The Blood Tree Read Online Free PDF Page A

being demoted because I didn’t care any more.
    We walked up to the collegiate building with the high twin towers that stands in front of the Assembly Hall. Both the buildings had connections with organised religion, but those counted for nothing when the atheist Enlightenment came to power. The college was turned into an auxiliary training block, and the hall to the rear became the Council chamber for the first twenty years of the regime. Then, in what I took to be a mark of the guardians’ burgeoning lust for the trappings of power, they moved the chamber to what used to be the Scottish Parliament building in Holyrood – a collection of upturned boats that was raked with machine-gun fire during the riots leading up to the last election. Of course, the Assembly Hall itself served as the Scottish Parliament for a couple of years before the boats were launched, so the Council’s love affair with the architecture of power had actually been going on from day one.
    â€œWhat have we got?” Davie asked the guard commander at the entrance.
    â€œSome pretty handy excavation works, Hume 253.” The balding auxiliary nodded at the deep hole inside the gateway. “As you can see, they had all the necessary equipment. Compressor, drills, mini-digger, pick-axes—”
    â€œWhere did the gear come from?” I interrupted.
    â€œAh, citizen Dalrymple. Good evening.” The commander gave me a brief smile. I’d had dealings with him from time to time in the command centre. He was one of a select group of senior auxiliaries who didn’t have a problem with a demoted citizen like me being employed by the directorate.
    I returned his smile. “How are you, Knox III ?”
    â€œFine, thank you. It’s Labour Directorate equipment. We’ve just checked. It was taken from the Canonmills depot last night, along with a pick-up truck that’s still unaccounted for. I’ve authorised an all-barracks search for it.”
    â€œHow the bloody hell did they get away with it?” Hamilton demanded, coming out of the mist like an irate werewolf. “What happened to the watchmen?”
    The commander twitched his head nervously. “I’ve asked the local barracks for an explanation.”
    Lewis kept up his rant as I moved to the hole and looked down. Lights had been strung into it and there was a ladder leaning against one side. It was at least fifteen feet deep and at the bottom I could see a paved floor strewn with earth and lumps of stone.
    â€œWhat do you reckon?” Davie said, squatting down beside me.
    â€œI reckon these guys knew what they were doing.” I looked round at Hamilton. “There were three of them. We saw them.”
    â€œWhat?” the guardian said with a gasp of surprise.
    â€œWhen we were driving to Hector’s. The commander here even spoke to one of them.”
    â€œIs this true, Hume 253?” Hamilton demanded.
    Davie nodded sheepishly. “I didn’t see much of him, though. He was wearing full work gear. I assumed they really were citizens on overtime.”
    â€œGood God, man,” the guardian said. He started winding himself up for another harangue.
    â€œI made the same assumption, Lewis,” I said, taking the wind from his sails. I turned to Knox III . “Who raised the alarm?”
    â€œThe sentry,” he replied. “Eventually.”
    I glanced at my watch. Being poor-quality, ordinary citizen-issue, the glass was partially clouded by condensation, but I could see that it was after eleven. “It took him his whole shift to work out there was something dodgy about the workmen?” The second guard shift starts at two p.m. and ends at ten. “What finally got to him?”
    â€œThe sentry’s a guardswoman,” Knox iii said, stepping aside. “Ask her yourself.”
    I was confronted by a heavily built middle-aged woman in a tight guard uniform. Her face was ruddy and her mousy hair