Gatekeeper

by Alison Levy

  She tilted her head and tightened her lips. He sensed that his explanation was not entirely satisfying to her but that she didn’t feel comfortable quizzing him. That wasn’t surprising. This was really the first time they had met, when it came down to it, and she wouldn’t want to ask too many personal questions of a stranger. Besides, she had work to do. That was where her thoughts were focused. That was why she had sought him out.

  “Will you do something for me?” she asked.

  “If I can.”

  She fished something out of her pocket and held it up before his face. A flash drive. Sparks flared inside him as he looked at it.

  “There’s a familiar sight,” he said.

  “Any chance you could tell me where to find its owner? Or what’s on it?”

  “Can’t you hook it up to this thing”—he jerked his thumb toward the wall screen—“or that laptop I saw in the other room?”

  “I tried but I can’t read the languages on it. I wanted to take it into the . . . to where I work for help, but for some reason the office is closed. Listen,” she said, her tone level and serious, “even overlooking for the moment that I have a job to do, the guy who dropped this is very dangerous. I need to find him, fast, and this thing is the only link I have to him. I sent samples of the documents on this thing to several people I know—mostly daemon collectors like me—but so far no one’s been helpful. I don’t like to do this, but the local office hasn’t left me much choice. I think I have to use an expert from the Nota to read this stuff. But the thing is, if I go to a Notan who asks a lot of questions about me or how I got this memory stick, I’m fucked. I don’t expect you to be able to translate all this stuff, but I thought maybe you could point me in the direction of someone who can help while not being too nosy.” She smiled hopefully and offered him the USB key. “What d’ya say?”

  “I say I owe you big and I’ll do anything you’d like me to do,” he replied, plucking the drive from her fingers. “Let’s see if I get anything from your little clue here.”

  He held it in between his right thumb and forefinger and looked at it closely. On its surface, it was unremarkable. Its body was gray and black, sleek and glossy. There was a mark of some kind on its back, some sort of tiny logo, but he didn’t recognize the brand. There was a dent, probably from when it was dropped during the scuffle, and a scratch on one end that suggested it had once been attached to something. Bach felt his sight-beyond kick out some information, but when he reviewed it, he was disappointed.

  “Your guy used to have this thing clipped on his keychain,” he said. “He was so paranoid about losing it that he didn’t want it out of his sight. The keychain broke when you knocked his keys out of his pocket. He grabbed the keys after fighting you, but he didn’t see that the flash drive was gone.”

  “Anything else?”

  “Just a feeling that he’s a tough customer.” He flashed her an apologetic expression and handed her the drive. “Sorry.”

  “It’s okay. Thanks for trying.” She picked up the remote on the coffee table, pointed it at the wall, and started clicking through menu options. “I’ll just have to pick some expert at random and hope for the best.”

  Local listings appeared on the large screen. Fascinated, Bach absorbed the display of unfamiliar technology as Rachel calmly flipped through several categories before finding a list of language consultants.

  “The problem here,” she said under her breath, “is that I don’t know what languages I’m dealing with. It’s going to be a little weird to walk into someone’s office and try to explain why I have a memory stick full of foreign-language documents if I don’t even know what languages those documents are written in.” She stared at the long list of names, her nostrils flared. “How do I know who to see?”

  “You’re in the wrong category.”

  Rachel turned to him, eyebrows raised. He felt an equally surprised expression overtake his own face.

  “What’s that?” she asked.

  “Wrong category,” he repeated, marveling at the words coming unbidden from his mouth. “Oh, I know something,” he murmured thoughtfully. “Give me a second.” His eyes vibrated as their gaze turned inward, seeking out the information that was gently prodding him from the crevasses of his mind. “You want a category called ‘Museums.’”

  He could feel her watching him as he stared straight ahead, his eyes not seeing what was before him, his attention focused inward. He heard a few clicks, and then Rachel prompted him.

  “Now what?”

  “There should be a list of employee names for the Rigaceen Museum of Natural and Human History.”

  She clicked again. “There it is.”

  His eyes gradually refocused. He stood up and walked closer to the screen, his eyes dancing over the list of names. He slowly ran his forefinger down the column. “Swan,” he mumbled. “Swan, swan, swan . . .”

  His finger slowed and hovered over the name “Dr. H. Swann.” But no, that wasn’t it. He pointed farther down the list to a name near the bottom. “That’s your expert,” he said decisively. “No doubt about it.”

  Rachel clicked on the name. Bach watched as she squinted at the brief biography pulled up from the museum website, and saw her sag a little. Clearly, the profile struck her as unimpressive.

  “Are you sure?” she asked. “This says she’s an assistant to the museum curator. Doesn’t say a thing about language expertise.”

  “Trust me,” he said. “She’s the one you’re looking for.” He could feel it.

  Rachel wrinkled her nose a bit and glanced over the biography again. “What about all that babble about a swan?” she ventured. “Are you sure I shouldn’t call this Dr. Swann?”

  “That threw me at first, too,” he said. “But check out the assistant’s name.” He pointed at it. “Leda Morley,” he read. “Leda, like the Greek queen who was seduced by a god in the form of a swan.” Bach chuckled humorlessly and pointed at his head. “It’s weird how things get bounced around up here. Sometimes I don’t know what I know until it comes out of my mouth.”

  Rachel looked again and nodded with a comprehending sigh. “But you’re sure she’s the right person for this?”

  “As sure as I’ve ever been.”

  An uncertain sound rumbled in Rachel’s throat. She looked sidelong at the screen, as if it was a platter of food that smelled appetizing despite having an off-putting appearance.

  “Okay,” she finally said. “I’ll give her a call. But”—and here her tone grew sharp—“if things go squirrelly, I’m taking it out on you.”

  “It’ll be fine,” he said.

  He spoke with a confidence he didn’t quite feel. Miss Morley was indisputably the right person for the job, and yet there was a doubt in the back of his mind—a tiny doubt, just a speck, but it was persistently present, like a grain of sand caught between two toes. What was it?

  When the answer didn’t immediately come forward, he decided to ignore the misgiving and give Miss Morley his wholehearted recommendation. This woman had returned his humanity to him and he was eager to repay her.

  He nodded smartly. “Nothing to worry about.”

  After a moment’s hesitation, Rachel pulled out her phone.

  9

  EXPERT

  The Rigaceen was an immense complex surrounded by greenery that enclosed the building like a moat, providing a small degree of separation from the busy streets. It was a formidable structure, a fortress of solid gray that rose three stories tall and stretched to fill most of a city block. Multistory banners hung on the front face of the museum, advertising new exhibits, while smaller banners, frayed and faded, stood near the doors to remind visitors of older displays still available for viewing. Two realistic-looking dinosaur statues flanked the front steps, a triceratops and velociraptor, though the snarling predator was made considerably less fearsome by the colorful tie around its neck and the beer bottle in its three-fingered hand (the late-night contribution of a drunken pedestrian, Rachel
guessed).

  Just inside the doors, above the information desk, an enormous photo of the Rigaceen family, the patrons of the museum, smiled benevolently through a printed statement welcoming visitors to their generous endowment. Rachel rolled her eyes at the picture. Those people gave off the air of royalty bestowing a favor on the little people. History wasn’t to be owned and handed out like trinkets. It certainly shouldn’t be attached to one family’s name. That, she felt, was the absolute personification of arrogance and elitism. She wrinkled her nose, recalling a lesson from childhood: There is no surer sign of a diseased culture than the casual acceptance of inequities.

  The receptionist got on her phone to confirm Rachel’s appointment with Miss Morley and then kindly provided directions through the maze of hallways by taking out a visitor’s map and marking the way with her pen.

  Rachel passed through a few exhibitions on her way to the employee wing, and as she did, she reflected that she rarely got a chance to visit places like this back home anymore. Between work on her family’s farm and daemon collecting, her time had seldom been her own ever since leaving school. But as a child, she had really enjoyed museums and historical sites.

  Her eyes drifted over the artifacts and displays, and she felt a nostalgic buzz of curiosity. It was a shame, she thought, that the Central Office wouldn’t sanction spending money on nonnecessities, or she would come back sometime and spend a leisurely day wandering the halls. Honestly, charging people money to gain access to their own history. What a disgrace!

  Pushing aside her loathing, she made a note to check the website just in case the museum offered a free day. It would be nice to lose herself in history for a while, even if it was just Notan history.

  The assistant to the curator had a small, cluttered office. Boxes were stacked four feet high against the far wall, though the stacks were left lower in one area to allow sunlight from the window to pierce the encroaching shadows. Dark though the room was, Rachel preferred it to the fluorescent-lit hallways she had navigated to find this office; fluorescents gave her terrible eyestrain.

  Behind the desk, several framed degrees and photographs were hung in such a way as to accommodate the twin filing cabinets that towered over all like a pair of metal giants. The musky scent of the museum wafted by the door in gusts, but inside the office it was muted by a floral aroma, either perfume or a scented candle. It all smelled artificial and stuffy to Rachel, who wished she could open the window to let in the clean scent of autumn air.

  When the office’s occupant spotted her at the door, she rose from her desk with a smile and offered her hand in greeting. “Miss Wilde? Leda Morley. Nice to meet you.”

  “You too,” said Rachel, shaking her hand. “Thanks for meeting with me today.”

  “Not at all. Please, have a seat.”

  Though Rachel was still reluctant to hand the flash drive to Miss Morley, Bach’s certainty, combined with the fact that she still could not reach her superiors, had convinced her that this was the best thing to do. So she told Miss Morley a made-up story about how she’d come to possess the memory stick and asked if she could possibly translate any of it for her, just to satisfy her curiosity.

  The curator’s assistant seemed happy to comply, so Rachel sat on the far side of the woman’s desk and waited with fake patience while she loaded the files.

  Leda Morley was a young woman, only a few years older than Rachel. She was dressed in a frilly blue skirt and white knit top, which were pleasantly muted by a dark blue blazer. She wore well-coordinated jewelry and pumps with intimidating heels. She had the long, tapered fingers of a lady-in-waiting and the buffered expression of a woman intent on climbing a career ladder. Her black hair was styled perfectly straight, and her light dusting of makeup was nicely complimentary to her features. Rachel found the Notan obsession with professional appearance to be nonsensical—dressing in restrictive clothing too expensive to risk damaging struck her as an impediment to a hard day’s work—but the way Miss Morley presented herself strongly suggested that she took her job seriously, and that gave Rachel confidence.

  Over the next few minutes, Miss Morley’s dark, dark eyes danced over her computer screen, and occasionally darted in Rachel’s direction, with a light of scientific fascination in their depths.

  “This is very interesting stuff,” she finally said, nodding at the computer. Her voice was rich, like coffee, but had a measured quality to it, as though she was accustomed to choosing her words with care. “Where did you say you got it?”

  “My great-uncle died recently,” Rachel lied. “This thing was in the stuff I got from his estate.”

  “Was he a historian or archaeologist?”

  “I don’t think so.”

  Miss Morley’s contoured eyebrows twitched slightly and her thick lips pursed. “You don’t think so?”

  “I didn’t know much about him,” Rachel said, trying to sound casual. “He was kind of the black sheep of the family. As far as I know, nobody from my family had talked to him in ten years or so. If you can read what’s on those files, then you probably know more about him than I do.” She cocked her head and smiled in what she hoped was a not-too-eager sort of way. “Can you read it?”

  “Sort of,” Miss Morley said. “This is some sort of cursive variant of Middle Egyptian, but it seems to be an obscure dialect that I’m unfamiliar with. It’ll take some time to translate.” She clicked the mouse and continued to stare at the screen. “This could be Turkish. If it is, I’d guess it’s Ottoman Turkish. That won’t be too difficult.” She clicked again, her interest blazing through her eyes. “These are the real mystery.” She leaned forward in her chair, the light of the screen reflecting in her eyes. “At first glance, this one looks like some variant of Central Semitic. Could be Phoenician . . . maybe Punic. This other one . . . I have no idea.”

  “I’m sorry,” Rachel politely interrupted. “I don’t follow you at all.”

  “Oh!” Miss Morley blinked rapidly, seemingly surprised to realize that Rachel was still in her office. She straightened up and smiled kindly. “I’m sorry! These files of yours are just very interesting. With your permission, I’d really like to keep this flash drive for a few days so I can examine everything. I think I can give you at least a partial translation of most of these documents.”

  “That would be great.”

  “I’m curious, though: How did you know to bring this to me?”

  “Why do you ask?” Rachel said, mentally scrambling for an explanation. “You sound like you’re the perfect person for this job.”

  “I might be,” Leda replied, a hint of personal pride leaking through her professional smile, “but my background in linguistics isn’t advertised on the museum website. How did you know to ask for me when you called?”

  Rachel’s stomach twisted, but her face remained placid. “A friend recommended you.”

  “I see . . . May I ask who?”

  “Mr. Bach . . . uh, Bridges. Bach Bridges.”

  “Bridges,” Miss Morley mumbled thoughtfully. “I don’t remember him.” She shrugged. “Well, my boss does parade a lot of people through here. I probably forget half of their names before they even leave the building.” She smiled again, easing Rachel’s nerves. “Please thank him for me. This is the most fascinating thing I’ve seen in years. I’m really looking forward to working on it.”

  “Great!” Rachel stood up and pulled on her coat. “I’ll leave you to it. You have my cell number. Let me know when you find something. I can’t wait to know what my uncle was up to.”

  “That makes two of us.”

  Miss Morley held out her hand and Rachel accepted it. The assistant curator’s firm grip raised Rachel’s estimation of her.

  “I’ll be in touch soon,” Miss Morley promised.

  Rachel was halfway to the door when Miss Morley’s computer suddenly let loose a noisy series of beeps and electronic wails. The assistant curator’s expression flashed alarm, and she quickly returned to her chair. The
blinking light of her monitor bounced off her dark skin and lit up her eyes with a red warning banner. Her fingers flew over the keyboard.

  Rachel’s muscles tensed. “Is something wrong?” she asked anxiously.

  “I’m not sure.” Miss Morley’s forehead was a maze of crinkles. “The computer’s telling me that a file on the USB key infected my system . . . which is weird, because I scanned it for viruses when I loaded it.”

  Rachel recalled performing her own scan, with the same result: no virus detected. A sense of foreboding nibbled at her gut even as the fear of exposure, a constant worry for any Arcanan in her line of work, suddenly reared up. Fighting to keep it from swelling any more, she asked,

  “Is there any damage?”

  “Doesn’t look like it. Actually, I think the virus, if there was one, went after my email. Looks like it sent a message from my computer, but the address has been deleted already.” Miss Morley groaned. “You watch—it’ll spam my entire department. Did you have this problem when you loaded it on your computer?”

  “No, I didn’t,” Rachel honestly replied. “I’m so sorry. I never would have given it to you if I’d thought there was a problem.”

  “It’s okay.” Miss Morley frowned at the computer screen and shook her head dismissively. “I’ll call the IT guy, have him look at it.” She glanced up at Rachel and smiled distractedly. “I’ll take care of it. I’ll give you a call as soon as I know something about your files. Thanks again for bringing them to me.”

  More discomfort crept into Rachel’s spine and tickled its way up her back to the base of her neck. The memory stick had sent an email? Why? To whom? She thought of the near-soulless man and cringed internally. A man living under the perpetual influence of a daemon. A man who was, until recently, in possession of a flash drive full of peculiar languages and a sneaky virus that evaded detection long enough to shoot off an email. Her mind conjured a wealth of possibilities to explain this madness, none of them pleasant.