Grail - Elizabeth Bear [36]
Judging by the stricken faces of his Administrative Council, Danilaw was not the only person thinking so. Gain traded glances with Amanda, and Jesse seemed enmeshed in some sudden, vitally important, research project for whole seconds as he got his expression—and his emotions—under control.
When he looked up, though, his eyes were clear and his brow serene.
There was no talk of refusing sanctuary, nor would there be. While Danilaw, with his historical perspective, could imagine scenarios where turning away refugees would be the only possible choice, no matter how tragic, you would have to be unrightminded to consider it beyond the option stage under the current circumstances. “I wish they’d told us their numbers.”
“It is probably,” Captain Amanda said, with a bright flash of smile, “their first time doing this, too.”
Speaking in tones of quiet reason, Jesse said, “We need to consider the worst-case scenario.” He swallowed, as if the words had gotten stuck in his throat.
“Care to illustrate?” Gain asked, facilitating whatever it was Jesse was working himself up to saying.
Jesse wouldn’t notice, but Danilaw gave Gain a little grateful smile.
Jesse said, “There used to be traveling charlatans, people who moved from town to town promising miracle cures for a variety of ailments. They’d provide a series of fake ‘proofs’ of the efficacy of their products, and then they’d ‘sell’ the patent medicines and move on. They charged money for these treatments—scrip that could be exchanged anywhere else for goods or services.”
Danilaw had a sickening sense that he knew how this would come out. “And then what was in the bottle? Cold tea?”
Jesse shook his head. “Oftentimes, the patent medicines contained harmful substances. Mercury, arsenic, lead, radium. But by the time people started to get sick, the medicine man had moved on, and he’d taken the money with him.”
Gain sat back in her chair. “That’s barbaric. And these were just normal people, not Kleptocrats?”
“That’s the point,” Jesse said. “They were all Kleptocrats—some more successful than others. That’s what unrightminded people are like. They will trade future suffering for gratification now. They’re hierarchical, and they don’t care how badly they hurt somebody if they get something out of it.”
“And that’s what we’re up against?” Gain said.
Captain Amanda nodded. “There’s a whole shipload of them, headed right at us.”
8
where they ought stand
A woman will have her will.
—ANONYMOUS, The Marriage of Sir Gawaine
(medieval manuscript)
Perceval, still pacing the Bridge in her armor, the cowl stripped back but the seals intact otherwise, knew there was news because Tristen came in person. It being Tristen, she didn’t know if the news was good or bad until he spoke. And, it being Tristen, he did not draw out the suspense.
“I do not believe Dorcas is behind the raid,” he said. “But she knows or suspects who the culprit is, though she is withholding that information for now. Did you have any luck with the bodies?”
“Mercenaries, most likely.” Because it was Tristen, Perceval allowed him to see her twisting her hands in frustration. “Mallory performed the autopsies while you were with Dorcas. Their colonies wiped on their deaths. They were AE-deckers born, both of them.”
Tristen’s expression drifted from neutral to disapproving—or perhaps disappointed. It was not precisely a dead end, but after the Breaking of the world, the AE decks had been wild and isolated places. Cut off from the rest of the vessel, their Mean inhabitants had developed a tightly controlled martial society, defending their limited resources from all comers and forbidding overpopulation to the point of exposing both unplanned and malformed infants, and the unproductive old, to the Enemy—on tethers, because the quick-frozen bodies were a resource too rich in proteins and amino acids to be easily discarded.
They were clannish and xenophobic and fought among themselves as frequently and ferociously as they fought against