“Of course,” Nova responded softly and her eyes flickered to Khoth. Just once.
“And then we’d be going through this farce once more with a person who hates humans so much that she’ll never negotiate,” Jace said as the Osiris offered him a sketch of this other Councillor.
Nova’s shoulders released a little tension. “So you’d rather deal with me?”
“I don’t know if I can. You’ve compromised yourself so badly,” Jace remarked.
Her mouth looked pinched for a moment. She said nothing.
Jace leaned forward on his table. “So what’s it going to be? Are you going to work with me or against me? Are we going to speak openly and honestly or do you want to posture some more and bang the table?”
“Is there any choice? As you say, I’m about to be… replaced. I’ll lose everything if I don’t work with you.” She let out a brief laugh that held no mirth.
“Of course, there is always a choice,” Jace told her. “I don’t need you to accomplish my goals so you can always exit stage left if you like. The choice is really about whether you want to be involved or not in what’s going to happen next. Still want to shake the pillars of heaven, Nova? Or do you want to be cast aside like so many before you and be replaced by someone far lesser?”
“Why do you want my help?” she asked. “If I am so inconsequential and compromised as you seem to indicate, why do you still want me in any position of power? I can’t imagine you won’t compromise Councillor Ardath Ulgex, too, if there are truly no secrets.”
Jace considered how he would answer this. He could praise her acumen. He could wax poetic about her past accomplishments. He could even say that her prior honor would be helpful in getting people to trust him. He could simply stress that she was the lesser evil and that the Devil known was better than the Devil that was not.
But none of that was true. Well, it wasn’t fully enough to keep her where she was.
They both knew that.
The overwhelming reason he wasn’t having her hauled to the brig and then taken to Haseon in chains was Khoth. His eyes slid to Khoth’s blue hands that rested on the table. She had been right to think that he had feelings for Khoth. And she had been right to think that he would be influenced by his Commander. She had just been wrong about how much loyalty that Khoth had to her.
Finally, he said, “You know why.”
He saw Khoth frown at him, not understanding what Jace meant. But Nova did. She gave a sad smile and a single nod.
“Then yes, I am interested in working with you,” she answered.
She still loves Khoth, Jace thought with a relieved sigh. She still has ambitions too. But she loves her son and understands why I’m doing this.
“Good,” Jace said. “Let’s get started then.”
Mercy
Khoth turned his chair so that his back was facing his mother. “May I have a word, Pilot?”
“Of course.”
Jace barely turned his head to face him. His gaze remained forward on Khoth’s mother. His expression was bland. Khoth knew that would frustrate his mother. She expected humans to display emotions. Since she, herself, was doing so, such placidity from Jace likely was infuriating.
“Respectfully, what are you doing?” Khoth asked.
Jace sighed as if he had expected the question and Khoth hadn’t disappointed him. “I am trying to salvage this.”
Khoth grimaced. He suspected there was only one reason for Jace to not be condemning his mother and requiring new leadership from the Alliance.
“For me?” Khoth asked.
There was the slightest pause, but that told Khoth all he needed to know even as Jace answered, “The devil you know is better than one you don’t.”
Replacing the word “devil”--which had some kind of religious connotations that he did not fully understand--with “enemy” made the sentence make sense to him. Jace believed them to be better off with someone whose prejudices were well known to them. That would lessen any surprises.
As Nova was his mother, who better than her? Khoth would be the most likely person to understand her motivations and what she would do. On some level there was truth to that. But Khoth was beginning to think that he hardly knew his mother at all. Yet he was certain that Jace was weakening his position simply to spare Khoth pain. That was not acceptable.
Khoth stated, “I know Councillor Ardath Ulgex’s views and likely positions on Earth and humanity--”
