Elysium Fire

by Alastair Reynolds

  “I thought you put Jirmal onto the problem?” Baudry asked.

  “I did,” Aumonier said, curling her lower lip as she tried to push away feelings of guilt and duplicity. “I also told her to use her discretionary powers.”

  “Which is a polite way of saying ‘give the impression of taking the query seriously, but stall for as long as possible.’”

  “No … Jirmal understood. She definitely understood.” She looked at Baudry, waiting for reassurance. “I wanted the query looked at … but not at the expense of diverting our time and energy from the real emergency.” She set her jaw determinedly. “I’ll make sure Jirmal understands the delicacy of the situation. But Hestia Del Mar has to understand we’re not—”

  Clearmountain joined them at the lock.

  “Dreyfus has really exceeded himself,” he said, shaking his head, but very clearly taking a certain morbid delight in this latest turn of events.

  “Perhaps, in hindsight, it was a mistake for him to continue with field duties after the Aurora emergency,” Baudry ventured. “I’ve always respected him, but …”

  “But what, Lillian?” Aumonier demanded. She was still thinking of Hestia Del Mar, oddly troubled by her own lack of helpfulness towards the woman, and the vague way she had delegated the matter over to Jirmal.

  The lock sequenced.

  Devon Garlin came out first, helped by a gentle shove from Dreyfus. His hands were secured behind his back, but he showed no signs of injury or maltreatment, and if his clothes had been damaged or scuffed in the arrest, they had repaired and self-cleaned on the journey.

  Garlin looked at Aumonier. Doubtless he recognised her. All of the senior prefects involved in the Aurora crisis had become public figures, at least in the immediate aftermath of the emergency.

  “I owe you a debt of gratitude,” he said, his face oddly composed. “You’ve done more for my cause in the last two hours than I’ve managed in months.”

  “I wouldn’t be so cocky,” Aumonier said, staring into his ice-blue eyes without blinking. “If you’re found to have violated the articles of public order, you won’t have a cause to go back to.”

  “Then there’s some doubt about culpability, is there?” He twisted around to look at the man behind him. “That’s odd, because Dreyfus couldn’t have sounded more certain.”

  “The stability of the Glitter Band depends on social cohesion, Mister Garlin. We don’t have standing armies, we don’t have a citizen militia. Even the local constabularies constitute a vanishingly small proportion of our population. But this system only functions in the absence of malicious fear-mongering. I have no time for those who disseminate lies and half-truths for their own ends.”

  “Either there’s a crisis or there isn’t, Supreme Prefect. Or are you seriously suggesting that you’ve arrested a man because he had the temerity to repeat a rumour? What’s next—a moratorium on gossip?”

  She nodded at Clearmountain. “Take him to a debriefing room, please, Gaston. I’ll be along shortly.”

  “I brought him here for interviewing, not debriefing,” Dreyfus said.

  Aumonier fixed him in the eyes. “I’d like a word, Tom. It won’t take long.”

  Near the middle of Panoply a modest area had been set aside as a miniature forest, a steamy, rambling maze of dense greenery and dripping, burbling waters.

  Aumonier had designed the space. The hothouse’s confusing, beguiling geometries had been laid out in her mind during her long convalescence: those weeks before she regained motor control of her limbs and had little to do but stare at the ceiling. It was meant for all of the prefects and analysts, irrespective of rank. The winding, branching paths were supposed to encourage non-linear thought processes and counter-intuitive jumps of logic. By some silent consensus, though, it seemed to have remained Aumonier’s personal space. She rarely encountered anyone else during her walks, and after some initial misgivings she had gradually come around to an acceptance of the arrangement, even quietly welcoming it.

  Now she walked with Dreyfus, a brook bubbling alongside the path, filling in the silence that had prevailed since they had started their stroll.

  “I thought better of you,” she said, finally speaking. “I still think better of you.”

  “It was an act of provocation.”

  “Of course it was. Do you think I’m a fool? He knew exactly where, and when, he needed to be to extract that response from you. And you should have had the professional detachment to ignore it completely, to turn the other cheek—”

  “I—” Dreyfus started.

  “Speaking. And before you say you don’t like demagogues, I don’t like political embarrassments that gift the moral ground to our enemies. You were right to be angry, Tom—I don’t blame you for that. But you should have exercised the discretion and good judgement I normally feel able to count on.”

  Dreyfus walked on in silence, clearly thinking very carefully about the next thing he was about to say.

  “He knows more than he should. You can excuse his knowledge of the Wildfire deaths, if you wish. Maybe he really is just picking up on rumours and using them to stoke public unrest. But that doesn’t account for him showing up in Hospice Idlewild.”

  “He’ll say it was chance.”

  “And will you believe him? It’s part of a pattern—of a man with knowledge he shouldn’t have. We’re not just dealing with a well-connected agitator here. It’s something more than that.”

  “All right,” she said. “Let’s take what you’re saying at face value. Garlin has access to information channels he shouldn’t have—at least according to your theory. But he’s just a man.”

  “From a wealthy background.”

  “The Voi fortune was frittered away years ago. After Aliya died in her shuttle accident the Shell House fell into a ruin. Being born into that family may have given Devon Garlin an early advantage, but now his whole operation is self-financing.”

  “What we know of it.”

  “Don’t make this into more than it is, Tom. He’s one man with a few deep-pocketed sponsors and a little more influence than we’d like. That doesn’t mean there’s some sinister, shadowy cabal behind him, feeding him secret information.”

  “There are other things we can’t sense,” Dreyfus said. “Distributed intelligences, spread across the networks.”

  “We’ve heard nothing from Aurora or the Clockmaker in two years. That’s because they’re so preoccupied with their slow war against each other that they can’t spare even a fraction of their energies to bother with our little affairs. So why would either of them start now?”

  “I don’t have the answers. I’m saying it looks as if there’s something looming behind Garlin—some agency or power that’s providing him with this information.”

  “I can’t hold a man on that basis, Tom.”

  “From what I gathered, you’re not planning to hold him at all.”

  “I won’t delay the inevitable. I have no grounds for detaining Garlin and the longer he stays in Panoply, the more ammunition we will give him. So I plan to lance the boil immediately.” She walked on, Dreyfus following. “The immediate damage is containable. No one was hurt, and Garlin will have his liberty back within a few hours. There’ll be a fuss, of course, and it will play against us. But I can make a case that you were entitled to detain him under a very literal reading of the articles. Zealous—that’s the word. My officer may have been over-zealous in his duties, but there was no irregularity in his interpretation of the law, and I stand by his actions.”

  Dreyfus evidently felt it safe to smile. “So, no demotion—yet.”

  “No—not just yet. It’s your tactical judgement I prize, not your ability to give a few commands to a whiphound.” Keeping a stony face, she added: “How did it feel, though, to take down the snivelling little shit?”

  “I’ve had worse moments,” Dreyfus said.

  She patted his back. They walked on in silence.

  Ghiselin Bronner looked up as
Dreyfus entered the interview room, pushing back her sleeve to rub the skin above the wrist where the Painflower had been attached.

  “If you’ve come to apologise for the way my security arrangements were bungled, Prefect, you can …”

  Dreyfus eased into the seat opposite her, and placed a large black evidence box on the table between them. He left it unopened for the moment.

  “I haven’t come to apologise, no. But I thought I’d set your mind at ease in one respect. Grobno—the man who fixed that thing onto you—is no longer a concern. I’ve delivered him to the Ultras, where he’ll face their justice.”

  “Their justice?” She slid her sleeve back down. “Is that your idea of a joke, Dreyfus? They sent him in the first place. He’ll be rewarded, not punished.”

  “What I mean to say is that Grobno acted alone. There’ll be no further repercussions as far as you’re concerned. I’ve had a personal guarantee from Harbourmaster Seraphim to that effect.”

  “That name’s supposed to mean something, is it?”

  “He’s a man I happen to know and trust.”

  “Trust an Ultra.” She made no effort to hide her sneer. “You really haven’t had much experience with them, have you?”

  “Enough.” Dreyfus reached over and began to undo the lid on the evidence box. “Sufficient to know that if you don’t try and get one over on them, they’ll leave you well alone. They have their own ideas about honour and loyalty, exactly as we do. Just a pity you and Antal didn’t take that lesson to heart, isn’t it?”

  “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

  “Spare me the routine, Madame Bronner. Grobno told me everything I need to know. You were playing one faction of Ultras against another, faking goods, inflating margins—swindling the last people in the universe you really want to make enemies of.” Dreyfus set the lid aside and removed the protective wadding from inside the evidence box. “Still, that’s water under the bridge now. You’ll be audited, every transaction you’ve ever made looked into anew. But that won’t concern me. Fraud’s a criminal matter, but not something Panoply needs to waste its valuable time pursuing.”

  “Well, then—” she began.

  Dreyfus pulled the white candelabra from the evidence box. He set it on the table by its base, then pushed the box to one side. “This, on the other hand … this interests me quite a bit.”

  “You’re insane.”

  “Do you recognise it?”

  “Of course I recognise it. It was in our home. There were others like it. Why have you brought it here?”

  “My operative thought it might be of interest, so she flagged it for evidence collection. Can you explain the significance of the design?”

  “Yes. It holds candles. Should I tell you what candles are for?”

  Dreyfus paused and reached for the compad at the far end of the table. He called up an image and tilted the compad so Madame Bronner had a clear view of it.

  “You’re looking at a structure, presently being investigated in relation to an ongoing enquiry. Your husband’s death also relates to that enquiry. Do you recognise the structure?”

  “No.”

  “Would you like to reflect on that answer a little longer?”

  “I don’t recognise it, so why should I? It’s just a white building. Where is it?”

  “I’m not at liberty to say.”

  “What do you mean, my husband’s death was part of an ongoing enquiry? We know why he died, and the people behind it.” She paused, as if she might also have admitted too much, but then some belated acceptance seemed to come over her. “You even had the man who did it. What more is there to say?”

  “Grobno didn’t kill your husband,” Dreyfus stated. “I doubt he was even aware of your husband, until after his death. But that death was part of a larger pattern. This building may relate to that pattern—”

  “If you know where that building is, why don’t you just go there and find out?”

  “My operatives are already investigating it. But I think your husband may have known about that building, or had some contact with it.”

  “He’d have mentioned it.”

  “Can you explain the similarity with the candelabra? The narrow stem, the branching structure, these globe-like candle-holders.”

  “Ask Antal. You can speak to his beta-level, even if you won’t let me.”

  “Was he responsible for the candelabra?”

  “I never liked them, all right? He had them made. They were meant to be sold on to the Ultras, faked up to look like something more valuable than they were … but Antal decided to keep them. He wanted them in the house.”

  Something softened in Dreyfus, if only for a moment. “Do you know why?”

  “Like I said—ask him.”

  “Perhaps I will. But there’s someone else I could speak to as well.” Dreyfus tilted the compad again, so that they both had a clear view of it. “Madame Bronner?” he asked, raising his voice.

  “I’m sitting right here, you idiot.”

  On the compad, a lone figure turned slowly, eyes searching in various directions as if hearing a noise in fog, a sound that they could not immediately localise. They continued looking around in confusion, lost in a cloying silvery whiteness. “Who’s there?”

  “Madame Bronner? This is Prefect Dreyfus. You’ve been sequestered by Panoply. I’m with your living instantiation at this very moment. You’ve both been brought in for interviewing in relation to an ongoing investigation.”

  “You can’t sequester her,” the seated widow said. “You have no right. I’ve done nothing wrong; I’m not even dead …”

  “This is an affront,” said the simulated widow, stepping nearer to Dreyfus.

  “When our lawyers hear about this—” began the living widow.

  “He has no right,” the simulation said.

  “Well, I’m glad you can agree on something,” Dreyfus said, eyeing both versions of Madame Bronner. “Because it may make this a little easier. I suspect that the living instantiation of you was engaged in commercial fraud. If it’s found to be the case, she’ll be prosecuted under the usual civilian laws of the Glitter Band.”

  “What does that have to do with me?” asked the simulation.

  “Quite a bit,” Dreyfus said. “Whatever sentence is decided, it would be fully applicable to both the living and beta-level instantiations of you.”

  “That’s completely unreasonable!” the beta-level interrupted.

  “I didn’t draft the laws,” Dreyfus said, managing to sound suitably unmoved. “A beta-level shadows and mimics its primary instantiation very closely—that’s the whole point, after all. Close enough to embody knowledge of criminal activity—to become a tacit or active accomplice? Who can say? But if there are reasonable grounds for suspicion …”

  “I was brought here for protection, not to be treated like a common criminal!” the living widow said.

  Dreyfus slid the candelabra until it was in clear view of both the versions of Madame Bronner. “Here’s the deal. I can’t offer immunity from prosecution, but I can make a case to the civil authorities that one or both of you were of assistance to Panoply in a wider investigation. But I’d need to be persuaded that you were offering me genuinely useful information—especially where that information relates to your recently departed husband.”

  “What are you talking about?” asked the beta-level.

  “I want to know why Antal had these candelabra commissioned. What they meant to him—and anything you can tell me about a white building that shares a similar form.” Dreyfus flashed a smile. “I’ll give you time to think it over, shall I? Half an hour?”

  He rose from the table and left the living and unliving versions of Ghiselin Bronner to consider their decision.

  Aumonier stepped through the passwall and conjured up a chair, sitting down opposite Devon Garlin. He started to speak, but Aumonier raised a cautionary finger and said: “Save yourself, Mister Garlin—this needn’t take up
much of your precious time. I have a high-speed corvette ready and waiting to take you back to the Glitter Band—name your destination and we’ll have you safe and dry before you can blink.”

  “I was brutalised.” He touched his throat, as if he had been throttled. “Set upon for speaking freely—for exercising my rights as a free citizen of the Glitter Band.”

  Aumonier pinched her features in mock contrition. “It’s a shame things happened the way they did.”

  “A shame?” He looked at her with startled disbelief. “Is that the extent of your apology?”

  “Oh, it’s not an apology—nothing of the sort. You were detained, as was our right, and now you are being released. This sort of thing happens all the time, Mister Garlin, so please don’t make it all about you.”

  “This won’t end here.”

  “I think it will.” Aumonier leaned forward. “You’ll go back to being the low-level irritant you have so far proven to be. I have every confidence that your breakaway movement will burn out of its own accord, like a weak fever. You may continue to spread populist, rabble-rousing nonsense as you see fit. As far as I’m concerned, the local constabularies can deal with you. You’re not enough of a problem to keep me awake at night—and believe me, I’m a very light sleeper. But you will never go near Hospice Idlewild again.”

  “You can’t forbid—”

  “Did I say I was done?” She elevated her chin, looking down at him along the length of her nose. “Don’t talk to me about what is and isn’t forbidden. You scuttle into the protection of the laws of the Glitter Band when it suits you, but at the same time you hold the entire institution in utter, loathsome contempt. You’re dirt, Mister Garlin—and if I didn’t respect those laws and conventions as much as I do, I’d gladly find a way to silence you. But I won’t. I will, though, tell you that you’d be very ill-advised to test my patience in the future—and going near Hospice Idlewild without excellent reason would be a very effective way of doing so.” She allowed herself a breath, giving him the full cold stare. “Beyond that, you’ll show no more interest in Dreyfus. You’ve made an enemy of him and frankly he has my complete sympathy. Dreyfus doesn’t like demagogues. I’ll confess I take a harder line. I despise you. I’d like to smear you out of existence before you damage something very precious to me.”