Burning Bright

“So that’s Ambidexter,” she said, and accepted the glass that Beledin held out to her. The liquor was thick and fizzy, and cheaply sweet. She took a careful swallow, waiting for their answers.

“Indeed it is,” Savian said.

“He’s a good player,” Beledin said. “Nobody’s matched his Court templates, outside the Grand Game.”

“Harmsway’s a great character,” Vere agreed.

Once diverted into the Game, they could go on for hours. Lioe glanced away from the conversation, searching for Ambidexter—Ransome—among the crowding bodies. He was not a tall man, and it took her a minute to find him. He was standing with Gueremei and the man who had been pointed out to her as Davvi Medard-Yasine, Shadows’ primary owner—standing between the two of them, so that he seemed to be holding court, the other two dancing attendance. Does he do that on purpose? she wondered. It’s obnoxious—but he does do it well. “Why did he quit gaming?” she asked, and the others looked at her in surprise.

“Ransome, you mean?” Beledin asked, and Lioe nodded.

“Sheer pique,” Savian said, with a wicked grin.

“Give it a fucking rest,” Beledin said. He looked back at Lioe, shrugged one shoulder. “He said he was bored. And he’s got his story eggs to keep him busy.”

There was a note of constraint in his voice, the faintest hint of something unspoken. Lioe cocked her head, wondering how to ask, and Savian said, “They’re easier than real people.”

Beledin scowled, opened his mouth to say something, and Savian held up both hands. “I’m not being bitchy, that’s the truth. I think he got tired of trying to bully his players into doing what he wanted.” There was something in his voice—a certainty, maybe—that silenced Beledin.

“So what did Ambidexter want?” That was Roscha, emerging from the crowd like the avenging angel in a popular film. Lioe caught her breath, impressed in spite of herself—in spite of being all too familiar with the type, of having written the template for the type—by the streetwise swagger and the striking figure.

“He said he enjoyed the session,” Vere said.

Roscha whistled softly. “From him, that’s a compliment and a half.”

“So what does he do?” Lioe asked. “Now that he doesn’t play.”

Roscha shrugged—clearly, the world outside the Game meant nothing to her, Lioe thought, not sure if she admired or was annoyed by the attitude—and Beledin said, “He’s an artist, an imagist, actually. He makes story eggs.”

“What are those?” The others looked rather oddly at her, and Lioe smiled broadly to hide her embarrassment. “I don’t know them.” And I dare you to comment, either.

Beledin gestured, shaping a sphere, an ovoid, about twenty centimeters long, miming a size and weight that would be reasonably comfortable in the hand. “It’s… they have these pictures in them, like a holofilm loop, that tells a story—suggests it, more like. You look through a lens at one end to see the display. They’re really neat, the ones I’ve seen, very stylized, so you do a lot of guessing.” He stopped, shrugged. “I’m just a musician, though. I don’t know much about it.” There was frustration in his voice, as though he was still looking for the words to describe what he’d seen.

Savian said, all trace of malice or mischief gone from his tone, “They really are spectacular, some—most of them. I saw one, it was just a plain, black metal case, smaller than usual, something you could put in your pocket, but when you looked into it, it was as though you were looking into a Five Points palazze. It was all golden lights, and carved furniture, and jewels, and velvets, and you could just see two figures moving through that setting, in and out of the clutter of things. You could turn the egg, rotate it, I mean, and you could see more bits and pieces of the scene, but you could never be quite sure what the two were doing, whether it was courtship, seduction, or one of them trying to escape. And you never could see the end of the scene, either, no matter how hard you tried.” He shook his head. “It was very—well, sensual, more than sexy, but ambiguous, too, so you couldn’t be comfortable with it.” He paused, tried a smile that carried at least some of his former detachment. “I don’t think Ransome likes you to be comfortable.”

I can believe that, Lioe thought, glanced again through the crowd. Ransome had moved away from Gueremei and Medard-Yasine, was standing for that moment a little apart from all the rest, a glass of methodein one hand, the other deep in the pocket of his plain black trousers. For just an instant, his face was without expression, held nothing but its lines and a bone-deep exhaustion. Then someone spoke to him, and Lioe saw his face change, take on a mask of detached amusement. So that’s where Savian got it, she thought, and had to hide a grin, deliberately turning her back to Ransome.

“That was a great session, Na Lioe.”