Ghost Ship Read online

  - - - - -

  Shugg looked up from the workbench and gave him a nod.

  “Andy’s gone over the Emerald; said to find ’im there.”

  “I will, then. Any news?”

  The mechanic shrugged. “Ships comin’ in, buildin’ goin’ on, Road still open.”

  The essentials. “Right. I’ll just step along to the Emerald. Need anything?”

  “Nah, I’m good. It’s better’n a lullaby, putting one of these to rights.”

  A man happy in his work, and his attention already back on it. Clarence lifted a hand and moved on.

  - - - - -

  It was a busy house, Theo thought; almost like living in a dorm. People arrived and departed at all hours, so it seemed. Some were family—she met, in quick succession, her cousin Shan, who was Anthora’s brother-by-blood, his lifemate, Priscilla, and his other sister, Nova, who lived in the city and worked for Pat Rin. She also met Ms. dea’Gauss, the family accountant. Many of the other arrivals were pilots; they were ushered in to see Val Con or Miri or Val Con and Miri, no matter where they happened to be. Val Con had even been called from dinner to see “a Scout, sir, in the half-parlor,” much to Lady Kareen’s displeasure.

  Not that Val Con seemed to care about Lady Kareen’s displeasure.

  For all the parade of people, though, the one person that Theo wanted to see most didn’t arrive, and she began to fear that it would come time to go back down to port to meet Uncle and lift before she saw Father again.

  “He’ll be home for the party,” Padi told her on the third afternoon of her visit. They’d been playing bowli ball on the side lawn, where the dead dry grass had been a positive menace to footing. Padi and Quin were good, and Theo had enjoyed herself immensely before they had all three declared time out and collapsed onto that same dry grass, panting and laughing.

  “If he’s doing something important for the delm, why would he break for a party?” Theo asked.

  “Because the party is an important diplomatic statement,” Quin explained. “My father said that it will demonstrate to the Bosses and those whom they govern that Korval is committed to them and to the contract. Every clan member will be present at the party. The delm has ordered it.”

  “After the party,” Quin added, “I will go down into the city and live in my father’s house.”

  “And learn how to be Boss Quin!” Padi crowed, rolling onto her stomach and propping her chin in her hands.

  Quin looked glum.

  “I’d rather finish my board hours,” he said. “And ’prentice on one of the small traders.”

  “My father said that we’d be seeing Scouts for piloting tutors.”

  “Oh,” Quin said. He sat up and looked down at Padi. “Oh.”

  “I had a Scout teach me menfri’at,” Theo said. “He was a very good teacher.”

  “Scouts are often good teachers,” Quin said absently.

  “Uncle Val Con says it’s because Scouts are taught to learn,” Padi added.

  “Yes, but as piloting instructors, they tend to train as if the student will . . . be a Scout.”

  “All the sooner to achieve first class,” Padi pointed out. “You’re ahead of me. If you draw a despot, you could have first class within the Standard.”

  Quin looked thoughtful.

  Theo took a deep breath of chilly Surebleak air and considered the pair of them—child pilots who had grown up in a house full of pilots. Quin already held a second class ticket though he was younger than she’d been when she’d been sponsored to Anlingdin Academy—and Padi was younger, still.

  It occurred to her to wonder what her flight path might have been like, if she’d grown up as Father’s child in this house of pilots. They’d’ve started her in on math early, knowing how important it was, and she wouldn’t’ve had to cram to catch up.

  “But Theo will be there, won’t you, Cousin?”

  She blinked at Padi.

  “Be where?”

  “At the dance.”

  Right, the dance—important diplomatic event that it was.

  “Unless my contact hits port early, I’ll be at the dance,” she said, and sat up suddenly, caught by a thought.

  “Are there formal dance moves?”

  Padi rolled her eyes.

  “Certainly, there are—” Quin began, and blinked. “Cousin Theo, can you not dance?”

  “Of course I can dance,” she told him, “but I’m betting I don’t know the steps for the party dances here.”

  Her two young cousins shared a long look.

  “We can teach her,” Padi said decisively.

  “In two days? With Grandmother insisting on adding protocol lessons onto the rest of our studies?”

  “We will explain that Cousin Theo must be tutored, in order that she not cast dishonor on the Line,” Padi said loftily. “Cousin Kareen will precisely understand.”

  “You explain it to her,” said Quin.

  “I will, then.” Padi turned a brilliant smile on Theo. “How fortunate that you realized that there might be a problem! We will see you floating on the dance floor like a—what is that thing, Quin, that Grandfather floats?”

  “A zephyr,” he said.

  “Precisely. Theo will float like a zephyr. Now! I think we should adjourn to the studio, don’t you?”

  THIRTY

  Boss Vine’s Turf

  Surebleak

  “Well, now, here’s the man thinks he can rat honest ships to the Watch and keep on breathin’.”

  The door to the lodgings opened out into what might be called a courtyard or a pocket garden on a less hardscrabble world. It being Surebleak, the sun didn’t necessarily reach into all the backest corners of that sterile little pocket of ’crete. The voice came from one such corner, to Clarence’s right. It was, he thought, a deuced familiar voice, and not welcome for all of that.

  “Nothin’ to say, Boss O’Berin?”

  Oh, sure; he had it now.

  “Sanella Thring. Early in the day for dream-smoke, ain’t it?”

  “No dream that you went into the Watch office last evening and laid witness against Thresher and Beauty,” Thring snapped, and he could see her now, a darker shadow in the dim corner. “No dream they been denied landing, and warned out of the system.”

  Warned out of the system, now; that was new. O’ course, there were a good many Scouts at loose ends coming in, offering to be useful. Better to have them occupied than busting up the port.

  “I been waiting for those supplies for weeks! You got any idea the money that’s to be made here? No, ’course you do—an’ you want it all in your pocket, same like on Liad. Well, you don’t have your bullies backin’ you up now, do you? An’ I ain’t lettin’ you ruin nobody else, O’Berin. You’re done.”

  He saw the beginning of the move. There wasn’t any question of trying to wing her—not in that light. He went for the sure shot, with scarcely that much thought for it, waited, then went over to check his work.

  “Now, dammit . . .” That was the landlady, drawn to the door by the noise, and right she was to be aggrieved.

  Clarence stood up and came out to the center of the courtyard, where the sun was brightest.

  “You’re hale?” she asked, giving him a hard stare.

  “I am,” he answered, giving the personal noun some weight.

  She sighed, explosively, hardly bothering to look into the corner. “Come on in, then; I’ll send the kid down to fetch the Boss’s ’hand.”

  That was a new rule, that any violence on the street had to be reported and the Boss make a disposition of was it justified, who was to blame, and if a fine was to be assessed. Technically, the violence in question hadn’t happened on the street, but Millie Lear—that was the landlady—had the right of it. Best to show themselves sensible of the rules. And, besides, with there only being himself standing, he was pretty sure he’d come away with a “self-defense.”

  He went forward, pulling his jacket straight as he did.

&
nbsp; “The two of us can visit a bit while we’re waiting,” Millie said, stepping back to let him through the door. “There’s coffee ’n’ spring-cake, just fresh out o’ the oven.”

  - - - - -

  “Did you want to see me, sir?”

  Shan yos’Galan looked up from his computer, his white hair shiny as silk in the sun from the window.

  “Sir? I wish I got as much respect from my other sisters! Do allow me to persuade you to teach them how to go on!”

  “I think they’re probably disadvantaged by knowing you so well,” Theo said, walking toward the desk.

  “Or, as our mother used to observe, family doesn’t stand on formality. I’m not certain my father entirely agreed—it seemed to me that he would occasionally have preferred a little more formality within the family. I, however, prefer as little as possible, as that’s what I grew up expecting. Do be informal, Theo.”

  She paused by the chair set at the corner of the desk and frowned at him.

  “Jeeves said that Master Trader yos’Galan wanted to speak with me,” she explained.

  “And you wished to place melant’i correctly. I understand. Well, then, you are correct. It falls to me to adopt a more formal manner.” He moved a big hand on which the Master Trader’s carved amethyst gleamed, showing her the corner chair.

  “Please, Pilot Waitley, sit. I have a proposition to place before you.”

  Theo sat and inclined her head, which indicated both that she was listening and honoring his higher rank. She had supposed that learning Liaden kinesics would be like learning a new dance, and had expected to pick it up as easily as the dance steps Quin and Padi had been teaching her. Unfortunately, “dancing Liaden” was less like dance and more like yet another language. And it meant that she had to pay attention to people in ways she just normally didn’t.

  It really wasn’t fair to practice on Shan, who really did seem to prefer Terran to Liaden, but if she didn’t practice, like Miri said, she wouldn’t learn.

  “Yes,” Shan said, and cleared his throat. “The Master Trader has come up with a notion that you and your ship might be well served by having some occupation. Since Bechimo is a loop-trader, I have taken the liberty of designing a loop.” He held up his hand like he thought Theo was going to say something, but she was still trying to sort out what he meant.

  “Now, I want to be clear: If you accept this route, you would be paid Korval’s standard contractor percentage. However, the loop is a new one, as I said, and may not yield as much profit as I fondly imagine. Which means that, in addition to minding the trade and the loop, I would like you and Bechimo to do research for me. Suitably compensated, of course.”

  “Research?” Theo repeated, thinking of research, Delgado-style, with libraries and primary sources, and nesting search matrices.

  “I should say, market research,” Shan said. “As Korval’s master trader, I need to know, of course, what goods are wanted, and what goods are on offer. I’ll also need to know something about the ports, the surrounding environment, and what, if anything, the local trade community happens to think about Tree-and-Dragon.”

  A shadow separated itself from the window ledge, resolving into a small black cat. She stretched and jumped down to the floor with a thump worthy of a tiger.

  “Bechimo wants a loop,” Theo said slowly, “but I’m under contract to Crystal Energy Consultants, as a courier pilot.”

  “Are you certain—pardon me, please, if I raise a painful subject—but are you certain that your relationship with your employer will continue, past the return of his ship?”

  Theo stared at him. “Why—” she began and stopped.

  Shan was right. Uncle might not want to continue to employ a pilot who had almost lost a favored craft. Or he might not want Bechimo running courier—and Theo couldn’t blame him if he didn’t. Bechimo was a hunted ship—and Theo, as a pilot of Korval, was now on somebody’s screens.

  “There was a cancellation-by-mutual-consent clause,” she told Shan. “And you’re right; I’m not exactly low-profile.”

  “Neither was Arin’s Toss,” Shan commented. “I think you are wise to at least consider that your contract will be bought out sooner rather than later. In which case, it is only prudent to consider other routes to profit.”

  A bowli ball with needles attached landed on Theo’s thigh.

  “Hey!” she said, and looked down at the black kitten, who turned her tiny face up and squinched her eyes in a cat smile. She began to knead and purr.

  Shan shook his head. “It is a good thing we live retired in the country. That purr would break ordinances, if there were any, in the city.”

  “I appreciate the idea of trying to think about other avenues of income,” Theo said slowly. She stroked the black kitten’s back, waking even louder purrs. “The thing is, I went for courier—I didn’t want a loop, and I’m not a trader.” She paused, staring at her hand on the kitten’s back, then looked up to Shan’s silver eyes.

  “Do you have that route all laid out in form?” she asked.

  “Pilot Waitley, I do,” he said solemnly.

  “Please ask Jeeves to transmit it to Bechimo. He was built for loop-trade, like you said. If he likes it then—I’ll give it a provisional yes. If I am out of contract. And only for one loop.”

  “I accept your terms and conditions,” Shan said, and raised his voice slightly, “Jeeves?”

  “Master Shan?”

  “Could you please transmit this loop plan to Bechimo, as Pilot Waitley asks, and inform him that his pilot would like a reading on the interest of such an enterprise to ship and crew?”

  “Certainly, sir. Transmitting at once.”

  There was a short silence, broken only by the kitten’s steady rumble, then Shan spoke again.

  “You will need a company name in order to enter into a loop contract. Have you one in mind? Waitley Enterprises, perhaps?”

  “No . . .” The kitten emitted an astonishment of purrs and curled neatly up onto Theo’s lap, eyes squinting with pleasure.

  “No, I think—Laughing Cat.” She looked up and met Shan’s eyes. “Laughing Cat, Limited.”

  He nodded, perfectly serious. “We will of course have Ms. dea’Gauss draw up the documents, so there will be no delay, should you and your ship decide to—”

  “Pilot Waitley?” Jeeves said from somewhere overhead.

  “Yes?”

  “I have a message from Bechimo, Pilot. He wishes you to know that he finds the route very much to his liking and believes that it will yield profit to ship and crew.”

  * * *

  Theo emerged from the meeting with Shan, and the subsequent meeting with Ms. dea’Gauss, with head awhirl. All the things she didn’t know about running a trade route had been thrown into relief, and her attitude toward contracts, which she personally thought was alert and advertent, was called into question by Shan.

  “That paragraph there—do you like that?” he asked, as she passed over a provision for an early delivery bonus.

  Theo’d shrugged. “I would have liked a larger percentage, but you said this was the standard contract, so—”

  “It is the standard contract,” he interrupted. “Korval’s standard contract. That doesn’t mean that you are required to accept our terms. Contracts are about negotiation.”

  Theo eyed him. “If all the rest of the contractors accepted this paragraph, then you don’t have any reason to negotiate with me.”

  “And if all the children at the port threw themselves on a hotpad, Shannie yos’Galan, would ye be doin’ the same?”

  Theo sighed. “My mother used to say, If everybody on your team falsified their sources, would you do it, too?”

  “I believe,” Shan said seriously, “that there is a subscription service.”

  That made her laugh, which made her head feel better, until she leaned in again and tried to wrest another percentage point in bonus. She came away with half a percent—Ms. dea’Gauss was more stubborn than she looked!
—and a determination to weigh each continuing paragraph by could it be more to her advantage. She asked for two more adjustments, didn’t get one and got another partial on the other.

  Details hammered out, signatures and thumbprints affixed in the proper places, Theo exchanged bows with Ms. dea’Gauss, shook hands with Shan and escaped, believing that she was late to meet Padi and Quin for another expedition to stores—this time for party clothes.

  But, no; her time with the contract had only seemed to take hours. She still had almost two hours, house-time, before she was due to meet her cousins.

  That, Theo thought, was good. She grabbed her jacket and let herself out into the inner garden.

  Theo strolled down the stone pathway, which was not quite so overgrown as she recalled it, noticing some flowers opening tentatively in the sunnier beds, and a glimpse of crimson among the glossy dark leaves of a shrubbery.

  Well, she thought, taking a deep breath of cool, spicy air, Val Con had said it was spring.

  She passed a bench set temptingly in a glade framed by climbing roses, and thought to turn aside. Instead, she kept walking; she’d been wanting to get a good look at the huge tree that grew out of the center of the garden. She hadn’t really had a chance to study it on her first visit; she’d been so tired, and so worried, and so focused on finding the Delm of Korval . . .

  The path described one more curve and vanished, leaving Theo standing on a moist carpet of pale blue grass, staring at the monumental trunk, and upward into the full-leafed branches, so intent on the impossible, undeniable treenees of it that she did not for several minutes register that she was not alone in the glade.

  An elder pilot stood quite close to the trunk, hands tucked into the pockets of his jacket and his face tipped up to the branches as if he were having a conversation with the Tree.

  Father.

  Her chest cramped, and she started forward across the grass, not meaning to disturb him—

  Her steps weren’t as quiet as she believed, or, she thought whimsically, the Tree told him that she was there. He turned neatly, hands slipping out of his pockets, but not rising in greeting. His face lit with pleasure, which she saw only because she knew him so well, but he didn’t quite smile, either.