Vikram stretched his arms above his head, relishing the solitude and the peace. A week had passed while he worked in the Red Rooms, preparing for his presentation and watching Adelaide’s magical filmreels. Adelaide had just left, slamming the door of her apartment shut with a small implosion. It was not an aggressive sound; she always slammed doors. Vikram had got used to her. On this day of the Council address, though, he was glad of these last few minutes alone to prepare for the debate ahead.
He lifted his gaze from the Neptune to the window-wall. The sleek silver towers stretched away like sentinels. If it weren’t for the year of storms, the entire city would have looked like this, and Vikram might not have been here at all. The sight stirred up a rare well of nostalgia within him. He examined the feeling, turned it over, tested its value toward today’s proceedings. Once more he read through the notes he had made.
Adelaide had been surprisingly, even shockingly useful. She knew all the intricacies of the Council. The more they talked, the more he realized that as an ally she would stretch far beyond this initial appeal.
There had been times when working with the girl was actually fun. They ran ideas past one another, tentatively at first, but grew increasingly frank in their discussions. Together they had pored over legal documents. They looked at records of previous appeals to the Council, from the Western Repatriation Movement’s first address, to the threats issued by an emerging NWO. Adelaide was quick to spot the inconsistencies in a piece of legislation. With her caustic commentary, she made him laugh more than once, and if she wasn’t expected at some soiree or other, they could quite easily sit arguing late into the night. Her energy reminded him of Eirik, although he could never tell her that.
Neither of them ever mentioned that first night.
A knock at the door interrupted his thoughts. He did not register the noise at first. Nobody ever came to Adelaide’s flat. Then it sounded again. He raised his head. Definitely a knock. It had occurred to Vikram, before now, that his and Adelaide’s cavalier attitude to the Council might well have made them enemies.
His hand went to his ribs but he was not carrying a knife. He went to the kitchen, picked out a paring knife from the block and slipped the blade into the back of his belt.
In the hallway he listened. The knock was not repeated. There was no other sound. He caught a glimpse of himself in Adelaide’s mirrors, a bundle of tensed muscles camouflaged by a suit. He opened the door.
Standing in the corridor, a good metre back, was a short woman in a bulky coat. Her hair was flecked with grey. She had a scarf around her neck and her cheeks were flushed, which told him she had probably travelled by boat. Vikram knew instantly that she was a westerner. As always, it was the eyes that gave her away. She was good though; the expression almost but not quite repressed.
“Hello,” she said. “I’m looking for Adelaide Rechnov.” She spoke quickly, a gruff voice.
“She’s not here at the moment.” Vikram kept one hand on the door. “Can I help?”
The woman brought her hand up to her hair, as though she might smooth out the frizz, then dropped it again.
“No-no. I need to see her directly.” She did not move, all the same. Vikram’s apprehension evaporated; he was caught between irritation that she might delay him, and curiosity. What connection could another westerner have to Adelaide’s glamorous life? Perhaps she was-what did they call it over here, an airlift.
“Can I take a message?” he persisted. “What’s your name?”
Her eyes wavered. He thought she might bolt. With the speed of sudden decision, she removed a haversack, unzipped it, and took out an envelope.
“I was told to bring this here if Mr Axel went away. He’s not here now so I guess that means he’s gone away. So here I am.” The last words were almost incomprehensible, her voice trailing downwards with her lashes.
“Would you like me to deliver it to Adelaide?” he asked. She hesitated, still a metre away, the envelope gripped tight in her fingers. Instinctively, he knew if she left now, she would never come back. Vikram recognized that fear; he knew the effort it must have cost to come. “I’m going to see her very soon,” he said gently. “In about an hour, in fact. If you want to leave it with me I’ll make sure she gets it.”
“Alright,” she said finally. “You’ll tell her what I said. I-meant to come sooner. But I don’t want anything more to do with it-with them. These people. You understand.”
He knew then that she had recognized him as well.
“I’ll tell her,” he said.
She held out the envelope abruptly. He stepped forward to take it. The smell of outside was on her. Her fingers clasped the paper for a moment longer, then yielded. She zipped up the haversack and settled it firmly across both shoulders.
“Thank you,” she said.
She hurried away down the stairs and he guessed she would call the lift a few flights down, out of sight. As soon as she had gone, Vikram realized how much he had failed to find out. He hadn’t even asked who she was.
He shut the door and looked at the envelope in his hand. The letter A was written in green ink. The envelope was bumpy. There was something more than paper inside.
He put the envelope under the bowl where Adelaide kept her scarab o’comm and her keys, and went back to the study. He read through his notes a final time, enunciating each word clearly in his head before some part of his nervous system admitted he was taking in none of it and his legs took him back to the main room.
Fifteen minutes before he needed to leave. He glanced down at the bowl. The keys were there, the big brass one and the smaller silver, on a large metal ring with a red enamel rose. Vikram bent to pick up the keys and straightened with the letter in his hands.
That’s more like it, he heard Mikkeli saying. For a minute there I thought you were going to leave it.
The ink on the envelope was blurred, as though the writer had scratched the A hastily and the nib of the pen had snagged, spattering bright green gobbets. No, he thought. I can’t read this. In the same moment he was walking towards the kitchen, knowing exactly what duplicitous trick he was about to perform, and unable to summon the willpower to stop himself. He filled the teapot with water and put it on the heat. When it began to whistle, he held the envelope over the plume of steam and carefully prised apart the seal. Inside was a letter, intricately folded, written in the same green ink. Something else fell out: a necklace, with a charm, smooth and ivory coloured. It looked like a shark tooth.
He read the letter twice.
A.
I’m taking advantage of an afternoon’s rare lucidity.
That is to say, there are times when the clouds clear, and I know that I have been walking in clouds-because once I am in them, I forget they are really there and assume that this fogginess, yes, today I’ll call it fog, is real. So I was surprised to find blue sky today. You understand.
Listen. I think, A, that I have been taken away. I’m not sure where, or how, or even what for, though I suppose there’s some design in it. Or not. That’s the way Osiris-the name just came to me, this is a good day, A, a productive day! — the way Osiris works. Not with wheels and bolts and mechanisms. With yarn and threads. There is a big web of knots and sometimes you put your finger on one and know the answer but mostly you don’t, and in the fog you have to trust your instincts, Adie. Always trust your instincts.
This Osiris appears to be a maze. I have gone along some of the walkways but not today. I haven’t felt like exploring for some time. There are too many people. I look for you often, though. I search all the windows. (There are many of them, and they are like eyes. It takes time.) Today you are clear, but often you make yourself indistinct, as if you are hiding. Then I remind myself that you are playing a game, and it is my mission to find the rules and then you will become like crystal.
The horses were back earlier. They still don’t speak, but they’re running, secretly. I’m waiting for them to stop. I know they have something important to tell me-something about Osiris. I’m not alone, Adie. We’re not alone.
The white horse will talk first. I am sure of it.
Now, there is an event, a slide of what they call memory… it’s not focused, because it hasn’t been out in the sun long enough… I’m jumping in water, A. It’s very cold. It’s cold here, as well. I think it’s a test. I have to turn to ice before I can be warm again. The ocean calls and I will have to dive deep to discover its purpose.
I am going to tell you a secret, Adie. That is why I am writing to you, because when the hour comes I will have to leave very quickly and will not have time to say goodbye. I am making a balloon. Don’t tell anyone. It’s just between you and me. I was going to tell you before, but I knew you were angry, and I thought the horses might not like it. Don’t be cross, A. It’s for the best. And when I come back we can find the sand. You’ll like that. No more mazes, no more clouds.
I’ll find you soon.
A.
The teapot was screeching. Automatically, Vikram moved it and switched the electricity off. Steam lent the windows a temporary mistiness. It was misty outside too and his own vision seemed to slide out of focus. He refolded the letter back into its original shape. It looked to him roughly the shape of a horse’s head. A conversation with Adelaide flashed into his head. What was he like, your brother? He was clever. It was the only time he had heard her refer to her twin in the past tense.
Even as the implications of what he had read settled upon him, Vikram realized he had no time to ponder the consequences. It would be insanity to give Adelaide such material minutes before they appeared before the Council. He slipped the envelope and the necklace inside his jacket pocket. He would reseal it later.
In the hallway he paused, catching his reflections once more. A young man in a smart suit met his gaze, clean shaven, his dark hair combed neatly back, a necktie at his throat. Vikram stared at this stranger. The clothes had done their work; he did not appear, at first glance, like a man with a history of violence. Truth was in the eye, wasn’t it? He moved closer to the mirror. His breath, quicker than usual with nervousness, made a patch of condensation. He looked deep, but found no history there. The belief that you were able to see a person’s soul in their eyes was false after all. The eye was only matter. Axel Rechnov had known that, once. Just another example of human frailty.