Free City on Fire (Metropolitan 2) by Walter Jon Williams

before I met Parq. But I’ve made you digress— do go on.”
    “ The prophet Dalavos preached continually against those with twisted genes, claiming that they— we — are a spiritual evil polluted by our altered genetics.” He clasps his hands together, the knuckles turning white. His voice maintains its objective tone, but the gesture informs Aiah of his feelings with perfect eloquence. “His target was the Avian aristocracy, of course, but the rest of the twisted fall almost by accident within the scope of this condemnation.”
    Aiah watches Ethemark’s hands, the furious, trembling pressure they exert on one another.
    “I would not find it congenial,” Ethemark says, “if Parq were able to control personnel in this department, or indeed in any other. The Dalavan prejudice against the twisted would be exerted to the full.”
    “If Parq ever controls hiring to that extent,” Aiah says, “I would leave. I am not willing to offer my services to a theocracy.”
    Ethemark’s huge deep eyes gaze at Aiah. Regret touches his voice. “You are lucky in having someplace to go, Miss Aiah.”
    For a moment there is silence. Aiah’s nerves tingle with the force of this rebuke.
    “You are very frank, Mr. Ethemark.”
    Nictitating membranes half-shutter Ethemark’s eyes, and Aiah feels another eerie shiver up her nerves at this inhuman gesture.
    “I answer frankness with frankness,” he says. “You were open in regard to our department’s deficiencies, and I in regard to what the future might bring us." He sighs, his short child’s legs swinging below the chair, and uncouples his hands.
    “To tell the truth,” he says, “we both owe our jobs to our loyalties. You are loyal to Constantine and I to Adaveth— or perhaps to the purpose each of our patrons represents—and therefore we have no present cause for conflict, as our two patrons are in alliance.”
    Aiah raises an eyebrow. “No present cause?”
    Ethemark presses his gray palms together and cocks his large head at a strangely birdlike angle. “I understand that you spent yesterday studying the plasm system within the Palace.”
    “ You are changing the subject, Mr. Ethemark.” And Adaveth has some good spies, she thinks.
    “I hope to return to the subject by way of illustration, but in order to make my point I would like to take you outside the Palace. May I?”
    “Now?” Dubiously.
    “If you are not otherwise engaged. I gather you are not.”
    Aiah hides her amusement. Ethemark is trying to rig a chonah for her. It will take more than this little gray-skinned homunculus to catch one of the Cunning People.
    At this point there is a knock on the outer office door, and Aiah rises to discover the workers come to replace her window.
    At least she can successfully give orders to the maintenance staff. This was more than she ever achieved in her old job at the Plasm Authority in Jaspeer.
    She turns to Ethemark and resigns herself to spending more time with him.
    “Very well,” she says. “I hope we will not have to go too far.”
     
    THE BLUE TITAN THREATENS . . .
    BUT THE LYNXOID BROTHERS ARE READY!
    NEW CHROMOPLAY AT THEATERS NOW!
     
    It isn’t far— forty minutes by aerial tram from the station nearest the Palace— but in terms of a difference in character, for sheer existential antithesis, a hundred hours would not be far enough.
    Aiah leaves the department files, still in their briefcase, at one of the palace guard stations. A change of clothing is necessary: Ethemark advises waterproof boots, overalls, a waterproof hat. Aiah buys them en route. Dressed like a sewer worker, she enjoys her first ride on an aerial tram. It flies much faster than she’d expected, and when the high winds catch its slab sides the tram bobs alarmingly on its cable. Below, boats leave silver tracks in gray, watery canyons. The white granite towers of Lorkhin Island loom close, then are left behind.
    Once they leave the tram station, they find a water taxi, but the