Back in my room, I called Daniel and told him to be especially careful of Darius.
‘You have to go through all Darius’s staff and contacts again, especially the men. And do it now.’
‘God! You’ve become so bossy!’
‘Oh, well, sorry. Hey, Daniel, who’s the one out here trying to sort things out? Like you’re in a position to do something?’
‘Don’t get used to it,’ he grumped. ‘I still outrank you.’
‘Oh, right. Yes, sir, no, sir!’ I retorted. I picked at the embroidered edge of the duvet cover. ‘Have you…have you heard anything about Conrad?’
‘With our lack of comms?’
I could almost hear him thinking my brain had fallen apart.
‘Don’t worry,’ he said much more kindly, ‘he‘ll get out of this. He’s tough as hell and he’s survived one rebellion.’
Apollodorus and I talked over breakfast two hours later.
‘Do you still have that secure facility over by the industrial park?’
‘Of course,’ he replied, looking surprised.
‘Good, I want the librarian, Trosius, plus Pisentius, Cyriacus and Sextus picked up, held separately and prepared for a little talk with me and Justus. We’ll let Caeco run for the moment. Tell the troops ditto for Petronax. If they see him, they must exercise extreme caution – he’s a mean little shit.’ I smashed the top of my egg. ‘It’s only a remote possibility, though. I’m sure he’s holed up inside the PGSF barracks.’
‘You’re very focused this morning.’
‘Yes, well, we’ve spent enough time dithering around.’
I looked at the table with its impeccable silver cutlery and white porcelain, and my fingers twitched on the damask cloth. I swallowed some coffee and looked directly at Apollodorus. ‘Do you have any contacts at the Transulium?’
‘Ah! I wondered when we might come to that.’
‘I’m not going to pretend an attitude or play any little games. I will beg and plead if you want, but I must break him out of there, Apollo.’ I looked across the room at the buffet with its arrangement of white and yellow roses, glass jugs, bowls, and preserves, and eventually back to Apollodorus. I rubbed the back of my left wrist with the fingers of my right hand and stared back down at the tablecloth.
‘Yes, I think so, too, or you won’t be able to concentrate.’
How strange this man was. He always managed to surprise me with his curveball comments. What on earth could his real motivation be? Such an operation would take resources and time. It could lead to injury or death of one or more of his people.
‘Leave it with me,’ he said. ‘One thing: I will not have him running round afterwards, playing soldiers in an operation where my people are involved. The best I can offer is to put him somewhere neutral. I hope you understand that.’
Neither Justus nor I was too bothered by the summer heat reflecting inward from the sheet metal walls of the old warehouse on the industrial park: we’d both opted for light tunics, but our guests weren’t so comfortable waiting in their locked, windowless cubicles. I insisted on giving them a water bottle each, despite Justus’s protestations.
We started with Sextus, who was young and less experienced. Two of Justus’s heavies plunked him on a chair in the middle of the empty cavern. Sextus’s eyes were covered by a black cloth and his hands strapped to the edges of the chair. Justus and I played Nisius and Nisia, a delightful pair of siblings. Standing just within earshot, we discussed ways of breaking bones, specifically kneecapping. We ranged through whether to use a gun, knife, a crowbar or sledgehammer, and whether from back or front was most effective and painful.
‘I don’t know, Nisius,’ I moaned, my tone nasal and whining. ‘Why we don’t just pump him full of the chemical stuff and wait for the verbal diarrhoea to start?’
‘Or the real thing!’ Nisius/Justus laughed nastily. ‘You know it makes the veins in their dick rupture and go septic. Remember the mess last time?’
‘Oh, all right, we’ll go for the physical then.’
Sextus was trembling by now. Our boots resounded on the concrete floor as we approached the seated figure. The metal tools we carried clanked loudly. They were, in fact, assorted lengths of domestic pipe.
Sextus had a deepening bruise on his cheek and a dried blood dribble at one corner of his mouth. Sweat soaked his front hairline, and his forehead glistened. Maybe it was the heat, but probably not.
‘Oh dear, dear...What happened to you? You didn’t try to pick a fight, did you?’ My fake sympathy was a long way from the nervous tones of old Catherine MacCarthy. ‘Now, we need to have a little talk and you’re going to do most of it.’ I tapped his knee firmly with one of the pipes. He shivered. Sweat broke out above his upper lip.
‘My boss is a bit cross with you and your friends – you’ve interfered with an operation he was running.’
I paused, waiting for the fear to soak in.
‘You just tell me everything like a good boy and we’ll part friends. You screw around and what’s left of you won’t be able to limp back into your little hole.’
He gulped and then started.
Caeco had recruited him after the demonstration he had been involved with. He’d been barely seventeen and was only nineteen now. Jupiter! Corrupting a cross, frightened kid was classic fundamentalist tactics, but purposefully damaging an already fragile soul looking to strike out at something was worse.
Sextus had been assigned to Aidan Hirenses’ office as receptionist as he was presentable and well-spoken enough to divert clients’ enquiries while still watching Aidan. As Novius had found when we’d raided, they’d had a remote alarm installed that Sextus could easily trigger from his desk.
Aidan had been targeted by the conspirators because several PGSF used his practice or his services at Mossia’s gym. Sitting inside the PGSF building, surely Petronax could have accessed any information they needed, including personal stuff about Conrad? Then my brain started up. Of course, Petronax wouldn’t have cleared access to the personal records for somebody as high-ranking as the legate. None of the PGSF would dream of saying anything to Petronax unless absolutely necessary professionally, and then only if he threatened to pull teeth. He was a bare rock stranded in a sea of information, and no boat ever landed there.
‘Now, Sextus, I have this bad feeling you’re not telling me everything. Maybe I’ll have Nisius think up a way to remind you.’
Justus rubbed two of the pipes together as if he were sharpening some tool.
‘No!’ Sextus all but screamed.
‘Fine then, you tell me right now what information they wanted and why, and I might be able to persuade Nisius to fetch you a cup of water.’
Growls of “spoilsport!” came from Justus. I glared at him.
‘They said they had to take the PGSF legate out. Eliminate him.’
My turn to tremble.
‘Now, why was that?’ asked Justus.
‘Because he is the child’s father.’
I froze. I glared at Sextus through a red haze that had welled up in front of my eyes, tensed my muscles ready to spring, and brought both hands up ready to tear him apart. Justus grabbed me in time.
‘The child’s name?’ Nisius’s whiny voice asked, a little short of breath. He was struggling to hold on to me.
‘Darius, the so-called Imperatrix Silvia’s son. The whole line is tainted but, with a male child at least, we could restore the normal order of things,’ he shouted with some defiance.
I gave him his due. That was a courageous thing to say in the circumstances.
Justus took over while I tried to pour water into a plascard cup with shaking hands.
‘How is that to happen?’
Silence.
Incredibly, Sextus appeared to be sulking. Had he found some grit deep in his being? Was he reverting to the stubborn Cornelia type at last?
Justus slapped his face. ‘I asked you a question, sonny. Now answer me.’
‘The
woman and two female children will be disposed of in the traditional way and the boy put in her place. We have enough supporters in the Senate to make a Council of Regency until he matures.’
‘Nice,’ hissed Nisius. ‘Kill a popular ruler along with two of her children. What were you going to do, strangle the six-year-old and rape the teenager to death like in ancient times you love so much?’ He spat in Sextus’s face, shoved the chair to the ground and gave Sextus a vicious kick.
I was astounded. I didn’t know Justus had it in him.
We left him there. I ran outside and threw up.
‘Do you need a few moments before we do the others?’ Justus asked and made me finish the cup of water I’d fetched for Sextus.
‘I need to make a phone call. Back in five.’
‘Nice delicate fingers, Trosius. Shame if they got broken and healed crookedly.’ Nisius put a little backward pressure on his right-hand forefinger. By the time we’d acted out the preliminary pantomime, Trosius had turned white, a contrast with the black cloth covering his eyes. He started to tremble once Justus bent down to whisper the threatening words in his ear.
‘Now, now, Nisius, you’re going to make him scared,’ I cooed from the other side. ‘Trosius, be a good boy and tell me about what you’ve been doing for Martinus Caeco. And don’t say “Martinus who?” or I will have to let my brother loose on you.’
‘Please,’ he moaned. ‘Don’t break my fingers, please!’
Justus bent one more back, a little more than was necessary, but didn’t snap it. I frowned at him.
He shrugged, but relaxed his grip a little.
‘Well, let’s start with your messaging lists and protocols, and see how we do.’
He spilled the lot: names, e-addresses, protocols, system passwords, schedules and more.
Cyriacus proved a little more stubborn. His was quite a sad story: his son had been taken away by his dead wife’s mother who’d somehow rescinded the settlement her daughter had made on Cyriacus. He was left destitute and childless, virtually a beggar until he had some luck gambling. Then, of course, he’d run up debts. Caeco spotted the opportunity, stepped in, paid them off and recruited him into the patriarchalists. From that moment, Cyriacus felt he’d found a purpose in life, strongly motivated by his earlier misery. I felt sorry for him until he started saying he’d be proud to be a martyr attempting to kill the women heading the Twelve Families starting with the old Mitela bitch. I kicked him. Hard. After that unprofessional spurt of temper, I settled down with Justus to interview Pisentius.
Another one with gambling debts. Was there a type emerging, I wondered? What we really wanted was his dealings with Caeco. He looked pale, but determined. This was not going to be easy, or pleasant.
‘Now, Pisentius, your friends have been very cooperative. You’re not going to spoil the pattern, are you?’ I asked reasonably. He told me to go and do something very rude, and anatomically impossible, so I stamped hard on his upper instep with the heel of my boot.
He shrieked.
‘That was the wrong answer, Pisentius. You lose ten points.’ Tears streamed from his eyes. He flinched as I placed my heel on his other instep.
‘Now, let’s start with an easy one – tell me when you last saw Caeco.’
‘Last week,’ he mumbled.
‘And you talked about…?’
‘Things.’
‘Oh dear, you are trying to give yourself a hard time, Pisentius.’ I sighed.
I walked away as Justus brought his right arm up to start the lesson in behaviour. Although I heard, I couldn’t watch.
A little while later, I intervened. Justus was enjoying himself too much.
‘Now, Pisentius, let’s see if you’re in a mood to be a bit more chatty. Caeco came and saw you. Tell me what happened.’
‘He saw off that bastard trying to put pressure on me for some money I owed. We should’ve finished him off.’ He took a deep breath and spat out a tooth and gob of blood. ‘Martinus said we had better things to do. Shame.’
‘Then?’
‘He had a list of senators who supported our cause – he’d picked them out himself. He knew they were right thinking.’
‘So where is this little boys’ fan club meeting?’ I sneered.
Justus shot me a warning glance and stepped in. ‘Never mind her, she gets a bit over-excited. Just tell me, between us men.’ Justus smirked at me.
He was irritating, especially when he was right.
Justus tapped Pisentius on the knee as a reminder.
‘They’re meeting in three days’ time at the Senate, before the formal quarter day. He’s going to do it as a charity petition.’
‘So which senators are we talking about?’
‘I don’t know – Caeco never said.’
‘Oh, please! Do you really want that injection? No bother to us which way we go,’ I said in my coldest voice.
‘No! Really, I really don’t know. Please.’ His voice thinned and he gulped.
‘You do know that Caeco is only after power, don’t you? He doesn’t care a minim about your cause.’
‘That’s not true. He embodies the cause.’
‘Oh really? None of you means anything to him.’
‘You’re just saying that, you lying bitch.’
Justus slapped him hard.
‘If you talk to my sister like that again, I will put your eye out.’ He pressed lightly through the blindfold on Pisentius’s eyelid and spoke in an over-gentle voice. Pisentius shrank back.
‘Sorry to disappoint you, Pisentius, but why do you think Caeco and his boy, Trosius, met with the Head of Security at the PGSF. Not exchanging flower arranging tips, I think.’
Silence.
Justus handed me the photos and we stood behind Pisentius’s chair. I curled the lower edge of his blindfold up so he could see.
‘Manipulated,’ he mumbled.
‘Gods, you are ignorant. Look again. See the pixels, how the pattern’s not disturbed? Didn’t you learn anything at school?’
‘No. Not possible.’ I could hear the desperate hope in his voice that it wasn’t true.
Justus’s troops took him back to his cell. All four would stay locked up for the duration. For operational security, I calculated Petronax would have forbidden Caeco to contact any of them before the Senate meeting. A risk for us, but an acceptable one.
Back at the house, Justus poured me a large brandy. ‘Here, get this down your neck.’
‘Thanks,’ I muttered.
‘You don’t like this side of it, do you?’ Behind the curiosity in his eyes, I saw unexpected sympathy. ‘I remember from before, you preferred to trick them.’
‘I’m realistic enough to know we don’t have time now,’ I conceded. ‘But no, I don’t.’
I’d given up counting how many laws I’d violated.
XVIII
Next morning, I woke feeling optimistic. We had identified the conspiracy’s principal targets, neutralised several key plotters, and accessed their comms. We would move on Caeco at the pre-Senate meeting and Petronax was entering into my sights. But we had one serious vulnerability, or rather I did.
I was peering over Albinus’s shoulder at the screen displaying the richness of the comms info we’d gained from Trosius.
‘You know, this guy was very meticulous,’ he said. ‘His organisation and filing are immaculate. It’s also his weakness.’
‘He’s a librarian!’ I snorted.
‘Somebody has to be – my father was one.’
The heat spread up my neck. ‘I apologise. I didn’t know. I shouldn’t have been so judgemental.’
He swivelled around on his chair. ‘Gods! Don’t go all formal on me, Pulcheria – you shouldn’t be so sensitive.’
‘Now who’s being judgemental?’ But I gave him a smile.
He turned to the screens again. ‘I’ll send you a list of the main correspondents when I’ve teased them out. You’ll want them before the Senate meeting, I suppose?
’ He moved his head up and down by a few millimetres at a time as his eyes followed the scrolling data down the screens.
‘Please,’ and gave him an encouraging pat on the shoulder.
Apollo materialised behind me and scanned the screens for a few minutes. He bent down, his mouth brushing my ear and whispered, ‘He’s not quite the sorcerer that one of my former employees was. How is the delightful Fausta? Still using her nimble fingers to delve around in forbidden places?’
I kept my eyes on the screens. ‘She’s settled in very well.’
‘I was more than a little annoyed when you poached her. But, on reflection, I have to acknowledge she had finished her most important project for me, so it wasn’t such a loss.’
Technically, I hadn’t poached her. The custodes had pulled her in on suspicion of hacking a bank, a private project of her own. When her name came up on the watch report as a Pulcheria Foundation employee, it generated an alert in my mail. I knew how talented she was, so I gave her the choice: a crushing length of imprisonment as a cyber criminal or a career as a cyber cop with access to the most powerful security systems in the country.
She gasped once then almost immediately reassumed a nonchalant pose. But I’d seen the fire in her eyes in response to my offer. She flipped from a truculent teenager into a keen recruit faster than I could have spun a solidus coin. She’d worked hard to prove that the best defenders were former pirates. And to my surprise, and I think hers, she was an excellent soldier.
I shrugged and followed him into his study.
Perfiditas Page 13
