She smiled and tilted her head just so. “I take it you mean that in the traditional sense, from before the conquest. I would not have guessed but for the conversation on the beach. Coming from Maram it meant one thing. Coming from you, however…”

“I am loyal to Maram and Maram alone.”

“Ah,” she replied. I disliked her tone. “Loyalty to Maram does not require loyalty to the Vath.”

It was a show of weakness, I was sure, but I came to my feet and walked to the balcony. Much of the city was obscured by rainfall, but even through it I could see the many lights winding their way around the hill atop which the estate sat. It appeared as a bejeweled skirt, spread just so around us.

“I looked into your province,” I said without turning away from the view. “It is quite wealthy, but it wasn’t always. At the start of the war the average household was starving. Your family fixed that.”

Rabi’a’s voice was hard. “That is the social contract we enter into as rulers.”

I laughed. “The Vath believe the powerful rule over the weak, and that is the social contract we enter into by not being born in the right places. But Maram—she is like you. She wants the planet and its people to prosper.”

Rabi’a’s jewelry chimed and sang as she came to her feet and stood beside me.

“And that is where a queenmaker comes in,” she said. It sounded almost like a question. I eyed her sidelong.

“Is that what you think I am?” I asked, my mouth twisting. “Her Highness has no need of a queenmaker. The throne is her birthright. What she needs are allies who—”

“What she needs,” Rabi’a interrupted coldly, “is an army. A war. Maram is no different than the rest of the hostages—a means to control the state before the galactic senate. I will not be party to—”

“To what?” I dared her.

“A rebellion,” she said. “I will certainly not be party to a rebellion spearheaded by a rankless girl who has never been to war.”

“There is none better than a rankless girl,” I replied, “to see the injustice on the ground. Maram can fix much, but she cannot do it from within the machine of empire. And the cost of complacency is too high. Surely you can see that.”

Rabi’a walked back to her seat. “There is no hope, Amani,” she said quietly. “Any rebellion will fail. You will be wiser when you accept that.”

“When I was eight,” I said, looking back at the city, “my parents took me and my brothers and marched us through the mountains on Cadiz to a new home. It took six weeks. Six weeks of bitter cold and little food and nonstop walking. I was half my weight when we arrived at the village.”

“Why would your parents put you through such an ordeal?”