The Baba Yaga (16 page)

“Some soup,” she said. “Nothing special—just proteins and vegetables. But filling and warming.”

“It’s great,” said Maria, digging in. It might have been her hunger, but she thought it tasted fantastic: a good savoury flavour with a little spice. Jenny was enjoying it too. They both tore through what they had (and seconds) and, when they were done, Jenny curled up in the crook of Maria’s arm. Maria stroked the little girl’s hair for a while, and slowly Jenny’s breathing began to slow, and she snuffled her way into sleep.

“I can’t begin to say how grateful I am,” Maria said softly. “I don’t know what we would have done if you hadn’t turned up when you did.”

Amber, who was sitting in a chair opposite, cradling a mug of tea, shook her head. “No need to thank me. I saw what was happening and I knew I could do something. Shuloma’s not a bad place to live on the whole, but there are always some people trying to make a quick buck out of others, whatever the consequences. It’s the price we pay for living outside the Expansion.”

For being free
, Maria thought. That was what Reach-people thought, wasn’t it? That living outside of the rules and regulations that controlled everyday life in the Expansion was what made them free...

“You have to take care,” Amber went on. “And sometimes we need someone else to look out for us—” She stopped. Maria’s mouth had opened in a jaw-cracking yawn.

“I’m so sorry!” Maria said. “It’s been a long day... An awful day... I can’t even begin to tell you.”

Amber smiled and her gold teeth shone in the dim light. “Don’t worry about it. You had a shock—and I think there’s another story behind all this. But that’s for the morning.” She looked at the child leaning against her mother. “She’s deep asleep, and I think you will be too, soon.”

Maria gave another huge yawn. Her eyes were drooping, and there was a warm fuzz working its ways through her limbs. Her arms and legs felt heavy.

“Lie down beside your girl,” said Amber. Her voice was very soft.
Yes
, thought Maria,
if I could lie down for a while, everything would feel so much better...
“You don’t have to worry,” Amber was saying. “Sleep now. We’ll talk again in the morning...”

Yes
, thought Maria.
You’re right. I should do what you say. I should sleep. You’re right. You’re right. I’ll do what you say...

A
LTHOUGH
G
USEV HAD
only resigned a few weeks ago, Grant had installed herself in his office within days. This was the first time that Kinsella had been summoned to see the new power in the Bureau in her lair—and that in itself was a change that spoke volumes. He had been in and out of Andrei’s office almost every day.

The room in which Grant sat was nothing like the one in which Kinsella had spent so many hours with colleagues, strategizing, analysing, making and refining plans, while their patron watched over them with a sharp, amused eye. The room had looked like a professor’s study, at an old, prestigious university: shabby armchairs that sagged comfortably under one; the shelves weighted with those rarest and most precious of artefacts, genuine paper books; and a glass or two of something warming to help heat up the debate.

Grant’s space was completely different. The walls, once cluttered with portraits and bookcases, were now white and blank, except for one covered with viewscreens. Twelve in total, four by three, bringing Grant news and information from across the Expansion. The sound had at least been lowered to no more than a background hum, although Kinsella doubted that this was in deference to his presence. Andrei’s single viewscreen, propped on a wooden chair behind his desk, had been tuned to play classical music, and Kinsella had never seen it showing pictures. Yet somehow Andrei had managed to keep abreast of everything significant happening within the Bureau and across the Expansion.

Andrei’s big faux-wood desk was gone too: Grant had replaced it with something clear—Glass? Perspex? The comfortable chairs were now moulded plastic, except for the one behind the desk, in leather and chrome. This was a wholly functional space: the space of a person who, it seemed to Kinsella, had no time for the finer things in life, and had pared down to what was considered essential. Kinsella wondered, if he asked for a glass of water, whether Grant would be able to supply it.

At a gesture from Grant, Kinsella perched on the edge of one of the new chairs. Grant continued working at her personal viewscreen, which was the only piece of equipment on her desk. After a few minutes, she closed the lid, firmly, and turned a cold eye on Kinsella.

“Where’s Larsen?”

“What?” said Kinsella, caught completely off-guard.

“Kay Larsen has disappeared. I want to know where she is and where’s she heading. I assume that you know and I’d like you tell me where she is and why she left.”

Kinsella gaped like a fish. “Why would I...? What makes you think that I’d...? Kay’s
gone?
”

“Nice try, but I’m not buying it.”

“She’s
gone?
When? How?”

Grant rested one hand upon the lid of the viewscreen. “I strongly suggest that you drop the pretence—”

Kinsella regrouped, slightly. “If Kay Larsen has decided to go AWOL, I swear I know nothing about it. Why would she tell
me?
”

“You were lovers, yes?”

“A long time ago!”

“Her and Walker—you get about, don’t you, Kinsella?”

“Neither of them were exactly what you could call monogamous—”

“You had a private meeting with Larsen at the end of last week—”

Kinsella shifted uncomfortably in his uncomfortable seat. “I consulted my doctor about migraines.”

Grant slammed her other hand down flat against the desk. “Don’t treat me like an idiot! Delia Walker is gone, and now Kay Larsen is gone, and behind them they’ve left at least one corpse.”

Kinsella stared at her. “A corpse?”

Grant folded her hands in front of her. “We’ve been keeping this as quiet as we possibly could.” She regarded him coldly. “Andrei Gusev’s body washed up on the beach at Merida Island yesterday.”

For a moment the world seemed to sway around Kinsella, as if he had unexpectedly gone into phase and entered the void. “Andrei...”

“He had been missing since the start of the week. Had you not tried to reach him?”

He had in fact tried several times over the past week. “I thought he was fishing... Taking a break... I didn’t
think
...” For a moment, he found himself disbelieving Grant, as if she was playing some kind of baroque trick on him. It was much easier to believe that than that Andrei Gusev was dead. Andrei was going to live forever, surely... But then Kinsella would not have believed a month ago that this room could be as different as it was now. Things changed, it seemed, and rapidly.

“I realise this is hard to believe,” Grant was saying, “but I’m not in the custom of lying about such matters. Andrei Gusev is dead, and Kay Larsen is missing. It is natural for us to connect these two events.”

“You surely can’t believe Kay has anything to do with Andrei’s death?”

“You have to admit it looks suspicious.”

“No, actually, I don’t! Do you know that it’s murder?”

“Gusev didn’t strike me as the kind of man to commit suicide.”

“I mean—a heart attack or something. He took good care of himself, but he liked a drink and he liked a good dinner. If he’d had a heart attack, he could have fallen over the edge of the boat and drowned...”

“He could, but there’s been a post mortem. Do you think I’d leap to conclusions?”

Kinsella had to admit that she wasn’t the type. He doubted she’d done anything spontaneous in her life.

“Gusev didn’t drown,” Grant said. “He was dead when he went into the water. Poisoned. If he committed suicide, he managed to haul his own body over the side of the boat.”

Murder, then. “But Andrei was a man with many enemies.”
Not Kay...
Kinsella put his hands to head. He could not believe this of Kay Larsen, whom he had known for so long, and whom he had once loved. Yet he was sure, absolutely sure, that it was Kay who had told their superiors about Delia’s pregnancy. “This is a nightmare...”

“If you know anything,” Grant said quietly, “now is the time to tell me.” Her voice grew gentler, coaxing. “Come on, Mark. What was the plan? Was there an inheritance? Andrei had no children. Were you and Larsen and Walker the beneficiaries? The island alone would have put all three of you into comfortable retirement. Did you know that you were all on the way out here at the Bureau and decide to get out? Money would come in handy if you were trying to get away—”

“What?” Kinsella stared at her. “Don’t be ridiculous! We all loved Andrei!” He looked around the room; white and empty now as a ghost. “We
all
loved him,” he repeated. But the seed of doubt had been sown. Larsen had betrayed Walker to Grant. What else was she prepared to do? Had he really misjudged her so badly? Had he misjudged both of them? They were gone, Andrei was dead, and he was the one sitting in Grant’s office, under suspicion. Had he been played for a fool?

“Well,” said Grant, “we’ll find out the reason in due course. Murderers very rarely get away with their crimes. In the meantime, we are treating Walker and Larsen as rogue, and—given their seniority in the past—that makes them a threat to the Expansion. Which leaves me with a mission to assign.”

“A mission?”

“One that someone whose loyalty had recently come under scrutiny might well choose to take on—if he had any sense.”

Kinsella felt the net closing around him. Wearily, he said, “What do I have to do?”

“Find Walker. Find Larsen. Track them down and bring them back.”

Kinsella straightened up in the uncomfortable seat and stared right back at her. “Dead or alive?”

Grant’s eyes widened. “Alive is more useful. Dead is... tidier.”

Kinsella looked round the room. “And you like things tidy, don’t you, Commander?”

Grant smiled. “I like things orderly.” She opened up her viewscreen once again. “I’ll arrange for a ship to be put at your disposal. Good luck, and happy hunting.”

W
ALKER AND
F
AILT
followed Heyes and Viola back into the Crossed Keys. “At the back,” said Viola quietly. “In the far booth.”

Walker led the way, wishing, not for the first time, that she had brought some kind of weapon with her. But her fears dissipated when she reached the booth. Slumped over a glass, head in hands, was Yershov.

“For Christ’s sake,” muttered Walker, then glanced at Heyes. “Sorry.”

“Don’t mind me,” said the priest. “Do you know this, er, gentleman?”

“He’s my pilot.”

Yershov looked up glassily. “I’m my own pilot,” he said. “My own man.”

“Yes, yes,” Walker said, impatiently. She was conscious of Heyes, watching them with curiosity. “What’s brought you here, Yershov? I thought I told you to stay by the ship.”

“Someone down there came to speak to me. Said that someone had been asking questions about the
Baba Yaga
and the visitors from the Expansion. I came,” Yershov said, with considerable hostility, “to
warn
you.”

Walker frowned. Had someone been sent after her? All the more reason to get information from Heyes about her planet of refugees and be on their way.

“The
Baba Yaga
?” Heyes asked.

“That’s the name of our ship,” said Walker.

“
My
ship,” Yershov muttered.

Heyes smiled at him. “A good name.”

Yershov scowled back at her and said nothing.

“Why?” said Walker. She had assumed it was some kind of nonsense that Yershov had dredged up from somewhere. “Why’s it a good name?”

“You’ve never heard of Baba Yaga?” Heyes laughed. “The old witch who lives in the forest in a hut that runs about on chicken legs, and who flies about on a mortar and pestle?

Good God, Walker thought, it really was some kind of nonsense that Yershov had dredged up from somewhere. “That sounds like a children’s story.”

“But no less truthful for that,” said Heyes. “The wise woman, the arch-crone, the goddess of wisdom and death. In some versions of the legend she has iron teeth.” Heyes looked wistful. “I rather liked that. Iron teeth. Anyway, you’re wise not to cross her. You’re wise to stay on the right side of her.”

“I’ll bear that in mind,” said Walker dryly. “All right, now we know that there’s nobody here to kill any of us, can we get back to business? I was trying to get your help. This place where you sent your refugees from Shard’s World—can you send me there?”

There was a long pause, but eventually Heyes shook her head. “I’m sorry.”

“You’ve got to understand,” said Walker, “I’m running out of options.”

“It was years ago, all of this—I’ve no idea whether there’s anyone still there. And I never heard anything on the lines of what you’re describing. I’ve heard of the Weird and...” Heyes shook her head again. “No. There was nothing like that.”

“If you’re afraid I’ll betray your people there, the people that you saved—believe me when I say I’m good at keeping a secret. I won’t give them away.”

“I can’t,” said Heyes. “For many reasons, but even more so given your condition—” She stopped herself. “I’m sorry,” she said quietly, “I shouldn’t have said that.”

Walker glanced hurriedly at Yershov, but he seemed not to have heard. “Please,” she said. “I’ve given up everything to find this place. If you think I can simply go back to the Expansion—I can’t. There’s nothing left for me there.”

“There’s nothing in the Reach for you either,” said Heyes gently. “This is not the same place as your Expansion. This is a wilder world, and sometimes it can be a crueller one. Is that what you want for—is that what you want?”

No, of course Walker didn’t want that, but she didn’t want the consumption of all humankind either. Somebody had to take this chance, to find out whether there was a way that humans and Weird could live together, or else there would be no more humans, never mind one baby. Somebody had to do this—and who else was fool enough or desperate enough to try?

“Consider your options,” said Heyes softly. “Consider whether you can go home.”