“But no life—”
“Before the uprising? No. Why do you want to know? Surely your business with her is finished.”
“We—we found a body,” The Shadow’s Child said. “A woman who died in deep spaces.”
“And you have some sympathy. That’s understandable.”
“She has none.” And then she realised what she’d said and fell silent, horrified. Because it wasn’t true. True, Long Chau had never shown any emotion. But she’d never called the corpse “it”, always “she”. And of course she might think the death an abstract problem to be solved, but she was looking into it, all the same. And—before she’d started dissecting The Shadow’s Child’s past, she’d been trying, however awkwardly, to show consideration, to check that The Shadow’s Child was doing fine in deep spaces. “I don’t know what to think of her.”
“She fascinates you?”
The Shadow’s Child wanted to say no, but it would have been a lie. Long Chau was an expanding star, burning loud and bright, mesmerising in her relentlessness, and ultimately one that would swallow you whole.
Sharpening Steel into Needles was very still, watchful. Their bots were perched on the porcelain bowls in the display cases, all sensors turned towards The Shadow’s Child. Sharpening Steel into Needles was going to take that opportunity for a tongue-lashing rebuke, words that had reduced other ships to weeping. But when they spoke, their voice was slow, thoughtful. “She’s not an outsider to the belt. In every interaction she had with other ships, she was very cognisant of families and customs that most outsiders never grasp.”
“She’s a fast learner,” The Shadow’s Child said.
“Not that fast. Don’t make the mistake of granting her magical powers.” A pause, then, “Pomegranates Buried in Sand thinks—and I’m inclined to agree—that she’s too familiar with the tribunal.”
“Surely, as a detective—”
“Not that kind of familiarity,” they said. “She was arrested, at some point. I’ve seen the other ships’ vids of her. The scans show scars on both her arms, in a pattern that’s characteristic of militia bots.”
So not only arrested, but interrogated under mind-probe drugs. “Is that the reason—”
“That she keeps drugging herself? You’d have to ask her.”
She’d almost have felt sorry for Long Chau, if she didn’t remember the casual arrogance and high-handedness with which she’d acted throughout.
“What will you do, if you find out who she is?” Sharpening Steel into Needles asked.
She’d never quite stopped to consider. Would she really throw Long Chau’s past at her, with the same casual lack of consideration? “I—” she started, then stopped. “She’ll be back.”
“Of course. She attacks problems the same way crocodiles attack prey, with relentless abandon. Giving up would be physically painful.” They sounded amused again.
The Shadow’s Child reached for rice. She inhaled the fragrance, thinking of a kitchen filled with the laughter of children. “I don’t know what I’ll do. I just—”
“Need to know?” A silence. Then, “Control. It’s a currency you’ve always been short of.”
“Don’t.” She’d see them again, if Sharpening Steel into Needles insisted—all of her living and her dead, Captain Vinh and Lieutenant Hanh and all the ones who’d thought they knew better than her, that a ship didn’t need to know the larger picture—that had led her, inescapably, into the ambush—and from there to hang, wounded and broken, in the deepest places, where time kept stretching and snapping, like claws drawn again and again against her hull. “Please don’t.”
This time, there was pity in their voice. “I won’t.”
* * *
The Shadow’s Child was in the middle of a tricky assessment on an Outer Habitats bots-handler when Long Chau walked into her office.
“We need to talk,” she said. “When convenient.”
The Shadow’s Child pointedly didn’t move. “It’s not.”
“We need to talk all the same.” Long Chau lounged against the wall with the ease of someone who owned the compartment. Bots hung on the back of her hands—gilded and ornate like jewels, the needles on the tips of their bodies almost invisible. As The Shadow’s Child watched, they withdrew, leaving beads of blood pearling on Long Chau’s dark skin.
“Elder aunt—” the bots-handler was looking nervous, and the activity maps were starting to bleed into stress. Useless.
“Come back later, please?” The Shadow’s Child asked. “I’m sorry, but I have to deal with this.”
After her customer was gone, the room reverted to its neutral configuration: not her office with its tasteful decoration of modern paintings of starscapes, and statues of ships and bots. It was now a grey and white space with the polished sheen of metal, and the number and habitat reference of the compartment inscribed on every wall. The only ornaments were her physical bookshelves, crammed full of works Long Chau would no doubt disapprove of.
Long Chau had driven the bots-handler away. Wasted time, a process of mapping The Shadow’s Child would have to start from scratch again; wasted money, because the bots’ needles would need to be sterilised again. She didn’t have money to waste. Or time. “If you want to see me, make an appointment.”
“It seemed inefficient. And inappropriate. I’m not here to get a blend. Though I will of course pay you for your time. I wouldn’t want to cheat you of your living.” A pause, then a look that was no longer nonchalant, but as piercing as a spear’s point. “Unless you would deem that offer offensive.”
“I don’t,” The Shadow’s Child said, less sharply than she’d meant to. Long Chau’s payment had been good, but Bao was right: at the rate things were going she’d default on the rent next time it was due. Long Chau seemed to alternate between flashes of singular consideration, and complete disregard of others’ feelings. “I don’t do misplaced pride.”
A pause again; as if Long Chau meant to say something and hadn’t. “Fair enough. Anyway, I thought you’d be interested in knowing more as soon as I had it. It’s not every day you find a corpse.”
Not insofar as she was concerned, for sure. A nudge on The Shadow’s Child’s implants: an authorisation access limited to sharing data.
