Michael Flynn - Up Jim River

“I said let me think!” Donna strode across the modest room and sat once more on the bed, where she fell into closed-eye silence. Méarana heard the other woman mutter under her breath in a tone that she recognized as Donovan’s. She rose and padded silently to the other side of the room, where she drew the curtain aside.

The sun was setting behind the hotel, throwing long shadows forward into Boditown, as if night were advancing on it in columns, like an army. It was a small town. Smaller than Jenlùshy, much smaller than Pròwenshwai, likely no larger than Preeshdad. But it was less ramshackle than either Preeshdad or Jenlùshy, the buildings solid, wider than they were tall, embracing central courtyards. Trees were plentiful, at least along the winding streets and in several parks visible from her vantage point, though sparser toward the red-lit horizon, where housing gave way to rolling grasslands and security bastions against the bad ones .

She heard Donovan say, “But we dare not draw attention to ourselves. We’ve only got the one.” And she turned from the window to see Dame Teffna rise from the bed and go to the ‘face on the writing desk.

“Do you have something?” she asked.

Teffna pulled from her scrip a standard brain, which she inserted into the receptor. “While I was changing into my dainty self back on Siggy O’Hara,” she said, “I sent a Circuit message to Greystroke. He heard back from Kàuntusulfalúghy, by the way. Sofwari last contacted the College of Scholars about eight weeks after Bridget ban dropped from sight. He was on Ampayam, heading out the Gansu Corridor to collect samples in the Wild. As far as they know, he never came back.”

“Then we should heigh for Ampayam as fast as e’er we can!”

“Don’t slip the leashes yet. First things first. There’s more than one world out the Gansu Corridor. Greystroke can’t leave Yubeq just yet, but he did send Little Hugh to Ampayam to suss things out. He also sent me a warrant.”

“A warrant! Then we can get Teodorq out of prison!”

“We could…except the warrant doesn’t say ‘Teodorq Nagarajan’ in the right places. I’ll have to make some changes the Gray One might not approve of. But if it works, we’ll be well away from here before the paperwork clears the Kennel. No Circuit station here.”

“Can we have it ready by tomorrow? I already set up an appointment.”

Dame Teffna shook her head. “I don’t know. It’s many years since I’ve practiced the skills. A League warrant is not the easiest thing to alter, and this is one world where I cannot call on the Brotherhood. There are any number of sisters in the Brotherhood, but I’d rather not lean on divided loyalties.”

Méarana had never seen Donovan so conflicted before. “I understand. If you’re caught…”

“If you are caught. I can’t present the warrant. My chit identifies me as Donovan, remember? That’s why I’m worried. If you present it and it doesn’t pass muster, then you’re for the women’s prison. It wasn’t supposed to be this way. Vagosana! It wasn’t supposed to be this way.”

The harper suddenly understood. “Donna…Who was the warrant for?”

Without a word, Dame Teffna turned the screen of the face so that Méarana could see it. She leaned closer.

The warrant was “to secure the person of Donovan buigh of Jehovah and deliver him to the custody of Greystroke Hound or his Pup.”

Méarana turned to look into Donovan’s eyes. For once, they were steady. For once, all of Donovan was looking back. “This is…”

“I promised Zorba I would take care of you,” Teffna muttered. “I had to catch up and drop to Boldly Go with you. I had to visit the prison with you. I had to be close enough in case the bad ones came looking for fresh blood for their cloning tanks. Rama-rama!” She struck the desk. “What if one these tarka devis harm you? What I tell then Uncle Zorba, hey?”

Méarana reached out but Donna flinched, so she touched the screen gently instead. “This was your ‘get out of jail free card.’ In case your were exposed…”

“I would find some way of telling you where to find it and you’d throw some serious Kennel weight around and spring me.”

“So if you alter it to spring Teodorq…”

“Greystroke wouldn’t like writing a second one. He stretched a point to write this one. The Kennel doesn’t give them out as party favors.”

The harper shook her head. “You can’t take the chance. We can pick up clues to the medallion elsewhere.”

“Of course. But where? We could wander Lafrontera for years before we stumble on them. Besides,” and he entered a command even as he was speaking, for the Fudir’s skills at forgery did not require the Silky Voice’s silence, “Nagarajan deserves to be rescued for his own sake.”

Méarana cocked her head. “He does? Why?”

“He staged a panty raid on an entire planet on a drunken bet. A man like that belongs on a hopeless quest.”

They sat in a drab outdoor café whose striped canvas awning fended off the blistering midday sun. Lazy fans stirred the tepid air. The white strap-chairs and tables, the “spressaba,” and other tattered and faded equipment seemed to have come from their packing crates already sun-worn and in need of repair. Dame Teffna wore a white borke; Méarana, a more dignified cut. She had programmed the anycloth to a trim powder-blue coverall with tabbed pockets and epaulets. It was not a uniform, certainly not a Pup’s uniform, but it suggested that it might almost be one. She wore no insignia or patches. That would have been pushing matters too far. The Kennel would, in the Fudir’s words, “throw the book at her” if she crossed the line from “special representative” to “impersonating a Hound.”

“But,” said Dame Teffna, “the Boldlys may not be too clear on what a ‘special representative of the Kennel’ can do. So act as if it means more than it does. Act like the true quill. Show confidence, but try not to lie more than is necessary. The Kennel really does want to learn where Bridget ban was going when she…Where she was going. So it’s not a lie to say that the Kennel wants Nagarajan as a material witness.”

“Donna,” said Méarana, “I know how to act like my mother.”

The Fudir wagged his head. “I wish it were me going in. If they detect the forgery…”

“All the more reason why you can’t. Donna, I appreciate the risk you’ve taken for me.”

Dame Teffna lifted her coffee and the tasse vanished behind her face-veil. “What risk?” she said as she put it down. “You’re the one they’ll seize if my handiwork fails. That’s the hard part, you know. It’s not hard to risk yourself. It’s risking others that gnaws at you.” She toyed a moment with the empty tasse. “What time is your appointment?”

Méarana glanced at the Salon of Justice across the street. A heavy, three-storey building, it consisted of a central cupola and two wings. One wing housed the prosecuting magistrates, the other wing housed the police and their laboratories.

“It wouldn’t do to be late.”

“I know that.”

“Does Judge Trayza know why you made the appointment?”

“I told her dark it was Kennel business and let it go at that.”

“Good. Good. That helps create an air of importance. ‘Need to know,’ and all that.”

“I’m no fool.” With a brisk, snapping motion she opened a tunic pocket and pulled out a timepiece of the Die Bold style. “It’s time for me to go.”

“Is that set to metric time?” Die Bold and the other Old Planets famously preserved their ancient dodeka time scales in the face of not uncommon confusions with other League worlds.