Shadow Man (Paragons of Queer Speculative Fiction)

by Scott, Melissa

  Jillamie: (Hara) literally "girlfriend"; always very casual, and can easily become an insult.

  10

  Warreven

  The fog had come in while they were in Bon'Ador, filling the streets that led up from Harborside. From the doorway of the club, Warreven could see the lighthouse tower at Blind Point rising above the heavy layers of vapor, the beam of light cutting a golden wedge through the dank air. To his left, the empty street ran straight to the Glassmarket, drowned in cloud. The sunken center held the fog like a basin, only the poles of the streetlights rising out of the mass: even if it hadn't been well after hours, the merchants would have had to close. A single figure was moving on the larger sales platform--a cleaner, or maybe a late-closing merchant, shaal-hooded against the damp. He or she was knee-deep in fog, and more wisps curled and eddied, fine as smoke, around her/his shoulders, clearly visible in the market lights. Warreven caught his breath, admiring the image, and the door opened behind him.

  "Any luck?"

  Haliday stepped up beside him, shaking 3er head. "There's not a car or rover to be had, for love or money. The service said, maybe in an hour, but Reinier wants us out of here."

  "He could let us wait," Warreven said, irritated, and Haliday shrugged.

  "He's got his license to think of. He said the mosstaas and the Service Board have been breathing down his neck."

  "He could close the damn bar," Warreven said, and sighed, looking back toward Blind Point. There was no one else in sight--not surprising on a night like this--and the street seemed to vanish before it reached the top of the hill, obscured by a drift of fog. "I don't suppose we could get a trolley."

  "It's a fifteen-minute walk to Harborside, or thirty to Terminus, and we'd never make that before they shut down," Haliday said. "We could make it home in that."

  Warreven hesitated. He didn't want to walk, not tonight, not with the ghost ranas still loose, but he especially didn't want to have to cross the streets above Dock Row where they'd been most active to get to the trolley station at Harborside. "I guess we walk," he said, and Haliday nodded.

  "There's two of us, and it's a nasty night. Even the ghost ranas have to take a night off sometime."

  "You hope," Warreven said sourly, and jammed his hands into the pockets of his trousers. It was cold--he was cold, and the fog was seeping through the fabric of his tunic, damp on his skin.

  Haliday made a sound that was almost laughter and started up the hill. Warreven followed, hunching his shoulders against the chill. "At least the meeting went well," he said.

  Haliday nodded. "We should have a couple of good presances worked up, and then the ranas--our ranas--can start playing them."

  "If that's enough," Warreven said. He shook his head, trying to shake away the memory of Tendlathe in the Harbor Market, denying that the off-worlders were human.

  "It will be," Haliday said, and smiled, the expression wry. "It has to be. Temelathe hasn't left us any other way."

  Warreven shook his head again. They reached the top of the hill and started down the other side, the fog rising to meet them, damp on their faces and necks. The streetlights seemed to make the mist more opaque than ever, so that for a moment he could barely make out the buildings on the other side of the street. Haliday's face, little more than an arm's length, was blurred, as though seen through smoke. Haliday glanced at him again.

  "Pity the poor sailor," 3e said, and the words were half a prayer.

  Warreven nodded, thinking of the seascape tonight: no wind, calm seas, all the familiar sea- and landmarks flattened, just the lights and mostly the bells and horns to mark the coast's worst hazards. He'd been at sea once in a similar fog, coming down from Ambreslight with Chauntclere, and Clere had made no pretense of bravado. They had dropped anchor, set all the lights blazing and rigged the boat-horns to sound steadily, and had been very glad of the dawn. He tilted his head, wondering if he could hear any of the ships that must be caught offshore, but heard only the familiar tri-toned howl from Ferryhead. It was followed a few seconds later by the louder double note of Blind Point, and then the Sail Harbor buoy.

  "Do you think the off-worlders will support us?" Haliday asked.

  Warreven shrugged. "Some of them, maybe. Tatian will--they, NAPD, are already sticking their necks out for us, with Reiss's statement."

  "He's getting enough for it," Haliday said. "And remember, Raven, by all accounts he's so-abed."

  "That's not the point," Warreven answered, all the more sharply because he'd heard the same rumors. "And this could do a lot for us. What was it Astfer said, all we need is one clear case?"

  Haliday nodded. "But this isn't going to be it, that I'm sure of. Destany's hardly the perfect candidate."

  "Neither's 'Aukai," Warreven muttered.

  "Temelathe is being smart," Haliday said. "He's letting Tendlathe do all the dirty work, and then he goes out to the mesnies and wonders aloud if the pharmaceuticals will go on dealing with us if he can't keep the peace."

  "There's not much the mesnies can do about Bonemarche," Warreven said.

  "You hope," Haliday said, with another crooked smile.

  The fog had thinned a little, was drifting in patches across the roadway. The buildings to either side were changing, becoming older, residential, tall narrow buildings jammed close to the street to leave room for gardens and spider pens at the back of the property. There were no streetlights here; instead, each household was responsible for a light above the main door, so that the street was lit by a line of orange globes, each a little above head height. In the fog, they looked like strands of night-pearls, the glowing spheres stretching the length of the street. They reminded Warreven vaguely of holidays, of dancing on the Irenfot beaches when the shedi were spawning and the strings of phosphorescent egg cases washed ashore with every wave. The last time he'd seen night-pearls had been three years ago, after the kittereen races, the year he'd met Reiss.

  A shape loomed out of the fog bank ahead of them, the low-set lights throwing its shadow back across solid-looking mist. Warreven stepped sideways into the middle of the street, looking around for a police light, and slipped his hands out of his pockets again. Two more shapes joined the first, instantly and silently, familiar shapes in the loose black robes and hoods and the white, doll-faced masks. Warreven looked over his shoulder, ready to run. Five more ranas blocked the street behind them, three in the lead, two shadowy in the fog behind. He turned back to the first group, heard Haliday swear under 3er breath beside him. The ranas moved toward them, not hurrying, and instinctively he shifted so that he could see both groups. Haliday matched him, so that they stood back-to-back in the middle of the open road. On any other night, there would have been traffic, some chance that a rover or shay would come by, disrupt the line, give them a chance to run, but they hadn't seen a vehicle all night. He glanced quickly at the windows on the upper floors, saw a few still with lights behind them, and raised his voice to shout.

  "Hey! What do you want with us? Leave us alone, or there'll be trouble."

  He had pitched his voice as low as he could, but it still came out contralto, more woman than man. One of the ranas pointed and mimed laughter, arms crossed over its belly. Warreven felt himself flush.

  "Let us past," Haliday said, in the same tone 3e would have used to a dream-drunk sailor.

  The ranas ignored 3im, circling to surround them. There were at least a dozen of them, most of them carrying the clubs and spider-sticks Warreven had seen before. There was no drummer, this time, no bell carrier, and he tasted fear, sour at the back of his mouth.

  "What have we here?" The whispering voice came from the nearest of the ranas, one of the three who carried a spider-stick. A man's voice, Warreven thought, but the mask seemed to have an electronic distortion unit built into it, hiding his identity completely. "A pair of titticocks--and one of them pretty, too."

  Again, several of the ranas mimed laughter. Warreven could feel himself shaking, looked up at the windows, hoping someon
e would see what was going on, would help. Instead, the windows that had been lit were suddenly darkened: the neighborhood had made its decision. The rana leader lifted his stick, shook it so that the joints snapped suddenly into place, three sharp clicks like breaking bones, turning it into a rigid bar of ironwood.

  "You, jillamie." He pointed the stick at Haliday. "You got a pretty face, but the body's a mess. What the hell are you?" The circle moved closer, closing in.

  Warreven looked up at the darkened windows, unable quite to believe they'd been abandoned to the ranas. Haliday took a step toward him, so that they were almost touching, close enough that Warreven could feel the faint warmth of 3er body against his back.

  "And how about you?" The stick cracked again, bending all along its length, snapped rigid pointing at Warreven's chest. "Dressed like a boy, yells like a girl. So which are you, swetemetes?"

  Warreven took a deep breath and played the only card he had. "I'm Warreven. The Stiller seraaliste." To his relief, his voice sounded almost normal, deep enough to pass for male.

  "Warreven. We know Warreven." Even through the distortion box, the leader's voice was rich with satisfaction. He gestured with his stick, and the nearest of the ranas lunged like a dancer, flourishing a docker's hook in his left hand. Warreven dodged by reflex, but the hook caught his tunic, ripped down and away, the sharp tip scoring a painful line across his chest and side. He spun away, too afraid to cry out, turning his shoulder to catch the next blow that never came.

  "What've you got under there?" the leader asked. "Show us, Warreven. Show us what a man you are."

  "Go to hell," Warreven said, and the docker raised his hook again.

  "Show us," the leader said.

  Warreven stood frozen for an instant, the fog cold on his exposed skin, burning on the long cut that ran from collarbone to hip. He couldn't fight them, not unarmed--not even if he was armed--and it might get them out of this alive. He'd done worse, he told himself, and didn't believe it.

  "Need some help?" the leader asked, and Warreven achieved a sneer.

  "Not from you," he said, and lifted his hands to the tunic's neck. He pulled the torn cloth apart, baring his breasts to the fog and the cold. The house-lights left no hope of concealment; he stood half naked and fought to seem unashamed. The ranas mimed laughter--no, he thought, they were laughing behind their masks and knew his cheeks were burning.

  The leader laughed softly and turned to Haliday. "And what about you, jillamie?"

  "Go to hell," Haliday said.

  Behind 3er, a window scraped up in the wall of houses. Warreven looked up, letting the torn tunic fall closed again, but saw no one in the narrow opening. All the windows were still dark, just the one open a handspan at the bottom. A voice came from it, high and quavering with age or fear.

  "I've called the mosstaas. I've called them."

  There was a moment of silence, of stillness, the ranas for an instant unmoving, and then the leader laughed behind his mask. More slowly, another rana mimed laughter, and then a second, and a third.

  "We don't need to worry about that," the leader said, and pointed his stick at Haliday again. The window slammed down again behind them. "So what are you, jillamie? We can't tell."

  Haliday glared at him. "I'm a herm."

  "No such thing, not on Hara," the leader murmured.

  "I'm still a herm." Haliday stood braced and rigid, fists clenched, ready to take them all on.

  Warreven recognized the blind fury, had seen it before and knew enough to fear it, to fear what 3e would say or do. "Hal--" he began, and bit off the word before it was formed.

  The rana leader said, "We don't have herms on Hara, just titticocks who can't make up their minds. So which are you, jillamie, or do we have to decide for you?"

  "I'm a herm," Haliday said again.

  The leader shook his stick, and it bent at the three joints, cracking loudly. Three of the ranas lunged for Haliday, who swung to face them, one arm raised to block the first blow, the other striking for the nearest rana's stomach. Warreven grabbed for another rana's shoulder, pulling him partially away from Haliday, felt hands on his own shoulder and, painfully, on his hair. He drove his elbow into someone's ribs, heard a gasp of pain, but the grip on his hair didn't loosen. A fist slammed into his kidneys; something else--something harder, he caught a blurred glimpse of what might have been a knobstick or the end of one of the clubs--caught him a glancing blow along one cheekbone. Pain exploded in his head, down his neck, sharp yellow lights flowering across his vision. He tried to kick the ranas holding him, but his knees buckled instead, and he sagged bonelessly in their grip. He heard Haliday cry out, a short, meaningless sound, saw through a haze of tears and doubled vision 3im stumble and fall huddled to the pavement. The ranas moved in, but not too close, taking turns and leaving each other plenty of room to swing their clubs.

  "Boy or girl?" the leader said, and laughed aloud.

  "Hal!" Warreven struggled to get his feet under him, to shake himself free of the hands on him. Someone hit him again, twice, body and head; he tasted blood, and knew his legs wouldn't hold him. His sight was going, or maybe the house-lights had gone out, and then a whistle sounded, and the ranas abruptly let him go. He fell to his hands and knees, shook his head in a desperate attempt to clear his vision, but only set off another wave of light and pain, knifing down his neck and spine. He heard footsteps, running away, the sound flattened by the fog, and thought the street was empty again--except for Haliday.

  Ȝe lay crumpled, body drawn in on itself, arms still lifted to protect 3er head. There was blood on the pavement, smears and a spreading pool, almost black in the house-lights. Warreven dragged himself to 3im, not daring to try to stand. He heard a window open, and then another and another, but didn't bother looking--he doubted if he could have seen that far--reached awkwardly for Haliday instead. Ȝer face was a mess, swollen and bloodied; one arm was visibly broken, bent between wrist and elbow. He touched 3er neck, feeling for a pulse; 3er skin was cold under his fingers, and he felt nothing. He thought 3er chest was moving a little, but couldn't be sure. Please don't let 3im be dead, he thought, and heard a door open behind him. This time, he did turn, newly afraid, to see a woman standing there, poised to slam the door shut again if there was more trouble. She looked old and frail, shaal pulled tight around her shoulders.

  "I called the Emergency," she said, and he thought she might have been the person who had called the mosstaas before. In the distance, he heard the sound of a siren, drawing rapidly closer; he hoped, vaguely, that they would see him and Haliday before they came too far down the street. Red lights flared through the fog, and the noise of the siren was suddenly overwhelming. He tried to turn, to call to them, but the world seemed to swing under him, and he collapsed sideways on the cold paving.

  Gay: (Concord) one of the nine sexual preferences generally recognized by Concord culture; denotes a person who prefers to be intimate with others of exactly the same gender.

  Mhyre Tatian

  Tatian woke to a wail of sirens and lay for a second in the red- pulsing darkness of his bedroom before he realized that the sound was coming from the communications system. He swore under his breath, and fumbled for the remote that lay beside the bed, touching the keypad to bring up the lights and accept the incoming message. He grimaced as the light hit his eyes, blinked hard, and jammed fingers into his tangled hair. The air from the environmental system was dank and smelled strongly of the sea. He heard the media center come on in the main room, and then the relay screen on the wall beside his bed lit, asking if he wanted to establish a reciprocal transmission.

  "Not likely," Tatian muttered, and then, because it was an older system, jabbed blindly at the remote.

  The screen blinked confirmation--I/T VIDEO AND AUDIO, O/T AUDIO ONLY--and opened like a window on bright lights and white-painted walls and a face that he didn't immediately recognize. He recognized the background first--hospitals were the same all over human space--and only then re
alized it was Warreven beneath the bruises.

  "Tatian?" Ȝer voice sounded small, lighter than usual, distorted by 3er swollen mouth.

  "I'm here," Tatian answered. "Jesus, what happened to you?" Or do I need to ask? I warned you there would be trouble-- He killed the thought, startled by his own response, frightened by the ugly swellings. One eye was covered with a dark bandage, the cheek- bone beneath it puffed and misshapen, 3er lower lip split and swollen into an ugly pout. Ȝe was standing close to the sending unit--it would be a cheap pay-as-you-go unit, and they were close-focus at the best of times, a poor substitute for real privacy--but Tatian thought he could see the iridescent shape of a neck brace below the bruised chin. "Are you all right?"

  Improbably, one corner of Warreven's mouth twitched up in what might have been a smile. "Very sore. But I need your help."

  "You got it," Tatian answered, and flung back the covers. "What do you need?" Only then did it occur to him to wonder what he was doing, and he shoved the thought aside, impatient with himself. Warreven was a friend as well as a business partner, and 3e was hurt. That was enough for anyone.

  "It's Haliday," Warreven said. "We were together, he--3e's a lot worse than I am. I want to get 3im into the off-world hospital, where they know how to deal with herms. I need your help, Tatian."

  "You got it," Tatian said again. He was reaching for his clothes as he spoke, pulling on trousers and a shirt. He fastened his trousers and picked up the remote again, wishing he had been able to get his implants repaired. He touched the control pad, and a side screen lit, date and time prominently displayed--0358/9/14, nearly dawn. Beneath it, a cursor flashed its silent query. "Where are you?"

  "Terminus Hospital," Warreven answered.

  Tatian shifted his fingers on the remote, wishing he were at his office, with the shadowscreen and the fall system at his disposal. Then, impatiently, he triggered a secondary line and watched the side screen flush red as he waited for the connection. The red faded to pink as the office systems came on line, vanished completely as the link was fully established and he touched keys to send the proper passwords. As the screen cleared, he entered more commands, calling up his annotated map of the city. It flashed into view a heartbeat later: the system was slow, its response coming through too many ports for real efficiency, but it would do. Terminus Hospital was close to the massive railroad complex just north of the city proper, maybe twenty minutes' drive from the Nest; he wondered how far Warreven had had to come to get there. "I can be there in half an hour. Do you need me to bring anything?" Our doctor, he added silently, and probably money.