Babylon's Ashes

“Already done,” Rosenfeld said, and Filip glanced to Karal, catching the little scowl at the corner of the older man’s mouth. Rosenfeld was a friend, an ally, one of the inner circle of the Free Navy, but he shouldn’t have been able to bring his private guard on the ship when Marco wasn’t there. The Pella was the flagship of the Free Navy, after all, and temptation was temptation. Marco and Rosenfeld reached out together, slowed their two-body rotation with a handhold jutting off the lockers, and still arm in arm, pushed out to the corridor and into the ship. Filip and Karal followed after.

“Going to be a hard burn getting to Ceres in time for the meeting,” Marco said.

“Your fault. I could have taken my own ship.”

“You don’t have a gunship.”

“I’ve lived my whole life in rock hoppers—”

Even with only the back of his father’s head to see, Filip could hear the smile in Marco’s voice. “That was your whole life until now. We’ve changed the game. Can’t have the high command moving unprotected. Even out here, not everyone’s with us. Not yet.”

They reached the lift that ran the length of the ship, shifted around it, and swam headfirst through the air, down toward the crew decks. Karal looked behind, toward the operations and flight decks, as if to be sure none of Rosenfeld’s guard were at their six.

“Why I waited,” Rosenfeld said. “The good little soldier, mé. Too bad about Johnson and Smith making it safe to Luna. Only took down one out of three?”

“Earth was the one that mattered,” Marco said. Ahead of them, Sárta appeared, floating up past them toward ops. She nodded her greeting as they passed. “Earth was always the prime target.”

“Well, Secretary-General Gao’s with her gods now, and I hope she died screaming”—Rosenfeld mimed spitting to the side after he said it—“but this Avasarala who’s taken her place—”

“A bureaucrat,” Marco said as they hauled themselves around the corner and into the mess. The tables and benches bolted to the floor, the smell of Martian military food, the colors that had until recently been the banner of the enemy. They all stood in contrast to the men and women in the space. Belters all, and still Filip could pick out the Free Navy he served with from Rosenfeld’s guard. Self from not-self. They could pretend the division wasn’t there, but they all knew better. A dozen people, all told, like it was the change of shift. One of the Pella’s crew for each of Rosenfeld’s, so Karal wasn’t the only one to think a little vigilance between friends was a good thing.

One of the guards tossed Rosenfeld a bulb. Coffee, tea, whiskey, or water, there was no way to know. Rosenfeld caught it without missing a beat in the conversation. “Seems like a bureaucrat with a hate on. You think you can handle her? Nothing personal, coyo, but you’ve got a blind spot underestimating women.”

Marco went still. Even as Filip saw it, his mouth flooded with a coppery taste. Karal grunted softly, and when Filip looked to him, his jaw had slid forward and his hands were fists at his sides.

Rosenfeld took a place against a wall, his expression a mask of empathy and apology. “But maybe this isn’t the place to say it. Sorry for the sore spot.”

“Nothing hurt,” Marco said. “We’ll chew it all through on Ceres.”

“Gathering of the tribes,” Rosenfeld said. “Looking forward to it. Next phase should be interesting.”

“Will be,” Marco said. “Karal can put you and yours in the right cabins. Should plan to keep there. It’s going to be a hard burn.”

“Will do, Admiral.”

Marco pulled himself out of the room, floating down toward the machine shop and engineering without so much as meeting Filip’s eye.

Filip waited for a moment, uncertain whether to follow or stay here, whether he’d been dismissed from duty or was still at his post. Rosenfeld smiled and winked a bumpy eyelid at him before turning to his men. Something had happened there; he could feel it in the air and in the way Karal held himself. Something important. And from the way his father acted, he had to think it was something to do with him.

He put his hand on Karal’s wrist. “What is it?”

“Nothing,” Karal said, lying badly. “Nothing to worry over.”

“Karal?”

The older man pressed his lips together, stretched his neck. He didn’t look at Filip.

“Karal. Something I should ask them?”

Slowly, Karal shook his head. He shouldn’t ask. Karal licked his lips nervously, shook his head again, sighed, and spoke low and calm. “Was a report back a while. Observation data from the… ah… from the Chetzemoka. About how the ships with Johnson and Smith didn’t die?”

“And?”

“And,” Karal said, the word as dense as lead.

Then he went on, which was how Filip Inaros, in front of Rosenfeld and his half dozen smirking guards, learned that his mother was still alive. And that everyone on the Pella knew it but him.

Under burn, he dreamed.