Necessity's Child (Liaden Universe®) (3 page)

“First, we must be certain of our position,” she said. “Good fortune may approach the Bedel at this time because the
kompani
has already hosted her fair sister. Can you, headman, recall any recent unlucky events?”

“
Luthia
, I cannot. Song and dream bring me no more than waking memory. We have long been fortunate; the last great distress upon us was the collapse of the second retreat tunnel. Thus, I bring the matter to you, whose memory is longer, whose eyes are sharper, than my own.”

That last part—that was a Proper Asking, and in truth, the
luthia
had the longest memory of any in the
kompani
. Her eyes were sharp enough, for her age, but that was great—she had been a child, had Silain, when the
kompani
commenced its
chafurma.

Kezzi gasped, snatching again at her wandering thoughts—
focus
!

“ . . . I will dream on this. Since the Bedel wander, as is our heritage and our right, it may be well for the headman to convene an Affirmation.”

Kezzi bit her lip. An Affirmation was three days of singing, tale-telling, eating, and dance. A time, said the
luthia
, for the Bedel to recall what it meant to be of the
kompani
, and to forget the ways and worries of the
gadje
—Those Others—among whom they lived, but were apart.

“I will think upon it,” the headman said, taking his pipe from his mouth and blowing a circle of smoke. He rose with that, and gave the
luthia
her proper salute. “
Luthia
, I thank you for the gift of your wisdom,” he said, and went away across the common area, toward his own place.

Kezzi sat back and sighed out the breath she hadn’t known she’d been holding.

“Little sister,” the
luthia
said from the hearthside. “Come and share tea with me.”

* * *

There was music in the hallway.

Syl Vor stopped with his hand on the bannister, listening.

He had just come in from the garden, and it was time to go upstairs and do his prep work for tomorrow’s lessons. But the music . . . it
pulled
him somehow, down two stairs, to the hall, and down the hall, to the library door.

Which was closed.

Syl Vor took a breath, the music tugging at him. The door was closed; he hadn’t been invited in. He had work to do upstairs, he was already late, and—

The music crashed, soared; the door opened to his touch, and he was inside the library.

Uncle Val Con was standing at the desk, his shoulder to the door, his hands working the keys of the omnichora, and the music . . .

Impossibly, the music soared higher, sounding . . . angry, and joy-filled, and sad, all at once. It pulled at his chest, and he was sure that if he opened his mouth, his heart would fly out and up, tangled in the music, taken by the turbulent air, and never be found, or seen again.

Uncle Val Con leaned into the ’chora, and the music
screamed
. Syl Vor jammed his fist against his mouth, and then—

It was like the music spun, and caught a downdraft, circling down, back down to Uncle Val Con, through his fingers, softer now, and simpler, only sad, but so very sad . . . and then it was quiet, and Syl Vor realized that he was crying.

He swallowed and tried to think of the calming exercises he had learned on the Rock, but all he could hear was the music. He was cold, and his chest hurt. He bent forward a little to ease the pain.

“Syl Vor!”

Strong arms drew him close, and his cheek was against Uncle Val Con’s shoulder and he was trying not to cry, straining all his muscles trying to stop, but all that did was make him hiccup—and cry harder.

“Softly, softly. Cry if you must, sweeting. There’s no shame.”

Syl Vor felt a slow stroking down his back, over and over, like he would stroke a cat. Slowly, he warmed, and eventually he realized that his chest didn’t hurt anymore.

He sniffled, and raised his head to look into his uncle’s face.

“Forgive me,” he managed, his voice husky.

“For what wrong?” Uncle Val Con asked, and his voice sounded strained, too, like he’d been screaming with the music. “Surely there is nothing to forgive if kin weep together.”

And it was true, Syl Vor saw. Uncle Val Con’s face was wet, his eyelashes were sticky with tears.

“But why?”

Uncle Val Con sighed, and shifted his position, crossing his legs and drawing Syl Vor onto his lap.

“Let us agree for the moment that I lost something . . . very precious, that I ought to have guarded more nearly.”

“But,” Syl Vor said, remembering what Mrs. pel’Esla said when
he
lost something, “you can find it again.”

“No.” Uncle Val Con used the tips of his fingers to brush the damp from Syl Vor’s face. “No, child, I can’t.”

He looked so stern that Syl Vor didn’t like to ask any more questions. He had been quite little when Uncle Val Con stepped away from clan and kin to take up duty as a Scout, but he remembered him as laughing and lighthearted. Now that he was returned, and
properly delm
, as Grandaunt said, he seemed not to laugh so much.

“I do ask your forgiveness,” his uncle murmured. “I had not intended the music to distress you.”

“I had just come in from the garden,” Syl Vor said reasonably. “You couldn’t have known I was in the hall. And it was rude, to open the door when it was closed.”

He felt a slight jerk; heard a light snort, as if Uncle Val Con had tried not to laugh.

“Well, then,” he said, “we are both beyond shame, and need say nothing more.”

“Except . . .” Syl Vor began—and stopped, uncertain if that meant
nothing more at all
.

“Except?”

“What
was
that music, if you please?”

“Ah.
That
music was taught to me by your Grandmother Anne. It is called
Swan Lake.
”

“What is a swan?”

“A large and elegant waterbird. Your grandmother said that swans were sometimes mistaken for dancers all dressed in white, so graceful are they on the water. That, she said, was what inspired the story.”

“Story?”

“Ah, are you interested?”

“Yes!” Uncle Val Con’s stories had always been interesting.

“Hold. You are wanted in the nursery, are you not?”

Syl Vor sighed, seeing the story flutter beyond his reach.

“Yes, sir.”

“In that case, you must allow me to escort you, and make your excuses to Mrs. pel’Esla. I will tell you the story as we walk. Do we have a bargain?”

“Yes!” Syl Vor said again.

They rose, Syl Vor first. Uncle Val Con held down his hand, and Syl Vor took it as they left the room.

“Now it happens that the
delm
had decided it was time for a son of the House to enter into his first contract of marriage . . .”

* * *

“You did well, little sister,” the
luthia
said, after the first cup of tea and Kezzi’s recitation of the conversation with the headman were both finished.

“Your pardon, Grandmother,” Kezzi answered politely. “I was twice distracted.”

“So you were,” the
luthia
said, as if she hadn’t noticed until Kezzi spoke of it. “I will give you a small dream, which will teach how to avoid unbidden memories; and another, to reinforce the art of listening for later.”

“For now . . .” She put her cup aside, and held out both hands.

Hesitantly, Kezzi surrendered her cup. In the usual way of things, they would now drink more tea, and the
luthia
would invite her to tell this tale or that, that she had learned from another of the
kompani
.

“You must excuse me, little sister,” the
luthia
said with a smile. “I have said that I will dream upon this matter of the
kompani
’s fortune. This I will now do. I ask that you walk past Jin’s hearth on your way across the common, and say that I crave her assistance.”

“Yes, Grandmother,” Kezzi said, rising and bowing, with the tips of her fingers tucked into the sleeves of her sweater.

“That is well. The dreams, I will send this evening. Come to me again in two days, and bring with you a branch of limin blooms.”

“Yes, Grandmother,” Kezzi said again. She snapped her fingers for Malda and went off to give Jin the
luthia
’s summons.

CHAPTER FIVE

“You’re up early,” Nova yos’Galan said to her cousin Pat Rin yos’Phelium, ignoring the fact that she was, also, up before Surebleak’s uncertain sun.

“One likes to take the air while it is still crisp,” Pat Rin told her loftily, one eyebrow raised.

Had they been on Liad, and she a forward-coming acquaintance met before Day Port, that mode—and that eyebrow—would have succeeded in destroying all pretension. Indeed, it would have suddenly seemed not merely the most natural thing imaginable, that Lord Pat Rin would take the predawn air, but produced a certainty that everyone of proper breeding did so, as well.

Nova, no pretender, but Pat Rin’s fond friend and cousin, merely shook her head.

“There is frost on your coat,” she said. “Take it off, do.”

She looked to the young man hovering in the doorway, and spoke in Terran. “Gavit, please take Boss Conrad’s coat to the kitchen to warm—and ask Beck to send a new pot of tea, please.”

“Thank you,” Pat Rin said, moving effortlessly into Terran.

He shrugged his coat off and handed it to Gavit, who received it with the small, crisp bow that her staff had settled upon as the generally correct mode, and murmured, “Yes, ma’am, Boss. Comin’ right up.”

He left the room, closing the door softly behind him.

“Come and sit, Cousin,” Nova said, dropping back into the Low Tongue. Theirs was a multilingual House, as befit a family of traders and spacefarers, and Nova spoke Terran well. Still, it was . . . a pleasure to speak Liaden, and especially to speak familiarly, to kin.

Obedient, Pat Rin sat in the chair next to her desk, sighing, even as he nodded his head toward the radiant wall unit, which was glowing gently orange.

“It is, according to my household, very nearly spring.”

“I have received similar information,” Nova replied. “I take leave to doubt it.”

“Certainly, the hope of spring must be seductive,” Pat Rin said. “However, as one who has previously enjoyed the balmy pleasures of that season, I fear I must encourage you in doubt.”

“Perhaps we will become acclimated, in time,” Nova said.

“Perhaps we will,” Pat Rin replied politely. “Or perhaps Weather Tech Brunner will speedily finish his studies, and find an optimum orbit for the mirrors and weather satellites.”

Should Mr. Brunner finish his studies after breakfast, and launch the first satellite before dinner, it would be several years before Surebleak would begin appreciably to warm—Nova had seen the summary reports. And even then, Surebleak would never achieve Liad’s inoffensive perpetual springtime.

She had seen those reports, too.

There was, however, no sense dwelling on cold news. At least so long as there were radiant heaters.

“You were going to tell me,” she said to her cousin, “why you are about so early in the day. Surely now that you are lifemated, you have no need to keep wastrel’s hours.”

“Now that I am Boss of Bosses, I keep hours that would put a wastrel to the blush,” Pat Rin retorted. He shook his head. “No, as it happens, Mr. McFarland had wished to consult with Mr. Golden regarding an expansion of patrol coverage, and to gain his opinion of the child-on-the-street policy.”

Cheever McFarland was Pat Rin’s head of security, a tough, able man of wit and a certain rough charm. In her household, his counterpart was Michael Golden, whom Mr. McFarland had speedily taken as his advisor in matters of greater street security and implementation of new policy—what one might call “law.” Unlike Mr. McFarland, Michael Golden had grown up on Surebleak—indeed, on this very turf, which had come lately under the protection of Boss Conrad—and his insights were, as she had found for herself, invaluable.

“And of course,” she said, giving Pat Rin High Mode, “you are a slave to Mr. McFarland’s schedule.”

He smiled, which he did less easily than her brothers. Val Con of late stood within bowing range of solemn; one had the sense of his listening twice to every utterance, which was, she had persuaded herself, the
delm’s
weight. Pat Rin had been serious from a boy. It had been the first bond between them.

“Mr. McFarland of course rules me utterly,” he said now. “But, as it happened, there is a matter that I wished to bring to you. Regarding—”

The quick sound of knuckles against plastic interrupted him. A moment later, the door opened to admit Gavit, bearing a tray. He paused just inside the room to look at her, his head tipped slightly.

“On the conference table, thank you, Gavit,” she said.

“Yes, ma’am, Boss.” He disposed of the tray neatly, and turned again to address Pat Rin. “Beck says, Mr. Conrad, if you’d care to sit down to breakfast, there’s griddle cakes and hot apple toppin’.”

“Please tell Beck that I am honored,” Pat Rin said gravely. “However, I am wanted elsewhere very shortly, and while Mr. McFarland may stay, I—may not.”

Gavit nodded. “Heard Cheever tell Mike he was short-stoppin’. I’ll give Beck the news.”

“Thank you,” Pat Rin said.

Gavit bowed and left them, pulling the door to.

Nova rose and Pat Rin with her. She poured a single cup, which was proper, raised it for the sip . . . and paused when Pat Rin put a second cup forward to be filled.

She met serious brown eyes.

“I recall that it was you who counseled me to learn Surebleak custom and observe it stringently.”

“So I did. However, I find it unlikely that Beck would have invited me to stay for griddle cakes if she had poisoned the tea.”

“It does seem inefficient,” Nova agreed and filled his cup.

* * *

“You are aware,” Pat Rin said, after they had both returned to the desk and had a grateful sip of tea, “that Korval has taken up several persons in relation to what we now understand to have been a deliberate attempt on the life of the
delmae
.”