City on Fire (Metropolitan 2) by Walter Jon Williams Page B

little skill on the part of your deponent.”
    She raises her glass, offers him a salute. “Congratulations.”
    “Thank you.” He tastes his creation, raises his eyebrows in pleasant surprise.
    “Better than I thought, in truth.”
    “Let’s hope it’s an omen.”
    “Let’s.” He sips the wine, takes a few more bites. Looks up from his plate. “And how are you getting on with Ethemark?”
    “It was—” She takes a breath. “An interesting day.”
    “Tell me.”
    She tells him. They finish their meal and take the wine bottle to the couch.
    “So what have I done?” she asks. “Have I sold the department to some little gangster in return for a handful of names?”
    He considers this. “You judge yourself overharshly,” he says. “You have made no promises to this man, none at all. What you have done is make a policy decision— the first of a great many— to the effect that you will concentrate your efforts on one area of your mandate and not another.” His frown changes to a catlike smile. “It is a decision I support fully, by the way. The half-worlds are potentially a great resource. We should not waste them, or their people.”
    Relief eases the tension that clings between Aiah’s shoulder blades. “But what about Ethemark? His loyalties are clearly with the half-worlds, and not with us.”
    “That will require tactful handling, if and when the difference becomes important. But you need not worry over the loyalties of most of your people— I’ve decided that everyone will require deep plasm scans, to discover where their loyalties really lie.”
    Aiah looks at him in surprise. “Who’s going to do the scanning?”
    “The Force of the Interior. Sorya’s department. It’s the sort of thing they’re good at.”
    Alarm jangles along Aiah’s nerves. “I don’t want Sorya in my brain!” she cries. Involuntarily she lifts a hand protectively to guard her head.
    Constantine reaches out, takes her hand in his, gently lowers it to her lap. “Not you,” he says. “Nor Ethemark, nor any other political appointee I am forced to accept. But everyone else, yes. You need an absolutely straight department, even if we have to hire every single one of them from outside Caraqui, and plasm scans are the only way to make certain.”
    She clasps Constantine’s big hand in her smaller ones, looks at him. A shiver of memory raises the hairs on her nape. “I saw Taikoen yesterday, Metropolitan.”
    He looks startled, then masters himself and nods. “Yes. He is ... making use ... of an officer of the Specials. A killer, a torturer. He broke hundreds in his dungeons, and murdered many.” His lip curls in disdain. “Such people are best disposed of with the trash. If anyone deserves Taikoen, it is he.”
    Aiah finds her lower lip shivering and wills it to stop. “Who knows about him? It.”
    Constantine’s eyes gaze somberly into hers. “You. Martinus, my bodyguard. Myself. Sorya may suspect, though I have not told her. And lastly that torturer, who though his body lives is already dead.”
    A shudder runs through her. “He recognized me. I was terrified.”
    “He will not harm you." Constantine puts his arms around her, cradles her against his massive chest. “Making use of Taikoen is the worst thing I have ever done. It is the worst thing I can ever conceive.” His hand caresses her jaw-line, turns her face up to his. There is a smoldering anger in his eyes, in the twisting muscles of his jaw. “Taikoen weighs on me,” Constantine says. “He is necessary, but...” There is a flicker in his pensive eyes, echo of a chill thought that passes through his mind. “I hope I judged this aright. The balance of rights and wrongs, the hope of a better outcome.”
    Aiah smiles wanly. “It isn’t all as easy as cooking, is it?”
    He nods in answer. There is a kind of painful hopelessness in his eyes. “Taikoen is a trap, I know. He is too powerful a weapon to ignore, but the very knowledge of him is