Michael Flynn - Up Jim River

“All three,” she said. “Doo-dah time, Taran Green Time, and it picks local time off the planetary tock.” She meant the satellite system that transmitted the standard times around Boldly Go. “Stop fretting. I’ll be fine.”

Judge Trayza Dorrajenfer was a tall, graceful woman, elegantly dressed in a flowing dark-blue robe and a gold filigreed circlet binding her hair. Her office was an airy room on the first floor of the north wing, adjacent to her courtyard. Everything was done in plaster or plastic or metal, except the desk and chair, which were wood imported from Kwinnfer in the forested northeast. In the corner stood a rack of spools that Méarana took to be law books. A small fountain emitted a fine spray that kept the room cooler than it otherwise would have been.

The judge came from behind her desk and took Méarana’s proffered hand between both of hers. “Welcome to my chambers, Méarana Harper,” she said, guiding her to a pair of shapeless bags which, to the harper’s surprise, turned out to be chairs. When she sank into the one indicated, it conformed itself to her contours.

“My, these are comfortable, your worship.” “Please. Call me Trayza. You’ve never seen smarticle chairs?” “I’ve heard of them, but I’ve never seen them. I’m surprised to find them here—”

“There may not be another set on all of Boldly Go. These are imported from Valency, where they are all the fashion. The smarticles are micron-sized particles, I am told, that use the same sort of techne as any cloth. That is an any cloth outfit you are wearing, isn’t it?”

Méarana had the judge pegged now. She had been born to money, and while she had the graciousness of her class, she also had more than her share of its conceits. In her first few sentences, she had alluded to her wealth in that indirect manner the wealthy had— There may not be another set on all of Boldly Go —and put Méarana in her place. Bolt-for-bolt, any-cloth was expensive, but a full, dedicated wardrobe was the mark of class.

“Why, yes,” she told the judge, fingering a sleeve. “Where I go, it can be important to travel light. On my estate on Dangchao…”

“Dangchao belongs to Die Bold, does it not?” the judge asked. “I’ve always wondered if there were some ancient connection between your world and ours.”

Méarana doubted that, but she would not secure Nagarajan by debating demographics with the judge. “I really don’t know much about the migration era. There is a science-wallah drifting about the Periphery collecting facts that may answer that question. I think he may have stopped on Charming Moon to swab cheek samples.”

“Him? Everyone thought he was mad. There was a woman, about ten or twelve weeks earlier, asking about him. She was a League marshall, so when this wallah bike showed up, we thought she had meant to take him into cutody for his own safety.”

“The League marshall—the Hound—did you meet her?”

“Me?” Trayza laughed. “I am only a simple servant of the courts. We don’t see many Hounds here, so everyone was chattering about her. There was talk of a reception. But she landed in Nest Admantine on the western plateau, and the bad ones had cut the monorail line out of the mountains. So…What may I do for you, mistress harp?”

Méarana handed over the brain and a print copy of the warrant. “I have been requested by Greystroke Hound to secure a prisoner in your custody.”

The judge did not glance at the print copy. “Let me guess. The Wild-man, Nagarajan. You visited him two days ago.” Méarana was not surprised. Boditsya did not run a surveillance state, but that did not mean they lacked the means to discover where she had gone since landing.

“Yes,” said Méarana. “We—that is, the Kennel needs him as a material witness in a case.”

The judge grunted and held the print copy of the warrant. “What is the case, if I may ask.”

“Ah, this is embarrassing…”

The other woman made a face. “No need to rub my nose in it.”

“They don’t tell me everything, either,” Méarana said to take out some of the sting. “The warrant came to Siggy O’Hara because I was coming this way.” Donovan often said that the truth was the best sort of lie, and she understood now what he had meant.

“The Kennel is using harpers now?”

Méarana shrugged. “You know how thin the Kennel is spread. They often use auxiliaries for minor tasks. I happened to be in the right place, and I had a special advantage.”

“Really. What advantage does a harper have for the Kennel?”

“My mother is a Hound. You almost met her when she was here.”

The judge retreated a little in her bag chair. “The case involves her?”

“Yes, but you will understand that I can tell you no more than that.” Leave the matter vague, the harper told herself. Bridget ban had come to Boldly Go asking after Sofwari. Later, Sofwari appears. Then the Wild-man comes, apparently on a feckless adventure. Shortly after, the daughter of Bridget ban comes with a warrant chopped by Greystroke demanding the person of that very Wildman. Greystroke could not have known of Nagarajan’s imprisonment when he wrote the warrant. And that meant the Kennel really had intended to pick him up before he had even landed on Boldly Go. Perhaps the Wildman had deliberately gotten himself imprisoned to escape the Hounds—only to find he had jumped from the kettle to the fire.

Méarana let these thoughts circulate unspoken. It was a tissue of misdirection, and a tissue will bear not too much weight. Such things are more persuasive the less they are stressed, and when they hold just enough truth to give them substance.

Judge Trayza rose from her chair. “This is not something we like to do. It sets a bad example to other bikes, that they can come down here and get away with it.”

Méarana also rose. The judge would not contest the warrant. No one begins a refusal with such protestations. She would have to justify her compliance first. The harper followed the judge to the desk, where she took a chair designed to subordinate those who sat in it.

“I will release Nagarajan to you on a single condition; namely, that when the Kennel is finished with him, he will be returned to us to complete his original sentence.”

Meaning that the Nest of Boditsya fully intended to execute the man for the crime of being a man. Méarana unhesitatingly agreed. The important thing at the moment was to secure his person. She would decide what to do with it once she had it.

Trayza considered the harper. “Will you be able to retain control of him? It does neither the Kennel nor the Nest any good if turning him over means turning him loose.”

Méarana emptied herself the way her mother had taught her and sat very still, allowing her eyes alone to speak. Let them see the killer in your eyes , Nagarajan had advised her. “My mother is a Hound,” she said when the right amount of time had passed. “She taught me certain things, and that I know these things may certain you. I have people awaiting above on Charming Moon, and between here and Stranger Station, to where might a man escape?” All this in sweetly reasoned tones. Not sarcastic; certainly not threatening. But with just enough condescension to carry the conviction.

The judge dropped her eyes and muttered that she hadn’t meant to suggest that the Kennel would assign a task to one unqualified to bear it. She plugged the brain into her desktop ‘face. “You’ll need this requisition for the chief Warder at the…” She hesitated, unplugged the brain and reinserted it. “…at the prison, and you’ll have to sign a re…” She replugged the brain a second time. “…a receipt.”

“Of course.” Méarana refused to look at the balky insert. Donovan had warned her that his alterations might not pass the quality control checks.