An hour later, Brill heard footsteps on the front path, and a rattle of keys. She dropped her magazine and stood up silently, standing just inside the living room door as the front door opened. One person, alone. She tensed for a moment, then recognized Paulette. “Hey, Paulie,” she called.
“What!” A clatter of dropped bags. Brill stepped into the passageway. “Brill! How did you—”
Brill raised a finger to her lips. Paulette glared at her, then bent down to pick up the spilled grocery bags. “Let me,” Brill murmured. “Shut the door.” She gathered the bags: Paulette didn’t need prompting twice, and locked the front door before turning back to stare at her, hands on hips.
“What do you want?”
Brilliana shrugged apologetically. “To talk to you. Do you have a cellular telephone?”
“Yes.” Paulie’s hand tightened on her handbag.
“Please switch it off and remove the battery.”
“But—” Paulie looked round once, then shook her head. “Like that, is it?” she asked, then reached into her bag and pulled out a phone. “What happens next?” Brilliana waited. After a moment Paulette slid the battery out of the phone. “Is that what you wanted?”
Brill nodded. “Thank you. I’d already swept your house for bugs. Would you like a coffee? I’m afraid I’ve been here a while, it’s probably stale, but I could make some more—”
Paulette managed a brief chuckle of laughter. “You slay me, kid.”
“No, never.” Brill managed a wan smile. “I apologize for breaking in. But I had to check that you weren’t under observation.”
“Observation—” Paulette frowned “—why do I get the feeling I’m not going to like this?”
“Because.” Brill took a deep breath: “You’re not going to like it. Before I say any more—when did you last see Miriam?”
“Shit, kid.” For a moment Paulette’s face twisted in pain. “She’s in trouble, isn’t she?”
“When did you last see her?” Brilliana repeated.
“Must be, let me see…about three months ago. We did lunch. Why?” Her expression was guarded.
Brill sighed. “You’re right, she’s in trouble. The good news is, I’ve been ordered to get her out of it. The duke thinks it can be papered over, if she cooperates. I can’t promise you anything, but if you happen to see her, if you could make sure that’s the first thing you tell her…?”
Paulie frowned. “I’m telling you the truth.”
“I know that,” Brill said quietly. “Not everybody would choose to believe you, though. They’d want to believe you’re protecting her. She’s missing, Paulie. Nobody’s seen her for a week, and we’re pretty sure she’s on the run. I’m talking to you because I figure if she makes it over here you’re one of the first people she’ll turn to for help—”
“What do you mean, if?”
“It is a long story.” Brill pulled out one of the kitchen chairs and sat down. “I know part of it. I think you know another part of it?” She raised an eyebrow, but Paulette stared at her mulishly and refused to answer. “All right. Three months ago, Miriam did something really foolish. She stole some information about a project she was not supposed to know of, and then she tried to bluff her way into it. It’s a Clan operation on this side, that’s all I’m allowed to say, and she tampered with the Clan’s postal service—that alone is a high crime. To make matters worse, she was caught by the wrong person, a conservative member of the council’s security oversight board. What Miriam did, that sort of thing—” she shrugged uncomfortably “—carries the death penalty. I’m not exaggerating. Sneaking into that particular operation—” She stopped. “You know the one I’m talking about?”
Paulie nodded once, sharply. “She told me what she was going to do. I tried to talk her out of it, but she wasn’t listening.”
Brilliana rolled her eyes. “I am going to pretend I didn’t hear what you just said, because if I had heard you say it, certain superiors of mine would want to know why I didn’t kill you on the spot.”
“Ah—” Paulette’s face paled. “Thanks, I think.”
“No problem. Just remember, those are the stakes. Don’t let anyone else know that you know.” Brill gestured at the coffee machine. “Shall I refill it? This may take some time.”
“Be my guest.” There was no trace of irony in Paulette’s voice. “You meant that. About the Clan’s involvement in a fertility clinic being so secret people can be killed out of hand for knowing about it?”
Brill stood up and walked over to the coffee machine. “Yes, Paulie, I am absolutely serious. The project the center is working on is either going to change the structure of the Clan completely, and for the better—or it will trigger a civil war. What’s more, the authorities here are now aware of the Clan’s existence. There have been disturbing signs of covert operations…If they discover what has been happening at the clinic, we can’t be certain how they will respond, but the worst case is that several thousand innocent teenagers and their parents will find themselves on a one-way trip down the rabbit hole.” She finished with the coffeemaker and switched it on.
“I find that hard—”
“What do you think the clinic’s doing?” Brill demanded.
“What?” Paulette shook her head. “It’s a fertility clinic, isn’t it? It helps people have babies. Artificial insemination, that kind of…” she trailed off.
“Yup,” Brill said lightly. “And they’ve been helping couples have children for nearly twenty years now. The fact that the children just happen to be de facto outer family members, carriers of the world-walking trait, is an extra. The clinic is still helping couples who’re desperate to have children.” She looked down at the table. “Half of the children are female. In due course, some of them will be getting letters from a surrogacy agency, offering them good money for the use of their wombs. And they’ll be helping other couples have children, too. Children who will be world-walkers. And when they grow up, they’ll get a very special job offer.”
Paulette nodded slowly. “I’d gotten that much.”
“About twenty years from now, the Clan’s going to have to absorb a thousand Miriams, and their male counterparts. They’ll all crop up at once, over about a decade. A torrent of world-walkers. At the peak of our power, before the civil war, there were less than ten thousand of us; now, I’m not sure, but I think only a couple of thousand, at most. Think what that change means. One of the reasons everyone has been bearing down on Miriam is that she’s, she’s a prototype, if you like. Raised outside the Clan. Not uncivilized, but she thinks like an American. They all want to see how—if—she can be integrated. If she’s going to fit in. If Miriam can learn to be part of the Clan, then so can the children. But if not…in fifty years time they could be a majority of our members. And the established elders will not willingly give up their power, or that of their children, in favor of uncivilized upstarts. Think what Miriam is going to do to their lives, if she makes a mess of things now!” Brill stopped abruptly. Her shoulders were shaking.
“What’s it to you?” Paulie demanded. She stared at Brilliana for a few seconds, then jammed her fist across her mouth. “Oh. Oh shit. I’m sorry. I didn’t realize.”
“Not your fault. My mother had…difficulties. Around the time the clinic was being set up. Angbard proposed to my father that he and my mother…”