Holding Onto Hope

by Michael Anderle

  He bit his lip. “So, you’re saying…”

  “I am saying,” Prima said with a great deal more gentleness than he had expected, “that in my admittedly limited experience with you, I have noticed that you tend to be motivated by the sincere desire to solve problems quickly. Your morals are unwavering. The issue others have seems to stem from the fact that your desire for quick action does not allow for information-gathering and thus, your actions may do more harm than good.”

  In silence, he lowered his face into his hands.

  “I think, from our discussion last night, that you have already begun to mull over that same issue,” she said. “I won’t tell you that Jorys was innocent or that he did not deserve justice. The question to ask yourself is simply how you can best achieve justice in a way that does not do further harm to his victims.”

  She paused as if to give him time to respond, but he made no effort to do so.

  “What are you thinking?”

  “That I can look at my life and see a thousand things I did wrong and a thousand situations I made worse,” he said bluntly.

  “That is an overreaction and you know it.” Her answer was immediate. “The matter before you is how best to use your skills for the people of Heffog. Not to mention how best to heal yourself.”

  “Right.” Ben shook his head and looked at Delia. Whether she’d noticed his conversation or not, he wasn’t sure. She smiled blandly at him. “I’ll do it. But I want more information first and I want to speak to your employer.”

  “Done,” she agreed. She gestured to the side of the building, where a ladder led to the ground.

  He stepped closer to it but stopped at the edge of the roof.

  The woman looked expectantly at him. “Yes?”

  “You played me,” he said slowly. He ran their conversation through his mind.

  She frowned slightly. “I’m not familiar with that expression.”

  “You merely repeated what I said until I told you everything I wanted, then you offered me that.”

  “And you’re…upset?” She looked bemused. “You get what you want, and we get what we want. Surely that’s not a problem but instead, a welcome solution.”

  Ben sensed that it was useless to try to make her admit that she could as easily use that skill for bad purposes as good ones. He shrugged and followed her but told himself he would have to keep his guard up. It was all well and good to pretend that people could find mutually agreeable solutions most of the time.

  But you only found out who people really were when the two of you couldn’t agree.

  Chapter Twenty

  Unlike Elantria, Delia did not travel on foot through the city. A carriage waited when she and Ben reached the street and she held the door open for him before she followed him into the shadowed interior. Black gauze hung over the windows to obscure their features from curious passers-by, and the carriage had no coat of arms.

  He replayed what Prima had said in his mind.

  It was difficult to keep his thoughts from circling to the single, horrifying memory of the slaves stumbling out of Jorys’ study. They were terrified and powerless. That fear haunted him.

  Every moment he spent dwelling on it was a moment he didn’t spend trying to fix it.

  With Prima’s blunt words in his head, he could see now that the merchant had merely been one point in a web. The people in that room hadn’t been frightened because he sold them but because so many others would collaborate with him to keep them enslaved. The guards would prevent them from escaping while they were brought to the market, the authorities wouldn’t intervene when they were sold, and the people wouldn’t rise up and stand in the way of them being sent off to God only knew where.

  What he needed to do was to bring the entire network down. Not only that, he needed to salt the ground so thoroughly that nothing would ever grow in its place.

  But that wasn’t possible. At least, no solution came to him. He could hear all the mealy-mouthed advice now—people telling him to provide profitable industries for the slave traders to switch to. But why should the city be rewarded with new industry when it had profited for so long off the fear and enslavement of others?

  He had no clue what to do and he was damned certain that Elantria’s approach wasn’t doing any better than his. His hands clenched, and when he looked up, he saw Delia watching him.

  She didn’t say anything and simply leaned back in her seat and stared out the window as the city rolled past. They were heading east to the district where the richest of the rich lived, and he took the time to consider what this said about her employer. A rich person who wanted to prey on the other rich? Who collaborated to steal the prized possessions of fellow nobles? It didn’t add up.

  When he arrived, he realized why it didn’t add up. It wasn’t a noble doing this.

  It was a servant.

  The carriage brought them to a small gate at the back of a walled compound, where they stepped out in a small courtyard. It was humble but swept clean. Against the outer wall stood a two-story house, grand by the standards of the city but dwarfed by the mansion that lay at the center of the compound.

  Delia, who now wore a dull cloak over her dress, brought him inside. A man with blue-green hair and black eyes looked up from a table where he studied a building layout. He rolled it carefully before he approached quickly and held a hand out.

  “I am Nemon,” he said and seemed unperturbed by his visitor’s searching gaze. “I am the product of many generations of by-blows,” he said with little emotion. “The nobles mingle more with their servants than they would have you believe.”

  Ben swallowed, unsure what to say to this. “I’m Ben,” he said. On a whim, he added, “Nothing about my lineage is noteworthy.”

  It seemed his instinct had been correct because the man responded with a genuine grin. “As you can see from my residence, lineage is more about the circumstance of birth than about the parentage of an individual.”

  He looked around. “That’s true in comparison to the main house. And yet, you have your house in this compound. That suggests a certain favor.”

  “Well.” Nemon returned to the table. “My…owners…were not certain whether to place their trust in the new elven king and thus, only half the household has departed to maintain a residence in the new capital with the lady of the house. The husband remains and the rest of us have more space than usual. Certain complications have arisen in my business since the shift but also certain opportunities.”

  “Why do you do it?” he asked him simply. “Delia says you steal from the nobles and give to other nobles. Why take such a risk?”

  The man propped himself on the edge of the table as he considered this. One leg swung slowly. “Because I can,” he said simply. “Unlike the vast majority of this city, I have no reverence for my relatives. I understand that their blood is no different from mine and I have grown up among them, so their mannerisms are not a mystery to me. They give or deny birthright on capricious grounds, so I take whatever I can lay my hands on. What is it to me which noble has a particular necklace if I get a good fee for supplying it?” He shrugged.

  Ben looked at him in silence. Nemon was one of the people who had found his place in the current system, a peripheral member of the web. Whether from apathy or greed, he was not interested in tearing the system down. He would simply grift from it.

  He did not even pretend that he had selfless motives for doing so.

  “Perhaps you’ll feel differently when Delia tells you what I demanded as my price,” he said.

  “Oh?” The man focused on Delia.

  “He wants to assassinate the mark while he’s there,” she said flatly. She smiled when her employer laughed.

  “You…don’t mind?” Ben asked, a little unnerved.

  “Not in the slightest,” Nemon said. “After all, the confusion after a noble is killed is ripe ground for theft—as are the auction and transfer of goods that follow.”

  Now, he felt a growin
g unease. The slave traders of Heffog were not people he felt charitably toward, but he also felt that the act of killing deserved gravity. The man was apparently willing to view life and death as matters that affected his business and nothing more.

  It was unnerving to find that he preferred Elantria’s inaction to this cheerful self-interest. He wondered what she would say to this and wished he could ask her.

  No. That door is closed.

  “So, what’s your plan?” Nemon continued to swing his leg and seemed genuinely interested.

  “I’m not sure yet,” he replied and pointed at the table. “Is that the layout of the house in question?”

  “Yes.” The other two exchanged a glance and Delia gave a small nod. Having been assured that the recruit was trustworthy, the man went to the table and unrolled the map. “The necklace is here in the family’s personal vault. It’s an ancient piece, very valuable but not well-known these days. It should be quite a long time before anyone notices that it’s missing.”

  “So why does your client want it?” he questioned.

  “I don’t ask those things,” Nemon told him. “It’s one of my guarantees. In any event, the necklace looks like…” He pulled a sketched rendering from a pile “This.”

  Ben studied it. He wasn’t an expert on jewelry, but he had to admit that he found it more gaudy than anything else. To him, it looked like nothing more than a wild jumble of large stones and pearls crusted over a thick piece of metal in no particular pattern.

  “Are you sure they don’t merely want it for the jewels?” he asked dubiously.

  “Again, I do not ask.” The man smiled. “Exactly as I will not ask your reasons for wishing to assassinate the owner.”

  He grew less comfortable by the minute.

  “Tell me about the owner,” he said.

  “You’ve signed on, then?”

  “Yes.” He didn’t allow himself time to hesitate. If he did, he knew he’d leave and make new enemies—powerful ones who didn’t mind killing.

  If he stayed, he gained access to someone who could help him destroy the nobility one by one, at least until the man realized he was ending the gravy train. And, hell, if he stole enough items for him, Nemon might not even mind.

  Sometimes, to do good, you had to resort to unpleasant means. He reminded himself of what had happened at the fae castle.

  “Very good.” His new employer gestured to a seating area around the fireplace. The furniture was worn and the expensive fabric faded and threadbare. “Come, sit. We will talk.” He waved for Delia to join them.

  “Don’t you cause suspicion by coming here?” Ben asked her curiously.

  “Oh, no.” She leaned back in her chair. “I’m known around the city as a courtesan. I often arrive at various estates in insufficient disguises, usually at back gates.”

  “A courtesan?” He had to admit a courtesan would make a good ally for a thief.

  “I said I’m known as a courtesan,” she corrected.

  “Ah.”

  “It means no one tries to marry me and I get to go almost anywhere I want.” Her dimples returned. “It’s perfect.”

  Ben could only smile. There was something amusing about her taking joy from what others probably tried to shame her for.

  “She’s not mentioning,” Nemon said, “that she runs a boarding house for runaway courtesans and sets them up with new identities in new cities.”

  “I don’t make fun of how you spend your money,” Delia protested.

  He looked from one to the other. It was interesting to see the range of morality various people in this city had. And if Delia worked with Nemon, the half-elf couldn’t be all that bad, surely.

  “Who’s the mark?” he asked.

  “Lord Kerill,” Nemon stated.

  “Who’s his heir?”

  The man looked curious. “His niece, Birra.”

  A thought had begun to take shape in his head. Elantria had said that one of the problems with his assassination of Jorys was that the slave trade would only accelerate under any of his heirs. If he wanted to not make the same mistake again, he had to be careful.

  “What’s her opinion of his business?” he asked.

  “She already runs some of it.”

  Ah. Not an ally, then.

  “And what if she’s dead?” he asked. “Or otherwise unable to claim the inheritance.”

  “She’d better be dead,” Nemon warned him. “If she’s not, she’ll fight tooth and nail. Behind her in line, you see, is his son—who’s quite the abolitionist.”

  Ben allowed himself a satisfied smile. Excellent. “And how difficult would it be to forge a letter with Kerill’s seal?” he asked.

  His employer now looked deeply interested. “Not overly. It can be done if you need it. For a price, of course. What would you like it to say?”

  “That he has repented of his dealings after a religious experience and intends to make his son his heir. Oh, and he will have the son help him unravel his business and put the fortune to work fighting the slavery industry in Heffog.”

  “You plan to pin his murder on Birra,” Delia said quietly.

  “Yes. Yes, I do.” His smile was grim.

  “That’s…sneaky.” Prima sounded almost worried. “And—what’s the human term? ‘Ice cold?’”

  He gave a tiny nod to tell her she was correct. “Do you think it will work?” he asked Nemon.

  “Oh, very well.” The man was deeply amused. “And would I be correct that you will kill Birra as well to make sure?”

  “Of course.”

  “You will make an interesting addition to the city.” Nemon studied him. “Already, you’ve been seen in the company of Kural and Elantria and now, I find you’re an assassin.” He tapped his mouth and raised an eyebrow. “Did she hire you to kill Jorys?”

  “No,” Ben said and added nothing further. He didn’t want to talk about Elantria, nor did he want to make it seem like she had anything to do with the merchant’s death.

  “A mystery!” The man seemed delighted by that. “Very well, keep your secrets. I’ll find a time in the near future when Birra will be at Kerill’s house and we’ll get you in to accomplish both goals.”

  Chapter Twenty-One

  When Jacob arrived at the lab in the morning, a box rested on one of the tables with several staff members gathered around it.

  “What’s that?”

  “It’s for you,” Amber said. She waved a hand at it.

  “It’s…okay, we’ve checked that it’s not a bomb, right?” The hate mail had mostly tapered off after the initial burst of publicity, but some people were still not happy about the idea of virtual reality.

  “It’s not a bomb,” she said and rolled her eyes good-naturedly. “Nick brought it.”

  “Oh. Okay, then.” He put his cup of coffee down and stepped closer to open the box. The cake inside was his favorite kind—funfetti with boring white frosting. As Amber said, it was the “basic bitch” of cakes.

  He had argued that one should not tamper with perfection.

  CONGRATULATIONS was written across the top in blue frosting.

  “Congratulations?” he asked.

  “Yes.” Amber reached under the table and pulled out a bottle of champagne. “Taigan and Jamie were able to see each other in-game for a while.”

  “Holy shit!”

  After the disappointing first meeting, everyone in the team had been in a funk. The girl’s undeniable progress toward consciousness constantly encountered snags they hadn’t realized there could be, and he had doubted that they could truly help her. But this brought hope.

  He smiled at the group. “Holy shit,” he repeated. “Gimme that champagne.” He popped the cork to the sound of cheers and put his mouth hastily over the opening when contents began to fountain out.

  “Okay, that’s his bottle,” Amber said to the others. She retrieved another one.

  The cake was cut and served—breakfast for the team coming in and dessert for the
team heading home. Everyone watched the video of Taigan and Jamie fighting the jackalopes, and raucous laughter erupted as both teenagers went full berserker in their individual special ways.

  “It’s working,” Jacob said to Nick and Amber in an undertone. “I can’t believe it. I had…stopped believing it.”

  “Me too,” she admitted.

  “Yeah, me too.” Nick sighed. “I felt like such a shitbag, too, having spoken to them all and…like you said, we shouldn’t get too invested, but I did. I thought it would be easy—and it’s very definitely not.”

  “Not in the least,” she agreed. “And we should have thought of that tactic sooner, you know—mortal danger and all that. It was one of the key pieces DuBois talked about at the start.”

  “Yeah, how stupid of us,” he quipped. “Going easy on the comatose girl.”

  “Okay, point taken. Still.” Amber finished her last mouthful of cake with a happy sigh. “Finally, a good update for her parents. Plus, she said she wants to see them all.”

  “And there’s no way that forcing them all into mortal danger together could backfire on us,” Jacob said mildly.

  Nick chortled and reached for another piece of cake.

  “I don’t suppose Ben has also had any leaps forward while I was gone?” the other man asked hopefully.

  “Greedy,” Amber admonished. “Isn’t one piece of good news enough for you? But since you ask, he continues to gain his coordination at a frankly astonishing rate. Last night, he climbed a building on his own. Although that was after he assassinated someone and was kicked out by the person sheltering him.”

  Jacob put his fork down. “I’m sorry, he what?”

  His partners exchanged a look. They tested their wills against each other for a moment and, when neither backed down, sighed and played a round of rock-paper-scissors. She lost and recounted the story of what had happened.

  “Fuck, I might have done the same,” Jacob admitted. “I didn’t even know there was slavery in this world.”

  “There’s a lot we didn’t get to discover because the game wasn’t developed,” she pointed out. “We simply input all the lore and let the procedural generator guide people through it. Our players are seeing parts of the game that we’ve never seen.”