The 97th Step (15 page)

There were other recreational kiosks in the area, but none close to the one he sought. He arrived, shut the flitter down, and hurried to the small wooden building. He had sent a message that he would be arriving, and he expected to find Shar waiting for him.

She was gone. She had left a note:

"Willie—the day is too perfect to waste. I've gone for a hike, and I should be back by evening. Love, Shar."
i
Ferret walked out into the sunshine. It
was
a beautiful day. A few fleecy clouds marred the otherwise clear blue sky; Krishna and Brahma hung in space, pearly blue-green globes, while Shiva was below the horizon and not visible; everything in delicate gravitational balance. Birds and insects peeped and buzzed in the greenery, and the scene held no sense of danger. Maybe he could even relax and enjoy it until Shar returned from her hike.

He found a chair leaning against the kiosk and sat in it, under the shade of the rustic wooden building's overhang. It was warm, with a gentle breeze blowing the woody smells about him. But the gun weighed heavy under his belt, and the knot inside him would not relax under the gentle ministrations of the forest's quiet beauty. He slipped off the jacket and carefully laid it next to the chair where he could reach it easily.

He wished that Shar would hurry her return.

Despite himself, Ferret dozed. He awoke to find that the day had wound down into the beginnings of dusk. A thunderstorm built in the distance, the clouds mushrooming up and flattening at the top, going from white to gray to almost purple at the bottom. There was a smell of impending rain in the air.

Where was Shar?

He stood, and worked the kinked muscles of his back and legs loose. There was a cut-off point at which he would begin to worry, but her note had said "evening," and that covered a wide stretch. It could mean by dark, it could mean midnight. Shar had little concept of time; she was almost always late for any meeting.

He found a package of cutlets in the freezer and a loaf of bread. He popped the thick slice of soypro into the microwave oven. When it was done, he made a sandwich and ate it slowly, washing it down with sips of splash from a can he found in the cooler. His stomach felt jittery, and the food was nourishing, but tasteless.

He heard a rattle at the back door, and he went to check it, gun in hand. Some small catlike creature with dark-striped fur stood there on its hind legs, begging for food. He smiled at it, and tossed it the last of his sandwich. The thing caught the quarter-slice of bread and soypro, and darted out into the darkness.

Apparently the local animals were used to man's encroachment on their territory. Can't beat 'em, make'em feed you. There were probably worse philosophies.

Ferret powered up the unit's holoproj and tuned it to an entertainment broadcast. The story, as nearly as he was able to tell, involved a rich athlete and his sexual conquests. He watched it with half his attention.

By nineteen hundred, despite his resolve, he began to worry. The storm was apparently moving this way; the wind had picked up, and the nearby trees swayed and rustled under the gusts. He shut off the holoproj and stared through one of the windows into the windy night.

Shar arrived just before the storm broke over the kiosk. The wind was so loud by then, he didn't hear her open the door.

He was startled by the sight of her, and he had the gun halfway up before he managed to smile and put it away.

Her smile matched his, but only for a moment.

"All right," she said, suddenly serious. "What is going on, Willie?" She pointed at the gun. "What are you doing with that?"

"Come sit down, love. I've got a story to tell you."

He hugged her first, then began to unwind the whole thing, starting when he'd first met Gworn and working through to that bungled theft on Mwanamamke, ending with the death of Stoll on Thompson's Gazelle.

She had known about Stoll—he'd included that in his first message, to assure that she'd hide like he asked. Even so, her tears flowed when he talked about it. He found himself starting to cry, too. The grief that had been blocked by the fear broke through, and the two of them clutched each other like children.

The rain began a wavelike pounding on the roof of the kiosk; lightning flashes sparked in the night, and close thunder rumbled, vibrating the air with its deep voice.

The external storm continued, while the one inside the two of them abated somewhat. Shar sat nestled next to Ferret, with his arm draped over her shoulders.

"So, what now?"

He shook his head. "I came to make sure you were all right. I'll have to find Gworn, before he finds me. I want the advantages to be on my side, this time."

"And what will you do when you find him?"

"Whatever it takes to end this."

"It doesn't sound like he'll listen to reason," she said.

"No. Probably not."

"And you want me to stay here until it's settled." It was not a question.

"Yes."

"It might take months."

"No. Gworn was never particularly patient. Besides, I'll find him."

"How do you know where to look? It's a big moon, and a bigger galaxy."

"I know where to look."

"Where—?" she began. Lightning flared and thunder ripped the rainy night, the light and sound almost together.

"Close," he said. "Are there arresters on this place?"

"Yes." A beat. "I knew you shouldn't have gone on that caper."

"If it hadn't happened there, it would have happened somewhere else," he said. What he didn't say was that if it had happened somewhere else, Shanti Stoll might still be alive, and he might be dead in his place.

He didn't need to say that.

The storm started to move off, taking the high energy of its electrical fury, but leaving the comforting sounds of the rain pattering on the roof. "Let's go to bed," Ferret said. "I need to feel you next to me."

She turned her head slightly and kissed his arm. "Yes."

There was less passion in their connection than there was clinging and stroking. Feeling her aliveness, the taut muscles and smooth skin, that was what he wanted more than sex. Eventually, the two of them reached a peak, after a long, slow rocking he wished would never end. More than anything, he wanted to keep her here, making love and being together. If he'd thought he could run and hide, he would have already been gone, hand in hand with Shar. But she would have to dance, somewhere, in front of some audience, and word would travel. If Gworn had found him once, he might find him again. That was no way to live, looking over your shoulder for the rest of your life. No, he would have to find his old friend and somehow settle what lay between them.

Somehow.

Fourteen

THE MORNING SHOWED few traces of the night's rain; the sun bathed the kiosk in gentle light, and the air was only a little muggy. Ferret and Shar ate breakfast outside.

"So you'll be going soon?" she said.

He swallowed a mouthful of poached egg. "Yes. I'll call you, to keep you up to date."

"Got time for a walk before you go? There's a lake a couple of klicks from here. It's lovely in the morning."

"Sure." He didn't want to leave. Not ever.

They finished eating, and stood. She smiled at him and said, "Let me wash my face and—oh!" He heard a sound like a taut string being plucked.

Her smile fell, replaced by puzzlement.

"Shar?"

Her features went slack. "Oh. Willie, I—it's so cold…"

She started to collapse. He grabbed her, but she was slack, almost boneless, and it was like trying to hold a sack of sand. He slowed her fail, and his hand scraped something sharp on her back. Quickly, he turned her, to see a spring dart sticking up from just under her left shoulder blade. The metal dart was fletched with a spiral of plastic, bright with a black stripe, stark against the white of her shirt. Red with a black stripe: poison.

"Shar!"

By the time he jerked the dart free and tossed it away, she was already going gray.

She said, "Willie… I-I-love… you…"

"Shar, it'll
be
all right. I'll get a medic!"

He picked her up and started for the house.

He could hear somebody moving through the bushes behind him, but he didn't pause. He ran into the house, put her down, and started punching the phone.

It took a second for it to register that the unit was without power.

The flitter! He would get her to a hospital!

But when he looked at her, lying on the floor next to the phone, he knew it was too late. Frantically, he searched for a pulse. Nothing. He started CPR, breathing for her, pumping her heart with his hands on her chest.

Time passed. He could not say how long. He stopped finally, when he was exhausted. It was obvious he was wasting his time. She was gone.

Shar Li Vu Ndamase would dance no more in this life.

Shock hit him, as if he had been slammed with a giant boot. He sat next to Shar, his mind stalled, body limp. She couldn't be dead. Couldn't be. He stared at her. What had happened?

As through a dark haze, he remembered pulling the spring dart from her back. And, all of a piece, knew what had been done, and who was responsible.

Gworn. Gworn had killed her.

He was up, and the gun was in his hand, killing magic. He hit the door with one shoulder, breaking it from its hinges, and tumbled to the damp ground. He rolled up, screaming.

"Gworn! Where are you, Gworn!"

He ran into the brush, heedless of the branches that scratched him. "Goddamn you, Gworn!"

Ten minutes of searching the brush gave him nothing. Gworn was gone.

But he knew where.

He put Shar's body into the bed they had shared the night before, covered it, and left a note next to her.

It said, "The man who did this is Bennet Gworn. I have gone to find him." Then, using the name he hadn't called himself in fifteen years, he signed it, "Mwili Kalamu."

The bracelet he had slipped onto his wrist on another world—another lifetime—gleamed in the room's light. He pulled the carved semiprecious stone from his arm and slid it over Shar's cold hand, take my last gift, my little dancer. I will miss you more than I can say.

He went to the flitter. He found the tracker, stuck to the underside of the frame. Gworn hadn't had to follow him; he only had to follow the signal. He had led the man here himself. Stupid. Even though it was a rental, he should have checked. Ferret gave the kiosk one last look, then left. He knew exactly where he was going. Gworn would be at the spaceport. Waiting for him.

Well. The time for talk was past. He would find Gworn, and he would kill him. No questions, no hesitation. Bennet Gworn, whatever his grievance, was a dead man.

They were both dead men now, each in their own way.

He had been in the main port two dozen times, as a laner and since. Jumping on- and offplanet, picking up friends of Shar's, seeing people off, the place was familiar. Gworn couldn't know it as well.

He spotted laners, all new faces, but with the same look they all had. They saw him, and knew that he knew them for what they were. He stopped a kid of maybe nineteen. "Do you know Gworn?"

"Piss off, Rickie," the kid said, sneering.

Ferret grabbed the kid by the wrist, and dug a knuckle into a pressure point on the back of his hand. It was painful. From three meters away, he looked as if he were shaking the boy's hand in greeting.

"Ow, shit, cut it, cut it!"

Ferret eased up. "I don't have time to play games with you, laner. If you know Gworn, spill it!"

"I don't know him! Straight shit, Rickie, I swear!"

"He's death, kid. If I find out you lied to me, you're final chill with him, you copy that?"

"Yeah, yeah, I hear you!"

Ferret dropped the boy's hand and turned away. He stalked off, and did not look back. The boy would be afraid. Laners were always afraid, but Ferret had added more to it. He didn't care, it didn't matter.

Nothing mattered.

Where would Gworn be? Think! It's been more than ten years, but you knew him once. You know how he thought then. He might have changed, but you ran together. Come on, Ferret, use your brain!

He considered the layout of the port. The main terminal was multileveled, a major level, with three terraces above and two below. And the basement, where the air exchangers and power transmission bars were—

The basement.

It was that quick, and that certain. That's where Gworn was. He wants to kill me, and he'll want privacy for it. He'll know I'm coming.

Ferret found an access door, and waited until somebody came out through it. Before the door could close, he had it. The man who had just exited said, "Hey, you can't do that!"

"Yes, I can. You don't want to get involved in this, citizen."

The man must have seen something in his face. He backed away warily. "Yeah. Right, I-I can see that."

Ferret started into the access tunnel, the door closing softly behind him. Maybe the man would call security, maybe not. It didn't matter. Nothing mattered. He was going to find Gworn. Find him and kill him.

The basement walls were thick, to keep the droning of the machineries from reaching the passengers four floors above, but this close the sound was a constant thrum.

He passed several dins, tending circuitry and mechanical devices, but they took no notice of him.

Apparently the place was run by robots. Good.

He wound his way down a narrow corridor, between stacks of thick pipes. Some of them were covered with a thin layer of frost; others were warm to the touch. The air stank of lube, and a musty odor, something like mushrooms.

There were a lot of corridors, and few rooms walled off in the basement, but it was a big place. It might take days to search it properly. Fuck it.

"Gworn! I'm here!"

The yell was lost in the throb of machines.

"Gworn! Where the fuck are you, you bastard!?"

Only the whirring of metal blades, the hum of greased bearings, the whine of power, answered him. At first.

Then: "I'm sorry about the girl," came the yell. "I wanted you to suffer. I went to see her dance, once.