Datra sauntered to his seat, past the field of charts strewn across the table. The officers fell silent, but he waved them on. “By all means, keep going. What has Anya wrought?”
“Sergeant laid out the basics,” said Levine. “Gut flies in G. Not sure who has them. Gotta find out. Clear as rain, save for the bit where she goes in herself.”
Datra hmm’d and gave her a side-eye, but Anya kept sorting through files. Tremaine coughed and slid over a map of G’s peninsula; buildings in delicate gray, ran through by streaks of blue and black. “Chief, that drain you singled out connects to a few properties, but only one full-time residence.” He jabbed a finger at the crusty lead pipe, then traced its path inland through the square, ending in front of a blocky manor; flanked on one side by a long, thin rectangle; the other, a lumpy courtyard. “I recognized the house. The neighborhood’s cistern is inside the fence. We have to knock to get in.”
“You know the owners, then?” Datra asked.
“Not so well as you,” said Birch. “We rent that space from the Pentacosts.”
Datra leaned back and rubbed his forehead. “Wonderful,” he said. “One of the thinner branches, I hope?”
Birch looked to Anya, who still had her nose in her papers. After several moments, she felt the eyes of the table upon her. “Jenya,” she said.
“Praise Chur,” Datra sighed.
“Jenya, the poet?” asked Barlow.
“Yeah, although in my day she was Jenya: Menora’s cousin. Lived in her palace when Old Menander was still around.”
“Are they close?” asked Levine.
“No,” said Datra. An image flashed through his mind. A dark skinned boy sat in his lap, playing with Datra’s baton. One chair over, an infant suckled at a taut, stretch-marked breast; held fast by delicate, bangled hands. “At least I don’t think so.”
“They aren’t,” said Anya.
“Did you and Jenya become pals while I wasn’t looking?” Datra asked.
“No, but I see her daughters pretty often. They handle family business so their mother can stay home and write.”
“Jenya was always a shut-in,” said Datra. “Glad she found an excuse.”
“The older one, Veronica, goes to everything. She’s practically on Menora’s council.”
Birch pursed her lips and flipped through her files. “This Veronica is an impressive young woman.”
“She is,” said Anya.
“Top one percent in every subject, won a garland running laps, has not yet taken the Civil Service Exam but holds an outstanding offer from Customs and Mercantile.”
“That’s adorable,” said Datra.
“Plays the harp,” Birch continued. “Recites pre-Imperial poetry, speaks Pidgin… and she’s over sixteen. Sergeant, why hasn’t this girl submitted for the Draft?”
“I don’t know. Menora wants her to work in her palace. Jenya doesn’t like it. I’m not sure what Veronica wants.”
Birch turned another page. “Jenya’s youngest, Nadya, isn’t much of a scholar. She may get into a less choosy bureau, but I doubt they’d pay for her cleanse—I certainly wouldn’t.” She looked up and waited for Anya to speak.
“That could be part of it, but they do have a brother in the bureaus, so I don’t know.”
“Yes, in Heredity. Charming young man.”
“Who else lives there?” Datra asked.
“Just those three,” said Anya.
“What’s that, then?” Datra pointed at the smaller building.
“Servant quarters,” Anya said. “But it’s empty. Jenya fired them a while ago.”
“Poetry not paying so well?”
“She said they were stealing.”
“I’ll say the same when Levine goes.” Datra chuckled and leaned in to squint at the waterlines, eyeing the sharp, awkward turns which linked the two buildings. “How old’s that shack?”
“Old,” said Anya.
“The plumbing is new, if that’s what you mean,” said Tremaine. “Four or five years.”
“Such a hack job.”
“If I remember correctly,” Tremaine said, eyes flitting around the table. “The request for new construction listed an unrealistic budget. There were compromises.”
Datra shook his head at Levine. What good was letting him do paperwork if crap like this slipped through?
“Gave us a reason to be there,” said Levine. He moved to refill his horn, but the carafe was empty. Anya stood for a fresh one and went around the table, starting with Birch.
“Sure did,” said Datra. “Can say we’re checking the joint’s integrity or flow or something… actually, let’s just do that for real. We’re there, right?”
“Should I put together a team?” asked Tremaine.
“Yes, and give them plenty of busy work. That area’s full of pensioners with nothing better to do than watch canals all day.”
“That all sounds great,” said Levine. “But my question—and if I’m a fool, tell me. I’d rather know—is why we’re being so shy about this. Sergeant explained how the owner writes a column and people will talk and all that, but we’ve had four outbreaks in three weeks. I don’t care who her cousin is; we could smoke the place and the Patriarch would still back us up.”
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“And when their neighbors saw the flames?” asked Birch.
Levine’s eyes flitted to the big map—the map of the clade—to the Northwest corner, where a narrow bridge stretched out towards an unseen destination, scribbled over with a bright red ‘Q’ just before it slipped out of frame. Levine leaned back, grinned, and showed Birch his palms. “Seems I was a fool. Thank you, ma’am.” He reached over and tapped the alcove where Datra had read his manuscripts. “I have men in that chase processing by hand. That should buy us some time, since we’re going with stealth.”
“I think stealth is good,” Barlow chimed in. “Less stress.”
“Thanks Barlow,” Datra said. “Can you put someone in there to run tests and keep a log? Preferably an officer; it does not have to be you.”
“I’ll send Lyre.”
“Perfect, and keep three ready beds for patients of a certain class—the one which likes to cause problems—just in case. That goes for everyone. Be ready to jump in if discretion doesn’t work.” Datra looked down the row. “Birch, of course, will be in charge while I’m gone.”
The room squealed as a chair shot back from the table, and everyone turned to see Tremaine hold an overflowing horn in one hand while the other slapped at his crotch, wet and trailing steam. “Sorry!” said Anya, dropping the carafe as she fumbled for a towel. As the chaos unfolded, Datra slipped into his office and picked through his paperwork, hand hooked on the doorway as he stretched for the corner heap. He came back with a sharp, unopened memo, purple seal in the center.
“Every few years Oren tries to annex the peninsula on the grounds it’s inefficient and stupid and really should be part of Clade J—he’s right, for what it’s worth—and this seems like a fine time to play peacemaker. Don’t you agree, Sergeant?” Anya kept dabbing Tremaine’s groin. “I do appreciate you taking the initiative on this. I’ll send a runner to Menora; and, knowing her, I expect he’ll come back with an invitation. Let’s meet in Palace district around five. Everyone else: you have your orders.”
Datra ended the meeting with a clap. Levine wrenched open the deadbolts and set off towards Admin. Birch followed, but Datra slipped into the hallway besides her. “Have a minute?” he asked.
“I’m going to Customs, why?
“I’ll go with you.”
----------------------------------------
Datra stepped into the growing light, rolling his shoulders as he settled on the canalside fence. He stood with one hand on a pike, stretching his ankle as the front doors closed behind him. He looked back and saw Birch chatting up the front desk just before the entrance snapped shut. The brass panels flashed and hit him like a torch—sensitive from too much time in the pool.
A hinge squealed below, and Datra stuck his head through the bars, staring down at the crystal waters of a mother canal. A door swung open, and the rankless from before stepped out on the scaffold, followed by Nick, robes bright as a sail as he moved from the shadows. The escort pointed upstream and both set out for Palace District, the youth marching with a stiff swing which, to a random onlooker, might have passed for bravado.
Another squeal—Birch was back, clacking over the cobbles with short, smart strides. Datra wandered to her side and took one extra step, pulling Birch’s eyes away from the water, and Nick. “Enjoy your chat?” he asked.
“I did, Dat,” she said. “And how did your talk with Nicholas go?”
“Seems like a good kid.” In the corner of Datra’s vision, the boy walked the long, slow bend to the bureaus, a lonely bright patch in a haze of blue and brown. Datra forced himself to hold Birch’s gaze, lest his eyes betray him—he felt they still might.
“He is,” said Birch, refusing to blink.
Both took a false step towards the other, then hesitated. “Mind if we cut through A?” asked Datra. “I’m behind on patrols. Your choice, of course.”
Birch’s pupils bored into his. “Of course,” she said, falling in beside him.
They worked down the slivered parcel which made up Irrigation, from the main building to the garden to the triangular storehouse at the tip of the property: the last slip of space between the wall and canal. The path veered off over the water, and they followed it, passing through a dilapidated guardbox—unmanned, empty, doors lifted off their hinges.
“When will you tear this down?” asked Birch.
“When I know I won’t need it,” said Datra.
“Such an eyesore.”
They stepped into Clade A, passing up the main paths for the grid of brittle footways which cut through the center. Before long, they joined with a wider street, flanked on either side with shops and offices. In the nearest doorway, an old man smiled and lifted his cane. “S’morrow, Don,” he said, and Datra answered in kind. A few shops down, a middle-aged woman with a tray of pastries called out “Lieutenant Birch!” and gave them both samples. Similar exchanges happened every ten or twelve paces, so Datra ducked down an alley, towards a smaller street one row over.
He heard a rhythmic thump, stronger with each step. In a nook between houses, Datra saw three girls stomping on a fourth, robes flapping about their knees as sandaled feet came down on the victims chest, thighs, and crotch. Though ungrappled, the girl on the ground failed to fight up, drowning under the weight of the blows. “Fucking clades,” Datra mumbled, reaching for his baton; but before he slid it out, Birch made a noise: something between the word “hey” and two tomcats meeting in a gutter. The assailants spun ‘round and bolted. The victim thrashed up, hair and clothes in a bloody tangle, then he (Datra now saw it was a boy in need of a barber) pulled his robes together and gave chase as the ganglet vanished around a corner.
“Future bureaucrats, all,” said Datra. “Shame they didn’t stop to chat. I might have offered them a job.”
“And might still,” said Birch, “It’s healthy to have some fight at that age. It shows initiative, leadership.”
“It shows an absence.”
“How fortunate then, that they have you.”
“Your jokes have worsened with age,” Datra said. “And they weren’t funny to start with.”
Datra tried to look annoyed as they left the alley. He collided with a mousy adolescent in overfine robes, a bureau kid if he ever saw one. The boy looked up with bugged eyes, stammered “my apologies, patre!” and jumped to the side, hands clasped, head bowed. Datra nodded and moved on. Birch could hardly contain her laughter. Once the youth fell out of earshot, she quit trying.
“So Dat,” said Birch, giggling, “what did you want to talk about?”
“Ansels.”
“Was Barlow not available?”
“I want someone who’s lived with flies, not studied them.”
“Anya?”
“I’d like a mother’s perspective.”
“Is Anya not?” Birch asked. “Ah, but they were born in a bureaus… You suspect Jenya’s daughter, the younger one.”
“Suspect is a strong word, but when I’ve seen gut flies before, it was people who were broke or sick or touched in the head. People who didn’t ask for help.”
“I’ve seen the same.”
“Well, maybe this Nadya doesn’t know she has them, or does but thinks it’s normal. She’s at that age, isn’t she?”
“Well, you never want to assume…”
“Yeah, consistently inconsistent.”
“But, yes, ansels mature with their human. Babies only have worms, kids have small pods, and adults have big ones.”
“I know that much, but what does it feel like? How fast is the change?”
“For me, it was almost overnight. Jitters went from a few times an hour to a few times a minute, stronger as well, and more variety. They moved more at meals, less at night, that sort of thing.”
“I swear I would rip my own guts out.”
“For a while, I wanted to, but you get used to it. After my treatment, I almost felt guilty, like I’d lost an old friend.”
“That’s insane.”
“You wanted first-hand experience, didn’t you?”
Datra had no answer, so Birch continued: “To your point, I’ve never had precocious flies—few have, and fewer survive—but I think I would have known. Mature jitters were just early jitters, but stronger. If I’d felt something totally new, I would have noticed.”
“And what would you have done?”
“Told my mother, obviously.”
Datra hmm’d as they reached the edge of the clade, a flat stretch overlooking The Maine. Masts and sails poked up behind the pikes, and Datra heard the bustle of commerce below. Birch glided over to a gap in the wall, grasping the laddertop with a forced slowness, almost sarcasm. “Thanks for the company, Dat. I hope you enjoy your time with Anya.” She clambered down and dropped out of sight.
Datra looked about and decided he may as well finish the patrol. He slipped into another alley and wormed through the fat of the clade, greeting the odd servant or gardener as he moved between houses. He passed a square of grass, too small to be called a yard, and saw the youths from before; the boy flat on his back while one girl sat on his legs, another pinned his hands, and a third rested on his chest—knees on either side of his jaw, palms clamped over his mouth. Datra paused to glance at the windows around him; seeing nobody, he kept walking.