“Yes, I do.” His answer was the same, either way. “I was there when his memory came back. I believe him.” He took a deep breath, forcing his mind to seek a quiet, focused center. “Sir, he saw the Special Ops team you told me about; he recognized Captain Cabrelle.…” He broke off as his resolve faltered.
“Yes—?” Aranne said.
“Chief Inspector, he said Cabrelle tried to kill him—would have killed him, in cold blood, if that grenade hadn’t gone off.”
Aranne stared at him. “What are you saying?”
Gundhalinu looked down, away, at the wall. “Maybe they thought the vigilantes were a threat … but LaisTree said Cabrelle knew him. Added to the kinds of questions the Ondinean and the others asked me, and what we got from Herne—” He looked up at Aranne again, searching the Chief Inspector’s impassive face, his impenetrable eyes. “Sir, I believe that someone on the force is in collusion with the killers, and maybe worse. And furthermore, the information you gave me about the missing tech does not jibe with what Herne told us.”
“Explain.” Aranne sat back, his face grim.
“Herne told us the missing tech is actually a functioning Old Empire artifact of some kind, and that he was delivering it to the Ondinean, for Arienrhod; not the other way around.”
“He was lying, obviously.”
“No, sir, I don’t think so. He believed we’d given him a truth drug.” He explained, briefly.
Aranne shook his head, with a reluctant smile. “That was uniquely resourceful, Sergeant.” His expression sobered. “Then perhaps he was telling you the truth. But as you say, it doesn’t match what you—or I—believed was going on that night at the warehouse. In which case, I am as concerned as you are about getting to the real truth.” His frown deepened as he stared at the displays flickering over and through his desktop. Abruptly he shut off the access; the terminal went dark, metamorphosing into a plain metal surface. “What else did this Herne tell you?”
“He gave us the identities of the other offworlders who were at the warehouse that night. He mentioned the names of the men whose bodies were identified, so I believe he was also telling the truth about that. I have his entire testimony on tape.”
“Father of all my grandfathers, why didn’t you say so!” Aranne leaned forward again, his eyes shining. “Input it into the system directly. We’ll finally be able to nail those bastards who cost us so many good men. Good work, Gundhalinu. Excellent work!”
Gundhalinu settled back in his chair, feeling the tension in his shoulders and neck loosen as he activated the data transfer from his remote. He had been right. Aranne couldn’t be corrupt; he cared too much about the men under his command to ever betray them. He rubbed his eyes, praying that now, finally, he would be able to sleep again at night.
“What else did you and LaisTree find out from this Herne?”
LaisTree—Gundhalinu looked up again. “Herne described the missing tech. That was enough for us to recognize that the necklace was part of it … and that LaisTree had the rest of it.”
“What?” Aranne said, in disbelief. “You have the headset too? Why didn’t you tell me?”
Because I didn’t know whether I could trust you. Gundhalinu looked down. “LaisTree has it, sir. He took it with him.”
“Where is he?”
“Pursuing a lead on the Ondinean.”
“Why the hell didn’t you take the headset from him first?”
Gundhalinu stared at his feet. “Sir, I didn’t get the chance. He was upset and angry. He left me behind—”
“Never mind, Sergeant.” Aranne took a deep breath. “You’ve obviously been through an ordeal. So has he. Neither one of you should be faulted for errors in judgment. But he shouldn’t be out there alone, for gods’ sakes, with that piece of equipment or without it. Do you know where he went?”
Gundhalinu shook his head. “He has informants all over the Maze.”
“But he’s still wearing the tracer?”
Gundhalinu grimaced. “No, sir. He removed it.”
Aranne swore under his breath. He stood up and moved out from behind his desk. “Let’s give the men those names, at least. They’ll want to be out there hunting down the suspects … and I want them searching for LaisTree too, as quickly as possible.”
Gundhalinu forced his reluctant body up out of the chair, fighting the gravitational drag of his exhaustion. He followed Aranne toward the door.
Just as he reached it, his remote began to buzz. He glanced down, stopped dead as he saw the caller ID.
It was LaisTree.
* * *
“An old superstition on Newhaven says that perfection attracts the Evil Eye.…” Jerusha PalaThion limped across the common room toward her desk. “So there’s always a flaw somewhere in a weaver’s design, if you search for it long enough.”
“Selfish pride offends the gods … the Goddess.” Devony nodded, forcing her thoughts to wander as randomly as her fingers roamed the surface of the antique carpet that hung on PalaThion’s wall. “So the weaver made a mistake in the pattern, on purpose. She believed that doing it would keep her … safe.” Her voice faltered as she suddenly found the flaw. She pulled her hand away, folded it into a fist. The rug’s intricate pattern blurred into pools of formless color in front of her eyes. “But believing she could control fate that way … that’s just another kind of arrogance, isn’t it?” She shook her head.
PalaThion was silent for a long moment, as if she was trying to think of a response that wasn’t simply a platitude, or a lie. At last she just took the pack of iestas from her caftan’s sash pocket without answering, and turned back to her monitor screen. “Damn it!” she murmured. She dropped awkwardly into her desk chair.
“What—?” Devony crossed the room to look over her shoulder. The other woman’s hands moved over the touchboard too rapidly for her to follow the results. “What is it? What happened?”
“I’ve been monitoring Gundhalinu’s remote,” PalaThion said, frowning. “He just got a call from LaisTree, on the Police band.” Words began to appear on the screen as she tapped into his communicator line. She activated the port’s speakers.
“—where you are?”
“I don’t know … I mean, just listen—”
Devony froze as she heard their voices in the room, speaking as clearly as if they were standing next to her. “But that’s good, isn’t it?”
“No.” PalaThion canceled the sound. “LaisTree doesn’t carry a remote since his suspension. He didn’t make this call on his own, and I doubt he made it willingly. He must have walked straight into a trap after he left your place. The Ondinean, probably—which means the Source. They’ve got the headset now. They’re trying to pull in Gundhalinu, and the necklace.” She shook the pack of iestas; three fingernail-sized pods dropped into her hand. She shook the pack again, then crumpled it into a wad. “Shit.…”
“It’s my fault.” Devony turned away, sick at heart.
“How do you figure that?” PalaThion spat a pod into a bowl on the desk.
“He would have listened to Gundhalinu, he wouldn’t have gone off on his own, if … if he hadn’t.…”
“If he hadn’t found out you were telling everything to Arienrhod?”
Devony nodded; her hands closed over the back of the common room’s single chair until they whitened.
“You really care about him, don’t you?” PalaThion said, surprised.
“I barely know him—” Devony broke off as her defensiveness sublimed, suddenly becoming another emotion entirely. “I’ve never met anyone like Nyx. Never.… He really wanted me.…” She pressed her hand to her lips, without actually touching her own flesh; her eyes burned with unshed, wholly unexpected tears.
PalaThion sighed. “Devony, it’s not your fault that he made a bad decision. He let his emotions cloud his judgment. He’s a Blue; he’s trained to know better.”
“He’s not a Blue!” Devony said sharply. “Not anymore. They took that away from him too—
after he lost his brother.”
PalaThion looked down, grimacing. “It still isn’t your fault,” she said. “And it isn’t really his, either. The only ones to blame, for everything that’s happened, are the killers.” She gestured at the monitor; her hand tightened into a fist. “Gundhalinu’s at the station house. He’ll know the call is a setup; they’ll find a way to get LaisTree back—”
“I wouldn’t be too certain of that, Inspector,” a voice said, from somewhere behind them.
Devony turned and her breath caught as PalaThion said, “Who the hell are you?”
“Mundilfoere…” Devony murmured, both a question and an answer.
PalaThion reached for the gun lying on the tabletop beside her.
“Don’t bother with that, Inspector.” Dressed in black, Mundilfoere crossed the room like a shadow dancing with light. “There is no need, and there is no point.” Something glinted as she raised her hand.
PalaThion turned away from the stunner, leaning back again in her seat with a casualness that belied her expression. “How did you get in?” she asked, as if she honestly wanted to know.
Mundilfoere gave a fluid shrug. “It’s a gift,” she said, smiling faintly. “You Police take too many things for granted. That is far more dangerous than this is—”
She nodded at the object she held in her hand, then tossed it out suddenly. It arced through the air into PalaThion’s startled grasp.
PalaThion made a disgusted noise as she looked at it. “A subdermal infuser?”
“I used it to drug your sergeant earlier today,” Mundilfoere said. “I truly regret that I couldn’t afford to take his honesty for granted. He actually was as innocent as he seemed to be.”
The stunner was in PalaThion’s hand between blinks of an eye; she fired.
It had no effect. Mundilfoere smiled, not even slowing down as she finished crossing the room. “Your poor sergeant.” She nodded at the monitor screen. “I see he has insisted on taking Aranne at face value after all, in spite of LaisTree’s warning, and everything we let him overhear during the interrogation.…”
“Cut the crap,” PalaThion said. “What do you want?”
“She knows what I want—” Mundilfoere turned back. “Don’t you, Devony Seaward?”
“The necklace,” Devony said softly. “But I don’t have the necklace anymore. Gundhalinu took it. The Police must have it by now.”
“Obviously,” Mundilfoere said, as if that fact was no more than a tiresome detail. She glanced at the monitor again. “But all stasis is flux at heart. Tell me, Devony, what did Nyx LaisTree mean to you?”
“Did?” Devony whispered, and the unguarded grief in her own voice shocked her. “Oh … oh, gods, no.” She sank into the chair that was suddenly the only thing supporting her.
“That’s what I thought,” Mundilfoere said, with a brief, oddly sympathetic smile. “LaisTree is still alive, Devony.… What would you do to keep him that way?”
Devony stared at her, dazed. “Anything I have to,” she said, at last.
Mundilfoere nodded, as though she had anticipated that reaction as well. “I need your help, then. Will you come with me?”
Devony got up and crossed the room to her side.
“Wait a minute—” PalaThion pushed to her feet, swore as the abrupt motion threw her off balance and she banged her hip against the desk. She stood glaring at them, as conscious as they were of her helplessness. “Devony, don’t be stupid,” she said. “You don’t really believe that woman needs your help. Even if LaisTree’s not dead, do you think she’ll let either one of you walk away from this—?”
“You underestimate Devony’s resourcefulness, Inspector,” Mundilfoere said; “and also her gifts, because you don’t really know her. I have genuine need of her help.” She locked eyes with PalaThion. “And you know nothing about me. I learned at an early age that I had to make my mind large, like the universe is large, in order to make room for all of life’s paradoxes … especially the paradoxes in my life. I let your sergeant walk away, today. Do you think Aranne will be as generous to him, or to LaisTree?”
“Aranne has no reason—”
“You know that is always an unwise assumption to make … Inspector.” Mundilfoere glanced at PalaThion’s helmet and uniform coat hanging by the door. “Especially when you serve on this world. Every time you peel back the layers of meaning around a word, or think you see what lies behind someone’s smile—or even imagine you’ve fathomed the reasons for this city’s existence … you only strip away one mask to find another. When we speak of gods, and say that to gaze on them naked would be suicide, what we really mean is Truth. If you’re weak, it will destroy you. But look away at your peril.… Your position is precarious enough. Be sensible.”
PalaThion didn’t answer, but Devony saw the frustration that burned in her eyes, the subtle movement of her head that said accepting the Ondinean’s words would mean committing suicide, for a man she barely knew.
“I chose the life I lead because everything happens in Carbuncle, Inspector,” Devony said quietly. “I just never really realized what ‘everything’ meant, until now.”
“This is the real world we’re talking about, damn it!” PalaThion said angrily. “The rules apply to you, too.”
Devony canceled the sensenet’s image, abruptly showing PalaThion her real face. “I make my own rules—”
PalaThion’s eyes barely flickered at the transformation. “And you’re the one who just told me how arrogant it was to believe that.”
“You’re forgetting one thing, Inspector,” Mundilfoere said. “We’re in Carbuncle. ‘The Rules’ are suspended for the duration. Making your own rules, and living by them, is an act of self-preservation here. Isn’t that true, Geia Jerusha…?” She raised her eyebrows. “Saint Geia, your namesake, is the protector of innocents, is she not?”
“The protector of fools,” PalaThion muttered.
“It’s all in how you translate it.” Mundilfoere shrugged.
“I am a Hegemonic Police officer. I obey the Hegemony’s rules.”
Mundilfoere laughed. “And Arienrhod makes a mockery of them. So whose rules are you obeying, really? And what is it you’ve been risking your life for all these years—?” She gestured at PalaThion’s cast.
PalaThion looked down at her injured leg. Then, slowly, deliberately, she picked up the stunner again, and took aim at Devony. “It’s my duty to protect all the Hegemony’s citizens—even from themselves, if necessary. Nobody dies on my watch … not if I can prevent it. I’ll stun her before I’ll let you take her away from here, Mundilfoere. Drag her dead-weight down the stairs if you can, but she won’t be much use to you … if that’s really why you want her.”
Devony stiffened, looking from PalaThion to Mundilfoere.
“Fire the gun and you’ve killed your sergeant,” Mundilfoere said. “Nyx LaisTree, too. I swear it—” Something in the woman’s voice stopped Devony’s breath in her throat. “They will not be temporarily inconvenienced. And if that happens, you and Devony will be the next victims. There will be no way you, or anyone, can prevent it.”
“So you’ll guarantee that, too,” PalaThion said, with deadly spite.
Mundilfoere shook her head. “It will be out of my hands by then. Whether I live or I die, Inspector, I simply won’t be here after to-night.… The time to stop the inevitable is before it starts. For once in your career, you have the chance to live up to your name, Geia Jersuha PalaThion. Will you take it? Isn’t it better to face the truth unafraid, to live honestly even for a day, than to surrender your entire life to a lie?”
PalaThion stared at her for an endless moment. Then, slowly and deliberately, she put the gun back on the desk. “Saint Geia, protect us all…” she muttered, looking down.
Devony glanced back as she followed Mundilfoere out the door. PalaThion stood staring at the monitor screen, her face clenched with silent pain.
As they walked down the alley toward the Street, Devony fina
lly let herself ask, “What is it you expect me to do?”
Mundilfoere glanced over at her. “I expect you to help me be in two places at once, of course. Do you think you can do that?”
Devony returned her smile like a steel mirror. “I think you’ve given me enough motivation for the performance of a lifetime.”
“I don’t doubt it.” Mundilfoere’s amused smile turned sardonic.
Devony frowned, stopping.
“You’re in no danger from me,” Mundilfoere said mildly. “I need you. And I never burn my bridges behind me, unless the enemy is at my back. I’ve always preferred to keep my options open.” She started on with an impatient motion of her hand. “I’ll tell you the details as we go. Time is short.”
A vacant Police patrolcraft was waiting for them at the entrance to the alley. Devony felt something drop sickeningly inside her as she realized where the patroller had come from.
Mundilfoere opened the doors and reached in. “Can you use one of these?” She handed out a stun rifle from the rack behind the seats.
Devony took it, checked it. “Yes.”
Mundilfoere raised her eyebrows.
“I grew up in the outback,” Devony said, shrugging. “I could pick off thieving nomads with a pellet gun before I could spell my own name … And target practice became a hobby of mine, very soon after I moved to the city.”
“Well, then,” Mundilfoere smiled, “welcome to the League of Competent Women.” She got in behind the controls.
Devony got in beside her, and the doors closed. “Where are we going?”
Mundilfoere started the power unit. “Down,” she said, as the patroller rose over the stream of pedestrian traffic. “Into the underworld.…”
18
Gundhalinu walked alone down the ramp that gave access to Tiamat’s omnipresent sea, and to the sheltered moorage that lay among the city’s massive support pylons. Darkness rose to meet him, all the more unnerving for his having grown used to Carbuncle’s endless day. The hour was well into graveyard watch, as it had been on the night when he had so stubbornly begun this fool’s progress into the abyss.
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