The Green Memory of Fear. B. A. Chepaitis

tell me what it’s all about.”

      She smoothed her hair back from her face and looked at him, then past him. They were co-workers again, suddenly and without much elbow-room.

      “It’s about a four week gig, Alex. I thought the change would be good for me. Keep me from going stale.”

      He tapped a finger against the table. “And what if I say no?”

      She gazed down at his hand, pressed a finger against it. “Will you?” she asked.

      He laid his hand, tense and flat, against the wood of the table. She continued to press her finger against it. She was so much better at putting up ‘No Trespassing’ signs than she was at reading them.

      “I need to know why you want it before I decide,” he said. “And you don’t take research for fun, Jaguar, so try something else.”

      “You seem to know a lot about me, for a first date.”

      “I’ve had a few years of my own preliminary research. Look, if you want, we can talk about it tomorrow, in my office.”

      She sighed and stood up. “Get the bill, and meet me back at my place. I’ll show you.”

      * * * *

      Alex spent the ride to her apartment in a staff meeting with himself, asking questions about his general sanity. Like most staff meetings, everyone had a lot to say, and none of it was helpful. He ascended the stairs to her apartment and walked in the door, which was open for him.

      “I’ll make tea if you want some,” she said when he was in.

      “No thanks,” he said, moving to a chair at her kitchen table. “I’ll just sit and stew in my own juices.”

      “Suit yourself,” she said, and crossed the living room to her desk. She opened a drawer and pulled out the Senci file, brought it to Alex. As she handed it over, he saw a tremor pass through her hand, up her arm. He opened the file and read. She stood at his back and waited motionless for his response.

      He took his time, checking to make sure she hadn’t gathered any information he didn’t already have. When he was done, he closed the file and let his hands rest on it. Rachel had given him a more complete file, so for once he knew more than she did, except on one count—why she was interested. He decided to push at her about that.

      “Not much of a case,” he said. “A doctor who continues a successful practice in Toronto. Works with pre-teens to early adults, mostly on sequential dream modification and anxiety reduction programs.”

      “Yeah. He likes his clients young and scared. He moved to Toronto right after the Killing Times,” she said. “He was at Columbia until—well, until the safety squads blew it up. Then he packed it in for Canada. Oh, Canada.”

      Alex could feel her at his back, motionless as ambient light, but bristling with anger. Canada gave a general amnesty less than a year after the dust settled from the Serials. No one would be prosecuted for the crimes committed during that time. Jaguar found that appalling.

      “Lots of people left Manhattan after the Killing Times. Lots of them went to Toronto. That doesn’t mean he’s either a murderer or a pedophile. Besides, he still maintains a residence in New York.”

      “I know. He’s a respected neuropsych specialist, and blah blah rat fuck blah.”

      “Since you’ve made your mind up about the Doctor, what do you know about the boy?” he asked.

      She walked around to the table and sat across from him. “Nothing, yet. I’m not cleared for the information until my supervisor approves the assignment.”

      “If he approves,” Alex amended. Then, “The boy’s name is Daro Karas. Must be quite a kid because he got a voxchip recording of Dr. Senci admitting what he did. He’s twelve, likes baseball, and his family would greatly prefer if he kept the hell out of it.”

      “How do you—“ Jaguar started.

      “—It’s that supervisor thing,” he cut in. “I’m cleared for all information—except why you’re doing this. That’s not in the files, so you’ll have to fill in the blanks.”

      She stayed cool, casual. “I work a lot with pedophiles. It’d do me good to track one from the prelims. That’s reasonable, isn’t it?”

      “Yes,” Alex said. “And I’m guessing it’s also true, since in fact you’re a lousy liar. But you’re a master of evasion, and I smell one here. There’s more, isn’t there?”

      She’d known him long enough that she didn’t deny it. “It’s—complicated,” she said.

      “Like I’m not used to that? If you want the gig, you’ll have to tell me.”

      She pressed the tips of two fingers against her forehead. Gesture of the empath. She went subvocal.

      I’m called to it, Alex.

      Show me, he requested.

      She obliged, and he saw her chasing something into an alley. A little girl. Spirit child, by the feel of it. She wasn’t solid—just an image projected into space. The girl disappeared and there was a newspaper flapping at Jaguar’s ankles, an article about Dr. Senci visible.

      “Okay,” he said out loud. “I see.”

      She was called to it, by a spirit child. Not the sort of thing she’d fake for any reason. But it was, as she said, complicated. Senci had no record of molesting girls, for one thing, so who was this girl child and what did she have to do with the case? And what was she? Ghost, traveling thought, projection?

      “Do you know the girl?” he asked.

      “No. But she—she wears my clothes. Clothes I wore when I was a girl,” she said. “I’ll ask One Bird and Jake about it. See what they have to say.”

      If she planned to talk to Jake and One Bird, this was serious. She lived with them after her grandparents were killed in Manhattan, made her way from the City to their New Mexico village, mostly on foot, to find them. They were her guardians, her elders, her guides. He’d met them once when Jaguar took him to their village and he thought as highly of them as she did. They kept it simple, like the point of an arrow aimed at a bull’s eye.

      “Does this have anything to do with your interest in Greenkeepers?” he asked.

      She startled just enough to scrape her chair back. That answered his question.

      “All right,” he said. “Tell me what this has to do with your interest in Greenkeepers.”

      She crossed her arms and glared at him. “Adepts,” she said, “are so manipulative.”

      “And chant-shapers,” he replied, “are so elusive. Tell me, Jaguar.”

      “It might be related,” she said. “And it might not. I don’t know yet. The two things occurred at the same time, but I’m not convinced they’re causally connected. If I find out they are, I’ll tell you.”

      “Jaguar,” he said, “look at me.”

      She brought her eyes to focus on his, and he felt the force of their pull. That unrelenting, tidal pull. He let himself wash into it, skimming the surface of her emotions. They were turbulent, but not hidden. She was telling him the whole truth, as she knew it. This was all he was going to get.

      He pushed his chair back from the table and stood to leave. “Okay,” he said. “I’ll grant the assignment. You’ll be there a few weeks, but you’ll keep in touch with me while you’re away.”

      “Why?” she asked suspiciously.

      “For one thing, it’s procedure to report to your Supervisor when you’re on a prelim. For another, I’ll miss you.

      “In that order?” she asked, still making light of it. But he didn’t want to. Not anymore.