Rising Tide (10 page)

Lord Tess was old the first time I met her, so she's positively ancient now. She's also remarkably well-preserved, especially in a world where the average life expectancy is something you can count on your fingers and toes. The story goes that she actually remembers the Clean, or at least had a parent who lived in it and so knows more about it than most people. Looking at her, I can believe it.

Her face is pale and a mess of wrinkles. She keeps her hair short and doesn't wear a scarf or anything on her face aside from the large, dark glasses that cover her eyes. She wears a dark sweater that covers her neck and some kind of shawl around that. Her pants are thick and loose, and she wears thick slippers on her feet.

She sits in a large, comfortable-looking throne, draped all over with blankets and old rugs. Books stand in tottering, old piles around her. The throne sits in a large, open space in the library. Above her, a mostly still-intact skylight sends light down to us. Most of the other glass has been boarded up, especially at the lower levels, but she left the skylight intact. It's something of a wonder—glass doesn't usually survive long these days.

On the levels above us, on little balconies, stand some of Tess's guards. She may be too valuable to touch, but that doesn't mean she's stupid. Right now they probably have guns trained on us. Precision weapons. If they want us dead, we're dead.
But we're old friends
, I keep telling myself.

I like libraries, though. Goes hand in hand with liking books. A lot of the places I've come across have been wrecks. Books burnt or waterlogged. Yet there are always treasures to be found, even in places like that. They can be sad places, though. Take the Seattle Public Library, for example, up north. I found a picture of it once in an old magazine. It looked like something out of a dream. But, these days . . . Like I said, glass doesn't usually survive these days.

Standing next to Tess is a young man with dark skin and a mess of short, spiky dreadlocks on his head. His face is uncovered, and he appears unarmed.

Tess claps her wrinkled hands together. “Well, well, well,” she says. “If it isn't Benjamin G. Gold.”

I smile at her. “Glad to see you remember me,” I say, wishing I had never let slip my middle name. Not even Miranda knows that.

She smiles, and it crinkles her cheeks into a mess of fault lines. “I remember everything.”

“Some things don't change,” I say.

“Yet I think you have.” She crooks a finger at me. “Come closer.”

I do.

The glasses are thick lenses inside thicker plastic frames. Glasses always impress me, as rare as they are, but on Tess they don't surprise me. She looks me up and down. “Well, you're in trouble, but that's a given or else you wouldn't be here.” She squints. “You've been through something harrowing recently. And . . . there's a woman.”

“Now how the hell would you know that?” I ask.

She smiles again. “That one's easy. You have a long, wavy hair stuck to your beard, as if you had embraced someone recently.”

“That could have been a man's hair,” I say.

She holds up a liver-spotted finger. “Sometimes you just have to play the odds. Who is she?”

“She is none of your concern,” I say. “I'm here for information.”

She gives me a disgusted look. “Of course you are. That's why people come to me. I don't just sell knowledge, I trade it. You know that. So . . . what's her name?”

“Miranda,” I say.

“Ah,” she says. “Back in the Clean, there was a singer named Carmen Miranda. She used to wear fruit on her head.”

“Now why in the hell would you know that?”

“A commission. For a rather . . . wealthy client.”

“Fascinating,” I say. “But I'm not paying for that.”

She laughs and it sounds like a wet cough. “What does she do? Is she a pilot? No, wait, she's not. What
does
she do, my boy?”

I grit my teeth. This is all part of the dance, I know, but I'm eager to get on with this thing. “She's a scientist.”

Lord Tess's eyebrows lift. She smiles. “That is a treat, young man. What particular flavor of—”

“Biology. Virology. She's studying the Bug.”

She gets a contemplative look on her face. “Some things do change,” she says.

“We'll see,” I say.

“What is the nature of your relationship?”

“What?”

“What is she to you?”

“She used to be my employer.”

She holds up her finger again. “‘Used to be.' What is she now?”

It's a good question. One I'm not sure of the answer to. I think back to the kiss we shared before we jumped out of the
Cherub
. “A friend,” I say. “A comrade-in-arms.”

She frowns. “I thought you said she was a scientist.”

“She is. But we're in the same fight.”

“Against?”

“The end,” I say.

Her smile returns. “I don't think you're telling me everything, Benjamin. I think there's more there, more stones to turn over, and some valuable finds beneath.”

“I'm telling it straight” I say.

“You do know that there's this little light that comes into your eyes when you're talking about her, don't you? It's clear she's special. If that's true, keep her close. The Sick doesn't like special people. It tries to stamp them out.” There's an underlying sadness to her words, and I suddenly realize that she once had “someone special.” And lost them. I'd love to hear the particulars of her life, but the truth is that I couldn't afford it.

“So what is it that you want?” she asks.

And here we are, where I need to be, and yet I can't stop thinking about the Valhallans that just left here.

“You're keeping interesting company these days,” I say.

“What?”

“The two that left before us.”

She snorts. “You know I don't take sides. If you can trade for what you need, I give it to you.”

“Just like that.”

She nods. “This is a business.” She smiles. “Now I'm telling it straight.”

I sigh. It makes me uneasy, but this is what I came for. “I need help. Fast. There's a ship. A military ship, and it's sinking. The pumps that keep the water out, at least some of them, have stopped working. I need replacements. And quick. Before the boat sinks.”

“Uh-huh,” she says, nodding. She shifts in her chair, and I catch a quick grimace of pain. “I just have one question.”

“Go on.”

Her face loses all trace of humor. “Why do you think I would help our old friend Malik?”

I stare at her. “How did you—”

“Tattoos. His people tend to get them. Your escort has one on his wrist.” Orkney. I remember seeing that mark on his wrist when he rolled up his sleeves. A flame, I think. Or maybe a star? I turn to look at him. He's not paying attention. His eyes are on the shooters above us.

Shit.

“Hold on, now,” I say. “Let me explain . . .”

“Do you know what he did? He came looking, after what happened back in Arizona. I thought he was dead. But he showed up here one day—one of the drawbacks of people knowing where to reach me—and he was—”

“Mad,” I say.

“
Mad
would be an understatement. He came in here full of threat and swagger. And when one of my people tried to get in his way . . .” I can see her hand trembling at her side. “He's lucky he made it out alive.”

“I'm sorry,” I say.

“What's almost more surprising is why he's working with you after what you did.”

“You know how it is,” I say. “He needs something, I know how to get it for him.”

“And what do you get in return?”

I pause. “I get to keep on keeping on.”

“You're going to have to tell me the whole story.”

I loosen my scarf just a bit. “It's a long story.”

“Uh-huh,” she says. “I have time.”

I turn and look back at Orkney and Whistler. Orkney's scratching his stubbly head. Whistler is staring at me.

“Perhaps you two could leave?” Lord Tess says, directing it toward them.

“No way,” Whistler says. “He doesn't leave our sight.”

Tess gives me a sad look as if to say, “I tried.”

I tell her. First everything from the destruction of the
Cherub
onward, and then she starts asking me about how that happened, and I go farther back, telling her about how I hooked up with Miranda and her team, about how Gastown raided the boffin base, about how I lost the
Cherub
, ended up on Tamoanchan, how I got the
Cherub
back but how I had to stop the raiders on their way to the island.

“I'm not telling you the name of the settlement or where it is.” I say.

“I know all about,” she leans in and whispers, “the
T
word.”

“What? How?”

“Knowledge broker, remember?”

I narrow my eyes. “Would you sell that information?”

She stares at me. “This is my business,” she says, her voice hard. “And I don't need to explain or elaborate about how I run it to you or to anyone. I provide a service and I have for a long time. It's a service valuable enough to keep me protected.”

I just stare back at her. She's not going to tell me and I still need information from her.

After a long pause, she continues. “There is an art to this. I know, for example, that the location of . . . that place . . . is a valuable commodity. I also know that were I to sell this location to some in this world, they would attempt to raid the island or even destroy the settlement there. As such, the value of that knowledge would decrease as would the number of customers and sources that I currently have available to me. So that is something I have to weigh heavily.”

“I get it,” I say. And I do, of course. But I'm not under any illusions. I trust that Tess will keep the information secret . . . only until a better offer comes along. She's not a saint. I need to keep reminding myself of that.

“So you're looking for the location of replacement pumps,” she says, finally.

I take a breath. “Yes. It's to help Mal, yes, but there's more than that. He has Miranda. She's aboard the ship. If I don't get back in time to fix it, well . . .”

She shakes her head. “You're still asking me to help Malik.”

I lower my voice. “This arrangement is temporary. Hopefully so is my time there. I'm basically a prisoner. Believe me, I am going to do everything I can to find a way to . . . part ways.”

“So?”

“So . . . like you said, Mal and I aren't friends, either. At some point he's going to get what's coming to him.”

“And you want me to keep you alive long enough so that you can do it.”

“That's about right.”

She chews a thin lip. “Pumps, huh?”

I nod. “And I came to the best knowledge broker in the world to help me.”

She shakes her head. “That's laying it on a bit thick, don't you think?”

“Can you help me?” I ask.

She holds up her finger as if to stop me. “Do you have the details on the ship?”

I nod and fish out a crumpled piece of paper from my pocket, the specs that Mal gave me. She looks the paper over. “This is beautiful penmanship, Benjamin.”

“Thank you,” I say. “Can you help?”

“I think I might. I just need to consider for a moment. Wait here.” She gets up from her seat, shuffles off into a back room, through a large, thick curtain. She's using a cane these days, I see. I wonder how many years she has left in her. And what happens to all that knowledge when she goes?

I turn and smile at Whistler. “Isn't this fun?” I ask. Whistler scowls back at me. Orkney smiles at me. He's missing several teeth. “A right laugh,” he says.

I look at the young man. “What's your name?” I ask.

“Rufus,” he says.

“Hi, Rufus,” I say. “I'm Ben.”

“I know,” he says.

I shrug. “What's your job here?”

“I assist Lord Tess in her research.”

I nod. It's a good idea, getting others to help her. To be her eyes and fingers. I suppose that makes him next in line for the throne. He's learning the ropes. Smart move. But then Tess only seems to make smart moves. Except for that one time back at the police storage unit.

“How long is this going to take?” Whistler asks.

“It takes as long as it takes,” Rufus says. It sounds rote, like he's said it or heard it plenty of times. Some of Tess's commissions must take days. Weeks, even. But hopefully not this one.

“You're welcome to wait back on the
Raven
,” I say.

Whistler scowls at me.

“Is she doing okay?” I ask Rufus, gesturing in the direction of where Tess disappeared.

“Yes,” he says. “She's a tough old bird.” I think I hear a note of disappointment in his voice.

Tess shuffles back out a few moments later. “I believe I can help you.”

Relief drops my shoulders and shakes some of the tension away. “That's good news.” I turn to Whistler and Orkney. “Hear that? Good news.”

“There's a naval base,” Tess says. “They should have the replacement parts that you need.”

“Where is it?”

She holds out a paper. On it are some coordinates. “Washington,” she says. “The location's there.”

It's not the best of news. I was hoping for closer. “So we just have to do some foraging?” I ask.

“Not exactly,” she says. “The base is . . . inhabited.”

“Oh.”

“They should be willing to barter with you. My information tells me they're reasonable. But . . .”

“Yes?”

“They're a little strange. Eccentric. They may need a little convincing.”