Michael Flynn - On the Razor’s Edge

On Dangchao such markets were housed under one roof, carefully proctored by the Wardens for cleanliness, and prices were posted, not chaffered over. Buying and selling here seemed more of a sport, much more like the Starport Sarai on Jehovah than the city markets at Port Kitchener. Of course, this was only a citadel, deliberately remote, sutlered by its own outlying villages, and she supposed that what cities the Earth might possess were better furnished than this.

A little ways to the south and east, on the Great Green, an itinerant theatrical troupe had set up in the amphitheater; and as she and Khembold passed by, a Queen (by her masque and tiara) was excoriating a large warrior as “… you great lump, you kraken off the moor…” At which the warrior cringed and tripped over himself, to the delight of the audience.

Inside the Administration center, Khembold led her to the communications directorate, where magpies and clerks sat by. “Gidula left instructions that we are to simulate his continued presence here,” Khembold explained. “By now, the Names may know his standing in the Revolution, and if they know he has departed for Dao Chetty, they may anticipate the play he is unfolding and take measures against him. For that reason, take care in what you say. We don’t know that They listen, but neither do we know otherwise.”

“In what I say?”

“Here is the communicator. Sit here and wear this helmet. Be aware that Messages Sendable will monitor the call for quality purposes.”

“Meaning, I don’t spill the beans.”

“Spill the beans?”

“A Terran expression my father taught me.”

Khembold shook his head in irritation. “Mention no names at all. Not the Old One, not your own, especially not Padaborn.”

When she donned the helmet she found herself in a virtual room with Donovan buigh. His image perched on an ordinary hard chair in a room plain and undecorated. A chronometer floated in midair behind him, set to zero; and a signboard read: INBOUND MESSAGE STREAM.

“Fudir!” she cried, using one of his less-public names.

But of course he did not hear her. He was far upsystem on the crawl, near one of the gas giants—known for some unknown but ancient reason as Wood-star. He had started talking some time ago and his words and image were just now reaching the Forks. The image, which had been frozen until she logged in, began to move and speak.

The first thing, Méarana told herself, is to establish that it is a live image and not a sim. She waited for him to say something no one else could possibly know.

“I am just calling to tell you everything is fine and the trip is so far without incident. Everyone is excited, of course. But I’m curious to learn how much has changed in the twenty-five years since I’ve seen the place. I may not be able to find my way around, and I thought, ‘That can’t be good.’ But I hope I do because so many folks are depending on me. By the way, you can begin answering whenever you like. You can’t interrupt me, and that way I’ll receive your responses that much sooner. So feel free to comment on anything I’ve been saying. If you talk over me, you can always back up and replay.”

That can’t be good had been a tagline used by Teddy Nagarajan, a Wildman who had died defending their escape from Oorah Mesa on Enjrun. No one else who had been there had survived. She nodded. It was Donovan.

Méarana chatted as if they were in fact sitting together in a cheerless room. It was a curiously one-sided discourse. Given the time lag, it seemed as if they were talking past each other. Donovan would speak, she would answer, but Donovan did not respond to her answers. It would be hours before he could.

“By the way,” Donovan said, “give your escort my special thanks for conducting you safely.”

The scarred man was multilayered and few of his sentences had but one nut within its shell. His “special thanks” would be some sort of rebuke to Ravn for dragging his daughter into this peril. The harper had not seen Ravn since she and Gidula had gone to the Nose, but the very fact of the request had to mean that the Shadow was not aboard the slider, either.

And that was Méarana’s second reason for good cheer. She had spent the evening trying to reassemble everything that had happened to her; and as was often the case when you took something apart and put it back together there was a piece left over.

Domino Tight.

Donovan talked for an hour straight while saying little, a skill he had learned in the Bar of Jehovah. In the course of the monologue, he conveyed several warnings and bits of advice, couched in Aesopic allusions to various shared experiences. Neither code nor cipher, it was impossible for outsiders to break. Méarana responded in like manner but was not nearly as optimistic in her glosses as Donovan seemed to be.

Yes, if Ravn was not on the slider, then she was somewhere nearby, her twin goals of rescuing Donovan and assassinating Gidula now thwarted by circumstance. And Khembold Darling had spoken of his admiration for Geshler Padaborn and had shown by various gestures and words that he was watching over her. But if Mother was truly close behind, taking care of Méarana might take second place to capturing Bridget ban. The garrison was expecting her. She would walk into a trap. The harper’s one consolation was that her mother had walked into traps before and knew how to do so with grace and style.

Afterward Khembold escorted Méarana back to her assigned quarters. On the Great Square, the auditorium announced a public lecture for the coming evening: “Implications of Potency and Act for Being as Such.” A small group of villagers were chaffering with the philosopher, who stood in sandals and a long brown robe at the open door. His hood shadowed his features, but he glanced up as the harper walked past.

“Be of good cheer, sister!” he called. “I hope to see you tonight!”

Good cheer, indeed, she thought, and realized a third reason. Krakens did not come off moors!

“Perhaps,” murmured Khembold when they had reached the door, “I might come in with you for a time. There are things you need to know about how matters stand here.”

The sun had gone down and Ravn’s arm had gone numb. Gidula’s shuttles had soared off to rendezvous in orbit at Gidula’s slider. Good-bye, Donovan, she thought as they rose. I suppose we shall not be such good friends now.

No one would be coming up to the Nose to look over the edge in the expectation of a dangling Ravn. Or rather, those who did expect it would not be disposed to come. She amused herself for a moment with the list of those who might be in the Old One’s confidence. The list was a curiously short one, Gidula not being widely known for his trust, and most of those were to have been left behind to staff the Forks.

With her right foot, Ravn felt out another ledge to relieve the strain on her left. But the thin shelf crumbled under her and her arm twisted. The cliff was limestone and sandstone and unaccustomed to such strenuous duty. Rock fragments clattered and bounced on their way to the river, where a narrow shelf marked the track of an ancient road. A road paved of bones now, she supposed, but she did not look down to confirm this deduction.

How many others had Gidula tumbled off this cliff? And what had Magpie One done to earn the Old One’s disfavor? Or had it been the Old One who had earned the magpie’s disfavor? Perhaps there had been some disagreement over loyalties. Judging by how long One had been on “detached duty,” he had been removed about the time Gidula began planning the assault on the Secret City.