by Sharon Lee
So—a touch, and another, a press, a stroke; knowing kisses shared between familiar lovers—and the bed, all three aflame. And after they had rested, once again, comfortable and comforting, before sliding into shared sleep . . .
To wake and find morning busy before them.
As if to punctuate that thought, there came a discreet knock at the door, which was very likely their eviction notice.
Running his hands over his short-cropped hair, he crossed the room and opened the door, expecting to see his sister, frowning her irritation. Instead, there was another tray on the table beside the door, a multitude of small covered plates clustered on it, with a steaming teapot, and a carafe of morning wine nestled next to a small vase holding three small dark red flowers.
Well.
He picked up the tray, brought it into the room, and put it on the table by the window.
Daav, Aelliana murmured inside his head; has Kareen had enough of us?
Very much the contrary, he told her. True affection is honored, and we are invited to make merry.
We HAVE made merry, Aelliana pointed out.
Ah, but have we been merry thrice? He asked, focusing deliberately on the vase and its contents.
There was a flicker of something from Aelliana. Perhaps it was astonishment.
KAREEN sent that?
So I suppose, as it was Kareen who urged us to call and make our bows. She must feel a certain proprietary interest. And she does appear genuinely fond of Kamele.
She is . . . much changed, Aelliana offered eventually.
I am told that age mellows, he answered. Not that I would know, of course.
Of course, his lifemate said politely. If you have done fussing with the tray, you might come and help me wake Kamele.
Daav smiled, and bowed gently to the three bold flowers in their vase.
Certainly, he said. After all, one would scarcely wish to disoblige one's sister.
#
Later, having obliged Kareen most thoroughly, they tardily addressed breakfast, each telling over the tasks of the advancing day.
"We have two ships to inspect, so that we may vigorously debate the merits of each," Aelliana said, sipping the last of her tea.
Kamele tipped her head to one side. Her hair was still damp from the shower, and droplets glittered like gemstones, strung through her pale curls.
"Will you set up as small traders?" she asked.
"As couriers," Aelliana said. "We are quite unsuited to be traders, I fear."
"And it must be said," Daav added, "that the potential of randomized danger draws her, like a moth to flame."
"Very true," Aelliana said gravely. "Besides, you know, if I fail to fall into enough scrapes from which I must be extracted, Daav becomes bored, which I am certain you agree is to be avoided."
Kamele laughed.
"When he's bored, he takes things apart," she said, giving Aelliana a comradely nod; "as you know. You'd definitely want to avoid that, on a spaceship."
"Unkind!" Daav protested; "I always put them back together again!"
He put his empty cup on the table, and met Kamele's eye, lifting a shoulder in a half-shrug. "Nearly always."
She laughed again.
"Do you plan an immediate lift?"
"Not quite immediately," Aelliana said. "The debating of merits may take some time. Also, we must be tested for new licenses."
Kamele frowned, and glanced to Daav.
"Theo tells me that a master pilot's license never expires."
"Very true, but in the particular case, it is—more expedient, let us say—to obtain a new license under a new name than to undertake an explanation of my current estate to either the Pilots Guild or to the Scouts."
"The delm is adamant," Aelliana added. "We must qualify on our current abilities, and the tickets we fly on must be true."
"No falsifying sources," Kamele said wisely, and was rewarded with a wide smile.
"Exactly so."
"And you?" Daav said. "Are you entirely fixed on resigning your position at Delgado?"
"Yes. I'll be sending my letter this week. I expect Admin will be delighted. I've been more of a thorn in their side than a rose in their crown, lately."
"I wonder . . ." Aelliana said, and hesitated, casting Kamele a conscious look. "I fear that I am about to meddle."
Kamele met her eyes blandly.
"Well, I'm certainly not used to that."
Aelliana inclined her head gravely.
"Indeed, how could you be? Now that you have been warned, I proceed—Kamele, must you resign?"
"What else should I do? Go back to Delgado and be compliant?"
"Oh, no; that would be too dreadful! I was only thinking that—of course, you will wish to use your expertise to build Surebleak an educational system. Surebleak, though, is short of funds, and likewise short of scholars trained in the traditional way. How if you allowed Delgado to participate in the project? Would not a satellite school on a planet which is poised to enter the universal conversation increase Admin's melant'i, and the whole worth of the university?"
"Especially," Daav murmured; "if they could assign some of their more . . . non-compliant scholars to the project?"
Kamele stared . . . toward him, though she was seeing her thoughts. It was an expression he knew well.
Our work here is done, van'chela, he said to Aelliana.
We may trust so. And only think what a gaggle of Delgadan scholars might do with Surebleak.
Imagination balks, he assured her.
Bah.
Kamele blinked back to the room.
"I take your point," she said to Aelliana. "This is an op—"
She was interrupted by sudden commotion in the hallway, followed by a pounding on her door.
Daav came to his feet, and moved across the room. Behind him, Aelliana rose to stand between Kamele and the door, one hand in her pocket.
He spared a thought for his own hideaway, then simply jerked the door violently open.
Amiz, Kareen's personal bodyguard, stood framed in the doorway, both hands in plain sight.
"Sorry to interrupt," he said quickly; "but there's Mister Jeeves on-comm calling for Professor Waitley's guests to go up to the Road Boss's house, quick! He says there's Clutch involved."
He hesitated, and eyed Daav speculatively.
"He said you'd know what that meant."
Clutch? Daav thought.
How fortunate that we are at home, Aelliana commented dryly.
Daav did not laugh. Instead he nodded to Amiz.
"Indeed; we know precisely what it means," he said, stretching the truth in the interest of preserving calm and order.
"Thank you. Please tell Jeeves that we are on our way."
Chapter Two
Surebleak
The Bedel
The sound bellowed across the camp, echoing in the garden, rattling the steam pipes inside their confining metal belts, intruding, even, into the din and thunder of Rafin's forge.
The kompani leapt to their feet as one, hearts pounding, breath caught. Not one among them had ever heard that alarm, yet all knew it for what it was.
Droi had been sitting beside her hearth, having just finished her first cup of tea. Kezzi, who had been sharing her tent in accordance with the luthia's wisdom, had just gotten to her feet, and Malda with her. Kezzi was to go up into the City Above, and the gadje school, while the dog stayed with Droi and Maysl, her child within.
She froze, looking down at Droi, dark eyes wide.
"The ship!" she said.
"No," Droi said, forcibly calm, and as if the distinction made the moment less significant. "Only news of the ship."
She put the mug on the hearth stone, and struggled to get her feet fairly under her. Her belly defeated this effort, as had become its habit. Droi sighed, and held up her hands.
"Help me rise," she said moderately, though it was hard for her to ask for aid.
Kezzi obeyed with alacrity, and in ad
dition made certain to stand so that a steadying shoulder was within reach, should Droi's feet be momentarily foolish.
In this moment, she was steady enough, though her blood remained chilled by the klaxon's blare. It was quiet now, having destroyed the kompani's peace, and already there were those of her brothers and sisters moving past her hearth on the way to the common fire.
To hear news of the ship.
"I'll be late for school," Kezzi said, keeping pace as Droi turned her face, as well, toward the gather-place.
School had become important to Kezzi, as had her brother in the City Above. It had come to Droi just lately, as she dozed and dreamed by her hearth, communing with Maysl—it had come to her that the kompani had developed many ties with the gadje here, on this world. There was Kezzi and her brother; Silain the luthia with the Lady and the Professor; Udari, Memit, Syaera, and Isart with the madman at the end of the road; Rys and his Brother Undertree, not to mention his mad oath to the Headwoman there . . .
Indeed, thought Droi, it had come to her a few nights ago that the common thread running through all these now-woven relationships—was Rys. Rys, who was himself an outsider, until he had stood before the fire and bound himself, soul and heart, to the kompani, accepting the Bedel as his brothers and sisters. Rys had also bound himself in brotherhood to Val Con yos'Phelium, Headman of the People of the Tree; Kezzi's brother Syl Vor was of that folk, as were Lady Kareen and Professor Waitley.
The madman, Farmer Yulie Shaper, might as well be undertree, as near as his holding stood, and it had been Rys' brother the headman who had brought news of the work to Memit, who had brought it to Silain the luthia, who had dreamed upon it . . .
. . . and now there were four gone from the kompani to the far end of the Port Road, to help Yulie Shaper take in his crops.
"Droi?" Kezzi said again. "I'll be late for school. Syl Vor will worry, if I don't send a message."
The brother, yes. Yes, he would worry, being, by everything Droi had heard, a tender boy, who would, she made no doubt, grow into a man of heart.
"We must to the fire," Droi said. "Your brother's mother is a luthia, is she not?"
Kezzi nodded.
"So. She will advise him. This thing—is of the kompani . . ."
She shivered suddenly, black showing ragged at the edge of her vision.
"This," she said, feeling the burn in her blood, "will alter the fate of the kompani. We must all of us be present, to witness."
Her foot caught on an uneven stone, and she staggered. Kezzi thrust a shoulder beneath her questing hand, and, so steadied, they went on, in silence.
After all, Droi thought, Kezzi was Silain the luthia's 'prentice. She knew a foretelling when she heard one.
The common fire was lit, the Bedel grouped in a half-circle facing it. A hand rose in the air, which was Luma, Maysl's hearth-mother, beckoning them.
They joined her, Kezzi and Luma helping Droi to the blanket, before sitting, one to a side, and Malda curled on Kezzi's lap. They gave their attention to the fire, before which stood Alosha the headman, Silain the luthia, and Pulka, who listened along the byways of the stars.
The Bedel, so say the Bedel of themselves, speak with many voices, as heedless of their song as the birds. Yet, it was not so, this day. Those assembled sat quiet, tension roiling above their silence.
Up before the gather-fire, she saw Silain the luthia make a small gesture, and the air lightened somewhat. Droi drew an easier breath, sighed it out, and put her hand on her belly.
Maysl, she said inside her head, attend this well.
She felt her daughter's attention sharpen, even as Alosha the headman took one step forward, and raised his hands.
"All of you heard the klaxon," Alosha said. "We have received a message from the ship. Pulka will explain the nature of that message, and what is required of the kompani."
He stepped back to Silain's side; Pulka took one step forward.
He looked, Droi thought, tired, and very nearly grim. Pulka was not, by nature, a happy man, nor was he a stern one. A placid man, who liked his comforts; who could, occasionally, be nagged into brilliance. Very little in life was sharp enough to cut Pulka. The ship's message though, which he would have been the first to read, had burned a tiny scar on his heart. Looking with luthia's eyes, Droi could see it, still hot and hurtful.
"Sisters and brothers," Pulka said; "we have this morning received a message from the ship. It is not a direct message, meant for this kompani alone, but an automated dispatch, which has been wide-cast to several kompanis such as ours, which have missed their pick-up date by a certain number of years."
He paused, in anticipation, Droi knew, of the flood of questions which would normally engulf him at this point.
There was silence; not one voice was raised, no single one of the kompani rose to their feet to speak.
Pulka cleared his throat; glancing at Alosha the headman, who gave him a grave nod, and turned again to face those waiting, silent, and finished what he had to say.
"The ship requires an answer. If we fail to answer, it will assume that we have not heard; that we are, in fact, Lost, and the logs will reflect this as our kompani's fate. The ship will not query again."
Another pause, but the exclamations of horror, of outrage did not arise.
"A proper answer to the ship requires codes which I have dreamed. When that answer is returned, the ship will flag it for the captain, who will review it; and who will eventually send pick-up instructions and an estimated time of the ship's arrival."
At long last, one of the kompani raised herself to her feet, Jin, the luthia's good right hand.
"How long," she asked, "will it be, after a message is sent, for the ship to arrive here for us?"
Pulka showed empty palms.
"That, we cannot know. Such information will doubtless be given us, when the captain responds to our ack."
"Thank you, brother."
Jin sat down. Pulka waited for more questions.
Droi, sitting beside Kezzi and Luma, had many questions, though none that she would willingly shout out before all the kompani. She—the ship was so late, she had thought it would never come; that it had forgotten them. And yet, here was news; the ship had not forgotten; it remembered. And that—that altered everything.
From the far edge of the circle rose a tall, powerful figure—Rafin.
"Why did the ship not come," he asked, "at the appointed time?"
Again, Pulka showed empty hands.
"That, too, we will doubtless be told, later. This automatic sending; it only seeks acknowledgment; it does not give reasons."
"We are certain, then, that this is from the ship. Our ship?" Rafin pursued, which was, Droi thought, a good question, and one which had not been among the dozen others clamoring inside her head.
"I have confirmed that it is from the ship. It is on the correct band; it utilizes the correct codes; it matches all the necessary protocols. If you want to do so, come to me, and I will show you the message itself."
"I will do that, brother," said Rafin, and sat down again.
Pulka looked 'round.
"If any others are interested, come to me and I will show you the protocols, the bands, the codes, the match-ups. I have, also, the original dream from the communications technician who was set down with the kompani, if any wish to dream it."
There was a small murmur 'round the circle at that, and here came another of the kompani to his feet. Apparently, thought Droi, her brothers and sisters were beginning to waken from their shock.
"How long," asked that brother, and Pulka blinked.
"I—" he began.
"No, I'll ask it proper," said the brother. "How long do we have to dream on this? Before the ship needs its answer?"
And that, thought Droi, was the most interesting question at all. In story, in dreams, every kompani is eager to be taken up again into the bosom of the ship. It would seem that her brothers and sisters had not embraced these stories with
all their hearts.
Alosha the headman stepped forward; Pulka dropped back one step, to stand next to the luthia.
"The ship needs its reply at once," said Alosha. "There are technical reasons for this that Pulka is also able to explain. But, there is no call for a decision on this matter. The decision was made when this kompani was formed. We guaranteed to return to the ship with those things we had learned, and those things which we had found. That the ship is late makes no difference to our guarantee."
He paused and looked around the circle, his gaze seeming to rest on each one of them in turn.
"We have heard the ship," said Alosha the headman; "and we will answer the ship. We are here; we are ready for pick-up."
Chapter Three
Surebleak
Jelaza Kazone
It sat, steaming gently, on the driveway, not much bigger, Miri thought, than the forty-eight-seat touring bus mothballed in the garage. There was no visible hatch, no visible instrumentation, or lights. No obvious identification.
Just a rock, that was all.
"Good landing," Theo noted from beside her. "Didn't even dimple the tarmac."
That was a point in its favor, Miri allowed, but not enough to off-set her growing irritation.
She turned her head to address the man-high canister topped by a ball that was at the moment glowing palely orange.
"Jeeves, please ask Mr. Joyita to find out when our visitor intends to emerge. The delm of Korval awaits. Impatiently."
"Transmitting the delm's request," Jeeves said agreeably.
There was a brief pause, followed by Joyita's voice.
"The pilot thanks the delm of Korval for the gift of her time. She will emerge with all haste."
A crack appeared in the rock's pitted surface, and another. Soundlessly a hatch opened, and a figure, stooped, yet still taller than either Miri or Theo, emerged, moving awkwardly.
It achieved the surface of the drive and straightened—a very young Clutch, Miri saw, the shell no bigger than a field pack high up on the back. Pockets and bags depended from a vest woven from what seemed to be leather strips.
