Page 24 of Pocket Wife

Corvek sees the room slipping away from him.

“This is not over,” he says.

“No,” I reply. “It is now properly begun.”

The Helix attorneys gather their slates. Corvek leaves last, his smile restored for the watching settlers, though the effort costs him. The security officer follows, boots striking the hall floor with unnecessary force.

No one speaks until the outer door closes.

Mayor Reeve exhales. “Does this mean the valley has standing?”

“It means the records do,” I say. “For now, that is enough to keep the case alive.”

Lucy enters the room. “And Helix?”

I study the amended classification glowing above the table. Already, the public registry has begun distributing notice to regional authorities, Helix counsel, local administration, and every listed stakeholder in the affected zone.

The dispute can no longer be buried in a private file.

“Helix has been forced into the record,” I say.

By midday, Helix’s private threat will belong to the whole valley.

CHAPTER 11

LUCY

The first neighboring settlement arrives with six wagons, twenty-three people, and one argument already in progress.

I hear them before I see them. Wheels over gravel. Voices raised at the cooperative hall steps. Someone saying Helix wouldn’t dare take four valleys at once, someone else answering that corporations dare whatever people let them dare.

By the time I reach the doorway, the room has divided itself without permission. Solaris families cluster near the records tables. The newcomers stand near the entrance, dusty from travel and guarded in the shoulders. Worry brought them, but pride keeps them from admitting it.

Mayor Reeve turns to me.

So does everyone else.

I set down the crate of copied notices in my arms. “All right,” I say. “If we’re going to argue, we do it usefully.”

The room quiets by degrees.

A broad woman from North Well folds her arms. “We came because drones crossed our ridge last night.”

A man beside her adds, “And because Helix survey markers appeared near our south pasture this morning.”

“That is outside Solaris Valley,” Rethan says from the records table.

Every head turns toward him.

He doesn’t rise. He doesn’t need to. “If Helix is marking neighboring land while claiming this dispute is limited to Solaris Valley, that contradiction matters.”

The broad woman looks him over. “And you are?”

“Rethan Veyr. Interstellar Cultural Preservation Authority.”

“Are you here to protect us?”

“Not by promise alone.”