The Third Claw of God

by Adam-Troy Castro

  Jelaine didn’t offer that much restraint. “Oh, he’s damned all right. “The Khaajiir was our friend. He was a personal guest of our father. His blood is our blood. Whoever did this… will never be able to run far enough.”

  I took their personal grief as very much beside the point, and answered Philip. “The corollary, sir, is that we’re stuck in here with him. Or them.”

  His eyes narrowed. “Just how many killers do you think there are?”

  “I have no idea, sir. But the possibility of more than one is worth considering, given that Mr. Pescziuwicz already has two in custody up at Layabout, and the existence of a conspiracy always suggests an unknown number of collaborators.”

  “You still don’t have any reason to believe that’s true here.”

  “Nor do I have any reason to rule it out. I once heard of a famous murder case, aboard another stranded vessel, where it was essentially every passenger on board. Right now we don’t know anything except that we all remain in danger until we know who’s guilty and who’s not.”

  Philip gave me a disgusted look. “Yes, but of all the people in this room, you’re the only one known to have murdered Bocaians before. Why should we trust you?”

  “Sir. I don’t consider myself above suspicion. I may know I’m innocent, and have faith that my associates are innocent, but I also know that I’m not about to persuade you of either proposition until I demonstrate to your satisfaction just who committed the crime. Similarly, I know that your family has killed any number of people over the years, even if the preponderance of those victims were slaughtered by proxy via the weapons you design, mass-produce, and sell. You’re all part of that enterprise yourselves, and so neither you, nor your employees, all the way down to the stewards, escape suspicion, either as the Khaajiir’s principal murderer or as fellow conspirators. Even the sole person here unaffiliated with either the Bettelhine organization, or myself—that would be Mrs. Shapiro—is a suspect. As you established earlier, she’s been an enemy of your family for years, and we all know she has financial resources that equal your own, and thus provide her with more than enough influence to arrange this. So we’re all under suspicion, and can cease taking that fact personally. The fact remains that, right now, we’re all the prisoners of somebody who can not only smuggle a deadly weapon on board, but also has the capacity to isolate us by arranging the complete communications shutdown after this so-called emergency stop.”

  He licked his lips. “You can’t know those was arranged too.”

  I raised my voice to a near shout. “Show of hands! Who within the sound of my voice is confident that the emergency stop, the loss of communications, and the murder of the Khaajiir all have nothing to do with one another?” Silence. “Don’t be shy, people! If you believe that, stand up for it!”

  The silence, broken only by scattered sobs from Dina Pearlman, persisted.

  Jelaine murmured something inaudible to Dejah, who whispered something back. Skye, who was beside them, twitched her lips in appreciation. Something to ask her about, when I had a chance.

  “There’s something else that needs to be established,” I said, turning away from Philip and sweeping my gaze from one set of frightened eyes to another. “We have not yet confirmed that help is coming. If it is coming, we don’t know how long it will take to get here. We don’t know if the people at Layabout or at Anchor Point have any bigger problems to deal with. We don’t know whether the damage already done to this cabin poses any additional threat to our lives. We don’t know if the killer, or killers, is satisfied with the one corpse or if there are any remaining targets. And finally, we don’t know whether the answers to any of these questions will wait until help can arrive and take over the investigation…or whether we must race the clock if we hope to get out of here alive. The only thing we know is that we’ve been left with no other immediate possibility of helping ourselves. This is something we can do.”

  Philip coughed. “And…I suppose…you want to run the investigation, yes?”

  “Please, sir. I know I have no jurisdiction here. I don’t mean to overstep my bounds. Were your man Mr. Pescziuwicz or some other authority you trusted available, I’d shut up and defer to him. But who in this room, aside from my associates and myself, has had experience running criminal investigations? You?”

  To my surprise, Dejah Shapiro raised her hand. “Ummm…I’ve had to do it, several times.”

  There was silence as I gaped at her, my precious momentum derailed. I was not alone in that, either; just about everybody forgot our current predicament long enough to gather from her expression that she was entirely serious.

  Of all of us, it was Jelaine who ventured, “Really?”

  “Really.” For a moment Dejah just looked tired, less like a woman who had spent much of her life cocooned by extreme wealth than one who had known more than her share of struggle and heartbreak. It aged her, but only for a moment, and then the vitality came rushing back in. “Some of you already know that I once found myself saddled with a sociopathic ferret of a husband, one Ernst Vossoff, whose messes needed to be cleaned up on a regular basis. There were occasions, in places cut off from my usual resources, where…well, where I was the only one available to connect the dots.” She turned to me. “Just providing a footnote, Counselor. I’m not claiming my experience adds up to anything as distinguished as my own.”

  “Appreciated,” I said. “Maybe it will prove helpful anyway.”

  Philip glanced at his brother and sister, neither of whom had raised any objections to me taking command of the situation. They just met his gaze, giving him nothing. After a moment, he ventured, “Since you do admit you’re a suspect, how do you suggest we work this, so we can trust each other?”

  Oscin stood beside the Khaajiir’s body, awaiting further instructions. Skye was still with Dejah and Jelaine. Neither had spoken a word, or made a move to interrupt the confrontation between Philip and me since the moment Dejah silenced the party. But I didn’t need to know them as well as I did to know that their shared mind was racing.

  I said, “I’ll need to step aside, for a moment, and confer with my associates. I’ll leave one here and take the other. But even the two of us who walk away will still be in sight every second. Watch us and make sure of it. In the meantime, nobody leaves this room.”

  I left it up to the Porrinyards to decide which one joined me. The volunteer turned out to be Oscin. He accompanied me to the other side of the capsized dinner table, at one point steadying my arm as I stepped over the place where an upended bowl oozed yellow cream into a carpet already spotted with damp. We didn’t stop until we were up against the bulkhead, until recently a scenic view of Xana, now a claustrophobic closeup of emergency shutters, shutting out everything else in the universe.

  My left shoe made a noise as it pulled free of something sticky. “What a mess.”

  Oscin kept his voice low. “Which one are you talking about?”

  “The whole thing, of course. The murder. The politics. Even the family relationships, here. You did pick up that Philip’s the odd man out in this particular collection of Bettelhine siblings?”

  He nodded. “It’s all over their body language, and the way they speak to one another. And you saw that he’s not happy about that?”

  I spared a look at Philip, who had stepped aside with Jason and Jelaine, the three of them already engaged in intense conversation. Philip looked angry, Jason upset but placatory. Jelaine stood between them, watching both their faces, not participating for the moment but very much prepared to step in, as either peacemaker or manipulator. “I won’t say they hate him, or that he hates them, but there’s definitely some powerful tension going on. I wouldn’t be surprised to hear that it goes back years. Maybe even before Jason’s disappearance.”

  Oscin followed my gaze. “Oscin the single had the same kind of strained relationship with his older brother. They didn’t want to fight, but by the time they reached their teens, they always approached each other w
ith excessive delicacy, rather than risk tugging at some emotional tripwire and setting off the explosion neither wanted. As a result, nothing ever got said. This feels…something like that.”

  “Maybe Philip never forgave Jason for going away.”

  “Maybe,” Oscin said. “Maybe it has to do with wherever he went.”

  “We’ve been given an explanation for that.” I left out the drama and, over the next few minutes, summarized the story Jelaine had told me before dinner, concluding with: “It could all be bullshit, of course. Have you ever heard of this place, this Deriflys?”

  “No,” he admitted. “But if the story’s true, and Jason did have to live like an animal to survive, it could very easily explain why Philip would resent him for it. He’s the type who would consider it a stain on the family honor, or something—more so if Jason was a favorite who remained a favorite even after he came back, sullied but forgiven. A jealous sibling, of the kind who always obeyed the rules without question, and always lived up to everything his parents expected, might even come to hate the one who involved the family in scandal but was still granted the rewards of a favorite son.”

  He went distant for a moment, perhaps weighing the information we had, perhaps giving his full attention to whatever Skye was hearing. Then he said, “What about the AIsource? Have you attempted to contact them again?”

  “On and off since we stopped. They’re not answering. I’m not even getting the buzz I get when they’re receiving but not in the mood to acknowledge. Either they’re cut off by whatever’s shut down all the Bettelhine hytex links, or they’re determined for us to handle this ourselves.”

  “I suspected as much,” he said. “It’s a pain in the ass, though. I can deal with being trapped here, but it would be nice to know what’s going on outside, if help is coming or not.”

  “It’s coming. With Bettelhines aboard, it’s coming. But the silence so far gives me the impression it’s going to be a long wait. Something’s interfering.”

  He nodded without surprise. “Unseen Demons?”

  “I don’t know. Could be. Not enough data to know.” Once upon a time I’d had the habit of nibbling my fingernails at moments of intense concentration. My fingers had looked raw much of the time, but it had been something to do, some way to postpone speaking while I chose the right thought of the many possibilities clamoring for my attention. Sometimes, like now, I missed it. “There’s something else I want to ask about. Earlier, as Skye, you told me you’d picked up an implication you didn’t consider any of my business.”

  “That was before this became a murder investigation and it became important data. Do you need me to tell you now?”

  “No,” I said. “I’ve already figured out what you must have been talking about. I think I’d already sensed it for a while, but it wasn’t until after the emergency stop that I went back over everything else I’d been seeing and knew for sure. You can rest your conscience and consider this secret spilled without your help.”

  His relief was palpable. “Should we let on that we know?”

  “We might as well pretend that we’re still out of the loop, watch what happens, and reserve the big reveal in case we find ourselves needing to spring it during questioning.”

  “Good plan. What else?”

  “Jelaine and Dejah exchanged some words during my confrontation with Philip. Skye was present. What did they say?”

  He surprised me by breaking into a rueful grin. “It’s not important, but you should know. It was right after you made Philip back down. Jelaine said, ‘Wow.’ And Dejah said, ‘That’s my girl.’”

  I don’t know what I’d expected. Certainly not a whispered confidence between two conspirators cackling that their evil machinations were all proceeding according to plan. But the answer sandbagged me. It was a moment before I could answer. “Really?”

  “Really. I keep saying, Andrea: You should stop being so surprised when people are impressed by you. The universe is not entirely populated by enemies.”

  I looked at the Khaajiir, still slumped in his chair, his eyes still open and seeming to pass judgment on everything within his field of vision. The accusatory expression seemed new. Before he’d died, he’d seemed gentle, wise, saddened, and at most amused my understandable distrust. I realized again that he’d been the first Bocaian to treat me with civility since that long-distant day when I’d joined in the madness of my family of neighbors, and wanted nothing more than Bocaian blood. For the first time since I’d discovered his death I felt the loss become personal. How great a gulf had this sentient crossed, to stand in the same room with me and profess that he did not want me dead? Was it lesser, or greater, than the gulf he’d crossed in the last minutes of his life? Worst of all was a thought so terrible that it made my stomach lurch with a nausea I had not felt from the mere discovery of the murder: had he died blaming his death on the monster child Andrea Cort, who he had so foolishly approached without fear?

  Damn you, whoever you are, for making me think that.

  The Porrinyards were correct. The universe was not entirely populated by enemies. But they were still thick on the ground, and the Khaajiir’s unknown assassin had just become one of mine.

  I didn’t know whether the carriage would start moving by itself or, if not, whether the rescue craft, the Stanleys or whatever Philip had said they were called, would reach us in minutes or hours or days. But I made a vow right then. If there was anything I could do to help it, I would not leave this place before I had a chance to spit in the murderer’s face.

  I rubbed the corner of my eye with my thumb. “I…ah…don’t suppose anybody’s said anything incriminating, the last few minutes.”

  Oscin had the grace not to recognize a moment of uncertainty when he saw one, “Farley Pearlman claims to have had some problems breathing. He’s sure the air’s going bad, but everybody else thinks it’s just fear and the stench coming off what’s left of the Khaajiir. I believe we may have to move everybody into one of the suites, for humanitarian reasons. That tableau over there is really more than people unaccustomed to crime scenes should ever be expected to take.”

  I considered that. “They’re going to have to wait. Nobody except us, and whomever we’re questioning, goes in or out of any of the other rooms until we can check them out ourselves and eliminate the possibility of evidence tampering. If they have any trouble dealing with the smell, we’ll put them on an oxygen unit.”

  “That won’t compensate for the evidence of their own eyes. The body’s sickening.”

  “I know. But if we’re very, very lucky, it will bother the killer too.”

  O scin and I returned to the bar area, where the others stood, watching our return with varying mixtures of hope and fear. By the time we got there the Pearlmans were huddled together, breathing into cloth napkins. The somber but dry-eyed Colette remained behind the bar, where she’d been joined by Arturo Mendez, Loyal Jeck, and Paakth-Doy. Dejah Shapiro and the three Bettelhines all stood at the opposite end of the bar, all managing to look defiant and glum at the same time, if that was possible. Vernon Wethers and Monday Brown stood apart from them, the first with his hands clasped behind his back, the other with hands clasped in front. I don’t believe either one intended to be a parody or an editorial response to the other, it just worked out that way. As for Skye, she’d moved to the easy chair where the corpse of the Khaajiir sat, still leaking black ooze into the cushions.

  Jason said, “So, Andrea, have you come up with anything?”

  Damned if he didn’t seem to be showing genuine affection for me. Couldn’t have that, not now. “First things first, sir. Out of my own intimidation by the circles where I now find myself traveling, and my confused uncertainty over your father’s purpose in inviting me here, I’ve been allowing the members of your family to get away with calling me by my first name. That assumes a familiarity you have not earned. I don’t know if we’ll ever be cordial enough to merit such liberties, but until I find out who among you killed
the poor Khaajiir I must insist that everybody except my traveling companions return to calling me Counselor. It’ll remind us all where we stand. Are we agreed on that?”

  Jason’s nod had the ghost of a smile in it.

  Philip’s eyes bugged a little at my effrontery. He might have objected, but his siblings appeared, if anything, even more pleased by me, and that bothered him more.

  Jelaine flashed a shell-shocked grin. “Whatever you say. Counselor.”

  I didn’t know what was going on here, but sooner or later, I’d have to teach those two that I was not a pet performing tricks for their amusement. But not now. “Second. In a few minutes I’m going to start questioning you, one or two at a time. I will need to do this away from the others, to make sure that everybody speaks freely and without contamination by other testimony. You may nominate one person, preferably one of the stewards we know to have been belowdecks during the emergency stop, to monitor those interviews and ensure that we do not do anything to obstruct or alter the results of the investigation. That person will remain sequestered with us unless he, or she, finds reason to object to our activities. One of the Porrinyards will also stay with me throughout, while the other stays with you, serving the same purpose as the person you have designated to watch me. While I’m doing this I must insist that you refrain from discussing your testimony with one another. The reasons for this should be obvious, but just in case any of you decide to defy this request, my associate will be monitoring you to detect any signs of collusion in the meantime. Are we agreed on that?”

  There was even less enthusiasm for this, but everybody mumbled and nodded and allowed as how it was all right, they guessed, the sole exception being Dejah, who actually raised her glass in approval.

  According to the Porrinyards, she’d called me “her girl,” earlier, assuming ownership based on the few short weeks we’d worked together a few years ago. That rankled. Sooner or later I might have to teach her that I did not belong to her any more than I belonged to Jason and Jelaine Bettelhine.