The Lady Storm radiates sincerity, but still Misery peels her lips back from her teeth. “Your attempts at emotional manipulation are pathetic. Do you understand why Diamond did what she did? The Heretics aren’t our friends.”

She sighs, heavy with a great and unnameable sadness. “It was an accident, you know.”

“Oh, I’m sure.”

“It’s the truth, like it or not. What happened to your captain’s crew, years ago … Esse’s ship was new, they didn’t quite understand its mechanics yet. She was trying to leave. The ship was giving her problems, technical problems, she didn’t want to engage in battle. But the jump didn’t work right. She dropped in the middle of the seraph cluster. An accident. She never intended to do it.” A shake of the head. “Her superiors … They made her a hero. She kept saying it was an accident but they didn’t want to hear it. Didn’t want to believe it. Propaganda is a terrible, soul-consuming beast. It haunts her, those deaths. She kept bringing it up, over and over. I could not get her to stop.” She looks at Misery, full of sorrow. “Believe what you wish. You never knew the real Esse, the person behind the name on all the waves.” Pensiveness overtakes her. “Your captain … I wonder. If they had met, if they could have talked, would she have forgiven her?”

“She would never.” Flames shoot through Misery’s veins at the very thought. “You never knew her either. Some things are not forgivable.”

In the Lady Storm’s face she sees the closing of a door. She too has realized that there is no compromise to be had here, no portal that can cross the warped gulfs that lie between them. Whatever closure or reconciliation she wanted, she will not get. She bows her head. “To be honest, I have forgiven you for what you did to my station, Misery Nomaki. I know I will be better at peace not holding a grudge. In truth it is not my place to pardon you. That will be up to the Emperor and the Throne. Tomorrow a ship comes to take you and the Imperial princess back to the Capital for judgment.”

Misery’s fingers vibrate. “And what’s your purpose in telling me this? To emphasize that if I’d rolled over for you, you would have put in a nice word with those shitbirds?”

She folds her hands over her belly and turns away. “I thought perhaps talking to you might shed some light on why things happened the way they did. I thought I might find some answers. But I’ve clearly wasted both our time.”