Reclamation

by Sarah Zettel

  “We will also have to talk further, Cousin Director,” she said with what she hoped was a knowing leer.

  She let him walk her to the door and salute her as she left.

  Back out in the corridor, she used her torque to call Allenden.

  “Where is she?” she asked under her breath as she skirted two interns who were deep in their own discussions.

  “Sweeping the attic, actually,” came Allenden’s reply, “Iyal, what…”

  “I’ll tell you later. Just sit still for now, all right?”

  “All right, Iyal, all right.” There was a peeved note in his voice. Iyal swallowed. She couldn’t risk getting Allenden angry right now. There was too much she might need him for later.

  “Allenden,” she said. “We need to move with extreme caution on this. It could shape up into a family war if we don’t.”

  She could tell by the length of the pause that she had gotten to him.

  “I’m waiting on the news, Iyal,” he said, and shut the connection down.

  In no mood to wait for the service lift, Iyal ran up three flights of stairs.

  The attic was actually a lab that had been shut down three years ago when the Vitae had finished implementing their plans for controlling the genetic engineering industry on Kethran. The loss of business had forced Amaiar Gardens to cut its staff. The unused lab had never been officially converted into storage, but unused equipment, broken furniture, and anything else that anybody wanted to get out of the way turned up there. Every now and again some intern in trouble with his supervisor would be sent up there to clean it out and organize it.

  Inside, Aria was lugging a polymer crate full of anonymous cables from its spot in the middle of the floor. Iyal stood in the threshold and watched her for a moment. Aria wore the plain moss green shirt and trousers that most of the interns favored when doing heavy jobs, but she still kept her spill of dark hair wrapped under her black turban. The thick tool belt around her waist had a cattle prod dangling next to the bumpy leather pouch she always carried, because even though they weren’t supposed to, the newer handlers had taken to quietly getting Aria out into the pens to help deal with balkier specimens. She had, as near as Iyal could understand, been some kind of animal handler back on her homeworld. She never complained about the extra work. She never even asked why she was being tapped. She just waded in and did whatever she was told to with an eagerness to please that bordered on groveling sometimes. For the past couple of weeks, Iyal had been wondering what all that ingratiation was covering up.

  Now she was still wondering.

  Aria stacked the crate on top of a container of silicate blocks and turned around. She saw Iyal in the doorway and flinched.

  “Zur-Iyal,” she said as she recovered. “Sorry. Was…I was startled.”

  “Don’t worry about it.” Iyal stepped all the way into the room and let the door slide shut behind her. “I need to talk to you, Aria.”

  “All right,” said Aria, without hesitation, like she always did. Sometimes, Iyal had the feeling she could tell the woman to go jump off a cliff, and Arla’d still say “all right.”

  Sometimes. Other times, out of the corner of her eye, Iyal caught Aria studying her with her innocent, brown eyes turned to black slits like she was memorizing Iyal’s motions, and calculating…calculating what?

  Iyal shot the bolt on the manual lock. “Aria Stone, you’ve got two minutes to explain why I shouldn’t hand you over to the Vitae Ambassador who was here looking for you.”

  Aria blanched until she was nearly as white as a Vitae herself, but her voice remained steady.

  “Do you understand what you are saying, Iyal…”

  “You’re lying.” Iyal said. “Now you’ve only got one minute.”

  For a moment, Aria did nothing but rub her hands together and stare at their scarred backs. She murmured softly in her own language. Then, abruptly, she switched to Iyal’s. “I should’ve known,” she said, without a trace of accent or awkwardness. “You’re not like the Nobles in the Realm. You’ve got no expectations about what I can and can’t do. You’re not so easy to bluff.” She faced Iyal. “The Vitae. What is it they want from me? Did they say?”

  “Yes. They say you’re their property. That you’re an artifact that was stolen from them and that they want you back.”

  Aria sank into a rickety chair, wrinkling a short stack of polymer sheets that rested on the seat. “You do not like them.”

  “No.” Iyal folded her arms. “But right now I’m trying to decide if I like you less. I’ve got security footage of you breaking into secured documents, Aria.”

  Aria’s head jerked up. “You’ve got what?”

  “Don’t try to go back to the country girl act, Aria Stone…”

  “No! No! “Aria waved her hands violently. “I don’t understand. Security footage. What is that?”

  Iyal stabbed a finger toward the boxy camera over the doorway. “Pictures from a camera like that one. Security surveillance. Yards of tape with your picture on it, pulling off ninety-nine different illegal maneuvers.”

  Aria stared at the camera. Her mouth moved silently and her face went from white to green. For a moment, Iyal thought she was actually going to be sick. Then, Aria let out a cluster of syllables so bitter and explosive that Iyal couldn’t imagine them being anything but curses.

  “No more time,” Iyal said. “Start talking.”

  “All right.” Iyal didn’t have to strain to hear the new tone in her voice. This was not innocent trust. This was considered acceptance. “What do you want to know?”

  A dozen different questions leapt to the front of Iyal’s mind: What are you? Why do the Vitae want you? How did you learn to read so fast?

  At last, she said, “How did you manage to access the Diet transcripts?”

  “I saw Zur-Allenden do it once.”

  “Once?”

  Aria nodded. “That is all I need. I was resetting one of the research tables and he was paying no attention to me.”

  “So, you’ve got a photographic memory?”

  Her lips moved, repeating the term, and her brow wrinkled. “Something like that, yes.”

  “So you can read. The illiteracy was an act.”

  “Sometimes, now. It wasn’t when I first came here.”

  “Then how…”

  Aria fumbled with a pocket on her tool belt and pulled out a pair of gloves; then she opened the leather pouch she carried with her and drew out an ice white sphere.

  “This is one of my namestones.” She kept it cupped in her hand as Iyal leaned over it. “They give me the ability to remember everything I have ever seen, or ever heard. But they also let me have a base for those memories…” She frowned. “They correlate what is in my head so it makes sense to me. If I have a question, I hold the stones and they find the answer in my mind and give it to me. The more I have seen, the better the answers get.

  “Before I came here, I was in a Vitae holding cell and a ship called the U-Kenai. I saw a great deal. I knew something about computers and I’d heard at least spatterings of your language. The stones were able to"—she frowned again—"create relationships for me so I was able to learn very fast.”

  Iyal felt her mouth move as she tried to form the words “that’s impossible.” She couldn’t get the sounds out, because in the back of her mind she knew that was not a valid argument. Aria was impossible, yet there Aria sat, relatively calm and collected and holding a stone in her hand that was really…what?

  Can’t be an AI, there’s no way for her to interface with it. Can’t be any kind of computer I know about. Artificial total recall? AND the ability to create contextual relationships? How? HOW?

  Iyal stumped over to one of the old research tables and, with one sweep of her arm, dumped a pile of miscellaneous debris and dust onto the floor. She slammed her hand against the ON key and as soon as the screens and boards flickered to life she began activating the scanners.

  “Aria, let me see that.”
Iyal extended her hand and was not surprised to see it was shaking.

  After a moment’s hesitation, Aria laid the stone against Iyal’s palm. It was heavy, smooth, and cool as polished crystal. She cupped her fingers carefully around it. Its surface did not warm up. It was as if it resisted her body’s heat.

  Iyal set the stone gently into one of the table’s scanner pockets and closed the lid over it. Aria gripped the arms of the chair until her knuckles turned white. Iyal said nothing. Aria knew this would not hurt her precious stone, she must know that or she never would have let go of it.

  The main screen lit up with the preliminary information. First there was a shell, primarily constructed of crystallized carbon, but there were several trace elements. It had a micro-level capillary construction. Capillaries? In a doped-up diamond? Inside, primarily liquid…then how had it not evaporated over time…proteins, ribonucleic acids, electrochemical traces, and a filament structure…

  Iyal blinked up at Aria and down at the screen again. The stone was a hollow, porous, enriched diamond filled with a miniature nervous system and a whole stew of unidentified virus chains.

  And I’d bet my marriage contract that each one of them has binders that match that host of extra receptors Aria’s carrying around inside her…but no…the scan only identifies ten variable strings and Aria has twenty-two unused receptors…

  She’s not a tool then, she’s a system component. And this thing still can’t be an artificial intelligence, but it might just be a real one. Iyal wished there was a spare chair for her to collapse into.

  “Where did this come from, Aria?”

  Aria shrugged. “I was told that the Nameless Powers left them to my family in case they needed to send another servant to the Realm. This might be true, but I don’t know what it means.”

  Iyal lifted the stone out of the scanner and turned it over in her fingers. This thing should be in the splicing room getting peeled apart a micron at a time. They should know exactly what was in there, how it was built, and what made it possible. Total, context specific, recall in a sphere the size of a small peach. Who’d need computers anymore? She could buy Kethran the leadership of the Quarter Galaxy with this thing and the woman it belonged with.

  “You’ve been very calm about finding out you’re not what you thought you were.”

  “I haven’t found out anything like that,” said Aria coolly. “The Teachers say I came into being when the Nameless spoke the word that is my name. My mother said I was split from the same word that made the stones. You say I came into being when somebody strung together some proteins in a laboratory. It doesn’t matter. I am still myself. My name is still mine. Only the Nameless can take that away.” She held out her hand. Iyal decided to take the hint and she handed Aria the stone.

  “Are there…many people like you in the…Realm?”

  “I don’t know.” Aria replaced the stone in the pouch and drew its strings tight. “I do know there aren’t many arias, stones, I mean, left.”

  “How do you know that?”

  Aria’s mouth quirked up into a tight smile. “About ten generations ago, the Teachers declared them sacred to the Nameless and stole them. The ones that exist are mainly in the Temple vaults. I heard one very highborn Teacher say he’d only ever seen one set. So there cannot be that many.”

  Iyal’s mouth was dry. There didn’t have to be that many. The Vitae were trying to lay claim to the world where they existed. What if the Vitae got their hands on even one more person like her? Or a single stone like the one she carried in her pouch? They’d jump so far ahead of the rest of the Quarter Galaxy in technological development, the labs would look like entrail knitters by comparison. There would be no catching them. No countering them in anything. They could have whatever they wanted, whenever they wanted it.

  “Aria,” Iyal said. “Do you know what world it is the Vitae are laying claim to?”

  “No,” Aria shook her head. “They’ve only given an astronomical notation. I haven’t got a context for it.”

  “Aria, it’s the Realm. Your home.”

  Slowly, Aria’s hand crept to her mouth. She pressed her palm hard against her lips, as if to stifle a scream, and her eyes squeezed shut. Iyal shifted her weight, uncertain of what to do, but in the next moment, Aria’s hand dropped back to the pouch of stones. She whispered something in her own language and swallowed hard.

  “Got to find Eric Born,” she said, at last. “Got to warn him. Got to get back. Warn my family. Warn…warn everybody.” The fear that widened her eyes could not have been faked. “The Teachers and the Nobles are bad enough, but those Skymen? We’d never get away. How can the Nameless permit this?” She spit the question.

  How can you still believe in the Nameless Powers, whatever they are? Iyal wondered. Then she thought about the stones. Then again, maybe I should start believing in them.

  “We need to get you off the planet, fast. We’ve got eleven hours before the Director comes looking for you. Maybe the Unifiers…”

  “No,” said Aria flatly. “They started the war in the Realm. They’re too much like the Vitae. I’ve been listening to their blather. They talk about conquest in terms of contracts and agreements. I must leave Kethran, yes, but I must do it free and clear. I must get back to the Realm, with Eric Born. Then, then I will figure out what to do next.” She smiled. “I have plenty to work with.” She laid her hand over her pouch.

  “What you’ll need is credit.” Iyal forced her mind back to the practical. “Don’t want to risk a transfer to you. The Vitae have got to be watching me.” She glanced reflexively toward the door. “Eleven hours…I can get the Diet hopping, create a distraction while you get out of here…I might get arrested, too, and they’ll freeze my account…do you think you can get back to Perivar’s on your own?”

  Aria nodded. “I know I can, but he told me not to return…”

  Iyal waved her words away impatiently. “When you get there, tell him I said he’d better help you out or he’ll be answering to me. Tell him to give you a loan. Whatever you need. I’ll pay it back. Or Killian will.”

  “I’ll tell him.” Aria got to her feet. “Thank you, Iyal. I’ll remember your name.” She spoke so seriously that Iyal could only assume it was a blessing or a compliment.

  “I’ll get you back to your room so you can pack…”

  “Pack what?” Aria spread her hands. “I’ve got clothes and shoes and my stones, and I need to hurry. The public transport runs all night, doesn’t it? Is there anyone to prevent me from walking out of the door?”

  “No one. Zur-Kohlbyr will be holed up in his office for at least another hour, plotting.” Iyal undid the door’s lock.

  Aria marched out without looking back. Iyal just watched her. When the door closed again, Iyal turned up the power on the old table’s comm board and sent a call out toward Killian’s ship on the Lous Division Lake, on the other side of the world.

  He was sleep-tousled and bleary-eyed when he appeared on the screen, but he woke up fast as he saw it was her. His eyes went round as he read the grim expression on her face.

  “Iyal, love, what’s happened?”

  “Killian…I…I’m about to find where I left my voice.”

  “Oh-ho?” he breathed.

  “How do you feel about emigrating again?”

  He paused for a bare second. “I hear the northern continent of Fresh Dawn has a very unfussy border policy. They need hands and heads.”

  Iyal’s heart swelled. “Love you.”

  “Love you.” His smile was warm as sunshine and almost succeeded in banishing the chill in her soul. “I’ll go hand in my leave request now. If there’s a shuttle in port, I can be back by ten in the morning and we’ll pack, all right?”

  “All right.”

  They said good-bye and cut the signal and Iyal was alone again with her four walls and the silence of an empty room.

  “Enjoy it while you can, Zur-Iyal,” she muttered as she placed a request for a line to the
Diet. “Enjoy it while you can.”

  Paral wished the Witness would stop looking at him. Even though his gaze was fastened on the monitors and comm boards in front of him, he knew she had her attention fastened on him. He could feel it like a cobweb that had laid itself over his entire body.

  Lines 89A and B checked and open for another six hours. Should send the update request for another four…He forced himself to think about his job. He had to have the current resources inventoried and updated. He couldn’t think about the Witness at his back, watching every movement of his hands, every twitch in his shoulder blades. He didn’t have the energy to spare to think about that. He had to get the inventory done and try to find some way to get out to meet Ordeth without looking suspicious, without the Witness seeing an anomaly that could be traced to the Imperialists. It was vital that the Witness be seen to be the only anomaly on Kethran.

  Even though the workspace was thoroughly secured and monitored, it held none of the private technologies. It was full of the same kind of consoles and transmission centers that could be seen in any busy clerical office on Kethran. Its security was so it could also hold a Vitae who was not an Ambassador.

  It was necessary. Paral knew his lessons like he knew the subtleties of his Master-Ambassador’s movements. The Aunorante Sangh had been able to drive off the Ancestors because they knew too much about them. Such power could not be given away again.

  That the Vitae had to hide themselves, even from the monstrous Shessel, struck Paral to the core and made it possible for him to plot under the gaze of his master.

  If only the Witness would stop looking at him.

  The monitor that watched the station’s plain, white antechamber beeped, and Paral nearly jumped out of his skin. His eyes flickered toward the Witness before they found the monitor. The door to the outside had opened and Basq crossed the smooth floor to tap the reader for the inner door.

  Paral stood and folded his hands, ready for his Master-Ambassador’s entrance.