Damian’s plan took several hours of tromping through the woods to complete. With the help of RX’s sensor array, Damian led the group straight into an outlaw encampment. The men, hiding in a cave with several barrels of bootleg whisky-equivalent, became much more friendly, and agreed to lower their many weapons, when they got a good look at Evech. That bought time for Damian’s fast talking, and offer of money “graciously offered by my employers,” to set in. Soon, Nick, Damian and the royals were walking the golden road toward Extor wearing rough brown homespun and walking next to a wagon with a false bottom. The driver, a pleasant farmer who, in trying to keep his many secrets, had a habit of keeping to himself, offering a friendly nod and a one-syllable response to nearly any question a being could ask him. 

“This is not going to work,” Asl said, trying to adjust her too-small and oddly flared new pants. Apparently, the wagon driver had a wife who’s reach as a seamstress far exceeded her grasp.

“It’ll work,” Damian said confidently, though Nick noticed his hand twitching a bit. Their friends the bootleggers had insisted he and Nick store their guns in the wagon with the whisky, to keep from arousing suspicion. Damian hadn’t argued with the suggestion, but Nick could tell by his too-wide grin that he didn’t love the idea. The bootleggers had been bought off with the promise of cash, but Nick remembered that the only reason the conversation got that far was their guns, and Evech backing them up. Now the Wreithling was on her way back to the ship with RX, and they were trusting everything to the honor, and lust for money, of men they had only just met. 

Nick wasn’t terribly concerned, not least because, to be perfectly honest, Nick’s laser gun was more useful to him as a deterrent than anything else, and if things with either the bootleggers or the guards at the gate went sideways, deterrence wasn’t likely to be much help. Certainly not against the guards’ guns.

They were the first thing Nick noticed as they walked up to the narrow gate in the wooden wall. Two men on either side of the road with one standing dead in the middle. They all carried heavy duty weaponry; serious looking battle armor, a pistol, and a large rifle as long as Nick’s leg and as thick as his chest. They carried the rifles out, pointed at the sky, fingers on the trigger.

“Stop,” the guard in the center commanded. “What’s your business?”

The driver stopped the wagon, and the weird engine that pulled it, like a gunless tank the size of a coffee table, grumbled in the road. “Hay,” the driver said, tipping his head back at the cart. 

The guard stepped forward. “The city is on high alert. There have been reports of dangerous terrorists in the area. Have you seen anything?”

“No.” Nothing shown in the man’s eyes. Nick couldn’t tell if he was a master liar, or genuinely didn’t realize that the guards might be talking about the strange men that he had met barely an hour before when they walked up to him and pointed a gun in his face.

Wait, that made it sound like they were actually terrorists.

The center guard waited for elaboration which never came. When he realize the driver was done, he cocked an eyebrow and stepped forward. “What’s in here?” he asked, poking at the straw piled in the wagon. 

“Hay,” the driver repeated. 

The guard poked around some more, then paused. Nick’s heart flew into his throat as the guard drew his hand out of the wagon holding something, an envelope, tight in his fist. The guard stepped away from the wagon, keeping the hand with the envelope low, crumpling it to fit more closely in his fist. 

“You’re free to go.” He waved the wagon through the gate. The engine started again with a whine, and the four of them followed the creaking wagon into the city.

“That man just accepted a bribe,” Et said under his breath, “while the city’s on lockdown.” He sounded genuinely offended.

“Don’t complain too much,” Nick said. “It got us inside.”

“Still.”

On the other side of the gate, the city wasn’t much better than it looked from the forest. The streets were dirty and cracked, and most of the small buildings were cheaply constructed from sheets of metal, often with patches of different colors welded on in spots. The grumbling from the engine echoed off the metal walls as they walked through the city. There was no one around, probably a part of the ‘high alert’ the guard was talking about. They followed the wagon driver back to his house, a small two-story with a shed in the back where he parked his wagon.

Door to the shed safely closed, the man pried up the false bottom and drew out Nick and Damian’s guns. 

“Want my money,” he muttered as he handed the guns to Damian, butt first. 

Damian grabbed the guns before saying, “We’ll pay you later. We don’t have the money now, we just have to go to a friend in the city to get it.”

The old man frowned.

“I promise, we’ll get you the money,” Damian said. “If we don’t come to you, you can find me at my ship, the Stargazer. It’ll be in town soon. Come meet us at the docks.”

“Starship?” the man asked, caterpillar-eyebrow askance. 

“Yes, a starship,” Damian said. “We’ll have your money there.”

The man grunted, which Damian took as a goodbye. He led the way out of the shed, into the golden sun, and was halfway down the street before he slowed down to let the royals in front of him.

“Where to?” he asked. 

“The embassy will be in the richer part of town,” Asl said. “Close to the Council Palace, at the center of town.”

“And once we’re there, you can sort everything out?” Damian asked.

“Probably…” Et said, but Asl spoke over him.

“Absolutely,” she said. “The embassy will be the end of it.”

The streets in the city were deserted except for the gangs of guards marching through at random intervals. Damian seemed to have a sixth sense for when they were coming; he would turn the group, ducking down side streets and into dark alleys just ahead of the jackbooted thugs.

“I have to say, the martial law in the city isn’t really giving me hope,” Damian said to the royals. Asl huffed and Et frowned.

“It’s going to be fine,” Asl said again.

“Get us to the embassy, and we’ll work everything out,” Et said, though he didn’t look as confident as his sister.

It took more than half an hour to walk from the bootlegging farmer’s shed to the center of the city. The buildings here, predictably, grew larger. They also shifted materials, made of stone or concrete instead of aluminum or wood. They looked more like bunkers than the homes of the rich.

Finally, the royals stopped them in front of a rusty gate set into a metal wall just too hight for Nick to see over. Asl pushed a buzzer near the gate, and the speaker crackled.

“Who is it?” a gruff voice said.

“I’m looking for Ambassador Bariz,” Asl said. “Is he in.”

“Yes.” The speaker clicked off.

Asl sighed and buzzed again.

“May we speak to him?” she asked.

“No.” Click.

Asl frowned, buzzed again. “Tell Ambassador Bariz that the Sclipthwing flies abroad,” she said, speaking quietly and leaning into the microphone.

“What? No.”

“Ugh!” Asl jammed the button down as hard as she could. “Tell the ambassador the codeword you unrepentant mass of fungal matter or I’ll climb this wall and tell him myself after I’ve pulled out your teeth and carved them into dice.”

Et patted Asl’s shoulder as she panted. The speaker didn’t respond. After five minutes which stretched forever, the speaker buzzed and the gate clicked open. Damian pushed at them experimentally, then stepped inside when they opened freely. 

“You don’t often see threats like that work,” Damian noted off-hand. “Usually that sort of thing makes people want more walls between them and you.”

Asl frowned and ignored him.

The gate opened onto a small courtyard with stone pathway winding through a thin lawn of grass. The pathway ended at the front door of a building, three stories tall and made of concrete, like most in this neighborhood, its harsh face broken by a few trellises with climbing vines. Two men were standing at the door. 

The four of them walked across the courtyard. Et smiled, and Asl opened her arms wide. They reached the door and Asl hugged one of the men.

“Your highness, I was so worried when I didn’t here from you,” the man said. He was short, round and dressed well, his clothes trimmed in the same blue that Et and Asl wore on everything. His eyes were orange like theirs, and his hair, including his neatly trimmed beard, was white, though that was more likely to be from age than it was for the royals.

The other man was tall and reedy. He wore similar clothing to the wagon driver, and the way he eyed Asl nervously made Nick think he had been on the other end of the door speaker. 

“We’re here now,” Asl said.

The ambassador looked at the bag Et carried. “Is that it?” he asked.

Et nodded and shook the bag. It clinked a little. “Where is the governing council? What’s been going on?”

“Our ship was attacked as soon as we got in-system,” Asl said. 

“That was you?” Ambassador Bariz’s eyes got wide. “The whole town’s been talking about a gang who used to terrorize the system. They’ve locked down the whole city. I didn’t realize it was all a lie.”

“Not entirely a lie.” Asl glanced over her shoulder and down her nose at Damian. “Our transport’s captain has a bit of a past in the system.”

“I told you, it was all petty theft,” Damian said. “And some regular theft… but nothing to justify ‘shoot on sight.’”

Bariz frowned. “They must not have known it was you…?”

“With the princess screaming it on every open channel?” Damian asked. “Not likely. Someone on Blen wants those two dead.”

“This is… troubling news.” Bariz glanced over his shoulders by habit, then stared out over the top of his walls. “Maybe we should head inside…”

They followed Bariz through his front door. Inside, the house, still made of concrete, was richly decorated. Rugs and wall hangings covered the cold surfaces and lent the place a cozy air. The Reitan turquoise blue color predominated.

Bariz lead them to a sitting room, and offered them overstuffed cushions  to sit on. Nick and the royals sat, along with Bariz. Damian stayed standing near the door when Bariz dismissed his servant. 

“What’s going on, Bariz?” Et asked, leaning forward as well as he could in his uneven seat. 

“I-I don’t know,” Bariz said. He stared into nothing in the center of the room.

“Bariz,” Et said gently. “Someone is after us. Things aren’t safe on Blen, and you’re the best source of information we have. What’s going on?”

“I don’t…” Bariz repeated, then trailed off. He looked over his shoulder again and leaned forward. “Marshal Kinter.” 

“Marshal Kinter?” Et asked.

“He’s the head of the planet’s military and police force, such as they are,” Bariz said. “I’ve been… suspicious of his loyalties recently. He’s been bringing a lot of men into the city lately.”

“You think he might be trying to have us killed?” Asl asked.

“The governing council is, well, it’s in a bad state. I’ve told you that,” Bariz said. “Blen is poor, people are starving. There’ve been a few bad crop years… you know how it goes. But the council is still very new. The government on Blen has been in flux for years now. The council doesn’t have the money to fix anyone’s problems, and they can’t get money without rich people being furious at them. The poor are angry, and the rich are afraid the council will take their money to give to the poor. The council has no allies.”

“That’s what the loan is for?” Damian asked.

“We hope to stabilize the government of Blen,” Et said. “To prevent people from trying to take over.”

“You think the Marshal wants to overthrow the government?” Asl asked.

“Well, I have heard unsavory rumors about his actions in the last Troubles,” Bariz said. “Nothing confirmable. And he’s been moving people and weapons into the city…”

“And he’s in charge of the patrol that tried to blow us out of the sky yesterday,” Damian said. “Princess, I think you’ve found your man.”