City on Fire

“You can have the other two,” Raymo says. “But Rag-dath’s on the proscription lists, and he’s worth five thousand dinars to us.”

“He’s on the what?”

Raymo turns to his friend, pulls out a sheet of paper. “Here,” he says. “Five thousand. Dead or alive.”

Aiah looks at the sheet in stunned surprise. The face of Ragdath gazes back at her from the plastic flimsy, a face perfectly familiar from chromographs in her own files.

She realizes that this is one of the chromographs from her files.

“Who issued this?” she says. “The triumvir Parq.”

The tromp of Aiah’s police is heard in the stairwalls. The Dalavan Militia glance nervously over their shoulders.

“Tell the police the situation is over,” Aiah says to her assistant, back in the Palace. “It’s the Dalavan Militia.”

In the corridor, Aiah asks, “Do you have the rest of the list?”

“Part of it.”

As her police step wonderingly into the corridor, Aiah takes the pages in her ectomorphic hands and leafs through them. Many of the names and faces are familiar.

“The whole thing’s going to be available on Interfact in the next day or so,” the militiaman says. “Anyone can get a copy.”

This list is hers, she realizes. It was the list of Handmen she gave to Constantine weeks ago, after the first series of bombings.

Five thousand dinars for each name. Dead or alive. Her list.

CRIME BOSS APPOINTED MINISTER OF PROVISIONAL GOVERNMENT

RATHMEN TAKES TREASURY POST

“Shield above,” Constantine says, eyes aflame, “would you have this Silver Terror continue?”

“I gave you this list,” Aiah says. “Now Parq is using it to kill people.”

Constantine gives a snarl. “Then Parq will take the blame, won’t he?”

“This list—,” Aiah protests. “It’s not error-free. We acquired it in the first place from the police, and we know how efficient they were. We haven’t had a chance to check more than a fraction of it. Much of it is out of date, and people with similar names can be victimized. And the Dalavan Militia look like they were recruited out of the slums—they’ve all got guns and they’re enjoying themselves far too much.”

Constantine gives an uneasy glance toward the polarized windows—he is in another suite today, with his files and papers, and moves to a new one each day, carrying his portable ministry, his papers and boxes, with him from place to place.

His leather chair creaks as he leans forward over his desk. “It was not my decision,” Constantine says. “Parq is triumvir—I work for him.”

“Couldn’t you point out—”

“Aiah.” His rumbling voice is cold, and there is a dangerous glint in his eye. “I supported the decision.”

“I—” Aiah’s voice fails. Despair rains down her spine. “We cannot afford to fight a war against an army and a war against the terrorists simultaneously,” Constantine says. “Five thousand dinars for each Handman—that’s cheap, cheaper than hiring mercenaries and mages.” He glances to the window again, his face uneasy. “If I had won the Battle of the Corridor…,” he growls. “If I had won… things would be different.”

“Then why—” Aiah’s head whirls, and she wants to lean on something for support. “Why are you bothering with my department at all? If you can just offer a bounty for anyone you suspect, why bother with me, with the forms of legality…”

He gazes at her, smouldering resentment in his eyes. “Emergency measures are for times of emergency only. After the war, there must be a structure we can build on. The Dalavan Militia are amateurs—they will do well enough for keeping a rude sort of order, but they aren’t investigators, and if they’re not kept on a short leash they’ll turn as bad as the Silver Hand. So after the war is over, I will be able to argue that the Militia are no longer needed, because the PED is sufficient for peacetime.”

Aiah glowers at him. “And will you win that fight?”

“It’s too early to say. I have a war to win first.” His eyes soften, and he leans forward across his desk. “If you want to keep some of these Handmen from being abused by the Militia, you will have every opportunity simply by arresting them through your department.”

Aiah takes a breath. “Yes,” she says. “Yes. Very well.”

“And then the reward will belong to your people.”

Anger simmers in her veins. “Keep the money,” she says. “I don’t want my people working for rewards.”

Constantine looks at her. “I remind you that your military police are mercenaries,” he says. “Rewards will keep them loyal. And you can use part of the reward to fund your own department, perhaps give your people a bonus or two.”

Aiah reconsiders, backpedals a bit, shifts her ground. “I don’t want my people taking heads.”

Constantine is curt. “See that they don’t, then.”

Everything has become my responsibility again, she thinks. Even whether or not the Handmen receive decent treatment.

How does he do it? she wonders.

There is a whir and thump as an artillery shell lands nearby, and then the sound is repeated. Aiah finds herself counting the rounds: there are six guns in an enemy battery, and once six shells have landed, there is a little respite.

Four, five, six. Silence.

Constantine looks up at her. He, too, has been counting. “Is that all?” he asks. Aiah supposes that it is.

PARQ PROCLAIMS MILITIA “A SUCCESS” THOUSANDS OF HANDMEN ARRESTED CRIMES OF TERROR REDUCED!

The amateurs of the Dalavan Militia are as bad as Aiah expects. Lists of the proscribed in hand, they knock down doors, or simply shoot through them; they arrest the wrong people, and sometimes kill them; and it’s only a matter of days before the first complaints of extortion are heard.

Enthusiastic citizens make the situation worse. The rewards are available to anyone who brings in one of the proscribed, and Caraqui is full of desperate people, many of them left homeless and rash by the war, willing to risk their own lives by finding a Handman or two and dragging them before a magistrate. Cases of misidentification are legion, and though it’s bad enough when the wrong man gets hauled before a magistrate, it’s far worse when the victim is dead before he—or anyway his head—appears in court.

And since these enthusiasts charge into the fray without proper intelligence, without support, and usually without mages to cover their backs, the hardened criminals of the Silver Hand are not inclined to go quietly, and they do not always prove to be the victims. By now their plasm houses are shielded and fortified: sometimes plasm attacks leave the attackers dead or injured, and sometimes there are gun battles that put a dozen people in the morgue or in hospital.

Aiah directs her department’s efforts toward the most hardened targets she can find, hoping by the efforts of her own professionals to keep the casualties to a minimum. She divides the rewards between her mercenaries and her department’s own treasury, with occasional handouts to informants.

And the Silver Terror fades. Scores of Handmen are captured trying to leave Caraqui, and thousands of others join Great-Uncle Rathmen in exile. The number of bomb and plasm attacks declines remarkably.

Progress, Aiah concedes, of a sort.