He hadn’t taken a different way. Just before the bridge over the Iogh River the groundcar’s lights brushed the back of some kind of large construction mech that had slid off the road and into the edge of the trees. “Stop,” said Ingray, and got out.
There were no lights but the groundcar’s, and the ribbon of stars above the road, thick and bright this far from an actual city. She should have thought to bring a hand light, but it hadn’t occurred to her until now. “Danach?” she called. “Danach, are you there?” No answer. She girded up her skirts and stepped carefully off the road, into mud—a good thing she’d worn shoes for this. She reached out and put one hand on the two-meter-high mech and took one slow step toward its front end. If this mech was like others Ingray had seen, it would be about three meters long, not including the massive shovel on the front, which could swing in nearly any direction and dig from whatever angle the pilot liked. Somewhere toward the front there would be handholds that would let a pilot climb up on top, and while there wasn’t an actual seat, there would be room to sit. Danach would probably have been sitting there when the mech went off the road—she couldn’t imagine him walking this far in the dark, when he could ride an excavation mech, just like in children’s entertainments.
She stepped very slowly, wary of tripping or putting a foot wrong in the dark. The mech was silent, and cold against her hand. The shapes of trees began to resolve themselves out of the black, Ingray’s eyes adjusting now that she’d come a little away from the groundcar’s lights. “Danach, are you all right?” No answer. Suddenly she was truly afraid—what if he’d been injured when the mech slid off the road? What if he was unconscious, or dead? She reached the front end of the mech, put a hand on the folded-down shovel. “Danach?”
Danach’s voice, out of the dark, just above and behind her. “What the fuck are you doing here?” Angry.
She looked up and back. Saw Danach sitting on top of the mech, only a shadow in the starlight and what light reached here from the groundcar. “I’d ask you the same thing but I already know the answer.” Relieved, but she said nothing about that.
“I suppose it’s a good thing you’re here,” said Danach, from atop the mech. “Now you can tell me where the vestiges are, once I get this fucking mech back on the road, and I won’t have to dig randomly and hope I guess right.”
“They aren’t here,” she said. “They aren’t in the parkland. They never were.”
“Nice try.” Danach’s voice was contemptuous. “If you don’t help me find those vestiges, I’ll spill the whole story to Mama.”
“Go right ahead,” said Ingray. “If you don’t come down from there and come back home with me, I’m calling Planetary Safety.” It was a threat she knew she had to be willing to make good. She knew that Planetary Safety getting involved in this would likely be a disaster for her, but she’d had time on her way here to think about what choices she had, and what Danach was likely to do, and what she might do in response.
“No,” Danach said. “You’re not calling Planetary Safety.” With a groan the mech’s shovel unfolded and rose high and swung, just missing Ingray’s head. She stepped back in alarm, tripped, and fell sprawling. Danach swore, and the shovel swung back the other way and slammed into something—it must have been a tree. The tree cracked and groaned as the shovel pushed against it, and the mech seemed to tip toward Ingray and then steady, and the shovel swept back toward Ingray again, lower this time, she could feel the breeze as it passed.
She rolled over and crawled toward the road. “You think this is going to keep Planetary Safety away?” she gasped, and got a mouthful of muddy strands of hair.
“It doesn’t matter.” There was a crack as the shovel slammed into the tree again. “By the time anyone gets here I’ll be kilometers away, and there are at least a dozen people who’ll swear I was home all …” Danach’s words turned into a strangled cry.
And then a whispery, whistling voice said, “The brother Danach is not a good brother.”
Ingray stopped crawling. “Tic?” And then realized that what Tic had said had sounded much more like the ambassador—he was still in character. Of course he was. “Ambassador?” Realized, too, as she got to her feet and walked cautiously toward the now-still mech, that the Geck ambassador assaulting humans had to be some sort of treaty violation. Good thing that wasn’t actually what was happening. “I thought you stayed with Pahlad.”
“Bad brother Danach,” repeated the spider mech. “Will you kill the brother Danach, Ingray Human? It tried to kill you.”
“I wasn’t going to kill her!” Danach’s voice, hoarse and terrified. “Fucking ascended saints! Ingray! What kind of person do you think I am?” In the starlight Ingray could see a looming, hunched shadow atop the mech.
“You are the kind of person who tries to kill their clutchmate,” said the spider mech. “Your mother may eat you if she finds you too young, but your clutchmates you rely on from the moment you hatch until age takes you. I am sorry I cannot kill this bad brother, Ingray Human. It would be a violation of the treaty. But if the brother Danach fell in front of this machine it might roll over him.”
Ingray found the set of rungs and climbed up the side of the excavation mech. “No! Ambassador, don’t!” She didn’t think Tic would really kill Danach, but even through the mech, even with its strange whistling voice, he managed to sound menacing. “And you almost did kill me, Danach.” Or at least almost injured her very badly.
“You were going to call Planetary Safety! That wouldn’t have just been bad for me, it would have been bad for the whole family!”
The spider mech had wrapped several legs around him and held him down flat against the top of the excavation mech. One claw gripped Danach’s hair, pulling his head back. Another claw hovered over his throat. Still clinging to the side of the mech, Ingray said, “I had to stop you somehow. I’m telling you the truth, the Budrakim vestiges aren’t in the parkland.”
Still tight in the spider mech’s grip, Danach closed his eyes. “Then where are they?”
“Where they’ve always been,” said Ingray. “Pahlad never stole them. The prolocutor made that up because Pahlad discovered they were forgeries to begin with. Prolocutor Budrakim didn’t want that to come out, so instead he made up a story about the real ones being stolen and replaced with fakes.”
Danach’s eyes opened. “What? That’s fantastic!” He tried to sit up, but the spider mech still held him down. He made an exasperated noise. “Have you told Mama?”
“No, because I just found out today. And Pahlad has every intention of going public with the story emself, if e can get around the objections of the prolocutor, who’s going to do everything in his power to prevent the news services from saying anything at all about it.”
“We can take it to one of the local independent services,” Danach suggested. “Talk it up, get it passed around. It might take a while for it to build up to where the planetary services can’t ignore it anymore, but that’s just a matter of some work. Nuncle Lak could do it easy. Hell, even you could do it, Ingray.”
Ingray said nothing, only waited.
“No,” Danach said after a moment. As though she had said something. “Nobody knows I’m the person who rented this excavation mech, I used a fake ID. So we’ll just leave it here and go home.”
Still, Ingray waited. The silence stretched out.
“Okay, so I wouldn’t have found anything. But nobody would ever have known it was me, so I don’t see what difference it makes.”
“How do you think I found you, Danach?” asked Ingray. “Next time you want a false identity you really should come to me. Whoever did this one was more or less competent, but it didn’t stand up to a really determined search.”
A silence. Then, “Oh, fuck.”
“Bad brother Danach,” said the spider mech. “Ingray sister has been very generous to you although you do not deserve it.”
“Let him go, Ambassador,” said Ingray. “You know you can’t hur
t him without causing some kind of diplomatic incident. You really shouldn’t be holding on to him like this.”
“He tried to kill you,” insisted the spider mech, but it loosened its hold on him.
“It was an accident!” Danach protested. He sat up, rubbing his throat. “I was only trying to scare you so you wouldn’t call Planetary Safety. I wouldn’t kill you!”
“You wouldn’t be sorry if I was gone, though,” suggested Ingray.
A pause. “Infernal powers, Ingray! I’m not a murderer.”
“Ingray Human has been very generous to you,” repeated the spider mech.
“Here’s what we need to do,” said Ingray. “We get in the car. We go home. If anyone asks, yes, you rented this excavation mech. You were drunk, you were thinking about the murder, you got upset. You’d gotten to know Excellency Zat and liked her; she was a gentle soul who only cared about knowledge. You were angry and sad that she’d been murdered. You’re not really sure what you were going to do with the construction mech but whatever it was, it made sense on a bottle of arrack. It probably had something to do with Dapi the Dirt Mover.” That was the central character of a children’s entertainment that had run for decades. There weren’t many Hwaeans who hadn’t at some point in their childhoods harbored an ambition to be a heroic construction mech-pilot on account of it. “You couldn’t control it, it crashed …”
“I couldn’t,” Danach put in. “I’ve hardly drunk anything at all and this thing is a huge pain to drive. I didn’t think it would be that difficult, I’ve piloted mechs before.”
“Is not easy,” whispered the spider mech. “Important to practice.”
“It crashed,” said Ingray again. “You’re very sorry. You’re going to pay for the damage to the excavation mech. Out of your allowance. Without being asked. You’re going to think hard about whether you’re going to be doing any more drinking in the future. Pahlad being Pahlad, and the business with the vestiges, all of that will take you completely by surprise.”
“I can’t get down if you don’t move,” said Danach. And then, when Ingray didn’t move, and didn’t say anything, “All right. All right, thank you.” Graceless and resentful. “I would have been completely fucked if you hadn’t turned up. Even if I’d managed to get into the parkland with this heap of junk. Is that what you wanted?”
Ingray took a breath. Considered answering, but instead she climbed back down to the ground and walked carefully back to the road, and the groundcar. Behind her there was a plop, and a scrambling sound, and the spider mech came alongside her. “You’ll probably have to be a bag again,” said Ingray. “It won’t help if the news services get the idea the Geck were involved in this.”
“A bag, a bag,” whispered the spider mech. “Hah! The bag. I see now. But no, I will make my own way.” It trudged onto the road and shoved itself underneath the groundcar.
“Whatever you like,” said Ingray. Suddenly she shivered. She hadn’t been paying close attention, had been thinking two and three steps ahead. What had the spider mech just said? Hah! The bag. I see now. A nauseatingly horrible thought occurred to her. “Tic?” she called. “Tic, that is you, isn’t it?” But it had to be. Why would the Geck ambassador threaten to kill Danach like that? That was certainly an unambiguous violation of the treaty.
“Let it alone,” said Danach, coming up behind her. “You might have made friends with it, but I don’t want to ride with that thing anywhere near me. It’s so … so squishy.” He shuddered. “And it almost strangled me.”
Ingray opened the groundcar door. “Right, let’s go.”
12
By the time the groundcar pulled up to Netano’s house, it was well after midnight. The house was dark, except for a faint glow of light through the blue and red glass around the doorway. And bright against it, casting a yellow glow on the pavement at an exactly legally allowed distance from the house, the tall, four-legged bright orange column of a news service mech.
Danach swore. “District Voice?”
“District Voice,” Ingray confirmed, peering out the window at the black lettering across the mech’s front panel. “But it’s the only one. The news about Pahlad must have gotten out, but only District Voice is doing anything about it.”
Danach gave a short, tired laugh. “The prolocutor must be leaning on the big services. If it is about Pahlad, then I imagine they’re here for you, sis.” That last a trifle smugly.
“What a time for you to be so very drunk,” said Ingray. “I’m going to have to call a servant to help me get you into the house.”
“I think I’d have sobered up some by now,” Danach pointed out.
“You drank an awful lot, and you’ve had an exhausting night. You’ve passed out and I don’t want to try to wake you up, or risk you saying something awkward to the District Voice. Besides, I’ve already called for help.”
“Ingray,” said Danach, sounding suddenly, unaccountably pleading. “I really wasn’t trying to hurt you. I just … I thought you were there to get me in trouble, or take credit for finding the vestiges, or …” He trailed off.
“Why do you do any of it, Danach?” asked Ingray. Her anger and frustration had receded during the ride, as they always seemed to, but at Danach’s halting attempt at an apparent apology it broke out afresh. “You know Mama’s going to choose you. You know I’m no danger to your future prospects, I never was.”
“I don’t know that. I never did, not either one. Mama doesn’t always do what anyone expects her to. And Nuncle Lak likes you better than me. You know e does. And Mama listens to Nuncle Lak.” Danach sighed. “Look, I didn’t mean to start another fight. I’ve been sitting here thinking what would have happened if you’d been hurt or even killed back there. And I just … I don’t want that, Ingray. I never wanted that. I just, it seemed like I had this thing, that I was going to have a chance of coming home and laying the Budrakim vestiges in front of Mama, right before elections, and Mama probably won’t wait much longer to name her heir, and you turn up to take that away.”
“That’s not why I was there.” She wanted to say more, but he sounded actually sincere. And she knew what that felt like, that anxiety to please Netano, the feeling that her life, her future, depended on it.
Then the front door of the house opened, and the news service mech spun to see who it was but lost interest when two servants came out. “That was quick,” observed Ingray, and opened the groundcar door. “I’m so sorry to trouble you at this hour,” she called as the servants came to the car. “It’s just Danach. He’s”—she lowered her voice, though not enough to conceal her words from the news mech—“drunk rather a lot. He’s either asleep or passed out, but I don’t think the street is the best place to find out which one.”
“Of course, miss,” said one servant, without even blinking, and between the two of them they slid the limp, resistless Danach out of the back of the groundcar and carried him into the house.
“Miss Aughskold!” said the news mech, as Ingray followed them. “Can you explain your involvement in the return of Pahlad Budrakim from Compassionate Removal? What is eir involvement in the murder of the Omkem Excellency Zat? Why are the Geck involving themselves in this? And what about the Budrakim vestiges? And how in the world did you come to be covered with so much mud?”
Ingray smiled as she walked past. “I’m so sorry. It’s been an eventful night and I’m a bit worried about my brother just now. Perhaps we can talk later.”
“What do you take me for?” asked the news mech. “This isn’t the first time Danach Aughskold has been carried home drunk. He’ll be fine once he gets past the hangover. And it’s you I want to talk to, not him. Did you know who Pahlad Budrakim was when you brought em to Hwae? Do you think it’s true that the prolocutor lied to the Magistracy Committee about his family vestiges being stolen? Do you think Pahlad is right when e says the Rejection of Further Obligations in the System Lareum is a forgery? Could Pahlad have stolen the real one emself?”
“I??
?ll be happy to talk to you in the morning,” Ingray promised as she reached the door of the house.
“Oh, right, after the big services get here,” complained the mech. Not moving from its spot—it couldn’t legally come any closer to the door, or Ingray, without an explicit invitation. “Come on, Ingray, a little help for the local news service.”
“In the morning!” She stepped inside and the door closed behind her.
Inside, in the dim, nighttime entrance hall light, she found Danach, uncharacteristically submissive-looking, standing in front of Nuncle Lak, who sat on the bench beside the stairs. “Ingray,” Nuncle Lak said. “I got in less than five minutes ago, and I’ve been wondering where you were. Didn’t I ask you to keep me informed? And how did you come to be covered with so much mud?”
“That’s my fault, Nuncle,” said Danach.
“Ascended saints,” replied Nuncle Lak with mock surprise. “Danach admitting responsibility. It really is true what they say, anything can happen and there’s no end to surprises in this life.” E turned to Ingray again. “Not that I’m letting you off the hook. I did ask you to keep me informed.”