Necessity's Child (Liaden Universe®) (15 page)

He ducked, snatched, and jumped to his feet.

“I need to get to Boss Wentworth’s turf,” Ms. Taylor told him. “Shortest route.”

He blinked up at the map, at a loss; not even knowing who he might call on among his classmates. Boss Wentworth’s turf? He fingered the pointer, pushed the bracelet up under the sleeve of his sweater, and yet the map gave him no—

“Wentworth’s Jopha,” said a boy who looked as if he ought to be ’prenticed. Peter Day, Syl Vor remembered. He got up slowly, as if standing pained him, and gave Syl Vor a nod. “Jopha,” he repeated.

Syl Vor looked back to the map, stomach tightening as he didn’t at first—there! Jopha Road ran on a long diagonal from their location. And the shortest route?

His eye measured, and he brought the pointer up.

“The shortest route to Boss Wentworth’s turf takes us out the back door, to Brehm Alley, following until it ends at Taplow Street. A left turn onto the street and up the hill to—”

“Don’ wanna go that way,” Peter Day interrupted.

Syl Vor blinked, frowned at the map, reran the possible routes—and turned to his self-appointed assistant.

“It is the shortest?” he said.

“Well, yeah, it is, by steps. But it ain’t by time.”

Oh. A blocked road, then, which the map wouldn’t show, but which someone local to the area would be aware of. Syl Vor nodded.

“If the way is not passable, then—”

“Ain’t nothing the matter with the
way
!” Rudy Daniel shouted. “Don’t listen to that dope.”

“Rudy!” Ms. Taylor said sharply. “No name-calls. Make it right with Pete.”

Rudy took a deep breath, held it and let it all come out in a hissing rush which sounded rude to Syl Vor. Then he rose and went to Peter, holding his hand out.

“Sorry, Pete.”

The elder boy nodded, and put his hand in Rudy’s. They moved their linked hands up, then down, and loosed their grips, each going one step back.

“Now!” said Ms. Taylor. “Pete—tell Syl Vor why you advise him not to go that way.”

“Yes’m.” Pete turned around and looked down at Syl Vor. His eyes were different colors—one blue and one brown, both sleepy-looking.

“Your way’s right through the middle of the old store-buildin’s,” Pete said, as if that explained everything.

Syl Vor nodded and, when Pete said nothing else, repeated. “But, it is the shortest route?”

“Looks that way, but ain’t so,” Pete said.

Syl Vor thought he could understand why Rudy had lost patience. He took a breath, thought, and asked the best question he could think of.

“What bars the way?”

Pete smiled and nodded once, as if he had been particularly clever.

“Ghosts,” he said. “There’s ghosts up there in them old buildin’s. Best to go around.”

* * *

After routes was history, and after history was lunch. That was vegetable soup and bread and milk, which they ate in the room next to the classroom, where there was a table, chairs, and a serving stand.

Ms. Taylor stood at the serving stand, ladling soup into their bowls as they filed past. They carried their bowls to the table, and sat, hands folded in their laps, until everyone was in place and Ms. Taylor had sipped from her spoon, and nodded once.

It was oddly spiced, the soup—not bland, like the tinned supplies they’d eaten from in Runig’s Rock; and not sour or sweet, like Mrs. ana’Tak’s soups. Syl Vor ate his, doggedly, as he had used to eat the tinned soup, before it had become something that was ordinary and even, in its very blandness, comforting. The bread was good, chewy and brown—but the milk was the most unpleasant that he could recall drinking, speaking as one who did not favor that beverage.

While they ate, Ms. Taylor asked each of them in turn a question. For Tansy, it was the health of a younger sister, which was reported to be, “Much better, ma’am, and my ma thanks you for asking.”

Syl Vor listened as he spooned soup, and drank milk in small, loathsome sips. Anders worked after school at Bentler’s Brewery, as “scrubs,” which Syl Vor gathered had to do with cleaning the equipment; Delia was walking a beat with a Patrol team . . .

“Syl Vor, how do you like Surebleak?”

Hastily, he swallowed the last of his milk, and took a breath.

“I’ve hardly seen much of Surebleak yet, ma’am,” he said, remembering that Grandfather had told him in polite conversation to be as truthful as was gentle, and as gentle as was wise. “But what I have seen, I find interesting.”

“
Interesting
,” Rudy Daniel said in a low hard voice, from the next chair. “Boss’s brat.”

“Rudy? Did you have a question for Syl Vor?”

The other boy’s face turned a dull red.

“No, ma’am,” he said.

“Well, then,” said Ms. Taylor. “Have you decided whether you’ll try out for the All Street Stickball Team?”

If possible, Rudy’s face got redder.

“No, ma’am. I-I think I won’t be signing up for that.”

“That’s too bad,” Ms. Taylor said. “I think you’d be an asset to the team.”

Rudy swallowed and stared down into his soup bowl. A moment passed, then Ms. Taylor asked Vanette how her mother was recovering from the flu.

After lunch, they returned to the schoolroom for arithmetic, which was boring; then calisthenics; then prep groups for reading.

Syl Vor’s partner was Peter Day, who just shook his big head at the book, and leaned back in his chair.

“Naw, I ain’t no hand at letters, the way they always move around like they do. You just read it at me and I’ll say it back when it’s my turn.”

Syl Vor frowned at the page—just a plain paper book with the words printed in big Terran letters.

“These letters don’t move.”

“Not for you, they don’t. For me, they don’t set still. Got something wrong with my eyes. Just read it out, like I said. Nothin’ the matter with my memory.”

There didn’t seem to be anything to do, but what he was told. Syl Vor put the book on the desk, so Peter could look at the words, too, if he wished, pushed the bracelet up out of the way, and read out their two assigned pages about a girl named Hannah, who had gotten separated from her elder brother on the wrong side of the toll booths.

Peter leaned back in his chair, eyes closed, not watching the page at all, nodding his head slightly.

After reading—or, in Peter’s case, reciting—was dismissal.

“For tomorrow,” said Ms. Taylor, “everyone bring a news report from the Council of Bosses. Walk alert! Taxi’s waiting for Moravia and Townsin!”

Anders and Vanette dashed toward the front door, while the rest of the class headed toward the back, coats open, and heads bare. Standing by his seat, Syl Vor sealed his jacket and pulled on his hat and gloves. If it had gotten so warm that he might do without either, he could always take them off.

“How did you like your first day of school, Syl Vor?” Ms. Taylor asked him.

He looked up into her face, but found no immediate words that were either gentle or wise.

The teacher smiled.

“Speechless, eh?”

That was Padi’s sort of joke, and Syl Vor returned Ms. Taylor’s smile.

“In truth, I am not certain what I think. It has been . . . different from what I . . .” He took a breath, and decided on a flat truth, as the others were far too complex. “To go to school is not something that I have done before.”

“Gotcha.” She nodded. “But, you know, that’s the case for all the other kids here, too. School’s a pretty new concept. And a school that’s not on your turf? With kids from all over? That’s just radical.” She smiled again. “We’re learning, though. All together.”

She touched his sleeve.

“I’m glad you decided to give school a try. You come on back tomorrow, okay? It’ll be less different.”

“I plan to come every day,” he assured her.

Her smile grew broader, and she patted his sleeve, walking with him toward the back door.

“That’s the spirit! You go on home now. I’m looking forward to seeing you tomorrow.” She opened the door.

“Thank you,” he said, and stepped out into the alley.

* * *

The door closed behind him, and Syl Vor spun, suddenly remembering that Larnce had brought him to the front door this morning, and would be waiting there for him.

Face hot, he thought about going back inside. Ms. Taylor would think he was a foolish student, who couldn’t even remember his arrangements for going home. That
did
figure into his calculations.

And also that, really, there was no problem. All he had to do was go ’round to the front. Brehm Alley to Rendan, go right at the corner, then up six doors. That was his route.

Nothing could be simpler.

Decision taken, he turned right, toward Rendan Road.

A hand hit his shoulder, hard enough to send him staggering. Before he could catch his balance, another blow landed, and he fell.

Something heavy pinned him facedown to the alley floor before he could roll, and a strong hand grabbed his arm, pulled it back at a painful angle, and tore the bright brass cuff from his wrist.

“Interesting, ain’t it?” asked a voice, and the weight was gone, amid the heavy sound of running.

Syl Vor rolled to his knees, took a couple of deep breaths. His arm hurt, and his back did, and so did his shoulder, but he didn’t think anything hurt bad enough to be broken. He got to his feet and thought about running after Peter Day. Then he thought that perhaps that would be one of those “stupid notions” that Mike Golden had particularly asked him not to act upon.

He scrubbed at the grit on the front of his coat, and gulped, the alley blurring out of sense as his eyes filled with tears.

He gulped again and squeezed his eyes shut.

When he was pretty certain that he wasn’t going to really cry, he resumed his walk down the alley to the corner, on the alert now.

He wouldn’t be surprised again.

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

From his cot to the fire was scarcely a dozen steps, which Rys accomplished, leaning heavily on the child’s shoulder with his good hand, balanced on his right leg, the ruined left dragging painfully behind.

By the time the fireside was accomplished and he had half fallen onto the rug there, he was damp with sweat and shivering with reaction. The child gave him a thoughtful look and went away, returning almost immediately with the blanket from his cot, which she silently draped over his shoulders.

“My thanks,” he said, hearing his voice shake. “It is a kindness.”

“No thanks,” she answered, sounding sharp.

He bowed his head. “I meant no offense.”

Kezzi shook her mass of black hair back from her face. “There’s tea. Would you like some?”

“Tea would be welcome,” he said courteously, and watched as she poured from a blackened kettle.

When the mug was in his good hand, he took a sip, then rested hand and mug against his thigh.

“Is it permitted that I sit alone for a time?” he asked. “I wish to . . . order my thoughts.”

The child’s eyes widened, and she came to her feet with such alacrity that he feared he had again given offense. When she spoke, however, her voice was soft, even reverent.

“Of course it is permitted. If you have everything that is needful, Malda and I will go. I will stop at Jin’s hearth and tell the
luthia
that you are praying.”

Praying?
Rys thought. Yet, if it gained him a hour of solitude . . .

“I have everything that is needful,” he assured her, and gave her a smile.

She inclined from the waist, hands tucked into the sleeves of her sweater, an oddly solemn gesture, then straightened and turned away, snapping fingers for the dog, which yipped once, and ran after her.

Rys watched them race toward the clustering hearths that bloomed dark red at some distance from the one he sat beside, until he lost their silhouettes amongst the larger shadows.

He closed his eyes, and listened.

A small breeze kissed his cheek, wanton in the darkness, scented with smoke, and hot bread, and dust. From overhead came a quiet, steady rumble, which he realized that he had been hearing constantly since his first waking here. It was neither a large sound, nor alarming—rather, it comforted, as the steady hum of life support might comfort a seasoned spacer.

He considered that thought—but no, most certainly he was not on a ship. Had not the grandmother asked after his enemies, when first he’d waked? And had she not supposed that those enemies were located in the City Above?

He was, therefore, situated on a planet, beneath a city, assuming that Silain-
luthia
was more practical than alliterative. If he might bring himself to recall which planet, or yet, what city . . .

But that was the heart of the thing, was it not? He could not recall.

His stomach clenched, and he swallowed bile. Carefully, he opened his eyes, raised the mug and sipped tea. From the direction of the grouped fires came a series of high sharp notes, supported by a low thrumming. Music, he supposed.

The tea calmed his stomach; the music calmed his thoughts.

Perhaps, he thought, he might fly another course with more profit. What
did
he recall?

That was scarcely less distressing. He recalled . . . he recalled tending the smudge pots with his elder cousins through a frigid, long night. He recalled weeping with relief the next morning, when his father said that the vines were no longer in danger. He recalled his pride at being given his own set of shears, and a row to tend.

He recalled his grandmother straightening his collar and abjuring him to be clever for Master Pilot pin’Epel. And he recalled the feeling of bewilderment upon learning that he had somehow qualified for pilot training, and that the season just commenced would be his last among the vines.

He recalled—the sight graven into his bones—the shadow of the wings flickering across the long rows of grapes, hugging the contour of the hill, staying secret and hidden until . . .

He was sweating. Putting the cup carefully on the rug next to his knee, he used a corner of the blanket, clumsily one-handed, to dry his brow.

So, then, he asked himself patiently. What else could he recall?

The cave—oh, very clearly, he recalled the cave and the long hiding, after which the rescue, and the crowded transport to the nearest refuge—a Terran station.