Palace (64 page)

* * *

The medical staff insisted that Jevon stay in the hospital far longer than she wanted. They’d taped electronic bone stimulators over her rib cage to heal the broken ribs and put her on an IV drip of bioactive calcium as well. By the morning of Twenty-one Gust, three days after the bombing, they pronounced the ribs healed and released her to Se Hivel and Nju.

‘Remember to take it easy for a couple of days,’ was the doctor’s parting shot. Jevon nodded and agreed, but her mind was already turning to the work that must have piled up in her absence. She needed to work, she absolutely had to work. Work was the one thing that would fill her mind and crowd out the images from the vidscreens that tormented her memory. Se Hivel, unfortunately, had heard the doctor’s remark.

‘You’re taking as much time off as you need,’ he said cheerfully. ‘We’ve got your room all fixed up. Se Vida sent flowers.’

‘Did she? How kind of her.’ Jevon felt like crying. I don’t deserve it, she wanted to say - no, she wanted to scream it out: I helped kill those people. I helped send them to the rally. ‘I mean, she hardly knows me.’

When they reached East Tower, Nju insisted on carrying her to the lift booth and then again to the Cyberguild suite. Wrapped in his arms she felt as small as a child and oddly safe. For the first time it occurred to her to wonder why she’d never hated the Garang the way she hated Leps. A number of painful ideas had been occurring to her, when she’d been forced to lie alone in a hospital bed with only the chattering vidscreens for company. Yellow flowers heaped the dresser in her room, a match for the flowered drapes and bedspread she’d brought there an eternity ago, it seemed, when Se Hivel had transferred to quarters in Government House. Nju set her down in her armchair by the window.

‘I had thought to procure you a plush animal toy,’ he said. ‘It seems customary in these circumstances, but Se Hivel told me that it would not be suitable.’

‘It isn’t, no, Nju. But thank you for the thought.’

At last they all went away and left her alone. Through the door at first she heard their voices, discussing their plans for the after noon; then there was silence. She got up, gingerly, took off her jacket and hung it in the closet, then stripped off her dirty clothes and tossed them into a hamper, even though she knew she could never stand to wear those clothes again, the ones she had been wearing when so many UJU members died. Her closet hung crammed with clothing; she took an old robe and slipped it on, then stood looking around her room just for the comfort of her familiar things. On the end table lay a box of her favourite chocolates and two holonovel tapes, presents from her employer. Se Hivel had been generous again, so damned generous, so gallantly and constantly generous, once again making it clear that he had everything to give while she had nothing. ‘Arno,’ she whispered. ‘Oh, Arno.’

On the vidscreen on the far wall the door unit buzzed. Dukayn’s image appeared in the corner.

‘Let me in, Jevon. I know you’re there.’

Jevon sat down hard on the edge of her bed and gasped for air. The unit buzzed again. Dukayn’s hard-edged face showed no feeling at all.

‘Jevon, come on. You don’t want a public fuss, do you?’

She could not speak, could not find the air to speak, but she did reach out and pick up the transmit from the end table by the head of her bed. At the third buzz she flicked the door switch and let him in. She got up and opened her bedroom door just as he came into the hall from the gather.

‘I wanted to see how you were doing,’ Dukayn said. ‘You don’t look well.’

She shook her head and clutched at the doorjamb to steady herself as he strode down, dressed in his usual black with steel studs gleaming down one sleeve. For a moment they stood facing each other over the threshold; when he took a step forward, she was forced to move back and let him in. He glanced around her room, then stood, watching her, between her and the chair. She nearly collapsed onto the edge of the bed.

‘I’m sorry,’ Dukayn said. ‘I didn’t think you’d still be ill.’ He turned and shut the door behind him. ‘Or are you just frightened?’

‘Damn you,’ Jevon whispered. ‘How can you be so calm after what’s happened?’

‘I didn’t set that bomb. Neither did you.’ Casually he sat down next to her on the bed. ‘I figured you’d be agonizing over this, and that I’d better check up on you. You’re blaming yourself, aren’t you? You’re blaming UJU. That’s not the right place to lay the blame.’

‘Rationally I know that.’

‘Ah, but you keep seeing the images, right? From the vids.’ She nodded.

‘And you’re thinking about trying to leave UJU.’ Dukayn’s voice stayed level, almost warm.

‘Aren’t you?’

She could not look at him. He grabbed her by the shoulders and wrenched her around to face him. She felt trembling start around her mouth and spread like plague until she was shaking in his hands.

‘What were you going to do?’ Dukayn’s voice turned soft. ‘Tell Se Hivel everything? Throw yourself on his mercy? Beg him to protect you?’

When she tried to speak, the shaking overwhelmed her voice. How had he known? How could he have known? He stared into her eyes.

‘No, Jevon.’ He was whispering. ‘No. You can’t leave. We need you, and you know a great deal - you know as much as any of us. If you try to leave I’ll kill you. I’ll find a way, no matter how many Garang your employer hires. You know I will. I’m the one who set up the security system here, aren’t I? I’m the one who knows how to circumvent it.’

She could only stare at him and shake. He tightened his grip on her shoulders until the pain made her whimper.

‘Am I hurting you?’ He smiled a little. ‘UJU-Prime wanted you killed right away. He knew you’d break. I talked him out of it. Do you understand? You owe me, Jevon. You owe me your life.’

For a moment she thought that she would faint, tossed her head back and saw the ceiling spin. Dukayn loosed his grip a slight degree. When she looked at him, his smile sickened her.

‘Terrified?’ he whispered. ‘Good.’

He bent his head and kissed her, forced her slack mouth open with his and kissed her again. For a moment she could neither think nor move, trapped by her terror. He shifted his weight against her, flung her down across the bed, and laughed when she started to struggle. She tried to twist free, but he threw one leg across her and pinned her down.

‘Don’t scream,’ he whispered. ‘You won’t like what’ll happen if you do.’

All her will broke. She fell back against the bed and felt herself tremble in cold sweat. With one hand he pinned her hands above her head; with the other he pulled back her robe and opened his trousers. The act itself was mercifully brief. He was so aroused by her terror that he’d barely entered her when he came. When he released her, she rolled away from him and wondered why she couldn’t cry. She had never wanted to weep more in her life, but the tears refused to fall. Dukayn grabbed her by the shoulder and hauled her back to face him.

‘I’ll probably never do that again,’ he said. ‘Don’t worry about it.’

He got up, fastened his trousers, and strode out of the room.

Jevon lay on her bed and stared at the ceiling. She felt like a heap of old rags thrown to the floor, filthy and too limp to move. She could kill herself. She only had one way out that she could see: suicide. And what would that do to her mother? All at once she sobbed, rolled over on her stomach and began to weep in great convulsions of sobs. There was no way out at all.

* * *

Two hours later, Karlo Peronida, First Citizen, with the full support of Centre Council and a slight majority of support on the inter-actives, declared martial law. His regiment of Garang Marines were placed ‘at the disposal’ of the Protectors’ Guild with Captain Nikolaides sworn in as a temporary deputy to head them up. The captain’s first action was to establish a curfew for Leps at the twenty-twos with the proviso that those Leps working night jobs could be deen typed and apply for exemptions. The curfew, of course, would protect Lep citizens. Hadn’t a Lep been found dead in South Canal, murdered by one of the terrorists? Not that there was any proof of the link, Kata thought bitterly. But Nikolaides knew a point to make when he saw one. He had to hand it to the dung-sucking little human. Kata had learned all of this in snatches of news from the public vidscreens in Pleasure Sect, while he staggered around dressed in filthy clothes and carrying a pair of equally filthy canvas shopping bags. He sang little snatches of pop songs to himself, and every now and then he drooled. Whenever he saw a brightly coloured piece of litter, he would stoop and pick it up, examine it carefully, then tuck it into one of the bags, which held his websling and shoulder sack under the decorations. No-one ever stopped and questioned him, neither the Protectors nor the one pair of Garang soldiers that he saw.

Toward sunset he began ambling in the direction of the Carillon Tower. A couple of times he turned out of the direct way and wandered down side streets, still singing, still drooling, but he kept one eye on the fading light. He needed find some kind of shelter before the curfew cracked down. Why not satisfy his curiosity at the same time? This time he approached the tower from the street and walked up the public stairs rather than using Vida’s longtube route. At the base of the tower he walked round and round, looking for a hidden exit. He found nothing.

By then twilight lay heavy and grey over the gardens. Kata crouched in the shadows, dumped his day’s take of litter, and stuffed the canvas bags back into the shoulder sack. He put on the websling, slung the sack over his back, and waited. At any moment the outdoor lighting would turn on, but he needed the twilight as thick as possible before he risked the climb up. Finally he could bear to wait no longer. Under the clinging vines he found the trellis that had served Vida as a ladder and climbed, fast and easily, up to the bell tower. He swung himself over the edge and behind the covering wall just as the lights snapped on. There was no way out. He sat on the floor and stared at the black obsidian pillar, the floor, the encircling wall. No lift booth, no stairs - nothing! How could she have escaped?

‘It hardly matters,’ he said aloud. ‘Tomorrow she’ll be dead, and I won’t have to worry about her any more.’

Kata had brought with him a meat stick, a bottle of water, and a detailed map of Government House. After he’d eaten, he studied the plans with a tiny penlight. The Cathedral itself would be heavily guarded, of course, but the warren of Government House, its buildings and monuments, wooded areas and canals, would shelter him after he picked up his pulse rifle. He could see any number of lanes of movement that would bring him close to the Cathedral close enough for the long-range gun. Sooner or later she would have to come out, and when she did, he would kill her.

He put his map away, pillowed his head on his shoulder sack, and slept, buried in the shadows of the Carillon Tower while overhead the police choppers thudded through the air.

* * *

In the dark silence of Datechange Rico followed Dukayn through East Tower’s roof garden. Fog hung low; it dripped from the vine arbours and transformed the gleam of phosphorescent blooms into eyes, peering through the night. Lit from within, the blueglass surveillance centre glowed in the middle of frond-trees. Beyond it he could see a landing pad, luminescent in silver. At the door Dukayn laid a hand on an ident plate. The door slid open. ‘I’ve brought the cybertech.’

The enure room glittered with top-rank photonics: a full Map-station, surveillance screens, comm taps, tracer circuits, scanners of every kind. Two men with the robes of Lifegivers but the stance of soldiers waited by a long control panel.

‘All right, Hernanes, let’s get that loop of yours up and running,’ Dukayn said. ‘I’ll need it piped into every security system in Government House.’

‘Okay, that won’t be a problem.’

‘What about this? Can you get the alarm to transmit directly to one of my chips?’

‘Probably.’ Rico hesitated, struck by a sudden thought. ‘Can I use that Mapstation to play around a little? I just might be able to go you one better. If we set up triangulations from long-range scanners and channel that to your neural input, you might be able to trace him directly. We could mark his course on a map, but what I’m hoping is that the chip will flash in the corner of your vision. When you get near him, the flashes would come closer together, so you’d know you were zeroing in. But I’ll need chip access for that, if I can even do it.’

Dukayn hesitated, torn.

‘You can replace that chip or encrypt it again after Kata’s caught,’ the taller Lifegiver said.

‘What Hernanes is offering sounds pretty damn good to me.’

‘Right, Brother Thom.’ Dukayn nodded briskly. ‘Okay, cybertech. Let’s get to work.’

Linking Dukayn’s neural chip into the scanner system proved possible, but it took Rico half the night to do it. By the time they were certain the tracer would work, the fives were just chiming. Dukayn offered him a cot in the duty room just off the surveillance centre and the chance to get a few hours’ sleep.

‘We’ll need you here later,’ Dukayn said. ‘Just in case something goes wrong.’

‘All right,’ Rico said. ‘Glad I can help.’

Rico took off his boots, then lay down on the narrow cot fully-dressed. As he was drifting off to sleep, he was thinking about Wan Peronida and how much he hated him.

* * *

‘Well, it’s here,’ Vida said. ‘The day I sign Wan’s contract. I can’t get out of it now.’

‘I wish it was only the signing,’ Samante said. ‘I hope to God that I don’t end up wearing black for you, too.’

They were sitting in the eatery, sharing breakfast. From the undraped windows a pale shaft of watery sunlight fell across the table. Vida laid her hands into the brief warmth.

‘I was thinking,’ Vida said. ‘If this were a holonovel, you know? The assassin would get into Government House, then outwit everybody until the last minute. He’d burst into the Cathedral in the middle of the ceremony, and just as he was about to kill me, Wan would save me. It would be awfully romantic, wouldn’t it? And then I wouldn’t mind marrying him.’