Luna: New Moon

Music! The Kids are Back. The Moços theme. Here come the boys, the boys, the boys! The fans rise. Their voices become something more than noise. The closed colosseum of Estádio da Luz throbs with it. Rafa Corta bathes in it. It washes him clean of anger and hurt. This moment he loves even more than winning; the moment where he opens his hands and the magic bursts out. See what I give you? But I’m selfish; I give it to myself as well. I’m a fan, just like you.

The team starts its on-court warm-up. An Xiuying leans forward on the rail. Rafa can see in the movements of his contact lens: his familiar is zooming in. Muhammad Basra’s back. His name, his number, the sponsor’s logo.

‘It’s the first run out in those game-suits,’ Rafa says. ‘New deal. Golden Phoenix Holdings.’ The same name is on the back of every João de Dios Moço.

An Xiuying steps back from the rail. His hands are shaking. His face is pale and sheened with sweat.

‘I don’t feel very well, Senhor Corta. I’m not sure I can finish the game.’

And Lucas is behind him. His shirt so crisp, his creases so sharp, his pocket-square so precise.

‘I’m sorry to hear that Mr An. It’s quite a sight. Has our choice of shirt logo upset you? An interesting company, Golden Phoenix. I found it surprisingly hard to pin down what they actually did. From my research, it seems to exist solely to redirect infrastructure development funding through a series of shell companies registered in tax havens – many of them here on the moon – in a pattern even I found difficult to unravel. If you don’t want to watch the game – the Tigers will win, Rafa’s boys have been on terrible form all season – maybe we could have a talk about your connection with Golden Phoenix. You see, I can disclose it. Your government seems to be going through one of its periodic clamp-downs on corruption. The penalties are quite harsh. Or I can conceal it. Rafa can retire those shirts. Your decision. We could also talk about the China Power Investment Corporation’s future helium-3 requirements. Corta Hélio is eminently capable of meeting those. The game lasts an hour. I’m sure that’s enough time to make a deal.’

A hand on the shoulder guides An Xiuying back into the director’s box. Before he closes the door, Lucas nods to his older brother.

Rachel was right, Rafa thinks. You are smarter than me. Then the whistle blows and the ball goes up. Game on!

One hour, plus time-outs. The Tigers win; 31-15. A trouncing. Jaden Sun is jubilant, Rafa Corta despondent. Lucas is never wrong about the outcome of games.

The tram will carry one passenger. Boa Vista security has been notified. Surveillance will be discreet. Under no circumstances may the passenger be searched. She comes at the personal invitation of Adriana Corta.

The car pulls into Boa Vista Station. The woman who steps on to the polished stone is tall even by lunar standards; dark of face and eye and blade-thin. She wears voluminous white: a many-skirted dress, a loose turban. Colours: a woven stole in green gold and blue; string upon string of heavy beads around her neck, gold hoops at each ear and around each finger. Her loose clothing accentuates her height and thinness. The woman wears no familiar; an absence like a lost limb. The guards straighten their backs. Charisma crackles from her. They would not dream of searching her.

‘Irmã,’ says Nilson Nunes, steward of Boa Vista. She acknowledges him with the least inclination of the head. In the garden of the Cortas the woman stops. She looks up at the sky panels and blinks in the false sunlight. She takes in the great stone faces of the orixas, mouths the name of each one.

‘Irmã?’

A nod. Onward.

Adriana Corta waits in the São Sebastião Pavilion, a confection of pillars and domes at the highest point of the sloping lava-tube. Waters rush from between its columns. Two chairs, a table. A samovar of mint tea. Adriana Corta, dressed in lounging pants and a soft silk blouse, rises.

‘Irmã Loa.’

‘Senhora Corta. I bring you the fondest greetings of the sisterhood and the blessings of the saints and orixas.’

‘Thank you, sister. Tea?’ Adriana Corta pours a glass of mint tea. ‘I do so wish we could grow coffee on this world. It’s almost fifty years since my last arabica.’

The woman sits but she does not touch the glass.

‘I’m sorry for your family’s recent trouble,’ she says.

‘We survived.’ Adriana says. She sips her mint tea and grimaces. ‘Vile. You never stop worrying for them. Rafa will not give up on Robson. Carlinhos is fretting to get back in the field. Ariel has gone back to Meridian. Lucasinho has run off. Lucas has frozen his account but that won’t stop the boy. He is more like his father than Lucas realises.’

Irmã Loa lifts a cross from amongst her cascades of beads to her lips and kisses the crucified man.

‘Saints and orixas protect you. And Wagner?’

Adriana Corta brushes over the question with another.

‘But you; your work is secure now?’