Law of Survival
Page 38
Declan joined his wife, plucking pages from the newssheet after she finished perusing them. “The Commerce Ministry is giving a party next week in honor of the Commonwealth Cup Final Four. Dr. Shroud said that we are all invited.” His eyes lit in anticipation. “All of the United will be there. Desjarlais, even. And Heinrich and Zaentz, from Gruppo.”
Jani perched on the far end of the couch. Replace the posh surroundings with a crowded eating area that vied for space with the overflow from her father’s workroom and her mother’s collection of glass figurines, and it was a replay of her childhood mornings—breakfast, newssheets, plans for the day.
I have plans for the day. The Elyan Haárin had arrived with the dawn, and she had already received a formal request from Cal Burkett to attend the afternoon’s conclave. After that, she received an identical invitation from the Commerce Ministry. Then one from the Treasury Ministry. No word from Nema, however. Not that she expected Shai to allow him to contact her.
Jani picked at her sleeves. She still wore the purple outfit the orderly had scrounged for her the night before. John had, of course, offered her access to every shop in Chicago, but she planned to use the need to change clothes as an excuse to return to her flat. She had not yet decided whether to attend the conclave. Even thinking about the need to think about it made her nervous. But when she made the decision, it would be on her own turf, and in her own good time. And in the meantime, she had time. Free time, the first she’d had in weeks.
“Hand me the Government page, please.” She took the newssheet section from her father, then walked back to the table to get another cup of coffee.
Jani left her parents a few hours later with the pledge to return that night. She departed Neoclona with every intention of making the northward trek via her usual system of L’s and people-movers. It didn’t disappoint her, however, to find Niall waiting for her in the building entry circle, wearing dress blue-greys and a smug expression.
“I’m your new best friend, by special request of General Burkett.” He led her to a dark blue Service-issue two-door, popped the gullwing for her, and shut her in, his eyes on the teeming morning traffic.
Unlike the sleek Lucien, Niall looked like a walking sidearm. Jani waited for him to close himself in and merge into traffic before speaking. He had a job to do, and her new job was to let him do it. “Who else is out there?” she asked, after a slight easing in Niall’s level of alert let her know it was OK to talk.
“Five vehicles behind, five ahead, and checkpoints all along the way.” Niall grinned. “Nowhere near the level of the PM. More a Deputy Minister.”
“You trying to tell me my days of hopping the L are over?”
“You got it.” He reached into his tunic and pulled out his nicstick case. “Burkett wants you to have it. Burkett called in all kinds of markers to get it. Pledged a few, too, from what I heard. That attack last night sure lit a fire under his brass.” As if to illustrate his point, Niall shook out a ’stick and bit the bulb end. The tip flared orange; the smoke streamed.
Jani recalled Derringer’s last message, his sleep-starved face. “When did you talk to Burkett?”
Niall nodded through the haze. “At about 0300. He looked pissed as hell. Not that he doesn’t always look like that, but this held a special edge.”
“You talk to him in person?”
“Yeah.”
“Derringer with him?”
“Nah. Didn’t see him.”
Jani smiled. Looks like your career plans hit a snag, Eugene. She wondered how long it would be before he turned up again at the embassy, if ever.
Then the thought occurred that Derringer could face something more drastic than mere reassignment. Lie down with dogs, get up with fleas. That didn’t bother her, either. She settled back in her seat and watched the city float past. “Montoya mentioned that you had been at the hospital. I looked for you later, but I couldn’t find you.”
“I rode point for your ambulance. Then I spent the rest of the night running from pillar to post trying to find out what the hell happened.” Niall looked at her. “Care to compare notes?”
“Who else was at the scene?”
“No, none of this answering questions with questions. I’ve watched you tie other people in knots doing that, and I’m not going to let you do it with me.” Niall blew smoke as he turned onto Armour Place a little more sharply than necessary. “I was on the way back from North Bay when I got your message.”
Jani smiled at him. “You helped move my folks. Thanks.”
“You’re welcome and don’t change the subject.” Niall slowed to a stop in front of her building. “I wonder how long it’s going to take these people to realize that you’re the reason their nice, quiet neighborhood has hosted three attempted murders and one accidental death in the last three days.”
“Lescaux wasn’t an accident.”
“Well, rumor has it.” Niall tossed another, colder grin at her as he waved the doorman away and popped his own door. “I say we let rumor keep it.”
Steve and Angevin reacted predictably to Jani’s return, giving loud and persistent voice to the fact that while they were thrilled that she lived, they’d kill her themselves if she ever put them through “hell like this” again.
“Calls. Let’s talk about calls.” Angevin fell onto the couch next to Jani, recording board in hand. “Trib-Times, chief Cabinet correspondent. PM’s office. Commerce office. Treasury. AgMin. Hodge, begging our pardon but asking if you were all right.”
Jani looked across the room at Steve, who sat next to Niall on the window seat and smoked. “What did you tell him?”
“We lied. Said you were fine. Like we knew what the fook were goin’ on.” Steve punctuated his displeasure with a smoke ring.
“General Burkett,” Angevin continued the litany of calls. “Frances Hals. Aunt Dolly.”
Jani waggled her eyebrows. “Aunt Dolly?”
“Swank,” Steve muttered.
“And the list repeats.” Angevin dropped the recording board on the seat and slumped dramatically. “There are a lot of deputy ministers mixed in here too, all asking whether you’ll be attending the conclave at the embassy this afternoon.”
“Can’t be bothered with the names of mere deputies—just too fookin’ many to count.” Steve walked to the couch, planting himself in front of Jani. “Gel, I’m enraptured that you’re all right, but I can’t live like this. It’s aging me prematurely.”
Jani turned to Angevin. “I’m sorry. Really.”
Angevin shrugged. “We lived. Kept busy. Your projects are caught up—I’ve learned a whole lot about many subjects of which I knew nothing two days ago.” She yawned. “And a few of your clients asked that their stuff be put on hold until after the conclave. That saved us some grief.” She blinked. Yawned again. Her eyes watered. “So, are you going to the conclave?”
Jani looked down at her clothes. The brilliant purple held a magenta cast in the morning light. She hated magenta.
“I need to get out of these clothes. I’ll be back.” She had darted into her room and locked the door behind her before anyone had a chance to stop her.
She perched on the windowsill overlooking the alley and watched the occasional lunchtime trespassers cut through on their way back to work. She wanted to stop them, ask them questions. About their lives. Their thoughts.
Did anyone ever hate you enough to try to kill you? Did anyone ever think you dangerous enough to kill? Did you wonder how the hell you got in that position in the first place? Was it something you did, or was it simply the fact that you were?
She tried to transmit her questions to a young woman who scurried down the alley, a sheaf of papers flapping in her hand.
Have you ever killed anyone? Did you ever put a friend in the hospital because of a mistake you made? Did a friend ever die because of a mistake you made?
She pulled her right knee up to her chin. It didn’t hurt much now, and last night she could barely walk on it.
If you knew that saying yes meant never being able to call yourself human again, would you still think it a good idea?
She rolled her left shoulder, and felt the mildest of twinges. Four hours to go. She shifted position so she couldn’t see the clock atop the armoire.
She tried to ignore the knock at her door. Neither Steve nor Angevin were the most patient of souls—they’d give up and leave, eventually.
But this knock went on, and on, and on.
“Wait a minute!” Jani struggled to her feet, shaking the life back into her right leg as she limped to the door and deactivated the lock. “I just wanted a little bit of downtime—is that too much to ask—?” Her complaint fizzled when she found Niall standing in the hall, hand clenched in the mail fist salute of someone who would knock as long as he had to.
“We the hapless bystanders wondered if you planned to come out sometime this year.” He lowered his arm and took a step back, his manner suddenly tentative.
Jani stepped aside. When Niall still held back, she grabbed his sleeve and pulled him into her room. “This isn’t the sanctum sanctorum—come on in.”
“I didn’t say it was.” He hurried toward the window, shooting his cuffs along the way. “You’re going to need to move to a higher floor—this won’t do.”
“It’s cheap.”
“And for good reason.” Niall fiddled with the privacy setting on the windowside touchpad; the glass darkened to black. “I’ll talk to the building manager—what’s his name—Hodge—and find out what else is available. If I don’t like anything here, be prepared to move.” He turned to her, the hard-edged Spec Service officer once more. “Is this something I should plan to do this afternoon, or will you need me to drive you someplace?”
“Is this your way of asking me if I’m going to the conclave?” Jani crossed one foot over the other and lowered to the floor. “I’ve still got two hours to make up my mind.”
“One, if you take preliminaries into account.” Niall wandered over and sat on the floor across from her. Like John, he didn’t relax well—he braced straight-backed against the bedframe, and even though he tugged at his tunic’s banded collar, he made no move to loosen it. “So?”
Jani had no trouble defining the question contained in that single word. “I’m not political. I’m not the least bit skilled in that area.”
Niall shrugged. “So much the better. Politicians got us into this mess in the first place.”
“No. Greed got us into this mess. For money, power, career advancement. Simple, dull, boring greed.” Jani tried to pull both knees to her chest, but her cracked ribs objected, forcing her to sit with her left leg straight in front of her. “And say what you will, but we are going to need politically skilled people to get us out of this mess. The ability to deal is necessary. To compromise. To not take everything personally. I don’t possess that mind-set, and it’s not something I can learn. I could butcher these negotiations and set back human-idomeni relations twenty years.”
Niall rested his head against the footboard. His scar skewed his quizzical frown into a scowl. “What do you think should happen?”
Jani groaned. Her head had started to ache. “I think we should purchase the microbial filter from the Elyan Haárin until we can build a new Karistos treatment plant. We need to set up a timetable for the construction, and stick to it so that the unaligned Elyan merchants see that we mean it when we say that we won’t tolerate any bullshit. Any businesses affiliated with L’araignée shouldn’t be allowed to bid for the job, but I doubt that will happen. So, if any of them win, they’ll need to be watched.”
Niall nodded. “Accounts to be paid on a milestone basis. Have their work inspected every step of the way.” He paused. His hand went to his tunic collar, as though it felt tighter.
Jani grinned humorlessly at his discomfort. “Yep. They’ll scream, and the Elyan government will scream, and the Elyan Haárin will scream. We’re probably going to have to drag the Service in to act as a silent threat, so someone from Intelligence will scream that we’re blowing their deals with L’araignée. It will be a mess however it’s handled, but the important thing is that we’re left with a working water treatment plant. Once the Elyans have one thing that works, they’re going to want more things that work. If they know they’ll have the government watching their back as they obtain those things, they can begin to rebuild their broken system. Something like L’araignée needs to be excised one tendril at a time. You do that by making their method of doing business uneconomical, and vigilance backed by a strong Service threat equals uneconomical. That’s my solution, and if you think it will be as easy as I make it sound, your collar really is too tight.”
Niall pulled his hand away from his neck, his face reddening. “I think what you’ve said sounds quite reasonable.”
“Once I proposed it in open session, I’d give it five minutes before Ulanova’s team tears it to shreds.” Jani straightened her right leg and lay back. Everything hurt now—her shoulder, her ribs, her back. “Does what I want to do have any bearing on this? Does the fact that I do not want to spend the rest of my life grappling with the Anais Ulanovas of the Commonwealth come into play at all?”
“How often does what you want have anything to do with anything?” Niall regarded her with an odd admixture of impatience and kindness. “You and I came up from the same place. A hardscrabble colony youth leaves wounds that never heal.” His honey eyes darkened. “One thing you learn is that what you want to do doesn’t always matter. It’s what you can do. What you have to do. What you must do.”
“Duty?” Jani cocked an eyebrow. “I was never the best soldier in the Service, Niall, or didn’t you notice?”
“Obedience isn’t your strong suit, no.” Niall’s lip twitched, but the smile soon faded. “But I will say without reservation that you’re one of the most dutiful people I’ve ever known.” He fixed his gaze on the opposite wall. “I’d follow you into hell, because I know you’d bring me out, or stay behind and burn with me. What you’d never do is leave me behind to burn by myself. That’s not a bad quality for a future Chief Propitiator to have, I should think.” He boosted to his feet. “I can’t tell you what to do. I wouldn’t try—not with a decision like this. But I’ve never seen you give less than everything, no matter who you angered, and regardless of the cost to you. That has to count for something, even in this lousy city.” He nodded sharply to her, his manner turned formal, distant, as though he felt he’d revealed too much and needed to shut down fast. “I’ll be in the other room.”
Jani listened to the door close, the fading echo of Niall’s footsteps. “Dutiful.” She stared at the ceiling. “I don’t want to be dutiful. I want to be left alone.” The armoire clock chimed the half-hour. “They’d eat me alive, Niall. I’m not political. I’m…what I am.” Derringer’s “meddling bitch.” Frances’s “lone operator.”
She sat up by rolling onto her right side and pushing herself to her knees. Then she went to her closet and hunted down the lightest-color suit she owned, a tan tunic and trouser combination. She tossed it on the bed, then retired to the bathroom to shower. Her left side had indeed turned into a relief map of bruises and gashes. She stood sideways in the water stream, and counted down the minutes.
Dutiful. The suit fit her, even though she had bought it months before. Shoes had become as big a problem as clothes, since her feet had grown longer and narrower, but she managed to uncover a pair of brown boots that didn’t feel too tight.
She studied herself in the mirror as she arranged her hair. The suit, spare and utilitarian, looked like a uniform of sorts. It lacked medals and badges because she hadn’t yet earned any in this particular war, and it lacked rank designators because thus far, she didn’t need any. I belong to an army of one. She laughed at her own pomposity;
the sound died as she continued to stare in the mirror, and thought of sheared heads and horsetails, and gold hands closing around the handle of an ax-hammer.
Not alone. Not really. Not anymore. Others followed her, which meant she needed to lead.
She peeled off the eyefilms one at a time, then returned to the bathroom to wash them down the sink. As she walked back into the bedroom, she watched herself in the mirror to observe the effect.
Her eyes caught the light in strange ways, shades of green from forest to lightest sea. They’re not…beautiful. But they defined her somehow, as her filmed eyes never did. Not human anymore, but not idomeni, either. In-between. She tried to see what Lucien saw, even though she knew that she never would. Not beautiful. But what she was, now. Point man.
She headed for the door, then stopped and detoured to her closet. Given the state of her ribs, stretching proved impossible—she had to drag the clothes cleaner into the space to serve as a stepstool so she could reach the back of the shelf.
She slid on the redstone ring, then wrapped the soulcloth round her wrist. The single knot stayed tied and the ends remained tucked. She took that as a favorable omen.
The armoire clock chimed the hour as Jani walked out into the main room. Steve and Niall stood by the window smoking and talking while Angevin sat on the couch and leafed through a magazine.
Angevin saw her first—she tossed the magazine aside and bounded to her feet. “Hey, there she—!” She stopped. Stared. Squinted. Then she emitted a tiny yelp and slapped her hand over her mouth.
Steve and Niall had fallen silent. Steve took one step closer, then another. “Bloody hell, Jan.” He stuck his half-spent ’stick in his mouth, and worked it from side to side.
Niall extinguished his own ’stick and brushed off his tunic. Then he stepped around Steve and walked to Jani’s side. “Are you sure?”