Graham Vilter gazed solemnly out the main display of his personal ship, Endeavor. The tiny planet of Eipra Point gazed back, its atmosphere casting a sparkling glow all around the small sphere.

  Hues of purple and green swirled around the planet, a collage of colors that would have taken any ordinary traveler’s breath away. As it was, Graham Vilter did allow himself a moment of frivolity, watching the amethyst waters of the planet dance over the display.

  He had only visited Eipra Point twice in his life — once to pledge his allegiance to the Tzannic Council and receive his Consulateship, and once to meet his blushing new fiancé on her way from the Tzannic Moons.

  The planet of Eipra Point served as home to the opulent high society of the POLIS. Tzannic Councilmen, Terran Nobles, Barons and Baronesses of unaligned planets — Eipra Point was a mixing pot of the high and mighty families across the universe.

  Graham Vilter adored it.

  Unfortunately for him, however, this particular trip was not one of pleasure. After his brief moment of adoration for the view, he turned his thoughts back to important matters. Serious matters.

  He fingered the scansafe pouch in his pocket, and the comm drive hidden within.

  Matters that just might put him in the favor of the Tzannic Council, and just might elevate his status beyond the Consulate Judge of the small station of Port Havre.

  Just maybe.

  ***

  “I don’t understand!” snapped the old Tzannic woman, her perfectly-quaffed hair quivering. She brought a hand down heavy on the long, half-moon table — around which nearly two-dozen other figures sat to her left and right.

  She pushed to her feet and glared at the figure, who stood ramrod straight in the center of the room. He leveled a flat stare straight back. “Baroness Hella,” he began.

  “You mean to tell the Council,” she interrupted, her voice curling elegantly over the Terran words, “that not only has Bonna escaped, but he has amassed enough troops to launch a full-scale assault?”

  The man simply offered a stiff nod.

  “You-”

  Another council member lifted a hand. “You may go, Enforcer General Orrin. Thank you.”

  Enforcer General Orrin bowed deeply at the waist and snapped his heels. Then, with jerky movements, he spun and strode out of the chamber. His footsteps echoed across the steel floor and around the domed glass ceiling.

  The Tzannic Council waited until the door boomed closed behind the retreating General… then burst into a cacophony of indignant shouts.

  “How did he escape-”

  “What are we going to do-”

  “He has to have spies in the Council-”

  “Do you think-”

  “Ahem.”

  “-first flight out of here-”

  “Ahem.”

  “-stop him?”

  “AHEM!”

  A voice broke through the din. One by one, the council members quieted down, turning twenty-two stunned looks at the meek figure who dared interrupt the Tzannic Council.

  The young secretary shrunk back into their dress. “A-another messenger for the Council,” they stammered. Then, with quick steps, they scurried back into the shadows.

  A man strode into view — tall and ornery-looking, with thin-cut lips and a heavy brow. He cleared his throat and ran a hand down his finery — which, in the heat of the Council’s gaze, felt rather more like grease-stained coveralls than his nicest formalwear.

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  “I am Judge Vilter of the Port Havre POLIS Consulate Office. I bring grave news,” the man pronounced, relishing the boom of his voice around the hemispherical room. “Major Bonna has escaped from his confinement on Elba ii and is gathering his armada to storm Eipra Point as we speak.”

  Silence followed the proclamation.

  Someone coughed.

  After a moment, a Tzanntan with a shock of blond hair and white lashes said, “We know.”

  “How do you know?” a middle-aged Terran woman questioned. Suspicion dripped from her words.

  Graham Vilter, who had been expecting a more explosive reaction, didn’t quite know where to find his feet. He shifted. “I intercepted a covert comm drive from Major Bonna to one of his trusted Generals detailing their numbers, their escape, and the plan of attack.” He frowned. “By his calculations, Major Bonna and his army should reach Eipra Point in just under two days.”

  At this, the Council twittered nervously.

  “You’re Graham Vilter?” one of them asked.

  Vilter nodded once.

  “Your father is Martial Norr? One of Major Bonna’s most trusted advisors?” Suspicious glares followed his words. “How can we trust what you say?”

  Vilter’s spine stiffened. “I have never been anything but loyal to the Tzannic Council and the greater POLIS,” he snapped, affronted. “I have renounced my father’s name and dedicated my career to ensuring Bonna’s supporters rot exactly where they should.”

  “Don’t interrogate the boy, Reson,” the first Tzannic woman scolded. “He is exactly what he says, a loyal supporter of the Council. And he is engaged to your niece, you will recall.”

  Lord Reson grumbled something and deflated back into his seat.

  She turned to Vilter. “You have proof of your claims?”

  He held out the drive, which gleamed in his hand. “Here, your ladyship.”

  “Good.” She jutted her chin towards the secretary’s desk. “Leave it with them and go.” As Vilter strode to follow her direction, she called him back, “and Judge Vilter? You have the Council’s gratitude.”

  Graham Vilter deposited the drive on the secretary’s desk and strode out, a small, self-satisfied smile playing across his lips.

  ***

  “A visitor for you, sir,” came the deep rumble of the butler as Martial Norr stepped through his open door.

  The Martial, an imposing-looking man in his late sixties, tall with a close-cropped beard and a curl of blond peppered hair, paused. He slipped his hat from his head and deposited his cane into the butler’s outstretched hand. “A visitor?” he repeated mildly.

  The butler leaned in. Lowered his voice. “Your son,” he supplied quietly.

  Martial Norr sniffed. His son? Visiting him? Voluntarily?

  Either someone very important had died, or the planet was about to explode.

  He strode down the hall and turned quickly into the drawing room, almost as if his son might disappear if he took too long. Sure enough, deposited on one of the lumpy settees, looking supremely uncomfortable, sat Graham Vilter.

  Martial Norr’s brows shot up. “Son,” he said simply.

  Graham Vilter cleared his throat. “Father,” he returned.

  “Well,” Martial Norr stepped further into the room, as Graham pushed to his feet. “This is…unexpected.”

  “Is it?”

  “Don’t lie,” snapped the Martial, “it is unbecoming.” He leveled his son with a steady look of censure. “You haven’t visited once since renouncing your family name — my family name.”

  Thunder crossed Graham Vilter’s brow. “You can hardly have expected me to keep that name, when Norr was practically synonymous with the Bonnan Rebels.”

  Martial Norr just stared his son down with that look that never failed to make Graham feel every bit the ten-year-old boy caught with his hand in the cookie jar, not the well-renowned Consulate Judge with an entire station under his thumb.

  He shook off the feeling and straightened under his father’s glare. “That is not why I came.”

  The older man stared for a moment, then some of the tension in his shoulders melted. “Of course not.” He moved to the button beside the door. “May I buzz for some tea-”

  “No.” Tea meant he was staying long enough to need a cup — which was, evidently, the last thing Graham Vilter wanted to do. “Thank you,” he said belatedly. Then he took a breath. “I came to warn you. The enforcers are looking for the Bonna rebel responsible for the assasination of Tzannic General de Palacio’s.”

  A brief glance revealed Martial Norr hadn’t moved. Not a single muscle. That sharp gaze followed Vilter as he moved to the couch and lifted off his coat.

  He turned to face his father. “I recall the two of you were friends once.”

  This unfroze the Martial. He scoffed and turned to the dresser along the wall. Pulled something out of a top drawer. “Acquaintances, at best. We haven’t spoken since before his death.”

  “That is how death works, yes,” the son drawled. When his father said nothing else, he simply frowned and shrugged into his coat. “I hope you know you are backing a hobbled horse.”

  “Better a horse with three legs,” the Martial said quietly, “than a horse with none.”

  Graham Vilter had nothing to say to that, and he strode out of the dressing room with hurried steps.

  “Son?” the voice called him back. Graham turned. The Martial still hadn’t looked up from the open dresser drawer. “Changes are coming. You might want to take that lovely Tzannic fiancé of yours on a wonderful vacation. Perhaps spend a month or two on one of those newly discovered tropical planets that are all the rage with your generation.”

  Graham traced his father’s carefully-schooled expression. Suspicion rooted deep in his gut. “Do you… know something?”

  The Martial waited until his son turned and left, and then his lips curled into a knowing smile.

  ***

  Precisely thirty-two minutes later, the Consulate Judge watched from a dark lamppost across the street as another man stepped quietly out of the Martial’s entryway. The figure sported a deep hunch, a gaunt, clean-shaven face, and a shock of long white hair pulled down its back. A deep shadow threw his face into darkness, but Graham Vilter would know his father’s features anywhere. Even across the street, under heavy disguise.

  The son watched silently as his father alit into a dark, unmarked transport pod. Then he turned and disappeared in the other direction.

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