Starbuck smiled — she saw his eyes crinkle, insolently, the face alter beneath the smooth surface of his mask. He did not move until the Queen gestured him away.
“Get up, BZ,” Jerusha said it gently, keeping her voice together with an effort. She put out her hand to help him to his feet, felt him trembling with fury. He didn’t look at her; the freckles stood out blood red against the darkness of his skin.
“If he were my man, I would discipline him for such arrogance.” Arienrhod watched them, expressionless now.
Punishment enough. Jerusha glanced away from his face, lifted her head. “He is a citizen of Kharemough, Your Majesty; he’s nobody’s man but his own.” She looked pointedly at Starbuck still standing at her side.
The Queen smiled, and this time there was a trace of appreciation in it. “Maybe Commander LiouxSked sends you to me as more than just a token female, after all.”
That proves you’re not omniscient. Jerusha’s mouth pulled into a tight half-smile of her own. “If I may ask your indulgence, then, I would like to make the point that—” she moved suddenly, and with a hidden nerve-blocking pinch, took Starbuck’s gun away from him, “these weapons are not toys.” The blunt metal grip settled in her hand, the tube pointed like a cautionary finger as he started toward her; she heard the excited twitter of the onlookers. “An energy weapon should never be aimed at anything unless you’re willing to see it blown apart.” Starbuck froze in mid-motion, she saw his startled muscles tense and twitch. She lowered the gun. “A repeller field will fail under a direct hit one time in five. Your nobles should keep that in mind.” The Queen made an amused noise, and Starbuck’s head twisted toward the throne, light dancing through the spines of his helmet.
“Thank you, Inspector.” Arienrhod nodded, making a curious motion with her fingers. “But we’re well aware of the limits and liabilities attached to your off world equipment.”
Jerusha blinked her disbelief, held the gun out again silently, butt first, to Starbuck.
“You’ll regret this, bitch,” for her ears only. He twisted the gun out of her hand, bruising her palm, and strode back to the dais.
She grimaced involuntarily. “Then… with your permission, Your Majesty, I’ll present the Commander’s monthly report on the status of crime in the city.”
Arienrhod nodded, leaning out to lay a possessive hand on Star buck’s arm, as one might soothe a hackled dog. The nobles began to drift away, backing out of the Queen’s presence. Jerusha suppressed a smile of pained empathy. The report was no more significant than a hundred others before it, or any that would follow; she would sooner be elsewhere herself. She reached down and switched on the recorder at her belt, heard her commanding officer’s voice reciting the statistics on the number of assaults and robberies, arrests and convictions, off world or domestic crimes and victims. The words ran together into a meaningless singsong in her mind, raising all her familiar frustrations and regrets. Meaningless… it was all meaningless.
The Hegemonic Police were a paramilitary force stationed on all Hegemony worlds, to protect its interests and its citizens… which usually involved protecting the interests of the local on world power structures. Here on Tiamat, with its low technology and sparse population (half of which barely even entered into the Hegemony’s consideration) the police force was only a single regiment, confined to the star port and Carbuncle for the most part.
And its activities were confined, hamstrung, restricted: the breaking up of drunken fights, the arresting of petty thieves, an endless cycle of nose wiping and futile prosecutions, when right under their own noses some of the most blatant vice in the civilized galaxy went unchallenged, and some of the Hedge’s most vicious abusers of humanity met openly in the pleasure hells where they were so much at home.
The Prime Minister might symbolize the Hegemony, but he no longer controlled it, if he ever had. Economics controlled it; the merchants and traders had always been its real roots, and their only real lord was Profit. But there were many kinds of trade, and many kinds of traders… Jerusha looked up at Starbuck, slouching arrogantly at the Queen’s right: the living symbol of Arienrhod’s peculiar covenant with the powers of darkness and light, and her manipulation of them. He was all that was rotten, venal, and corrupt about humanity, and Carbuncle.
Crime and punishment on Tiamat — in effect, in Carbuncle — as on other Hegemonic worlds, had been split into the jurisdictions of two courts, one presided over by a local official chosen by the Winters and acting under local laws, and one by an off world Chief Justice, who passed judgment on off worlders under the laws of the Hegemony. The police provided the grist for both mills, and to Jerusha’s mind the harvest should have been bountiful. But Arienrhod tolerated and even encouraged the presence of the Hedge’s underworld, creating a kind of limbo, a neutral ground convenient to the Gates. And LiouxSked, that pompous, boot-licking imitation of a man and a commander, didn’t have the guts to stand up against it. If she only had the rank, and half an opportunity’ Do you have any comments to make about the report, Inspector?”
Jerusha started, feeling stupidly transparent. She switched off the recorder, an excuse to keep looking down. “None, Your Majesty.” None that you’d want to hear. None that would make the slightest difference.
“Unofficially, Geia Jerusha?” The Queen’s voice changed.
Jerusha looked up at Arienrhod’s face, open and compelling, the face of a real woman and not the mask of a queen.
She could almost trust that face… she could almost believe that there was a human being behind the ritual and deceit who could be reached… almost. Jerusha glanced back at Starbuck standing at the Queen’s side, her henchman, her lover.
Jerusha sighed. “I have no unofficial opinion, Your Majesty. I represent the Hegemony.”
Starbuck said something in the unknown language; she translated the crudeness of the insult from his tone.
The Queen laughed: high, incongruously innocent laughter. She gestured. “Well, then, you’re dismissed, Inspector. If I want to listen to a canned recitation of loyalty, I’ll import a coppok. At least their plumage is more imaginative.” The Elder Wayaways appeared, bowing, to lead them out of her presence.
Jerusha stood in the palace courtyard at last, staring fixedly at the patrol craft. A starburst of exploded cracks rayed out from the slagged impact point on the ruined windshield. So it’s come to this? “I’m sure there must be a lot of heavy remarks I could make about this.” Her hand jerked out at the vandalism, dropped away to the door latch instead. “But I’m goddamned if I’m going to put on a show here.” She slid into the bobbing seat as Gundhalinu got in on the driver’s side. “Besides—” she pulled down the door, “all I can think of to say is that I’m tired, and I feel like I’ve been spat on. Sometimes I wonder if we’re really in charge of anything on this world.” She dug into her pocket for the pack of iestas, tapped a couple into her palm. She put them into her mouth and bit down on the leathery-tough pods, felt the sour tang begin to ease her nerves. “Finally . Want some?” She held out the pack.
Gundhalinu sat rigidly behind the controls, staring out through the wild tendrils of destruction. He had been silent through their journey back, crossed the Hall of the Winds as though he were crossing an empty street. He began to punch in the ignition code, and didn’t answer.
She put the pack away. “Are you capable of driving, Sergeant, or shall I take the controls?” The sudden goad of officiousness in her voice made him flinch.