ChaoticArmcandy

  Aralia was, predictably, pissed off and hiding it well.

  Going in, she’d known this routine all too well. She’d known what these people were like. The superior snt to all their comments and questions. The ceaseless snubbing. The way they’d made her fsh the showy alchemical seal of her office and security clearance over and over, at every turn.

  She’d known how the orderlies and underlings would feign sickly sweet regret for the ‘necessities of protocol’, how the secretaries would dismiss her authority and how the gatekeepers would talk down to her. She was well used to it.

  It still pissed her off. No Dragonian would ever be made to brook such treatment.

  So she held herself ramrod straight in the sumptuous upper level office, ignoring the surreptitious stare of Penelope’s secretary and idly perusing her memory of Ellie’s gzed expression from earlier that morning, until the viper herself slithered through the door and rounded the desk.

  “Cordivar,” acknowledged Penelope Caul, without preamble, as she sat. “What brings you to my realm today?”

  “Bad news, I’m afraid,” said Aralia shortly. “I’ve caught wind of some subordinate…errors in my own department, and upon further review I thought my concerns pertinent enough to your own work to be worth a warning.”

  Penelope’s eyes narrowed. “Go on.”

  Aralia steepled her fingers. “Over the st few terms I’ve trained several Ministry alchemists in Apomasaics—alchemists who have since joined your team and whose skills you now employ, I believe?”

  “And you know this, how exactly?” Penelope’s voice was deadly casual.

  Aralia ughed without an ounce of mirth. “Come now, Prefect—”

  “—it’s Factor, now—” spat Penelope.

  “—Quite. Let’s not be naive about the way things work here, shall we? I have the ear of quite a few of those who sit on the inner cabinet, all of whom are more than grateful to me for the contribution of Apomasaics.” Aralia’s gaze was fastened intently on Penelope’s face. “As well as the alchemical research leads that were derivativefrom my discovery.” She watched as the Prefect’s jaw tightened. “Especially a certain, very promising substance with more…esoteric implications.”

  “I’m afraid,” Penelope hissed. “That I haven’t a clue what you’re on about.”

  “Come now,” Aralia smiled coldly. “I’m merely protecting my investment by warning you that some of your staff may be turning out fwed batches. Heed my warning and we both win. Don’t, and only you lose.”

  “And how do you suggest I proceed, given this…warning?”

  “If you’ll allow me to make a brief survey of your team’s notes, I should be able to set the quality control issue straight at once.”

  “That will be quite unnecessary,” returned Penelope smoothly. “The batches, as you say, have performed as expected, though now I’m wondering if I should report you for knowing of their existence, as my department functions well above your security clearance.”

  “I have been offered the highest security clearance that the Ministry has—” countered Aralia, gesturing carelessly.

  “—apparently not—”

  “—But do as you wish. I am too well protected to be concerned by your petty power pys, I assure you.”

  “As you say.” Penelope’s smile was all teeth. “Well, then, I suppose some thanks are in order.”

  “Thanks?”

  “For discovering Apomasaics, of course. An invaluable contribution. Without it, my own department could not have achieved our much more glorious triumphs.”

  “Alleged triumphs.” Their gazes were locked in a bloodless, deadly duel, tawny matching pale.

  “Of course.”

  “I’m sure you’ll get published one day, dear.”

  “Go eat bricks, you filthy half-breed.”

  “Well then,” Aralia stood. “If you’re quite sure I cannot be of further assistance…”

  “I am,” Penelope smiled like a portcullis dropping.

  “Then I have urgent business to attend to, as I’m sure you do.”

  “Obviously.”

  Aralia turned on her heel and left. She wended her way down the maze of corridors and stairways, and out of the Tower, a mask of indifference riding tight and stony on her face. Knots of students parted for her, staff scurried out of her way.

  Inside, she was fuming and scared.

  Pasha had been right.

  She had all the confirmation she needed.

  Someone in the Hierophancy had seen through the cloaks and veils Aralia had woven around Apomasaics, had isoted the alchemical realm-crossing key hidden inside the Making of halia and extracted its most dangerous potential. All without her knowledge, outside of her control.

  They didn’t trust her. She had thought to use the Imperiati and their byrinthine ways of power for her own purposes, and found herself more sorely used still.

  There was nothing more she could get from them. Nothing that was worth the risk of continued compliance.

  Aralia clenched her fists, her thoughts darkening.

  This had all gotten out of hand.

  She had to burn this pce to the ground.

  ~ ~ ~

  “Fascism, like desire, is scattered everywhere, in separate bits and pieces, within the whole social realm; it crystallizes in one pce or another, depending on the retionships of force. It can be said of fascism that it is all-powerful and, at the same time, ridiculously weak. And whether it is the former or the tter depends on the capacity of collective arrangements, subject-groups, to connect the social libido, on every level, with the whole range of revolutionary machines of desire.”

  Félix Guattari, “Everybody Wants to be a Fascist”, Semiotexte, Volume II, Number 3