There was a moment of stunned silence. Dejah’s lips curled still further. Jelaine sipped from a drink that might not have been hers. Philip seemed to have woken up; he now sat up straighter, his eyes darting from his brother to his sister in furious search of the sensitive deduction I’d alluded to and which he must have wished he could share.
Jason wore no signs of defeat, just an increased sadness, as if my rejection of his friendship remained the most heartbreaking experience he’d been through all day. He spoke softly, as if placating a recalcitrant child. “The translation function is automatic, for anybody holding the staff by the friction strip. Opening the Khaajiir’s files requires the use of a Bocaian password phrase: ‘Decch-taanil blaach nil Al-Vaafir.’ Speaking it out in a clear tone of voice, once, will train the internal software to recognize it when subvocalized. After that you’ll have permanent access.”
The closest Mercantile translation to the phrase he’d given me was Judgment Denied the Heavenly Fathers, an odd combination of words given that no Bocaian sect I’d ever heard of had any orthodox creation myth. It didn’t matter; passwords are hardest to crack when random, and the Khaajiir would have been just as baffled by one I’d used to shield my personal files during one nasty dispute over interspecies jurisdiction: Pity the Fat Tchi with My Elbow up His Ass. I asked the Porrinyards, “Did you get that?”
“Decch-taanil,” Oscin began.
“Blaach nil Al-Vaafir,” Skye concluded.
“Great. Pick one of you to stay here and one of you to work on it on private.”
They nodded. Without any discussion, Skye remained where she was, while Oscin took the Khaajiir’s bloody staff down the stairs.
I tried not to let my satisfaction show on my face. It made sense for the Porrinyards to pore through the Khaajiir’s files; their data-absorption speed was so far beyond mine that relegating this job to them could save me hours in pursuing false leads. Still, there was no need to make them do more work than necessary, so I turned my attention back to Jason. “Anything in particular you think we should focus on?”
“Yes,” Jason said, his tone now determinedly upbeat, as if he could only be happy now that the strain of keeping secrets was safely in the past. “The Khaajiir’s writings relating K’cenhowten’s Enlightenment to his theory of historical momentum. A failed and then aborted Bettelhine project, from some three generations back, called Mjolnir, a reference to the hammer of the ancient-Earth Norse thunder deity, Thor. The writings and eventual fate of one Lillian Jane Bettelhine, my paternal aunt, now deceased. These are all things your friends would no doubt uncover within a couple of hours; you might as well find them now and then get back to me once you’re done, if you have any questions. Or, you could just take me aside and ask me. I won’t make you waste any more time.”
“You’re too late. Besides, I’ll have more questions for you soon enough.” A deep breath. “Right now I’d like a few minutes alone with your brother.”
Philip stirred himself and began to stand.
Vernon Wethers raised his hand. “Ummm…I object.”
It was the first time he’d spoken in quite a while. His soft, hesitant voice, an open apology for itself, startled in ways that angrier interjections might not have.
I said, “This is not a court of law, Mr. Wethers.”
His lips moved for a beat or two before words emerged. “No, but it is still my duty to stand for Philip Bettelhine’s interests, and I take that mission seriously. I must insist on being present during any consultation.”
I liked that: consultation rather than questioning. Even his word choice cleansed any implication of guilt from the moment.
What I didn’t like was Wethers. The man was a shadow, not just in terms of his habitual proximity to his employer, but also in personality as well. I had sensed no structure to him, no emotional depth that did not exist except as an imprint of the man he served. It would be dangerous to conclude from this that handling Philip would amount to handling him as well. Fanatics always have their own trajectories. But now that he’d spoken up…“Very well. Understand that some of my questions will be of a personal, and perhaps embarrassing, nature. You might find yourself intruding on Mr. Bettelhine’s feelings.”
Wethers dabbed at the corners of his lips with a napkin, then stood, adjusting his jacket to bring it incrementally back in line with the character-deprived perfection he owed the Bettelhine empire. “That is all right. Mr. Bettelhine knows that wherever his personal life is concerned, it has never been my function to form opinions…”
Philip Bettelhine sat on the edge of the couch in the outer suite, downcast, his wrists propped on his knees and his hands dangling like dead fish. His eyes avoided mine, making contact only long enough to establish that every instant of the process was being catalogued for future resentment. His creature Wethers stood against what would have been the panoramic window, his arms folded over his chest and his colorless eyes maintaining a strict focus on his employer that suggested years of reading volumes from every micro-alteration in Philip’s facial expressions. I would have found constant appraisal of that kind both off-putting and creepy, but Philip seemed used to it, and accepted his vassal’s gaze as his due even as he took mine as impudent intrusion.
Paakth-Doy, uncomfortable in this company, sat apart from all of us, trying not to make eye contact.
I said, “Mr. Bettelhine, you don’t like me very much, do you?”
He looked tired, the question already pushing him to the limits of his patience. “From what I’ve been able to determine, not all that many people do.”
“Your brother and sister seem to.”
“Is that what this discussion’s going to be? Juvenile tallies of who likes whom? Please. I know I’m comfortable disliking you, I know you’re comfortable disliking me, and I think you and I have much more pressing business to talk about.”
He didn’t know it, but I found myself respecting him more after that little speech than I had at any point since meeting him. Honest dislike is always a breath of fresh air. “You don’t know why they invited me.”
“They didn’t invite you. My father invited you. But no.”
“You resent my presence.”
“I resent you strutting around like you own the place, especially when I’m the bastard who owns the place. Your actual presence doesn’t bother me one way or the other.”
“What do you think of me being the honored guest of your father?”
His tone dulled. “It baffles me.”
“The same would go for his close association with the Khaajiir.”
“Of course.”
“You don’t know what that’s about, either?”
“If my father wanted me to know, my father would have told me.”
“Have you asked him?”
“He has let me know that he considers the matter classified.”
“Is this typical of your relationship?”
Philip rubbed his eyes, as much, I think, to continue avoiding mine as to alleviate any strain he may have felt over the disasters of the evening. “My father and I have more than one relationship, Counselor. As a father with a respected and accomplished son, he has often been very close to me. As Chief Executive Officer commanding one of his chief lieutenants, he has sometimes been obliged to keep information flow on a need-to-know basis. I understand this. It is not atypical.”
“And yet,” I said, leaning in close, “as an accomplished executive in your own right, one often assumed to be your father’s most likely successor, who would at the very least hope to be groomed for greater and greater responsibility as you rise in the family profession, you would also expect to become privy to more classified and secret material as the years passed and the time of succession grew ever closer.”