The Dragon Variation

by Sharon Lee

  "Right-o," he said. And threw.

  It was more difficult this time. The universe narrowed to the ball and its antics, to the absolute necessity of catching and throwing and catching and—

  There was no ball.

  Disoriented, Aelliana spun, found Clonak, his hands hanging empty and a sheepish look on his round, mustached face. To the right Daav still sat atop the tool cart, his hair neatly braided. To the left was Jon dea'Cort, red ball held high in a hand.

  "I win," Jon announced, fixing Clonak in his eye. "How long has this been going on?"

  "About half-an-hour," Daav spoke up. "Indeed, Master Jon, I was about to call time, as Pilot Caylon must make the twilight ferry."

  Jon moved his glare to Aelliana, who became aware that her heart was pumping hurriedly and she was warm and rather damp.

  "If you have to catch the ferry, math teacher, now's the time to jet. Good evening."

  She bowed, trying to bring her rapid breathing under control. "Good evening, Master dea'Cort. Clonak—"

  "I'll deal with Clonak," Jon said awfully. "Move."

  Aelliana blinked and flicked a glance to Daav. His fingers moved atop one knee, shaping a word in Scout finger-talk: jet.

  In the back of the bay, the clock that kept official Port time sang the quarter hour.

  Aelliana ran.

  It wasn't until she left the ferry in Chonselta Port and was walking quickly toward the train station that she recalled the hair-ring and reached up to pull it free.

  Her hair flowed forward, shielding her from the world. Slowly, almost reluctantly, she slipped the ring into her pocket.

  Tomorrow, in the first hour after dawn, she thought and smiled within the fortress of her hair. Whatever pain Ran Eld might mete this evening, tomorrow she would fly.

  Chapter Seventeen

  Preserve your life, preserve your folk, preserve the Tree, no matter what the means. Grovel, if your enemy demands it; beg; swallow any insult. Stay alive, preserve you and yours.

  Watch close, stay alert. And when your enemy turns his back, kill him and run free.

  —Excerpted from Cantra yos'Phelium's Log Book

  THE CREW DOOR CLOSED and Jon spun back to Clonak, red ball held out like a judgment.

  "I shall be very interested to hear," he stated in a height of tone one very rarely had from Jon, "your reasons for engaging in a round of bowli ball with Pilot Caylon."

  Clonak very nearly gaped. He did shoot a glance over his shoulder at Daav, but gained nothing from that quarter save a grave inclination of the head.

  "Why not?" he asked, returning his full attention to Jon. "She gave good game."

  "Good game!" Jon's glare grew blacker. He took a step forward, shaking the bowli ball until its internal gyro squealed. "Good game! Do you have any notion how long I stood there, watching you?"

  "Well," Clonak allowed, leaning slightly back from the older man's approach, "there was the game to be concerned with, Master Jon, and my goddess out to knock my head off, if she could but manage it." He grinned. "I'm fond of my head, after all, so it seemed prudent to keep both eyes on the ball."

  "You never had a prudent thought in your life, you heedless—" Jon cut himself off abruptly. "Fifteen minutes I stood there, watching as you—you, who visit the gym every day and follow a full exercise routine!—barely held your own against a desk-bound, half-starved scholar with her second-class license shiny-new in her hand! I've a good notion to tell your trainer that—"

  "Second class!" Clonak yelped, going back a step and flinging a look of wild amazement over his shoulder. "Daav!"

  "Second class provisional," that gentleman said calmly, "awarded barely ten days gone."

  "What meat-brain granted her a provisional? She's as fast as any first class I've ever seen—faster than most!"

  "Flight time, Master Clonak," Daav chided gently. "The regs are quite clear."

  Clonak said something rude regarding the regs.

  "Yes, dear. I showed her where her suits were stowed today, and helped her inventory the emergency kit."

  "She's never so green as that!"

  "She's every bit as green as that!" Jon shouted. "And if she had succeeded in knocking your useless block into the center of next twelve-day—which I swear is no more than she should have!—she'd have stuttered and stammered and blamed herself and we'd have never seen Aelliana Caylon at this yard again!" He took a mighty breath, and released it in a roar.

  "Gods abound, I will tell your trainer!"

  "It never happened!" Clonak cried. "Jon, for pity's—"

  "And you!" Jon hurled the ball forcefully to the right and down. It twisted, hummed, skated and charted a rising course for the tool chest, speed increasing. Daav put out a long arm, captured the thing in a swoop and set it upon his knee, stroking it with firm fingers, as if it were a particularly frolicsome kitten.

  "I?" He lifted an elegant eyebrow.

  "Don't you come all High House with me! What the devil did you mean by letting that go on? Timing it, were you? I suppose it never occurred to you to interfere? It was easier to sit up there like a melant'i-choked dirt-scruffer—"

  "Certainly not," Daav said, his calm voice cutting effortlessly across the other's tirade. "I hope I know my obligations, as trainer, as comrade and as copilot. In any of those faces I'd be blind not to see she needs to learn how to fight—quickly."

  It could not be said that Jon's mouth actually hung open. However, there was a long moment of silence before a grudging, "Well, that's the first sensible thing I've heard said in the last ten minutes, all considered. Still, lad, she might have took damage. Clonak's got the edge."

  "It's what I've been telling you!" Clonak cried plaintively. "My so-called edge was enough to keep the pace." He moved his shoulders. "I don't say I couldn't have worn her down, if it came to an endurance test. But the unvarnished truth is, Master Jon, she might very well have pegged me before it came to stamina—and I'd be in the 'doc even now, growing me a new head!" He set his hands on his hips and gave Jon back his glare. "Tell my trainer, then!"

  "Hah." Jon flicked his glance aside. "Daav?"

  "Not entirely unlike my own judgment, though I believe Clonak over-tender in regard to his head. I rather thought she was homing in on his nose."

  "Smashed to a purple pulp," Clonak mourned. "Blood all sticky in my mustache."

  "Brace up, darling, the 'doc would have put everything right."

  "Yes, but you know," Clonak said earnestly, "it still hurts."

  "One of life's inequities," Jon said, and sighed. "Why I ever let the pair of you pass piloting is a puzzle for my old age. How came you to be our math teacher's copilot, young Captain?"

  "She asked me to accompany her on a thorough testing of the new navcomp and backups," Daav said, sliding silently to his feet. He tossed the bowli ball lightly to Clonak, who scooped it up in the instant before it touched his belt buckle.

  "We're to lift in the first hour after dawn, tomorrow."

  "If she keeps this pace, she'll lose provisional well ahead of spec," Jon said. "Good lift to you, then." He turned back toward his office.

  "Fair flying, Master Jon," Daav returned softly, and cocked a meaningful eyebrow at Clonak.

  "End of shift, old friend?"

  The pudgy Scout sighed and used the tips of three fingers to smooth his mustache. "I suppose you're right," he said, walking at Daav's side toward the crew door. "Why are you always right, Captain?"

  "Now, do you know, my perspective is that I'm often wrong."

  "A terrifying statement! Do not, I pray, say it to anyone else! As for myself, consider my lips sealed—I shall carry your secret to the grave."

  The crew door cycled and they stepped out into the twilight. Clonak drew in a noisy lungful of free air and grinned up at Daav. "Come 'round to Apel's and let me buy you a glass of wine."

  A glass of wine with Clonak had a woeful tendency to become many glasses of wine, and a night so late it might just as easily be called tomorrow.
Daav moved his shoulders and returned his friend's grin.

  "Another time. I've an early lift."

  "So you do! I'm reminded that I'm jealous." Clonak lifted a hand and moved away. "Until soon, darling."

  "Take good care, Clonak." Daav stretched, drinking in the evening air, then turned toward Mechanic Street and his landcar. An early lift, he thought, and smiled.

  RAN ELD STROLLED INTO her room without the courtesy of a ring to announce his presence. He had long ago possessed himself of an override to Aelliana's door-code and used it as his right. She suspected that he also kept an ear on her so-called private comm line, and thus routed all calls to her office at the college.

  Aelliana blanked the reader and spun, coming quickly to her feet. She had as little desire for Ran Eld to discover her perusing a volume on Terran culture as she had for being trapped in her chair against the desk, her brother looming close above her.

  As it was, her position was less than perfect, with her back to the L-shaped desk and a bookshelf cutting off escape to the right. Still, she was on her feet and that was something, she told herself as her brother came close—and then closer—a sheaf of printout in his ring-heavy hand.

  "Good evening, Aelliana, how delightful to find you yet awake." His voice held its usual note of sweet malice, though with a certain undertone that said he would have been better pleased, if it been necessary for him to roust her from bed.

  He moved the sheaf of papers carelessly, fanning her face with a cold, tiny breeze. Aelliana shivered.

  Ran Eld smiled. "I have the report on the progress of your investment, sister. Allow me to congratulate you on the timeliness of your delivery. Alas, I find I am not entirely convinced of the superiority of your Fund; it seemed to run neck-and-neck with my own."

  "A twelve-day is not sufficient time to test out," Aelliana said, hating the quaver in her voice. "You know that."

  "Do I? But perhaps I had forgotten. Stupid of me." He moved the papers closer, laying the sharp edges against her cheek. Aelliana shrank back, the papers followed, edges beginning to bite. She froze.

  "I hear," Ran Eld said conversationally, "that you have taken to frequenting gaming places. That you tend—after receiving tuition on the subject from your elders—toward the company of Scouts. Is what I hear true, sister?"

  The paper edges burned against her skin. One quick move of her brother's hand and her cheek would be sliced, eye-edge to jaw. Aelliana took a deep breath and forced herself to meet his eyes.

  "How could I frequent gaming houses?" she asked, keeping her voice humble, welcoming now the despicable, cowardly quaver. It sometimes happened that Ran Eld gave over punishment, if her groveling proved sufficiently amusing. "My wages are given entirely to yourself, brother—and you even now hold the proof of what befell my quarter-share."

  There was a long pause, long enough for Aelliana to feel the breath begin to thicken in her throat.

  "So I do." He lifted the papers away, glanced at them—and glanced up.

  "I note a copy forwarded to the delm. Why is that?"

  "I—Merely I had thought it proper," she gasped. "It was Delm's Word began the venture and I—I meant no offense, only right action."

  Another pause, excruciating to her quivering nerves.

  "Better to err on the part of right action than to fail of giving full honor," Ran Eld allowed at last, though not as if this judgment pleased him. "I advise that there is no need to send future reports to the delm. Do you understand me?"

  She bowed her head cravenly, blessing the forward-falling shroud of hair. "I understand you, brother."

  "Good. Of this other matter—you will look at me, Aelliana."

  Swallowing against terror, she raised her head. Gods, what if one of Ran Eld's cronies had seen her in Quenpalt's Casino? What if the tale of her win had come after all to his ears? Her ship—Ran Eld must not, must not, be allowed—

  "I ask you again, sister, if you have not been gambling in casinos. If perhaps you had not acquired—a spaceship—through playing a game of chance with a High House lord out of Solcintra?"

  "A spaceship?" She stared at him, striving for a look of rankest stupidity. "What should I do with a spaceship?"

  Ran Eld's eyes bored into hers. Somehow, she endured it, feeling the weight of Ride the Luck's keys, hanging cold between sweat-slicked breasts.

  "I thought it a wine-tale," he said at last, moving his eyes from hers. It took every erg of will not to sag against the desk and sob aloud with relief, though she did dare bow her head, and draw the curtain of her hair once again across her face.

  Above her, Ran Eld sighed. "Do you recall, Aelliana, your instruction regarding Scouts?"

  "I am—am only to teach those Scouts registered to my courses," she said hoarsely, "and shun their company at all other times."

  "Precisely. I warn you now, sister, that it will go extremely ill with you, do I find you have disregarded this instruction. Scouts are not fit company for one of Mizel—even if that one is only yourself. Do you understand?"

  "I understand," she whispered around a sudden surging desire to behold at this moment any of Binjali's crew, with a special thanks to the gods if that any should chance to be Daav or burly Jon dea'Cort.

  "Very good," Ran Eld said, out of the real and dismal present. "I give you good-night, sister. Sleep well."

  She raised her head sufficiently to watch him cross the room and pass through the door. The closing of that portal was like a knife against the wires of fright that held her upright.

  With a dry sob, she crashed to her knees, hands flying up to cover her face as she huddled against the desk-legs and shivered.

  Chapter Eighteen

  We signed the final draft of the contract tonight. Thought they'd choke on Captain's Justice. Stupid groundlings. How do we know the length of voyage, assuming we even break out? How do we know there's any worlds left to run to? Situation like this, there has to be one voice that's law, not some damn committee. And that law has got to be in favor of the ship, and the greatest good. There can only be one captain. One voice. One law. For the best survival of the ship.

  —Excerpted from Cantra yos'Phelium's Log Book

  IT WAS RAINING in Solcintra Port.

  Aelliana ran through the downpour, less conscious of the wet than the joy that heated her blood, reducing Clan Mizel to a speck and Ran Eld Caylon to an infelicity born of a bad night's dreaming.

  Here in the wakeful world, she would soon meet her co-pilot at the foot of her ship's ramp, and Liad itself would be left behind, reduced to a mathematical necessity, one of many factors supporting an equation of flight.

  She reached The Luck's pad, raced 'round the curve to the end of the ramp—and all but cried aloud, her run shattered by dismay.

  There was no tall graceful figure awaiting her at the base of the ramp, rain-jewels glittering along leathered shoulders. The gantry was empty, from tarmac to hatch. Aelliana swallowed, shivering in the dismal downpour, and walked the rest of the way forward on joy-dead feet.

  To the left, a flicker of noiseless movement. Aelliana spun as Daav ducked out from beneath the ramp, leather collar turned up against the wet, long fingers dancing cheerfully.

  Relief hit in a giddy wave, rocking her into laughter as she shook sodden hair away from her face.

  "A very fine morning, to be sure!" She answered the silent greeting aloud. "I thought you had forgotten me!"

  "No, but I have an excellent memory," he said earnestly. "Even Jon allows me that much." He sighed heavily, shoulders slumping in an attitude of exaggerated remorse. "My woeful decadence is to blame for your distress and I humbly ask pardon."

  Giddy yet with the return of joy, Aelliana smiled and tipped her head, trying to read beyond the mischief in the black eyes and into the heart of the joke.

  In a moment she had given it up, glancing away from a gaze that seemed to read her all too easily, while remaining a cipher to her closest study.

  "Decadence?" she asked.
r />   "Well, you see," he said, slipping past her and ghosting up the ramp, "I would much rather be dry than wet."

  She choked on another laugh and followed him, pulling the keys up on their neck-chain and slipping it over her head. "I wonder that Master dea'Cort allows one so in love with comfort to work for him."

  "How could you not, when Master dea'Cort wonders as much himself? Often. And loudly."

  Almost she laughed again, but lost it in a tiny shiver of alarm. The landing was very thin and Daav, slim as he was, filled a significant percentage of the available space. She would need to practically lean against his chest to access the hatch panel.

  As if he felt her hesitation in his own muscles, Daav pivoted sideways on the ramp, arms outstretched, one hand gripping the rail, the other resting against the hull. He grinned and inclined his head.

  "Your shelter from the storm, pilot. Be quick, I beg you, else I will be wet!"

  She slid by, feeling his nearness like sunlight on her back, raised the shield and fingered the first key into place. The ID board came alive. She fed in her code and seated the second key. There was a muted click and the hatch began to rise.

  Aelliana pulled the keys free and turned carefully on the landing, inclining her head with a forced smile. "Quickly, before you are soaked."

  "Pilot first." Daav stayed where he was, one eyebrow askance. "I've been well drilled in protocol."

  Pilot first. Aelliana blinked as the words found home, then drew a deep breath and stepped into her ship, deliberately squaring her shoulders as she did.

  DAAV ENTERED THE ship; the outer hatch cycled and locked behind him.

  Before him, Aelliana hesitated on the edge of the inner hatch. He read in the set of her body an awareness that had nothing to do with wariness and saw, in one of the flashes of instinctive understanding characteristic of him, that Aelliana was poised on a precipice of change. Here and now, she was engaged in letting go of something past and potent and simultaneously reaching forth to grasp something other and infinitely precious.