Stelios and Ursella both turned and Ryan saw Stelios’ jaw descend before he managed to catch it up once more.
Nayara radiated power and grace. As she walked over to Stelios, Ursella tugged at her own skirt and touched her hair.
Stelios cleared his throat. “I’m guessing you’re Nayara Ybarra.”
“And you’re Cáel Stelios,” she replied. “But I interrupted. Please go on.” She smiled at him.
Stelios spread his hands in a gesture Ryan instinctively understood. All nonsense over. This was plain speaking. With that one movement, he had dismissed the effect Nayara had on him and got back to business. “Have you heard of a man—a psi—called Gabriel?”
Both Ryan and Nayara shook their heads. Nayara settled herself on the corner of Ryan’s desk, her sleek length elongated by the pose. Ryan knew it was a practiced position. It was also a defensive one. The casual lean on one hand looked indolent, but it put Nayara in the best position to push herself up and into action in one quick movement. Nayara was still wary about Stelios.
Stelios frowned. “That surprises me.”
Ryan braced himself. “How much do you know of this Gabriel?” he asked Stelios. “What can you tell us?”
“A lot of it is speculation. Psi-filers are hard to document—hard to pin down.”
“We’ve noticed,” Ryan said non-committally and saw the corners of Nayara’s mouth turn upwards.
“Gabriel is the son of psi-filers. Two of them, so he’s technically a full psi himself. More interesting is that his parents were both designated File P. That makes them one of the last batches of psi ever made. By then, the geneticists had learned a lot about what they were doing and they were turning out some very powerful psychics. Not just the range of abilities, but the power they could wield was enormous.”
“We have a File P psi working for us,” Ryan said. “We’re familiar with their abilities.” There was no harm in telling Stelios that. Ursella had surely already revealed it.
Stelios nodded, as if this was not news. “Gabriel himself may or may not have inherited all his parents’ abilities, or more. With them both being psi, there’s no knowing what came out of the mix of their genes. Worse, he had an uncontrolled childhood.”
Ryan lifted his brow. “Uncontrolled?”
“All the original psi, the ones raised in state crèches, had basic ethics and discipline instilled—for all the good it did us.”
“I wasn’t aware of that,” Ryan responded. It occurred to him that there was a lot he didn’t know about Pritti. He had found her in the streets, fighting off a pack of scratch acid freaks. There had been five of them and all of them outweighed her. Such basic unfairness had caused Ryan to even the odds a little. Later, when he brought her back to the Agency to have her wounds dressed, she’d hinted that she had been living on the streets for many years. She had gone to work for the Agency after that and had demonstrated her character. Demands for further proof would have been an insult.
Stelios carried on. “Without the state crèche, Gabriel shouldn’t have developed much more than a strong sense of selfishness, but it seems that the man has a mission.”
“Psi rights,” Ryan finished flatly.
Stelios didn’t look surprised, merely thoughtful. “Yes, I thought you might leap to that sooner than most.”
“Psi can’t be trusted with the full responsibilities and freedoms of an adult human,” Nayara said.
“That’s what they said about us, once.” Ryan kept his tone mild, even though Nayara’s disparagement was not like her.
“It’s what many people still say.” Nayara’s gaze slid towards Ursella, who had the grace to blush.
“When it comes to psi, I tend to agree with them,” Stelios added. “Individual rights should come with equivalent responsibilities and the psi as a race have not shown they are capable of carrying much responsibility at all.” He straightened. “Which brings me to why I’m here. I think the Agency is in danger, Ryan.”
This time, Ryan completely failed to hide his surprise. So did everyone else in the room, but Ursella was the most shocked.
She straightened, her eyes widening and her mouth dropping open. “But…” Then she remembered where she was and shut it again. Her lips grew very thin. “Assemblyman Stelios, you had me bring you here under false pretences.”
“Yeah, sorry about that, old girl. But you wouldn’t have brought me here otherwise and I didn’t have time to build up my contacts and grease the skids.”
Ryan hid the smile that formed at Stelios’ casual ‘old girl.’ “You could have just called,” he pointed out.
“And cooled my heels for three weeks while you tried to figure out what I wanted. I don’t think you have the time for that.” Stelios brought his hands together. “Where I come from, a man discusses serious business over ouzo and ice. I don’t suppose you…?” he said hopefully.
Nayara went to the bar to pour the drink. Stelios looked pleased. “I was hoping, but I didn’t think you guys could eat or drink anything.”
“We can physically eat and drink, even though we don’t need to do either. Our bodies don’t use it for energy and can’t eliminate it. So eating and drinking comes with unpleasant side effects. Still, it allows us to pass as human when we need to.”
Nayara handed Stelios the freed-crystal glass.
“Then this…?” he asked, holding it up.
“For human visitors, such as yourself.”
“Your loss, then. Cheers,” Stelios said and drank. A sigh followed and he sank back in his seat. “Authentic stuff. I’m glad to see you know how to spoil your visitors.”
Ryan waited him out.
“It’s been a very long day so far,” Stelios said, putting the half-empty glass aside. He sat forward again. “If this Gabriel fellow is organizing psi, pumping them full of enthusiasm for his cause, then he’s building a bloody army, one that will come gunning for your folk.”
Ryan considered that. “If he’s interested in psi rights, then why would he build an army at all? Politics doesn’t need an army.”
Stelios shook his head in disagreement. “He’s building one, anyway.”
Ryan studied Stelios for a long moment, while the man sipped his ouzo. “You know something. Something else, not connected with this agency. That’s the thing you found out today, that brought you straight here.”
“Very good,” Stelios said softly.
“I must point out, for the last time,” Ursella said, “that this information is privileged and sensitive. You can’t just hand it over to anyone you feel like.”
“Ms. Shun, you’re an employee of the Worlds’ Assembly and by extension, you serve at my pleasure,” Stelios told her. “This man here saved my life.”
“He’s vampire,” she pointed out coldly.
“Vampire, human, psi—we’re all men at the base. We can all interbreed, with the right conditions, so don’t confuse your distaste with pragmatism.”
Having chopped Ursella off at the knees, Stelios turned back to Ryan, who hid his amusement carefully. It wouldn’t do to make Ursella too much of an enemy.
Stelios drained his glass, put it aside and spread his hands on his knees. Back to business again. “A bill has been introduced to the Assembly. It went through a reading this morning, but I’d heard rumour of it before today. It’s a comprehensive health bill, but buried in the footnotes is a nasty little clause that, amongst other things, calls for the enforced sterilization of psi…and their off-spring.”
Nayara caught her breath. It was a soft sound, but Ryan knew she was thinking of Natália, trapped back in the past, and how every vampire who knew of Natália’s plight was envious of her chance to bear off-spring. To be able to have children and then have that ability forcibly ripped from you… Yes, it was a nasty clause.
“And the Assembly supports this clause?” Nayara asked.
“It’s not being talked about openly.”
“It amounts to genocide!” Ryan declared. “This is i
ntolerable. Why is no one talking about it?”
“I believe many in the Assembly are unaware of the clause. And there are some who silently support it.”
“How could anyone support it?” Ryan was horrified.
It was Ursella who responded. “Psi-filers breed indiscriminately and run rampant. The half-breeds have even less conscience and control. Their upbringing is abysmal, then their parents die young and leave them uncivilized.” She grimaced. “I must point out that I am quoting recent dinner conversations, not pronouncing my own feelings. After two hundred years fighting for vampire rights, Ryan, why do you need to ask this? Many people believe that psi are unnatural, a failed experiment that should be shovelled into the garbage can and forgotten. They also feel the same way about vampires, but vampires can’t breed.”
Ryan fought a sharp, short battle not to glance at Nayara to check her reaction to this statement. Natália’s situation may have changed that fact for vampires. Nayara would also have figured out the potential impact of her pregnancy on the rest of the world, too. “Your candour is appreciated, as always,” he told Ursella before returning to the more terrible facts. “This clause, the bill that carries it…it will be passed?”
“It’s on its second reading and the clause itself is not the one under dispute,” Stelios said. “If they iron out the wrinkles in the one they are arguing over, it will pass. It could pass in the next session, Ryan. It was a minor argument over technicalities.”
“Why didn’t you bring the clause to light, then?”
“I wasn’t sworn in until the end of the session and by then, the bill had been read. You know how these things work, how they have to work or the whole system will crumble from exceptions and precedences.”
“Then raise your objections at the next session.”
“I can’t.” Stelios put his hands together and threaded the fingers one by one. “You think you’re the only race to pass successfully as human? You think they don’t have their spies in the Assembly? If I raise an objection in-session, it’s as good as handing them a musket. Gabriel will instantly put his agenda into action, whatever that agenda may be. Whatever it is he plans, it involves his personal army.”
“If you don’t object, the bill will pass and the clause will be law.”
“A law that could take over a year to swing into action. A lot of things can happen in a year.”
Ryan took a breath, giving himself time to consider the implications. “That’s a huge gamble.”
“Only if you don’t consider the alternative—a guaranteed guerrilla action by psi.”
“What is it you propose should be done about this? You came to me for a reason.”
“To warn you,” Stelios said. “If this bill passes, I’ll make sure it takes a year for the clause to be acted upon. But you need to watch your people. Gabriel may target vampires.”
“Why?” Nayara asked sharply. “We have nothing to do with this…insanity.”
Ryan rubbed his temples as pain throbbed there sharply. “Gabriel won’t see it that way. He will see only that vampires got the better handout from humans. We got the Agency, the pat on the head, the partnerships. Psi-filers are getting a death sentence.”
The silence that greeted his words was eloquent.
Ursella was the first to break it. She shifted her feet, her business robe sweeping the ground with a soft rustle of fabric.
Stelios grimaced. “Well, you got there faster than I did, vampire. It took a bottle of ouzo before it hit me.”
Ryan gave him a bitter smile. “We have been dealing with these race dynamics for two centuries. Such mental gymnastics come easily to me now.”
“Damned shame, huh?” Stelios grunted. He looked up at Nayara. “I’d rather spend mental sweat trying to figure out how to get your private comm number and a date than out-think the psi, but here we are.”
Nayara’s lips parted and her eyes widened. It was all the shock she showed but it was enough for Ryan to know that Stelios had thrown her completely. Her jaw flexed. “If the psi realize we are trying to stop them, they’ll will most certainly turn on us,” she pointed out. “We’d be fighting that guerrilla war. We’d be your own private army, not your watchdogs. The Agency was not built to fight wars.”
“But the people in it are admirably suited to do so,” Stelios said sharply. “I don’t know how old you are, but I know you’ve been around at least a thousand years. Tell me you’ve not learned how to defend yourself in that time and I’ll laugh in your face.”
“I didn’t build the agency to fight a war,” Ryan said, repeating Nayara’s words deliberately to show he and Nayara were of like minds on this matter.
Ursella got to her feet. “Perhaps not, but a war may well come to you, anyway. If you want to be completely anal about it, Ryan, let me point out that my Bureau has purely oversight duties. Your Agency has all the executive power. You insisted upon it, or so the history books tell me.” She nodded and swept from the room, her chin jutting forward.
Stelios grinned. “She’s pissed at you,” he said unnecessarily.
“You’d best be careful, then, because it’s not just me she’s pissed at,” Ryan shot back.
Stelios stood up. “I have your agreement?” he asked.
“You knew you would get it before you came here.”
“It was a gamble. You’re not part of the Assembly executive. You don’t have to do a damn thing I say.”
“But we do share a common future with you and it’s a future we’d like to preserve as much as you.”
Stelios handed the crystal glass back to Nayara. “Good booze, thanks. Keep the bottle for me.” He winked at her and left.
The room was profoundly silent when the door shut behind him.
“We can’t fight a war to stop another race from having what is rightfully theirs, whether they can meet those rights or not. Who are we to judge?” Ryan murmured.
Nayara put the empty glass down on Ryan’s desk. “We can’t judge,” she said flatly. “We must not. But if the psi come after us, then we will have no choice but to defend ourselves. Gabriel will have made the choice for us, in that case.”
Ryan studied her. “You’re proposing we do nothing until Gabriel attacks us?”
Nayara bit her lip. “Yes,” she said at last. “Defence only.”
“That could be a very dangerous stance to take,” Ryan suggested. “Especially if Stelios’ information is inaccurate or underestimated.”
Nayara shrugged. “It’s a risk, but we simply cannot attack without provocation, Ryan. It goes against everything you and I believe in.”
Ryan considered it from every angle he could think of. “Agreed,” he said at last, reluctance dragging at him.
“You don’t like the idea of doing nothing, do you?” Nayara wore a small smile.
“When Stelios made us his first port of call, travelled thousands of miles and arm-twisted Ursella Shun into bringing him here, just to warn us? No, sitting on my hands and waiting for this Gabriel to take a pot shot at me feels like utter stupidity.”
Nayara settled onto the edge of his desk right next to him, so she could look almost eye to eye with him. “We could investigate. See if we could find out more on our own.”
Relief circled through him. “Do it. Do something. I know you have the resources.”
Nayara nodded and stood up. “Done,” she told him and smiled.
He could still smell the light scent she wore even after the door to her office closed behind her.
“That was really stupid,” came a quiet voice from behind him. It had a soft accent that sounded vaguely familiar to Ryan. He spun in his chair, all his muscles taut and ready to lash out.
Shock made him fall back in the chair, a stingless puppet.
He was staring at himself. But the version of himself moving through the door from his private quarters was a worn, ill-used one. The other version of himself stared at the door to Nayara’s office. When he looked back at Ryan, he had tears i
n his eyes. “You sent her to do the most dangerous work in the world, you fool. Do you not realize how little time you have left?”
“What do you mean? You’re from the future, aren’t you?” The tears meant he had a human physiology, as he could only have when he moved into the past. This was himself, but from the future. “What are you doing here? How could you risk this? You know it is not permitted in the charter—”
“Shut up, you stupid idiot,” his future self snapped. He moved around the bar, poured himself a half-glass of rum and knocked it back in three or four swallows. Then he refilled. Ryan noted the two-day growth and the shadows around his eyes. He had not slept when his human body demanded it.
“Watt is it you’re wearing?” Ryan asked, studying the long, black and shabby coat with a wrinkle of his nose. It looked dusty and as beaten-up as the wearer.
His future self half-fell into the chair that Stelios had recently vacated and looked at him over the glass. “You have to listen hard.” He paused, dug inside his coat and extracted a sawn-off shotgun, which he dumped in the chair beside him. He resettled, then lifted his hip and pulled out a revolver, that landed next to the shotgun. Then he carried on as if the interruption had not taken place. “If I’ve timed this right, then Cáel and Ursella just left. No?”
“That’s right.” Ryan couldn’t pull his gaze away from the man. “What has happened to you? I mean, me?” he amended awkwardly. “What is going to happen?”
“Bad things,” his future self intoned. “Everything Cáel just told you will come to pass, and worse. But I never believed him. Not in my gut.” He dropped his chin, and closed his eyes. “I paid the price,” he whispered. He brought the glass back to his lips and there was a visible tremble in his hands. After a moment, he cleared his throat and looked up again. “Don’t let it happen.” His voice was hoarse.
“You’re trying to change the future,” Ryan accused him. “The very thing we swore to protect.”
His future self thrust himself to his feet. “There is no future! Not one worth preserving.” He glanced over his shoulder toward the door to the suite, as if he were monitoring for arrivals. “Your love for her is doomed.”
Bannockburn Binding (Beloved Bloody Time) Page 14