After the hearing, the senators gathered in the ballroom for a cocktail party. It was mostly an excuse to mingle and network. Sometimes more important rulings were made here than at the hearings.

Zax made it a point never to miss one.

Tonight, the Emperor’s proclamation was everything anyone could talk about. It made him sick to his stomach. He tried to change the subject.

“Crime rate is through the roof,” he said to a dozen men who had assembled around him. “It’s out of control. We need new measures to—”

“Don’t you think we have more pressing matters to attend to?”

He turned to face the woman who had interrupted him. Agna Gorvik. He hoped she wasn’t referring to the damned proclamation.

“Like shielding the entire city,” she continued, pointing toward the ceiling.

He felt relieved.

“I am not denying the importance of—”

She cut him off again. “Why do you think crime is out of control? Because people are desperate. And why are people desperate? Because rocks are falling on their heads. Things like that tend to annoy people. Surprising, I know.”

Agna was always defying him, disputing his ideas. Yet, for some reason, he liked her.

“Of course,” he said with a smile. “The issue needs to be addressed, I agree. But that does not mean we can’t take precautionary measures. As you know, extending the shield will take time—possibly years. Are we supposed to let crime spread in the meantime?”

She returned his smile. “Precautionary measures have a cost, Zax. As does extending the shield. Our budget is—”

“You!” screamed a voice in the crowd. Everyone turned toward the man who had so rudely interrupted Agna. “You are a despicable human being!”

Senator Evram Tolish was pointing an accusing finger at Zax.

“Coming from you,” he said calmly, “that is quite the compliment.”

“How dare you talk to my children behind my back? What horrors have you told them?”

“Why not ask them?”

The man was fuming as he approached. Tall and handsome, with short blonde hair, wearing the traditional brown senatorial robe with the Imperial wreath. He stopped a few feet from Zax and waved a finger under his nose.

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“They refuse to speak to me! See what you’ve done?”

“That has nothing to do with me and everything to do with you. I only told them what everyone on the planet has been saying for weeks. You have no one else to blame but yourself. What, then? You thought you could commit fraud and get away with it?”

Tolish was livid.

“You poison the well, Iden, that is what you do! What you have always done.”

“Are you claiming innocence, then?”

The senator gritted his teeth.

“You are a despicable human being,” he hissed.

Zax sighed. “You have said that already. But I forgive you. Anger can turn even the brightest mind to mush—and you were never the brightest to begin with. Now that you’ve had your moment in the limelight and got things off your chest, could you let us continue our conversation?”

For a second, he thought Tolish was going to hit him, but the senator managed to keep himself under control. Shame, that. It would have made things so much easier. The man would have been locked up right away. Now, they’d have to keep digging for the evidence. But he was confident they would find it—eventually.

“Insult me all you want, but everyone here knows who you truly are. They won’t say a thing to your face because you have power, but they know.”

Who he truly was? Zax thought that was hilarious. So much so, he burst out laughing. Many threw him startled looks—most of all Tolish. At least, it had sucked the anger out of the senator.

Zax stabbed the man in the chest with the tip of his finger.

“Yes, I have power. And you have none. You are done. I will crush you like the little bug you are. It’s only a matter of days now. You could run, of course, but never far enough. Wherever you go, we will find you.”

Tolish clenched his fists, his anger returned.

“You’ve threatened me once too many, Iden! Never threaten me again.”

Zax quirked a brow. “Is that a threat?”

Tolish grunted, spun, and stormed out of the room.

Whispers spread through the crowd.

One of his friends turned to look at him.

“Wasn’t that a bit much, Zax? You didn’t need to drag him in the mud like that.”

He frowned as he considered the people around him. Eyes looked down, faces turned. They were uncomfortable.

This would not do.

There was a reason for all this.

He had to make sure they understood.

“I do what I must do,” he said out loud, “as I always have, to ensure the safety of our people. That is our mission, is it not? That is what they pay us to do. The people. They pay us. Or have you forgotten?” He looked around at the assembled senators. “Sometimes I wonder if any of you still remember our purpose? We are not here to serve ourselves, or even to serve one another. We are here to serve them.” He pointed at a window and the city beyond. “That is all that matters to me. If I need to crush a few bugs along the way, so be it. But rest assured that no one will miss them, least of all me. We have a job to do, and we can’t do it if there are people like Tolish pulling us down. Never forget that.”

Several of his friends nodded, though others still seemed troubled by what they had just witnessed.

He sighed.

Why did he even bother?

He would be leaving soon anyway.

He was so sick of this world.

Sometimes he wondered why he had started down this path at all. It had been so long ago, he almost couldn’t remember.

Almost.

He felt someone grab his arm and pull him away from the crowd. When he turned his head, he saw it was Agna.

“When are you leaving?” she asked with a mischievous grin.

“Not soon enough,” he muttered.

She raised a brow. “Really now? And here I thought you enjoyed my company.”

He smiled. “I do. But there is only one of you and hundreds of them.” He pointed over his shoulder at the assembled senators.

She laughed. “Fair enough. But I bet I can make you forget all of them—at least for a few hours! Come.”

He let her lead him out of the building and into the night.