Demon

More demonstrations had been needed, but she had expected that. Of the twenty-five she had named, eighteen were now dead. Seven had come in, weaponless, to pledge their fealty to the new Boss. She knew damn well she couldn't trust any of them with a brass paper clip, but it was best to let them sink themselves through their own greed, let them hatch their conspiracies and hang them with due process of law. One could be perceived as fair, even when the fix was in.

So, in that sense, the bad guys were no problem. As usual, it was the good guys who gave endless headaches.

"We ca

"And we won't give up our weapons," Stuart said. Stuart was the man who had come in response to Cirocco's demand for a representative of the Vigilantes, just as Trini had come as an elder of the Free Females. "You talked about law and order. For seven years, we've been just about the only group that has tried to maintain a degree of decency for all humans in Gaea"-and here he glared at Trini, who glared back. "We have been and remain willing to protect even those who don't belong to our organization, subject only to the availability of manpower and weapons. I won't claim we've made the streets safe. But our aim has been decency."

Cirocco looked from one to the other. Oddly, both of them had summed up their respective positions in two minutes. It was likely that neither of them remembered they had been arguing and embellishing for ten hours without saying a hell of a lot more than they had just said.

At any rate, they shut up for a moment, and looked anxiously at Cirocco.

"I like you both," Cirocco said, quietly. "It would bother me a lot to have either of you killed."

Neither of them flinched, but their eyes looked a little hollow.

"Stuart, you and I both know my weapons policy couldn't last long. I have been given one very large break, and I intend to use it for all it's worth. To control all the ammunition in Bellinzona. There are plenty of guns around. I intend to round them up, with house-to-house searches, if necessary. Making useful guns is beyond Bellinzona's industrial capacity, and will be for quite a while. But you can and will make knives, more swords, and bows and arrows and blackjacks ... and so forth.

"I'm going to use this short time when everybody is disarmed to... to give the people a chance to breathe freely. There's going to be a lot of killing in the next few days, but it's going to be Titanides killing humans. If a human kills another human, execution will be swift and public. I want people to see that. My goal here is to get a social compact going, and I'm starting practically from zero. My advantages are superior force, and the knowledge that most of these people came from lawful societies before the war. They'll soon remember the ways of getting along."

"You're trying to make a paradise, is that it?" Stuart sneered.

"By no means. I have few illusions about what's going to happen here. It will be brutal and unfair. But it's already better than it was twenty revs ago."

"I felt safe twenty revs ago," Trini said.

"That's because you lived in a walled camp. I don't blame you; I'd have done the same thing, in your positions. But I have to tear down the walls. And I can't have a lot of sword-toting Vigilantes swaggering around until I know more about them." She turned to Trini.

"I have a couple things to offer you. After the disarmament, I'm going to have a period of time-possibly as long as a myriarev-during which only the police will be allowed to carry swords and clubs. And only women will be allowed to carry knives."

"That's not fair!" Stuart shouted.

"You're damn right it's not fair," Cirocco went on. "It also isn't fair that most of the women who arrived here after the war were knocked out and dragged away by some large hairy item and sold at public auction."

Trini was looking interested, but still dubious.

"Some women will die," Trini pointed out. "Most of them don't know how to handle a knife."

"Some women died yesterday because they didn't have one," Cirocco replied.

She was still looking dubious. Cirocco turned to Stuart.

"As for your Vigilantes... we are going to be needing human police after this initial period. I intend to give preference to the Vigilantes."

"Armed with sticks?" he asked.

"Don't underestimate the billy club."

"So my people will be going up to guys and searching them, right? What happens when the guy pulls a knife?"

"It depends on how good your man is. He may very well die."

She let them think it over again. It was a great temptation to come right out and say it: you don't have any choice. But they knew that. It would be better if they found a way to like it, or at least part of it.

"So there will be laws, and courts?" Stuart asked.

"Not just yet. I've already sketched out laws about slavery and killing. For now, they'll be enforced at the scene of the crime with Titanides acting as judges. Pretty soon we'll elaborate the laws and go through the formality of arrest and some sort of trial."

"I'd feel better with some laws and courts right now," Trini said.

Cirocco just looked at her. She did not mention that there was an even more brutal alternative which she had considered for some time-and had not totally ruled out even yet. She called it the Conal Solution. The Titanides could make judgment calls that Cirocco trusted utterly. If they said this or that human ought to be killed, she knew they were right. There was no denying it would make things quicker and easier.

She didn't even know if it was wrong. Cirocco believed in good and evil, but right and wrong were something else entirely. Trini craved the sanction of law because that's what she had grown up with. Cirocco had, too, and believed it was ultimately necessary if humans were to live together. But she didn't worship it. She had no doubt that a Titanide's i

But it didn't feel right. So she had elected the more arduous course.

"We'll have laws and courts eventually," Cirocco said. "We'll probably have lawyers, too, in time. But that's all up to you."

Trini and Stuart looked at each other.

"You mean the two of us?" Stuart asked. "Or all the citizens?"

"That'll be up to you, too. If you can get along with me for a while, you'll be in an excellent position to take over government when I leave."

"Leave?" Trini said. "When would that be?"

"As soon as I can. I'm not doing this because I want to. I'm doing it because I'm the only one who can do it, and... for reasons that don't concern you now. I've never had any urge to govern. I expect it's going to be a huge headache."

Stuart was looking more and more thoughtful. Cirocco thought her original assessment of the man was correct. He had the hunger for power. She wondered how high he had gotten in government before the war. She had no doubt he had been in government, though she had not asked him.

Trini had the same impulse, though in a different form. Cirocco had known Trini for twenty years. It was only in the last seven that Trini's hidden perversion had surfaced. All things considered, she had done rather well with it. She had been a founding mother and guiding force behind the Free Females. She was basically a good person. Cirocco didn't need a Titanide to tell her that.

So was Stuart. Cirocco didn't really like either of them. She felt that the urge to lead large groups of people was basically not very nice, but knew such people had to exist. She could deal with them when she had to.