Aeryn has no use for politics. She's a weapon not a diplomat. The explosion, the jab, the thrust. She's not the nuance. She's the bright burst of change. The end point. The spark. As an assassin, and yes, she'll say it out loud now, she learned how words could be weapons, how the twists of the tongue could be just as lethal as a pulse blast. As a parent,as a mate, she's learned subtlety and rage and the art of offering choice in it's purest, most controlled form. She's learned not everything should be solved by violence, learned it far earlier than any of those careers in fact, but she still preferred those moments of clarity when she was told to strike and she did, swiftly and perfectly and with unmatched grace.
***

Neither Pullo nor Vala have much use for politics. Politics are for other people - people with time and wealth and no blood on their hands, who've always got coin in their pockets and wine at the ready and dark, cold eyes betraying the kind of ambition that involves more than a warm bed and someone to share it with a bag of gold tucked under the mattress.