I also looked up the data from LemurCandy (damn it, what was his real name?) and printed the username of the sender at the top of each Murder Prophet message. The first eight had alternated between SurlyHypnoticMoccasin51, Artsy_Symphonic_Council, MushyNonsocialCryptic, and Loony#Pushcart%Cynicism. Coro's had been from MushyNonsocialCryptic, and mine from SurlyHypnoticMoccasin51. They ranged from short, four lines like the first one and one other:
April is the cruellest month, breeding
Lilacs out of the dead land, mixing
Memory and desire, stirring
Dull roots with spring rain.4
to the longest, at eight lines:
How wonderful is Death,
Death, and his brother Sleep!
One, pale as yonder waning moon
With lips of lurid blue;
The other, rosy as the morn
When throned on ocean's wave
It blushes o'er the world;
Yet both so passing wonderful!5
Sometimes they mentioned a period of time, as in Coro's fortnight, some a date, like my first day of spring or a month, like April, some another pinpoint in time, like the waning moon. Some were easier to interpret than others, although they all made sense in hindsight, after the murder had occurred.
But looking at them all laid out here, I had the strongest feeling that they had to be from the same person. A person with very strange ideas about usernames. They made "LemurCandy" look quite normal.
I messaged LemurCandy on Chatterz® and he said,
I typed, trying to come up with a way to explain why I thought she was important.
There was a pause before he answered.
I expected that if he was using an avatar right now, it would be pouting. I said, to soothe his ego.
There was an even longer pause this time, and then he typed,
he said.
I looked up from my screen. Kikufaax stood in my doorway, grinning. As usual, she looked stunning, today in a burnt-orange tank dress, countless oversized tassels dangling from the skirt. I would have looked like some kind of giant dusting mitt in it.
"What?" I asked.
"What are you going to wear tonight?"
"Help?" I said, and she laughed.
"Don't worry, we're going shopping."
"You're a life saver."
"And," she added, as she steered me out into the street, "Saga approved a budget."
"Really?" It wasn't like Saga to spring for expenses that he didn't think were absolutely necessary.
She grinned. "It's not a huge budget, but it'll do. I think it might be a touch of payback for saving his life."
"I'll take it," I said gratefully, and surrendered myself to Kiku's expertise.
***
Four hours and the entire budget later we were back at the office, although I'd only dropped in to see if there were any last-minute instructions for tonight. Kikufaax had totally come through, finding the perfect dress in one of her "secret" shopping spots after an hour or so. It was a deep mauve satin gown sewn with silver knotwork at the hems of the sleeves and skirt. The sleeves nipped in close at the shoulder but were wide and trailing at the wrist, and the skirt was a straight sheath that fell to just below my knees in the front, and flowed out into a short train in the back.
"Perfect if you have to run anywhere," Kiku told me. I hoped it wouldn't come to that. Intricate silver beadwork traced the front of the skirt. The dress fit me perfectly, making my curves look more like the ones I'd given my avatar than my usual endowments. We'd taken it straight to my apartment, and it now hung, safely encased in protective plastic, in my closet.
Kiku had also taken me to get my hair "done" in a downtown hair boutique so pink it made my eyes water. That translated into an hour and a half during which her stylist combed and straightened, trimmed and twisted and pinned until I was in a torpor brought on by too much gossip and hairspray and the fumes from glossy magazines.
Glaive cat-called me from his office as I walked past, and that was just for the hair and makeup. I stuck my tongue out at him, secretly pleased. If Glaive thought I looked good, chances were that LemurCandy would, too.
Disaster struck about a minute later. Saga emerged from his office wearing a more-solemn-than-usual face and beckoned me toward the boardroom. Anna, sombre today in a grey wool dress that looked so soft it made you want to pet it like a kitten, followed right behind us.
"What's wrong?" I asked as soon as the door shut.
Saga regarded me gravely and clasped his hands behind his back. He had a sort of parental 'I'm not angry just disappointed' look on his face. "A police officer called here this afternoon, wishing to follow up with you about an 'incident' the other night." He raised an eyebrow a quarter of an inch. "You forgot to mention this incident, Kitano?"
Phash. I really had forgotten it, for a while. I tried to play it cool, leaned against the embossed wallpaper and shrugged. "It wasn't anything really—I did forget to tell you about it. I handled it, and the guy's in jail. Nothing to worry about."
Anna shook her head, her eyes dark. The looped golden chains on her earrings tinkled their own disappointment. "Kit! We looked up the report, and it's absolutely something to worry about! It doesn't matter that we don't know who hired the man, it must have been triggered by the Murder Prophet case. It's the only big thing the firm is working on right now. And we already know you're a target, because of your message." She began to pace the small room, her heels ticking anxiously across the hardwood. "I can't believe you left us out of the loop on this."
"Okay, I'm sorry," I said, guilt descending on me like a hungry wolf. "I admit I put off telling you at first. I didn't want you to over-react, like you are now. And then it slipped my mind. It really did."
"It is not an over-reaction to try and make sure that our employees stay safe," Saga told me sadly. The tiny frown line was back. I opened my mouth but he held up a hand. "I know what you are going to say, Kitano, that this is a dangerous profession. That is very true. Which makes it all the more important that we avoid danger when we can."
I sighed. "Okay. I agree. I should have told you. I'll be more careful from now on. Now I really have to get going, or I'm going to be late—"
"Anna and I have decided that Glaive is taking you to the safe house, where you will stay for the next few days," Saga said, interrupting me.
For a moment I couldn't even speak. "What?" I finally sputtered. "I have to go to MageData tonight!"
He shook his head. "Kiku can go. You could be putting yourself in imminent danger if you were to go,
and I can't allow that."
I turned to Anna. She had stopped pacing and sat in one of Saga's big armchairs, fingers tented in front of her, fingertips tapping slowly together. Surely she would be more reasonable. "I'm not in any real danger, you know that. The real danger is to Coro. The message to me was just a scare tactic."
She stopped tapping her fingers. "Perhaps. But you're an important part of our team here, Kit. I won't expose you to danger unnecessarily. The safe house is really the best idea."
I turned back to Saga and gave him a meaningful look. "You know I can take care of myself," I said, hoping he would remember that my transmutation magic made me much less vulnerable than a person without that ability.
"I do know that." He nodded imperturbably. He knew what I was talking about. "But it does not alleviate my responsibility to also take care of you. We do not know what resources this person has at his or her disposal."
"It's for your safety, Kit," Anna said in a soothing voice, but underneath it ran that ribbon of steel that I knew meant the decision was already made. No more discussion.
"We have already told LemurCandy to pick up Kikufaax instead, and briefed him on the situation," Saga said. "Glaive will take you to your apartment to collect whatever you might need."
And that was that. Unless I wanted to quit, I didn't have much choice but to go along with the idea.
I tried not to give Kiku a dirty look as I passed her desk. It wasn't her fault. Although somehow it made it worse to realize that she'd be ready and look as good as I would have in less than half the time. I went into my office to collect my notes and the Anagrammatics book Trip had found. The goose followed me in and hopped up on my desk. He leaned his long neck forward to put his orange bill near my ear.
"Sorry you have to go to the safe house, Kit," he said in a low voice. "I heard them talking about it."
I didn't trust myself to say much since I was still seething inside. "Thanks," I managed.
"Why don't you just tell everyone you're a Transmute?" he whispered. "Then they'd know you can take care of yourself."
I shook my head. "Saga knows, and he's still sending me into hiding," I said. "And you know what he's like—what they're both like. When they make up their minds—"
The goose nodded. "Yeah, I know. Once Saga thought I was spending too much time playing video games and not getting enough exercise, so he set the console on a timer. I told him okay, okay, I'd start going for walks when I couldn't play." He grinned that weird goosey grin at me and winked. "But when I went for a walk, I only went as far as the arcade."
"You tricked Saga?" I gaped at the goose in amazement.
"Shh!" he hissed at me. "He still doesn't know."
"Nice one," I said. It was no small feat to put one over on Saga. "But that won't work for me. He's setting Glaive as a watchdog."
Trip shrugged and shook out his feathers, letting them settle back into place before he spoke again. A few stray bits of down drifted across my desk. "Well, anyway, it'll probably only be for a couple of days. Maybe it'll be like a vacation for you."
Yeah, right. A vacation during which I missed a date with LemurCandy, and had no Netz access. Sounded peachy.
When I emerged from my office, Kikufaax was closeted with Saga and Anna, no doubt getting the good news that she had about an hour to get ready for the charity event. I didn't really want to see any of them again just then, so I told Glaive I was ready and we went out to his Cloudwalker. "I have to get a few things from my apartment," I told him, and he nodded.
"They're only doing the smart thing, you know," he said.
"Whatever. Just drive," I said, and we drove to my apartment in silence. It wasn't Glaive's fault, either, but I wasn't feeling too fond of anyone just then, and he was the closest target.
Glaive waited in the car while I went in and threw things into a bag, not very gently, I admit. I took all the other notes I'd made on the case, too. Might as well work, if I had to be confined.
"Kit, are you going somewhere?" Phoebe asked suddenly.
"Saga and Anna are sending me to the safe house," I muttered in reply.
"They don't think you're safe here, with me?" She sounded insulted.
"Guess not," I replied, not really paying attention.
"Well, I like that!" she huffed.
"Phoebe, you're a great apartment AI, but you're not really defense-capable," I told her absently.
"We'll see about that," she said.
I ignored her. I paused in front of my closet, staring at the mauve dress. I felt almost as sorry for it as I did for myself. We were both missing a chance to shine. Served Saga right that he'd had to spend the money on it for nothing. I slammed the closet door.
"See you in a few days, Phoebe," I called on my way out. "Just put everything on hold until I get back." She didn't answer. Probably still mad. Well, weren't we all? I locked the door and stomped back out to the car, wordlessly dropping my bag into the back seat. This time Glaive said nothing when I got in, which was fine with me. We took a slightly roundabout route to the safe house in which Glaive executed some maneuvers designed to shake anyone tailing us, but I wasn't impressed. I doubted that anyone was taking any interest in us—particularly me—at all.
The Smith Street safe house was about as nondescript as a house could be. Two storeys with a brick facade, a pale grey door and an uninspired front yard. Still, the most important thing about a safe house was not calling attention to itself.
Glaive put the Cloudwalker in the garage and we went inside. He locked up, then wordlessly turned on the television. Obviously if I didn't want to talk, he wasn't going to let it bother him. Or maybe he thought he was punishing me with the silent treatment. I went upstairs and dumped my things in one of the bedrooms, then threw myself on the bed to sulk. I could not believe this was happening. I thought briefly about calling Nana Nina and asking her to come over and break me out. She was a Spellquick, after all, there must be some kind of magic she could use on Glaive to get me past him. She'd never do it, though. Maybe I could overpower Glaive. The thought almost made me laugh out loud, although it didn't make me feel any better.
I was missing out on a date with LemurCandy. Phash.
His username made me think of the other usernames, the ones in the case, and they started traipsing through my head in an aggravating chorus line. A horrible, cacophonous chorus line. SurlyHypnoticMoccasin. ArtsySymphonicCouncil. LoonyPushcartCynicism. MushyNonsocialCryptic. They had little enough meaning to start with, but repeating like this even the component words became gibberish, just jumbled letters.
I closed my eyes, but that only made it worse. I got up from the bed and paced the room, looked out the window at a scruffy back alley, opened up my Anagrammatics book and tried to focus on a puzzle, but they just kept on. I tossed the book on the bed and went back to pacing.
And I realized, as I looked out the window for the fourth time, that the usernames did contain a certain internal harmony or resonance. They reminded me of something. I pulled a pencil and notebook out of my bag and jotted them down the left margin of a clean page.
SurlyHypnoticMoccasin51.
Artsy_Symphonic_Council.
Loony#Pushcart%Cynicism.
MushyNonsocialCryptic.
I discarded the numbers and underscores—they were just filler. My eyes went from one line to the next, then on to another one, matching up letters as if I were doing an anagrammatic. I started crossing out letters they had in common.
A. L. T. Two o's. Three c's.
They had every letter in common.
They were all anagrams.
In a flash of inspiration, I wrote down one more, under the others. PsychoticMuslinCrayon. Another anagram.
"Holy phash," I breathed. Something tied all those usernames together, all the other Murder Prophet ones and Aleshu Coro's and mine. My theory that Coro was the crux of the Murder Prophet case must be right.
I just wasn't sure what it meant.
I pulled out my p
hone, ready to call Saga, but I stopped. I was still mad at him for sticking me in here. And it wasn't like I had any real answers, only another piece of the puzzle. Maybe it was childish, but I wasn't ready to talk to him yet. I put the phone back carefully and went downstairs to make coffee.
I poked my head into the living room. Glaive was still on the sofa, watching some kind of martial arts sporting event on the big-screen tv. Darcko and Sadatake makes sure their guests are comfortable. "Coffee?" I asked.
"Sure," he said, without looking up.
"Glad you're keeping such a close eye on me," I said in what I hoped was a withering voice.
"Anybody tries to break in, you're safe," he said. "Not much to worry about beyond that. No Netz, and no one knows we're here anyway. That's the point of a safe house. Just scream if you need me."
"Haha," I retorted. Obviously he was still miffed at me for taking my anger out on him. "Coffee will be ready in ten, and you can fix it yourself."
He didn't deign to answer that, so I went back to the kitchen and put the coffee on to perk. If he was going to be like that, I wasn't going to tell him about the anagrams, either.
The cupboard holding the coffee was right next to the back door, and as I opened it and reached for the bag, what I'd said to the runaway transmute Idala Kineall in this very kitchen came back to me. This house keeps you safe inside, it's not for keeping you prisoner.
I thought of Trip, pulling one over on Saga, all the while pretending to be a good little goose.
Glaive was on the lookout for someone breaking in—he wasn't expecting me to try and break out. I could be out the door and long gone in a magicab before he'd even know I wasn't upstairs sulking.
It was very tempting. It was very wrong, of course. But very tempting.
The Murder Prophet Page 20