wait.’
The guard enters further information.
‘I have put in the request. Come with me.’
The guard leads Adelaide further down the empty, white-walled corridor. This is something else she has forgotten: the space, the absence of people. They stop by a numbered door and the guard swipes them into a room that is also empty, except for a single chair and a table.
‘Please wait here. I will return once your second vault is on site.’
‘Thank you.’
The door closes behind the guard. Adelaide sits, then instantly stands again. She can’t shake the feeling that this is a trap. That at any moment the door will burst open and skadi will pin her to the floor, or worse, a member of her family will step through.
It occurs to her that there may be other vaults in her name, in other branches. Her grandfather would be the sort to do that. Heirlooms locked away in boxes, the way he hoarded secrets in the attic of his brain.
Her nervousness increases. She can’t pretend she’s not scared of what she might find here today. She takes out her scarab, prepared to risk a call to Dien, only to find there is no signal this far underwater.
The next thirty minutes are the longest of her life.
At last she hears the door handle turning. She stands, tense, prepared to fight if necessary. But it is the guard, returning as promised with two slender rectangular boxes made of a lightweight steel, featureless except for the names branded into the metal. Adelaide’s relief is crushing.
The guard holds aloft the DNA sample she took from Adelaide before.
‘This is your key. You hold it against the activator, here. Push the buzzer by the door when you are done and I’ll come and collect you.’
‘Thank you.’
The guard nods and departs once again.
Left alone, Adelaide is reluctant to open either box; she looks from one to the other, torn. But she doesn’t have the leisure of time. Dien is up there in the foyer, counting the minutes. Alone and exposed. Dien put herself on the line to get them in here, based on nothing but a hunch, a feeling that there is something Adelaide needs to see; and she’s already exceeded their agreed time limit.
She opens the box in Mikkeli’s name first. It is empty except for a folded piece of paper and a necklace. She recognizes the necklace at once: a shark tooth strung on a single cord. The last time she saw it, the necklace was around her twin’s neck.
The letter is a copy. Her brother’s handwriting leaps from the page, blotched here and there with frenzied splatters of ink. She already knows what the letter says: Vikram recited it to her word for word. It is Axel’s goodbye note.
She folds the letter back and slips it into her pocket. As she activates the key on the second box, she notices her hands are trembling.
What the hell did you find, Axel…
Inside is a sheaf of papers, each stamped with a familiar motif. She has seen this symbol before. Six-legged. Translucent-winged.
Operation Whitefly.
She spreads the papers over the table and begins to read.
The papers are in no particular order. They date sporadically from the past fifty years. There are logs of ships approaching the city. Ships from other places. Ships from land. There are execution orders for the crews of those ships. She reads through the list, disbelieving.
Polaris
, 14
Cepheus Blue
, 11
Svetlana
, 7
Draconis V
, 21—
It goes on.
Some of the names have scribbled notes against them.
Some resistance encountered. We had to weight them…
There are references to meetings. Payments made to certain members of the skadi. Records of Osirians who tried to leave the city, but were incarcerated or removed. There are documents signed by the founding family elders.
The names include Leonid Rechnov, Adelaide’s grandfather.
She stops reading, overcome with nausea. Panicking, she looks around the room again. There are no receptacles, nothing but the chair she is sitting on and the table in front of her and the two vaults.
The guard enters further information.
‘I have put in the request. Come with me.’
The guard leads Adelaide further down the empty, white-walled corridor. This is something else she has forgotten: the space, the absence of people. They stop by a numbered door and the guard swipes them into a room that is also empty, except for a single chair and a table.
‘Please wait here. I will return once your second vault is on site.’
‘Thank you.’
The door closes behind the guard. Adelaide sits, then instantly stands again. She can’t shake the feeling that this is a trap. That at any moment the door will burst open and skadi will pin her to the floor, or worse, a member of her family will step through.
It occurs to her that there may be other vaults in her name, in other branches. Her grandfather would be the sort to do that. Heirlooms locked away in boxes, the way he hoarded secrets in the attic of his brain.
Her nervousness increases. She can’t pretend she’s not scared of what she might find here today. She takes out her scarab, prepared to risk a call to Dien, only to find there is no signal this far underwater.
The next thirty minutes are the longest of her life.
At last she hears the door handle turning. She stands, tense, prepared to fight if necessary. But it is the guard, returning as promised with two slender rectangular boxes made of a lightweight steel, featureless except for the names branded into the metal. Adelaide’s relief is crushing.
The guard holds aloft the DNA sample she took from Adelaide before.
‘This is your key. You hold it against the activator, here. Push the buzzer by the door when you are done and I’ll come and collect you.’
‘Thank you.’
The guard nods and departs once again.
Left alone, Adelaide is reluctant to open either box; she looks from one to the other, torn. But she doesn’t have the leisure of time. Dien is up there in the foyer, counting the minutes. Alone and exposed. Dien put herself on the line to get them in here, based on nothing but a hunch, a feeling that there is something Adelaide needs to see; and she’s already exceeded their agreed time limit.
She opens the box in Mikkeli’s name first. It is empty except for a folded piece of paper and a necklace. She recognizes the necklace at once: a shark tooth strung on a single cord. The last time she saw it, the necklace was around her twin’s neck.
The letter is a copy. Her brother’s handwriting leaps from the page, blotched here and there with frenzied splatters of ink. She already knows what the letter says: Vikram recited it to her word for word. It is Axel’s goodbye note.
She folds the letter back and slips it into her pocket. As she activates the key on the second box, she notices her hands are trembling.
What the hell did you find, Axel…
Inside is a sheaf of papers, each stamped with a familiar motif. She has seen this symbol before. Six-legged. Translucent-winged.
Operation Whitefly.
She spreads the papers over the table and begins to read.
The papers are in no particular order. They date sporadically from the past fifty years. There are logs of ships approaching the city. Ships from other places. Ships from land. There are execution orders for the crews of those ships. She reads through the list, disbelieving.
Polaris
, 14
Cepheus Blue
, 11
Svetlana
, 7
Draconis V
, 21—
It goes on.
Some of the names have scribbled notes against them.
Some resistance encountered. We had to weight them…
There are references to meetings. Payments made to certain members of the skadi. Records of Osirians who tried to leave the city, but were incarcerated or removed. There are documents signed by the founding family elders.
The names include Leonid Rechnov, Adelaide’s grandfather.
She stops reading, overcome with nausea. Panicking, she looks around the room again. There are no receptacles, nothing but the chair she is sitting on and the table in front of her and the two vaults.
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