#warofshallows
## War of Shallows 005: The Second Leader
Radiv climbed out of the river and sat on the broken rock. His wet trousers made a defeated sound against the stone.
"Let me understand your generous proposal," he said. "You become ruler. I perform the work. You receive the respect. I receive nothing."
"You will receive complaints."
"How many?"
"All of them."
"At last, an honour suited to my gifts."
Juva sat beside him. The remaining half of the stone tilted under their combined weight, but neither moved.
"What do you think will change?" Radiv asked.
"I told you. I don't know."
"Vantack rules. The borders hold. Dials trade for Piezs. Nevulos keep to their forests. What exactly requires two leaders?"
"I did not say two rulers."
"No. One ruler and one unpaid worker. A meaningful distinction."
Juva watched a dark shape pass across North Eis. It may have been a distant bird. For an instant she saw it as Radiv had seen the world after her touch: not a body, only a boundary around light.
"A ruler stands where everyone can see," she said. "That does not mean danger will approach from the front."
"If danger has any sense, it'll approach while you're speaking."
She nudged his bruised shoulder. He flinched and pretended he had not.
"You travel," Juva continued. "You know people I don't. You return with their clothes, their weapons, their hair and half their bad habits."
"Only the useful half."
"You see what changes beyond Pila Land before it reaches us."
"And you see millions of lives inside a star. Between us, we are almost useful."
Juva smiled.
If Radiv had wanted the throne, Juva would have known how to meet him. Rivalry had rules. It could be watched, answered and defeated. But he had never treated her succession as something stolen from him. He mocked the throne because he did not want it, and mocked himself before anyone could suggest he had not been worthy of it.
"You are my elder brother," she said.
"You remembered."
"I may need you."
Radiv's face grew still. Juva could lift him by his hair, throw him through stone and insult every alteration he had purchased across the known lands. Saying she needed him was the one attack for which he had no defence.
He looked back at the river.
"I still remember the day Vantack brought you home," he said.
Juva did not interrupt.
"You were tiny. Not ordinary-infant tiny. Tiny even for an infant. He held you in one hand and said, 'Here is your sister,' as if he had found you beside the road."
"I know the story."
"Not the way I know it."
Radiv rubbed the shifting ink along his forearm. The patterns slowed beneath his fingers.
"His name was still Ranga then," he said. "He had a face. He wore clothes. And when the others told him what had to be done with you, he looked frightened."
Juva turned toward him.
She had heard a hundred versions of the day she was given life. None of them had ever said Vantack was afraid.
"What others?"
Radiv raised his eyes to hers.
"The ones who had come to end your life."