Stories by Elizabeth Bear Part 15

"It's pretty."

"I know," he said, and gentled me with a hand on my hair. "Come away. We need to talk to Ms. Bukvajova."

"You know," I said, "I swear I've heard that name."

"I know." His voice did something funny. "I've heard it too."

He lead me under the porch roof, in out of the sun-we must be somewhere in the South for there to be bottle trees, and the sun sure felt like it-and thumped on the security door because the doorbell was busted. Or if it wasn't busted, anyway, you couldn't hear it chime from the outside, so he knocked to be sure.

A moment later, the inside door swung open a crack, and bright cloudy eyes peered through the crevice, half obscured by strings of yellowed hair. "Boys!" the old woman said. "Stewart! Jackie! Come in. Come in. Would you like an iced tea?"

"Yes, please, Ms. Bukvajova," the blond man said, and I gaped. But Miss Bukvajova was suddenly young, all auburn hair and sparkle and aerialist muscles, power and grace....

The person overwhelmed by that memory was not me.

But for a moment I saw her as she had been, a short, hourgla.s.s-shaped, broad-shouldered woman with a ballerina waddle, and someone else's grief filled up my throat. She lead us through a cluttered red-flannel living room, fussy and terrible, every surface cluttered with dusty photographs, and I could not hold her steady in my sight.

"Drink."

My elbows propped rudely on her kitchen table, I sat in a creaking ladder-back chair with my hands cupped loosely around a cold empty gla.s.s.

"Drink," she said, and poured more tea.

Though it tasted of cement dust and brackish water, I drank. I saw her again, and this time she swung with perfect grace on a flying trapeze, as if she were dancing there. She somersaulted through the air, and a strong man caught her. I stung my throat shouting, stung my palms clapping, felt fingers close on my wrists and pull my hands apart. Stewart-and my blood was dripping over his nails. "You idiot," he said. "You broke the gla.s.s."

"Stewart?"

He met my eyes, and his mouth went thin. "Jackie?"

"Sort of," I said. I felt thin as a watercolor of myself, but I was there. He looked down quickly. Holding my hand still, he began to pick the slivers of broken gla.s.s out of the palm, leaving the ice melting on the table. "Miss Bukvajova?"

"You remember me?" she said.

"Yes," I said. "We do." Because it wasn't just me remembering her. "That was Jeff Soble," I said, and winced as Stewart picked another shard of gla.s.s from my palm. I turned away, so I wouldn't have to watch him, and watched the sun glint off the bottle tree on the other side of the slatted blinds. "In the tea."

"It works," she said, and made a moue like a much-younger woman. "He was a friend of mine. He worked on the dam."

"But you married Powers."

She rose from the table, fetched another blocky Anchor Hocking gla.s.s from the cabinet, and plunked it to one side of the puddle of ice and broken gla.s.s. She added ice with her fingers and poured the tea from a scarred yellow Rubbermaid pitcher with a push-b.u.t.ton top. She said, "It's like getting dehydrated. You need more to catch up than you think you will. Keep drinking. I'll get a towel."

Keep drinking the memory of her friend. The one who brought me here to save her.

"You married Powers," I said again, and drank the tea with my left hand, which was only cut a little. The cold gla.s.s stung the sc.r.a.pes on my palm. "Not Jeff."

I couldn't call him Soble when I was drinking his memory.

"Wouldn't you?" She poured herself a gla.s.s too, and drank. "Not that Eli was anything special then. He owned a gambling hall downtown, on Fremont Street. And you all know where that led."

"Empire," Stewart said, laying another piece of b.l.o.o.d.y gla.s.s in his pile. "I think that's all of it, Jackie."

"So the marriage didn't work out?"

She pushed a greasy lock out of the way with a spotted hand and finished her tea. "Imploded like an outworn casino," she said. "His other wives haven't been so lucky." She gestured around. "I got the marriage annulled-unmade-and he hasn't been able to eat me up entire. The bottle tree keeps me going. Las Vegas is full of ghosts. Suicides, mostly. They taste all right."

Stewart wrapped a paper towel around my palm to stanch the bleeding. The fluid in my gla.s.s tasted like cement and nitro, with too much sugar.

Stewart said, "So why is he coming after Jackie now?"

She shrugged. "Jackie came here? Jackie caught his attention? Jackie's a better source of power than I ever was? I can feel my head filling back up again; I think he must be letting me alone."

"You know the circus is in town?" It was mean of me to ask that way, just drop it in her lap and see what she did.

What she did was blanch. "They don't want to hear from me."

"If there was bad blood," Stewart said softly, "I think they've forgotten it now. Why would all this start happening while your family is here?"

"Jeff," she said. "I think he was waiting to bring you to me. Because I couldn't have made much sense, unless you caught me just at the right time. You would have needed what my family could tell you. And Eli-Eli's used so many women up."

"Not just women," Stewart said, with a sidelong glance at me.

I drank another swallow of sweet tea and Jeff Soble. "I wonder," I said, "if he's using me to get to something in particular. You wonder, if Vegas forgets stuff but I remember it-what happens to the parts of Vegas that I don't remember?"

"Martin Powers," Stewart said, without hesitation.

I remembered the newspaper. And nodded. "He's trying to protect his grandson," I said. "Martin Powers is up on racketeering charges. He'll lose his gambling license. But Vegas is the city of second acts. We'll forgive anything, as long as you give us half a chance to forget it."

"And he can make the city forget," Stewart said.

"Well," I answered, sipping my tea, "he can make me forget. And Vegas forgets easier than I do."

Tires crunched on the gravel drive.

Not just one set, but many.

Powers's men surrounded the house and knocked on the door. Branka and I both gulped down the last mouthfuls of our tea before we filed out and went quietly. Every bit helps, right?

Well, maybe sometimes.

Most of the cars waiting for us were black sedans, but parked closest to the house was a limousine with Babylon Casino plates and a very polite driver who held the door wide. The implied arrogance never changes: No one can touch me here.

One of the gentlemen in black suits with an earpiece rode with us. I noticed that the bulletproof gla.s.s was up between the pa.s.senger compartment and the cab.

A long ride through rush hour followed. Vegas's gridlock starts in the afternoon and persists into evening, and it seemed like we sat through most of it. A tractor trailer had jackknifed in the Spaghetti Bowl. I guess those effortless car rides only happen in movies.

The Tower of Babylon rose through a veil of transplanted jungle foliage and piped-in orchid scent to sc.r.a.pe a desert sky burned almost colorless by the Nevada sun. Visible the entire length of the Las Vegas Strip, it collapsed in fire and fury six times daily, six days a week, wind conditions permitting.

For a premium, you could ride it down.

Gold-gla.s.s ziggurats flanked it on either side. Shaded pathways led from the summer-scorched sidewalk and the broiling asphalt of the Strip through glades and grottoes, beside a bubbling piped waterfall. There was a slidewalk, for those who found the hundred meters or so under misters and date palms too far to walk in the Las Vegas heat.

The chattering monkeys caged behind "invisible" fencing on either side of the path were New World varieties, though most of the tourists could be counted on not to notice that, and the mossy ruined temples they played amongst were more Southeast Asian than Mesopotamian in character, but-authenticity aside-the "Hanging Gardens of Babylon" were a landscape designer's masterpiece. A bare few feet from the bustle of the Strip, the plants and animals-the palm trees also teemed with brightly colored birds-and the chuckling water and the architectural sound-damping introduced a sort of mystic hush. Even the tourists walked through with lowered voices.

We didn't. We came around the back, in the smoked-gla.s.s limousine, through a concealed gate that opened to the flash of the telemetry device clipped to the sun visor. I don't know if it chirped: The bulletproof gla.s.s was up.

The limousine rolled silently into a tunnel jeweled with lanterns, and the gate scrolled shut behind us. Branka made a noise like one of those monkeys in distress, and Stewart squeezed her arm. I wished he'd squeeze mine, too, but not enough to whimper for attention.

When the limo rolled to a halt, I could fool myself that what I felt was relief, but really it was a cold, shallow kind of fear that sloshed over me like river water. Our silent warden-he hadn't acknowledged anyone's presence since he sat-reached for the door. He rose and ushered us out. We stepped onto plush carpet and stood blinking in the VIP tunnel of the Babylon Hotel and Casino.

Ornate doors paneled with mock ivory relief swung wide. Branka squeezed my hand with her salamander-damp one and drew me forward. I shook my head. I was the One-Eyed Jack, genius of Las Vegas. I could see magic and talk to ghosts. The City of Suicides was mine to protect. I didn't need to be afraid of ...

I leaned over and spoke into Stewart's ear. "Stewart?"

"Shh," he said, and I dropped my voice as we walked forward, escorted by more men with earpieces and dark suits.

I said, "What am I afraid of?"

The look he gave me was sad and bottomless. "Do you remember why we're here?"

I should. I just had. I knew it was on the tip of my tongue. "Powers," I said. "He's making me forget."

We three moved forward in the middle of a ring of security, as they led us along the tunnel to an elevator. I felt like a rock star on the way to the gallows.

"What are we going to do about it?" Stewart asked.

I looked down at my hands and shook my head. "Not let him?"

"Good plan," Stewart said, as the doors chimed. "Let's see what we can do about managing that."

In the tiny paneled elevator, Branka's sour sweat overpowered the piped-in aroma of gardenias and orchids, some functionary's idea of how Babylon smelled. Were there such things as scent designers? Our ride-whisper-silent, crowded, tense-terminated in the penthouse, where, still ringed by all those refugees from The Matrix, we were herded forward onto oriental carpets, myself in the middle and Branka and Stewart one to each side.

I thought I knew what to expect. Eli Powers was as old as Las Vegas, but-in his rare television appearances-getting around under his own power, though wizened and leaning heavily on two crutches. I thought I would find an old man relying on a mechanized chair in the comfort of his own home. Instead, a man in his forties came forward to meet us, hair just graying at the temples, light eyes bright behind bifocals. He extended his hand, focusing a little behind me, and I accepted the handshake.

"Martin Powers," he lied.

"Jackie," I answered. "This is Stewart. Branka you already know. Tell me your right name, Mr. Powers."

He glanced from me to Stewart, and then to the half dozen hotel-security operatives standing behind us. Whatever the gesture he made, they understood it and withdrew to the edge of the thirty-foot living room. Out of earshot but not out of range.

They wouldn't have done it if Powers wasn't armed.

"I will do you the honor of not pretending I don't understand you," Eli Powers said through his grandson's mouth. "You're the Genii of Las Vegas."

"And you used to be Eli Powers," Stewart said, and stuck his hand out.

With apparent equanimity, Powers shook it, then let his own hand fall to his side. "For my own use, later on-what gave me away?"

"Logic," Stewart answered. He stepped forward, not close enough to impinge on Powers's personal s.p.a.ce but close enough to demand his attention. Making himself the spokesperson, taking the focus off me. That meant that he expected me to figure out what to do about Powers.

Did I mention that Stewart is the smart one?

He folded his hands in the small of his back, tipped his head like a saucy girl, and continued, "You're a mnemophage. You've kept yourself alive all these years by eating up the memories of anyone you could trick into giving consent-and the memories of the city itself. Wives, children-you have a legal claim on them, don't you, Eli? It's enough to get a grip on them with sorcery. And Las Vegas itself-how much of it do you own, in your own name or through proxies?"

"Enough," Eli said, smiling tightly. He looked interested-wouldn't any narcissist, confronted with someone enumerating his accomplishments?-but unconcerned. I hoped that was dangerous arrogance on his part and not justified confidence.

Stewart didn't glance at me. He took a step to the left, further dividing Eli's attention. But I couldn't rush him. Nothing physical would work under these circ.u.mstances; it would only earn us each a bullet.

Stewart clicked his tongue. His left hand, as if without his attention, made a dismissive flip. He said, "So did you just eat up Martin totally and move into his head like a hermit crab switching sh.e.l.ls?"

The turn of phrase conjured up a horrible image, a pincered brain heaving itself from skull to skull, slimed with cerebrospinal fluid. I flinched, hard, and had to bite my cheek to get my face under control again. I edged my head sideways to catch Branka's eye, hoping for inspiration, but she had her hand pressed against her mouth, gaze fixed on Powers. Her lips moved, shaping words. I don't remember.

Eli smiled. It was a good smile-honest, interested. I would have voted for him.

"Martin made a very great sacrifice on my behalf," he said, making it sound for all the world as if his grandson had given him a kidney or something. Branka's hand reached out, clutched on my wrist. I can't remember anything.

I cleared my throat, which was pretty dry right then, and said, "Let them go, Eli."

Stewart started, so caught up in his performance he had forgotten what he was stalling for. He and Powers both swiveled. I squared my shoulders and said, "What you want from me is the city, isn't it? You want Vegas to forget why it's angry. You want it to remember only what's best about you." I breathed. "You want the love back, don't you, Eli?"

He stared for a moment and then his lips pressed thin and he nodded. "We only want the same thing," he said. "What's best for Vegas. I'm glad you see that, Jackie."

"Let them go," I said. "And I'll let you have it all."

"You have my word of honor," he said. "But you give me what I want first."

I had to pull my hand out of Branka's, though she clutched at my fingers like a child. Despite the air-conditioning, I rubbed slick palms on my trouser legs before I came forward to meet Powers. "Jackie," Stewart said, "don't-"

"Stewart. I got this. Really."

He didn't want to back down. Branka rocked on her heels, moaning softly, but I couldn't help. There was no way to give her back what she'd lost, no way to make it easier for her. In the real world, there are no reset b.u.t.tons, no epiphantic healings.

If I were a decent human being instead of a city, I'd have noticed her pain and done something about it years ago. But that's not the way I operate, and I'm not sure there's anything anyone can do to make that change.

"What's the deal?" Powers asked.

"I give you my memories of you," I said. "And you let my friends go."

"He won't stop," Branka insisted. I put the back of my hand against her upper arm.

"No tricks," Powers said.