Accepting the Lance, page 17
part #22 of Liaden Universe Series
Droi drew a breath; said nothing.
Udari lifted his mug and drained it in one long swallow.
“Luma,” he said, placing the mug on the rug at his side.
Droi raised her chin, feeling the prick of her daughter’s interest. “Luma is to take Maysl to her hearth. It has long been arranged.”
Udari nodded. “So Rys said. I spoke to Luma before I came to you. She has doubts. She does not like walls, and most nights sleeps beside the hearth, rather than withdraw to her tent.”
“I knew that, but this other—she did not say so, to me.”
“There was no need—the ship had not yet spoken when she agreed to take Maysl to her hearth. Now, it becomes something to consider, and Luma’s heart…is unsure.”
Droi finished her tea and put the mug down.
“There are others,” Udari said. “When the time comes to board ship and become, each of us, one of that kompani…I think there will be others who cannot—or will not—give up the sky, and the snow, and the free air. I think that we might have numbers sufficient to a kompani.”
“A kompani with no hope of a ship in the future,” Droi pointed out. “Soon or late, you must take gadje to you. Your children will not be Bedel.”
“It is in my mind,” Udari said softly, “that there is more to being Bedel than blood, and that a kompani of souls who are bound together goes beyond blood. Is Rys not Bedel?”
“Yes!” she said fiercely, and looked down at her hands, twisted together so tightly that she was in danger of breaking a finger.
“What do you think, Sister?” Udari asked, his voice yet soft.
Droi sighed and looked up to meet his eyes.
“The Dreams teach me that ship rules do not accommodate those like Black Droi, whose Sight is dark, and who may strike out even at those she loves. The Dreams provide…protocols…which are applied to disruptive persons who might damage or endanger the ship. These make the ship safe—and the person a stranger to her soul.”
Udari extended a hand to touch her knee. He did not speak.
“I Dream,” she said, staring into the glowing hearth. “Early, and late, old Dreams and older yet—searching for a way to cure me of myself, Brother, but in truth…”
Udari’s eyes were wet. A man of the heart, indeed.
“In truth,” she said, her voice roughened by her own unshed tears, “if the ship were to come for us this night, I would take myself and Maysl to the house of Silain’s sisters in the City Above and…wait for Rys to return.”
She raised a hand, and touched a particular chain about her neck.
“I have his soul after all.”
Blair Road
Boss Conrad’s House
• • • • • • • • • • • • • • •
Breakfast had been served in the house’s common dining room; it was only they two, which was unusual. The rest of the house, Pat Rin thought ironically, had doubtless been up for hours.
“What may be your plans for the day?” he asked his lifemate, though really, there was no doubt what Natesa the Assassin would be doing today.
“I intend to accompany you to the Emerald,” she said serenely. “Mr. McFarland is already gone to the Watch House, to find what there may be to know.”
“Such ambition.”
Natesa sipped her tea.
“I believe he considers this…event to be a personal insult,” she said. “We ought to be beyond these ‘shines,’ as he has it.”
“It is possible that we are—beyond ‘shines,’” Pat Rin said, considering the so-called cheese scramble before him with some doubt. “The native population does not incline to coordinated action across territories: it runs against the cultural wisdom of generations. It may be that what we saw yesterday was—an opening move to a longer game. Something, as it were, to focus our attention.”
“That is possible,” Natesa conceded. “How will we know if we are in the long game?”
“When we see the next move,” he replied, picking up his fork and addressing the sticky mass on his plate. “Unfortunately.”
In another part of the house, a bell rang. Pat Rin heard Mr. pel’Tolian’s deliberate tread on the plastic floor.
“Is your breakfast not edible?” Natesa asked.
Pat Rin sighed and looked at his plate.
“It is very nearly edible. In fact, I am persuaded that I have eaten something like with pleasure, only recently. This morning, however, it…bemuses.”
“Perhaps you would like something else to eat?”
“Perhaps I would,” he said cordially. “If only I could think what.”
He reached for his cup, realized that Mr. pel’Tolian’s footsteps were growing louder, and turned toward the door just as the butler crossed the threshold, looking—if one could imagine such a thing—irritated.
He carried an envelope in one hand and, when he reached table side, he bowed, offering it across his two palms to Pat Rin, as if it were a dagger.
“Your pardon, sir. I would most usually of course put this in your office, but the young person who delivered it was adamant: You must see it at once.”
“Thank you, Mr. pel’Tolian. I daresay it is a very important letter.”
“As you say, sir.” He bowed again, and left them.
Pat Rin considered the envelope—local make, rough against the fingers; Boss Conrad spelled out in thick, handwritten, black letters across the face. Sealed, of all things, with a wafer.
Pat Rin broke the seal, shook out the single rough sheet, and read the few lines therein, twice, before he met Natesa’s eyes.
“We have a demand letter,” he said.
She sighed and put her fork down.
“From?” she asked.
He looked back to the page.
“Take back Surebleak, over the signature of Boss Surebleak.”
Pat Rin lifted his eyes. “A touch, you must admit.”
“But I do not,” she said. “Though I will admit that it is wonderful, how having an alias to hide behind emboldens the weak of character.”
“You are severe,” he said, and glanced again at the letter.
“Boss Surebleak demands that the Council of Bosses immediately retire Conrad and the Road Bosses. Children and those adults of Clan Korval who were not involved in the invasion and hostile takeover of Surebleak will be allowed to leave the planet. All real property of Conrad, the Road Bosses, Clan Korval, and all of their holdings, on-world and off, will be confiscated to partially offset the damage deliberately and maliciously done to a sovereign world.”
He sighed and refolded the letter.
“All of this to be accomplished within the next two weeks, local.”
Natesa leaned back in her chair, frowning.
“Are we to assume that retiring is used in the local sense?”
“Given that our correspondent styles herself Boss Surebleak, it could scarcely be otherwise.”
“Hmm.” She reached for her cup.
Pat Rin slid the letter back into its envelope and put it next to his plate. The eggs…the eggs had not improved themselves. He reached to the warming basket in the center of the table and chose a piece of cinnamon toast.
It was quite good.
“Someone,” Natesa said eventually, “has been tutoring Boss Surebleak.”
“It seems so, does it not?”
“I propose that we have this next move you were so eager to see, Master. What shall you do?”
Pat Rin finished his toast and brushed the crumbs off his fingers.
“Boss?” The door to the kitchen slammed open and Jennetta rushed in, a copy of the morning paper clutched in her hand, her face white. Behind her, other white faces, and Mr. pel’Tolian, frowning.
“Boss, the paper just came,” said Jennetta and thrust it under his nose.
On the front page, above the fold, bordered in thick black, which lent it a certain gravitas, was the text of the letter he had just received, signed, yes, by Boss Surebleak.
“Boss,” said Jennetta—the child was shivering, Pat Rin saw. “Boss, what’re you gonna do?”
It was an excellent question, and his answer was no different than the one he had been about to give Natesa, but as it happened, he was not allowed to speak on his own behalf…for Mr. pel’Tolian arrived at the table just then, teapot in hand. He slipped between Jennetta and Pat Rin, refreshed the cups as if nothing untoward were about, and put the pot by Natesa’s hand.
“Will you like anything else, sir?” he asked while the kitchen door remained open, and his household held its collective breath.
“Thank you, Mr. pel’Tolian. I believe we are quite well.”
“Yes, sir.”
The butler turned and moved toward the kitchen, the waiting multitudes melting before him, snow to his sun.
“Boss Conrad will, of course, do everything that is proper.” Pat Rin heard him say, before the door swung closed again.
Natesa looked up from the paper.
“Boss Surebleak plays a bold game,” she commented. “How will you answer, Master?”
“It is not mine to answer,” he said, sipping from his warmed cup. “As to what I will do, as Jennetta asked it so neatly, I will send a copy of the letter to every member of the Council of Bosses, so that even those who have not yet read the paper are informed. I will include a complete list of yesterday’s targets, and I will invite the Bosses to attend a remote conference in two hours, so that we may plan our answer.”
He inclined his head. “Have you other suggestions?”
“No—yes.” She smiled at him, picked the basket up, and offered it to him.
“I suggest that you have another piece of toast.”
Jelaza Kazone
• • • • • • • • • • • • • • •
The comm pinged.
Miri detoured to the unit and touched the button.
Val Con paused, spun on a heel—and felt the flash of her anger in the same instant that he heard her hiss.
“What’s to do?” he asked, crossing the room.
He looked at the screen over her shoulder, reading the letter in a blink.
“I see,” he murmured. “That does clarify a few matters.”
Miri took a hard breath, and straightened, her back against his chest. He put his arms around her waist.
“Leaves just as many murky, too,” she said. “It’d be nice to know for sure if this is street-grown.”
“I agree. Pat Rin sends this, does he? Is there anything more?”
“A list of the streets and other locations targeted in yesterday’s fun, and an invitation to a virtual meeting of all Bosses in—just under two hours.”
“Nothing from the Watch?”
“Not here. Prolly have that at the meeting.”
“Shall I—”
“No,” she interrupted. “I’ll do the All Boss, you take the Road Boss.”
“Are you certain?”
She turned in his arms, slipping her hands around his waist and leaning her forehead against his shoulder.
“I’m certain. I gave enough speeches yesterday. If anybody still cares about Emissary Twelve after yesterday, you can speechify.”
“It is very proper in you to share these small pleasures,” he murmured.
She sighed and stood with her head against him, thinking about the letter.
So. Boss Surebleak, was it? And Boss Surebleak wanted to retire the Road Boss—that being her and him—and Conrad, too? One missed stitch right there, if Boss Surebleak thought he could retire Pat Rin and leave Natesa standing…
Retired. In street slang, retired meant murdered and was Boss-specific. Pretty usually, a Boss was retired by the next person who wanted to be Boss. And pretty often, the Boss in question needed retiring. The sad truth of Surebleak being that the new Boss was hardly ever an improvement on the old Boss.
No mistakes, the Road Boss in particular hadn’t made a lot of friends ’mong the streeters, and there were definitely people who might want them out of the way, so that a Road Boss could be set up who accepted bribes, skimmed off the top, sold their own brand of insurance, and just acted like a Boss from the time before Pat Rin yos’Phelium hit Surebleak and changed everything.
And then, just like always, there was the Department of the Interior, who wanted Korval erased from the universe and who hadn’t been shy, in the past, about pushing the local politics ’round to their view of things.
“Miri?” Val Con murmured.
She sighed again and stepped back, looking up into his face.
“So!” she said brightly. “Let’s get some breakfast. Then you can open the port office, and I can be present and accounted for at the meeting. We’ll debrief when you get back. Deal?”
Val Con bent and kissed her forehead. “Deal,” he said.
Five Light-Hours out from
Surebleak Libration Point Five
• • • • • • • • • • • • • • •
If they had a peculiarly powerful telescope or a very sensitive Jump detector and the leisure to look, the crew of Bechimo could have seen where they’d been five hours earlier. As it was, there were a few seconds of quiet in between as the Struven units split and merged the space around them.
The aftermath of that transit was immediate: alarms, warnings, and noise. The bells sounded hoarse, and Theo sat dangerously calm, as she considered the roiling cloud of timonium dust centered on the targeting screen, the Gilmour Agency space probe perfectly visible at its heart.
“It came with us!”
Dismayed, Kara stared at the cloud. It was the same cloud—the proof was in the scan analyses sharing the targeting screen—though the visibility of the probe had changed, as if the transit through Jump had thinned its dusty cloak.
“Not good,” Theo muttered. “We don’t want it here.”
“Communications intercept,” Joyita announced. “I’m receiving five clear bands, all of them…unusual.”
“Ship signals, device signals,” Clarence said from his board. “I’ve got gibberish: no voice, all data. Somebody lost a load of toasters and they’re talking to themselves? No, wait, what’s this? Joyita, can you bring this up—”
“Yes, Clarence, I have it!”
“Let’s all hear it,” said Theo.
There was a faint crackle, then a mild, well-modulated voice filled the bridge with clear and unhurried Terran.
“…resuming active service. Probe Stone Ronin asserts rights of unfettered passage, navigation, and exploration within this system as a unit of Surebleak Power Minerals, under duly-filed exploration patents recognized by TerraTrade Intergalactic. Interfering with my operations without permission of the Gilmour Agency or related contractors is against civil space law and custom. Only properly authorized tenders may interact with this unit. Service status update follows. Service status update follows.
“Probe Stone Ronin is resuming service. Beware potential rotation or orientation adjustments. Full status checks available via usual links.” There was a pause before “Message repeats.”
…which indeed it did do, this time in Trade.
Joyita dropped the volume, so the voice was merely a pleasant-sounding whisper.
“Why is it here?” Clarence muttered under his breath. “We’re none of its kith nor kin.”
“I have an image of its maker’s plate,” Bechimo said suddenly. “Screen five.”
Kara drew a hard breath.
Remco-Carresens Mark II Margate Zone Works.
ID 00001K001.
“Kin,” Bechimo said then. “I was built in that yard many years before Stone Ronin, but there will be similarities.”
“You’ve got the clan face,” Theo said, and then, “Subether’s wild. Shields up.”
“Shields up,” Bechimo agreed, and Kara saw the confirmation on her board.
“All weapons live,” Theo continued. “Win Ton, you’re fire officer. Joyita, can you talk to Stone Ronin?”
“I do not believe a dialogue is possible,” Joyita said. “I believe I have the command set, however.”
“Quick,” muttered Clarence, half-admiring.
“Do you?” Theo sounded interested. “That was quick. Tell Stone Ronin that we’re the boss, and to be perfectly quiet. We don’t need her insulting whatever’s out there and making them any madder than they already sound.
“Clarence, keep paying attention to those transmissions. Kara, work with Joyita to get Stone Ronin’s specs—and a schematic if you can convince her to release it.”
* * *
“Who are you? Are you from Headquarters? Do you dare declare lead? What are your energies? How much destruction do you carry?”
The subether was full of color and sound, Bechimo by necessity sharing all of it with Theo, as there had not been time to shield her. The flow was mixed—no. It was chaotic. Information and demands for information, hints of information, hints of threats, threats of hints, hints of most primal desire, hints of death barely averted, beseechings of mad beings and absolutely insane data-driven plans to shred Surebleak and all life in-system.
Having given her orders, Theo immersed herself again. Somewhere within a light-minute, dozens of devices demanded attention, obedience, or called out in languages Theo knew—ranging from ancient Yxtrang to fine Liaden and poor-docker Terran to voices that may have been nonhuman…Who knew what a Clutch in a hurry sounded like?
“What are you? We know your scars! What are you now?”
“Are these all ghost ships?” Theo demanded inside of bond-space.
Bechimo hesitated, reluctant to tell her…but she was his captain, and she deserved only the truth.
“Not ghost ships,” he said quietly. “These are…old ships and devices of mayhem. They are here to kill Surebleak, if no one convinces them otherwise.”
Blair Road
• • • • • • • • • • • • • • •
It was undoubtedly an historic moment, Boss Conrad thought, as he looked upon the mosaic of faces before him. For the first time in modern Surebleak history, the entire Council of Bosses were met together, not in one room, but on one screen.
