“I just want it to be done. I want this shit to be over with. I want everyone to fuck off out of our inn. They all need to go somewhere else, and we need to go get Wilmos.”

I groaned and bumped my forehead against his shoulder. “And we don’t even know what we’ll find on the other side of the Karron portal.”

We stood together for a few minutes. Sean stroked my hair.

“If they void the selection, they won’t have another right away,” I said. “It might take years to set one up again.”

“Maybe he’ll do us all a favor and marry the fish.”

“I can’t,” Oond’s mechanical voice said behind us.

We turned. He had stopped swimming and was hovering near the transparent wall.

“I can’t do it. It’s too dangerous. I’m not brave enough. I cannot go to the Dominion. I cannot stay there. I cannot be the spouse. Someone will kill me. Someone will kill my offspring. It will all end in tragedy and death. So much death.”

“Well, there goes that idea,” Sean said under his breath.

“I am so sorry. I am a failure. I have failed my people. I have come here for the minor ask. The survival of my people depends on it. If I withdraw, we leave with nothing. But I have no courage. I have no strength. I am miserable.”

A slightly opaque cloud of water spread from him.

I hid a sigh. “I will speak to the Sovereign on your behalf.”

Oond’s fins fluttered weakly. “You will?”

“I will. You are our guest. Your wellbeing is important to us. I’m sure some solution can be found. Rest and try not to worry.”

I took Sean’s hand for moral support, before I lost it and peed myself too, and the two of us went back upstairs.

* * *

“I don’t understand.” Miralitt frowned at me. “The oombole does not want to be the spouse? Does he think we can’t protect him?”

I sighed. Around me Kosandion’s private balcony was a flurry of activity. Right after the Game Day assassination attempt, Kosandion had requested a private portal. Considering that a civil war in the Dominion was looming, refusing seemed unreasonable. The big portal was shut down most of the time anyway, so we completely closed it off, and opened a smaller one right on the balcony. It could only transport one person at time.

As soon as the portal was opened, Miralitt’s guards came through and positioned themselves all around the balcony, ready to respond to any threats. Normally I might have taken that as an insult, but if I balked, Miralitt would’ve had an aneurism, and we needed a favor from her. This whole affair was a lesson in learning to compromise.