A Liaden Universe® Constellation, Volume 4

by Sharon Lee

  Either way, it wasn’t none of his bidness. He just hoped he’d never see her again.

  • • • • • •

  Villy woke up from his nap in plenty of time to eat dinner and get ready for his regular date with Bradish Faw.

  Bradish was one of his favorite dates, and not just because he brought a platter of pastries every week to share out among the whole crew, and a special treat, tied up in colored cellophane with a big bow, for Villy himself. No, he liked Bradish because the baker was genuinely kind, and because no date was exactly the same as all the others. Sometimes, Bradish would bring a book and ask Villy to read to him, sometimes he’d bring a music tape, sometimes he would bring a toy or something special he wanted—or wanted Villy—to wear.

  Tonight, Bradish hugged him, then held him at arm’s length, looking him up and down.

  “You been worryin’?” he asked severely.

  “Studying,” Villy answered with a smile. “Does it show?”

  “I saw it, din’t I? Nothin’ wrong with studyin’, but you don’t wanna lose your looks over it.”

  He released Villy and looked around the room, his eye lighting on the low table with the toys laid out, and the oil on its warming tile.

  “Oil nice and warm?” he asked.

  “Ought to be. I’ll check it while you make yourself comfy.”

  “No, you get comfy, and I’ll check it. I ain’t give you a massage in too long.”

  Dates went the way the client said they did, within limits set out in the House Rules—that was a House Rule, too. Villy slipped his robe off, stretched out on his stomach, and put his head down on his crossed arms. He heard the sound of Bradish getting undressed, and raised his head again.

  “Want me to help you with that, honey?” he asked, husky and suggestive.

  “You just stay right there,” Bradish told him, “where I can ’preciate the view.”

  There was some more rustling, then a gentle clink which was probably the oil bottle being lifted off the tile. The bed gave when Bradish knelt beside him, and Villy shivered when warm, knowing hands stroked his back and sides.

  “Beautiful,” Bradish said, moving his hands away. “Let’s get you relaxed.”

  The hands were back, oiled this time, strong fingers finding the knots in his shoulders and the tight places along his spine and patiently smoothing them away.

  Villy sighed—and sighed again, as his muscles loosened. Over his head, his date laughed softly.

  “You melt like butter on a griddle,” he murmured, his breath warm in Villy’s ear. He shivered obligingly, and Bradish returned to the massage.

  When he was thoroughly oiled, utterly melted, and almost half-asleep, Bradish leaned over him, murmuring in his ear. Villy lifted his head; Bradish gently pushed it back down onto his arms.

  “You just stay like you are. I’ll take care of everything,” he whispered.

  • • • • • •

  Some while later, Bradish having left for home, the sheets changed and hygiene observed, Villy went downstairs. Bidness’d been light the last few days. Even though he was still feeling languorous and drifty, he really ought to take another date tonight, if there was anybody waiting in the parlor for company. In the event that there was, he was wearing fluid dark pants, and a see-through white shirt. The new rug in the downstairs hall felt nice under his bare toes as he headed for the parlor.

  “Hey, Villy,” Jade said as he paused by the desk beside the parlor door. Jade was on reception tonight, keeping track of requests, who went upstairs with who, and how long they were logged for.

  “Hey, sweetie,” he said, smiling at her. “Anybody lonely in the parlor?”

  “Nothing to worry you, if there are. You been reserved. Paid cash upfront, too, for a whole two hours.”

  Villy blinked. Two hours was pretty rich. Then he realized that it had to be one of his pilots, back on-port and looking for company. He didn’t wince, though vigorous pilot exercise wasn’t quite what he wanted after Bradish’s treatment. But, two hours paid up full wasn’t something he could afford to pitch aside just because he wasn’t feeling athletic.

  “I’ll just get a cup of coffee first,” he said to Jade. “What his name, my date?”

  Jade shook her head.

  “The lady said her name was Desa ven’Zel. Liaden—well, with that name, what else?—and she asked for you, specific.”

  Villy felt a cold breath of air down the back of his thin shirt. Suddenly, he was a lot more awake.

  “Lemme see the screen,” he said, and Jade obligingly spun it around to him.

  There were four clients in the parlor. Three streeters were talking with Nan, Vera, and Si, for values of talking that involved lap-cuddles and nuzzling. The fourth client sat in the chair nearest the fireplace, hands folded on her knee, pensive gaze directed to the hearth stone.

  Villy spun the screen back to Jade, wide awake now.

  “Who’s bouncing?” he asked.

  “Patsy.”

  “Buzz her and ask her to meet me at the coffeepot.”

  “You’re not taking the date?”

  Villy shook his head, emphatically.

  Jade didn’t frown, but she did say, “I need something to put in the log.”

  “Not safe,” Villy said, which wasn’t something you put down in the log lightly. Not safe, meant that Ms. Audrey would never open to this particular client again.

  “I’ll buzz Patsy,” Jade said. “Go get your coffee, Villy; you look green.”

  • • • • • •

  “. . . at the casino. She said she was a friend of Quin’s, like I was, and wanted me to tell her where to find him. I—something felt off, is all, an’ I brushed her off, told her my melant’i didn’t let me talk right then.”

  “Took that, did she?” Patsy asked. She was leaning against the wall by the buffet, watching him drink his coffee.

  Villy nodded.

  “Took it. Shift went over ’bout then. I looked out for her on the floor when I left. Didn’t see her and figured somebody smarter’n me’d sent her up to the Boss.”

  Patsy nodded.

  “Shoulda been the way it went, if it was Quin she was after,” she said in her deep, quiet voice. “Her comin’ here, after you, again—either she didn’t get her answer from the Boss, or she did, and took a fancy to you, separate from that bidness.”

  Villy’s stomach cramped. He held his coffee cup in icy hands and looked up at Patsy.

  “I don’t want to talk to her,” he said. “She scares me.”

  She eyed him.

  “Considering the people I’ve seen who don’t scare you, that’s pretty tellin’. Quiet a minute, now; I gotta think this out.”

  Patsy stared up into the corner of the room. Villy felt his stomach sink. Nothing good could come outta Patsy’s thinking about this. Dammit, there wasn’t anything to think about! It was open and shut; he had the right to refuse any client he considered was dangerous—that was in the Rules a couple times, put down in different ways.

  “Where is Quin?” Patsy asked abruptly.

  “Off-world making a delivery,” Villy told her, and put his cup down, still half-full of coffee. Patsy had thought something out and he was pretty sure he wasn’t going to like whatever she’d decided on.

  “So,” she said pensively, “we got this Liaden woman asking the Sticks dealer does he know where’s the Boss’s son? Even if she’s a friend, she still might not know anything more particular about where he is, past Surebleak. Still an’ all, why ask the Sticks dealer? Why not ask the Boss—or McFarland, if the Boss was too busy to talk?”

  Villy didn’t answer; the questions weren’t for him; they were to help Patsy fix her reasoning. She was working her way up to something, and he didn’t like the direction she was tending toward.

  “Patsy, I don’t wanna talk to her.”

  Her eyes focused on him; she gave him a smile and patted his shoulder.

  “I know you don’t, sweetie. Stick here
just another sec. I gotta check something with Jade.”

  She left, walking fast. Villy considered going up to his room, but Patsy was perfectly capable of getting Ms. Audrey to order him to come out and do what he was told.

  He sighed, looked at the coffee cup he’d put down—and didn’t pick it up again. Which was a good thing, because here came Patsy back again, her face firm and professional.

  “Okay,” she said briskly. “Your date’s starting to get impatient.”

  “I said I didn’t want the date,” Villy said, as patient as he could. “Jade can tell her that, and give the deposit back.”

  “Well, she might’ve done that,” Patsy said, as one being fair, “’cept I butted in and told her you’d be right down.” She held up a hand to stop him squawking, so he just shook his head.

  “Look, this—whatever this is—bears on the Boss’s household. She might be a friend—though McFarland didn’t know anything ’bout nobody looking for Quin today. From t’other side, she might not be a friend, which fits with the pieces we got. Either side, it’s Boss Conrad’s to solve. McFarland’ll be here inside ten minutes. All you hafta do is keep her in the parlor ’til he gets here and takes her in hand.”

  “Give her money back and set her out on the street. Cheever can take ’er up there,” Villy said, knowing it wasn’t going to go that way. Patsy’s mind was made up, and, well, sleet—what was ten minutes? He could talk that long in his sleep.

  “No, now, you’re not thinkin’. We don’t want to put ourselfs in the way of Balance, now, do we? Because we’re nice, sensible people who don’t wanna get shot today, or to get put on a list to get shot five years down the road when we’re least expecting it, because we interfered where we shouldn’t’ve. So, if this lady wants Quin, and Quin ain’t here, then the very best thing we can do is get her into the hands of Quin’s dad—and Quin’s dad’s ’hand—who’ll know zackly what to do with her, and how to do it.”

  Put that way—well, he was thinking now, if he hadn’t been, before. He didn’t believe for a minute that Desa ven’Zel was any friend of Quin’s. That didn’t mean they didn’t know each other, anyhow, and maybe did have bidness—Liaden bidness—to do together. Either way, Patsy was right; they didn’t want to tangle themselves—and maybe the whole of Ms. Audrey’s house, too—in any Liaden Balances.

  Villy sighed, quietly. He knew what Patsy wanted him to do, and if it had been anyone else—well, sleet, it was what he did do, a lot of the time, if somebody was upset, or rambunctious—get Villy, that’s what they said, and he’d come and get ’em all settled down. That was all this was, really, soothe the lady’s impatience, and keep her busy talking ’til Cheever came and took her in hand.

  “All right. But I don’t want her in my room.”

  Patsy smiled at him.

  “You don’t worry about that; she’s not going anywhere outside that parlor. Just all you gotta do is talk to her ’til McFarland gets here,” she said soothingly. “I’ll be watching the whole time. If she tries to hurt you, I’m there. Promise.”

  “Even if it means she puts you down on her list?”

  “Sweetie, you’re more important to me than any Liaden’s shit list. I started living on borrowed time a year or two before you was borned.”

  He took a breath. All you gotta do is talk to her, he told himself. Give ’er an on-the-house drink and ask after what she likes and how she likes it. Keep her from killing Jade—that was an uncomfortable thought, but he didn’t doubt the aptness of it. He looked at Patsy.

  “Time for Jade’s coffee break, maybe,” he said.

  Patsy narrowed her eyes.

  “I think you’re right,” she said, with hardly a pause to think on it. “I’ll relieve her while you go in to see your date.”

  “Right,” Villy said.

  He breathed in, and breathed out, which he pretended calmed his stomach, and headed for the parlor, stride loose and face languid.

  • • • • • •

  “I have been waiting for you,” she said, rising as he came into the room.

  Villy looked around the room; the three couples had apparently moved upstairs, and he was alone in the parlor with the Liaden woman—Desa ven’Zel—who was at least not smiling. Her face wasn’t really doing much of anything; it was like she’d painted it over with clear glue. If her greeting was a complaint, you couldn’t read it in her expression, or in her eyes.

  Villy gave a little smile of his own.

  “I didn’t know you were waiting, honey,” he said, carefully avoiding anything that sounded like an apology. “I’d’ve been down sooner, if I had.”

  “I made an appointment,” she said. “The person at the desk was to have told you.”

  “Well, but my last date went over,” Villy said, improvising; “and I didn’t check my messages right away, after I was alone.” He gave her another smile, purely professional, and made a show of looking her over and liking what he saw.

  “There’s no reason for us to fight. I’m here now, and we can get to know each other.” He moved over to the refreshments table, wondering how many minutes he’d used up outta Patsy’s ten. His nerves said it’d been a year since he’d come into the parlor, but his head was arguing for under two minutes.

  “What would you like to drink?” he asked over his shoulder.

  “I would like nothing to drink,” she said sternly. “I desire to go to your rooms. There are . . .” She hesitated, and he turned to look at her, which was a mistake, because it encouraged her to smile.

  “There are . . . very special things that I wish you to do for me.”

  Villy managed to suppress his shudder, and smiled back.

  “I’m looking forward to that,” he said. “But the first thing we gotta do is sit down and talk a little bit about the House Rules. The very first House Rule is that we have to talk about ’em with all our new dates, so there’s no misunderstandings or . . . unwanted surprises. This is a house of pleasure,” he said, warming slightly to his topic; “we don’t want any . . . mistakes.”

  The smile had slipped off of her mouth, leaving it hard and straight. He thought he saw impatience in the set of her face, but she bowed her head nice enough.

  “Indeed, all should be informed of the House Rules,” she murmured. “Mistakes are very costly, as I’m sure your Ms. Audrey would agree.” She raised her chin. “For the drink, is there wine?”

  “Sure there is,” he said heartily, knowing that what he had on offer wasn’t anything close to the beverage she’d expect. “I’ve got lorinberry wine, dandyweed wine, and soran wine right here, all nice and cold.”

  She considered him out of narrowed eyes.

  “Soran wine is sweet?” she asked finally.

  “Sweet as love,” he assured her.

  “I will have that.”

  “Good choice. Why don’t you take a seat and get comfy while I pour for us?”

  • • • • • •

  He’d hoped she’d go back to the single chair she’d been sitting in, absent his specific invitation to get comfy on one of the couches. The hope was dashed when he turned, glasses in hand, to find her curled into the corner of the softest, and least easily escaped couch Ms. Audrey owned.

  She smiled, and patted the cushion beside her.

  He crossed the room, frantically wondering how long it had been now, handed her a glass and settled in beside her.

  She lifted her glass, by which he knew she meant to offer a toast. He lifted his glass in imitation.

  “To successful endeavors,” she said, which sounded a little strange for a toast from a client to a host in a whorehouse. Villy raised his glass in answer.

  “Successful endeavors,” he murmured, and sipped.

  The wine was icy, and so sweet the inside of his mouth puckered for a moment. Even Desa ven’Zel seemed momentarily speechless.

  Villy took a breath.

  “A question,” his so-called date said.

  “Sure.”

&nbs
p; “Is this time that we linger over the rules deducted from the amount I placed upon deposit?”

  Worried about her money, was she? Villy guessed he didn’t blame her. He gave her a reassuring smile and reached over to pat her knee, which was the last thing he wanted to do, but, under other circumstances, was the thing he would have done. It was like patting a rock, except that a rock couldn’t narrow its eyes. And she wanted him to do very special things to her? When snowballs got up and danced a jig, she did.

  He sipped his wine and got his hand back without making it seem like he couldn’t let go of her soon enough; and smiled again.

  “The talk and the drink’s on the house,” he told her, which was true for every new client. “The clock won’t start ticking on that deposit until we close the door on our bedroom.”

  “That is well,” she said, and leaned forward to put a hand on his thigh.

  That was a surprise, and what was more of a surprise was that she kept it there. Her fingers were cold through the thin pants, and her grip was hard and impersonal. Away in another part of the house, he could just make out voices. The doorman was sending visitors down to the overflow parlor. That meant Ms. Audrey knew what was going on, and approved it. The House was making sure him and his date weren’t disturbed.

  “So,” she said, and her fingers tightened until it hurt. He drew a sharp breath, looked into her eyes, and gasped again at her smile.

  “Tell me the rules, Villy Butler.”

  She leaned back into her corner then, taking her hand with her. He’d have a bruise for sure, and—

  Where the sleet was Cheever McFarland? Villy thought, in a sudden spike of raw terror.

  He took a breath and pushed it out of his head, pushed all of it out of his head. For the length of the date, he concentrated on the date. He pretended—only it wasn’t pretend, not zackly—that the date was the most important thing in his life. The only thing in his life. That was the way it worked. Let yourself get distracted and the date noticed. Even if they didn’t know what they’d noticed, they wouldn’t ask for Villy again . . .

  “The Rules,” he said, smiling into her eyes. “Since you want me to do really special things, let’s talk about those Rules.”