Nemesis

the pitch of the rotors deepening.

Daig gave him a confused look. “The trader’s men won’t be here for another

couple of days yet. What are you doing?”

“Everyone wants to keep Eurotas happy, so it seems,” Yosef told him. “I think

we should use that to our advantage.”

They landed on a tree-lined transit pad just within the walls of the Consortium’s

compound. In a definite attempt to stand out from the more typical Iestan

architectural styles of the other great manses in the area, the Eurotas house was

modelled on the Cygnus school of design, reminiscent of many reunification-era

colony palaces from the early decades of the Great Crusade. It was an open, summery

building, full of courtyards and cupolas, with fountains and small pocket gardens that

were at odds with the cool pre-winter chill of the day.

The two reeves were barely to the foot of the coleopter’s drop-ramp when they

were met by a narrow woman in the bottle-green and silver of the rogue trader’s

livery. Standing behind her at a discreet distance were two men in the same garb, but

both of them were twice her body mass with faces hidden behind the blank glares of

info-visors. Yosef saw no weapons visible on them, but he knew they had to be

carrying. One of the many tenets of the Consortium’s corporate sovereignty

throughout the Taebian Sector allowed Eurotas to ignore planetside laws the Void

Baron considered to be detrimental to his business, and that included Iestan weapon

statutes.

The woman spoke before Yosef could open his mouth, firmly determined to set

the rules of the impromptu visit immediately. “My name is Bellah Gorospe, I’m a

Consortium liaison executive. We’ll need to make this quick,” she told him, with a

fake smile. “I’m afraid I have an important meeting to attend very shortly.” The

50

woman had the kind of silken Ultima accent that automatically categorised her as

non-native.

“Of course,” Yosef said smoothly. “This won’t take long. The Sentine require

access to the Consortium’s database of passenger and crew manifests for incoming

starships to Iesta Veracrux.”

Gorospe blinked. She was actually startled by the directness of his demand, and

didn’t say no straight away. “Which ship?”

“All of them,” Daig added, following his lead.

The automatic denial that she was trained to give came next. “That’s impossible.

That data is proprietary material under ownership of the Eurotas Trade Consortium.

It cannot be released to any local jurisdictional bodies.” Gorospe said the word local

as if it rhymed with irrelevant. “If you have a specific request regarding any data

pertaining to Iestan citizens, I may be able to accommodate you. Otherwise, I’m

afraid not.” She started to turn away.

“Did you know Cirsun Latigue?” said Yosef.

That brought the woman to a halt. She covered her hesitation well. “Yes. We had

cause to work together on occasion.” Gorospe’s lips thinned. “Is that pertinent?”

“We’re investigating the possibility that whoever murdered him is following a

vendetta against employees of Baron Eurotas.” That was an outright lie, but it got

Yosef the response he wanted. The woman blinked, and she was clearly wondering if

she could be next. The reeve had no doubt that by now everyone in the compound, no

matter if they were supposed to know or not, knew exactly how horribly Latigue had

died. “We believe the killer may have arrived on planet aboard a Eurotas-operated

vessel,” he added.

If the murderer was from another planet, then that was undeniable; the

Consortium ran every inter-system ship that came to Iesta Veracrux, and as a part of

Imperial transit law, all travellers were required to submit to cursory medical checks

in order to prevent the spread of any potential biosphere-specific contagions from

world to world. That data would exist in the Consortium’s records.

Gorospe was uncertain how to proceed. Her plan to dismiss the Sentine officers

and return to whatever her other tasks were had crumbled. Yosef imagined that she

was now thinking of a way to deal with this by invoking some higher authority.

“Sanctioned Consortium security operatives will be arriving in fifty hours. I suggest

you return at that time and make your request to them.”

“It wasn’t a request,” Yosef told her. “And given the frequency of the murders to

date, there could be two, perhaps even three more deaths before then.” He kept his

voice level. “I think that even the Baron himself would agree that time is of the

essence.”

“The Baron is coming here,” Gorospe noted, in an absent; distant manner that

seemed to be half disbelief.

“I’m sure he would want as much done as possible towards dealing with this

unfortunate circumstance,” said Daig. “And quickly.”

She glanced back at Yosef. “Please tell me again what it is that you need, reeve?”

51

He resisted the urge to smile and instead offered her the data-slate. “There’s an