Ariock put some thought into how to announce the conquest of a whole planet.

He could say “Umdalkdul is liberated” in a grand voice, as Garrett suggested. He could launch into a speech about valiant freedom fighters and what each major battle had cost.

Or he could cast Kessa in the spotlight, as Thomas suggested. He could ask her to make the speech, even though everyone on the war council knew that the Torth Empire had to be defeated by force, and Ariock was the leader of that force.

Or he could do what Kessa suggested, and praise every battle leader in public, but also remind everyone that penitent laborers and the civilian workforce were just as important. He ought to talk about how their victories were largely due to Thomas and the superluminal technology he had invented.

Ariock stood in the open courtyard of the war palace, facing hundreds of civilian councilors and military leaders.

He wasn’t going to make a fancy speech. That just wasn’t his style. Instead, he said three simple words.

“Umdalkdul is ours.”

They erupted in jubilation.

Even the most reserved councilors stomped their feet and whooped with victory. Eyes shone with pride. It was one thing hear the total conquest announcement on their new superluminal broadcast network, and another thing to hear it straight from the battle leader who had taken the most prisoners and who killed the most enemies.

Everyone felt the cost of freedom on a personal level. Every civilian was proud of the bravest war heroes, the ones who took repeated risks.

Ariock sat in his chair of polished meteorite. He wished it didn’t look so much like a throne, but … well, the whole point was so he could stop looming over people. He had insisted that everyone have a chair.

“We are consolidating our forces on Umdalkdul,” Ariock assured them. “But we need to discuss our next step. Garrett will go over our options.”

The options were preselected. Ariock did not tell the war council that he had already hashed out his next steps, in private, with Thomas and Garrett. These councilors would receive a distilled version of three strategies which Ariock had already approved of.

It was easier this way.

Ariock wanted the people under his protection to have agency and to feel empowered. Yet he could not afford endless arguing about whether Thomas was a trustworthy ally or a demonic rekveh. The war could not afford the strain of doubts and distrust.

Unity was what made the Torth Empire powerful. Ariock felt that sort of power whenever he rallied his troops, and whenever they fought with him. Rushing into a battle solo was a far different matter than rushing in with friends and allies who had the same drive to win.

He needed unity. This war was a survival situation. If they won? Well, in the aftermath, there would be plenty of time for discordant fracturing and partings of ways.

“Let’s talk about Parity first.” Garrett used his staff to point to a holographic display.

Hundreds of semi-transparent planet holographs glowed beneath an overhang, each one rotating at a slightly different rate. Quite a few of them looked Earth-like. As Garrett spoke, one of those Earth-like planets grew until it eclipsed others, while the rest faded to insignificant points of light. Backstage technicians were in charge of the display.

“The thing about Parity,” Garrett said, “is that it’s a shipping hub. Think of it like a crucial piece of an artery. If we slice it?” He drove down his staff for emphasis. “Then we can count on the Torth losing some of their nuclear weapons capabilities within that celestial sector. That renders more than two dozen planets vulnerable to our attacks. We…”

Ariock began to tune out, having already heard this plan in great detail.

If only he could make the Torth Empire vulnerable in the long-term. They had space armadas. Ariock had a few thousand half-trained shuttle pilots.

“Can we talk?”

The voice was feminine, throaty, and intimately whispered in his ear.

For a moment, Ariock assumed that Evenjos was speaking through his earpiece. But he wasn’t wearing an earpiece. This was a war council, where distractions would be considered rude.

Ariock twisted around, searching for Evenjos.

He caught a faint outline of wings standing behind his chair. She was all but invisible. She must have forced a quasi-voice out of dust particles.

“Follow me,” Evenjos whispered.

Her voice, directly inside his ear, felt like an invasion of privacy. Ariock had to work to control his temper. He did not spike out his awareness. He did not cause things to float, or make the sky beyond the open-air windows grow dark with clouds.

What do you want? Ariock asked inside his mind.

Evenjos floated to the colonnade and beckoned with a barely-there hand.

Then she breezed directly though a granite wall. She had probably sucked herself through cracks.

“…We could disrupt their space fleets by taking over Precision Bay Station,” Garrett was saying. “If they can’t repair their ships, they’re less likely to…”

The war council could continue without Ariock. Most of them would have guessed that Ariock was already well-informed.

He rose out of his chair. There was no way to be unobtrusive, like Evenjos. All gazes turned towards him. Ariock gave Garrett a thumbs up signal, showing that he approved of what the old man was saying.

“Ariock is aware of our options,” Garrett assured everyone. “Anyway, to continue…”

Ariock stepped through the colonnade, rounded a corner, and went indoors.

Evenjos floated amid polished marble and mirrored walls. She solidified, her hair rippling in an intangible breeze.

“Why bother to let them vote?” she asked. “They will do whatever you decide.”

Ariock glanced at the sentries on duty. Then he realized that they had not understood Evenjos’s words, because she had spoken in his native language, English.

“I am not a dictator,” he told Evenjos. “I want them to have a say.”

She rolled her eyes. “You’ve been avoiding me, Emperor Ariock.” She beckoned. “Come. There is a topic we ought to discuss.”

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Ariock hesitated. He owed Evenjos some common courtesy, since she healed warriors and soldiers during every major battle. Aliens praised the Lady of Sorrow almost as fervently as the Alashani used to do. She saved hundreds of lives every day.

And yet…

His burden of daily protection would only increase. He had to somehow take over more than seven hundred hub planets from the galactic Torth Empire. He needed her help—as a warrior.

If Evenjos were to take up residence on Umdalkdul, then Ariock would no longer need to teleport there on a daily basis, making sure that the planetary population was not in danger. Evenjos could sweep her awareness through a solar system almost as fast as he could.

Maybe now was a good time to bring up his concerns about their defenses?

“Fine,” Ariock said.

Evenjos glided away before he could suggest that they chat in the public garden, leaving him with little choice but to follow.

Ariock added “entitled” to his inner list of complaints about Evenjos. Really. If she had a topic worthy of discussion, she should have made an appointment. Vy was in charge of his schedule. Although the populations of Reject-20 and Umdalkdul could now talk to each other, thanks to the interstellar superluminal relays Ariock had set up—at the behest of Thomas—he still had import and export duties. He had spaceports to repair, battle leaders to get to know better, and a space armada to build.

Would Evenjos be willing to help with any of that? Did she even care?

Ariock’s natural walking speed was too fast for most people, due to the length of his stride, so he usually went for a gentle amble. Otherwise Vy or council members would be unable to keep up with him. But Evenjos moved at a brisk pace. He hurried after her winged form, glad that he had built the war palace to his own scale. He didn’t need to duck through doorways.

Evenjos glided onto a stone balcony and spread her wings. “Let’s go for a view,” she said in a giggly voice.

She leaped several stories higher.

Ariock sighed. Of course Evenjos wanted to turn a serious discussion into a pointless game.

Was he being too judgmental? If they were ever going to fight battles together, as he wanted to do, then he supposed he needed to accept her personality quirks.

Evenjos fluttered onto a clifftop behind the war palace.

Ariock suffused his body with power and leaped to join her. He reshaped wind currents to avoid their buffeting force.

Someone had landscaped the clifftop to include alien crocuses, flowery ivy along the balustrade, and hedgerows. Pretty.

Ariock landed in the garden with a bit too much force. He was used to slamming people through marble walls, or shattering floors with the force of his landings. When not in battle, he tried to move only with the utmost care. He sat or knelt most of the time, to put himself closer to eye level with whomever he was speaking with.

But he did not have to contort himself downward for Evenjos.

She elongated her body, approaching his height, becoming a willowy eight and a half foot tall giantess. Sunlight shone on her wavy hair, giving her head an electric magenta halo. Outer strands danced on the breeze.

“Hey,” Evenjos said.

Ariock stepped back, ready to fly away. Had he fallen for yet another stupid attempt to seduce him?

“I haven’t treated you very well,” Evenjos said. “And you are my rescuer. You and Thomas. You gave me your blood and lent me your power so I could be resurrected.”

Ariock waited, wary.

“I’m sorry,” she said.

The apology made her look vulnerable.

Ariock remembered that she had suffered, alone, for eons.

Somehow, she had held onto her sanity. And some kindness. She had survived torment, and the loss of everyone she had ever known, and then she had nearly died in her efforts to revive Ariock from a depletion coma. She had done that without even knowing whether or not he was worth the risk.

Every day, Evenjos healed people in need.

People considered her to be some sort of angel, and they weren’t wrong. After all, she had freely healed Thomas, despite her fears that the boy would turn out to be some sort of combination of her worst enemies from the past.

“I’m sorry, too,” Ariock admitted. “I don’t think I’ve been judging you fairly.”

Evenjos looked down in shame. “Your judgment of me was fair. I am not brave, like you.”

Ariock had a hard time thinking of himself as brave. He only did what needed to be done. But he supposed that he looked that way, to many people. Otherwise the city wouldn’t be named after him. Otherwise nussians wouldn’t be carving his likeness into a cliff, as a way of honoring the Son of Storms.

“I just happen to have a useful power,” Ariock said. Mass-teleportation seemed to be a crucial advantage.

Evenjos gazed up at him, her lavender eyes liquid with unspoken pleas. “I want you to know that I value you. And I respect you. Even if…” She averted her eyes, clearly ashamed. “I understand that your heart belongs to Vy.”

A tension that Ariock hadn’t been aware of loosened. Was Evenjos finally letting go of her obsession?

“I am sorry that I failed to understand that,” Evenjos said. “I understand, now.”

Ariock felt as if storm clouds had evaporated. The sky overhead was clear, marbled with the color bands of the nearby gas giant. Could he finally stop worrying about the threat to his relationship with Vy?

He didn’t have to be on guard around the deposed goddess-empress anymore.

Sighing with relief, he assessed Evenjos with fresh eyes.

She looked melancholy. But she was fundamentally a good person, and she did not need to suffer endless penance and loneliness. Someone would fall in love her. Surely.

Because really, she was beautiful. Her skin looked silken. Pliable—yet unbreakable. Ariock could theoretically seize Evenjos and crush her, without a care, and she would just laugh and toss her head back, unharmed. Not much could physically hurt her.

He wanted to caress her cheek, to reassure her that everything would be all right.

Instead he pulled his hand back without touching her. He wasn’t going to betray Vy’s trust.

“I understand,” Evenjos said.

She picked up his huge hand, and brushed her lips against his knuckles in a slow way that sent electric tingles through his body.

Ariock wanted to apologize. He just wasn’t sure why.

“I shall not interfere with you and Vy.” Evenjos made it a noble-sounding announcement. She floating Ariock’s hand away from herself on an air current. “But I feel it is my duty to warn you of the danger to your love.”

“Danger?” Ariock asked, baffled.

“Mm hm.” Evenjos averted her eyes, looking ashamed. “You must know, by now, that Yeresunsa have problems with self-control. Especially in intensely emotional situations. Such as rage. Grief. Panic.” She lightly touched Ariock’s chest, running her slender finger down his ornamental council armor. “Lust.”

Ariock’s heartbeat sped up, although it was from horrified realization, not lust.

Sometimes, when Vy was being particularly cuddly—or just near him—objects floated along with his arousal. Candles. Throw pillows. Curtains might billow. Vy thought that was funny, but they were both aware of the danger.

They were in a habit of moving away from each other whenever that happened.

“Yeresunsa cannot control their powers in a fit of lust or any other strong emotion,” Evenjos said in that regretful tone. “This was a well known fact. At least, it was, in my time. That is why the Yeresunsa Order nurtured a social division between ourselves and common people.”

Ariock had wondered why Evenjos was such a proponent of elitism.

Now he understood. He imagined long-ago Yeresunsa accidentally tearing apart their ordinary lovers. He could see a husband electrocuting his wife during sex. Or a boyfriend causing his girlfriend to float and then plummet to her death. Or connecting to the very air and crushing her delicate body. There would be wives with missing limbs, because their husbands were too powerful.

He had to be on guard around Vy. Always gentle. Always aware of what he might do by accident. And apparently, there was no cure for that problem.

“But you love her.” Evenjos smiled. “I am sure you are extremely cautious at all times around her, because you are cognizant of how breakable she is.”

Ariock swallowed. Although Vy was tall for a human woman, she was undeniably small and fragile when compared to him. Their difference in mass was like that of different species.

Maybe it was stupid to try so hard to downplay the differences?

Maybe he ought to be even more careful with Vy.

Or reconsider spending so much time with her?

Even Torth Servants of All were ultra careful, weren’t they? Torth military ranks owned fewer slaves and avoided civilized society.

And the Torth Empire had outlawed sharp emotions. That was an obvious way to avoid triggering Yeresunsa powers.

What about Garrett? Hadn’t his human wife died when he was in his early thirties? Garrett had never remarried. He had fled from his family on Earth. Perhaps that had more to do with fear of his own power than fear of the Torth Empire?

“Your heart has led you in a strange direction, Ariock Dovanack.” Evenjos caressed his arm with a light, sympathetic touch. “But I respect your choice.” She smiled ruefully. “I only beg you to remember that—when we are saving the universe together—I am unbreakable.”

She stole a kiss on his cheek.

Then she disintegrated into the wind that swept down off the mountains. Her sparkling particles billowed along a cliff and towards the ocean.

Ariock watched Evenjos coalesce in the sky, taking the form of the phoenix bird, carefree and … well, completely impossible to break or hurt by accident.

Clouds formed in a harsh wind overhead, reflecting his inner worries. He tried to put the conversation out of his mind.

He had to stand on the cliff for a long time before he felt ready to rejoin the war council.