by Dan Stout
Ajax flipped a page in his notebook.
“Tell us about the Squib delegation,” he said. “How many of them are there? Are there any tensions among them?”
Good man. We’d had to fight to get in to see Gellica, and this was the closest we’d get to a briefing on the Squib delegates.
“There are five members of the delegation,” she said. “They’re mostly driven by—” She broke off. “Well, how familiar are you with Squib history?”
“As it happens,” I said, “my partner has a degree on Southern Crossing cultures.”
“Oh?” Gellica looked at Ajax, who was staring daggers at me.
“Poli-sci,” said Ajax.
She pursed her lips. “Then you know all about the reason the Squibs are so interested in the wind farms.”
Ajax wavered, as if torn between wanting Gellica to answer, and wanting to demonstrate his knowledge after our earlier argument. In the end his ego won out.
“The beach panic,” he said. “About seventy-five years ago, Squib researchers found trace manna on their beaches. People went wild. Fresh manna hadn’t been seen in over a century, since the Shortage began. And it had obviously never been found outside of a whale.”
“Which is exactly where the manna on the beach came from,” Gellica said. “The decaying body of a whale. Probably one of the last that ever lived in the wild.”
“Maybe,” said Ajax. “Or maybe an old manna-powered shipwreck got dislodged by a storm. No one knows, but it was enough to start a speculation frenzy.”
“If it was real,” I said, “it would’ve changed everything.”
Ajax’s eyes crinkled. “That’s an understatement.”
I thought of the manna-driven machines and factories, wondered how many had been scrapped, and how many were sitting mothballed in museums. What would it take to restart the first industrial revolution?
“So they searched,” I said. “And didn’t find anything. And now they want to buy windmills?”
Gellica sighed. “If you want to believe something is there, not finding it won’t stop you. The Squibs dredged almost every square inch of shoreline they had. They had a tourist economy and overnight their beaches were nothing but mud and boulders.”
“Took decades to repair the damage.” Ajax hummed a note of remorse. “The reefs never will recover.”
“The Squibs are doing fine now,” I said. “They’ve got enough cash to buy up the old oil fields.”
“Sure,” said Gellica. “Once the beaches were sand covered again, tourists came back, along with their money. And the fallout from the false manna debacle pushed the Squibs into alternative energy. Now they have plenty of cash and the infrastructure needed to make wind farms work. It’s the great irony, I suppose: the same pipe dream that crippled their economy has put them in the perfect place to take advantage of the oil shortage here.”
“They must be excited to get the purchase closed,” I said.
“Oh, they are,” she said. “This deal justifies the economic disaster they suffered through for a generation. For the Squibs this is equal parts pride and greed. It makes them motivated buyers, which is exactly what we need.” She tucked a stray strand of hair over her ear. “In the end, we all benefit.”
“And Garson Haberdine’s death?” said Ajax. “Who benefits from that?”
“No one.”
Ajax and I exchanged a look.
“Surely there’s some—”
Gellica held up a hand. “No one I know of. I can’t speak to the personal lives of the Squib delegation . . . but on a political level?” She shook her head. “I can’t think of anyone who’d want him dead.”
“Maybe it’s not him,” Ajax said. “Maybe it’s the talks.”
“There, either. If the talks are postponed there’s no money for the landholders who want to sell to the Squibs, there’s no income being generated for the city off that land, real estate values drop . . .”
“Someone wants them to stop,” said Ajax. “I’ve seen anti-wind farm ads all over the place.”
I was sure he had. They’d started appearing on television, radio, newspapers, even on the sides of buses. Always the same message: keep Titanshade great by turning back the clock and staying true to oil.
Gellica sighed. “That’s Harlan Cedrow,” she said. “He’s been making noise about deep-layer reserves, but there’s no geological surveys to back it up. And again”—Gellica held up empty hands—“no deal means no money at all. Harlan has to answer to his investors. The PR push is just posturing for better terms.”
“Harlan Cedrow,” Ajax repeated, jotting it down. “Is he tied to one of the oil companies?”
It was a blatant reminder that Ajax was new to town. No native Titanshader would need to ask such a question.
“That’s Rediron, kid,” I said. “They own pretty much everything.” My father had worked a Rediron rig, owned part and parcel by the Cedrows, the oldest oil family of them all.
“Rediron holds the majority of remaining oil land,” said Gellica, “and they are the largest group still holding out. But they certainly don’t own everything.”
“The Cedrows are popular,” I told Ajax. “The family kicks back to the community. Raises funds, runs charities. I’ve seen it firsthand.” I didn’t feel the need to tell him about how exactly I’d seen it. I looked from him to Gellica.
“What about the other landowners?” I asked. “Even knowing they could be shooting themselves in the foot.”
Gellica reached down to the tea service and plucked a sugar cube from the serving dish. She slid it into her mouth and pursed her lips, as if considering the possibility.
“You’re asking me if anyone would rather go without than see someone else profit more than they do. It’s possible. There’s no shortage of people who want a bigger piece of the pie.” She ran a thumbnail over her dimpled chin. “But this murder threatens to destroy the pie completely.”
She sat up straighter, as if secure in her conclusion.
“No,” she said. “Everyone knows the wells are running dry. Titanshade powers the nation. The entire Assembly of Free States is on borrowed time unless we can bring the city into a new age, with an alternative energy supply.”
“We grasp the situation,” said Ajax, tugging at his shirt collar, pulling it away from the speaking mouth in his throat.
“Then you know that the only way out of this mess is forward. I don’t know who killed Envoy Haberdine, or why. But I know that stopping the talks doesn’t benefit anyone. The world is changing, Detectives. Titanshade is about to enter a new era.”
I looked at Ajax. If she was starting to break out sound bites, then we’d gotten everything useful out of her. We muttered our thanks as we stood up to leave. Gellica walked us to the door, but paused before opening it. Even the doorknob under her fingers was heavy with ornamentation.
“Keep me informed about any developments, Detectives.”
Jax and I exchanged glances.
“We don’t really keep the public up to date with ongoing investigations,” he said.
She didn’t smile, much as I may have wished she would. “I mean keep me informed so that I can help you. Whether it’s one of our employees or not, you’re going to run into some bureaucratic roadblocks at some point. Tell me when you do, and I’ll apply pressure best as I’m able. You might be surprised at what the AFS is capable of.”
I thought of Talena’s friend Stacie, and the offhand comment that had led us to Envoy Gellica and her handsomely decorated office.
I gave her a smile. “We appreciate that, we really do, Ambassad—” I broke off with a chuckle. “Hells, now I’m doing it.”
Jax tensed and I half expected another pencil jab, but Gellica waved my comment away.
“That’s quite all right, Detective.”
“Out of curiosity, tho
ugh.” I circled around to my real question. “Is there anyone else with the title of ambassador other than Paulus? Even informally, I mean.”
She frowned. “Not from the AFS. The only member of the Squib delegation with a formal title is Ambassador Yarvis. Why do you ask?”
“No reason, really. That stuff interests me. Titles and ceremonies and so forth.”
“Well, the next time we talk I’ll see about getting you a book on the subject.”
The door opened, and we walked out of her office. From the hallway I glanced back, and was rewarded with one more glimpse of her smile. Then the door closed, and we still had a killer to find.
9
AT THE BUNKER THERE WERE more people gathered in the street, and the mood was changing from unhappy to unruly. Some held signs, crude drawings of frogs with x-ed out eyes, banners covered with slogans: “Who do you serve?” “Who do you protect?” Oil protectionists screamed at wind farm proponents and they all jeered at the police. Protesters and counter-protesters, they were there because their world was changing and there was nothing they could do about it. It was one step up from a primal scream of frustration, all ready-made for the six o’clock news.
Ajax eyed the growing crowd with unease.
“You get this kind of reaction for all homicide cases?”
“Nah,” I said. “Just the ones I’m assigned to.”
We were parked down the street from the Bunker, watching the churn in the streets as pedestrians and drivers worked their way around and through the protests. We’d come down to turn over the materials Gellica had given us, but stopped short when we got a look at the crowd.
The killing had the city on edge. If there was no wind farm deal, most of the people walking these streets would be affected. Once the oil ran dry, those lucky enough to still have jobs would be living in fear of a complete economic collapse. And it didn’t stop at the city limits. The rest of the AFS depended on Titanshade petroleum to fill their fuel tanks and to manufacture everything from ballpoint pens to toothpaste tubes. Without our oil reserves the central government would have to go crawling to one of the other world powers to ramp up production. It had been a hundred years since the first industrial boom collapsed when the world ran short of manna. Now we might be headed there again. Titanshade usually got lip service from the politicians once an election cycle. But as we teetered on obsolescence, the rest of the world watched and wondered: Would Titanshade’s collapse drive the world into another Shortage?
International politics, domestic unease, and basic fear for one’s life. They all came together in the Haberdine case, distilled into the waving signs and chanted slogans of the crowd.
We sat in silence, looking at the crowd, the traffic, the slow-moving Therreau wagons that rolled along, never stopping.
My mind kept returning to the gory scene in room 430, and the devastation visited on the Squib diplomat. The attacker must have raged, like a wild animal. Or worse—an animal kills, even eats, but it doesn’t shred the carcass into near nonexistence.
Whoever had killed Haberdine had been able to collect themselves enough to escape unseen. Was it someone working alone, or a team? Why would Haberdine let them in the room in the first place? I remembered the red sticker on the Do Not Disturb sign. But the sign had been inside the door—
“Hey, do the Therreau always wear masks?” Ajax broke my concentration.
I looked at the Therreau cart. It was driven by somber-faced, hairless humans wearing cloth bandannas tied over their noses and mouths.
“No, those are new,” I said.
“You think they’re afraid of breathing in Squib smell?”
“I don’t know and don’t care enough to find out.” I looked away from the cart. “More important things on my mind than a bunch of farmers and their lack of fashion sense.”
“Seems kind of paranoid. The streets would have to run with blood before the smell got to entire crowds. Their boots would be dripping with the stuff.”
I tried to ignore him. A wasted effort, as he kept talking.
“Footprints!” he said.
I clearly wasn’t going to get a chance to think in silence.
“Footprints?” I asked.
“The Haberdine murder scene was such a mess we all had to wear shoe covers in the room. But the killer didn’t leave any bloody footprints in that hallway.”
I grunted assent. “It’s why I think a pro’s behind it,” I said. “One of the reasons, anyway.”
“They could’ve been cleaned up with magic.”
It was the overenthusiastic theory of a rookie.
“You saw the divination officer doing her thing after what, two weeks in the city?” I asked. “Most people in this town go their whole lives with only a glimpse or two of real magic.”
“And there aren’t other sorcerers in town?”
I cut him off with a frown.
“Back in your hometown,” I said. “Kodachrome.”
“Kohinoor.”
“Whatever. How many times did you see people there use manna?” I asked.
I guessed it’d be close to zero. His lack of response told me I’d guessed about right.
“Titanshade’s got no shortage of the super-rich,” I said, “but that doesn’t mean they’ve got gold toilets. Manna and sorcery are expensive and getting more expensive each day. And that’s the legal stuff. Manna for non-government work sells at black market prices.” I scanned the crowd. “Magic’s always the last option. The day someone figures how to make more manna, that’s when we’ll start worrying about magical crimes.”
Ajax had stopped listening halfway through my speech, opening the glove box and pulling out the map of Titanshade that was included with the car. He unfolded it, tapping the seams out and spreading it across the dashboard. My city painted in primary colors. A complicated grid of streets and alleys, Titanshade was a rough circle with the irregular shape of the Mount blocking out its upper-right quarter.
“Like a moon going into eclipse,” muttered Ajax.
“Funny,” I said. “I always thought it looks like a cookie with a bite taken out of it.”
A human bite, of course. A Mollenkampi would obliterate a cookie.
Ajax ran one finger over the streets until he found what he was looking for. The Eagle Crest.
“Where’s the Bell-Asandro home?”
I tapped a spot farther leeward, in the direction of the Borderlands.
“It’s not too far,” he said.
“Not too close, either. The boundaries around neighborhoods are economical more than physical.”
“Still,” he said. “It’s close.”
“Everything’s close,” I said. “That’s the problem. Five million of us piled on top of each other, clinging to the geo-vents like drowning sailors on a life raft. It’s no wonder we’re all trying to kill each other.” The horror of Haberdine’s murder scene came rushing back, and for a moment I thought I smelled a whiff of cinnamon in the air. I pinched my nose. I needed a drink.
* * *
We delivered the files that Gellica had given us to Kravitz and retreated to our desks to plan our next move. A mail cart rolled around the perimeter of the Bullpen, its progress announced by the wobbly, squeaky wheel that maintenance kept forgetting or just plain didn’t care about. When it came around to our desks, the mail clerk dropped a yellow interdepartmental envelope in front of Ajax.
Ripping the seal open, Ajax pulled out a packet of ten or fifteen stapled pages. He riffled through them.
“This is the profile on the Bell-Asandro kids’ aunt. The one who split babysitting duty with the neighbor,” he said. “Nina Bell.”
“She came up in the system? So she’s got a record.”
“Yeah. Long and nonviolent. Minor thefts, numerous counts of drug possession and public intoxication.”
“W
hat’s her drug of choice?”
Jax flipped through a second page. “Looks like it varied with whatever was cheap, but I’m seeing lots of chono.”
That made sense. Chono had been plentiful and cheap a few years ago. For the price of a meal users could buy a sense of calm confidence, along with a wicked comedown and an overwhelming urge for another fix. The mayor’s office fought the epidemic with a series of poorly produced ads that featured wealthy kids in light clothes, always ending with the tagline “Chono? Oh, no!” Not surprisingly, it hadn’t worked.
“Hard to believe the Bells let a spiker watch their kids,” I said.
“No arrests in . . .” He ran a finger down the page. “Almost eighteen months. She may be clean.”
“Doubtful,” I said, though I hoped I was wrong. I also hoped that the nightmare she was about to go through wasn’t going to push her into using. There was always someone waiting to help those in pain escape their reality, and some organizations moved veritable rivers of the stuff. I thought of Jax’s reaction to one of them when we were at the Hey-Hey.
“The Harlq Syndicate,” I said. “They push it in Kohinoor?”
He nodded once. A curt affirmative that also told me I wouldn’t be getting any further details. I moved on.
“So we should talk to this aunt.”
Ajax stared at the rap sheet, perhaps still banishing whatever memories my mention of the Harlqs had dredged up. Finally, he slid the report over to my desk.
“You mean you should,” he said. “I’ve got that report on the Bell-Asandro murder to write up, after your demonstration of how to deduce possible motive.”
“Aw, kid. I’m not gonna hold you to that.”
“Nope,” he said. “A deal’s a deal.”
* * *
I rang the doorbell of Nina Bell’s townhome, half hoping that she wouldn’t answer. Family interviews were a part of the job I truly hated. I’d rather chase down a homicidal roughneck in a dark alley than rattle the cage of someone truly in mourning.
