- Prologue

by Sharon Lee

  Ahead was the Conglomeration of Portcalay; within it were several millions of people, and the air strip center she was on course for.

  The maps and positioning were fine so far; what she hadn't expected was that the place would be so bright. The runways themselves were lit, of course; Theo read the various beacons as they came to view—this was the emergency strip, that was backup for regional commutes, the pair of general strips were at right angles, one north-south to the east of the vague square that was Portcalay and the other well to the south of center, running to the west for her.

  Conversation in the cockpit had been quiet, then nonexistent after Veradantha fell asleep; yos'Senchul sat the copilot's seat as observer only and several times appeared to be drowsing himself.

  The excitement of the flight itself kept Theo awake, though she managed not to comment on it to herself, out of respect for Veradantha's rest. She did, though, need to give air control a verbal ack for touchdown on Portcalay G East.

  Quiet as it was, her confirmation woke both her passenger and her copilot. Both were chattering away about sauces of choice, and the taste benefits between whole grain and spelt, when Theo guided the King Six into the final turn for landing.

  Well before her, the white line became thicker; Theo unlocked and touched the landing gear switch, felt the drop and lock, and now the thick line was a runway, gleaming in the night, marks of myriad previous landings approximating her landing zone, the lights guiding her true. She backed the throttles slightly, looked at a sudden wind speed change, confirmed that with the ground, and sighed. Almost over. The headwind bobbled the nose, and she trimmed out the elevators with a touch.

  The King Six smoothed into the final seconds, the wind allowing her just a hint of flare at the very last moment and . . .

  They were down.

  Chaos, did this plane have great suspension! She couldn't feel the gear bottom out, instead there was simple, smooth settle. Soft as a pillow.

  She glanced to the screen then, and wrinkled her nose.

  "And there is a problem worth a grimace?" Pilot yos'Senchul sounded interested, but unconcerned.

  She felt her face warm, but the instrument lighting wouldn't betray her blush.

  Theo reduced throttle, letting the craft slow, watched for the runway ahead to take on a green stripe, to the left, and she followed the green stripe, toward those bright lights.

  "According to the chronometer, I was seventeen seconds late on touchdown," she admitted.

  From the back came a sneeze that might have really been a strangled laugh, while the flight instructor peered into the night, his reply bouncing off the windscreen.

  "By so much, Pilot Waitley? Where do you think your error lies?"

  She pondered that while steering the plane through a sudden maze of lights and lines, the beacons and strobes of a dozen or more craft in her sight.

  The arrows guided her left once more, around the large hangar and maintenance areas she'd spotted from on high, into a kind of courtyard. The lead lights flashed, steadied—

  "The Howsenda Hugglelans," yos'Senchul intoned, entirely unnecessarily, since the name was emblazoned in intricately flashing purple signs taller than the control tower.

  The parking slot for the King Six was there: Number Eleven. There were picnic tables just ten or twelve plane lengths ahead, and beyond that a bulky building that was all balconies and torches, with smoky fire pits and . . . motion.

  People. Dozens. Hundreds! Some were waving at her plane, some were seated at benches, some were moving in a strange line, right hands on the hips of the people in front of them, some . . .

  Theo checked clearance carefully, and used the correct brake to slide the plane into position, trying not to gawk at the same time.

  "Part of it was the head wind," she said, in answer to yos'Senchul's question. "Maybe a second or two, there."

  "Part of it, no doubt," he said dryly, reminding her of Father's tone when something obvious escaped her, "is that the flight plan did not extend to switching runways. The default is north, but that would have been a nasty little crosswind, indeed, and traffic didn't warrant making you fight it on manual. In any case, late or not, we are here and I, at least, am hungry. Let us eat!"

  Theo looked at the menu painted above the reservation desk, knowing none of the names of things, and shrugged at her mentors, who asked, almost in unison, "Today's special?" One nodded, and the other bowed—to each other and to the desk manager, who whistled sharply into the din, producing someone to guide them.

  Theo didn't mind following the guide—he was dressed in a tight sleeveless vest over a smooth, muscled chest, and moved quite well for a non-pilot, his bell-bottomed slacks encasing what was probably a dancer's body. His stride was forthright, his eyes, when he looked behind to see that they were still with him, compelling. He carried a bundle in each hand, and Theo was finding it hard to remember that the evening had started out with a fight and an administrative hearing.

  Everyone they passed seemed to be having a good time; everyone was eating—well, not everyone. At the smaller and less well-lit tables sat shadowy couples, sipping together with straws from tall, glowing cylinders. Some of the couples were awfully close together, and perhaps getting closer.

  Their own table was at terrace edge, with a view of the airport, and a fire pit right there, with a small tabletop leaning against it. Veradantha chose her seat, and perforce, Theo found herself between her hosts while their guide bent in front of them and busied himself with the fire pit.

  Surprisingly close came Veradantha's whisper.

  "Admirable, is he not? It is a shame we can do no more than admire, Theo Waitley. I, for not having the energy beyond my eyes and nose, and you, you for being Pilot tonight, and thus too tightly scheduled to wrestle three falls with someone who wears vya so extravagantly."

  She opened her mouth—and closed it. Yes, she knew what vya was, and obviously so did Veradantha.

  As if oblivious, yos'Senchul turned to them, hand waving wide toward their guide. "And now, the show!"

  As if he had been waiting for the announcement, their guide deftly picked the tabletop up from its lean against the pit. A small spindle depending from it was placed precisely into a matching notch, leaving about three quarters of the thing over the fire zone.

  Wait, now she saw it! Their guide was their cook, too!

  The cook spun the "table" hard with his hand and it continued to rotate. With a practiced air he wiped it with a small paper cloth, gave the table an extra spin, and waved at the pit, which dutifully roared into flame, as he proceeded to carefully portion stuff onto the cook surface.

  Theo did as she was told: she watched. His implements were wood and ceramic, his hands quick and sure.

  "Thus we clearly see," Veradantha said, bringing their attention to herself, "that the universe encompasses more than the classrooms and grounds of Anlingdin Academy. The choices are varied, and the methods, as well. Some assume that a proper education instills particular beliefs and necessities as much as it instills knowledge; indeed, some would have it that the failure to assume these beliefs indicates a lack of knowledge."

  Theo took the cue, offering, "The Simples are like that on Delgado—in fact Delgado is like that on Delgado!"

  Her companions looked on, alert, interested, so she continued with, "I mean, the whole thing about the university is that they want to raise people to do what they do, the way they do it."

  The flight instructor coughed lightly. "Yes, and after all, pilots wish there to be more proper pilots. This is the way of the universe, is it not?"

  Theo paused as the cook flashed his knife rhythmically across something on the inner section of the whirling disk, heard it sizzle as a flash of vinegar was added . . .

  She put her hand to the side of her head, where it itched, then drew it away suddenly, glancing at her hand to make sure she hadn't compromised the dressing on her wound.

  "No," she said after a moment, "there's a differenc
e. If an instructor tells me that I ought to use landing gear, and I don't, then I have probably made a mistake, a bad one. A demonstrably bad mistake! If someone tells me that I need to read a particular chapter of a book three times each year and repeat a sentence from that book every day else the universe will collapse on itself . . . that is not demonstrable."

  Neither of the pilots spoke: still they watched with intent interest. Maybe she hadn't explained fully—

  "We need pilots. We need people who know about rugs, and people to sell things, to cook, and . . . but they're all doing something. I want to do something. I don't want to go to a meeting and . . . I mean look, my mother and father have to go to meetings and spend time—waste time is more like it!—because they have all these silly levels of things to keep track of, all these holes to put people into.

  "Adjunct," she said firmly, holding up her left hand, one finger up. Using her right to tap that hand she said, "Assistant adjunct. Associate adjunct. Associate assistant adjunct. Assistant associate adjunct."

  She stopped, gathered herself. "I don't want to spend my life worrying about how many credit-months I've sat listening to someone tell me about something I know about already!"

  She made a face, scrinching up her eyes, and when she opened them found a beverage cart.

  So many choices . . . but, "Nothing with alcohol," she said austerely. "Not for me, I'm flying."

  "Of course, Pilot. Something to increase attention? Soft drink, tea, water, coffee?"

  "Do you have real tea? Liaden tea?"

  The cart driver laughed.

  "Yes, real tea, Pilot. It could be worth my life to offer anything else."

  * * *

  The meal was served with flourish, each plate filled first with a third of the food on the outer circle of the wheel, then with a third of the next orbit, and finally from the center, each expertly scooped, each precise.

  The sauces were extravagant, and Theo too busy eating to speak. The cook stayed, using the now still disk over the warm pit to encourage a slowly rising bready dessert, which was covered in fruit and folded on itself before serving.

  "And so," yos'Senchul offered as the cook was arranging their final dish, "what would you, Theo Waitley, if you had no need to sit in classrooms for a certain number of hours? If your flight time was counted and found adequate, what would you do? Would you hire yourself off to Tree-and-Dragon?"

  Theo waited a moment, raised her hands from the table, palms up, in question, then flashed repeat query please.

  The instructor sighed, very gently.

  "Do you not sit with your classmates of an off-hour, pining for a ship—perhaps a cruise liner or a yacht? Don't you wish for a berth with a particular company, or have plans to own a freight line of your own?"

  Theo shook her head, nibbling delicately at her dessert.

  "This pilot, your father." Veradantha took up the questioning. "He did nothing to aim you to a company, a preferred ship? The Moon-and-Rabbit, perhaps, if not the Dragon?"

  Theo put her fork down, suddenly finished with dessert. There were questions in back of the questions Veradantha was asking. She could feel them, but she didn't understand them. Sighing, she answered the surface, hoping the back questions would come clear. Sometimes, that happened.

  "My father didn't even tell me he was a pilot until Captain Cho offered to sponsor me to Anlingdin. Then he warned me how dangerous it is!"

  The instructor touched the empty left sleeve where his arm should be.

  "Danger, yes. There can be danger, after all."

  Theo nodded. "I'm learning that. On Delgado—on Delgado, danger isn't acceptable." She looked down at her plate. "My father did help me bring my math up, and he taught me how pilots pack. When I was ready to ship out, the last thing he told me was to remember that really big problems went to Delm Korval. I thought he was making a joke, to take my mind off—" She looked up at yos'Senchul's eyes. "But that might have been advice, too."

  "So it might. As you say, Liadens place a certain value on subtlety—and a father would wish to care for his child."

  She nodded again, fiddled with her fork, but didn't pick it up.

  "I played bowli ball with some cruise liner pilots—there are like six on at a time, working as a team." She paused, then looked to Veradantha.

  "I'm not sure I'm good with people, really. I'm not sure about being part of a six-team. I just want to . . . pilot, to fly. If I had everything Pilot yos'Senchul said, and all the choices were mine—that's what I'd want."

  "To pilot, eh?" yos'Senchul waved across the terrace. "You'll have your chance to pilot on the way home, I assure you. Look!"

  She'd been so busy eating and talking that she hadn't noticed what she should have: the breeze off the lake had filled the sky with fog.

  "You have a morning class and I have an early meeting," Veradantha said conversationally, "and I intend to sleep through the return trip. Please, Pilot, do your duty."

  Seventeen

  Ops

  Anlingdin Piloting Academy

  The King Six sighed, or maybe it was Theo. Systems counted their fingers and toes one more time, reporting in to the pilot so she could shut them down or bank them as needed; the only oddity was waiting for her passengers to finish gathering themselves together. She'd never had passengers before this trip.

  Her copilot had been awfully active. He'd watched without comment as Theo used the plane's credit to top off the tanks, heard her call in an amended flight plan to avoid a towering storm predicted for Lake Sawya, and carried on a running hand-talk conversation with Veradantha the entire time they were on the runway and lifting to cruise. For that matter, he'd periodically turn during the flight, chattering by hand for extended periods that seemed to have nothing to do with the progress of the flight. For all she'd vowed to sleep through the return trip, Veradantha's fingers were often active on her small keyboard, the tiny rhythmic clicks distinct in the plane's otherwise steady aural background. When the clicks stopped, that was when yos'Senchul would hold forth.

  At one point, Theo had turned her head to pointedly look at him, since his level of discussion had gone from active to agitated, and the motion was distracting. She'd caught what might have been inadequate preparatory curriculum but, given the syntax and motion of the single hand doing the work of two, could just as well have been weakly unbaked circles.

  To his credit he signed apologies to the ship, I rest now, which she'd also acknowledged with a quick one-handed yes thanks, but in only a few moments, after a spate of clicking from the back seat, he was again signing, albeit in a more subdued manner.

  The amended flight plan the King Six followed put it over the continent's largest lake, where the venerated and light-spangled Thirty Islands could be paralleled but not directly flown over. The sky was clear enough that she could see lights below and stars above, and if she'd wished she could easily have flown entirely by eye, ignoring the track line on GPS as each island's distinctive shape showed clearly. This part was fun as she threaded the needle in several places, making sure the while she was both above minimum attitude and between the noisier flight modes, enjoying the comfortable g-forces of the banking turns.

  Approaching the last of the islands, though, the plane gained altitude suddenly, and a column of cloud leapt out of the darkness, enveloping them, as the sigh of air passing around them changed timbre.

  The King Six bounced. She brought it level and began descending very gradually, the while keeping the variometer a focus. The plane behaved itself really well when they hit a quick burst of rain and hail that clattered on the skin, startling her, then they were through, the ship on course but tending downward . . .

  Veradantha spoke, gently, from her place: "We often forget, when we fly, that valleys and channels well below us are mirrored in the sky. You have flown through what some call 'the smoker.' You will look it up and send me your reaction in the morning, if you please."

  The variometer telling tales, Theo nodded, and increas
ed throttle, watching the crosswind which threatened to bring the ship uncomfortably close to the no-fly zone.

  Advertency won out—just. Then it was time to run a check of the backup instruments, and the flight resumed the comfortable silence, enlivened until the end with near random bursts of hand-talk and the low clicks of Veradantha's fingers on her notepad.

  They filed through the small terminal, yos'Senchul's, "Follow me if you will, Waitley," recognized as more of an order than a request.

  Passing by the Ops desk, they went down a short hall. yos'Senchul used a swipe key and bowed Veradantha and Theo into a brightly lit conference room.

  Theo shivered, belatedly recognizing that it was cool and damp outside, something she'd not noticed when leaving the plane. Maybe it was the hour, too, or concern about this sudden change of course.

  Veradantha sat at the table, pulling out her ubiquitous timer. Without looking up, she patted the place next to her, so Theo sat, too.

  yos'Senchul paced, his hand describing gestures that were not quite signs, his shoulders moving with a rhythm and beat—with a shock of recognition she realized that this was a calming routine, a tension reliever. Father sometimes—

  "The thing is, Waitley, that you are dangerous." The words were spoken gently, which concerned her greatly.

  Theo sat forward and steeled herself, admitting, "I don't understand."

  He used his hand for emphasis and said again, "You are dangerous. We, between us, have seen you tonight to be an adequate and more than adequate pilot for one of your flight time, background, and training. At flying, you are precocious, as your flight in the sailplane showed. That isn't dangerous, that's good."

  Theo sat back a little, unmollified.