Akim returned. "All set," he reported. "Which one is Radig Nardin?"
"He's gone," Daulo said mechanically. "Drove off a couple of minutes ago."
"Oh? Well, that solves that problem."
Daulo took a deep breath. "I guess so."
Chapter 34
Azras was twenty kilometers north of the section of forest where Jin had hidden
Daulo's car-a healthy run even for a Cobra, and one that allowed plenty of time for worrying about what lay ahead. Just one more reason to be thankful that the predawn jog itself was totally uneventful.
Her timing, for a change, was good, and she arrived at the city just as the sky to the east was growing light. Already some of the shopkeepers in the nearest marketplaces were beginning to prepare their booths for business, and she drifted through the streets pretending to be on various errands, feeling safer than she had since landing on Qasama. Disguised in lower-class male clothing, her hair covered by a carefully trimmed wig and her features altered slightly with face-shaper gel, she ought to be totally unrecognizable, especially to people who thought they had a good picture to go by.
That was the theory, at any rate... and as the morning progressed, it appeared to work in practice. She bought herself some breakfast-a nice treat after a day of emergency ration bars-and spent an hour wandering around the marketplace, observing the citizens of Azras as they began their new day.
She'd forgotten to ask Daulo when the work party selection would get underway, but when she made her first pass by the city center she saw that timing wasn't going to be critical. The park-like open area was teeming with men, most of them standing in a ragged and snaky line running up to a set of tables at one end.
She watched for a few minutes, timing the procedure and estimating how long it would take to process the entire line, and then wandered off. Without Daulo it would be foolish to try and get into the work party in any straightforward way, and there would be little opportunity to try anything less obvious until the workers were ready to move out.
An hour later she returned, to find perhaps thirty minutes' worth of line left.
Easing through the milling crowd of those who'd had their turns at the tables and were awaiting the results, she made her way across the center toward where a line of buses were parked along the street. Transport to Mangus, presumably.
Also the simplest way for her to penetrate the place, assuming she could find some private hiding place atop, beneath, or inside one of them.
And with most of her attention on the buses, she suddenly found herself walking directly toward Daulo.
Fortunately, he was nearing the front of the line and seemed to have most of his own attention on the tables ahead. Bless the angel who watches over fools, Jin thought to herself, shifting her path to give him a wide berth. Beyond him, near the buses, another official-looking table had been set up; beyond that, a group of men were loitering near the vehicles. Together they effectively canceled any chance for approaching the buses from this side. If she swung around to the other side, made her approach from there-
Her thoughts froze in place. One of the men in that group, eyes ranging alertly over the crowd...
Was Radig Nardin. Watching, presumably, for Daulo.
For a half dozen heartbeats she just stood there, oblivious to the men milling around her. With Moffren Omnathi and the Shahni occupying her worries lately, she'd almost forgotten Mangus's own attempts to discourage her and Daulo. But
Mangus obviously hadn't... and having seen Daulo in Milika less than four days ago, there was little chance Nardin would fail to recognize him.
At least, assuming he was able to continue looking...
She chewed at her lip, thinking hard. Step close and stun him with her sonic, hoping the others would assume he was ill and rush him away for treatment? But she would have to be practically up against him to deliver that kind of jolt without the others feeling some fringe effects. Use her lasers to set one of the buses on fire? No good; with his rank Nardin wouldn't be one of those fighting the fire. Besides which, any large-scale trouble she caused would more than likely just hold up the loading of the workers without guaranteeing that Nardin wouldn't still be around to watch it.
Unless...
She gritted her teeth. It was a borderline crazy idea... but if it worked, it would solve both her problems at one crack.
Across the city center, near the rearmost of the line of buses, was a small shedlike building, possibly a public toilet. Jin crossed to it and, positioning herself facing the wall away from the would-be workers, she worked her fingernails under the edges of the face-shaper gel and began tearing it away. It wasn't a pleasant task-the stuff wasn't supposed to be removed except with a special solvent-and her cheeks and chin felt raw by the time she'd finished. The wig and men's clothes she would have to leave as is; but if Nardin had been paying attention during his trip to the Sammon mine it ought to be enough.
In Milika she'd noted evidence of gaps between social classes, and as she walked up to Nardin's group it became quickly apparent that city dwellers worked under a similar set of rules. A lower-class man, wearing the clothing Jin was, would never have tried to barge right up to someone of Nardin's status, a fact that registered clearly in the startled expressions of those around Nardin as she passed between them. She was within arm's reach of the other, in fact, before two of the entourage broke their astonishment enough to step into her path.
"Where do you think you're going?" one of them snarled at her.
"To speak to Master Radig Nardin," she said calmly. "I have a message for him."
Nardin turned to glare at her. "Since when do-?"
The words froze on his lips as recognition flashed onto his face, followed immediately by a whole series of startled emotions. "You-what-?"
"I bring a message for your father, Master Nardin," she said into his confusion, touching fingertips to her forehead. "May I approach?"
Nardin glanced at his companions, seemed to pull himself together. "You may. Let her pass," he ordered.
She sensed the shock pass through the others as she slipped between them-apparently they hadn't yet realized that she was in fact a woman. Dimly, she wondered if transvestism was a crime on Qasama, then dismissed the thought.
"I bring a message for your father from Kruin Sammon of Milika," she told him.
"Will you take me to him?"
Nardin's face had become an unreadable mask. "I remember you," he said. "You were in the village Milika in the company of Kruin Sammon's eldest son. Who are you that he trusts you with messages?"
"My name is Asya Elghani, Master Nardin."
"And your relation to the Sammon family?"
"That of a business professional," Jin said, choosing her words carefully. She had no idea if the service she was about to describe even existed on Qasama; but with the widespread Qasaman use of drugs, there was no reason why it shouldn't.
"I'm a messenger, sent as I said to your father, Obolo Nardin."
Nardin cocked an eyebrow, his gaze flicking pointedly over her clothing. "And what is so special about you that you should be trusted with messages of any importance? Aside from the fact that few people would think you so trustworthy?"
Jin ignored the snickers from the others. "What makes me special," she told
Nardin, "is that I carry an oral message... the contents of which I don't know."
Nardin's eyes narrowed. "Explain."
Jin let a look of barely controlled impatience drift across her face. "The message was given me while I was in a special drug-induced trance," she said.
"Only in your father's presence will I be able to return to that trance and deliver the message."
He gazed at her for a long moment, and she mentally crossed her fingers. "How important is this message?" he asked. "Is the timing of its delivery crucial?"
"I have no way of knowing either," Jin told him.
One of the other men stepped close to Nardin. "With your permission, Master
Nardin," he murmured, "may I suggest that the timing of this supposed message is extremely suspicious?"
Nardin's eyes stayed on Jin. "Perhaps," he muttered back. "However, if this is a ruse, it does little but buy him some time." Slowly, he nodded, "Very well, then. I'll take you to my father."
Jin bowed. "I'm at your disposal, Master Nardin," she said.
He turned and headed to the rear of the line of buses. Jin followed, sensing a second man join them. A car was parked behind the buses; the other man slid into the driver's seat as Nardin and Jin took the back, and almost before she had her door closed the vehicle swung out into the street and headed east.
Carefully, Jin took a breath, exhaled it with equal care. Once again, it seemed, the pervasive Qasaman disdain of women had worked in her favor. Nardin might have swallowed the same "private message" routine coming from another man, but he almost certainly wouldn't have let a male stranger into his car without some extra protection along. But as a woman, Jin was automatically no threat to him.
Settling back against the seat cushions, she watched the cityscape go past her window and tried to figure out just how best to turn that blind spot to her advantage.
Chapter 35
It was a fifty-kilometer drive from Azras to Mangus, along a road that was clearly newer and in better shape than the highway Jin had jogged alongside earlier that morning. Neither Nardin nor the driver spoke to her throughout the trip, which gave her little to do but study the scenery outside and-more surreptitiously-the two of them.
Neither examination was all that impressive. Nardin rode impassively, eyes flicking to her occasionally but generally staying on the road ahead. The driver, too, seemed stiff and distant, even toward Nardin. Their few exchanges were short and perfunctory, and she could sense none of the easy camaraderie that she'd seen between Daulo and his own driver. A strict master/servant relationship, she decided eventually, without a scrap of friendship or even mutual respect to it. In retrospect, given her first impression of Nardin four days previously, it wasn't all that unexpected.
The landscape outside wasn't quite as unfriendly, but it more than made up for that in sheer dullness, consisting mainly of flat tree-dotted plains. Further to the east, she knew, the dense forest that surrounded Milika began again, extending across Qasama to the villages at the opposite end of the Fertile
Crescent. But here, at least, the forest had failed to take.
Which meant that there would be far fewer deadly predators between them and
Azras, should she and Daulo need to get out of Mangus in a hurry. Fewer beasts, and considerably less cover. All things considered, she would have preferred to take her chances with the predators.
Mangus was visible long before they reached it... and the satellite photos hadn't nearly done the place justice. From what she could see of the high black wall surrounding it, the compound appeared to be shaped roughly like a diamond, in sharp contrast to the circular shape of Milika and the villages her father had visited on Qasama. The diamond's long ends seemed to point southeast and northwest-along the direction of the planet's magnetic field, she decided, remembering the similarly angled streets in Azras and the other cities. Qasama's migrating bololin herds took their direction from magnetic field lines, and builders either had to deflect the huge beasts around human habitations or else give them as free a passage as possible.
Impressive as the wall was, though, it paled in comparison to the shimmering dome-shaped canopy arching over it.
The Cobra Worlds' satellites hadn't been able to make much of the canopy. It was metal or metal coated; it wasn't solid, but a tightly woven double mesh of some sort whose varying interference patterns actually blocked the probes more effectively than a solid structure would have; and it was almost entirely opaque to every electromagnetic wavelength the satellites were able to work with.
Now, seeing it at ground level, Jin found she couldn't add much more to that list. It was anchored, she could see, by tall black pylons set into the ground outside the wall, which were in turn held in place by pairs of guy cables. How the canopy was being held up in the center was still a mystery, especially since its slight but visible rippling in the wind showed it to be more akin to fabric than to rigid metal. She was peering toward it, trying to see through the slight gap between its lower edge and the upper part of the wall, when a movement past the wall to her left caught her eye. Keying her optical enhancers to telescopic, she focused on it.
It was a bus. Identical to the ones that had been waiting to bring Daulo and his fellow workers to Mangus... except that this one was heading northward on a different road. As was the bus that followed it. And the next. And the next.
"They're going to Purma," Radig Nardin said into her thoughts. Startled, she looked at him, to find him gazing hard at her.
"I see, Master Nardin," she said, remembering to show proper respect. "May I ask who they are?"
His forehead creased a fraction more. "Last week's workers. On their way home."
Jin hesitated. Another question might be out of Qasaman character... but, then, she'd already established herself as an anomaly, anyway. "Do you hire from Purma often?"
"Every other week or so," he said. "It alternates with the hiring from Azras."
"I see." Carefully, Jin settled back into her seat, returning her eyes to the wall and dome ahead. So Mangus did have enough work to keep what amounted to a full-time force busy. So why didn't they simply go ahead and hire permanent workers, instead of going through all this trouble every week?
They had passed the line of pylons now, and as they neared the end of the road a gateway swung open up in the wall ahead. The only gateway on this side of the compound, she noticed, and built furthermore along the lines of a minor bank vault. Bololin-proof, for certain.
There were half a dozen buildings visible as the car drove through the gateway and into Mangus proper: an office-looking one directly ahead, a residence-type building beyond it, a guard station and garage flanking the road to right and left. But Jin saw them only peripherally. Her full attention was grabbed by the totally unexpected black wall rising off to her right.
It ran, as near as she could tell, between two of the diamond-shape's corners, cutting Mangus into two roughly equilateral triangles. A single gate was set into it at its center, a gate that looked to be just as strong as the one they'd just passed through. The only way into that section? she wondered, remembering that there'd been just one gateway into Mangus on the western part of the outer wall.
If so, that implied that Mangus's dark secrets came in two distinct shades. Now if only Radig's father Obolo Nardin kept his office beyond that internal wall...
But it wasn't going to be quite that easy. "The administrative center, Master
Nardin?" the driver called over his shoulder.
"Yes," Radig said, looking at Jin. "You'll be given-" his eyes flicked down
"-more suitable clothing before being brought before my father."
"Thank you, Master Nardin," Jin nodded gravely. Leaning slightly toward the window, she saw that another of the black pylons rose from the top of the interior wall, reaching upward to the center of the overhead canopy. The shield's primary support, clearly, with perhaps medium-strength ribs extending from it to the outside pylons to maintain the dome shape. Simple but effective.
"I trust you'll provide me with transportation back to Azras once I've delivered my message," she added to Nardin.
He cocked an eyebrow. "That may depend," he said coolly, "on just what the message is."
They kept her waiting a long time, far longer than it took her to change into the clothes they'd given her. Long enough, in fact, that she was beginning to wonder if they were secretly monitoring her; and if so, when she as a supposedly busy professional ought to start looking annoyed at having her time wasted. But eventually someone came, and she was taken down a series of corridors to Obolo
Nardin's throne room.
There was no other way to think of the plac
e. Larger and far more elaborate than
Kruin Sammon's study-larger even than the big-city mayor's office she'd seen tapes of-it was clearly designed to intimidate all who came in. A light breeze continually played across her face as she was led through and around the maze of hanging curtains to the center. A quick mental picture flashed across her mind, a picture of a spider waiting in the center of his web...
"What is your name?" the man on the cushion throne growled at her.
With an effort, Jin forced the spider image from her mind. I'm a Cobra, she reminded herself. Spiders aren't supposed to scare me. "I am Asya Elghani,
Master," she said, making the sign of respect and studying his unnaturally bright eyes. Excessive use of Qasama's mind drugs? "Are you Obolo Nardin?"
The man's face didn't change... but an abrupt shiver ran up her back. "I am," he said. "What have you to say to me?"
Timothy Zahn - Cobra 03 - Cobra Bargain Page 27
