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  And, truth told, the Agent's influence was hardly any worse than his own in allowing a native of an interdicted world onto a spacecraft, in telling him things no man of his world and culture had need of.

  Val Con sighed again, quietly.

  He had tracked down both Hakan and Kem and assured himself of their continued good health. Indeed, it was the need to be certain that they had not fallen under the eye of Agent pel'Nara that had prompted him to infiltrate the Agent's base and copy those very revealing files.

  Seeing that Kem and Hakan had not come into the Agent's circle, he had reconsidered his own plan to visit them and drop a word of warning in their ears. Better not to take the chance, in case the Agent were after all aware of his presence and interested in his movements.

  The breeze freshened, rattling the handbills nailed to the post he leaned against. He wondered, idly, how long the Explorers Club would meet.

  He was considering the advisability of moving closer when two figures came 'round the corner, moving quickly, their footsteps noisy on the cobbled walk. Latecomers to the meeting, Val Con thought–and then came up straight in his hiding place.

  For the two latecomers were Hakan and Kem. As he watched they jogged up the sagging wooden stairs and disappeared into the depths of the Explorers Club.

  Oh, Val Con thought. Damn.

  *

  The pattern of the last meeting held; after the presentation Zhena Pelnara was immediately surrounded, and there was no getting near her.

  "She certainly is admired," Kem said, as they helped themselves to cider and cheese. "How long has she been a member?"

  Hakan shrugged. "According to Zamir Fulmon, the zhena was sponsored into the club during the mid-course tests, and scarcely missed a meeting until she was called away on business. The last meeting was her first in some time. I didn't have time to attend meetings during the tests–which is why I'd never seen her before."

  "Has she done a presentation?" Kem wondered. "What's her specialty?"

  "I don't know," Hakan said. "We could check the event book."

  "Maybe–no, look. She's leaving."

  It did seem as if the zhena was taking leave of her friends. Zamir Fulmon, Hakan's informant of the last meeting, brought her coat and held it for her. The man with the odd mustache stood with two drinks in hand, as if he'd brought her one and been overlooked. Another zamir made an offer of escort, but she declined.

  "No, it is kind of you, zamir, but I will meet my brother only a step down the walk. Stay, and continue this excellent conversation! Next meeting, I will want to hear how you have come to terms with this conundrum!"

  She moved firmly toward the door, and the group stood aside to make way for her. Kem grabbed Hakan's arm and pulled him with her, heading for the door the long way, around the edge of the crowd.

  "What–?" he managed, as they reached the vestibule, coats flapping open in their haste.

  "Let's try to overtake her on the walk," Kem said. "It will be a perfect chance to ask her about Cory!"

  *

  Someone, Val Con was certain, was watching him–and had been for some time. There was no overt evidence to support this certainty, which only meant that whoever it was, they were very good. He didn't believe it was Agent pel'Nara, though it certainly could be one of her team, assigned as back-up.

  He considered wandering away, to see whether the watcher would follow, but that would mean leaving Hakan and Kem in the Agent's orbit without back-up. Though what he might do if the three of them emerged arm-in-arm from the–

  The door to the Explorers Club opened and Agent pel'Nara stepped out, alone, pulling on her gloves as she descended the tricky stairs. Apparently his friends had no need of his protection this evening. It galled him to let Agent pel'Nara go, but he judged that prudence would counsel him to walk away in a moment or two, and lose his watcher in the narrow streets to the west of the campus. He could always find the Agent again, tomorrow.

  Agent pel'Nara was almost to the walkway. The door to the Explorers Club opened again, spilling Hakan and Kem into the night.

  Val Con froze.

  Agent pel'Nara, apparently oblivious, strode steadily down the walkway toward his position. Kem clattered down the last few steps and hit the walk very nearly at a run, Hakan lagging behind.

  "Zhena Pelnara!" she called.

  The Agent checked, then turned, head cocked to one side.

  "Zhena?" she said politely, as Kem came, breathlessly, to her side. "I am not aware of your name, I think?"

  "Kem Darnill. I was at the meeting. I'm sorry to chase you down like this, but it was impossible to get near you at the reception."

  "Ah," Agent pel'Nara said indulgently. "You have an idea, perhaps? A theory? But you must return and share it with the others. It is with sadness that I must leave early, but–I have an appointment, zhena. Good-night."

  She turned, and Val Con dared to hope that the encounter was over. Kem, however, was not to be put off.

  "I don't have an idea," she said, "but a question. It will only take a moment, zhena."

  Agent pel'Nara was seen to sigh. She turned back. "Very well," she said, her voice a little impatient now. "But quickly if you please, Zhena Darnill."

  Kem smiled as Hakan came up next to her. "This is my zamir, Hakan," she said to the Agent. "We both noticed you in the meeting. You look very much like a friend of ours . . . from . . . away."

  The Agent's stance changed; she was no longer poised to walk away. She was, Val Con saw, interested in this. As well she might be.

  "I am intrigued, zhena," she said; "there are very few of my–of us in Laxaco City. What is your friend's name?"

  "Corvill Robersun," Kem said.

  Val Con closed his eyes, briefly.

  "Corvill Robersun," the Agent repeated, caressingly. "Now, Zhena Darnill, I must tell you that I do not know Zamir Robersun, myself. His work, though–that I know well. Do you say that he is in Laxaco? I will ask you for an introduction."

  "Cory and his zhena went back home," Kem said seriously. "We'd hoped that you might have word. Also–"

  "Do you happen to know–" that was Hakan, speaking quickly, his words all but stumbling over each other. "You said you knew his work . . ." He stopped, apparently embarrassed at having broken into the zhena's discussion.

  Agent pel'Nara turned her attention to him. "I do indeed know his work, Zamir Darnill. What is it you wish to ask?"

  "He had an . . . an aircraft, he called it," Hakan said, more slowly now, as if he dreaded the answer his question might earn, now that he was committed to asking it. "It wasn't . . . it didn't have a propeller, and there were other things kind of odd about it. But the oddest thing was that it lifted straight up. I saw the snow, and there were–"

  "Who's there?" Kem said sharply.

  "I hear nothing," Agent pel'Nara said soothingly, but Val Con, at least, knew she was lying.

  The watcher was moving, stealthy and almost silent. Moving toward the threesome on the walkway.

  Almost unbidden, Val Con found himself falling back into agent training and called up the decision matrix he knew as The Loop. Yes, there it was, the question of what an agent should do in this situation . . . and the probability that the watcher was going into an attack mode was close to unity.

  Val Con's reaction was just as certain. Necessity existed.

  Carefully, he bent and slipped the knife out of his boot, pausing to listen to the watcher's progress. Then, moving with considerably less noise, he charted an interception course.

  *

  The zhena's face had gone frighteningly, familiarly blank, as if she read some inner dialog.

  It seemed to Hakan as if time suddenly speeded up. He felt a surge of adrenalin.

  There was a crashing, a shout, from the small dark park beyond them. Zhena Pelnara reacted by reaching out and grabbing Kem's arm, simultaneously reaching inside her coat.

  Kem twisted, broke free, and Hakan leapt, spinning behind the zhena, and his left arm w
as around her upper arms, pinning them, while his right hand held the sharp point of the slick horn zamzorn firmly against her throat.

  The zhena relaxed slightly, as if recognizing and submitting to peril, and Kem dodged in, snatching something from the zhena's hand, and dodged back, holding the odd-shaped object uncertainly.

  "That is not a toy, zhena," Karsin Pelnara said, her voice perfectly matter-of-fact. "Please have your zamir release me."

  Hakan saw Kem adjust what she held, as if determining what it was, how to use it . . . and then she held it, surely, as if it were a tiny gun.

  "Kem," a familiar voice, slightly breathless said from the suddenly silent park. "Please be very careful. The zhena is correct; that thing is not a toy. Hakan–"

  Cory stepped out onto the walk, hair rumpled and coat torn, the knife he used against the invasion force–or its twin–in his left hand. It looked quite as it had during the invasion, too, with its shine mottled with fresh blood.

  "Hakan, I will ask you also to be very careful. You have not finished your training with that . . ."

  The woman in his grip twisted suddenly, a move Hakan reacted to with his guardsman training. She redoubled her efforts, snarled, and bit at his hand holding the the instrument to her neck. He tried to pull away and the zamzorn slipped and clattered on the cobbles as it fell. Zhena Pelnara kicked, as the move required, but he'd moved and she missed, and spun her attention on Cory, who had dropped into a crouch, knife ready.

  "Stop!" Kem shouted, and simultaneously there was a strange coughing sound, followed by the ring of metal on stone.

  Zhena Pelnara stumbled–and collapsed to the cobbles at Cory's feet. He knelt down and turned her over, fingers against her throat a hands-breadth above a small stain on her blouse front.

  "Did I kill her?" Kem asked, her voice unnaturally calm.

  "No," Cory said shortly. "It is a . . . hypnotic . . . a sleep dose. She will rise eventually." He sighed then and said "The man in the woods, he was not armed with such a benign device, I think, and is not so lucky."

  "Hakan, we will need something –a rope, a scarf, to tie her before–"

  Very close, someone cleared his throat. Hakan jumped, and then relaxed as the pudgy man in a well-worn jacket smiled at him.

  "Peace," he said, his words barely intelligible. "A friend of Cory, me."

  Cory sat back on his heels and looked at the man over his shoulder. "You took your time," he said, crankily, to Hakan's ear. "Binders?"

  "Right here," the pudgy man with the wispy mustache said, and knelt down beside him, adding, "Had you come inside, you might have found me an hour ago, you know, before I had to sip any of that treacly punch they expected us to drink . . . ."

  *

  Hakan was wide-eyed, and Kem no less so. Val Con leaned back in his chair and let them think it through. At the far end of the table, Clonak fiddled with his note taker, though Val Con was willing to bet there was nothing in the least wrong with it.

  "Let me understand this," Hakan said finally. "You, and Clonak, and Zhena Pelnara, and–you're all from another world. And Zhena Pelnara broke some kind of law about leaving . . . worlds . . . like Vandar alone, and now there will be . . . mentors here to guide us . . . into the next phase. And you want me to be the go-between– between the mentors and the King, or the assembly or–whoever."

  "That's right." Val Con smiled encouragingly. "I know we give you a lot of information, very quickly. If you agree, we can teach you–and you can teach us."

  Hakan took a breath, eyes bright.

  "He wants it," Miri commented.

  "I–" Hakan started, glanced at Kem, then back to Val Con. "Why me?"

  "Good question. Because already you have seen the impossible, already you . . . stretch and accept new ideas. Also, you act quick and with decision. Not many people could have surprised that zhena, or held her for so long." He, too, glanced at Kem, noting the tightness of her shoulders, the forcibly calm expression and the eyes bright with tears.

  "Kem, you also make a quick decision–to take that weapon, to use it. It is well. This will not be so strange for you–already you are a teacher."

  Her face relaxed slightly, though her eyes still swam.

  "We'll have to talk it over," she said, sending a look to Hakan. He nodded.

  "Yes," Val Con said. "But not too long. I am sorry, but work must start–soon." He rose, gathering Clonak with a glance. "We leave you for an hour. Then we come back and you tell us what you decide."

  "Lunch," Clonak added, "comes to help thought." He left the room, presumably to order lunch, and Val Con turned to follow him.

  "Cory."

  He stopped, and turned toward her. "Kem?"

  "That aircraft Hakan told me about, with the tea that's brewed inside the wall, and the doctor machine you slide people into?"

  "Yes."

  "Is that really true?"

  "Yes," Val Con said gently. "It is really true. And if Hakan wishes it, he may be taught to fly–not that craft, but one like it. You both might, if you wish."

  "Wants that, too," Miri observed.

  Val Con smiled. "That is for the future. For now, you decide the future."

  As Val Con turned, Hakan said something quiet to Kem that sounded like, "We may wish to be two things, I think . . ."

  *

  He paused outside the door to the suite he shared with his lifemate, took a breath, and put his palm firmly against the plate.

  The door slid aside; he stepped into their private parlor–and stopped.

  Across the room, the curtains had been drawn back from the wide window, admitting Surebleak's uncertain dawn. The rocking chair placed at an angle to the window moved quietly, back and forth, back and forth, its occupant silhouetted against the light.

  "Took your time," Miri said.

  He smiled and moved across the room, dropping to his knees by her chair and putting his head in her lap.

  "I am glad to be home, too, cha'trez."

  She laughed, her hand falling onto the back of his neck, fingers massaging gently.

  "Emerging world, huh? Pretty slick way of doing things, Scout Commander."

  "It was the only possible solution," Val Con murmured. "Hakan and Kem will do well, I think, as planetary liaisons."

  "I think so, too."

  "Also, we are to take our child to make her bow to Zhena Trelu, when she is old enough to travel safely."

  "Be glad of the vacation," she said. "You don't mind my saying so, you could use some sleep. No need to rush back so fast."

  "I did not wish to miss the birth of our daughter," he said, drowsy under her fingers.

  "Not a worry. Priscilla says day after tomorrow."

  "So soon?"

  She laughed, and pushed him off her lap. He made a show of sprawling on the rug, and she laughed again, pushing against the arms of the chair.

  Val Con leapt to his feet and helped her rise.

  "I believe I will have a nap," he said. "Will you join me?"

  "Wouldn't miss it for anything."

  ABOUT THE AUTHORS

  Sharon Lee and Steve Miller are the celebrated co-authors of the best-selling Liaden Universe® series and have been writing together since the first "Kinzel" stories hit Fantasy Book in the early 1980s. They started the first Liaden story in 1984 and have published a dozen novels and several dozen short works in that series alone. Along the way they've become fan favorites at SF conventions from California, USA to Fredericton, Canada, with Guest of Honor and Special Guest appearances at PenguiCon, COSine, AlbaCon, Trinoc*con, ConDuit, MarsCon, ShevaCon, BaltiCon, PortConMaine,SiliCon, Second Life Library, and elsewhere.

  They count Meisha Merlin, Ace Books, Phobos, and Buzzy Multimedia among their English language publishers and have several foreign language publishers as well. Their short fiction, written both jointly and singly, has appeared in Absolute Magnitude, Catfantastic, Dreams of Decadence, Fantasy Book, Such a Pretty Face, 3SF, and Amazing

  Their work has enj
oyed a number of award nominations, with Scout's Progress being selected for the Prism Award for Best Futuristic Romance of 2001 and Local Custom finishing second for the same award. Local Custom was published by Buzzy Multimedia as an audio book read by Michael Shanks - StarGate's Daniel. Balance of Trade, appeared in hardcover in February 2004 and hit Amazon.com genre bestseller lists before going on to win the Hal Clement Award as Best YA Science fiction for the year. Their most recent Liaden novels are Crystal Soldier and Crystal Dragon -- and as usual they have a book due out in the spring.

  More: Steve was Vice Chair of the Baltimore in 80 WorldCon bid as well as Founding Curator of Science Fiction for the University of Maryland's SF Research Collection, while Sharon has been Executive Director, Vice President, and President of the Science Fiction Writers of America; together they were BPLAN Virtuals, an ebook publisher in the late 1980s. These backgrounds give them a unique perspective on the science fiction field.