Foxhunt Page 23

  Orfeus waited. Nothing. “Innovative,” Orfeus suggested.

  Bright groaned. “Dire!” she said. “You always have to be so dramatic. You probably could’ve just gone home and planted some trees or something.”

  Orfeus folded her arms over her chest. She could feel Rivasoa’s eyes on her. “Then I’d be planting trees for a long time,” she said tightly. “Can we not talk about this?”

  Normally that would be enough to make her drop it. Part of why Bright and Orfeus got along was a shared fondness for sliding out of serious conversations. This time, Bright shook her head. She settled onto her stool. “I’ll drop that part,” she said. “I’m just saying, you could’ve come to me.”

  Orfeus shook her head again. She fussed with her cloak, smoothing it out. “Not when it meant putting you in danger,” she said. “I know I’m a favoured experiment of yours, but—”

  “Orfeus!” Bright said. “You’re my fucking friend! Just stay safe!”

  A long and careful pause.

  “Alright,” Orfeus said. She lifted her hands placatingly, then lowered them again. “Alright. Thank you,” she added, at a loss. Friendship shouldn’t have felt so alien, but it was hard to believe her.

  Bright looked away, just as uncomfortable. “I’ll get your shots,” she mumbled.

  They went into the little clinic, with a door between them and Rivasoa. Orfeus wasn’t actually sure that was better. Rivasoa could just learn whatever Blood secrets she might want from rifling through Bright’s equipment. Admittedly, rifling hardly seemed her style.

  “Blood sample first,” Bright said, almost gently. Orfeus looked away as she did it. She’d been stabbed with knives repeatedly now. Needles shouldn’t have been disconcerting, and yet. It was mostly the fact that knives didn’t stay in the body all that long, whereas the needle had to lie under her skin, getting cosier with her vein than Orfeus really wanted.

  Bright pulled back and slapped a cotton bud on her inner arm. “Press down,” she said, with that same patience. Bright was a lot less short-tempered when she was working.

  Orfeus did, holding down so the tiny wound wouldn’t bleed too much. Bright shook the little red vial, peering at its contents. She shook her head. “Honestly,” she said almost to herself. “You’re remarkable. I’ll need to run tests to be sure, but even with them being self-replicating, you should have a lower count than this.” She looked at Orfeus fondly, a little like how Orfeus looked at her plants. “Something in your blood or brain just makes you the perfect environment for my little nanites to grow in.”

  Orfeus pressed down on the cotton and bit her lip. “Mm-hmm,” she agreed.

  Bright paused, and then set the vial down. “Sorry,” she said. “You honestly are my friend, not my experiment, but uh, maybe it’s a bit of both?”

  Bright got carried away, always said the first thing on her mind, didn’t care much for subtlety. Orfeus knew those things about her. A lot of the time, she appreciated them. “There’s no need to choose between two or more things when they’re all good,” she said, gravely. “I relate to this deeply as a bisexual.” Bright laughed.

  “Anyone caught your eye?” she said absentmindedly, fetching even more needles.

  Claws digging into her neck. Orfeus shook her head and shook the image away, widening her eyes. “Rivasoa,” she said. “We are madly in love.”

  Bright snorted with laughter, shaking her head. “Have you told her that?”

  “No, I must bear my tragic torch in secret.” Orfeus leaned back, grinning.

  Bright did her shots. One of estrogen and one of blood, or of Blood, rather. There was no transfusion of actual human blood, that’d be all kinds of messy, just the nanites that formed Blood in a clear solution. Orfeus hadn’t asked about the science.

  “That should do you right,” Bright said cheerfully, but her eyes lingered on Orfeus as she stood.

  “I feel amazing,” Orfeus told her honestly. Energy flooded through her veins. Right now, it didn’t seem to matter that she couldn’t trust anyone, or that she’d held back her trust from the people who did deserve it. Right now, it felt like she could face Rivasoa and Faolan and the Elders and the Order and all the world. Everything would flow as it was meant to. She’d perform the right tasks, at the right time: all would be as it should.

  Bright still looked worried. Right. Orfeus added, “This should help.”

  Bright nodded, looking pleased.

  She washed her hands, then ushered her outside. There was a slight edge of impatience to it, through the friendly worry. Bright could seldom bear to be long away from her work. Rivasoa sat where they’d left her, hands folded, demure.

  “Oh, Orfeus,” Bright said suddenly as Orfeus made to stride towards the Elder. “Wait.” Orfeus paused, standing as calmly as she could in the room which, without Em’s orderly influence, was too cluttered to really move around in. Bright dived into a pile of things, shuffling through them, then came out again triumphantly.

  She passed something to Orfeus, a small needle in a sealed pack, holding a clear solution. “An emergency Blood boost,” Bright said, looking sombre. She paused, then added, “Hopefully it’ll work,” which was not reassuring. Orfeus looked her in the eye and nodded, tucking it into her pocket. It would be churlish to refuse a friend’s worry. “You ought to be able to apply it yourself,” Bright said, then scrunched a look at her. “Only in the worst case scenario, mind. Just stick that in you if you run all out of energy, if someone, uh, does the thing again—”

  “Does what thing?” Rivasoa said.

  Bright clamped her mouth shut and tipped a broad wink. She was at least willing to keep a secret, if not good at it. Orfeus looked at Rivasoa and decided.

  “While we were in Eldergrove, someone took some of my blood,” Orfeus said, politely. She kept her suspicion reined back.

  Rivasoa rose to her feet in a whirlwind of startled fabric. “What?” she exclaimed. Her eyes were huge with disbelief. “With—without your consent?”

  Orfeus hadn’t heard her stammer before. “Without even my knowledge,” she agreed, “until Bright found the signs.” She waved at her friend, and Bright waggled her fingers impressively. “You remember I was weak on the train back.”

  “I’d assumed you stayed up late carousing,” Rivasoa said automatically. Orfeus grinned tight-lipped, and Rivasoa shook her head. “I…have assumed a lot of things.” Her eyes fixed on Orfeus, determined. “This is abominable. We must get to the bottom of it.”

  Rivasoa was possibly a very good actor, or possibly sincere. If she was sincere, it was heartening to have an ally whose morals rebelled so strongly against injustice that she was furious for the sake of even Orfeus, just for the wrongness of the act. Orfeus nodded. “Not this very instant, though,” she said wryly. “There’s our current mission first.”

  Rivasoa met her gaze, and the light glinted gold off the metallic threads running through her eyes. “But what if the two are connected?” she said.

  Orfeus paused.

  “I…huh,” she said, after thinking about it. She shook her head. “That seems … Farflung.” Bright snorted.

  Rivasoa shook her head, more animated than Orfeus had ever seen her. She gestured with one arm. “If there is one person or group of persons loose in my city and taking people for unknown reasons, and then some other person or group of persons who committed this unspeakably immoral violation of agency on you,” she said, “why would they not be connected?”

  “Well,” Orfeus said slowly. “It’s worth considering.” A little terrifying, with its implications that people were being taken in order to have unspeakably immoral violations performed on them as well. But it certainly narrowed down the suspect pool. If she decided to trust Rivasoa. She shook her head, which was starting to ache despite the reassuring sing of Blood through her veins. “A person or a group of persons, one mystery or two, we’ll stop them.”

  Chapter Fifteen

  People used to say fireflies were fallen stars, li
ghting up the dark. Not around here, I’ve never seen one, but you love to wander, ma chérie, and you light up our hearts when you sing! Maybe one day you’ll see fireflies in your travels, and you can write to me and tell me all about it. Lights that burn in dark places are the most precious of all.

  - Basma of Hollyhock

  * * *

  Rivasoa’s house in Eldergrove was settled midway up one of the overgrown towers, trees extending out of it, ash and birch and maple. She had whole rooms full of books.

  The air in the book-rooms felt careful, like mechanisms were at work to preserve them. Rivasoa wouldn’t let Orfeus even touch them, and that made something in her ache. She wanted to read those books. She wanted to find those stories. What wondrous songs could she sing if she worked directly from the old sources?

  Not the time.

  Rivasoa crossed her hands in her lap and leaned forward over the surprisingly muted grey and white table. “So you propose to be bait,” she said.

  “Well,” Orfeus said. She leaned back in the backless chair and considered. “That isn’t how I would have put it, necessarily. More of a…lure?” The difference was semantic at best.

  “I don’t like this plan,” Rivasoa said.

  Orfeus lifted her brows. “It’s one that puts me in danger. I honestly thought you’d approve.”

  “I’m starting to think your nanite technician friend was right,” Rivasoa said. “You know, you don’t always need to do the most dramatic thing possible.”

  Orfeus shrugged. It was too hot for her cloak in here, so she pulled it off, but thought better of leaving it amongst Rivasoa’s well-arranged density of books and vases. She folded it in her lap. “Do you have a better plan? Because I was under the impression you didn’t.”

  Rivasoa set her hands in her lap, calm and straight-backed. “Investigate,” she said. “Wait and watch and listen.”

  Orfeus’s foot twitched restlessly. Not from Blood overuse, just the stirring of impatience and energy. She’d already wasted too much time sitting around doing nothing, without even knowing anything needed to be done. “Wait until someone else is taken and follow the trail?” she said. “I’d really rather not. Doing something, however flawed, is at least better than doing nothing.”

  Rivasoa sighed. “Did you even bring Galahad?”

  Orfeus liked her a little more for remembering Galahad’s name. “No. But there must be guitars somewhere in this town, I’m sure. You keep other old precious things.” She nodded at the books.

  Rivasoa looked devoutly unconvinced. Orfeus could do it without her, but she’d really rather not. Use the resources you had.

  “It only makes sense,” Orfeus said, as patiently as she could. “They go after passionate people, so I put on a show, get myself snatched –” hopefully not just instantly killed – “report back, save everyone and bring them home to their doting families, reap riches and fame. Secondarily. It all scans, doesn’t it? Or don’t you think I’m talented enough?”

  In one sense, it was almost a test. Was she good enough, passionate enough to be taken? Was she passionate at all, or did she just want her name on the lips of strangers?

  Rivasoa looked frustrated. “I’m not going to physically restrain you from staking yourself out for the vultures,” she said. Orfeus liked her odd archaic imagery. She liked nearly as many things about Rivasoa as she found horrendously irritating. Rivasoa clasped her hands together and breathed in, deep, through her nose. Out through her mouth. “Can you allow me merely ten minutes?”

  Her foot jittered. The clock, ticking. Allegiances, and what they were worth. Orfeus leaned back and said, “I’ll give you twelve.”

  She leaned back. After a while, she stood and prowled. Rivasoa sat still, sedate, not appearing to do anything. Her eyes glowed blue with those thin threads of wires.

  Orfeus flinched from it, a little. She turned to look at the books, but honestly, it was less disconcerting now than when they had first met. She could hardly be hypocritical at the bodily modification the Elders practiced when she had modified herself so tremendously. To be better, to be stronger, to be who she was meant to be. They were all just people, after all.

  After a while, in the silence, Rivasoa let out a small, soft ha.

  “Ha?” Orfeus said.

  Rivasoa looked up at her with her eyes flooded blue, then shook her head, frowning faintly. She pulled out a web rectangle and splayed out her fingers so it stretched, then tapped at it rapidly. Blue schematics sprung up, layers of grids, and Orfeus leaned forward, studying intently.

  “Eldergrove,” Rivasoa said. Orfeus nodded, secretly glad for the clarification. She hadn’t seen many maps of this type and it was hard to instinctively associate the blue square grid with the growing organic green and colours of the city. Rivasoa pointed at a spot, blank against blue lines. “This place in the Catacombs has been generating far in excess of the required energy, and putting energy back into the grid.” She waved her hand and another map laid itself over the first one, this one shining in liquid lines of gold like a series of rivers. The energy of the city, flowing and rising, brightest at the height of the sun. “This wouldn’t be noticeable, except that it stopped, some three weeks ago.”

  Orfeus squinted at the blip. “You think they moved base?” she said. “But wouldn’t it make more sense to trace some secret lab by seeing who used too much energy, not too little?”

  Rivasoa shrugged. “Perhaps they’re overly conscientious in covering their tracks,” she said. She grinned just the tiniest bit. “Or they mean to do good. Many atrocities can begin with good intentions. And this could indeed be some entirely unrelated group of engineers or similar, or it might not be.” Her eyes, looking a more human brown, stared up into Orfeus’s in challenge.

  Orfeus sighed. “Worth checking out,” she said, “but if that falls through, you owe me a guitar.”

  Rivasoa didn’t dispute this, and Orfeus hid her surprise. She wouldn’t complain about a free guitar.

  Catacombs beneath the city seemed an odd idea. Eldergrove was so much a city of above. The city towered, tree-laced buildings reaching up for the sky, stained glass solar panelling capturing the light and splaying it out in rainbows over distant streets.

  But Rivasoa led her out into the streets, lightweight flyers and pedestrians passing them, and then to a grate. Rivasoa wiped her hands once, twice on her robes before she sighed, lifted the grate and climbed inside.

  Orfeus followed her, curious. She bundled her cloak around her shoulders to keep any grime from getting on the rest of her clothes. Perhaps she should have worn a less pretty cloak.

  In fact, down past the first slightly rusting ladder, it was very clean. Sanitation was an important part of any city, she supposed. Most human waste was treated, used to fertilise, recycled. These were more for stormwater.

  “You said catacombs, not sewer drains,” Orfeus said.

  Rivasoa shrugged. Her face had a slightly distant serenity. Orfeus thought it unlikely that she wasn’t bothered by being in such dripping and damp surroundings, and rather more likely that she was trying to distance herself from it, curling into the core of herself where nothing mattered as much.

  Rivasoa said like she was reciting, “The most ancient part of any city is its foundations. And tunnels connect, singer.” She eyed Orfeus. “Fox,” she corrected, even though Orfeus wasn’t wearing her mask right now. “All things connect. If you walk long enough in the dark, you’ll find a way into the ancient places.”

  Orfeus glanced around the tunnel. Lights glowed about every hundred metres, lending a dim glow to the place, supplemented by small algae sconces to purify the air. Overall though, after the rainbows that blazed outside, the dimness hurt her eyes.

  “Walking in the dark doesn’t sound that great,” she said.

  Rivasoa held up one hand, fingers upright. Light welled and bubbled from it, calm and gold and swelling.

  Orfeus watched her motions, then nodded. She tapped her foot against the ground
in the quick one-two-step that was as far as she’d ever gotten into tap dancing, and held up her hand. Light enveloped it, though hers burned closer to red.

  Rivasoa’s eyes glowed the red back at her, wide and startled. She opened her mouth, then closed it, shaking her head.

  They walked along through storm tunnels magic-lit. “Do you even know where we’re going?” Orfeus said, and glanced at Rivasoa. Her eyes were threaded serenely with blue. “Ha. Never mind.”

  After ten minutes in the tunnels Rivasoa stopped in front of a circular door, shabby and far from any lights. Orfeus stopped too, then glanced at Rivasoa, whose eyes were distant. Orfeus sighed and dropped her own smaller red light, shaking out her hands. She strained at the door till it opened, then shoved it aside. Rivasoa stepped through.

  Orfeus followed. The arch of her right foot twinged in remonstration. “Yes, I know,” Orfeus said. Rivasoa didn’t glance at her at the incongruous comment. Orfeus stepped a little closer to her, to rely on her light instead. She had far more Blood power than she’d ever had before, combined with all the new techniques and experience she’d gained training and on missions for the Order, but there was no point burning herself out.

  Five, ten minutes through a narrower, more crawling tunnel, unlit, water murmuring past under a rusted grill that served as a catwalk. Then Rivasoa stopped and stooped, and on hands on knees she moved through a small tunnel. Orfeus puffed out a breath and followed.

  Rivasoa had dropped her light when she started crawling. Orfeus followed her through the dark, trying not to think about how close the tunnel was, scraping at her shoulders as she moved, painful on her hands and knees. It would be so easy to be ambushed or misled down here.