10: The Noble Weapon

3 Pluvo 712, 7:13 a.m. (XIII)

Jon opened his eyes and stared into the soft darkness of his curtained four-poster. This is the one, he told himself. This is the one you make real.

The expected protest rose in his mind: there was no reason for this iteration to be the one, or for any to ever be the one. Every iteration could be replaced. He could do anything (or nothing) today, and it would not matter. No one would even know.

He blanked his mind before the protest could gain purchase. He put his palms on the floor, then lifted his feet and stood on his hands. He took a deep, slow breath, then launched himself into the air and landed on his feet again. He shed his robe and began a series of stretches, followed by a series of calisthenics. He alternated muscle groups until every muscle was exhausted, permitting no thought other than counting repetitions.

Jon opened the wardrobe and examined his sweat-streaked body in its mirrors. Like a man who stares into an abyss until his vertigo has passed, he stared at his own flesh until he felt no affinity for it. This is my body, he said to himself, and he meant, This is the body which I control. The coming day was a puzzle that he had already solved; he would guide this body through the steps of the solution. His self, whatever that was, his soul, if there was such a thing, would sit like a devil on his own shoulder, whispering in his own ear.

“Bitali!” he called into the speaking tube.

“Yes, sir?” it answered.

“Clothes. Bring me an outfit tagged for recreation, something with lots of blue or green in it, preferably both.”

Jon did not know what clothes the Great Detective would wear, but he knew what clothes Lowdous de Cynd would expect the Great Detective to wear. Cynd, a man of independent ideas who had ridden the tsunami of the Technological Revolution to wealth while most businessmen of his generation had been destroyed by it — Cynd would respect a man whose highest value was respect for himself, a man of hot ego contained by cold rationality. His Great Detective would be more concerned with keeping his mind at peak focus than with impressing clients, so he would dress for his own comfort, in clothes suitable for meditation or exercise. The cut would be simple, which would increase the importance of color. The colors would be those of outmoded gods, to subtly suggest atheism.

Having constructed this version of the character, his choice of hairstyle was obvious: he would wear his hair down and loose, so that it could be quickly swept into a ponytail.

* * *

“Good morning, Anna.”

“Good morning, Mr. Alder. How was your vacation?”

“Pleasant. How is your son?”

“Simon is fine.”

“Good. I’m glad that your employment with me is beneficial to him.”

“It is, sir.”

“Anna, I have made one of my rare errors. Diligent as you are, I’m sure you already noticed it. The leaked documents case for the Mayor of Orotarbo…”

She met his eye to show that she knew what he was talking about. He gave her a smirk to show that he knew embarrassment would be appropriate in this situation, but that he was not embarrassed. The Great Detective was never embarrassed.

“Smooth it over,” Jon commanded.

“Yes, sir.”

For the next forty minutes Jon pretended to be interested in Anna’s summation of his finances, and her descriptions of the prospective clients she had arranged for him to meet. He did not allow himself to question how convincing his act was or how much of Anna’s response was reciprocal acting. He simply fulfilled her expectations. If nothing he said struck her as out of character, then he would have succeeded, and he could move on to the next task.

“Thank you, Anna. Excellent work as always,” Jon said when she had finished. “Now, I don’t want to cancel the other appointments, but I have already decided that I will be taking Lowdous de Cynd’s case. I suspect that the disappearance of Mrs. Cynd is related to another matter that has been on my mind. Have you ever heard of Vivdauro?”

“Vivdauro?” Anna said, startled by the sudden change of topic. “Uh… yes… It’s a logistics company. They provide services to other corporations.”

“What sorts of services?”

“I don’t recall.”

“I want you to go through your files and pull everything you have about Vivdauro, especially anything relating Vivdauro to Cynd Ceramics. Make a folder and leave it on your desk. I’ll read it tonight.”

“Yes, sir.”

“And Anna… I really do appreciate the work you do for me. I know that the conditions of your employment can be stressful, but we are making a fortune together, you and I, and when I retire, you will receive a fair share.”

“I look forward to that, sir.”

* * *

There had been a period in which Jon was intensely interested in religion. He had read every holy book he could lay hands on (which, as far as knew, was all of them) hoping that one would explain his non-mortality. Any religion that did not acknowledge the Emperor as its chief deity was illegal, but many cults flourished quietly, like rats scavenging beneath a high table. The largest cult was Restorationism, and Jon had had little trouble finding its literature.

The Restorationists believed in a god who was omniscient, knowing everything, and also omnipotent, able to do anything. Jon saw how this sort of god might appeal to weak and fearful people, but to him it was an absurd contradiction. Choice required ignorance. A being who knew everything would know the optimal path to achieving any goal, and it would be obligated to follow that path. This all-knowing being might still choose its goals, but the Restorationist god was morally perfect, which meant that its goals were also obligatory. If this god, due to its perfection and omniscience, could not choose its goals or its means of achieving them, then it was just a leaf in a stream, and calling it “omnipotent” was nonsense.

A feeling of godly indifference grew in Jon as the day passed. He knew the optimal path, so there were no choices to make. Manipulating everyone, he was manipulated by everyone. Controlling everything, he controlled nothing.

When Jon met with Cynd that afternoon, he complimented the craftsmanship of his flintlock pistol, and subtly prompted him to expound upon it. This led to discussion of aspects of the world which were permanent or unchanging. This led to discussion of reincarnation, with its stable cycles. Jon mused that if the Emperor were indeed the First Sage — a man with an essentially infinite lifespan, even if it were divided into innumerable embodiments — then the soul of the Emperor experienced a linear permanence, which was quite different from the cyclical permanence of unenlightened souls. Jon hinted that he viewed this as a contradiction, hinting that he might therefore be open to unorthodox models of ensoulment. Cynd glanced at Jon’s blue and green robe. And so when Cynd revealed his belief that Beatrace was the reincarnation of Bernice, it seemed like a natural evolution of the conversation, as if Beatrace were a topic that had come up spontaneously, not because she was the explicit subject of discussion.

They agreed that Jon would investigate Beatrace’s disappearance, but he requested that they meet again the following morning to discuss details. Cynd left swinging his cane, clearly satisfied.

Jon ordered Bitali to cook supper, then left the house and walked to the smithy of Korvo de Lirio, nodding politely to people he passed. The smithy was closed for the evening. Jon had expected this. He knocked on the door of the residence, and Cycil de Sturn answered. Jon asked politely what time tomorrow he might speak to Korvo. Cycil retreated, then returned a minute later with an answer of noon. Jon thanked the boy, then returned home and ate the steamed vegetables and fried duck that Bitali had made for him.

Jon excused Bitali for the rest of the evening, then went into Anna’s office. As expected, a folder labeled “Vivdauro” sat on her desk. He took it and was about to leave the room, when a whim struck him. He went back to her desk and began opening drawers, looking for her copy of The Testament of the Resurrection. He did not find it; she must have taken it home with her. He shrugged and went upstairs.

It was eight o’clock. Jon would go to bed at ten. Just before bed, he would set a net. Doing this, he would validate the iteration of 3 Pluvo that he had just lived. This one would be the real 3 Pluvo, the one that would be part of the world’s history, the one that Anna and Cynd and everyone else would remember. All of the other iterations — the 3 Pluvo in which he tortured Jorcyn de Liist, the 3 Pluvo in which he contrived for Anna to become Cynd’s hostage, the 3 Pluvo in which he broke the legs off his chair — only he would remember those. They would be his private hallucinations. The 3 Pluvo in which he was the Great Detective everyone expected him to be — clever, dignified, disciplined, erudite — only that would be real.

He needed to prepare for his meeting with Cynd in the morning. At that meeting, he intended to tell Cynd that he suspected Beatrace’s disappearance was related to Vivdauro, and that he would be traveling to Argintarbo, not Norbus, to investigate. He needed to invent a convincing explanation for why he believed this. So after he set his bedtime net, he would break into Cynd’s hotel and interrogate Cynd, Marle, and Hanns, forcing them to tell everything they knew about Vivdauro. With details extracted from them, he should be able to create his explanation. Then he would fall back a final time, and he would go to bed. In the morning he would set a new net, erasing the nights he had spent burgling and torturing, and validating the night he had slept.

Jon sat on the floor and opened Anna’s folder. It was thin — there must have been little information on Vivdauro in her files — but it was enough to keep him occupied for an hour. The hour after that he spent in silent meditation, keeping his mind empty of all thoughts. At ten o’clock he set a net and went to his wardrobe.

* * *

4 Pluvo 712, 7:07 a.m. (IV)

Jon sat up in bed, feeling confident. The third iteration of the meeting had gone smoothly, but elements of it had felt unnatural. Among other things, he had asked for Marle and Hanns to be in the room. He had wanted to gauge their reactions to certain things he said to Cynd, but there was no real reason for them to be there. With a few refinements, the fourth iteration should be perfect.

“When we spoke yesterday,” Jon said to Cynd, in the parlor two hours later, “certain details of your case seemed familiar to me. I did not mention them at the time because I did not want to speculate, but after consulting records of my previous cases, I am confident.”

Cynd arched his eyebrows but said nothing. Despite having already promised the case to Jon, his attitude this morning was aloof and skeptical. Jon knew from experience that Cynd was actually both impressed and curious, but anticipatory silence was the only way he expressed such things.

Jon continued: “Are you familiar with a corporation called Vivdauro, headquartered in Argintarbo?”

Cynd’s face darkened at the mention of the name. “I am,” he said.

“Vivdauro is unusual in that it does not produce any physical product. It only licenses designs to other corporations. It is almost unknown to the public, but most corporations — including Cynd Ceramics — use its designs and pay large royalties to it. The use of Vivdauro designs is, in fact, so widespread that it profits from almost every product sold in the Empire.”

“How do you know any of that?” Cynd asked.

Jon said nothing. He looked Cynd in the eye until the old man nodded, giving him permission to continue.

“Some time ago,” Jon said, “one of my corporate clients (you understand I can’t say which) developed a product that was in direct competition with a design Vivdauro was licensing. Vivdauro put the owner of that corporation under intense pressure to sell the design to them rather than retain it for himself. That pressure was in the form of kidnapping.”

“You think Beatrace was kidnapped by Vivdauro?” Cynd exclaimed, leaning forward in his chair.

“Has Cynd Ceramics been developing anything that Vivdauro might see as a threat to its profits?”

Cynd glared at the floor, then at the wall before answering. “Yes,” he said, “but I haven’t gotten any demands from Vivdauro, or from anyone! If Beatrace has been kidnapped, then why isn’t someone demanding a ransom?”

“There are several possibilities. Some of them may be difficult for you to consider.”

“What do you mean?”

“It is possible that no ransom has been demanded because Beatrace is dead.”

“Then I’ll kill whoever did it! Find out who!”

“It is also possible that Beatrace was complicit in her own kidnapping. She may have been coerced into stealing information from you — surely in the belief that she was protecting you somehow — and no ransom has been demanded because her captors already have what they want.”

“Beatrace would never steal from me.”

“She may be motivated by circumstances of which we are unaware. Can you tell me about the product you were making, the one that Vivdauro may have felt threatened by?”

“You think that’ll help you find Beatrace?”

“It might.”

Jon already knew all about Cynd’s secret product: void matrix ceramic, a material slightly lighter and much stronger that ordinary ceramic because of tiny cavities placed strategically throughout it. Any stress applied to an object made from the material would be channeled through the matrix of voids to be distributed evenly across the object’s entire bulk. It was ingenious, but Jon was not actually interested in it. He already knew that Beatrace had not stolen its designs. He also knew that she had not been kidnapped. But he needed a pretense for going to look for her in Argintarbo, a pretense that Cynd would accept.

Jon guided the conversation through strategically vague descriptions of his past dealings with Vivdauro, his suspicions about its influence over Beatrace, and his plans for how to find her location. This was all lies, but no one except Anna could have known. By the meeting’s end, Cynd was convinced that Jon had logical reasons for going directly to Argintarbo instead of beginning his investigation in Norbus, and so the meeting was a success. Cynd inquired about a contract, and Jon said that none was necessary: he trusted Cynd to pay him fairly when the job was done. Cynd was visibly impressed by this show of confidence, and so the meeting was doubly successful.

Cynd, Marle, and Hanns departed Jon’s house at eleven o’clock. This left him more than enough time to walk across town for his noon meeting with Korvo de Lirio.

As Jon approached Korvo’s, he noticed that, as on the previous day, the smoke from the smithy was defying the breeze to avoid the open windows of the house’s second story. He wondered if Gretel was still the one doing it, working the wind like a captain’s wife of old.

And it struck him that those days were still in living memory. Lowdous de Cynd had traveled on sail ships. Anna had owned a few, briefly. A magician standing in the prow of a ship, feeling the air, observing the evolutions of the clouds, discerning what winds might blow and intuiting the smallest change necessary to realize them — Jon was only one generation removed from this, but it felt like ancient history, like another world.

The smoke was a brazen defiance of Prohibition. Obvious. Public. But it did not seem defiant. It was simply magic being used as it had always been used, since prehistory, to ease the common hardships of life. It was simply people living — not modern people, with their fast, noisy machines made in distant fractories by means no one understood — people who lived at the pace of their own heartbeats, who knew the face of the neighbor who wove their cloth, and of the neighbor who raised the wool from which it was woven. Not so long ago every little town had had its own magician, who used magic in ways just like this. The world had changed. Korvo’s house had stayed the same. Did that make the house strange, or was it the only thing that was normal?

Jon felt his watch. Noon exactly. He entered the smithy.

Cycil sat behind the counter. As soon as he saw Jon, he leapt down from his stool and ran through the door that connected the smithy to the house. “He’s here, grandpa!” Jon heard the boy call. A moment later Korvo de Lirio came through the door, the smile he had given his grandson still crinkling his cheeks.

Jon had met Korvo before, talked to him before, but subjective years had dulled his impressions, and he felt as though he were seeing the man for the first time. The smith’s hair and beard were white, and his face was deeply lined, but he did not strike Jon as old. He moved with the confidence of youth, not the timidity of age, a man who expected his body to shape the world, not be injured by it. He wore simple trousers, and an uwagi with no undergarment, both black (to hide soot, Jon presumed). His rolled-up sleeves revealed muscular forearms.

“Mr. Alder! Welcome!” Korvo said. His voice was rough, but warm. A well-used voice. He gave a polite bow, which Jon returned. “What brings Nordarosso’s most famous citizen to my humble shop?”

“Your skill,” Jon said, “what else? I want you to make me a gun, something special.”

“A gun? I haven’t made a gun in a long time. I have made them, though. Not like the last time you came in, when you wanted a crossbow that would shoot a grappling hook. That was unique!”

Jon laughed. It was not until after he stopped laughing that he remembered the crossbow, or what he had used it for.

Korvo continued: “My grandson, Cycil, wants to be a detective like you. He saw me making that grapple shooter, so he thinks a detective is someone who sails over rooftops and swings off towers. I told him a detective is a person who finds missing things, and grappling hooks don’t work like that. But you know how kids are. Everything is exciting to them. But your job really is exciting, isn’t it? Is there any truth in those books about you? Grettel (that’s my youngest daughter) was thinking about getting Cycil that new one, Five Great Cases of Johannes de Alder. Is that any good?”

“I haven’t read it.”

Korvo laughed. “Well, if the books are true, then you’re too busy to read them, right? If you really solve an impossible mystery every month, you must barely have time to piss! You’re probably annoyed that I’m wasting your time right now.”

“Ha! Um…”

“That’s the spirit of this age, though, isn’t it? Everyone tries to do so much that they can’t remember what they’ve done!

“So you want a special gun?” Korvo said, conspicuously changing the subject. “You must know that a village smith can’t make guns that are more powerful than what Tencaj or Anberg make in their factories. So you must want a gun that is more beautiful?”

“Yes. I met with a client today who is the owner of an elegant flintlock pistol. A work of art! It made me jealous.”

“A flintlock? That would be fun to make! With a flintlock, all the functional parts are on the outside, so the decorations can compliment the functions. The parts can be decorations. You can’t do that with an automatic. With an automatic, all you see is the case.”

“I’ll meet you halfway. What I want is a single-shot pistol, small enough to conceal in a palm, but with a large bore. Easy to carry. Lethal at close range.”

“A suicide gun.”

An icy shock shot up Jon’s spine. He felt as if Korvo had suddenly (but very gently) wrapped a hand around his throat. How could he know? He could not know. He was simply using a slang term; it meant nothing.

“Or an assassin’s gun,” Jon said, smiling to cover his discomfiture.

“Is that what it’s for?” Korvo asked. “Are you going to assassinate someone?”

“No…”

“Of course if you were going to assassinate someone, you wouldn’t tell me, because then you’d have to kill me, and then you wouldn’t get your gun,” Korvo chuckled. “What’s it for, though?”

“Does it matter what it’s for?”

“It does if you want it to be beautiful. A thing’s beauty is always related to its function. In the most beautiful things, the appearance describes the function. Tell me, Mr. Alder, what is the most beautiful thing in the world?”

An answer came to Jon immediately, but it seemed too obvious. He hesitated, trying to think of something more clever. “A woman?” he said, adding a hint of sarcasm to his tone in case Korvo judged this answer naive.

“A woman!” Korvo grinned. “A particular woman, or women generally?”

“I suppose that depends on if you’re in love with a particular woman.”

“In love? Hmph. Are you married, Mr. Alder?”

“I am… not.”

“I’m married. I’ve been married for fifty-two years. My wife, Pasera, her particularly: she is the most beautiful thing in the world. You wouldn’t recognize it. She’s all wrinkly and saggy. Her voice isn’t sweet like it used to be. And she’s sick: her lungs are failing. She doesn’t get out of bed much anymore. She’ll die soon.”

Korvo stopped speaking, leaving a silence that Jon felt obligated to fill. But Korvo had spoken so plainly that it invited no response. Ten seconds passed like ten minutes. Korvo continued:

“All peoples in all times in all places have agreed that woman is the most beautiful thing. If you go east to Sunland, or north to Palmurba, or all the way north to the ice cap, where people live their whole lives without ever seeing land — everyone says the same. But lots of other things are beautiful. Sunrise is beautiful. Silver is beautiful. Flowers. Animals. Men can be beautiful. But nothing is as beautiful as woman. Why is that?”

“It’s just how people are,” Jon said. “It’s just part of our psychology. Why does everyone like music?”

“Why does everyone like music?”

Jon shrugged.

“You call yourself a detective, and you haven’t found out why people like music?” Korvo’s tone was not mocking, but admonishing, like a schoolmaster urging a pupil to apply himself.

“Woman is the most beautiful thing,” Korvo continued, “because all other beauties are contingent upon her. Every person — every farmer, every warrior, every mother, father, artist, inventor, philosopher, visionary, every good cook, every man, woman, child — literature, art, culture, civilization — humanity! — all of it comes from the womb, and all of it is nurtured at the breast. A sunrise is nothing without eyes to see it. And where do eyes come from? Ears that hear, minds that understand, hands that create: it all comes through woman.  She is the bringer of beauties. That is her function, and her form describes her function. The qualities of woman that we admire — the softness of her skin, the curves of her silhouette, the tenderness of her gaze — these are the means by which the world is beautified, and so all the world’s beauties are nascent within them.”

“That’s very poetic,” Jon said.

“By which you mean ‘unimportant?’”

“No… I meant… What does this have to do with guns?”

“Not with guns. With your gun. Woman is the most beautiful thing. But woman is a concept, an abstraction, an ideal. You can’t have woman; you need a woman. And how do you have a woman? You can just hire a whore for a night, and that’s having a woman, yes?”

Jon opened his mouth to say “That depends,” but Korvo continued:

“No. Because a woman does not exist in a night. A woman exists in a lifetime, and it takes a man a lifetime to appreciate her. That is why Pasera, her particularly, is the most beautiful thing in the world. Because she is the woman who is woman to me, and so I see all the world’s beauty in her.”

“But couldn’t every man — every married man — say the same thing about his wife?”

“Yes!” Korvo exclaimed. “And they would all be right! It’s a wonderful system.”

“I see what you mean,” Jon said, not really seeing, but uncomfortable and wanting to move the conversation along.

“All beauty is derived from purpose,” Korvo said. “The more completely an object embodies its own purpose, the more beautiful it is. Weapons are not exempt from this principle: for a weapon to be beautiful, it must have a noble purpose, so that its form can describe that purpose. Every weapon’s function is to destroy, of course, but why does it destroy? Does it destroy to protect? To protect what? A home? A business? A nation? Does it destroy for sport? For vengeance? Perhaps it is a symbol that destroys ideas? I could scratch pretty doodles on the side of a gun, but I could scratch pretty doodles on anything. Without noble purpose, a weapon is just scrap for an engraver to practice on. So tell me, Johannes de Alder, what is your gun for?”

An unexpected dread grew in Jon as Korvo spoke. This question disturbed him. He did not understand why.

He could not answer honestly. That was nothing in itself: Jon lied to everyone as a matter of habit and routine. But his lies were always in service to his own agenda, calculated to bend others to his will. This question was forcing him to lie, and being forced to do anything made him feel violated, like he was the one being bent. Beneath that sense of violation was an absurd fear that, somehow, Korvo knew what he was asking.

Jon regretted that he had not set a net before coming here. He wanted to fall back and start the conversation over, assert control before Korvo could start his stupid rant about beauty and purpose. But if he fell back, it would be to that morning, and he would have to repeat his meeting with Cynd. He did not want to do that.

“The gun is for hopeless situations,” Jon said. “When it seems that I have been defeated, I can use this weapon to save myself.”

“So this weapon embodies survival to you. The opposite of a suicide gun: a survival gun.”

Again, Jon felt intruded upon, as if any answer to this question would reveal more than he wanted Korvo to know. He nodded acquiescently.

“So, you want a single-shot pistol, powerful, but small enough to easily conceal. You won’t be showing it off to anyone. It’s for your eyes. And when you look at it, it will remind you that there is no circumstance that can defeat you. That is what you see as your own essential quality, and this gun will embody that quality. You are the man who cannot be defeated, and this gun ensures that you never are.”

Korvo regarded Jon with an expression he could not place. The gaze was… pitying? That made no sense. Inviting? He must simply be waiting for Jon to comment…

“Close enough,” Jon said. “Is that description enough for you to start work?”

“It is,” Korvo said. He looked away. He seemed disappointed, like there was something he had wanted from Jon and not gotten. He picked up a tiny hammer and toyed with it for a moment before speaking again. “Do we need to talk about price?”

“No,” Jon answered. He smiled, relieved that the conversation seemed to be at an end. “I’m sure the quality of your work will match the quantity of your price.”

* * *

The rest of the day was spent preparing for the trip to Argintarbo. There was little that Jon really needed to bring. Anything he needed could be bought in the city — except for dams. There was a black market for dams, but not within cities, where prohibition wards were common, and Bureau agents were present (if not actually vigilant). He packed a small trunk that contained half a dozen dams, half a dozen guns, two outfits, cosmetics for disguises, and several sacks of silver and platinum coins. There was no need to give Anna or Bitali instructions: they knew how to manage the house and business while he was gone.

The preparations were mundane, but Jon felt an unfamiliar anxiety as he went about them, as if someone were watching him, as if he were being judged.