Chandra did feel sorry. Jonnah was in a terrible situation, with no good way out of it. She wished she could help him.

She couldn’t.

As she left Jonnah’s apartment, she sank back into the mindshare. Twenty-three voices flashed through her mind in a twisting collage of words and impressions.

Fight in the barracks, sent in….

East lift secure for….

….asked me for details….

…what she was wearing….

The effect was dizzying. Too new. Too much. Her Red Guard would need—both Guards would need to be at the top of their game once Bastyen was in the palace. Jephan’s Guard were long settled, but hers were still off-balance and struggling with their newly-boosted brains. It made Chandra nervous at a time she should have felt triumphant.

Back in the rotunda, dining staff were setting up long tables near the east lift, and gardeners were clustering chairs in places they wouldn’t hurt the foliage. Chandra grabbed the first palace sentry she saw. “What’s going on?”

His dark blue uniform pulled tight as he snapped to stiff attention. “Captain Chandra! I didn’t see you there.”

His attention, like hers, had been on the catering. More good news. “Answer my question, please.”

“It’s the foreign prince. Since Captain Jonnah’s arrived back, news is the rest of them will be here any time. People want to see him.”

The rest of the story Chandra could fill in for herself. “And you can’t have a pile of highborns standing around for more than ten minutes without food and drink available.”

He nodded.

Nothing she could do. “Stay alert. I don’t want any more excitement today than is necessary.”

“Yes, Captain!”

Party starting in the rotunda, she sent to the mindshare. Let’s double the blues down here.

A fleeting, On it, from Rain. While officially the palace sentries were their own service, with their own command, the day their officers refused a “suggestion” from the Red Guard would be the day they were out of a job.

As the first couple partiers—a Teyn and her husband—came off the lift, Chandra dipped back down into the mindshare. She had to get better at this dual awareness. Jephan had said it would become second nature eventually, but Chandra and her Guard didn’t have time for eventually.

The top level was mostly her own mind. Chandra was the Captain; she had no partner tied directly into her brain. She couldn’t block any active sending from her twelve, but she didn’t have to broadcast her every thought if she didn’t want to. This was the most comfortable and the least engaged level of consciousness.

Just below that, what Chandra thought of as the chattering level. A constant drone of thoughts and conversation. Here the Red Guard communicated, their minds locked together so the sending was easy and intimate. A dampening field couldn’t block it. No-one outside the mindshare could overhear it, no matter how strong their gifts. A lateral reach could pull in Jephan’s Guard and they could all talk quickly and privately. This was where Jephan’s Guard lived. This was where Chandra’s Guard needed to be. But it took practice and a strange sort of focus to be tied in to twelve other minds and still be alert.

Deeper still, Chandra could push out from her own senses and work through theirs. She saw through twelve sets of eyes, heard through twelve sets of ears. Disorienting was too tame a word for the experience, but Jephan insisted that once they all got used to working at that level, that was when the Guard truly became unstoppable.

It wasn’t so bad, Chandra had learned, if everyone was standing still. But most of her people were in motion, engaging in last-minute preparations for Bastyen’s arrival.

Four were stable. Goren and Yosef on guard at the checkpoint—the single point of access to the top floors where the royal family lived. The other two—Nicci and Sestian—were standing outside the door to the King’s bedroom.

??? Chandra sent a wordless query to the pair.

Nicci answered with a salvo of images that overlapped together until Chandra’s mind was able to sort out a narrative. General Fierre with the King. Queen Yinicof. Arguments that had pulled in the two Guard on duty. Nicci and Sestian filling in.

The King’s safety wasn’t her Guard’s primary concern, but any help they could give Jephan was in the best interest of Aravene. And Jephan’s Guard was spread thin these days.

Chandra reached for Therar, one of Jephan’s who was in with the King. What’s going on up there?

The King. Therar’s sending was sharp, precise. He’s decided he wants to attend the ball, to help welcome Prince Bastyen.

Of all the—Chandra shut herself off, but not before she caught the echo of Therar laughing at her through the mind-share. Of course, Hyresh's Guard were used to rolling with his whims.

Jephan on his way down to you, Yosef sent from the checkpoint. Behind the words, curiosity.

Chandra spread her thoughts to the whole of her Guard. Hyresh will be coming to the party.

A wave of questions blended together. Serious? Who allowed? Anyone tell the queen? Chandra hadn’t mastered the half-conscious listening that would absorb and remember the cacophany of mental feedback and let her pick it apart and identify each bit of simultaneous information. She thought she’d heard each of them, but tonight she couldn’t afford to take chances. Confirm you heard me. One at a time, please.

This time, she counted ten individual voices. All of them, except for Genoff and Zairr who were still far enough away to be out of range.

Chandra? A voice stronger than the rest pushed against her mind at the same time she saw the East lift plunge to its dais in the rotunda. It pulled her back into herself and she noticed the growing crowd around the lifts and the refreshment tables. The frittering flocks of nobles parted as Captain Jephan stepped among them.

As Captain of the King’s Red Guard, he would have been imposing enough, but the jagged scar that ran from his forehead down to his jaw gave him a terrifying air. Miyelle ian Jenshen had left her mark, and Jephan served as walking reminder of her treachery. She’d taken half of his Guard, and his left eye on top of that.

Chandra stood as straight as she could. Captain Jephan was more than the only person in the palace who outranked her; he was the person she had spent her entire life wanting to be when she grew up. Sir? she sent.

Jephan made a direct line for her; he did not slow or turn aside from anyone in his way, and Chandra fought to hide her amusement as Marqine and Teyn alike scrambled to keep from being run over. He scowled at them all, but Chandra could feel his own dark amusement through the mindshare. I haven’t seen this bunch so a-flutter since Hyresh broke his engagement to the Jenshen woman.

A wave of cold dread washed over Chandra. Before she could quash it, or shield it, Jephan lay a hand on her shoulder. “Easy, Captain.” Gallows humor. Forgive me.

“What’s going on, Jeph?” The question was shorter than she’d meant, driven by embarrassment that he’d heard her fear.

“The usual last-minute chaos.” Jephan leaned back against the wall next to Chandra, a casual pose masking a mental state that was anything but. Hyresh insists on coming to the party. Fierre tried to talk him out of it, but….

If Chandra had been a spiritual woman, she would have believed they’d done something to piss off the gods. Can’t the Queen talk some sense into him?

You know how she indulges when he really wants something.

She’s the one who wanted to make an impression. Does she think she can keep him in line.

Jephan shrugged.

As if the party wasn’t going to be headache enough. They’d been planning the thing for a month and Chandra wouldn’t have minded a year more. Kardenel soldiers. A Kardenel prince they couldn’t afford to have assassinated in the Aravene palace. Nobles in favor of the treaty. Nobles against the treaty. All in the same room. And now, another threat they hadn’t considered. I wish you hadn’t joked about Miyelle. Part of the new treaty is that Kardenel surrender her to Aravene justice.

Jephan’s mind went silent as he pulled away from her awareness. Chandra could only speculate at the colorful cursing that was doubtless raging through his shielded thoughts. “If I thought there were any way to get Yinicof to cancel this idiotic display….”

His mind opened again—not just to her, but to every Guardsman in the mindshare. Chandra was pulled back into the gestalt by his firm mental hand. Listen. Chandra felt twenty-two other minds fall still. More complications. Yinicof is asking for Miyelle Jenshen’s head as part of the treaty. If Miyelle’s still got supporters—and we know she does—this could be the excuse they’ve been waiting for to cause trouble.

“I hate that woman,” Jephan said aloud, scratching at the empty socket on the left side of his face. “Why won’t she just lay down and die?”

“I’m pretty sure that’s what Yinicof is working to bring about.” Chandra’s words were flippant, but her chest was tight. The political situation with Kardenel was so delicate, and they couldn’t afford distractions.

Let her try something, Jephan sent to Chandra alone, a bloodthirsty tone to his mental voice. I owe her.

Not me. “The less eventful the next few days are, the happier I’ll be.”

Jephan laughed and clapped her on the shoulder as the settled back against the wall to watch the pageantry.