Adventures in the Liaden Universe Part 21

"Are you ready, Clonak?""I am, Shadia."

"Your authorization?"

"The ship is yours."

"As you say."

They'd managed to turn the ship and align it. The idea was simple. They were going to fire what in-system engines they had to decrease the size of their orbit and bring it closer to the more traveled ways of the system. The first time they'd tried, nothing happened, and Clonak had spent another two days tracing wires as Shadia refined the orbit-numbers.

The other necessity was manning the radio, making certain that ship kept an antenna-side to the primary.

They were on a round-the-clock talk-and-listen, and would be until- One of the more raspy bits of s.p.a.ce debris in some time distracted them; it sounded almost as if it were rolling along the side of the hull. There was a ping then, and another.

"If we're in cloud of debris-"

"It doesn't sound too bad," Clonak was saying untruthfully, just as a full-sized clank rang the hull. Then came more of the scratching sound, almost as if the hull were being sandpapered or- "Well," Clonak said softly, and then, again. "Well." He moved to the battery-powered monitor and waved his hand at the other scout. "Come along, Shadia. Let's have a look!"

They crowded round the battery-powered monitor and Clonak once more turned it on and twisted the wiring until a connection was made.

The view was altered strangely with a motley green-brown object...

Belatedly, Shadia grabbed for the gimmicked suit radio and turned it on- "Please prepare to abandon ship. This is Daav yos'Phelium and Ride the Luck. If Scout ter'Meulen is aboard, it would be kind in him to answer-one's lifemate is concerned for his health."

The hull rang, then, as if Ride the Luck had smacked them proper.

"Breath's duty, but you've the luck," Daav yos'Phelium continued conversationally. "The hull is twisted into the engine back here... If I do not receive within the next two Standard Minutes an answer of some sort from the resident pilots, I shall have no choice but to force the hatch. Mark. Don't disappoint me, I beg. You can have no idea of how often I've dreamed of forcing open the hatch of a-"

Here, the pilot's mannerly voice was drowned out by Clonak hammering the hull with one of his discarded pieces of piping.

It was Shadia who thumbed the microphone on the makeshift radio and spoke: "We're here, Pilot.

Thank you."

Certain Symmetry

Adventures in the Liaden Universe #4Sharon Lee and Steve Miller

Certain Symmetry is dedicated to: Angela Gradillas, SinCitian

The Wine of Memory

"WELL, HERE'S AN improvement," the magician said to his apprentice, watching her walk the red wooden counter across the backs of her fingers. The counter reversed itself, returned along the thin, ringless fingers to the end of the hand, over the side, to be deftly caught by that same hand before it had fallen an inch.

Moonhawk looked up with a grin, as proud of mastering this minor bit of hand-skill as she had ever been of learning any of the true-spells taught in Temple. It had taken days of almost constant practice to teach her muscles the rhythm required to move the counter smoothly across her own skin. It was the sort of thing one might do while walking, which was Lute's stated reason for teaching her this skill first. They had been walking for two days.

"I do believe you are ready to learn something a little more difficult," the magician said now, and looked around him.

The road was empty. The road-the track, really, Moonhawk thought-had been empty for two days.

Of all the people on Sintia, only Lute and Moonhawk found the village of Karn a destination of interest.

"The season is early," Lute murmured, seeming, as he so often did, to be reading her very thoughts.

"When summer is high, this road will be crowded with folk who have business in Karn."

"It will?" Moonhawk frowned after her Temple lessons, recalling the long tales of provinces and products she and the rest of the Maidens had been obliged to memorize. Karn had certainly not been on any of those lists.

She sighed and looked up. Lute was watching her with that particular expression that meant he was receiving the G.o.ddess's own pleasure from her ignorance, which he would not, of course, enlighten until she asked him.

"Very well," she said crossly. "Whatever comes out of Karn, Master Lute, that the world should walk for days to have it?"

"Wine, of course," he answered, setting his bag down in the road with a flourish. "The best wine in all the world that is allowed to those not in Temple."

She blinked. "Wine? But wine comes from Mandnel and Barbary..."

"From Astong and Veyru," Lute finished. "Fine vineyards, every one. But the Temples are thirsty. Or greedy. Or both. No drop of wine from those four provinces escapes to a common gla.s.s. That wine comes from Karn."Almost she frowned again, for it was not his place to pa.s.s judgement on the Temples-and by extension the witches who served the G.o.ddess there. But she remembered another lesson from her days as a Maiden in Temple. The wine cellars at Dyan Temple were large and an accurate inventory of vintage and barrel very close to the heart of Merlot, the Temple steward. Inventory was considered the sort of practical, useful work most needed by Maidens who were, perhaps, just a bit prideful of their magics.

There had been one season when Moonhawk had spent a good deal of time in the wine cellars, inventory list to hand.

"Attend me now," Lute said, tossing his cloak behind his shoulders.

Moonhawk moved a few steps closer, her irritation forgotten.

"Perhaps you think you have mastered the counter, but the counter may yet be the wiser, eh?" He smiled, but Moonhawk didn't see. All her attention-and all her witch sense-was focused on his long, clever hands.

"Now we enter the realm of magic, indeed. I am about to reveal to you the method for making a counter disappear." He extended his empty right hand, frowned and flexed the fingers.

"First, naturally enough, one must make a counter appear." And there, held lightly between his first and second fingers was a bright green counter. How it had come there, Lute and his skill knew. Certainly, Moonhawk did not, having neither seen the movement that would have retrieved a cleverly hidden counter nor felt the surge of power that would have been necessary to create a counter. Or the illusion of one.

Lute extended his hand. "Please verify that this is indeed a common wooden counter, such as might be found in any gaming house on Sintia."

She took the disk, felt the smoothness of the paint, the rough edge of wood where the caress of many fingers had worn the paint away. No illusion, this. She handed it back.

"I find it a common wooden counter," she said, for she must also practice the eloquence of his speech, which served, so he said, to divert the attention of an audience and give a magician valuable seconds in which to work. "Such as might be found in any gaming house on the planet."

"Excellent," he said, receiving the token on his callused palm.

"A common counter." He tossed it lightly into the air, caught it on the back of his hand and walked it negligently across his fingers.

"Behaving commonly." He flipped his hand, caught the counter between thumb and forefinger and held it high.

"Now, behold its uncommon attribute."

Moonhawk stifled a curse: There was nothing between the magician's thumb and forefinger but sunshine and cool spring air.

Lute lowered his hand and smiled. "Another lesson that may be practiced as one walks. Though we haven't far to walk now. Tonight, we shall eat one of Veverain's splendid dinners, sample somewhat of last year's vintage and sleep wrapped in soft, sweet-smelling blankets."

Moonhawk stared from him to the red wooden counter in her hand."I'm to practice? Pray what am I to practice, Master Lute? I saw neither pa.s.s nor Witch power."

Lute smiled. "You saw that it was possible." He bent and retrieved his bag. "Come. Veverain's hospitality tugs my heart onward."

THE TRACK CURVED 'round a grove of dyantrees, and there was Karn, tidily laid out along two main streets and a marketplace. To the east of the village lay the fields; to the west, the winter livestock pens.

Behind the village rose a hill, showing terrace upon terrace of leafless brown vines.

There were folk about on the streets, and Lute's stride lengthened. Moonhawk stretched her own long legs to keep the pace, the red counter forgotten for the moment in the pocket of her cloak.

"Ho, Master Lute!" A stocky man in a leather ap.r.o.n raised a hand. "Spring is here at last!"

"And not a moment too soon," Lute agreed with a smile, crossing the street to where the man stood in the tavern's doorway, Moonhawk a step behind him. "How came the village through the winter?"

The man looked sober. "We lost a few to the cold-oldsters or infants, all. The rest of us came through well enough. Except for-" The man's face changed, and Moonhawk caught the edge of his distress against her Witch sense.

"You're bound for Veverain's?" he asked, distress sharpening.

"Of course I am bound for Veverain's! Am I a fool, to pa.s.s by the best food, the snuggest bed and the most gracious hostess in the village?"

"Not a fool," the man returned quietly, "only short of news."

Lute went entirely still. Moonhawk, slanting a glance at his face, saw his mouth tighten, black eyes abruptly intense.

"Our Lady of the Snows has taken Veverain?" he asked, matching the other's quiet tone.

The man moved his hand-describing helplessness. "Not-That is to say-Veverain. Ah, G.o.ddess take me for a muddlemouth!" He lifted a hand and ran his fingers through his thinning hair.

"It was Rowan went out to feed the stock one morning in the thick of winter, and when he didn't come back for the noon meal, Veverain went out to find him." He paused to draw a deep, noisy breath. "He'd never gotten to the pens. A tree limb-heavy, you understand, with the ice-had come down and crushed him dead."

Lute closed his eyes. Moonhawk raised her hand and traced the sign of Pa.s.sing in the air.

"May he be warm, in the Garden of the G.o.ddess."

The tavern-keeper looked at her, startled. Lute opened his eyes, hands describing one of his elegant gestures, calling attention to her as if she were a rare gemstone.

"Behold, one's apprentice!" he said, but Moonhawk thought his voice sounded strained. "Moonhawk, here is the excellent Oreli, proprietor of the justly renowned tavern, Vain Disguise."

Oreli straightened from his lean to make a somewhat inexpert bow. When he straightened, his eyes were rounder than ever."Lady."

Moonhawk inclined her head. "Keeper Oreli. Blessings upon you."

He swallowed, but before he could make answer, Lute was speaking again.

"When did this tragedy occur, Friend Oreli? You give me to believe the house is closed. Is Veverain yet in mourning?"

"Mourning," the other man repeated and half-laughed, though the sound was as sad as any Moonhawk had ever heard. "You might say mourning." He sighed, spreading his hands, palm up, for them both to see.

"Rowan died just past of mid-winter. Veverain ... Veverain shut the house up, excepting only the room they had shared. She turned us away, those of us who were her friends, or Rowan's-turned us away, shunned our company and our aid. And she just sits in that house by herself, Master Lute. Sits there alone in the dark. Her sister's man tends the animals; her niece tilled the kitchen garden and put in the early vegetables. They say they never see her; that she will not even open the door to kin-and you know, you know, Master Lute!-that Rowan would never have wanted such a thing!"

"A convivial man, Rowan," Lute murmured. "He and Veverain were well-matched in that."

"Is she still alive?" Moonhawk asked, somewhat impatiently. "Her kin say that they never see her, that she will not open the door. How are they certain that she has not been Called, or that she has not taken some injury?"

"We see the hearth smoke," Oreli said. "We-the care basket is left full by the door in the morning.

Some mornings, the basket and the food is still there. Often enough, the basket is empty. She is alive, that we do know. Alive, but dead to life."

Moonhawk frowned. "She has been taking care baskets since Solstice?"

Oreli raised a hand. "A long time, I know. The baskets usually are not sent so long. Forgive me, Lady, but you are a stranger here; you do not know how it was ... how Veverain cared for us all. When our daughter was ill, we had some of Veverain's baskets-hot soup, fresh bread, tiny wheels of her special cheese-you remember Veverain's cheeses, eh, Master Lute?"

"With fondness and antic.i.p.ation," Lute replied, somewhat absently. He glanced at the sky. "The day grows old," he murmured.

Abruptly, he bowed to the tavern-keeper, cloak swirling.

"Friend Oreli, keep you well. I hope to visit your fine establishment once or twice during our stay.

Immediately, however, the duty of friendship calls. I to Veverain, to offer what aid I might."

"You must try, of course," Oreli said. "When she turns you away, remember that the Disguise serves a hearty supper. And that Mother Duneper will gladly house you and your apprentice."

Lute inclined his head. "I will remember. But, first, let us be certain that Veverain will refuse us." He turned, cloak billowing, and strode off down the street down the street at such a pace that Moonhawk had to run a few steps to catch him.

* * *VEVERAIN'S HOUSE was at the bottom of the village; a long, sprawling place, enclosed by a neat fence, shaded in summer by two well-grown dyantrees. The trees, like their kin at the bend in the track, showed a pale green fuzzing along their limbs; at the roots of each was a scattering of bark and dead branches-winter's toll. When the dyantrees came to leaf, then it would be spring, indeed.

Lute pushed open the whitewashed gate and went up the graveled pathway, Moonhawk on his heels.

The yard they pa.s.sed through seemed neglected, ragged; as if those who had care of it had not come forth with rakes and barrows to clear away the wrack of winter and make the land ready for spring.

There were some indications that neglect was not the yard's usual state; Moonhawk spied mounds which surely must be flower-beds under drifts of dead leaves, more leaves half-concealing a bird-pool, rocks set here and there with what might prove to be art, once the debris was cleared away.

Gravel crunching under his boots, Lute strode on, to Moonhawk's eye un.o.bservant. He was also silent, which rare state spoke to her more eloquently of his worry than any grandiose phrase.

The path curved 'round the side of the house, and here were the neat rows of the kitchen garden put in by the niece, a blanket over the more tender seedlings, to shield them from the cold of the coming night.

A few steps more, and the path ended at a single granite step up to a roofed wooden porch. A black-and-white cat sat tidily on the porch, companioning a basket covered with a blue checked cloth.

Lute paused on tine step, bent and offered his finger to the cat in greeting.