Crystal Singer

by Anne McCaffrey

  “About bloody time! I came to that conclusion an hour ago.”

  Airborne, she skimmed ridge and hollow, heading north at 11 for half an hour. She turned on a western leg for twenty minutes and was starting a southern track when she flipped over a gorge that looked familiar. A blur of orange in the shadows brought to mind Moksoon and his wretched pink crystals. The storm readings were insistent now. She made another pass up the gorge and saw Moksoon bent over his outcrop, two cartons beside him. He ought to have been heading out, not calmly cutting as if he had all day and a mach storm wasn’t bowling down.

  She came in as quietly as she could, but the grating of her sled runners on the loose rock at the valley bottom warned Moksoon. He charged down the slope, cutter held aggressively. She slapped on the playback, turned up the volume, but he was caterwauling so loudly about Section 49 that he couldn’t have heard it.

  The wind however had picked up and made it difficult for him to swing and keep his balance, though Killashandra doubted that the infrasonic blade would do her sled much harm. Break his cutter.

  “Storm, you addled pink tenor!” She roared out the open window.

  Despite the wind scream, she could hear the hooter-buzzer-bell systems of his sled.

  “Mach storm on the way. You’ve got to leave!”

  “Leave?” Panic replaced wrath on Moksoon’s face. He now heard her ship’s klaxons as well as his own. “I can’t leave!” The wind was tearing the sound from his mouth, but Killashandra could read his lips. “I’ve struck a pure vein. I’ve—” He clamped his mouth shut with caution and had to lean into a particularly strong gust to keep from being knocked over. “I’ve got to cut just one more. Just one more.” He raced up the slope to his site.

  Unbelievingly, Killashandra watched him raise his cutter, to tune it in the teeth of a gale. Cursing, Killashandra grabbed up her handlight. Not as sturdy a weapon as she’d’ve liked, considering the probable denseness of Moksoon’s skull, but used with the necessary force in the right spot, it ought to suffice.

  As she left her sled, she experienced a taste of what it would be like to be caught in a mach storm in the crystal ranges. Sound, waves of dissonance and harmony, streamed through her head. She covered her ears, but the sound maintained contact through the rock under her feet. The keening wails masked her slithering approach, and Moksoon was too preoccupied with cutting to see anything but the octagon he was excising. Just as she had braced herself to slug him, he laid the cutter down but caught a glimpse of her descending hand and flung himself to the side. She grabbed up his cutter and pelted for his sled, nearer than hers. He’d follow her for that cutter, she was positive. She bounced into his sled, plastered herself against the wall, the brackets digging into her shoulders, wincing against the shrill obligato of Moksoon’s unheeded warning devices.

  He was wilier than she’d credited him. Suddenly, a strong hand grabbed her left ankle and hauled her leg sideways, a rock coming down to crush her kneecap. But for the fact she still held his cutter, she would have been crippled. She brought the cutter handle up, deflecting the rock, bruising Moksoon’s fingers. She pivoted on her captured foot and delivered a second blow to the old man’s jaw. He hovered a moment until she thought she’d have to club him again, but it was the wind that supported him, then let him crumple.

  Automatically, Killashandra bracketed his cutter. She tapped for a weather printout, which silenced three of the mind-boggling alarms. Glancing to the rear of the sled, she saw that Moksoon had not bothered to web his packed cartons. She did so, ignoring the filth and discarded food that littered the living section. Then she remembered that there were several cartons by his claim.

  Luckily, she hadn’t any rocky height to negotiate from Moksoon’s sled to his claim or she wouldn’t have made it back with the heavy cartons. Moksoon showed no signs of reviving. She lugged him into the sled, then deposited him on the couch. He didn’t so much as groan. He was alive, though she was revolted by the grease on his neck as she felt for a pulse.

  It was then she realized her dilemma. Two ships and one conscious pilot. She tried to rouse Moksoon, but he was completely oblivious, and she couldn’t find the medaid kit that contained stimulant sprays.

  The alarms attained a new height of distress, and she recognized that time was running out. She couldn’t transport all of Moksoon’s cargo to her sled. She had four cartons more precious than all of his. There must be something in Guild rules about rescue and salvage. She’d got two vouchers for escorting Carrik, so she decided the wind had gotten her wits. She made a battered dash to her own sled, slung her cutter over her shoulder and grabbed two cartons. The warnings in Moksoon’s sled had climbed several deafening decibels toward the supersonic, but there was no way she could diminish them until she had taken off.

  She staggered back to her sled, which was bouncing now from the gusting wind. She wondered if she could secure her craft, somehow keep it from being flung about the gorge, and decided against wasting the time.

  She grabbed her remaining cartons and was glad of the weight to anchor her feet to the ground. She was gasping for breath as she finally closed the door of Moksoon’s sled. He still lolled on the couch. She webbed her four cartons and secured her cutter among his empties. She strapped Moksoon tightly to the couch and then took her place at the console.

  All sleds had similar control panels, though Moksoon’s was much the worse for wear.

  Moksoon’s claim was a dangerously enclosed area from which to ascend into a wild storm. She fought to keep the vertical, fought again to increase the horizontal to clear the ridge top, then let the wind take the sled, hauling as hard as she could on the yoke toward the west.

  The mach-tuned dissonances were worse in the air, and she made a grab for Moksoon’s buffer helmet. It was stiff, dusty, and too small, but it blocked the worst of the wind-shriek. She’d not got it on a moment too soon, for the sled behaved like a crazed beast, plunging and diving wildly then sliding sideways. Killashandra learned appreciation of the simulation drills sooner than she would have liked.

  It was as well she’d strapped Moksoon down, for he regained consciousness before they’d quite cleared the Milekeys and started raving about pain. She felt quite enough jabbing at her nerve ends through the ear pads.

  Moksoon regained unconsciousness after throwing his head against the duralloy wall, so the last hour into the Guild Complex gave her sufficient quiet to ease her own aggravated nerves.

  She had reason to be proud as she brought Moksoon’s canting sled up over the wind baffles at the complex and landed it conveniently close to the racks. She signaled for medics, and as she pointed them toward Moksoon, one of the hangar personnel grabbed her arm and gestured urgently toward the hangar office. The information that Lanzecki awaited her was reinforced by that message on the green display, blinking imperatively.

  Cargo personnel had opened the sled’s storage, and now Killashandra moved to collect her precious cutter and to point out the four cartons which held her blacks.

  “Enthor!” she roared at the handlers. “Take these immediately to Enthor!”

  Despite their obliging grins and nods, she wasn’t sure they understood her urgency. She followed them, but halfway there, someone matched pace with her, tugging angrily at her arm.

  “Report to Lanzecki,” the hangar officer yelled, pushing her away from Storage. The look in his eyes was not reassuring. “You might at least have saved the new sled!”

  She jerked her arm free and, leaving the man astonished at her imprudence, ran after her cartons. She saw the first handler just plop his burden down on the stack. She grabbed it and roared at the others to follow her into Sorting.

  “Killashandra? Is it you?” a familiar voice asked. Without checking her determined forward march, she saw Rimbol following her, one of her cartons held carefully against his body.

  Two absurdities impinged on her thoughts as she rushed into Sorting: Rimbol was unaware of the fortune of black crystal he carried,
and he had trouble identifying her.

  “Yes, it’s me. What’s the matter?”

  “You haven’t looked in a mirror lately, have you?” was Rimbol’s reply. He seemed amused as well as surprised. “Don’t scowl. You’re terrifying, you—you crystal, you!”

  “Be careful of that carton,” she said, more commanding than she should be of a friend, and Rimbol’s welcoming smile faded. “Sorry, Rimbol. I had one helluva time getting in. That bollux Moksoon wouldn’t believe a storm was coming and him having trouble standing straight against the gusts.”

  “You brought another Singer out of the ranges?” Rimbol’s eyes widened with incredulity, but whatever he had been about to add was cut off as Killashandra spied Enthor and called his name.

  “Yes?” Enthor’s query was surprised. He blinked at her uncertainly.

  “I’m Killashandra Ree,” she said, trying to keep the irritation out of her voice. She couldn’t have changed that much since she’d last seen Enthor. “I’ve black crystal!”

  “Black?”

  “Yes, yes. Black! Here!”

  “And how were so you fortunate as to find that which eludes so many?” an implacable voice demanded.

  Killashandra was setting her carton down on Enthor’s table, but the cold, ominous tone paralyzed her. Her throat went dry and her mind numb because no consideration was excuse enough for her to have ignored the Guild Master’s summons, to make him seek her out.

  “Well, it doesn’t surprise me that you have,” Enthor said, taking the box from her.

  Lanzecki’s eyes never left hers as he advanced. She let the sorting table support her shaking body and clutched its edge with nerveless fingers. Regulations and restrictions that could be levied against a disobedient member by the Guild Master sprang to her mind far more vividly than the elusive ones about rescue and salvage. His lips were set in a thin, hard line. The slight flare of his nostrils and the quick lift of his chest under the subtle gleam of his shirt confirmed that he had appeared through effort, not magic.

  “You could improve on your acute angles,” Enthor was saying as he unpacked her triad. “However, the credit is good.” Enthor blinked before he peered approvingly at Killashandra. He noticed her immobility, looked around, not unsurprised to see the Guild Master, and back to Killashandra, aware now of the reason for her tension.

  “Which is as well for Killashandra Ree,” Lanzecki said with deep sarcasm, “since she has not returned in her new sled.”

  “Moksoon is all right?” Killashandra asked, anything to be able to speak in the face of Lanzecki’s fury.

  “His head will heal, and he will doubtless cut more rose quartz!”

  That Lanzecki’s tone was not derisory did not signify. Killashandra understood what was implied. Nor could she break from his piercing stare.

  “I couldn’t very well leave him,” she said, the solace of indignation replacing fear. After all, Lanzecki had arranged for Moksoon to shepherd her.

  “Why not? He would have shown no compunction in leaving you had the circumstances been reversed.”

  “But . . . but he was cutting. All the storm warnings were on in his sled. He wouldn’t listen. He tried to slice me with his cutter. I had to knock him out before he . . .”

  “You could be subject to claim-jumping, Section 49, Paragraph 14,” Lanzecki went on irreconcilably.

  “What about the section dealing with rescue and salvage?”

  Lanzecki’s eyelids dropped slightly, but it was Enthor who answered her in a startled voice.

  “There are none, my dear. Salvage is always done by the Guild, not a Singer. I would have thought you’d been taught to know what exactly is in rules and regs. Ah, now these . . . these are very good indeed. Two a trifle on the thin side.”

  Enthor had unpacked the quintet. For the first time, Lanzecki’s attention was diverted. He shifted his body slightly so that he could see the weighplate. He lifted one eyebrow in surprise, but his lips did not soften with appeasement.

  “You may come out of this affair better than you deserve to, Killashandra Ree,” Lanzecki said. His eyes still glinted with anger. “Unless, of course, you left behind your cutter.”

  “I could carry that, and these,” she retorted, stung more by his amusement than his anger.

  “Let us hope then that Moksoon can be persuaded not to charge you with claim-jumping since you preserved his wreck of a ship, his skin, and his crystal. Gratitude is dependent on memory, Killashandra Ree, a function of the mind that deteriorates on Ballybran. Learn that lesson now!”

  Lanzecki swept away from Enthor’s table and walked down the long room to the farthest exit, thus emphasizing that he had come on discipline.

  CHAPTER 10

  Killashandra stayed with Enthor while he tallied her four cartons, though she was hardly aware of what the old Sorter was saying to her. She kept glancing toward the far door where Lanzecki had made his dramatic exit, aware of the surreptitious looks in her direction from other Sorters, aware of an emotion more intense than hatred, emptier than fear.

  “Now that’ll buy you your two sleds.” Enthor’s words penetrated her self-absorption.

  “What?”

  “Those black crystals brought you a total of twenty-three thousand credits.”

  “How much?” Killashandra stared incredulously at the displayed figures, blinking green. “But a sled only costs eight thousand.”

  “There’s the tithe, my dear. Thirty percent does eat a hole in the total. Actually, you have to pay for two sleds, the one you lost and the replacement. Still, 16,100 clear does help.”

  “Yes, it does.” Killashandra tried to sound grateful.

  Enthor patted her arm. “You’d best take a good long radiant bath, m’dear. Always helps. And eat.” Then be began to package her beautiful black crystal.

  She turned away, unexpectedly feeling the separation from her first experience of crystal. The weight of the cutter made her sag as she slung it to her back. She would take it to be checked in the morning. She estimated she had just enough strength left to get her body back to her quarters and into the radiant bath. She took the nearest door out of the Sorting room, aware marginally that people were still rushing cartons in to Storage, that the howl of the wind was loud at this level even inside the complex. She should be grateful! She was too weary to laugh or snort at her inappropriate choice of word. She got into the lift and its descent, though smooth, made her sink toward the floor. She was able to prevent complete collapse only by hanging on to the support rail.

  She wobbled to her room, oblivious to the gaze of those in the Commons. As she walked, the drag of the cutter pulled her to the right, and once she caromed numbly from a doorway.

  When she finally raised her hand to her own doorplate, she realized that she still wore the ident wristband. She wouldn’t need that anymore, but she hadn’t the strength to remove it. As she passed a chair, she dropped her right shoulder, and the cutter slid onto the cushioning. She continued to the tankroom where she stared in dazed surprise at the filling tank. Did her entry into the room trigger the thing? No, it was almost full. Someone must have programmed it. Enthor? Rimbol? Her mind refused to work. She tore at her coverall, then her sweatliner, pulling her boots off with the legs of her coverall, and crawled up the three steps to the platform around the tank. She slid gratefully—that word again—into the viscous liquid, right up to her throat, her weight supported by the radiant fluid. Fatigue and the ache of crystal drained from her body and nerves. In that suspension, she remained, her mind withdrawn, her body buoyed.

  Sometime later, the room announced a visitor, and she roused sufficiently to deny entrance. She didn’t want to see Rimbol. But the intrusion and the necessity of making a decision aroused her from her passivity. The fluid had provided the necessary anodyne, and she was acutely aware of hunger. She had pulled herself from the tank, the radiant liquid dripping from her body, and was reaching for a wrap when a hand extended the garment to her.

  Lanz
ecki stood there.

  “I will not be denied twice!” he said, “though I will allow you couldn’t know that it was I at your door.”

  Surprised at his presence, Killashandra wavered on the edge of the tank, and he immediately held out a steadying hand.

  “You can fill tanks and open doors?”

  “One can be programmed, and the other was not locked.”

  “It is now?”

  “It is,” he said smoothly; his mouth, she quickly noticed, was amused. “But that can be changed.”

  For a picosecond, she wanted to call his bluff. Then she remembered that he had said she might be luckier than she deserved as Enthor tallied her cut. He had implied she had enough credit not only to buy a new sled but pay off what she already owed the Guild. Lanzecki had remembered the vouchers she still held. With those, she would have just enough. What mattered was that Lanzecki had remembered that margin at a time when he was rightfully infuriated by her disregard of her Guild Master’s summons.

  “I’m much too tired to change anything.” She gathered the toweling about her and extended her hand to him, palm up, summoning a weary smile.

  He looked from her smile to her palm, and his lips curved upward. Now he took a step forward. Placing both hands on her slender waist, he swung her down from the tank platform. She expected to be set on her feet. Instead, Lanzecki carried her into the lounge. The spicy aroma of a freshly cooked meal was heady, and she exclaimed with pleasure at the steaming dishes on the table.

  “I expected you might be hungry.”

  Killashandra laughed as Lanzecki deposited her in the chair, and she gestured with the overblown gentility of an opera heroine for him to assume the other seat.

  Not that evening or ever did Lanzecki ask her if she had found Keborgen’s black crystal, though he had occasions later to refer to her claim. Neither did he ask her any details of her first trip to the Milekey Ranges. Nor was she disposed to volunteer any comment. Except one.

  Having teased her adroitly, Lanzecki finally gave her the caress she had been anticipating so long, and the sensation was almost unbearable.