Shadow Man (Paragons of Queer Speculative Fiction)

by Scott, Melissa

  Tatian heard Warreven laugh softly behind him. "Ȝe tried. It wasn't a planned thing, Isa--it was worse than you'd think, believe me. But I--3e needs a medic."

  "I know someone who'll come," Isabon answered. "Leave it to me."

  The medic arrived within half an hour, Isabon at 3er heels. Ȝe was quiet, competent, and quick to agree to Tatian's suggestion that 3e hadn't seen or treated anyone. Ȝe rebandaged Warreven's eye, shaking 3er head, then helped get the indigene into Tatian's bed. They left 3im there, already half asleep, as much from emotional exhaustion as the drugs the medic had given 3im, and the medic left, muttering anathemas on local politics. Tatian went back into the main room with the others and switched on the media center. The camera was still showing the Harbor Market, but the fires seemed to be under control, and there was no sign of angry ranas. He shook his head at the screen, at the newsreader's head in the corner of the display, muted the voice that listed the dead and injured and asked people to stay indoors until the crisis was past. He settled himself on the couch, too tired to stay awake, still too keyed up to sleep, dimmed the lights until the media center was the brightest thing in the room. In the screen, the picture changed, became another open space, a square--not the one they had gone through, Tatian thought; this one was bigger, had a fountain and a stand of trees. More people, a trio of herms in the lead, all sporting the rainbow rana ribbons, faced a line of mosstaas; someone threw a rock, and then a bottle, something that shattered in front of the advancing line. The mosstaas kept coming, and Tatian fingered the remote, changing channels before the two lines met.

  There was news on every narrowcast channel, though not the same pictures. He looked away, feeling vaguely guilty, as though there was something he could have done. And that, he knew, was stupid. Whatever he had done, Warreven would have gone to the Market, would have made 3er stand--and 3e had been right, was still right about the laws. Nothing he could have done would have changed that. Even so, he sat staring at the media center, riot and fire filling the screen, until he finally fell asleep from sheer exhaustion.

  He woke to bright sunlight coming in through the imperfectly shuttered window. He winced, feeling the sweat on his skin, and pushed himself to his feet to close the shutters, flicking the cooling system to full power as he passed the control box. Outside the window, the broad wedge of lawn between the buildings of the Nest was filled with vehicles and people, indigenes in an even mix of traditional dress and off-world clothes. Some would be company employees, of course, taking shelter with their families, but it was obvious even at this distance that a number of them were herms, fems, and mems. There were children, too, lots of them, and someone--one of the companies, or maybe one of the housing committees--had set up a table to feed them. Tatian shook his head, and pushed the shutters closed.

  The media screen came back into focus as the light faded, and he worked the remote to bring the voices up again. The Harbor Market filled the picture, empty now, the stones soot-marked from the bonfire, the remains of the barricade piled to one side of the Gran'quai. A drag engine was hauling away the last balks of wood under the watchful eyes of armed mosstaas, while in the background silver-suited firefighters prodded at the remains of a large storage shed. That was the only thing that had burned on the Gran'quai itself; Tatian was glad to see that the docked ships and the factors' offices seemed untouched except for the occasional broken window.

  "--order was restored," the newsreader was saying. "A few ranas remain active, but the Most Important Man has vowed that they will be closed down by noon. We have been asked to remind our viewers that all political activity has been suspended until the crisis is over, and that rana bands of any type have been explicitly prohibited until that time."

  "Bastard," Warreven said, from the bedroom doorway. Ȝer voice was a little slurred, more from the swelling than the aftereffects of either the sweetrum or the doutfire. "How bad is it?"

  "I haven't heard yet," Tatian answered. "Last night, they were saying thirty confirmed dead at the Market, and another dozen around the city. Plus Temelathe, of course."

  "Of course."

  "Tendlathe moves fast," Tatian said. It was probably better to get the worst news over with. "Everyone's already calling him the Most Important Man, and he's formally taking over tonight. There's an emergency session of the Watch Council then."

  "Bastard," Warreven said again. "Not that I should be surprised." Ȝe put 3er hand to 3er bandaged eye. "I don't suppose you have any doutfire, do you?"

  Tatian shook his head, not for the first time envious of the indigenes' tolerance for their extensive pharmacopeia. "The doctor left some pills. Ȝe said you could take up to four at a time. They're in the kitchen."

  "Thanks," Warreven said, and disappeared through the door.

  Tatian watched 3im go, wondering what to do now. He would be recalled, unless Tendlathe expelled him first--someone at the Harbor was bound to have recognized him, and Masani would have to recall him, if %e wanted to go on doing business with the Harans. However, he wasn't looking forward to explaining this to %er, no matter how sympathetic %e had been to the odd-bodied. As for Warreven... He shook his head. Tendlathe was blaming 3im for his father's death, and he doubted Warreven had enough support left among the Modernists to have much chance of surviving arrest and trial, no matter how many times 3e swore 3e'd seen Tendlathe shoot his father. Could the other odd-bodied, the wrangwys, protect 3im? he wondered. They didn't seem organized enough to offer much help, either political support or physical protection, and he had a strong feeling that the latter would be necessary. Tendlathe needed a scapegoat, and Warreven was the obvious one. That left off-world, but there his imagination failed him. He couldn't picture Warreven on any of the Concord Worlds, part of Concord society: 3e was too much of Hara. Maybe 3e could head for the Stiller mesnies north of Bonemarche, he thought. Anti-Stane feeling might outweigh everything else....

  The communications system sounded then, and he touched the remote, accepted the call without thinking, expecting Isabon or Derebought. Codes flowed across the screen--official codes, the codes for the White Watch House, and he barely stopped himself from canceling the call. He had already accepted it, already betrayed his presence in the flat; to refuse the call would only cause more trouble. At least the Harans had no direct power within the EHB compound, he thought, and braced himself to pretend innocence. The screen lit at last, and Tendlathe's neatly bearded face looked back at him, a narrow bandage running across his forehead. At least Warreven marked him, Tatian thought, and looked down. The reciprocal transmission was already established: too late to do anything except brazen it out.

  "Mir Tatian." Tendlathe's voice was cold and very precise.

  "Mir Tendlathe," Tatian answered. "What can I do for you?"

  "You can stop playing games," Tendlathe answered. "I want Warreven, and I have every reason to think you have him. If you give him up, I'm prepared to overlook your part in last night's fiasco."

  "I don't have 3im," Tatian said. He heard a faint noise from the kitchen, suppressed the desire to look, to wave Warreven back out of sight.

  "I don't have time for this," Tendlathe said. "You helped Warreven get away, you were seen--you were filmed--doing it."

  "Films can be altered," Tatian said. "They're hardly evidence."

  "They're evidence here," Tendlathe answered. "And if it comes to that, I'll bring NAPD down with you--I'll be sure they're implicated, as well as you, in conspiracy and murder."

  "Anything I did was on my own authority. It has nothing to do with the company," Tatian said, and Tendlathe gave a thin smile.

  "I'm sure, but I can make it look otherwise. And I will, if I have to. I told you, I want Warreven very badly."

  Tatian looked down at the control bar, glyphs flickering at the edge of the screen. He had no doubt that Tendlathe meant exactly what he said--and I should have realized it, he thought, expected it--and he couldn't risk NAPD's position on Hara. He had no right to jeopardize not only everyth
ing Lolya Masani had worked to build, but Derebought and Mats and Reiss, but at the same time, he couldn't give Warreven up. Not now, he thought, and not to these people.

  "Tendlathe."

  Warreven stepped out of the kitchen doorway, came slowly forward into the camera's range. Tatian opened his mouth to say something, anything, to wave 3im back, but one look at 3er face silenced him. He stepped back against the window, feeling the heat radiating from the shutters, wondering what Warreven thought 3e could gain from this.

  "Warreven," Tendlathe said, and there was a kind of grim satisfaction on his face. "I knew you'd be there."

  Warreven shrugged. "It doesn't matter where I am, does it? You and I have a lot to talk about--what's it like, Ten, being the Most Important Man?"

  "It feels good, thank you," Tendlathe answered. "It feels good to be able to deal with you as you deserve."

  "No matter how you got there?" Warreven asked. "I didn't want him dead, and you'll never convince anyone I did, not when it means you taking over. Besides, I saw him die--I saw you shoot him, Ten."

  Tendlathe's expression didn't change. "No one's going to believe your lies--"

  "And I can't be the only one," Warreven went on.

  "The only thing that matters now," Tendlathe said, "is where and how you surrender to me."

  Warreven managed a sound that was almost a laugh, and Tatian could see the ghost of 3er usual humor in 3er bruised face. "The last thing you want is for me to turn myself in. That would bring everything into the courts, including how and why Temelathe died. Do you really want to open that door?" Ȝe laughed aloud this time, sounding genuinely, incredulously, amused. "God and the spirits, maybe I should. It might be worth it, to see how you explain that."

  "I can make very sure you don't get a chance to talk," Tendlathe said.

  "That's not much incentive to surrender," Warreven answered, and there was a little silence. Tatian looked from one to the other, from Warreven to the bearded face in the screen, but couldn't read anything in their expressions. Tendlathe's face was taut, muscles standing out at the corners of his mouth; Warreven was still smiling faintly, hiding behind 3er laughter.

  "So what do you want, Raven?" Tendlathe said at last.

  Warreven took a deep breath, and Tatian realized that this was what 3e'd been waiting for. "I want this over," 3e said. "So I'm prepared to make a bargain with you. Let me off-world--I can claim asylum, I know that much about Concord law--and I'll go, and not cause you any more trouble. You can make whatever deals you want with Dismars, or whoever's speaking for the Modernists now, and I won't interfere. But if you don't let me go, I'll do my very best to make sure you not only have to fight the whole question of gender law through every step of my trial, but I'll make very sure that everyone knows you killed your father."

  "No one will believe you," Tendlathe said. "And you are responsible, Raven. None of this would have happened if you'd kept your mouth shut."

  "I opened a door," Warreven answered. "You walked through it."

  For the first time, Tendlathe flinched, the merest shiver of taut muscles, but Warreven saw it, and smiled. "Plenty of people will believe me, Ten, you're not universally loved. I can make your life impossible--even if we can't fight you, there are enough of us wrangwys to guarantee you won't have an easy time running things."

  "The Modernists won't help," Tendlathe said. "Dismars has already disavowed your actions."

  "I'm not surprised. Issued a bulletin from somewhere safe outside the city, no doubt," Warreven said bitterly. Then 3e shook 3imself. "Look, I'm offering you a way out, Ten. You can take what you've got, pull things together, or you can get revenge. I'm prepared to give you that. Either one."

  There was another little silence, and then Tendlathe smiled faintly. "Opening another door?"

  Warreven smiled back. "I suppose, yes. And there is a price."

  "Well?"

  "Leave the off-worlders out of this." Warreven tilted 3er head toward Tatian. "This is our business, yours and mine."

  "Mhyre Tatian was seen helping you," Tendlathe said.

  "So expel him, or have his people recall him," Warreven said. "If you absolutely have to. But let the company alone."

  There was another pause, longer this time, and then, slowly, Tendlathe nodded. "You have twenty-six hours to get off planet, Warreven. After that, the deal's off."

  Warreven smiled thinly. "Agreed." Ȝe looked down then, looking for the remote, and Tatian touched the key that ended the connection. The screen went blank, and Warreven took a deep breath.

  "Look, I--I'm sorry to have gotten you into this. Of everything, I wish I could have gotten you out clean. It's the best I could do--I think it's the best anyone could do, and the company should be fine, but--" Ȝe broke off again, shaking 3er head. "I'm sorry."

  Tatian set the remote carefully back in its niche, unable quite to believe what had happened. "The--Masani was bound to recall me anyway, after this. And we do a lot of business with a lot of mesnies. We should be all right."

  "But will you?" Warreven tipped 3er head to one side.

  Tatian took a deep breath, overwhelmed, suddenly, by the possibilities. Will I be all right? he wanted to say. I'll be better than all right: I can go home--go back to Kaysa, back to Jericho, hell, I can even get my damned implants fixed, and by technicians that I know will know what they're doing. Even if Masani fires me--and I know %e won't--it'll be worth it. He could already imagine Kaysa's response, laughter first, at the absurdity of it all, and then the sudden fierce embrace. She would be glad to have him back--that had been clear in their last exchange of mail--but not half as glad as he would be to be back with her....

  "You didn't have to get involved," Warreven said, "didn't have to do any of this. I'm sorry."

  Tatian shook his head, responding as much to the pain in the other's voice as to the words. "No. I--it sounds stupid, but I did have to help you, or try to, anyway." He shrugged. "It's what I said last night, you're right. What you were trying to do is the right thing. I couldn't just stand there and do nothing. Sometimes you have to do something."

  "But your job--"

  "Masani's not going to fire me," Tatian said firmly. "As for leaving--I'm going home, Warreven. I'm not sorry about that. What about you?"

  Warreven laughed then, not a pleasant sound. "I have money, and I can still get at it. Tendlathe can't block the off-world bank networks without annoying the pharmaceuticals even further."

  "That wasn't exactly what I meant." Tatian stopped, tried again. "What about the gender laws? You started this. How the hell can you back out now?"

  Warreven's gaze flickered, but 3e answered steadily enough, "I already tried fighting him, and look what happened. I don't know how to fight the mosstaas, I don't know if we can fight the mosstaas, and not all the wrangwys were on my side to begin with. Now they certainly won't be, and you'd need all of us, and the Modernists and some of the mesnies to beat Tendlathe now. There's no chance of any compromise if I'm here--Tendlathe is stupid enough, no, angry, enough, to make a martyr of me, and that would mean there'd be no way to get the laws changed. Not to mention that I have no desire to be a martyr."

  "What about Temelathe?" Tatian asked. "Are you going to let him get away with that--killing his own father, for god's sake?"

  "Do you think I have a choice?" Warreven shook 3er head. "It would be my word against his, Tatian--nobody else is going to come forward, no matter what they saw, not if it means speaking against the Most Important Man--and people will believe what they want to believe, anyway. It won't do any good."

  "But he won't revise the laws," Tatian said again. "And the Modernists won't push him on it, we saw that last night. Which still leaves people like you--the people you said you were speaking for last night, damn it--outside the system. Not quite human, you said that yourself."

  "And I don't have a side anymore," Warreven answered. "As you said last night."

  "Haliday, for one, and what's-3er-name, Destany," Tatian said
. "Aren't they your side?"

  "Hal has money, too, and 3e's in the off-world hospital," Warreven said. "Malemayn can take care of 3im until 3e's well enough to decide what 3e's going to do--and Mal can take care of Destany's case, too, for that matter."

  "Can he?"

  "He'll have to," Warreven answered. "Do you really think it'll do either one of them any good to have me around? It'll be hard enough to disassociate me from the case--I doubt Mal can win it, now, though maybe he can get Destany off planet as a refugee, ask for asylum, or something."

  Ȝe shook 3er head. "I don't want to abandon them, Destany or Haliday--especially Hal--but I can't help them now. I can only hurt them at this point."

  "You can't just walk away," Tatian began, and broke off, shaking his head in turn.

  "Watch me," Warreven said. Ȝe took a deep breath. "For what it's worth, I didn't say how long I'd stay away." Ȝe caught 3er hair, wound it into a loose twist, then seemed to realize what 3e was doing and released it. "But right now--I opened a door, all right; it just wasn't the one I thought it was." Ȝe smiled suddenly, almost whimsically. "Which I suppose is typical of Agede, when you think of it. But if there's a door open at all, any chance not to get more people killed, then I've got to take it. I could maybe try to be a demagogue, lead the wrangwys in rebellion, but I didn't exactly do it well last night. Look, Tatian, we don't have a tradition for this, for revolution--we don't even have a word for it, like we don't have a word for herms, and I don't know how to make one happen. We've got plenty of words for protest, for objections and obstruction and compromise, all the subtleties of ranas and presance and clan meetings and the spirits and their offetre, and I know how to do all of that. I've trained all my life to manipulate that system, and it's not going to work this time. We need something new--there's going to be a revolution, there's going to have to be one now, because Tendlathe can't keep this system stable forever, but I don't know how to make it happen. Off-world, in the Concord--well, I can learn what I need there."