ONE

An electronic chime sounded through the small room as Kon looked away from the ceiling. The small room he'd been sequestered in was tight, the confines of it hardly large enough to hold the small bed he was on. There was nothing else in the room aside from himself. No decorations, no furniture, nothing besides the bed that was hardly long enough for him.

Kon swung his feet around and the chill metal sent an electric shock through his bare soles as he reached over to open the hatch. There was no lock on it, the chime nothing more than a false sense of privacy. More than once an Inquisitor had opened the door without sounding the chime.

The doorway slid inward to the wall revealing a plain looking man in a off-white uniform. Kon had been on the ship long enough to recognize the stewards uniform. On the Dragon's Maw, a Knight ship first and foremost, there hadn't been any stewards around. It had been a fighting ship, filled with women and men whose job it was to fight and kill.

Shadow of Steel wasn't a Knight's ship. It wasn't even an Inquisitor's ship. It was a Lord's ship. It had a complement of Knight's on it, all of them house Knight's not sworn to an Order or Chapterhouse. It was these Knight's under Lord Tiery that had found and rescued them.

"Cadet Kon," the steward said, partially bowing at the waist. The man was well groomed, his hair slicked back, the small mustache neatly trimmed, not a hint of a wrinkle to be seen. Kon grunted back at the man.

"Your presence has been requested by Jason Thiery, sir," the steward said. Kon wanted to roll his eyes at the over the top request. Jason Tiery was the much younger brother of the current Lord Tiery and the commander of the expedition.

"Lead the way," Kon said. The steward pivoted on a polished heel with tight military discipline and began to briskly walk away. Kon followed behind looking around the clean ship corridors. The Shadow was a clean, well lit ship, polished to a shine; the dark metal allowed him to see his own reflection as he walked, a twisted shadow that followed him.

The corridors were empty, no one else quartered on this section of the ship. The rest of the survivors of the Dragon's Maw had been sequestered on another ship of the small fleet that had arrived above Crucible. Only Kon and Diur had been allowed to come aboard this ship, the still unnamed Knight that had rescued them dropping them off and quickly retreating.

The still, steriles, silent ship slowly weighed on him. He'd never been somewhere so silent, the weight of it pressing down on him as he walked down the halls. Kon took a deep breath as he walked, filling his lungs with the clean air. There was no taste to it, no presence of energy, no scent of humidity or of greenery.

They arrived in front of dark, hardwood doors, polished to the same dark shine as the floors. There were no handles on the door and the steward rapped on it three times in rapid succession. In the silence of the ship the sound of knuckles on wood was loud, filling the hallway.

A rasp of metal followed in the echoes of the knock, the doors swinging open silently. The steward lifted a gloved hand, indicating for Kon to go in front of him. Kon passed by the man and entered the room. It was a long room, narrow, with a single long table with a dozen seats on each side and a single larger chair at the end of the table. There was a holo emitter in the center of the table, currently not active, and a few small platters with finger foods on them.

Jason Thiery stood with his back turned at the end of the room, holding onto his own wrists, back straight. He was a short, lean man, his black hair starting to gray at the temples. As every time Kon had met him, the man wore a three piece charcoal gray suit with a black cravat.

"Hello, Kon," the man said, his voice whispery, the hint of a scar running up his throat and to the lower edge of his jaw. Pale gray eyes peered at Kon, reptilian in their coldness.

"Mr. Thiery," Kon replied. He gave the small half bow that he'd been taught early on in his dealings with the noble.

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"Take a seat. It appears your time as my guest is drawing to a close," Thiery said as he pulled his own throne-esque chair free of the table and sat in it. Kon watched the man closely, the subtle, relaxed confidence the man had, his complete control of the space around him.

Kon followed his example, sitting in a chair a few seats down from the head of the table. He threaded his fingers and sat patiently, waiting to be spoken to. That was another lesson he'd learned.

The nobility had a strict code of manners and decorum that was foreign to Kon. There was so little he knew about this greater part of human civilization, parts he was expected to understand. He was growing weary of the constant demeaning looks he'd receive as he made blunder after social blunder.

"Now, you and the Ulmna woman have been cleared of any wrongdoing in the death of Knight Evelyn Bosch and Knight Alice Roose. You will be held to fulfill the contract you signed, back pay will be paid to your dependents." Thiery stopped, waiting for Kon to say anything. When he remained silent Thiery had the faintest smile on his face.

"This leads to a complication. Your wages were paid by your Chapterhouse, which is in the process of liquidation. Your contract, along with all other surviving cadets and Squires, shall be sold off. Part of your contract buyout will be used to pay out your wages. Now, we shall be rendezvousing with an Order ship. There you shall be auctioned off."

"Like some item?" Kon whispered, not able to stop the words. Thiery's smile widened further, predatory gleam in his eyes.

"Yes. Admittedly with plenty of rights about the treatment of Squires and Cadets. What really interests me is not you, but your friend. I have no plans to divert to Ulmna space, which would be quite costly in fuel and honestly, she hasn't asked. While I do not hold my brother's title, I do hold several rights. Which could be useful to you," Thiery said.

"Finally getting around to what he wants." Kon managed to hold his tongue this time as he waited for the older man to get to his offer.

"I am not the Inquisitors who for all their fame can be rather dogmatic and shortsighted. I know something happened on that world. Something stranger than a B-Grades ascension. And I think you know what it is."

Kon held his tongue as he waited. The suspicion he'd been feeling had ramped up into full blown anxiety and fear. He controlled it as much as he could, breathing slowly, deeply, holding the sterile air in his lungs before releasing it through his nose in a long three count.

"I am willing to attach her to you as a steward, something that only those of my station can do. It will make her part of your contract, she'd stay with you regardless of who buys your contract."

Kon licked his lips as he stared at the man. He wanted to say yes. He wanted to say no. His foot bounced under the table as he met those lifeless gray eyes.

"Have you asked her?" Kon asked. He hadn't talked to her since they'd left the shuttle, isolated from each other. He wasn't mad about it either. The time apart from her had allowed his emotions to settle, allowing him time to think about what it was that he wanted. He just wished he could decide what it was that he wanted.

"No. This is completely within your control. I don't need your response right now, but in the next twenty hours. We will be leaving the system in the next few hours, so you will have time to think about it." Thiery waited for a minute before turning away from him, waving a single limp hand at him.

"What did you want? In return?" Kon asked as he rose up.

"I don't know yet. But you will owe me one," Thiery said, not looking up from his nails as he polished them.

Kon grunted and left the room, the door opening silently without anyone touching them. The steward waited outside of the doors, leading him back to his room without speaking another word. The door closed behind him, sealing him back inside of the still room as Kon sat back down on the bed.

He laid back on the bed, the softness of the mattress so foreign to him after months of sleeping on the ground. Kon closed his eyes and went back to the techniques that Alice had taught him, seeing his body in the metaphysical sense.

There was a golden glow through the entirety of his body, the energy absorbed by his body cultivation. Then his nodes were there burning like small stars, dimmer than what he remembered. He hadn't been able to consume any energy rich meat or cores since he'd been sequestered, his nodes slowly burning away the leftover energy he'd managed to consume.

He understood now what Alice had been talking about when it came to cultivators struggling in space. There was no energy out here in the void, nothing for him to gather even passively as he sat there. He was slowly weakening as he sat there, becoming closer and closer to a regular mortal.

"I need to talk to Diur."

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