“Oh. Uh, bloody,” said Zada.
A knock sounded.
“Come in,” called Daphne.
The door swung open. Chancellor Fallow stood in the doorway, fully dressed in a gray suit and looking nothing like a man who had just woken up less than twenty minutes ago.
“Daphne,” he said, nodding to his granddaughter. “Miss Chambers.” A noticeably more curt nod to Zada. “Do you have any idea why the motion gauge in my study just went off?”
Chapter ThirteenIn Which a New Plan Is Cobbled Together
Daphne tensed beside Zada, the set of her shoulders stiffening almost imperceptibly.
“Could it have been one of the cleaner bots? I thought I saw the vacuum in the front room the other day.” Despite the tension in her stance, Daphne sounded remarkably calm.
“None of them are scheduled to be in that wing of the house at this hour,” said Chancellor Fallow.
“Then it sounds like they’ve got a case of routine creep, sir,” Zada said, willing her voice to be as steady as Daphne’s. “The programming can slip over time if it’s not updated, particularly with older models.”
Chancellor Fallow blinked. “Thank you, Miss Chambers,” he said. “Very helpful.”
Zada nodded.
“Daphne,” said Chancellor Fallow, “when are you coming in for your job assessment reading?”
Zada glanced over at Daphne, confused. The readings were meant to be done in the final term of school. That was largely the point of senior year.
“My answers were found to be incomplete,” Daphne told Zada in an undertone.
“Yes,” said Chancellor Fallow. “It was almost as if someone had purposely fed the Core inaccuracies as a misguided attempt at humor. However, the algorithm noticed something was amiss, and with any luck, there may still be time to fix it and get Daphne into a career that would make her father proud, as she must wish him to be.”
Daphne’s jaw ticked. She said nothing.
“Daphne, Miss Chambers.” Chancellor Fallow gave each of them a small nod and then swept out the door.
Daphne stared at the open doorway for a long moment, then leapt to her feet and strode to the bathroom adjoining her room. She returned just as quickly with a wipe, scrubbing furiously at the slashes of lipstick on her hand.
“He won’t come back for a while,” said Daphne in a dull tone. She dropped the wipe into the incinerator chute by the door, which she shut with surprising restraint. “He never drops a bombshell like that without giving it an hour or two to really marinate.”
“Daphne,” said Zada. “What your grandfather said—”
“What about it?” Daphne didn’t meet Zada’s eyes. “If you’re going to say something admiring about New Ionia’s beloved leader, spare me.”
“He has no right to tell you what your father would’ve thought. He can’t know any more than you can.”
“He says it with such confidence, though,” Daphne said, and then seemed to catch herself.
Zada took a seat on the floor and beckoned for Daphne to join her.
“I searched his offloaded thoughts for any message from Mozelle about any possible error with the Core, right?” saidZada.
“Right,” said Daphne.
“Mozelle was talking like the sisters knew something about Heartsong,” Zada said. “A leak. She said they were sniffing around—something about them maybe printing pamphlets?”
“Pamphlets against Heartsong?” said Daphne.
Zada nodded. “I think so.”
