The bridge was pretty much the same as on every other Chiss merchant ship and diplomatic cruiser Qilori had seen: small and efficient, with helm, navigation, defense, and comm consoles. The captain was seated in a chair behind the helm and nav consoles, with other Chiss at all but the nav position.

That seat, of course, was Qilori’s.

“Pathfinder,” the captain said, nodding in greeting. “As soon as you’ve taken your place, we’ll be off.”

Qilori’s cheek winglets flattened as he sat down and flexed his fingers over the controls.

Right. Have fun.

The trip was uneventful. On the captain’s command Qilori put on his sensory-deprivation headset and slipped into his trance, letting the Great Presence whisper into and around and through him.

As usual, the Great Presence was miserly with Its wisdom and insights, making for a somewhat slower trip than Qilori would have liked. Fortunately, the space in this part of the Chaos was relatively smooth, with only a few of the anomalies that made navigators like the Pathfinders necessary for long-range interstellar travel. They reached Bardram Scoft a few minutes ahead of the captain’s proposed schedule, and in a whole lot less time than a jump-by-jump trip would have taken. All in all, Qilori decided as he slipped off the headset, he’d earned his pay.

He blinked away the post-trance cobwebs, flexing the stiffness out of his fingers. The planet loomed large in the viewport as the ship settled into orbit. The bridge had mostly emptied out, with only Qilori and a pilot still there. “Where is everyone?” he asked.

“Preparing the ambassador for the welcoming ceremony,” the pilot said. “Scoftic culture requires the highest-ranking military officer to accompany the ambassador, and there may be other protocols to be observed.”

“May be?” Qilori asked, frowning as he scanned the sky. There were a lot of ships out there, more than he’d ever seen at a backwater world like this. “I thought you Chiss liked to be prepared for everything ahead of time.”

“We do,” the pilot said. “The Scoftic government has changed again, and with it the protocols. Our ambassador must relearn them.”

“Ah,” Qilori said. So that was it. New government, and everyone nearby had sent emissaries to offer their best wishes and size up the newcomer. “I didn’t know the old Prefect had been unwell.”

“He wasn’t,” the pilot said. “He was assassinated. What ship is that?”

“What?” Qilori said, his winglets fluttering with surprise. Assassinated? “And everyone’s okay with that?”

“It’s not unheard of among the Scofti,” the pilot said calmly. “That ship. What nation does it represent?”

Qilori peered out the viewport, still struggling at the casualness of it all. “I think it’s a Lioaoin.”

“Is it a new design?”

“I don’t know. How should I know?”

“You’re a navigator,” the Chiss said. “You see many ships, from many nations.”