Glass by Stephen Palmer

Subadwan that her council group, at which she was being considered for special honours, went badly. She accepted that Subadwan had not called, but took no blame, and seemed wary when the topic of the call came up. To make matters worse, Subadwan accidentally smashed a memory fishtail belonging to Aquaitra, which for some reason had moved inside its cubby hole so that when the door opened it fell to the ground. Seething with frustration, Aquaitra left early. It seemed to Subadwan that somebody was trying to cause friction between them.
    There came a final blow. Rhannan had arranged for herself, Aswaque and Subadwan to meet Lord Archivist Tanglanah later that night to discuss Archive relations. She shrugged. She would have to go.
    The tiresome day left Subadwan in no mood for further intellectual jousting with the suave pyuton, but as early evening merged into late she found herself waiting with her superiors on waste ground by the Ulcerated Courtyard, between the two Archives. ‘Did Tanglanah give you any hint as to what she wanted to discuss?’ she asked.
    Rhannan grumpily replied, ‘I only agreed to it to stop her and that cursed adjutant of hers, Laspetosyne, from bothering us. Once this is over I’m going back to the Archive, and we’ll have no more wheedling calls from oh so graceful Tanglanah.’
    Aswaque added, ‘No, she did not set an agenda, except to remark that relations between our two Archives were frosty enough to need thawing.’ He nodded to himself.
    ‘Whatever that means,’ Rhannan muttered.
    Subadwan noted two tall, cloaked figures walking up the lane toward them. ‘Well, here they are.’
    ‘Mind your tongue,’ Rhannan said. ‘I’ll do the talking.’
    Tanglanah’s face was impassive as she approached, her manner calm, but Laspetosyne’s spiky hair seemed ruffled, as if she had run.
    Tanglanah spoke with a haughty air. ‘I am glad we could find neutral ground on which to discuss our future,’ she began. Pointing at the door of the building next to them she said, ‘Let us retire inside, there to talk.’
    Rhannan suspiciously appraised the one-storey metal house. ‘Is this some hide of yours, Lord Archivist?’
    ‘Please call me Tanglanah. We are friends here, or, at least, not enemies.’
    ‘You haven’t answered the question,’ Aswaque grunted.
    Tanglanah walked to the door and opened it. ‘It is perfectly safe.’
    ‘For humans as well as your kind?’
    ‘For all. The public city map, as you well know, refers to it as a warehouse for articles of toughened clothing. It is no property of mine.’
    Subadwan followed her superiors into the house. Tanglanah led the way, while Laspetosyne closed the door. They found themselves in a single room lit by glow-bean chandeliers, dust on the floor, cardboard boxes all around. Various small creatures scuttled away as they moved in. Tanglanah placed five boxes in an exact pentagon, then sat on one. Laspetosyne followed suit. Subadwan waited for Rhannan and Aswaque to sit before taking the final box.
    A curious and rather embarrassing silence then followed. Tanglanah gazed at all of them with her mesmeric eyes, before glancing to Laspetosyne. Subadwan imagined telepathic messages being sent. She shivered.
    There came a knocking sound. ‘What was that?’ Aswaque asked, glancing at nearby holes nibbled into the walls.
    ‘Just ferrophagic vermin,’ Laspetosyne said.
    ‘I heard nothing,’ said Tanglanah.
    ‘You have good hearing?’ Rhannan asked, adding a sarcastic edge to her voice.
    ‘I have the most perfect hearing in the world,’ Tanglanah answered. ‘It has been tested to seventy thousand cycles per second.’
    ‘What does that mean?’
    ‘It means I can catch the encrypted conversations of bat gliders as their pilots hover above the city simply by angling my head in the correct direction.’
    Rhannan laughed as if giving this no credence, but the boast clearly made her nervous, as no doubt it was intended to. ‘Can we get on with