Shadow of the Warmaster

by Jo Clayton

  “I see.”

  “Must have guessed we were heading here and messaged ahead.”

  “No doubt.”

  “Right. Kumari, take our client to the bubble, I’ll collect Pels and my gear and meet you, five minutes, I swear.”

  “Right.” Kumari drawled the word, turning it into a sarcastic comment. “Have you ever noticed, aici Arash,” she touched Adelaar’s arm and nudged her toward the exit, “how much men talk about women dawdling and how long it takes them to get themselves together?”

  2

  The shuttle platform was a towertop that looked down on clouds when there were any and south across the great glittering city, a city that grew on the edge of an ocean and spread inland to jagged young mountains. In the trucegrounds and the business sectors, sunlight ran like water along slickery surfaces, flickered erratically off shattered diamante walls, was thrown in white hot spears from mirror to mirror, mirror mirror on the wall who’s the costliest city of all, mirror mirror everywhere and never a one to look in (go blind if you tried), the spears going here, going there, constantly altering direction as the mirrors changed orientation and the sun rode its customary arc across the sky. It was a city of light, beautiful in its imperious way, meant to intimidate the visitors stepping unaware onto the glassed-in platform; even those who’d been there before were affected by it no matter how blasй a face they wore. We touched down late in the afternoon when some of the glitter and slide was muted, not quite blinding, and still it was a breath stealing thing to stand there and look out across it to a sea bluer than blue melding into a misty blue sky.

  Down on ground level the light was even more intense, shooting past you, through you, around you, dissolving wall and street alike into more light, until you began to wonder if anything was real, including yourself; it was disturbing, uncomfortable-and very practical. Among other things it kept streets and walkways clear, no matter how many visitors descended on the city. Scattered haphazardly, at all levels from roof to cellar, there were small arbors with mossy fountains and cool air rustling through the leaves of lace trees and pungent conifers, where shadows flicked across the face of the person sitting across a table from you with the intimacy of a caress. The contrast was a killer punch more subtle than a drug, and did they know it, those buyers and sellers, those agents and facilitators who were parasites on the primary business of Helvetia, those citizens and business agents who lived in the city and on the city, year round, year on year. More contracts were registered from the arbors than in all the offices, cabinets, bureaus put together.

  We bought visors from a robovender in case we needed to hit the streets, dropped to the terminal and fought the swarm at the tube cars until we managed to snag a car bound for the ottotel trucehouse where Kumari had booked us in. Kumari and I kept Adelaar sandwiched between us and Pels rode rearguard, pulling after him a mob of females of every shape and size, bipeds, tripeds and even a hairy monopod; they all seemed to want to catch him up and cuddle him (the monopod too, which presented an interesting problem in logistics), they giggled when he snarled at them, a daring octoped with blushing tentacles scratched behind his ear, you wouldn’t think these were hard-driving, high-pressure businesswomen capable of metaphorically (or even actually) cutting a rival’s throat with zest and panache; it must be some pheromone he gives off; if you could package it and sell it as perfume you’d make a fortune. It was as effective as it always was, his peculiar defense, those females made a fine and fancy shield for the rest of us. Anyone who had mayhem on his (or her or ves or its) mind generally backed off from performing in front of that many interested spectators. And, give this to the Faceless Seven, we didn’t have to worry about long distance sniping.

  Pels wriggled loose, jumped into the car as the doors were sliding shut; his growl when I grinned at him was more heartfelt than usual; I think it’s time he had a vacation, probably back on Mevvyaurrang making triads with Arras and Maungs; he comes back from those visits with his not-fur shivering and his eyes glazed and not talking to anyone but his plants for a month or more. I signed a question to Kumari (we assumed everything public was on-line to the mainBrain)-had she seen any unusual interest in us? She had a smile for Pels, but shook her head. Pels grunted. One, maybe two, he signed. In the next module over on this car. I didn’t like it, but I expected it. I swung my chair round to face the back of our module in case they’d figured a way to get through it and I waited for the trip to end. We’d be on truceground when we came out, so we could hang around and see who emerged with us. Stupid planning, maybe. I exercised a few brain cells running that one round, but in a breath or two it was obvious I was counting angels and pinheads so I let it drop. Maybe Pels was wrong, but I didn’t think that was any too probable; like I said before, Aurrangers are predators and good at it and not all that long ago semi-cannibals, by which I mean one of the ways they kept the population stable was to hunt down and eat any excess Raus when they were young and tender and about to hit puberty. A few millennia of this and the descendants of those Raus who escaped the pot were very very hard to track.

  Half a dozen came out of that module, more from the third, say around thirty bodies altogether, but the two we wanted weren’t hard to spot, idiots, they were so careful not to look at us. Not pros, no way. Like the two going after Adelaar back on Telffer, the ones Shadow dropped, local computer jocks trying to earn points with the head office. Making sure we went where we told the world we were going. They scuttled out of the lobby like startled mice. Wonder what they’d do if I sneaked after them and yelled boo in their bitty ears. Mmh.

  3

  Kumari’d got a sealed four body unit for us which she charged to the client’s diCarx when we got inside. Adelaar didn’t comment, just marched her gear into her cubby and did her best to slam the door on us. It’s not that easy to work off a snit in an ottotel, the doors ooze shut at the same speed whenever they’re pushed or left alone, there’s nothing much you can break or throw and the walls are padded so beating your head on them doesn’t make much sense. She wasn’t annoyed about having to pay expenses, that was part of the deal. It was being shut into a tincan for three solid months with the same people that got to her, especially Kinok. Arguing with a Sikkul Paem was an exercise in frustration; when ve decided ve didn’t want to talk any longer, ve shooed Kahat away from the translator board and dug ves roots in one of ves earthbeds; after that you might as well try arguing with a dill plant which is more or less what ve smelled like. Slancy’s workshop was down in ves region and ve insisted on knowing everything that went on in that part of the ship. Adelaar was furious at ves interference and loathed having ves snooper cells everywhere she went; her methods were part of her business assets, she said; they were emphatically not part of the deal and if I thought they were, I was soft in the head. Kinok wasn’t talking when I went round to see him, so I told her to set up distorters in the workshop and I stationed Pels outside the door to keep our pet Paem from barging in on her. Ve took it well enough, ves the only Paem I’ve met who has something resembling a sense of humor, which is probably the reason ves lasted so long with us. Something I didn’t tell Adelaar and I’d really rather she didn’t find out, ve budded off a Kahat-clone and sneaked the little creature into the shop; it pretended it was one of the plants that kept the air fresh. I found it a couple of days before we flipped back to realspace and got it out of there. Kinok just rubbed two of ves coils together to make that squeaky sound ve thinks is laughter and ate the clone. Which, if I understand anything about Paem physiology, transferred all the clone knew into Kinok’s own nerve cells.

  After a bath, a change of clothes and a reasonably edible meal, we met in the parley to decide how we were going to work this situation. Sealed units are supposed to be free of snoopears, but anyone who trusts official noises about such things doesn’t last long on Helvetia or anywhere else. We swung tupple loungers around one of Adelaar’s choicer distorters and stretched out on them. For a breath or two no one said anything. Pels
was digging his claws into his chin fur, Kumari had a dreamy look as if she were contemplating a favorite poem, Adelaar had lost her frown and was a lot more relaxed than she’d been in days. Prospect of action, I suppose.

  “Sooner or later each of us is going to be challenged,” I said.

  “No.”

  Adelaar looked like she wanted to start an argument over that, but I shook my head at her and, wonder of wonders, she shut up; I knew that sound, Kri was running on a mix of hunch and logic that was almost never wrong.

  “No,” she repeated. “Not all of us. You and Adelaar. Stink too much of setup if they went after all of us; there’s a limit how far a pro can go; it flexes some; I doubt that much; the Seven want to avoid any smell of ambush, not good for business. And there’s no need anyway. It’s your ship, Swar; should they get you, we’d have to go through all that business of transferring title, could take a year or more, plenty of time for Bolodo to clean up their act. And it’s Adelaar’s daughter; without her around to pay the bills, Bolodo might think we’d say hell with it and go on to something else.” She waved a hand at Pels, wriggled her fingers in a kind of digital grin. “Us you could replace in half an hour or less.” Pels growled. “Well, as far as jobs go.”

  I looked at Adelaar. She lifted a hand, let it fall, but didn’t say anything. “Right,” I said. “How good are you with that sword of yours?”

  “I’m still alive, one challenger’s dead, another can’t walk very well, I cut a few nerves in his left leg. One was pro, one wasn’t, the dead one. The pro was middling good, it was a business matter.”

  “Hmm. Bolodo won’t be fooling around this time, they’ll buy the best there is, no more amateur talent.” I thought about that a while. “If we can’t avoid a challenge, maybe we can maneuver the ground. You up for taking a chance, aici Arash?”

  “If there’s a point to it.” She tapped on the pneumatic arm beside her. “You mean bait them. Tonight?”

  “Catch ’em before they’re set.”

  “And if they don’t bite?”

  “Then they don’t and we have some fun playing before we get serious.”

  “Sounds good.” More tip-tapping on the soft resilient plastic, tiny scratching sounds; her nails were pointed and painted with a metallic film that turned them into small knives; I wouldn’t be all that surprised to learn they had poison packed behind them. She’d fixed them up that way before we left Slancy; that was one of the reasons I started thinking it might be a good idea to force the pace. “What ground?” she said.

  “Darkland. The Rabbid Babbit. You know it?”

  “I’ve been there. Why that House, what about Tinzy’s Amberland, or some other place?”

  “Amberland’s too establishment, too many high level execs and bankers in the crowd. I want room for some creative cheating. Those types are either a bunch of half-assed romantics with an inquisitor’s touch with heretics, or a bunch of snobs who want to keep… um… ah… the creative interpretation of rules as an executive privilege, not something available to the working slob or us common visitors. Those fingernails of yours, as an example, they’re apt to rule them illegal given a protest. I’m sure you’d rather keep them as is.”

  “Babbit’s different?”

  “As different as the Seven allow. A lot of duelists base from there.”

  She laughed, startled into it; for the first time she seemed pleased with something I said. “And that’s a recommendation?”

  “Right.”

  She thought that over a minute, then nodded. “What works, as long as it’s not flagrant enough to be nailed on.”

  “Right.”

  “And that gives us an edge?”

  “Me, yes. You, I don’t know.”

  She laughed again, a real laugh bubbling up from her toes; I didn’t know she had it in her. For a minute I almost liked her. “All right, I can go with that. One thing though,” she hesitated, then pushed herself up. “I’ll give you a signature that’ll release the escrow account to you…” she slipped off the tupple lounge, stood with her arms crossed, “day after tomorrow, if you’ll give me your word you’ll fetch Aslan out even if I’m killed or put down for a long stretch at the meatshop.”

  “You got it.” She waited, her eyes on me. “All right, I’ll spell it out,” I said, “Whatever happens, long as I’m alive and reasonably intact, I’ll fetch Aslan aici Adlaar home to University. Satisfied?”

  “‘Quite. When do you want to leave?”

  “Mmh. Sun’s down. I’d rather wait till after midnight, things get looser.”

  She examined me, eyes narrowed. “Black leather with studs. Lots of studs.”

  “Not leather.” I grinned. “Synthaskin, elasticized.”

  “Better. Shirt or bare arms?”

  “White silk, billowy. To cover possible deficiencies.” I looked her over. “Imaginary deficiencies.”

  “Right.” She grinned. “Earrings, rings, wristbands, fake gems wherever there’s a place to hang them.” She touched her forehead. “Pearshape ruby dangling here?”

  “If it won’t bother your moves.”

  “I can always shuck it before things get serious.”

  “Right. Hair?”

  “Silvergilt. Both of us. A matched pair.”

  “Two minds with but a single thought. Kumari.” She was fizzing and rattling with her kind of laughter. I ignored that. “Put off Vnok till tomorrow and order us a jit. We might as well let whoever’s interested know we’re coming.”

  When we came out of our cubbies and struck a pose, Pels and Kumari fell out laughing. We left them holding their sides and whooping and drop-tubed to the lobby where we climbed in the jit we’d ordered and took off for the Darklands.

  4

  The jit dropped us at the Dusky Gate, city drivers wouldn’t go into the Darklands for fear of losing their machines. No law past that heavy arch, only Darkland rules which said what you had was yours as long as you could keep it and only that long; whatever someone was sly enough, quick enough or brutal enough to take belonged to them under the same rules. Once you made a House, though, you could rent protection and be reasonably secure from muggers, cutpurses and assassins. That was a matter of business, there had to be an edge of danger but nothing too threatening or the slummers wouldn’t come and the game rooms would lose their pigeons, the psychodromes would spray their putchemeio dreammist on props, not people. Which meant we were safe from ambush only when we reached the Rabbid Babbit. We walked through the Gate.

  Mainstreet was wide, paved with thin slabs of rough-cut stone. Right now they were wet (it must have rained while we were getting ready), with puddlets in the chisel gouges shining yellow and red as they reflected the light from the luso torches that lined the sides of Mainstreet. The torches looked real enough until you noticed they never seemed to burn down; the smell of hot tar and burning oil, the crackle and snap of the fire, the heat, they were all there; a little too much there tonight, I expect the nerp who ran the illusion was high on something and got carried away with the effects.

  The Houses were set back a short distance from the street, leaving room for sidewalk cafes with tables under markVdomes where anyone interested could watch the action on the street without any danger of that action spilling over on them. There was a middling crowd out, walking from House to House for the thrill of flirting with thieves and budding duelists (and because there was no other way to change Houses, you walked or you stayed where you were). The air was cool and damp, though it wasn’t raining now. The strollers seemed more subdued than I remembered, but maybe this was just a more inhibited bunch. The body paint on a lacertine group we passed was a mix of earth colors, dull reds and grayed-down yellows; last time I was here the lacertines had gone for brilliant primaries, a slim green back could be like a shout of laughter. Now those backs were more like smiles, subtle smiles that might speak either pleasure or mockery. Times change and who can read the branches if he hasn’t watched them grow?

  Adelaar w
alked half a pace ahead of me, no more joking for her. Made me a little sad, she’d let an imp show briefly, then shooed it home; I liked that imp, a bit more of her in the woman would improve the mix a lot, but I think she was afraid of that side of her. And I think she was already regretting the impulse that stuffed her into that costume.

  We went past Amberland. Adelaar glanced at the holo-females of half a dozen species moving through a complex and beautiful melange of half a dozen ancient dances, swaying through the air across the front of the House, larger than life, gaudy, garish, down-and-dirty seductive, there was a little blonde, well, I dragged my mind back to where I was, and what I was doing; I could see Adelaar preferred the company in there to mine, poor little imp deep inside her never let off its leash; we weren’t going to be friends, Adelaar and me, maybe pleasant acquaintances if we kept off politics. There were several shadows drifting after us, but they kept back, ready to vanish down the nearest alley if either of us took a notion to chase them, which made me think they were just making sure where we went. It wasn’t the crowd in the street that stopped my attack, no one in his right mind interfered in a fight, not in Darklands. If you or your party weren’t involved, you got out of there. Fast. No lingering to gawk at the pretty fight.

  We passed several other Houses, each with its identifying holo. Crezmir Tarkitzdom, bull-leapers and vodi slayers and antique idols. Surrealismo, hmm, indescribable and constantly changing (I’ve never seen that holo repeat itself and it’s always weird; when I have a moment with nothing else to occupy me, I wonder about the minds that come up with some of the things I’ve seen there). Wildwood. Tranqworld. The Rabbid Babbit. Its holo was the same as before, a collection of assorted Uglys and Hairys barbequing a Banker over a lusty pile of coals, a prim-faced character with an immaculate tunic and stovepipe trousers, chained to a spit which the Ugs and Hairs were turning and turning, wringing sweat of a sort from him, gold coins dropping like rain. Adelaar made a face at the thing, gave me a dark look and pushed through the Gate onto the Babbitwalk.