“Heed the Littorane girl,” Gregory told Silky. “She’s got more sense than the rest of you put together.” She handed a small object to Clewie. “If you’re interested in progressing in this world, contact me.”
Clewie examined the object, which was a physical version of a contact card, waterproof and written in Littorane script.
“I made Mr. Lee swear to leave you alone,” Mrs. Gregory told us. “I have persuaded him that there are fates worse than death. If he displeases me, then he, his family, his friends, and their families will be caught within the wide net of retribution that I shall cast. All those within shall discover what it means to beg for death’s release.” The Earthborn woman gave an unearthly screeching laugh. “As will you if I am harmed.”
The sun rose over the trees that bounded the canal, throwing cheerful illumination over the two actors in this drama. And it did have an air of performance. Section ‘C’ and the Littoranes held back, but watched every movement. The kitchen had also gone ominously silent.
Gregory confronted Silky. Kurlei and Earthborn: they may have started life with similar builds, superficially far more alike than I was to my wife, but Silky was a killer honed to physical perfection while Gregory was a pitiable wreck of a person. Skin hung off her in crusted folds, and the scars on her head spoke of a skull that had cracked open to make way for its expanding contents. The Gregory I had met in Tata-West had at least retained some grace to her poise, and when I’d encountered her as the Grotesque wreathed in her full power, she had scared the drent out of me yet captured my gaze as effortlessly as a goddess; this creature before me was different again. She flexed gently as she stood, as if her bones were transforming to rubber. And yet, through all this decay and deformity, I sensed that I was before the most dangerous being I had ever encountered.
“K’Teene-Joshua Sylk is such a lovely new name,” she said in a cracked, masculine voice that nonetheless carried an echo of her cultured Earthborn accent. “Oh, did I tell you that my organization spreads deep into the Littorane community?” Her voice deepened an octave, and sharpened into a poison-barbed blade. “Shall I tell you what gets the mayor’s boner?
“No,” I replied.
“It was the mayor who named me the Grotesque. Oh, he knew exactly who I was and how valuable I could be. But his obsession drives him. He is worse than the parasite inside my flesh that goads me to such dark acts. There is no alien within Philamon Dutch. He is all human, and he does not fight his depravity. He embraces it.”
She peered into Silky’s eyes, making her shudder.
“Yes, you understand me, Kurlei. My job offer to you still stands. And you may bring your husband too, if you must. But I shall repay your call to murder me with the curse of knowledge.”
“Don’t listen to her,” I urged, but everyone was rooted to the spot, myself included.
“Philamon Dutch gets his jacks off toying with deformed women,” said Gregory. “Beautiful women who are nonetheless deformed in some way, whether in their external appearance or inwardly. He enjoys punishing them for their deformities.” She turned to Silky. “Humans are a sickening race, alien, and on Klin-Tula you see us at our worst.”
A little of Gregory’s poise returned to her. She straightened and stiffened, regaining a veneer of her former humanity. “Just to be clear, people,” she said in the voice I remembered from Tata City, “We are all of us in business here. Unnecessary violence is an unnecessary expense. NJ and Silky – such a sweet couple – if you attack my junior associate, Mr. Lee, I shall be obliged to kill you all. And that would be a shame, since you saved my life, McCall. Our debt is cleared. Our paths will cross if you stay with Revenge Squad, and so I strongly advise you to take your impressive and exotic bride and flee somewhere safe. Unlike you, I appreciate her. You certainly married up in your case.”
“I can’t flee,” I said.
Gregory hissed inhumanly. “I don’t like the word can’t. Mostly it’s a word used by the weak who refuse to admit that they won’t. Why won’t you flee, McCall? Do you lack the imagination to leave Revenge Squad? Do you need to be given orders and structure from dawn to dusk?”
I thought of all the many reasons why I couldn’t leave. Caccamo and his cool spy stuff, the sense of belonging that was in such contrast to the isolation I had suffered on my farm, the curiosity about the secrets in the Cabal, and call me a naïve frakker but I believed Revenge Squad could be an important force for good, and then there were all the people who threatened to march Silky front of a firing squad for desertion if I didn’t do what they wanted. But there was one standout reason that mattered more than all the others put together.
“Why can’t I run, Mrs. Gregory? I think you know the answer. There’s nowhere to run to. The bad times are coming. No one will be immune. There is no place on Klin-Tula to hide.”
Gregory thought for a while. “That future is not inevitable, but I concede it is probable. This is why I am reluctant to kill you and your wife. If it were down to me, I’d hang you by your balls and force your wife to watch you die, but the parasite inside me thinks you will prove useful. I can overrule the parasite, but I lose a little of myself every time I do. Get in my way again and I won’t hesitate to pay the cost of eliminating you. This is your second strike. Three strikes and I retire you permanently.”
I had served on Earth and understood her reference, but not her conclusion. If we met a third time, I’d kill her without hesitation.
Nolog advanced meaningfully. His bunching fists raised a crest line along his knuckles like tectonic plates colliding.
“Stop!” I shouted.
“NJ,” said the Tallerman, “logic says we should kill her now. She is dangerous. So too is Mr. Lee. We kill them now. You’ll thank me in the morning.”
“Listen to me, Nolog. Mrs. Gregory is not as helpless as she looks.” Through the kitchen window, I heard the whining of a railgun charging. “Neither is Mr. Lee,” I added in a loud voice. “Together, we might be able to take down Mrs. Gregory, though some of us would not live through the experience. But that would only invite an overwhelming counter-attack that would wipe out every one of us and everyone we hold dear.” I glanced over to the Earthborn. “Am I right?”
“McCall is correct. I am not immortal, but my death would bring dire consequences.”
“Stop!” I shouted when I felt Silky’s mood sharpen to murderous levels. “You didn’t hear Gregory’s screams when the mayor tortured her. At the hands of our mutual enemy. She was violated.”
Silky glared at me with contempt flowing through her head. “You are weak,” she accused, drawing a knife. “Your weakness loosens my bond to you.”
“You yourself set me the agenda of mercy,” I said. “Or at least to think beyond simple violence, and I say I need to show Gregory mercy today. And so you must do so too. Lay down your weapon, Silky.”
“She’s too dangerous to live. So is Lee.”
“Is this the moment you turn on me?”
My friends hovered nearby, primed to intervene but how and for whom? Gregory seemed amused by our argument.
“If I spare her today,” said Silky, “you must give in return, human.”
“Okay. I’m listening.”
“You are weak. Diseased. Not meeting your potential. I will not and cannot follow you much longer in this state. And that would be the worst outcome for both of us. If I let that beast live, you must open your mind to me as far as I need to fix you.”
The last time she’d pushed for this, she’d talked about putting me in a coma. But I had no choice. “I agree.”
“That’s not enough. Swear on the memory of Sanaa. Swear on Bahati’s memory too.”
“I do so swear.”
“Swear on the memory of your daughter.”
Sanaa’s rage erupted like superheated lava spewing through my gorge. Such a cacophony of fury filled my head that I had to throw my arms out for balance.
“Swear!”
Speech was well-nigh imposs
ible, but I managed to force a few words her way. “I. Detest. You.”
“You will swear to me.”
I searched the horrified faces of my friends but found no answers there. Clesselwed kept close enough to spring to my defense in a fight. Only Gregory appeared relaxed.
How dare Silky used my daughter against me in this way? The rage that heated me also broke our mental link, but I knew she would not do this lightly. My wife was trying to protect me, and I had to do this to protect her.
Friendships have their costs. So do marriages.
I took a deep breath and gave her what she wanted. “I swear on the memory of my daughter. I shall open my mind to you. And you had better be worth it, Kurlei.”
“I’m worth a hundred of you, human. You are weak, but I shall obey you in this matter. The infected freak shall live.” She pressed the tip of the blade against Gregory’s chest. “Go now!”
The Earth woman ignored Silky and gave me a smile of sympathy. “You do realize that if you surrender your mind to her, you will be her slave until the day she tires of you and throws you away like an empty shell casing. Her people manipulate minds, McCall. They toy with their prey and then cast them away. It’s what they are. It’s why I want your wife to work for me.”
With the slightest pressure on her blade, Silky cut through Gregory’s blouse and began to peel her, a thin red line drawing down her stomach.
Then she stopped – just giving a hint of what she was capable of – and allowed Gregory to back away into the restaurant.
“Remember what I said about the second strike,” said Gregory from the door. “Next time you get in my way, you will be dead before you even know I’m involved.”
——
We returned in a somber and silent mood through Littorane back alleys and side streets until Silky halted without warning. “The infested Earthborn woman is correct,” she said. “She implied I would be the perfect bait to lure the mayor to the place and time of our choosing.”
“Are you insane?” I screamed. I looked to the others, incredulous because they didn’t immediately deny this. “She’s your comrade, for frakk’s sake. Don’t let her do this. I forbid it, Silky.”
“Forbidding won’t work this time” she said. “Support me. It’s the only way. Chikune, contact Lieutenant Silverberg. Tell her we are bringing her a prominent fugitive to arrest. Me. Through me we can lure in the mayor. I’m not throwing myself away needlessly, but neither will I give up this chance. I want all of you to work out the details of how we take advantage of my move. Now go. Leave us with our Littorane cousins.”
——
“Why did you ignore me?” I asked when the others had gone, and Clewie had taken the hint to keep watch over us from a distance.
She looked at me thoughtfully. “I think you mean how. Back at the Slaughterhouse you forbade me to stop you going after the mayor, but that time you wanted to kill him and I did not, and so I had to yield to your objective. This time we share the same objective – to discredit the mayor and bring him to justice. I am in operational command here. This is my section and I lead. You do as I say.”
“But there must be a better way than to give yourself up.”
“So you keep saying. And yet no one can tell me what this better idea might be.”
We stood squared off for several seconds before her resolve crumbled. I felt her mind switch, as if with one sharp pull, the desperation of our plight had ripped away her kick-ass layer to expose the far more vulnerable person within.
“NJ, I’m frightened. Hold me.”
I folded my arms around her for a long time until our trembling eased.
— CHAPTER 47 —
I lowered my binoculars and forced myself to close my eyes for a few moments, a surveillance ritual that had been pointless ever since the eyes I had been born with were blown out the front of my head. The replacements never experienced fatigue but I took advantage of the break to attempt conversation once more with my partner on this mission. “Do you think Silverberg will help?” I asked. “She’s not given us anything useful yet.”
“If she helps,” Sel-en-Sek replied, “it will be to get us killed.”
Eyes still closed, I waited for his elaboration, but none was forthcoming. Sel-en-Sek always chose his words with the precision of a nano-engineer, which meant he knew something he wasn’t telling, or he thought he did. Either way, he was he was an annoying pig-licking wixerer.
I was so fed up with his funk that I was just about ready to hit the annoying veck. Normally I couldn’t shut him up if I wanted to. I ducked beneath the low wall that ringed the roof of the apartment block, and regarded my friend. Bald head, beard like a white spearhead, black studded earrings and mythical (I hoped) sea monsters tattooed down his neck that sank beneath the collar of his sea-green leather coat, which was artfully distressed with what appeared to be white stains from briny spray. At first glance, Sel-en-Sek was so obviously a child of the sea that you expected to see webbed feet beneath his polished boots, the result of a grandmother who’d had a scandalous love affair with a Littorane.
He was wet sailor through to the skin and deeper, but his appearance was artfully cultivated, and far from having just stepped off an ocean-going battleship, Sel-en-Sek was the most fastidiously clean individual I’d ever known.
Until recently.
Sel-en-Sek’s spirit was crumpled and unwashed. No matter how cool his leather coat looked, it couldn’t cover that.
“You still love him,” I accused with uncharacteristic insight born of frustration at Sel-en-Sek’s moodiness these past weeks.
He nodded. “When I arrived at Port Zahir I contacted the brethren of course.”
“You mean you announced your presence as a Klin-Tula Maritime stockholder?”
“Yes, the very same. He was there – my Kelker-Jay – in the yard where I met the local branch of the brethren. His back was turned but I instantly knew it was him, and with as much certainty I also knew I wasn’t over him. I’d fooled myself for years that I’d moved on. That foolishness died in a heartbeat.”
“He dumped you, right?”
I sensed Sel-en-Sek tense his muscles, but then release them. He knew me too well to expect sugared words to come from my mouth. “Kelker-Jay explained that he needed to see the world, to know more people before settling for any one man.”
“Mate, your boy was in a hole to the tune of 200,000 shillings, and he couldn’t do a thing about it stuck in a hospital pod. Now that you’ve helped sort him out, isn’t that a passport back to his rack?”
“I doubt it,” Sel-en-Sek replied sullenly. “But to do something dangerous, to risk everything for someone else and expect nothing in return. I would do that again for him in a heartbeat. It’s as good a definition of love as anything. Frakk it. Can’t your wife do something to my head to blast away my capacity for love? It’s a disease, chronically overrated by old dogs like us who should know better.”
His words brought a volley of dismay from my spinal column. My ghosts and I didn’t agree with him. “Perhaps,” I said carefully, “but I know for sure that you overrate that preening skangat if he doesn’t appreciate you.” I clapped my hand over my friend’s shoulder. “If I didn’t know this would upset you, when Kelker-Jay gets out of hospital I would break a few of his bones, put him right back inside, and keep on doing it until I was sure he’d thought carefully about how much he’s hurt you.”
Sel-en-Sek laughed, a deep and resonating sound. At least that part of him wasn’t broken; he had a proper man’s laugh, at odds with the sullen teenager he was impersonating. “Don’t think I haven’t imagined doing the same,” he said. “Won’t help, though, NJ. He is more stubborn than anyone I know. Take your pigheadedness, Silky’s independent spirit – except where you’re concerned, of course – and add Nolog-Ndacu’s willingness to sit on a proposal for a few centuries until he’s had time to think things through properly. Add that all up and you’re still not close to Kelker-Jay’s stubbornnes
s.”
“Still, 200,000 big ones, saving his life, and all in the company of a handsome old warrior like me… Come on, that’s got to add to your appeal in his eyes.”
“NJ, thanks. Really. Now shut your vulley hole.”
“Love hurts,” I told him in an angry whisper. “If it didn’t, then it wouldn’t be love. Be a man, Sel-en-Sek. Get drunk, brawl, explode your load into someone who gets you, and repeat until you’re ready to fall in love all over again.”
My sage advice was forged in the fire of long experience, but Sel-en-Sek ignored me anyway.
I ignored him right back. Besides, we had a job to do: conducting some overdue recon of the mayor’s base of operations. Just in case we decided to pay him a visit.
I raised my binoculars to my eyes and adjusted my vision to motion-sensitive mode, scanning the southern perimeter of the mayor’s residence at Three Sisters Fields, nestled in the heights above the city.
This was the second vantage point we had scanned from so far, and the more we saw, the more impregnable our target seemed.
The mayor’s home was a palace in all but name, surrounded by tree-lined avenues and with a fussy garden alongside the main residential building that Sel-en-Sek called a parterre. Then there were shady glades, a pile of building debris that my more cultured companion called a folly and supposedly resembled a ruined Roman temple, an ornamental lake, and a graveled outdoor amphitheater ringed with statues depicting an age when human women saw no need to leave the house wearing any more than a plumed bronze helmet, optionally accessorized with a trident. I wasn’t even sure they were human. Most of them had something different: cloven hooves, an avian head or two human ones, and the mayor definitely had a thing for crossing humans with Littoranes to arrive at a result with sexy gills and long heavy tails sneaking out of hips flared with human femininity.
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