“There must,” Aiah says, “must be a reason……”
“Constantine is allying himself with Parq. He and the Dalavans together can dominate Caraqui—neither of the other two triumvirs has a following. Adaveth and Myhorn are both considering whether or not to resign.”
“No.” Aiah’s response is instant. “There is—” Her mind stammers, and she tries to work out what is happening. “There has to be something else happening here. If Adaveth and Myhorn resigned, it would be giving Parq exactly what he wants.”
There is a grudging silence.
“This has to be some kind of stratagem,” Aiah says, and hopes she is right. “Give it time.”
“I have no choice but to ‘give it time.’ We of the twisted have been compelled to cultivate patience for many centuries now. ‘Giving it time,’ ” he snarls, “is what we know best.”
“Can we meet outside of the office?” Aiah says. “In my apartment, say? We can attempt to work out some strategies to limit Togthan’s influence.”
“Hm.” There is a brief silence, then, “Very well. Let’s do that.”
Aiah does some rearranging and gives Togthan an office with Alfeg. Put her own spy, she thinks, next to Parq’s spy. Then she calls Togthan in to see her.
“I apologize for the delay,” she says. “The war and our expansion has caused a good deal of disarray.”
Togthan seats himself in the offered chair with a graceful swirl of his gray robes. His voice is smooth and unhurried. “I understand,” he says, and sips delicately from his cup of coffee.
“Because of the shortage of office space,” Aiah says, “I’m afraid you’re going to have to share an office with one of our mages.” Togthan frowns—the first hint of disapproval he has allowed himself, so Aiah hastens to add, “But he will often be in the Operations Room or otherwise working through telepresence, and I hope he won’t be too much of a bother.”
“Well…,” Togthan says, “I suppose that if it will assist with the war effort, I daresay I can manage the inconvenience.”
If I can put up with you, Aiah thinks, you can put up with Alfeg.
“I observe,” Togthan says, “simply in walking through the corridors on my way here, that there are many of the polluted flesh working in this department.”
“I’m sorry?” Aiah says.
Togthan flashes an apologetic smile. “Beg pardon,” he says, “I introduced a Dalavan term. I refer of course to those who have been genetically altered.”
“Oh. I see.” Aiah hesitates, chooses words carefully. “When our department began we were underfunded, and had to hire those who we could. The, ah, altered were often the most available, because they were denied opportunity elsewhere.”
Togthan smiles and sips his coffee. “That is no longer the case, surely? Your pay is more attractive now, I have heard, and there are many more looking for work on account of the disruptions caused by the war.”
“Our policy has always been to hire the most qualified.”
“Miss Aiah, I’m sure no one desires that you hire the incompetent or deficient.” Togthan’s smile is all reason. “But there is much popular prejudice against the polluted flesh in Caraqui. I know that they are not to blame for their condition—our Dalavan faith is just in that regard—but nevertheless if there were too many of the twisted seen in this department, it might bias the people against you. Whereas if the population of your department more accurately reflected the composition of the population of the metropolis, I think you would find in the people a greater reservoir of goodwill toward your efforts.”
Aiah recalls Constantine’s wish that she become Togthan’s best friend, and compels herself to grace her clenched teeth with a smile. “I’ll give your wishes my best consideration,” she says.
Togthan sips his coffee again, his confiding smile an answer to hers. “I’m gratified that we understand one another,” he says.
Oh yes, Aiah thinks, / understand, all right.
TRIUMVIR HILTHI DECLINES TO ORGANIZE POLITICAL PARTY
WISHES TO REMAIN ABOVE POLITICS
“WILL ENDORSE IDEAS, NOT CANDIDATES”
The Kestrel Room faces the guns of Lorkhin Island and is closed on that account; and so Aiah’s luncheon with Aldemar takes place at Dragonfly, a restaurant on the other side of the Palace, with a view of the distant blue volcanoes of Barchab. Dragonfly is smaller than the Kestrel Room, without its intimate alcoves and private rooms, and without its luxurious wood paneling; but it is a brighter place, its white plaster walls featuring strips of dark glossy polymer. It looks out over Caraqui with multifaceted, insectlike eyes, each reflecting a slightly different Caraqui, a slightly different plane. Along the walls and between the tables are fish tanks filled with scaled, rainbow-colored exotica, few of which Aiah imagines are actually to be found swimming in Caraqui’s sea below.
The actress wears a russet-colored rollneck, gray pleated slacks with nubbles and a subdued russet stripe, tasteful gold jewelry, suede boots with high heels. Her skin is flawless—the result more of genetics and lavish care, Aiah suspects, than plasm rejuvenation treatments, though beneath carefully applied cosmetic Aiah can see evidence for the latter, a kind of eerie, ambiguous glow notable more for its absence of character than anything else. Aiah finds herself envying Aldemar her epidermis far more than her celebrity.
Aiah orders fried noodles with prawns, vegetables, and chiles. Aldemar asks for half a grapefruit.
“You eat worse than I do,” Aiah says in surprise.
Aldemar’s answer is matter-of-fact. “It’s my job.”
“I guess you’re paid well enough for it.”
A smile tweaks its way onto Aldemar’s features. “Yes. Otherwise I’d never eat another damn grapefruit as long as I live.”
“What has become of the chromoplay you were working on? The one you abandoned to come here?”
Aldemar blinks. “Ah.” A dissatisfied look crosses her face. “Shut down for six weeks, a deadline soon to be extended. They have very cleverly shot every scene that can be managed without me. There are wrangles over money—I expect I shall have to part with some—but it’s not a very good chromo anyway, and letting it age in the bottle will not do it harm, and may do some good. And since in the chromo we get as far as staging a revolution, I suppose I can claim that I’m here researching a sequel.”
“Why are you making this chromoplay,” Aiah asks, “if it isn’t very good?”
Aiah is relieved that Aldemar doesn’t seem offended by the question. “To begin with,” she says quite seriously, “good scripts are rare, and for the most part they go to other people. Those few that I have been involved with have all gone wrong somewhere—bad direction, bad editing, actors who didn’t understand their roles, or who demanded inane rewrites to make their parts larger or more sympathetic… well—” A dismissive shrug. “I have not been lucky that way.
“And while I am waiting for something good to turn up, I must remain bankable—I must remain popular enough for investors to wish to invest in my ’plays. And it may surprise you to learn that the most popular chromoplay, worldwide, is the sort in which people like me fly and fight and war against evil. The genre transcends problems of ethnicity, dialect, metropolitan allegiance—everyone understands them, and everyone buys a ticket.”
“Is it what you intended when you chose to be an actress?”
Aldemar blows out her cheeks, looks abstract, a bit melancholy. “Perhaps that is why I’ve become interested in politics.”