“I think we might do well to set up a few drone-eyes,” Caleb said. “And possibly a discreet installation on the farthest moon. As I’m sure you’ve gathered, we’re here until further orders can be pulsed through to us. I hope you don’t mind.”
“Mind!” Grinning like an idiot, Jon shook his head in the human fashion. “Having new people here?”
“I rather thought that would be your reaction,” Caleb said drolly. “In any event, we’ve enough equipment and certainly the skills to produce a good early warning system, even if we have to manufacture some things here on Erehwon.”
Jon turned serious again, too.
“Two sightings might mean a reasonably regular shipping lane through this area of space. On the other hand, maybe the trail was from a ship heading away from another wormhole exit. I think I prefer shipping lines.”
“I think I do, too,” Caleb said with a grin. “But shipping what and by whom? M-type planets are rare enough. Since the Sh’im were caught by the wormhole, those traces might not be from their colony ships. I think we need more evidence before we put it on the worry list. I’ll include your observations in my report.”
Jon nodded. “Then, too, the Sh’im would prefer a dimmer primary than this one, or those of the other two M’s. Sh’im eyes need shading. That’s why we borrowed the tarpaulin.” Jon gave a droll smile. “For an unpopulated area of space, this sector shows more traffic than certainly I thought there’d be.”
“We’ll just keep optics up there to spot the next batch of traffic. Did you ever see any exploratory probes while you were here?”
Jon gave a bark. “Not so much as a con trail. Though we were scarcely in a position to do any signaling once the shuttle was crocked. Sure had the surprise of my life when Nimisha flew in to our site on the Poolbeg’s gig.”
“Yes, but then she’s been surprising people since she was Necklaced. Which reminds me, Jon . . .” Caleb rose and picked up a neat package from his bed. “Think these might come in handy for today’s ceremony. And they’ve improved tropical dress whites while you’ve been gone.”
Jon didn’t waste any time opening the parcel and grinned with real pleasure to find the hat fit his head perfectly. “I appreciate this, Caleb, more than you know. Those dress blues are not for this climate.”
“Got to preserve all the naval traditions we can. When the fun’s over, let’s get our com experts together and see what we can come up with”—Caleb held up a warning hand—“without exactly explaining why we want the equipment.”
“Since when did the Navy explain more than need-to-know?” Jon asked with a cocky grin. Then he noticed the wall clock. “I’d better go get dressed. Thanks again.”
Jon ended up showering and changing in the only empty cabin. He was buckling the white web belt—an item of uniform that had never altered—when there was a quick knock at the door and before he could say anything, Syrona, exceedingly correct in her whites, entered and closed the door behind her.
“I’m here to trim your hair, Captain Svangel.”
Jon’s right hand went to the damp hair well below his shoulders. Syrona grinned and held up scissors and comb.
“Casper didn’t complain, and you better not.”
“You haven’t cut your hair, have you, Syrie?” Jon demanded anxiously.
She turned her head so that he could see the intricate braids that extended below the back of her hat.
“Sit,” she said, pointing to the stool, and draped his damp towel over his shoulders. “It won’t take long. And may even look better than the job I did on Casper, now I’ve got the hang of it again.”
“Hey!” Jon protested when he heard the first snip.
“Oh, relax. I’ve never cut anyone’s ears, and you simply have to look as good as you can to match Nimi and Cuiva. That is, when her mother and Perdimia finally made her stop playing long enough with her brothers and sisters to get dressed. You’d think they were more important than her Necklacing.”
Jon chuckled, careful not to move his head. “Got over that one easily, didn’t we?”
“Cuiva’s a nice person. Everyone on the Five B—and we have got to do something about proper names for those ships, you know—thinks the world of Cuiva. D’you know she intended to keep looking for her mother if it took her entire life?”
“Dedication seems to be a Boynton trait.”
He felt her comb through much shorter hair. “Sit still. I need to clip . . . just . . . one or two. There!” She gathered up the towel carefully from his shoulders to keep the cuttings from escaping.
Jon blinked twice in the mirror at his new elegance and grinned. “Thanks, Syrie.”
“Now finish dressing. It’s nearly time to take your seat.”
Placing his hat correctly under his left arm, Jon made his way out of the cabin and into the main lounge of the Fiver. There he stopped short, his jaw dropping as he saw Lady Nimisha Boynton-Rondymense and Lady Cuiva Boynton-Farquahar looking every inch the First Family scions they were. Nimisha was now clad in the filmy delicately blue gown, no doubt from the box Perdimia had brought over from the Five B. Her luxuriant hair had been plaited into a high coronet on the crown of her head, with jeweled pins that picked up the colors of her Necklace, making the hairstyle truly regal. The Necklace was magnificent in its intricacy, covering exactly the heir tattoo beneath it as Cuiva’s Necklace shortly would.
He had trouble breaking his eyes away from Nimisha, for he’d never seen her in her role as a First Family body-heir, despite knowing every whorl of her tattoo. She smiled gently, as if she understood his confusion at her transformation.
Reassured by that smile, he took time to regard Cuiva, dressed in a subtle, not quite formfitting white gown that flowed about her slender body, outlining young breasts, slender waist and hips, reaching to her ankles, her feet in white sandals. Her hair was also dressed high on her head with ringlets that cascaded down but were somehow held on a level with her delicate ears. The neckline of her gown had been designed to show the body-heir tattoo that would soon be covered by her Necklace. She was as radiant as her mother, but she dropped her eyes shyly as he stood there, mesmerized.
“I gather we pass inspection,” Nimisha said, breaking the spell.
“I’ve never seen you look so beautiful, Nimi,” he said in a rough, low voice, and then laughed softly when she blushed. “And you, Lady Cuiva, must be the most radiant minor major body-heir ever seen in the entire galaxy, including this sector.” He accorded her his deepest bow.
Perdimia entered the room, her shorter hair somehow more elegantly arranged. She was clad in a long pearly gray gown, its elegance understated. She carried the Coskanito box that held Cuiva’s Necklace.
“May we,” Doc began, “the AI crew of the Fiver, congratulate you, Lady Cuiva, and salute you on your first step into maturity. May you live long and be happy.”
“Hear! Hear!” chimed in Helm’s tenor and Cater’s alto.
“If you’ll just get out of here now, Jon,” Nimisha said with a wide grin to take the edge off the order, “we can begin.”
The automatic bells signaled noon, and Jon strode as fast as he could out of the Fiver and toward the circle where the ceremony would take place. He couldn’t quite shake off the amazing visions of mother and daughter until he was suddenly engulfed by the sun-warmed fragrance of the blooms that had been gathered to enhance this outdoor affair. The tarpaulin did provide shade for Sh’im sun-sensitive eyes, but it also kept in the floral aromas, intensifying them. Bleachers that had been erected to accommodate the hordes of spectators were already crammed. He saw Syrona taking her seat by Casper and Tim, and noticed there was an empty place on a chair—not a Sh’im stool, for which he was immensely grateful—beside Caleb, with his first officer just beyond him. So he made his way there. Opposite the naval contingent was a special raised section, designed so the view of the smaller Sh’im would not be impeded by the floral decorations massed to create a circle. Many of the humans were seated on cou
ches and chairs, Jon absently noted. Safer than those wretched stools.
The circle was broken by a few strategically placed gaps for exits and entrances. In its center stood a three-tiered podium. That was where Nimisha would formally Necklace her daughter.
Over the liquid vowel sounds of the Sh’im, he heard music. The musicians might have been professionally inferior to the fine orchestra that Lady Rezalla would have hired for the occasion, but the strains of old Earth tunes were, to his thinking, far more appropriate to rustic Erehwon. As he took his seat, he thought maybe they should call the Fiver “Erehwon.” Not accurate, though: That ship would always know where she was!
A hush settled. The soft music faltered a moment and then bravely started a triumphant march, not quite martial but vaguely familiar to him and in the proper tempo for a sedate progress. He turned his head, as everyone did, to see Nimisha, leading her daughter by the hand down the slight slope to the shaded arena. Sunlight sent shafts of light from the jeweled Necklace Nimisha wore. There were oohs and aaahs from the humans and the Sh’im liquid sound of approval, certainly the most beautiful sounds they made and far more evocative of joyfulness than human exclamations. Cuiva kept her eyes down, not so much in modesty as to be sure of her footing on the uneven, sun-baked ground. Behind them came Perdimia, looking as if she held back tears by sheer willpower.
Nimisha led Cuiva into the garlanded circle through one of the openings, where Perdimia halted. Mother and daughter continued around its circumference: mother on the inside. This was the point of the ritual, the presentation of a daughter to the mature spectators invited to a Necklacing ceremony that signified the daughter’s right to set childhood behind her. That none were relatives or highly respected family connections did not matter. Cuiva’s only other near kin were fast asleep or being amused elsewhere, since even the twins were much too young to behave during this formal part of the day’s ceremony.
Jon felt himself almost bursting with pride as Cuiva inclined her head to him as well as to Caleb. Having completed the circle, Nimisha led her daughter to the central podium and Perdimia advanced slowly to them. Nimisha stood on the highest tier with Cuiva on the one below, facing her mother. Perdimia held up the opened case. Slowly and gracefully Nimisha lifted up the exquisite Necklace by its ends, the jewels sparkling from the glare of what sun did penetrate tiny holes in the tarpaulin.
“With this Necklace, Cuiva Boynton-Farquahar, I, your mother, Nimisha Boynton-Rondymense, confirm that you have reached your fourteenth birthday and your minor majority. I confirm you unequivocally as my body-heir and eldest daughter.”
Then Cuiva turned her back on her mother while Nimisha carefully draped the beautiful jewelry about Cuiva’s slender throat, making certain that it fitted exactly over the tattoo that it replicated in gemstones, size, and design. She clasped it so that the drop sapphire exactly covered that part of the tattoo on Nimisha’s back.
Nimisha stepped down to the same level as her daughter, signifying Cuiva’s new level in First Family social ranking, and kissed her six times. Tears of joy streaked, but did not mar, their cheeks.
Cuiva stepped to the ground and gave Perdimia the four kisses of deep friendship before she made her way toward the naval contingent and the space station personnel. They rose as one body, the Navy saluting. Cuiva gave Caleb the six kisses of kin relationship that plainly astonished him. Jon could see Nimisha’s smile of approval. But when Cuiva accorded him the same degree of relationship, he had to blink away tears of surprise and unexpected pleasure, and swallowed against a huge lump in his throat. What a graceful way to accept a stepfather! She winked at him, her eyes full of mischief for a moment before she stepped to Kendra, embracing her warmly and with two cheek kisses. She gave similar salutes to all those who had been on the Five B. She warmly embraced Syrona, Casper, and Tim, which Syrona later told Tim was more than they could have expected since they had only just recently met Cuiva. She shook hands with the Acclarke crew members and the space station personnel before she made her way across the arena to curtsy deeply to Ook and Ool, graciously bowing to the others.
Then Caleb Rustin stepped into the arena, hat under his arm, walked toward the podium where Nimisha stood, and surveyed the crowd.
“Let us all give a rousing cheer for our Lady Cuiva on this auspicious occasion.”
He led the cheers, punctuated by the ululations of the Sh’im, who jumped up and down and waved their hands high above their heads, spinning round and round in place until it was a wonder none fell. With a word to Nimisha, who looked surprised, he led her to his chair and gestured for Cuiva to take the one Kendra Oscony immediately vacated, snugging a long black case under her left arm. The XO entered the circle, one step behind Caleb as he strode to the podium. Caleb took the top level and pointed his finger at Tim and Cherry, who ducked quickly around the circumference of the arena to where Ook and Ool sat. There they crouched beside the couches so they did not obstruct the Sh’im view of the next event.
“Lieutenant Commander Jonagren Svangel, Lieutenant Casper Ontell, Ensign Syrona Lester-Pitt, front and center.”
Marching abreast and immediately in stride, the three came forward and halted.
“At ease,” Caleb said in his most official voice.
The silence was broken by two light voices doing their best to translate unknown rites into a culture that might have nothing similar at all.
“I received a pulsed message at the beacon that I may now read,” he said. He took from his breast pocket a handful of the parchment on which commendations and special orders were printed; various colored ribbons and seals adorned the documents. “Ensign Syrona Lester-Pitt.”
She took one step forward to break rank, turned an exact forty-five degrees to port, took two more steps, and smartly turned to face the commander, saluting.
“I have the pleasure to announce your promotion to Lieutenant Commander, retroactive to your landing here on Erehwon twenty-two years ago.” He handed her the promotion document, and Kendra handed him the small box with the proper rank collar tabs. He stepped down and attached them to her uniform. Then he saluted her with a broad smile. “Well deserved, Commander. Don’t move,” he added as Syrona started to turn away. “It is also my distinct pleasure to award you the Galactic Medal, Gold Class with two clusters, for courage and devotion to your service above and beyond the call of duty.”
Syrona’s eyes widened and she blinked against tears. Kendra passed over the beautiful medal on its multicolored bar so that Caleb could pin it above Syrona’s breast pocket. This time his salute was held moments longer than necessary.
“Your courage is exceeded only by what you and your fellow survivors have managed to achieve in the most dangerous and primitive conditions. Your Service has asked me to extend their deepest respect. Your name is already listed on the Honor Board at Headquarters.”
Syrona somehow managed to return to her place in rank and paid no attention to the tears still trickling down her cheeks or the fact that she had to sniffle.
Casper Ontell was promoted to full Commander and received his Galactic Medal, Gold Class with two clusters, and a repeat of the citation that Syrona had been given.
“Lieutenant Commander Jonagren Svangel, I have the great pleasure of confirming your rank as Captain, retroactive to the date you assumed command on the death of Captain Panados Querine of the Poolbeg.” Caleb’s grin was broader than ever as he pinned on Jon’s new rank pins and handed over the promotion document. “I am also directed by Federated Sentient Planet Exploratory Service to award you the Galactic Medal, Platinum Class with four clusters.”
“I don’t deserve that,” Jon murmured.
“Shut up,” Kendra muttered back. “You bloody well do.”
“Quite right, XO,” Caleb said, and attached the medal with its iridescent ribbon bar to Jon’s chest, saluting him with extra precision and length. He waited until Jon had taken a backward step to fall in line with his companions before he held up the final sheet.
“If you are in accord, Lieutenant Commander Lester-Pitt, Commander Ontell, and Captain Svangel, it is the wish of your Service as well as that of Fleet High Command and the Senate of the Federated Sentient Planets that you accept the administrative management of this planet and continue the fine work you have already done with your—with our alien allies. Such a decision, so far from your home planets and family, may not be an easy one to make and I am directed to allow you to consider the proposition until we have received further, or different orders sent by pulse messages. Additional support units are on their way—though we know they will take approximately four years to reach us—but any and all of them are subordinate to your commands and such titles as seem relevant to enforce the policies of mutual cooperation and development of equable Human-Sh’im relations.”
The audience, including those nearest the translators, erupted into cheers, hoots, hollers, calls, whistles, and other sounds that made some humans cover their ears in protest.
Caleb stepped down from the top level. “You’ll have to draft a plan for development and exploration of this sector of space, you know,” he said quietly to the three newly promoted and honored officers. “But we can take our time on that.”
“Who owns this planet then?” Jon murmured, his face expressionless.
“The indigenous personnel,” Caleb said with first a nod and then a shake of his head. “Which I interpret as those born here.” He looked directly at Tim, so earnestly translating to Ook and Ool. “And the Sh’im. Your lot, too, Jon. D’you think Nimisha will stay on?”
“You couldn’t drag Nimisha away from here with a space gantry,” the Lady answered for herself, having quietly joined them. “How did you manage to blackmail so many people into agreeing to all this?” she asked.
“I didn’t do anything,” Caleb said, holding up his hands in mock defense. “I was on my way here.” Then he relented with a big grin. “Now your esteemed mother, Lady Rezalla, made certain that neither High Command nor FSP Senate was going to slight her body-heir, since it was your ship and inimitable wit and courage that precipitated the discovery of this brand-new sector of space. And rescued our lost officers.”
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