Outlanders 36 Refuge by James Axler

Author:James Axler
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 17

Brigid's breath condensed on the glass of the carriage window as she watched the evening streets of Gloriana roll by. She almost expected frost to form. It was unlikely; the window was double glazed for insulation, and the doors sealed with synthetic gaskets. It was quite warm inside the luxurious interior.

Outside it was cold. The people hurried against wind, clutching threadbare garments close about them, holding their rounded little hats to their heads. Although it was but early September, winter came early at these latitudes, her hosts had told her. Earlier than it once had; though long ago, the records showed it. It seemed to be another byproduct of the Great Change, although the tremendous nuclear winter caused by the Destructor's passage should have ended within a few years, as skydark in Brigid's home line.

Brigid was growing frustrated. Mornings, in the weeks since arriving in Gloriana, she had passed by reading mostly newspapers and history books, and in mild exercise on the extensive palace grounds. Evenings she dined alone or with quietly convivial groups of male and female courtiers evidently selected to put her at her ease and engage her in conversation she would not find boring: the art, culture, history and current events of this world.

In fact she found it fascinating and did enjoy it; she also took for granted her clever companions all reported her every word promptly to hegemonic intelligence. She knew far more than she liked about the ways and wiles of internal security. Domi's accusations, she still believed, had sprung from paranoia fueled by her near pathological hatred of authority. But Brigid took for granted her charming hosts were spying on her. From their perspective it was a matter of survival.

Out on the street a pair of men with close-cropped hair and beards and black-and-white-striped prisoner's attire scrubbed at a stone wall under the supervision of a stone-faced police officer in blue uniform and helmet with a strap beneath his lower lip. They were apparently trying to efface a stylized but rather surprisingly detailed graffito of a white rose.

Brigid pressed her nose to the glass. She had begun to notice symbols chalked on walls in white, but never before had been close enough to see clearly what they were.

An intercom connected the interior of the carriage with the driver's box up front and on top. Brigid had never used it. She wondered now, with a vague pang of guilt, if perhaps she did identify too strongly with the rulers here and look their servants and other commoners for granted.

She pressed the button. "Yes, marm," a voice said promptly from the golden grid.

She leaned her face toward the pickup. She knew such devices were neither powerful nor sensitive. "That symbol those men are cleaning off that wall," she said. "Can you tell me what it's all about, please?"

A pause, as static crackled. Miles-Burnham had assured her they were caused in this world by micropotentialities, differences in the probability stream resolving themselves. It struck her with sudden chill that perhaps the topic was impolitic, even forbidden.

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