“Horse is fine,” uncle Denys had said. “He’s just fine. You’re the one we’re worried about.”
That was nice. People generally weren’t, not in any nice way. Dr. Ivanov was kind to her, the nurses gave her soft drinks, Florian and Catlin hung around her until she sent them away. The one thing she had not gotten out of it was uncle Giraud: uncle Giraud had not come at all, but she was too tired to want him there anyway, it was all too much work.
Now Florian and Catlin were back and she was safe in her bed and she really, truly, felt just sort of—away from everything. Quiet. She was glad people were being nice, not because she couldn’t Work them, but because she was so tired and it took so much, and she just wanted to lie there and not hurt awhile, after she had drunk a little of her soft drink.
“It’s not your fault,” she said to Florian and Catlin. “It was my idea, wasn’t it?”
“We shouldn’t have let you,” Florian said.
“Yes, you should have,” she said, frowning real quick. “You do what I tell you and that’s what I told you. Isn’t that so?”
“Yes,” Catlin said after a moment. “That’s so.”
They both looked happier then.
She slept all afternoon, with her arm raised in a sling the way Dr. Ivanov said she had to, to keep her hand from swelling. She didn’t think that would work, because she always tossed around a lot, but it did: she went right off to sleep, waked up once when Nelly told her to take a pill, and went back to sleep, because it was her bed and her room, and the pills that kept her from hurting also made her very drowsy.
But Nelly woke her up for supper, and she had to eat with her left hand. Dr. Ivanov had said things about left-right dominance to her and said how she mustn’t do any writing until she got out of the cast, but she could do everything else. Dr. Ivanov said she should have a Scriber to help her with her lessons, just like his, and she liked that idea.
He said that she ought to be in the cast about three weeks, because he had done a lot of special things to help it heal fast, and it was going to be good as new. He said she was going to do gym exercises after, to make her arm strong again. She agreed with that. Having a broken arm was an adventure, but she didn’t want it to do anything permanent.
It was kind of interesting to have the cast and all, and to have everyone fussing over her. The way people changed when they were anxious was interesting. She thought a lot about it when she was awake.
She had her supper, things she could eat with her fingers, and she wanted Florian and Catlin to stay in her room, because she was awake now. But uncle Denys came in and said they could come in a little while, but right then he had to have a Talk with her.
“I don’t want to,” she said, and pouted a little, because she really hurt, and it wasn’t fair of uncle Denys, uncle Denys had been nice all day, and now everybody was going to go back the other way before she was ready for it, she saw it coming.
“It won’t be a long one,” uncle Denys said, shutting the door, “and I’m not even going to mention about your going down to the Town.”
That wasn’t what she expected. So she was curious and uncomfortable at the same time, while he pulled Nelly’s chair over: she was glad he wasn’t going to sit on the bed, because she was just settled and he was so heavy.
“Ari,” he said, leaning forward with his elbows on his knees and his face very anxious. “Ari, I want to tell you why everyone was so upset, but this isn’t about the Town: it’s about how important you are, and how there are people—there are people who might want to hurt you, if they got into Reseune. That’s why you scared Security so bad.”
That was serious. It clicked right in with the Safety in the Halls lecture and the fact that she was the only kid she knew who had two Security azi for company. She was interested and scared, because it was like it sent out little hooks into a whole lot of things. “So who are they?”
“People who would have hurt your predecessor. Do you know why they put PR on a CIT number?”
“Because they’re a Parental Replicate.”
“Do you know what that means?”
She nodded, definitely. “That means they’re a twin to their own maman or their papa.”
“Just any kind of twin?”
“No. Identical.”
“Identical all the way down to their genesets, right?”
She nodded.
“You don’t have a PR on your number. But you could have.”
That was confusing. And scary. It didn’t make sense at all.
“Pay attention. Don’t think about it. Let me guide you through this, Ari. Your maman, Jane Strassen, had a very good friend, who died, who died very suddenly. Reseune was going to make another one of her, which, you know, means making a baby. Jane said that she wanted that baby, she wanted to bring it up herself, for her own, because she didn’t want that baby to go to anybody else. She did it for her friend, who died. And when she got that baby she loved it so much it was hers. Do you understand me, Ari?”
There was a cold lump in her throat. She was cold all over, right down to her fingers.
“Do you understand me, Ari?”
She nodded.
“Jane is truly your maman. That’s so, nothing can change that, Ari. Your maman is whoever loves you and takes care of you and teaches you like Jane did.”
“Why did she leave me?”
“Because she had to do something only she could do. Because, next to the first Ari herself, Jane Strassen is the best one to do it. Also, Ari, Jane had another daughter—a grown daughter named Julia, who was terribly jealous of the time you took; and Julia had a daughter too, named Gloria Strassen, who’s your age. Julia made things very hard for your maman, because Julia was being very difficult, and Julia was assigned to Fargone too. Your maman finally had to see about her other daughter, and her granddaughter, because they were terribly jealous and upset about her being your maman. She didn’t want to, but that was the way it was. So she went to Fargone and she took them with her because she wasn’t going to leave them here where they could be mean to you. She told me to take care of you, she told me she would come back if she could, but it’s a terribly long way, Ari, and your maman’s health isn’t too good. She’s quite old, you know, and it would be awfully dangerous for her now. So that’s why your maman left, and why she knew she might not be able to come back: she’d done everything for her friend who died, to start with. And she knew she’d have to go away before you were grown. She thought it would be easy, when she started. But she really got to be your maman, and she got to love you not just because of the Ari who died, but because you’re Ari, and you’re you, and she loves you just because, that’s all.”
Tears started rolling down her face. She didn’t even know she was crying till she felt that. Then she moved the wrong arm to wipe them and had to use the other hand, which was awkward.
“She can’t have you at Fargone,” uncle Denys said, “because, for one thing, she has Julia and Gloria there. And because you’re you, you’re Ari, and your genemother was what she was, and because you have enemies. You could grow up safe here. There were teachers to teach you and people to take care of you—not always the best; I know I’m not the best at bringing up a little girl, but I really have tried, Ari, and I go on trying. I just figure it’s time I explained some things to you, because you’re old enough to try to go places on your own, that’s pretty plain, isn’t it? You might run into people who might accidentally say the wrong thing to you, and most of all I didn’t want you to hear any of this from some stranger down in the Town. A lot of people know who you are, and you’re getting old enough to start asking questions—like why your name is Emory and not Strassen, to start with.”
She hated to feel stupid. And that was a big one, a terribly, terribly big one. Of course people had different names, a lot of people had different names. She thought it was who maman picked to make her baby with.
You got into trouble, making up your mind why things were that grow
n-ups wouldn’t tell you.
Why can’t I be Strassen? she remembered asking maman.
Because you’re Emory, maman had said, because, that’s why. I’m Strassen. Look at Tommy Carnath. His maman is Johanna Morley. Grown-ups figure these things out.
Her stomach turned over, suddenly, and she felt sweaty and cold.
“Please,” she said, “uncle Denys, I’m going to be sick. Call Nelly.”
Denys did, real quick. And Nelly got her arm unhooked and got her to the bathroom, where she felt that way for a long time, but nothing happened. She only wished she could be, because she hurt inside and out.
Nelly got her a glass of fizzy stuff for her stomach, and it was awful, but she drank it. Then she felt a little better, and lay against her pillows while Nelly stroked her face and her hair a long, long time and worried about her.
Nelly was the same. Nelly was the way Nelly had always been to her. She guessed it was true maman was really still her maman, but she was not sure who she was anymore. She wanted to find out. Uncle Denys knew, and she wanted to ask him, but she was not sure she wanted any more yet.
Uncle Denys came back in finally, and he came and patted her shoulder, the good one. “Are you all right, sweet? Are you going to be all right?”
Maman called her that. Uncle Denys never had. Ari bit her lip till it hurt more than that did.
“Ari?”
“What other things was I going to notice?”
“That there was a very famous woman at Reseune who had the same name as you,” uncle Denys said, and pulled the chair over, so Nelly got back, and took some stuff off the night-table and took it to the bath. “That you look just like her when she was a little girl, and her pictures are all through the tapes you really need to study. She was very, very smart, Ari, smarter than anyone. She wasn’t your maman. You aren’t her daughter. You’re something a lot closer. How close we don’t know yet, but you’re a very extraordinary little girl, and I know Jane is very, very proud of you.”
He patted her shoulder then. Nelly had come back through and left. Now he got up again. She didn’t care. She was still thinking and it was like her brains were mush.
“Ari, I’m going to have Florian and Catlin stay all night in your room, if you want. I think you’d like that, wouldn’t you?”
She didn’t know how she was going to tell Florian and Catlin she had been that stupid. They wouldn’t stop liking her: they were her azi, and they had to like her. But they were going to be upset. They were going to be upset by her being upset. So she swiped the back of her left hand across her face and tried to stop sniveling.
“Ari?”
“Does Nelly know?”
“Nelly knows. Nelly doesn’t understand, but Nelly knows, she always has.”
That made her awfully mad at Nelly.
“Nelly was your maman’s, Ari. Your maman put an awfully heavy load on Nelly, telling her as much as she did, and telling Nelly she had to keep that secret. Nelly is very loyal to your maman. Of course she would.”
“Ollie knew too.”
“Ollie knew. Do you want me to send Florian and Catlin to spend the night? They can have pallets over in the corner. They won’t mind at all.”
“Do they know?”
“No. Only your maman’s people knew. They’re yours.”
She felt better about that. At least they hadn’t been laughing at her. “Does Amy Carnath know?”
Uncle Denys frowned and took a second about that. “Why does Amy Carnath knowing matter?”
“Because it does,” she snapped at him.
“Ari, I’m in charge of your education. Your maman and I agreed that there are some questions I just won’t answer, because they’re for you to figure out. You’ll be mad at me sometimes, but I’ll have to stay by what I agreed with your maman. You’re very, very bright. Your maman expects you to figure out some of these things yourself, just the way the first Ari would, because she knows how good you are at figuring things out. It’s part of your growing up. There’ll be a lot of times you’ll ask me things—and I’ll say, you have to figure that one, because you’re the one who wants that answer. Just remember this: whatever you ask anyone—can tell them a lot. You think about that, Ari.”
He closed the door.
Ari thought about it. And thought that uncle Denys was maybe doing what maman had said; and maybe again uncle Denys wasn’t. It was hard to tell, when people could be lying to you about what maman had said.
Or even about what she was.
In a little while more Florian and Catlin came in, very quiet and sober. “Ser Denys says you have orders for us,” Catlin said.
Ari made her face azi-like, very quiet. Her eyelashes were still wet. She figured her nose was red. They would pick all of that up, but she couldn’t stop that, they had to be near her. “I’ve got something to tell you first. Sit down on the bed. I’ve found out some answers.”
They sat down, one on a side, very carefully, so they didn’t jostle her.
“First,” she said, “uncle Denys says I’m not from maman’s geneset at all, I’m a PR of somebody else, and she was a friend of maman’s. That maman has a grown-up daughter and a granddaughter maman never told me about, and Nelly and Ollie both knew all about where maman got me. But he won’t tell me a whole lot else. He says I have to find it out.” She made the little sign with her fingers that said one of them should come close and listen. But she couldn’t make it with the right hand. So it was Florian who got up and came clear around the bed to put his ear up against her mouth. “It might be uncle Denys Working me. I don’t know. And I don’t know why he would, except Giraud is his brother. Pass it to Catlin.”
He did, and Catlin’s eyebrows went up and Catlin’s face got very thoughtful and still when she looked at her. Catlin nodded once, with a look that meant business.
So she was not sure whether she felt stupid or not, or whether it was true at all, or whether part of it was.
Florian and Catlin could track down a lot of things, because that was what they knew how to do.
It answered a lot of the What’s Unusuals, that was what scared her most, except it didn’t answer all of them.
Like why the Disappeareds and what Giraud was up to.
Like why maman hadn’t written her a letter in the first place, or what had happened to it if maman had.
There were new ones.
Like it was Unusual that they didn’t just tell her the truth from the start.
Like it was Unusual maman had gone all round the thing about her name, and told her her papa was a man named James Carnath. Which was still not where she got the Emory.
It was Unusual maman had dodged around a whole lot of things that maman had not wanted to answer. She had not wanted to ask very much when she was a little kid, because she felt it make maman real uncomfortable.
And when she thought about it, she knew maman had Worked her too, she could feel it happen when she remembered it.
That was what made her want to throw up.
She was scared, scared that nothing was true, not even what uncle Denys was telling her. But she couldn’t let anybody know that.
That last uncle Denys had said was something she knew: what you asked told a whole lot to somebody you might not want to trust. So uncle Denys knew that too, and warned her not to ask him things.
Like maman, only uncle Denys did it a different way, straight out: don’t give things away to me because you don’t know whether I’m all right or not.
If uncle Denys wanted to Work her, he was doing something real complicated, and the pain medicine made her brain all fuzzy. If that was what he was doing he was starting off by confusing her.
Or taking her Fix off what she was trying to look at.
Dammit, she thought. Dammit.
Because she was stuck in this bed and she hurt and she couldn’t think at all past the trank.
xii
Report to my office, the message from Yanni said, first thing that Justin read
when he brought the office computer up; and he turned around and looked at Grant. “I’ve got to go see Yanni,” he said; and Grant swung his chair around and looked at him.
No comment. There was nothing in particular to say. Grant just looked worried.
“See you,” Justin said with a wry attempt at humor. “Wish you could witness this one.”
“So do I,” Grant said, not joking at all.
He was not up to a meeting with Yanni. But there was no choice. He shrugged, gave Grant a worried look, and walked out and down the hall, with his knees close to wobbling under him, it was still that bad and he was still that much in shock.
God, he thought, get me around this.
Somehow.
Grant had kept track, with Grant’s azi-trained memory and Grant’s professional understanding of subject, psychset, and what he was hearing, of everything that had gone on around him while he was answering Giraud’s questions and of everything that had gone on around him in recovery, right down to the chance words and small comments of the meds that had taken him home. Playing all that back and knowing it was all that had gone on, was immeasurably comforting; having Grant simply there through the night had kept him reasonably well focused on here and now, and made him able to get up in the morning, adopt a deliberately short-sighted cheerfulness, and decide he was going to work.
I can at least get some of the damned records-keeping done, he had said to Grant, meaning the several towering mounds of their own reports that had been waiting weeks to be checked against computer files and archives and hand-stamped as Archived before being sent for the shredder. Can’t think of a better day for it.
He could not cope with changes, and he reckoned on his way down the hall and up to Yanni’s door that Security thought it had found something or suspected something in the interview, God knew what, and Yanni—
God knew.
“Marge,” he said to Yanni’s aide, “I’m here.”
“Go on in,” Marge said. “He’s expecting you.”
A flag on his log-on, that was what.
He opened the door and found Yanni at his desk. “Ser.”