Ninefox Gambit

“THAT’S ANOTHER POSITIVE,” Cheris said after reading the latest Shuos report.

She wasn’t standing in the command center. She wasn’t standing in the cindermoth at all. Instead, she was pulled to Drummers’ Forum, what was left of it. The videos had been clear. Blast marks, craters, torn viscera, splintered trees. There was supposed to have been a priceless gun down there, a pearl-handled affair that had belonged to the great general Andan Zhe Navo. She would have liked to hold it up to her head and see if it still worked. The guns at her belt wouldn’t work. They were back with her body on the Unspoken Law where everyone could see them.

“That’s good,” Jedao said in a way that indicated that he didn’t think it was good at all. “Cheris, you’re dissociating or hallucinating, I can’t tell which. Go to Medical.”

She barely remembered to speak subvocally. “No,” she said. “It’s supposed to hurt.”

She had told six Kel companies that the best use she could make of their loyalty was to have them fight the heretics and lose. Meat for a sham victory. All for one day of the calendar.

Formation instinct had made the infantry colonel implement her orders. Formation instinct had made the companies obey. They wouldn’t be the last.

“You used to make people do things like this without the benefit of formation instinct,” Cheris said.

“Yes,” Jedao said. “Remember the numbers, Cheris. Sometimes they’re all you have.”

Thanks to the Shuos, they had a reasonable map of Liozh Zai’s allies and their material holdings in the six wards, even if the individuals’ locations were guesswork. That was the nice thing about factories: hard to move at a moment’s notice. The suspected source of the amputation guns’ components was located deep in the Radiant Ward.

Engineering reported that the threshold winnower refit was only twenty-seven minutes behind schedule, which was a miracle. Engineering added that the work was slowed down because a number of the most technically skilled servitors were having an adventure down on the Fortress, and maybe the next time the general pulled a stunt like that, she could consult Engineering about assignments instead of simply letting the servitors run loose.

Cheris marked that with a simple acknowledgment and didn’t bother with a more elaborate reply. She blinked, and was standing outside herself again. This time she was in the dueling hall, and Kel Nerevor was saluting her with that fierce yellow calendrical sword. There were at least three things wrong with the scenario, but she didn’t want to leave.

“Cheris,” Jedao said again. “General. Either get some fucking drugs or get out of the fucking command center. Right now you’re a menace to the swarm.”

“It’s 2.9 hours until the operation begins,” Cheris said. Nerevor was trying to tell her something, but she spoke in words of fracture, seizure, cooling ash. Cheris couldn’t decipher the words. “I have to—”

“Cheris, most generals have aides for this sort of thing. Unfortunately, you’re stuck with me. Drugs, sleep, drugged sleep, I don’t care, pick something or I will figure out how to possess you.”

“Commander, I’ll be in my quarters,” Cheris said to Hazan.

“Sir, I’ll call you when the action starts.”

She wouldn’t trust herself to wake up, either. At least he didn’t realize she was lying.

Jedao figured it out straight off. “Cheris,” he said, “you’re being ridiculous.”

When Cheris entered the dueling hall, several people looked at her with wide eyes. After all, she had only come here the one time.

“I hope it’s redundant for me to say this,” Jedao said, “but you shouldn’t duel. You’re apt to slaughter people by accident.”

Her chest hurt. “I suppose that’s to be preferred to killing them on purpose.”

“When you became a soldier, what did you expect it to be about? Parades? Pretty speeches? Admirers?”

“I know it’s about killing,” she snapped. “I didn’t want it to be about deliberately killing my own soldiers.”

“Sometimes there’s no other way.”

The shadow was behind her, so she couldn’t glare at it. “Yes, well,” Cheris said, “you live your beliefs. How commendable.”

“I wasn’t referring specifically to Hellspin Fortress.”

She snorted.

“I am not good for you,” Jedao said. “I know this. But if I were as good at manipulating people as you think I am, you would be taking a nap instead of making all the duelists nervous.”

“You don’t sleep,” Cheris said, remembering. “You don’t sleep at all. What do you do in all that time? Count ravens?”

Jedao was silent for so long that she thought something had happened to him. Then he said, “It’s dark in the black cradle, and it’s very quiet unless they’re running tests. Out here there are things to look at and I can remember what colors are and what voices sound like. Please, Cheris. Go sleep. You will never realize how valuable it is unless someone takes it away from you forever.”

“You’re only telling me this to get me to do what you want,” Cheris said.

“You’ll have to let me know how that works out,” Jedao said. “Something’s bound to go wrong in the Radiant Ward, and they’ll need you.”

“Need you, you mean.”

“I said what I meant.”

Cheris looked around the dueling hall, then let her feet carry her back to her quarters. Before she lay down, she asked, “Are you lonely when I sleep?” He didn’t answer, but this time she left a small light on.