Night's Pawn (6 page)

The clerk looked him over for a moment, then nodded. Chase grinned, saluted the clerk, and turned toward the stairs. He took them two at a time in case the clerk decided to make more of an issue of the patches. But behind him was only silence.

He'd come to the fourth floor and started to check the room numbers when the echo of voices began coming his way. As the voices grew louder and angrier, he moved forward down the dim, but fairly debris-free corridor. Rounding another corner Chase paused a moment alongside an open door. Voices and light spilled out into the corridor.

A man's voice, angry, probably representing the Caina: "Eighteen hundred bucks is what you owe. I don't care about nothin' else."

"I told you give me a couple of days." It was the voice of a young woman, undoubtedly Cara.

"You said that last week. Like I'm going to believe you now?"

"If she says she's gonna pay," said another man's voice, young like Cara's but wrong for the toughs, "stretch a little, will ya?"

The first man again. "You just jam that. You and your drekhead friends ain't supposed to be here in the first place. I could throw you all out just for that."

"You could try, you fraggin' piece of—" The blow shut the young man up, and from the sound, it also sent him flying. Cara, or another woman, made a noise at the same time and Chase decided to show himself.

The flat was cheap, a main area with kitchenette systems and a door leading to what looked like a bedroom; two smaller doors probably led to a closet and a bathroom. There were more people in the room than Chase had expected: the two toughs, their backs to the door and their eyes on the sprawled youth; an older man, maybe Chase's own age, dressed slightly better than the rest; Cara just kneeling down to help the youth who'd been hit; the kid himself, who looked to be in his late teens and reveling in it; and two boys of similar appearance who were just standing up. They all turned as Chase rapped twice on the door and stepped in.

The two toughs immediately began to size him up, and shifted position to flank him. The manager scowled. "Who the hell are you?"

Chase shrugged. "I was in the neighborhood, thought I'd drop by." Cara was kneeling next to the boy, who was bleeding from the mouth. She looked up at Chase blankly. He nodded at her and suddenly the color began to rush back into her face. She let go of the kid and began to stand.

"These pukes friends of yours?" asked the manager.

Chase nodded. "One at least." He was looking at Cara, who was standing rigid with her hands clenched together in front of her. She turned toward the manager.

"Could I have a second…"

The manager rolled his eyes. "Sure, whatever, but out in the hall. We ain't leavin' this room without the money."

"Sure," she said, walking toward Chase, her gaze locked to his until she moved past him into the hallway. She'd grown a lot taller. Chase looked at each of the toughs once, ignored their grins, and went out after her.

"Look, I'm sorry," she said. "I didn't want to—"

"You need money."

She blinked at him. "Well, yes, I—"

"Eighteen hundred dollars?"

Her eyes widened. "How did you…"

"We'll worry about how you're going to pay me back later." He squeezed her shoulder gently and stepped past her into the room. The bleeding kid looked like he was just about ready to get up and do something stupid. Chase cut him off. "Get up and
I'll
knock you down." He turned toward the manager.

"You want eighteen hundred dollars."

"Damn right."

"How do you want it?" He began to reach into his jacket pocket. The two toughs got nervous, but Chase ignored them.

The manager looked at him. "Waddya mean? I want it in money."

"What kind of money do you want? International nu-yen? UCAS dollars? Corporate scrip? What?"

"Dollars, for Christ's sake, what do I look like, the bank of—"

Chase pulled an envelope out and tossed it at the manager. He caught it and looked at it, surprised. So did Cara, who'd moved up alongside Chase. "Count it if you like," said Chase, "but get the fuck out of her room."

The manager slit the envelope open and riffled the bills. "If it's not right, I'll be back." He moved toward the door, and gestured the two toughs after him. They followed, but the ork turned as he passed Chase.

"You actually said fuck, how quaint."

Chase snorted. "And you formed a complete sentence; get the
fuck
out." He reached out and slammed the door after them.

The bleeding kid jumped to his feet. "I ain't gonna let no fraggin' grunt badface me." He spit a mouthful of blood onto the carpet as his hand came out of his pocket, clutching a thin switchblade knife. "I'm going to cut that goblin's fraggin'—"

Chase hit him at the base of the thumb, knocking the knife onto the bloody carpet. Before the kid could react, Chase hit him again, hard, in the solar plexus, knocking him back into a chair.

Cara was still standing near the door, wincing at the blow Chase gave the kid. She was tall, only a bit shorter than Chase, much taller than he'd expected. Her hair had gotten darker, or been darkened, and was now cut shorter than it had been the previous day on Teek's security video. She was dressed all in black, wearing knee-high Italian boots, black jeans, a tight shirt with the red and white emblem of the French trash band L'Infame, and an oversized jacket. She suddenly looked very young.

"You all right?" he asked.

She nodded, and looked down. "Thank you, I—"

"Cara, who's this guy?" It was one of the other kids, who'd suddenly found his voice while the other one helped the bleeding kid.

She looked from the kid back to Chase. "This is Simon Church, an old friend of my family."

"Thanks, chummer," the kid said to Chase, "but me and the boys can breeze it from here. We'll pay you once we get some gigs, big truth."

"Glad to hear it," said Chase, turning, " 'cause I expect it—"

"I didn't call you about rent money," interrupted Cara. They all turned toward her as she looked down again for a moment, then back up at Chase. He noticed the gleam of metal below her left ear, just covered by the wave of her hair. "I need some real help," she said.

"Cara, what the hell—" The kid near Chase snapped his gaze back and forth between them.

"Someone wants to kill my father."

Chase stiffened. "You're certain?"

"Someone's trying—?" said the kid.

Chase cut him off. "Shut up, you. Cara, how do you know?"

She fidgeted, looked away and then back. "It's a long story, but I'm sure."

"Do they know?"

"My father?"

"No, the people who want to kill him."

She nodded.

"Then we're out of here." Chase turned toward the boy nearest him, then down at the bleeding kid and the one helping him. "Gentlemen, I suggest you think about leaving too. Odds are trouble's coming, and you don't want to be here when it does."

5

Chase led Cara Villiers out of the Caina by the back door. The three boys started to protest, but were put off not only by Chase's presence and manner, but by Cara's readiness to leave them behind and go with him. Chase doubted if the three would listen to his warning to leave the flat, which bothered him. If he needed to make Cara disappear, they were a weak link: they'd seen her—and him—and had heard her use one of his names. Once he got Cara to relative safety, he'd have to send someone back to pay the boys a visit. Hopefully they'd listen to cash.

"Do you think they're in danger?" Cara asked as they reached the street.

"Depends. I don't know anything about what's going on. Either way, they'd be smart to move on and vanish for a little while." He decided to walk a ways before grabbing transport. Chase wanted to see if they were being followed. A derelict shouted obscenities at his foot as they passed.

She sighed. "They won't do that."

"Oh?" Chase led her across the traffic on Eighth and turned south. They slipped into the human flow and moved with it.

"They're going to be famous." Cara shifted the strap of her bag into a better position on her shoulder. "They've got to be high profile, even if they're not performing. Keep the band's name in the public mind."

Chase saw no signs of any immediate trouble. The rest of the city moved without pattern or seeming concern. "What do they call themselves?"

"Rouge Angels." She walked with her gaze on the ground, her eyes looking everywhere but at him.

"How'd you get involved with them?"

"I met them at the Whisper Gardens. They seemed wiz enough, and maybe had something. They do a retro-acoustic thing."

"Trying to repeat history?"

She stopped walking and looked up at him. He stopped, too, and the pedestrian flow cleaved around them. "You know about that?" she said. There was something in her look, something he couldn't read. Plastic collided with metal a few blocks away. Someone yelled.

He nodded and pointed at the L'Infame logo on her shirt. "Hard not to. It was in all the media." And Lachesis' report.

"I didn't mean it to work that way." She started to move slowly back into the flow of the crowd. He followed.

"I certainly hope not." He waited for her to volunteer more, but she didn't.

"The hospital says there's now about a forty percent chance the one boy, Gerard, will regain use of his legs without implant surgery." Her head twitched slightly as if she was about to respond, but she didn't. "The Marseilles police have been holding off filing charges against the other, Alain, wasn't it?, until they've spoken with you."

Now she really did stop. The crowds parted again, this time with some grumbling. She looked up at him, her expression easy to read. "Look, it's history, all right? I don't want to talk about it."

Chase shook his head. "If you're in trouble and you want my help, we're going to have to talk about it. And about everything else."

Her eyes narrowed and she began to walk again, then stopped after only a few steps and looked back at him. "Where the frag are we going anyway?"

Chase finished the call, but waited until his telecom security circuits completed the commands that he hoped would make the call difficult to trace, erasing it from the phone company's records. Cara moved about, alternately watching him and examining the artifacts of his apartment. "It's taken care of," he said.

She turned. "Will they be all right?"

Chase shrugged. "Tiger may not be a lot of things, but he's polite. Whether they listen to him or whether someone else gets there first is hard to say."

She looked away and back to some of the paper and databooks on one of the shelves. She gestured at them. "I don't remember you being the spiritual type. This is quite a collection of shamanic stuff." She picked up a small bracelet woven from twigs and vine and adorned with stone beads and feathers.

"They belonged to a woman I… knew."

Cara stopped with the bracelet halfway down her hand. She looked at him and then away. "I'm sorry."

"She was killed in an—accident—a few years ago. Like you said before, history." He entered the kitchen area and pulled some glasses down from a rack. "Like a drink? I think it's time we talked about
your
life."

She sat down on one of the soft couches, near where she'd draped her jacket. "Yes, rum slicer, if you know how to make it."

"I do. I take it you're planning to pass out early tonight?"

"Don't play daddy with me, all right? I've already had one man frag that up on me."

Chase worked on the drinks, but glanced up. "Sorry."

She shifted in her seat. "It's all right."

"It sounds cliché, but care to start at the beginning?"

"Sure, just give me a sec."

Chase finished mixing her drink, and his own, and carried them over. He chose a seat near her, but facing. He wanted to be able to see her face. She took the drink and sipped it, licking her lips slightly afterward.

He remembered the series of images of Cara that Lachesis' report had contained. Spaced just about evenly, one image passing per year, he could see how the girl—no, woman—before him had come to be. He could also see it in the data files, the five runaways after he'd left the family's employ, and the last one, four years ago, to the wilds of Europe. She'd honed her independent streak into such a fine instrument that not even her powerful family had dared retrieve her when she ran away for the last time. All the reports revealed Cara Villiers as a young woman who could take care of herself. And yet she was here looking for his help.

She took another sip. "About three years ago I was staying with some members of a German radical student group called Neustimme, New Voice. They were mostly Cunningham socialists and fond of sitting around talking, yelling, and slipping propaganda pieces into national datafaxes.

"At one of their parties, I met a guy named Adler, who was a chummer of one of Neustimme's more raddy members. He was older and very charismatic, in a quiet, powerful way. I thought he was interested in me, but now I think he knew who I was." Her gaze had softened as she spoke, and her eyes and words took on a distant quality.