He took up one end of the litter on which Nikos slept. His father lifted the other, and the two of them started back toward their own wagon.
Nikos stirred at the motion and tried to push himself up. “I can walk.”
“The doctor said not to,” Prax said. “Lie down.”
Nikos complied with a faint groan.
Konstantin grunted as they set the litter down by their own campfire. “Tomorrow, you and I are assigned to help bring water to the camp, Praxiteles. Achilles wants at least twenty-five barrels, so we’ll all have enough to wash as well as cook for the feast.”
Prax grinned at his brother. Nikos had always hated hauling water. “You must have gotten shot on purpose.”
Nikos laughed, but then flinched and lay still.
“It’s been a long day,” their father said. “We can thank whatever gods watch down on us for our salvation.”
Despite his fatigue and the grimness of the day, Prax couldn’t resist arguing. “Not the gods—Mistress Rishi Trahn and her blue lightning.”
His father merely laughed, but Prax wondered as he lay on his bedroll and stared up at the stars whether the off-world woman would come to the feast of thanksgiving. If she didn’t, he might never see her again. Somehow, that thought disturbed him.
Chapter Two
Rishi woke with a start. She had a sense that she had been having a bad dream, but she couldn’t recall any of the details. She frowned when she looked around and realized she wasn’t in her cabin on the Golden Hawk. After a second, she identified the sofa she was on and the nearby tables and chairs as belonging to the aft cabin of her personal shuttle.
All at once, the events of the day flooded back to her consciousness. She had killed someone. True, she had done it to save hundreds of innocent lives, but still, she had deliberately ordered the death of a human being. When Rishi remembered the charred remains one of the Elliniká had carried in a bucket, she shuddered and fought nausea.
She sat up and brushed her hair back from her face. She had no real regrets. If she had waited, perhaps tried to call Pireaus for help, more Elliniká would have died. And from what the guide had said, the municipal government in Pireaus might not have done anything anyway. She had never expected to have to make such a decision when she had asked to have a picnic lunch on the plains of Celadon.
When she put her feet on the deck, she felt the faint vibration that meant they were in flight. She straightened her blouse, slipped on her shoes, and headed for the main cabin.
If the aft cabin resembled a parlor, the main cabin looked very much like a commercial shuttle. All the seats were in rows, with an aisle down either side.
Hari released the web of his safety harness and stood up as soon as he saw her coming up the aisle. He gave her an anxious head-to-toe glance but seemed reassured. “Hello there. You look better.”
“I feel better.” Rishi glanced around the cabin. Besides Hari, the other occupants included Dr. Warchovsky and several crewmen and security staff who must have been helping her. They all looked exhausted. “How is everyone else?”
Dr. Warchovsky glanced up from studying the display of a terminal in her lap. Her gray hair was damp with perspiration; her middle-aged face looked almost elderly with weariness. “We lost five of the Elliniká. There are over two dozen of them with serious wounds.”
Rishi swallowed. Five people in one day was a lot of death in a population that must number well under a thousand.
“It would have been worse if you hadn’t acted so quickly,” Hari said at once. “Much worse.”
“I know that.” Not that knowing erased the tight, grim feeling in the pit of her stomach. Rishi moved forward and took a seat in the same row as Dr. Warchovsky, so that Hari would sit down, and the other woman wouldn’t be obliged to twist her head around to talk to Rishi. “So, how about the wounded?”
Dr. Warchovsky looked noncommittal. “I don’t think any of them are in imminent danger.”
“How is that woman who went into shock?”
The doctor frowned, but Rishi decided it was merely the effort of remembering which patient she meant. “Ah, the smith’s wife. Her burns are serious, but she should survive. It’ll be a long healing process for her, and some bad scars.”
“And the boy with the burned back?”
Her expression cleared. “Oh, he was less serious. No organs were injured, and he’s still young enough to heal very quickly. He’s only twenty or so in Terran years.”
“What about his brother, the translator?” Rishi asked.
Dr. Warchovsky waved a hand. “Compared to the others, his wound was minor.”
Rishi glanced at Hari. He had reclaimed his seat on the other side of the aisle and seemed to be reading a report on his wrist com. She turned back to the doctor. “And is he young enough to heal very quickly, too?”
The doctor’s frown returned. “Not quite so young.” She glanced at her terminal and scrolled the display. “Twenty-seven or twenty-eight according to the scanner. But he’s very healthy.”
Hari looked up. “We’ll be docking in a few minutes.” He leaned back in his seat, and in a few seconds, the safety webbing enveloped him.
Rishi flicked on the view screen above her head as her webbing engaged. The immense, reassuring mass of the Golden Hawk filled the screen, like some giant silver planetoid. Star ships never landed on a planet surface, so they had no need to be sleek; they had only to carry cargo and passengers quickly and efficiently while folding space to shorten the distance between stars.
The Golden Hawk had been her home for the last six months, while she made a tour of her operations, and coming back to it now did seem like a homecoming. She breathed a sigh, half relief, half regret. She had work to do, and an hour’s diversion on the plains had turned into a whole day lost.
A small dot on the view screen grew large as the iris of the docking port opened. Darkness filled the screen as the shuttle moved into the void. Suddenly, the port filled with light as the automated landing sequence began.
A slight jolt told Rishi the docking arms had locked the shuttle into place on the deck. She unfastened her webbing and got to her feet. “Time to get back to work.”
Hari stood beside her. “You haven’t eaten anything.” His tone was just this side of a scold. “You missed lunch and dinner.”
Rishi frowned. It was bad enough when he nagged her in private. “I’ll eat later.”
He didn’t answer, but went away to deal with a question from his staff. Rishi took advantage of his absence to go straight to her cabin and log on to her com center.
The artificial intelligence that she relied upon for so much of her business came alert. “Do you require assistance, Mistress?” the politely neutral voice asked.
“No, not just yet, but listen in as usual. I may need you later.”
She called Trahn headquarters on Subidar just to check in. The only crisis was a minor one that had sprung up in a distant sector where the deteriorating economy had caused business to suffer. She dealt with that, then pulled up her general ledger information. Her father had taught her the importance of keeping a close track on every aspect of their business. Rishi didn’t like to go more than a few days without checking the statistics generated from current business input.
“How do things look?” she asked the AI.
“Well enough. But if you’ll notice, currently two sectors have failed to meet their revenue projections. A third one has that potential, but their numbers aren’t in for this quarter yet.”
Two of the boxes that contained revenue totals for the various business sectors began to glow red. Rishi opened them up and studied the data. “There’s a notation in this one that a revolution on a colony world called Zealand caused the interruption of a major deal for electronics.”
“That deal only accounts for half the decrease.”
; Rishi nodded. “True. Do you know if the revolution is over?”
There was a three second pause while it consulted its general knowledge databank. “News reports indicate that a ceasefire is in effect, but not that the situation is resolved.”
She pondered this. “Get me more information on those sectors, will you? I need numbers and I need to see all internal reports. And I need it by tomorrow night.”
“For both sectors?”
“Yes, both. In fact, get me the same data for that third sector that looks iffy.”
“Certainly, Mistress. I should have it for you by tomorrow afternoon.”
A short while later, three rising notes sounded, distracting her from the intricacies of her operating margin. Rishi sighed. Hari would let himself in if she didn’t answer.
“Come,” she called, shutting down her monitor; she didn’t like the AI to be on and listening for anything except business.
She heard the door open, although she couldn’t see it from her office alcove.
Sure enough, Hari strolled in moments later and dropped into the chair near her desk. “Are you still working, girl? You never ate anything, did you?”
She managed to frown, but it was difficult. He was the closest thing she had to family. “You sound just like my mother.”
He snorted. “It’s too bad you don’t still have a mother. If she were here, she’d tell you a thing or two.”
A vast sadness filled Rishi as she thought about everyone she had lost. She had learned over the years how to keep the tears from welling up in her eyes, but she had no way to stop the sorrow from welling up in her heart.
It must have shown on her face because Hari leaned over and hugged her. “I’m sorry. I made you remember them, didn’t I?”
She let herself clutch him back for a few seconds while she got her composure back. “It’s okay,” she said, letting go. “I don’t want to forget them. The memories are all I have left.”
He snorted his disapproval as he leaned back in the chair. “You should quit working so hard and start your own family. Go to some of those parties you’re always getting invited to, and you might meet someone.”
She sniffed back at him. “Not at those parties. The men with social connections are out for my money, and the business types just want a merger with the House of Trahn, even if they have to marry me to get it.”
He frowned but didn’t argue with her objection. “Then go out incognito sometime. Not to a bar or a sex club. Go to a play or a concert or to one of those association dances they have all the time in Shembor.”
She shook her head. “What’s the point? If I met someone I liked, sooner or later I’d have to tell him my real name and that I had lied to him. Would you like it if a woman did that to you? Would you have kept seeing Anika if she had done that to you?”
He rubbed his chin, and Rishi noted that he hadn’t shaved recently. “Well, maybe I wouldn’t have liked it, but I probably would have understood the reason for it.”
“Or you might not.”
“I suppose so.” He glared at her. “This is just your usual excuse for misbehaving. When are you going to stop cruising the sleaziest places in Shembor and picking up guys who just want a quick lay with no strings?”
“When I want more than a quick lay with no strings.”
His glare grew more disapproving. “If you were my daughter, I’d turn you over my knee.”
She laughed at this. “You’re not old enough to be my father.”
He looked pleased, but he shook his head. “Nineteen years older is technically old enough. Besides, I knew you when you were small.”
Sadness returned at this reminder of happier times, but Rishi managed to fight it off. “This is just your usual nagging, Hari, to use your phrase.”
“Maybe.” He glanced at the blank field of her terminal. “But you do work too much. And you still haven’t eaten anything since breakfast.”
Somehow his persistence made her lighter-hearted. Someone cared about her enough to nag. She laughed. “You really do sound like you’re trying to mother me.”
His brows lifted. “So? What’s wrong with that?”
She made a face. “I’m twenty-nine. I don’t need a mother. And killing someone made me lose my appetite.”
“Ha!” He scowled. “Don’t lose any sleep over Gemal. From what Praxiteles told me, you should be in line for a medal.”
“Praxiteles?” The name conjured up a picture in Rishi’s mind—Praxiteles standing on the plains, the breeze stirring his golden-brown hair, his eyes as blue as the Celadonian sky, his mouth curved in a warm smile.
“Yes,” Hari said. “Praxiteles Mercouri, our Elliniká translator. The one you asked Dr. Warchovsky about, remember?”
She smiled reluctantly. It was no good trying to hide things from Hari. “Okay, he’s very good looking, and I noticed him. Is there any reason I shouldn’t?”
“None, except we’re leaving this system at midnight tomorrow.” He got to his feet. “Oh, and I forgot to mention it, but the Elliniká are giving a feast of thanksgiving tomorrow night, and you’re the guest of honor. We’re all invited.”
She debated. She still had some business to conduct in Pireaus. “Well, it would give Dr. Warchovsky a chance to check on her patients. And I suppose it would be rude to refuse, wouldn’t it?”
He laughed. “Quite rude. Especially if you care what the Elliniká think of you—at least one of the Elliniká.”
She nodded. “It’s settled then. I’ll tour the market, check on any last-minute things with Gutmahn, and then go to the Elliniká dinner. Once that’s over, we can take a shuttle back here to the Golden Hawk, and get going. The captain says at maximum fold, we should be home on Subidar in less than ten days.”
Hari got to his feet and stretched. “Good. It’s been a long trip and I’m looking forward to seeing Anika waiting for me on the terrace when I get back.”
Rishi thought about her own house, enormous, but empty of everyone but servants and security staff, and said nothing. For once, Hari seemed not to notice her mood. He gave her a quick hug and started for the door.
“Don’t forget to eat something,” he called over his shoulder.
Rishi threw a stylus at him and then started to get ready for bed as soon as the door closed behind him.
RISHI was ravenous at breakfast. She always ate the first meal of the day alone, but when Lidiya brought the tray, Rishi didn’t even wait for her to leave before she started eating.
Lidiya commented on it when she returned for the tray. “Hari was right; you were hungry enough for an extra serving. You cleaned all the plates.”
Rishi suppressed a stab of annoyance that Hari had interfered in her morning menu. “Where is Hari now?”
Lidiya stacked plates onto the tray. “He’s working out with Rurhahn. He asked me to let him know when you’re ready to leave.”
For a few seconds, Rishi debated the possibility of giving Hari the slip and going down to Celadon by herself. She decided against it. The crew would certainly obey her orders, but Hari had his own way of exacting revenge for going against his procedures. “Tell him I’ll be ready in an hour.”
Lidiya nodded. She was very petite, even shorter than Rishi, but she had no difficulty lifting the tray in the light gravity of the Golden Hawk. “All right. I’ll tell him. Will you need me today?”
“Not until tonight. I plan to dress for dinner.”
Lidiya looked curious, so Rishi filled her in on the events in the Elliniká camp. There was nothing confidential about it, and Lidiya was something of a friend.
“They sound very primitive,” Lidiya said.
“They are, I suppose.” Rishi thought back to the events of the day before. “Their wagons are just long wooden boxes with cloth covers and huge wheels. They don’t seem to have any machines at all. The
wagons are pulled by big, shaggy animals with large heads and knobby knees. The Elliniká call them alogos.”
“And they live in these wagons?”
Rishi nodded. “They rarely visit the cities. Hari thinks they’re language refugees.”
“Language refugees?”
“Some of the earliest sleeper colonists were people who left Terra because they didn’t want to give up their native languages and speak Standard,” Rishi said, flipping through the wardrobe program on her console. “These folks speak a language that sounds very different. Only a few of them learn Standard so they can go to the cities to trade.”
“You seemed to have learned all about them.”
“Our guide told us a lot before we even saw the attack.” Rishi had found what she was looking for. “I’ll wear this tonight. Can you have it ready?”
Lidiya glanced at the screen. “Of course. But are you sure? That’s a lot of dress for some primitive herders.”
“Well, I am the guest of honor.” Rishi managed to keep a straight face for only a few seconds before a pleased-with-herself smile escaped her as she thought about seeing Praxiteles again. “And their translator is very good looking.”
Lidiya laughed and reached across her to press the retrieval key to fetch the gown from storage. “Your dress will be ready for the Elliniká. I just hope they’ll be ready for it.”
THE ride down to Celadon was uneventful. Rishi spent the morning touring the market, which was made up of many stalls and strolling vendors hawking their wares in loud voices. Rishi enjoyed the bustle and even the tantalizing smell of meat grilling from the food stalls. After purchasing some smaller trinkets, she spotted a blue-green bowl that looked like metal until she picked it up and realized it must be ceramic. The timid young vendor swore it was an antique from an ancient, ruined city that predated Terran colonization. Rishi handed over the credit chits knowing that she was paying too much.
Worlds Apart (ThreeCon) Page 3
