Evensong

1

Anwar sat in a formal garden in northern Malaysia on a pleasant September afternoon, reading. The Moving Finger writes; and, having writ, Moves on…He liked FitzGerald’s translation of Omar Khayyam, but felt it took liberties with the text; he preferred the original, in the cadences of twelfth-century Persian.

It was 4:00 p.m.: time. He closed the book and retreated back under the roof of his verandah, just as the afternoon rain began with its usual promptness and intensity. While he watched it he performed one of his standard exercises: using the fingers of his right hand to break, one by one, the fingers of his left hand. The core of the exercise was not to blank out the pain—though his abilities were such that he could have done that, too—but to feel the pain and still not react to it, either by noise or by movement, as each finger was bent back beyond the vertical and snapped. It was a familiar exercise and he finished it satisfactorily.

The rain stopped, as promptly and suddenly as it had begun. He leaned back, breathing in the scent of wet leaves and grass. A brief gust of wind shook rain from the trees, so that it sounded, for a few seconds, like another downpour beginning. He cupped his right hand round his left, easing his fingers back to their normal position, and waited for the bones to set and regenerate; it would take about an hour.

It was not unheard-of for a VSTOL from the UN to land on the formal lawn at the centre of his garden, but it was not something which happened often. This was one of their latest, silent and silvered and almost alien. A door melted open in its side and a dark-haired young woman got out and walked across the lawn towards Anwar. She was Arden Bierce, one of Rafiq’s personal staff, and they smiled a greeting at each other.

“Rafiq wants you.” She handed him a letter. He studied Rafiq’s neat italic handwriting, not unlike his own, and the courteously phrased request and personal signature. When Rafiq made this kind of request, he did so by pen and ink and personal meeting. Never remotely, and never electronically.

“I should go now.” He was telling her, not asking her. She nodded and turned back to the waiting VSTOL. Anwar Abbas stood up, stretched, and walked after her. He was as powerful as a tiger, as quiet as the flame of a candle.

Offer and Acceptance. The VSTOL would take him south to the UN complex outside Kuala Lumpur, where Laurens Rafiq, the Controller-General, would formally offer him a mission and request his acceptance. Anwar Abbas had received such requests before from Rafiq, but this one would be different. It would lead him to two people, one of them his beginning and the other his end.

2

Anwar liked the VSTOL, almost to the point of kinship; it was quiet, did exactly what it was supposed to do, and did it supremely well. It was even superior to America’s Area 51 planes, and their Chinese and European equivalents.

There was a growing concern in some quarters that the UN was developing better hardware than its members. Another example, Anwar reflected, of the Rafiq Effect.

The northern highlands of Malaysia hurtled past under-neath. They were heavily wooded, and seemed to be smoking without flames; vapour from the last downpour, hanging above treetop level. He clenched and unclenched his left hand.

“Is it healed?” Arden Bierce asked him.

He smiled. “The Moving Finger breaks, and having broke, resets itself.”

“Don’t you mean ‘broken’?” “Wouldn’t scan.”

He liked her; she had this ability to make people feel comfortable around her. She was very attractive, but seemed genuinely unaware of it. Most people born with looks like that would be shaped by them; would probably be cynical or manipulative. She was neither. Perceptive and clever in her dealings with people, but also pleasant and companionable.

Anwar had never done any more than flirt mildly with her. He was awkward socially, the result of having a normal circle of acquaintances but few close friends. Only about thirty people in the world knew what he was.

He leaned back and watched the shapes and colours moving just under the silvered surfaces of the walls and furniture of the VSTOL’s lounge. It would be a short flight. The UN complex outside Kuala Lumpur would soon appear.

The UN had adapted to the increasing complexity and volatility of the world order. It had a Secretary-General(political) and a Controller-General (executive). As it gradually took on more executive functions, the Controller-General became more important, at the expense of the Secretary-General. The Controller-General was Laurens Rafiq.

The old UN in New York still remained, but Rafiq’s UNEX (UN Executive) in Kuala Lumpur was overtaking it— restructuring the major agencies like UNESCO, UNICEF, UNIDO, and transforming them. Policy was still in the hands of the old UN, but it was becoming apparent that policy was meaningless without executive rigour. The medium was overtaking the message.

Rafiq had acquired many assets at UNEX. Not only the agencies, but also some independent military capacity—not enough to make the UN more powerful than any of its individual members, but enough to settle some of the increasing conflicts over resources, energy, borders, and trade. Often Rafiq’s UNEX would take pre-emptive action which later the political UN had to ratify—had to, because the action worked.

One of the smaller and more mysterious components of Rafiq’s UNEX was something he called The Consultancy, known colloquially (and inaccurately) as The Dead. Its members did things for him which mere Special Forces could never do. Outside UNEX, nobody knew exactly how many Consultants Rafiq had, but it was only a handful. This was because only a handful could survive the induction process, and because only a handful was all that even Rafiq could afford.

Their training, and the physical and neurological enhancements which made them unique, were uniquely expensive.

Anwar Abbas was a Consultant: one of The Dead.

Dusk fell quickly and was short-lived, turning abruptly to darkness in the few minutes’ duration of the flight. Anwar got only a glimpse of the lights of the UN complex before the silvered plane dropped vertically and landed—or, rather, hovered politely one inch above the ground while they stepped out through the door that had rippled open for them. What enabled it to hover was something to do with room-temperature semiconductors, the Holy Grail of frictionless motion: not fully achieved yet, but getting closer.

The plane slid noiselessly up into the night. For the second time, Anwar found himself following Arden Bierce across a lawn. This lawn was part of the park which formed the centre of the UN complex.

Ringing the park were some tall buildings, each a different shape and colour: ziggurats, pyramids, cones, ovoids. Each stood in its own smaller piece of manicured parkland, and was festooned with greenery hanging from walls and windows and balconies. The overall effect was pleasing, without the pomp of the old UN buildings in New York and Geneva; more like the commercial district of any reasonably prosperous city. Kuala Lumpur, a few miles south, was similar but larger-scale.

The central parkland had lawns and woods, landscaped low hills and a river, over which was cantilevered the Controller-General’s house, Fallingwater. It was based on Frank Lloyd Wright’s design, scaled up, but still house-sized.

The security around this building, of all the buildings in the complex, appeared to be nonexistent, the way Rafiq had personally designed it to appear. They simply walked up to the front door and rang the doorbell. The door opened into a large reception area.

“I’ll go and tell him you’re here,” said Arden Bierce as she went through an adjoining door, usually known as the door because it led to Rafiq’s inner office.

Anwar looked around him. He knew Fallingwater well, and found it calming. The interior of the house was larger than Wright’s original, but furnished and decorated in the same style: comfortable and understated, a mix of regular and organic shapes, of autumn browns and ochres and earth tones. Large areas of the floor were open expanses of polished wood, with seating areas formed by clusters of plain stone-white sofas and armchairs. Several people were there, talking quietly. They were all members of Rafiq’s personal staff, like Arden Bierce, but only a few of them looked up as he entered.

The rest paid him no attention.

Except for Miles Levin. He and Anwar had known each other for years, and they exchanged their usual greeting.

“Muslim filth.”

“Jewish scum.”

Their Muslim and Jewish origins, if any, were no longer important. They had taken their present names, along with their present identities, when they became Consultants.

Which they had done at the same time, seven years ago. Levin was six feet five, nearly three inches taller than

Anwar, and more powerfully built. He looked generally younger and stronger, and was—for a Consultant—louder and more outgoing. Anwar was thin-faced, with a hook nose. Levin’s face was broader and more open. Both were dark-haired and wore their hair long.

“Waiting to see him?” Anwar asked.

“I’ve seen him. Offer and Acceptance. I was just leaving.”

Normally they’d have had a lot to talk about, but not this time. They couldn’t discuss missions, that simply wasn’t done; and also, Anwar noted a strangeness in Levin’s manner, a kind of preoccupation. So he just nodded briefly at him,and

Levin turned to go.

“Take care,” something prompted Anwar to whisper.

Levin heard. “You too.” He did not look back.

“Scum.”

“Filth.” The door closed softly behind him.

Another door—the door—opened. Arden Bierce came out.

“He’ll see you now.”

3

Laurens Rafiq was of Dutch and Moroccan parentage. He was a small, neat man, quiet-spoken like Anwar. He was not the UN’s first Controller-General, but was by far its most effective. Even the enemies he had made during his ascendancy conceded that.

“Thank you for coming so promptly, Mr. Abbas.” Rafiq motioned to a chair, and Anwar sat down. “I want to offer you a mission. May I describe it?”

“Please.”

“First,I should tell you this. It involves bodyguard duties.” Anwar spoke carefully, to mask his surprise. “We don’t

usually do that, Mr. Rafiq. Even for you.”

“This isn’t for me, it’s for someone else.”

His surprise turned to anger. For someone else? Playing for time, and trying to compose himself, Anwar gazed round

Rafiq’s office. Like the original Fallingwater, and the reception outside, it was spacious and understated and restful. But it didn’t relax him. This is wrong, he thought. Special Forces, mere Special Forces, do bodyguard duties. Not us. Asking a Consultant to do that is like…

“It must be like asking Shakespeare to write greeting card verses,” Rafiq said. “I know how you feel.

“But there’s a UN resources summit next month. Several member states attending have been, or still are, at war with each other over water rights. A volatile subject, and security will be a concern. Also, the usual venues might offend political sensibilities. So the New Anglicans have offered us the conference centre attached to their Cathedral in Brighton, on the south coast of England.”

“I know where Brighton is, Mr. Rafiq,” Anwar said. “I go to bookfairs there.”

“Yes, I’d forgotten.” He hadn’t. He wanted to give Anwar a minor point now, to help the dynamics later. “So. The New Anglicans’ offer is tempting. Their Cathedral complex, with conference centre and hotels, is large and well-equipped.And, most important for security, it’s at the end of a two-mile-long ocean pier. But there’s a price.”

Rafiq paused, not for dramatic effect but because what he said next could lead to something unprecedented, a Consultant refusing a mission.

“Olivia del Sarto has asked for a Consultant to attend her during the nine days of the summit, starting October 15.

Apparently she’s always wanted one of The Dead—” he spoke the phrase with distaste “—as her personal bodyguard.”

Olivia del Sarto, thought Anwar, still somehow masking his feelings. Archbishop of the New Anglicans. And Archbitch: brilliant and offensive, with her hidden political and financial backers and her sexual appetites and her foul ginger cat. The sexual appetites and the cat were familiar parts of her media persona. She consistently refused to tone down the former, or to have the latter castrated. He’d seen her, again and again, on the news channels. This is wrong. One of us, as a fashion accessory for her?

“She’s asked you for something you shouldn’t give. We only do things for you. For the Controller-General.”

Rafiq said nothing, just waited for Anwar to continue. He knew when to pause and when to press. So did Anwar, but with Anwar it came from enhancement and training. With Rafiq it came naturally.

“It’s the heart of the compact. Any mission you offer us must be impossible for anyone else. And only for you. This doesn’t qualify on either count.”

Again Rafiq waited.

Anwar stood up suddenly, shockingly fast, and glared down at Rafiq. “Occasionally, very occasionally, if there was exceptional risk, we’d do bodyguard duties for you or the

Secretary-General. This is different! You want me to nurse that—that person, because you’ve done a deal with her for a conference venue?”

With Anwar still towering above him Rafiq thought, I’m alone with one of The Dead, and I’ve seriously annoyed him. Be careful with this one, he’s obsessive. Likes everything just so. >But still he said nothing.

“You negotiated with her? You let her have one of us, as a fashion accessory?”

Still Rafiq said nothing.

Anwar added, “And she must have security people of her own.”

Got him. Rafiq smiled. “She has. Mere Special Forces, as you would say, but they’re good. I doubt whether you’ll either add to her safety, or uncover anything her people may have missed. Also, she’s not a participant in the summit, only the host. The national leaders and UN officials are more likely to be targets, and they too will have their own security.”

“Including you?”

“I won’t be there. This is political, not executive, so the Secretary-General will go.” Rafiq rarely referred to the Secretary-General by name; he had already outlasted three of them.

Something’s threatening her, Anwar thought suddenly. Something beyond the abilities of her own security people, so she wants one of us. And whatever it is, it’s specific to the summit, because she only wants me for the nine days.

“You’ve just assigned Miles Levin. Are our missions connected?”

“You know I can’t answer that.” Rafiq knew that they genuinely weren’t connected, but even if he’d said so he doubted that Anwar would believe him. Anwar had a tendency to look for pockets of darkness in everything.

In fact, Anwar had only asked about Levin to buy some time while he tried to think it through. She isn’t asking this as a whim, and Rafiq doesn’t grant whims. He must owe her. Or the New Anglicans, or their political and financial network.And for a lot more than just a conference venue. Do I cite the compact and refuse? Or find out what it is?

“Why did you ask me to do this?”

“I really don’t know. I just had an instinct that you would be the right one.”

Pause.

“I need Offer and Acceptance. Will you do it?”

“Yes.” As he spoke, Anwar heard a succession of doors closing, and others opening, all the way to England.