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daughter broke it, and Fosyf decided it had lost all value, and threw it away.” I turned and handed the box to Five, who had replaced Eight in the doorway again. Properly speaking, the tea set was hers. She was the one who had gone to the trouble of fishing it, all of its pieces, out of the trash after RaughdDenche, in a devastated fury at her mother’s disowning her, had dashed it to the ground. “It was good to meet you. I hope to talk to you again soon.”
    As I exited Security onto the station’s main concourse, Kalr Five behind me, carrying her shattered tea set, Station said in my ear, “Fleet Captain, the head priest has just left Governor Giarod’s office and is looking for you.”
    In Radch space, head priest with no other modifiers meant the head priest of Amaat. On Athoek Station, the head priest of Amaat was a person named Ifian Wos. I had met her when she had officiated—somewhat resentfully—at Translator Dlique’s funeral. Beyond that I had not spoken to her.
    “Thank you, Station.” As I said it, Eminence Ifian exited the governor’s residence, turned immediately in my direction, and made her way toward me. Station had no doubt told her where I was.
    I didn’t want to talk to her just now. I wanted to talk to Governor Giarod about the person in custody in Security, and then see to some questions about my soldiers’ quarters. But Station fairly clearly hadn’t told me Head Priest Ifian was looking for me so that I could avoid her. And even if I attempted it now, I wouldn’t be able to do so forever, short of fleeing the station entirely.
    I walked to the middle of the scuffed, once-white floor of the concourse and stopped. “Fleet Captain!” called the head priest, and bowed as she reached me. A nicely calculated bow, I thought, not one millimeter deeper than my rank demanded. She was two centimeters shorter than I was, and slender, with a low and carrying voice, and held herself and spoke with the sure confidence of someone with the sort of connections and resources that made appointment to ahigh-ranking priesthood possible. Citizens passed to either side of us where we stood, their coats and jackets sparkling with jewelry, with memorial and associational pins. The ordinary, everyday traffic on the concourse. Most of those who came near us affected to ignore us, though some looked sidelong at us, curious. “Such shocking events, the past few days!” Eminence Ifian continued, as though we were merely friendly acquaintances, gossiping. “Though of course we’ve all known Captain Hetnys for years , and I don’t think anyone could have expected her to do anything untoward!” The many pins on Head Priest Ifian’s impeccably tailored purple coat flashed and sparkled, trembling momentarily in the extremity of the head priest’s doubt that Captain Hetnys might ever do wrong.
    Captain Hetnys, of course, had just days ago threatened to kill Horticulturist Basnaaid Elming in order to gain some sort of control over me. Horticulturist Basnaaid was the younger sister of someone who had been a lieutenant of mine, when I had been the troop carrier Justice of Toren . I had only consented to come to Athoek because Basnaaid was here, because I owed her long-dead sister a debt I could in fact never truly repay. “Indeed,” I replied, the most diplomatic response possible.
    “And I suppose you do have the authority to detain her,” Eminence Ifian continued, her tone just the smallest bit dubious. My confrontation with Captain Hetnys had ended with the Gardens a shambles and the entire station without gravity for several days. She now slept frozen in a suspension pod so that she couldn’t make any more spectacularly, foolishly dangerous moves. “Military matters no doubt. And Citizen Raughd. Such a nice, well-bred young person.” Raughd Denche had attempted to kill me, mere days before CaptainHetnys’s untoward behavior. “Surely they’ll have had reasons for what they did, surely that should be