“Execarne!” Tau cried, sitting up. “You mangy addled runt! I’ve told you a thousand times, I’m not a hermaphrodite, I can’t satisfy your fantasies!”

“Damn!” the spymaster said, snapping his fingers, which made Baru’s right hand ache. The enact-colonel Osa stopped him: he submitted wordlessly as she searched him for weapons.

“How are you?” Tau offered, by way of apology.

“Shot up and sore,” Execarne complained. “And nearly out of drugs. Ah, look, you’re befriending Baru! Risky fucking proposition, going by the evidence! I knew her about two days before I had marines and jackals burning down my farm.”

“Did you lie to her? Lying at first meeting does invite misfortune.” Tau had gotten a bay leaf stuck in their teeth.

“I didn’t even tell her I was the Morrow Minister!” Which faded into hacking laughter as he folded up around his crossbow wound.

She put her hand into Tau’s mouth without permission and plucked the leaf right out so assuredly that she did not even brush their lips. “Goodness,” Tau said, “you’re nimble.”

“You probably oughtn’t associate with her,” Execarne wheezed, “she’s definitely an Imperial agent, and she’s made it this far for purely political reasons. Dangerous.”

“Nonsense. I’ve told you before, Faham, I believe that the atom of the human universe is the dyad, the connection between two people. The most precious thing there can be.”

“Is that so,” Execarne said. “Have you told her the truth about that ship that sank your clipper, then?”

Tau stiffened so suddenly that Baru heard their teeth click. Behind Execarne the enact-colonel inhaled sharply. “Your Federal Highness, I strongly advise you to let this matter lie.”

“Always so subtle, Osa.” Tau-indi touched Baru’s collarbone. “But I can’t speak of it. Baru, do you know what happens to a fetus exposed to uranium?”

Baru had never seen such a thing, had never even read much uranium-lore: the Oriati insisted the black pitch was magical, the books said they were wrong. “No, I don’t. What happens?”

“They become monstrous,” Tau-indi said, in a small brave voice which Baru could not bear to laugh at, although she wanted to. “The soul cannot inhabit them at birth, for they are already full of uranium light. What enters them does not come out of the Door in the East. Our alliance is young. There are certain things you and I cannot touch upon, lest our work give birth to a monster.”

Baru’s wound prickled. Suddenly she did not feel like laughing.

“The Prince needs to rest,” Osa said, firmly, and suddenly the nearby Cheetah crew were toasting Execarne and Baru, shouting thanks for the timely rescue, inviting them into a circle of smiling faces to offer them fine wine, over here, away from Tau-indi Bosoka.

“It’s all bullshit,” Execarne said, conversationally, to Baru.

“What’s bullshit?”