Burning Bright

Lioe shrugged. “I’ve no idea.” She reached for the workboard, typed in a string of codes, an inquiry first, to Ransome’s own directories, and then into his storage. To her surprise, the codes to contact the hsai ambassador were held in open storage; she copied them to the communications system, but hesitated, wondering if she should send them. What do I say, anyway? “I’m so sorry to bother you, Ambassador, but is Ransome with you?” How do I explain why I’m calling, if he’s there, without getting him into trouble? More important, what do I say if he’s not? She touched the final key before she could change her mind. I can always just say he told me he might be there. I don’t have to tell a jericho-human—no, not even a jericho-human, a conscript, chaoi-mon— anything of what’s going on. The handset chimed softly, from beside the working chair, and at the same time the secondary screen displayed connect symbols.

“What the hell?” Roscha said.

“I’m calling the ambassador,” Lioe answered, and crossed to pick up the handset. The green telltale was lit at the base of the set, indicating a machine on the other end of the connection. “I want to know if Ransome’s there.” She touched the connect button before Roscha could say anything, heard a delicate mechanical voice in her ear.

“Hsaie house. May I help you?” A moment later, the voice repeated the same message in tradetalk.

“I’m trying to contact Illario Ransome,” Lioe said.

“Who may I say is calling?”

So he is there. Lioe felt a sudden surge of relief, a kind of deflation, and said, “Quinn Lioe.” She heard her voice flat and irritable in the handset’s reflection.

“One moment, please.”

“He’s there?” Roscha demanded, and Lioe shrugged.

“He seems to be—” She broke off as the handset clicked, flipping over to the new connection.

“Chauvelin.”

The voice was familiar from the ambassador’s party, low and crisp, with only a hint of the hsai accent. Lioe froze, not knowing what to say, what she should do, and Chauvelin said, “Na Lioe?”

“I’m sorry to have bothered you, Ambassador,” she said. “I—I was looking for Ransome, he said he might be with you.” Maybe that wasn’t the best phrasing, she thought, but it’s the best I could do on short notice. Things must be bad, if Chauvelin himself is talking to me.

“I’ve been looking for Ransome myself,” Chauvelin said. “Are you at his loft?”

There was a certainty in his voice that made Lioe think the call had been traced. “Yes.” No point in lying: even if he hasn’t traced it yet, he will.

“Has he been there, do you know?”

“I don’t know,” Lioe said. It was a safe answer; better still, it was the truth. “Is there anything wrong?”

There was a little pause, just enough to make her sure he was lying. “No, not at all. But I would like to talk to him as soon as he returns.”

“I’ll tell him that,” Lioe said, and waited.

“It’s important,” Chauvelin said. There was another pause, barely more than a hesitation, and then the ambassador went on, “I was expecting a message from him. Did he leave anything for me?”

Lioe shook her head, then remembered it was a voice-only line. “Not that I’ve seen.” She glanced quickly at the console, double-checking the messages displayed on the screen. “No, nothing.” She hesitated herself, wondering how much she could say, then said, “I was expecting to find him here. I’m a little—concerned.”

“So am I.” She could almost hear a kind of wry smile in Chauvelin’s voice. “If you hear from him, please tell him to contact me.”

“I’ll do that,” Lioe said, and broke the connection.

“So what happened?” Roscha asked.

Lioe shrugged, looked back at the massive console, at the symbols and codestrings filling the screens. “Ransome isn’t there, as you heard, and Chauvelin badly wants to talk to him.”

“That doesn’t sound good,” Roscha said. “What about hospitals, or the Lockwardens?”

“I bet Chauvelin’s already done that,” Lioe said, “but it couldn’t hurt to check again.” Or could it? What if he wants to keep this quiet? She shoved the thought away. “How are you on the nets?”

Roscha shrugged. “Good enough to find that out, anyway.”

In spite of everything, Lioe grinned. “Can you take care of it? There’s something I want to check.”

Roscha reached for the handset. “All right.”