would be a good time to yell at you for being crazy, stupid, and reckless, both with yourselves and with my ship?”
“Yell at Loch,” Veronica said. “He’s the one who decided to jump out of the ship after you. Without his calming influence, Rhys and I were left to our own devices.” She said it with a straight face, but her eyes danced with humor.
I rounded on Loch. “You did what?”
“I told you I was there when you blew up Rhys’s shield in Rockhurst’s face. I wasn’t on the ground when Polaris took off, so how did you think I arrived? You might not like jumping out of ships, but I don’t mind it.”
“Wait, wait, wait . . . back up,” Rhys said. “You blew up my shield? Do you know how much trouble I had to go through to get that?”
“Hopefully, it was a lot,” I said without remorse. “But we’re getting sidetracked. We were discussing how Loch jumped out of the perfectly good ship he promised to take to Father.”
Loch shrugged. “I never promised anything. You just assumed I did because I made a vaguely agreeing statement.”
I glared at him. “You made an agreeing statement right after I asked you to promise. Next time I’ll get it in writing, in triplicate,” I grumbled. “So you jumped out of the ship. Then what?”
“All of the soldiers were wearing Rockhurst space suits. So was I. In the chaos you created, one of them disappeared and I took his place. Once I was on board the Santa Celestia, things got dicey a few times, but no one expected a foreign operative on the ship.”
I certainly hadn’t expected it, so I doubt Richard had even given it a moment’s thought.
Loch continued, “I knew approximately when Rhys and Veronica were due, so I just had to find your cell. It took longer than I expected; Rockhurst kept your presence quiet. Otherwise, I would’ve given you warning. Nice escape, by the way.”
“I’d spent the day going over my marriage contract. I was getting out of that cell no matter what.”
Veronica turned to me. “Rockhurst still wanted to marry you?”
“If you can call it that. He was blackmailing me into a sham of a marriage with a number of threats, including one on your life and Rhys’s.”
“You wouldn’t have gone through with it, right?” Veronica asked.
“I don’t know,” I said honestly. “The way the contract was originally written—no. Richard wanted me to feed false information to my House, which would’ve cost hundreds of thousands of lives. I was modifying it when Loch rescued me. If I could’ve gotten it into a halfway decent state, I would’ve signed it, only to breach it as soon as an opportunity presented itself. Signing it would’ve given you and Rhys at least a slim chance of escape.”
“But that would me—” she started.
“Trust me, I knew what it meant,” I said.
Veronica bowed her head to me. “I am glad we rescued you from that,” she said.
I smiled at her. “You and me, both.”
“You want to clue in the rest of the room?” Loch asked.
“When two Houses join in marriage, there is a marriage contract that lays out all of the details, like the dowry. The lower houses try to marry into a High House for power and prestige. High Houses marry into lower houses for strategic purposes or because the lower house offered money, territory, or technology as part of the contract.”
“Sounds mercenary,” Loch said.
“It is and even more so when two High Houses marry. The duty usually falls to younger sons and daughters, those far down the inheritance hierarchy. It pays to have a spy in your enemy’s House, as well as a tiny bit of influence. Plus the contracts are dense with concessions from both sides, and sometimes marriage is the only way to get treaties signed. But neither side actually wants the two Houses to combine, so heirs are not married to rival High Houses.”
I shrugged and continued, “If I’d signed the marriage contract Richard proposed, I would belong to him, both in his eyes and in the eyes of the Consortium. It wouldn’t matter that it was coerced. If I broke the contract, Rhys and Veronica would die. If I killed or escaped him, I would be shunned by the entirety of the Consortium, including my own House.”
Loch looked furious but Rhys didn’t seem shocked. I wondered again about his background. I decided to pivot the conversation back into safer waters. “Where are we jumping?”
“Back to