Page 124 of The Song Rising

“You disappoint me.”

“The feeling’s mutual. You once said, inOn the Merits, that we had to fight fire with fire to survive,” I said. “Did you lose your nerve, Obscure Writer?”

His face closed, and he released me. “All I lost was my naïveté. I have always had the best interests of our kind at heart.”

“How is it in our interest to work for the Rephaim?”

“They need us. We need them. You were going to start a fruitless war with them—and war will not improve conditions for clairvoyants, Paige. What we need now is a time of stability and co-operation.”

“Have you said as much to your employers?”

“The Republic of Scion is not at war.”

“I saw the depot, the factories,” I said. “The Second Inquisitorial Divisionispreparing for war, and I won’t flatter myself by thinking it was all for me. Who are they invading?”

For some time, he gazed out at the sparkling Thames.

“Scion has long had a tenuous understanding with the free world,” he said. “Scion tolerates them, and in return, they tolerate Scion, in spite of occasional incursions.” He paused. “You may have noticed ambassadors from two European free-world countries in the Archon. Weaver has invited them here to demonstrate to them the advantages of Senshield, to persuade them that it will identify unnaturals in their countries with infallible accuracy, in the hope that those countries will peacefully convert to Scion. If they do not . . . well. Let us say that my hopes for peace may be scotched in the short term.”

As I realized what he was implying, the muscles in my abdomen clenched.

Someone was knocking at the door. Jaxon turned back to me.

“Our time is up. Nashira will make you a final offer,” he said. “If you wish to live, take it. Think of yourself.”

Another knock. “Grand Overseer,” a voice called.

Suddenly I was full of pity, of sorrow, of grief for the man he might have been. I went to him and touched his face with one finger, imagining what it had been like once, before the knife had given it a new shape.

“I am sorry,” I said, “to see the White Binder reduced to nothing but a boundling, a pawn on someone else’s board . . . I really am disappointed.”

“Oh, you may think me the pawn on this particular board, but I am playing on many others. And mark my words, we are nowhere close to endgame.” The sun gilded his eyes. “Even so, it seems that, in my brief time as a pawn, I have taught you one very valuable lesson, O my lovely. Humans willalwaysdisappoint.”

22

Ultimatum

Jaxon had confirmed it. Scion was ready to expand its empire again, just as we’d thought.

The Vigile outside my cell had mentioned Spaniards.

Spain was their target. Spain, and possibly Portugal, if there were ambassadors from two countries here.

I didn’t know much about the free world, but I knew Scion had promoted the virtues of its system globally in the hope that other territories would join the fold of their own free will. It had worked on Sweden.Join us, they would say,and rid your country of the plague of unnaturalness. Join us, and you can keep your people safe.Some countries, like Ireland, had been taken forcibly—but it would be easier, and cleaner, if they could avoid costly invasions altogether.

Of course, Scion had many hurdles to overcome if it meant to convince the rest of the world to embrace the anchor. Every free-world government with sense would be wary of a rising, militarized empire. Some would have moral concerns about Scion’s methods, although they had always taken care to conceal the beheadings and hangings from the outside. Others might not believe clairvoyance existed, and even if they did, they might fear that innocent people would be mistakenly identified as unnaturals. Nadine and Zeke had mentioned that being one of many concerns about Scion in the free world.

Now, however, Scion had the perfect answer to it. They had Senshield, an accurate means of isolating criminals. Why shouldn’t they take control, they would ask, if they had a foolproof method for winnowing the unnaturals from the innocents—a way of removing dangerous individuals from society?

Senshield.

It always came back to that.

The ambassadors being here must be a final test of the water. The scanner-guns would be kept secret, but if they showed an ordinary Senshield scanner to the Spanish—if they proved to them how efficient Scion was about to become, and if they still refused to see the sense in being part of Scion’s empire . . . then, and only then, did they mean to invade.

The Vigiles herded me back to my cell and administered my drugs. In the precious seconds before clarity left me, I hid the roll of paper under the mattress of my cot.

If Nashira meant to see me today—and my meeting with Jaxon implied that she did—there was a good chance Alsafi could be with her. He had seldom been far from her side in the colony. And it might be my chance to tell him—somehow—what I knew.

---