by Sharon Lee
Silent on stealth hinges, the painting swung away from the wall, revealing a door and a simple tumbler lock.
It required only a moment for her to work the combination, pull the door open, and remove a velvet box slightly smaller than her palm.
She paused, long fingers curled into a cage around the box. Had it been someone other than Dollance-Marie Chimra, and had there been anyone else in the treasure room to see, that hidden watcher might have said that she . . . hesitated.
As it was Alabaster herself, whom the tabloids had in their genius named well, and no one else inside the tightly guarded room—she paused, only that, and took a deep, cleansing breath before she closed the safe and spun the tumblers. The painting swung back into place, light fading from its perimeter.
Raising her chin, Alabaster met the fierce eyes of the woman in the painting, and smiled.
She had planned the evening carefully—first, drinks in Erabeck’s public parlor, to satisfy those who followed Alabaster; then befores with Smyth-Erin Nodmere and Dane Belnesky—Yin and Yang, according to the society news, in recognition of their long and complimentary partnership.
From Yin and Yang’s semi-public table, they proceeded to a private dining nook, said privacy Erabeck’s specific guarantee.
The door closed behind the security escort. Dollance-Marie put her palm against the plate. The room chimed, indicating that the privacy blanket was in force.
She turned with a smile that had no place on Alabaster’s face, and stepped forward to seat her guest.
“Please,” she said, moving the chair on its track, “be comfortable.”
John Vernon tipped his head, considering her from serious blue eyes.
“Must we be formal?” he asked, and she paused with her hand on the back of the chair.
Vernon was a good bloodline, if not so exalted as Chimra. The family elders had collected a following of note, which they managed with a subtlety even Chimra might with profit study.
This particular Vernon, whom the media had ignored until Alabaster had engaged him for a moment of conversation—this John Vernon, now code-named Galahad—had been raised out of society by his father’s people on Hascove, this having been stipulated in the Terms of Dissolution. He had returned, unRanked and with a scant base of Followers, to his mother’s house and business upon achieving his majority—also in accordance with the Terms. He possessed a lively wit and was quick to learn—so quick that one sometimes forgot that he was learning, until he asked just such a sweet, naive question.
“We are private,” Dollance-Marie said, matching him for seriousness, “and may be as informal as you wish.”
As soon as she had uttered the words, with their suggestion of more risque ventures, she wished to call them back. Others that she had favored with her notice would have immediately heard an invitation to sport, and acted accordingly.
John, raised in innocence, only smiled, his sweet countenance undisturbed by even a blush. He settled with casual elegance into the seat she held for him, touching one finger to the seal at his throat, loosening it somewhat.
Taking her own seat, Dollance-Marie smiled. John’s dislike of the current male fashion for tight collars and flowing tunics was his mother’s despair.
“Perhaps we ought to have you establish a fashion for neck scarves,” she said, pouring wine into painted palm-cups.
“And be choked twice?” he asked.
She leaned forward and offered him a cup, which he took with a frank smile.
“How if,” she mused, “the vogue was to drape the scarf loosely in order to call attention to a charming dishevelment?”
“My mother would murder me.”
She laughed, and brought her cup against his.
“To informality,” she said.
“To informality, and all its pleasures,” he answered, capping her, according to the latest mode.
Dollance-Marie gave him a sharp glance.
“Is something wrong?” he asked, alert, as ever, to her moods.
Alabaster would have answered that question with her cool, cutting laugh. Dollance-Marie smiled a small smile.
“You’ve been studying again,” she said. “That was quite fashionable.”
Such notice of his progress might have pleased any another country cousin striving to learn greatness. John . . . frowned, and put his cup aside, untasted.
“I have been studying,” he said slowly. “I must, for my mother has set me to learn so that I can take my place in the family business. But I am determined not to be fashionable with my true friends, Marie. I beg your pardon.”
True friends was a notion from backward Hascove. That it had survived John’s first year moving in the Leadership levels of Feinik society was a testament to its tenacity. Or, as certain of Alabaster’s acquaintance might say, John’s lack of motherwit.
Dollance-Marie knew that John’s wits lacked nothing. And she had admitted to her innermost self that she was charmed—no! that she was honored, to employ another word little-used by the Leaders—to be one of his true friends.
Her breath caught on that thought, and her heart took up the odd pounding that John’s presence had lately woken. It was, she thought, time. She had done her research; she had formally expressed her intentions to her mama, who had, depend upon it, done her research, and had raised no protest. John Vernon had captured her attention; he was comely, sweet, and modest. His father’s people had kept him close, so Dollance-Marie need not be concerned with paying off any of his wild oats, or placating a former liaison.
She would be his first—that was a thought that warmed her blood distractingly during her precious hours of privacy. She would teach him—so very many things.
Her hand shook; the wine in the palm-cup shivered.
“Marie?” He touched her wrist gently. “Is something wrong?”
It was time. Now. She must have him.
“Not wrong,” she said. Putting her cup aside, she reached out to take his hand between both of hers. “John, I—I propose that we two come to an agreement of partnership.”
He blinked. “Partnership?” he repeated. “Like Dane and Erin?”
Yin and Yang had renewed their agreement more times than Dollance-Marie could count. She shivered at the thought of entering into so long a partnership—but of course John hadn’t meant to imply such a thing; it was his innocence speaking again.
“Like Erin and Dane,” she agreed, therefore, and smiled at him, while her heart pounded against her ribs, and her breath came short.
“I know,” she said. “I know that it must seem very sudden to you. You mustn’t be frightened, or think that I will be angry if you want time to think, or—” But no; she was not going to put the unacceptable into his sweet, naive head. She was not going to lose him. And while she might be his true friend, she doubted not at all the necessity of what she did next. Hadn’t her grandmama taught her? Pay good value for what you want.
She kept hold of John with one hand; with the other, she reached into her pocket for the velvet box. Gently, she placed it on the table before him, and tapped it so that the lid rose, revealing a faceted ruby the size of her thumb, from nail to knuckle. The storied Hamptonshire Ruby. She felt a small tremor, looking at it—not exactly hers to give, but a treasure of the house. As John would be.
“That,” she said softly, “is yours.”
John glanced down, and blinked, likely dazzled, as were most when they first beheld the Ruby. He raised his head to look directly into her eyes.
“Marie, are you certain?”
She blinked in her turn.
“Certain?” she repeated, noticing only then that it was now her hand held with firm sweetness between his two palms.
“I can think of nothing better than . . . than a partnership with my true friend,” John said seriously. “But . . .” His lips twisted into a wry smile. “I have been learning, and I know that my view of the matter is not . . . current here on Feinik.”
“I can think of n
othing that I want more than for us to be together, in public and in private,” Dollance-Marie said truthfully. Right now, she wanted John with her; she would, she thought, take ill if she could not have him.
John nodded. “Then I accept. I think that the traditional initial term is one Planetary Year?”
“Yes,” she said eagerly. “I’ll send my formal request to your mother this evening. And the Ruby—I’ll have it made into a ring for you, John. Will you like that?”
He frowned, almost as if he had forgotten all about the magnificent gem she had given him.
“If it pleases you,” he answered.
The comm light was dark.
“Oh,” said Aelliana, leathered shoulders drooping. She put her hand on the back of the pilot’s chair, frowning at the board as if the application of raw will would produce a message in queue.
Daav, who had come onto the bridge in her wake, paused at her shoulder, and waited a decent count of twelve before clearing his throat.
“As eager to lift as that, Pilot?”
“Well . . .” She sighed and turned to him, her eyes wide and very green. “One does wish for work, after all. We have put our name and our credentials on the for-hire lists, and I had thought, that, surely . . .”
Her voice faded.
“You had thought that surely, Ride the Luck, with three successful contracts fulfilled, would speedily attract not one, but several job offers,” he finished for her.
“If you will have it,” Aelliana said steadily. “Ridiculous it may be, but a pilot has a certain pride in her ship, and in the abilities of herself and her copilot, sad rogue that he otherwise stands.”
“That’s set me in place!”
“Yes; as it should.” She sighed, and continued more seriously. “Truly, Daav, if we are to continue this course we have chosen—and perhaps someday see profit from it!—we cannot lift empty.”
“Indeed, we cannot,” he agreed, serious himself. “A ship wants work; and pilots surely need work, or who knows what error they may fall into? But, if the pilot will allow—we have been on-port a scant six hours; the errand that brought us here has scarcely been tagged as satisfactorily completed.”
“I am, in fact, too eager?” Aelliana asked.
“Naturally so, but—yes.”
“What do you propose, then, Copilot?”
“Why, only that we allow the process to work, while good ship and pilots take a well-earned rest.”
“Rest!” She gave a small laugh and shook her tawny hair back. “I hardly suppose that I can rest, van’chela.”
“Well,” he said, with a laugh of his own. “Perhaps we can think of something else to do.”
Feinik’s lemon-washed dawn was rousting the night when Dollance-Marie returned to her residence. John had let his reserve down, and talked confidingly about what he hoped for their partnership. It had been exhilarating, strange, and made her desire him all the more, this exotic, innocent creature who with one breath agreed to stand publicly as Alabaster’s consort, and with the next expressed a wish to live retired. His wistfulness had sparked her genius, and she had offered travel to some less-mediad locales as something that they might undertake, to broaden their minds.
He had seized upon that, speaking of this world and that—on which subject he was astonishingly well-informed. She was entranced.
Erabeck’s security at last alerted them to the hour, and an additional fee brought them to a back door, and what appeared to be a common taxicab. It was in that humble conveyance that Alabaster brought Galahad to his mother’s house, and saw him safely inside.
She then directed the cab to her own residence, thereby denying the media news of her activities for more than five hours on the evening. Her ratings-coach would scold her on the morrow, not to mention her head of security, but for tonight—for this morning!—Dollance-Marie cared only for the future, when John would be hers to protect, and to tutor, and to shape into, oh! something that the world had never before seen!
So exalted was her mood that she did not notice the priority message lamp glowing discreetly pale lime on the console by her bed until she had come out of the refreshing room, loosely wrapped in a gossamgay robe, damp black hair flat against her head.
Her first thought on observing the patient light was that here was her ratings-coach, up early, or late to bed, and already scolding, and she was of a mind to leave it until she had slept.
Her second thought was that her ratings-coach never called on the private line; indeed, that line was keyed only to her mama’s code.
A tiny tremor disturbed Dollance-Marie’s euphoria.
She sat on the edge of her bed and touched the lime-green panel.
“Good evening, Marie,” her mama’s voice was so crisp that it seemed she was standing in the room. “I see a steady trending increase in Followers; an increase which our house’s profits reflect. I am pleased. I am also pleased with your decision to form young Vernon’s initial partnership. He is an appealing boy—pleasantly original. Handle him well and you’ll not only please yourself and be the making of him, but you’ll have made a strong ally in Vernon.
“Now, if you will be so kind, I have a task for you. We have been approached by the Albion Historical Museum for a display detailing the illustrious history of our bloodline. This is an extremely prestigious opportunity, as I am certain you will immediately grasp, and one which I am pleased to accept.
“Of course, no display of our history would be complete without the inclusion of the Hamptonshire Ruby. I desire that you have it brought to me at once, by courier, and properly insured for guaranteed delivery.”
As it happened, they had easily hit upon something mutually amusing to pass an hour, and eventually, limbs tangled and pillows in disarray, they drifted companionably into sleep.
Which was rudely interrupted by the persistent chime of the comm, growing louder even as Daav leapt to his feet, spilling yet more pillows, Aelliana diving sideways across the bed to slap the wall unit. She drew a breath and stated with admirable steadiness, “Caylon, Ride the Luck.”
“This is Gan Bok, security head for Chimra-on-Feinik. Query: Is Ride the Luck available to take a package to Albion, immediate and personal pick-up, guaranteed delivery.”
“Ride the Luck is available at our usual rate,” Aelliana said composedly, while her fingers twisted the poor, abused blanket into yet another knot. “All of our deliveries are, of course, guaranteed.”
“And insured?” demanded Gan Bok.
Insured? Daav frowned, plucked his pants from the confusion of garments on the floor, and padded out of their quarters.
In the piloting chamber, he touched a toggle on the comm board, directing the ship to trace the call to its source, and brought up a research screen before he skinned into his pants and sat in the copilot’s chair.
“What size and weight is the packet?” Aelliana asked, clever woman that she was.
“Eight centimeters by eight centimeters by five centimeters,” the security woman said. “Point three-five-nine kilograms.”
A small thing; and the contact did, indeed, originate from an address said to be the residence of one Dollance-Marie Chimra. He tapped the name into the research screen.
“We will carry it,” Aelliana said, which of course she would, mad for work as she was. There followed from Gan Bok a brief direction for their arrival time, and the promise of a transmitted map. The connection was then closed.
Daav, bare back against the cool leather of the copilot’s chair, sighed lightly.
Aelliana’s step in the hall came simultaneous with the ping that announced receipt of the promised map. Her hand was cool on his shoulder, her breath warm against his ear, as she leaned in to see his board.
“Are we safe, Copilot?”
“It would seem so,” he said, waving at his screens. “Fair chance, Pilot.”
“Fair chance,” she repeated ruefully, “and yet I should have been more careful, so I learn, and run my checks before ever
I said yes.”
“Perhaps.”
She laughed lightly, tickling his ear. “What would you have done, had the call proved bogus?”
“Cut it off,” he said, touching a fingertip to the appropriate toggle. “It is an unfortunate fact that comm systems sometimes fail to mesh.”
“Ah,” Aelliana said. “I will recall that. In the meanwhile, I have committed us, and the luck has smiled upon my foolishness Shall you come with me to collect this package?”
“With great pleasure,” he said gallantly.
“Meaning that you will in no wise allow me to go by myself. Well, then, if you will, you must have something more to wear, for I see that we are called to a High House.”
“As Feinik counts such things,” Daav acknowledged, and rose. He turned, and tipped his head.
“Forgive me, Pilot,” he said, “but you are wearing my shirt.”
“I couldn’t find mine,” she said composedly, and led the way back to their quarters. “Come, let us sort ourselves out.”
Since it was so dainty a packet they were to pick up, he prepared the small satchel, making certain that the transport boxes were coded and functional. Satisfied on that score, he slipped the strap over his shoulder and went to join his pilot on the bridge.
Dollance-Marie waited in the public parlor, fully visible to the media. She wore at-home dress that showed her pale skin to best advantage. Her hair was charmingly tousled, as artless as an hour with her stylist could produce.
She had arrived somewhat in advance of the courier pilot’s appointment, box in hand. Her mama would wish the whole world to see that the Ruby began its journey well, placed into the hands of a reputable courier, with delivery guaranteed.
She placed the velvet box on the glazed table next to her chair, and tapped the lid, a preemptive silencing of the inevitable wag who would look to increase his ratings by loudly doubting that the Ruby had ever been in the box.
Gemstone on display, Dollance-Marie touched the screen set into the glazed table. The courier articles—guarantee and insurance—had arrived. She perused them leisurely, and set her thumb to the screen in approval.