by Sharon Lee
"Of course," Aelliana said. "Go, now—fetch your lifemate, and come home to us quickly."
There wasn't anything to say to that. Aelliana knew to the last decimal point just how likely it was that Miri could fetch Val Con home again. Wordless, she bowed, turned and ran down the hall, scarcely paying attention to how she went. The door before her opened, and she rushed out—
Into the garden.
She ran down the overgrown path, to the Tree Court; to the Tree itself. Dropping the bag, she shrugged into her jacket, squinting up into the high branches.
"I don't have a lotta time," she said.
A breeze kissed her cheek, bearing the suggestion that the situation was perhaps not quite dire.
"Easy for you to say;" Miri said bitterly; "you still got dragons, and you'll get more if we die out."
The air conveyed the idea that the Tree understood that she was upset, but that she was mistaken if she thought that the Tree failed to properly appreciate each of its dragons. The quality of thought turned slightly acerbic: If they were each and all the same, the Tree would have an easier time keeping up with them. But, no, they were all individuals, to be tended individually – and the Tree valued each.
Remembered each.
Miri took a breath – and extended a hand before she realized that she was hearing a pod, descending through the leaves.
She'd barely caught it before it fell open in her palm, and had eaten it before she realized that it had no odor at all.
More racket came from the high branches, and she held out her hands, catching one . . . three . . . five . . . seven pods of differing sizes. Quickly, she stowed them in the pockets of her jacket, and raised her hands to catch the rest.
The last of the pods pocketed, the breeze abruptly turned sharp, pushing at her, insistent. She grabbed the bag, slung it over a shoulder and ran back the way she had come.
Emissary Twelve met her at the rock, which was cold as the air, now, and showing reflective surfaces. She took the bag, and passed through the hatch into the ship, Miri following.
Inside was weirdly familiar; a very small scale replica of the bridge of Edger's ship, that she and Val Con had used—well, it wasn't all that long ago, not by the count of years, anyway.
Emissary Twelve turned from lashing Miri's bag into a cubby cut into the rock wall.
"You will sit there," she said, pointing with one three-fingered hand.
Miri sank on the rocky ledge indicated, and looked straight ahead, into the view-tank.
"I have several signatures from this ship that has captured the Tree's dragon," Emissary Twelve said, sitting on the ledge directly before the tank, and a panel of instruments.
"How are you going to be able to track them?" Miri asked. "Not only is a Jump ship, but it's probably a Scout ship—really fast, and really slippery."
Emissary Twelve made a sound that could have been a sigh, or a laugh.
"None of that matters; the ship may fly away from us with all speed, yet, we will always come to rest beside her. I have entangled this vessel's signatures with theirs. In the eyes of the universe, we are one."
Well, thought Miri, that explained everything nice and tidy, didn't it?
There came a quiet hiss, and Miri turned to see the hatch coming down. There was no seam where it joined the rest of the rock; no seals; nothing to show that there was, or had ever been, a hatch there.
"They lift," Emissary Twelve said, her fingers moving deliberately among her instruments.
She pressed the crystal button set in the center of her board.
"We follow."
* * *
The door closed behind Esil, and Theo heaved a sigh of relief.
Food, and tea, and the ambiance of the kitchen had warmed her, so she thought she might not need a shower—an opinion she rapidly changed when she caught sight of herself in a hallway mirror.
Her hair was a knotted snarl hanging over one ear; her face showing bruises where Jake had hit her; her sweater—what was left of it between the holes—was liberally streaked with mud, and grease.
Her pants were scarred and muddy, but at least they hadn't torn, and her boots were going to need serious attention. Aside from all of that, she was grubby, and one look at the green sweater and flowing black pants that had been laid out for her, made up her mind.
She pulled her sweater over her head, hissing when her ribs complained, and dropped it to the floor. Sitting down on the stool, she tugged off her boots, and her socks, stood up to pull her belt off, and skin out of her pants, which dropped to the floor with a definite thud.
Theo frowned—then shook her head.
"Right," she said aloud, "Val Con's small weapon."
She found the leg pocket and reached inside to pull out the pouch she'd taken out of her brother's jacket. Now that she wasn't distracted by trying not to fall off the back of a racing duocycle, it felt heavier than she expected for a small weapon, and in fact, seem to be two things, not one.
Walking over the to the table where her clean clothes had been laid out, she upended the pouch.
A flat, dull black metal rectangle fell onto the green sweater – Theo shook her head as she recognized a flat-fold knife. In its current, folded flat state, it was perfectly safe. Trip the corner safety, though, and you were suddenly holding a three-inch, very sharp cutting edge, which was undoubtedly dangerous, but mostly to the person using it.
Still, it was a weapon, and she would have absolutely used it, say, on Jake, if she'd had the chance.
Something glimmered against the sweater, drawing her eye. She leaned closer, and after a moment located the source. A ring. In fact, a rather large ring, which had landed on its face, leaving the broad band to catch the light from the overhead fixture.
Theo extended a finger and turned it over.
"Pharst!"
Korval's Tree-and-Dragon shone in bright enamel work, the clan's motto, Flaran Cha'menthi—I Dare—framed by two large emeralds—one showing a dark crack at its heart, the other tinged with yellow.
She had seen this ring just this morning.
On Val Con's hand.
She shivered.
"Theo?" Bechimo asked in bond-space. "Are you ill?"
"Something bad just happened," she said, taking a deep breath, and moving her eyes from the Ring. "I don't understand it, but—where's Val Con?"
There was a small pause before Bechimo answered.
"Your brother has been captured by enemies of his clan. Miri has gone in pursuit after making Lady Kareen Korval-pernard'i."
The meaning of that last came through as Korval-in-Trust.
Theo closed her eyes.
"Lady Kareen is safe?"
"Indeed. She is in her parlor, accessing such files as are of immediate necessity to Korval. Jeeves has reinforced extended his protections over the house."
"All right," said Theo. Either Lady Kareen knew Val Con had given her the Ring to deliver, or she didn't. In either case, there was time to take a shower.
So she could show a clean face to the delm.
* * *
The recording ended with his mother—with Korval-pernard'i—directing Jeeves to distribute it to all adult clan members. Pat Rin closed his eyes, and reviewed a mental exercise to steady the nerves, and sharpen the wits. It was a pilot's exercise, Pat Rin having grown up in a clan where very nearly all his kin were pilots, though he had come late to the duty. Instead, he had used this particular exercise for most of his life as an aid to gambling and card-play, the activities which had funded himself and his household.
He might, of course, have claimed his quartershare, but pride—he supposed it must have been pride, if it were simply not arrant stupidity—had him spurn the clan's money, as he was no pilot, and therefore no use to the clan.
The door to his office opened.
"Pat Rin—what has happened?"
He opened his eyes, and met his lifemate's depthless black eyes.
"Val Con–" he began, but his voice c
hoked out. He shook his head, and took a drink of cold tea from the cup on desk to clear his throat.
"Val Con has been abducted by a pair of what Jeeves believes to be agents of the DOI."
Her face shuttered.
"Is it known where he is being held?"
Pat Rin waved a hand at the screen.
"Auxiliary information is apparently being compiled. What we have at the moment is a recording of Korval Herself making Kareen yos'Phelium Korval-pernard'i."
"In trust," Natesa said, momentarily puzzled—her eyes widening as she understood.
"In trust for Lizzie?"
"Yes," he said, extending a hand. "Precisely for Lizzie."
Natesa stepped forward and took his hand, looking down into his face, her own troubled.
"Miri has gone after Val Con?"
"As she must. They are linked; she is an open door to Korval, if Val Con . . ."
His voice faded, but he scarcely needed to finish that sentence for Juntavas Judge Natesa the Assassin.
His desk unit chimed—message incoming.
"Possibly, this is the answer to all our questions," he murmured, leaning forward to tap the screen.
Natesa sat on the arm of his chair, slipping her arm around his shoulders, pressing companionably against his side.
The file was encrypted; Korval house code. Pat Rin entered his key, and information bloomed on the screen.
"We have confirmation: the abductors are agents of the Department of the Interior," he said, around a sudden feeling of queasiness.
"Yes, certainly," Natesa murmured, leaning to the screen and scrolling gently through the information displayed there.
"I think I see," she said, after she had reached the end of the file.
"What do you see?" Pat Rin wondered.
"I see that Captain Lisle was hired to take up the Road Boss—Val Con or Miri will accomplish the DOI's purpose for them. She and her compatriots watch the office, and—in a burst of luck, Theo visits her brother there. Captain Lisle may or may not believe that she has both Road Bosses, but she clearly thinks that the chance provided to take both is worth her risk. Perhaps it is; she does take Theo, though it is an expensive acquisition for her."
"Theo is not Miri," Pat Rin protested.
Natesa shrugged.
"That is immaterial. Ultimately, the agents of the DOI want Val Con or Miri, but Theo has high value as bait. Val Con will scarcely leave his sister in the hands of pirates, especially after it is demonstrated that she was helpless to prevent them taking her jacket from her. When Jeeves calls for duocyclists to assist in the rescue attempt, how easy for a pair—or more—of the agents we know to be on the planet to join the host. Theo, having served her purpose, is allowed to escape; Val Con is acquired."
She looked down into his eyes.
"The DOI wants Korval; they need only one half of a true lifemating to achieve this. Break one; command both."
Pat Rin's stomach cramped. He took a hard breath and reached to the screen, scrolling once more through the information—and pausing at a notation.
"I think," he said, his eyes on the screen, "that we now know who has been tutoring Boss Surebleak, and who is funding the Take Backers."
"Yes," said Natesa; "I think we do, too."
* * *
Her last voyage via Clutch ship had been on Edger's vessel, docked at Prime Station around a planet called Lufkit. Then, the pressing of the crystal knob at the center of the board had immediately made the stars go away. At the time, Miri had thought that meant Clutch ships moved really fast.
She'd soon learned that the opposite was true. Clutch ships weren't slow, but were . . . limited by the peculiarities of the Electron Substitution Drive, which required a dense field to operate. So, instead of what sane ships did in terms of seeking Jump points and doing their level best to avoid dense systems and starfields that would interfere with the utilization of their drives–Clutch ships sought out gravity wells and cluttered star systems, using the curious habit of electrons to appear elsewhere before they left their original orbit as a means of motion, if not propulsion. It wasn't ordinary star flight by human standards, but it did the job.
Eventually.
The other thing that made Clutch ships sort of stand out was that they tested the space away from their starting position before they committed to leaving that position and fully occupying the new one. Miri had never seen a vid of a Clutch ship traveling through space, which she figured was just fine.
Emissary Twelve's little boulder, now . . .
It slammed into the air like it was using the mass of Surebleak entire to thrust against—which it probably was.
Miri, thrown back hard into her stone chair, bit her tongue, eyes tearing, and ears popping. Her head hit the wall, and she saw stars, though not the local ones.
When her sight cleared, she saw Jelaza Kazone, the Tree, in the bottom third of the view-tank, and in the upper third, the depths of space.
Speaking with back straight and attention on the screens, Emissary Twelve might have been talking for her own benefit, except she spoke in Liaden.
“Here I measure the local constants so I might instruct the ship itself to return here with you, if need be, without my presence. Also, I confirm and reaffirm the constants reported to me by the T’carais of the Knife Clan, known to you as Edger. The ship also tells me of this system’s distant cloud of dust wishing to become a gas planet, which we will use rather than this star for our next transition. My extreme attention will be required when we arrive at that cloud; I may be required to act rapidly in order to take best advantage. It would be best if you remain quiet until next I speak with you. Also, cushion yourself, for our entanglement requires motion.”
In the view tank Miri made out part of the port road, the slight widening where the Road Boss shared the road’s width with their neighbor, and the canopy of the tree itself. She thought she saw a car rushing up the road – and heard Emissary Twelve began to hum, to sing!
And then the view tank’s image meant nothing, her sight reft from her by the pressure of back against stone as electrons danced to the tune called by the young Clutch turtle.
* * *
The delm had made plans.
Kareen yos'Phelium leaned back in her chair and closed her eyes.
Of course the delm had made plans. It was the business of delms to make plans, after all, and Korval delms moreso than many.
Most especially this Korval delm, who had taken up the Ring as Korval's salvation . . .
. . . and its doom.
That the Ring now came to her to hold in trust for the True Heir—that was not only just, it was so flagrantly necessary that one could only bow and do all that was required.
One might pause for a moment, now, having closed one file, and before opening the next, to reflect upon her anger, so many years ago, when her delm had offered her this same duty—take the Ring, and keep Korval safe, for the na'delm.
Ah, how one had frozen the face – just so! And how one had refused anything less than her ascension to Korval Herself, who would steer the clan away from the cliffs that had threatened them, seen their numbers increased, their alliances multiplied, and their social standing cemented. Oh, she had been terrible in her disdain.
And she had been so very certain.
Oh, my, yes, but she had been—not young, certainly, not by that point – though a case could be made for both naive and arrogant.
Had she also been wrong?
Well – perhaps she had; perhaps she had not.
Many things, after all, would have remained the same.
Daav would still have removed himself from the clan; Val Con would still have grown up and enlisted in the Scouts, as the children of yos'Phelium so very often did. Likely, this Department of the Interior would have recruited him just the same; a Scout Commander is surely a prize worth winning – and the Department had long since included Korval among its inventory of those to be eradicated.
So, per
haps nothing would have changed very much . . .
And now, she was Korval-pernard'i, trusted to hold the Ring, and the clan, safe, for the na'delm.
And, therefore, to duty.
She opened her eyes, leaned toward the computer and glanced up at a small sound that had emanated from the door of her study. Possibly, she thought, it had been meant as a knock. She ought at least to test the theory; a delm of Korval would do no less.
"Come!" she called.
The door opened sufficient to admit the lanky form of her niece, Theo, looking rather paler than usual, her hair pulled back with an unaccustomed severity that only served to cast the bruises adorning her face into high relief.
Her eyes were wide, and very dark, and for a moment Kareen thought she was looking at an incidence of deep shock. However, after a moment to gather herself, Theo produced a very credible bow in the mode of younger to elder, which was perfectly unexceptional from niece to aunt.
"Bechimo says that you're delm-in-trust," she said, in Terran, which, Kareen thought, spoke eloquently of the state of her mind. It was a point of pride, with Theo, to address her in Liaden.
In proper Liaden.
Kareen inclined her head.
"Bechimo's information is accurate," she said, also in Terran. "A sudden reversal in my estate."
Give the child credit, she caught the irony; pale lips bent in a wan smile even as she stepped to the desk, and held out her hand, so that Kareen could see the object resting on her palm.
She raised her eyebrows, and looked up into Theo's face.
"How very—unexpected. We had thought the Ring taken."
"Val Con," Theo said. "He—when he picked me up out of—he said there was a small weapon in his pocket, and I should take it. I didn't—I didn't need it, forgot I had it until just now, when I was getting ready to shower."
"Quite. I might myself allow it to be somewhat larger than a small weapon, but he would know best how to value it."
Theo shook her head slightly.
"There was a flat-fold, too."
"Excellent," Kareen murmured, and forced herself to extend a hand, and take Korval's Ring into her possession.
"I thought he was safe," Theo said, then, dropping back a few steps. "If I'd known he was still in trouble, I would've gone after him; I wouldn't have let him –"
