Seth and Tam got their shoes spread out, too. They all engaged in involuntary slapstick as they struggled to put them on. Eventually, Tam came to Seth, who had fallen into the snow and was half-submerged with legs in the air. She seized one of his feet and shoved it into the bindings, then did the other, then hauled him upright. He lifted the shoes clear of the snow and set them atop it, and found to his delight that he was stayed on the powder, which creaked beneath the shoes’ webbing. He gave Tam a double thumbs-up, and she handed him her shoes and flopped onto her back and stuck her feet in the air.
He wasn’t as good at putting them on as Tam, but that was okay. The clear skies, the entombment in the cargo-pods, and the thought of a walk through the woods on these cool-ass outdoor prostheses made them giddy. He wished he could take her into a pod, get naked, and fuck her brains out. It was a comforting randiness. The suit was surprisingly accommodating of his erection. He contrived to brush his hand over Tam’s crotch as he helped her up—this was something they did often, with the ardor of school kids who’ve just found their first fuck-buddies and can’t believe that they’ve got all the ass they want on tap, twenty-four/seven—but the suits were too padded for him to tell if she had a boner, too. He decided she did—she’d changed her hormones recently and hard-ons were a welcome side-effect of the new regime they both enjoyed.
They held hands—she squeezed, which made him even hornier—and approached Gretyl, who scowled at her shoes, having tramped a wide circle as she tried to put them on. They flanked her and she looked from one to the other.
“Oh no,” she began, then Tam put one snowshod foot behind her and Seth pushed and over she went, legs in the air, howling in mock-outrage. They clipped the shoes to her feet as she giggled, pulled her upright.
Seth looked at his heads-up, pulled up the wayfinder, and pointed. “Thataway,” he said.
They tramped on. As the sun set, they activated nightscopes, and watched the starlight and enhancement algorithms turn everything milky, glowing—a fairyland.
[xiv]
Natalie napped a lot. Maybe she was depressed, or maybe it was dope in her food, though Dis didn’t find any record of that anymore in the patient management stuff in control-central.
Maybe it was her mind’s defense mechanism, shutting down in the face of boredom and frustration. Her friends said they’d come get her. Gretyl promised, but days had passed since she’d heard from them. Her father stopped visiting. She didn’t know if that was because she’d gotten under his skin, or because he’d blown town for some business, which was the sort of thing he’d always done. Mom and Cordelia visited for regular, sterile half-hours. Every time they left, she swore next time, she’d freeze them, sit in stony silence.
But then they arrived and opened with rehearsed pleasantry—“Oh, Natty, it’s been such a day—” and smile, and she was a Redwater girl among Redwater girls, the sisterhood of ladies who lunch and who would never be allowed to be more than that. Her mother missed Greece, and often passed the whole half hour in a monologue about a particular boat captain, or wonderful honey, or a shrine a Greek family brought her to, approached by knee-walking pilgrims who wore painter’s kneepads to protect themselves as they humped up the hill to the icon of Madonna in the humble building.
Cordelia talked about school, professors, and a boy—a man, she said—whom Jacob would never approve of. It was easy to hold up her end of these conversations. All she had to do was nod and make noises and not stand and scream it was bullshit, everything Cordelia dedicated her life to was worse than a sham, fueled by delusional conviction that the money, power, and privilege of the Redwaters was something they’d earned—and therefore, everyone without lovely money and power and privilege hadn’t earned it.
Sometimes, the merc came in. Natalie had listened carefully for someone to mention her name. She desperately wanted to know. The merc was a bridge between worlds. She had to live in the real world where privilege was obviously undeserved. How could she meet clients and not know? She had to be able to make it not matter, because her paycheck depended on her not letting herself care, on understanding walkaway well enough to snatch them. The merc wasn’t her friend, but she was important.
No one called her by name. When Jacob wanted her, he changed the pitch of his voice, switching to a command tone he always used on bodyguards. It was different from the command tone he used on domestic servants, more militarized, like he was LARPing a blue-jawed sergeant in a war movie. When Mom wanted the merc, she switched to her wheedling tone, the “do me a favor” voice, less gracious for the iron-clad conviction the favor would be done.
Cordelia never spoke to the merc. She treated her as if she were invisible, a walking C.C.T.V. If she ever looked at the merc, it was with fear.
The merc was key.
The next time the merc came in—bringing in a basket with snack food, fresh underwear and shirts, and a pointless shatterproof vase of unseasonal hothouse flowers that had undoubtedly originated with her mother—Natalie locked eyes with her.
“We could do a side-deal. No one would have to know, not at first. They can’t keep me here forever. Eventually they’ll get bored of the crazy sister in the attic and ship me to a nut-hatch and kick you out on your butt. If I can get out, I can get a contingency lawyer to harass them into unlocking my trust fund. You know how I feel about money, you’ve seen how I want to live. I’d sign it over to you. Airtight and irrevocable. It’s more than they’re going to pay you, more than they could ever pay you. A fortune. A dynastic fortune, the kind that will still be intact when you’re an old lady and your kids are fighting over your deathbed for the dough.
“I’m sure you’re thinking if you did this you’d be radioactively fucked. That’s why I’m offering you the whole package: life without having to work another day, ever. Automatic deposits, every month, for you, your kids, their kids. The way the trust is written, there’s a good chance that when Mummy and Daddy kick the bucket, there’ll be fresh dough in the trust, even more for you and yours. All they can offer you is a bed under the stairs—I’m offering to turn you into a zotta.”
The merc looked at her.
Natalie smiled. “You know I mean it.” She hesitated, because this part was dangerous, if she’d misjudged the woman. “There’s no video of this conversation. Check for yourself, then let’s deal.”
A maybe-smile crossed the merc’s face, so subtle Natalie might have been kidding herself. She set the basket down and backed out, like she always did, with that confident stride that said, I’m not afraid of you, this is just best-practices.
As soon as the door clunk-clunked, Dis said, “That was…”
“I know. I’m sick of being a fucking damsel. Princess Peach sucks. I wanna be Mario. It’s been weeks. This isn’t going to get better. Dad isn’t going to wake up and say, ‘what the fuck was I thinking? Nice people don’t kidnap their daughters!’ If I can’t fake capitulation, he’s going to bury me in some deep hole, a boot camp for rich bitches where they shave your head and make you crawl in mud until you mewl for mercy and then they send you home with a zombinol pump in your appendix and your smile stapled on with sutures.”