Brian Stableford - Asgard's Secret

Amara Guur wanted me to work for him—on his terms. He’d been prepared to ask politely, or at least to pretend, but either I’d been too slow to respond or something had happened after Heleb’s visit to increase his sense of urgency. I had to admire his efficiency, though. Had he actually planted Balidar in that bar to wait for me? Had he given Saul’s doorman instructions to send me along there if and when I turned up?

It seemed so—the only alternative was that the whole plan had been stitched together in a matter of minutes as soon as the bartender had spotted me with Balidar.

Either way, it was a lot of trouble to go to. Whatever Amara Guur had found that had given him a sudden interest in going out into the cold was obviously a powerful incentive.

If he’d only told me what it was, maybe…

I put that thought aside. Honest dealing wasn’t the sort of thing Amara Guur went in for. If he’d already committed a murder or two to get hold of whatever it was he had, he’d probably got stuck in that particular procedural groove.

My lawyer turned up at forty-one ten, full of apologies for the delay. His name was 238-Zenatta. He explained, regretfully, that it had proved impossible for 69-Aquila to contact Saul Lyndrach, who was currently being sought by Immigration Control. They were apparently anxious to know what had become of a human named Myrlin, who had been entrusted to Saul’s care following his arrival on the surface.

I wasn’t surprised by this news. After all, if Amara Guur’s men had given instructions to Saul’s doorman about where to send me, they must have known that he wouldn’t be at home when I came looking for him. I had more urgent matters to consider, though.

“The evidence for the prosecution has all been filed,” 238-Zenatta told me. “The witness statements seem to be in order and the forensic evidence is entirely consonant with it. It seems to me that your only possible chance to minimize the magnitude of the offence is to plead diminished responsibility due to alcoholic poisoning.”

I could see why he might think that. All DNA-based humanoids react in much the same way to alcohol—except, of course, for the Tetrax, who have apparently modified their entire species by means of genetic engineering to correct nature’s mistake and save them from the indignities of drunkenness.

“I didn’t do it,” I told him. “I was framed.”

“You didn’t kill Mr. Atmanu?”

“No.”

“Then how do you account for the fact that your handprints are arrayed on the murder-weapon, in a configuration suggesting very strongly that you were holding it in such a way as to strike out with it, aggressively.”

“There was nothing aggressive about it. I was trying to hold him off when he came at me with a knife. I tried to hit Heleb with it, but the Sleath was perfectly all right when the Spirellan knocked me out. Heleb killed him.”

“You say that you were knocked unconscious?” 238-Zenatta queried.

I sighed. “No, I don’t have a bruise or a fracture,” I admitted. “He squeezed the arteries at the side of my neck—and I wouldn’t be at all surprised if he knew how to do it without leaving a mark.”

“There are five witnesses,” the lawyer pointed out. “Their statements agree in every detail. Simeon Balidar has admitted that you and he were cheating, and the cards entered into evidence do appear to be marked. All five witnesses state that when Mr. Atmanu attempted to take his money back, you attacked him with the chair, and that you continued to beat him with it after you had rendered him helpless. Sleaths are, by nature, a relatively fragile species, and Mr. Atmanu appears to have been a lightly-built individual, so I suppose you might claim that you did not intend to kill him, but the court is likely to take the view that it was your responsibility to take your victim’s seeming fragility into account when…”

“He wasn’t my victim,” I reminded him. “He was Heleb’s victim. Heleb killed him—on Amara Guur’s orders. They wanted to frame me. They were all in on it. They all work for Amara Guur.”

238-Zenatta was a good lawyer. He cut straight to the heart of the matter. “What motive did they have for arranging such a conspiracy?” he asked.

“They came to my apartment,” I said, fully conscious of how feeble it sounded. “Heleb and Lema, that is. They offered me a job I didn’t want to take. Guur wanted to make sure that I had no choice.”

238-Zenatta consulted his wristpad. “Heleb and Lema have stated that they did indeed come to your apartment to offer you a job,” he agreed. “They have made a tape of the conversation available to the court. They have explained that they subsequently discovered that your reason for hesitating over their offer was that the alternative plans for raising capital for your expedition, to which you refer on the tape, involved conspiring with Simeon Balidar to cheat at cards. Balidar confirms this. Heleb claims that when he discovered what you were doing, he made a second attempt to persuade you that it would be far better to swallow your pride and join his expedition than to resort to criminal means.”

“Does he have a tape of that conversation?”

“Alas, no. He explained that because there were Zabarans present, who have particular concerns regarding privacy, he switched off his recording device before entering the room.”

“If we can prove that they were all working for Amara Guur,” I said, hopefully, “that would surely be evidence of a conspiracy.”

“Can we prove that, Mr. Rousseau?” asked 238-Zenatta, sceptically. I couldn’t blame him. Whether he believed me or not—and I was pretty certain that he didn’t—his chances of finding any evidence of a formal contract of employment between any of the five fatal witnesses and our unfriendly neighbourhood crime-lord were a bit slim.

“Can we prove that they dosed me with the alcohol after I was unconscious?” I asked.

“Perhaps, if a sufficiently thorough medical examination were carried out,” he said, even more sceptically. “But it would be severely detrimental to our best defence if we did.”

“I’m not going to admit to killing the Sleath,” I told him, flatly. “Diminished responsibility is not an option. I’m not guilty, and that’s the way I’m going to plead. Whether anyone believes me or not, I’m going to tell the court the truth.”

“I fear, Mr. Rousseau, that the court might not approve of that strategy,” the lawyer said. “It might well seem to the court that you are adding a manifest slander to the burden of your culpability. You would be asking the court to believe that someone would go to extraordinary lengths to obtain your participation in a perfectly ordinary expedition. There are hundreds of people in Skychain City who have skills similar to yours, Mr. Rousseau, many of whom are desperate for employment. Why would Amara Guur, or Heleb, or anyone else commit murder in order to obtain your services, when they could hire a person of almost equal capability for little more than half the wage that Heleb offered you in your apartment?”

Put like that, it did seem impossibly weird. Obviously, I considered myself the best of the best when it came to pioneering the trackless wilderness, but I could see how other people might find it difficult to agree with me. After all, I’d never actually made the big strike for which I felt myself destined. I was so poor, in fact, that if I really had thought that I could finance my next expedition by running a crooked card-school, I might very well have tried it.

I looked at 238-Zenatta, and he looked back. There wasn’t the slightest hint of challenge in his stare; none was necessary.

“I didn’t do it,” I said. “I don’t have any real evidence that Heleb did, or that anyone was working for Amara Guur, so we’ll leave that out of the story—but I’m sticking to the truth. I wasn’t cheating, and I didn’t kill the Sleath. He went for me with a knife, and I defended myself with entirely reasonable force. He was still alive when Heleb attacked me and knocked me out. That’s it.”