Persona by Genevieve Valentine Page A

fired a weapon.
    â€œI beg your pardon?”
    But Suyana couldn’t take it back. There was only forward, into an anger that was becoming an obstacle, but she wouldn’t condemn them. She wouldn’t.
    â€œIf this is a delicate time for our reputation, going on television for such a small thing will only make us look more troubled.” It occurred to her only after she’d spoken that it was what Margot had intended. She set her teeth.
    Margot narrowed her eyes. “Small thing?”
    â€œIt was property damage. No one was hurt. Why would I go on television to condemn vandalism?”
    â€œBecause these are terrorists,” Margot said, utterly reasonable. “They’re out to harm your country.”
    â€œOh, that’s different,” said Suyana. “But the list is incomplete. Four years ago the Americans came over to revitalize Altamina silver mine. When they left, they buried two tons of waste. When my government complained it was leaking into the groundwater, they covered it with sand. That’s harmed more lives than this explosion. I’m happy to go on TV and talk about threats to my country, if you insist, but if I do, I want to be thorough.”
    She could hardly breathe as she said it; her bravery was drying up.
    For an awful second, nobody moved, as if she’d been so angry she’d managed to stop time.
    Then Margot turned to Hakan. “And this is how you’ve trained the Face of the United Amazonian Rainforest Con–federation?”
    Hakan looked at Suyana with an expression she didn’t understand, and said, “I train diplomats, not puppets. She must know her own mind.”
    â€œI see that,” said Margot, raising an eyebrow. After a moment longer of looking at Suyana, waiting for a change of heart, she stood. “Well, we certainly wouldn’t drag her to the podium against her will, and there’s no need to make this a laundry list of complaints. We’ll issue a general statement denouncing terrorism. I assume you stand with us?”
    â€œOf course,” said Hakan.
    When they were alone, Suyana said, “I’m sorry.” She felt like she’d been punched in the stomach. Her hands were trembling.
    Hakan shook his head. “You’re a better diplomat than that.”
    â€œMargot was trying to lower us. No matter what I did it would have been wrong.”
    â€œYou can find ways out of that, Suyana.”
    â€œI got angry.”
    â€œThe UARC isn’t in a position to be angry. Too much still relies on the Big Nine. Chordata are terrorists.”
    â€œThey’re not,” she said. “Not like Margot says. You know they’re not.”
    â€œThey’re not helping you,” he said.
    It was the closest he got to telling her, if he knew.
    â€œMargot isn’t helping us,” she said, but the venom was already gone. She was looking down the limbs of a tree that had nothing but Margot at the end of every branch.
    After a moment he said, “Not anymore.”
    He left after that, to talk to Bolivia about some chance at positive PR that could help drown out the noise this would make for them.
    The IA’s official denunciation of terrorism in the heart of a troubled, unstable UARC ran without them, on every channel.
    Three weeks later, Hakan was gone.
    Suyana had gotten better at seeming docile since.
    Ã—  ×  ×  ×  ×  ×  ×
    One of the things that kept her up at night was wondering if she would ever have told him, or if she would have kept it secret, something that was hers.
    She’d told no one else about Chordata, until tonight. Then she’d shown it to a stranger, a stranger under her protection, because he was the reason she was still breathing.
    She was in a bad way now, having let him help her, having walked across Paris in the shelter of his arm, having fallen asleep in front of him, an unforgivable weakness. No