The Fractal Prince

10 TAWADDUD AND ALILE

Councilwoman Alile is a labyrinth.

Tawaddud watches her move behind the haze of Seals. It makes her think of the nursery rhyme Chaeremon the jinn used to sing to her.

It is in our food, it is in the air, it’s even in our hearts and that’s just not fair. But if you keep a clean mind, whisper Secret Names to the Aun kind, if you do what you are told, you too can tame wildcode—

Alile fills the bright, tetrahedral workspace of her palace on the Soarez Shard almost completely.

She is a tangle of glowing sapphire pathways, transparent fleshy cables and blooms of tiny, waving tendrils. She stretches across the floor and up the walls and around tables and statues like some exotic sea creature, graceful in the ocean depths but limp and helpless washed up on the beach. Some of her has grown into the walls, merging with the clear diamonoid tiles of the palace, pushing through towards the outside world in spiky branches. In the middle of the web is a misshapen sac that looks like the belly of a mosquito, filled with blood, with knotted organs floating inside it, pulsing.

The haze of the Seals in the hallway – silver and golden graffiti in the air that the muhtasibs have woven around the infected part of the Alile’s palace – obscures some of it, but not enough. There is a stinging smell of burning dust and metal in the air.

Tawaddud tries to look at her like a doctor. She has seen wildcode do terrible things to her patients, but this—

After a few seconds, she has to turn away and cover her nose and mouth with a hand.

‘I did warn you,’ Rumzan the Repentant says.

Alile visited Tawaddud’s father once. She was a dour-looking woman, spare and lean, with a weather-beaten face, dressed in the stark, practical clothing of a mutalibun, with straps and hooks for Seal armour, athar glasses hanging around her neck. Alile’s hair was black and long, but she had a continent-shaped patch of rough, hairless sapphire in her skull, making her look like one of Duny’s old dolls, with some of its hair torn out in a tantrum.

Unlike normal muhtasibs who carried their jinn companions around in a jar, Alile’s qarin lived in a mechanical bird, with feathers of gold and scarlet and eyes of ebony, made from a metal so thin and delicate it could actually fly. Tawadudd always imagined it amongst the rukh swarm that carried Alile’s ship to the desert, giving its mistress eyes that saw the wildcode storms and mad jinni. Her name is Arcelia. She is the sensible half of me, Alile said.

Tawaddud wanted nothing more than to be like Alile.

But this is why you should not become a mutalibun.

Tawaddud becomes aware of Sumanguru standing next to her.

‘What can you tell me about what happened here?’ he asks Rumzan. The Sobornost gogol was silent throughout their brief carpet ride from the Station, indifferent to the vistas of Sirr below them. Matter: what kinds of heaps it’s piled up in makes no difference, he said, when she asked if Sirr pleased him. But now his eyes are alive, full of cold curiosity.

Rumzan spreads his skeletal fingers. He is a thin, elongated creature whose wispy feet barely touch the ground. His body is covered in intricate, interlocking tiles of white, red and black that make him look like a living mosaic: by Sirr law, jinni thought-forms cannot look human. He has a glowing golden symbol on his forehead, indicating Repentant rank, third circle. The jinni policemen rarely wear visible shapes – their primary task is to stay invisible, root out crime and body thieves. Rumzan smells faintly of ozone, and every now and then he becomes grainy and crackles. To Tawaddud, he seems familiar, from one of her father’s parties, perhaps.

‘We have a partial reconstruction of the lady’s movements yesterday from athar traces,’ Rumzan says. ‘She arrived back from an early Council meeting around nine in the morning. We can provide a record of the meeting and her schedule, although you will have to request access to the detailed minutes from the Council.’ Rumzan makes a high-pitched humming sound.

‘I understand that may be a somewhat . . . delicate matter. In any case, the Councilwoman took her lunch in the rooftop garden alone, went up to her private observatory and then went into her office.’ He points at the wildcode-filled space ahead.

‘Then – the infection hit. It was so violent and sudden that we can only assume she had a Sealed container with a wildcode-infested object in it, which she opened. From speaking to the housekeeper jinni, I understand she used to be a mutalibun and brought mementos with her from the desert. With her experience, she must have been aware of the consequences of such an act. The infection must have taken hold in seconds. In other words, effectively the lady Alile committed suicide.’

‘How was the infection contained?’ Tawaddud asks. She remembers the drills Chaeremon made her go through as a child, the Secret Names to speak if her father’s palace ever experienced a wildcode attack.

‘The housekeeper jinn Khuzaima – who you are welcome to speak to – alerted us and the muhtasibs,’ Rumzan says. ‘The spread of the infection was slow and restricted to the Councilwoman’s body, as far as we can determine. That should not be surprising: after all, this is the residence of a muhtasib, with several layers of Seals everywhere.’

‘Are you sure you cannot provide a more accurate reconstruction than that?’ Sumanguru asks. He is staring at the walls, frowning. ‘Could anyone have brought in the wildcode from the outside?’

Rumzan spreads his hands: his fingertips flutter like candle flames. ‘My Repentants are good, but there are limits to what we can do with the athar. Especially now that the ambient wildcode levels are much higher than normal. Athar traces decay quickly. However, as for outside access, like with all Council members, the palace is under constant Repentant surveillance. All comings and goings of both jinni and humans are accounted for. But we do not know what happened inside.’

Sumanguru narrows his eyes. ‘My branch would call this a locked room mystery,’ he says. There is a strange note of amusement in his voice.

‘My sister said this was a possession,’ Tawaddud says. ‘How can you be sure of that? Have you found a possession vector?’

‘Nothing,’ Rumzan says. The jinn turns his glowing symbol at her like an eye. ‘Nothing forbidden. No books, no athar stories. Of course, the athar here is very complex, so we may have missed something. Given the circumstances, a suicide is a natural hypothesis, although there is no suicide note – and it seems unlikely, given the ardour with which she has been preparing for the Council voting session, according to her aides. That would seem to support the conjecture that when taking her own life, the Councilwoman was . . . literally not herself.’

‘So it is just speculation?’

‘Yes. However, it appears to be the only line of enquiry that fits the facts. Another complication is that we have not been able to find her qarin.’ Rumzan’s face tiles arrange themselves into something that looks like the facepaint of a sad clown.

Sumanguru runs his fingers along the Seal haze at the door.

‘How long do they last?’ he asks.

‘What?’

‘How long would my Seals last in there?’

‘You can’t be serious.’

‘Tell me,’ Sumanguru says.

‘I don’t know. Two to three minutes? They tell me sobortech is more vulnerable to wildcode than we are, so perhaps less. But you should wait for the muhtasib, they can—’

Before she can finish, Sumanguru steps through the Seal wall.

A faint aura shimmers around him in the athar. He walks past the remains of Alile, head turning, looking everywhere. Tawaddud wonders what kind of range of senses he has beyond human. He touches things, the empty jars on the high tables, traces the arabesque patterns on the walls. His movements seem different, not so much a clumsy, unstoppable machine but a cat, looking for something.

Then he stops in front of a wall with an ornate pattern of graphical representations of Secret Names, geometrical shapes on a four-by-four grid, made from multicoloured ceramic tiles the size of a palm, inlaid with gold.

In the athar, Tawaddud sees a black stain marring his Seals, spreading. Wildcode.

‘His Seals won’t hold!’ Tawaddud shouts. ‘Lord Sumanguru, get out! Rumzan, get help!’

The Sobornost gogol starts pressing the tiles. They move under his fingers. The Alile thing’s sapphire tendrils coil around his limbs but he is immersed in his work. There is a click, and a part of the wall slides aside, revealing a dark space. Sumanguru reaches within, brushing aside a sapphire tendril with his other hand. Then he is back through the Seal wall, clutching something in his arms: a metallic bird.

It looks smaller than Tawaddud remembers, but still large for a bird, the length of her forearm, a hawklike, graceful thing with a forked tail. Its eyes are closed, covered by tiny golden lids.

‘Arcelia?’

Tawaddud holds the bird in her arms. She expected it to feel cold and metallic, but the feathers of its back are almost alive, sharp but warm, and the flywheel in its chest hums steadily, like a rapidly beating heart. She strokes it to soothe it, but with no effect. Whatever happened to her, she had time to hide it. The sensible part of her.

‘Explain a qarin to me,’ Sumanguru says, pointing at the creature. ‘In simple words.’

‘A qarin is . . . a jinn companion, entwined with a muhtasib,’ Tawaddud says, voice shaking slightly. ‘A qarin and a muhtasib are one being, brought together as a child by an entwiner.’

‘What you describe is a forbidden act to us, only for the Primes,’ the Sobornost gogol says. ‘Perhaps there are even more reasons to cleanse your city than I thought. Why is this thing done?’

‘It is a custom,’ Tawaddud says. ‘A symbol of the alliance between our two peoples. But it also allows the muhtasib to regulate the economy of the city. To see athar like the jinni do, to watch the flow of information, the shadows of everything in the athar, money, products, labour, people.’ She looks at Rumzan. ‘Directly, not through a primitive instrument like athar glasses.’

Sumanguru laughs, a resonant, barking sound. ‘Matter and mind. Dualism. Primitive distinctions. All is information. Are you saying that this creature, this qarin, contains remnants of the Councilwoman’s mind?’

‘No,’ Tawaddud says. ‘I’m saying that the qarin is a part of the Councilwoman’s mind.’ There is something wrong here. Why does he not know all this?

‘Perfect,’ Sumanguru says. ‘Repentant Rumzan, is there a quiet space in this palace? Somewhere where we would not be disturbed?’

‘Lord Sumanguru, if you don’t mind,’ Rumzan says, ‘in the capacity of the official investigator here, I am compelled to ask what it is that you are intending to do? I cannot let you—’

Sumanguru draws himself to his full height. ‘Perhaps your Council has not explained the situation to you,’ he says with a rumbling voice. ‘We are not all like my sisters the hsien-kus: not all gentle. There are those who say that the Great Common Task demands a cleansing here. If I can’t find the enemies of the Task, those voices may be heard. Do I make myself clear?’

Ripples run through Rumzan’s thought-form. ‘Lady Tawaddud—’

Suddenly, she remembers how she met the jinn. He had started to identify with his thought-form, and so she wore a mask and body paint that duplicated his tilings, to match his self-image. She took him out to her balcony. He liked the feel of sunlight on his skin.

‘If there is a problem,’ she says slowly, ‘you also have a problem with me and my father. I may not have an official position in the Council, but I assure you I have my father’s trust,’ she holds up the jinn ring, ‘as well as that of the Council. Not to mention the fact that Mr Sen is a close personal friend.’ She gives the jinn the sugary sweet smile Duny always uses when making threats. ‘Do I make myself clear?’

Rumzan makes a little croaking sound. ‘Of course,’ he says. ‘My apologies. I just had not been briefed properly, that’s all.’

‘Lord Sumanguru,’ Tawaddud whispers, ‘it would be useful if you were to share what it is that you intend to do.’

‘Just the obvious,’ Sumanguru says. ‘Interrogate the witness.’

Alile’s palace is even larger than Tawaddud’s father’s residence – a maze of transparent cylinders, bubbles and projecting pyramids.

As the Repentant takes them through a large, sunlit gallery of sculptures, another thought-formed jinn appears, a cloud of purple and white flowers. Rumzan’s form becomes fluid, mixing with the newcomer’s. When he coalesces back to his mosaic self, his movements are quick and agitated.

‘The Council is requesting progress reports,’ he says. ‘I must leave you for a moment. In fact, perhaps it is better that I do so, if Lord Sumanguru intends to do something . . . unorthodox. That way, I will have no knowledge of such matters if questions are asked. I will ensure that my Repentants give you privacy. You will find an aviary through the doors at the end of the gallery and down the stairs.’

‘Thank you, Rumzan,’ Tawaddud says. ‘Your loyalty to the cause of Sirr will not be forgotten.’

‘I am at your service,’ the jinn says. ‘And for myself, I have not forgotten a certain pleasant afternoon and the new perspectives of the world you showed me.’

‘It will continue to remain our secret,’ Tawaddud says, forcing herself to smile.

At first, the noise in the aviary is deafening, a cacophony of high-pitched screams and the flapping of wings. It is a high dome of glass nearly a hundred metres in diameter. Most of the bottom half is taken up by chimera plants from the wildcode desert, thick purple tangled networks of tubes that expand and contract, geoengineering synthbio of old Earth gone wild in the absence of its masters. A few windmill trees rotate slowly, spiky turbine foliage catching the light in hues of amber and angry dark red.

When Tawaddud and Sumanguru enter, the rukh swarm notices them. They are everywhere: flying things of different sizes, from tiny sapphire insects to two or three manta-ray like gliders who circle near the ceiling. Tawaddud shields her eyes against the storm of wings. Then she barks a Secret Name at them and the swarm disperses and quiets down, becomes a coiling cloud amongst the vegetation.

Down in the centre of the aviary is a clear space, with a delicately wrought white table, a few chairs and a perch. Tawaddud sets Arcelia on it. The bird does not open its eyes but clings to it, flapping its wings briefly for balance.

Sumanguru studies the bird closely, leaning forward, hands clasped behind his back. Then he reaches out, fingers spread like a magician’s, surprisingly graceful for a man of his size. Five crackling lines of light appear between his fingertips and the bird. Arcelia lets out a shrill, mechanical scream and starts flapping its wings furiously. A bubble shimmers into being around it, holding it in place, and the sound is gone, leaving the bird scratching and pecking at its invisible prison in silence.

Tawaddud clenches and unclenches her fingers in rhythm with the bird’s suffering. Finally, she can’t bear it.

‘What are you doing?’ she hisses at Sumanguru.

‘Interrogating, like I said.’

‘How?’

‘Copying its mind into a vir. A little reality, if you like. Running a genetic algorithm on it: asking the bird-brain questions and changing its brain structure until I get something sensible out.’ Sumanguru flexes his fingers. ‘It should only take a few thousand iterations. Half a minute, I’d say.’

‘Stop that. Immediately,’ Tawaddud says. ‘This is a Sirr citizen you are talking about. I will not have her tortured. I will alert the Council.’ She makes a fist, ready to summon a Repentant from her ring.

Sumanguru turns to look at her. His grin merges with his scars into a monstrous grimace.

‘It’s your city’s future. I can make it talk. Means getting your hands dirty.’

Tawaddud swallows. Is this what Dunyazad meant? That it’s not a game. The things you might have to do. She looks at the frantic qarin. Her heart thumps. Not like this.

‘There might be . . . another way. A better way.’ There has to be.

She pulls her doctor’s bag over her shoulder, puts it on the table and opens it. She takes out her beemee and puts it on her head. ‘Please let her go. I can find out what we need.’

‘How?’

‘I could entwine with the jinn. It will want to anchor itself to a body, just like with Alile.’

Sumanguru frowns. ‘Explain.’

‘Self-loops. The stories in our heads. When you love someone, you become entwined. Your self spreads to others, like swarms of fireflies, mingling. There are ways to . . . invite someone in. The body thieves do it with stories. But you can be more direct. The athar responds to commands we call Secret Names. Many have been lost, but they can be used for many purposes, if you know how.’

The Sobornost gogol’s eyes narrow. ‘And you do.’

‘I was taught.’

‘In the guberniyas, the Founders forbid this. We know this leads to monsters and horrors. Hominid minds were made to be separate.’

‘Perhaps it is you who is afraid of getting your hands dirty,’ Tawaddud says.

Sumanguru looks first at her and then at Arcelia. He looks curious, like a child, almost.

‘Very well,’ he says, finally. ‘We are wasting time as it is. Just make sure it doesn’t fly away.’

The aviary does not have the kind of harmony as her assignation room, but she takes a few moments to meditate, breathing, letting her awareness spread out, into the noise of the rukh swarm and the plants and the hot humid air. Then she whispers to the metal bird in her arms.

Tell me your name. I am Tawaddud. Tell me your name.

At first, nothing, just a tickle in the back of her head. It occurs to her it is dangerous to do this in a place so full of wildcode, even if it is behind Seals. But it is better than letting an innocent creature suffer.

What is your name?

Something moves inside the bird, in her head, suddenly, like a startled serpent. A shape in the athar, like smoke, coiling in the bird’s heart. She is an ouroboros of software, in the tiny confines of her metal shell, in a little world that feels like a dream – except that, suddenly, there is a corridor of light, and a voice calling out to her.

I am Arcelia.

Arcelia, she says. Arcelia, listen to me. I’m going to tell you a story.

Stories always lie.

This one is a true story, I promise.

What is it about?

It’s a love story.

I like love stories.

Good, Tawaddud says and begins.

Once upon a time, there was a girl who loved only monsters.