“You’ve always seen right through me.” She was still embarrassed. “Even when you found me on Nilt. I suppose you already know that Horticulturist Basnaaid is on her way here?”

Basnaaid had insisted on going over to the dome repair crew’s vehicle, back at the station. She had requested to be brought here while I slept, and Seivarden had acceded, with some surprise and dismay. “Yes. I’d have done just as you did, had I been awake.” She’d known that, but still was gratified to hear it. “Is there anything else?” There wasn’t, or at least not anything she wanted to bring up, so I dismissed her.

Thirty seconds after Seivarden left, Tisarwat came into my cubicle. I shifted my legs over, gestured an invitation to sit. “Lieutenant,” I said, as she settled herself, gingerly. There were still correctives around her torso, cracked ribs and other injuries still healing. “How are you feeling?”

“Better,” she said. “I think Medic has me dosed up. I can tell because I’m not wishing every ten minutes or so that you’d thrown me out the airlock when you found me.”

“That’s recent, I think?” I hadn’t thought she’d been suicidal before now. But I had, perhaps, not been paying as much attention as I should have.

“No, it’s always been there. Just… just not so real. Not so intense. It was when I saw what Captain Hetnys had done, threatened to kill Horticulturist Basnaaid to get to you. I knew it was my fault.”

“Your fault?” I didn’t think it had been the fault of anyone in particular, except of course Hetnys herself. “I don’t doubt your politicking alarmed her. It was obvious that you were angling for influence. But it’s also true that I knew about it from the start, and would have prevented you if I’d disapproved.”

Relief—just a bit. Her mood was calm, stable. She was entirely correct in her guess that Medic had given her something. “That’s the thing. If I may speak very frankly, sir.” I gestured permission. “Do you understand, sir, that we’re both doing exactly what she wants?” She could only be Anaander Mianaai, Lord of the Radch. “She sent us here to do exactly what we’re doing. Doesn’t it bother you, sir, that she took something she knew you wanted and used it to make you do what she wanted?”

“Sometimes it does,” I admitted. “But then I remember that what she wants isn’t terribly important to me.”

Before Tisarwat could answer, Medic came frowning into the room. “I have you here so you can rest, Fleet Captain, not take endless meetings.”

“What meetings?” I affected an innocent expression. “The lieutenant and I are both patients here, and both resting, as you see.”

Medic hmphed.