Dragon Ship Read online

  “They say that’s an old ship, Rickers, listen. Could be a hand-me-down.”

  As he was talking, the pilot of the pair tried to intercept his friend a little more firmly, grabbing his elbow.

  Theo’s move was automatic; a half step back, proper flat-soled ship shoe in front pointed at the threat, foot behind at the proper angle to support, push, kick, or lead a breakaway run.

  Tut, if that was his name, recognized danger.

  “Damn it, Rickrix, you’re off!”

  The pilot moved smoothly then, putting his back to Theo, fronting his companion.

  “Pilot,” he said over his shoulder, and to general laughter, as several others from the Taverna had come out to enjoy the show. “Pilot, I do apologize for interrupting your walk. Please pass. We won’t bother you again.”

  “As you will, gentles,” Theo said. She tossed a quick thanks off her fingertips, not knowing whether he caught it, and went.

  They hadn’t gotten around to giving her a card, and that, she thought, was just as well.

  * * *

  The Taverna incident stayed in her mind as she walked on—obviously the pilot had been uncertain of his signs, obviously his training was minimal, and obviously he ought not to be tied down to the older Rickrix, whatever the hold. Still, it seemed a shame. His instincts were good, and if eager, she’d seen that before in young pilots. The need for a job for the pair of them when they were already on station was an oddity—had they arrived with no contacts at all? And hadn’t the pilot registered at the Guild Hall?

  Theo fuffed her hair out of her eyes. People. Who knew why people did things? Anyway, she wasn’t responsible for those two, so long as they didn’t get their heads broke at Bechimo’s tie-up.

  And that, she thought suddenly, was her biggest and most glaring inadequacy as a ranking member of a long-term crew. She was stupid about people. Oh, she had learned, and could do, basic social engineering. When she remembered, that was. But pretty often, she didn’t remember, and more often, she thought it was more important to deliver the information than weigh each word for possible offense beforehand. And here she was thinking to hire crew! She’d never hired anybody; she was, in fact, too young—too inexperienced—for her chair. Somehow, she’d gone from expelled student to First Board and Acting Captain on a loop ship without dancing the steps between. It was true that she’d sat Second and learned the courier business from Rig Tranza. If she’d taken Huggelans’ contract, then right now she’d’ve had her own ship, and whatever ’prentice or Second Board the home office saw fit to send her. Leaving Huggelans and taking Uncle’s contract—that had been a lateral jump. She’d run single until she learned why that wasn’t such a great idea, and then she’d signed on Clarence. But Clarence had come with Father’s strong recommendation; Theo hadn’t hired the pilot so much as she’d taken advice from a trusted source.

  That wasn’t going to stand her much use in trying to hire on a competent and compatible crew member, was it?

  She fuffed her hair out of her eyes again, frowning so ferociously that two women in bland uniforms like Grafton and Rutland wore, swung one to each side of the hall and let her pass.

  When she’d first come aboard, Bechimo had addressed her as “Captain.” He’d stopped doing that after she’d asked to have the bonding ceremony put off until they could learn more about each other. She figured he was having second thoughts. And she figured he was right to have them. Might be the best thing to do would be to have him advertise for captain, listing out all the desirable traits of such a one.

  There might be something there. Maybe she’d talk it over with Joyita this evening, while Clarence was out on his date.

  These cheerful thoughts having brought her to the hub, she paused to look about her.

  To the right was The Nook, where Clarence’s cookie waited for her to collect it. And across the court was Keenstart. She headed in that direction, thinking about that date she could have, if she wanted it.

  But once she was inside, facing a screen, she realized that she didn’t want a date, or to have to deal with a new person, for a quick session of what Bova, way back at Anlingdin, had called exercise. Maybe, if someone—if Kara, or Win Ton, someone she knew and cared about were here. Someone who would be both exciting and comforting . . .

  But, there—she hadn’t seen Kara for years. And Win Ton . . . Well, Win Ton wasn’t in any case to be either comforting or exciting.

  Theo sighed.

  She wanted . . .

  What she really wanted, she thought suddenly, was a good hard game of bowli ball. Surely a station this size had activity rooms—gyms. Open games. She’d look it up in the amenities list when she got back home.

  In the meanwhile, her tour time was winding down. She glanced at her watch, and looked across the court to The Nook.

  — • —

  The music room was dark, except for some night-dims, glowing in the high corners. Val Con was at the big ’chora, the one they’d taken on from the yos’Galan house. The instrument that had belonged to Shan’s mother, Val Con’s foster-mother, who had taught him how to play.

  It was a quality piece of equipment originally intended for use in concert halls, which meant it would crack walls if given its full voice, which he hadn’t done. Val Con’s eyes were closed, his face underlit by keyboard’s glow, his hair stuck in sweaty spikes to his forehead.

  Even with the ’chora’s voice set down to whisper like it was, the room was full of music. So full of music that for several long minutes it was all Miri could do to stay upright two steps beyond the door, and remember to breathe.

  When she felt like her lungs could operate without her close attention, she walked forward, careful of her footing, and hoping her heart wouldn’t burst before she reached the ’chora, leaned her hands against the smooth, cool wood; cleared her throat and whispered into the teeth of the music—

  “Val Con.”

  There was no way he could have heard her, and the music was pounding her to flinders.

  She closed her eyes—and the music crashed into silence.

  “Miri!”

  She opened her eyes and met his across the ’chora.

  “You should be . . . asleep,” he said, breathless with all the effort he’d been making.

  “You should, too,” she answered, and her voice doing wasn’t doing any better. “Think I can sleep with all this going on?” She dared to take one supporting hand away from the ’chora to sketch swoops and slashes in the air in imitation of the music he’d been playing.

  He raised an arm to mop his face on his sleeve, which left the spikes of hair sticking straight up.

  “Cha’trez, forgive me. I had not considered. Let me escort you back to bed.”

  “No.”

  It took more effort than it should’ve, but she pushed away from the ’chora and stood on her own two feet, deliberately meeting his eyes. His were bright, the lashes damp.

  “We need to talk,” she said. “Right now. It ain’t—it ain’t any use pretending that it’s not my fault Daav’s gone missing. My decision. I still don’t know what else I could’ve done, seeing as Pod 78 needed pure Line blood in order to settle it down. But that’s by the way. What’s not by the way is that it’s tearing you up. I don’t know what you and the Tree were talking about, or what you’re thinking when you go up to the nursery—but I do know you’re not getting any sleep, and you’re not laying this thing to rest.”

  She took a hard breath.

  “I don’t know how to help. I don’t know how to make it square between us.” Her mouth twisted. “Some delm I turn out to be.”

  “Some delm we turn out to be,” Val Con murmured. “Miri, I cannot second-guess your decision; had our positions been reversed, I would have decided as you did.”

  “No, you wouldn’t have,” she said. “You’d’ve gone yourself.”

  “I would have tried to go, yes,” he said seriously. “But I would have been wrong, and I submit to you that Father is .
. . is quite persuasive enough to have shown me my error and given me the opportunity to arrange matters more appropriately.”

  “More appropriately.”

  He nodded, his breathing easier now.

  “Delms protect the clan. Delms send kin into danger, sometimes knowingly send them to die. It is the paradox of our duty.”

  “Which don’t mean—”

  “Which doesn’t mean that one may not mourn, or seek ways to spend at least cost. In this instance—Father must have gone. He was expendable, if need be. We—are not. For who would protect the clan, if the delm fell? And I submit that no one involved in that transaction knew it better than he did himself.”

  He sighed and moved toward her, extending a hand along the top of the ’chora. She put her hand in his, relief making her giddy; the flow of his love buoying her.

  “I know the delm’s duty,” he murmured. “It is fixed in the mind of all of us before we take our first flight. What I have been attempting is to fix that duty in my heart. I have several times over the last few nights sat with the Tree, learning stories of past delms, from . . . a primary source that is . . . not the Diaries. I have also tried to . . . employ its assistance in strategy, for I, we—Korval—must believe that Daav yos’Phelium has been abducted by the Department of the Interior. To believe otherwise endangers those whom we are sworn to protect.”

  “Tree have anything useful to say on that front?”

  “I believe it is considering the matter,” Val Con said, with a quirk of an eyebrow.

  Miri sighed. The Tree was hundreds of years old. It might still be thinking when Lizzie came to be delm.

  “This evening, I was—there was a protocol for breaking an ordinary person to the Department’s will; for implanting a particular course of action in the psyche while hiding the action from the person himself. I believe this is what they might attempt with Father. The Department has, after all, attempted to defeat us from without, and has seen . . . less success than they would like. A strike from within will surely succeed.”

  “You were trying to remember this so Daav could be defused, if he comes back?”

  “Yes. And also to try to guess if he would allow himself to survive such treatment, or if Mother could, in some way, interfere.”

  “Any answers?”

  He looked wry and waved his hand at the ’chora.

  “No.”

  She nodded, thinking.

  “The stories the Tree’s been sharing with you. Will it share with me?”

  “I believe it will. Or, we might see if you might learn from me.”

  She frowned at him.

  “Think that’ll work?”

  “It may.”

  He smiled and his fingers tightened on hers.

  “Come, cha’trez. You should be in bed, and so, we agree, should I. Let us dream together and find what that may tell us.”

  “Sounds like a plan,” Miri said, and raised her free hand to cover a sudden yawn.

  “Sounds like a good plan.”

  — • —

  “Help you, Pilot?”

  Theo hitched a hip onto one of the stools.

  “Clarence sent me,” she said. “Said there was a cookie in it for him, and he’s serious about new-made cookies.”

  The woman nodded calmly. “Looked like a mana rare good sense. You’ll be ’is mate, then. What’s for you?”

  Theo cast a suddenly wistful look at the menu board . . .

  “You want something special like they make at home, you tell me,” the woman said comfortably. “I can fix more’ns on that board.”

  “Can you?” Theo sighed. “I don’t—you wouldn’t be able to make me a toasted cheese sandwich, would you?”

  “Why not?” asked the woman, turning toward her galley. “Be a couple, makin’ it from scratch. I’ll slip it inna warmbox for you so’s you can take it with. That do ya?”

  “Yes,” said Theo, and blinked at the sudden prickling of her eyes. “That’ll do me . . . just fine.”

  FIFTEEN

  Tradedesk

  “Sorry to say, Pilot Aitchley, but somebody fed you bad info.”

  The voice was male, adorned with an exaggerated version of the station accent. Voice was all Theo had, though the connection was marvelously crisp; visual had been denied at the contact point on world Chustling.

  “Nobody here got any affiliations with Tree-and-Dragon Family, Pilot. Guess that’s kinda good news for you, innit? Get to stay up there in the squeaky-clean, ’stead getting your boots dusty down here with us.”

  Theo held on to her patience, just.

  “The name I have is Ravin Paylot,” she said. “At ChivinTrade Limited.”

  There was lag—surprisingly little, before the man’s voice came back at her again.

  “Yes’m, Pilot, you got ChivinTrade all right. Ravin Paylot—can’t help you there. No Tree-n-Dee affiliates here. Might could be some on-world. Maybe. I can’t tell you.”

  Theo closed her eyes, glad now that the video had been denied. There wasn’t any sense wasting more time or money on this call. There might be a way to research Ravin Paylot, to find where she’d gone after leaving ChivinTrade.

  “Thanks then, ChivinTrade,” she said. “Like you said, it’s an old name the Master Trader had in a file. I appreciate your help.”

  “No trouble, no trouble at all, Pilot Aitchley. You have fun up there. No need to come down here to Chustling. ChivinTrade out.”

  “Bechimo out,” Theo answered.

  There was a pause before Joyita spoke, from Screen Six.

  “That’s a clean disconnect, Pilot Theo.”

  “Thank you, Joyita.” She frowned, then shook herself and glanced at Screen Two, which was currently showing local times at Tradedesk, Chustling, and Vincza. She had a name and a contact code for Vincza . . . which she supposed ought to be used, if only so she could tell Shan that she’d done as he’d asked. Though she was beginning to think that Shan’s Master Trader inside info wasn’t as good as he thought it was.

  “The person you just spoke with was beyond concerned. Scared scans in the emotional registers I reference,” Joyita commented.

  Theo blinked at him. “Scared?”

  Joyita raised his eyebrows.

  “Yes. It sounded clearly that way to me,” he said. “Deciding if it was us he was scared of, or of somebody in the commlink using a snooper and hearing ‘Tree and Dragon,’ that is an issue I can’t resolve.”

  “I didn’t think of that. I should have thought of that.” Theo fuffed her hair out of her eyes and sighed. “Well, we’ll put it in the report to Shan as your observation.”

  Joyita raised his hand as if his fingers had something to put into the conversation, but he only clenched them into a fist, as if he’d thought better of whatever it was.

  “Master Trader yos’Galan doesn’t know of my existence,” he pointed out.

  “Sure he does,” Theo said.

  Joyita looked dubious, but bowed his head.

  “I leave it to the pilot’s judgment,” he said.

  “Okay.” Theo hesitated on the edge of a question, then shrugged and looked back to Screen Two.

  Clarence had left some while back for his date, looking respectable and scholarly in dress kilt and ruffled shirt. He had his ship key locked snug in his belt, to Bechimo’s clear relief, and was obviously anticipating an enjoyable leave.

  Once he’d reported Clarence off-ship, Bechimo had . . . retired, leaving her Joyita in Screen Six for company. That was odd, but maybe he was trying out another affect. Joyita was, after all, art, and art was, in Theo’s opinion, tricky at best.

  “Can you set me up a relay to Vincza surface, offices of Macker Marooney?” she asked Joyita now. “I’ve got the code here in notes.” She shunted it to the communications queue with a ripple of fingers across keys. “Content of initiating relay, Laughing Cat Limited under trade contract to Korval seeking Ornth Delabar for possible association. Contact Waitley, and our code.”

>   “Will do,” said Joyita, glancing down at what she was meant to think of as his board. “It is nightside where we’re sending, Pilot Theo. There could be some little while between now and an answer.”

  “If there’s an answer,” Theo said grumpily. She sighed, and stood up, spinning away from the chair to dance a half-dozen energetic steps.

  “I’m going to go down to the cellar and see how Win Ton’s getting on,” she said.

  Joyita glanced up, his expression curious.

  “You visit the young man often,” he said.

  Theo gave a rueful laugh and shook her head.

  “I don’t visit nearly as much as I should, and I don’t know what to do when I do. Except wait, and hope he’s getting better. That we’re doing the right thing and not just . . .”

  Extending his suffering, is what she didn’t say. Uncle’s information had been firm, if sparse. If there was help for Win Ton at all, it was with the machine, the Remastering Unit.

  The question she kept coming back to, peripheral to the question of Win Ton’s eventual recovery of good health, was—why hadn’t the Scouts just let him go? Why hadn’t they let him die his death? Why had they compromised the policies of their organization—which held such tech as Bechimo sprang from, tech such as the Remastering Unit, was to be destroyed—in order to buy Win Ton’s life? He wasn’t a high-ranking, nor, she suspected, a particularly valuable member of the Scouts. He hadn’t given her to believe that his clan was so important that the Scouts had no choice but to make the attempt to save his life.

  Worse! He had broken—Win Ton himself had broken Scout rules and regulations by coming aboard Bechimo, sitting in a chair, and bringing the piloting keys away. If he hadn’t done that—if he had instead done whatever he was supposed to have done: reported an intruder device, blown up said intruder device, sent for a team of specialists to deactivate and dismantle said intruder device . . . If he hadn’t let curiosity overrule his common sense, he wouldn’t be in the Remastering Unit at all.

  The only thing she could think of was, if the instrument of torture that had been used on Win Ton was deployed against . . . more Scouts, utilized as a means of blackmail and assassination . . . If entire clans or armies could be wiped out by the same means that had turned Win Ton’s very cells against themselves . . .