by Rachel Ford
Kaya arn Vulari, the woman we’d met in the markets and had plum cake with, was brought on one of the afternoon casts, almost as a kind of sacrificial lamb. Arrayed against a panel full of hostile voices, she was called to account not only for her own views, but for the accusations against us. She barely got out, “Well, first I’d like to say that this entire case is awful, and my heart bleeds for the Nikyas-” before she was interrupted.
“Really?” a handsome Kudarian in a fine keltar asked. “I thought this was the sort of thing you were all for? Open borders, and all that that entails.”
“There’s no evidence that-”
“No evidence? These last days, we’ve seen nothing but evidence that Kia arn nikya was murdered by a social outcast who had fallen under the influence of humans. Possibly with the assistance of the humans.”
“Which is exactly what many have predicted would happen, once we started allowing these aliens onto our home world,” a prim matron pointed out. “They would feed the worst impulses of the basest Kudarians.”
“You know,” Kaya answered, “I’m personally concerned that this entire case is being used as a proxy for a larger cultural battle. I don’t know if F’er ark inkaya is guilty-”
“You don’t know?”
“The evidence speaks for itself, I think.”
“However,” she continued, raising her voice over the objections pouring her way, “it seems to me there are quite a few Kudarians who would rather convict him on the basis of associating with humans than any factual or evidentiary basis.”
A chorus of tutting ensued, and though she did her best, Kaya’s words were lost to the deluge.
It was the same for anyone who took a less reactionary stance.
Eventually, Maggie convinced me to stop watching. “We know they’re not giving Frank a fair shake. The only thing we can hope for now is that Zaldar finds something. Something big.”
Chapter Fifty-Eight
The investigator, though, seemed to fall off the radar. Days passed, and we didn’t hear from him. Malone, usually guarded in her expressions, sighed despondently when the topic came up. “I don’t like it. He’s not answering my calls. If he doesn’t find anything…well, that’s not good news for us.”
And, still, we were denied access to visit Frank. “Our prisoners’ safety is our utmost concern,” Warden Kriy informed us.
It was “utter malarkey,” Malone declared. “There’s not a damned reason his friends and family can’t see him. They’re no more likely to harm him than his solicitor. It’s just petty vengeance.”
Still, the prison was his own private domain, and he was king. There was no arguing with Kriy. So we waited, unable to speak to Frank, relying on his solicitor to pass along any messages.
The days passed slowly, and every day of radio silence only heightened our general anxiety. J’kar came and went, but he heard no more than any of us. The vandalism at his family estate, at least, stopped. Perhaps torching the Britya home was a step too far. Or maybe the vandals were simply too frightened of the heightened patrols to tangle with the Kridar family again.
Still, to those confined to the Inkaya estate, it was not much consolation. The Brityas grew sullener by the day, commenting now and again how very much they wished they could go home. If not for F’riya’s intervention, her father’s observation – “believe me, my dear Mia, we all do” – might have caused bad blood.
But, from then on, the young couple did their best to separate their families, and the elders managed to remain reasonably civil during meals. Nonetheless, the forced proximity with so much yet in the balance, so many questions unanswered, was taking its toll on everyone’s nerves.
Maggie and I were just getting ready for bed when a call came in. My heart leapt. “Zaldar,” I said aloud. We were a day away from the magistrates’ one-week deadline. “It’s got to be Zaldar.”
But it wasn’t. It was Rita Malone, and she was grinning like a Cheshire cat. “Turn on the news, Katherine.”
“What?”
“You heard me. Turn on the damned telly.”
“What? What’s going on?”
She would not be budged into revealing anything further, though. Grumbling all the while, Maggie and I complied.
“This is a developing case,” a breathless young woman reported, “but sources in the constabulary have confirmed that they’ve placed him under arrest for suspicion of not one, but two murders.”
I glanced at Mags, frowning. “Arrested who?”
The view switched to a scene of police vehicles parked outside a Kudarian estate. Another voice intoned, “This is the scene of the Nikya residence, where just minutes ago Kor ark nikya was arrested.” The footage rolled to show the man in question, escorted out in cuffs.
“What the…?” Maggie asked.
“I told you you’d fucking want to see it,” Malone cackled.
I’d forgotten she was still on the line. “Wait, why did they arrest him? What’s going on?”
“You know how I hadn’t heard from Zaldar?”
“Yeah.”
“He was pursuing a lead. Not about Kia’s death. About her mother’s.”
“Nefi?” I said, blinking in surprise. “But she died of cardiac arrest.”
“Brought on deliberately,” Malone declared triumphantly, “by her son.”
“Wait,” Mags said. “Are you saying she was murdered? By Kor?”
“That’s right.”
“But I thought she had a heart attack?”
“She did. But because he slipped a compound into her evening glass of milk, acenephrine.”
“Forgive me, solicitor: my chemistry is a little rusty. What the hell is that?”
“It’s a naturally occurring stress hormone Kudarians produce. Similar in structure to our own epinephrine. But concentrated, it can be lethal. He gave her enough to kill her.”
“And the autopsy didn’t raise any red flags?” I wondered. It seemed Kudarian forensic science left something to be desired; so far, of two cases I’d witnessed, they’d missed the mark both times.
“Kudarians naturally produce acenephrine,” she reminded me. “There’s nothing unusual about finding it in someone’s bloodstream. And, when someone’s died of a heart attack, it’s usually a factor.”
“I see. So…it looked natural?”
“Exactly.”
“But how did Zaldar figure it out?” Maggie wondered. “And more importantly, how did he prove it to the cops?”
“As for how he figured it out, I’ll let him tell you that,” she said with a smile. “I wouldn’t want to steal his thunder. But they found the tablets still in his possession. Not just that, though: they found kalgra.”
“Kalgra? So they have evidence that it was him, not Frank, who murdered Kia?”
“Exactly.”
“Where’d he get kalga?”
“Not sure yet. Zaldar didn’t have time to get into the details. But you’ll be hearing from him. Probably tomorrow morning.
“In the meantime, I’ll let you two go. Tell the family: it’s over.”
We did, and R’ia wept openly. It was, I realized, the first time I’d ever seen her mask slip. She’d been the perfect hostess, the stoic Kudarian, so long, I hadn’t quite grasped what a toll this was taking on her.
As she bawled into her husband’s arms, as F’rok and F’riya wrapped their parents in hugs, I understood now. Mags and I left the room, shutting the door behind us, to give the family their space. They’d been through a hellish agony of uncertainty and fear. Right now, they needed each other. They needed to digest the news, to come to terms with the fact that the nightmare was finally over. They needed to be able to do it together.
We walked in silence down the hall, observing a kind of unspoken decorum. It came, I suppose, from living among Kudarians so long. But the sense that we should not interrupt what was happening a few rooms away was powerful.
When we got to the stairs, though, I said, “I guess it’s ov
er. Finally over.”
Maggie pulled up short, taking my hands in hers. “I guess it is. But babe?”
Her eyes were sparkling with mischief, and I wondered suspiciously, “What?”
“I’m picking the next vacation spot.”
Chapter Fifty-Nine
Zaldar didn’t call the next morning. He showed up in person shortly after breakfast, and eased himself into a comfortable chair. Waiting until we were all assembled – this time, the Inkaya and Britya elders joined us – he said, “Good morning. I believe Solicitor Malone has already told you something of what I’m about to say. And, if not, you will have seen it on the news.”
“We know a little,” R’ia said. “We know that you found evidence that Kor murdered his mother and sister, but not much more.”
This seemed to please him, for he nodded contentedly. “Well, then I am sure you are anxious to know the whole of it.”
“Very.”
He nodded again. “I left here last resolving to discover Kor’s means of poisoning his sister. We knew already that he had motive and opportunity, but the investigators believed they had their man: they would never pursue Kor without something more solid. If I could find evidence of means, I thought I’d be able to persuade them.
“This, though, was not so easy to do. There are plenty of ways in which one could obtain kalgra. In Kor’s case, he would have been in proximity recently due to his mother’s embalming. But of course that didn’t prove that he had obtained it.
“I spoke with the priests, but as soon as they understood my purpose, they were not interested in discussing further. They believed F’er was guilty, and that looking into the behavior of any member of the Nikya family was a gross insult in the circumstances.”
He smiled now. “In fact, one of the priests was quite adamant on the point. At any rate, I suspected Kor had gotten the poison during his mother’s funeral rituals, but I could not prove it.
“And without being able to prove it, we were no further than we had been.” He settled a little deeper into the chair, steepling his fingers in front of him. “But then – and I’m embarrassed I had not thought of it earlier, if I’m being entirely frank – I considered Kor’s motives again.
“We had concluded already that he was driven by greed: he desired to inherit the family estate.
“It struck me as a pretty coincidence that a man so driven by profit should have an otherwise healthy mother who suddenly dies of a heart attack. It struck me, too, that Kor had acted quickly when F’er entered the picture. This was a careful murder, and yet it must have been devised in the span of a few days’ time.”
He shook his head. “In my experience, outside of crimes of passion, it takes a murderer a while to work up his courage for that first kill. And this was not a crime of passion, but a careful and premediated one.
“So I could only conclude one thing: Kor ark nikya had in all probability killed before.
“And what more likely target than the mother who had only just passed, leaving him that much closer to the inheritance he’d kill for just weeks later?”
He spread his hands now and smiled. “It was plain as day. All I had to do was prove it. And here, we were fortunate, because he had had no need of the elaborate pretenses he’d utilized in his sister’s case.
“He relied on acenephrine, which made the killing seem natural. His mother was old enough so that it would raise no questions: unexpected heart attacks are not so infrequent in her demographic as to be suspicious.
“So I scoured the city’s apothecaries, looking for someone who might have sold him the drug. When I turned up nothing, I checked Kor’s recent travel logs. I had to call in a few favors for that. But, sure enough, a few months back, he’d gone to the province of Tarak.
“It didn’t take me long to find his supplier in Tarak. The man, of course, had no idea his sale had been used to commit murder. Like your epinephrine, acenephrine can be used in varying dosages for a host of legitimate medical reasons.
“Of course, it can also be used for murder.”
“So the apothecary’s testimony is what changed the investigators’ minds?” R’ia wondered.
He nodded. “It was enough to get a search warrant. We found the acenephrine, and kalgra too. He’d stolen a bottle from the embalmers; and once the priests knew what had happened, they acknowledged that a bottle had gone missing at some point during the process. They didn’t know when or where.”
I shook my head. “Holy shit. To think the evidence was there all along. They just had to look for it.”
He nodded. “They believed they already had their suspect, though.”
“Suspects,” Maggie reminded him.
“Suspects,” he acknowledged.
“How long do you think it’ll take before they let Frank out?”
He shrugged. “I imagine F’er ark inkaya will be a free man before the morning is over. There will be some paperwork, of course, but there’s no reason to hold him any longer. The same is true of your travel restrictions. I know your lawyer is already working on that. I expect we’ll have a decision today.”
“Then,” Maggie said, “we’re deeply in your debt, Investigator Zaldar.”
He shrugged again. “I told you, Miss Landon: I would find the truth, whatever it was. And I did. No more, and no less.”
He was right: Frank was released before midday, and the warden even provided a shuttle to take him back to the Inkaya estate. “We’re swarmed with press right now. I don’t think you’ll want to deal with that, ma’am,” he told R’ia. Kriy was all politeness and cordiality, now.
J’kar had joined us, and we were waiting on the step for him when he arrived – our own swarm assembled to greet Frank. He was immediately surrounded, and pressed into hug after hug.
I don’t think he minded. He looked a little leaner, a little gaunter than he had been last time I’d seen him. But he was all smiles, and when he reached Mags and me, he pulled us both into a bear hug. “I was afraid the next time I saw you, we’d all be in the dock together.”
Then, he was lost to F’rok’s embrace, and in a minute, R’ia said, “Let’s get you in, F’er. We have an early lunch set out for you.”
“Oh thank the gods. I’m starving.”
She nodded. “I can tell: you look like you haven’t eaten in a year.”
He ate like it, too. I suspected that the Inkaya kitchens had been working since Kor’s arrest the day before, because they’d prepared enough food for an army or two. And Frank certainly appreciated their efforts.
Not a dish passed by that didn’t find a heaping serving deposited on his plate at least once. And when, after he’d gorged himself on course after course, he began to slow his consumption, R’ia would urge, “Eat some more, F’er. They’ve been starving you in that jail.”
Chapter Sixty
It was two days after Frank’s release, and a day after our travel restrictions were lifted, when our approval to leave Kudarian airspace came. We’d agreed to stay on another day, to give the family time to say their goodbyes, but the truth was, Mags and I were both eager to be off planet. I liked Frank’s family for all the same reasons I liked him – they were gregarious, warm and loving people – and I would have been delighted to spend more time with them.
But after spending time in a Kudarian prison, and knowing how perilously close we’d come to spending more, it would be a long season before I wanted to return.
Rita Malone stopped by the Inkaya estate to take her leave. “Well, it might not feel like it from where you’re sitting, but this whole shitshow has actually been a good thing. After being ready to throw you all in prison for being human – to say nothing of beating you black and blue, Katherine – the Kudarian position is not a strong one.” She shrugged. “I know it sucks for you, but silver linings, and all that: it gives our diplomats a lot to work with.”
We did not see Zaldar again, but he did drop a line when the travel ban was lifted, wishing us well. He had, J’kar
said, refused any payment, saying to the young man’s parents, “I confess, I fell into the same vulgar trap as so many of my colleagues on the force: I initially allowed myself to believe they were guilty, on evidence that was not solid enough to persuade me for purely logical reasons. Let wisdom be my profit this time; for hopefully I’ve gained some measure of it.”
The crew seemed almost as eager as we were to be on their way. They phoned several times a day, every day. And Dave found a way, each time, to remind us that it had been him who saved our necks.
On the final day of our stay, though, we received a visitor none of us had expected. It was just around ten in the morning when Kaya arn vulari showed up at the Inkaya estate, a pair of plum cakes in tow.
A footman showed her in, and she flashed an apologetic smile. “I hope I’m not intruding. I just…well, I heard on the casts that you were leaving soon. And I felt that – I know it won’t make up for all that’s happened – but I shouldn’t let you leave without stopping by. To offer my apologies if nothing else.” She glanced at the parcels. “And plum cake, of course. Perhaps it will go some way toward softening your memories of Kriar.”
The fact was, it did. In the time since our release, outside of the immediately involved parties, no one had bothered themselves about us. No apologies came in, no contrite check-ins happened. The news cycle moved on. The warden and the investigators moved on. It was as if it had never happened.
Except, of course, it had, and the feelings of hopelessness, of terror, of absolute aloneness could not just be switched off with Kor’s arrest. The Kudarian legal system would have scapegoated us all. It was fully intent on doing so, and those memories didn’t just vanish once the right suspect was apprehended.
But seeing Kaya, whose welcome had been so unexpected early on, again was a reminder that we had spent pleasant moments here on Kudar too, and met pleasant people. It was a reminder that Kudar was not a monolith.
She was apologetic and as friendly as before. “I’m so glad it wasn’t you, you know. Not only because I like you – and I do, and I usually have very good judgement, so I would have been surprised to be so off. But also because – bluntly – it would have been very bad, politically. The traditionalists would have mentioned your names at every opportunity.”