Carnival

“Katya,” he said as he hopped off his stool and came around the table to stand beside her, “if you tell me where they took your mother, I can let you sleep. I can get you something to drink and put you in your own bed. Wouldn’t that be nice?”

She blinked, wrapping her fingers around each other, her legs splayed wide as she tried to balance herself. Her toes curled into the carpetplant, flexing tendons playing across the tops of her feet. “Can’t tell,” she said, in a tired little‑girl voice that could have broken his heart. “S’important.”

She sounded drunk. But she still wasn’t to the point of giving him any old answer he asked for just to placate him.

“Your mother’s life is in danger,” he said, and managed not to frown when Katya shook her head.

No impatience. It wasn’t his style. And however long it was for him, it seemed twice as long to her. Katya couldn’t know it, because House had been asked to conceal time cues in the ceiling and walls (which Vincent also hoped was disconcerting to someone who had spent her life under, more or less, natural light), but the sun was setting outside, and Lesa and Michelangelo had been in captivity since the afternoon of the day before yesterday.

And the evening and the morning were the second day,Vincent thought, and stroked her hair, pushing dark strands off her clammy forehead. Admittedly, the insurgents had taken great care to capture them alive, and if it was the same group that had tried to snatch Vincent, they had been almost solicitous.

But his training and his experience told him hostages that weren’t rescued within seventy‑two hours usually weren’t rescued. The logistics of keeping somebody alive in detention started to wear on the captors, arguments started, and mistakes…were made.

“Your mother needs you. You can save her, Katya.”

“My mother’s fine,” she insisted, words slurring out after such a delay that he startled at the sound.

“What if she’s hurt? What if she needs medical attention? You made some bad choices, Katya. But nothing we can’t fix, if we get to her in time.”

“They wouldn’t hurt her.” A chink, the first admission she’d made that she knew who had Lesa. She didn’t seem to realize her error. Instead, she waved her hands for emphasis, but the manacles brought her up short and the weight of her own arms overbalanced her. Like Vincent’s, her stool was an extension of House. It didn’t tip.

But Katya did, flailing, and fell hard. Vincent caught her, cushioned the impact, but he was tired, too, and she slipped through his hands and landed on her shoulder on the carpetplant with a sharp sound. She pulled her knees up as if to hide her face against them.

Vincent crouched beside her, none too steady himself. He had to pause and adjust his chemistry, or he would have joined her on the floor. Energy rose through him like sap. It didn’t fool him; he could feel the ache of weariness in his bones, the sensation of every joint in his hands swollen and fouled with grit. The itch and ache of peeling skin on his back, thighs, and shoulders wasn’t helping. At least the sun toxicity had faded, and his fever, muscle pain, and nausea had broken. If he wasn’t so damned tired, he might even be thinking clearly.

It was a small enough consolation.

Katya giggled as he got his hands under her armpits and hauled her upright. It morphed into a sob when he deposited her back onto the stool, balancing her carefully before he stepped away. Agnes, wherever she was watching from, was probably scandalized. Vincent really didn’t care.

With Katya swaying behind him, he crossed to the door and tapped it open. As he’d predicted, Agnes waited there, arms crossed, chin tilted belligerently when he stepped into the corridor.

“Would you get us a drink?” he asked. “Something sugary. Fruit juice. With a stimulant in it.”

She nodded and turned away. He waited just outside the door until she came back, two cups in her hand. He took only one of them, smiled, and stepped back into the small chamber that had become an interrogation room.

Katya, miraculously, was still on her stool. He set the cup down on the table, out of her reach, and stood between her and it. “Come on, Katya,” he said, quietly. “Help me out here.”

She lifted her eyes, focused on his face. Another crack in the armor. His heart rate picked up. Sometimes, when they broke, it happened all at once. Like pebbles rolling down a hill. “I want to sleep,” she said, more distinctly than he would have thought she could manage.

“Me, too.” He reached around behind him, picked up the mug, took a sip of the juice. It was cold and sweet, with bits of pulp that burst on his tongue when he swallowed. By an act of will, he managed not to drain it.

Katya watched what he was doing, and couldn’t stop herself from licking her lips. She wouldn’t beg, though.

He came to her, put his hip against her shoulder, and with one hand encouraged her to lean back against him. He brushed her hair, stroked it gently, smoothed the tangled strands. “Talk to me, sweetie,” he said. “We both want to sleep. You can end this, you know, anytime.”

“Can’t,” she said. Her hair was dirty; the greasy strands coiled between his fingers when she shook her head. She probably would have fallen over again if he hadn’t braced her.

His fingers wanted to tighten in frustration, but hurting her wouldn’t net him anything. “Not can’t,” he said. “Won’t. I can save her, Katya, but you have to let me.”

She leaned her head against his belly, and he stroked her hair and held the cup to her mouth so she could drink. Her manacled hands cupped around his, and she drank in long, lingering swallows, licking the edge of the empty cup before she’d let him take it away.

The sugar and stimulants worked fast. He felt her stabilizing before he finished reaching over her to set the empty cup down. She shifted on the stool, but didn’t fall or pull away. Instead, she leaned her head against his stomach, closed her eyes, and sighed.

He didn’t say anything, just kept stroking her hair. Gently, impersonally, as he would stroke a child’s hair. She was relaxing, slowly.

People were surprisingly easy to tame, when you knew how to go about it. A little kindness at an unexpected moment could create a bond. An interrogation was a relationship, and relationships were based on developing trust. All seductions worked the same way; the seducer must create empathy with his target. He must project himself into the target’s emotional space and create a co

Vincent couldn’t remember if this had ever bothered him.

“Would you like another drink?”

“Please.” She hesitated. “Could I use the toilet, please?”

She hadn’t been so polite thirty hours ago. “In a moment,” he said, and steadied her with one hand before he stepped away. He made sure to collect the empty cup before going to the door. It was light and rounded, shatterproof, not much of a weapon–but any weapon was better than none.

He’d once seen a man killed with an antique paper fan. It was the sort of experience that stayed with a person.

He exchanged the empty cup for the full, ignoring Agnes’s glower, and returned. Katya’s eyes were closed. This moment of clarity would be brief, and before long she’d crash harder than ever. Borrowed energy would be repaid with interest.

He held the cup for her again, and again her hands came up to cover and control his, the ceramic of her manacles warm against his wrist. She drank half, paused, and drank again, licking her lips when he took the empty cup away. “Do you really think she’s in danger?”

Vincent turned and put his backside on the edge of the table. He folded his arms over his chest and waited, letting his silence be his answer.

“You’re really worried.” Her voice still had that vague, frail note, more strained now though the hoarseness had faded.