Castles Made of Sand (37 page)

It appeared, amazingly enough, that it was Ax Preston’s England that had been snarling-up global connectivity (something he would have had to spin, in Europe, if he wasn’t quitting!).
Not
the raging civil disorder and social collapse on the Continent, oh no, no, no. It was the rockstar with the hippy army, taking over Buckingham Palace. And here’s me thinking we were the ones that looked sensible and reassuring. There you go, no accounting for taste: but now the President had met Ax, and decided he’s an okay sort of guy (the Ax effect again, weird how it hardly ever fails).

The President of the USA might be only a titular monarch, kind of a Fujiwara, feudal Japan situation, with the great lords of commerce calling the shots. But he had friends in high places, reverence for his traditional standing…and that’s how things work. Person to person, it always comes back to that. A smile, the look in someone’s eye, an exchange of pheromones, and everything flows.

He sat on the plinth of the statue, thinking about his lovers. He’d been thinking of them a great deal while his mind was on its journey to recovery, feeling terrible about the way he’d left them. How bewildered they must have been, how abandoned they must have felt. He’d been ready to go back and tell them he was sorry, even before Lurch’s phonecall. Now that would be his next task. They were made for each other, I can’t stand in their way. Yeah, tough to accept, but what the fuck was all the rage and despair about?

If they will let me, I’ll be their best friend. He saw himself accepting the role that Sage, noble soul, had accepted once, and been prepared to bear for a lifetime. If my big cat could do that, then I can. And it would be cool (balm for his pride) if he could say, oh yeah, and the data quarantine is fixed. Which he should know before he left, and he was confident.

Ready to leave, he took a look at his minor deity. It was John Paul Jones, Revolutionary War hero. Great tactician, always in trouble, ended up as rear-admiral to Catherine the Great, of all things. Dishonourable discharge, died in France… The story was instantly in his mind, presumably from his chip. He’d long ceased worrying about the difference between chip memories and ‘real’ memories. Another populist hero who outlived his glory days. Greetings, compadre. But I won’t go to the bad. I can’t be their lover, but I can love my darlings, which is the important thing, and no one can take it away. For the sake of what we had, I will make something positive of the rest of my life. I swear it.

Surrender? I have not yet begun to fight.

He returned to the Four Seasons and told the friendly desk staff he’d been to see Mr Eiffrich. They thought that was pretty funny, and told him again about how England is that place where it rains all the time. In his room, using his pay-as-you-go phone, he called Lurch, discreetly let her know the good news, and said no, he didn’t want company tonight. Alone but no longer alone, Fiorinda and Sage restored to him, he slept for hours.

Later he went out (in a downpour) to eat at a tapas bar, DC style, booths and islands all majestic polished wood; a little stage at the back. When he was eating the waitress came and ducked down by his table. ‘Excuse me, Mr Preston, would you play for us?’ The bar staff and manager were grinning hopefully. He’d met this reaction before, in DC. Maybe they don’t know why he’s famous but they’ve heard he’ll do this sort of thing, and it sounds like a desirable freebie.

‘Yeah, okay. You’ll have to provide the guitar.’

So he played, sitting on a stool with an acoustic guitar, the pick-up plugged into a little amp. On the low-down, in the USA, he’d had to get used to stepping over cables again. He was a free agent; they didn’t have a clue what to expect. He gave them Willie Nelson,
blue eyes crying in the rain…

Goodbye, my blue-eyes, goodbye my darling girl. I love you both, I know it’s over; and I’m coming home.

The next day Lurch came to the hotel. She told him he had a gig at the White House. The President would be honoured if Ax would play at a reception. It would be in a couple of weeks, and she knew he wanted to get home, but he really ought to do this. There’d be other meetings on the data quarantine that he’d need to be part of, anyhow.

Ax felt, irrationally, somewhat demoted. Put in his place.

‘I don’t suppose you’d care to arrange for my assets to be unfrozen, if I’m staying? I think the Chosen have
some
US earnings piled up in bond.’

‘Don’t worry about expenses. I’m embarrassed you ever thought that.’

Lurch (aka Kathryn Adams) was used to the kind of money where you never, ever have to think about it. She had the rockstar mentality on the subject (though she’d be hurt if you told her so). Ax’s behaviour, walking out of the hotel in Seattle and going on the road, had been mystical and strange to her. It hadn’t crossed her mind that he simply wanted to be in charge of where his next sandwich was coming from. So we get to know each other, and there are jarring moments, but she’s still a very good kid, this fairy godmother of mine. And the leader of the free world is her Uncle Fred.

‘Okay, let’s look at the line-up.’

She hadn’t expected the question, but she located the information and showed it to him on her virtual-screen palm-top. The line-up at the White House put Ax on stage with a notorious outfit of blood-daubed-Celtic wannabes who openly supported Europe’s green nazis, and a crew of African-American so-called Islamist hate-merchants whose enemies were Uppity Females, Christians, Homosexuals, Asians, Koreans, Jews… These were respectable corporate-earning name bands. They were just making a buck, all in fun and in the scared name of free speech, and Ax would be a fool to take offence.

He sighed. He could see someone had tried hard to put together a themed package.

‘Sorry, Lurch. I can’t do this.’

He tried to explain why not, and made her understand he was serious. I don’t have to play if I don’t like the company. I’ve never been that kind of rockstar, don’t plan to start. Thanks, but no. Lurch
blanched
. He would not have thought her whey face could turn whiter, but it did. She argued her case, becoming agitated. The person who put this together didn’t understand. I do, I tried, but what the President, uh, or people round him see is, they’ll see you
being awkward
. Please Ax. You can do this. You have to do it.

Sorry, said Ax. Credibility issue. Surely the White House can understand a credibility issue?

Ah, well, he was thinking, watching her shocked face. So that’s the way things are, and that nice civilised patrician gent I was talking to was really Pigsty Liver For whom might is right, and now I’ve bust the deal—

She left, saying she’d get back to him.

Ax, crestfallen and exasperated, wondered if his life was actually in danger (she had been so flustered), but decided not. Fred Eiffrich isn’t Caligula, he’s just an emperor whose favour is easily lost. Too bad. And if Ax no longer had a patron in this town, that was okay. He had a contingency plan.

In the morning he took the Metro to Dupont Circle, bought himself coffee and a muffin and went to sit in the park. People walked briskly, a school class of teenagers were doing drill-exercises. Sparrows flirted and chirruped and hunted scraps. The central fountain featured a
ronde
of undraped forms, male and female: sleek, pallid stone. Two white guys, clad in running shorts and singlets, sat on the rim of the bowl talking quietly. Could one of them be my man? He wondered if he’d been stupid about the gig, but decided he’d been right to say no as an opening gambit; see what Lurch comes back with… On his VIP ticket he’d have flown into Shannon by private jet (no flights to England, but he could have handled the rest of the journey). Getting out of the USA otherwise, when he had little money, wasn’t supposed to be here, had a chip in his head and came from a contaminated country, was not going to be straightforward. But he’d been working on it.

I like to be in charge of my next sandwich.

The sparrows caught his attention. What a strange city it is, where nobody feeds the birds. He wanted to crumble some of his blueberry muffin for them, but respect for Lurch’s feelings restrained him. I’d hate to create an artificial food chain… One of the little birds hopped to within inches of his foot, without the bait. She looked up. He saw in extraordinary clarity the blonde stripe above her shining dark eye, the soft pelt of smoky brown feathers. She reminded him of Fiorinda, and he had a wistful thought that she might come to his hand. He could almost feel the tiny claws, digging into him—

Oh

He recognised the penumbra of something untoward happening in his brain, and the next instant
there was Fiorinda
, her living ghost: Fiorinda, in her storm-cloud indigo and the orange fluffy cardigan, one arm across her breast, the bi-loc set in a white-knuckled grip against the side of her head. His heart
leapt
. Oh God, she has remembered. My telecoms-allergic babe finally realised
why the fuck
I gave her that thing. She looked as if she’d been crying.

‘Ax!’

‘Fiorinda, my baby. What’s the matter? What’s happened, sweetheart?’

‘Ax, you have to come home. Sage has gone. Olwen wouldn’t give him life support any more. You don’t know because he wouldn’t let us tell you, but he was taking far too much snapshot, in the Zen Self experiments. He said he couldn’t stop, it was something he had to do, and now he’s gone to Caer Siddi.’

The moment he saw her, the moment he heard her voice, the world turned upside down and righted itself, and he was
there
, in the world he thought he’d lost, loving her and Sage, grasping that they were in trouble and he’d have to sort it out—

‘You two haven’t been getting on then, I take it. And the stupid bugger wouldn’t let you tell me. Fiorinda, don’t cry, it’ll be okay. Just explain to me what went wrong—’

She shook her head, her trouble only darker. ‘N-not at this distance, Ax. You don’t understand, he’s
gone
. He was, I think he was dying when he left Rivermead. No one who goes to Caer Siddi ever comes out again. He’s never coming back.
Sage is gone
. Things are okay here but not too good. Fergal’s taken command of the London barmies, apparently Sage told him to do that, but I’m not sure, what do you think?’

‘I’m on my way. I’ll be with you soon as I can. Fiorinda,
don’t worry
. It won’t be as bad as you’re making out. I’ll talk to Sage, I’ll go and haul him out—’

‘Oh.’ She looked around. ‘You’re outside. Can other people see me? Do I look weird?’

‘Yeah, they can see you, like a ghost. They won’t worry. It doesn’t—’

‘Shit. I’d better break the connection, this is contraband. Please, please come home as quickly as you can. I love you.’

She had vanished before he realised that he could have touched her.

He was on his feet. He sat back on the bench and reached for his cooling paper cup of coffee. His eyes were fixed on the Art Deco fountain; his mind was racing. I must go home, I must get back. They’ve had a bust-up over the Zen Self, and Fiorinda’s alone: but there’s something else. Something I ought to know.
I can feel it
. Ideas started to click together in his mind, hints he’d dismissed, disregarded inferences, a cascade that he couldn’t stop. Straws in the wind, random objects out of place that reveal the direction of a great secret mass of moving air—

‘Oh my God!’ he gasped, starting to his feet again, his whole body thrilling with fight-and-flight. ‘
My God
, Sage—! What have you done?’

If desperation had been enough he would have dived through the ether, around the world, and snatched her out of danger, as if from a burning building. A youngish, good-looking Hispanic bloke, in worn-down funky leisurewear, was coming towards him. ‘Mr Preston? Hi, I’m João. You waiting for me?’

It was his underground ticket home connection.

The man offered his hand. In the split second before he took it Ax recalled that this was no longer a gesture between negotiating strangers in the USA. Yesterday morning the President clapped Ax around the shoulders and squeezed his arm, getting physical without a qualm; but he didn’t shake hands. They don’t wear gloves, that would be too weird, but they don’t touch skin to sweaty skin on the first date. Bio-terrorism’s a real danger. He remembered, but he took the hand because it was too late, and everything went black.

Where am I? He was lying on his side on a hard, dusty surface. He thought it was wood, floorboards or planks. He was handcuffed, blindfold; he couldn’t hear anything. When he moved, he found the cuffs were locked to a wall. Further inventory: he was wearing teeshirt and underpants, he had some bruising he’d rather not think about, a sore face, the taste of old blood in his mouth, but no serious physical pain. Where am I
now
? I’ve been moved. I was somewhere different, floating in a sea of drugged daze, they have moved me. A blurred impression of the past few days began to surface. He lay still, deathly afraid,
Oh, Fiorinda…
Okay, it could be worse. I could be naked, could have been hurt much worse. This isn’t
too
bad. This is not an absolutely hopeless fix. Objective one, calm yourself. Be open and ready for whatever chance comes.

At last, footsteps. Someone ripped off the blindfold.

It was the bloke from Dupont Circle, with others. Two deeply tanned white guys, one with grey bristle hair, the other much younger. Two stocky, dark-skinned guys, alike as brothers; and a tall, thin man black as tar. They all had handguns. The older white guy was clutching his and looking trigger-happy. The others less so, guns in reserve.

‘What’s going on? What’s happening?’

‘Same as last time, Ax. You’ve been kidnapped. You know the score, you co-operate, be nice, or we’ll hurt you.’

He sat up, cuffed to the wall, and tried to look around without appearing to do so. The bed had no mattress, just dusty planks. No window was in his line of sight, and neither was the door. A sink in a corner. Bare dingy-brown walls. It could be a very cheap, shabby and dirty hotel room. He couldn’t hear traffic.

‘So, what is it you want?’ He gave them a rueful smile. ‘Contrary to the sound of the thing, I don’t have easy access to large sums of money, but—’