Archon's Queen Read Online Free PDF

crimson hands out. The sound of the latex glove peeling from his fingers scared her motionless.
    He asked her name again; she recited it. The panels of light on his face shifted, brightening. She imagined a picture of her in front of him.
    “Says ‘ere you’re twenty-three?”
    “Yes, Sergeant.”
    “Looks like your father died eleven years ago…” His voice trailed off as he read, an eyebrow lifted. “Faulty food reassembler?”
    The drugs could not suppress the shiver that time. The Sergeant’s terminal erupted in a flurry of blue sparks, making him swat it twice. Anna looked away, muttering at the wall. “Yes gov’na. He got a right nasty zap from the thing.”
    His chair squeaked when his weight left it. She struggled, pedaling her legs, as he swiped the derm from the corner of the desk and carried it toward a trash disintegrator.
    “Gov’na, beggin’ your pardon, please don’t. I’ve been on it too long, comedown could kill me.”
    “Zoom withdrawal can’t kill, though you’ll be wishin’ it did. You’re better off without it, girl.”
    At a wave of his hand, a panel slid open in the wall. Beyond it, the steel interior of a chute glowed yellow from light deep within. In slow motion, the plasfilm flew through his fingers, drifting like a snowflake toward its conversion to a lump of beige matter. Her mind’s voice screamed inside as if he had taken a kitten away from her and murdered it before her eyes. The thing in the back of her head rose up, but she clamped her eyes shut and focused on staying calm. A police checkpoint was the
last
place a display of her talent needed to happen.
    He was behind her before she realized she was crying. With no strength left in her legs, her body jerked about as he fixed her skirt back into place. Beeping above her head signaled her imminent release from the restraints, but even with warning, she fell when they no longer supported her. The Sergeant caught her and carried her over to a chair by the wall, folding her arms in her lap and shining a small light in one eye and then the other.
    “Shall I call for an ambulance?”
    Annabelle glanced at the red marks on her wrists, thankful her ‘gate tax’ had taken the mild form of sore arms and lost time.
That’s what you get for storming off alone.
The nicety of this policeman seemed unusual, exacerbating her sense of being cheap and dirty. She considered the blame for the shamble of her life was as much hers as it belonged to society. Most constables thought of people in her social strata as meat puppets for their personal amusement. The men became occasional victims of police combat training and the girls… well, the girls did whatever the constables wanted. Anna had no idea how to handle a cop who treated her like a person.
    It hadn’t much happened since she was twelve.
    She ventured a dazed smile and shook her head. “I’m all right.”
    “Are ya then? You look ‘orrible.”
    “I just got out of bed, and…” She shivered. “The zoom’s wearin’ off.”
    He made a face of condescension and disapproval. “Cannae hide forever, girl. Sooner or later, you’ll need to confront your demons. I’ll git started on the incident report then.”
    “Incident?” She looked up, wide-eyed.
    “That berk, Brown.”
    She swallowed hard. “It’s no bother, Sergeant. I don’t want trouble. His mates’ll give it to us twice as bad.”
    “Aye, suppose’n they would at that. I’ll deal with ‘im then, an’ leave your name out of it. G’won, yer free ta go.”
    He walked her to the door. Anna hesitated, glancing down at the portable metal steps between her and the rain-soaked street.
    “Sergeant?”
    “Go on.”
    Anna shivered, grasping the doorframe for support. “Thank you.”
    He nodded, a motion she caught from the corner of her eye. Wind whistled past as she gathered her jacket tight and walked away. The Sergeant leaned against the opening with folded arms, watching her leave the puddle-laden mud of The