Walter Williams - City on Fire

“It had promise, but they wrecked it in the editing.” There is resignation in Aldemar’s voice. “Don’t worry—if you come for a premiere, I won’t make you watch the whole thing. You can slip out early and go to the party.”

“If you can watch it,” Aiah says bravely, “I can.”

“You’ll be luckier with your production,” Aldemar assures her. “You’ve got more money behind it, and Olli is a first-rate producer. He always does a high-class production.”

There is a moment’s pause. “You’ll get quite a bit of money, you know.”

Aiah will, in fact, receive a sum that, as a girl in Old Shorings, she would have thought beyond her wildest imagination. If she is not quite able to consider herself rich, she can certainly consider herself very, very lucky.

“With some competent management,” Aldemar says, “the money should keep you comfortable for the rest of your life.”

“I’ll keep myself in less comfort,” says Aiah, “because I’m going to give half the money to charities for refugees here in Caraqui.”

“That’s admirable.”

“They did all the suffering, and I got all the glory. It’s their story, too, and they deserve some of the profits.”

“In that case,” Aldemar says, “it’s more important that the money you keep be handled well. I can introduce you to some good money managers—they’ve made me a lot over the years.”

“Thank you, yes,” Aiah says. “It’s not a world I know much about.”

Her world, she thinks, is beginning to overlap with others in interesting ways. Requests for interviews, people who want her as a speaker at various functions, the continuing demands of her job… She needs a manager for everything, she thinks, not just her money.

Perhaps she can talk Constantine into allowing her an assistant.

THE GOLDEN LADY

A SPECIAL DOCUMENTARY—THIRD SHIFT ON CHANNEL 51!

“There is someone to see you.” Aiah’s receptionist Anstine, unusually pale, slides into Aiah’s office and quietly closes the door behind him.

“Yes?” Aiah says, looking up from a desk overflowing with documents relating to her department’s budgetary health. It’s an unusual visitor who actually prompts Anstine to enter her office, when he can just call her on the intercom from his desk.

Anstine bites his lip. “He—I think it’s a he—he says he knows you. He gives his name as Doctor Romus.”

The talons of the Adrenaline Monster dig into her back and Aiah starts upright, all at the sudden thought of Aground, of sudden death and terror. She looks into Anstine’s eyes and sees a look of concern cross his face at her reaction.

“Oh. Well,” she says. “Send him in.”

Anstine looks dubious, but leaves without comment. Aiah looks down at the documents covering her desk—all that postponed wartime paperwork catching up—and takes a long breath to calm her trip-hammer heart.

The war is over. Why does the Adrenaline Monster still lurk in her tissues, ready to rake her nerves with his chemical claws?

The door opens and Romus glides in, feathery tentacles fluttering around his little brown face. “Miss Aiah,” he says in his reedy voice, “I am honored to make the acquaintance of the Golden Lady.”

Aiah rises and tries to look at the unearthly figure without flinching. She represses an urge to shake hands: Romus has no hand to shake. She wonders if she should offer him a chair.

“I’m relieved you survived,” she says. “Ethemark has been trying to find people from Aground, but there are so many refugees, so many transit centers…”

Romus coils his lower body before Aiah’s desk and rears his head to her level. “I think most are dead,” he says. “The mercenaries killed everyone they could find, whether they were armed or not. Most of the able-bodied died trying to protect their families, and none had my gift of hiding.”

Sorrow floats through Aiah’s mind even as her body jitters to the Adrenaline Monster. Your fault, a voice whispers. She resumes her seat, and Romus curls his upper body into a fishhook to keep his face level with hers. “I wish,” she says, “things were different.”

No trace of sentiment glimmers in Romus’s yellow eyes. “Sergeant Lamarath knew the risk he was taking,” he says. “He agreed willingly.”

Aiah looks at him. “And what did he agree to, exactly?”

“He asked for money, medicine, and weapons, and he got them. He—we, for I advised him—felt it was a gamble worth taking.”

“And the other people who died? Did they think the gamble was worth taking?”

“For us,” Romus says, “all life is a gamble. The war could have killed us all without anyone ever knowing. The militia could have got us afterward. It could even have been an inhabitant of Aground who betrayed your mission—we tried to keep it a secret, but in a place like that it was impossible.”

Aiah does not find this reply entirely satisfactory, but finds no reason to dispute it. Romus, too, must live with his memories.

“I’m glad you are here, in any case,” Aiah says. “I wanted to thank you for helping me when the Provisionals attacked.”

Romus tilts his head. “You are welcome.” He licks his lips. “I would be very pleased should it prove possible for your gratitude to take a more material form.”

Aiah feels a more calculating, warier self sliding efficiently into place behind her politician’s face. She is not prepared, she thinks, to be taken for a passu by a giant snake.

“Yes?” she prompts.

“Quite frankly,” Romus says, “I could use a job. I have no home, no place, and no prospects.”

“What sort of job did you have in mind?”

A morbid smile crosses his lips. “I would hope that, in my case at least, genetics does not equal destiny. Mages created my kind for the purpose of inspecting pipes from the inside, or conducting repairs in tight places. The truth is that I find such duty about as fulfilling as you might, if you were forced into such work.”

“You hope for a job as a mage? Are you actually a doctor of some sort?”

Romus bobs his upper body in a kind of nervous apology. “Titles in the half-worlds are strictly honorary. The boss is called sergeant, and his assistant is called doctor. Though I took the title as seriously as I could, and did what was possible to look after the health of Aground’s population, I am strictly self-taught.”

“I’m afraid we don’t really need medicos, self-taught or otherwise,” she says.

“I have other experience with plasm. I have done quite a bit of surveillance, and”—he licks his lips, and bobs his upper body again—“and a certain degree of bodyguard and enforcement work. The half-worlds are dubious places, and sometimes such things are necessary.”

Aiah finds herself in no position to criticize. She folds her hands on the desk, frowns, gives the matter her consideration. Romus very possibly saved her life, and she will employ him if she can.

“It’s a mixture of talents that we can use,” Aiah says. She leans forward and looks into Romus’s eyes. The strength of her position gives her the power to look into the eerie face without flinching. “But I want to explain that our entrance exams are very stringent—we’re going to do a brain scan that will uncover any past criminal activity and any present notions of treachery. If you’re working for someone else, we’ll find it. If you’re planning on selling any information you find here, we’ll find that. So if there’s anything you’re not comfortable revealing to government interrogators, you might consider applying for a job in another department. I will give you a high recommendation.”

Romus considers for a long moment. His yellow eyes turn uneasily away. “I will admit to you now that I have stolen plasm in the past,” he says. “I will also state that I have no intention of stealing any in the future.”