"Of course." Jusa opened the package and looked at the lustrous gems. "Can I keep them?" she asked, in a very small voice.

"Of course not."

"I didn't think so," Jusa said sadly. She had been just another Malan girl, but had been chosen as Empress on the basis of her looks, which were heartbreakingly lovely. It was axiomatic that an Empress should be heartbreakingly lovely. The Malans had seen enough Earth films to know that.

But an Empress should also be cold, calculating, cruel, as well as gracious, headstrong and generous to a fault. She should care nothing for her people, while, simultaneously, all she cared for was the people. She should act in a manner calculated to make her subjects love her in spite of and because of herself.

Jusa was a girl of considerable intelligence and she wanted to be as Earthly as the next. But the contradictions in her role baffled her.

"Can't I keep them just for a little while?" she pleaded, holding a single pearl up to the light.

"It isn't possible," Nob said. "We need guns, tanks, planes. Therefore you sell your jewelry. There are many Terran precedents."

"But why did I have to insist upon the pearls in the first place?" Jusa asked.

"I explained! As Empress, you must be flighty, must possess a whim of iron, must have no regard for anyone else's feelings, must lust for expensive baubles."

"All right," Jusa said.

"All right, what?"

"All right, swine."

"That's better," Nob said. "You're learning, Jusa, you really are. If you could just fluctuate your moods more consistently—"

"I really will try," promised the Empress. "I'll learn, Nob. You'll be proud of me yet."

"Good. Now there are some problems of state which you must decide upon. Prisoners of war, for one thing. We have several possible means for disposing of them. First, we could—"

"You take care of it."

"Now, now," Nob chided. "Mustn't shirk your duty."

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