Sobon met with Ki''el some time be-fore din-ner, and was pleased to find that the girl''s knee was fair-ly well healed, though her sys-tem was be-gin-ning to get clogged by sticky med-i-c-i-nal qi, as Jom''s had been. With a lit-tle ex-tra time to kill, Sobon de-cid-ed to study it, tak-ing a cou-ple sam-ples of the qi and form-ing aether and qi pat-terns that would re-veal the spe-cif-ic com-bi-na-tions of in-tent that went into it, while also promis-ing to Ki''el that she would ex-plain more lat-er on.


    In truth, Sobon knew to ex-pect some com-bi-na-tion of ac-tu-al in-sight and child-ish mis-un-der-stand-ings. She was some-what sur-prised, though, to find that the ac-tu-al make-up of med-i-c-i-nal qi seemed al-most to be a cor-rup-tion of some-thing much bet-ter de-signed. Some of the qi seemed to be tak-en from plants, which was no sur-prise; it had ex-act-ly the sort of deeply for-ti-fied, sto-ic na-ture of an en-ti-ty which could only act upon the world from with-in, hav-ing no mus-cles to speak of. And there were lay-ers of hu-man in-tent, some of which guid-ed the med-i-c-i-nal qi, oth-ers of which re-ject-ed parts of it.


    But those lay-ers of in-tent were then buried by an-oth-er lay-er, which forced high-er en-er-gy into and through all of the calmer, more pro-duc-tive aether pat-terns. The in-tent was clear--high en-er-gy plus med-ical qi had to equal high-er pow-er med-ical qi, right? Sobon made a face. It wasn''t even ex-act-ly wrong, just poor-ly done. The am-pli-fi-ca-tion in-tent, if you want to call it that, was dis-mis-sive of many of the sub-tleties, and so the high in-ten-si-ty heal-ing also came with dam-aged, left-over qi that was vi-o-lent-ly torn away from the whole it had been a part of.


    In all, it was a pass-able at-tempt at med-ical aether, Sobon de-cid-ed, and easy enough to repli-cate if you had the right plants to sup-ply the base, though she would still pre-fer to use the Coro-na''s med-ical pat-terns where pos-si-ble. Plants had a place in most worlds'' med-ical his-to-ries for a great many rea-sons, but in the end, they were sim-ple en-ti-ties who had no un-der-stand-ing of ad-vanced an-i-mal bi-ol-o-gy or mind. Both chem-i-cal-ly and in spir-it, plants touched on fan-tas-tic in-sights, but ap-ply-ing those in-sights to a hu-man could be prob-lem-at-ic.


    "Hm," was all that Sobon ac-tu-al-ly said out loud, af-ter study-ing the sam-ples of med-ical qi for a good half an hour, then shook her head. "Well, it''s in-ter-est-ing, but my ad-vice is what it would have been be-fore. Flush out the med-ical qi with your own aether once the treat-ment is done." She glanced out a near-by win-dow, to get an un-der-stand-ing of the time. "We are in-vit-ed to a din-ner with the Base Com-man-der tonight. I pro-vid-ed her... some in-sight. Per-haps too much."


    Ki''el gave Sobon a look, which in-clud-ed a bit of judge-ment that Sobon sup-posed she had earned. "In-sight. De-spite what these peo-ple have done."


    Sobon shrugged. "I don''t think it will let them take over the world. And in truth, I ex-pect they will... mis-un-der-stand. We can speak more on it, lat-er." Sobon flicked a med-ical di-ag-nos-tic pat-tern over Ki''el''s knee again, al-though she had al-ready done so when she came in. It just... re-as-sured her, see-ing that the girl would be able to walk with-out do-ing more dam-age. "For now... we should prob-a-bly get some-thing to wear."


    Ki''el looked dis-gust-ed at that, and Sobon didn''t blame her. In truth, Sobon had no in-ter-est in play-ing fa-vors with even a high-rank-ing mil-i-tary agent, but there was a spir-i-tu-al as-pect to dis-play-ing one-self a cer-tain way, one that res-onat-ed deeply in peo-ple''s hearts. As at the Bilg mil-i-tary base... it could be very easy to con-vince a per-son''s spir-it that one per-son was right, and an-oth-er one wrong, if out-side fac-tors res-onat-ed with those truths. And while Alas-si''s clothes were in good con-di-tion, nei-ther she nor Sobon had picked them for so-cial pur-pos-es. Ki''el, who had picked up new clothes since Sobon had last seen her, had a mis-matched look that showed clear-ly that she would take what-ev-er she could get with-out com-plaint.


    Al-though Sobon end-ed up ar-gu-ing for a mo-ment with the med-ical or-der-ly in charge of Ki''el, the two were able to leave peace-ful-ly with-in a few min-utes, and Ki''el flushed out her sys-tem with her own right-hand aether as the two walked out of the base and into a large town at-tached to the base, which Sobon ex-pect-ed the lo-cals would also la-bel a ''city''. A few ques-tions asked and an-swered led them to a fan-cy-look-ing cloth-ier''s shop, whose name, if Sobon''s lim-it-ed un-der-stand-ing of Djang writ-ing was cor-rect, was some-thing like "Transcendent Gem Shin-ing Per-son''s Hon-or Shop." The char-ac-ters seemed a bit am-bigu-ous, and Alas-si sug-gest-ed they might have mul-ti-ple read-ings, but Sobon frankly didn''t care about the de-tails.


    As with the shops Sobon had seen in Emer-ald Val-ley, there was a youngish girl sta-tioned near the door, whose de-meanor was that of a man-nequin un-til pressed into ser-vice as a sales-per-son. For-tu-nate-ly, she passed Sobon and Ki''el off to a more know-ing fig-ure with-in min-utes, es-sen-tial-ly the very mo-ment Sobon men-tioned din-ner with the Base Com-man-der. And thus was Sobon in-tro-duced to a chub-by man in very el-e-gant, well-fit-ted clothes, who in-tro-duced him-self as Man Gai.


    "Wel-come, wel-come," Man Gai said, look-ing ac-tu-al-ly pleased to have some-thing to do. Al-though his eyes tore over every bit of Sobon''s and Ki''el''s bod-ies and clothes, Sobon could sense noth-ing to his gaze but pro-fes-sion-al in-ter-est. "You are look-ing for clothes, but more than just that, I think? Nei-ther of you shows in-ter-est in the art of cloth, but I sense that you are pow-er-ful peo-ple, in-ter-est-ing peo-ple. I think there is much in-side to show off."


    Ki''el bris-tled at that, or per-haps at the chub-by man eye-ing her, but Sobon just spoke qui-et-ly. "We would sim-ply like to rep-re-sent our-selves well in front of Base Com-man-der Rai at din-ner. We do not need to... dom-i-nate, so-cial-ly. But we would like to pre-sent our-selves as peo-ple who will not be con-trolled."


    Gai tapped his chin with one pudgy fin-ger, meet-ing Sobon''s eyes, and then nod-ded. "You have your se-crets, and wish to keep them."


    "Ex-act-ly." Giv-en what Sobon had seen of Djang cloth-ing so far, she had sus-pect-ed that a re-spect-ed cloth-ier would un-der-stand these sub-tleties.


    Some-how, with lit-tle more than that from ei-ther Sobon or Ki''el, the man be-gan his work, call-ing out to back rooms for cloth of var-i-ous col-ors, ma-te-ri-als, and pat-terns. Al-though it end-ed up tak-ing a cou-ple hours--only the first half-hour or so re-quir-ing their ac-tive at-ten-tion--by the end of it, Sobon and Ki''el were dressed in clothes that even Ki''el had to ad-mit were a per-fect fit for them, at the very least in their cur-rent cir-cum-stances.


    Ki''el was dressed in what Alas-si rec-og-nized as Djang fight-er''s wear, and which Ki''el her-self would lat-er ad-mit was clear-ly in-spired by Il-lan style, though Ki''el had not told him she was from the Il-lan isles. It was mod-est-ly cut in many ways, styled for free move-ment, and if Sobon looked close-ly, she could con-vince her-self that it was in-tend-ed to take some bat-tle dam-age with-out los-ing its over-all struc-ture; the pieces that clung to her pri-vate parts were re-in-forced, but sub-tly, and al-though the piece in to-tal hung from her shoul-ders, once she fas-tened it shut, the low-er part would hang off of her hips even if the up-per part were de-stroyed.


    Sobon''s own dress was ma-tron-ly, ac-cord-ing to both Ki''el and Alas-si, and Sobon could agree as she looked in the mir-ror that they gave her the look of a wise old-er woman, if one stiffer than Sobon hoped she was. Sobon her-self couldn''t quite pin what gave off the im-pres-sion, and stopped try-ing; it was enough that it was a good piece, with sev-er-al sub-tle and less-sub-tle tex-tures that blend-ed to-geth-er well, and Sobon was pleased to find that there were also many sub-tle, hid-den pock-ets on the in-te-ri-or and ex-te-ri-or of the gar-ment. Alas-si also be-grudg-ing-ly ad-mit-ted that the dress had styl-is-tic nods to her peo-ple, but didn''t say more than that, and Sobon didn''t press.


    Sobon paid for the clothes with a stipend that Com-man-der Rai had giv-en her, most-ly un-sur-prised that the ex-per-tise didn''t come cheap. Sobon chose not to hag-gle, al-though Alas-si warned it would be wise, and the two walked out as Man Gai bowed and wished them well, while his spir-it shone with a ra-di-ance that sug-gest-ed Sobon had prob-a-bly over-paid. In truth, Rai had giv-en her a sub-stan-tial amount of mon-ey--around a hun-dred gildra, gold-edged coins that Alas-si con-veyed were ten sil-vra, sil-ver edged coins apiece.


    The coin names, Sobon not-ed, were them-selves not Djang, and Alas-si ad-mit-ted that many peo-ple used the old Ijian names for cur-ren-cy, which it-self had his-to-ry. Be-cause be-fore the Djang em-pire had been the Ijian Em-pire, and be-fore them had been oth-ers. There were some places that in-sist-ed on us-ing Djang names for cur-ren-cy--but the cur-ren-cy was the same, and ef-forts by the Djang Em-pire to squash the old names had failed. [ Failed com-plete-ly, ] Sobon grumped qui-et-ly to her-self, [ if even their mil-i-tary base guards don''t use their own names. ]


    [ In truth, the Djang names are aw-ful. I was told that they have some-thing to do with qi, but I nev-er un-der-stood, and most peo-ple don''t ei-ther. It is why the Djang Gildra have gem shapes along the sides. Elec-tra, above Gildra, have di-a-mond edges specif-i-cal-ly, and Pla-tra, above Elec-tra, have flame edges. But they in-sist that the of-fi-cial names of the coins are No-ble Gem, and Lord''s Di-a-mond, and Im-mor-tal Flame coins. It would have been bad enough if they were sim-ple names, but they''re em-bar-rass-ing to say. ]


    Sobon in-ward-ly re-turned Alas-si''s com-ments with amuse-ment, but didn''t let the ex-pres-sion show through her face. Since there was still a lit-tle time, Sobon found her-self wan-der-ing to-wards an-oth-er in-scrip-tion-ist''s shop, al-though she sus-pect-ed that if they were any good, they would have been hired by the Base Com-man-der to fix some of the prob-lems Sobon her-self had dealt with. Or... per-haps they sim-ply wouldn''t want to be hired to fix wa-ter heaters and cleans-ing sta-tions.


    Sobon found her-self pleased, then, to walk into the shop and find it well-stocked and with two ob-vi-ous guards. Her eyes roved around the room, tak-ing in a num-ber of dif-fer-ent items, and she filed away var-i-ous rune com-bi-na-tions as she looked around, both the ones that seemed cor-rect and the ones that were ob-vi-ous-ly mis-takes.


    "No eye shop-ping," said a woman be-hind the counter af-ter a mo-ment. "Our de-signs are pro-pri-etary. Buy some-thing or get out."


    Sobon glanced over to find, for the first time in a while, a Djang woman whose dress well and tru-ly didn''t fit her style. She was dressed al-most shab-bi-ly, and Sobon not-ed that al-though she looked ful-ly adult, she was short, freck-led, and her hair a mess. She was, how-ev-er, in-tent-ly carv-ing into a bracelet with a sty-lus, one whose carv-ing point nar-rowed down to an in-sane-ly stiff hair.


    Ki''el bris-tled, and Sobon won-dered why the girl seemed to take an in-stant dis-like to the lit-tle grem-lin. "How are we sup-posed to shop with-out look-ing at your wares?"


    The woman paused, very care-ful-ly re-mov-ing the sty-lus from the work, then point-ed it at Ki''el with-out look-ing up. "Not talk-ing to you, dum-b-ass. You''re too stu-pid to steal my de-signs. You," she point-ed the sty-lus at Sobon, "I can sense what you''re do-ing. You''re not just look-ing, you''re read-ing. Buy some-thing or get out."


    Sobon couldn''t help but smile and laugh at that, a re-ac-tion that nei-ther Ki''el nor the shop-keep-er seemed to un-der-stand im-me-di-ate-ly or ap-pre-ci-ate. She shook her head. "You are a sharp one," she said, and went back to glanc-ing around, though not with the in-ten-si-ty she''d had. "I don''t in-tend to com-pete with you, I am only pass-ing through."


    "Com-pete," scoffed the woman, set-ting down her sty-lus and rais-ing her head. She had in-tense eyes, and looked weary. "I''m just sick of peo-ple copy-ing what I''ve done and claim-ing they''re mas-ters be-cause of it. And al-ways, al-ways they get things wrong. Worse, they do all that af-ter not even hav-ing the de-cen-cy to buy some-thing. Just walk in, look around, smile through their teeth, and open up a shop claim-ing to be mas-ters. And then, af-ter that, they come back, des-per-ate-ly try-ing to look like they aren''t try-ing to steal my work as they bore holes in them with their eyes. It''s pa-thet-ic."


    Sobon nod-ded along, glanc-ing over the items. "Your work does seem bet-ter than oth-ers I''ve seen. Most of them rely on care-ful in-tent in the glyphs, not just the lay-out of the script. I can see how--"


    "It''s both, of course," the woman in-ter-rupt-ed, sud-den-ly hop-ping up on the counter and swing-ing her legs over the front, show-ing that her feet were bare. Her loose shorts might have also been... some-what im-mod-dest, but Sobon didn''t care. The woman, like Sobon, seemed pleased to have de-cent con-ver-sa-tion, for once. "But the tru-ly pro-found in-scrip-tions re-quire pro-found in-tent, and pro-found in-tent with-out pro-found in-scrip-tions is use-less." She raised her hand, and a knife from be-hind the counter flipped into her hand, as though of its own ac-cord. Then, with-out even flinch-ing, she drove the knife straight into her own thigh--and re-moved it again, as Ki''el gasped, to show that the blade had left no mark on her own body. "Pro-found truths re-quire pro-found minds to un-der-stand, while com-mon peo-ple can only stare in won-der and won-der what kind of cheap trick you just pulled."


    Sobon stud-ied the knife, but tried not to fo-cus on the in-scrip-tions them-selves. "That''s cer-tain-ly not a cheap trick," Sobon ad-mit-ted, try-ing to make sense of what she''d seen. "Spa-tial pock-et?"


    "Got it in one." The woman sheathed the knife and tossed it hap-haz-ard-ly over her shoul-der. "Spa-tial mag-ic is a fas-ci-nat-ing dis-ci-pline even for the great-est in-scrip-tion-ists, but it''s only knock-ing on the doors of a greater truth. What that truth is still es-capes even me, but I can see it. I just don''t un-der-stand it." The short woman kicked her legs idly, like a child, but only as she was think-ing hard about some-thing. As soon as she came back to her-self, she stopped. "I get the feel-ing you know what I''m talk-ing about."


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    Sobon let a grin spread over her face. "I know a great many thing, enough that I too must keep se-crets. Es-pe-cial-ly, if you''ll par-don my say-ing so, from the Em-pire."


    The shop guards trad-ed ner-vous looks, but the woman sitting on the counter just nod-ded. "They won''t touch me, not as a na-tive Djang, but any for-eign-er who has some-thing they want, some-one will try to take by force. I un-der-stand. Per-haps some-day I''ll take a trip, and we can talk far from any lis-ten-ing ears." She paused. "Oh. I am Lai Shi Po. Just in case, as you say, you''re a for-eign-er and don''t know my shop from a hole in the ground."


    Sobon laughed. "Shi-va Alas-si, from Emer-ald Val-ley to the west. Though I don''t know if that is al-ways where I''ll be, or what I''ll be called." Sobon paused, very care-ful-ly as-sess-ing Lai Shi Po, be-fore quick-ly throw-ing to-geth-er a pri-va-cy pat-tern and send-ing her an aether pulse. [ If you go to the city, have the guards di-rect you to Sobon. It is... a slight-ly com-pli-cat-ed mat-ter. ]


    The woman nod-ded, out-ward-ly ig-nor-ing the aether con-struct, al-though she had a strange look in her eyes. "I doubt I''ll go that way right away, but per-haps. The re-mote parts of the Em-pire are al-ways in-ter-est-ed in buy-ing up a few spa-tial rings for a hefty prof-it." Lai Shi Po snort-ed. "Those are al-ways the worst to have copied. Usu-al-ly, they copiers will say it''s some-one else''s work, which means that when they in-evitably fail, some-one else''s rep-u-ta-tion gets dragged through the mud. It''s why I don''t even put them out for dis-play, or sell them to oth-er in-scrip-tion-ists."


    "Hm." Sobon let her-self sound a lit-tle dis-ap-point-ed, al-though it didn''t sur-prise her. Any-one who did a bad job of mak-ing a spa-tial ar-ti-fact was play-ing a dan-ger-ous game, al-though since the Ri''lef''s qi script re-lied on spa-tial pock-ets, it was more like-ly that the con-tents would sim-ply be-come lost. "Well, we have a din-ner to get to, but... what about a pro-tec-tive ar-ti-fact for my com-pan-ion, here?"


    In the end, they left for din-ner a good forty gildra lighter, but Sobon had both a pro-tec-tive bracelet that Ki''el wore on her wrist, and also, Lai Shi Po had thrown in what Sobon rec-og-nized as a non-func-tion-al spa-tial ring, one with the cor-rect in-scrip-tions but no in-tent. The two had trad-ed amused looks at that, Sobon rec-og-niz-ing it as a test, but she sim-ply pock-et-ed the item with-out com-ment.


    The restau-rant Rai Su Anin had cho-sen was, to sur-prise, ex-treme-ly ex-pen-sive and ex-clu-sive, the ex-act sort of place that Sobon had known she would feel en-tire-ly out of place walk-ing into with her pre-vi-ous clothes. Even the ones she had bought, though they were in per-fect con-di-tion and well-made, were in-ex-pen-sive com-pared to any-thing else she saw with-in. The maitre d'' who met them at the front, a tall and thin woman who could have ri-valed Alas-si for hav-ing a per-ma-nent frown etched onto her face, gave their wear clear and un-mis-tak-able dis-ap-prov-ing looks, al-though she di-rect-ed the two of them to the Base Com-man-der''s pri-vate table with-out com-ment.


    The in-side was lav-ish, and al-though Sobon could have found rea-son to com-plain about it, in truth she found it at least a bit re-fresh-ing. Not be-cause Sobon, in his old life, had hung out at in-cred-i-bly ex-pen-sive restau-rants in the past; no, it sim-ply was a much small-er con-trast to mod-ern restau-rants than any-thing else she''d seen. There were a few ta-bles through-out the mid-dle of the room, with qi fields for pri-va-cy, and a num-ber of pri-vate booths along the edges. There was live mu-sic be-ing played by well-dressed mu-si-cians, who were both very ob-vi-ous-ly be-ing seen not to be spy-ing on any-one, and also, very clear-ly spy-ing on who-ev-er they could. Wait-ers hur-ried to and from back doors to the kitchen, and every-thing was kept im-pec-ca-bly clean and fresh smelling. There were even sev-er-al wa-ter-falls, set against the sup-port-ing columns that held up the sec-ond floor, which had a bal-cony look-ing down on the first floor, which pro-vid-ed a pleas-ing mo-tion and sound.


    Sobon was a lit-tle sur-prised that the Base Com-man-der didn''t take a sec-ond-sto-ry table; in-stead, they were tak-en to a pri-vate booth on one side of the low-er floor. Sobon not-ed that the booths to ei-ther side were filled, but with stiff peo-ple that seemed mil-i-tary them-selves, and she also not-ed that the pri-va-cy screens were not ful-ly set up, so that the guards on ei-ther side could hear the Base Com-man-der, at the very least if she shout-ed.


    "Lady Shi-va, and your dis-ci-ple. Doua Ki''el, I be-lieve?" Com-man-der Rai ges-tured to the bench across the cir-cu-lar table from her, as she re-laxed into her own couch, mak-ing no mo-tion to get up. "Please, be seat-ed."


    Sobon made no ef-fort to be for-mal, and with-in mo-ments, a serv-er that Sobon had not no-ticed hang-ing around near-by ar-rived, look-ing very pa-tient and for-mal. "Good evening. Do you need to be told what we have avail-able?"


    "I''ll have my usu-al," Com-man-der Rai said, dis-mis-sive-ly, and the serv-er shift-ed his eyes to Alas-si and Ki''el."


    "What-ev-er the chef rec-om-mends," Sobon said, not par-tic-u-lar-ly keen on learn-ing a menu she wouldn''t like-ly see again.


    "Fish and rice," was all Ki''el had to say.


    The serv-er sim-ply bowed and backed away, and Com-man-der Rai gave a wry grin. "As with a great many war-riors I have met, Lady Shi-va, you don''t seem to ap-pre-ci-ate the fin-er things in life. In truth, in my first hun-dred years of life, I was much the same." She lift-ed a wine gob-let smelled it, and set it down with-out drink-ing. "By the time I could no longer pre-tend that I had lived one full life in its en-tire-ty, I be-gan to re-al-ize that I tru-ly did not en-joy liv-ing that way. Al-though death does not come eas-i-ly for those of us in the Gem Phase of Qi, it still can come. It would be a pity to live an-oth-er full cen-tu-ry and still re-gret my life."


    Ki''el shift-ed un-com-fort-ably, clear-ly un-cer-tain of how to deal with a girl that looked her age speak-ing of a cen-tu-ry of life, but Sobon ig-nored it. Al-though Sobon was tempt-ed to talk about his own past--since Com-man-der Rai would like-ly not know all the de-tails of Alas-si''s--she stuck to the more ob-vi-ous an-swers. "I have my own re-grets in this life, Com-man-der Rai," she said. "Of time that I''ve wast-ed. Mis-takes made, and things left un-done. If I live long enough to see some of those mis-takes atoned for, per-haps there will be time for pleas-antries af-ter-wards. And if I do not live to see those mis-takes atoned for, I don''t be-lieve that crea-ture com-forts in the mean-time will make up the dif-fer-ence."


    Com-man-der Rai''s face dark-ened with those words, enough that it took the youth-ful cast off her fea-tures again, if not quite as much as Sobon''s in-sight into qi had. "Re-grets," she said, lean-ing back onto the couch and let-ting her arms splay over the top of it. "Yes, war-riors have those. And I sup-pose that is part of why you no longer wish to be a war-rior. Those of us raised to war, es-pe-cial-ly, are told to bond with our teams, work close-ly with them, and then thrown into a mess that all but guar-an-tees we won''t all come back alive."


    "By the time we are old enough and wise enough to un-der-stand what we could have done dif-fer-ent-ly, we can-not undo the at-tach-ments, can-not change back into the chil-dren we were be-fore." Her eyes flicked to Ki''el. "We can-not re-move the stains on our skin, or the mon-sters from our souls. We have be-come war-riors, through and through." One hand reached out to take the wine, and she swirled it and smelled it, but didn''t drink.


    "It is not only war-riors who have scars," Ki''el said, her voice heavy with judge-ment. "My peo-ple were tak-en by pi-rates. My home--my fam-i-ly raped and mur-dered by peo-ple who went on to sell the sur-vivors as slaves. And I am led to be-lieve that the buy-ers were Djang."


    "I wouldn''t doubt it," Rai Su Anin said, with a sigh. "The Di-a-mond Lord Him-self au-tho-rized a pro-gram of pri-va-teers, ships who would pil-lage to sell peo-ple to us. Not us, the mil-i-tary," she cor-rect-ed, her oth-er hand com-ing up to stop Ki''el be-ing riled up. "No-ble fam-i-lies, most-ly. There is too much work that needs to be done, too much mon-ey to be earned. If the no-ble fam-i-lies did the kind of aw-ful things they do to slaves to oth-er Djang in-stead, this coun-try would tear it-self apart. It''s eas-i-er to pre-tend we are civ-il when we don''t see our-selves in the vic-tims."


    Sobon could see the many in-tense feel-ings on Ki''el''s face, and put a hand on her arm. Ki''el shot her a glare, and Sobon met her eyes. "I think this is not a healthy con-ver-sa-tion to have, Base Com-man-der," she said, "though I am sur-prised you speak so open-ly about your own peo-ple''s sins."


    "Sins... that is a word for it. There are many for-eign con-cepts around evil. The Djang tend to fo-cus on the de-mon-ic, and I ful-ly agree that slav-ery is a de-mon-ic thing, but it is one that some em-brace as a source of pow-er." Com-man-der Rai fi-nal-ly took a sip of her wine. "But every word for evil be-comes un-der-stat-ed, even mean-ing-less, in the face of suc-cess, does it not? The few... pri-va-teers that I have had the un-pleas-ant for-tune to meet all had de-mon-ic qi in-side of them. But they were all of them suc-cess-ful. If I were to ar-gue that they should not have been demons... would any of them have seen suc-cess? The world would be a bet-ter place, but if they sunk into pover-ty and de-spair as a re-sult, wouldn''t they dis-agree?"


    "I can-not be-lieve--" Ki''el be-gan to say, but the Com-man-der raised her voice to drown it out.


    "I don''t agree with what they do," she said, with-out much emo-tion in her voice, "and I nev-er will, young Ki''el. I do not have the scars you have, but I see plain-ly that what they do cor-rupts them, the Djang, and the world at large. What I am try-ing to say, and what you would do well to un-der-stand, is that theirs is an evil that will not dis-ap-pear as long as it is giv-en a place to thrive. It must be erad-i-cat-ed, and as a mem-ber of the Di-a-mond Lord''s Army, I am not per-mit-ted to do so. What-ev-er ar-gu-ments you have, they are not with me."


    "I can-not take your words as any-thing but the words of a cow-ard," said Ki''el, ac-cus-ing-ly.


    Sobon didn''t sense any re-ac-tion in Com-man-der Rai, but did sense dis-com-fort from the booths on ei-ther side. They were in-ter-rupt-ed, though, when the servers re-turned, plac-ing three dish-es on the table. Ki''el had some kind of thin-ly sliced fish in sauce over rice and veg-eta-bles, while Sobon had a sur-pris-ing-ly mod-ern-look-ing dish of bread-ed and deep-fried meats and veg-eta-bles, with heav-i-ly spiced sauces over a small-er bed of rice. Rai had a mix-ture of sev-er-al dif-fer-ent items, but only a lit-tle of each--meats, dumplings, fried veg-eta-bles, all arranged around a sin-gle cup of sauce that smelled ex-treme-ly in-tense.


    "I am not hun-gry," Ki''el start-ed to com-plain, but Sobon put a hand on her arm, again, send-ing her a brief pulse of aether. [ It mat-ters how you phrase it to your-self, ] Sobon tried to say. [ The food isn''t hers, and the mon-ey she paid doesn''t taint your soul. This is just... tak-ing some small part of her re-sources for your-self. You might as well eat it. ]


    Ki''el looked back at her, strug-gling to put to-geth-er an an-swer-ing aether pulse. [ No like her. ]


    [ I know, ] Sobon said. [ Just eat. ]


    When Ki''el be-grudg-ing-ly start-ed eat-ing, Com-man-der Rai fi-nal-ly spoke. "Cow-ard... in a sense, I sup-pose. I could re-tire and fight the em-pire, but it would only get me killed. Al-though I have nev-er met the Di-a-mond Lord him-self, I am told that he is greater than any war-rior in our army, and pro-found-ly so. As though even our great-est war-riors, even the ones at the Flame Phase of Qi, are be-neath him. And those war-riors who are in the Flame Phase of Qi... they are so far be-yond me that to chal-lenge them would be fol-ly." The girl-ish woman dipped one of dumplings in sauce and bit into it, tak-ing a long mo-ment to chew and sa-vor the fla-vors.


    "In the end, all cow-ardice is un-will-ing-ness to face our own death or in-jury. In that sense, you are right. I will not face death, not when it won''t change the Di-a-mond Lord''s mind."


    Sobon took the time to eat her own food, and Ki''el forced her-self not to speak, which Sobon thought was a lit-tle out of the girl''s char-ac-ter. So Sobon de-cid-ed to change the top-ic. "What can you tell me about the Di-a-mond Lord? What do the peo-ple who have seen him say about him?"


    "Very lit-tle," Com-man-der Rai ac-knowl-edged. "There was a pan-ic some years ago, when every-thing changed for the sec-ond time. They said that at that time, some-thing hap-pened to the Di-a-mond Lord. And since then, very lit-tle has come down from him. But peo-ple still meet with him to dis-cuss mat-ters of em-pire. They say that his per-son-al ma-sion on the Great Moun-tain is so full of pro-found ar-ti-facts that every-one who vis-its rais-es their qi just by lay-ing eyes on things that the Di-a-mond Lord had made. And yet... they also say that peo-ple fear to meet him. As far as I know, none have died vis-it-ing him, per-haps be-cause none were fool enough to chal-lenge him. He is far enough be-yond them all that no one dares ques-tion his will, or his wis-dom. But there has also not been a time since the Em-pire was found-ed that he has fought."


    Some-how, amidst her speak-ing, Com-man-der Rai man-aged to keep eat-ing, re-ly-ing on qi waves turned to ver-bal speech, in-stead of let-ting the waves car-ry the in-tent them-selves. Most like-ly, Sobon thought, that was so that the guards would know what she was say-ing, or per-haps be-cause she wor-ried Ki''el wouldn''t un-der-stand. It didn''t mat-ter, ei-ther way. "When every-thing changed, the sec-ond time?" Sobon asked, hop-ing the woman would clar-i-fy.


    "Mm," Com-man-der Rai nod-ded. "Of course, there was the ap-pear-ance of the Star-beasts. That was the first change, when the world tru-ly be-gan to shift to a more pro-found state. But some years af-ter that, there was a shift, and the na-ture of it was un-clear. Some-thing that a few clear-ly know of, but which none will speak about. Since then, the Di-a-mond Lord has changed. I be-lieve, or per-haps sim-ply hopoe, that he is in seclu-sion, try-ing to reach new depths of pro-fun-di-ty. None will say what oc-cu-pies him, only that some-thing clear-ly does. Some-thing more im-por-tant to him than mat-ters of Em-pire."


    He''s try-ing to get into the Founder''s fa-cil-i-ty, Sobon thought, the idea stick-ing to her and sour-ing her stom-ach. Al-though the food wasn''t bad, the idea that the man--giv-en all else that he''d ac-com-plished--was still ac-tive-ly work-ing at it ter-ri-fied Sobon.


    I''m al-ready tak-ing too long. There is too much at stake. Sobon tried to keep the pan-ic down, and most-ly man-aged, but she couldn''t stop it from re-turn-ing to the fore-front of her mind. So she shook her head, and asked what she hoped was a sim-ple, in-no-cent ques-tion.


    "I''m not too fa-mil-iar with the ge-og-ra-phy. How far is the Great Moun-tain from here?"


    The look that Com-man-der Rai gave showed enough cau-tion that Sobon knew that the woman sus-pect-ed some-thing from Sobon''s tone or nerves, though she clear-ly wasn''t sure what Sobon was think-ing. "It is in the very cen-ter of the Em-pire, the One True Moun-tain that puts all oth-er moun-tains to shame. Raised by the Di-a-mond Lord, it stands upon the great-est nexus of ge-o-mat-ic pow-ers in the world. Those who fol-low the Di-a-mond Lord can al-ways feel it, shin-ing like a bea-con in the night. But as to how far..." she shrugged. "Per-haps two thou-sand Li from here? For a long time, I have been more fo-cused on maps of the sea and the near-by lands, not the in-ner ge-og-ra-phy of the Em-pire."


    "I see." In truth, Sobon had guessed the gen-er-al di-rec-tion while fly-ing east, but had been far more in-ter-est-ed in find-ing Ki''el to wor-ry about it. How that she was sure... it was a lit-tle dif-fi-cult not to try to fly clos-er, but Sobon had no doubts that some-one like the Di-a-mond Lord would sense her com-ing, es-pe-cial-ly once she was ac-tu-al-ly strong enough to do some-thing of con-se-quence.


    For the rest of the din-ner, both Sobon and Ki''el most-ly plas-tered on masks of po-lite com-pa-ny, and lit-tle else was said of note. Both of them were too dis-turbed to en-joy their food, al-though Sobon did take her own ad-vice to Ki''el, and con-tin-ued eat-ing. It was, af-ter all, good food--ex-cel-lent-ly spiced and per-fect-ly cooked, it de-served what-ev-er cost the Base Com-man-der had paid. But when all was said and done, like Ki''el, Sobon re-al-ly wasn''t in-ter-est-ed in en-joy-ing the Djang lux-u-ries.


    And so, af-ter fin-ish-ing their meals and en-dur-ing a few more un-in-tend-ed barbs from the Base Com-man-der, they left.