The Bloodline Feud (Merchant Princes Omnibus 1)

by Charles Stross

  ‘She protests in the strongest terms, my lord.’ The secretary shrugged slightly, his face expressionless. ‘I sent Roland to attend to her personally, to ensure she is adequately protected. For what it’s worth, there were no identifying marks on the bodies. No tattoos, no indications of who they were. Not Clan. But they had weapons and equipment from the other side and I am – startled – that Lady Olga, even with help from our runaway, survived the incident.’

  ‘Our runaway is my niece, Matthias,’ the duke reminded his secretary. ‘A rather extraordinary woman.’ His expression hardened. ‘I want tissue samples, photographs, anything you can come up with. For the hit squad. Get them processed on the other side, run them across the FBI most-wanted database, pull whatever strings you can find, but I want to know who they were and who they thought they were working for. And how they got there. The palace was supposed to be securely doppelgängered. Why wasn’t it?’

  ‘Ah. I have already looked into that.’ Matthias waited.

  ‘Well then?’ The duke clenched his hands.

  ‘About three years ago, Baroness Hildegarde ordered our agents – via the usual shell company – to let out one side of the doppel-gänger facility to a secondary Clan-owned shipping company she was setting up. It was all above board and conducted in public at Beltaigne, approved in full committee, but the shipping company moved away a year later to more suitable purpose-built facilities, and they in turn sublet the premises. It was walled off from the original bonded store and converted into short-lease storage, leaving it wide open. Purely coincidentally, it covered the New Tower, and parts of the west wing of the palace were left undoppelgängered. Helge wouldn’t have known enough to recognize this as unusual, but it left most of her suite wide open to attack by world-walkers.’

  ‘And where was Oliver, Baron Hjorth, while this was going on?’ the duke asked, deceptively mildly. A failure to doppelgänger the palace correctly – to ensure that it was physically collocated with secure territory in the other universe to which the world-walking and occasionally squabbling members of the Clan had access – was not a trivial oversight, not after the bloody civil war that had killed three out of every four members of the six families only a handful of decades ago.

  ‘He was worrying about roofing costs, I imagine.’ Matthias shrugged again, almost imperceptibly. ‘If he even knew about it. After all, what does security matter if the building caves in?’

  ‘If.’ The duke frowned. ‘That slime-weasel Oliver is in Baroness Hildegarde’s pocket, you mark my words. An unfortunate coincidence that they can both deny responsibility for, and Helge is left facing assassins? It’s almost insultingly convenient. She’s getting slack – we shall have to teach her a lesson in manners.’

  ‘What are your orders regarding your niece, my lord? Since she appears to have run away, like her mother before her, she could be found in breach of the compact – ’

  ‘No, no need for that just yet.’ The duke walked slowly back to his desk, his expression showing little sign of the stiffness in his joints. ‘Let her move freely for now.’ He lowered himself into his chair and stared at Matthias. ‘I expect to hear about her movements by and by. Has she made any attempt to get in touch?’

  ‘With us? I’ve heard no messages, my lord.’ Matthias raised one hand, scratched an itch alongside his nose. ‘What do you think she’ll do?’

  ‘What do I think?’ The duke opened his mouth, as if about to laugh. ‘She’s not a trained security professional, boy. She might do anything! But she is a trained investigative journalist, and if she’s true to her instincts, she’ll start digging.’ He began to smile. ‘I really want to see what she uncovers.’

  *

  Meanwhile, in a city called Boston in a country called the United States:

  ‘You know something?’ asked Paulette. ‘When I told you to buy guns and drive fast I wasn’t, like, expecting you to actually do that.’ She put her coffee cup down, half-drained. There were dark hollows under her eyes, but apart from that she was as tidy as ever, not a hair out of place. Which, Miriam reflected, left her looking a bit like a legal secretary: short, dark, Italianate subtype.

  Miriam shook her head. I wish I could keep it together the way she does, she thought. ‘You said, and I quote from memory, “As your attorney I am advising you to buy guns and drive fast.” Right?’ She smiled tiredly at Paulette. Her own coffee cup was untouched. When she’d arrived at the other woman’s house with Brilliana d’Ost in tow, the release of tension had her throwing up in the bathroom toilet. Paulette’s wisecrack was in poor taste – Miriam had actually killed a man in self-defense less than twenty-four hours ago, and now things were starting to look really messy.

  ‘What’s an attorney?’ asked Brill, sitting up on the sofa, prim and attentive: twentyish, blonde, and otherworldly in the terrifyingly literal way that only a Clan member could be.

  ‘Not me, I’m a paralegal. Just in case you’d forgotten, Miriam. I’d have to study for another two years before I can sit for the bar exams.’

  ‘You signed up for the course like I asked? That’s good.’

  ‘Yeah, well.’ Paulette put her empty mug down. ‘Do you want to go through it all again? Just so I know where I stand?’

  ‘Not really, but . . .’ Miriam glanced at Brill. ‘Look, here’s the high points. This young lady is Brilliana d’Ost. She’s kind of an illegal immigrant, no papers, no birth certificate, no background. She needs somewhere to stay while we sort things out back where she comes from. She isn’t self-sufficient here – she met her very first elevator yesterday evening, and her first train this morning.’

  Paulette raised an eyebrow. ‘R-i-i-ght,’ she drawled. ‘I think I can see how this might pose some difficulties.’

  ‘I can read and write,’ Brill volunteered. ‘And I speak English. I’ve seen Dynasty and Rob Roy, too.’ Brightly: ‘And The Godfather, that was the duke’s favorite! I’ve seen that one three times.’

  ‘Hmm.’ Paulette looked her up and down then glanced at Miriam. ‘This is a kind of what you see is what you get proposition, isn’t it?’

  ‘Yes,’ Miriam said. ‘Oh, and her relatives will want her back. They might get violent if they find her, so she needs to be anonymous. All she’s got are the clothes on her back. And then there’s this.’ She passed Paulette a piece of paper. Paulette glanced at it, then raised her other eyebrow and did a double take.

  ‘This is valid?’ She held up the check.

  ‘No strings.’ Miriam nodded. ‘At least, as long as Duke Angbard doesn’t cut off the line of credit he gave me. You’ve got the company paperwork together, ready to sign? Good. What we do is, we open a company bank account. I pay this into it and issue myself with shares to the tune of fifty grand. We write you up as an employee, you sign the contract, I issue you your first paycheck – eight thousand, covers your first month only – and a signing bonus of another ten thousand. You then write a check back to the company for that ten thousand, and I issue you the shares and make you company secretary. Got that?’

  ‘You want me as a director?’ Paulette watched her closely. ‘Are you sure about that?’

  ‘I trust you,’ Miriam said simply. ‘And I need someone on this side of the wall who’s got signing authority and can run things while I’m away. I wasn’t kidding when I told you to set this up, Paulie. It’s going to be big.’

  Paulette stared at the banker’s draft for fifty thousand dollars dubiously. ‘Blood money.’

  ‘Blood is thicker than water,’ Brill commented. ‘Why don’t you want to take it?’

  Paulette sighed. ‘Do I tell her?’ she asked Miriam.

  ‘Not yet.’ Miriam looked thoughtful. ‘But I promised myself a few days back that anything I start up will be clean. That good enough for you?’

  ‘Yeah.’ Paulette turned toward the kitchen doorway, then paused. ‘Brilliana? Is it okay if I call you Brill?’

  ‘Surely!’ The younger woman beamed at her.

  ‘Oh. Well, u
h, this is the kitchen. I was going to make some fresh coffee, but I figure if you’re staying here for a while I ought to start by showing you where things are and how not to – ’ She glanced at Miriam. ‘Do they have electricity?’ she asked. Miriam shook her head minutely. ‘Oh sweet Jesus! Okay, Brill, the first thing you need to learn about the kitchen is how not to kill yourself. See, everything works by electricity. That’s kind of – ’

  Miriam picked up a bundle of official papers and a pen, and wandered out into the front hall. It’s going to be okay, she told herself. Paulie’s going to mother-hen her. Two days and she’ll know how to cross the road safely, use a flush toilet, and work the washing machine. Two weeks, and if Paulie didn’t kill her, she’d be coming home late from nightclubs with a hangover. If she didn’t just decide that the twenty-first century was too much for her, and hide under the spare bed. Which, as she’d grown up in a world that hadn’t got much past the late medieval, was a distinct possibility. Wouldn’t be a surprise; it’s too much for me at times, Miriam thought, contemplating the stack of forms for declaring the tax status of a limited liability company in Massachusetts with a sinking heart.

  *

  That evening, after Paulette and Miriam visited the bank to open a business account and deposit the checks, they holed up around Paulie’s kitchen table. A couple of bottles of red wine and a chicken casserole went a long way toward putting Brill at her ease. She even managed to get over the jittery fear of electricity that Paulie had talked into her in the afternoon to the extent of flipping light switches and fiddling with the heat on the electric stove.

  ‘It’s marvelous!’ she told Miriam. ‘No need for coal, it stays just as hot as you want it, and it doesn’t get dirty! What do all the servants do for a living? Do they just laze around all day?’

  ‘Um,’ said Paulette. One glance told Miriam that she was suffering a worse dose of culture shock than the young transportee – her shoulders were shaking like jelly. ‘Like, that’s the drawback, Brill. Where would you have the servants sleep, in a house like this?’

  ‘Why, if there were several in the bedchamber you so kindly loaned – oh. I’m to drudge for my keep?’

  ‘No,’ Miriam interrupted before Paulette could wind her up any further. ‘Brill, ordinary people don’t have servants in their homes here.’

  ‘Ordinary? But surely this isn’t – ’ Brill’s eyes widened.

  Paulette nodded at her. ‘That’s me, common as muck!’ she said brightly. ‘Listen, the way it works in this household is, if you make a mess, you tidy it up yourself. You saw the dishwasher?’ Brill nodded, evidently enthralled. ‘There are other gadgets. A house this big doesn’t need servants. Tomorrow we’ll go get you some more clothes – ’ She glanced at Miriam for approval – ‘then do next week’s food shopping, and I’ll show you where everything’s kept. Uh, Miriam, this is gonna slow everything up – ’

  ‘Doesn’t matter.’ Miriam put her knife and fork down. She was, she decided, not only over-full but increasingly exhausted. ‘Take it easy. Brill needs to know how to function over here because if it all comes together the way I hope, she’s going to be over here regularly on business. She’ll be working with you, I hope.’ She picked up her wineglass. ‘Tomorrow I’m going to go call on a relative. Then I think I’ve got a serious road trip ahead of me.’

  ‘You’re going away?’ asked Brill, carefully putting her glass down.

  ‘Probably. But not immediately. Look, what I said earlier holds – you can go home whenever you want to, if it’s an emergency. All you have to do is catch a cab around to the nearest Clan safe house and hammer on the door. They’ll have to take you back. If you tell them I abducted you, they’ll probably believe it – I seem to be the subject of some wild rumors.’ She smiled tiredly. ‘I’ll give you the address in the morning, all right?’ The smile faded. ‘One thing. Don’t you dare bug out on Paulie without telling her first. They don’t know about her and they might do something about her if they learn . . . mightn’t they?’

  Brill swallowed, then nodded. ‘I understand,’ she said.

  ‘I’m sure you do.’ Miriam realized Paulette was watching her through narrowed eyes. ‘Brill has seen me nearly get my sorry ass shot to pieces. She knows the score.’

  ‘Yeah, well. I was meaning to talk to you about that, too.’ Paulette didn’t look pleased. ‘What the hell is happening over there?’

  ‘It’s a mess. First, Olga tried to kill me. Luckily she gave me a chance to talk my way out of it first – someone tried to set me up last time I visited you. Then the shit really hit the fan. Last night I figured out that my accommodation was insecure, the hard way, then parties unknown tried to rub out Olga and me, both. Multiple parties. There are at least two factions involved, and I don’t have a clue who this new bunch are, which is why I’m here and brought Brill – she’s seen too much.’

  ‘A second gang? Jesus, Miriam, you’re sucking them up like a Hoover! What’s going on?’

  ‘I wish I knew, believe me.’ She drained her wineglass. ‘Hmm. This glass is defective. Better fix it.’ Before she could reach for the bottle, Paulette picked it up and began to pour, her hand shaking slightly. ‘Had a devil of a time getting here, I can tell you. Nearly put my back out carrying Brill, then found some evil son of a bitch had booby-trapped the warehouse. Earlier I phoned Roland to come tidy up – someone had murdered the site watchman – but instead someone put a bomb in it.’

  ‘I told you that smoothie would turn out to be a weasel,’ said Paulette. ‘It’s him, isn’t it?’

  ‘I don’t think so. Things are messy, very messy. We ran into one of Angbard’s couriers on the train over, so I gave him a message that should shake things loose if it’s anyone on his staff. And now . . . well.’ She pulled out the two lockets from her left pocket. ‘Spot the difference.’

  Paulette’s breath hissed out as she leaned forward to study them. ‘Shit. That one on the left, the tarnished one – that’s yours, isn’t it? But the other – ’

  ‘Have a cigar. I took it off the first hired gun last night. He won’t be needing it anymore.’

  ‘Mind if I . . . ?’ Paulette picked the two lockets up and sprang the catch. She frowned as she stared at the contents, then snapped them closed. ‘The designs are different.’

  ‘I guessed they would be.’

  Brill stared at the two small silver disks as if they were diamonds or jewels of incalculable value. Finally she asked, timidly, ‘How can they be different? All the Clan ones are the same, aren’t they?’

  ‘Who says it’s a Clan one?’ Miriam scooped them back into her pocket. ‘Look, first I am going to get a good night’s sleep. I suggest you guys do the same thing. In the morning, I’m going to hire a car. I’d like to be able to go home, just long enough to retrieve a disk, but – ’

  ‘No, don’t do that,’ said Paulette.

  Miriam looked at her. ‘I’m not stupid. I know they’re probably watching the house in case I show up. It’s just frustrating.’ She shrugged.

  ‘It’s not that bad,’ Paulette said. ‘Either they got the disk the first time they black-bagged you – or they didn’t, in which case you know precisely where it is. Why not leave it there?’

  ‘I guess so,’ Miriam replied. ‘Yeah, you’re right. It’s safe where it is.’ She glanced at Brill, who mimed incomprehension. Until she was forced to smile. ‘Still. Tomorrow I’m going to spend some time in a museum. Then – ’ She glanced at Paulette.

  ‘Oh no, you’re not going to do that again.’

  ‘Oh yes, I am. It’s the only way to crack the story wide open.’ Her eyes went wide. ‘Shit! I’d completely forgotten! I’ve got a feature to file with Steve for The Herald! The deadline’s got to be real soon! If I miss it, there’s no way I’ll get the column – ’

  ‘Miriam.’

  ‘Yes, Paulie?’

  ‘Why are you still bothering about that?’

  ‘I – ’ Miriam froze for a moment. ‘I guess I’m still
thinking of going back to my old life,’ she said slowly. ‘It’s something to hang onto.’

  ‘Right.’ Paulette nodded. ‘Now tell me. How much money is there on that platinum card?’

  Pause. ‘About one point nine million dollars left.’

  ‘Miriam?’

  ‘Yes, Paulie?’

  ‘As your legal advisor I am telling you to shut the fuck up and get a good night’s sleep. You can sort out whether you’re going to write the article tomorrow – but I’d advise you to drop it. Say you’ve got stomach flu or something. Then you can take an extra day over your preparations for the journey. Got it?’

  ‘Yes, Paulie.’

  ‘And another thing?’

  ‘What’s that?’

  ‘Drink your wine and shut your mouth, kid, you look like a fish.’

  *

  The next day, Miriam pulled out her notebook computer – which was now acquiring a few scratches – and settled down to pound the keyboard while Paulette took Brill shopping. It wasn’t hard work, and she already knew what she was going to write, and besides, it saved her having to think too hard about her future. The main headache was not having access to her Mac, or a broadband connection. Paulie, despite her brief foray into dot-com management, had never seen the point of spending money to receive spam at home. Finally she pulled out her cell and dialed The Herald’s front desk. ‘Steve Blau, please,’ she said, and waited.

  ‘Steve. Who’s this?’

  ‘Steve? It’s Miriam.’ She took a deep breath. ‘About that feature.’

  ‘Deadline’s this Thursday,’ he rumbled. ‘You needing an extension?’

  She breathed out abruptly, nearly coughing into the phone. ‘No, no, I’m ready to e-mail you a provisional draft, see if it fits what you were expecting. Uh, I’ve had a bit of an exciting life lately, got a new phone number for you.’

  ‘Really?’ She could almost hear his eyebrows rising.

  ‘Yeah. Domestic incident, big time.’ She extemporized hastily. ‘I’m having to look after my mother. She’s had an accident. Broken hip. You want my new details?’