reflected, was ‘life’. The Inquisitor looked out across rain-soaked Cuvier. Her own reflection hovered beyond the window, a spectral figure stalking the city. ‘Will you be all right with this one, ma’am?’ the guard who had brought him asked. ‘I’ll cope,’ she said, not yet turning around. ‘If I can’t, you’re only a room away. Undo his cuffs and then leave us alone.’ ‘Are you certain, ma’am?’ ‘Undo his cuffs.’ The guard wrenched the plastic restraints apart. Thorn stretched his arms and touched his face nervously, like an artist checking paint that might not have dried. ‘You can go now,’ the Inquisitor said. ‘Ma’am,’ the guard replied, closing the door after him. There was a seat waiting for Thorn. He collapsed into it. Khouri continued to look out of the window, her hands clasped behind her back. The rain drooled in great curtains from the overhang above the window. The night sky was a featureless haze somewhere between red and black. There were no stars tonight, no troubling omens in the sky. ‘Did they hurt you?’ she asked. He remembered to keep in character. ‘What do you think, Vuilleumier? That I did this to myself because I like the sight of blood?’ ‘I know who you are.’ ‘So do I — I’m Renzo. Congratulations.’ ‘You’re Thorn. The one they’ve been looking for.’ Her voice was raised a little bit louder than normal. ‘You’re very lucky, you know.’ ‘I am?’ ‘If Counter-Terrorism had found you, you’d be in a morgue by now. Maybe several morgues. Luckily the police who arrested you had no idea who they were dealing with. I doubt they’d have believed me if I’d told them, quite frankly. Thorn’s like the Triumvir to them, a figure of myth and revulsion. I think they were expecting a giant among men, someone who could pull them apart with his bare hands. But you’re just a normal-looking man who could walk unnoticed down any street in Cuvier.’ Thorn rummaged around in his mouth with the tip of one finger. ‘I’d apologise for being such a disappointment if I was Thorn.’ She turned around and walked towards him. Her bearing, her expression, even the aura she radiated, was not of Khouri. Thorn experienced a dreadful moment of doubt, the thought flashing through his mind that perhaps everything that had happened since his last meeting here had been a fantasy, that there was no Khouri at all. But Ana Khouri was real. She had told him her secrets, not just concerning her identity and the identity of the Triumvir, but the hurting secrets that went deeper, those that concerned her husband and the way they had been cruelly separated. He never doubted for one instant that she was still terribly in love with the man. At the same time he desperately wanted to break her away from her own past, to make her see that she had to accept what had happened and move on. He felt bad about it because he knew that there was a streak of self-justification in what he wanted to do, that it was not all about — or even mainly about — helping Khouri. He also wanted to make love to her. He despised himself for it, but the urge was still there. ‘Can you stand?’ she asked. ‘I walked in here.’ ‘Come with me, then. Do not attempt anything, Thorn. It will be very bad for you if you do.’ ‘What do you want with me?’ ‘There’s a matter we need to discuss in private.’ ‘Here’s fine by me,’ he said. ‘Would you like me to turn you over to Counter- Terrorism, Thorn? It’s very easily arranged. I’m sure they’d be delighted to see you.’ She took him into the room he remembered from his first visit, with the walls covered in shelves loaded with bulging paperwork. Khouri shut the door behind her — it sealed tightly and hermetically — and then removed a slim silver cylinder the size of a cigar from a desk drawer. She held it aloft and slowly turned around in the centre of the room, while tiny lights buried in the cigar flicked from red to green. ‘We’re safe,’ she said, after the lights had remained green for three or four minutes. ‘I’ve had to take extra precautions lately. They got a bug in here when I was up on the starship.’ Thorn said, ‘Did they learn much?’ ‘No. It was a crude device and by the time I got back it was already faulty. But they’ve made another attempt since, a bit more sophisticated. I can’t take any chances, Thorn.‘ ‘Who is it? Another branch of government?’ ‘Perhaps. Could be this one, even. I promised them the Triumvir’s head on a plate and I haven’t delivered. Someone’s getting suspicious.’ ‘You’ve got me.’ ‘Yes, so I suppose there are some consolations. Oh, shit.’ It was as if she had only noticed him properly then. ‘Look at what they did to you, Thorn. I’m so sorry you had to go through this.’ From another drawer she produced a small medical kit. Khouri tipped disinfectant into a wad of cotton wool and jammed it against Thorn’s split eyebrow. ‘That hurts,’ Thorn said. Her face was very close to his. He could see every pore, and because she was so close he could look into her eyes without feeling that he was staring. ‘It will. Did they really rough you up badly?’ ‘Nothing your friends downstairs haven’t done to me before. I’ll live, I think.’ He winced. ‘They were pretty ruthless.’ ‘They weren’t given any special orders, only the usual tip-off. I’m sorry, but that’s the way it had to be. If there’s a single detail about your arrest that looks stage-managed we’re finished.’ ‘Do you mind if I sit down?’ She helped him to a seat. ‘I’m sorry other people had to get hurt, too.’ Thorn remembered the police piling into the woman with bad teeth. ‘Can you make sure they all get out all right?’ ‘No one will be detained. That’s part of the plan.’ ‘I mean it. Those people don’t deserve to suffer just because there had to be witnesses, Ana.’ She applied more disinfectant. ‘They’ll suffer a hell of a lot more if this doesn’t work, Thorn. No one will set foot on those shuttles unless they trust you to lead them. A little pain now is worth it if it means not dying later.’ As if to emphasise her point she pressed the wad against his brow, Thorn groaning at the needlelike discomfort.
