James S.A. Corey - Tiamat’s Wrath

BY JAMES S. A. COREY

The Expanse

Leviathan Wakes

Calibans War

Abaddons Gate

Cibola Burn

Nemesis Games

Babylons Ashes

Persepolis Rising

Tiamats Wrath

The Expanse short fiction

The Butcher of Anderson Station

Gods of Risk

The Churn Drive

The Vital Abyss

Strange Dogs

ORBIT

First published in Great Britain in 2019 by Orbit

Copyright 2019 Daniel Abraham and Ty Franck

The moral right of the author has been asserted.

All characters and events in this publication, other than those clearly in the public domain, are fictitious and any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

All rights reserved.

No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior permission in writing of the publisher, nor be otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.

A CIP catalogue record for this book
is available from the British Library.

ISBN 978-0-356-51033-0

Orbit

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Little, Brown Book Group

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www.orbitbooks.net

To George R. R. Martin
Good mentor, better friend

C hrisjen Avasarala was dead.

Shed passed in her sleep on Luna four months earlier. A long, healthy life, a brief illness, and she left humanity very different than shed found it. The newsfeeds all had obituaries and remembrances prerecorded and ready to spin out across the thirteen hundred systems to which humanity was heir. The chyrons and headlines had been hyperbolic: The Last Queen of Earth and Death of a Tyrant and Avasaralas Final Farewell.

No matter what they said, they hit Holden just as hard. It was impossible to imagine a universe that wouldnt bow to the little old womans will. Even when the confirmation came to Laconia that the reports were true, Holden still believed deep in his bones that she was out there somewhere, irritated and profane and pushing herself past all human limits to bend history just another fraction of a degree away from atrocity. It was almost a month between the moment he heard the news and the first time he let himself accept that it was true. Chrisjen Avasarala was dead.

But that didnt mean she was finished.

A state funeral had been planned on Earth before Duarte intervened. Avasaralas time as secretary-general of the United Nations had been a critical period in history, and her service not only to her world but to the whole human project had earned her a place of honor that could never be forgotten. The high consul of Laconia thought it only right and proper that she find her final resting place at the heart of the new empire. The funeral would be at the State Building. A memorial would be built to her so that she would never be forgotten.

The part where Duarte was complicit in the vast slaughter on Earth that defined Avasaralas career got skipped over. History was in the process of being rewritten by the winners. Holden was pretty sure that even though it didnt make it into the press releases and state newsfeeds, everyone remembered that she and Duarte had been on opposite sides, back in the day. And if they didnt, he certainly did.

The mausoleumher mausoleum, since there wasnt anyone else of sufficient stature to share it with her yetwas white stone polished micron-smooth. The great doors were closed now, the service concluded. A portrait of Avasarala filled the center panel on the north face of the structure. It was etched into the stone along with the dates of her birth and death and a few lines of poetry he didnt recognize. The hundreds of chairs arrayed around the podium where the priest had spoken were only about half-filled now. People had come from across the empire to be here, and now that they were, they mostly broke into little clumps with whoever they already knew. The grass around the crypt wasnt like the stuff back on Earth, but it filled the same ecological niche and behaved similarly enough that they called it grass. The breeze was warm enough to be comfortable. With the palace behind him, Holden could almost pretend that he might walk out to the wilderness beyond the palace grounds and go wherever he chose.

His clothes were of Laconian military cut, blue with the spread wings that Duarte had picked for his imperial icon. The collar was high and stiff. It scraped the skin along the side of Holdens neck. The place where his insignia of rank would have gone was blank. Empty was apparently the symbol of the honored prisoner.

Will you be going in to the reception, sir? a guard asked.

Holden wondered what exactly the escalation tree looked like when he said no. That he was a free man, and rejected the hospitality of the palace. Whatever it was, he was pretty sure it had already been practiced and rehearsed. And he probably wouldnt enjoy it.

In a minute, Holden said. I just want to... He gestured vaguely at the tomb as if the inevitability of death was a kind of universal hall pass. A reminder that all human rules were tentative.

Of course, sir, the guard said, and faded back into the crowd. Holden didnt have any sense that he was free, though. Unobtrusively confined was as much as he could hope for.

One woman stood alone at the base of the mausoleum, looking up at Avasaralas portrait. Her sari was a vibrant blue that was just close enough to the Laconian color scheme to be polite and just far enough from it to make it perfectly clear that the politeness was insincere. Even if she hadnt looked like her grandmother, the subtle-not-subtle fuck you would have identified her. Holden ambled over.

Her skin was darker than Avasaralas had been, but the shape of her eyes when she glanced over at him and the thinness of her smile were familiar.

Im sorry for your loss, Holden said.

Thank you.

We havent been introduced. Im

James Holden, the woman said. I know who you are. Nani talked about you sometimes.

Ah. Well, that must have been something to hear. She didnt always see things the way I did.

No, she did not. Im Kajri. She called me Kiki.

She was an amazing woman.

They were silent for the space of two long breaths together. The breeze made the fabric of Kajris sari ripple like a flag. Holden was about to step away when she spoke again.

She would have hated this, she said. Hauled into the camp of her enemies to be celebrated now that she cant crack their balls anymore. Co-opted as soon as she couldnt fight back. You could power a planet by hooking a turbine to her right now. Thats how much shes spinning in this grave.

Holden made a small sound that could have been agreement.

Kajri shrugged. Or maybe not. She might have just thought it was funny. I could never be sure with her.

I owed her a lot, Holden said. I didnt always realize it at the time, but she did what she could to help me. I never got the chance to thank her. Or... I did, I guess, but I didnt take it. If theres anything I can do for you or your family...

You dont seem to be in a position to do people favors, Captain Holden.

Holden looked back at the palace. Yeah, Im not really at my best these days. But I wanted to say it all the same.

I appreciate the sentiment, Kajri said. And from what Ive heard, youve managed to have some influence? The prisoner with the emperors ear.