Laldasa (2 page)

That felt wrong. Legal, proper, but wrong.

Jaya began to walk, holding the young woman at his side, half-supporting her tenuous steps. The Sarngin moved at a distance, shadowing. Well, he would at least go through the motions of taking her to a dalali. Once inside, he could wait the length of a processing and exit again. The thought of circumventing caste law was a perversely pleasing one, and Jaya Sarojin savored it.

Meeting the road to the spaceport, he hailed a public aircar, which carried him and his dazed companion back into Kasi. Here, her eyes scanning the buildings beyond the vehicle's windows, the woman finally spoke.

“Where am I?”

Jaya smiled, hoping to put her at ease. “At last! Words! I was afraid you'd been knocked dumb. You're in Kasi. Did you mean to be in Kasi?”

“Yes ... but not like this.”

“What happened?”

“Thieves,” she said.
 

He nodded as the car slowed to a halt before the dalali of Ashur Badan and Kareen Devaki. “They took your id,” he said, and felt her stiffen.

Her face went white as she raised a hand to her neck. “I know. I go to prison?”

He paid the driver and helped her out onto the gleaming walk. “No. You go here.” He turned her to face the dalali's glistening facade with its intricate pattern of inlaid tiles. As he did, he saw the Sarngin again, getting out of their blue aircar up the street. His reputation must have preceded him: Nathu Rai Sarojin, disrespecter of order, who treated das as if they were free men.

“What is this place?”

“A ... brokerage. Come.”

He led her gently, still thinking, still watching the Sarngin, into the sumptuous foyer. From behind the long gleaming service counter across from the doors, a clerk saw the Nathu Rai Sarojin and rang upstairs for the proprietors. The whisper of his name brought them both down to the foyer.

Jaya saw them at the top of the green-carpeted stair—Ashur, short and fat; and the svelte, handsome lady Kareen Devaki, still beautiful though graying. He smiled, then saw that the Sarngin had come into the foyer behind him. He nearly swore aloud. No faking then, unless he dared use his status to induce the brokers to run a bogus processing.

He gritted his teeth. No. He would not ask a law abiding business to break the very law he was honor-bound to uphold, even if that law itself soured his stomach.

Next to him the woman, her eyes on the couple descending toward them, murmured, “Who are they?”

Jaya's hand tightened on her arm, trying to soothe the fear he could hear in her voice. “Trust me,” he said. “Do as you're told and you'll be all right. What's your name?”

“Anala. I'm not going to prison?” she asked again.

“No prison, Anala. Just follow instructions. Good day, friends.” He spoke loudly for the benefit of the Sarngin and held his hand out to be taken by the two dalal, each in turn.

“This is a rare privilege, Nathu Rai. How may we serve you?” asked Kareen, appraising first him, then his companion. Her eyes, as always, told him he attracted her, and sent an invitation he always refused, though graciously. It was almost a ritual by now, having taken place at every meeting since he'd reached fourteen years.

Ashur Badan was more interested in the woman. “Yours?” he asked with characteristic bluntness.

“It would seem. I found her wandering without id. She'll need processing.”

Ashur took Anala's hands and turned them palms up. He grunted delicately. “Unmarked.”

Jaya feigned affront. “You think me a thief?”

“You think me a fool? But you do have a reputation, Nathu Rai.“

“Not for pirating dasa. I would have purchased her.”

“You, mahesa, have never purchased a dasa in your life,” said Ashur, with the familiarity of one presuming on an old family acquaintance. “This we know. You merely surprise me.” He turned his gaze back to the woman, assessing her with an expert eye. Breath hissed between his parted lips. “Exotic! Her coloring, her eyes. She would bring a rare price at auction, Nathu Rai. Would you—?”

“No.” Jaya cut him off, disgust leaving a sour taste in his mouth. “I need to have her processed.” Jaya sent the two watchful Sarngin a meaningful glance.

Following it, Kareen raised her artistically shaped brows. “Can it be that rita has finally caught up with our rebellious Sarojin?”

“Well, convention has, at any rate,” admitted Jaya wryly. He lifted off his personal id leaf and draped it around the woman's neck. “How long?”

“How much do you want done?” asked Ashur. “She has a natural beauty—won't need much painting. So pale. Is she Avasan?”

“I don't know.” Jaya surveyed the silent woman. “She needs bathing—clothing.”

“Consider it done.” The dalal fingered the medallion at Anala's throat. “Your personal seal?”

“Yes.”

“As you wish.” He signaled a clinician to his side and sent the woman away with her. “Will you wait here? We have refreshment ... ”

“No, I have some business to do next door. I'll come back for her.”

Jaya replied to Anala's last, pleading glance with one he hoped was reassuring.

oOo

Anala's present circumstance terrified her in a way the dangers she had faced almost daily on Avasa had never done. She had been in a mine when a pocket of manda gas was loosed; she had piloted a sandcat through a red blow. This was nothing like that. This was worse. Her mind felt muddy, her thoughts tangled, her body weak. There must have been at least one chance for escape—a chance she could have taken.

All she had to hang onto at the moment were the assurances of a total stranger that she was not destined for a Mehtaran prison. Now she was being led away from even that contact—denied the only hint of safety she'd known since the thieves had attacked her.

She fought her fear under control and clutched the cloak closed over the medallion. Those had to mean she'd be returned to him. He seemed kind. At least, she hoped it was kindness she saw in his face. He was obviously someone whose words were more than casually heard.

The clinician guided her through an archway into a nearly sterile corridor of white tile that opened into an equally immaculate warren of dazzling white and chrome. Steam rose from a myriad shower nozzles along the walls where clinicians bathed their female charges or watched them bathe themselves.

“Please disrobe.”

Anala turned her head too quickly and staggered against her attendant.

“You're injured. Here, let me see.”

She was seated on a tile bench while gentle but businesslike fingers made an inspection of her forehead.

“Quite a lump. Fortunately, the cut is not deep and it's above the hairline. It won't be seen. We can dress this with ointment. Now, your clothes.”

Those were summarily peeled off and her personal garments tossed into a bag. Her protector's cloak and necklace, however, were carefully handled by a young white-robed attendant whose sole task seemed to be their safekeeping.

Two women guided her now, taking her to a shower and washing her with embarrassing thoroughness. Her hair was cleansed, her wound cared for, and her body and hair both dried by a device that spewed warm air. Then she was perfumed from head to foot. It was all dizzying—all relaxing. She wanted to sleep, but her tenders kept her on her feet.

The bathing over, she was drawn into yet another tile chamber. Her eyes rebelled at the glare of white unveiled by steam. They closed against it.

“No inspection for this one,” said a half-familiar voice. “Nathu Rai Sarojin will be back shortly. Process her and dress her ... ” A hand captured her chin, then brushed her cheek. “And put some blush on those cheeks. She's deathly pale.”

“Yes, Devaki-sa.”

It was the woman from the foyer.

“And those cuts,” the woman went on, briefly touching her neck, lacerated where the chain of her id had cut. “They'll need to be covered. She's to have the mahesa's personal seal.”

“Yes, Devaki-sa.”

A swirl of skirts and the fading of her pungent scent signaled the proprietress's departure, and Anala was guided forward again. She was stopped before a vicom terminal with a luminous dome cabled to it. One clinician took her left hand and placed it atop the small dome, holding it there. The other woman touched the terminal's keys, calling an image to the screen before her. Nodding in approval, she tapped a final keystroke.

Anala jumped as the dome blazed with light, sending a burning tingle through her palm and up her arm. The hand was then turned palm up and a rod of purple light passed over it. To her surprise, her palm glowed with an intricate golden pattern.

Still tingling from the light globe, Anala was taken to a carpeted room with walls the color of an ice lake. Her eyes opened wide to take in the racks of bright clothing. Nearby, clinicians tried shimmering prints on a dark-skinned girl with a cap of curly black hair and a sullen expression. Around the room others were being fitted before large mirrors.

Anala was led to her own mirror to have a variety of materials tried against her complexion while her attendants debated which colors suited her best. They decided on a deep saffron dress, fitted her with undergarments and shoes, touched up the scars with flesh paint and her cheeks with tawny color. Minutes later, she stood dressed, curried and perfumed in a staging area near the dressing room.

“Good,” Kareen Devaki approved her. “The mahesa will be pleased. Hold her here until he returns.”

oOo

Carrying a new cloak and a package of roasted nuts, Jaya Sarojin entered the dalali through the long foyer to have a grinning Ashur Badan appear to escort him.

“Your timing is perfect,” enthused the dalal. “She's ready and waiting. If you will follow me, please?” He led the way to a small, but sumptuous gallery with a stage and walkway.

“Very grand,” commented Jaya wryly.

The dalal was obviously pleased by the compliment. “We're justifiably proud of it. We just bought out Asta Kagum, next-door. That makes Bedan-Devaki the largest dalali in Kasi—and the most prosperous. We now have eight showrooms. Three on the ground floor and five upstairs—plus private facilities. We guarantee every purchase ... if it passes our inspectors, of course,” he added, “in the case of this girl ... ”

“I understand. This is one of your showrooms, then?” Jaya glanced around the small gallery and up the carpeted walkway.

“One of our private showrooms,” explained Ashur. “We have a larger gallery which we use for our regular auctions. This room, you understand, is only for clients of the Taj. Now, please sit, and we'll bring your dasa to you.”

At a signal from the dalal, the curtains parted and a black-robed attendant led the dazed Anala down the walkway to the circular pedestal at its end. There, she was turned about so Jaya could see the transformation.

He caught his breath on a wave of pure sexual attraction. He'd thought her exotic before, now she was stunning—a jewel of garnet and topaz. But the jewel was flawed; the silver eyes screamed terror.

He stood and moved forward, gesturing at the attendant to bring her down the carpeted steps to floor level. The new cloak went around her shoulders immediately.

“How much do I owe you?” he asked the dalal.

“One hundred dagam for partial service, mahesa.”

He paid in cash, retrieved his own cloak and medallion, and the bag containing Anala's effects and took her to a waiting car. She was silent. Thinking she must be starving, he offered her the roasted nuts. Her hands shook as she put the nuts into her mouth. Three handfuls was all she took before she was sucked into a seemingly bottomless sleep.

He carried her into the House, directing Aridas to have a meal ready for her waking, and assigning Ari's wife, Helidasa, to be her attendant. Then he retired to his personal quarters, feeling irritable and morose. When he caught Aridas glancing at him warily, he laughed.

“Sorry, Ari. I'm finding new rooms in life, is all. And I'm not sure I like them very much.”

He got out the presents he'd bought then, still safely stored in his belt cache, and gave them to Aridas to present to his family, all indentured servants of the House Sarojin. The little glass bird he took himself, carrying it reverently to the wing of the House occupied by Jivinta Mina.

He found her in her dayroom, enjoying a break in the clouds. She sat in pillows beneath a skylight, holding her sharp featured face to Mitras's brief smile.

“Jivinta,” he said softly.

Her bright eyes opened and snapped to his face. She was bird-like in her movements—sprightly despite her advanced age.

“Gauri!” She smiled and a thousand tiny wrinkles transformed her face into a thing of art.

He didn't mind the childish pet name from her—or from Aridas, who also used it in private moments. He would always be their Golden One; it would be useless to protest.