The Iron Swamp (16 page)

"Anyway, I came to talk to you for a reason," Nealson said. "No one else is going to tell you this, but I think you need to know. Vins has escaped."

My fingers went numb, and I dropped the plate. It was worse than being told Lisbold was my long lost brother. Nealson caught it before it smashed on the ground, but not before I decorated the Battle of Thrix with shells, skewers, and various condiments.

"Sorry," Nealson said. "I should have given you more warning. Clazran is too embarrassed about it to make it public knowledge, but I don't think you are in danger. Vins has more to worry about than killing you, but if he does try something, he won't expect you to know he's free, so you have that advantage."

I could feel sweat moistening my suit at the armpits. "And the woman who tried to kill me?"

"As far as I know, she is still in the hospital."

She scared me more than Vins. I was putting thoughts in her head, but it felt as though she had a stronger motive to want to kill me. I would have preferred to hear that she was locked up or dead, but attached to a ventilator under guard was a solid third.

"You should go tell Lisbold now that I told you Vins is loose. It is the best explanation for why you dropped your plate. Otherwise, they'll be curious. And trust me, you don't want that." He offered me his hand again, and said, "Pause before you shake it."

The prospect of having to talk to Lisbold again was about as appealing as shaving my neck with a chainsaw, but Nealson was right. I found him just as a couple were walking away from a joke that had obviously offended them. He glared after them, half chuckling, half irritated. "What do you want short ass?"

"Vins escaped. The Guardian told me. We need to be careful."

"You need to be careful. He doesn't care dis about me."

Most likely he was right, but I had no incentive to tell him so. "You're not thinking clearly. If it weren't for you betraying Rake no one would have even looked at my report, and Rake is Vins' nephew."

He ignored the pair of tongs at the side of a bowl and grabbed a handful of squishy cylindrical animals, unloading them onto his plate. "I did my duty to the President. I didn't betray anyone."

This was my chance to make him look useless. "Either way, you need me to complete this case. Even if you have the ability to do it on your own, you're too lazy."

He tilted his head backward and dropped a few of the animals into his mouth. "You're probably right there."

I had to scrunch up my mouth to avoid smiling. If Clazran got to hear the gist of our conversation, Lisbold would be kicked off the case. "Fine," I said in my best irritated voice, "be about as useful as a wrist strap for an armless man." I walked off resisting the urge to wink at Nealson who was watching from a distance. I had to hope that no one else at the party said anything more important that might overshadow that Lisbold was useless.

I spent the rest of the party bent over a table picking at the less filling items. A few of my enemies had fallen away, but I wasn't safe yet. I was now working a case that the SP had been working on for weeks while I drank myself to death. Usually cases went as stale as an open beer in the hot sun after that long. Adding to that a partnership with Lisbold, and they might as well have asked me to find a lost fingernail in the Gargantua.

The feeling did little to affect my appetite. The food was as addictive as heroin. When dinner was finally over, I had eaten half the endangered species in Cos, and my stomach was stretching as though I'd eaten a boulder. I told Pollo I would prefer to go home, and a JC arrived to take me. Mercifully, he did not accompany me, which aside from a severe stomach pain, made the journey pass more quickly.

I swiped my tablet over the locks, and the door unfastened. Lola squeezed through the gap desperate to meet me. She ran around my legs brushing against them in worried affection. She was cooped up for so long that my return triggered an explosion of energy, and she ran back and forth around my feet even though she must have been starving.

I thought about giving her a couple of extra portions of food but decided against it. While Lola was undeniably intelligent, she carried the same evolutionary defect of all dogs that caused them to eat until they exploded – although the bloating and aching of my own gut suggested I was not immune to this folly.

I sat down on the sofa for a few minutes building up the energy to take her for a walk, while looking for a single item she hadn't chewed in my absence.

*

I checked my messages on the way to the station. There must have been about a hundred requests for interviews from various journalists, talk show hosts, and their staff. It seemed easier to delete them all without reading a word of them.

Lisbold was waiting for me in the foyer, his straw hair visible again now his pillow had unstuck a few strands from his head. "We've got a meeting with the new Commissioner."

"When?"

"Ten minutes ago."

We got into the elevator, and I pressed the button for the sixth floor. "Good night sleep?"

"I ate too much."

"Me too."

The door opened, and I stepped out. Lisbold overtook me almost instantly, and we both walked up to the secretary's desk.

"You can go right in," she said.

"Thanks, honey," said Lisbold, in a voice laced with sweetness.

He walked in ahead of me, deliberately obstructing my attempt to step along side. "Sorry we're late, sir. I was waiting for Nidess."

"Apologies," I said, "I wasn't feeling too well this morning."

"Have a seat." The new man, whom I should definitely have researched last night, was taller than Figuel and had a tattoo that was just visible out the top of his dry-top. Otherwise, the two could have been twins. They both had the same paunch and brushed their fringe over to the left side revealing an extended widow's peak on the other. Somehow, I knew this was another member of the Figuel family.

Fache was already seated in a third chair looking as if he'd been diagnosed with terminal illness. The office was huge, and the entire back wall was a window overlooking the city. Off to the left were the Almori Peaks and the colossal skyscrapers that went nearly as high. To the right was Foldorei Hospital, the only building for tens of kims that climbed as high as the Police HQ. The floor of the office was empty except for a rectangle of desks at the back where the Commissioner sat, each containing its own cluster of network screens, and a small selection of gym equipment sitting at the entrance. No running machine or cross trainer for endurance, just three different weight machines. Although he was by no means spindly, neither was there much evidence that he ever used them.

He didn't introduce himself. "Both of you have gone straight from basement washout to lead investigator." There was a little silver model of a rifle on his desk, facing where I sat. "You may not know this, but Commissioner Figuel and Lisidia Vins were both my cousins, and Philip Rake was my nephew." He smiled at Lisbold as he added this. "But please don't think for a moment that I will hold this against you three. What you did was brave, and I am not about to repeat my family's mistakes."

I grimaced. It was like a labyrinth where every corner hid some new member of the Figuel family. "With respect, sir, all I did was submit a report on the Kenrey case. The rest of it all went on while I was trying to drink myself to death on my sofa."

The Commissioner's face sagged. "I don't want your excuses. I told you I don't hold it against you, and I find it insulting that the next words out of your mouth follow the assumption that I'm lying. Not to mention the description of your home life, which is extremely inappropriate." He stood, thrusting his chair back into the desk behind him. "This police force is undergoing a metamorphosis. There will be no more of the corruption and nepotism that has preceded me."

I wasn't sure whether he meant the same nepotism that elevated him to the position in the first place, but I assumed not.

"I'm looking to axe the dead wood around this place quickly," he continued, "and make a more efficient force. Currently, I am unconvinced that any one of you are capable of the jobs you hold, and unless you find me Kenrey's killer fast, you will be out on your asses with the first mistake you make."

The new Commissioner was going to be no friend to me, but then when had I ever had friends? Whoever replaced him would have found some reason to dislike me. "I have one question," I said, dismissing his threats.

His eyes drooped as if he was watching me try and insert a square key in a round hole. "What is it?"

"During my extended absence, have the SP come up with anything we could use in the case?" They weren't going to give it to me unless I asked. Probably, they weren't going to give it to me anyway.

"Peti was initially ruled out by the SP along similar lines as your own, but they reverted when my cousin went to Clazran. He used to have weight with the President before..." The Commissioner trailed off. "So anyway, Reens chimed in and said Peti was their prime suspect as well. Since then, for all I know the frackers have been as drunk as you. Now get out."

The three of us shuffled to the exit, only to have him call for me to stay behind. Fache glanced at me on his way out the door, warning blazing from his eyes.

"A drunken fool you might be, Nidess, but you're my best hope of solving this case. So if you need anything, you ask. You want an assistant then hire one. Money, officers, cameras, whatever, it's yours. But if you frak this up, or the SP get there first, then there will be nothing left of you for me to sack." He grimaced and waved for me to follow the others, which I needed no incentive to obey.

Lisbold was outside with his head in his hands, squatted against the wall. "We're fracked."

Fache looked equally dejected. "Of all the candidates for that post, how did
he
get it?"

"Perhaps," I said, "we are the only members of this police force who aren't members of the Figuel family."

Lisbold stood again, his face burning with disappointment. "While he's in charge, this place is going to be Cythuria for us. He won't even have to ask. Everyone will assume it's what he wants anyway."

I felt no sympathy for Lisbold; this was his choice. It was my safety I worried about. At least Lisbold could stand up for himself physically. For the weaker individuals, I was the obvious target.

Lisbold started to walk away. "Wait," I said. "There is something I need you to check out."

He stopped but didn't turn around. "What?"

"The roof. I was thinking the killer might have avoided the guards by coming out of the bedroom and getting onto the roof. If any of the satellites have images of the grounds, I want to see them."

Lisbold thumbed his chin as if he was deciding whether to rebuke me for my insolence. "OK."

I wasn't sure whether he would do it, but he walked off looking sufficiently dejected that I was almost grateful the Commissioner was related to Figuel. The feeling wouldn't last the day.

There was no way Lisbold would find anything. The killer was too smart to be caught via satellite. But if there was footage, it could rule out climbing the building as a potential escape.

I went back to my desk in the basement. They were supposed to be giving me one upstairs, but with everything that had happened The Kaerosh would dry out before it materialized.

Everyone looked at me as I exited the elevator, some of them grinning, others pretending not to notice me. Lisbold was right. It had already started. At my desk both the figures had been pulled apart. The card, once mint condition, was ripped to pieces and sprinkled around the limbs and torsos of Sally and Pida Whey. On my chair was a note.
You're too short for this. Get out while you can
.

I grinned as wide as my cheeks would allow. The security camera I had intended to use to blackmail Rake and Lisbold for breaking the same figures was still on, so whoever did it was caught, and I would make them pay.

I pulled up the chair and started work. It was tempting to look through the database to find out how many more of Figuel's family I needed to worry about, but there were other things to do. I checked the name of the new Commissioner, Denrick Hayson, then despite myself I had to check what the press headlines said about me.

There was not a bad headline amongst them. People were calling me
hero
and
courageous
and a whole host of words that didn't fit me at all.
The Kaerosh Rotation
called me a
monument against corruption
.
Infinite Kaerosh
stated that I could survive pressure great enough to
snap a normal man's spine
.

I couldn't help wondering if Pyke had read any of it and whether she would still have rejected me. A few of the international sites had mentioned me, but the rest of Cos regarded Clazran's praise with the skepticism it deserved, and none of them were particularly flattering. Though none of them stated it outright, there was the underlying assumption that I was playing some sort of game.

I had several more messages from journalists. Most of them had given up, or were waiting for me to contact them, but a few of them had messaged me a second time, and a few of those had messaged me a third. One of them, a woman named Lelia Hoskin at
Kaeroshi Life
, had sent me four more on top of that, two of which had been in the last hour. I deleted all the messages and blocked Hoskin before she filled my message tray.

I briefly considered jacking-in. It had been a long time now since I'd checked even to see if someone had burned down my hideout or killed Dae Daniel. But I immediately dismissed the idea. I had more important things to do.

The ether had not lost all its appeal. After five cycles in the basement, Dae Daniel Sun was a feared member of the Towdari sea scourge, and a lead player in the success of the mutiny against Captain Kowras, who was until his death one of the most feared names in the ether.

I had at points regretted choosing the name Dae Daniel Sun, as Xizor or Khan might have inspired a greater level of fear, but it had not damaged my reputation as some had. I wasn't P.O.O.P.A.N.T.S, D.I.S.F.A.C.E, or some other name that mocked the unreality of the ether.