A Liaden Universe® Constellation, Volume 4

by Sharon Lee

  “Peace,” he heard her say, in a calm, carrying voice. “Child, stand down. We are not here to hurt you.”

  • • • • • •

  It was a terrible tale the lad, Jax Ton, told them—starting with his own family’s ruin and destruction—a small clan, a small business located on the edge of Mid-Port and Low, in the section known as Twilight. To throw suspicion off of themselves, a neighbor had given information against them for smuggling and human trafficking. It wasn’t true, Jax Ton said hotly; his delm would never have stood for it, but the Port Authority didn’t care to hear the truth, so long as they put the fear of retribution into guilty and innocent alike. The clan was broken; the elders arrested, and Jax Ton—Jax Ton had fled. Into Low Port. Growing up in the Twilight, he had friends in Low Port, or so he thought, until his friends tried to sell him and he ran again, not to Mid-Port, where the proctors waited, but deeper into Low Port, where he found two children, starving, and spent his last coins to feed them.

  Over time—Jax Ton wasn’t entirely clear on how much time—three relumma? A year?—more children had gathered to him, usually an elder child with a younger in their care. They were eight, now, and Jax Ton; they had needed a safe place, a place that they, that was—

  “Defensible,” Serana said with a nod, looking ’round at the ring of tense faces. “You have done well. These walls will stand against a siege engine.”

  In fact, Don Eyr thought, looking at those same tense faces, they had done well, indeed. The faces were grubby, perhaps, but not distressingly so, and while they were dressed in a motley of garments, those were, by local standards, clean. Thin, yes, but not desperately so. Wary, but not feral. Or not quite feral. No doubt, the elder ones were accomplished thieves.

  There was nothing here that he had not seen before. Lutetia had its poor, after all, and the Institute, sitting in the shadow of the Old City, saw them often.

  “As much as this place meets your needs . . .” he said now, speaking softly so as not to startle any of them, but Jax Ton, particularly. It was Jax Ton they must win to trust. The others would follow him.

  “I regret, but you cannot stay here. The man who owns this building is both acquisitive and cruel. Best for all to relocate. Is there another place, perhaps not quite so well arranged, where you might go?”

  Jax Ton frowned, and one of the older children leaned forward.

  “There’s the Rooms,” she said, speaking to Jax Ton.

  “Need money for the Rooms,” another child protested.

  Don Eyr held up a hand.

  “Money need not concern you at the moment. Is it a place where you might keep together and in safety?”

  Jax Ton looked at him, eyes wide.

  “Money no concern?” he repeated. “Will you pay for us?”

  Plainly, he disbelieved it, and Don Eyr could not blame him.

  “Indeed, I will pay for you. More, we will escort you to this place, and see you settled and provisioned.”

  The boy was wary of a trap. Of course he was. Don Eyr waited.

  “My friend, you cannot stay here,” Serana said. “What my partner has told you is true. If we turn a blind eye and report this property clear, Arba will learn soon enough that we lied. Aside from what may be done to Don Eyr for such transgression, you will again be exposed and in danger. Best to retreat in good order, and establish a base elsewhere.”

  Jax Ton took a hard breath, looked around at his band of eight, wordlessly gathering their input. His gaze moved to Don Eyr, to Serana, and he inclined his head, jerkily, as if the gesture were not much used.

  “Yes,” he said. “We will go with you.”

  • • • • • •

  The Rooms was a rambling and ramshackle building that had, Don Eyr thought, once been half-a-dozen buildings, now connected by catwalks, ladders, and impromptu lifts. It looked a veritable fire-trap, and the manager was no better than she ought to be. Still, she showed them a suite of rooms on the top floor, accessible by a stair, a woven rope walkway, and a catwalk connecting them to the next building.

  Jax Ton inspected it, and Serana did, Don Eyr standing with the manager at the door.

  “That’s a twelfth-cantra for a relumma,” she said. “No business done up here, though if they wanna work, I can put ’em in touch.”

  Don Eyr feared he did not misunderstand her, which did nothing to reconcile him to this place. To leave children here? And, yet, they were capable children, and they had been surviving very well, snug inside their rock walls. This . . . he looked around—plasboard walls, plasboard floor, plasboard ceiling with discolorations, here and there, which hinted that the rain came through.

  “Yes,” said Jax Ton, arriving with Serana. Don Eyr looked at her over the boy’s head, saw doubtful eyes in a grim face.

  “That is well, then,” he said to Jax Ton. “Go and bring the others up.”

  “My money, sir,” the manager said.

  He turned. Perhaps he moved too quickly; perhaps something of his thoughts showed on his face. In any case, she stepped back.

  “Your money,” he repeated moderately. “Of course. Let us go to your office and settle the account.”

  • • • • • •

  The rent was paid for two relumma, and it did occur to Don Eyr that it was perhaps not quite wise to have exposed himself as a man who had so very much coin in his pocket. Still, it was done, while Serana stood aside with Jax Ton, handing over a card, and speaking with him most earnestly.

  The boy slipped the card into some inner pocket, and made sober reply, then extended both hands to catch Serana’s.

  “Thank you,” Don Eyr heard him say as he left the manager’s office. “I am—grateful.”

  “Be wary, and take care,” Serana told him. “That is our thanks. And remember—if there is trouble you cannot turn aside, send or come to that address. I will help you.”

  It was on the tip of his tongue to correct that, but, there, Serana, as ever, had the right of it. He could not promise we. His life was ordered at the whim of Arba, who would surely do his utmost to thwart any assistance Don Eyr might offer.

  “Sir, thank you.” The boy grasped Don Eyr’s hand, his grip strong, and perhaps, a little, desperate.

  “You are welcome,” he said, smiling into the worried eyes. “Be well, Jax Ton.”

  The boy left, climbing the swaying stairs like a squirrel. He and Serana walked out to the street, and turned their steps toward Mid-Port.

  They walked a block, and those pedestrians they encountered did very little to set his mind at ease regarding the fate of those eight children.

  Don Eyr stopped, and looked up at Serana.

  “They cannot be left there,” he said. “Capable as they are, they are too soft, too easy. There are too many against them. That woman—offered to guide them to a brothel, in case any wished to work.”

  “I agree,” Serana said softly. “They are too vulnerable. I will return, and guard them. You, with your twisty mind, will consider how we may do better for them. Come, I will escort you to safer streets, and—”

  “I need no escort,” Don Eyr said, recalling the last group they had passed on this street.

  “Go back to them, now, Serana. I will . . . think of something.”

  She gazed into his face, hers showing wonder and no little irony. At last, she raised a hand and touched his cheek.

  “I will see them safe, petit. Guard yourself close.”

  And with that, she turned and left him on the street.

  • • • • • •

  “Children in the Low Port, my friend?” Chef vas’Urbil looked doubtful. “What would you have me do?”

  “Advise me,” Don Eyr said. “Surely, there must be some safe place to which we can deliver them, where they can receive an education other than how to survive on the streets.”

  “As I understand it, that is the highest class available in Low Port,” returned the chef. He moved a hand. “Understand me, I am not unsympathetic; children ough
t not to be in danger, and yet, Low Port . . . you will not find many in Mid-Port or High who will care to discuss Low Port. It is widely held that those who live there deserve no better, else they would not have fallen so far. There is no . . . agency . . . to support them.” He paused to sip his tea, and looked at Don Eyr with curiosity.

  “Was it not thus at Lutetia?”

  “At Lutetia there were slums, surely, and the poor. But the city and the citizens provided some support. Orphanages, clinics, schools.”

  The chef looked aside.

  “We on Liad are not so kindly. The clan is all and everything, as you have found. What recourse is there for you, ceded to Arba to cover your delm’s markers?”

  “None that I am aware of,” Don Eyr said, and considered his friend with weary amusement. “Is my delm an idiot?”

  “That and more!” the chef said heatedly. “He might have paid off Arba and gained income for the clan. Only, he would have had to find investors for a restaurant, which would have been easy enough, with an École de Cuisine chef to manage it, not to say provide the breads and desserts!”

  He looked thoughtful.

  “Of course, investors would demand that the profits be safe from Serat, which he would not like, at all. And, yet, this! It is to throw you, and every hope of Serat ever coming about into the wind!” He blow out a hard breath.

  “Fool and son of a fool.”

  Don Eyr raised his eyebrows.

  “Did you know my grandfather?”

  “I am older than you, though not so old as that. No, it was a tale to amaze all of Liad, that Serat chose to send his daughter outworld—”

  “I have heard the tale,” said Don Eyr, and the chef threw him a wise look.

  “You have heard the gossip, I’ll warrant, and the most malicious of it, at that. Serat’s daughter was sound; the son was a fool, but the son had not defied the father, nor called his judgment into question. For those crimes, she was sent to mind the clan’s faltering fortunes off-world, since she was wiser than her delm in finance. The boy—your delm, now—grew up with the fixed notion that any competition for the ring was dangerous, and his intellect has plainly deteriorated from there.” He drank off what was left of his tea.

  “Forgive me if I offend,” he added.

  Don Eyr laughed.

  “Yes, well. Returning to your children in the Low Port . . . I cannot advise you, save to say, walk away. Life is cheap in the Low Port, and children’s lives cheaper than most. Rabbits among wolves, if they are without a clan or a . . . a group of some kind.”

  “And would you walk away from children in need? Children in danger?”

  His friend moved his shoulders, turning empty palms up.

  “Gods grant it never comes to me, because, in truth, I do not know what I would do.”

  • • • • • •

  It had been Don Eyr’s intention to return to Low Port within a day—two at the most—though his vaunted twisty brain had not yet produced a solution for the children. Surely, there must be something . . . and Serana . . .

  Serana was a warrior; she was cautious, and canny, and fully capable.

  But Low Port was a killer, and he did not intend to leave her there without backup . . .

  It was Arba’s genius to know precisely how best to do harm. For the next twelve-day, he kept Don Eyr busy from dawn to dawn, with errands all about the city and the port, and then to stand as his trained monkey, trailing him from party to gaming table to an assignation.

  At the latter, the lady considered him with interest.

  “Does it perform?”

  “One supposes so,” Arba said, voice languid and eyes glinting. “Will you try it?”

  “Perhaps I will—unless you do not care for competition?”

  Arba raised his head at that, and there was a look in his eye that did not bode well for the lady, should she persist in this vein. She ignored him, or perhaps she did not see. Instead, she crossed the room to Don Eyr standing where he had been left, near the bureau. He lowered his eyes, and recruited himself to stillness.

  “I believe he is shy,” said the lady, and he felt her stroke his hair. “Serat’s sister’s child, you say?”

  “It is what Serat says, in any case,” said Arba, carelessly. “Will you have him?”

  “While you watch?”

  “I fear so, as I own him, and must therefore be certain that he comes to no harm.”

  The lady snorted delicately.

  “Surely, the Code forbids slavery,” she said, trailing a slim hand down Don Eyr’s arm, and raising his hand to her lips.

  He stiffened as she blew lightly across his knuckles—before releasing him to toy again with his hair.

  “But this is not slavery; it is the payment of a rather considerable debt. In essence, I own him until such time as he has worked out the amount Serat owes me. Which, given the leisurely pace at which he pursues his duties, will be some years into his second lifetime.”

  “You might call the debt paid,” said the lady.

  “Now, why would I do that?”

  “Ah, of course; I forget myself,” said the lady, and slid her hand under Don Eyr’s chin.

  “Look at me, little one,” she murmured.

  His temper flared, and he raised his head, meeting her eyes, which widened slightly, eyebrows rising, as she tipped her head to one side, as if considering his merits.

  “Insipid,” she said after a moment, and turned away.

  “Come, Har Per, send the child home, and let us continue our explorations.”

  “Perhaps he needs an education, if he is as insipid as you say?”

  “I am not a school,” the lady said tartly. “Nor do I desire an audience this evening.”

  “But perhaps on some other evening? I tremble with anticipation,” Arba said, placing his hand over his heart.

  “Yes, very likely. Perhaps you would care to leave, also?”

  Arba stiffened, and Don Eyr feared for the lady, who, perhaps did not know the limits of her power.

  . . . or perhaps she did. Outrage melted into something else, and Arba raised a hand to cup the lady’s cheek. He bent as if to kiss her—and paused in the act to look over her head.

  “Go home,” he snarled. “Tomorrow is rent day. Mind you find tal’Qechee in his office. I want no missed payments.”

  Don Eyr bowed, and turned, finding the door opening before him, and the lady’s butler there to guide him away.

  • • • • • •

  tal’Qechee’s office was not in Low Port. Not quite in Low Port, though it danced with the boundary. His business interests were definitely based on the other side of the line, and the persons he employed were questionable at best. He was also difficult to find in his office, as Don Eyr had discovered on the previous occasions when he had been sent to collect tal’Qechee’s “rent.” The best hour to find him was early—very early—in the morning, when he was counting his own receipts from the night before.

  Don Eyr therefore arrived early.

  Night Port had not quite given over to Day; dawn teased the horizon, but had not yet committed to a fuller embrace. The streets were damp, it having rained somewhat in the night time. The gambling hells, bars, and other night side entertainment would be calling last bid, last drink, last start, and Mr. tal’Qechee would surely be in his office, now or very soon, in order to receive the couriers bearing the night’s gleanings.

  His reasoning was correct, though his arrival did not please Mr. tal’Qechee, who required him to tarry until all of the night’s receipts were in and counted, so he was later than he wished to be, leaving for his next errand, which was much on his mind as he finally departed, his inside pocket heavy with cash.

  The second errand was not so difficult as Mr. tal’Qechee, who made difficulty an art, but it would require some finesse to extract the “rent” when he was so far beyond his appointed hour. The second appointment pretended to grandeur, and a missed appointment was an affront worthy of a duel. />
  Still, he managed the thing, ruthlessly sacrificing Mr. tal’Qechee’s character in the process, so that they both had a common boor to deplore, and left the office with a hurried step. If he went quickly, he might arrive at his third destination very nearly at the proper time.

  Hurry and distraction almost saw him murdered.

  As it was, he glimpsed the attacker from the corner of his eye in time to duck, and kick, feeling a kneecap go under his boot, even as he spun to engage the second, who had a cudgel . . .

  • • • • • •

  “Not broken,” said his friend the chef. “Mind you, it ought to be broken. You have the Dragon’s own luck, Don Eyr.”

  “I was stupid,” Don Eyr protested, wincing as Zelli wrapped an icy towel around his shoulder. “He should never have touched me.”

  “And he?” asked the chef.

  “One has a shattered kneecap; the other—the one with the stick—I think I broke his wrist.”

  “You think.” The chef stared.

  “I was distracted,” Don Eyr told him. “Happily, I kept hold of Arba’s rent money, or I would be hurt, indeed.”

  “I will tend this, Zelli—see to the small breads,” the chef said, and looked closely into Don Eyr’s face.

  “He strikes you? Arba, I speak of.”

  “When he feels able,” said Don Eyr. “After all, he owns me; why should he restrain himself?”

  “He may say that he owns you, my friend, but that is not the truth. I grant that the difference is subtle, but Serat did not sell you. He contracted with Arba for one of his to work off his debt. Serat might beat you, all by the Code and proper. But you are not Arba’s; and he ought to be careful—very careful, I might say—with Serat’s asset.”

  Don Eyr stared at him, took a breath. This—Arba’s lover had said much the same; giving him a hint that he had been too ignorant to take up.

  “I wish to send a note around to Mr. dea’Bon,” he said abruptly. “Can you spare someone to take it? I would do so myself, but I’m to wait on him tonight.”

  “Cho Lin will carry your note, as soon as you write it. You are in no condition to go anywhere tonight, save bed, after a good meal, and wine.”