Ravenor Omnibus

by Dan Abnett

Beyond the great doors of panelled oak lay Ricken’s domain. A looming wooden mezzanine lit by cream-shaded electrolamps that hung on long chains. Files and slates were heaped up on the floor under the tall windows, and piled high along the tops of the battered filing chests. Mam Lotilla was dutifully processing case files at her old-model codifier, and Plyton, the savvy young junior marshal narco had sent his way, was pinning crime scene pict-stats of disembowelled bodies onto the wall boards. Beyond the mezzanine, wide wooden stairs led down into the main vault of the department, where hundreds of his officers worked at console stations or long rows of desks. A penetrating background murmur rose from the great room below.

  Rickens had a headache. He’d been in budget meetings all afternoon, and they’d run over like they always did.

  Sankels, the bull mastiff from interior cases, had been up to his tricks again, and had managed to get all the finance additionals from narco, homicide, xen-ops, special and prohib-pub thrown out in favour of booster funds for his own office. There was cleaning to be done, he had told the chief magistratum, and the chief magistratum had agreed.

  Which was all nonsense. The chief magistratum had only agreed because he knew Sankels was nose-deep with Jader Trice, the first provost of the newly formed Ministry of Sub-sector Trade, a man Rickens knew well from his numerous pict-channel interviews but had never met in person.

  And that meant that Sankels had a direct line to the lord governor himself, because Trice’s Ministry was the lord governor’s own idea. If the chief magistratum hadn’t made nice with Sankels, the chief magistratum would have been back on stack-beat in Formal X come morning.

  In all truth, Rickens wondered why the city bothered with a Departimento Magistratum at all. The interior cases division was fast becoming the lord governor’s own private police force. Such were the powers of a lord governor sub-sector.

  His, he reminded himself, was not to reason why. His was to get the knuck on with his job and run his department to the best of his ability with increasingly limited resources.

  ‘Good evening, deputy magistratum,’ Plyton said, looking up from a close-up pict of an intestinal mass she had been turning over. She was trying to decide which way up it was supposed to go.

  ‘Is that meant for us?’ Rickens asked. ‘Looks like homicide should be dealing with it.’

  She shrugged. She was twenty-two years old, thick-set and fine featured. Her black leather uniform suit was always perfectly turned out, the silver marshal’s crest always polished. Her dark hair was cut short to fit under her duty helmet. ‘Sent it to us, sir. Said it fell into special’s purview.’

  Rickens headed up the Department of Special Crime. The smallest of the hive’s Magistratum divisions, it was a catch-all division, designed to investigate anything that didn’t neatly fall into the remits of the other departments. Special was looked on as the misfit member of the family, the unpopular cousin. The shit they got sent…

  Limbwall plonked his armful of slates down on a desk, and wiped a hand across his mouth. ‘Anything else, sire?’ he asked.

  Rickens shrugged. He was a small man in his early one-fifties, with a permanently put-upon expression. For seventy-two years, he’d walked with a limp caused by a ball-shot from a hammer’s pivot-gun that went through his hip. Seventy-two years, tap… tap… tap…

  ‘It’ll have to wait,’ Rickens said, tapping the pile of slates.

  ‘Actually, I don’t think so, chief,’ smiled Plyton. ‘This fell into our laps because the perp claimed she was an Imperial inquisitor.’

  ‘She what?’

  Plyton shrugged. ‘And there are some people in your office. Waiting to talk to you about it.’

  RICKENS’S PRIVATE OFFICE was a quiet space of dark wood and soft illumination screened from the mezzanine and the rest of the department by a panelled wall with frosted glass mullions. As he entered and closed the door behind him with a soft click, the two men waiting for him rose to their feet. Rickens tapped his way over to his carved cathedra, settled himself down and punched in a private code that brought his cogitator to life. The screen glowed green and sidelit his face. He gestured for the two men to resume their seats on the leather bench facing him.

  By then, he had already made an assessment of them. Off-worlders both: an over-dressed youth and an older man, probably muscle. The youth’s body language betrayed confidence. The older man was unreadable, but then muscle usually was, in Rickens’s ample experience. Until the split-second it decided to act.

  He called up the file onto screen, and carefully set his half-moon spectacles on his face.

  ‘What we seem to have… a female, lacking citizen validation, work dockets, status codes or visitation permits… physical age twenty-five years standard by approximation, though some traces of juvenat procedures… apprehended in an undersink of Formal D this afternoon having just killed or crippled seven individuals, all local males. The female refuses to answer any questions, but on apprehension she identified herself as Inquisitor Gideon Ravenor.’

  Rickens took off his spectacles and looked up at the two men. ‘This is an old fashioned world, perhaps behind the times with cutting Imperium fashions, but I believe Gideon is still a name reserved for the male gender?’

  ‘It is,’ said the well-dressed youth.

  ‘So, this female is lying?’

  ‘Yes,’ the youth replied cordially. ‘And no. We request you release her into our custody.’

  ‘She is a friend of yours?’ Rickens asked.

  ‘A colleague,’ said the youth.

  A friend,’ the muscle said quietly.

  ‘Given her crimes, I really can’t see how—’

  The youth leaned forward, interrupting Rickens, and set a small black wallet on the table in front of him. Rickens flipped it open. The light of the electrolamps glinted off the Inquisitorial rosette.

  Rickens didn’t react. He took a scanner wand from his jacket and played it across the badge.

  ‘Stackers have been known to fabricate this sort of thing out of tin and glass,’ he said. He sat back and regarded the wand’s readout. ‘This, however, is genuine. Which one of you is Ravenor?’

  ‘Neither,’ said the younger man. ‘Like the female in your custody, we both work for him. I repeat my request.’

  Rickens drummed his fingers together. ‘It’s not that simple. Not at all.’

  ‘You would impede the operation of the Holy Inquisition, deputy magistratum?’

  ‘Throne of Terra, of course not,’ Rickens looked at the young man. ‘But there are protocols. Procedures. I know the Inquisition has the power to run rough-shod over every law and statute on Eustis Majoris. It may demand the release of an accredited agent. But… I would expect such a demand to come from the Officio Inquisitorus Planetia itself. Formally. Not like this.’

  ‘Inquisitor Ravenor does not wish this matter to become formal at all, deputy magistratum,’ said the older man softly. ‘It would… I’m sorry, it might… jeopardise the entire nature of our investigation here. We want our colleague returned to us, and all data surrounding her arrest erased.’

  ‘That is beyond my power.’

  ‘Not at all,’ said the younger man. He leaned forward again. ‘I see the case file on your display still has a green tag. It is pending, subject to you processing it. You could erase it here. Now. With a touch of your keypad.’

  ‘I would be betraying my office,’ said Rickens.

  ‘You would be serving your Emperor,’ said the younger man.

  The other man said nothing, and that’s what did it. Deputy Magistratum Rickens was not easily intimidated, but there was something about the unreadable face of the older man. Rickens had a sudden image of himself, dead in his old, carved cathedra, while these two ominous servants of the Inquisition slipped away into the night. And all for what? For sticking to his tired principles?

  Rickens believed in Imperial justice, and these days he got damned little chance of taking legal action at all thanks to the powers that b
e. Who was he to stand in the face of the real thing, however unorthodox?

  ‘Very well,’ he said and tapped an erasure code into his cogitator. ‘You may collect your colleague from holding pen nine at the south entry.’

  ‘Thank you, deputy magistratum. Your efforts will not be forgotten.’

  THE TWO MEN had only been gone ten minutes when Plyton knocked and entered the office cautiously.

  ‘Sir?’ she asked. ‘All my files on that Ravenor case have… uhm… gone.’

  ‘I know.’

  ‘What did those men say to you?’

  ‘Forget it, Plyton. Erase it from your mind.’

  ‘But sir—’

  ‘Do as I say, Plyton. No good will come of it.’

  ONE OF SONSAL’S staff had voxed ahead to inform the house of his master’s dinner plans. When the motor-carriage swept them in under the rain-proofed portico, servants were waiting for them in the courtyard. Sonsal descended from the carriage and courteously handed Kys down to the pavement.

  The house, like those of all Petropolis’s worthies, was on the surface level. Despite the burning curse of the rain, it was thought improper for the wealthy and the respectable to dwell in the deep sinks. Sonsal’s house was in Formal B, one of the three core districts of the city-hive, and the only one given over exclusively to residential buildings. To the north and west rose the many massive towers of A and C, the hub of sub-sector bureaucracy and government.

  Sonsal conducted Kys into the atrium, where floating glow-globes cast a shimmering yellow light. The walls were lined with hand-printed paper showing a repeat print pattern of the holy skull-cog in gold leaf. More iconography of the Adeptus Mechanicus decorated the iron staircase. Engine Imperial was proud of its association with the machine cult. Like other incorporated commercial firms, it leased tech processes and construction secrets from the guild, and manufactured them under license. The great financial return made it worth the huge lease fees and the pressure of regular inspection.

  Ewer bearers waited for them, and they washed their hands and faces clean of air-pollution in silver dishes of clean water.

  Sonsal invited her to wait in the inner chambers. ‘I have a small piece of business to attend to, then I will be with you.’

  ‘I’ll be waiting,’ she said, tense with the terrible effort of being suggestive.

  ALONE, KYS RELAXED and paced in an ornate apartment. A carpet of woven silver thread filigree covered the black tile floor, and the pink-upholstered furniture had heavy, gilt feet and arms. Lead-glass cabinets displayed various pieces of klaylware, and there were a number of ugly oil paintings and hololiths on the walls

  ‘You with me?’ she said quietly.

  +I am.+

  ‘You’re very faint. Why is that?’

  +I’m tired. That, and the landspar. Very heavy, very dense. Most of the residences in Formal B are made from it. It is particularly resistant to the acidic rain. A rich man does not want to lose status by having his house crumble around him, after all.+

  ‘So?’

  +It’s psi-inert. Dead stone. It’s all I can do to hear you and let you hear me.+

  She frowned. ‘All right, don’t wear yourself out. I’ll call if I need you.’

  She strolled around the room, thought-feeling for niches, hidden panels, hiding places, though she doubted Sonsal would be foolish enough to keep anything in a public room. There was a panel, however, in the west wall, the size of a small door. She could sense its hollowness. She traced its catch mechanism delicately with her mind, and then popped it open. The panel swung inward. Behind it was a small, private study, lined with shelves of books, slates and wafers. There was a desk, and a leather suspensor chair.

  She turned her head slowly, feeling around. A particular density in the third drawer down on the left side of the desk.

  The drawer’s lock was significantly more complex than those of the other seven drawers. It refused to pop with a simple, blunt thought-thrust. She was forced to analyse it, component by component, comparing and matching tumblers and pins. The intense mental effort made her perspire. Finally, with a triumphant blink, she turned the last drum and heard the lock click.

  Kys reached out a hand and started to slide the drawer open. She saw three, small red-tissue packets lying on top of several envelopes.

  She heard a door handle turn. She slammed the drawer shut and dashed back into the public apartment, taking a seat by the heavy, leaded window just before Sonsal came in.

  ‘My dear, are you all right? You look slightly flushed.’

  ‘I’m fine,’ she said. He was coming towards her. She saw that, in her haste, she had not pulled the panel door into the study fully shut. Another step, and he would see it.

  ‘Just a little warm,’ she smiled, standing up quickly and undoing the top four clasps of her dark brown bodysuit. His hungry attention was immediately focused on the exposed V of white skin. Kys took advantage of his distraction and hooked her mind around the lip of the panel door, snapping it flush.

  ‘Dinner is served,’ he said. ‘Shall we?’

  THE FOOD WAS excellent. Little bowls of spiced goshran, followed by stuffed pettifowls that had been imported from off-world, then a kuberry sorbet wrapped in a parchment of filo pastry. The sommelier kept their glasses filled with a series of fine wines that matched each course to perfection. When Sonsal wasn’t looking, Kys glanded an antioxidant to keep her head clear. His conversation was poor. He kept telling her about the various vintages, how difficult some had been to procure, how hard it was to import decent pettifowl these days, the secret of the spices that made the difference between good goshran and great goshran. He wanted to impress, and like many wealthy, empty men, his conspicuous wealth was the only thing he could think of using.

  She nodded and smiled, and hung on his every word through sheer force of will. Her act was working. They both drank too much, but where she was glanded against it, he became loose-tongued and over-familiar. Gently, she mind-stirred the air-molecules around him, heating him up and making him sweat. Then she started to custom-build her own pheromones to suit his very-readable templates, and steer them towards him. By the end of the meal, he was intoxicated in more ways than one.

  He ordered the sommelier to pour them a large amasec each, and then dismissed him and all the serving staff.

  Sonsal raised his glass, dabbing his sweaty neck with his other hand. ‘My dear Patience,’ he said. ‘This evening has been a delight. The entire day too. I have placed my purchases in the vault. Perhaps we could go and admire them later? I have some other pieces you might find most enchanting.’

  ‘That would be nice,’ she smiled.

  ‘I want to thank you again,’ he said.

  ‘Please, Umberto. There’s no need. This fine meal has been more than enough. You’re spoiling me.’

  ‘Impossible!’ he declared. ‘Nothing could spoil a woman of such infinite beauty.’

  ‘Umberto, you will turn my head with such compliments.’

  ‘Such a fine head. Of such infinite beauty,’ he said, getting up badly and sloshing his drink.

  She kept a smile on her face, but watched him carefully.

  ‘How is your amasec, Patience? It’s forty year-old Zukanac, from the mountains of Onzio.’

  ‘It is wonderful, but I fear I have drunk too much already. Any more, and I might forget myself.’

  He leered.

  ‘My tolerance for good drink is low these days,’ she continued. ‘It dulls the senses, don’t you find? I have travelled widely, and know there are other intoxicants that freshen and clear the mind most wonderfully. Sadly none are available on such a proper world as Eustis Majoris.’

  He considered this for a moment. ‘You never did tell me what you do,’ he said.

  ‘I have a modest, private income. I travel. I explore. It is most… liberating.’

  He nodded knowingly. ‘Then you are open to experiences. How delightful. Set your amasec aside, Patience. I have something else you
might enjoy.’

  He walked unsteadily over to the hidden panel door, opened it and disappeared for a moment. When he came back, he was cupping something in his hand. ‘I think you’ll find Eustis Majoris is less proper than you thought. This will clear our heads. It will relax and refresh us. So that we might enjoy the rest of this perfect night.’

  Kys made sure the smile she gave him showed nothing but total approval of that prospect.

  TWO, SMALL HARD shapes, each one wrapped in red tissue paper. He led her by the hand over to a chaise and set the red parcels down on the lacquered top of the low table nearby.

  Then he kissed her.

  ‘What are these?’ she asked. It had taken a great deal of resolve to accept the kiss and not kill him with a sternum punch.

  ‘They are flects. Have you heard of them?’

  ‘No,’ she said. ‘Umberto, I thought you might have been talking about obscura or lucidia.’

  ‘Obscura is far too addictive and debilitating for a man of my station,’ he said, sitting down beside her. ‘And lucidia is too coarse. It has an unpleasant low, I find.’

  ‘These flects then… what are they?’

  ‘Like nothing else. Wonderful. Liberating. New. You will not be disappointed.’

  He began to unwrap one, slowly teasing out the tissue paper.

  ‘Where do they come from?’ she asked. He shrugged. ‘I mean, how do you come by them?’

  He finished his amasec and set the glass down. ‘I have a contact. A fellow who provides. It is very unofficial. Now then—’

  She reached out a hand and set it on his. Then she leaned forward so her mouth was very close to his ear. ‘There’s something you should know, Umberto,’ she said.

  ‘What… what is that?’

  ‘I am an agent of the Imperial Inquisition, and you are in very big trouble indeed.’

  SONSAL STARTED TO cry. Sobbing at first, then deep bellows of despair woven up with anger. He curled up on the chaise like a child, kicking his feet.

  ‘Shut up,’ she said.

  His weeping became so loud, the apartment door opened, and a houseman peered in.

  ‘Go away,’ Kys said, slamming the door shut with a stern blink.