Carlyle: “…”
Julia: “Stuff?”
He gave a guilty smile.
“Do you want a consult?”
“No, it’s fine.”
“The whole bash’ is very guarded, from the files. If you push you’ll spook them. Relax and take things naturally. You’re a brilliant sensayer, Carlyle. I have you where you can do the most good. You’ll know if anyone tries to get at them, and you’ll stop it.”
“Yes.”
“I’m so glad to have you to depend on at times like this.”
Despite his gloom, he couldn’t fight a smile. “Thanks. Oh, Julia?”
“Mm?”
“What do you know about Tribune J.E.D.D. Mason?”
“The Celebrity Youth Act has never had a tougher case. You met?”
“They’re doing the investigation, they came to the bash’house.”
“J.E.D.D. Mason is not a problem. Believe me, there’s nowhere I’m more vigilant than Hive leadership. Yes, they have ties to Andō, but it’s the Mitsubishi brood we have to watch out for. J.E.D.D. Mason has nothing whatever to do with them.”
“It isn’t the ties to Andō, it’s … you know about ‘Dominic’ and ‘Martin’? Is it a cult?”
“No. Nothing like that. There’s nothing dangerous at all with J.E.D.D. Mason, I check up with their sensayer all the time.”
“Their sensayer, is that Dominic Seneschal?”
“Yes. Dominic has an odd comportment, I know, but they’re immensely skilled, just right for J.E.D.D. Mason’s case, a specialist, like you but different. J.E.D.D. Mason is a very strange young person, it was inevitable for someone growing up around so much power, but I watch, and I’m careful, and there’s no cult, no danger.”
Relief let Carlyle slump. But not complete relief. “And what is J.E.D.D. Mason’s relationship with Mycroft Canner?”
“Confidential.” The Conclave Head gave her prize student another shoulder squeeze. “Don’t worry about J.E.D.D. Mason. No one is less threat to the world order. If anything, they’re the pillar of stability that keeps the rest from teetering. Now, would you like a session?” Her perfect nails played through the fraying crochet of the old scarf she had given him. “Anything new with you on the theological front? New questions? Discoveries?”
Carlyle summoned his best smile. “No, nothing new with me. Could we talk through the post-bash’-loss psych reports on Mycroft Canner? I’d love to hear your readings in light of thirteen years of further development, that’s an amazing resource.”
“Yes. Yes, Mycroft is quite the resource.”
HERE AT LONG LAST, IN THE TIRED DARK OF MORNING, ENDS THE THIRD DAY OF THIS HISTORY.
CHAPTER THE TWENTY-FOURTH
Sometimes Even I Am Very Lonely
I slept that night in Alexandria, and breakfasted with Caesar’s staff, though Caesar himself will not break bread with Mycroft Canner. I had no time to return to Cielo de Pájaros before reporting to J.E.D.D. Mason’s Utopians, but gave myself a half-hour to stop at the nearest Servicers’ dorm, where our tainted and all-forgiving brotherhood was still willing to call me ‘friend.’ I have been adopted many times since the explosion killed my birth bash’. I was adopted by the Terrafirma Cousin bash’ next door. I was adopted by the Mardi bash’ next to them, and our four other neighbor bash’es, which all let me grow up half-wild like a cat with several homes, whom no one thinks to check on so long as it visits once a week. I was adopted by Thisbe, Bridger, and the Major. But only with the Servicers has my adoption been completely without lies. I was at first just one more Mycroft who slept and shoveled beside them. They soon noticed that I made good conversation (invaluable in a society which has no other entertainment), and by the time the wiser of them added ‘Canner’ to ‘Mycroft’ they already felt too much affection to know fear. Apollo Mojave used to frequent a pub in Liverpool, mad as that seems. He was a Utopian, a vocateur, a Familiaris, as in demand with the Powers as I am, with his own bash’, his lover and her bash’, his constellation, his work, his writing, me, all vying for scarce hours, but he still made time for a pub. It was filthy, one of those dives where locals come for talk and dominos. At first none spoke to this alien Utopian, planted at the counter with his vizor and his coat, but beer erases barriers, and he was soon listening to tall tales and filling in at games, as dear as any puppy. Apollo needed that, he told me. Even if he only saw them once a month, it kept him from forgetting what it meant to be a human being—without that how could he claim to be acting for all humanity? Perhaps the Servicers give me the same.
At a crossroads, three blocks from my destination, hands seized me by the throat and dragged me backwards into the alley with a killer’s violence. I do not know, reader, if you are so blessed that you have tasted an embrace like this, a universe in itself, so all the outside world could cease and you would smile uncaring. If you have not tasted something like that, it cannot be described. Fierce, dear arms dragged me to the bedding of the alley’s trash, pinning my hands more out of habit than need, as his lips tasted my ear.
«Saladin,» I whispered. It is a name I chant sometimes to myself, over and over, as if language had been invented only to form those syllables.
«Mycroft,» he answered in kind. His breath tasted of meat and wild places, the grit of urban underbellies and the clean of mountain stone. My Saladin. No threat, no order, no torture could have made me speak of him to any living soul, but for you, only for you, reader; never again accuse me of keeping secrets.
His voice is a savage, hungry whisper-hiss. «I’ve found Tully.»
Sobs without tears seized me, as when one who can no longer pretend he is not sick gives way to coughing, but my Saladin absorbed my sobs, his body like warm hands around a shivering chick. «Where?» I asked.
«Luna City. Thirteen years up there, I can’t imagine what it cost.»
I had guessed Luna City. There are places within the human sphere beyond my reach; the nearest is the Moon.
«They’re coming back, tomorrow. I saw them on the passenger list, Port-Gentil elevator.»
We spoke Greek together, our birth bash’ tongue, the language of our intimacy since forever and forever. «Could be a trap. Tully Mardi wouldn’t use their real name on a passenger list—no Utopian would raise a child that stupid.»
I can feel when Saladin smiles, the way his collarbones flex when he bares those human fangs, more dangerous than an animal’s since they both bite and speak. «True, ‘Tully Mardi’ on the list would’ve been stupid. ‘Tully Mojave’ transcends stupidity and qualifies as painting a bull’s-eye on your face.»
«Tully Mojave?» I repeated.
«How’s that for throwing down the gauntlet?»
He laughed, and I laughed with him, our bodies as aligned as clapping hands. I could feel him getting hard beneath me, and heat stirred in my member too, eager to awaken after so long a sleep.
«Pup must fancy themself the successor.» His hand reached up my shirt, his nails tracing paths of fire across my chest. «Let’s finish it,» he invited. «Seventeen was never a good number.»
It would have been easier to drive a dagger through my heart than answer. «I can’t. You finish, please. Finish alone.»
He seized my throat. His calluses had changed again, some new labor or game making them thicker on the edges. «Who did this to you?»
«No.»
«Tell me!» As too-tender Carlyle expresses anger sideways by weeping, so Saladin’s sadness manifests sideways in snarls and lust for blood. «Someone did this to you!»
«No.»
«Tell me!»
He was all around me, can you imagine? His lips hot at my ear, his left hand scraping my chest while his right stroked my inner thigh, maddening and gentle as a cat’s rough tongue. I wanted him. I wanted nothing but him and me to have existed for the whole of time. «I can’t!» I sobbed. «I can’t! They’ll do it to you, too.»