A Liaden Universe Constellation: Volume I

by Sharon Lee

  WE WANDERED, that endless afternoon, visiting tradebars, dives, and talking-booths on both sides of the river. Some places folk eyed us; some places they eyed our employer. Other places they ignored us entirely, and those I liked least of all.

  The last was near the city-line, close enough to the Temple that the evening chant echoed off the dirty windows and the tawdry buildings, making even Cly Nelbern look up for a moment before turning down the short, ill-kept walk.

  This place at least made some pretense of cleanliness: the window was clear enough to let the evening light come through; the bar was chipped but polished; the tender’s tattered apron had recently been washed.

  I was three steps into the room before I realized why it felt so comfortable. It reminded me of Mona Luki: desperately shipshape and tidy, and showing the worn spots despite it.

  It hadn’t always been so. When Mam and Jake had run her, back when I was little enough to be strapped in a net slung between their seats, watching baby-eyed while they worked the Jumps between them—then Mona Luki’d gleamed, oiled and cared-for and prosperous as you like. Then there’d been coffee—yes, and chocolate—and repairs when they were needed and spare parts in third hold. Lil was too young to remember those days—too young, just, to remember Jake, killed in the same mishap that had taken Mam’s leg.

  I’d dreamed that accident; I’d even told Mam. They’d gone out to make the repair anyway, of course, as who, save on Sintia, would not? I’d climbed into the netting with the baby and held her ’til Mam started to scream.

  Six years old, I was then, but it got me thinking hard about dreams.

  “So!” That was Cly Nelbern and here was the present. I came alert to both, sending my gaze along hers to the man in Sintian town clothes—shabby, bright blue overshirt, bold with raveling embroidery, darker blue pants, worn wide and loose in respect of the heat, with matching fancy-work around the hems.

  He had a tired face, used honestly, I thought, with eyes showing desperation far back. Likely I looked the same: respectability balanced on the knife-edge of despair, needing only one more disaster to send us all over into thieves.

  He gulped, brown eyes darting from her face to mine, barely glancing from me to Lil before his face softened a touch and he bowed, gesturing toward the rear of the little room.

  “I have a table, La—ma’am.” His voice was agreeable, though it quavered. Nelbern shrugged and pushed forward.

  “Delightful,” she said, and the edge in her voice put the shine of fear in his eyes. “Lead on.”

  It was a small enough table in a snug, ill-lit corner, tight seating for four, but he’d clearly been expecting only her.

  “My—companions,” Cly Nelbern said to his startled glare. “Captain Fiona and Ms. Lillian Betany, of the Mona Luki.”

  It gave me a chill, being named there, and by the sudden dart of Lil’s eyes, I could see it chilled her, too. But she stayed tight where she was, perched on a chair crammed next to the man—and Cly Nelbern smiled.

  “Well?” she said, and the icy edge was back in her voice. “Where is it?”

  He gulped, sent a hunted glance around the room at my back and firmed his face to look at her.

  “In the office at the Port House, Lady. And that’s where it’s going to stay.”

  Nelbern didn’t frown, which was what I expected. She picked up her drink and had a sip, eyeing him over the chipped rim.

  “Indeed.” She set the glass aside. “That wasn’t our agreement.”

  Mild as it sounded, it was evidently bad enough. The man stared at her dumbly, pale to the lips.

  “Our agreement,” she pursued, still in that mild-as-milk voice, “was that you provide me with a certain item, in return for which I provide you with a particular sum of money.” She stared at him. “That was the agreement?”

  He gulped. “Yes, Lady.”

  “‘Yes, Lady’,” she repeated softly, then leaned suddenly across Lil, to put her face right up to his and hiss: “Then what in the name of the Last Hell do you mean by telling me you don’t have that file?”

  “I—” he tried to pull back, but there was nowhere to go. He licked his lips. “There is a—a Maiden out of Circle House, come to study and catalog the files. She—Lady, I dare not! If Circle House finds me—”

  “What I’ll leave for the Temple to find if I don’t have that file within the day will be far beyond worrying about Witches,” Cly Nelbern snarled. “Do you mark me, Pirro Velesz?”

  If he hated the speaking of his name, in that place and in such company, he gave no sign other than the roll of an eye.

  “The Maiden,” he said, “is named Moonhawk.”

  Nelbern leaned back and reached for her glass. “What do I care for her name? If you can’t match wits with a half-grown chit out of Circle House—”

  “Moonhawk,” the man interrupted, with an intensity that raised the hairs along the back of my neck, “is the oldest Name in Circle. Moonhawk is the most powerful servant of the Goddess—every life she lives is exceptional—historic . . .”

  “Don’t prate at me like an abo! So the girl had the wit to pick an elite name—she’s still in school. Come to Port House to study the records, you said. Where’s the danger—”

  “The girl,” Velesz interrupted again, “is Moonhawk’s incarnation in this life, Lady. Fact. She is young, but the power abides within her. The danger is that she has not yet relearned control. The training her elders-in-world provide is to ensure that she will not—accidentally—use more force than might be necessary.”

  “Loose cannon.” That was Lil, unexpected and great-eyed, but still well away from fright.

  The man turned his head, eyes easier for looking at her again. “Loose cannon,” he repeated and nodded, a smile coming and going in the second before he looked back to Cly Nelbern. “Power without guidance.”

  “Well, then we’ll see to it that she has no need to expend her powers.” Nelbern finished her drink and put the glass away. “I have a client, can you understand that? An—organization—that has paid me to—collect—a certain fact. The only place this fact has come to light is Sintia. My client has paid for proof. I will provide proof, whether you earn your fee or not.” She looked closely at Velesz.

  “My client is not easily thwarted, you see? Satisfaction earns reward. The wages of inefficiency are destruction and disgrace.” She leaned forward, and I saw fear bloom at last in my sister’s eyes and saw the sweat bead on the man’s face.

  “Disappoint me and be sure that your name will pass higher.”

  “Lady—” he began, but Cly Nelbern had pushed back her chair and turned away, carelessly flinging a handful of coins to the table.

  “Tomorrow midday,” she said softly. “At Diablo’s, in the port. Have it.” And she was gone.

  I half-rose, but Lil stayed put, the fear like lunacy in her eyes. If she wasn’t ship and blood I’d have left her but—

  “Let’s move,” I said, gruff-like, so not to spook her, but she stared at me like she had when Mam died, and never moved a hair.

  “Lil—”

  “Lady Lillian,” that was Pirro Velesz, leaning over to take her hand, oh so gently. His voice was soft, and I seemed to hear it, like a cat’s burr, somewhere in the middle of my brain. “You cannot stay here, Lady Lillian. Go with your captain.”

  Incredibly, the fear subsided and she turned her eyes to him. “What’re you gonna do?” she asked, matter-of-fact as if they were old shipmates and she had every right of an answer.

  He smiled and pressed her hand, speaking as if to a child, “Why, I will go to the Port House and do what I may, and trust that the Goddess is good.”

  It seemed to satisfy her, who never had patience with my dream-tellings. She nodded and rose, Velesz with her, and he gave her hand into mine with a little bow, as if all were right and tight with him.

  But the eyes he lifted to mine in the moment he gave Lil over were blighted with dread. His lips held the ghost of the smile he’d sh
own her, but his eyes were the eyes of a man looking at his death, or worse.

  I hesitated, thinking to offer—what? I had no aid to give, trapped likewise by Cly Nelbern’s coin. I nodded my thanks and went away, my sister’s hand warm in mine.

  IT’S A MARVEL how many repairs can be done to a ship, in the course of six short hours. A marvel, too, how much it all cost: enough to put a sizable dent in Cly Nelbern’s cantra-piece. Though, truth told, the leavings of money would be enough to give Luki some semblance of credit again—enough, even, to claim a small amount of interest, if Lil would agree to forego real coffee for a time.

  I had just thought that comfortable thought, musing among the itemizations on the screen, when I caught a sound behind me and spun the chair, fast.

  Cly Nelbern smiled her ugly smile and came forward another step, to lean companionably against the copilot’s chair and nod at the bill on the screen.

  “Everything put to right now, Captain?”

  “Everything’d take a deal more than a cantra,” I said, reluctantly honest, “but we’re set to fly.”

  “Good,” she said, somewhat absent, and I asked the next question even more reluctantly.

  “You’ll be wanting our escort tomorrow?”

  She looked up at that, alert as a dock-rat. “But of course—and a lift out, too. If we’re up against the Temple—if that fool out there trips up . . .” The words faded and she focused on me again. “Have us moved to a hot-pad, Captain.”

  I looked at her hard. “We’re ready to fly, I said. I didn’t say we were champing on it. Plan to look around, take on cargo.”

  “You have a passenger.” The voice was milk-mild and I felt my heart shudder, remembering her at the tavern.

  I shook my head. “We’re through with passengers. Trade’s what we were born to; trade’s what we’ll stay with.”

  “Indeed.” She pointed at the screen, at the invoice still visible, waiting for my thumbprint so the funds could leave Luki’s account. “I demand return of my loan, Captain Betany.”

  I stared at her. “That was no loan, and you well know it. Payment for escort, was what you said.”

  “Really?” she purred and then I knew how far Lil had lost us. “Do you have a contract stating so, Captain?”

  I held onto my glare with an effort. “No.”

  “No.” She smiled. “But I have a contract stipulating that I offered a cantra in loan for needful repairs, payable upon demand, else the ship resolves to me.”

  My mouth dried and my heart took up thumping so hard I thought the scans might read it. “You have no such thing.”

  “Oh, I do,” she assured me; “and so do you. Right there in the daily log.” She leaned away from the chair and started back toward the companionway. “Do move us to a hot-pad, Captain; there’s a good girl.”

  It took me a long time to move, after she was gone. The first thing I did was open the log and read the thing she’d put there, sealed with my own codes.

  Ship and blood. Mam’d told me to save things in that order, always. Ship first, then blood. I’d never in life have signed such a thing, nor agreed for the sake of a cantra . . .

  Ship and blood. I thumbprinted the invoice and put the call through for the ready-pad. I okay’d those charges, too, forgetful of the meaning of the numbers; and then I went to my bunk to lie down, sealing the door and detaching the bell.

  After a time of lying there in cold terror, eyes screwed shut against the awful sight of the ceiling, I fell asleep and I dreamed.

  The dream was a confusion of pointing fingers and harsh voices making accusations that echoed into meaninglessness. At the center of it all stood my goddess of the barroom, her hair quiescent, though her eyes were not; and the one word that echoed clearly from the finger-pointers was “Recant!”

  The word that I woke with among pounding head was hers, shaping my mouth with Her will: “No.”

  THE SHIP WAS QUIET. World clock showed midnight, straight up. Ship clock showed 0200.

  I made myself a cup of ’toot and slid into the pilot’s chair, worry gnawing at my gut. Cly Nelbern was surely mad, with more than grounder lunacy. No simple dockside bully, she; but a dangerous woman, and on more levels than gave me comfort.

  The man? The man was desperate, and that carried its own brand of danger. But he seemed sane enough, and perhaps might be turned a card—made a pawn. Sacrificed for ship and blood.

  It was snatching at starlight, of course, and madness in its own way, but I had to try something, there in the dark quiet; had to make some stab at saving my ship, my sister.

  Curiously, it was Nelbern’s money that bought me a way to make that stab, sorry as it might be. I set aside my cold drink and cycled the chair forward. I’d never had the credit to tap into a current planetary data bank before. We’d always bought old records—last week’s cargo movements, yesterday’s closing prices, and left it at that—but not this time.

  I typed in Pirro Velesz’ name. I tapped the dot for full database inspection. I offered up a prayer to whatever gods might be awake and listening, there in the deep heart of the night.

  Then I went to sleep.

  CLY NELBERN WOKE me by laughing, waving a hand at the screen where Velesz’ information glittered like an unexplored star system.

  “That’s close to the way I found him, Captain, except that I didn’t have a name—I just looked for a desperate person.”

  She laughed again, harder.

  “That’s how I found Mona Luki, too. Hard as you try to hide it, the information’s there. I know how to read that spiral. Dreamers like you and that greengrocer—always thinking you’ll find a way to beat the universe.

  “I’ve seen it over and over again. You think you’re something special. Think luck’ll be with you. Well, you got lucky, Captain. I found you, thought you’d be useful and pulled you out of your downspin. I’m your luck, and if you’re a smart girl, you’ll ride easy with me, no arguments.”

  She waved at the screen again.

  “But you want to know all about Senor Velesz—go ahead—read it. It’s not a secret, is it?” Her words bit, deep and bitter, but I couldn’t think of anything useful to say to a dirtsider who held mortgage to my ship and my kin, so I spun the chair back around and I read.

  THE SHORT OF IT was that Pirro Velesz got himself suckered into a contract to supply some upcountry Temple with vittles for a year. When he couldn’t make delivery the Temple took his business and put him to work at the rate of a Standard year for each month the Temple had to buy its food from someplace else. He had the option of buying himself out, of course—but he’d rolled everything on that losing deal—and no one on Sintia would lend money to a Temple debtor.

  I sagged back into the pilot’s chair, yanked two ways: pity and despair. So much for the stab to save us. Pirro Velesz was in worse case than Mona Luki or either of her sorry crew.

  MIDDAY AT DIABLO’S. Too far from the city to hear the Temple chanting. Too close to the port to see anything but outworlders, half of them drunk and the other half out of luck, hunched over the bar like their last hope of salvation, eyes blurred like the middle of Jump.

  Not one of them took note of us at all.

  Lil was jumping terrified—the move to the hot-pad in the middle of our night and the guilt that came with knowing she’d sold our ship, however unknowing, had her in a state already. The bar filled with chancy spacers wired her even higher.

  Pirro Velesz was nowhere to be seen.

  Cly Nelbern found us a ringside table, ordered up a round of drinks and leaned back. She sipped from her glass now and then, and her hands were steady when she did, but for all of that I thought she looked tense and I tried not to think what she’d do, if she were forced into hunting him out.

  The crowd thinned soon enough, as my drink sat untouched on the table. Lil’s was long swallowed and Nelbern had all but finished her own.

  She had just waved her hand for the waiter when there was a flicker at the doorway and a ri
pple of city-clothes in the corner of my eye. Nelbern came to her feet in one smooth flow, moving through the knot of patrons.

  Lil charged to her feet the next second, wailing something inarticulate under her breath.

  “Lillian!” I cried as she went by, but her eyes were full of anguish and she never heard me at all.

  A circle had opened around them—Cly Nelbern and Pirro Velesz—a circle of the dead-eyed incurious, who turned back to drinking after a glance determined the business was none of theirs.

  “Well?” I heard her say, as Lil pushed a way to his side.

  “Well.” He looked tired, his shabby blue tunic draggled and dirty. He swayed where he stood and Lil put a hand under his elbow to steady him.

  I saw a smile come and go on his face, like a whisper of might-have-been; then he reached in his sleeve and pulled out a thin white envelope of the kind used for dirtsider’s mail and handed it to Cly Nelbern.

  She shook her head toward a table and we moved that way, Lil bright in the reflection of the man’s wan smile.

  “So.” A purr of satisfaction as Nelbern opened the folder and pulled out a strip of film. “The original?”

  He nodded. “As agreed.”

  “Delightful. And I have payment for you.” She patted her own sleeve. Something in the gesture chilled me, and I saw Lil clutch after the man’s arm, her eyes showing white at the edges.

  It was then that I saw Her, in life as in dreaming, walking into that place in Her cleanness and her power, as if nothing evil could ever touch Her.

  “Witch!” screamed one of the drunks at the bar, and threw a glass, which fell, stone-heavy, and broke on the floor at Her feet.

  She turned Her head and there was silence at the bar; raised a hand and drew a sign in the fetid air. The silence shimmered, then broke apart, as the one who had thrown the glass lay his head upon the bar top and wailed.

  She turned back then, fixed us with those eyes, which saw us and saw through us.