Always wary of unsupervised Dharman males, Kord accompanied Basterra and his men to the Thalassa's cargo bay, ostensibly to offer assistance with unloading. Janek kept to himself, but Cynara had no doubt that he'd already sent his own messages to the surface.
Once Lizbet had the shuttle undocked and under way, Cynara invited Ronan to observe planetfall on the screen in the passenger compartment.
The scene was always the same, and always different. First one saw the crystal blue of Dharma's interconnecting oceans and seas, obscured here and there by banks of clouds, and then the brown and green of islands. Archipelagos appeared like paint spattered from a brush, all quite beautiful and deceptively peaceful.
As they approached Novaterra, the island that harbored the city of Cynara's birth, the modern buildings and landing fields of Dharma's sole spaceport became visible in the distance. It was no accident that die spaceport lay within the jurisdiction of one of the planet's wealthiest and most influential burgher-lords, Magnus Casnar D'Accorso of Elsinore.
The shuttle skimmed over the coastal waters, giving the observers a clear view of oceangoing vessels of every shape and size. The old seaport was still very much in use, for trade between islands was still largely a matter of surface transportation, supplemented by Dharma's small airfleet.
The D'Accorso palace stood on a rocky outcrop overlooking Elsinore's chaotic sprawl. Sunlight struck sparks from the palace's golden roofs and turrets, growing more distinct as the shuttle made its final approach.
"This city is your home?" Ronan asked, standing very close at her shoulder.
"Yes. Dharma's traditional government consists of city-states, generally one to each smaller island and several on the greater. Elsinore is an exception—it's the sole city-state on Novaterra, the largest island in this hemisphere."
"And the captain's father is its ruler," Janek said behind her.
Cynara smiled and stifled a yawn. "Thanks for the reminder, Ser Janek."
Ronan cast Janek a narrow-eyed glance. "Your immediate male progenitor is the First of your Line, Aho'Va?"
She was glad of his formality. "You might say that, though most humans reckon political and family relationships differently than shaauri do."
"The captain is too modest," Janek said, gazing at the screen in apparent fascination. "Magnus D'Accorso rules the equivalent of many of your Lines."
"Dharma has long been an aristocracy," Cynara said. "Our society is still very rigid in many respects."
"Rather like the shaauri," Janek remarked, "who remain much as they have always been since their days of savagery. Isn't that so, Ronan?"
"Humans may change Paths and act independently of House or Line, in disregard of the confusion that may follow," Ronan said, showing the edges of his teeth. "Is this not a flaw in your species' evolution?"
"My species?"
Cynara moved between them. "Change is never easy."
"It strikes me as very strange, Captain D'Accorso, that Ser VelKalevi still defends the shaauri when he claims to hate them."
"You'll have your say before the Council," Cynara said sharply. "Until then, stow it."
Janek's jaw clenched, but he had the sense to bite his tongue. Ronan's gaze never left him until he fled the observation area.
"I am unselected," Ronan said quietly, "and thus unworthy to defend your honor, Aho'Va. But if you permit me, I will fight that one by the laws of your world."
Cynara imagined Ronan with a ceremonial sword in hand, facing Janek in a duelist's square. That was certainly a savage custom.
"My honor is in no danger," she said. "Whatever Janek does to provoke you, I ask that you do your best to ignore him."
"He is not First, Second, or even Third of this ship, yet he offers challenge in his speech and manner. Will you accept?"
"I'm very tempted, my friend, but with humans it seldom comes to outright violence. Trust me to handle Janek."
Ronan could express the most eloquent doubt with a fractional twitch of his mouth. He looked at the screen. The Thalassa hovered above the port's landing field, and Cynara felt vibrations under her feet as landing gear was deployed.
"Secure for landing," Lizbet's voice said over the intercom. Cynara took one of the passenger seats and Ronan the one beside her. An almost imperceptible jolt, and the shuttle touched down on Dharman soil.
* * *
PART II
Alliance
* * *
Chapter 10
« ^ »
Home. Cynara could gladly have gone a lifetime without seeing it again.
A messenger from the city was waiting for her on the field, carrying a note sent from Uncle Jesper in response to her urgent request.
Captain,
In receipt of your message. Have managed to delay Council action for a day, but require further discussion. Bring your guest to the usual place. I'll know when you've arrived.
Cynara tipped the messenger and smiled to herself. Jesper had followed through exactly as she'd hoped, and she was sure he knew to the minute when the Thalassa had landed at the spaceport.
She tucked the note in her pocket and went to consult briefly with Basterra. The cargomaster's men were already offloading cargo with the help of the spaceport dockhands. As soon as they had finished, they were at liberty to spend the day visiting family and friends before reporting back to the Pegasus.
Kord's habit was to follow the Dharman crew, covertly observing the places they went and the people they spoke to. He was always predicting rebellion against a female captain, but Cynara had long since given up trying to convince him that Basterra and the others would obey because they were under the Council's orders to do so. The average Dharman didn't make a very good mutineer.
Lizbet was also free to visit her few relations in Low Town, but she seldom did. She stuck very close to Cynara whenever they stayed on Dharma, and Uncle Jesper always kept spare rooms for former proteges and students.
Cynara hoped he'd have one available for an unexpected guest. She disembarked with Ronan in tow and waited for Lizbet to catch up.
Ronan must have seen a spaceport before, or he wouldn't have been flying a darter. Perhaps his absolute stillness and concentration came from the fact that he hadn't visited a human city since early childhood. Cynara had heard that shaauri cities were hardly cities at all, but sprawling residences surrounded by parkland, inhabited not by many unrelated families and individuals but single kinship groups.
"Your port seems underutilized," Ronan said, glancing at the empty berths and the unoccupied expanse of the field.
"We maintain a small fleet of ships for in-system mining and a few for trade among the Nine Worlds, but most of them are constantly in use. There's been much debate over what remains of the Dharman space program. Some feel it's a waste of resources, like educating girls."
"This is foolish, even for humans."
"I'm glad you agree."
"Where do we go now, Aho'Va?"
'To my Uncle Jesper. I'll have to report to the Council, and Janek has certainly made sure they know all about you. He'll see to it that you're summoned for questioning. However, I've received a message that suggests my uncle has managed to delay the debriefing. He's to meet us in the city."
"This is good news," he said.
"So far. While we travel, I advise that you remain quiet and pretend you're a regular member of the crew. Many Dharmans speak Standard—it was fashionable to learn it years ago, especially among those who aspired to bettering their positions in society."
Ronan nodded, preoccupied. A few minutes later Lizbet hurried down the ramp. She wore a veil, as she always did on Dharma.
Cynara flagged a runabout and the three of them rode it to the port offices, where she called a cab. Motorized vehicles were still not commonplace on Elsinore's narrow streets; they remained very much a mark of privilege and wealth. She could have summoned a D'Accorso vehicle and driver, but she was loath to call attention to Ronan until he was safely under Uncle Jes
per's wing.
The cab driver stared at Cynara's unveiled face until he recognized who she was, and then became considerably more respectful. He offered Cynara a seat in the front, but she refused and slid into the back seat with Ronan and Lizbet to either side.
No one spoke until they were behind the privacy screen of the cab. The vehicle's large windows gave all three of them an excellent view of the scenery, the rolling ocher hills and sun-warmed vegetation of what had once been called a "Mediterranean" climate. Through the trees one could see the ocean, stretching like azure velvet to the horizon.
Whatever Ronan thought of Novaterra remained a mystery until the cab approached Elsinore's outermost gate. At the foot of the great stone wall huddled the city's poorest dwellings, cobbled together of every sort of material. Before Jesper's arrival and his influence on Casnar D'Accorso, the barrio had been far worse. But change on Dharma was slow.
"These are your ne'li?" Ronan asked.
"Not in the sense you mean… but yes. Elsinore is a city of three gates. The people who live outside First Gate are those who have no steady work or source of income."
"Ne'li," he repeated. "How do they survive?"
"My father and uncle began a charitable foundation some years ago. Children are encouraged to attend free schools to learn professions, and are provided with medical care. But we haven't gone far enough. Much more must be done to truly civilize this world."
The cab passed through First Gate and into the small but slightly more prosperous Low Town. Here were all the features of a city in miniature, shops and residences and inns catering to the working poor. Trees were few and far between, and the air smelled of fish and coal. Clothing tended toward the drab with little flashes of color in scarves or caps, and not every woman went veiled.
Lizbet pressed closer to the tinted glass. This was her town, her place of birth; she hated and loved it at the same time. She had worked hard to overcome all traces of a Low Town accent and to develop the talents and intelligence Uncle Jesper had found in her. Cynara knew better than to ask if she wanted to stop.
"This is the dwelling place of your an'laik'i," Ronan said, watching Lizbet intently.
"Human families—Houses—aren't divided by Path," Cynara said. "There are people of most occupations in all sections of the city. The divisions are more… economic and cultural. One is born into a part of the city and usually remains there."
"Not unlike Selection, except it occurs at birth."
Neither way pleased Cynara. When she was gone from Dharma, she tended to forget how much poverty and ignorance had yet to be overcome. "No one should be Selected at birth or forced to walk the same Path her entire life."
Ronan made no argument. Another kilometer of winding uphill road brought them to Second Gate and Middleton. The houses were farther apart, some almost large enough to belong in High Town. Gardens held their own trees and flower or vegetable gardens. Attire mimicked the fashions of the elite, but on a much more modest scale. The streets were cleaner, and the sea breeze swept away the odors of Low Town.
"Middleton," Cynara offered. "This is the largest and busiest part of the city. Many from Low Town come here to work."
"For other Houses and Lines," Ronan said.
"It may seem confusing at first, but you'll get used to it." She noted the street signs, watching for one in particular.
"Humans are always fertile and recognize no boundaries of Path in mating," Ronan said. "Is this why your city is so crowded?"
Lizbet made a choking sound. "Oh, there are boundaries," Cynara said, willing the flush from her skin, "but they aren't always obvious. A subject for some other occasion."
He seemed content enough with that answer and returned to his observation. Cynara found the sign she was looking for and buzzed the driver, who pulled up at the nearest curb adjacent to a busy ale-house.
"We'll get out here," she said. "My uncle asked us to meet him at a pub a few blocks down this lane." She paid the driver and followed Lizbet out of the cab, making sure that Ronan was behind them.
He stood on the cobbled sidewalk, every bit as alert as on previous occasions when he'd been prepared to initiate or fend off an attack. The relatively few midday pedestrians hardly glanced at him as they passed, saving their stares for the unveiled woman. Cynara moved closer to him.
"Are you all right, Ronan?"
"Your uncle lives here?"
"Oh, no. But he thought it best to meet us first on neutral ground where unwelcome observers aren't likely to meddle."
He looked at her in surprise. "You fear for my safety, Aho'Va?"
"That's another thing… you should know that in Elsinore I am not a First. My family is of high rank, but I am far from the highest of D'Accorsos."
'Then you fear your own enemies," Ronan said with dogged persistence. "Janek?"
The utter grimness of his face did not invite levity. "Not in the sense you mean. I'm not in any physical danger, and neither is Lizbet."
Noises of drunken revelry in a masculine pitch drifted from the ale-house door. Lizbet glanced nervously down the lane. "Captain?"
"Let's go." Cynara took a step toward the street corner just as a man barreled out of the ale-house, followed by several more healthy and inebriated young bucks in brocade sleeves and fine seacow-skin breeches. One of them half carried a very pretty unveiled woman whose hair tumbled loose as she laughed.
Ronan stopped. "Are these males mating with this female?"
Poseidon. "This is not the time to discuss it, Ronan."
"The woman is unveiled. Is she not adult?"
"She sells her body—her sex—to earn her living. It's best not to interfere."
Lizbet grabbed Ronan's arm. "C'mon," she said, lapsing into Low Town dialect.
Cynara had clear prescience of trouble even before she felt the hostility in Ronan's mind. "A ne'lin who trades sex for food and shelter," he said. "I have heard such things whispered among shaauri, but—"
"What have we here?" One of the men, the least drunk of the lot, drew himself up before Ronan and grinned. "Want a drink, stranger?"
Ronan's nose wrinkled in obvious disgust, though he couldn't understand Dharma's primary language. "I am Ronan."
"Ronan." The man circled him with exaggerated interest. "Ronan. Where're you from, Faber Ronan?" he asked in Standard.
Cynara pushed forward. "Your pardon, Nestus," she answered in the same language. Ser Ronan is not from Dharma and does not understand our ways. If you will permit—"
The man widened his eyes. "Look, gentlemen. Another whore to entertain us. Maybe our new friend is a pimp." He punched Ronan's chest. "What say, Faber? What's her price?" He noticed Lizbet. "We'll take both. Maybe we'll let you watch!"
The other men leered at Lizbet and Cynara. Ronan's nostrils flared. He didn't even wait to ask for definitions of the gentleman's ugly words. He grabbed the leader's arm, wrenched it behind his back, and dumped him on the ground brocade and all.
The male shrieked almost as loud as the receptive female, flopping on the ground like a snared hylpup. The other men scattered to a safer distance, but Ronan was not deceived by their apparent helplessness. He waited calmly for attack.
It did not come, proving that these men were not ve'laik'i. They showed far too much bad judgment to be of Reason, Heart, or Spirit, and were too old to be indulged as children. Even an'laik'i did not act so. They behaved like youths on Walkabout, which was not a human custom.
And they had insulted Cynara.
"Anki-ne'karo," he said, turning his back.
He heard the fallen man stir behind him, uttering a stream of human curses. Cynara planted herself between Ronan and his enemies. "I apologize for this misunderstanding, Nesté," she said. "I neglected to introduce myself—Cynara D'Accorso-fila, captain of the Allied ship Pegasus. I trust that you will forgive my friend's unintentional discourtesy?"
"D'Accorso?" one of the men muttered.
"There is no need to continue this misunderstanding,"
she said, offering her hand to the man at her feet. "Please accept my apologies in all goodwill, Nestus."
Ronan half turned his head to watch. The man did not take Cynara's hand but scrambled to his feet, waving off the aid of his companions.
"My apologies, D'Accorso-fila," he said. "I did not recognize you."
Cynara's bearing spoke of humor, but Ronan felt the anger she suppressed. "I understand. If you require satisfaction, my family will pay the honor-debt."
"No need." The man brushed off his leggings and backed away with one last, burning look at Ronan. "Safetide, Filia."
"Good day." She watched the men stagger down the road as fast as their legs would carry them and released a long sigh.
"Filia," Lizbet whispered. "They mocked you, Captain."
"You and I should be used to that by now." She glanced at Ronan. "All in all, we got out of this easily."
"They offered to buy you—for sex, as they did the other female," Ronan said, showing his teeth. "This could not be permitted."
Cynara laughed. "They would have punished themselves once they realized who I was. No matter how much contempt they have for females, or for me in particular, they can't afford to anger the D'Accorsos." Her smile faded. "I'll require your promise that you won't try that again, Ronan, whatever the provocation to either of us."
"They asked me to sell you," he said. "Why?"
"Because you're male and I'm not wearing a veil. In Middleton, only loose women walk unveiled. It's an advertisement of their wares." She took firm hold of Ronan's arm. He let himself be pulled, thinking over what he had learned during the encounter.
Humans lived in a state of constant ferment. Females sold themselves for sex, and those who did were regarded as ne'li. Was this not a kind of Selection in itself? Humans on this world regarded a female's eyes and hair improper to look upon, and any unveiled female was appropriate for mating. Males of unknown Path could insult one of much higher rank, and yet it was she who apologized.
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