“Because of the sub,” argued Mulch. “If I hadn’t done it, your bones would be buried under a hundred million tons of molten iron right now.”
“Good point,” noted the centaur. “I’ll mention it at your hearing.” He turned to Artemis. “I see you managed to cheat the mind wipe, Artemis.”
Artemis smiled. “A good thing for all of us.”
“Indeed. I’ll never make the mistake of trying to wipe you again.” He took Artemis’s hand and shook it warmly. “You’ve been a friend to the People. You too, Butler.”
The bodyguard was hunched on a sofa, elbows on knees. “You can repay me by building a room I can stand up in.”
“I’m sorry about this,” said Foaly apologetically. “We don’t have rooms for people your size. Sool wants you all kept here until your story can be verified.”
“How are things going?” asked Holly.
Foaly pulled a file from inside his shirt. “I’m not actually supposed to be here, but I thought you’d like an update.”
They crowded around a table while Foaly laid out the reports.
“We found the Brill brothers on the chute wall. They’re singing like stinkworms—so much for loyalty to your employer. Forensics have collected enough pieces of the stealth shuttle to prove its existence.”
Holly clapped her hands. “That’s it, then.”
“It’s not airtight,” corrected Artemis. “Without Opal, we could still be responsible for everything. The Brills could be lying to protect us. Do you have her?”
Foaly clenched his fists. “Well, yes and no. Her escape pod was ruptured from the blast, so we could trace it. But by the time we reached the crash-down site on the surface, she had disappeared. We ran a thermal on the area and isolated Opal’s footprints. We followed them to a small rustic homestead in the wine region near Bari. We can actually see her on satellite, but an insertion is going to take time to organize. She’s ours, and we will get her. But it may take a week.”
Holly’s face was dark with rage. “She’d better enjoy that week, because it will be the best of the rest of her life.”
Near Bari, Italy
Opal Koboi’s craft limped to the surface, leaking plasma gouts through its cracked generator. Opal was well aware that this plasma was as good as a trail of arrows for Foaly. She must ditch the craft as soon as possible and find somewhere to lay low until she could access some of her funds.
She cleared the shuttleport and made it nearly ten miles across country before her engines seized, utterly forcing her to ditch in a vineyard. When she clambered from the pod, Opal found a tall tanned woman of perhaps forty waiting for her with a shovel and a furious expression on her face.
“These are my vines,” said the woman in Italian. “The vines are my life. Who are you to crash here in your little airplane and destroy everything I have?”
Opal thought fast. “Where is your family?” she asked. “Your husband?”
The woman blew a strand of hair from her eye. “No family. No husband. I work the vines alone. I’m the last in the line. These vines mean more to me than my life, and certainly more to me than yours.”
“You’re not alone,” said Opal, turning on the hypnotic fairy mesmer. “You have me now. I am your daughter, Belinda.”
Why not? she reasoned. If it worked once . . .
“Bel-inda,” said the woman slowly. “I have a daughter?”
“That’s right,” agreed Opal. “Belinda. Remember? We work these vines together. I help make the wine.”
“You help me?”
Opal scowled. Humans never got anything the first time.
“Yes,” she said, barely concealing her impatience. “I help you. I work beside you.”
The woman’s eyes cleared suddenly. “Belinda. What are you doing standing there? Get a shovel and clean up this mess. When you finish here you must prepare dinner.”
Opal’s heart skipped a beat. Manual labor? Not likely. Other people did that sort of thing.
“On second thought,” she said, pushing the mesmer as hard as she could, “I am your pampered daughter Belinda. You never allow me to do any work in case it roughens my hands. You’re saving me for a rich husband.” That should take care of it. She would hide out with this woman for a few hours, and then escape to the city.
But a surprise was coming Opal’s way. “That’s my Belinda,” said the woman. “Always dreaming. Now take this shovel, girl, or you’ll go to bed hungry.”
Opal’s cheeks flushed red. “Didn’t you hear me, crone?
I do not do physical work. You will serve me. That is your purpose in life.”
The Italian lady advanced on her tiny daughter. “Now, listen here, Belinda. I’m trying not to hear these poisonous words coming out of your mouth, but it is difficult. We both work the vines; that is the way it has always been. Now, take the shovel, or I will lock you in your room with a hundred potatoes to peel and none to eat.”
Opal was dumbstruck. She could not understand what was happening. Even strong-minded humans were putty before the mesmer. What was happening here?
The simple truth was that Opal had been too clever for her own good. By placing a human pituitary gland in her own skull, she had effectively humanized herself. Gradually the human growth hormone was overpowering the magic in her system. It was Opal’s bad fortune that she had used her last drop of magic to convince this woman that she was her daughter. Now she was without magic, and a virtual prisoner in the Italian lady’s vineyard. And what’s more, she was being forced to work, and that was even worse than being in a coma.
“Hurry!” shouted the woman. “There is rain in the forecast, and we have a lot to do.”
Opal took the shovel, resting the blade on the dry earth. It was taller than she was, and its handle was pitted and worn.
“What should I do with this shovel?”
“Crack the earth with the blade, then dig an irrigation trench between these two frames. And after dinner, I need you to hand wash some of the laundry that I have taken in this week. It’s Carmine’s, and you know what his washing is like.” The lady grimaced, leaving Opal in no doubt as to the state of this person Carmine’s clothing.
The Italian lady picked up a second shovel and began to dig beside Opal.
“Don’t frown so, Belinda. Work is good for the character. After a few more years, you will see that.”
Opal swung the shovel, dealing the earth a pathetic blow that barely raised a sliver of clay. Already her hands were sore from holding the tool. In an hour she would be a mass of aches and blisters. Maybe the LEP would come and take her away.
Her wish was to be granted, but not until a week later, by which time her nails were cracked and brown, and her skin was rough with welts. She had peeled countless potatoes and waited on her new mother, hand and foot. Opal was also horrified to discover that her adopted parent kept pigs, and that cleaning out the sty was another one of her seemingly endless duties. By the time the LEP Retrieval team came for her, she was almost happy to see them.
E7, Haven City
Julius Root’s recycling ceremony was held the day after Artemis and Holly arrived in Haven City. All the brass turned up to the commitment ceremony. All the brass, but not Captain Holly Short. Commander Sool refused to allow her to attend the commitment, even under armed guard. The Tribunal investigating the case had not made its decision yet, and until it did, Holly was a suspect in a murder investigation.
So Holly sat in the executive lounge watching the commitment ceremony on the big screen. Of all the things Sool had done to her, this was the worst. Julius Root had been her closest friend, and here she was watching his recycling on a screen while all the higher-ups attended, looking sad for the cameras.
She covered her face with her hands when they lowered an empty casket into the ornate decomposition vat. After six months, his bone and tissue would have been completely broken down and his remains would be used to nourish the earth.
Tears leaked out between Holly’s fi
ngers, flowing over her hands.
Artemis sat beside her, placing a gentle hand on her shoulder. “Julius would have been proud of you. Haven is here today because of what you did.”
Holly sniffed. “Maybe. Maybe if I had been a little smarter, Julius would be here today, too.”
“Maybe, but I don’t think so. I have been thinking about it and there was no way out of that chute. Not without prior knowledge.”
Holly lowered her hands. “Thanks, Artemis. That’s a nice thing to say. You’re not going soft, are you?”
Artemis was genuinely puzzled. “I honestly don’t know. Half of me wants to be a criminal, and the other half wants to be a normal teenager. I feel like I have two conflicting personalities and a head full of memories that aren’t really mine yet. It’s a strange feeling, not to know who you are exactly.”
“Don’t worry, Mud Boy,” said Holly. “I’ll keep a close eye on you to make sure you stay on the straight and narrow.”
“I have two parents and a bodyguard already trying to do that.”
“Well then, maybe it’s time to let them.”
The lounge’s doors slid open, and Foaly clopped in excitedly, followed by Commander Sool and a couple of flunkies. Sool was obviously not as thrilled to be in the room as the centaur, and had brought the extra officers along just in case Butler got agitated.
Foaly grabbed Holly by the shoulders. “You’re clear.” He beamed. “The Tribunal voted seven to one in your favor.”
Holly scowled at Sool. “Let me guess who was the ‘one.’”
Sool bristled. “I am still your superior officer, Short. I want to see that reflected in your attitude. You may have escaped this charge, but I will be watching you like a hawk from now on.”
Mulch clicked his fingers in front of Foaly’s face. “Hey, ponyboy. Over here. What about me? Am I a free dwarf?”
“Well, the Tribunal decided to go after you for the grand theft auto.”
“What?” spluttered Mulch. “After I saved the entire city!”
“But,” continued Foaly, “considering the time already served for an illegal search, they’re prepared to call it even. No medal, I’m sorry to say.”