by Gary Gibson
I’m only a girl, she reflected, for her twenty-first birthday was less than three days away. And too young to be a murderer, however much those she would soon help to kill deserved their fate.
She reached up to touch her scalp, feeling the faint crenellations and bumps of the machine-head hardware beneath her skin. Her long and lustrous hair hid most of the visible traces of the technology, except where faint lines could still be seen on her exposed temples. Unless people looked very closely, they might never guess, Karl had reassured her.
Gabrielle heard distant voices echoing beyond her chambers, coming closer.
Stepping back out of the antechamber, she let Mater Cassanas adjust the fastenings on her robes. Gabrielle did not resist when the old woman then took her by the elbow and guided her out of the bedchamber and into the reception room beyond the double doors, where Thijs and his entourage were already waiting.
Smalling turned as she entered, as did Lampard, Abramovic and Thijs himself, each of them dressed in his own distinctive robe of office. They stood in an untidy group by a long table that had already been prepared for the morning meal.
These men present were the true rulers of the Demarchy of Uchida, as Karl had once explained to her; she, by contrast, was little more than a means to an end, regardless of endless public pronouncements to the contrary. Accompanying these high officials of the Demarchy were a number of yellow-and-black-capped attendants, most of them acting as security personnel under Karl’s direct command.
Gabrielle forced herself to unclench her shoulders, taking a deep breath and then exhaling slowly until the rapid thundering of her heart had slowed to a gentler rhythm. She avoided gazing directly at Thijs, whose eyes roved with obvious interest over the few curves of her body actually visible beneath her voluminous robes.
From the direction of the riverside docks came the sound of music – a recording of a choir singing a hymnal. The melody came and went with the wind blowing in from the river and the sea beyond.
‘Mer Gabrielle,’ said Thijs, his eyes finally finding their way back to her face. ‘I can’t tell you how happy it makes me to see you looking so well, and on the eve of such a special occasion.’
The Demarchy’s chief of security, Thijs kept his hands locked in front of him like two sea anemones grappling over a fragment of food. Lampard regarded her with a cold and distant gaze, as if already engaged in the act of dissecting her alive. Abramovic remained as aloof and unreadable as ever; Gabrielle could recall no more than a very few occasions throughout her life when the master of sciences had actually spoken to her directly.
‘Is everything all right?’ asked Thijs, a flicker of concern crossing his face. ‘You look a little pale, Mer Gabrielle.’ He glanced to one side of her. ‘Mater Cassanas . . . ?’
Gabrielle saw the old woman turn towards her, her gaze dipping briefly once more towards her mistress’s belly before rising to meet her eyes.
I dare you, thought Gabrielle, staring back. Not for the first time in recent months, she had the sensation of her whole life hanging in the balance by the most delicate of threads. Tell them how Karl’s been blackmailing you. Bring the whole damn Pilgrimage crashing down around their ears, and see just how grateful to you they are.
But when Cassanas turned to address Thijs a moment later, she was transformed into the very picture of smiling obsequiousness. ‘Mer Gabrielle is just very tired,’ replied the old woman. ‘I think that’s understandable, given the circumstances, as there’s so much to do before we sail for Dios.’
Gabrielle forced another smile. ‘Mater Cassanas – Edith here – she’s been fussing over me all morning, haven’t you?’ She glanced at her, then turned back to Thijs. ‘She’s so worried about me.’
Cassanas nodded robotically, then flashed a sideways glance at Gabrielle that was just a few degrees north of absolute zero.
‘Enough of this,’ said Lampard, his eyes studying them both from out of that broad face. His voice had a permanently weary edge, yet carried a lifetime’s experience of exerting authority. It was to Lampard here that Karl was expected – he had once told her – to report on a daily basis concerning her every movement and word. ‘Mer Gabrielle,’ he continued, ‘if you have any concerns or queries about the Grand Pilgrimage before it begins, it would be best if you voiced them now rather than later. Let us know if there’s anything you need, or anything you think might ensure things run as smoothly as they should. This is your moment, after all.’
You miserable, lying piece of scum, thought Gabrielle.
‘Of course,’ she replied instead, once again summoning up her every element of deceit within her as she met his eyes. ‘I have no special requirements or requests. Perhaps we should waste no more time and just get started.’
Lampard smiled tightly and nodded, with a look in his eye that might have meant nothing to Gabrielle if Karl hadn’t already described in detail the fate intended for her.
If Thijs should to be the first to die, she decided, then it was only right that Lampard should be second.
THREE
Gabrielle
The day was bright and chill, small airships and null-g platforms floating above Port Gabriel’s skyline, as Gabrielle and her entourage exited the People’s Palace. They were protected from the freezing weather and the unbreathable native atmosphere by a containment field that moved along with them, making breather masks or any other kind of respiratory aid unnecessary.
The voices of the choir were amplified across the plaza surrounding the palace as Gabrielle, Thijs, Lampard, Abramovic and an accompanying entourage of nearly a hundred made their way towards a bulk transport waiting just outside the palace gates. Parts of the transport’s transparent hull had been painted over with broad gold and black stripes. Further away, close to the shores of the Ka River, Gabrielle could see the monument to the Port Gabriel massacre of two centuries before, towering over the surrounding buildings.
The details of the journey lying ahead of her had been drilled into Gabrielle from such a young age that she could visualize almost every step of the way. A barge would carry her a few hundred kilometres downriver, to the mouth of the Ka River and the city of Dios, not far from the Demarchy of Uchida’s disputed border with the River Concord States. And, once there, she would be transported to her ultimate destination: the ancient Magi starship known to the Demarchy’s citizens as the Ship of the Covenant. The alien vessel still lay half buried where it had fallen from orbit, centuries before, on the slopes of Ascension Peak, a stub of volcanic granite standing guard over the city below.
But there were other things she knew about the Ship of the Covenant that were not public knowledge, and were in fact known only to very few of the high officials accompanying her. The Demarchy’s own long-term and highly secretive research project had demonstrated almost conclusively that, by the time the next Speaker-Elect was due to depart for Dios in another twenty-one years’ time, the Ship of the Covenant would have nearly finished the centuries-long process of repairing itself – and, when that day came, there was nothing Thijs’s or Lampard’s successors could do that might prevent the alien craft’s inevitable departure.
On that same day, the Demarchy of Uchida would, in one swift stroke, lose the technological and military advantage it had held over the River Concord States for so very long. There would no longer be any reason for the Accord to maintain its military orbital presence, and war between the Demarchy and its neighbours was only one possible outcome.
Given all that, there was a very real chance Gabrielle might be the last of the Speakers-Elect. It was therefore imperative for the Demarchy that they grab whatever data they could from the alien craft, which could then be traded to the Accord in return for continued protection, not only from rival states but from the renegade Freehold camps hidden deep in the Montos de Frenezo.
Even though she, like all the other Speakers-Elect who had come before her, was outwardly exalted by the Demarchy, Karl had taught her that it was solely because
of the advanced scientific data they could each bring back from the Ship of the Covenant that they were in any way valued. And if that ship had only flown off long before now, Gabrielle might never have been forced to undergo this whole insane charade.
But then again, she reminded herself, if it hadn’t been for the Ship of the Covenant, there would never have been a reason for her to be born in the first place.
They walked at a steady, unhurried pace for the benefit of the state propaganda and news agencies recording today’s events. Joining the recorded choir now could be heard the massed voices of the pilgrims gathered beyond the palace walls, filling the air with their chattering and shouting and occasional singing.
They’re here because of me, she realized in a daze. She wondered what it would be like to walk, unknown and unrecognized, through those same streets beyond the palace, to be able to engage fully with the Tabernacle, or experience life far from Redstone. She wondered how the pilgrims would react if they knew the truth of Gabrielle’s purpose in life – a truth she had learned from Karl in her bedchamber after he had chased Mater Cassanas away with threats to her son’s life.
She thought of those long evenings of lovemaking, when she had given herself all too willingly to him. She would lie in his arms as he described how her physical appearance, and that of every Speaker-Elect who had ever lived, had been carefully tweaked at a young age to hide the fact they were all clones of the same woman – the first human being ever to communicate with and then pilot a Magi ship.
At that moment she saw a figure wearing the armour of the Demarchy’s security services step out from under the broad wing of the transport. His feet were clad in heavy black boots, a decoratively filigreed breather mask strapped over his nose and mouth. This was Karl Petrova: bodyguard to the Speaker-Elect, confidant, lover and, before very long, partner in crime.
Gabrielle struggled to hide her joy at the sight of him. His eyes, however, met hers only briefly before moving on to regard Thijs and the other members of the Demarchy’s ruling junta with apparent equanimity. And yet she knew that Karl’s rapid rise through the security services, despite his not being a citizen of the Demarchy – despite not even having a faith chip – had earned him the security chief’s unending enmity.
Along with the rest of her entourage, she was swept through the palace gates and on board the transport. Steps had emerged from within its hull as they approached, the doors sliding apart like steel jaws. Almost as soon as she had taken a seat within the transport’s opulent interior, it lifted off the ground on a cushion of shaped fields.
The journey to the docks and the Grand Barge took barely more than a minute or two, the transport seeming to drop towards its destination almost as soon as it had risen. She had a brief glimpse of the massed pilgrims filling the streets beyond the palace, before they dropped to make a landing on the dockside. The Grand Barge was riding low in the Ka’s lapping waters, while an Accord dropship stood a short distance away, with defensive fields flickering around its outer skin.
They disembarked to find a thin sleet outlining the shape of the containment field around them. The Grand Barge, dwarfing everything in its vicinity, had recently been repainted and refitted, and its upper hull was now festooned with pennants.
Gabrielle tried to look appreciative. Indeed, under any other circumstances, the sights and sounds of this day would have struck her as extraordinary. Her younger self would have revelled in the commotion, in the smell of the water able to find its way through the containment field. Yes, that previous Gabrielle would have been thrilled, but she now had to force herself to pay attention – to conceal the tension and fear that gripped her.
Other barges, equally opulent if not quite so enormous, waited at alternative moorings. These would be transporting Abramovic’s research staff, whose purpose was to analyse and measure all the data recovered from the Ship of the Covenant.
And then, unless she acted, she herself would be killed and her body secretly disposed of, as had happened to every Speaker-Elect before her.
Members of the security services expeditionary forces, under Karl’s command, stood at attention on either side of the ramp leading up into the barge, their body armour glittering in the morning light. They had, she knew, arrived fresh from wiping out a Freehold stronghold in the Montos de Frenezo. Most Freeholders had long since fled Redstone, but a few fanatics stayed behind to strike against the Demarchy.
The hull sealed itself behind them as soon as they entered the Grand Barge, a deep bass rumble then running up through her feet and into her bones as the fusion-driven turbines began to power up.
They were under way.
FOUR
Gabrielle
There were endless civic duties to be performed en route, as the barges slowly made their way one by one downriver and away from Port Gabriel. She duly performed her part, having been trained for this day throughout her life. The final ceremony did not come to a close until the sun was long sunk beneath the horizon, and then it was time for Mater Cassanas to accompany her to her temporary quarters aboard.
Barely a minute had passed before a knock came at the door. Karl entered as soon as Mater Cassanas opened it.
‘I’ll speak with the Elect alone,’ he told the older woman. ‘I’ll let you know when you can return.’
‘I don’t know what you’re planning to do when we reach Dios, Pater Petrova, but—’
‘Take care, Mater Cassanas,’ said Karl, ‘not to say anything you might regret. Your boy lives or dies by my word.’
‘For all I know he’s dead already,’ she spat, rounding on him and visibly shaking with anger. ‘How would I know?’
Karl studied her with clear contempt, and Gabrielle waited, heart in mouth, to see what he might do next.
He first made sure that the door was properly closed behind him, then made a gesture in the air to activate his Tabernacle link. In response, a bubble of light appeared before him, and within it Gabrielle saw a ragged-looking man aged probably in his late twenties, who was crouching on a dusty floor somewhere with his back pressed against a wooden post. His dark eyes were full of defeat, while a patch of hair on one side of his head was still growing out again where the faith chip had been extracted from his skull. His face was barely illuminated by a single lamp hanging from a piece of twisted wire, but the torn remnants of his Demarchy insignia were visible on one dust-specked shoulder.
Cassanas’s son was, as Gabrielle knew, a member of the same elite guard that Karl commanded. He had been officially missing in action for some months now.
‘Believe me,’ Karl said to the old woman, ‘he’s in just about the safest place he could be right now.’
Gabrielle wondered what in the world he meant by that, but it didn’t seem like the right moment to ask questions.
‘I don’t believe you,’ said Cassanas, but her voice sounded full of defeat. ‘How do I know this isn’t just a fake recording?’
‘If you prefer –’ Karl took a step closer to her – ‘you can watch his execution in real time, right now – if you don’t get the hell out of here and leave us alone.’
The last shreds of defiance fled Cassanas’s expression, her fingers busily working at the buttons of her robe as if she wanted to tear it off.
‘Please,’ she said, her eyes full of despair, ‘at least let me speak to him just the once.’
Despite herself – and despite the long hatred she had built up towards Cassanas over the years – Gabrielle nonetheless felt an unexpected stab of pity for the old woman in her anguish. There were times when Karl could appear immensely cruel and heartless, as if in reality he was someone quite different from the gentle and passionate lover she had come to know.
‘Here,’ said Karl, extending the bunched knuckles of one hand towards Cassanas before flinging the fingers wide, thus sending a small, glowing icon from his hand to hers. The icon hovered in front of Cassanas, then vanished when she reached out to it.
‘That’s everything you
need in order to talk to your son via a secure link,’ said Karl. ‘You’ll have two minutes to speak with him. But tell no one about this, and make certain your conversation is private – or I will make absolutely sure that he takes a very long time to die.’
Gabrielle watched the old woman bow her head obediently, with what seemed like supreme effort, before stepping out of the bedchamber and closing the door behind her with a loud thud.
Gabrielle flung herself towards Karl, and he took her in his arms. As he returned her kiss, his hands began roaming across her back, tugging at the fastenings of her robes until they slipped from her shoulders.
She let her garments tumble to the floor before locating the seams of Karl’s own uniform with practised efficiency. Before long, they both stood naked, Karl sliding his hands through her hair as he bent to kiss her breasts, then lifting her up and carrying her over to the bed.
He laid her down on the soft sheets, taking hold of her wrists and pinning them against the pillows above her head. She responded by wrapping her ankles around his thighs as he slid on top of her. Within moments he was deep inside her, and thrusting hard.
She delicately nipped the soft tissue of Karl’s neck with her teeth, hearing him groan in response. She was conscious that his hair had streaks of grey in it. Uchidans in general, and Demarchists in particular, did not approve of overt body modifications, seeing them as a slight offered to God, including even such changes as made one look younger.
Something about the confrontation with Cassanas had charged the atmosphere, so that Gabrielle felt her orgasm building more quickly than usual. She could see it was the same for Karl: barely a minute or two had passed before she felt the muscles of his body go tense. He let out a restrained grunt before collapsing on top of her, finally releasing her wrists and leaning his head down to kiss her.