“Tell Rhys to warm that up and translate it.”
She wiped over the obvious places on the body where he might have kept organics, hidden documents, or internal transmission bulbs, but came up with nothing.
“Burn his clothes, cut him up, and feed him to the bugs,” Nyx said. They had a composting bin on the other side of the basement. “The last thing we need is a dead mercenary in our fridge.”
Khos went out to get the butchering equipment.
Nyx climbed upstairs.
Taite was still in the hub working at the com. His dark hair was held clipped back with converted bug clips— the jawed ends from a couple of mud beetles. A stack of books sat at his elbow, half of them written in Ras Tiegan, and he kept an idol of one of the Ras Tiegan demigods—he called them saints—named Balarus or Baldomus or something unpronounceably Ras Tiegan like that. Old Baldo was the demigod of locksmiths, apparently.
“You hack Raine’s system yet?” she asked.
“I need another half day,” Taite said. He looked up from his work. “Are you voting this week?”
“What?” she said, letting the door drop. She wiped her hands on her trousers.
“The vote. Queen Zaynab’s asking for a public vote about whether or not to draft half-breeds. She’s bypassing the low council and going directly to the people. You remember?”
“Queen does what she wants no matter what we vote. This isn’t a democracy.”
Nyx walked toward her office. Taite followed her.
“It matters,” he said. “If she thinks there’s overwhelming disagreement with the policy, she’ll back down. Things are hot right now between her, the bel dames, and the high council. The vote might actually sway her this time. Only you and Anneke are eligible, so I thought—”
“Why not have your boyfriend get his sister to do it?” Technically, Taite’s boy-boy love affairs were illegal, but Nyx had seen enough boyish affection at the front that she didn’t have much of a problem with it.
Taite flushed. “She already is. But I need—”
“Taite,” Nyx said, getting back to her desk. She tried to find something to do with her hands. “You get drafted and die and your sister gets a pension. What’s the difference if you die on the road with me or at the front?”
“My sister can barely make it on the eight I give her every month. And the baby’s not here yet. You know how much a pension is?”
Him and his fucking pregnant sister. What was that fool woman doing, getting pregnant outside a breeding compound? And what fool man had she been cavorting with? Ras Tiegans had absolutely no control over the fecundity of their citizens. Nobody—male or female—ever got bugged or permanently severed, and just like the Mhorians, none of them was legally compelled to give birth at a compound that would properly inoculate their children. It was like some kind of human dice game.
They’re fucking refugees, she reminded herself, but some of that old anger stirred, her school-taught aversion for wasted reproduction. There were a lot better things Taite’s sister could be doing with her womb. Single births thrown away on a kid who likely wouldn’t live past five were a waste. Hell, Nyx could justify selling her own womb to gene pirates who’d take the zygotes out and build better zygotes for some compound somewhere, but spread her legs with the intent of getting pregnant? What the hell for?
“Didn’t it go up to seven?” Nyx said. She honestly had no idea what pensions were running these days.
“Four. Four a month for a half-breed woman and her illegal kid. Come on, Nyx. It’s two minutes of your day.”
“Anneke will vote. Tell her you’ll buy her a big gun.”
“Think about how much of your team you’d lose. You work with more men than any other hunter.”
She packed the last of the bursts, and tied her bag closed. “I’ve gotta go,” she said.
“If they draft half-breed men today, they’ll take resident foreigners next,” Taite said, and his tone got wheedling. She hated it when he did that. “They’ll take Rhys.”
“I’ll be in Jameela for a few days,” she said. “Transit’s about a week turnaround. Rhys is in charge of the keg, but you’ll need to back him up if there’s security trouble. Khos has a transmission for Rhys to sort out. You’ll need to help him. And finish hacking into Raine’s com.”
“You driving all the way to the coast?”
“Yeah. You’ll need to take a local caravan if you have to get out.” She dug into her pocket and pulled out three of the notes she’d pawned off the body. “You get that to your sister. Tell her if we make a bag on this note I’ll get her kid inoculated.” Nasheen didn’t inoculate foreign kids for free.
“You’ll vote?”
“Don’t push me.”
Nyx went out into the keg. Rhys was sitting at the front desk doing paperwork, bleeding bugs onto greasy pages.
“You have the keg,” she said. “I’ll be back in about a week.”
He glanced up. Looked at her with his dark eyes. She remembered listening to him pray, back at the palace. Had she ever heard him give a salaat that included personal prayers? They’d worked together for six years, and for six years she’d managed to be in some other room or smoking out on the street or patching together a bakkie every time he prayed. What did he pray for, all those times she wasn’t listening?
“Nyx?” he said.
God, she wouldn’t mind standing there a while longer while he looked.
She hated that.
Nyx dropped her bag, and splashed her face with water from the ablution bowl near the door.
“Are you all right?” he asked.
“Never better.”
Her whole body ached. She hadn’t slept well on the train, and she’d had dreams about that old boxing match in Faleen—Jaks the outrider and stocky-legged Husayn bashing each other’s head in, blood soaking into the organic matting of the ring, the whole first row of spectators covered in blood and saliva, their faces animated, jubilant. She had dreamed of her womb, a perfect heart, cut up on a butcher’s block somewhere between Punjai and Faleen.
“Make a couple of calls to some people you know in the Chenjan districts. Just make sure Nikodem’s not there.”
“I will.”
“And keep everybody on high security. The bel dames might move on you here. Not likely, but it’s possible. Council can’t find its own ass some days, and it’ll take them a long time to agree on whether or not we’re worth killing. Hopefully we’ll be in Chenja by then and they won’t touch us. Not even bel dames like running the border. Where’s Anneke?”
“Getting lunch.”
“Keep her on point this afternoon. And you double-lock the doors and set up an organics net. Taite and I were burned out of our first office before you came on board. I don’t want to take any chances.”
Nyx picked up her bag and pushed out the door and onto the hot, reeking street. She rolled under the bakkie and checked it for bugs, bursts, and regular explosives. The organic guts surrounding the hoses and wires were clear, and the pulse was good. She opened up the trunk to make sure Khos hadn’t left any more bodies in there. She saw nothing but some bloody blankets and toolkits, but she knew Anneke better than that. She reached into the trunk and pushed back the blankets. Anneke had two long rectangular boxes shoved in the back, tied with brown paper. Regular, not organic. Nyx shook her head and threw the blanket back over them. She might end up needing the guns anyway, and if Anneke had forgotten about them, it might make her sweat a little knowing they weren’t in her hot little hands.
She tried to open the passenger side door. Jammed. She tossed her bag in through the window. She needed to get Anneke to fix that.
Nyx hopped in, kicked up the engine, and headed east, to Jameela. To the sea.
To the bloody fucking sea.
