Chapter 3

The frontier planets had grown less happy, though. So had the neglected shipyard workers, the smaller merchants, the survey ships whose mission was simply exploration, plunging into the unknown, bringing back knowledge instead of outright riches. Kit, who loved her small quick ship and her rambling crew, had listened to a few concerns.

No one knew what might happen. No one knew much about the Heir—very shortly to be the Emperor—at all. Quiet, rumor said. Scholarly. A student of languages. Which might be helpful for negotiations, if he’d ever been allowed near any. Elise had said the young man had hardly ever been permitted to leave Home, supposedly for fear of anything happening to the only Heir. She’d said so in a way that suggested instead that the Regents preferred him ignorant of the universe, of power.