by Sharon Lee
Hazenthull’s eyes moved, questioning.
“The scout who stands beside the captain is of Jela’s own blood,” Nelirikk said in the tongue of the Troop. Daav saw Diglon start and lean forward, face intent.
“The Line the captain asks you to give oath to is the Line to which I have myself given oath. When the captain and the scout go against the enemy of their blood, I will be at their backs. If there is a place or a service of greater glory in all the galaxy, I have not heard of it.”
There was silence. Hazenthull looked to Diglon Rifle, not as if she were seeing him, Daav thought, but as if she were weighing the burden on her soul. She sighed, and saluted.
“Captain. We came to offer ourselves and our weapons to Captain Miri Robertson. That has not changed. If a captain so wise in war will accept our oaths and weapons, we will serve her until our last bullet is spent.”
The captain nodded, glanced aside—and Daav found himself pinned in a feral gray glance.
“If Scout yos’Phelium will relinquish the short-oaths he holds in my name, this man and I will take your oaths to Line yos’Phelium.”
***
YOS’GALAN had been roused from his bed, Emrith Tiazan surmised, not without a certain satisfaction. Not that he was rumpled, mis-buttoned, clumsy, or in any way unseemly; but the silver eyes were heavy, and the charade of the voluble fool was missing entirely. Indeed, one might almost say the bow he accorded her was . . . terse.
“Erob.”
“yos’Galan.” She inclined her head, merely, not bothering to rise from her seat on the edge of the stone bridge; and pointed at the giants slumbering in her quiet place.
“Those are yours, I believe?”
He sighed. “In fact, they are not, though they stand kin to my brother and his lifemate.”
She sighed in her turn. “How else? Well, no matter. Korval’s kin-lines are not mine to tend. Thank the gods. Remove them. Immediately.”
The thin white eyebrows lifted. “I failed to notice the location of the pneumatic hoist when I came in. Perhaps you would be good enough—?”
“Or perhaps I would not. Wake them, yos’Galan, and remove them. Understand me, I would not require it of you, were your cha’leket or his lifemate able. However, my information is that both are convalescent, so the duty falls to near-kin.”
“They are,” he said slowly, “guests of your House.”
She stared at him. “I beg your pardon? Who admitted them?”
“Surely that information is in the door-log.”
Well, and so it would be—later just as much as now. And she was far too wily an old woman to be found in doubt of an assertion made by one of Korval. She sighed again and looked at the large, unmoving bulks of them, sprawled all over her comfort place.
“And I suppose this is just like home?” She raised a hand. “No, leave it. Only tell me how long they will sleep.”
“Forgive me, but I am ignorant of their customs and their habits. It may that my brother’s lifemate will know the length of their sleep cycle, though I hesitate to disturb her own rest.”
“Yes. Well.” Creakily, she began to rise from her seat on the edge of the bridge, and was agreeably surprised to find a large brown hand extended to her service. She slid her hand into his and allowed him to help her rise, then walked with him, companionably side-by-side back across the bridge and toward the door.
“This is a pleasant garden,” yos’Galan said, smiling at a colorful bank of gladoli.
Well, and it was that, Emrith allowed, when it wasn’t being invaded by giant turtles. She inclined her head.
“I thank you,” she said calmly. “It is one of the joys of—”
The remote in her pocket gave tongue. She snatched it out, thumbed ‘receive’ and snarled, “Who dares?”
There was a moment of terrified silence, or so she devoutly hoped, before An Der spoke, respectfully.
“Your pardon, my delm. I relay a message from the door. Lady Nova yos’Galan has arrived claiming guest-right and requesting the comfort of her close-kin.”
“Has she,” said Erob, and directed a glare at the lady’s brother. “Pray conduct Lady Nova to the guesting suite in the garden wing. Her brother will be with her shortly. Should she have any other requirements, the House exists to serve her.” She closed the connection.
yos’Galan spread his big hands. “Surely you can’t blame me?”
“Oh, can I not?” Emrith Tiazan snapped. “She is your sister!”
“But more than that,” he said soothingly, “she is Korval-pernard’i, in which face she strongly represents a force of nature. A brother—a mere thodelm!—hardly commands her arrivals and departures.”
She drew a deep breath, but he was bowing, gracefully, and with more than a touch of irony.
“However, since the House has promised my sister the comfort of her close-kin, I should betake myself to the guesting suite in the garden wing with no further delay. Good evening, ma’am.” And so he left her, seething.
***
“LIEUTENANT, please take the troops to the staff cafeteria inside and wait for me there,” Captain Robertson ordered. She turned her head, looking out across the dark garden.
“Shadia Ne’Zame.”
The darkness shifted, and coalesced into a woman in scout leathers, bowing the bow between equals. “Captain Redhead?”
“Do me the favor of lending your countenance to the troop,” the captain said, and her Liaden bore the very accent of Solcintra. She switched to Terran. “Stay out of trouble, got it?”
Shadia grinned. “Got it.” She waved a hand at Nelirikk. “After you, Lieutenant.”
“Troop, about! Single file! Follow me!” Nelirikk marched into the House of Erob, followed by an explorer, a Rifle, and, lastly, skipping, a scout, who lightly touched the control as she passed over the threshold. The door slid shut behind her.
Daav shifted, and found himself caught in the regard of two pair of eyes—one gray, one green.
“Clonak,” the scout said, without turning his head. “Grant us half-an-hour.”
There was no reply, merely a subtle disturbance in the air, then the slight sound of the gate at the end of the garden, opening—and closing.
Daav waited.
Surprisingly, it was Miri Robertson who spoke.
“Any ideas what we ought do with you?”
The tone was more than a little ironic; the dialect street-rat Terran. Daav shrugged, deliberately Terran.
“I don’t know that you need to do anything with me,” he said, in his most finicking, professorial accents.
She snorted. “Got the proper respect for command,” she told the green-eyed man at her left shoulder.
“Ah,” he said, eyes and face bland. She shook her head and looked back to Daav, an expression of mingled exasperation and amusement informing her mobile features.
“Wanna tell me under what authority you took those oaths?”
“Blood kin,” he said, more sharply than he had intended. “I couldn’t very well take oaths for the House, you know—especially as I rather think my name has been written out of the roster of lives and into the lists of Korval’s dead.”
“No,” the scout said in his soft, murmuring voice, “it has not.”
Daav met the green gaze and waited.
The scout’s left eyebrow slipped upward a fraction. “Surely, you don’t think your brother gave over hope of your eventual return—or that your son did?”
“My brother,” Daav said slowly, “perhaps not. What my son might do is—alas—beyond my ability to predict. He was so young when we parted, you see.”
“Precisely,” the boy murmured. “It will perhaps amuse you to know that your son did not strike your name from the book of the living, nor did he ever give over hope of your eventual return. He had several pointed questions to ask you, as I am certain you will understand.”
“My understanding is perfectly engaged,” Daav assured him, “since it was the very need to ask po
inted questions which drew me out of my Balance and sent me back toward Liad.”
Something flickered in the green eyes. The boy inclined his head. “I regret to inform you that Er Thom your brother has died during your absence. He survived his lifemate by only a Standard.”
It still sent an electric chill along his veins, the knowledge that Er Thom was gone; that he would never again see his brother’s face, or hear the rare, sweet music of his laughter. Daav took a hard breath, inclined his head in turn, and dropped into High Liaden for the perfectly correct response.
“I thank you. Clonak had previously informed me of these things, but I had not yet had it from kin.”
He straightened to find the captain looking over her shoulder at the scout.
“Well?”
“Well,” he returned.
“Right.” She looked at Daav, gray eyes serious now. “You want back in or is this just a visit?”
He had discussed this very choice with Aelliana, several times. She was of a mind to become re-clanned, pointing out that he could not reasonably expect to resurrect Professor Kiladi on Delgado and would thus need to establish another character elsewhere, over another period of years, before he might take up his Balance once more.
“And truly, van’chela,” she had said, “I believe this phase of Balance complete. Now it is time to gather allies and to pool what is known.”
Sound advice it was, and well-argued, yet there was a certain disinclination to return to the confines of Liad after having for so many years enjoyed the easy customs of the Terran worlds.
Miri Robertson grinned. “Tough call, ain’t it?”
“Surprisingly so.” He smiled at her. “I am guided in this by my lifemate, who I am persuaded would wish me safe among kin.”
“Safe among kin ain’t what we’re offering this quarter,” she told him, very serious indeed. “Be sure you know that.”
Daav raised his eyebrows. “I know it now, I thank you. The condition is not so different from my life away.”
“OK, then. First things first.” She moved one step back, which put her shoulder-to-shoulder with her lifemate.
Daav took a sharp breath, and felt Aelliana, awake and aware, and very interested in the matter at hand.
Miri Robertson lifted her chin and looked him in the eye before spreading her arms in the ritual gesture.
“We see you, Daav yos’Phelium,” she said, the High Liaden phrase ringing against the darkness. “Come forward and be reunited with your House.”
Throat tight, and eyes misted, he stepped forward. He had to bend a trifle to accept his Thodelmae’s kiss; not at all to receive the Thodelm’s. He did not entirely anticipate the embrace that followed—as perhaps his son had not, judging by its abruptness and the rough, anguished whisper in his ear:
“Father, where the hell have you been?”
DAY 308
Standard Year 1392
Blair Road
Surebleak
DESPITE A NATURAL desire to please one’s oathsworn, Pat Rin did not sleep well. Indeed, his exertions toward a restful slumber were so little rewarded that he arose from his celibate, sagging bed after only a few hours of tossing and turning, and made hasty use of a shower which could at best be coaxed to produce tepid water. Thereafter, Natesa at his back in defiance of a direct order to seek her own couch, he had another tour of his new property, yanking open every drawer in every room, ending—unfulfilled, frustrated, but considerably warmer for the exercise—in the so-called “parlor,” where he was in good time to greet the printer.
That worthy came, as she had last evening, ink-stained and breathless, with the addition this morning of a fistful of flimsy gray sheets, which she thrust at Pat Rin with a broad grin.
“On the street, Boss. Got a couple of mine from the shop and some of Audrey’s on the corners, reading ’em out, with extras to give the ones who can read themselves.”
“Well done.” Pat Rin shook one sheet loose and passed it to Natesa, took another for himself, and put the rest atop the chest of drawers he had been, fruitlessly, exploring.
It was, he saw at once, the paper that was gray; the printing itself was remarkably crisp and resisted smudging. The announcement of the change in administration was set top-and-center, with no alteration in his original text. That was good. At the bottom of the page was a boxed advertisement, announcing the grand opening sale at the Carpet Emporium on Blair Road, directly across from Al’s Hardware.
“We will want one of these put out every morning,” he said to the printer. “I will give you news from the boss’ office. It would please me, however, if this effort were to develop into an . . . honest . . . publication, imparting news of interest and importance to everyone who lives on these streets.”
The printer nodded. “I was talking to one of mine last night, while we was setting the type on this. Old fella. He remembers way back, and he says we usta have a—a daily gab-rag. Told me how to set it up. We’re gonna need couple people on the street, finding out what’s up and who’s doin’ which. They’d write it up and we’d set it—and every morning, early, it’s on the street, free. Free,” she said again, emphatically, though Pat Rin had made no demur. “Reason we can give it away, is we sell these boxes like you got here to the joint-owners—like Al and Tobi and, hell, Ms. Audrey. Sounded weird to me, but Laird—that’s the old guy—Laird says the owners paid up, and were glad to do it. The percentage is that they got more traffic through their joints, especially if they’d do a—a special on something everybody needs—sugar, say. Sell it low instead of high to—”
Pat Rin raised a hand, and the printer chopped off in mid-sentence, eyes showing white in her ink-smudged face.
“I am familiar with the concept. It is precisely what I propose and I am delighted that you have an advisor to hand. Do you find yourself able to undertake this project?”
“I’m in,” she told him. “I need to know what your piece is so we can price up the boxes right.”
Pat Rin frowned. “My . . . piece. I—Ah.” It was expected that he take a profit from the printer’s endeavor, while absorbing nothing of the risk. Gods, what a hideous place. He sighed.
“My piece will be taken in advertising space,” he said, showing her the flimsy sheet. “A box, precisely as you have it here, with words that will alter at my discretion. Three times a week, I will have such an advertisement from you.”
She blinked. “That’s it?”
He lifted his eyebrows, consciously adapting a High House hauteur. “It is sufficient.”
“Yessir,” she said hastily, and cleared her throat, looking around her. “Well, if you’re not—”
“Hold.” He extended a hand, and she froze as if he had turned her to stone. “There may be another service you may perform for me. I will pay,” he said sternly, “for this service.”
The printer glanced aside, possibly trying to gain something from Natesa’s face. In this, she was apparently frustrated, for she looked back to Pat Rin with a jerky nod. “Sure, Boss. What can I do for you?”
“Pens,” he said.
“Pens?”
“To write with. Ink pens. Black ink, by preference, or blue. But any color will do—I apprehend that I may not be able to afford to be proud. Have you such access to such things?”
She swallowed, her eyes sliding toward Natesa again, before being forcibly brought back to his face. “Yessir. I can get you pens. Black ink and blue. Got red, too, and green. Purple . . .”
“Black,” he said firmly, and added, after taking thought. “And red. A dozen each, if you have them in such quantity. If not, as many as you can bring me today, with the balance due when they are available.”
She nodded, jerkily. “Right, Boss,” she said, her feet sliding against the plastic floor, preparatory to taking her leave—and froze once again when Pat Rin raised his hand.
“One last thing,” he said. “A—a logbook.”
“Logbook, Boss?” There was genuine puzzlement on th
e woman’s face.
Pat Rin sighed. “A bound book, with the interior pages blank, so that one may—may make notations. Of a good size . . .” His hands moved, squaring it out in the air between them. “The binding of some durable material—leather, perhaps or—”
“Got it!” The printer’s face lit. “Can do, Boss. Got just what you need. I’ll send it over with the pens.”
“And an invoice,” Pat Rin cautioned her. “I will purchase these from you.”
“Sure, Boss. Whatever you say.” She moved her feet again, clearly aching to be gone.
“Thank you,” Pat Rin told her. “You have done well. Natesa will see you out.”
“Right. Uh—you’re welcome. Boss.” She darted after Natesa and Pat Rin closed his eyes, wishing most heartily for a cup of tea.
Pat Rin put the tin down on the kitchen table, not quite able to repress the shudder, and stood, head bent, striving for patience. Once, the tin before him had contained a perfectly unexceptional blend of afternoon tea. Now . . .
The cook, who had been hovering, hands twisting in his apron, sighed.
“Bad, huh?” He said it almost wistfully.
“On several counts,” Pat Rin told him, with really commendable calmness. “First, it is old. Second, it is damp. This sort is a dry leaf tea.” He took a careful breath. “Well. We shall have to purchase more. When—”
The cook was shaking his head vigorously. “No, sir. Or, at least, not if you’re after more that look like that tin there. Got a bunch of ’em in the pantry.”
“Which are of like age?” Natesa murmured.
Pat Rin moved a shoulder. “The age perhaps does not matter so much,” he said. “This tin had been stasis-sealed. If the others have not been breached, there may actually be something in this house worth drinking.” He waved a languid hand at the cook. “Take me to the pantry.”
The man blinked. “Ain’t no need of that, Boss. Won’t take me a minute to fetch ’em out for you.”
