Undercity - eARC

by Catherine Asaro

  “I can’t usually get thoughts,” Lavinda said. “Most of the time, I only sense moods.”

  Sweat beaded on my forehead. “You’re a psion.”

  “An empath,” she said. “I’m a bit of a telepath, but I can only pick up unusually strong thoughts, and even then, only if a person is close by.” She was watching me closely. “You shield your mind well. Usually I can’t read you at all. You relaxed here for a few moments.”

  Well, shit. No, I couldn’t think that. She might pick it up. But she said I had shields. Damn right. I was no expert on psions, but even I knew that most people raised natural barriers to protect their minds without even realizing it. In the army, we had learned methods to strengthen and control those barriers. I imagined an iron wall ten feet thick clanging down to protect my mind.

  Lavinda winced. “That much force isn’t necessary.”

  I spoke carefully. “I’d heard that some royals were psions.” I hadn’t ever really believed it, though. The words empathy and Majda seemed incongruous.

  “It varies,” Lavinda said. “I’m the only full psion in our family. Both of my sisters show traces, as did our parents and most of our children. Dayj and his father are full empaths.”

  That was one little fact the EI at my penthouse had neglected to mention when I asked about the Majda husbands. No wonder Dayj’s mother had married Ahktar. Empaths were rare, less than one in a million. Someone with Lavinda’s ability was probably one in a ten billion. How very nice for the Majdas, that life bestowed them with yet another advantage over the rest of the universe. Like they needed more.

  Don’t, I told myself. Resenting the Majdas served no useful purpose.

  Don’t what? Max asked.

  Nothing. I needed to be more careful. It was odd Lavinda said I had dropped my defenses. It was true, though, I did feel a bit more relaxed with her than I did with her sisters or Chief Takkar.

  After several moments of me pondering, Lavinda gave a wry smile. “You’re an unusual one.”

  I blinked. “I am?”

  “Very few people can stand in silence with me. Most get nervous and talk to fill the empty space. You don’t.”

  “You like that?” She had smiled. Sort of.

  The colonel spoke dryly. “I don’t need people to tell me what they think I want to hear. They fill up my hours with useless words.”

  Even after I had learned to converse in the above-city style rather than the abbreviated dialect of the aqueducts, I’d never been one for much talk. However, I did need answers, especially after her cryptic comment about offworld task force commanders. “We should talk more,” I said. “Why did you say we have a problem with the taskforce?”

  “They want me to send troops into the aqueducts,” Lavinda said. “The exact wording on the communiqué I received was ‘Clean up the blasted place.’”

  Damn. “Colonel, if you send down soldiers, my people will hide, not only themselves but anything useful we could hope to find.” They were experts at disappearing. Like Jak. He could close up his casino in less than an hour, and even I couldn’t find him. “They’ll scatter into the dark. You’ll never find what you’re looking for.”

  Her voice cooled. “I have full ISC resources, Major. We can rout out anyone or anything.”

  I doubted she had any idea how much stolen tech-mech was floating around the undercity, including from the military. I couldn’t say that, so I gave her another truth. “If you do track people down, what will that achieve? No one will talk to the military. You’d have to interrogate citizens who’ve done nothing wrong, and they couldn’t give you a good picture even if you did. I doubt my people even know how much they know. You need someone who can convince them to trust her with enough pieces of the puzzle that she can assemble it into a coherent whole.”

  “That person being you, I assume?”

  “That’s right.”

  She watched me with one of those appraising Majda stares. “Very well, Major. I will give you three more days. Beyond that, I need results or we do it my way.”

  Three days to stop a disaster. ISC wouldn’t see their attempts to “clean up the slums” as a threat, but they didn’t know my people. Families would hide. Children would flee. Gangs would stalk the shadows, ready to explode. The drug punkers would arm themselves. If ISC went into the undercity with force, my people would fight back. It could only end in violence and death.

  “Major?” Lavinda was watching me with that unsettling scrutiny, except now I understood. She was trying to read my mood. I imagined the barrier still protecting my mind.

  “Three days,” I said. “I can work with that.” It wasn’t enough, but it was better than nothing.

  We took our leave of each other then, but just as I reached the arched exit of the room, Lavinda said, “Major, wait.”

  Puzzled, I turned around. “Yes?”

  She was standing by the window, facing me in the streaming sunlight. “Your army records say that you lived as a ‘feral child’ before you enlisted. What does that mean?”

  My shoulders tensed. “Probably that children run in packs in the undercity.”

  Lavinda frowned. “And their parents let them do this? Why aren’t they in school?”

  Gods. She had no clue. “We learn, just differently.” My voice cooled. “Even if children in the aqueducts wanted a formal education, no Cries school would take them.” I’d heisted my education, sneaking access to the most elite virtual schools by shadowy pathways few people knew existed. I learned enough to get me into the army, and once there I enrolled in every class they had available to recruits. I’d studied in a fury, making up for all those years of eking out an education from a system denied to us.

  Lavinda blinked. “None of our schools will take undercity students?”

  “None,” I said flatly. I had tried every blasted one.

  She said, “I understand you were part of a gang.”

  “That’s right.” Was that supposed to justify denying me an education?

  “Where were your parents?”

  “I don’t know.”

  She frowned. “Some records must exist. Where were you born?”

  “The down deep.” I was lapsing into dialect, even knowing I should use above-city speech with a Majda. It was instinctual defense against her questions.

  “The what deep?” she asked.

  “Down.”

  “What did you say?”

  “Born under the aqueducts.”

  “Then how did you end up in the orphanage?”

  “Someone left me there.” I did not want this conversation with a Majda. Not now. Not ever.

  “The orphanage must have records of your family.”

  “Nahya.”

  Her forehead furrowed. “What?”

  Above-city, I told myself. Talk like her. “No,” I said. “They have no records of my parents.”

  “How long were you there?”

  “Three years.”

  She looked frustrated. “Did someone adopt you?”

  “No. I ran away.”

  “At three years old?”

  “Yes. With an older girl.” I clenched my fist, then realized what I was doing and forced my hand to relax. “This is all in my army files.”

  “I’d like to hear what you have to say.”

  “Nothing to say.”

  “How did you and the other girl live on your own?”

  “With other rats.” Damn! I’d sworn never use that word again.

  Her forehead furrowed. “Other what?”

  “Other children.”

  She spoke carefully. “My understanding is that very few children live in the slums. The authorities in Cries collect the younger ones and find them better homes. They’ve had less success with the gang down there.”

  “Gangs.”

  “There’s more than one?”

  Gods, she had no clue. “Kids form groups. It’s a support system, especially for those without enough to eat.”

  “I hadn
’t realized.” She hesitated. “Maybe we could help.”

  You bloody think so? I held back the angry words.

  Think what? Max asked.

  Nothing. Gods. Now both Max and Majda wanted access to my brain.

  I believe she genuinely wants to understand, Max thought.

  I didn’t know what to make of Lavinda’s interest. If I said nothing, I might lose the chance to help my people deal with their unrelenting poverty. If I screwed this up, though, ISC would send in troops or take away our children.

  I spoke with care. “Colonel, the undercity is a valued community to its people. They don’t want it torn apart.” She would understand community, being part of two that were close knit, the military and aristocracy. “But they could use help. For one thing, the children need better food.”

  She rubbed her chin. “I thought someone ran a soup kitchen down on the Concourse.”

  That was news to me. “Who?”

  “I’m not sure. It’s been there several years, I think.”

  A soup kitchen. It was a generous idea, but my people would never go. They hated anything with a whiff of charity, besides which, they’d believe the kitchen was a place to trap kids so the Cries authorities could haul them off to the orphanage. Which for all I knew might be true. Nor were they likely to visit the Concourse openly, with all its lights and crowds, especially given that vendors or the police might shoot at them.

  “I’m sure it’s a nice place,” I said.

  Lavinda was studying me again. “Major, I’m not your enemy.”

  Of course she wasn’t my enemy. We both were loyal to ISC and the Imperialate. Except I knew that wasn’t what she meant. The idea that an aristocrat might actually care what happened under the city was so hard to process, my brain wanted to shut down.

  Careful, Max thought. You might not like her solutions to the problems you both see. But Bhaaj, she could help. You have to figure out what you want and convince her to do your way instead of sending in troops.

  I don’t know what I want. Not yet. I spoke with difficulty. “Colonel, it’s hard for me to talk about my youth. But I appreciate your interest in helping. Give me some time to think about answers to your questions and let’s talk again.”

  “I understand.” She inclined her head. “Take all the time you need.”

  After that I really did take my leave, and I was glad to escape the palace. I didn’t yet know how to absorb this latest development. A Majda had taken a personal interest in the undercity.

  What would that mean?

  XIII

  Memory

  The Alcove was “down-deep,” several levels below the Maze where Scorch had locked up Dayj. No passages led there; you had to ease your way past stone walls and outcroppings. You wouldn’t find the Alcove without previous knowledge, luck, or just plain cussed determination. I’d found it when I was ten. I had decided to memorize the Maze, and I stayed with the project until I could go places few people knew existed. Over the years, though, the pathway had changed. I wasn’t sure today if it become more encrusted with minerals or I was just bigger, but I had a hard time squeezing between the walls and rocky cones, especially with my backpack stuffed by the jammer and filtration equipment.

  The Alcove, however, didn’t look much different than I remembered. Smaller, maybe. It was a few meters across with no real open space, just rock formations sticking up or hanging from the ceiling. I set up my desalination equipment next to the only section with a solid wall rather than a lacework of rock. I had bought the best apparatus available for personal use in homes. The heavy-duty get-ups used by the city would have been better, but I’d need a license to purchase anything that big, and those permits weren’t easy to come by. Regardless, Gourd could perform magic with this little gem.

  While I worked, I brooded on my talk with Lavinda. I’d always be on guard with her now, knowing she could feel my moods if I slipped up. And yet it was true, I was more comfortable with her than with the other Majdas. That empaths felt other people’s moods wasn’t the same as saying they empathized with people, but the two traits often seemed to go together.

  I knew about psions from the army; ISC tested every soldier for the traits. Telepaths could access the Kyle, a universe where physics as we knew it had no meaning. The constraints imposed by the speed of light didn’t apply there. Your thoughts determined your “distance” from someone else; think a similar thought and you were next to each other regardless of your location in real space. Telepaths didn’t enter the Kyle, they accessed it with their minds. Once there, they could communicate across interstellar distances with no delay.

  At least, we of the Skolian Imperialate communicated that way. The Traders and the Allied Worlds of Earth couldn’t use the Kyle webs unless we gave them access. The Traders had a bigger military, one better armed than ISC, but we had better communications. We were faster. With that advantage, we just barely held our own against them. That advantage came from the Ruby Dynasty, the strongest psions known. Only Ruby psions could power the Kyle web; it would kill anyone without their mental strength. Four of them existed, five if you counted Roca Skolia’s new husband, who supposedly descended from the ancient Ruby dynasty even though he was a simple farmer. If he was a full Ruby psion, that explained the marriage. Nothing else mattered. The dynasty no longer ruled, but they were irreplaceable. They were the only reason we could use the Kyle.

  Although only Ruby psions could build or maintain the Kyle web, any telepath with training could use the network. In fact, it took more of them than existed to keep the communications of an interstellar empire flowing. They were notoriously difficult to clone, impossible in the case of the Rubies. It made psions among the rarest, most valued resources of an empire. Without them, the Kyle web would disintegrate, and without it, we would fall to the relentless war machine of the Trader slave empire.

  I didn’t envy the Ruby Dynasty. They paid for their privileged lives with an inhumanely high price; they could never let up, not for a season, not for day, not for an hour. If they died, so did the Imperialate. Seen in that light, I didn’t resent the Majdas, either. They had the responsibility to see that the Ruby Dynasty survived.

  I couldn’t solve the problems of an empire, but at least I could help people get clean water. I sat back, regarding my work on the filtering equipment. I’d set out the parts and ensured they worked according to spec, especially the osmosis membranes, which were the most sensitive. I didn’t finish putting the equipment together, though. Gourd would decide what he wanted to do with the pieces, incorporating them into his wizard’s creations.

  I stood up, rubbing the small of my back. It seemed unlikely Gourd would send me here without a reason, but I saw nothing Scorch might have left in this place. I walked around the cave, stepping between the outcroppings. Nothing unusual showed, not on the floor, columns, or rippled stone curtains that formed partial walls. What had I missed?

  Of course. The ceiling. Looking up, I saw a chaotic landscape of silicate icicles crusted with salts that glittered in the light of my stylus. Shadows filled in the crevices above me, sparkling here and there—but wait, that gleam looked different. I pulled off the stylus and reached my arm straight up, pointing the light at the silvery glint. It revealed curve of metal, some round thing embedded in the rock up there.

  “Huh.” I hung the stylus back around my neck, then clambered up a rock formation and stood on its flat top. That brought me close enough to the ceiling that I could reach into the crevice. As I brushed away the crusted dirt and mineral salts on the silver curve, grit rained down on me.

  Max, are you getting this? I thought.

  Yes. Just keep the lenses in your eyes clear of the dirt.

  I’d hope so. The silver curve looked like a fat pipe sticking out of the rock, its surface pitted with age. It wasn’t metal, but a composite. I had seen that material in a few other places around the aqueducts, part of the ancient ruins. Although that was interesting, it told me nothing about what Scorch
had wanted with a place as inconvenient as the Alcove.

  How old is that pipe? I asked Max.

  My spectral analysis suggests thousands of years.

  It looks like part of the original City of Cries.

  Probably. This cave is beneath those ruins.

  I scanned my light over the symbols etched into the pipe. Translate those glyphs.

  I can record them, Max thought. However, I doubt my translation attempts would be useful. Neither anthropology nor ancient languages are among my specialties.

  He had a point. I had acquired Max to help me investigate crimes, not ancient civilizations. Do what you can. I should tell someone at the university about this pipe. Maybe Doctor Orin was still there, the anthropologist who had studied these ruins when I was a kid. He bribed me back then with cocoa bars to show him artifacts. Gods, I had loved those treats. Never mind that he should have given me healthy food instead.

  I needed to wait, though, before I looked up Orin. He would come here to study the artifact, and right now I couldn’t risk disturbing any evidence this place might reveal about Scorch.

  * * *

  After I returned to the aqueducts, I walked alone along a deep, narrow canal. Its walls had collapsed in several places leaving ragged holes, as if the canal had frayed like an old shirt worn for too many years. I stopped, straining to hear a sound that barely registered on my senses, the distant rattle of pebbles.

  Someone is following us, I thought.

  It is hard to judge, given the echoes, Max answered. But I believe they are on the other side of the wall and about fifty meters behind you.

  Send the green bot to spy on them.

  A rustle came from my backpack as its flap lifted by my ear. The bot whisked out and darted into a crack in the wall.

  I kept walking. After a moment, I caught a faint scraping from the other side of the wall.

  Three women are stalking you, Max thought. Two are carrying knives and the third has a laser carbine. They are wearing the insignia of a dragon-hawk. I believe that refers to the Kajada drug cartel.

  Well, shit.