A servant admitted us, escorted us to a sitting room floored with blue-and-white stone, walled floor to ceiling with plants of all kinds, dark or light green, narrow-leaved or broad-, trailing or upright, some flowering, spots and swaths here and there of white, red, purple, yellow. Likely they were the entire occupation of at least one member of this household.
Daos Ceit waited for us there. Bowed low, seeming genuinely pleased to see us. “Honored Breq, Citizen Seivarden. Inspector Supervisor will be so pleased you’ve come. Do please sit.” She gestured to the chairs spread around. “Will you have tea? Or are you full up? I know you had another engagement today.”
“Tea would be nice, thank you,” I said. Neither I nor Seivarden had actually drunk any at Captain Vel’s gathering. But I didn’t want to sit. All the chairs looked as though they’d impede my freedom of movement if I was attacked and had to defend myself.
“Breq?” Seivarden, voice very quiet. Concerned. She could see something was wrong, but she couldn’t discreetly ask what it was.
Daos Ceit handed me a bowl of tea, smiling, to all appearances sincerely. Oblivious, it seemed, to the state of tension I was in, which was so obvious to Seivarden. How had I not recognized her the moment I’d seen her? Not immediately identified her Orsian accent?
How had I not realized I couldn’t possibly deceive Anaander Mianaai for more than the smallest instant?
I couldn’t stand through this, not courteously. I would have to choose a seat. None of the available chairs was tenable. But I was more dangerous than nearly anyone here realized, even sitting. I still had the gun, a reassuring pressure against my ribs, under my jacket. I still had the attention of Station, of all of Anaander Mianaai, yes, and that was what I had wanted. This was still my game. It was. Choose a seat. The omens will fall where they fall.
Before I could make myself sit, Skaaiat Awer came into the room. As modestly jeweled as when she was working, but I’d seen the pale-yellow fabric of her elegantly cut jacket on a bolt at that expensive clothier’s shop. On her right sleeve cuff that cheap, machine-stamped gold tag flashed.
She bowed. “Honored Breq. Citizen Seivarden. How good to see you both. I see Adjunct Ceit has given you tea.” Seivarden and I acknowledged this with polite gestures. “Let me say, before anyone else arrives, that I’m hoping you’ll both stay to supper.”
“You tried to warn us yesterday, didn’t you?” asked Seivarden.
“Seivarden,” I began.
Inspector Supervisor Skaaiat raised one elegantly yellow-gloved hand. “It’s all right, honored. I knew Captain Vel prided herself on being old-fashioned. On knowing how much better things were when children respected their elders and good taste and refined manners were the rule. All familiar enough, I’m sure you heard such talk a thousand years ago, citizen.” Seivarden gave a small, acknowledging ha. “I’m sure you heard all about how Radchaai have a duty to bring civilization to humanity. And that ancillaries are far more efficient for that purpose than human soldiers.”
“Well, as to that,” said Seivarden, “I’d say they are.”
“Of course you would.” Skaaiat showed a small flash of anger. Seivarden probably couldn’t see it, didn’t know her well enough. “You probably don’t know, citizen, that I commanded human troops during an annexation myself.” Seivarden hadn’t known that. Her surprise was obvious. I had known, of course. My lack of surprise would be obvious to Station. To Anaander Mianaai.
There was no point in worrying about it. “It’s true,” Skaaiat continued, “that you don’t have to pay ancillaries, and they never have personal problems. They do whatever you ask them to, without any sort of complaint or comment, and they do it well and completely. And that wasn’t true of my human troops. And most of my soldiers were good people, but it’s so easy, isn’t it, to decide the people you’re fighting aren’t really human. Or maybe you have to do it, to be able to kill them. People like Captain Vel love pointing out the atrocities that human troops have committed, that ancillaries never would. As though making those ancillaries was not an atrocity in itself.
“They’re more efficient, as I said.” In Ors, Skaaiat would have been sarcastic on this topic, but she spoke seriously. Carefully and precisely. “And if we were still expanding we would have to still use them. Because we couldn’t do it with human soldiers, not for long. And we’re built to expand, we’ve been expanding for more than two thousand years and to stop will mean completely changing what we are. Right now most people don’t see that, don’t care. They won’t, until it affects their lives directly, and for most people it doesn’t yet. It’s an abstract question, except to people like Captain Vel.”