He wanted to look around to see the voting totals, but he knew it would be taken as a sign of weakness. He didn’t dare look unsure, not now. Weakness invited attack. Instead, all he could do was wait. He silently counted to a hundred under his breath, wishing he didn’t feel so exposed. The eyes of the world were upon him.
“The voting has finished,” King Hadrian said. “In favor, seven hundred and twelve; against, forty-two.”
And a number of abstentions, Peter thought. Did they refuse to cast a vote because they don’t want to take sides, even on something as pointless as this, or because they recognize the whole ceremony for the farce it is?
“I welcome you to the House of Lords, Duke Falcone,” King Hadrian said. He reached out and tapped Peter on the shoulder with his scepter. “You may rise.”
Peter rose, feeling suddenly stiff. “Thank you, Your Majesty.”
“Take your place among us,” King Hadrian said. “I’m sure you will find it a very edifying discussion.”
A low rustle ran through the chamber as Peter sat down on the bench. It was comfortable, but not too comfortable. Behind him, he heard a handful of lords and ladies leaving now that the important business was done. They were too highly ranked not to attend the investment, but neither wealthy nor powerful enough to make themselves heard during a debate. And besides, Peter reflected, they probably knew that half the business conducted in the chamber was meaningless. The real deals would be negotiated in private chambers. By the time they were presented to the Houses of Parliament, various initiatives would already have been revised thoroughly enough to make them broadly acceptable to everyone. The public debates would be largely meaningless.
The speaker came forward, bowed to the king, and took the stand. He was an elderly man, old enough to remember the king’s grandfather. Peter felt a little sorry for him, even though he was sure that anyone who’d held such a position for so long had to know where the bodies were buried. The speaker had to wait at the back of the chamber while the king had played his role. But then, that too was part of the ceremony.
“Thank you, Your Majesty,” the speaker said. He cleared his throat. “The issue before us . . .”
Peter glanced down at his datapad as the voice droned on. He’d received more than fifty private messages in the last five minutes, each one requesting a private meeting. Some were just feelers from friends and enemies alike, but others were quite serious. He hadn’t expected a PM from Israel Harrison. Technically, Peter was on the Privy Council; practically, he’d been . . . discouraged . . . from claiming his father’s seat. There’d been too much else to do over the last year for him to let that bother him.
“On a point of order, Mr. Speaker,” Israel Harrison said. His voice cut through the hubbub, drawing everyone’s eyes to him. “Is the government seriously proposing to expand the foreign aid budget?”
He went on before the prime minister could respond. “The emergency taxation and spending program was meant to be terminated with the end of the war. We were assured, when we gave our consent, that that would be the case. And yet, here we are, still paying the tax . . . and hampering our economy in the process. We need to cut back on government spending and resume economic growth.”
The prime minister stood. “The fact remains that a vast number of worlds, inside and outside the Commonwealth, have been devastated by the war. Millions upon millions of people have been displaced, cities have been destroyed, food supplies have been sharply reduced or cut off entirely . . . uncountable numbers of people have had their lives destroyed. Our reconstruction program may be the only thing standing between those people and utter destitution.”
“I fully understand why my honorable friend feels that way,” Harrison countered. “But I fail to understand why we should risk economic collapse, and our own utter destitution, to save those worlds. Many of them were formerly enemy states. Others have been, if I may make so bold, ungrateful.”
Peter gritted his teeth as the debate raged backwards and forwards, with government supporters exchanging harsh words with the opposition. It wasn’t about the displaced people, he knew, and it wasn’t about foreign aid in and of itself. It was the age-old question of just who got to control the budget. The government wanted to keep the emergency taxation program because it gave them more money to spend, while the opposition wanted to get rid of the program because it gave the government a great deal of clout to buy votes. And the hell of it, he knew all too well, was that the opposition, if elected into power, would want to keep the program too.
“The military budget is already too high,” Harrison said. “Do we face any real threat from an outside power?”
Grand Admiral Tobias Vaughn rose. Peter thought he looked tired. Vaughn had been the navy’s senior uniformed officer, which made him de facto senior officer for all branches of the military, for the last five years, a term that covered the entirety of the war. Rumor had it that Vaughn wanted to retire, but so far the king had convinced him to stay. Now that the war was over, Peter couldn’t help wondering just how long that would last.
“There are two aspects to your question,” Vaughn said. He sounded tired too. “First, we do not face a peer threat at the moment. However, our neighbors have been building up their own military forces over the last few years. We have reason to believe that they have been pouring resources into duplicating our advanced weapons and technology—unsurprisingly so, as they may regard us as a potential threat. It is possible
