Mittens's Arc

Chapter 5 of 5

Mittens came down the stairs with the pact still warm under her ribs. Fluffy was where she had left him. She paid him the first half of what she owed and told him the rest came after the shaft. Then she said the part he would not like. She had a father and a witness, but no mother. No womb. Whiskers had one woman still thinking, and Fluffy had said days, not weeks. Fluffy chewed his lip and said there was someone who moved biotech through the sector's back rooms. A woman with horns she did not need. He said she owed no one and answered to no court. Mittens told him to send word. They met in the garden behind the old castle, at a mossy table under the wisteria. The woman came alone. Black coat, tall horns strapped to her head, a black cat riding her shoulder. She sat without shaking hands. Mittens said what she needed. A viable womb-vessel, cleared for implantation, ready inside two days. Noir listened. She did not blink at devil or claim or heir. When Mittens finished, Noir said, "I don't grow people." Mittens said she was not asking her to. She was asking her to find one already grown and already loose in the market. Noir tapped the table once. "Cost." Mittens laid out her last infernal favor. A single pull, transferable, good in any court that took infernal paper. Noir's mouth moved a little at one corner. She said she was working a job. A neural implant, missing three rotations, owner failing without it. She said if Mittens spent the favor to surface the implant before it got wiped, she would spend her contacts to surface a vessel. Even trade, both by tomorrow night, or neither. Mittens agreed. She burned the favor at the table. Noir felt it land somewhere in her network and stood up. The cat on her shoulder yawned. By the next night Noir sent a name and an address. A woman in the lower rings, already carrying, willing to sell the child forward under infernal terms for a price Mittens could cover with what Fluffy had not yet claimed. The implant surfaced the same hour, three streets from where Noir had been looking. Mittens met the seller, signed with the arbiter present, and the vessel was hers before the sector clock turned. She walked out of the lower rings with a mother contracted, a father bound, and a witness on record. Whiskers still had one woman thinking. Mittens now had one already carrying. The clock she had bought yesterday now ran two lengths ahead of his. She sent Fluffy word to be ready at the shaft. Meowza's soul was no longer a question of if. Only of when, and of what she would do to it once the heir drew breath.