The LDC grandees. Company managers and finance directors. Lawyers and judges.
Judge Nagai Rieko nods over from across the room. Nods to the Eagle of the Moon. I’ve mentioned you to the Eagle, she says through her familiar. He approves. Ariel lifts a cocktail glass in answer. Welcome to the Pavilion of the White Hare.
And there is the Eagle of the Moon. Jonathon Kayode, Chief Executive of the Lunar Development Corporation; King, Pope and Emperor, in reality a figurehead, a brightly-plumaged cage-bird. His familiar is the lunar eagle itself. Only he is allowed to bear this skin. At his shoulder, his oko Adrian Mackenzie, careful to be always one shade drabber than the resplendent Eagle. His familiar takes the shape of a raven.
‘The famous Ariel Corta,’ the Eagle of the Moon says. He is big for an Earth-born; a giant Igbo from Lagos. He stands shoulder to shoulder with even the second generation moon-children. ‘I can trust you not to start a fight here?’
‘In this frock?’ Ariel says flirtatiously, but still turns her empty cocktail glass upside down; the sign that she will fight the entire party. The Eagle of the Moon does not know the sign but his husband, an Australian, understands the joke. His smile is thin.
‘I made on you in the Celebdaq,’ the Eagle whispers. He flashes his eyes at his oko. ‘We have these little competitions. They keep us sane. He is a terribly bad loser.’
‘Even on the moon the only way a girl can get noticed is by taking her clothes off.’
The Eagle of the Moon guffaws. His laugh is huge. The room freezes, then little aftershocks of humour ripple across the party; people laughing because more important people are laughing.
‘Too true. Alas, too true, what?’ He playfully slaps Adrian Mackenzie in the ribs. Adrian winces, chews resentment. The rumour is that Adrian Mackenzie has been manoeuvring the Eagle of the Moon into making his office more political, more powerful, more presidential, while settling it deeper into the pockets of Mackenzie Metals. ‘Your family has quite a facility for the public eye. You pull off a spectacular coup du tribunal in your underwear. Your nephew saves that Asamoah boy on the moon-run. And then your brother, well; shocking. Quite shocking.’
‘It seems we have compounded one security breach with another.’ Ariel sends a spiral of vapour up to the lights.
Jonathon Kayode pulls down one eyelid.
‘The eye of the Eagle,’ he quips. He guides Ariel out through hibiscus curtains to an outside balcony. A glance tells Adrian Mackenzie to remain inside. The balcony is high, stirred by air currents spiralling up from the lower levels. The light moves into sundown. Long golden light, mauve shadows, indigo rising from the floor far below; whole districts coming alive with lights, twinkling in the dust. Jonathon Kayode says in a deep, intimate whisper, ‘I am delighted to have you on my advisory panel.’
‘It’s an honour.’
‘Speaking personally, I think it’s high time the Cortas kicked the dust off their boots and took their proper place in political society. It’s not a dirty word, politics. However, we are disturbed by the assassination attempt. It is like some ghastly throwback to the sixties. Duels and vendettas and assassinations – we’ve moved on from that. Of course, the Eagle has no authority to intervene, but we can advise and warn. It would be a shame if an opportunity for the Cortas were stymied by the behaviour of the few bellicose brothers.’
The Eagle of the Moon dips his head. Ariel Corta purses her fingers. The audience is over. Jonathon Kayode brushes through the hibiscus curtain. Loose petals powder the shoulders of his agbada. Adrian Mackenzie links his arm.
Ariel lingers, leans on the stone balustrade. The riding lights of drones and pedicopters, the sparkle of fliers, the jewelled abacus of the elevator cars and cable gondolas: she is immersed in light, breathing it as a fish breathes water. Bubbles of exhaled light.
She draws on her long vaper and reviews the brief conversation. Two things. The LDC knew about the assassination attempt, and also Rafa’s certainty that it was a flare-up of the old Mackenzie-Corta feud. And the Eagle of the Moon had left the conversation on-record; overheard by familiars. She was meant to relay it to Boa Vista, with all its promises and threats. We can be kings of the moon like we are kings of helium but we must act like kings, not wild bandeirantes. The Eagle of the Moon had tasked her with restraining her impetuous brother.
The party beckons and she will flirt outrageously tonight, but there is one last piece of work; Corta work. Bandeirante work. She tilts her head to the man who has been hovering at the edge of her vision all evening. The man comes out on to the balcony and stands a moment beside her, looking out at the constant movement.
‘An Xiuying,’ he says without a look or an acknowledgement.
And he’s gone. He’s a middle-ranking Lunar Development Corporation civil servant in a suit better than his salary, who hired a nikah advocate better than his salary, to allow him to marry the Sun boy he loves with all his generous, weak heart.
‘Lucas,’ Ariel murmurs to Beijaflor. Her brother is on instantly. He’s been waiting for this call all night.
‘An Xiuying,’ Ariel says.
‘Thank you.’
‘And don’t ask me for any more favours Lucas,’ Ariel says and breaks the connection. She straightens her back, uncoils the day’s tensions and tightness. Confidence is the most alluring necklace. She suits the sexy jewels of power. She suits them so well.
Movement, noise at the door. A figure in pink beyond the bots and the obdurate human security. Some want, some grudge, some hope. Some petition. The Chinese are looking now.
‘Senhora Corta?’ Ariel did not see the aide approach. All of a sudden a voice is at her ear. That is what aides are supposed to do, approach inconspicuously. An eagle pin on the upper breast of her Suzy Perette dress identifies the aide’s allegiance. ‘Do you know a Lucas Corta Junior?’
‘My nephew.’
‘He would like to see you. Outside, if you would be so kind. His dress is not appropriate.’
The figure in pink recognises her. What is that, a suit-liner? But there is no mistaking the handsome big lunk. No mistaking those love-god cheekbones, that big heart-melting grin.
‘Tia, he says in Portuguese. ‘I’ve run away from Boa Vista. Can I stay at yours?’
Cake and mint tea wait for Ariel in her tiny, unused kitchen space.
‘I made you cake,’ Lucasinho says. ‘To say thank you. For the hammock.’ Ariel’s apartment is very small. Living for one. She sent Lucasinho there from the door of the Chinese reception. A hammock was waiting for him in the printer hopper. By the time she returned he was lolling in it, deeply unconscious, mouth open, limbs loose and sprawling in deep sleep beneath the wall-sized print of Richard Avedon’s full-face photograph of Dovima. It’s her only decoration: bleached-out face, soft dark eyes and mouth, holes for nostrils.
‘You won’t tell Papai?’ Lucasinho says.
‘Lucas will find out,’ Ariel says. She takes a slice of the cake. Lemon, light as a breath. ‘If he hasn’t already. He will ask me.’
‘What will you say?’
‘My brother owes me.’ Lucas would have been awake all night, calling in debts, tapping up allies, marshalling his agents biological and informational down on Earth. All his resources he would bring to bear on An Xiuying, but most of all his deliberate, relentless intelligence, that would never rest or relinquish until Lucas Corta had what he wanted. Ariel is almost sorry for the poor man. Lucas will play the coercion sudden, sharp and impossible to escape. ‘So I can say what I like.’ This time. But she isn’t clean. A seat in the Pavilion of the White Hare and she has already betrayed privileged information; under the eyes of the Eagle of the Moon himself. Lucas has never approved of her seeking a life and career outside the family. Now, making this one, tiny betrayal for family, she has given her brother an edge. Not now. Not soon. But some day, when he needs it most. For the family. Always for the family. ‘This cake,’ Ariel takes another bite. ‘Where did you learn this?’