The Unicorn Girl

by Anne McCaffrey

“Well, now, boy. You would hardly be letting your senior ‘wife’ run around without a bijab if you were truly a Neo-Hadithian, would you? I must admit, you completely took me in at the time,” he went on. He felt he could afford a little generosity, since Rafik was so completely off balance. It would soften the boy up for the final agreement. “But I hold no grudge. You have shown me that you have the true Harakamian mentality.”

  As Rafik only goggled at him, Hafiz continued, looking away from the boy so that his words would not seem too pointed.

  “Having lost my only son, I am in need of an heir. A worthy heir,” he emphasized, “one of my own blood, one almost as clever as I am myself. Such a one would, of course, have to be trained in the complex affairs of the House. Training him would be very nearly a full-time occupation for me. I suspect I would have very little time left to pursue my hobby of collecting…rarities.”

  Rafik gulped audibly. “I am committed to finishing the Maganos Moon Base project,” he said at last.

  “House Harakamian honors its commitments,” Hafiz said.

  “My partnership with Calum and Gill—”

  “Is it a lifetime contract?”

  “It’s not a formal contract at all,” Rafik said. “It just, well, things just worked out well for the three of us together.”

  “Perhaps,” Hafiz suggested, placing each word as delicately as a surgeon cutting out overgrown flesh, “it is now time for the three of you to work apart.”

  Rafik glanced at his partner. “Calum?”

  “Actually,” Calum said, “I would rather like to go check out my findings on Acorna’s home planet myself.”

  “Gill…”

  “If Gill can be compensated for loss of partnership,” Delszaki Li said, “is offer of Mr. Harakamian acceptable to you?”

  Rafik looked sternly at his uncle. “You’ll leave Acorna alone?”

  “I will swear on the Three Books,” Hafiz said.

  “Well, then.” All the tension seemed to drain out of Rafik’s slender body. “If it suits you…I, too, will swear on the Three Books to return to Laboue for training in the ways of House Harakamian—as soon as I have completed Maganos Moon Base…if you will compensate my partners appropriately.”

  After some formal haggling, they agreed that Hafiz Harakamian would buy out Rafik’s and Calum’s shares in the Uburu from Gill and would provide Calum with a subspace-equipped scout ship from the Harakamian fleet for his search. Rafik and Calum left, limp with exhaustion from the bargaining session, to revive their energies with something stronger than kava, while Hafiz and Delszaki relaxed with the satisfaction of old men who have seen matters properly arranged.

  As soon as they were well out of earshot, Rafik began chuckling to himself.

  “Uncle Hafiz drives a hard bargain…he thinks! But if you’re really okay with breaking up the partnership, Calum…”

  “I’ve been dying to get out to the Comes Berenices and check my results in person,” Calum said, “but I didn’t like to say anything to you and Gill. Anyway, we’re getting a bit old for this asteroid-hopping life. Gill, too. I think he’s about ready to retire into a planetside job…especially if it’s a planet Judit Kendoro is on!”

  “And I,” Rafik said with satisfaction, “have discovered considerable talent for trading during the process of setting up Maganos on a commercial basis. I had already been thinking what fun it would be to have the Harakamian assets to play with. We’ll go on letting Uncle Hafiz think he’s driven a sharp bargain, though. It makes the old man happy.”

  Meanwhile, Delszaki Li and Hafiz Harakamian were enjoying their own interpretation of the bargain over their third cups of kava.

  “My nephew is sharp,” Hafiz chuckled, “sharp enough to cut himself. If he had not been in such a hurry to extract a promise from me, he would have seen what I think you had already noticed.”

  Li’s face crinkled. “That you had no more interest in Acorna, now that she is believed not to be unique after all?”

  Hafiz nodded. “When this Calum finds her home—and he strikes me as the sort of obsessed fanatic who will not rest until he has solved the problem—unicorn people will be as common as Neo-Hadithians. What a fool I should have looked, collecting and announcing one as a rarity, when shortly thereafter they would be walking the streets everywhere. But it is well as it ends. I have an heir of the blood to carry on the affairs of my house, and young Rafik has a settled position in life. I keep thinking of him as a boy, but he’s not getting any younger, you know.”

  “None of us are,” Li said calmly.

  “Yes, but you and I have done our work. Rafik needs a wife—a real wife,” Hafiz smiled, “to give us another generation of traders for House Harakamian. I will settle the matter as soon as he comes home.”

  “I have no doubt you will,” murmured Li, “but might be wise not to announce plans to Rafik just yet. Leave him illusion of choosing his own woman. More kava?”

  Twelve

  The team of four returned from Maganos early that afternoon, with vids, datacubes, construction records, air and water quality analyses, and every other bit of evidence they could think of to support their contention that Maganos Moon Base was not just potentially habitable but already habitable.

  “Why must we wait for Phase II?” Acorna demanded of Delszaki Li before she was well in the door. “The base is in use now. The construction crews are living there; how can this Tumim Viggers say it is not safe? And there is much space available within the pressurized sectors. Provola Quero has caused to be built the very large repair and manufacturing facility which will be wanted later, only she does not need it at all yet—well, only a tiny bit of it,” she said with a reproachful glance at Gill’s choked-off expostulation. “We could wall off a small section for repair work and put children’s bunks in the rest—use it for a dormitory until the proper living quarters are completed. Why should they live so miserably any longer than is absolutely necessary? Further, Brantley Geram now understands how he can expand the ’ponics system rapidly enough to cope with a sudden increase in population.”

  “Acorna is responsible for that,” Pal put in. “While we were there, she found a nitrogen imbalance in the air, identified a potassium deficiency in the water, and showed Geram how to triple ’ponics production practically overnight without destroying the atmospheric balance.”

  “The first two things were data that could have been read from instruments, and I am sure Mr. Geram would have thought of the ecobalancing system on his own if he had had time,” Acorna murmured. “All that is not important, Pal—please do not interrupt!” She turned back to Delszaki Li, her pale face glowing with the cool silvery light that showed when she was excited, her eyes opened so wide that they were silver orbs in her face. “Truly, Mr. Li, there is no technical problem with beginning to use the base immediately—not one!”

  “Unfortunately,” Delszaki Li said, “technical problems are not the only ones. The Kezdet Authority has forbidden us to go forward with Maganos Moon Base, or to add any more personnel, until is completely satisfied by report of independent commission that all construction meets Kezdet building codes.”

  Pal snorted. “If the match factory where I used to work meets the building codes, Maganos is so far beyond that it’s not even applicable!”

  “Match factory has probably never been inspected by building commission,” Li said gravely.

  “Who’s on this independent commission?” Gill demanded. “We can meet with them right now, show them the data. I’ll convince them Maganos meets code, if I have to ram the cubes down their throats!”

  “Members of commission have not yet been appointed,” Li said. “Informed sources within Department of Public Works say selection and appointment of commission may take several years.” He regarded the four young people—from his perspective they were all children—benignly. “Is not technical problem. Is political. Someone does not intend plan to succeed.”

  “Who?”

  Li’s left hand
lifted slightly, his approximation of a shrug.

  “Many people profit greatly from exploitation of children on Kezdet. Could be any of them. Or all of them. But at this time, is still mystery. We know, for instance, that owner of Tondubh Glassworks has bought two judges and a subinspector of Guardians. Very well. I pay them better bribe than Tondubh, now I have them. Child Labor League has list of other corrupt government officials, paid by this factory or that to ignore abuses of Federation law. But even if we buy off all minor officials, is still blocked from top. Someone with much power and position in government is stopping plan. Someone so respectable, and so well concealed, that even Child Labor League does not know true identity of man called the Piper.”

  Gill’s shoulders sagged. “Then what can we do?”

  “Do not despair,” Li said. “You have on your side Delszaki Li, veteran of many years political and financial double-and triple-crossing. Also have now secured independent services of consultant with even more experience than Li in handling corrupt governments, because has run seriously corrupt organization himself. Hafiz Harakamian.”

  Gill turned white. “Get Acorna out of here!”

  “Harakamian no longer wishes to acquire Acorna,” Li said. “Talk to Calum and Rafik. They have much news for you.”

  But the talk had to wait, because Chiura got wind of Gill’s return. At this point she came flying down the lift-chute, squealing happily, “Monster Man! Monster Man!”

  “He’s big and ugly, all right,” said Calum, who had entered the hall just in time to catch Chiura executing a flying leap far too soon to reach her objective, “but don’t you think it’s a bit over the top to call him a monster?”

  Gill’s face was almost as red as his beard.

  “It’s…uh…a game we play,” he explained. By now Jana had arrived after Chiura and the girls were tugging Gill by both hands toward the lift-chute. “Umm…maybe we can talk upstairs?”

  The talk was again delayed until Gill had been exhausted by chasing Chiura and Jana around the suite on his hands and knees, roaring like a bull and occasionally reaching out one large hand to snatch at flying hair or the hem of a kameez, while they squealed in pretended terror. Even Khetala, who at thirteen considered herself too old for such games, got caught up in the excitement and laughed and giggled like the other two.

  “He is giving them back their childhood,” Judit murmured under cover of the noisy game. There were tears in her eyes. “I don’t know how to do that.”

  “You never had a childhood.” Pal put an arm around his sister’s shoulders and hugged her. “You had to grow up too fast, to save Mercy and me.”

  She looked up at the “little brother,” who had shot up so fast in the last years that now he stood half a head taller than her.

  “Oh, Pal, we need Gill at Maganos. The children need him. Can’t we persuade Calum and Rafik—”

  “That,” said Rafik, grinning, “was what we wanted to talk to you about.”

  “You want to talk business while Chiura’s crawling all over him and climbing his beard?” Calum muttered under his breath.

  “Safest time,” Rafik replied out of the side of his mouth. “He won’t turn violent while he’s festooned with kids.”

  They explained their arrangement with Hafiz Harakamian, somewhat apprehensively, and were relieved when Gill’s broad face broke into a beaming smile.

  “That,” he said cheerfully, “simplifies everything.”

  “We were, um, hoping you’d see it that way,” Rafik said.

  Gill looked at Judit.

  “That’s a nice living suite Delszaki Li has put into the Maganos design for you. Plenty of space for two people, wouldn’t you say? Think Li would hire a couple to work with the children, instead of leaving it all on you?”

  “The proposition would have to be put to him,” Judit said, lowering her eyes.

  “Well, then!” Gill made to get up, but he was too weighted down with children to make it on the first try.

  “And first,” Judit said, very demurely, “the proposition would have to be put to me. I’m old-fashioned about these things.”

  Gill looked at her.

  “Me, too,” he said, “and I draw the line at proposing to you in front of two miners and a gaggle of giggling kids.”

  “Then we’ll have to do it for you,” said Calum and Rafik in unison.

  Calum went down on one knee in front of Judit. Rafik laid his hand on his heart. Gill started turning red.

  “Dear Judit,” Calum said, “would you do us the immense favor—”

  “—and Gill the great honor,” Rafik put in.

  “Of providing a home and family for this poor, old, arthritic—”

  “I am not arthritic!” Gill bellowed. “That trouble with my right knee is an old sports injury.”

  “—broken-down, lonely, unloved—” Rafik continued over Gill’s protests.

  “Oh, stop it, you two!” Judit interrupted them. “He is by no means unloved.” She looked meltingly at Gill, who was now more purple than red. “But I think he might have a stroke if you don’t knock it off.”

  “Then you’d better accept him,” Calum said promptly. “You wouldn’t want to be responsible for the poor old fellow’s demise from apoplexy, would you? A kind-hearted girl like you?”

  “We’ll ask Li to name that suite at Maganos after you,” Rafik suggested. “The Judit Kendoro Home For Stray Miners.”

  “Get out of here,” Gill roared, having finally divested himself of children, “and let me propose to my girl in my own way and my own time!” He shooed Calum, Rafik, and all three children out of the room. “And no eavesdropping!”

  That the two former partners did not, spoke volumes for their self-discipline and the fact that they had both decided Gill and Judit were exactly suited to each other.

  Each went down the lift-chute with a much lighter heart to see what they could do to solve the major problem now facing the Maganos Moon Base scheme.

  “Bribery will only get you so far,” Rafik said. “I suspect there is more at stake than money or prestige or mere power.”

  “There’s nothing ‘mere’ about power, Rafik,” Calum said in a sudden fit of depression, brought on as much by the happy scene being enacted in the children’s quarters as anticipation of facing an unknown quantity of opponents.

  It couldn’t just be this mysterious Piper person, not when Mr. Li was confounded by the machinations behind the scenes.

  “Well, what Mr. Li can’t find out, Uncle Hafiz can.”

  “Don’t you mean Papa Hafiz?” he said almost snidely.

  “Uncle, smunckle, papa doppa,” Rafik said, shrugging indifferently, “we are both Harakamians and nothing will daunt us!” He raised a fist in respect of his determination as they reached the door leading to Mr. Li’s domain. The fist altered and its knuckles rapped most circumspectly for admission.

  During their absence in the children’s suite, Uncle Hafiz had joined Mr. Li, and so had the scruffy man they identified as Pedir, the auxiliary skimmer driver who had attached himself, limpetlike, to Acorna and Judit for their excursions.

  “Ah, is good you have returned,” Mr. Li said. “You know Pedir?”

  After Rafik and Calum had exchanged greetings and seated themselves, Mr. Li continued. “Is source of much local knowledge and gossip.”

  “Knows where a lot of bodies have been buried, you might even say,” Uncle Hafiz added, stroking the chin beard he was cultivating.

  “We,” and Mr. Li’s delicate hand gestured to Uncle Hafiz, “who feel is time to introduce Lady Acorna to society—”

  “—such as it is,” Hafiz put in.

  “—are inviting,” and he gestured now to Mercy who was seated at the console and furiously typing away, “every person of wealth and standing in city to splendid gala banquet and dancing the night away.”

  “Anyone who is anyone in Kezdet will come,” Hafiz said, “because it will borne in on them that not to be invited would indicate
social or industrial inferiority to those also on the guest list.”

  “But Acorna,” Rafik and Calum were instantly on the qui vive, “would be in jeopardy.”

  Hafiz flapped his hand dismissively, grimacing away their caution.

  “Not from this house,” Mr. Li said. “Not with so many watching her all night long with eyes of hawk and claws of tiger.”

  Hafiz leaned back in the conformable chair, at almost a dangerous tilt, steepling his fingers and staring up at the ceiling, a slow smile creasing his face.

  “She will be clad in raiment fit for a princess, a queen, an empress…” he extended one hand ceilingward, opening his fingers at the apex, indicating magnificence beyond imagining, “…bejeweled…and also,” he pulled his eyes down to his nephew, “warded from every possible danger by the built-in systems hidden in the jewelry.”

  “Ah, ingenious!” and Rafik relaxed into a chair, stretching out his legs, hooking his thumbs in his belt and preparing himself for whatever pearls of wisdom and crafty conniving were sure to be revealed.

  Calum, with a droll smile, wandered over to Mercy’s desk position and perched on a stool.

  “There will be music…” Uncle Hafiz went on.

  “Several groups,” Pedir said, “for I am promised to promote three groups and undoubtedly, once this is noised about, I will have to help others. All worthy and all good musicians…”

  “Only good musicians,” Mr. Li said, raising a slim finger.

  “Only the very best,” Pedir nodded, “for there ain’t no bad guys around here as play well. Get you good extra boys, girls for serving, too.”

  “I’m doing that, Pedir,” Mercy said, looking up from her screen.

  “No problem,” Pedir said, wriggling both hands to assure her he would not interfere. “What about a skimmer strike? Would that be any help?”

  Mr. Li shook his head with more vigor than he usually displayed for poor ideas.

  “Strike is ours to do,” he said. “A different strike. All will see.” Now he raised his frail arm, closing the fingers to a point, retracting his arm, then darting it forward in an unmistakably reptilian strike.