Dead Men Dream
Sharon Lee and Steve Miller
ONE
Even dead men have to eat.
It fell to Khana to forage for two such, and he was pleased to do so, for the necessity put him out among people, allowed him opportunity for exercise, and to improve his language.
This morning's foraging was nearly done. He had eaten his breakfast, and had the second in-hand, needing only to show the ID to the lad behind the counter and be on his way. However, he had another mission, aside food, and he asked about Malvern's continued absence.
A smile was his first answer, and Khana was once more surprised to find that this open betrayal of emotion was a. . .comfort.
"Don’t you worry," the boy—Miki, according to the badge on his shirt—said cheerfully, "she’ll be back after she finishes her tour. She’s a Reservist, and they call her up now and then."
Khana moved his head slowly side to side—this was a new gesture for him, and he feared that this was one of the times when he had failed of accurately displaying nuance, for the boy reached out and patted his arm, as one offering comfort.
"Oh no, it's not a sad thing! She did the work for twenty years and plus, but even once you’re done, you’re not really done, if you know what I mean?"
The boy was—yes, a boy; surely younger than Bar Jan, though much larger. He was Terran of the type the InfoBooklet claimed as "Port Chavvy Born, " his hair dark and long, and dark hair also on the lower part of his pale face.
"I mean," Khana said slowly in his careful new-learned Terran, "that I do not know what you mean. As you know—" here he waved his ticket that was at once ID, room key, permission to eat on Chavvy's cred, and entree to those places he was permitted to go on station, including this kitchen, "I am not from around here, myself."
"Oh, oh, right, I forgot! Sorry! You're a reg'lar and always glad to see you, and I just—well. Been here my whole life, is what. I forget things is different elseplace. Some day, maybe, I’ll land on a planet!"
There came a chime from a piece of equipment behind him.
"Be a sec," he said, turning to open a small baking unit, and using the paddle to slide out a pan of cheese muffins.
"There, let those cool a bit," he said, coming back to the counter, and bestowing another smile on Khana.
"See, when you’re born here, or if you take the course and go for Port Resident—gotta swear to do that—but it’s the same thing, really, 'cause that means you’re took care of if you die here, and Port Chavvy admits you live here if you go offstation and get in trouble Out There." He snapped his fingers, a gesture to which Khana could attach no ready meaning.
"I remember! It's called citizen, Out There. So being a citizen of the Port means you got responsibilities, and you gotta do service for three years wherever the Port needs you. After you're done your three years, though, you're on Reserve—a Reservist. That means you get called up in every little while, so somebody else can have a break, or to keep what you know fresh. So here's Chief Malvern, she served for seven turns—she wears those little pins, you might've seen ’em. Officially, she can’t be made to serve again full-time, so now they just call her up whenever they need her. An' that's where she is now—called up to fix something. I mean, Malvern knows it all—done all the spots, is what we say—and knows Port Chavvy inside out."
"I see," Khana said, bowing slightly in thanks. It was not done on Port Chavvy, the nuanced bow, there was none to read them, after all. However, it was allowed, the small inclination, as a thanks.
"Is it permitted to ask the nature of your own service?"
Miki's pale face reddened, but there, he was a comely lad for all his size and it went well on him.
"Oh, well—I mean—me, I’m training on the fuel supply systems and such, but part-time dock help for the A deck, that’s my official service spot. We don’t have all that many big ones come in, I mean the last was that Liaden. . .oh."
Miki stopped, took a breath, glanced over his shoulder at the pan of cooling muffins, and looked back to Khana, cheeks still becomingly pink.
"So eny-how, yeah, we’re trying to work out a service option that’ll let me combine the fuel system stuff with the A Deck stuff. But, see, Chief Malvern, she has so much time in grade. . .you know what that means?"
Khana thought of Malvern, her modest uniform impeccably presented, always alert. She had the bearing of a commander, even if it was only a commander of pastry and hot food. That she had been a leader, he did not doubt.
"I think," Khana said, careful of his pronunciation, "that this is related to the concept I was taught as melant’i."
"Might be, might be," Miki allowed, "but yeah, so she gets the call ‘cause even though she’s not in the chain of command these days, she’s the one who knows it all—all the systems, I mean, and how they work together, and—"
"Hey, Miki!" came a voice from behind. Startled, Khana turned to see a woman in a Port Chavvy volunteer duty vest waving an ID card. She gave him a nod, which was mannerly, here. Khana returned it.
"Them cheese muffins ready to be 'preciated?"
"Sure are!" the boy snatched a carry box, and turned to the tray he had put to cool. "How many?"
"Just the one today, they got me workin' solo, inventoryin' the aid closets. I'll be grabbing a cup of caf on the way out, too."
"You got it." Miki handed the box over, the worker slid the card through the reader, and that quick was gone, stopping briefly at the entrance to draw a cup of the hot, bitter drink that on Port Chavvy served as "work tea."
Khana turned back to the counter, thinking that he had taken up enough of the lad's time, but Miki wasn't done yet.
"So yeah, Malvern, she knows Port Chavvy inside out, like they say. An' she was right here behind this counter, doin' the dinner prep, setting the breads up to rise and all, when her comm buzzes. She listens for maybe two minutes, puts it away in her pocket and says to Baydee, 'I been attached for a few days, Hon. Keep the griddles in tune for me, right? And call upstairs to ask himself to tend to my breads.'"
"So yeah, it was sudden." Miki frowned, and leaned forward a little. "If this is rude, you just tell me so, all right, and no offense to me, nor meant to you, but I wonder—your friend. Ain't seen him for a while again. He doin' right fine? No troubles? Malvern worried, him bein' so broke up like he was."
This, Khana reminded himself, was not the seeking of advantage that it most certainly would have been in the society he had moved in before his summary death. No, this was kindness, very nearly kin-care, and was properly answered as such.
So.
"My. . .friend," Khana said carefully. "He grows stronger, though there is still pain. He was made sad when we last came here together, to find that Malvern was absent." He hesitated, wondering if he had said enough to satisfy—and it appeared that he had.
Miki nodded. "Yeah, everybody misses her. You tell 'im—your friend—that we miss him, too, and we're lookin' to see him again, when he's ready. An' you know what? I noticed he favors that dark loaf that none of us can get quite the way Malvern gets it? You tell your friend there's only one other baker on all Port Chavvy has Malvern's touch with that loaf. He's a top chef, an' it's hard to get him down here, but he'll be comin' to give us a hand alt-shift, and we'll be havin' the dark on hand, startin' tomorrow." He paused, and added. "Me 'n Baydee are gonna be standin' by as helpers, so might be we'll catch the way of it, this time."
That they had noticed so much, Khana told himself severely, was not dangerous. It was kindness, again, and he schooled himself to receive it as it was given.
"Thank you," he said. "I will tell him." He stopped short of saying that his friend would be pleased, and was saved from trying to introduce another question by a noisy bustle at the entrance to the Cantina.
Khana turned his head, espying a full work crew of ten, and looked back to Miki.
"Yeah, looks like I'm on," the lad said with a grin. "You take care now."
He turned down counter, raising a hand and calling out a greeting to "Reeves."
Khana took his carry box, and went out into the corridor.
#
It had become Khana's habit to take the long way home. Even on those infrequent occasions when Bar Jan accompanied him, they took the back hallways, his companion pronouncing them interesting with such sincerity that it had taken Khana two trips to realize that the most interesting thing about them was the scarcity of other travelers.
The benefit that Khana took from walking the back hallways arose from the fact that the route between Cantina and wayroom encompassed very nearly eight thousand of his short steps. The literature provided by the Port had suggested that the planet-born achieve ten thousand steps a day in order to retain a modicum of physical fitness while on station. Given the circumstances of their residence on Port Chavvy, it was unlikely that Khana would ever walk on a planet again. However, he dreamed—of flowers, and of Liad's green-blue day-sky, the taste of fresh air. He had visited the E Deck Atrium, once, and there had been flowers, trees, grass. At the time, he had been distressed by the lack of a sky, and the taste, still, of station air. Lately, he had been thinking that he might visit the atrium again.
Though not today.
There was an unusual amount of traffic in the back halls today, groups of people wearing gray overalls with the Port Chavvy logo on them. Some were inspecting doors and locks, others were occupied with the various cabinets and closets. He passed one worker who was staring into a closet lavishly decorated with the outlines of what must, Khana thought, be tools, masks, flasks. While some of the silhouettes were filled by the objects they represented, most—were not. The worker shook her head, and pulled a note-taker out of her pocket as he went by.
"Good thing we ain't had an emergency, s'all I can say," he heard her mutter.
At the intersection of hallways where his necessity took him to the right, there was a cluster of workers around several open closets, note-takers in some hands while others stood at ease, talking. Khana paused, looking for the best route through the crowd. One man looked up, saw him, and waved cheerfully.
"You come on ahead!" he called, and to his comrades, "Hey, make some room, why not? Commerce has gotta go forth!"
This was apparently a pleasantry, for those of the group laughed, or grinned, all in good humor, and arranged themselves so that Khana had a clear path through.
"Thank you," he said, loud enough, he hoped, to be heard by all.
"No problem," returned the man who had first noticed him. "We ain't paid to block the halls."
One of the inconveniences of traveling the back corridors was the lack of public newsfeeds. There was only one on the route between the wayrooms and the Cantina. Despite that, there were rarely more than three or four people paused to read the news, so Khana could be assured of finding a place where the screen was not blocked by tall Terrans.
Today, he was the only one attending the news at this hour. He put his box on the floor at his feet and looked up at the screen. Most often, the news had nothing to do with him, but it gave him practice reading Terran, and also gave him something of real life to take to Bar Jan on those frequent days when he did not venture beyond the wayroom.
The background news-view today was of starry space, courtesy of the top-class restaurant he’d never been to up in the high decks. He glimpsed, Oncoming trouble? as a brief headline, but the colors changed then, and he saw he was fortunate to have arrived just as the scroll was finishing. There came a space of blank screen, followed by the Port Chavvy logo, and the scroll began again, from the top.
First was General Port News: there were corridor closures in the business section, a part of the station Khana had never seen. The five year inspection and repair of the water delivery system to the Administrative Level was scheduled for tonight alt-shift; offices were to be closed during the work.
Next came an announcement from Port Administration, and this—so seldom did the news impact his life that Khana read the announcement, and the next item was scrolling up before he realized that something—advantageous—was about to happen.
The next item summarized the findings of the recent audit of the station's shielding; the next, a list of Amended Departures; and, last, the daily update on the comet.
Khana scanned them all impatiently, waiting for the scroll to repeat, so he could read that interesting item again, to be certain that he had read correctly, and that—there!
Allotment Increases for Awaiting Rescue, Transport, or Skillful Habitation: Eight percent base rate; four percent volunteer rate; one percent facilitator rate. Medical stipend increase six percent. All increases effective next pay-in.
Khana's breath caught. He drew at base rate. Bar Jan received the medical stipend through his next appointment at the clinic. If he was declared "fit" then he also would draw at base rate.
Once Bar Jan was "fit," Khana would be free to apply himself to the volunteer listings, something that had been beyond his reach, and that rate has also increased. Combining those resources, they might move into larger quarters in the ARTS hallways where their current wayroom was located. The potential to improve their situation was unexpectedly exciting.
Khana's gaze had still been on the screen, though he had seen nothing but his own excited thoughts until the word UPDATE in bright red letters caught his attention.
The same image he’d seen before courtesy of the Long View restaurant appeared.
The trajectory of the inbound comet has changed. Attempts are being made to push it further from Port Chavvy. There is no danger to the station; the adjustments are being made merely to increase the distance between the comet and the station during its passage.
Khana stared at the screen as the image magnification picked up. Comets, asteroids, meteors—he’d not had much to do with space objects while caring for his master’s needs, and before that, as a youth training to care for his master, he’d had only Liad’s quiet skies overhead and his delm’s admonition to always watch the skies, that the weather never show Rinork’s heir to disadvantage.
Khana shook himself from the hypnotic image and the news scrolls. If all was well, all was well, and Bar Jan was waiting for his breakfast and his news.
* * *
Shanna was late returning with the meal.
In the downtime between the fifth and sixth sets of exercise, he weighed whether Shanna was late enough that he must begin to fear himself abandoned.
Again.
Not that there was any fault to find, if Shanna had decided to leave. The only question that might be asked was why he had waited so long. Well. There was also the question of why he had remained at all.
Surely, it would have been the better plan to have departed when Delm Rinork had declared Shanna's master dead, and ordered the body stripped of everything of value. Rinork by contract was bound to return servants of the clan to Liad, should their service end while off-world. Not even Rinork could lay blame on Shanna. She had been displeased with him, but Shanna knew the way around her anger. If he had exerted himself, abased himself, only a little—Rinork would have honored the contract, and taken Shanna home to Liad, where his own delm would most assuredly have been angry, though not so angry that Shanna need fear for his life.
The timer declared his rest interval done. He stood once more, made sure of the weights on his wrists, and began the next set.
Six sets of six was the rule, three times a day, until he felt that had become too easy. Tomorrow, he would promote himself to seven sets of seven. His goal was to achieve ten sets of ten by the time he was to return to the clinic for his next evaluation.
It was, by any accounting, a modest enough goal.
If Shanna were gone, he would need to do better.
Fear interrupted the working of the weights.
If Shanna were gone, he, himself, had no ID—Shanna had needed both in order to collect two meals. He, who had stayed in the room they shared, had nothing to prove his status with regard to the station, which fed him, and clothed him, and provided his medical care.
Swallowing, he forced himself to take up the interrupted rhythm of the weight work. There was no advantage to Shanna in keeping his ID, he told himself. The assertion did little to soothe him. Perhaps if he had known less about unscrupulous means, and the justifications for using them. . .
He worked through the prescribed routine, counting meticulously. When he had done, he sat down and removed the weights. Then he closed his eyes.
Shanna's absence, he told himself, had been longer than average, but not worrisomely so. He was hungry, that was what fretted him. Hunger made him impatient.
As did so many other things.
He opened his eyes and he brought his hands up for inspection. One was well-shaped and seemly, the fingers long and straight, the skin gold-toned and supple. The other—was a nightmare, wizened, with blotched pink skin. The reconstructed fingers were long and straight, but the merest pegs, all but strengthless muscles not yet fully reconstituted.
Which reminded him that he had yet to work with the pressure ball. Usually, he did his first session after breakfast was eaten. Today, with breakfast late—no.
No, he corrected himself. The book; recall the book—change is opportunity, so the book had it, a curiously Liaden sentiment, given a special poignancy by circumstances.
He rose and crossed the small room, opened the drawer where he kept the pressure ball when it was not in use, and took it up in his ruined—no, he caught himself up once more. Not ruined. Rebuilt. His hand had been rebuilt, even now it was useful for some small tasks. It would become more so, did he continue with his exercises.
So. Today, he had been given the opportunity to have an extra session with the pressure ball, thus speeding his healing.
There, that was positive. The book also taught the importance of a positive viewpoint. See the benefit of the situation, then work to improve it, that was the book's advice. This placed one in a position of strength and allowed a survey of circumstance through eyes untainted by anger or fear.
He worked the ball, and turned to consider the place in which he found himself.
It was a small room—which was, he reminded himself, good, for there was less for Shanna to maintain. The space was orderly, neat, and clean, for Shanna would never tolerate a room that was at sixes and twelves. Everything must be where he could immediately lay hand on it, to best to serve his master.
So, a small room, two beds that folded into the walls during waking hours; a table and two chairs; an upholstered chair; the set of drawers. An alcove next to the table held a cool-box, a tap into the station's water supply, and a single heating coil so that they might make tea, or warm leftover food without having to go out into the common area.
Next to the drawers was a discreet door which opened onto a basic accommodation, with a sonic shower.
How had he, once the named heir to the delm of Clan Rinork, come to occupy this tidy, tiny space, and stand grateful for it?
Ah, but that had to do with his—error.
In the realm of errors, his had been—spectacular. There, that followed the book's advice.
He had goaded a trader—a lad scarcely past halfling, his junior by several Standards, adopted son to one of the most well-connected and canny of the masters of trade—he had pursued and goaded this young trader into a duel.
Had all gone his way, he would have killed the young trader, the dueling set he had proposed to use having been tuned to guarantee such a result. But the young trader, as the challenged, had the right to choose the weapons of Balance, and he had chosen. . .
Wisely. A canny lad, that one. He would do excellently—well. ven'Deelin's very apprentice. How could it be otherwise?
Stinks hammers and starbars, seven paces and closing! We shall have a smash to remember!
Wryly, he looked at his hand, moved his rebuilt arm.
Smash. An apt descriptor, smash.
The error then compounded itself, for he might have cried off before ever it came to smashing—his seconds had argued for it, and the boy's second, as well. But, no. By then, he had crossed into that state past anger, long lost to reason. Everything he had wanted in those moments was to kill Jethri Gobelyn ven'Deelin. He had been so enraged that it did not seem possible that he would fail in that goal.
He realized that he had stopped squeezing the ball, and resumed.
Well, he had failed. And if he had succeeded, he had no doubt—now—that the witnessing crowd would have carried him to the nearest airlock and spaced him. Odd, that the price of both failure and success was the same.
He might have died in truth from failure, had Port Chavvy not proved efficient. There was a wounded man on the docks? Port Chavvy gathered the injured to itself.
Meanwhile, his erstwhile victim, now victor—did not pursue Balance and call the minions of law down upon him. No, the victor, and those who had witnessed the affair—Terrans, very nearly all!—declared that there had been an accident, which had left the victor with a head wound, ably doctored by a medic from one of the docked ships, and himself, smashed. Questioned, not one deviated from this interpretation of the event, and so did Port Chavvy administration record it.
An accident.
The victim of an accident, he had lived some little while longer, until his mother and his delm had arrived to declare him dead.
He paused, having lost his count, looked down at the ball gripped in his fingers, and began again.
Port Chavvy was situated deep in a backwater spiral arm. It was near to trade lanes menaced by pirates and worlds of chancy circumstance, far from Liad. Liaden culture, tradition—Liaden law—meant nothing to Port Chavvy. The notion that a single person might create a death merely by announcing that it was so—that was not a notion to which Port Chavvy subscribed.
Of travelers and crew abandoned by their ships, Port Chavvy was well-versed, and being so far from Liad, and not in the least Liaden, Port Chavvy had fashioned its response to those unfortunates not out of Liaden Balance and questions of melant'i, but from the cloth of Terran hospitality.
Port Chavvy, confronted with someone who might bleed to death, stopped the bleeding.
Port Chavvy, confronted with someone who might suicide while despondent and under medication, mounted a watch comprised of volunteers and medics.
Port Chavvy, having seen someone on the path to recovery and judged to no longer present a threat to themselves, provided sleep-learning courses in Terran. Once proficiency was established, Port Chavvy released him to the lower decks and the ARTS halls, first providing ID, a packet including clothing, toiletries, the book, and the number of the wayroom that he would now be pleased to call his home.
When he had been alive, he would have laughed at the idea, but death—death, he discovered, provided a clarifying influence. In fact, he was pleased to call this compact and orderly space his home, and—
The door made the high-pitched squeak that meant someone had shown it their ID. It opened to admit Shanna, balancing boxes between hands, and looking practically disheveled.
* * *
Turning into their corridor, Khana saw he was later than he’d thought—the color of the wall was shading subtly from blue to green. When the color was solid, it would be Green Shift. The ARTS—that was, those Awaiting Rescue, Transport or Skilled Habitation—were housed in the older section of Port Chavvy’s under-warrens. Five of their nineteen cohabitants were gathered in a wide space designated as "the lounge." It was a gathering place for those who then departed for a group activity, as well as a place to socialize, and the place where the Session was convened.
He had a time or two lingered at the lounge when returning from the Cantina while Bar Jan slept off his pain meds in the early days of their time here, finding it a place where, all being in the ARTS community after all, there was a type of collegiality one might find backstairs at a delm’s home, an assumption of being in the same struggle, day by day. His fellow residents had gently corrected his pronunciations, the sleep learner apparently being academic on some words and phrases, not having the local accent, timing, or diction.
There was a corner near the intersection of halls where singers often gathered. This hour, there were five, four engaged in a complex round robin song-sing. All Terran, they nodded, smiled, and allowed him to pass without offering a place to stand. Khana felt a pang. They had used to offer, but he had not once in the twenty-nine days since Bar Jan had been freed from the med wards accepted this extension of that backstairs feeling. Why should the singers continue to open themselves to rebuff?
He continued across the lounge, hurrying now that he realized the time.
"There's the man himself," came a voice from his left, and here was Femta approaching, a meal box in his hand. Khana paused.
Femta rarely spoke, and, having caught Khana's attention, apparently felt no need to speak further. He offered the box, and when Khana did not reach out a hand to accept it, committed himself to a smile.
"Forgive me," Khana said. "I do not. . .understand."
Femta nodded and produced more words.
"Extras from last night. Kitchen help had them boxed, a little care because your friend's been distant. Time they came looking, you'd left, so they asked me to bring them, if you would not mind." The voice was oddly without accent, subdued, unobtrusive, like the person.
"Ah," Khana said, and took a breath. More kindness, he told himself, and offered a smile in return, as he took the additional box.
"Thank you for your care," he said, and added, perhaps not truthfully. "My friend will be grateful."
"No trouble for me," Femta said. "Hope to see your friend out and around soon."
With that, he turned and moved away into the lounge.
Khana shifted his various burdens cautiously. They were a little unwieldy, but it wasn't far now. He continued on his way.
#
A slight figure was turning away from the door to their room as Khana arrived at the top of the hall. Fear spiked, for bounty hunters were not to be discounted, though it had not yet been a relumma, and—
The figure raised her head, and fear evaporated, for it was Joolia, another of their group, so slim and small she appeared Liaden.
The smile she gave him was pure Terran, delight writ large on her pointed face, and touching her dark eyes with warmth.
"There you are!" she said. "I came looking for you, then I didn't want to press the bell, in case your friend was resting."
"Here I am," Khana agreed, smiling in his turn. "Why are you looking for me?"
That was, perhaps, unfortunately phrased. Joolia's face grew solemn.
"I need you—or, well! I need your help organizing the common supply room, if you have time? Ferlandy asked me to do it, and I can do it, but it'll take some time, it's that messy. So, I need a helper, and I'd seen you that time sorting the lounge closet into order, so quick I don't think anybody else noticed—and I thought—that's who I need for this!"
She looked doubtfully at the boxes in his arms.
"Unless you're busy?"
Khana bowed his head. This, too, reminded of the backstairs, the acknowledgment that one’s duty came first but that the sharing of burdens made all lives easier, all more worthy. It was an equality he was amazed to find offered, and was happy to accept.
"I am pleased to assist," he said, "but I must bring my friend his breakfast. I have gotten behind time."
"No worries," Joolia said. "I've got some things to take care of myself. Say we meet at the supply room in an hour, will that do for you? Give us time to do the job and still get to the Session."
"Yes," said Khana, unaccountably warmed. "That will do for me. Thank you."
He moved toward the door, fumbling for the ID card in his jacket pocket. The boxes shifted, and he twisted, making a recover, but—
"Here, let me," said Joolia, dipping a slender hand into his pocket and pulling the ID out. "I'll open the door for you."
She waved the card at the reader, and stepped back as the door began to open. Dropping the card back in his pocket, she turned away.
"I'll see you soon," she said.
#
Within, Bar Jan stood dressed, his good arm visible to what might be a public view, his day slacks on as well as his socks and mocs.
This was good, Khana thought, as he carried the boxes to the table. Occupational Therapy Tech Salmoa had assigned Bar Jan an occupation: to take care of his own needs. True, he should also have been coming to breakfast these last seven days and more, but balanced against that lack was the fact that Bar Jan dressed himself every day, and was meticulous in the exercises meant to strengthen his shattered arm and hand.
That it was difficult for Bar Jan to do these things, Khana had no doubt, for he had seen the sweat on the other man's face.
The exercise was also difficult for Khana, and he had to restrain himself from merely taking the task over. It had been part of his duty, to dress his lord, and to arrange matters, so far as he was able, that his master was in no way impeded in his business.
As he opened the boxes, he recalled his father, who had trained him in his duty, many Standards past: "You must take daily exercise, in order to properly serve. You must be strong, stronger than your lord, though you will never allow him to know it."
There was no doubt who was stronger, now, and that Bar Jan was aware. And how strange it was, that he must now use his strength in support of his master's struggles, and encourage him to do for himself.
"What is all this, Shanna?" Bar Jan was at the table, staring down, the exercise ball held in his spindly fingers. The rest of the arm from shoulder to wrist was still enmeshed in the healing shroud. In public, he wore a white second-hand lab jacket, the front sealed to his throat. In the privacy of their room, he wore a long-sleeved shirt, likewise sealed tightly. Khana pinned both unneeded sleeves neatly out of the way, which was certainly beyond Bar Jan's abilities, no matter his determination, and they both felt the better for it.
"The dinner staff made a box for you. Out of care," he added, because care had not been often present in Bar Jan's life, even between kin.
"Do they think we are desperate?" It seemed that the question was posed in simple curiosity, rather than anger, or insult. Khana was pleased to encourage this mood, so he did not mention that, compared to many on Port Chavvy, they were desperate. Instead, he focused on the lesson Miki had given him.
"The kitchen staff, they marked your absence from recent meals, and they felt concern, that your wound was paining you, or that you were unwell, or unhappy. Look, they have sent five of the cheese rolls you favor. The gift is thoughtful."
It was also practical, Khana saw. Each of the cheese rolls was individually wrapped, as were the two dense fiber rolls, with attending jars of jells. The food would keep for days in the carry box.
"So," he finished, looking up to Bar Jan. "These are extra, so that you may follow the tech's advice to feed yourself up!"
That of course was said in Terran, the Liaden—even in flexible Low Liaden—being nonsensical.
"I of course strive to follow all of the med tech's excellent advice," Bar Jan said, in a curious flat tone that was neither irony nor pique.
Khana looked at him carefully, before attending the table again. He placed the breakfast box next to the book that Bar Jan kept to hand—the book provided by Port Chavvy to all of its dependents, Crisis Survivorship: Managing Massive Life Changes, by Professor Linda Jeef Marteen. The volume was dual-language—Trade and Terran. Khana had read it, but Bar Jan—Bar Jan was studying it, performing the various closed and open-eyed meditations from its pages, and sometimes checking a dictionary tablet, that usually with a scowl.
"You are behind on your meal," Khana said. "Eat now, and I will tell you the news before I must go to an—" He paused, unsure of how to describe the task for which Joolia had requested his assistance—"an appointment."
"An appointment," still that odd, uninflected tone. Bar Jan put the ball aside, and sat to table. Spork in hand, he looked up.
"Shanna, may I have my ID card?"
"Certainly!" He pulled it from his pocket and placed it atop the book.
"My thanks." Bar Jan murmured. "So, there is news?"
"The comet continues our way," Khana began. "The station is attempting a protocol to increase our margin of safety. This from the newsboard. The audit of the meteor shields has been completed. It seems that they are more vulnerable than anticipated to the unique threat of this comet, which has both density and mass as well as velocity and rotation. The combination of these might breach the shields."
Khana paused, but Bar Jan seemed utterly intent on his meal.
"A number of ships at dock have filed for early departure, one assumes from concerns regarding the comet's pass."
"They will be safer undocked, if the station is struck," Bar Jan said, with something like his old authority. Khana blinked, and then recalled that he had been fascinated by the practical business of ships, which his mother and delm had deplored.
"Is there other news?" Bar Jan asked, glancing up from his meal.
"Ah! There is indeed. The Port has increased the ARTS allotments. Base rate increases eight percent; medical stipend increases six percent; the volunteer rate increases by four percent; facilitators will receive a one percent increase."
"Eight percent—" Bar Jan had always been good at his numbers. Now, he lifted his eyebrows, doing, so Khana supposed, sums in his head.
"You might achieve your own suite, Shanna."
He had not thought of that, and he paused to do so before shrugging it aside.
"What I had thought," he said, as Bar Jan finished his meal and closed the box, "is that we might together achieve a larger space. I daresay that will be best for both of us."
"Yes, you do dare say," Bar Jan answered–-angry words, but there was no heat in his voice. "Always planning, Shanna, and giving direction."
Seated as he was, Khana bowed, his temper engaged by this flat-voiced accusation. In all the years he had served Bar Jan chel'Gaiban, he had never felt such anger as this. It would have been inappropriate, given their melant'is.
But here, where there was no melant'i, no Code–
"Indeed, yes, I gave direction, and was sometimes fortunate to see you accept it!" The voice was hard–-angry. It was a moment before Khana realized that it was his voice, and by that time he was sweeping on.
"When you bothered to take my direction, you wore the proper suit at the proper time, the proper shoes, and boots. When you bothered to take my direction, your mother noticed you with more favor and less anger. I directed your choices, from hair shine to socks, for that was my duty! As for planning–-only see the success of your planning! You might have died in truth, save for my planning, my direction, my appeal—"
He stopped, his breath caught in horror. Bar Jan was standing, he saw, and realized that he was, as well.
There was a way to heal this, Khana thought rapidly. He need only admit his error, abase himself, and speak mildly.
He took a careful breath, averting his eyes.
"Master–-" he began–-and stopped, because Bar Jan had raised his good hand.
He was in pain, Khana saw, marking the damp forehead, the tight mouth, the narrowed eyes. He was too frail for. . .
Bar Jan sighed softly. "I have waited too long for this," he said. "It must be acknowledged, and it is mine to do."
He took a deep, deliberate breath, and in that moment the cheap station clothes were the business attire of a lord; a man of substance and melant'i.
Then, he bowed.
It was. . .a simple bow, carefully flensed of years of hauteur. It was a bow Khana had never in his years of duty seen from one of Rinork, much less from the heir himself.
It was the bow between equals, with an additional careful tip of the head, which acknowledged that a debt was owed.
* * *
END OF SAMPLE
Buy this Ebook to finish reading this story.