Destiny's Song (The Fixers, book #1: A KarmaCorp Novel) (6 page)

A
fter Tameka’s
tiny cabin and the Brookers’ comfortable, sprawling ranch, I’d somehow expected the Lovatts to live in something resembling an actual house.

I couldn’t have been more wrong. The Lovatt compound was something out of an old-school fantasy novel, complete with turrets, stone walls, and the kinds of weapons sticking out windows that were banned by at least a dozen kinds of Federation law.

“They’re none of them armed,” said a smiling woman passing by, her arms full of linens. “At least that’s what the Inheritor tells anyone who comes to inspect them.”

I watched her go, clad in a dress that looked like it came from the same era as the weapons.

“Someone will be here to greet you in a moment.” The guard who had waylaid me at the gate was most decidedly from this century, as was the blaster at his hip.

I decided to see how good security was. “This place looks like three vid sets got sucked up by a tornado and spit back out.”

He managed not to laugh, but just barely. “The Inheritor’s residence never fails to impress guests.”

I bet.

“Singer.” A young man with a slight build and quick eyes had materialized at my left shoulder. “If you’ll come this way, your presence is requested in the Rose courtyard.”

Roses had thorns. First message delivered, by whoever had sent it. I had my suspicions.

“Are you sure, Jordi?” The guard raised a quiet eyebrow that managed to communicate uncertainty and calm reassurance at the same time.

“Quite sure.” The slender man spared an extra glance at the guard before gesturing toward a left-curving path.

I sent out a quiet ping as I fell in behind him—he moved gracefully enough that I wouldn’t have been surprised to discover he was a Dancer. Nothing came back. Just a guy with some fluid moves on a backwater planet, walking me to my doom.

I grinned—apparently the gothic ambience was catching me up in its web, but I was nobody’s prey. I was a Singer here to gauge the lay of the land and get a closer look at the other half of the Brooker-Lovatt merger.

“Singer.”

The path had abruptly ended in a courtyard straight out of a creepy fairy tale. Roses climbed tall walls, creating the instant impression of a very fragrant prison. I studied the woman seated on a dais in the center. She certainly knew how to make an impression. “Hello again, Evgenia.”

She glanced around the thorny cage she’d fetched me to. “You’ll be shown to your rooms in a moment, and I trust they will be comfortable. I wanted to speak with you first.”

There were undertones to what she was saying, but they were muddy and unclear. I did what I should have done at the front gates and let my Talent unfurl a little. Passive mode only, but it would help me catch the nuances. “I’m happy to listen.”

“I want you to do more than that.” Her tone was clipped, quick, and final—the words of a woman used to having her commands followed. “You’re about to enjoy the legendary hospitality of the Lovatts. In exchange, I expect the courtesy of being informed before you take any actions that might unduly affect members of my household.”

That was blunt—and impossible. “I’m afraid I can’t do that. My freedom to act as I see fit is enshrined in Council covenant.” The Warriors of Karma had been very thorough.

She raised an eyebrow. “I didn’t ask to control your actions—only to be notified of them in advance.”

A questionable distinction, and a meaningless one. “You didn’t
ask
.”

My Talent buzzed an unnecessary alert—Evgenia’s temper was easy enough to read on her face. “This is my home, Singer, and you’d do well to remember that.”

My own temper snapped.
Enough.
I sang a sharp staccato trio, this time letting the notes be clearly audible. A warning—and a bit of a threat. No one leaned on a Singer, not unless she was under orders to let it happen.

Evgenia’s eyes clouded with disdain, even as they widened a little. “I’d have thought you were above that sort of parlor trick.”

I’d been accused of worse. “It’s only a parlor trick if I can’t deliver.”

That got rid of some of the disdain. “I don’t like you, Singer.”

Oddly enough, that wasn’t ringing true in my harmonics. “So long as you respect my Talent and my right to be here, that will be enough.” It wouldn’t be—I didn’t like getting kicked at any more than the next person, and I fully intended to hold a grudge—but it was the kind of politic answer that a representative of KarmaCorp was expected to give.

She snorted, but a decent amount of the wind had gone out of her sails. “Stick with threats. You’re a damn poor liar.”

I wasn’t here to be one. “Fortunately, I’m a much better Singer.”

“We shall see.” Evgenia stared down her nose at me. “However, whatever else Yesenia may have sent us, I don’t think you’re a pushover.”

It was good we’d gotten that much straight.

“Ah, here you are.”

I turned to watch the arrival of the person who belonged to the smooth and powerful voice. He moved out of the shadows of the entry portico, a tall man with dark hair, dark eyes, and the stride of someone who knew he walked on lands he ruled.

He was also a man with excellent timing. I held out my hands, palms up, and slid into full diplomatic mode. “Greetings, Inheritor. I deeply appreciate the hospitality of you and your family while I’m here.”

He smiled and cast his wife a long glance. “I trust it won’t involve too many more detours before we’ve managed to get you a bed and a decent meal or two.”

I was very glad I wasn’t standing any closer to Evgenia—her eyes looked ready to light things on fire. “We were just talking about Director Mayes, Inheritor. She sends you her best wishes, and those of KarmaCorp as well.”

The Inheritor chuckled. “She did no such thing. And I would be pleased to have you call me Emelio, as every citizen of this planet does.”

The waters of this assignment just kept getting murkier. I needed to change that, and if Evgenia and her thorns were any indication, I needed to do it pretty damn fast. I took a steadying breath. “Thank you, Emelio. I appreciate the warm welcome, and I’m glad to have a chance to speak with you about why I’ve been sent here.” The reasons on his radar, anyhow.

“To a lowly colony planet, you mean?” Evgenia’s eyes were sharp, her voice sharper. “Don’t underestimate the citizens of Bromelain III, Singer. We’ll be eligible for Federated status in three more years, and I intend to see that we get it.”

She fired a last seething glance at her husband and moved off in a storm of stomp and fury, immediately pulling a young woman in uniform garb into animated discussion. All while staying close enough to hear exactly what was said next.

I pondered, and looked at the man standing beside me. Federation membership was the Holy Grail for colony planets, and it wasn’t handed out lightly. “Will you get status?”

He tilted his head slightly and smiled. “Evgenia will be on the warpath if we don’t.”

I raised an eyebrow. Strong men didn’t usually hide behind their wife’s skirts, even as a conversational gambit. “And you?”

“I will abide by the Council’s decision.” His face gave nothing away.

Fortunately, I had better sensors—and my Talent said he wanted membership in the Commonwealth at least as much as his wife. Which explained why they’d asked for me. The Council liked new member planets to be neat and tidy, and a marriage of the colony’s two most powerful families would tidy this one up considerably.

That’s why I’d been requested. However, I doubted it was actually the reason I’d been sent. StarReaders didn’t get involved over the fate of a backwater planet, not unless it sent some serious ripples elsewhere.

Ripples I didn’t need to understand, at least not today. I was tired, annoyed, and I wasn’t here to practice my diplomatic waltzing, a class I’d barely passed as a trainee in the first place. Some Fixers navigated the political waters of their assignments with ease, but I wasn’t one of them. In the immortal words of one of my instructors, I tended to work like a kid who had grown up on the business end of a drill bit. Success had earned me some politer descriptors, but I still tended to be sent on missions where it was decently likely I would need to throw a punch.

Hopefully, that wasn’t going to happen on this one—Emelio’s nose looked pretty hard. I studied his face as he guided us out of the rose garden and back into more populated areas, and recalled one of his wife’s carefully aimed thorns—the one where she had called my boss by her first name. “How do you know Director Mayes, Inheritor?”

His eyes got careful and distant. “I met her when she worked in the field.”

I blinked—Yesenia had been a Traveler. As far as I knew, none of her assignments would have been in the current timeline.

Emelio waved at someone off in the distance. “And no, I won’t answer any further questions about that. Neither, I imagine, will she.”

Yesenia didn’t tend to answer questions, period. “Fair enough. How about a new question, then—why am I here to help two grown adults fall in love?”

He didn’t move, but his face sharpened with interest. “Why don’t you tell me how much of the answer you’ve already worked out?”

That was neatly done, but I imagined he was a pro at ducking questions he didn’t want to answer. “You’ve got a planet with two families that could call the shots. I don’t know yet whether you coexist reasonably well, but I imagine that worries the Federation bureaucrats.”

That earned me my first unscripted smile. “You’ve been busy.”

“Just doing my job.” I was pretty sure that if he’d wanted that information buried, it would have been a lot harder to find. Then again, so far BroThree hadn’t struck me as a place where anyone was used to being muzzled. “So, do you and the Brookers play nicely together in the sandbox or not?”

He raised one shoulder in a classically Gallic shrug. “Any society with two ruling powers is inherently unstable.”

That was a central tenet of the political theory that had given rise to the Inheritor model. One decently capable boss, less planetary strife. “So you’re going to solve the problem by merger?” Not a totally dumb idea—it happened a lot in the old-school fantasy novels I drank like water.

A chuckle again. “Nothing nearly so businesslike, my dear. I’m a romantic at heart. I hope my son finds true love.”

It came off as a throwaway line, but my Talent heard the quiet harmonics of truth underneath. Emelio Lovatt was ambitious, canny, concerned about his wife’s machinations—and he wanted his only son to be happy.

That
was why he had asked for a Fixer. He wanted his son to walk willing, or even eager, into a marriage that would keep the natives content, the Federation appeased, and his wife off the battlefield. My job was to smooth the way and nudge the two dominos that would tip the rest into place.

I hid a grin. Janelle would not appreciate any part of being compared to a domino. Which, even if it made my job significantly harder, I had to respect.

It was a good thing I liked improvising—this mission had already blown the usual operating manual all to hell. But at least I was beginning to assemble information.

What I needed to know next was how Devan fit into this picture. With two powerhouse parents, I assumed he was either a browbeaten son who said yes to everything or a dilettante who had abandoned responsibility altogether. Most rich and powerful families had a steady supply of both.

I turned toward the Inheritor, careful to keep my external demeanor impassive. “I’d like to meet your son.”

He flashed me a charismatic, sexy smile. “That’s what all the pretty girls say.”

The man had more masks than the planet Venetia during Carnivale. He’d also managed to make sure I was well informed in less than five minutes, within earshot of his wife. And he’d convinced Yesenia to send me here in the first place. Definitely not a man to underestimate. He’d pissed me off by calling me pretty, though. “Including Janelle?”

“Janelle Brooker is a lovely young lady.” He was as smooth as Tee’s silk hankies. “She and Devan have been good friends for a lifetime, and I’d be most pleased at the chance to welcome her into our family.”

I looked over to where Evgenia stood, regal, annoyed, and clearly listening. “And how do you feel about Janelle, Madame Inheritor?”

Her sniff was probably audible on BroThree’s twin moons. “Any woman would be lucky to have my son.”

In other words, she was a biased mama miffed that Janelle hadn’t fallen at Devan’s feet.

I wondered if it mattered to either of them what Janelle wanted. I felt my Song buzz a quiet harmonic of sisterhood, and cut it off. I wasn’t here to be sympathetic. In the end, I might not be able to care that much about what Janelle Brooker wanted either.

“You’ve asked some very direct questions, Singer.” Emelio’s words were polite, his eyes reflecting only casual interest. “Perhaps you will permit me to ask one or two as well.”

Not happily, but I was pretty sure that wasn’t an answer he heard very often. “Certainly, although I retain the right not to answer.”

The gleam in his eye said he didn’t hear that very often either. “Tell me about your last assignment.”

That sounded more like the beginning of a job interview than a question. “I was sent to one of the new greenhouse biomes. A small splinter group was on the edge of revolt.” Which probably wouldn’t have merited a Fixer’s attention except the biome produced a couple of vital medical ingredients, and one of the splinter group members had been pretty handy at building things that exploded.

Emelio inclined his head like he’d heard my unspoken words as well. “And why the rebellion?”

Mostly reasons I couldn’t give him. “A handful of people couldn’t handle the wide-open spaces.” The new greenhouse planets had them in abundance.

He nodded sagely. “Inner-planet volunteers, I take it.”

He’d managed to keep the disdain from his voice, but my Talent heard it anyway. And he wasn’t wrong. Seeding colonies was art, not science, and the failure rate, even with the help of the KarmaCorp Anthros, was still high enough to make Federation bureaucratic types cringe. The psychs could run all the tests they wanted, but in the end, they were only guessing—the only sure way to tell if someone from an overcrowded cage of an inner planet could handle a view of the unencumbered sky was to let them see it.