The Quantum Thief

sighs. ‘All right. I’m going to play Werewolf. Puny humans.’ She blows Isidore a kiss.

‘Enjoying the party?’ the man asks.

‘Not really.’

‘Well, that’s a shame.’ He picks up one of the beer cans on the table and opens it. ‘As you will have discovered, the beer here is absolutely horrible. It’s all authentic, you see.’

‘Works for me,’ Isidore says, opening another one as well. ‘I’m Isidore.’

‘Adrian.’ The man’s handshake is clearly from the Oubliette. But it does not seem important, with the odd freedom from gevulot and sweet intoxication.

‘So, Isidore, why are you not out there, dancing and entangling and picking up zoku chicks?’

‘I’ve had a very strange day,’ Isidore says. ‘I nearly got killed. I caught a gogol pirate. Or two. With chocolate. As for zoku chicks, I’ve already got one. Her mother is a goddess, and she hates me.’

‘All right then,’ Adrian says. ‘I was expecting something along the lines of I saw a tzaddik, or I had somebody else’s dream last night.’

‘Oh, there was a tzaddik there too,’ Isidore says.

‘Now, that sounds like a story! Tell me more.’

They keep drinking. It feels right to tell the story of the chocolatier.The words pour out easily. It makes him think of Pixil. How much did we ever really talk? And without gevulot restraining his thoughts or tongue, he feels like a stone skipping on water, light and free.

‘Who are you, Isidore?’ Adrian asks, after he is finished. ‘How did you get involved in this stuff?’

‘I couldn’t help it. I have to think about things I don’t understand. I used to wander the Maze and break gevulot locks, just for fun.’

‘But why? What do you get out of it?’

Isidore sits back, laughing. ‘I don’t understand people. I need to deduce things. I don’t know why anyone says or does anything if I don’t think about it.’

‘That’s amazing,’ Adrian says when Isidore pauses to sip his beer. Distantly, he notices the man is scribbling on a little notepad, old-fashioned, made from paper. That can only mean one thing, and even through his clouded brain Isidore realises he has made a mistake.

‘You are a journalist,’ he says. The momentum is gone, and the water swallows the skipping stone. His head feels heavy. In a world of perfect privacy, there are still analog holes, and publishing newspapers is one of the most lucrative tolerated crimes in the Oubliette. They have been after him ever since his first case with the haute couture thieves. But they have never managed to breach his gevulot. Until now.

‘Yes, I am. Adrian Wu, from Ares Herald.’ He takes out an old-fashioned camera from his bag – another trick to get around gevulot. The flash blinds Isidore for a moment.

Isidore hits him. Or tries to: he leaps to his feet and swings wildly, failing to connect. His legs buckle. He grabs the nearest object – the computer monitor on the table – and falls to the floor with it with a crash. He struggles to get up, reaching for Adrian’s camera. ‘Give me that.’

‘Oh, I will. You and fifty thousand other readers, tomorrow. You know, we have been dying to interview you since you were first spotted with the Gentleman. Any chance you’d like to tell us more about her?’

‘About her?’

‘Oh yes.’ Adrian grins. ‘And you are supposed to be the detective? The word on the street is that the Gentleman is a woman. Speaking of which – here is the lady of the hour.’

‘Hi, pumpkin,’ Pixil says. Even through the shock, anger and alcohol haze, seeing her makes Isidore feel warm. Her black lipstick makes her lopsided smile look like a comma. Her tiny body is squeezed into a tight tartan- patterned dress with leather straps that highlight her shapely dark-skinned shoulders just right. ‘Cyndra told me you made it. I’m so glad.’ She gives Isidore a kiss that tastes of punch.

‘Hi,’ Isidore says. ‘I brought you chocolate. The monster ate it.’

‘Goodness me. I think you are drunk.’

‘Better than that,’ says Adrian. ‘He’s a story.’ He gives Isidore a little bow and vanishes into the crowd.

The next hour is a blur, and after a while he forgets about the journalist. It is hot, and absolutely everything everybody says sounds funny. Pixil takes him from one zoku group to another. They talk to quantum gods who sit in circles and argue about which one of them is a werewolf. Pale-skinned super-heroes in ill-fitting latex costumes ask him questions about the tzaddikim. And it is hard to think about anything else except her small hand, warm between his shoulder-blades.

‘Can we go and find somewhere quieter?’ he finally says.

‘Sure. I want to watch the entanglements.’

They find a quiet sofa away from the main area of the party and sit down. The entanglements are spectacular. People attach their qubit containers – jetpacks and rayguns and magic swords – to huge Rube Goldberg devices with optic fibres and cables. With the primitive equipment, the entanglements do not succeed every time, but when they do, there are electric arcs from Tesla coils, thunderous sound effects and loud laughter. The smell of ozone in the air clears Isidore’s head a little.

‘I think I like you better properly drunk,’ Pixil says. ‘You just got your look back.’

‘What look?’

‘You are deducing something.’

‘I’m not.’ He is trying, but it is hard to think. Liquid anger goes round and round in his belly, refusing to settle down.

‘Tell me,’ Pixil says, tousling his hair. ‘I get to guess what you are thinking about. If I get it right, you will be my slave tonight.’

Isidore downs the rest of his drink from a plastic cup – some sort of overly sweet punch thing with guarana in it that they got from the last group, teenage girls in sailor outfits. It takes some of the drowsiness away, but also makes him jittery.

‘All right,’ he says. ‘I’m game.’

‘You are thinking about your tzaddik. Are you trying to make me jealous?’

‘No. It didn’t go well. I’m not going to be a tzaddik. But that’s not what I’m thinking about.’

‘Oh no.’ There is a look of genuine concern on her face. ‘What did that bastard want? You are a genius. You solved the . . . whatever it was, right?’

‘Yeah. But it wasn’t enough. Don’t worry. I don’t want to talk about it. Keep guessing.’ The feeling of failure is a yawning pit beneath his denial.

‘All right, then.’ She caresses his hand, tickling his palm with a forefinger. ‘You are trying to work out what is the best way to get me to bed as soon as possible?’

‘No.’

‘No?’ She makes a mock offended sound. ‘You might want to call a cab in that case, M. Detective. Why are you not thinking about that? I am.’

‘You still get a third guess,’ Isidore says.

‘Well.’ Pixil looks serious. She presses her fingers against her temples and closes her eyes. ‘You are thinking …’

‘No cheating with qupts or gevulot,’ Isidore says.

‘Are you kidding? I never cheat.’ She purses her lips. ‘I’d say you are thinking about Adrian and why I invited him here, and why did I ask Cyndra to parade you in front of the elders and why does my poor old tanglemother hate you?’ She gives him a sweet smile. ‘Does that sound about right? Do you think I am completely stupid?’

‘Yes,’ Isidore says. ‘I mean, no. You are right. So why did you?’ The anger is clotting into a tight clump inside his chest. His temples throb.

‘You are cute when you are confused.’

‘Tell me.’

‘Slaves don’t get to make demands. I won,’ Pixil says.

‘I don’t want to play just now. Why?’

‘Well, for one thing, I wanted to show you off.’ She takes his hand in her lap.

‘Show me off? I managed to offend them in the first five minutes. And your mother