gaze
elsewhere. He very rarely used his Gift on members of his family; he felt it was
wasteful, and nine times out of ten unnecessary as well.

Turquoise resumed the chair of the meeting, and said briskly, "Right, then.
Leucite, you and Spinell have managed to muff an assignment that even an infant
should have been able to perform. You two, therefore, get this month's paperwork
detail."

Leucite, secondborn son of Reachen's seventh daughter by the third wife, and
Spinell, fourteenth son by the third wife (nephew and uncle, respectively),
exchanged agonized glances. Neither of them were Savants; the paperwork, which
would have taken Morion and one of her lesser Savants about two hours, would
probably take several days for them.

They did not dare make this displeasure vocal; Reachen was already looking at
them, very thoughtfully, and they had no wish to make the mildly curious look in
the cold gray eyes deepen into something more ... personal.

"Ametrine, you and Vermarine have the watch over the Omega Clan and the Sunflare
Family," Turquoise continued, consulting his notes, "and ... oh, yes. Morion, do
you and your corps have Chabriri in hand?"

"Certainly," the Savant said. "We will take the necessary funds from the Eblis
treasury; it seems that the Seven Stars Sept and the Knifewinds have kindly made
us a gift of --"

"We aren't buying anyone in Chabriri, or anywhere else, either," Reachen
interrupted.

Morion was rarely surprised, and this was why her siblings savored the look of
uncharacteristic astonishment on her fine-boned face. ".... Why, sire?"

"We only buy people who need the money," Reachen said impatiently, waving a thin
hand. "If a moratorium on debts goes through, as it seems likely it will under
young Black Moon, then any politician in debt will find his debts forgiven, and
he'll be free to ignore anything we might offer him. Save our money; we'll need
it later, in the aftermath of the moratorium."

Morion looked as if she'd been slapped. This caused no comment; various others
around the table were feeling a bit gobsmacked as well.

"... Aftermath, sire?" Andradite managed at last.

Reachen looked utterly disgusted. "Oh, go _away_, all of you," he said coldly.
"Eventually it will occur to the brighter ones what I mean, and the rest of you
can stay in the dark until death takes you."

When Reachen told people to go away, it was not a suggestion. The room cleared
in less than a moment.

The old monster tidied up his notes, running long, bony fingers along the edges
of the stack. He looked up. "You're still here."

"Yes, sire," Morion said calmly, standing beside his great chair with her hands
demurely tucked into her voluminous sleeves. "I do need to know what you would
like me to do when Demand takes control of the Ministry of Finance."

Reachen almost smiled. "Good girl." The girl, who had just turned forty-five the
previous month, bowed her head in polite acknowledgement.

"Of course he will have to take control of the Ministry of Finance. The entire
system will collapse into chaos and anarchy, if he doesn't." Reachen sighed.
"Only a complete idiot would announce a cancellation of debt without any way of
regulating the panic afterward, and I rather think that Demand Black Moon isn't
a _complete_ idiot."

"Of course not, sire," Morion said dispassionately. "What would you like me to
do about it?"

"Nothing for right now. Let it lie for a few more days. The bureaucracy isn't
going to seize on the moratorium for a while yet. Bureaucrats move very quickly,
but only after they've been pushed right to the brink. Let it lie, Morion. It is
enough that you know what's going to happen. I trust you."

Morion nodded again. It was possible that she had never in all her life been
paid so great a compliment.

She slipped out.

Reachen remained.

He frowned.

He disliked very young politicians, and he absolutely hated clever young
politicians. Demand Black Moon was both very young and very clever. To top it
off, he was Ptolomean (something that the Judeccan Reachen detested as much as a
denizen of Atlanta, Georgia, would have instinctively detested anyone born north
of the Mason-Dixon), and he was a Black Moon. Nothing good ever came of the
Black Moon Family; they were a bunch of crass, sneaky, damned unprincipled
spin-doctors. The fact that the Graycloak Clan was nearly exactly the same
distressed Reachen not in the slightest; such contradictions are inherent to the
Nemesian sense of family.

More than that, Demand's great-great-grandfather had once caused Reachen's grand
aunt a loss of face which had lasted for more than forty years. Of such stuff
are blood feuds born.

And for all that, would he throw away the past and ally his clan with the Black
Moon Family, should the need arise?

You damn betcha.

"Expediency" was Reachen's middle name.


                                                                                                                                           
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~



Sard fitted his gloved hands together and leaned back in his chair, regarding
his nephew with a certain, grudging admiration.

He'd never thought that the idiot could lie so well.

"I assume you filed a complaint with the Peacekeepers, correct?"

Serpentine looked vaguely offended. "Of course, ojisan. I named Moldavite
re'Calcyte Bloodstorm as primary transgressor and directed it to Lord
Bloodstorm's attention. With my name on it as complainant, he can't afford to
ignore it."

"Of course not," Sard said quietly. Sard almost never raised his voice. He found
that a sibilant whisper filled people with more unease than a shout. It annoyed
him immensely that Carnelian, who delivered his every word with a cheerful lilt,
could rivet people's attention more or less at his whim.

"So, I'll be going, ojisan," Serpentine said, rising from his seat.

"What? Oh, yes," Sard said. "Go on, then." He ruminated for a few seconds, then
said casually, "I suppose that Feldspar-san's illusions held true right up until
he died, then?"

Serpentine managed not to betray the shock he surely must have felt. Sard felt
another twinge of admiration. Apparently the idiot didn't take after his idiot
mother, Sard's idiot sister, as much as Sard had thought. That was always good.

"How did -- Yes, Sard-ojisan. They did," Serpentine said cautiously, his hand on
the doorknob, his body still facing Sard. He hesitated, obviously torn between
the instinct to say nothing and the positive need to ask how Sard could have
possibly known about the illusions, which Serpentine had in no way alluded to...

Sard saw no need to deliver him from his dilemma. If it hadn't occurred to
Serpentine already that Sard knew the Gift of every member of the clan, down to
Third Star, then he didn't deserve to be told.

"Go on," Sard said, still gently, still quietly. "I should imagine that Lord
Seven Stars would like to be informed of this as well." A little dig, aimed at
reminding Serpentine at the breach of protocol, wouldn't go amiss. Of course,
the fact that Sard had bullied him into giving up his information didn't have
any bearing on the matter; Serpentine ought to have refused to say a word unless
Carnelian was present, no matter that Sard was Carnelian's prime minister and
might be expected to be told eventually anyway. Clan protocol did not allow for
the fear that one's uncle might glare at one and then make cutting remarks.

No discipline in the younger generation, that was the problem.

Of course, Serpentine's heritage from his idiot mother was probably at work, as
well, but there was still no excuse.

"Um, yes, Sard-ojisan," Serpentine said finally, and exited, not without a
final, puzzled glance back at Sard.

Sard sat behind his desk for a few moments. He was almost convinced that
Carnelian was doing something completely insane and completely dangerous to the
clan's standing, but there was always the chance, however slim, that Carnelian
was, in fact, saving the clan from going under. With Carnelian, who had managed
the dichotomy of idiocy and genius for all the time Sard had known him, it was
always hard to tell.

He decided at last to wait and see. He trusted Carnelian as much as he was
capable of trusting anyone, and the man was, after all, Lord Seven Stars.
Carnelian deserved a grace period. Who knew?  Carnelian might even decide to
come to Sard and lay out the whole plan, and it might turn out to be far too
brilliant and subtle for Sard to have picked up on, really nothing to have
worried about at all.

The dark man sighed. Yes, of course it might turn out that way.

And then worms would fly.

He had his doubts -- very serious doubts -- but Carnelian was his friend and his
lord, and he did deserve a grace period in which he could prove that whatever it
was that had killed a perfectly good clanmember and rattled Serpentine was
justified.

After that, Sard would have to take certain steps to safeguard the clan.

He truly hoped it wouldn't be necessary.

Damn all Black Moons, anyway.


                                                                                                                                           
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~



Saffir didn't ask for much. Anyone at all would have to admit that.

All he wanted was peace and quiet and freedom to play with mathematics, and
perhaps every now and then, when Demand-niisan wasn't busy, a few moments with
his brother. Maybe niisan might even smile at him and remember his promise that,
one day, Saffir would have all the flowers he could ever want.

It wasn't much, dammit.

All he asked -- all he had _ever_ asked -- was peace and quiet and freedom to
work with his numbers.

What he _got_ was Esmeraude storming into his workroom, and slamming her fan
down across his papers, and making him jump a mile.

"Useless, I need your help!"

Pumice, Esmeraude's slightly quieter sister, popped up behind her. "Hello,
Saffir-chan! Hey, that's a neat set-up. What's it do?" She poked curiously at
the delicate crystals and wires comprising a model of an irregular equation set;
Saffir rescued it and put it on a fairly inaccessible shelf.

Of course, to do so, he had to turn his back on his cousins, which didn't help
his already-shot nerves in the slightest.

Saffir tried to calm his breathing. 'Useless.' 'Saffir-chan.' She needed his
_help_.

He wanted to cry. Instead, he turned back around and faced them.

"Esmeraude, please don't call me 'Useless'," he said quietly. He figured that
there was nothing he could do about 'Saffir-chan'. Pumice had cute nicknames for
everyone, even Rubius.

"Oh, fine, Saffir," Esmeraude said impatiently, waving her fan in agitated
swoops. "The issue isn't you right now, anyway. It's me. Oh, and Pumice," she
added, as an obvious afterthought. Pumice beamed.

"Yeah, can you help us, Saffir-chan, please?" Pumice bubbled.

Saffir stole a suspicious glance at her. This was the first time he could
remember anyone asking for his help, _please_.

"Why would you come to me, if you needed any help?" he asked. His hands clenched
into loose fists. "I'm only one of niisan's counselors, I don't have any real
influence. Whatever I say, Wiseman will veto automatically."

He stopped, just in time, before he could launch into a full peroration upon the
many iniquities that was Wiseman. He felt the familiar fist clench his stomach
into knots when thinking of the old magician.  Poor Demand-niisan; he, so
clear-sighted in other matters, was blind when it came to the wiles of Wiseman.

"Well, that's just great," Esmeraude muttered, fluttering her fan.

Pumice tittered. "Don't sell yourself short, Saffir-chan, I'm sure Demand-sama
values your advice," she said cheerfully. Both Esmeraude and Saffir stared at
her as if she were an idiot; she just beamed back at them.

"Look, Useless --"

Saffir's blue eyes flashed. Esmeraude's own eyes widened in some surprise, then
her face cleared and she gave a trilling laugh.

"Oh, sorry, Saffir-chan. Anyway. Even if you don't think that you could possibly
sway Demand-sama -- and really, I don't know why I expected you to be of any use
-- you could at least keep reminding him that I should be put in a real position
of power, not just some little bitty holding-place job."

Saffir tried to imagine Esmeraude in a position of power. It made him feel
vaguely ill.

"I don't see niisan enough to 'keep reminding' him about anything," he said,
very softly. He turned back to his notepad and scribbled down a few ciphers.

Esmeraude muttered something very unladylike under her breath. Pumice said, in
very real shock, that she didn't think Daddy would approve _at all_ of language
like _that_, and Esmeraude muttered something else, likewise uncouth, about
their father's unreasonable expectations.

Saffir tried his best to ignore it, but better men than he had tried to ignore
Esmeraude and failed utterly. It was simply not possible to ignore the
green-haired woman; if it wasn't the laughter, in itself enough not only to
break glass but to clean it, it was that damned fan, waving languidly through
the air with an occasional side-trip to whap someone across the cheekbone.

As now, when she suddenly snicked the fan closed and tapped him on the nose.
"Look, Saffir-chan," she said in sugary tones, "you're supposed to be a genius,
even if you're not a _real_ Savant --"

Saffir's eyes flashed again. It had always been a sore point with him that he
hadn't been formally acknowledged as a Savant and given his blue earrings by
Rudra-sama's College; Esmeraude knew it, too, and used it as her penultimate
weapon against him. Next she would probably bring up his murdered parents.

"-- And for some reason, Demand-sama seems to be fond of you. So just apply your
clever little brain to my problem --"

"And mine," Pumice interposed cheerfully.

She was ignored by both sister and cousin, who were by then so wrapped up in
their dislike for each other that they very likely wouldn't have noticed an
interruption by anyone save Demand himself.

"-- and see if you can't find some satisfactory solution to the problem that
_I_, Esmeraude, the most beautiful and talented woman in the entire galaxy, have
been relegated to ... to..."

She couldn't finish, being choked by sheer indignation and disgust. She snapped
her fan open again and began to fan herself with feeling.

"I didn't know you knew a word like 'relegated'," Saffir observed
dispassionately. His hands were shaking. He concentrated on it, and the shaking
stopped. The feeling of sick annoyance remained.

"Oneesan's probably bothered cuz Demand-sama said it was a nuisance, trying to
put us somewhere," Pumice said, rather sadly.

Saffir glanced at her. When he had ever thought about her at all, he had been
inclined to think of her as a nice person, although extremely daffy, and
possessed of little or none of the casual malice that seemed to characterize
Esmeraude or Rubius. "Well," he said to her carefully, "I think there might be
something I could do for you. Do you know the Uncanny Sisters at all?"

Pumice brightened. "Of course I do, little Cooan's just the cutest little thing,
I was showing her how to braid hair, and she practiced on adorable little
Beruche all day," she said, and giggled. "I don't know Petz or Calaveras very
well, but I'm sure they're just the nicest girls, too."

Saffir thought over what little he knew of the Uncanny Sisters, and concluded
that Pumice was an extremely generous individual. He'd never met Petz or Cooan,
but, unfortunately, both Calaveras and Beruche had once been inflicted upon him
for an afternoon and he'd never really recovered from the shock of what Beruche
had done to his favorite alembic.

"If you'd like, I could suggest to niisan, or to Rubius, that you could assist
overseeing the Uncanny Sisters. Rubius is very competent --" that was true
enough, as far as it went -- "but I'm sure that he would welcome some help from
a woman, who could probably relate to the Sisters much better."

That was certainly _not_ true; Rubius would fight like a cornered demon if he
felt his command threatened, but Saffir found himself taken by the curious
desire to help Pumice out. After all, Pumice had never ever called him
'Useless', and Pumice had never pestered him or, for example, hit him with her
fan.

Pumice's green eyes glowed. "Would you really, Saffir-chan? Coo! That would be
very nice of you, I'm sure! I'd like working with the Uncanny Sisters, and I'm
sure Daddy would approve of that, it's almost a military job, isn't it?"

Saffir was forestalled from answering this by a sterling example of Esmeraude's
most eardrum-shattering laugh.

The green-haired woman stood with her hands on her hips, brown eyes gleaming.
"Commanding the Uncanny Sisters! Of course, what a fantastic idea!" She laughed
again. As each peal of mirth rang through the air, Pumice's face got more and
more downcast.

Poor thing, thought Saffir, and felt a sudden tinge of kinship and of pity. He
knew what it was like, being thrust into the shadows by a more dominant,
forceful sibling. Not, he hastily assured himself, that he thought of
Demand-niisan as annoying or as stupid as Esmeraude. Not at all. It was just
that...

He sighed. "I don't think Rubius would like to work with you," he said, with
commendable patience, if not with tact.

"As if it matters what Rubius wants," Esmeraude said airily. She smirked at her
cousin. "Well, well, well. You might not be as useless as I'd thought,
Saffir-chan. Never mind about asking Demand-sama about it; I'll just go and work
it out for myself. Ta!"

With that, she sashayed out of his workroom, leaving a stench of
attar-of-jasmine behind her. Saffir wrinkled his nose. He loved flowers, but
sometimes, there could be too much of a good thing.

"I'm sorry," he said, with genuine feeling, to Pumice.

"It's all right, Saffir-chan," she said brightly, almost brightly enough so that
he believed her. She bounced up. "I'll just go run after her and remind her that
I'm supposed to work with her, sisterly bonding and all that. I'm sure it will
work out; I'll like seeing cute little Cooan again. Ta, Saffir-chan, thank you
very much!"

And she, too, left, with considerably more grace and considerably less scent
than her elder sister.

Saffir got up and brought down his equation model.

Very soon, he forgot all about his visitors, forgot about everything, as he was
swallowed up in the numbers.


                                                                                                                                           
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~



Carnelian had been woken from a sound sleep with the news that his son had
returned home, but that didn't unduly disturb him. What did annoy him was the
fact that Sard had gotten to Serpentine first. He trusted Sard -- there was
simply no sense to reality if he couldn't trust Sard -- and he trusted
Serpentine not to tell Sard a damn thing more than was necessary, but it was the
principle of the thing.

He sighed. Serpentine was a nice boy, there was no one he'd ever met who
couldn't say with absolute truth that Serpentine was a decent and amiable
fellow, but the sad truth of the matter was that Serpentine would never in his
life be brilliant, or even more than merely competent.

He sighed again. Of course there was that old chestnut about how no great man
had a likewise great son, and the whole rigmarole about how nature abhorred a
dynasty, but all the same it was very disappointing, at fifty years old, to wake
up to the fact that your son and heir would never be able to fit into your shoes
as lord of the sept.

It was damned unfair, but that was just the way it was. At least Serpentine
could follow orders in a satisfactory manner. He had no complaint there. It was
just that there was no initiative, no drive.

Really, very vexing.

He finished braiding his hair, tied it all into the black braidsleeve, and made
his way down to meet his son.

Serpentine was altogether too predictable, that was another thing; Carnelian
found him precisely where he had expected: in the creche, playing with his
daughter.

Carnelian stood at the door and watched for a few moments. Serpentine's daughter
Cinnabar was what people called, vaguely, a _good_ baby, denoting a child who
never cried and rarely fussed, one who sat up straight at an early age and
watched, unblinkingly and with intense interest, everything that went on around
her. She had screamingly red hair and crimson eyes, like her grandfather; also
like her grandfather, she gave off an air of boundless energy, contained in a
little frame that seemed scarcely to do itself justice.

She was almost a year old, and Serpentine adored her beyond reason.

Although it was probably too early to really tell, Carnelian tormented himself
with the superstitious hope that Cinnabar had promise. These things did skip
generations, didn't they? He was only fifty, after all. He could probably manage
to make something of her before he died...

He cleared his throat; Serpentine looked around. "Oh. Hello," he said, rather
flatly. "I've spoken with Sard."

Carnelian, unaccountably, felt put out. Just because Serpentine had never helped
engineer a man's death before didn't mean that the boy was justified in taking
things out on his poor old man. "Have you?" he said inconsequentially. "Good.
Will you speak with me, now?"

"Certainly." Serpentine stood, holding the baby in the crook of his arm. She
stared owlishly at her grandfather and then, unusually, beamed. She held her
arms out and Serpentine silently handed her over; Cinnabar smiled blissfully and
began playing with Carnelian's collar.

Serpentine had a few words with the nurse on duty, who bowed and left them;
Carnelian sat down on a pile of rugs, arranging himself into a tailor's seat and
settling Cinnabar into his lap. Serpentine elected to stand, his arms folded
over his chest, staring down at his father in a rather baleful manner.

"So, Feldspar is dead," Carnelian said, quite naturally. "Did the Peacekeepers
want to keep his body for a bit, or did they remand it to the clan for
cremation?"

"What? Oh. Um. The Peacekeeper I spoke to said that Feldspar-san's body will be
brought to the Citadel in ... two hours," Serpentine said, caught off guard by
the sheer mundanity with which Carnelian was treating this. "He died quite well,
you know. Very, er, dignified. Considering the circumstances."

"Ah, yes. The circumstances." Carnelian, in an attempt to fend off Cinnabar
climbing all over him, gave her his keyring to play with. The baby immediately
began to gum the keys with an expression of fierce determination on her face, as
if she'd been assigned to reduce them to powder by nightfall, or die trying.

"So, who did the killing?"

"A Bloodstorm," Serpentine said, rather warily. "A young Bloodstorm. A captain,
by the number of lightning bolts on her shoulders."

Carnelian felt relieved. A Bloodstorm. Very good. At last, his luck was flowing
the right way. "Excellent. Really excellent," he said warmly. "Was that your
choice, or Feldspar's?"

Serpentine took another deep breath. Carnelian, curious, decided that he was
trying to keep his temper under wraps. Commendable. "Feldspar-san's," he said,
very quietly. "Feldspar-san pointed out that she was young, and she was alone,
and, when we walked in, we had occasion to witness that she had a rather
volatile temper. She seemed ideal. Our only other choices were a pair of Thunder
Blades, and a lone Blue Diamond."

Carnelian nodded. "Excellent," he said again, and skillfully evaded Cinnabar's
attempt to untie his bootlace. "Would she be likely to be believed, if she
claimed anything as ridiculous as that Feldspar wasn't sporting the correct
browmark when she hauled off and murdered him?"

"I think not," Serpentine said judiciously, "in light of the fact that she
wasn't exactly sober to begin with, and even less so when she buried her knife
in Feldspar-san's throat."

Carnelian winced. "Oh, dear," he murmured. "I wouldn't have thought it of him;
he seemed such a nice, inoffensive man. Scarcely the sort to be able to incite a
killing rage in a Bloodstorm."

"That's what I had thought, yes," Serpentine agreed, without changing
expression. "A very nice man. He probably didn't deserve it."

Carnelian felt cross. "Well, of course he didn't deserve to die with a drunken
Bloodstorm's knife in his throat," he said, very reasonably, "but we all must
make sacrifices where the clan is concerned, and since, of course, Feldspar was
one of Tanzanite's most valued intendants, we simply must demand a reparation
from Lord Bloodstorm. Dreadfully inconvenient time for the Bloodstorms to go
around killing Seven Starses; this was just the time when Lord Bloodstorm and I
were going to reaffirm that accord that our fathers signed." He sighed. "And
now, of course, Lord Bloodstorm is probably going to have to add something
rather extreme, in order to pacify me. I wonder if he would be amenable to
offering me a full alliance with his clan, plus their full military support if I
should happen to want to be friends with Lord Black Moon."

"That won't work," Serpentine said tiredly. "It just won't. Lord Bloodstorm is
almost as intractable as Reachen is --"

"Miserable old monster," Carnelian muttered, more out of sheer habit than out of
any real ill will for Lord Graycloak.

"And while Lord Bloodstorm will probably give us some sort of indemnity for
Feldspar-san's death, or possibly the captain's head as an apology, I very much
doubt that he'll agree to become bedpartners with Lord Black Moon, via us."

Carnelian was impressed. Serpentine was trying. A well-informed idiot was still
an idiot, of course, but the boy _was_ trying. "That's your opinion," he said
affably. He jigged Cinnabar on his knee; the baby giggled and clapped her tiny
hands. "Andalusite re'Iridium Bloodstorm is an honorable man," he said with an
air of indulging another's regrettable failings. "Not only that, but he can't
think around corners all that well. Trust me, dear boy. It will fall out as I
say it will."

Serpentine sighed deeply, and bent to retrieve his daughter. She discovered his
(thankfully clean) handkerchief sticking out of his pocket, and promptly stuffed
as much of it as would fit into her mouth.

"I hope it will, father," he answered. "I would hate to think that Feldspar-san
died for nothing."

"He died for the greater glory of Seven Stars Sept," Carnelian said firmly,
rising. He reached out and patted his granddaughter on the head. "Consider: we
lost one intendant, and will gain Bloodstorm support and military backers, tied
into one tidy package with which to present Lord Black Moon; we will regain some
of what we will lose from that damned moratorium, when it comes through; and we
will gain a mother for this little one."

Serpentine held his daughter even tighter. "I wish you wouldn't marry me off
again," he said. "At the rate I'm going, a wife already burned and you plotting
another one for me, I'll end up like Reachen-sama."

"Don't be ridiculous; two marriages do not an Old Monster make," Carnelian said
flippantly, although he immediately regretted it when Serpentine's face clouded.
The poor boy; he had to compound his other failings by being sensitive as well.
Carnelian had the vague but persistent feeling that Serpentine had been fond of
his late wife; at least, Serpentine had been extremely moody in the days
immediately after the girl had died.

Carnelian couldn't remember the girl's name. It vaguely bothered him that he
couldn't remember.

It also vaguely bothered him that, for some reason, he had the distinct
conviction that Sard had had something to do with the girl's death. Of course,
Sard had promised him that he wouldn't go around poisoning people anymore, since
that regrettable Incident at Dinner a while ago, but Sard _was_ prone to take
these little dislikes to people, and, unfortunately, Serpentine's wife _had_
been rather... outspoken, something that Sard absolutely detested in people in
general and in women in particular.

Ah, well. It couldn't be helped now. Wives for sons were a half-credit a dozen,
whereas prime ministers with a gift for numbers and a singularly formidable
memory for names, strengths, and Achilles' heels were very near irreplaceable.

"In any case," Carnelian dropped into the silence, "you should go wash your face
and get something to eat before you go to inform Feldspar's family of their
bereavement."

Serpentine absently disentangled his braid from his daughter's clutching
fingers, and said presently, "I suppose their compensation is two thousand per
annum for the core family, and the eldest daughter gets me without having to pay
any dowry, hmm?"

Wonderful. The boy was going to fall into line. "I was thinking two and a half
thousand per annum," Carnelian said tranquilly. "After all, Feldspar was an
exceptionally good seventh lord. I seem to recall that Tanzanite always mentions
him by name in his quarterly reports. Give the second-eldest daughter the option
to continue in her father's place, or to transfer to Lychnite's division."
Carnelian had been looking over personnel reports since his interview with
Feldspar; the man had, apparently, been blessed with singularly talented
offspring, at least according to Tourmaleen's analysis.

Serpentine looked resigned. "Very well. Here, take her. It's about her naptime,
anyway." He handed off his daughter before Carnelian had a chance to protest,
and patted the child on the head. "Be good, useless," he said affectionately.
"I'll be back soon."

Carnelian jigged her in his arms for a moment, then handed her over to the nurse
with a feeling of relief when that worthy came back in. "It's her naptime,
apparently," he said cheerfully, and went about his business.

He hadn't been given much to work with, but he felt that he'd done as well as he
could, under the circumstances.

Now, if only Demand would have the decency to slow himself down for a day or so,
there might actually be a chance of Seven Stars Sept surviving the coming chaos.

* * * *