Your remarks on any matters relevant to this department are always valuable. Your advisers may have misled you slightly on this one matter. May I say that I congratulate you on the fine organizational job you are doing in Inventory Distribution—your reputation has reached me—and add that I look forward to seeing you at the Kimberley Ball.
Text of Reply:
To: Benjamin Lawless, Lord Armorer
From: Raoul Simponella, Chief of Distribution
Re: Your Memo on Clarification of Rules Regarding Hand Weapons
Date: The Feast of Saint Jeremy, City Year 536
My most esteemed colleague:
I was honored to receive clarification from you personally on this matter. I fear that in my original message to you, I failed to express myself well. The protests I listed against the rental of hand weapons on the Transport deck were indeed made to me by a number of our workers, but the real problem is that I believe such rental is illegal by Diamond law. Actually there are other problems—there are those who feel that having weapons floating around in the presence of so many Outsider techs is not a good policy—but again, it was the legality of the question that I meant to bring up.
I regret that I was unclear.
Text of reply:
To: Raoul Simponella, Chief of Distribution
From: Benjamin Lawless, Lord Armorer
Re: Further Clarification of Rules Regarding Hand Weapons
Date: The Feast of Saint Ethan, City Year 536
My most esteemed colleague:
I am always delighted to hear from you. I trust those long days and nights of dealing with Outsiders has not affected your thinking! (A joke, sir.)
I know not to what you refer with your reference to legality. Nor do my advisers in the Armory. I’m sure you will see, when you consider the matter, that a custom of such long standing as the rental of hand weapons in Transport cannot possibly be against the law.
Perhaps you are referring to some Outsider law about the carrying of hand weapons onto a Station? I believe my previous memo answered that concern.
Please feel free to consult me if you have further questions.
Text of a memo from the Chief of Inventory Distribution to Geoffrey Famham, Chief Minister of Security
To: Geoffrey Farnham, Chief of Security
From: Raoul Simponella, Chief of Distribution
Re: Clarification of Rules Regarding Hand Weapons
Date: The Feast of Saint Tolliver, City Year 536
My most esteemed colleague:
I regret disturbing you when you are so ill, but I seem to have reached an impasse. As you will see from the enclosed memos, I am having difficulty getting a ruling on the legality of hand weapons on the Transport deck. As Chief Minister of Security, I know this issue will be as important to you as it is to me. Could you send me a copy of the relevant regulations, initialed by your office, so I may send them on to the Lord Armorer? I would hesitate to continue approaching one of his exalted position without the knowledge of your support on this matter.
This memo was never answered.
Will came through the Street of Dreams tired almost to the point of hallucination. He stole food and water from abandoned shops, and he would have stolen a car if he could find one operational; but he couldn’t, so he trudged on.
He couldn’t stop. When he tried to sleep, the Panic kept moving him forward. He would put his head down on anything looking vaguely soft, and a voice would say, Ten days. This could be the last day, the last shuttle could be lifting now. And sleep became out of the question.
Sniper Alley. It was misnamed; there hadn’t been many snipers in Sniper Alley. Will had only killed two.
He was glad neither of them had been a woman, because whatever they thought here, that would have made a difference.
The city was like a new corpse—damaged, but still recognizable. Too near life not to make you nervous. He threw an empty canteen into the open door of a shop where insects were gathering, but didn’t stop to check what was inside. Most likely it was just abandoned food, but it could be anything. There had been occasional signs of life in Lankio Quarter; shutters slamming shut abruptly as he passed, once a sound of fierce whispers behind a door. People waiting for scales to tip one way or another. But here in the government district it was as though the entombment had already taken place—not a movement, not a human sound; there weren’t even abandoned cars here—anything that could move had already been claimed.
All the birds had flown and the cage was rusting. He cut through the outskirts of the Duke’s grounds and came down the back of the hill. Nobody in the Visitor’s Residence either, or not that he could see. Will didn’t stop; if anybody was hanging around here, he preferred not to call attention to himself.
He made his way through the hills of the south district, past shops and warehouses. He was physically exhausted, but on another level he was less tired, more stimulated than ever. He was so near his objective. His heart was pounding as though he’d just had eight cups of strong tea; the rhythm was unfamiliar, like someone else’s body. He found he kept walking faster and had to stop himself because he knew he couldn’t take it.
At the base of south district he came over the ridge and looked down the hill: Everun Port.
He stood there, breathing deeply, and bent to put his hands on his knees to relieve his back. His eyes didn’t leave the port. The
