For years, the Saargs had smiled through his ravings on why people who did not work with their hands were more likely to suffer ‘illness of the soul’. A career such as his—in a workshop—was the most noble of all workplaces, though he’d been pressed to admit after some careless words that being Seeker was also a decent occupation.
Just so long as they kept out of offices.
Perhaps Uncle Morten had been on to something.
Miles and months from home, the glum similarities between the rostering offices was a marvel. Well, if she were stuck in this rectangular gray room for eight months with the same three people, perhaps she could personalize it. Make her gray corner of the world a little more colorful and give her less reason to spend her evenings sobbing into a pillow.
The first few weeks in rostering were all fevered guesswork and late nights. She would return to her apartment for a glass of wine or two while listening to her wave receiver. She’d settled into a pattern. Not a likeable pattern, but tolerable.
It took a month to learn that rostering was surprisingly easy, once you understood what you were supposed to be doing. It was the small, fiddly bits that absorbed her time. She lost herself in the numbing, monotonous tasks that comprised her day, keeping her attention from homesickness and wondering what she’d write in her next letter to Pella.
The first day of her second month, she brought in a drawing Pella had mailed her. It was a colored-wax drawing intended to remind Terese of home. As she pinned Pella’s picture to her desk, she realized she had only seven months left in Polis Sumad, though she was no closer to uncovering what Sumad Reach had been doing in the Refugee Territories. Somewhere in the fortress, someone would have left a trail to the truth.
But where to start and who or what to ask?
She dared not ask anyone for help, for she’d earned her burden and dared not endanger anyone by sharing it. Not poor, sweet Toornan, and certainly not Jools Teeber, whose good intentions would land Terese in more trouble than Terese could make herself.
Jools Teeber?
Stopping mid-yawn, Terese’s head shot up. She gazed at Pella’s colored rendering of the view from Terese’s parents’ apartment. She closed her eyes to help shut out Mr Sniffles’ tracheal symphony.
Jools’s roster hasn’t come past my desk once.
That wasn’t odd in itself, given the chaotic nature of roster balancing. Any one of the other three Heads could have dealt with Jools exclusively for any number of mundane reasons.
But after returning from the Wastes, Terese had seen her only once, visiting the apartment Jools shared with another Missionary. Jools had made tea and produced Sumadan biscuits while they caught up, listening to music wafting from the wave device. Jools had been evasive about her new complement, saying they were covert and investigative, tasked with following up on vibrational and chaotic fluctuations out northwest, verging on another chapterhouse’s territory. Terese hadn’t pushed for details because of the unspoken awkwardness: That Terese should have been leading Jools and the rest of their complement on excursions.
Terese’s eyes dropped back to her desk. Student names cut into paper clippings in one hand, spots of blue adhesive clay in the other. A sonorous sniffle erupted behind her.
When all else failed, a Seeker followed her hunches.
Mr Sniffles ignored her when she took a large manila folder from his desk. Miss Hung Over glared at her and Mr Tapper drummed his fingers. Rostering folders were communal, probably so they wouldn’t need to speak to one another. Combing through three files this size would set back her leaving time, but Terese had no plans that night. Or any night.
The sun dimmed. Her co-workers left. The admin building quietened.
She slammed the final folder shut, the thick slap echoing. She steepled her fingers and rested them against her nose, staring at the room’s calendar. Scents of dusty paper tickled her nose. Dried ink stains had forced the whorls of her fingerprints from hiding. Her chair screeched as she pushed it back. She walked to the window, placed her hands on the sill and her forehead against the glass, eyes closed against the mostly sunken sun.
There had been no mention of Jools Teeber in the other heads’ folders.
Jools. Smart—in her own way—and slightly ambitious, good memory and a capable fighter. She was the type to round out her experience as best she could before attempting anything higher than her pay grade. Unlike Terese, who—looking back, she had to admit—leapt at each opportunity like a starving dog after scraps of meat.
Jools was more of a ‘smell the roses’ Seeker who wanted to maximize each experience before looking for her next promotion. Just so long as she could explore new buildings and city designs, she’d be satisfied by a slow climb of the career ladder.
The woman could possibly make Keeper; she was reliable enough. But perhaps a little too obedient and gullible. She was one to abide by the letter of the rule when confused or rushed, not usually considering the spirit of the rule. Terese wasn’t opposed to breaking the rules to get the desired result, so long as none knew.
Terese knew what to look for. A group of Heads or Missionaries kept unusually sequestered. Correspondence of personnel matters stovepiped directly to the Keeper responsible and not following due process. Jools would have easier access to artifacts and rest days than normal Missionaries, and Terese wagered the woman’s chapterhouse
