I had sent for Captain Hetnys. She walked past the door to Lieutenant Tisarwat’s makeshift office, looked in. Hesitated, frowned. Walked on to receive Lieutenant Tisarwat’s bow—I had seen Captain Hetnys through her eyes. Tisarwat experienced a moment of pleased malice to see Captain Hetnys frown, but did not show it on her face. I strongly suspected Captain Hetnys turned to watch Tisarwat go into the office, but as Tisarwat didn’t turn to see it, I didn’t, either.

Eight showed Captain Hetnys into my sitting room. After the predictable round of tea (in the rose glass, now she knew about the Bractware, and Five could be sure she knew she wasn’t drinking from it), I said, “How is your Atagaris doing?”

Captain Hetnys froze an instant, surprised, I thought. “Sir?” she asked.

“The ancillary that was injured.” There were only the three Atagarises here. I had ordered Sword of Atagaris Var off of the station.

She frowned. “It’s recovering well, sir.” A slight hesitation. “If I may beg the fleet captain’s indulgence.” I gestured the granting of it. “Why did you have the ancillary treated?”

What answers I might have given to that question would doubtless have made little sense to Captain Hetnys. “Not doing so would have been a waste, Captain. And it would have made your ship unhappy.” Still the frown. I’d been right. She didn’t understand. “I have been considering how best to dispose of our resources.”

“The gates, sir,” Captain Hetnys protested. “Beg to remind the fleet captain, anyone might come through the gates.”

“No, Captain,” I said, “no one will come through the gates. They’re too easy to watch, and too easily defended.” And I would certainly mine them, one way or another. I wasn’t certain if Captain Hetnys hadn’t thought of that possibility, or if she had thought I might not think of it. Either was possible. “Certainly no one will come by the Ghost Gate.”

The merest twitch of muscles around her eyes and her mouth, the briefest of expressions, too quickly gone to be readable.

She believed someone might. I was increasingly sure that she had lied when she had said that she had never encountered anyone else in that other, supposedly empty, system. That she wanted to conceal the fact that someone was there, or had been there. Might be there now. Of course, if she had sold away Valskaayan transportees, she would want to conceal that fact in order to avoid reeducation or worse. And there remained, still, the question of whom she might have sold them to, or why.

I could not rely on her. Would not. Would be very, very careful to watch her and her ship.

“You’ve sent Mercy of Kalr away, sir,” Captain Hetnys pointed out. My ship’s departure would have been obvious, though of course the reason for it would not be.