Tools neatly hung away, Daav closed the cart and moved silently toward the front of the garage, stripping off his work gloves as he walked. The sight of his naked hands gave him a momentary shock, and he lifted a finger to touch the chain about his neck. Korval's Ring hung, secret and safe, hidden below the lacing of his shirt.
"Do you know," he said to the cat riding his shoulders, "I believe I shall see if I can repair the tea-maker. It's my belief Jon has recalibrated the brewing sensor in order to save money on leaf."
Patch yawned. This was an old line of chat, after all. Dozens of Scout fingers had been inside the tea-maker over the years, seeking to correct its tragic fault—all, thus far, in vain.
"I might just buy a new unit," Daav mused, rounding the ladder that led to the cat-walk. "And install it one day while he's out courting Mistress Apel."
That idea appealed. Daav ducked under a guy-rope and came out into the minor open space of the crew's lounge. Sitting before the tea-maker on the scarred counter—indeed, entirely concealing that rather bulky object—was a box. Attached to the box was a paper, 'scribed in garish orange ink. Daav plucked the paper free.
"Leave my teapot alone, you assassin." Jon dea'Cort's perpendicular hand was unmistakable. "When you've done with that minor five-minute repair job up-bay, lift this to Outyard Eight. Gat expects delivery before Solcintra midnight."
Daav grinned. "Horrid old man," he said affectionately, reaching up to rub Patch's ear. The purring intensified, setting up a very pleasant vibration across his shoulders.
"So, my friend, shall you watch the shop until Trilla arrives? Or shall we go back to the office and see what sense can be made from the roster-sheet? There's a—" Patch shifted abruptly on his shoulder, claws skritching across the leather vest.
Daav turned as the crew door cycled, admitting a wedge of mid-morning sun and a bulky, hesitant shadow.
The shadow came two steps into the garage, walking with something near Scout silence, then paused, head moving from side to side while the door cycled closed behind.
Patch twisted to his feet and jumped from Daav's shoulder, landing noisily atop one of the ancient stools.
"Hello?" The voice was strong and even, an odd partner for that uncertain manner. She came forward, soft-footed on the hard floor.
"Master—oh." A tensing of her entire body, as if for a blow, and a jerky inclination of the head. "I—beg your pardon," she stammered in Adult-to-Adult. "I was—Is Master dea'Cort about?"
"Not just at the moment," Daav said, deliberately relaxing his muscles and letting his mouth curl slightly upward. "May I assist you? I am Daav—one of the crew here, you see." He used his chin to point at the black-and-white cat now perched, erect and dignified, atop a stool cushioned in dull green leather.
"Patch will vouch for me."
She turned her head, furtively, as if expecting a reprimand, and drifted forward another few steps, pausing with her hip against the farthest of the disordered semi-circle of stools.
"Patch?"
"Half-owner and resident cat," Daav returned, pitching his voice for foolery. "We've been known to each other any time these eight years. His word is quite as good as Jon's."
She turned back, head lifting sharply, giving him sight of a tense, fine-featured face dominated by a pair of shadowed green eyes.
"You—are—a Scout."
"Retired, alas," he replied, hoping serious gentleness might fare better than comradely joking. "Is there some way in which I might serve you?"
"I had come," she began, and then cut off with a gasp, not recoiling so much as freezing in place, head bent to stare—
At Patch, who was twisting this way and that, stropping himself against her hip and purring outrageously.
"What—" Her voice died as if breath had failed her. Daav stepped gently forward.
"He wants his chin rubbed, spoiled creature. Like this." He reached down, carefully unthreatening, and demonstrated. The purring reached an alarming level."I—see." She extended a thin hand adorned by an antique puzzle-ring and used two tentative fingers on the black-splotched chin.
"A bit more forcefully," Daav coached gently. "It's a hedonist, I fear."
Once again, that quick lift of the head and startled flash of eyes. Then her attention was back on the cat, her face hidden by a rippling fall of tawny hair.
Daav made himself restful, as Rockflower had labored to teach him, cleared his mind of judging thoughts and allowed the woman before him to elucidate herself.
Observed thus, she was not bulky, but desperately thin, disguised and armored in layers of overlarge clothing. Likewise, the feral tension and the quiet, uncertain movements were two wedges of the same shield, meant to hold the world away.
Look away,
her tense shoulders seem to say.
Look at anyone—at anything—else, but at me.
She was misused, whoever she was—a person urgently in need of the benediction of friendship.
One of Jon's stray kittens,
Daav thought, but the notion sat not entirely balanced. He watched her fingers on the cat, more certain now, having moved from chin to ear in response to Patch's explicit direction.
Comrades she might need, and someone to ensure she was fed, yet he felt she was not entirely a stray. About the rigid shoulders sat a mantle of purpose and from beneath the imperfect, ill-confining armor roiled such a potent brew of energy that Daav shivered.
The woman's thin body registered his movement, countered it with an abrupt cessation of her own motion. He received the impression that green eyes had read his face through the curtain of her hair.
"I had come," she said, and the burr of a Chonselta accent tickled his ear, "to find if my ship was ready to lift. Master dea'Cort had said—perhaps it might be—today. Depending upon the crew."
"Ah. I am able to assist you, then. If you will walk with me to the office, we may check the roster."
"I am grateful," she said formally, and kept a wary step behind him down to Jon's office at the back of the bay, Patch walking, high-tailed, at her side.
Daav tipped the screen up and tapped the on-switch.
"May I know the name of your ship?" he murmured as she came forward, stopping with the solid mass of the desk between them. Patch jumped nimbly to the cluttered surface and leaned companionably against her side.
"
Ride the Luck
."
In the act of calling up the roster, he froze, and shot a glance at her shrouded face. Daav knew Vin Sin chel'Mara, as well as mutual dislike allowed, and knew somewhat of His Lordship's habits. He cleared his throat.
"Ma'am. . ."
"It is not complete," she interrupted, shoulders sagging within her large, shabby shirt. "I had hoped—but of course there was a great deal of work to be done. Might—might the roster indicate, sir, when she will be ready to lift?"
"Well," Daav murmured, "let us see." He tapped in the required information, then stood, blinking like an idiot, reading the name on the work order, over and over.
"Up to spec and ready to lift," he said after a moment, eyes yet stuck to the screen. A moment more and he managed to move, transferring his stare to the person before him.
"Forgive me. You are Aelliana Caylon?"
Green eyes met his amid a silken ripple of hair. "Yes, I—Of course, you will want identification! I do beg—" Her head was bent once more. She produced a thin metal card from a sleeve pocket and held it out, face averted.
He took it, automatically, noting the blurry likeness, and the date—two days gone. Provisional Second Class.
"Thank you," he murmured and gave himself a sharp mental shake, trying to align this tentative individual with the extraordinary mind that had reconstructed the ven'Tura Piloting Tables, the brilliant scholar who taught Practical Mathematics, or, as it was called in Scout Academy, Math for Survival.
"You are the revisor of the—"
"Of the ven'Tura Tables," she said breathlessly, all but snatching her license back from his hand. "I am. Please do not bow. I—I have explained to Master dea'Cort."
"Which is certainly enough for both of us," Daav said, grabbing for equilibrium. He smiled. "Your ship is ready and able to lift. You have, as I see, the skills necessary to the task. Good lift, pilot."
"I—That is." She floundered to a halt, took a shuddering breath and raised her head to squarely meet his eyes. "The fact is, I am in need of flight time. I've never lifted—you understand, I've never actually
gone
anywhere. And the regs—I had thought Master dea'Cort. . ."
"I see." Daav tipped his head, considering. "It happens there is a small errand left me by Jon. If you like it, I can serve as your second, and you may actually go somewhere. Outyard Eight to be precise."
The misty eyes took fire. "I would like that—extremely, sir."
"Then that is what we shall do. However, I must insist upon a condition."
Wariness cooled the fire, leaching color from her eyes. "Condition?"
"It is relatively painless," he said, offering her a smile. "The custom at Binjali's is to speak in Comrade. No one demands it, it is merely custom. In no case, however, am I 'sir'. I prefer to be addressed as Daav. If you find that too intimate, then 'pilot' is acceptable." He tipped his head. "Are you able to meet this condition?"
She inclined her head, very solemn. "I am—pilot."
"Good," he said, and shut down Jon's computer. "Let us see if Trilla has come on-shift."
The delm must be a smuggler-class pilot—take from yos'Galan if yos'Phelium fails, as it likely will. I'm a sport, child of a long line of random elements, and Jela—
Young Tor An's folk have been pilots since the first ships lifted beyond atmosphere, back among the dead Ringstars. yos'Galan will breed true.
The best pilot the clan possesses must be delm, regardless of bloodline. This will be taken as a clan law.
The delm's heir must be a pilot—of like class to the delm—and as many others of the clan as genes and the luck allow.
There must be ships, spaceworthy and ready to fly: As many ships as it is possible to acquire. Such a number will necessarily require funds for maintenance—whole yards devoted to their readiness. Therefore, Clan Korval must become wealthy as Jela and me only dreamed of wealth.
Serve the contract, as long as it's in force. The boy don't hold with oath-breaking.—Excerpted from Cantra yos'Phelium's Log Book
"LIFTING TO OUTEIGHT?" Trilla grinned. "Convey my undying affection to Gat."
"Yes, very likely," Pilot Daav returned, shrugging into a worn leather jacket.
Aelliana looked at that battered item hungrily. "Pilot's jacket" most would say, because of the cut, and as if any third-class barge runner might have one. In truth, only those who mastered Jump held the right to wear a pilot's jacket.
Trilla laughed and winked at Aelliana. "Scholar, good day to you. What luck at Chonselta Guild Hall?"
"Second class provisional," she said, pulling her eyes away from Pilot Daav's jacket, and warily meeting the other woman's merry glance.
"Everything fulfilled but the flight time! Ge'shada, pilot." Surprisingly, the Outworlder swept a bow of congratulation. When she straightened, her face was somewhat more serious.
"Daav's among the best you can have next to you at board, don't fret yourself there. Very good with ships—eh, Master Daav?"
"It humbles me to hear you say it, Master Trilla."
She laughed again, fingers shaping the sign for
rogue
. "Get your box, then, and haul out. I've work to do. Where's the Master?"
"Apel's."
"Think they'd just set up house—be cheaper, which ought to compel Jon."
"Yes, but Apel's not such a fool," the man said earnestly. "Besides, I expect she likes drinkable tea."
"Much more compelling, I allow. Heard news of crew?"
"Clonak, perhaps, and Syri. Al Bred this evening, if at all. The back-up jitney's on-line."
"Put you on that, did he?" She grinned and lifted a hand, turning toward the office with Patch at her heels. "Good lift, pilots."
"Thank you," Aelliana whispered, watching the man raise the bulky cargo box easily to his shoulder.
"After you, pilot," he said courteously, black eyes level and calm. Scout's eyes, that saw everything, gave back little, and judged nothing.
"Of course," she stammered, and turned to lead the way to the crew door, feeling him, silent and solid, behind her.
Outside, he stowed the box in the jitney's boot, straightened and stood looking down at her from his height, head tipped to one side.
"Shall you drive, or shall I?"
Aelliana swallowed, trying without success to calm nerves set all a-jangle by the last few harrowing days. The acquisition of the precious piloting license had not eased her position within Mizel, but rather increased the necessity for Ran Eld's unquestioning acceptance of her subservience. It had been necessary to placate her brother not once but several times, each time bowing lower, until she could taste carpet dust on her tongue, mixed with the bile of impotent fury.
It had been a risk to steal away today, she thought with a heart-wrench of panic. In general her days off were spent in the tiny office at Chonselta Tech. Ran Eld knew that. What if he were to seek her there and find the door bearing her name locked? He would want to know where she had been—would demand to know—and what might she tell him, that would buy his belief, while preserving her limited independence? She had been mad—she
was
mad, gods help her. How could she have thought—
"Scholar Caylon." Calm, deep voice, warm sense of a body near—too near!—something, feather-light, against her sleeve—
She gasped, cringing back, shoulders jamming up around her ears. Through her hair, she saw alarm cross the tall Scout's face, replaced instantly with careful neutrality. His hand, for it was his hand, dropped from her sleeve and he stepped back, beyond the boundaries of isolation she had woven for herself.
If he had simply turned and gone, she would certainly have fled to the ferry, and spent the return trip to Chonselta pleading with a pantheon of uncaring godlings for the grace of undiscovery.