The knowledge of what had been in the Remnanter ship – if the message it had carried was actually true, not itself a lie – had to be kept secret, hidden away not just from the vast mass of people but from everybody else as well. It rarely paid to frighten the masses, and it never paid to confuse them. Sometimes you could trust people in positions of power to understand this and even help keep things confidential – or at least muddied, so that people could self-deceive with whatever kept them best comforted – but not always. And with this, the stakes were too high. Nothing – nothing at all, in practice or in theory – mattered more than the Subliming. They were staking everything on it; he was staking everything on it, carrying the burden of the hopes of the whole Gzilt people on his shoulders.

Orpe – Virisse – moaned, panted. Not being able to see her face meant that he could let his own expression relax while he thought all this through.

And – precisely because it was so important – there was also the possibility that even somebody he’d normally have trusted, somebody from the rarefied upper echelons, would blab, just for the fame, just for the down-the-generations notoriety or supposed heroic status speaking out would bring, even if it was utterly and completely the wrong thing to do. Never underestimate the sheer selfishness and stupidity of people.

The girl’s grip on his ankles tightened. She shuddered.

He thought of the ship, slowing but still racing, powering down towards the planet, falling upon it.

Orpe moaned. He almost laughed. Supposedly, right now he was with the sub-committee making the decision about which Scavenger species got Preferred Partner status, making them the people who’d receive the cooperation of the Gzilt when it came to parcelling out the legacy stuff. But he didn’t need to be there, in the committee chamber; the personnel concerned had been briefed, knew what to do and which way to vote. In the end they remained frightened of him, even yet, and there was – he was entirely prepared to admit – a certain extra frisson about wielding such power without even having to be there.

Fuck the sub-committee. That would take care of itself. In the end, he’d rather be here.

With Orpe, whom he had to share with the president.

Normally he wouldn’t stand for this; he didn’t share lovers. But then Orpe’s other lover was somebody it was very useful to share her with. It was, indeed, the precise reason that he had befriended the girl, flattered her, courted her, finally bedded her. Not that it was any great sacrifice, of course; she was beautiful and attractive, after all, if a little too … assertive, equality-minded for his tastes. But no matter.