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  Aelliana looked from right to left and back again, trying to see everything at once. Her first new world—with snow! Perhaps, she thought, they might take a day, after the package was delivered, and explore Avontai more fully.

  It came to her then that Daav, too, was being watchful, but in an entirely different manner. She considered the side of his face and the set of his shoulders. Not worried, she decided, but on guard.

  Cautiously, she looked about, trying to see what might have made him wary, but saw nothing untoward. She swayed a step nearer to his side, though she did not take his hand. There was a chance that such contact would break his concentration, which she in no way wished to do until she more fully understood their position.

  "Does the port feel strange to you?" she asked.

  He looked down at her, his hair starry with snowflakes.

  "I have no comparison; this is my first time on Avontai Port."

  Aelliana bit her lip, and glanced about, but all she saw were shops and shoppers and people moving quickly, as if they had an errand in hand.

  "Your friend Clarence had said that he was hearing from pilots that the ports felt . . . odd. To me, Avontai feels unlike Chonselta or Solcintra, but surely that is as it should be and nothing odd?"

  "There are certain things to notice, when one is on-port. Do the natives seem unconcerned or anxious? Are proctors or security very obvious—or absent entirely? Does it seem that pilotkind cling close to each other, or that there are too few about on the common ways?" He moved his shoulders. "I will try to be a better teacher, Aelliana, though I suspect an experience of several ports may be necessary to build a sense of what is not odd."

  "That seems reasonable," she granted, and gave him a grin, inviting him to share the joke. "So, we see a necessity to raise many ports!"

  Daav, however, did not laugh; rather, and unexpectedly, he frowned.

  "There is a matter of melant'i," he said, slowly, his voice taking on a formal cadence, though he kept yet to the mode between comrades. "Clarence O'Berin is not my friend."

  "But of course he is!" The words were out of her mouth before she had time to consider propriety. Who was she, to tell Daav's affections out for him? And yet—

  "I beg your pardon, van'chela," she said more moderately, but with a degree of determination. "Recall that we were linked during the exchange with—with Pilot O'Berin. I grant that . . . I understand that there is a confusion of regard, but certainly there is . . . affection. Indeed, he must hold you likewise, else why step off of his path to speak of this . . . oddity among the ports?"

  Daav sighed, and said nothing. Aelliana bit her lip. She had transgressed; she had feared it. She curled her hand into a fist so that she not reach out to him, and cleared her throat.

  "It is ill-done of me to—to correct you on such a matter. As clearly as I might hear you, it is not I but you who must know best . . ."

  "No, that will not do," Daav interrupted, very gently indeed.

  His hand touched hers, and she gripped his fingers greedily. Wistfulness flowed from him, and a sort of wry amusement, thinly edged with resentment.

  "We have what we have, and a pilot who wishes to survive uses the information in her hand, no matter how it comes to be there. So, there will be no forgive-mes, my lady, nor any regrets, though I may sometimes be abashed, or even embarrassed. I will engage to do my best not to become angry, but my temper is not always biddable."

  "Nor, I fear, is mine," she whispered.

  "Well, it's a pair of hotheads we'll be, then, and no help for it. As for Clarence . . ." He paused; she received the sense of him marshaling his thoughts.

  "You are correct that I hold Clarence in some esteem—we are of an age, of like temperament, and bear the burden of similar melant'is. If circumstances were otherwise, we might indeed be friends. As it is, I have the honor to be Korval, and Clarence—is the final authority for the Juntavas based on Liad."

  So, Aelliana thought, she had judged Clarence's melant'i rightly. As for the Juntavas; the Guild handbook would have them be thieves, grey-traders, and warned pilots away from their employ.

  "Korval and the Juntavas," Daav continued, "have long ago agreed to a policy of . . . avoidance. Which means that, value him as I might, yet I cannot by policy assume Clarence to be trustworthy, nor may I consider that he holds Korval's best interest first in his heart."

  "Nor should he," Aelliana murmured. "He must care for his own folk first."

  "So he must and so I must. Thus we meet seldom, with pleasure tinged by regret." He glanced up into the dancing snowflakes. "Here is our street, I think."

  Hand in hand they walked down a narrower and only slightly less-well-lit street. It seemed to Aelliana that Daav was easier now—less chagrined—yet still on point. She caught a glimmer of concern, and a thrill of pleasurable curiosity, growing more intense as they found the door.

  It was recessed, hidden deep inside a series of arches, the first so black it seemed to swallow the light from the street lamps. The second arch was dark grey, the third foggy blue, the fifth ivory, and the sixth pure white, lit so brightly that no shadows were possible. The door itself was crimson, as bright as blood in the glaring light.

  She felt Daav hesitate—the tiniest catch between one step and the next—then they were walking side by side down the short tunnel; at the end of it, Aelliana put her hand against the plate.

  The door opened into a room dimly illuminated by red light. Aromatic smoke drifted between the tables; the servers moving languidly among them wore red shirts with billowing sleeves and tight white trousers.

  Beyond the half-moon of tables was an open area floored in black tile so glossy that the ceiling was reflected in its depths. On the far side of the floor was a stage. Thick white smoke rose 'round it, mixing with the ruby light. Inside the resulting pink mist, Aelliana could see instruments set up on racks, awaiting musicians who had yet to arrive.

  "Perhaps we should ask a waiter to take a message—" she began, but Daav was already moving, passing between the clustered tables like a wisp of smoke himself.

  Sighing, she followed, neither so neat nor so invisible, and caught him on the far side of the floor.

  "A warning before you move away," she said sharply, "would ease your pilot's mind. I am no Scout, recall."

  "Forgive me, Pilot," he murmured, not noticeably contrite. "As our hour approaches, it seemed best for us to seek the young gentleman backstage and dispatch our errand before he is called upon to perform."

  It did, she admitted, seem the only route to fly, outlined thus. Still—

  "What if I were to lose you?"

  He looked down at her, his face utterly serious.

  "You will not lose me, Aelliana."

  It was said so surely that the words had weight, as if he had placed six smooth stones into her hand.

  She sighed, soothed despite herself, and went with him 'round the back of the stage.

  Four figures dressed in grey and black turned toward them. Two held glasses half-full with dark liquid, one had a thin brown stick between two fingers. She watched them coolly as she brought the stick to her lips and drew on it, waking a sickly green spark at the tip.

  The fourth member of the group came forward, hands moving decisively against the air, as if he were pushing them away.

  "If you please, the band is preparing for the first set! You interfere with our art! Leave at once!"

  Aelliana took a deep breath, tasting smoke and spice in the close air.

  "It is not my intention to interfere with art," she said, speaking as she would to an excitable student. "We will leave, and willingly, as soon as we have delivered a package to Bre Din sig'Ranton Clan Persage."

  The young man paused, and glanced over his shoulder. Aelliana followed his gaze, and saw one of the three at the table—towheaded and plump, wearing a tight, sleeveless grey shirt and flowing black trousers—put his glass down and move slowly toward them.

  "I am Bre Din sig'Ranton," he said. H
is voice was light and slightly blurry, as if they had woken him. "Who are you?"

  "I am Aelliana Caylon, pilot-owner of Ride the Luck. I have been engaged by Dath jo'Bern Clan Hedrede to deliver a package directly into your hands."

  The young gentleman paused at his comrade's side. His eyes were wide and very dark, and there was a—Aelliana blinked—there was a tiny red flower drawn high on his right cheek, near the edge of his eye. He was not, she thought, very much older than Sinit.

  "Dath jo'Bern?" He breathed the words, though Aelliana did not know if it was awe or dismay that she heard.

  "Indeed," Daav said. "Precisely Dath jo'Bern, young sir. I suggest, if we are not to further disrupt art, that you take delivery of this package, sign the receipt, and allow us to depart."

  The girl holding the smoking stick laughed, sharply.

  "He has you there, Rose. Sign for the package and finish your juice."

  Bre Din moved his shoulders, as if shaking off her voice.

  "Where?" he demanded, taking a deliberate step forward.

  Aelliana drew herself up, determined not to show concern in the face of his intensity, despite the sudden tightness of her chest.

  "Here," Daav said, swinging the package off his shoulder and holding it out. "There's no need to stalk the pilot."

  Color drained from the boy's face, it seemed to Aelliana that he swayed . . . then he steadied, fairly snatching the package from Daav's hands. He spun back to the table, shoving glasses and other clutter roughly aside. Hands shaking, he unsealed the outer protective layer, and scattered a second layer of frothy tissue-glitter to reveal a carven wooden case.

  He paused then, as if he feared to continue. The boy who had tried to shoo them away drew closer to the table, shoulders hunched, as if he had caught the other's tension. The first girl lifted a mocking eyebrow and drew on her stick.

  "Make haste, Rosie," the second girl chided. "Or leave it until after the set!"

  "Peace," he murmured, but it seemed to Aelliana that he was advising himself more than her. Slowly, and with infinite care, he lifted the lid away.

  Nestled in silk, the dulciharp took fire; pegs flared, light ran along the strings, ivory keys gleamed.

  "Ah . . ." The second girl leaned close, extending a hand, as if to touch.

  "She's a beauty," the first girl said grudgingly, blowing smoke out of the side of her mouth. "From Liad?"

  "From Liad," Bre Din sig'Ranton asserted. Reverently, he reached into the box and had the instrument out, cradling it against his shoulder like an infant. His fingers moved, and the strings whispered, loud in the quiet dimness.

  "But—why?" asked the first boy.

  "Yes, why?" the second girl repeated. "Who is this—" She glanced aside, at them, Aelliana realized "—this Honorable jo'Bern? Why is she sending you gifts?"

  "Not a gift," Bre Din murmured. "Not a gift, Veen. A promise." He stroked the strings again, and sighed.

  "Dath jo'Bern is my grandmother's cha'leket. When my grandmother died, the dulciharp went to her, as a death-gift. I sent her—gods, relumma ago!—I sent her a recording, and I asked her—I asked her, if she would sponsor me to the Conservatory on Liad, and, if she thought I was worthy, to return me my grandmother's harp."

  "What's this?" Veen plucked a slim folder from inside the case and flipped it open.

  "Tickets," she said blankly, "and a bank draft."

  Cheek against wood, Bre Din sig'Ranton smiled.

  "If I'm to study at the Conservatory, I need to travel to Liad, Veen."

  "But—" She stared at him, the folder forgotten in her hand. "What about the band?" She took a hard breath. "What about—"

  "If you please," Daav spoke up, placing his hand on Aelliana's shoulder. "There is a confirmation of satisfactory delivery to be signed."

  Obedient to her prompt, Aelliana reached inside her jacket and withdrew the card.

  "Certainly, Pilots." Bre Din turned, the harp still cradled against him, and pressed his thumb onto the card's surface. "My thanks; you have—you have changed my life."

  Aelliana bowed, and stepped back to Daav's side, slipping the card away into the safety of an inner pocket. As one, they turned toward the door, which opened smoothly under Daav's hand.

  "Bre Din!" The second girl's voice was sharp. "Will you turn your back on—"

  "Leave it until after the set!" the first girl interrupted. "We're on!"

  The door fell shut, Daav turned to the right, opposite the direction they had entered, and Aelliana, wordless, followed.

  Chapter Twenty

  Norbear—Size: 16–22 cm; Weight: 121–180 g. Furred quadrupedal mammal with a burrowing habit; soft dense coat, ranging in color from grey, brown, black, orange, white and mixed. Herbivore. Fearless and lively disposition, natural empath. Adapts well to domestication. Banned on certain worlds. Check port rules before importing.

  —

  Courier Wildlife Guide, Fourteenth Edition

  The back door opened onto a service platform overlooking a thin alley harshly lit by vapor spots. Aelliana stood quietly at Daav's side, doubtless trying to figure out what it was that he saw which eluded her.

  In fact, he saw only an empty alleyway, and some bits of trash fluttering in the corner made by the intersection of ramp and foundation.

  "It's stopped snowing," she observed.

  "So it has."

  "I wonder, van'chela, why we exited this way, rather than by the main door?"

  It was a fair question, and one that a new pilot might with honor ask of a port-wise comrade. The pity being that he had no answer nearly so fair to offer her in return. Scout instincts, pilot instincts—things learned through bone and blood, recalled by the deep mind, acted upon, and never questioned . . . How did one explain, without seeming to be perfectly demented? Worse, how did one teach, except as one had been taught—by trial and error, and the occasional laceration or broken bone?

  Still, he told himself, rallyingly, there must have been a reason, mustn't there have, Daav? Only take a moment to reflect, and no doubt it will come to you.

  He cast his mind back to the main room: the dance floor, the charmingly attired wait staff, the tables made private by the wafting smoke. Had there been a potential for danger, an . . . oddity, damn Clarence and his ghosts! The tension in a shoulder; the attitude of a head? Some small thing set slightly out of place? An object that ought to have been there, noticed only by its absence?

  He sighed.

  "I don't know," he admitted. "Forgive me, Aelliana."

  She looked up into his face, her eyes deeply green in the sulfurous light.

  "Forgive you? For heeding your training, which has kept you safe on dozens of ports, and in far stranger places? I can scarcely find that a fault, van'chela, nor any cause for forgiveness. Had your training been less thorough, or yourself less advertent, I might never have met you, nor known what it was I lived in lack of."

  If, indeed, her brother had allowed her to live so long. Horror shivered through him; it had been so near a thing, their meeting so much a matter of chance . . .

  "Daav? Is there something amiss?"

  "Nothing amiss," he said, forcibly shaking off the chill, and producing a smile to soothe her. "I was merely thinking that the luck moves along strange pathways."

  "So it does," she agreed, and glanced about them once again. "If there is nothing here for us, do you think that we might leave?"

  "In fact, I do!" He preceded her down the ramp, in case the fluttering litter should suddenly turn feral, and nodded to the left as she joined him on the alley's floor.

  "I propose that we find us a convivial place for a glass and a bit of supper, now that we're at leisure."

  Aelliana tipped her head, her stance wistful. "I had hoped to see more of the port."

  Of course she would, he chided himself; this was her first new port—her first world that was not the homeworld! Who would not wish to walk such streets and marvel that she had come so far?

  "Th
ere's no requirement that we find supper at the first shop displaying a glass," he pointed out, and was rewarded by her smile.

  "There isn't, is there?" she said. "We are free to meet our own fancy. Let us, if you will humor me, walk." She held out her hand, inviting, and he stepped forward to take it in his own.

  "By all means, let us walk and observe the port! It has been an age since I've been at leisure to tour."

  * * *

  They bought bowls of stew from a cart outside of a greens market, and fresh-squeezed juice from a stall inside. Leaning on the railing at the observation window, they ate while watching pallets of vegetables being offloaded from rail cars, to ride the conveyors into the vendor area below.

  After, they went back out onto the port and walked, taking turns choosing their direction. At some point in their meanderings the snow began again, riding a freshening breeze. Aelliana shivered and turned up the collar of her jacket, curling her hands into warm pockets.

  They found a bakery open at the edge of what might have been a day-side business district, ate lemon squares and drank hot tea at a tiny round table while in the back the baker prepared the next day's dough.

  Warmed by tea and sugar, they went on the prowl again, pausing by a map board so that she could discover the locations of such landmarks as the Portmaster's Office, the Pilots Guild, Healer Hall, and Port Security. There were pointers to various ferries: the Ocean Line, the Mountain Line, the City Line—and the shuttle to the Pleasure Quarters.

  "The Pleasure Quarters?" she murmured. "What do you suppose that is?"

  "I am without information. Shall we find if the shuttle is running and explore?"

  Her laugh was swallowed by a yawn.

  "Perhaps tomorrow," she said. "For tonight, van'chela, I think it might be time to seek our ship, and our bed."

  "Well enough," Daav answered. "It's always good to have a plan for the morrow." He considered the map briefly, and raised a hand to trace out a route.

  "If we go north, past Avontai Port 'change, we'll cut the corner of the Entertainment District, and so come back to the public yard." He glanced down at her. "Or shall we find a cab?"