“It would take an Empress, wouldn’t it?” Redana laughs as she says it, but watch her carefully: how she starts to think, her brow furrowing, her face growing suddenly solemn. Her mother would have the motive, after all. Maybe that’s what’s in one of the Imperial Vaults: the secret of igniting one of these roaring, howling star-chambers. There’s all sorts of things in there; that’s what mother told her one night, a visiting-night, at the end of the day, sitting by Dany[1] on the side of her bed. There are wonderful things and there are dangerous things and only she knows the difference, and only she holds the keys. When she was little, Dany imagined all sorts of things in there: an entire ocean, a little thin-handled hammer with a golden head, the first seeds of all the vegetables in the world, a tusked monstrosity in adamant chains, a sword so thin you could only see the hilt. She drew them when she should have been taking notes: all the marvelous things her mind could conjure, all the forbidden gifts and curses of the universe.

How easy it would be to seal up Ignition inside there[2].

“Well, if it is her,” she says, and for a moment she is the daughter of her father, her eye the unhealthy green of a thunderstorm, her Auspex the blue-white of lightning, “then you don’t need to worry. We’ll open that vault and let Ignition out when we go home. We’re going to give everyone the stars again.”

A moment; little more. She diminishes with a smile. The echo of the Nemean— no, the reminder that the Nemean is Redana, too— dissipates. “But that’s going to take us a while. Tell me more about how our engines work, please! And if you have to explain something else, or walk me through what it [i]means[/i], first, I’m listening.”

She sits down, tosses one knee over the other, and gives the Hermetican her most attentive, malleable smile. She’s ready to listen to [i]this[/i] lecture.

***

[1]: And the hollow air where, one day, a best friend would be. But not yet.

[2]: Even Redana is fuzzy, here and now, on how much that thought is metaphor. The gods do enjoy making the metaphorical literal.