by John Scalzi
Grayland shook her said. “No. It’s doomed no matter what we do. We can’t stop the Flow streams from collapsing. We can’t save the empire. We need to save its people. Not just some of them. Not just the nobles. We need to save all of them. I need to save all of them. That’s my job, as far as I can see.”
“It’s a lot to ask.”
“Probably,” Grayland said. “But I don’t have a choice. I have to try. That’s why I have to know when it’s too late. I can’t stop these coup attempts from coming, not without making the choice to do nothing else useful with my time. But maybe I can do what you did—delay the ones that are out there already. Keep these coup attempts and their masterminds occupied for as long as possible. Because that’s how much time I have. Not until the last Flow stream collapses. Until the first of these coup attempts is successful. That’s how much time I have to save everyone.”
“Admirable,” Chenevert said. “How are you going to delay these coup attempts?”
“By introducing a little chaos.”
Chapter 12
Kiva Lagos reflected that it was easy to get access to just about anyone at any time, if (a) you were of sufficiently high status and (b) if you were willing to be a complete asshole about it. So when she stepped off the Guild House elevator on the floor where the House of Wolfe kept their offices, documents in hand, she didn’t bother stopping at the reception desk; she just turned left and went down the corridor to Drusin Wolfe’s office, ignoring the at first confused and then increasingly strident voices of the eventually three separate people who wanted her to stop.
She did not stop. She flung open the door to Drusin Wolfe’s office, and then slammed it shut and locked it before her reluctant entourage could get to her. Drusin Wolfe looked up from where he sat in a chair by a coffee table, in discussion with another man, about who the fuck knows or cares.
“What the hell?” Wolfe said.
Kiva pointed to the other man. “You. Fuck off.” There was pounding at the door. Kiva ignored it.
Drusin Wolfe put a hand on the other man’s arm to forestall any fucking off. “Are you insane? You can’t just barge into my office and tell people to fuck off.”
“And yet here I am,” Kiva said. “In your office. Telling this extraneous dimwit to fuck off.” She turned her attention to the extraneous dimwit. “What part of ‘fuck off’ aren’t you understanding?”
“He and I have urgent business.”
“You and I have urgent business,” Kiva said. She walked over and flipped a document at him, causing Wolfe a couple of undignified moments as he fumbled at it. “Because if I leave this office without talking to you about that, right now, you’re going to be unhappy with the attention that follows.”
Wolfe read the document, frowning. Kiva turned back to the extraneous dipshit. “This is where he tells you to fuck off,” she assured him. The extraneous dipshit, still deeply confused, looked over to Wolfe.
“I’m not going to tell you to fuck off,” Wolfe said, to the other man, and shot a look at Kiva. “But I’m afraid I do have to deal with this … person right now.”
“You’re kidding,” the extraneous dipshit said, finally speaking.
“I wish I was,” Wolfe assured him. “I’ll have Michael call your office and reschedule.”
Extraneous dipshit sat, gaping, until Kiva knocked him on the shoulder. “You heard the man,” she said. “Now fuck off, already.” She went to the door and unlocked it, yanking it open and causing at least one of the people who had been pounding on it to stumble through the threshold. Extraneous dipshit exited, and after a moment of Wolfe assuring his assistant, the receptionist and a hastily called security guard that everything was fine, Kiva and Wolfe were finally alone.
“Is this always the way you enter a room, Lady Kiva?” Wolfe asked.
“I learned it from my mother.”
Wolfe set the document Kiva had given him on the coffee table, and tapped it. “I’d be very interested in knowing how you came across this bit of information.”
Kiva sat in the chair recently vacated by the extraneous dipshit; it was still warm from his body heat, which was kind of gross. “Well, Drusin, when you come over to ruin my fucking dinner with a monologue, you can assume I’m going to do some research on what you’re up to.”
“I thought I was pretty careful with these transfers.”
“I’m sure you thought that. But you weren’t. And I’m good at finding secrets.”
“But not so good at keeping your own secrets safe, are you?” Wolfe smiled and cocked his head. “I heard you rather suddenly resigned from the emperox’s executive committee. And that you’re being investigated by the Ministry of Revenue. Something about you skimming a bit off the Nohamapetan accounts you were supposed to be auditing.”
“There’s nothing to that.”
“Of course not,” Wolfe said, dryly. “Actually I heard it was more than a bit of money being skimmed. There’s some irony there. You finding all the financial gymnastics the Nohamapetans were up to, and then performing some gymnastics of your own.”
“It’s all crap, and the investigation will show that, so it’s not as ironic as you think,” Kiva said, and then glanced down heavily at the document. “The good news is, I might have a way to get back into the emperox’s good graces.”
“You didn’t come here just to gloat, Lady Kiva.”
“No, if I wanted to do that, I would have just interrupted your fucking dinner.”
“So what are you here for?”
It was Kiva’s turn to tap the document. “I want in,” she said.
“Excuse me?”
“You heard me.”
“Do you even know what you’re asking to get into?”
Kiva smirked. “You think you’re the only one I have dirt on?” She waggled the sheaf of documents that were still in her hand. “It’s a nice, cozy little conspiracy you got going here. Shame if something happened to it.”
“It’s just…”
“What?”
“Well.” Drusin shifted a bit in his chair. “This is a bit sudden. Last week you were the emperox’s pet.”
“No.” Kiva shook her head. “After that last shitty coup attempt happened, Grayland needed a warm fucking body on the executive committee. Someone she thought she could control. I’m not exactly controllable, Drusin.”
Drusin smiled faintly at that. “I’ve noticed.”
“Of course you have; you’re not a complete fucking dimwit.” Kiva leaned in. “Why do you think I’ve suddenly been accused of financial improprieties with Nohamapetan accounts? It’s not because I’m fucking skimming off the top. It’s because our dear emperox needed a pretense for getting me off the executive committee without looking like she was sacking me on a whim. I’m sitting in my office when these fucking revenue goons come in and lay out this shit, and then when they’re gone, not twenty minutes later one of the emperox’s lackeys calls up and offers me the ‘opportunity’ to fucking resign. I know a setup when it happens. This isn’t something that happens in a fucking week. It was a long time coming.”
“You sound angry at the emperox.”
“Of course I’m angry at the fucking emperox. Fuck her and her pissant tactics.”
“So your solution is to blackmail me.”
“No.” Kiva shook her head again, and pointed at the document. “If I was going to use that to patch up things with Grayland I would have done it when her fucking minion called. No, I needed that to get your attention. Now that I have your attention, let me tell you what I can offer you for giving me a seat at this table.”
Wolfe leaned back in his chair. “I’m listening.”
“One: I teach you how to fucking move your money so it’s not as obvious as a child tracking paint on a kitchen floor. I’m one hundred percent amazed you don’t have Grayland’s goons stomping down your fucking door right now.”
“Considering you just had a visit from her goons, I’m not sure I’d want to take your adv
ice here, Lady Kiva.”
“I told you, that was a setup. A pretense. Now that I’m off the executive committee, all that’s going to blow away like a fart by a fan. Which brings us to two: You remember that renegotiation you wanted on the Nohamapetan contracts?”
“I do.”
“Congratulations, you got it.”
“Do I.”
“Yes—if I get in on this.”
“And you think after all this”—Wolfe gestured vaguely, encompassing the conspiracy they were mostly talking around—“is done, you’ll still be in a position to make such deals?”
Kiva snorted. “It’s not going to have to wait for all this.” She waved her hands around, mocking Wolfe’s movements. “We can get this part done now, before ‘all this.’ That way, your house gets its deal no matter if ‘all this’ falls apart.”
“And if ‘all this’ works as planned?”
“Then we’ll see what happens, won’t we?” Kiva shrugged. “I have my own house, Drusin. I have my own businesses and my own concerns. I was fucking drafted to take over the House of Nohamapetan’s business. It won’t exactly kill me to walk away. But in the meantime, you and I can still do business.”
“On my terms.”
“No, they’re my terms now. Now that I’m getting something out of the deal.”
“Hmmm. What else?”
Kiva waggled her documents. “Well, for starters, this adventure of yours is still seriously underfunded. I can get you capital.”
“You’re going to bankroll the revolution,” Wolfe said, sarcastically.
“Of course not,” Kiva said. “She is.”
“Who is ‘she’?”
“The same person whose clandestine personal accounts I’ve kept frozen over the last fucking year, that’s who,” Kiva said, and then enjoyed Wolfe’s shocked expression. “Come on, Drusin. I’m not dense. You didn’t think I was under the impression this was all your idea.” She waggled the documents again. “Or any of these jokers. Something like this takes actual ambition. This absolutely stinks of her.”
“I was under the impression you didn’t like her,” Wolfe said.
“I’m not going to fucking kiss her. I don’t need to like her. I just have to respect her. And that, I do. More than fucking Grayland at the very least. I’ve seen both of them work up close. One knows what she’s doing. The other really does not.”
“So how would you … liberate those funds? I was under the impression that you turned over the secret accounts of hers that you found.”
“I turned over all the secret accounts that I told them about, yes,” Kiva said. “And then there are ones I didn’t tell them about.”
Wolfe smiled. “And here I thought you weren’t skimming.”
“That’s not skimming. That’s prudent financial planning.”
* * *
“This is not the greatest plan I’ve ever heard of,” Senia Fundapellonan said to Kiva, that evening, after their customary nightly festival of mutual orgasms had settled down and they started doing the talking thing.
“It’ll be fine,” Kiva assured her.
Senia propped herself up on the bed. “You’ve manufactured a rift with the ruler of the known universe, are publicly accused of financial improprieties and are pretending to throw your lot in with a person who has tried at least twice to murder the emperox. This person belonging to a family that attempted a coup and also, let us not forget, murdered at least one member of the imperial family. Oh, and tried to murder you, by the way.”
“And which you also used to work for,” Kiva reminded her. “And still kind of do, really. The house, anyway.”
Senia leaned over and kissed Kiva’s shoulder. “I work for you now. You stole me away, remember? After they shot me, aiming for you.”
“When you put it that way, it does seem sort of dodgy,” Kiva admitted.
“Just a little. What I’m saying is, Nadashe will have a lot of reasons to be suspicious of you. You should be able to answer her suspicions.”
“We’ve already done a lot of work in that direction,” Kiva said. “It’s almost certain Nadashe has people in the Ministry of Justice and the Ministry of Revenue. When they check the complaints against me they’ll see the nice doctored investigation reports that confirm what I said to Wolfe. A record of a long investigation, in documents where the metadata says they were created in the last couple of weeks. Just what you would have for a setup.”
“You’re very proud of that,” Senia murmured.
“Come on, it’s a nice fucking touch.”
“It’s not a great idea to be too in love with your own cleverness.”
“What are you, my mother?”
“If I were your mother, I’d use the word ‘fuck’ more often.”
“It’s a perfectly good word.”
“Sure,” Senia said. “Maybe not as every other word that comes out of your mouth, though.”
“I don’t even hear myself saying it, half the fucking time.”
Senia patted Kiva. “I know that. You’d hear it if I used it as much as you did.”
“No I wouldn’t.”
“Fucking yes you fucking absolutely fucking would.”
“Now you’re just exaggerating.”
“Not by much.”
“Great. Now I am going to hear myself saying it every time I fucking use it.”
Senia patted Kiva again. “It will pass, I’m sure. But my point way back when was no matter how clever you think you are, you should be careful of Nadashe. You’re right; I did work for her family. I know who they are. They will find you where you aren’t looking for them. It’s what they do.”
“I know that.”
“I know you know it, Kiva. But I need you to feel it.” Senia sat up in bed. “Look. This might be coming a little early for you, because you’re, well … you, but the thing is, I’m in love with you. Which is not what I expected to happen. I enjoyed you, and then after I was shot and you took care of me, I appreciated you, and I’ve always liked you. But now I know I love you, and that’s terrible, because now I have to fucking worry about you. So I need you to feel, in your head and in your gut, the idea that Nadashe Nohamapetan is dangerous to you. Because you’re not safe until you do. Which is awful for me.”
Kiva lay there in bed, taking in everything Senia was saying, and then, after a respectful pause, she said the only thing she felt she could say in the moment. “You’re trying to fucking curse me, aren’t you?”
Senia looked confused. “What?”
“You’re trying to fucking curse me,” Kiva repeated. “Telling me you love me, right before I go and try to fuck with this fucking coup attempt. That’s some fucking bullshit right there.”
Senia gaped at Kiva, then burst out laughing, then collapsed on top of Kiva. “You asshole,” she said.
“That’s better.”
“It’s not better, but it’s you.” Senia snuggled into Kiva.
“I’ll be careful,” Kiva said, a couple of minutes later.
“Okay, good,” Senia said. “Don’t get me wrong. I know you’re going to righteously mess up Nadashe’s plans. No one blows up other people’s plans like you.”
“Thank you.”
“You’re welcome. Just don’t let her do the same to you.”
“I won’t,” Kiva promised.
* * *
It was Kiva who set the follow-up meeting. Because she both thought it would look better to appear that she didn’t trust the conspirators, and also actually did not trust the conspirators, she arranged to have it happen in a public place: the recently renamed Attavio VI Park. The park was very near Brighton, the late emperox’s home in Hubfall, which he had much preferred to the actual imperial palace on Xi’an. Kiva chose to have the meeting at midafternoon, when Attavio VI Park would be filled with people jogging, biking, walking their pets, playing with their kids and otherwise being in the way. Attavio VI Park was not grandly sized but did feature several pedestrian boulevards lined wi
th trees lush with foliage, forming a near-complete canopy overhead, which would make sniping difficult.
Kiva admitted to herself that she was exercising perhaps an overabundance of caution with the sniper thing. On the other hand, Nadashe had tried to murder her with a sniper before. So there was that. Maybe the overabundance of caution was actually a bare fucking minimum of caution when it came to the Nohamapetans.
Drusin Wolfe was sitting on a bench near the entrance of the park and waved when he saw Kiva; she came over to him. Wordlessly he held out his hand to her. In his palm was an earpiece, a familiar brand with gesture controls for power and volume on the outside surface. Kiva accepted the earpiece, inserted it into her ear, and tapped it to power it up. Ten seconds later there was a tone signaling an incoming call. Kiva tapped the earpiece again to accept.
“Hello, Kiva,” Nadashe Nohamapetan said, from the other end.
“Hello, Nadashe,” Kiva said. She lightly kicked Wolfe, who was still sitting, with her shoe.
What? he mouthed. Kiva signaled silently that she wanted him to stand up. Wolfe looked puzzled. Kiva rolled her eyes, yanked him up off the bench, slipped her arm into the crook of his arm, and started walking him down the pedestrian boulevard so she wouldn’t be a literal fucking sitting target.
“I understand you have an interest in joining our little concern,” Nadashe said, while Kiva was hauling Wolfe up from his fucking seat. “You might understand how I might be concerned about your sincerity.”
“You mean, because I am in control of your house’s business, and because your family tried to fucking murder me, so we both have very good reasons to dislike and distrust each other,” Kiva said.
“Yes, that,” Nadashe said. Kiva noticed there was a very slight pause between when she stopped talking and Nadashe responded. This suggested that wherever Nadashe currently was, it was not on Hub itself; rather somewhere far enough away that there was just a smidgen of light-speed lag. Kiva couldn’t blame her for that. Nadashe was an escaped criminal, after all. Coming to Hub was asking for trouble.
“I’ve already explained to Drusin Wolfe my reasons,” Kiva said. “You can either accept them as sincere or don’t. For my part, I’m willing to overlook your family trying to blow my brains out. I understand it was just business. Stupid and foolish as fuck, but just business.”
