At Empire's Edge (10 page)

The prostitute didn’t believe that the man wearing the tattered robe was a policeman, but she knew he had a gun. And, judging from the businesslike manner in which the intruder had ejected the pistol’s magazine and checked to ensure it was full, he knew how to use it. So she removed Lorkin’s wallet from his pants as her mother rolled off the other side of the bed, and both women hurried to gather their clothes.

Lorkin’s formerly erect penis had shriveled by then, but if the thief was embarrassed by that fact, there was no sign of it on his face as he eyed Cato. “So you survived,” Lorkin said matter-of-factly, as he turned to let a pile of pillows accept his weight. “Congratulations.”

“Thanks,” Cato said dryly, as the prostitutes clattered down the stairs. “I came for my money. Where is it?”

“Gone,” Lorkin replied calmly. “Once I left The Black Stocking, I went directly to an all-night card game, and having lost most of the money there, decided to party with the rest. Which is what I was doing when you arrived. Where’s Kregor by the way? He was supposed to keep people like you out.”

“Now that’s an interesting point,” Cato said thoughtfully. “Why would a person who doesn’t have any money hire a guard? Tell me where the money is, and tell me now, or I’m going to shoot you in the right knee. A rather painful wound which, given the level of medical care available around here, could leave you crippled.”

“That’s bullshit,” Lorkin replied contemptuously. “You’re a cop. You said as much in The Black Stocking. So take me in. . . . I’ve been there before.”

There was a loud
bang
as the gun went off—and the ten-millimeter bullet shattered Lorkin’s kneecap. “I operate a little differently than most cops do,” Cato explained patiently. “So listen up. Where is the money?”

A blood-splattered Lorkin hugged his badly pulped knee and moaned softly as he rocked back and forth. “It’s over there,” he said through tightly clenched teeth, “behind the mirror. I need a doctor!”

“You sure as hell do,” Cato agreed unsympathetically.

“And who knows? I might even send one to see you if the money is where you say it is.” The pistol was still pointed at Lorkin, but in order to move the mirror, Cato had to turn his back for a moment. That was when Lorkin slid a hand under a pile of pillows, found what he was looking for, and pulled a sawed-off shotgun out into the open.

Cato wouldn’t have been aware of the move if it hadn’t been for the mirror. But having seen Lorkin’s reflection go for a weapon Cato had time to turn and squeeze off two shots as the shotgun blew a hole through the ceiling. There was a look of pained astonishment on Lorkin’s face as two blue-edged holes appeared in the middle of his chest, and plaster rained down on him from above.

“That was a stupid thing to do,” Cato said conversationally, as the body toppled over sideways. “But who said you were smart?”

Fortunately, the money belt
was
concealed in a nook behind the mirror, along with the rest of Lorkin’s loot, which meant that Cato was able to recover the Corps’s money with some interest thrown in.

When he had secured the money belt around his waist, and filled his pockets with coins, it was time to recover the spent casings and leave through the front door. The street tough was gone, as was the mist, leaving The Warrens to bake in the sun. One of the city’s predators had been killed; but just a block away, another one was about to be born.

 

 

The sandal factory consisted of a long, low, one-story building tucked in between a noisy junkyard and an odiferous tallow plant. Small cubicles lined the interior walls, each with its own window, so that the sandal makers could see what they were doing. Not that veterans like seventeen-year-old CeCe Alamy needed to see what they were working on because after a year and a half in the factory, the young woman could have assembled sandals blindfolded had she been asked to.

The process of pulling straps through small holes, and hand stitching soles that incorporated three layers of material was hard on Alamy’s hands, which were callused and covered with tiny cuts. The fumes from the glue that the sandal makers were required to use were toxic as well, which was why so many of them were sick, and had a tendency to die young.

But there weren’t very many jobs in The Warrens, not for young, poorly educated girls like Alamy, so the youngster had been forced to take the only work she could find when her father took sick two years earlier. One decim for each pair of finished sandals wasn’t much, but the steady flow of square coins had been helpful during the final months of Roj Alamy’s life, as the formerly robust blacksmith lay dying on his bed. And now that he was gone, having left his second wife and daughter behind, Alamy continued to help support the household. Something she was proud to do.

But the days were long, frequently hot, and consistently tedious. So when the bell rang, Alamy was happy to put a half-stitched sandal aside and carry the basket of finished footwear to the front desk, where the owner’s sharp-eyed wife inspected each pair of sandals prior to paying for them. And, because Alamy’s work was consistently good, all ten pairs of sandals were approved. The accomplishment earned the teenager an approving smile plus one Imperial, which Alamy hurried to tuck away.

Then, when she had exited the building, it was time to make her way home, where all of the usual chores were waiting. At least half of them had originally been her stepmother’s responsibility but had gradually been delegated to Alamy after her father’s death. That was part of a larger pattern, because the moment Domna Alamy had legal ownership of her dead husband’s possessions, she’d been quick to sell his tools and bring in a male “boarder” who never paid rent.

The arrangement was far from fair, Alamy knew that; but she had plans to leave on her eighteenth birthday, when she would become an adult and a Citizen of the Empire. Then, with the money earned as a sandal maker, it was Alamy’s hope to buy an apprenticeship as part of a plan to become a dressmaker.

Such were Alamy’s dreams as she turned off Market Street onto a narrow passageway that led into the metalsmith’s quarter, where the clatter of hammers, the screech of power wrenches, and the rattle of rivet guns combined to create a familiar din. The Alamy home was five blocks back. It consisted of a ground-level shop, presently being leased by a coppersmith, second-floor living quarters, and a rooftop garden that had once been Roj Alamy’s pride and joy, but was presently turning brown as a result of Domna’s systematic neglect.

Still, the whitewashed structure was home, and Alamy was happy to see it as she waved to the coppersmith and ran up a long flight of stairs to the second-floor entrance. It was cooler inside, thanks to the solar-powered ceiling fan that Roj Alamy had cobbled together for the living room, and that was where Domna and her guest were seated.

Domna had been pretty once, but that was many years in the past. Now her hair was dyed an unlikely shade of brown, dark lines were drawn in where her overplucked eyebrows had once been, and an excessive amount of red lipstick had been applied to her mouth in a vain attempt to make her lips appear fuller. But Domna could be charming when she chose to be—and was quick to introduce her visitor. “This is Citizen Mortha, CeCe. He’s been looking forward to meeting you! But, before we get into that, how many sandals did you make today?”

“Ten,” Alamy answered proudly, and produced the Imperial to prove it.

“You see?” Domna said, as her plump fingers reached out to pluck the coin from the girl’s hand. “It’s just as I told you. . . . CeCe’s a hard worker—and that should be worth something.”

“It is,” Mortha allowed indulgently. “It certainly is. But, if you don’t mind my saying so, I suspect she’ll spend quite a bit of time lying down on the job!”

It was a wonderful joke, or that’s what Domna thought anyway, and she laughed uproariously as Alamy felt liquid lead trickle into the pit of her stomach. Mortha had shoulder-length white hair, a long, heavily lined face, and a sturdy body that was clothed in what the girl knew to be expensive fabric. Mortha’s calves were visible, however, as were his scrupulously clean feet, both of which were shod in the same type of sandals Alamy had been manufacturing earlier that day. “What do you mean?” the girl inquired anxiously, as she looked from face to face.

Domna had been laughing so hard mascara-blackened tears had carved twin pathways down along her heavily rouged cheeks. She dabbed at the tears with a handkerchief before answering. “Citizen Mortha and I have finalized an agreement,” the older woman replied importantly. “He’s going to put you up for sale the day after tomorrow. And, if all goes well, I should receive around a thousand Imperials. Minus Citizen Mortha’s commission, of course, but a significant sum nevertheless. And a good deal better than one Imperial a day!”

“But you
can’t
sell me!” Alamy objected desperately. “My father was free, and I’ll be free on my eighteenth birthday!”

“Which is still more than a month away,” Domna reminded her sternly. “And until that time, you are my property. . . . To do with as I see fit. And it’s my intention to sell you! So skip the tears, spare me the drama you’re so fond of, and concentrate on pleasing your new owner. Who knows? Maybe you’ll
enjoy
your new line of work!”

That produced another gale of laughter, which Alamy saw as her opportunity to escape, so she ran for the door. Domna couldn’t sell something she didn’t have, so if the girl could hide in The Warrens until her birthday rolled around, she could claim Imperial citizenship thereafter! Would the local magistrate support that claim? Or side with her stepmother? Alamy didn’t know, but figured that some chance was better than none, as she ran down the front steps toward the street.

But Citizen Mortha had anticipated such a possibility, and two burly slave handlers were waiting to grab Alamy and secure her hands behind her. Then, once an iron collar had been secured around Alamy’s neck, a single pull on the six-foot-long chain was sufficient to jerk her off her feet. A demonstration
all
slaves were subjected to as a way to communicate how helpless they were.

So there was nothing Alamy could do but lie there and sob, until Citizen Mortha emerged from the house five minutes later. Then, with his newest consignment in tow, the trader led Alamy through the neighborhood she’d grown up in toward Market Street and the slave pens located north of the slaughterhouse.

Alamy looked back over her shoulder at one point, in hopes that Domna might change her mind, but the older woman was nowhere to be seen. The coppersmith was visible though—and he was the only person to wave.

THE SKIMMER HAD A CRACKED WINDSHIELD, HANDLEBARS
rather than a steering wheel, and was capable of carrying two people with one seated in front of the other. Hot desert air pressed against Cato’s face as the vehicle’s cranky engine propelled it across the desert toward Station 3. Like the rest of the vehicles on Dantha, the EX-9 had been manufactured off-planet and shipped in. That made the beat-up skimmer valuable, even after fifteen years of hard service, which was why Cato had been forced to spend 556 Imperials on it. It wasn’t the way Cato had wanted to spend a large chunk of his remaining cash, but that was the way he’d had to spend it, since the planetary government was unwilling to provide him with any support.

Was the lack of cooperation on the part of Nalomy’s government the result of the hostility that many rim worlders felt toward the Xeno Corps? Or did Centurion Pasayo and the people around him know more about the massacre than they cared to admit? There wasn’t any evidence of governmental involvement yet, but Cato was determined to remain alert to that possibility, as a dark smudge appeared on the shimmery horizon.

Of course there had been other smudges over the last hour, all of which eventually morphed into rock formations, but thanks to the amount of distance Cato had traveled, he knew this one could be Station 3. The prospect opened up a chasm at the pit of his stomach because of what awaited him there. Especially after days in the hot desert sun.

Fifteen minutes later it became clear that Cato’s journey was nearly over as the last smudge resolved itself into the now-familiar outlines of Station 3 and the defensive wall that surrounded it. A wall which, though not entirely intact, should have been sufficient to keep attackers out. Yet it hadn’t been.
Why?

With that question foremost in his mind, Cato reduced power and put the skimmer into a wide turn, so he could examine the surrounding area for telltale tracks. But as Cato circled the station, no footprints or vehicle tracks were visible. That wasn’t too surprising, however, given both the scouring action of the wind and the amount of time that had elapsed since the murders.

Confident that he hadn’t missed anything, and reluctant to ride the skimmer into the middle of a murder scene, Cato brought the vehicle to a stop. The machine wallowed from side to side as it settled onto the sand, and the hot metal began to make pinging noises as it cooled. Cato was wearing his sidearm in a cross-draw holster, but because the empath could “feel” a second presence in the area, it seemed prudent to carry a weapon with more clout. So Cato removed the secondhand combat-style pump gun from its scabbard and carried the weapon one-handed as he made his way across the sand-drifted hardpan toward the fortresslike structure beyond. A hot breeze slid in from the west and brought the formerly limp Xeno Corps flag back to momentary life as two dozen stink birds exploded up out of the enclosure and circled above.

The freshly repaired gate was wide open, but that didn’t mean much, since it had probably been left that way by the prospectors who called the murders in. As Cato passed through the opening, he was greeted by the throat-clogging stench of rotting flesh. He had encountered the odor in the past, but never as strong, and never in connection with people he had known.